Category: miscellaneous

Trying

Nursing a coffee

nursing a care

marshalling thoughts running

like cats

here and there

trying to make a semblance of sense

trying to move into the present tense

on the outside I look to be comfortable and free

on the inside I hope no one else is like me

wrestling emotions cause they’re stealing my soul

wrestling hopes and dreams, writing down goals

another day living, another day spent

another day wondering where time and energy went

1

Perspective

He said, it’s just an accident, it’s just a death. Nothing to worry about, not worth the mess.

He said, everyone gets sick, it’s nothing to fear. Nothing to worry about, it’ll all come clear.

Then, when it was his own family who died, he said with a sad face, who could’ve known that this could take place?

1

Commercial Break

My wife informed me she’s ordered snail mucus.

The snail mucus is good for her skin. It comes from South Korea (aka, the Republic of Korea). The procurers assure us the snails are not harmed when the mucus is milked.

We’re talking about opening a snail farm in southern Oregon. Gotta figure out how to milk those snails. Don’t think our fingers are small enough. Must be really tiny fingers to milk those snails. Maybe it’s done by a machine. Hope they’re not using children. They have tiny fingers. Just sayin’.

I gather that South Korea is on a roll with skin and hair products.

Meanwhile a relative sent us CBD TheraReleaf lotions and creams in the mail. They’re extra-strength, of the Arnica+ variety. I applied some lotion to my sore left hand last night. That was the one I broke. Still swells and stiffens after strenuous flexing and exercise. The arm, hand, and wrist all felt mighty improved after the lotion was applied. That could be my mind thinking it should be better, right? Yes, but I think it’s the lotion. I’m going to keep using it.

I like its smell. It reminds me of licorice.

I’d like some licorice. It’s been months since I’ve had any. Why don’t we keep licorice on hand? Answer: because I gobble it up like a cat hoovering in catnip.

My wife mentioned ordering Kitty Chups for our felines. I searched online for more information. The first result was from Amazon, and was for women’s apparel. Whaaat? I clicked on it to see what came up. Cups came up. Cups, not Chups. Kitties were featured on the cups. No women’s apparel was on the page. No wonder half the world seems confused about what’s going on.

Amazon said, “You can search instead for kitty chups.” I clicked on that. Products similar to the Chups came up but the page asked, “Did you mean kitty cups?”

Oh, my, just watched a trailer for a new show, then the first seven minutes of the first episode. That would be Resident Alien on SyFy starring Alan Tudyk. Looks promising. Hope some streaming service picks it up fast. You listening, Netflix?

Bet Amazon gets it.

0

A Dream of Angst and Symbolism

Dream hits keep coming. In another busy night, one stood out.

I was welcomed into a luxury hotel, room 506. There, I found wonderful devices. Connected to my brain, they enabled to accomplish things with simple thought. Think the words and they’re typed. Imagine a food and it’s there. Ponder a drink and it’s at hand.

Wow, of course, right. I was giddy with amazement. Enjoying myself, I went off. Dream time zipped by. I found myself lost. Struggling to find my way back to my hotel and room, I ended up down on an airport tarmac looking for a way in. A woman gave me a white cap. Realizing everyone was wearing one, I put it on so I blended in. Then, trying to sneak into the building past the others (I was casual about it), another woman with a loud voice accosted me, demanding that I write three things on my cap. That confused the hell out of me. (Love that expression: look, no more hell in me! It’s a temporary state, though.) I asked, “Why should I write that on my cap?”

She snipped, “Because you’re part of my security team.”

Removing the cap with a smirk, I answered, “No, I’m not.”

I just walked past her after that. Suddenly back in the hotel, I asked the staff, “Where’s my room?” They replied, “Who are you?”

Although it irritated me, I gave them my name. Then I asked, “What room am I in?” They told me that I should know my room number. Irritation growing because they weren’t helping me and I couldn’t remember my room number, I began guessing. I recall something about two. “Two something, two something. Two oh five. Two oh six.” Then it hit me, no, no, it’d been eleven. One and one was two. I’d reached that by adding the numbers together. Right, five oh six.

Knowing the room number and suddenly the key, a card, was in my hand. I rushed to my room. Shock and dismay quickly displaced my happiness and satisfaction. The room had been trashed. All my neat stuff was damaged and broken. Walking around, I demanded, “What happened? Who did this?” As answers didn’t come, I thought, I must fix these, and began picking up the pieces.

That’s when this dream ended. Yes, this one was weighted with all manner of symbolism and angst. Still fun, you know?

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Monday’s Theme Music

I was out helping my wife with the Food and Friends Project. She’s the official volunteer. Once a week, the takes her place in the rotation to deliver meals to shut-in seniors. The list has become reduced to one page, just eight clients for her route, since the pandemic has set in. We know a few passed away to non-COVID-19-related issues. We wonder about the rest. I’m just the driver, helping her so it goes quicker for her, and it gets me out of the house, doing something else.

While out, I saw so many people walking alone. Of course, I generally walk alone; I plan to walk today. It’s sunny, temperatures in the high thirties, but dry (and that damn wind has stopped for a day). Perfect to do two to three miles of hills.

Among those walking alone were people who seemed like me. Out on errands or walking for the satisfaction of it. Some, though, you question their circumstances. Anyway, it prompted me to begin thinking about all of that, about who we are, who (and what) we were, and who/what we become. So much is beyond our control as circumstances and/or tragedy strikes and/or our bodies and minds betray us. Who we become often becomes dependent on who we have around us.

All these thoughts snaked around to a 2005 Audioslave song, “Be Yourself”. The song is about trying to find salvation (is it inside you or elsewhere) and also what you hide and what you reveal, and what you are inside.

Someone tries to hide himself, down inside himself he prays
Someone swears his true love until the end of time, another runs away
Separate or united, healthy or insane

h/t to Genius.com

2020 is closing up shop. Stay positive, test negative, wear a mask, and get vaccinated. 2021 is about to begin. Bring it on.

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Thursday’s Trinkets

  1. Feels like a Saturday. Odd, for me. I haven’t worked for a company where I kept a schedule for several years. You’d think the days of the week would’ve lost their feel by now.
  2. How does Saturday feel? Less structured. Freer. More relaxed and less stressed. Comfortable as a pair of your favorite shoes. Full of expectation that something good is just about to happen.
  3. Mood was dark earlier in the week. Ah, the standard black cycle. Went into a snarling depression. Thinking about what/how to write a scene, I sulked. ‘Thoughts went, I’ll be sixty-five years old next year, struggling to finish a novel. Written fifteen. Published four on Amazon to no great success. Agents are barely interested in what I submit to them, and I don’t pursue getting published with any great energy. Why am I wasting my time with this shit?’ Then I went mumbling away, did some other things, and thought, oh, this is what happens, and went back and resumed writing. Mine is a fickle mind, probably like most people. The fact is, I enjoy writing, and employing my imagination to create puzzles for my mind to solve, then scrambling to find he words. That’s writing, innit?
  4. Some of the week’s hours were spent helping my wife. She belongs to an exercise class. They meet every MoWedFri at nine AM via Zoom. Pre-COVID, it was an hour earlier at a gym. The instructor has been teaching this class for forty years, and my wife has been going for fifteen. We’ve made many friends through the class, including the instructor and her hubby. The class also launched my wife’s book club. Each year for Christmas, the class members take up a collection and sign a card for the instruction. Well, hard to do that this year. So I set up a private Gofundme for them. We worked with the Y on a letter that was sent to the members. Then I created an eighteen inch by thirty inch prop check for my wife to use to present the collection to the instructor. The prop came out okay, although elements reminded me of a fifth-grade project. But we had to use what we had on hand. It’s the thought that counts, right? The class took up over eleven hundred dollars. Knowing the instructor and her hubby, who aren’t in need, they’ll share it with others who are in need. They’re quite generous people.
  5. Setting up the Gofundme was extremely easy. It impressed me with how simple it was. Which had been my impression, leading to why I helped my wife. She and her friends were thinking it was technical and required computer savvy. It doesn’t.
  6. Reading Bill Bryson’s book, The Body: A Guide for Occupants. It’s rich with history and details. Great expanding knowledge. I’m not as intimate with my body’s functioning as I’d like to be. That’s one reason why I selected this book as a read. As I’ve aged and endured some minor health issued (enlarged prostate gland, broken arm, high blood pressure), I wanted to know more details about myself. I’ve been reading on the net, pursuing symptom after symptom, organ after organ, getting more granular with processes and functions. I suspect many people take up the same pastime of learning more about their body as they age. I keep thinking that I should’ve paid more attention when I was younger. You know, before things began giving me problems, right?
  7. Ran into a friend at the grocery store. I was checking out, he was coming in. About eight AM on Wed. We were both masked and had hats on. I said, “Pat.” He stopped in front of me, six feet away, and stared. “Who is that?” “Seidel.” “Michael!” A smile lit his eyes. “Didn’t know you. Hat. Mask.” We chatted for about ten seconds, and then pressed on. Not great socializers, either one of us, but it was pleasant encountering him.
  8. Watched Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom last night. Fraught with dialogue, tension, and foreshadowing, the film kept me focused. Strong characters…well, strong in every area and value. Viola Davis is on the shortlist of actors that always shade my opinion of a movie. If she’s in it, I’m more likely to be drawn to watching it. All that I’ve seen her in, she impresses me. Chadwick Boseman had also joined the list so it was crushing to hear of his death. Gotta say again, though, white people are often cruel, greedy assholes. Which, as a white person, pisses me off.
  9. It’s been a windy week. My cats DO NOT LIKE WIND. Tucker refuses to leave the house. His position is fine with me; he’s safer in the house. Boo the house panther likes to go out in the morning for a few hours in the back yard (if there’s sunshine) and an hour in the evening on the front porch. Papi, though, (aka the ginger boy, Youngblood, and Meep) despises the wind. He goes out the back and returns to the front, banging on to get back in. Does this six to eight times a day. Bored in the house but too bothered by the wind (and the cold) to stay out. Poor boy. I wrote about his feelings about the wind last month in The Despised Wind.
  10. My Fitbit report said that I did eighty-seven miles last week, three less than the week before. I thought, bullshit. I don’t know how that thing counts. Yes, I know the principles they employ; I’m just dubious of the results. Still, I keep trying to maintain a twelve-miles-a-day average. Need some sort of goal to focus.
  11. Got my coffee. Time to write like crazy, at least one more time. Happy holidays, whatever one it is which you recognize or celebrate. Remember, stay positive, test negative, wear a mask, social distance, and get the vaccine. Cheers
2

Next Year

Picked up some library books the other say. The library set up is working for this lockdown era: go online, put a book on hold on my account. They send an email when it’s ready. I have a window before it’ll be put back on the shelf, giving me time to plan when I’ll go down there to pick it up.

I go several times a month. There’s a table set up outside, under a canopy, Saturday through Thursday, noon to four. Tape is used as markers to indicate the traffic flow and safe distances. Patrons line up six feet apart. The librarian comes out. We’re all masked. You give your name; the librarian goes inside and return with your books. Your account number is verified verbally via the last three numbers. They give you your books and you go on your way.

As part of the process, a slip of paper with the book’s title and its return date is printed. On that little slip are also two little financial gems. One states how much money you’ve saved yourself by borrowing from the library. The other tells how much you’ve saved this year.

The first is $26 on my slip of paper today. That was for two books. Both are hardcovers. Neither were published this year. I suspect I could get them for less than twenty-six dollars used.

The second number is $660. That’s how much I saved this year, they said.

Well, I don’t know about that. I pay a little in taxes each year for this. It was a bond issue for the county library system, and it’s part of my annual property taxes. I don’t think they take those taxes into account when they tell me how much I’ve saved.

But I like the system. I’m a writer. I’d like people to buy and read my books. It’s great that the library system pays books to fulfill that for writers. I hope my books end up in the library some day. It’s also an excellentway to save on trees, innit? Buy a book and let multitudes read it.

All that led to ebooks. These books were available to be borrowed as ebooks. ebooks do even more to save trees, although we then get into the sticky situation of electronic waste.

I don’t do much ebooking; I like the personal heft of the thick books in hand as I carry them around and read in various postures. I know I’m silly and sentimental that way. I could use ebooks and save more trees. Yet, I resist.

I blame blue light for some of that resistance. I watch television (so cut down, you reply) while I’m running in place (oh, you answer, that’s a little different) or using the Stairmaster as part of my exercise. I’m not good at reading while walking (though I’m trying). I also spend a lot of time on the ‘puter reading news (so cut down, you suggest) (I probably should, I answer, as not much of the damn news is good for my spirit), writing, and editing. I don’t want to add the strain of reading ebooks to the strain I already thrust on my eyes.

Nothing is as clear cut as it first appears any longer, whether it’s environmental impact, saving money, or selling books. Our lives are choices, decisions, and compromises. I could, instead of running in place or exercising while watching television just curl up with a book. I could, instead of using a hefty volume, make it an ebook and reduce other strain on my eyes. Or I can go to audio books —

Yeah, don’t even go there. I am a fan of audio books; I’ve used them when driving long distances, and I’ve used them while exercising. I’ve found, though, I prefer the inner voice that I create when I’m reading something.

So, I’ve thought about these things. I recognize some of my habits are comfort ruts. Comfort ruts can be pretty useful in periods of stress, such as, say, a global pandemic. Then again, it may be that I’m just too lazy to change, modifying that ‘too lazy’ to ‘too old and set’.

This is just one facet of existence. These same sort of exercises go on with other things as we live, from medicines to using plastics to cars to public transportation to fossil fuels to recycling to GMOs to organic food to nutrition to healthcare to eating healthy to money to politics to welfare to taxes to social security to war to equality to fashion to music to film to being healthy to relaxing to having fun to —

Well, that point is hammered in. Life is a busy process of constantly re-balancing all these choices. I wonder what’ll it be like in another hundred years.

Strike that: let’s just see what it’s like next year.

1

Sunday Sprinkles

  1. Had an unsettling dream last night. Not a nightmare, but a dream that I didn’t understand. After writing about it, I decided not to share it.
  2. I watch the NFL. The refs fascinate me. Some of them seem like they’re so disappointed when they announce penalties. “False start, offense, number forty-three.” You can almost see him sigh. “Five year penalty,” is delivered with regret. “Remains first down.” I wonder what they’re like in their non-football lives.
  3. I said, “Don’t fear the android.” I was making a joke while re-watching Dark Matters on Netflix. My wife said, “Oh, that’d be a good book title.” It has me thinking.
  4. Several of my wife’s friends encountered her this past week. Always masked and distanced. They emailed her later. One said that she started crying in her car afterward because it’d been so long since she’d enjoyed a friendly, spontaneous conversation with someone outside their pod. Another said that she teared up after dropping off holiday goods on the porch (and picking some up from us, which were awaiting her on the porch). Human contact is so random and remote.
  5. My cancer-inflicted friend is out of the hospital and back home. Friends are calling him to wish him well. I want to do so but I’m terrible with small talk. Not good with the phone. Terrible with socializing in general. He stays in my thoughts but I should call. I’m probably overthinking it.
  6. Likewise, the cancer-affected friend across country is out of the hospital and at home, going through treatment there. We exchange messages but I sense his energy is low. He was always such an upbeat, energetic person. He’s my age, too, which amplifies the impact, right?
  7. It is interesting, maddening, and shocking to witness what friends are doing in other parts of the country. Social distancing and masking isn’t part of their routines. Some have even gone in for elective surgery. One is dating. We respond, WTF? And we worry about them, but they remain blissfully ignorant. Come on, vaccine.
  8. Meanwhile, two other relatives have been diagnosed with COVID-19. One was intubated on Friday. She’d gone in for elective surgery on a toe earlier in the month.
  9. My broken left arm continues its recovery process. It sort of becomes entangled and stiff at night as I bend it under my body. But reach, movement, flexibility, and strength are all improving. One frustrating thing: scratching. I still can’t bend my left hand to scratch my back and several other (ahem) places.
  10. My wife didn’t make us a soup last Sunday, the first time in weeks. Holiday baking occupied her — and the kitchen. I did my part; my role is decorating. I was disappointed with the gels and frosting. It blobbed and sputtered. They were okay, but not great. That’s about half of the batch. They’re PB Rice Krispies bars dipped in white chocolate or chocolate bark, more like a candy bar than a cookie. (That’s them in the photo.) She also made peppermint cookies and my favorite, cranberry cupcakes with drizzled frosting. Today’s soup in progress is a smoky lentil with garbanzo beans. Chilly day, in the forties, diluted sunshine. Looking forward to it with some hot buttered ciabatta bread.
  11. I thought writing was going well. Then I read a paragraph last night which had me wincing, groaning, and gagging. Press on, finish the draft, then come back, right? Yeah. Got my coffee. Time to write like crazy, at least one more time. Oh, yeah, and the soup is ready.
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Friday’s Fumbles

  1. Well, the Pittsburgh Steelers lost. Not completely unexpected. A loss isn’t the end of the world. Now riding eleven wins and one loss, they should have won the game. They had a lead, blew it, and then couldn’t come back, leading to a lot of teeth grinding on my part. What’s most disturbing is that the issues that fans like me were worrying about (the inability to execute the run game, dropped passes, offensive predictability) bit them as expected, the second week in a row. This time, they couldn’t overcome it. The question before Sunday’s game against Buffalo: can they address these issues? They have their #1 RB back, and DeCastro to the lineup. Those two things should help. Over on Defense, though…injuries thin the roster. It’s a hold-your-breath game this weekend. Most experts are predicting a Steelers loss. Which pleases me, as they seem to play better as underdogs.
  2. The lawsuit to overturn the results in four states disturbs me. It’s being led by Republicans who always insisted that states’ right are paramount, on behalf of a president who always insisted that states’ rights are paramount. Their rank hypocrisy and desperation to overturn the democratic process is revolting.
  3. Meanwhile, the writing days are going great. Always uplifting to have that going. Not going fast as thoughts are weeded, characters formed, pacing is monitored, and the story is honed. Very rewarding, though, satisfying. Writing for me is often creating and then solving complex logic problems, over and over again, and that’s fun. I hope I’m not jinxing myself by putting this out there.
  4. We helped some folks out with an online order. It’s an interesting situation. These people are twenty-three years older than me. Grandparents, their daughter and her family live down in LA (we’re ‘up’ in southern Oregon). Daughter (L) brings her children to see their grandparents every year for Christmas. That means…L and her family have no Christmas decorations! Amazing, right? So, the grands wanted to order something to decorate their grandchildren’s home. One of those blow up lawn ornaments would do. Being older, with vision issues, they struggled with the net. My wife and I stepped in to help. We found one, recommended it to them, then ordered it for them. The package was delivered. Except…the daughter said that she didn’t receive it. No, nothing there. WTF? Were we ripped off?
  5. The delivery company said they gave it to a resident. Our friend called her daughter to talk it through. “You didn’t get it? It’s a big package addressed to all of you.” Well, no, it was a big blow up ornament, but the shipping package is only ten by ten by seven inches, and weighed only seven pounds. And, no, it was addressed only to the daughter.
  6. Why, yes, that package did come. Daughter didn’t know what it was, and just set it aside and forgot about it. Whaaat? It seems strange to my wife and me. When we receive a package, we basically vet it by looking at the address, seeing who it’s for, wondering what it is, and then opening it, you know? This idea of setting a package aside and forgetting it is foreign to us. But then, perhaps our military background plays into it. An unexpected or unattended package was treated as a threat. Could be an explosive device. That was drilled into us through my twenty years plus of service. Also, getting packages always feels like a special moment for people of our generation. These young people…smh.
  7. So now, two friends are dealing with cancer, one local, and another across the country. Oh, that cancer. It’s not shying off just because of COVID-19. Both friends are coping, as are their families.
  8. Fitbit has notified me that I’ve done one hundred three consecutive days of meeting my walking goal. I enjoy receiving Fitbit’s weekly report on what I’ve done. It’s tangible. I’m maintaining a twelve mile a day average. I usually do eighty-five to eighty-eight miles per week. It gets harder to do twelve on some days. I’ve found that the eight mile mark is particularly challenging. If I make it through to nine miles, the other three miles seem pretty easy. Guess eight miles is where my wall comes up.
  9. This week’s soup was a vegetarian chili, but not the one I was hoping for. No, I’m not complaining, really, just commenting. I wanted the black bean vegetarian chili; she made the regular vegetarian chili. The one made incorporates chickpeas, black beans, and kidney beans, along with onion and green peppers. Very tasty on these cold winter days. She also baked cornbread, because chili must have cornbread. Yes, it was awesome. I had it for dinner on Monday, then lunch the rest of the week. Love it.
  10. Made fresh coffee. Time to return to writing like crazy, at least one more time. Please, stay positive, test negative, and wear a mask. Others will thank you. Cheers
0

Mask Musing

We ninja up in the morning

slipping out at dawn

masks tight on our face

racing past icy lawns.

Visiting the grocery store

has sure become an task

but it beats the alternative

of being dead sick on our ass.

2

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