It happens a lot this time of year, in recent years anyway: I lose all interest in blogging. In ‘21 I quit for most of January. It seems my writer’s block has extended even to this piece o’crap blog.
Edit: I erased several hundred words complaining about boredom, blah, blah. How about I tell you I got nuthin’ today and we leave it at that?
More Edit: Read This . Fuzzy writes what I should, if I was not so lazy. Except he writes it with far more erudition than I ever could.
I know you don’t click links, you need to here.
Ignore my previous post, it was just filler.
This is a question we should all ask. Biden says he will shut down the border as soon as he gets funding for Ukraine. Of which country is Biden President?
Let’s go Brandon, indeed.
The coffee is hot. Classic rock plays softly in the background. The neighborhood houses are black lumps against a dark blue-gray sky. I rock slightly in the un-reclined recliner looking out the window at nothing. It is cold, but not too cold outside. It is comfortable in the old office.
I usually block off Saturday and Sunday mornings to write. Today, I’m in a lazy mood. I should sit at the computer and write. I don’t want to put in the work. I’ve hit a writers block wall of my own design in my latest novel. I ended the last chapter and started the current one with exposition, not action. I have stated that things happened, not described the happening, if that makes sense.
For example, I might write that the basketball team lost a tough game in the State basketball tournament. I should describe the hot, sweaty, loud, raucous, competitive atmosphere of Hoosier Hysteria in the gym from the old days of single class basketball. The days when entire towns showed up on Friday night to see the team on the hardwood. I should write what the fans did, describe the smell of popcorn in the lobby, the sweat of the railroad worker crammed on the bench seat next to you.
See what I mean? I wrote one sentence when I should have written a hundred words. By the same token, I write a hundred words when one sentence would suffice. It is the endless editing and rewriting that sucks the fun out of it.
I know what I want to happen. I’m just too lazy to do the actual work. As the historian Barbara Tuchman once said, “research is endlessly seductive, writing is hard work.” I’m not talking the writing like here at the old blog, this is ridiculously easy. I sit and words flow stream of consciousness fashion right onto the electronic page. Narrative writing is difficult. I’m afraid I was only moderately successful in my first book. I learned from it. And to Tuchman’s point, since the current novel takes place in the past I am drawn and sucked in by the research. Do I really need to spend two hours researching the history of the Nickel Plate Railroad and the machinations of Jay Gould and the Vanderbilts?
Oh, I know I can write prose. I can craft sentences that flow, that describe, that are easy to read. Writing an actual story, that is a completely different animal. There were a couple of passages in my first book I thought were good writing. There was also some complete crap. There are chapters and passages that do nothing to push along the narrative. I should have taken an figurative red pen and marked them with a big red X.
None of this is compliment fishing. Rather, as Clint told us, “A man has to know his limitations.” I know mine. And a big one today is that I don’t want to do the hard work of writing. I think I’ll read a few blogs, then saunter off to watch something, anything on TV.
Ahhhooogha....Ahhhooogha...the fog horn sounds a mournful warning over Mudsock this morning. I can hear the lonely ship bells of the big freighters anchored in the icy White River cutting through the silence. Ding ding, ding ding as a warm breeze moves across the slowly thawing ground. It is still dark, only the neighbor’s porch lights cutting a weak yellow beam through the fog.
I sip my coffee. The furnace kicks on to bring warmth to the blogroom. Soon I will fire up the old laptop and slave away at my desk as Bob Cratchet babbles away over the pitiful exploits of his family one desk over. Scratch, scratch. Why won’t Bob use a computer?
Ahhhooogha.....Ahhhoooga....the foghorn sounds a mournful warning...
What? Do not push me. The Captain and Tennille are just a click away. I’ll do it, so help me...
Consider this four-slice toaster on Amazon. I’m sure it is a fine product, but it is a toaster. It cooks bread. That’s all it does. It is not made of gold or platinum. No artisan hand-forged the metal or inlaid delicate filigree like a Faberge Egg. We are talking 1920’s technology here.
What I do find remarkable is not that a company is selling a $300 toaster, but rather that more than three hundred people actually bought one of these in the last month! I mean what were you thinking?
Look, I’m not judgemental. Well, maybe a little. Okay, often, but stick with me here. I may judge you by your politics, your face piercings, or your blue hair. How you spend your hard-earned money is your business. You work hard and want a sports car or a Bentley. Not my concern. If you want gold plated hardware in your bathroom, it is none of my business. If you collect guitars or guns, I say, whatever.
If you buy a $300 toaster you are a blithering idiot.
A few days ago we found an old straggly cat at our door.
She was a sorry sight. Starving, dirty, smelled terrible, skinny and hair all matted down. We felt sorry for the cat and put her in a carrier and took her to the vet.
She had no name so my we named her Pussycat.
The vet decided to keep her for a day or so and said he would let us know when we could come and get her.
My husband, [the complainer] said,
“OK, but don’t forget to wash her, she stinks.”
My husband and our vet don’t like each other.
He calls my husband El-cheap-O. My husband calls him El-Take-0. They love to hate each other.
Next day my husband had an appointment with his doctor, which was located next door to the vet.
The doctor’s office was full of people waiting to see the doctor.
A side door opened and in leaned the vet; he had obviously seen my husband arrive.
He looked straight at my husband,
“Your wife’s pussy is finally clean. She now smells like a rose. And by the way, I think she’s pregnant. God knows who the father is!”
And he closed the door.
I have no memory of writing this.
I was “standing” in the hall bathroom bit after 4PM yesterday when power kicked off. I quickly finished, trying to maintain my aim in the dark, washed up, and went to check what was going on. First, I turned off he laptop since it was now running on battery mode. I looked across the street to see if the neighbors had power. It was not evident either way. I opened the electric company app and sure enough, their was a widespread power outage reported already.
Wait? What did that say there in small print at he bottom of the outage report? Power was expected to be restored at 10:30 PM! I looked down at my right hand. Let’s see, 4:30 to 10:30...I need more fingers...
I looked out the window, dark was not so far off. I grabbed a couple of flashlights, my Kindle Paperwhite, and little Bose bluetooth speaker. I had a seventy percent charge on the phone, that was good news. I called the wife, who was attending the grandgirls, and told her there was no need to hurry home. I lit a candle on the kitchen table, then, for next few hours I read, looked out the windows, and listened to music in the ever-darkening house.
Finally, around 6:30 the wife came to get me to go somewhere for dinner. After dinner we went to Target for stuff. I checked the electric company app. Power is expected to be restored at 1:30 AM. YGTBFKM.
Returning to the darkened house in a blacked-out neighborhood, I was happy I spent a few bucks extra for the battery backup on the garage door opener when I replaced it last summer.
It was chilly in the house, but not too bad upstairs. I retired to my office to read on the ebook’s lighted screen, the wife to the other recliner in the girl’s bedroom to play on her iPad.
No wonder our ancestors went to bed at sundown. They were bored. There is not much to do after dark but hump and draw stick figures of deer on the cave wall. Well let me tell you, the wife said no, and I couldn’t find the crayons.
Fortunately, the power kicked on a little after eleven. Satisfied all was good, I went to bed. In the dark. Now I have to reset the stupid clocks.
Here is some Saturday music that has nothing to do with power outages.
The eldest granddaughter got glasses yesterday. She is really excited. They look good on her. She already looks much older than her nine years, and the glasses emphasize the notion. I feel bad for her. As soon as the “new” wears off she will realize all of the things everyone hates about glasses — they hurt your nose, your ears, they get so very dirty, they fog up, they slide when you sweat, they fall off when you are doing stuff, etc. I suspect in a few years she will beg for contacts.
I first got glasses when I was eighteen. I mostly used them for reading. I hated them. By the time I was in my mid- twentiesI had to wear them all of the time. I hated them even more. In my forties I had to get bifocals. I hated them more. In my fifties my Fuchs Dystrophy got worse and I had to get cornea transplants in both eyes. The good news, I thought, new eyes means no more f-ing glasses. Nope, wrong. My severe astigmatism means I had to keep my glasses. Did I mention I hate my glasses? Within a few years I was back to bifocals. So it goes. First The astigmatism prevented the possibility of contacts, then the Fuchs, now the transplants. Currently, the I am waiting on my retina to recover fully from my surgery so I can get new, stronger glasses. Whoop!
Did I mention I hate wearing glasses?
Anyway, my granddaughter got glasses and she looks cute and grown up and the rest of the diatribe was not necessary, but there you go. That’s what you get around here.
It does give me an opportunity to play one of my favorite songs since it marginally mentions seeing:
Looks like an ugly weekend. Right now we are on the warm side of the front, lots of rain and a little snow before the really cold air seeps in.
A stiff wind is rattling the eaves. The neighbors’ porch lights cut a narrow holes of brightness through the black of night. Seventies rock music plays softly on my Amazon Echo spy device. Currently it is Fleetwood Mac. I have been up since 3:30 this morning. I don’t know why. These things happen.
I made a pot of potato soup for dinner. We had BLTs to go along with the meal. I had plain old iced tea, the wife added copious amounts of sugar to hers. It is possible the greasy bacon woke me up early. Perhaps it was work. Aches and pains in my joints from the changing weather patterns are equally complicit, I am sure.
It is okay. I will fire up the old computer and do a little work when this post is done. Maybe I’ll doze in the recliner instead. I spend a significant amount of time here in the old blog room, office, man cave — whatever I chose to call this spare bedroom at any given moment. I am more than comfortable here.
So we are at a crossroads with this post. I find it is a bit like a weak SNL skit, I don’t know how to end the thing. I could go searching for an old photo and turn it into a Wayback Wednesday post. I could post some music. The Allman Brothers Whipping Post is currently playing in the background to this one-fingered typing and is setting a fine atmosphere.
The answer is neither. You get Wednesday. Make it a good one.
Last week we went to our favorite pizza joint. They have awesome wood-fired pizza and we go there usually every week. The total for pizza and a couple cans of diet drinks was $19.35. The wife hands the girl a twenty, two dimes, and three nickels.
The cashier is a nice young girl, probably 18 or 19, definitely old enough to be out of school. She looks at my wife. She looks at her hand. She looks at my wife again. The cashier lays down the $20, then stares at the coins. She turns them over and stares some more. She looks up at my wife helplessly.
“That is thirty five cents,” says the wife.
The girl gives a little half smile. “Thanks, I have problems with coins,” she says. She drops the coins in the drawer, and stares at the twenty.
“I get a dollar back,” the wife helps move the transaction along. The girl says a polite thank you.
The wife and I wander to our table completely baffled at a person who cannot count change.
The girl hands the pizza ticket to the baker, completely baffled by old people who refuse to use a debit card.
The wife has a red KitchenAid stand mixer that I think she loves almost as much as she does me. It’s okay, she uses it to produce cookies and cakes and goodies. Her mixer has a white ceramic bowl with red stripes to mix the good stuff in. If there is anything my wife likes it is stripes (she wears a striped shirt nearly every day) and red. It is her favorite color. The combination of red mixer and red striped bowl makes her happy.
Flash backward to early December; way back last year. Yeah, I know it was just a month ago. Stick with me, I’m trying to gin up drama here. I was washing dishes and I bumped the mixer bowl on the side of the sink. There was a tremendous crash and ceramic pieces and shards were all that was left of the red striped bowl. “What was that?” she called from upstairs.
“You know what is was,” I replied.
“Did you break my mixer bowl?” She tried to not show she was ticked. Her disappointment grew when she discovered the bowl was a limited offering from Crate and Barrel and no longer available.
I scoured the interwebz and found the bowl on a kitchen ware website. Debit card in hand I placed my order. It was now December 15, so I paid extra for expedited delivery. Only when I paid and I got my confirmation email did it become clear I had ordered the bowl from China. The email assured me in polite Chinglish my order was on the way.
Then nothing. Finally two days before Christmas, I was emailed tracking information. They shipped it via the Chinese version of the post office. After moving around various terminals, I’m sure being dropped kicked onto trucks with poor suspension on pothole filled gravel roads, the box was loaded onto an airplane on December 30. Fifteen days to leave China. I’m glad I paid extra for fast delivery.
It is now January fifth. Tracking says it is enroute. I suppose my bowl was loaded on a Piper Cub flown by a pilot with narcolepsy because they only way it could take more than six days to fly a box from China to the US is if the pilot stopped to take a nap on every island across the Pacific. Planes back in the 1930s made it across the Pacific in a couple of days, including stops on Wake Island and Oahu. Did the pilot stop for a slice of Hula Pie at Dukes on Waikiki?
Anyway, my wife may or may not get a replacement for her beloved red striped mixer bowl. I’m betting the odds are high it will be in pieces when it does arrive. Her birthday is in June. Maybe it will be here by then.
I often tell my wife interesting facts and trivia. She almost always gives that blank look indicating she would roll her eyes, or worse, tell me “I don’t care,” if she didn’t love me too much to be rude. It is quite possible you roll your eyes or say “I don’t care” when I offer up fascinating tidbits.
These days when you think about the greatest MLB hitters ever, Pete Rose, Babe Ruth, and Ty Cobb come to mind. Some of you will think of Hank Aaron or Barry Bonds. Of course Mickey Mantle and DiMaggio always make the list.
You know who you forget? Stan Musial. Yes, I know he was a Cardinal, but he couldn’t help where he ended up. Musial ranks fourth in all-time hits. Did you know that? He only trails Rose, Cobb, and Hammerin’ Hank. When Stan the Man retired, he was second, only behind Cobb.
Okay, you say. Here is a fact you might not know. In his last at-bat Musial drove a single past a lunging second baseman into right field.
That is Harry Carey on the call. The second baseman? None other than rookie Pete Rose, the man who would later take the National League hits all time leader title (and MLB). What a strange bookend.
Did you know that Stan Musial, Ken Griffey, and Ken Griffey Jr. all came from the same little Pennsylvania mill town?
Yeah, you don’t care.
Why not? I actually saw the Go Gos in concert back in the early eighties. The Flock of Seagulls was the opening act. Here they are on American Bandstand.
True confession, I’m a sucker for dark curly hair.