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My new entrepreneurial endeavor
The time has come.
I am thinking of getting into the boxed meal business
Just think
HOBO JUNGLE BOX
That exciting cookery of yours can be delivered fresh each week
This week is chicken vegetable stew, with stolen chickens and vegetable, and enough of an old tire to cook it over.
Offered as an extra, an original tin-can cookpot, with a bailing wire handle …. just $99 Extra!!!
Coffee, Happy Birds, Sour Grapes and Private Jets
The second round of Democrat debates have come and gone, and gee willikers, Batman! I missed them. Darn, darn, darn.
But not to worry … our ever vigilant and hyperventilating lap dog press is here this morning with more exhaustive insight.
And the glitterats are jetting off to Googles whiz bang 20-million-dollar global warming soiree in Sicily’s Verdura resort, with cheapie rooms going for almost a grand a night, and the pricier ones kept a secret. Not not to worry. Google is picking up the hotel and food bill, and presumably the jet fuel for the 114 or so private jets flying the climate change warriors into the resort. They need the financial help. Really.
Obama is there, DiCaprio, Perry … all A listers … the rest of y’all will have to read about it on the fan sites. But it is for your own good. Go back to your video games now.
And life on a lower level here in the warm pampas of Central Texas, life muddles on, sans jets and celebrity fete’s … other than a few old worn out country singers who manage to straggle in unannounced to the kicker bars that dot the landscape.
The family pages have hints of troubles that go unheralded by the press. My family just isn’t like important. Or anything.
But perhaps that is a blessing. I don’t have to pretend to sound profound while swimming in a sea of banality. Or so I tell myself. Offer me a paid private jet, and I would probably take it. I can be had.
But the coffee is predictably good, the bird is excessively happy this morning, the sun is shining, and I don’t live in poverty or misery. I am blessed.
Good morning!
Habits and Muses
I awoke just as the coffee maker wheezed its last grunt as it topped off the coffee pot with thick, dark coffee. Snook thankfully poured that first cup for me since my eyes were still blurry and sleep swollen, and I staggered on down to the studio and plopped down in my $49 “Executive” chair that I bought in 1982, and since then repaired many times. But I don’t want to replace it … it fits my bottom now.
Answered a couple of emails, checked on the Democrat hate fest as reported by FoxNews online, made a few snarky comments to leftists who hate Fox, but spend a great deal of waking time making comments about how much they hate it.
Then I was out of things to do while waking up.
For the first time in weeks, I put up a blank page in the word processer to see what would happen. Lately, I have been looking at the page and telling myself “I just can’t do this …”
And like magic, there she was, perched on the right corner of the monitor. She was wearing nuns clothing and idly switching a string of rosary beads back and forth in her lap. Unfortunately, that angle on the monitor also revealed puffy shins and hosiery rolled down just below the knees. I averted my eyes. It was a bit more than I was ready for this early in the morning.
“What’s with the nuns get up? I would be careful if I were you. Them things can become habit forming.” I asked, chuckling at my cleverness.
She looked at me levelly for several seconds before shaking her head and replying. “It is the only legitimate occupation for a spurned woman.”
“You weren’t spurned. I was just … ah … busy.” I replied defensively.
“Yes. With that video game.” She said and pointed her nose in the air.
“It’s not a ‘game’. It is a simulation of a real railroad.” I shot back testily.
“Maybe. But it is a waste of time and it is NOT writing nor paying any attention to me.” She replied shrilly. Maybe a bit too shrilly.
“It isn’t a waste of time! It takes a LOT of skill to bring a train down Tehachapi Pass! And you are just a figment.” I tried explaining to her.
“Figment? Are you sure? And real engineers make about $90 grand a year. How much does an aged geezer sitting at the pc in his underwear make? If you sold just one story you would make more than you do playing engineer.”
I carefully picked that dart out and replied. “They are boxer shorts, not underwear. And it isn’t playing. It is simming!”
“OK. A geezer in lime green boxer shorts, idly ‘simming’ at the computer. Better?” She said, smugly.
I fired back again. “Has anyone ever told you that you have one really nasty streak in you?”
“Why thank you, sweetheart! That is the nicest thing you have said to me this year!” She crooned.
I brushed that off and replied, “Seriously, though, I just have not been able to write anything and follow it through. After two or three paragraphs, I have completely lost all interest in it and can’t seem to generate any new thoughts. I used to love writing 500 word shorts with trick endings. But that love has vanished as well.”
Her face brightened and she asked, “What about spiritual pieces? You have always had peculiar slants on great spiritual themes.”
“I dunno. I am surrounded by spiritual prigs, and just don’t have the patience with them that I used to. If I must tell someone that it is merely a funny story and ask them to not take offense, the joy goes right out of it. It is sad that the more I am around believers, the less I want to be around them. But then, I feel the same way about pagans too, so maybe I am just turning into an old crank.”
“Just turning?” She smirked.
“Back off, woman!” I growled.
“Well, I must go back into the cloister. They will miss me soon and start asking embarrassing questions. I don’t know what to tell you. But I sure hope you find what it is that is blocking you soon. Ta ta!” she said, then turned and walked away.
“Me too, sister. Me too.” But I don’t think she heard me.
Take it how you want it … or carping about the dayum
So what does this day mean to me now that one half of our population hates the celebration. The one that entire political party hates the duly elected President so much that it steals their joy and they loudly proclaim their disdain for those that do wish to celebrate it in an effort to share their discontent. Yet they call that democracy … I think I’ll have none of it.
They can yammer and pul all they want. I am inured to their surly mewlings. I’ll set the banner on the porch today and remember a god who generously set me in the midst of such wealth and comfort. The poorest among us live in such comfort in comparison to the truly poverty stricken in the world.
Does God love me more than them? I think not. But I’ll wager any of them would trade places with me in less time than it takes to say “We hates that Trumpses, we does, my precious!” *gollum!*
Carp away, my grumbling compatriots, if I can call them my compatriots. Maybe prisoners of unwarranted wealth would be a better description of this society of pampered malcontents. Fie on them, I say!
Good morning, and Happy 4th, if you are so inclined.
If not, enjoy a perfectly miserable day …
No time for chores …
Mr. Bladder nagged Mr. Sluggard out of bed this morning. Another night of thunder boomers and terrified dogs. Mr. Sluggards wife comments on how calm the dogs were during the storm, but she slept through most of the fidgeting, slobbering, panting, fits and starts of a terrified dog as each wave of rain passed overhead. Tic finally found refuge with Annie on my daybed where they huddled together for several hours. But ‘Becca da Beagle slept through it all too.
I finally dozed off, only to wake at 4am to turn off the lights. I need to keep them on when lightning is lighting up the windows. Jenna the Moose has epilepsy, and the flashes upset her more than the noise. Turning on the lights mitigates them somewhat.
But I am up, Mr. Bladder has settled down, and the warm coffee infuses my soul as I sit here collecting my thoughts on this Monday.
I need to finish swapping out the tires on between two of my mowers, replace a pinon bracket on one of them, bring one in out of the rain and blow off the mowing debris so that the mower deck doesn’t rust through.
Long term I want to sort the tools in the shed, and get rid of those I will probably never use again. But mostly, it is just to get the mowers all working again.
But I don’t let such thoughts interfere with my coffee sipping.
Good morning!
Some things are easier to tell.
This is a mostly true story, I had to change some of the characters and timelines to protect the identities because most of the people are still living. I posted this on multiply some years back, and post it here as sort of a self-revelatory piece. Abortion is not a comfortable subject, and I am conflicted. This is a painful coming of age story.
The four of us had become inseparable that last lazy summer of school. Little did we suspect that our tiny clique was about to be ripped apart. Danny had told me of his plan to win Patsy over, even though she and Larry were fast and intimate friends. At least what we called intimate back in those halcyon and innocent days. She and Larry got the back seat on trips to the drive-in movies, and we had a pact to not look. Still, the little…
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… a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together …
… a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together …
An obscure passage in the book of Ecclesiastes that has perplexed scholars and sages, yet it echoes clearly in my mind with meaning. My time to cast away stones has come, though I may have hesitated too long and now may have to leave that to others.
Pity
Cat tails and coffee
Some days you wake up and the world is just fine, and this morning was that exception. Dawn broke and I awoke feeling great. Distant news of a long-ago school friend brought back warm memories of summers wadding in the cat tails along the Rio Grande river and just generally being away from the ever watchful eyes of adults as I read through the newsfeeds and social sites this morning. It is a morning of reflection.
But soon, duty will call because this is waffle day. And grocery delivery day. And put the new tractor together day if I can locate some missing tools.
However, for this moment I am at peace, coffee cup at hand, thoughts in my head, and view a world out this digital window.
Good morning!
It’s Mōnandæg, or Monday as we have anglicized it. The second day of the week in my tradition. But my tradition also says the Moon was created on the fourth day, so it is a little odd that the Norse would think it was on the second day. Maybe they didn’t have a Book of Beginnings. So goes an old man’s musings as he sits down to herald a new day.
So, on this day when God invented atmosphere, clouds, rain and oceans, I gaze out my window at the freshly mowed verges as the puck plays music for da budgie and write a morning coffee post. I always feel like I’ve done something important when everything is mowed billiard table flat. Funny that I would retire to the wild lands, and then try to civilize it …
Snookums new riding mower is on the way and will arrive tomorrow, one riding mower is repaired, and one has parts on the way. Eighty bucks worth of small parts. But without good working machines, we’d live in high brush, cockle-burs, thorns and rattlesnakes. So, we mow. And mow. Then mow some more.
But early mornings are mine to savor. Coffee, bare feet, sometimes a cookie, music, and an electronic window into your world. I see that you aren’t dressed for the day either.
Good morning!
Poison Ivy
And preparation day rolls around again, but this time I sort of got caught up on my mowing, so I can rest this weekend with a sort of clear conscience. Snooks will bake challah and make up a one pot dish for the Shabbat. I will sit in my air-conditioned studio and look out on the freshly mowed fields with a sense of accomplishment. But it wasn’t all my doing. One neighbor came last week and mowed the verges, and another came this week and weed-whacked the edges so all I had to do was mow the middles.
Little acts of kindness like that make me feel less like an island and more of a part of something, though I admit I am not the easiest person in the world to do things for. I do miss my independence, but some of the little chores just wind me. A poison ivy patch has sprung up in the front yard, but the task of dragging out the sprayer, mixing the cocktail and pumping the blasted thing up can take me a whole day to accomplish. But it needs doing. And a fresh tree stump is awaiting the weed burner to burn it to the ground and make sure the roots are dead.
*sigh!*
But 50 years from now, no one will miss the tree stump, a new owner will put in a Chinese garden or some other civilized horror, and life will go on … unless Messiah comes first. One can always hope.
So, armed with a fresh cup, I peer out my electric window into your world, and out my glass window to a brave new world …
Good morning!
Rusty's Armory 