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… a bit more coffee
Wispy fingers of ground fog laces its way through the trees and bushes this morning. The warming trend continues, and we will reach 70° today, but with more rain. But the morning lows are still in the mid 40’s, so no porch sitting yet. Not wanting to curse the rain, we just sigh. We go from dreadful floods to depressing droughts at the drop of a Stetson hat here. A dry day or two would be welcome relief, however.
Trump is in Viet Nam today and has been wildly successful in bringing North Korea into the world community. This doesn’t please his detractors at all, and the news is full of ominous warnings from the same people who said we had to accept Kim sailing nuclear capable missiles over Japan.
House Democrats pass a ton of legislation that has no chance of passing both houses in a cynical attempt to show how relevant they are. Relevant would be to find out those areas that both sides could agree are good for the citizenry, and pass those. But no. It aint gonna happen.
And locally, some developers want to change the law that prevents developers from sitting on the water board. Of course, they are concerned about the water, and not their developments. Yep …
So now that I am informed, I can enjoy a second filling of coffee …
Good morning!
Ghosting Mz. Muze …
There she was, in the gloom forlornly standing on the rainy street corner looking like Lee Remick in the closing scenes of the movie Days of Wine and Roses. Well, maybe not exactly like Lee Remick. But you get the idea.
“I didn’t think I would ever see you again.”
I could almost see the tears in the darkness. Sometimes she is quite good at emotions. A regular Meryl Streep she is.
I shrugged, “I just didn’t feel like writing.”
“You don’t have to protect me. I know when I have been ghosted.” She replied passionately.
I was a bit surprised at the term. “Ghosted? Oh, you mean the post-millennial term to just disappear from a relationship without any explanations! I didn’t do that. I was just busy.”
“Busy is just the blow off excuse when a ghoster gets busted.” She snapped back.
“I have been distracted. I just haven’t had the desire to write until now.” I mumbled.
She laughed dryly and sneered, “You just got to the end of the YouTube sawmill videos.”
“Well, you can only watch so many sawmill videos before you know all you want to know about them. Besides, I am watching carpentry and cooking videos now.” I said, lamely trying to cover the obvious score.
Sensing she was on a roll, she pressed on. “You cook three meals a week, and never cook anything that takes more than fifteen minutes to prepare.”
“Hey! It is still cooking!” I shot back, still smarting.
“Yeah, and you’ve earned Snookums undying gratitude for sharing the chore. When are you going to start cleaning up afterwards too, hero?”
She was really going now, but it was time to stop this attack and I brought out the heavy artillery. Job descriptions.
“When did you become Snooks voice? I need a muse, not a guilty conscience!” I demanded.
She backed off slightly, changed her tone and replied, “All you needed to use me is go to work.”
“I haven’t us…” I said, beginning my counter attack.
“… watch it, buster, this is going on the family pages.”
She had me there. Refilling my coffee cup and composing myself, I started again.
“Writing shouldn’t be work!”
“Can you name one writer who believed that?” She asked.
“Well, no. But that doesn’t mean it should be work.” I answered, but I knew she made the final score …
Jenna and ‘Becca, the Rat Killers
Jenna and ‘Becca, the Rat Killers
Shabbat morning arrives with misty rains and grey skies. Interesting night last night. Went to bed before Snookums and woke to her yell of disgust from the bathroom … apparently a young roof-rat found its way into the bathroom.
As the official pest control department in this household, it was my duty to drag my sleepy body out of bed and deal with a healthy young rat. I called for Tic to come and help me, but he was confused by my invitation and sat on the bed looking at me quizzically.
But it was Jenna, the bathroom escort, that came to my aid. She cornered the rat, then expertly backed off a small amount to give it an escape route, and when he took it, she had him. *chomp! *shake! Then she released him to see if he was still alive … he was, so another comp and shake finished the job.
About that time, ‘Becca da Beagle arrived, and picked him up and carried him out. Good thing, because once he was dispatched, Jenna had no further interest in him. ‘Becca took him out to the living room, and poked and prodded him to make sure he was lifeless, but I really didn’t want to watch a Beagle dine on a rat, so into the dustpan, out the back door, and a long pitch over the fence where the wildlife could enjoy a meal.
I am sure glad for the dogs … if I didn’t have them, my 12 gauge would have been the chosen method of dispatching a rat. It’s real hard on the house, though.
This morning, Jenna kept trying to kiss my face, and was confused when I drew back. I knew where that mouth had been … *shudder!
Things return to normal quickly, however. I forgot to buy potatoes, so I made poached eggs on toast and turkey link sausage this morning. Canned pears for the juice. My culinary friends probably quiver in horror over using ersatz ingredients, but I just wasn’t up to growing my own pears and slaughtering my own turkeys.
Later this week will entail a close inspection of the bathroom to see how a rat got in …
So it is back to the studio. Praise music is on the puck for the day, and to keep the bird happy.
Good morning!
Fierce Men Await in the Wings
Wisps of ground fog threads its way between the trees this Shabbat morning. The nights are beginning to warm and the days will soon flow into springtime. Still, it is a chilly dawn that seeps in past the curtains and pulls warmth from the skin. Sips of hot coffee pushes back the chilly fingers as we await the sun to push aside the mists and light up the land.
One internet friend recovers in the hospital, and another recovers from a double whammy at home. Yet another recovers by cooking. And another chronicles her entry into a retirement community. Chicago boasts that it only had twenty murders in January. And a chef and restaurant owner apologizes for excluding people because of the color of their hat.
But in my world, all the news is like reading about a foreign land. I no longer recognize my old homeland. A generation has arisen that has no memory of what it used to be like. It is truly a cursed generation that will be the vanguard of woes to come. But like Neville Chamberlain and King Hezekiah, it is enough that there is peace in my time though fierce men wait in the wings.
*sip!
Good morning!
Green Dress Cookie Mafia
I used to feel good buying cookies each winter from the Girl Scouts, though I often wrote humorously of the Green Dress Cookie Mafia. I feel bad in disappointing the individual girls, but GSA is now a political organization supporting reprehensible causes that I loathe. I shan’t be ordering from the perky little cookie sellers. It is a sad day when the zealots can’t leave the children’s organizations alone.
A plea for mercy
Senility and dyslexia is a brutal combination. Please be gentle when you judge my posts.
Toxic Razors, Guests and Morning Fog
A light winters mist surrounds the trees in the distance. The damp from a gray lit window tries to chill me through, but I push it off with sips of hot coffee from the mug clasped in my sleep swollen hands. A treasured guest from the auld sod drove down to visit a spell, but they haven’t woken yet, so other than an occasional gleeful yap from one of the mutts and happy clicks, buzzes and burbles from the budgie, the house is hushed.
My sous vide salmon was a disaster. Not sure what I did wrong. I should have broiled it like a proper salmon instead. But live and learn goes the cliché.
Other than comments pro and con of a rather insulting Gillette razor ad, the news is muted this morning. I expected videos of Federal employees standing in soup lines and selling the children’s Christmas presents this morning, but there was little to be said. I suspect the Democrats sun filled soiree in Puerto Rico was a little too off putting for the media to cover, so we get … fluff. But I’ll take that. Fluff is a product the American media is skilled at. As left-wing partisans, they kinda suck.
So the family rouses …
Good morning!
Sunday Mashup
And waffle day rolls around again with temps in the high 30’s but feeling like it is freezing. But now that I am acclimated to this feral land, anything below 70° is freezing weather. Snook is feeling much better today and says her body is working normally. I guess that is why we say ‘see a doctor’. She saw a doctor and immediately felt much better. Saint Peter has nothing on doctors. His shadow had to fall on people for them to heal.
I think that is often the case with me. The time to see a doctor is at the onset of symptoms, but my first thought is to wait a week to see if the malady improves. And often by then it has, at the cost of days of misery.
My annual check the caboose day is looming in February. It is never a fun experience. Both doctors and men long for the medical breakthrough that eliminates the digital ‘walnut’ exam. I don’t get much sympathy from Snooks on that one. She says I know nothing of the indignity of a pelvic exam. Maybe she’s right, but I don’t think I’ll submit to one just to say I know.
This Sunday morning is a day of normalcy in the household. Thinking of a friend in recovery from heart bypass surgery. The first time is really the pits. Not that the second one was a walk in the park for me either, but at least I remembered the out of control emotions, irrational fear that my chest would explode if I coughed, fear that I wouldn’t have the energy to get back home from a walk.
And another friend who just moved into assisted living. She kept her home for well over a century, then suddenly had to give away many of her possessions because they wouldn’t fit in the apartment. It is not an easy thing to do.
The sun rises another 15° in the cloudy sky, the second cup of coffee is safely tucked inside, it is time to put this up on the website and do my Sunday chores.
Good morning!
One handed gods …
Tuesday. Not much to be said for this day. But I haven’t posted anything in a while, so I’ll set in front of a blank page and put down my usual stream-of-consciousness meanderings. Tiw, the one-handed god of the day apparently stuck his hand in the mouth of a wolf and lost it. That is a rather stupid thing for a god to do, so a minor day of the week is his reward.
Talk radio entertains me and the bird this day. Budgies thrive on noise and battle, but people probably shouldn’t. So now I am caught up on the political hate for the week. I feel so .. informed. It is easy to see a persons political affiliations by their use of memes and narratives, and just as easy to ignore the words that follow them. I am more curious to see who wins the pissing contest than I am whether the wall gets built or not. As a nation, I believe that we passed the point of no return a long time ago, and the natural course is a downward spiral. The best we can do is slow the inexorable helix to destruction. It will come.
So with those cheery predictions, I wander on.
The weather has been warm for the last few days, and the air-conditioner has come on in the afternoons, but that trend will likely end for a week or so. But spring here can’t be afar off. It is already time to start tomatoes indoors. If I was going to start tomatoes. I really haven’t had much luck with them.
The day has marched on, the coffee cup is empty and so is the pot. And it is time to stop the blather.
Good afternoon.
Rusty's Armory 