Category: Information

Monday’s Theme Music

Mood: summerpositive

The cats and I agree, it’s a strong sun today, biting my skin with its heat, blinding my eyes (yes, what else would it be blinding — my ears?) with its light. Not supposed to be hot today, just 87 F, and it’s just 67 F now. This is Monday, Jun 24, 2024.

The cats are pratically living in the backyard, slumbering beneath bushes or stretched out, floof-napping in green patches of lawn. They come in to visit me, get fed, and use the litter box, and then dash back out. Reminds me of being a young child in the summers, doing the same with Mom. Except I didn’t use a litter box. Not in those days.

I jest, of course! Spoke with Dad yesterday. He’s down. They — the omniscient they here is the medical staff — are pushing for the dialysis port, and he doesn’t want to go through with that. He seems fazed by the surgery and claims he doesn’t want to be a burden on people, as others would need to drive him to his appointments several times a week. I’m sure he will go through with the procedure but he needs to work himself up to it. I called him this morning to chat with him but reached his voice mail. I need to call Mom to catch her up on that news. Never did call her yesterday.

Terrible flooding in the midwest. Iowa was severely hit. Evacuations were ordered and bridges collapsed. I remember flying over the plains states decades ago. The floating and the heat dome are connected events. Hope the climate doesn’t get any worse or the nation and its citizens might start getting worried. Yeah, that’s snark, baby.

My spouse picked up a nice Charles Wysocki jigsaw puzzle at Ashlandia’s library of things yesterday. I thought we should have some on hand for more Internet outages. We began the puzzle last night, even though the net didn’t go out. Lovely little beach scene featuring an old house where a high school kite flying club meets. Kites lean against an old fence in the sand and a heart shaped balloon, tethered to the gate, floats above the scene, red against a cloudy blue and white backdrop. A few sailboats skim choppy waters in the background. I can almost smell that ocean.

Other than these matters and the standard form of our days of eating, cleaning, writing, reading, it’s quiet. I accept quiet. Still recuperating with my ankle issue.

Today’s music comes by way of Willy Nelson. I was reading about his show cancellations and the article reminded me of a gay cowboy song Willy sings. The Neurons immediately began a little rendition of the song, “Cowboys Are Frequently Fond of Each Other”, in the morning mental music stream (Trademark grazing). Although Willy’s version came out back when Brokeback Mountain was gaining Oscar attention, I picked up a later version done by Willy and Orville Peck. Hope you enjoy it.

Stay positive, be strong, lean forward, and Vote Blue in 2024. Also brace yourself for a busy news week. With more SCOTUS news forthcoming, the end of June sending up a cloud of dust as it sprints at us, and the debates and the weather, I’m sure there will be a lot to talk about, read about, and GRRRRR about.

Coffee has been sucked down. Here we. Cheers

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Floofbat

Floofbat (floofinition) – Activity characterized by an animal battling a machine, mechanical device, or inanimate object. Origins: Internet, circa 2020-2024

In Use: “Refusing to yield to the robot floor cleaener, the cat engaged in minimal floofbat with it.”

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Sunday’s Theme Music

Mood: Confloofeed

The world has dropped a Sunday bomb on Ashlandia, emphasis on sun. Little wind stir the heat. We’ll travel from our current relative pleasant found in 69 degrees to the upper eighties. Cooler than yesterday, not as hot as that endured by those under the skillet lid in the eastern U.S. Today is June 23, 2024. Next Sunday will be June’s final day. This means that almost half of 2024 has slipped by the surly calendar.

In bad news, a friend sent me stats on COVID-19, showing that it’s risin’ agin’. He saved me some time. I’d planned to look into it because eight friends reported they had it in June. Their experience was a few days with mild cold symptoms followed by two to three weeks of poor energy of any kind. One reported, she sit down with a book and go right to sleep.

I spent the morning texting with sisters. One is teaching her sixteen-year-old to drive as her newly adult high school grad takes on adulting as he preps for college this fall. She’s going down to Georgia to vacation with our oldest sister tomorrow. Meanwhile, texting me, the older sister tells me she’s had a couple strokes without elaborating on what kind. She’s always had back problems and now there’s stenosis and they want to fuse five of her vertebrae together. She’s also diabetic and has chronic kidney failure, a byproduct of her meds, she tells me.

Then there’s my middle younger sister. She and her family drove down to the Carolina coast yesterday. They’ve rented a beach house with a pool. They’re all hard workers and mo’ def’ deserve and need a vacay. Hope they’re able to relax and chill.

Meanwhile, my mind is floating around calling Dad to get an update on him and calling Mom to get an update on her and pass the update along about Dad. I’m not quite up to that yet. More coffee and some writing, first.

We had a net outage the other night. Actually, two nights in a row. This frequently happens when the heat jumps into the upper nineties. I mean degrees, not years, decade, or period.

With the net out, we read but then I surfed the television offerings. Since I cut the cable back in 2010, we survive on over-the-air digital broadcasts. We receive the big four networks, along with PBS, and the networks’ sub channels. Like NBC is channel 5.1, then there are three other networks broadcasting old shows or documentaries on channels 5.2, 5.3, and 5.4. X-Files, Two and a Half Men, Seinfeld, along with Green Acres and Hogan’s Heros, and several police/hospital/fire department-based dramas from past decades.

Watching Hogan’s Heros and its silliness, my wife and tried remembering what happened to Bob Crane. Was it suicide or murder? Bludgeoned to death, we rather later recalled, and then conneted it. (Yes, conneted is my word for ‘confirmed on the net’.)

My wife follows a tangent, recalling that Naomi Judd ended her own life. It’d shocked her and me; Naomi Judd, a lovely and talented person, seemed to have it all together, resulting in a life of artistic and commercial success. Naomi Judd, though, coped with many mental and physical health issues and decided, enough. Never know what’s happening in another’s skin and what’s passing through minds.

The final piece that evening was a sort of celebration of the Judds’ music, with my wife enthusing about their songs, like “Mama He’s Crazy” and “Girls Night Out”. But the one she particularly relished was “Turn It Loose” from 1988. She played it a few times once the net returned, heavily accenting her favorite lines by loudly singing along to them.

I love the slide of a steel guitar
I love the moan of an old blues harp
I love the shake of a tambourine
I love the bass when it’s low and mean
So put on your shoutin’ shoes
And turn it loose

h/t to Lyrics.com

It may surprise you that The Neurons in my head then loaded it up and sprang it on me this morning in my morning mental music stream (Trademark loose) as I was wandering around the kitchen, just minding my own business. So that’s today’s theme music.

Stay positive, be strong, and make what you can of the day. Needn’t be perfect. Just tryin’ can help. I’ve downed some coffee — the last gulp was cold as stone. Time to go write and roll.

Here’s the music. Cheers

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The Red Tricycle Dream

I was with some sort of military unit. A bunch of military units wre there, all living side-by-side with their families, including children in this big sort of hanger. It was a sea of chaos to my eyes.

The guy in charge held up a large white envelope. “Someone needs to go around and collect for the charities.”

“I’ll do it,” I said. Otherwise, it seemed like I was doing nothing but waiting.

Directions about what to do were in the envelope, along with a list of the units. My task was to go around and hit them up for money, not just the units, but some individuals in the units. Weirdly, I was to always get eight donations. That struck me because a few years ago, I had a series of dreams in which eight was always significant.

I began my collections, and fumbled my way through, telling others what I was doing and why, getting the required monies. After doing three, I thought, this is ridiculous. I was walking, and with the throngs of milling people and distances, snails would have outraced me. Going back and turning in my collection, I complained, “I need some way to get around faster.”

Someone gave me a little red tricycle to use, the kind of transpo suited to a toddler. I sat on the seat and grabbed the grips on the silver handlebars. The grips were white, with pink and white tassels hanhing off them. Applying my feet to the pedals, I tried to make progress, but it was ridiculous, with my knees rising above the handlebars and sometimes slamming into them.

Getting off the trike, I considered my transportation. “I need to make some changes,” I said, “but how?”

Like heat lightning on a summer evening, the idea came: I will think of the changes I want and make them happen.

First, the three-wheeler needed to be larger to fit my adultness. I picked up the thing and thought that until the trike was sufficiently sized. Next, I thought, I want the front wheel further out, like a chopper. Thought and done. Then, sitting on it again, I thought, I want the seat to be like a chair and reclined. Done.

Next, did I really need to pedal? Flying over this crowd and from unit to unit would make my task deeply easier. So I thought of wings, and then decided, yes, this can fly. Somewhere along that process, I gained a flying helmet with googles and a white scarf.

I took off on a practice run, flying around the hanger, and it was smooth as an icy pond. In quick order, I was flying to the units on my rounds. Some of the unit personnel knew me at one and asked, “How did you get that flying bike?”

I told them, “Someone gave me a red tricycle and I changed it.”

“But how did you change it?”

“I just thought of what I wanted,” I replied. “And that made it happen.”

4

Great Math

The debate between Trump and President Biden is coming up, and Trump has some concerns.

‘Mr. Trump also told his followers to be suspicious of the whole debate enterprise, although his campaign negotiated the terms of his participation. They should keep in mind, he said, that he’ll be up against multiple adversaries at once — not just Mr. Biden but both of CNN’s moderators, Jake Tapper and Dana Bash, who, Mr. Trump added, were constitutionally incapable of treating him fairly. “I’ll be debating three people instead of one half of a person,” he said.’

Great math, D.J. If you’re debating ‘a half’ and you add two — or never mind, you cheese whiz.

Vote Blue in 2024.

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Floofnomen

Floofnomen – The name by which an animal or animals refer to people. Origins: Roman empire.

In Use: “Many people mistakenly believe that cats reduce people to their roles, i.e. can-opener or spare human one, but almost all floofs give human specific floofnomen, although the floofnomen can often translate to things like ‘primary food giver’ and ‘the door man’.”

In Use: “Michael didn’t know it but his floofnomen among his cats was Mrupew, which was like an amusing sound to him, but which translates to ‘warm body person’ in Floofish.”

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Saturday’s Theme Music

Mood: upbeat and restless

Today is Saturday, June 22, 2024. Summer had asserted itself with a firm hand. A solidly blue sky gazes down on Ashlandia and bright sunshine blisters our skin and browns the land. Currently 73 F, Ashlandia’s area will experience low to mid 90s for the highs today. The wind has shifted and the smoke has drifted out of our valley to go plague others in another valley, so it’s breathable outside. Take precautions against the heat and outside activities can be pursued. It supposed to get cooler for a few days, with temperatures dipping into the eighties.

It feels like it’s been a long week. Realizing it’s Saturday surprises me. The big Biden-Trump debate looms on the calendar. Personally, I have a physical this week. Slowing down, moderately overweight, I feel like I’m aging by the day — which, yeah, we all are — so I’m not looking forward to the physical.

Mom and I spoke yesterday. She related one of her favorite precautionary tales. Her mother had a thing about smells. She was living alone, in her nineties, as her children discussed putting her into a nursing home or assisted living facility. Those discussions had stalled.

Meanwhile, on a cold December Nebraska night, her mother put on a light jacket and took a banana peel out to put in the outside trash. She slipped and fell, staying on the ground for forty-five minutes before noticed and helped. That was the end of her living alone. She lived for several more years but wasn’t the same.

On her part, Mom’s big fall over a decade ago triggered her long health decline. For my part, when I was immobilized with an obstructed bladder a few years ago, I saw changes quickly emerge. I was suddenly stiffer and less fluid in my movement. My balance felt slightly off. My metabolic rate had changed as I aged, of course, but suddenly I put on weight. Much of my muscle seemed to slack off overnight. Then, boom, my skin all seemed to be sagging.

It’s likely that all those things were happening but I didn’t notice until my routines were changed. Seeing those changes made me more cognizant of my retreating hair line, and the color fleeing my hair and beard. I feel older, slower, and weary. Reading news of the world and its people, and political news, doesn’t seem to help at all. I turn to coffee for energy boosts but I know I shouldn’t be drinking it any longer. Like Grandma and her banana peel, I can’t stop myself.

I read Jill Dennison’s blog as frequently as I can. She and I seem like kindred political spirits, part of the same tribe as many of you who regularly visit my blog and comment. I read one of Jill’s posts and commented yesterday. In her comments back to me, she mentioned that she’s looking for a rainbow.

That was like a set up for The Neurons. As soon as that was read and digested, they began playing Chris Rea’s song, “Looking for A Rainbow” from 1989, in the morning mental music stream (Trademark smoldering). The song starts out slow as it carries forward the album’s theme, The Road to Hell, but becomes jauntier and of course features Rea’s slide guitar work.

Well we come down to the valley
Yea we’re looking for the honey
I see a rainbow
I say that’s the land of milk and honey

Me and my cousin
Me and my brother
My little sister too
Come looking for a rainbow
Yea we’re looking for a rainbow

Well we come down to the valley
Got our babies in our arms
Yea we’re Maggie’s little children
And we’re looking for Maggie’s farm

Me and my cousin
Me and my brother
My little sister too
Come looking for a rainbow
Yea we’re looking for a rainbow

h/t to Genius.com

Yeah, Jill, baby, I think many of us are looking for a rainbow and the land of milk and honey. Some seem to believe the only way there is by holding others back, beating them down, or banishing them. Yes, I’m looking at you, Republicans.

Stay positive – yes, it’s hard – be strong – yes, also hard – and lean forward and Vote Blue in 2024. Maybe we can create a place that attracts rainbows. Here’s the music. Cheers

1

The Writing Moment

Finished editing and revising the current novel in progress. It’s either the sixth or seventh iteration. Doesn’t matter.

My vision for it has clarified through the process of writing and then reading and changing it. One storyline was excised as meandering, dull, and convoluted. Firmer insights into relationships, terminology, and setting crystallized, leading to more slices. Explanations and clarifications were thinned. Characters and relationships found sharper evolution.

All good. I enjoy the manuscript and that means something to me. It is lengthy and meaty, and I wonder and worry about its length. But then I shrug, because nothing emerges for me to deliberately remove.

Now I’ll begin editing and revising again. This time I’m pursuing more of the novel’s voice and feel. I suspect — it’s a feeling — that this will be the last go around. And then I’ll begin pursuing publication.

A friend — another writer — asked me what titles I would compare it to. And gosh, I came up with nothing. I have some vague notions. Historic fiction, science fiction, and fantasy all combined in this speculative effort. And it has stories and characters embedded in it whose stories I’d like to pursue. Like Humans. Humans’ are in the book’s forefront and background, as they were moved to isolation in a forbidden zone long before events in this book. They are important to the novel because the primary antagonist is a Martian who loves Humans and conquers others to spread Human cultures. That’s one reason the rest of the civilizations consider her so dangerous. The other is that she’s proven difficult to kill.

There’s also the main character’s stepmother and her complicated story. I’d like to pursue exploring her and how she developed into the person she is. Then, there’s the main character’s relationship to his sister, and what happened to her in parallel to him, and where she is and if she’s still a cat.

But then, there are also so many other projects sitting in the wings, waiting for me to come back to them. And they’re all stories, concepts, ideas, which interest me.

It’s all fun, reading, writing, editing, imagining, thinking, the life of a writer.

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