22 October 2021

books 2021

audio books
bury your dead - louise penny
the brutal telling - louise penny
a rule against murder - louise penny
the cruelest month - louise penny
fatal grace - louise penny
the weed that strings the hangman's bag - alan bradley
thrice the brinded cat hath mewed - alan bradley
still life - louise penny
the stationery shop - marian kamali
the madness of crowds - louise penny
rooster bar - john grisham
all the devils are here - louise penny
code girls (young readers edition) - liza mundy
harry potter and the chamber of secrets - jk rowling
harry potter and the goblet of fire - jk rowling
harry potter and the half blood prince - jk rowling
harry potter and the order of the phoenix - jk rowling
 
 
paper books
the stationery shop - marian kamali
while justice sleeps - stacey abrams
red cross lifeguard manu 2017 edition
the war that saved my life - kimberley bradley
the last story of mina lee - nancy jooyoun kim
the midnight library - matt haig
the family upstairs - lisa jewel
the exiles - chritina baker kline
ebooks
a breath of snow and ashes - diana gabaldon
 
 

03 October 2021

rhetorical question

it's just a rhetorical question,
that's what i chose to believe.
when she asked that thing 
at the place 
with the people 
where the packages all were recieved. 

it's a ridiculous question, 
i decided soon after that. 
when she asked that thing 
at the place 
with the people 
where it rained and i let in the cat. 

it's an unreasonable question,
i realized then, in a mo. 
when she asked that thing 
at the place 
with the people 
where nobody wanted to go. 

it's just a rhetorical question,
i made up my mind in the end. 
cause asking that thing 
at that place 
with those people
begged what came next, even then. 

22 September 2021

mabon balancing

i wrote this poem inspired by the celtic celebration of the autumnal equinox in sept 2011 and posted it on a blog which is now deprecated yet still accessible through my profile page.

********

stand precarious
tiptoe
one foot
facing west.
hold in your northern hand
light.
hold in your southern hand
darkness.

exposure:veil::awareness:oblivion
you cannot know what you do not see.

stand precarious
tiptoe
one foot
facing west.
hold your northern hand
open.
hold your southern hand
closed.

revelation:secret::awareness:oblivion
you cannot know what you do not know.

stand precarious
tiptoe
one foot
facing west.
hold in your northern hand
water.
hold in your southern hand
sand.

nourishment:drought::awareness:oblivion
you cannot know what you do not cultivate.

stand precarious
tiptoe
one foot
facing west.
hold in your northern hand
future.
hold in your southern hand
past.

wax:wane::awareness:oblivion
you cannot know what you do not experience.


mabon balancing

03 May 2021

snow white and the seven extraneous circumstances

 topic of the day: when prince charming kissed snow white, he did so without her consent. is this offensive?

on the one hand, making out with unconscious people is offensive. it offends their right to consent - to say, yes, let's make out or no, i'd rather not. we all have the implicit right to say what happens with our own body and therefore, the right to accept or deny being touched, kissed, having our hair cut, and so on.

on the other hand, performing resuscitative efforts on unconscious people is heroic. it is the job of everyone in the medical supply chain - from someone trained in first aid to EMTs to the top doctor - to "apply, for the benefit of the sick, all measures which are required, avoiding those twin traps of overtreatment and therapeutic nihilism." (from the modern version of the hippocratic oath). resuscitating an unconscious person would fit this bill.

so what is prince charming doing? is he assaulting an unconscious victim or resuscitating an unconscious sick person?

take the kiss out of the picture. what if prince charming had spoken a magic word or given snow white a pat on the arm? what if he had called a doctor and the doctor performed surgery - with snow unconscious all the while? 

what if prince charming had administered a potion that woke snow up? that doesn't sound like assault and doesn't sound like something he'd need her consent for. what if he didn't have a syringe so he administered the potion by pouring it in her mouth? sounds okay, depending on snow's swallow reflex... to avoid choking her, maybe he gets a potion that can be absorbed through the skin. that actually seems like a good idea. but what if the potion needs to be body temperature when delivered and all it does is wake someone up, causing no harm to persons who are already awake and it can only be absorbed by the skin of the mouth and it only takes a tiny amount to work?

so here we have unconscious snow white and (1) prince charming standing there with a potion that will wake her up and (2) needs to be administered (3) in a tiny portion (4) at body temperature (5) to the skin of the mouth (6) and it won't hurt him, (7) only help her. in order to get it to body temp, he can't just stick his finger in it and then daub it on her mouth. to really warm it up, and to get it to the correct temp without measurement equipment, his best bet is to put it in his mouth. it's not going to hurt him, after all. 

so he puts the potion in his mouth and holds it there until it is the same temp as his mouth. then he lets it out of his mouth in a way that coats his lips and immediately touches his lips to hers to administer the tiny dose. that seems okay, right? that's not assault... that's heroic.

now, take away the potion. 

 


01 May 2021

let it go and do better next time

there comes a time you* just have to throw it* out.

*i 
*3yo frozen meat

i am sorry. sorry. sorry. i bought too much ground turkey 3 years ago. mea culpa. 

but y'all - i am clearly not going to use this - ever. i mean, have you seen the steady stream of fresh meat parading through here? obvs not reaching into the ol' frigidaire to partake of the existing inventory. AND, starving children around the world do NOT need to be subjected to the presence of this frosty hardened lump of something only formerly known as food.

it's time to free myself of this culinary anchor. let it go and do better next time. 




30 April 2021

head 'em up & move 'em out

according to googleapedia, the average american moves 11 times in their lifetime. here's how i measure up...

virginia
grandmother's
dewey the plex
lakehouse 1
lakehouse 2
grandmother's redux
in the woods
dorms - frosh/soph/jr
grandmother's III
th'apartment
this house

do you count each dorm? and, what about summercamp - where i literally moved to for 1/6th of the year from age 8 to 19? those are all a form of moving, ain't they?

grandmother's house makes a re-recurring appearance on that list, and you're probably wondering why. or maybe you're not. doesn't really matter bc i can't tell you anyway bc i don't really know. alls i can come up with is - it was a perfect storm... that struck three times. the first and third were a convenient location for a young family on a tight budget with a parent in the nearby college. i don't think we were there more than about a year either time. 

the middle time was both the longest and least sensible. the location was wildly inconvenient for everyone but me, and i was in jr high - not something to build your location around. everyone else drove literally dozens of miles per day south or east. 

the thing that really made it a bad idea, though, was we were not a small young family. we were 4 kids and 2 adults plus the actual resident (grandmother), making 7 people in a three bedroom house. the solution was to make the boys live in the attic. it was a semi-finished attic with a powder room -- seems reasonable enough to ask three brothers to live up there. right? yes, you'd reasonably think that, but it fact it was not a stellar choice. not because of any characteristic of the house itself, but more because, of the three available adults, not a one could actually be bothered to pay significant attention to us kids. 

anyhoo - if you count the three dorms, that makes 13. if you count summercamp, which was arguably more of a home than some of the others, that's another dozen. 

how many times have you moved?



21 April 2021

left

a sudden & unexpected stroke
and the brittle thread of life was broke
now a cent'ry and a half gone by
and we are left to wonder why
poor robt. died at mere nineteen
his whole long life, left unseen


14 April 2021

additional soccer thoughts

so, on sunday, mon, tues, wed -- i have messed about with a soccer ball whilst wearing soccer turfs for half an hour.

sun - a bit of touches and whatnot, then the game
mon - ran three miles then touches
tues - touches then statbike plus some weights
wed - ran three miles then the touches

it's not like four days is going to make up for anything. just trying to jumpstart a habit. 

i am in terrible shape. the endurance is okay but the strength is pathetic. also, and maybe relatedly, i can't put the ball where i want it. i can literally barely hit the broadside of the mower shed at the park. 

it's a disgrace. 

alls i can do is try to be better, tho. so i am trying. 

11 April 2021

soccer thoughts

soccer season starts today and it's the first time i have played since fall 2019. i am excited about it but also leery. i haven't actually touched a soccer ball in over a year... probably should have done so. i am concerned i will let my team down but then again, it's just rec soccer. still, i should have kicked a ball around. but it's too late now. i enjoy soccer but i don't like embarrassing myself. maybe it will work out ok. 

05 April 2021

(not a) showcase staircase

the other day at the doctor's office, i took the stairs, and this is what i saw.

i swear each step has a different non-skid tile applied! it's like all the showcase staircases get first dibs and ol' back hallway gets the scraps. 

"jones! staircase C need a non-skidder on #6 - stat!"
"sir, is staircase C a showcase staircase?"
"jones! it is not!"
"i'm on it, sir!"
"good man, jones!"

so jones grabs a non-skid tile from the miscellaneous box, schleps up to staircase C, and glues it to #6. 

i know this is happening because, as you can see, some of the non-skids are scuffed but none are significantly scarred. this is a cared for staircase. it's in good repair. it's just not lovely. 

this is really the epitome of the back staircase: a functional structure which, if you know the basics of stair-stepping, isn't going to trip you up. it's humble. it's not at a beauty pageant. it's just doin' a job, breakin' at noon for a baloney sammich, and clockin' out at the end of the day to head home to the fam... junior's got math homework again. 






02 April 2021

the nasacort diaries: day one

i take zyrtec-d a lot, ergo i take a lot of zyrtec-d. it makes the difference between my head feeling like a head, and it feeling like a water balloon. the amount of liquid that my sinuses can create is impressive. they are the hagfish of sinuses. 

why? who knows. on my medical record it says "vasomotor rhinitis" which is as opposed to "allergic rhinitis". vasomotor refers to vascular operations and rhinitis refers to the ol' schnoz so vasomotor  rhinitis has to do with the blood vessels in the nose.

the term vasomotor rhinitis is a bit outdated. more common nowadays is "nonalleric rhinitis". there are various types (see https://www.aafp.org/afp/2018/0801/p171.html) and "Nonallergic rhinitis cannot be cured..." (https://www.aaaai.org/conditions-and-treatments/conditions-dictionary/nonallergic-rhinitis-vasomotor).

hence the zyrtec-d. 

thing about my precious zyrtec-d tho... whatever it does to dry out my head, it just goes on and does to my mouth, eyes, and skin. desiccation FTW! 

self mummification is a fun hobby, but i find myself looking for a change. so i asked my doc (whose enthusiasm for my health is rivalled only by my own) for suggestions. she suggested nasacort. topical application versus swallowing something and hoping it can find my nose - plus it's a steroid, an inflammation reducer, rather than a drying agent. 

so i got me three for $34 at sam's. PRICEY. this is not a cazh experiment. probably should have gone with one from publix for starters. anywhey, i used some when i took my evening dose of dulera.

well. it was not magic. if anything, it made things worse. i have by now also taken a zyrtec-d. hmph. tomorrow i will try one spray per noseside rather than two, see if that's better. the doc did say to give it a month, don't make a snap judgment. 

so i won't. 

but i want to.

but i'll resist. 




28 March 2021

the mullet of jabbings, as it were

i went for my second pfizer vax jab today. there were a lot fewer people going thru the process than were there when i got my first. i mean, it was steady, but no waiting in a line at any point. and the atmosphere was a bit subdued, not the party feel of the first jab. i don't know what upped attendance last time - maybe people were getting firsts and seconds then and only seconds today, or maybe people aren't coming back for the second. at any rate, smaller crowd, more subdued atmosphere and frankly a bit of a letdown. felt like i had been sucked in with the celebration up front, and now it was all business on the back end. the mullet of jabbings, as it were. 

but two jabs are better than one and i am certainly glad i have done it. looking forward to more freedom to go more places, do more things. 

right now, i don't feel tops. lethargic, slight headache, sore arm, shoulder, neck, and scratchy throat, stuffy nose. the lethargy is the worst because it's not just fatigue - it's being tired and being in the mood to do nothing at all. it's one thing to be tired, but this is an altered mood. blaaaaah.

so, just a warning to y'all who haven't gotten all your jabs yet -- bring your best good mood to jab number two!





25 March 2021

not even sorry, buster!

i don't like chocolate. 

i mean, i will eat it. i don't hate it. i am not allergic to it, altho my grandmother was. i just don't like it. on the gamut of sweets, i would choose chocolate last. vanilla is okay, better than chocolate, but not the winner either.

the real action starts to happen around the caramel/butterscotch zone. the brown sugar family, as it were. throw me some molasses, honey! or, for that matter, some honey itself will do.

spice cake, pound cake, 
nutmeg in your boiled custard,
chess pie's the best pie -
not even sorry, buster!

i'll take 
brown-sugar-cinnamon 
pop tarts 
any time
and i don't 
even care 
that they mess 
up the rhyme
scheme!

carrot cake, haystacks, 
oatmeal scotchies, snickerdoodles,
pecan pie is second best,
and biscoff? i can eat oodles!


i am also partial to your fruit varietals - strawberry cheesecake, skittles, starburst, sweetarts, necco wafers, jelly beans, and so on, but that's not what this post is about.



23 March 2021

just in case

i am a just in case carrier. in my backpack, you'd find the normal essentials like wallet, phone, burt's bees plus the superessentials like pens, nail file, kleenex plus unusual but not outrageous bandaids, dental floss, tylenol plus the sort of random shit that i needed once but didn't have at the time so now i carry it around all the time like one plastic spoon. 

one plastic spoon is not large. it doesn't take up a lot of space, doesn't weigh much. and it's dead useful. you get a yogurt at the airport or the gas station during a road trip, say, and presto, you need a spoon. 

but thing is you rarely need a spoon. and super rarely do you need a spoon and you could not have procured one, say, near the yogurts in the cold case. 

that spoon isn't the huge deal, though. just a plastic spoon. the huge deal is not the spoon. the huge deal is that carrying around a plastic spoon is a bit of a gateway drug to carrying around a pack of cards, warm gloves in the summertime, five pens and two pencils, your contact lens prescription, and a random red plastic whistle that you don't know where it came from but hey it might be useful at some as-yet unknown future point on the space-time continuum. 

so you see the problem, right? one thing leads to another and pretty soon i can't find the spoon when i need it, if i even remember i have it, so i am at the airport eating yogurt with a plastic spoon i picked up next to the cold case where i bought the yogurt and i finish the yogurt and i am on the verge of tossing the spoon with the yogurt container when i think, hey maybe keep the spoon... just in case...



18 March 2021

picture pages!

we took our first-round-vaccinated selves on a trip! we wore masks and did our best to not get too close to people and all that. the whole thing felt really safe. well... maybe the amount of ice cream was risky...

anyhoo - i brought you back some pictures!

this is an oil drum rocket from a random gas station where we had to stop because we thought we could make it to sam's but the light came on so we stopped at this random place. 



this is from the tiny town we visited in the foothills of the appalachians. it had some significant steepness! this hill looks less steep in the pic but that's ok because what i wanted to show you is the steps up to the house. they are like alice in wonderland steps - all twists and turns. plus, made of stone. so cool!


this is visible in the previous pic but i wanted to give you a better look at it. it's an elevated sidewalk. what's up with that? so interesting! who decided to build it that way, and why? it goes the length of the street -- maybe a couple tenths of a mile. i did not see any indication that it continues that way on any adjoining streets. i am fascinated by it! problem is, this tiny appalachian-adjacent town doesn't have detailed accounts of artifacts such as elevated sidewalks and their origins. at least, none that i have yet located... i haven't given up.



saw this in the woodcraft shop in the tiny town. look at that red stripe! it's literally red wood! i would have bought it but $145....



this is from a lake we walked around, 3 miles. it's 20 minutes or so from the tiny town. you can see the weather was grey and foggy, and i will tell you it was also like 55°. that's right - my favourite weather! and you know i like hiking and lakes. it was a good day. 




14 March 2021

3.14159

that's as much pi as i know. 

now, pie is a different question. 

as far as dessert choices go, given the gamut from which to choose, i'd probably go for a cheesecake, maybe a carrot cake with cream cheese icing. during the season, a claxton fruit cake hits the spot. i do like ice cream... a nice traverse city cherry from kilwins... mmm. but as for pie, i like two: chess pie and pecan pie. (the latter is basically chess pie with nuts.)

when i was a child, i didn't know that chess pie was a southern thing, nor did i know my paternal grandmother (ole sweet) was a chess pie magician. apparently they're difficult to make correctly. who knew?

chess is the pound cake of pies -- butter, sugar, eggs. less flour overall - just in the crust - but same basic ingredients. the thing is that it's difficult to get the consistency right. too custardy and too runny are common. too crystallized is less common and more acceptable, but still not correct. there's a specific consistency for a chess pie that is not only aesthetically pleasing but also texturally comforting. 

chess pie squares mimic the flavour but do not approach the texture. i've never made either, but i am sure the squares are simpler. 

if you have never had chess pie, i pity you. ole sweet is dead, so if you want the best, you'll have to get one from her in the hereafter. 




12 March 2021

sunshine steal

this weekend we spring forward which means at 2AM sunday morning, through no fault of its own, an entire hour of time will be erased. ERASED -- as if it had never existed! at 2AM, it will become 3AM. boom. do not pass go, do not collect $200, go straight to oblivion. 

prosecutor, to defendant..: where were you at 2:15AM on sunday, 14 march 2021?

defense attorney: objection! there was no 2:15AM on sunday, 14 march 2021!

judge: suh-stained....

i don't like losing an hour. i prefer the fall-back scenario, where we magically get to spend another hour sleeping. pluslywise, falling back adds daylight to the morningtime. springing forward means it'll be dark again when i get up. i feel like it's just now becoming light when i get up in the morning. 

so it's not a simple thing -- not a 1:1. the hour that's actually removed is the hour of daylight when i am emptying the dishwasher and brewing the caffeine. it's not 2AM that's taken, it's a sunshine steal!





11 March 2021

plimsoll joy

we are all standing up for something these days, and in doing so, we are stomping on each others toes. and so, our collective toes ache.

we could get steel-toed shoes to protect our toes, but some of us are all enamored with our current shoes or with looking at our toes themselves -- or (not to be too philosophical, but...) the shoes or the toes are the very thing for which we are standing up. 

it's like this: if i am standing up for bare feet, i do not want steel-toed shoes covering the very thing for which i am standing up. nor do i want your steel-toed toes or any otherclad toes standing on my bare toes. watch it, buddy! i am standing up for bare toes - you stand down!

but, that's the conundrum, innit? who should stand down - that's the question. 

if i am standing up for bare feet, and you are standing up for steel-toed shoes, we are fairly diametrically opposed there, see?

now, on one level, it's fine. it's a notoriously free country. wear shoes. don't wear shoes. it's your choice. live and let live! huzzah!

but when you start stepping on my toes, well then we have a problem, buddy. your freedom is encroaching on my freedom. we all have freedom, sure, sure. but the diametrical freedoms cannot, by definition, coexist. they simply cannot. it's a matter of physics, really. i mean, you are all - protect your toes! and i am like - just gerroff 'em ya big galoot. we can't be at the same place at the same time.

now, i am not talking about purposeful toe-stompers here. purposeful toe-stompers are clearly actively violating other people's space, rights, and freedoms. i am talking about inadvertently stepping on each other's toes.

to complicate the matter further, there aren't strict boundaries between stompers and stompees. some days you do the stomping, some days you are the stomped. steel-toed shoe aficionados can be stomped on and barefooters can stomp. it's not as simple as it looks.

and it's easy to say, if you don't like it - leave! but then who gets to live near the froyo shop? 

pluswise, if you only hang out with other barefooters or other steel-toeders, you are going to miss out completely on the joy of the plimsoll. or... well... the plimsollers will tell you there is joy in the plimsoll... it's not an innate joy, no... i didn't mean to imply that is is an innate joy, okay? so calm down. 

everyone just calm down. 



10 March 2021

london in the winter then

in london during summer, it doesn't get dark until like 10, 10:30pm. in the summer where i live, it gets dark about 8:30pm, maybe a little later, and the days seem to go forever. i don't want to think about having an even later sunset. so much daytime! i like my sleep. i guess i will take london in the winter then. 

09 March 2021

heli thoughts

a helicopter frequently flies low over our house, and i've been told it belongs to luke bryan. he lives just down the road a piece and he is rich enough to have a heli, so i have no reason to doubt this is his. i don't know if he flies it himself or has a pilot. that wasn't part of what i was told.

i can see the convenience and i feel like it's probably no more risky than a car, but i am just not sure i'd have a heli. i just don't know. 

i do know if i were rich enough to have a heli, i'd have a swimming pool. i love to swim and i don't think it's an overestimation to say i'd be in my pool most every day. clearly, i am rich enough for a heli, so my pool is an indoor/outdoor jobbie where you swim under the plexiglass window to get outside. i'd pay someone to come over and certify me as a lifeguard so i could keep all the kiddos safe.

i'd also have smallish lake big enough to canoe around. i like to canoe and it's good exercise. i would paddle around a while then lay back on the stern deck, put my feet up on the thwarts, and just get some sun. not too much, though, since you can only really comfortably lay on your back in a canoe, and i wouldn't want to be all one-sided.

i'd have a place to play my harmonicas. first, i would have more harmonicas, and second, i would play them more. apparently, i am assuming i am independently wealthy or something, because no one is going to pay me to play my harmonica. i am good, but i am not that good.

one thing i wouldn't worry too much about is having a bunch of televisions everywhere. i mean, one in the gym and one in the family room, but there doesn't need to be a TV in every room. read a book, why dontcha? 

i am not looking for a huge house, but it would be nice to have enough room to have everyone over. to have family or friends spend the night - like, to have guest suites with bathrooms. i might put a TV in the guest suite because that might feel homey, but you are here to visit, so don't be sitting in there all day! it would be nice to have enough space to be able to have people feel comfortable, not crowded. for visitors to have their own space so they don't feel like they are encroaching. maybe put a mini-fridge in the guest suite - and you don't have to pay for what you take out!

pool. lake. harmonica studio. not too many TVs. a place for company to be comfortable.

after i have all that, then maybe i will think about the heli.






07 March 2021

this book i'm reading

a friend from work invited me to join her book club, so i did. after a couple false starts, i was able to read the book and join the discussion in february. so it's march and we're reading another book and it's got some flaws. 

first of all, it's as if the author believes that L and M are the main two letters names can begin with. libby, lucy, michael, marco, mémé plus then there's a henry jr and henry sr. then she alternately gets fantasticly creative with birdie, phineas, clemency, stella. obviously she has an imagination. i'm telling you, though -- unless libby and lucy turn out to be somehow the same person, it's simply poor form. you're confusing your readers and demonstrating your lack of creativity. 

secondly, the way she's unfolding the mystery is less intriguing than frustrating. it's even like a mystery is unfolding, but more like it's being withheld and parcelled out -- like she doesn't quite have enough mystery to make it to the end, so she's got to be careful how much she gives out. so, it's not a natural development, it's an artificial construct. 

on top of all that, it seems a bit trite. i'm maybe 1/3 of the way in, and what we have so far is a well-to-do british family where the mom has some sort of mental breakdown, invites in some odd/dangerous boarders into the house, and things go downhill from there, culminating in suicides. 

the mystery is, what happened that led up to the suicides. 25 years later, the surviving baby is 25 and, unaware of her origins, inherits the house. the surviving teenagers are (1) narrating in the past tense and (2) destitute in the present. none of them seem to have awareness of the others in any meaningful way. 

so... it's confusing, slow, disjointed, and mechanical. now, in its defense, i have learned some new terms: wolf tone, wooden harboring, and chinese burn. the latter is what we in the states would call an indian burn, altho neither term is politically correct. 

i'll try to remember to let you know how it turns out. 



06 March 2021

the baby shower

i had been looking forward to it.

i was invited to a baby shower. it was going to be outside, with safe distances, and people wearing masks. at least, that was what i thought when i RSVP'd, and when i diligently shopped for & found a gently used copy of the 1965 edition of Andrew Henry's Meadow to fulfill the currenlty-very-fashionable practice of asking guests to bring a book instead of a card, and when i carefully crafted then carefully handwrote a heartfelt note on the flyleaf, and when i realized that the book wasn't meant to be the gift - that there would be other gifts - and so i bought something off the registry at target to be shipped to the baby's house, and when i printed the page from the registry to put into an envelope to wrap with the book so that it would be clear i had gotten A Real Gift, and when i wrapped it all in a reusable orange string bag with yellow tissue paper poking out the top like a sunburst, and when i planned to do my taxes in the morning so i could make it to the party in the afternoon, and when i selected an outfit and took a shower and dried my hair and got dressed and in the car and drove over and parked and all the way up to arriving at the decorated concrete driveway with the balloons and cupcakes -- that was what i thought right up until then.

but i was the only one wearing a mask and no one was even pretending to be six feet apart, and i felt alternately like a pariah and like a judgy mcjudgerton, and either way, nobody wanted to talk with me from six feet away, and everyone was all in these really tight groups talking in each other's faces and they were hugging people they never spent any time around, and i finally had to tell the expectant mom that i hoped the party went really well but i had to go.

i think i said something about cognitive dissonance.

so i went to sam's to pick up my zyrtec scrip and everyfreakingbody there was wearing a mask. one guy had his on his chin and one lady had hers hanging from one ear, but everyone else was properly masked up. nobody was too close, everyone was respecting everyone else's personal bubble, and overall it felt much safer than at the baby shower.

i stopped at starbucks for a blonde americano and came home to read my book.

i was really disappointed about the baby shower. i had been looking forward to it. i also felt somewhat betrayed - i had been led to believe it would be safe. these people had put me in the position of being the bad guy - i don't care what anyone says, that's what it is. i left, which means i deemed it unsafe. i judged them and decided they didn't meet my standard. like i am too good for them. or like i am not good enough. either way, it was me that had to be the one to leave, right in front of everyone, but at the same time, trying to be low key because it's not like i had someplace else to be or anything - i just didn't want to be there.

i wish i'd never planned to go at all. i wish i had just dropped off the gift and not acted like i was going to stay. that was the thing - i acted like i was going to stay, and then i had to be like, nope, can't do it. i wished i'd never said i was going to stay at all.

anyway. that's all there is to it.

05 March 2021

we'll see how far i get.

tomorrow i plan to do the taxes. we'll see how far i get.

i know it's outdated but i like to do my taxes by hand. i get a cuppa and settle in, download the forms from the IRS and just typpity-type away. i mean, uh... carefully enter precise and well-scoured data. that's what i do, that last thing. 

i always start by pulling out the previous year's as a starting point, and then i gather all the required inputs, and then i download the forms, and then i start filling them out, and then i get about 8 or 9 lines completed, and then i realize i don't have everything i need, and then i realize that it will take several hours or even days to get what i need, and then i get really frustrated and break things. 

so that's my process. we'll see how far i get. 

04 March 2021

not sorry

ducky ducky rubber ducky
floating in the tub
someone pulled the drain plug out
glub glub glub 

03 March 2021

a million channels and nothing to watch

every truck around here has a trailer hitch
whether it hauls anything or it don't
cause everyone around here wants the top of the line
whether they plan to use it or they don't

it's the sheer number of channels that's to blame. there are so many channels that there is simply not enough quality - or even anything close to quality - to go around. just pages and pages and pages of OMG IT'S THE SAME THING thumbnail after thumbnail just paging and paging through the thumbnails. 

good stuff is incredibly hard to come by. we watched anne with an e, longmire, hell on wheels, blacklist, yellowstone, arrow, queen's gambit, the komisky method, plus most of jane the virgin, some of the 4400, and a metric shit-ton of others i am forgetting. we have recently watched a dozen or so movies - spenser confidential, 6 underground, kodachrome, the highwaymen, the take, fisherman's friends, the fundamentals of caring, homefront, redemption, and who knows what else because who remembers all that -- but they were mostly-good to really-very-good, but that's like a dozen out of a million. oh, and we are watching one right now called behind her eyes. it's pretty creepy in a mysterious good way. 

it's the paging through the pages that just wears you the fock out. you get numb to the excess. blinded by the deluge. can't see the trees for the forest. 

yes, this is obviously a metaphor for life in the states, but we will take your netflix recs, so bring it on.

02 March 2021

dr seuss would have understood

read across america is a year-round program of events, resources, and partnerships which was launched by the national education association in 1998 with the goal of encouraging kids and teens to read. in the beginning, read across america was just a one-day celebration. the NEA chose march 2 as the one day to celebrate reading because it is dr seuss's birthday. 

today is read across america 2021, and to celebrate, the organization dedicated to preserving dr seuss's legacy - dr seuss enterprises - announced that six of his books will no longer be publised. woo! happy b-day dr s!!

the reason these books won't be published is that they, according to dr seuss enterprises: "portray people in ways that are hurtful and wrong". two of the books on the list were ones that were a big part of my childhood: on beyond zebra and scrambled eggs super. they were read to me, i read them to my younger brothers, i wrote my name in the family copy, and still have those very editions with me. of course, both are missing their covers - WEIRD. don't know how that happened, but the pages are intact and bound, and if you were here, i could take you right to them on the shelf. this morning when i heard they were now VERBOTEN, i took myself right to them on the shelf and picked them up and looked through them and here's my analysis: they are nonsense. the words, that is. in keeping with most of dr seuss, the words are loosely held together by a bit of a plot which is simply a framework from which to hang non-sense words and ludicrous situations. there is nothing offensive about the words, unless you are a stickler that your words not be completely made up out of thin air and comprised of sing-songy rhymes. 

as far as plot goes... on beyond zebra is a twist on the alphabet book. in it a younger boy is learning his alphabet and an older boy shows him the wonders of 20 letters that come after Z. nonsense. scrambled eggs super is - i think? - the same boys. they travel to far flung and obscure places to collect unique eggs for their meal. non. sense. nonnnnnn. sensssssssse. 

the problem is the pictures. dr seuss drew these fantastical illustrations, and there are one or two per book that purport to portray humanness. most everything he draws are animalish beings of which most resemble muppets. the humans are rare, but as is his tendency, he aims for the exotic. unfortunately, what was deemed exotic in 1955, and apparently every day since then up to yesterday, is now racist. 

i know that perceptions change plus people get tired of being inaccurately portrayed plus people get woke. i know all that, and really, you know what? that's life and change and progress and that's all good. all good. what i wonder is why didn't they go about this in a different way. they could have taken the existing books out of print and issued new versions with new illustrations. i realize the words and the pictures together are THE THING - it's a creation the the good doctor created to go together. however, times change and it's time for new illustrations. the existing ones are really tired and horribly outdated. even putting they offensiveness aside, they have a sadness to them that screams 1950s suburbia.

there is a joy to imagining letters beyond Z. there is a whimsy to collecting eggs from odd places. childhood needs joy and whimsy, now more than ever. dr seuss would have understood.

01 March 2021

nb255

i have lately been working to organize my home office, which is also now my office office, so i spend a good bit of time in there. for years it has also been a sort of catch-all room. like the junk drawer in the kitchen, it's actually filled with useful stuff, but everything has been all jumbled in there together. 

i get uncomfortable in a cluttered room. it makes me anxious. i have been coping these past months... er, this past year! by just staring at the people on the screen and doing my work, then leaving the room. there is just so long you can ignore all that tho. so, i got some paper trays for the paper and some decorative storage boxes for the keepsakes and have been generally sorting and straightening. 

one of the things i ran across is the toshiba netbook i used to pound out everything from bill payments to blog entries to old navy orders. hey, little buddy! it's a toshiba nb255, which apparently was introduced in 2010. a few years ago, windows was bogging it down so badly, i installed peppermint, a lightweight linux. i don't know why i gave it up... not exactly... i mean, i started using my laptop from work to pay the bills and this little buddy is pretty slow at loading web pages. but it seems to work fine for blogging - much better than typpie typing on my phone. 

welcome back, nb255. i kind of missed you! 

28 February 2021

sweet ivy

13 march 2020, word came down from the CEO's office that we'd indefinitely be remote workers. 

14 march 2020, a saturday, i went to the office to grab some things i needed. almost as an afterthought, i took my plant, sweet ivy. i was convinced we'd be back in the office real soon, but you know, just in case...

i can't remember who gave me the sprig that i first stuck in a pot of dirt, and i can't even remember when that was. alls i know is sweet ivy has kept me company in several different offices across two different buildings. she's been on the top floor and in the basement and in between. she's had natural light and fake light and practically no light. she can go a long time without water, but is consistently thankful to get some. she has always lived in the same white plastic pot tucked into an admittedly somewhat pricey-for-the-situation "m hadley" cereal bowl. 

so i brought her home and she's been just fine until a week or 10 days ago. she sort of started to droop, so i watered her, but it didn't help. i put her outside when the weather allowed, but it didn't help. some of her leaves were turning a sickly yellow-brown, and she had developed a serious case of the droops.

so today i repotted her. the soil was pretty musty, and the pot and bowl were stained and looking sad. despite its supposed value, i threw away the bowl along with the plastic pot, and it was oddly freeing. i took the musty soil to the back of the yard in case it was diseased or something. 

sweet ivy shed the old dirt like taylor swift sheds boyfriends -- just dropped it off and didn't look back. ivy roots are naturally shallow, so there isn't much to her hidden parts. i tucked her into some clean, rich, store-bought soil in a freshly rinsed terra cotta pot, and gave her a small drink of water. 

time will tell. send your loving thoughts sweet ivy's way. 




27 February 2021

longer

when i was a sophomore in high school, i received for christmas an alarm clock radio, among other things. on the first morning of school after christmas break, the alarm went off to dan fogelberg's "longer". it was the first time i had heard the song and my first thought was: welcome to the world of knowing about the music the rest of the world (i.e. my classmates) are listening to, ya giant dork. my next thought was: wow, excellent song. and so, longer than there've been fishes in the ocean, that song will have a special place in my heart.

that clock radio saw me thru the remaining years of high school and on through college. 8 o'clock classes were no match for my trusty alarm. i got a radio station sticker from somewhere and damned if i know where i got it or, at this point, what station it was. i stuck that sticker and a small red heart on him, and that was it, that was enough. he's cute but not fancy. 

he rolled on & on for many years after college, but time passed and his volume & tuner got glitchy and we'd wake to blaring or static or blaring static. a crew originally from honduras painted our house one summer and they asked if they could have him. ah, sure. what the heck. go, fly, and be free! 

i miss him, but i like to imagine he's raucously blaring static-infused tejana on demand, ad infinitum... longer than...


Longer by Dan Fogelberg. https://www.shazam.com/track/5586628/longer



26 February 2021

in the zone

the bomb fell in the earthquake zone
and the water rose so fast
that all the people were alone
when jesus floated past. 

25 February 2021

delicious tea and a sense of whimsy

we got really into tea a few years ago. really into. a kettle and tea bags and leaves and a box to store it and a teapot to brew it. i've not yet used the teapot altho i have used the hell outta the kettle. 

not really sure why i bought so many teas... the only one i really like is called constant comment. it's a type of spice tea made by the bigelow tea company. it comes in black and green, and used to be i could only find the green on trips to NYC but now it is of course available from amazon, the killer of all adventure and whimsy. 

bigelow is a family owned tea company, in business for 75 years, with constant comment being the flagship product. from the company's website:

"In 1945, inspired by an Early Colonial recipe, Ruth Campbell Bigelow disappeared into her New York brownstone kitchen to create a better cup of tea."

they sell all sorts of gifts off their website including a nicely engraved wooden tea chest and, for this one i'd take an adult M, the bigelow tea shirt.


delicious tea and a sense of whimsy. what's not to love?

24 February 2021

pet peeve #389

it is entirely possible that i have mentioned this before; however... it's no less true for the repetition. 

it peeves the hell outta me when fiction authors give two main characters names beginning with the same letter. 

i mean, come ON. these are made up people with made up names. go ahead and splurge on ANOTHER LETTER. there are literally 26 to choose from. 

the book i am currently reading has two L named women. i have just started it, so i don't know enough about Libby to tell her from Lucy, or Lucy from Libby. 

did you see that? uh-huh, that's right - L startings and Y endings. 

OH MY GOD.

23 February 2021

making your way in the world today takes everything you've got

well, you know how it goes. you commit yourself to something and you let yourself down, over and over again, and then you die. speaking of which...

21 months ago, we took in an elderly relative. she was NOT in good shape - cracked neck in a brace, oxygen machine on 24x7, feeble, etc. we frankly did not give her more than six months. however, she recovered from those ailments along with many minor illnesses, kicked the O2 habit, got stronger, ate well, slept well, had some overnight adventures to the homes of other relatives, and generally hung in there for 20 months. still, she spent a lot of time just sitting and watching the telly. she'd complain at night that she was sore, and i'd say - what, from your all day long of doing nothing? and she'd laugh, and agree, and then nearly every single night, she would commit to doing better. "i'll walk more, tomorrow." "i will drink more water, tomorrow." "i will go to bed earlier, tomorrow." "i will eat more fruit, tomorrow." 

she eventually ran out of tomorrows, as we all have done, are doing, and will do.

so here i am back again. recommitting to writing a little something every day. 

day 1: mission accomplished. 

cheers.