Science fiction, fantasy, mystery and what-not
After reading about South Dakota’s disparaging remarks about herd mentality and the subsequent spike in COVID-19 cases in that states, I thought of the phrase, against all odds.
Against all odds, Alabama held back until it was conclusively demonstrated that despite not being like California, Alabama was going to experience the coronavirus. Checking the news today, I see two thought-provoking headlines to use to compare and contrast:
The first article tells that Alabama’s tourism industry has been one of the least hard-hit in the nation. In the second article, ADPH reports that Mobile surged from 158 cases last week to 468 this week.
Anyway, I can hammer the point that social distancing works, but against all odds, churches, some Republican governors, and Liberty University disbelieve the facts and refuse to take the recommended actions.
And anyway, now that I’ve made this a stupidly long post for a theme music entry, today’s theme music is Phil Collins with “Against All Odds (Take A Look at Me Now)”, a 1984 song written for the movies, “Against All Odds”. Kind of a slow song, bit of sappy movie montage behind it, and it doesn’t even mention odds (what are the odds of that?). Not much of a theme song. Don’t Rachel Ward and Jeff Bridges look pretty, though?
Oh, well.
Cheers
Smiling as he raised the blinds, he gazed up at the sunshine. “Alexa, what’s today’s weather?”
“Right now in Eugene, it’s fifty-eight degrees with mostly sunny skies. Expect more of the same throughout the day, with a high of sixty-eight, and a low of thirty-seven. Enjoy your day.”
A heartbeat of sadness passed. He’d been hoping that she would say his name, as she’d been doing once in a while the last few days. Like yesterday, she said, “Have a great Sunday, Richard.”
That little bit had meant so much, more than it probably should, but it was the little things that kept him back from the edge during these days of isolation, and the edge seemed just a little too close today.
“Alexa,” he said in a softer voice, “how’s our weather today?”
He waited, hopeful for the answer.
Grand Floof Railroad (floofinition) American floof rock (flock) band active for a decade starting in the late 1960s, earning greater popular success as they transitioned” their sound to a more mainstream dance style.
In use: “One of Grand Floof Railroad (later shortened to Grand Floof), was “Some Kind of Wonderfloof”, a remake of a Floof Brothers Six song.”
Dreamed a lawyer was trying to seduce me. Blonde and female, she was young and friendly.
hadn’t started long that, though. First, she and several other young lawyers showed up. All were dressed in suits with trousers. She wore a gray suit with a white shirt. There may have been four in the beginning. They’d already to literally practice law by observing and doing mock cases. None were anyone that I know.
I was young and they were young. I wasn’t a lawyer. Seems like sometimes I was in the military but other times that I wasn’t, which amused me during the dream.
I found a place to sit on a secluded cement space just outside the courtroom area. The center was a courtroom; the rest was like a small arena. I wasn’t there to watch, but to rest and take a nap. The young lawyers arrived. I observed them but didn’t think much more about it than, “Look; young lawyers.” All were dressed neatly.
They came over to where I was seated and asked if they could sit there, too. Sure; I didn’t care. There was space. The blonde, and a slender, dark-haired white male, sat beside me. He was dressed in a blue suit with a white shirt and red and blue striped tie.
She was immediately adjacent to me. I had a blanket, and I told them that I was going to take a nap. They were fine with that. The mock trial started as I pulled my blanket up. The blonde said she was cold; would I mind sharing my blanket?
Sure, no problem. The trial continued. I was making comments about it because I knew the people involved, which surprised the lawyers. I shrugged it off; it was just stuff that I knew. The blonde cuddled up against me. As I drifted toward sleep, her hands roved over me. She began kissing me.
Amused, I chatted with her about it. She told me that she wanted me. I told her that I was flattered but I was going to pass. She was understanding. She went off to get something. Her friend told me that the blonde really liked me. The whole thing amused me, as it was so much like high school.
One mock trial ended. I was going off to another area. He wanted to walk with me. “Sure, come on.”
We left the courtroom arena. Now we were inside an enormous atrium attached to a tall, large building. I knew that I was on the eleventh floor. We could look down and see other sidewalks and bridges, all of it connecting buildings, all of it inside. I was chatting with the lawyer, who was young, bright, and friendly. He was also gay, he told me. Well, cool, fine he was friendly and polite person, so what’s orientation have to do with anything?
He wasn’t sure how to get to the next courtroom, so I took him there. We arrived, and as we were chatting, the judges arrived. Two were previous commanders of mine, 0-6 colonels. They greeted me, making jokes about things, hamming it up for the others beginning to arrive.
I took me leave as others arrived. The blonde female lawyer arrived dressed in a tight, dark-blue dress. She kissed me hello, told me that she had a room nearby, and suggested that we go. I let her take my hand and lead me away.
The dream ended.
“Geez, look at the friggin’ numbers, rising and rising, when will it end?”
“My god, did you read the news?”
“Look at those people! None of them wearing a mask, or gloves, and they’re not six feet apart!”
Such responses to things led to today’s song. Blasting out of 1978 right into today, it’s Chic with “Le Freak”. You can sing along with the refrain, “Ahhh, freak out!”
Yeah, read, think, talk, wonder, watch, and freak out. Perfect for today. Music, with a slice of humor and nostalgia.
When we began hunkering down, my wife used it as an excuse to clean out the freezers, frig and pantry. (Yeah, she’s one of those people who said, “Now I have time to clean things,” and then cleaned, making the rest of us in the household (which is me and the three cats, so, really, we’re talking about me, because the cats don’t care) look bad. (Yeah, I’m over it, okay?) While doing that, she found some lemon and blueberries pancake mix.
We’d bought it a while ago at a locally famous mill, famous because it’s been there a long time and still does things the old fashioned way, and there’s nothing else like that in the area. Called Butte Creek Mill, it burned down in December, 2015. Because it was local and famous, we visited it and the pancake mix about six years before it burned down. So, it’s old stuff.
There wasn’t any date on it. My wife wanted to pitch it. “It can’t be good.” She opened it. We smelled it. Everyone knows that smelling is the second best scientific way to check for freshness. I let one of the cats smell it, but he just walked away with a bored tail shrug.
“Smells good to me,” I said. Then said, “Save it. I’ll make us pancakes on Easter morning. It’ll be fun.”
That brings us to today.
I rose, made breakfast and ate it (oatmeal with cranberries, walnuts, with granola on top), made coffee, and started writing. My wife came out a little later. “I thought you were making us pancakes this morning.”
This morning? Today? Oh, yeah, Easter. “Sorry, I was writing in my head and went to auto-pilot and forgot.”
She gave me a glare that made the sleeping cats wake up and leave (that’s why they left in my mind — they were sensing danger). I proposed to make the pancakes for brunch. “You don’t like eating this early anyway,” I said, like that made it all okay, because I was really thinking of her.
“Fine.” I could tell she wasn’t pleased.
Fast forward a few hours. I made the pancakes. We don’t have cow milk so used vanilla almond milk. One egg refused to leave its perch in the carton. Instead of taking one of the other thirteen eggs available as a sane person would do, I tried pulling it out and put my thumb through the shell.
Stupid egg.
Now I had an egg mess to clean up. I also wondered if it was a bad omen for the eggs, because these things must happen for a reason, and the reason could be as a warning, “Don’t eat the pancakes.”
(In hindsight, though, that one egg was the only one on that side. I’d wondered why it’d been left alone on that side. Now I suspect that my wife set me up. She can be diabolical.)
But the pancakes were made, and we haven’t died yet. They were delicious. Even though the blueberries seemed like pea stones in the batter, when they cooked up, they were moist, and looked and tasted just like real blueberries.
The package made about twenty-six pancakes about six inches in diameter (because that’s how I like them). We ate some and froze eighteen with wax paper between them. Now we have something to look forward to finding when we clean the freezer again.
It’ll probably be during the next pandemic.
Michael Seidel, writer 