Another Dream Car

One of my dreams last night left me puzzled but optimistic and in a better mood when I awoke. As I went over its details with myself, one part that captivated me was it featured my first car.

In the dream, I was a young man again, and I was driving my first car. This was a 1965 Mercury Comet. Forest green, it was a four door automatic sedan with a 289 V8.

Dad gave me the car. He’d recently remarried, and this was his new wife’s transpo. Dad bought himself a used service van at an auction to drive to and from work, and turned over his 1974 Chevy Monte Carlo to her to drive. I was completely blown away by their decision. They’d not talked to me about it ahead of time. Until then, I’d been hitching or walking to get around.

With a car, I suddenly had a dating life and began dating the girl who is my wife. Our dates were never much because, car or not, I didn’t have much money. Dad did give me gas money and a few bucks besides. But I was in high school and on sports teams, and local jobs in our rural region were scarce.

After graduating, I joined the military and went in for training. After I returned home from basic training and tech school, I drove that car three hundred miles through a snow storm to my new duty assignment at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Fairborn, Ohio. It was a taxing drive. Ice and snow were thick on the car by my journey’s end.

One day, the car wouldn’t start. It was probably a starter or selenoid switch. As it was a 1965 car and this was 1975, and it was a four-door sedan, I did what many guys would do, and bought my first used car, a sleek little 1968 Chevy Camaro with a 327 V8. Ah, fun car! Young car!

I left the Comet sitting in its parking spot. A man saw it sitting there without movement, hunted me down, and bought it. I’m not sure how much he gave me but I didn’t haggle. The thing is, though, when he went to change registration, he learned it was still Dad’s car.

Oh, yeah.

Dad was pretty pissed but the sale went through. I still laugh about it, and he still shakes his head.

June 25, 2025 0

Twosda’s Wandering Thoughts

I had oral surgery with a dentist last week. They sent me home with a ‘complimentary’ pint of chocolate ice cream. Later that week, I found flowers from my dentist waiting on my porch: yellow roses with yellow and white daisies and baby’s breath. When I told others about these things, people replied, “I can see the ice cream. But flowers? I’ve nver heard of anyone receiving flowers from their dentist.”

I grinned. “I think you just need to spend enough money. Tier one is ice cream. Tier two, and they include flowers.”

June 24, 2025 8

Floofeffect

Floofeffect (floofinition) – Impact of animal activities on psyche, emotions, or mood. Origins: Internet, the United States, 2001.

In Use: “During the COVID-19 pandemic, people began discovering the positive floofeffects which fur people can deliver, and adoptions shot up.”I

In Use: “Hearing his cat’s happy chirp when Alex dished out wet food always lifted Alex’s mood, no matter how crappy the rest of us day was.”

In Use: “Running with her dog and playing with her in the park gave Barb a floofeffective of energy like a B-12 shot in the arm.”

June 24, 2025 0

T&P

Daily writing prompt

How do you practice self-care?

View all responses

For my personal self-care, I turn to America’s political leaders. Yes, just like DC’s elected denizens when disasters strike our nation, whenever something goes wrong with my health, I quickly turn to thoughts and prayers for my solutions. It’s wonderfully effective and doesn’t cost me anything! Although, there are sometimes complications. Like, when I broke some verterbrae in my neck. Despite all my thoughts and prayers, I ended up going to the medical clinic. They apparently didn’t have much faith in my thoughts and prayers, either, because they put me in a ‘halo device’ for the summer.

Other than that, oh, and when I had blocked bladder. Although I furiously prayed that my pecker would do its duty soon and gave it almost every minute of thought, I ended up in an emergency room where they fed me some meds and thrust a catheter in me. That relieved the problem, although I’ve remained on Flomax ever since.

Which was good, because I needed to turn my thoughts and prayers elsewhere. Thoughts and prayers were called for a year later when I broke several bones in my left arm. More thoughts and prayers were required for my ultra high blood pressure and then surviving COVID. Fortunately, medical authorities were there to augment my thoughts and prayers both of those times, along with when I needed surgery last year for a ruptured tendon in my ankle. I’d been tending it with plenty of thoughts and prayers but they surprisingly did very little. It does cause me some wonder about how they’re so successful with thoughts and prayers in Washington, D.C.

Now I think I need to lose some weight. I’m begun issuing a lot of thoughts and prayers that I’ll lose about twenty pounds. If that doesn’t work, I’ll probably see my PCP and go on a diet. Right now I’m going to eat some cheese. I pray that I don’t gain weight from it.

Time will tell.

June 23, 2025 0

Munda’s Wandering Thoughts

Some days, shit is happening, and all you can do is pretend to pursue the normal aspects of being. For one, war is hettin’ up in the Middle East or whatever you want to call it. It’s been a war zone for years. It’s usually a matter of who is going to strike back, how, and when. There will be violence, death, and destruction. The Middle East quagmire of religions, history, and tribes and factions are overstocked with tendencies to war.

Personally, dispiriting matters keep piling up in my world. I don’t write about all of them. Not going to start now. My basic bottom line which I return to again and again, is, this is life. Many of us — hell, I’ll go out on a limb and declare that most of us — go through this shit. I can only imagine how worse the shit is magnified if you’re suffering from serious diseases, homelessness, racism and other prejudice, discrimination, or hate. On paper, I have it pretty good but life is lived on a spectrum. We slide up and down it. I’m on the down side today.

We watched again a Neflix series on the gut and the biome’s influence on our brains and pains.* As part of this show, they talked about fecal transplants. Transplants were done by people who had problems and were seeking solutions. One woman used her boyfriend’s fecal material as her transplant source. She noted that he has ‘mental issues’ but didn’t specify more. Or maybe I spaced on it. I did catch her say that she began acting and feeling like him, emotionally unstable, anxious, and depressed. She quit using his shit and used her brother’s shit. After a week, she felt much better.

I imagine a future of routine fecal transplants. A partner on the computer says, “I’m ordering some groceries and things. Is there anything you need?”

“Yes, get me some new shit. I’m almost out of shit and I’m feeling it.”

“What shit do you want?”

“Same shit as last time. It should be in your order history.”

“Is it the Tom Cruise brand Improved Shit?”

“Yes, that’s the shit, but get a big jar. I’m really feeling it.”

“You got it.”

I think about whose shit I might order. Maybe Taylor Swift, Tom Brady, or Patrick Mahomes. I pity the fool who tries mine. But then again, I know people with some shit that’s a lot worse.

*The Neflix series is You Are What You Eat: A Twin Experiment

June 23, 2025 4

Subfloofmate

Subfloofmate (floofinition) A change of animal behavior to deal with an unacceptable situation or decision. Origins: 1559, Middle Floofish from Floofieval Flooftin, subflooftamus.

In Use: “Ollie wanted treats, to which Ali said, “No, you’ve already had our treats and can’t have more because you’re getting fat,” which caused Ollie to subfloofmate his frustrations by going into the bedroom and knocking everything off the dresser.”

In Use: “Part of the success of suavexavier’s posts about his dobies is how they subfloofmate to deal with the situations he presents them, especially when it’s Bear.”

June 21, 2025 1

June 19, 2025 0

Twosda’s Wandering Thoughts

It’s an oddity. Today, the coffee shop is filled with men.

Three regulars are among the dozen men. We regulars do our regular things with computers, eyes intense and intent on screens, fingers doing a keyboard dance, sometimes shifting a mouse tango.

The rest are pairs of men. Male couples. They’re all in deep and low-key conversations. Youngest looking are some twenty somethings. Most have ages hovering in the upper thirties to low sixties. I’m too far from any to overhear conversations. There’s little laughter among them. These are serious topics at hand.

Two by two, the meetings are wrapped up. The participants depart. Soon, it’s just me and one other regular, busy with our computers. A small break ensues. Quiets drapes the business. New people arrive. New orders are given. It’s a mix of males and females.

Coffee shop life resumes its normal posturing.

June 17, 2025 0

Twosda’s Theme Music

Welcome, welcome to Twosda, June 17, 2025. We’re continuing a nice weather balance in Ashlandia, dropping into the fifties at night, sunny & cloudy during the day, high of 84 F. No one has been heard complaining.

Although I slept well, I had a night rich with dreams. Papi has refined a way of awakening me which can only be called a bark. I don’t know where this cat learned his bark. I guess he went out and hung around with some dogs, heard them barking, and then imitated them. It’s effective — for him. I wish he’d go back to purrs and nuzzles.

My wife’s ‘movie group’ is meeting today. One of them began hosting about a dozen of her exercise class comrades to watch and discuss movies. Today, they’re watching the 1990 flick, Truly, Madly, Deeply, in which the late Alan Rickman plays a ghost, and Juliet Stevenson is his widow. What surprised me was how many of the rest professed to be unaware of the film. My wife and I both enjoyed it on its theater run and have seen it again since. She is a big fan of it and suggested the film. I’m interested in learning whether others remember the film when they see it again.

Dad’s surgery went well. He told me that his kidney was stented; his wife said, no, he had a nephrostomy tube and drainage bag installed. Come on, give him a break; he’s 92. When I speak to him and ask him for details such as, “Where did they put the stent,” he replies, “Hell, I don’t know. Ask Maxine. She takes notes.” Maxine is his wife (#3, and the longest tenured wife by far).

There’s something wrong with Trump. We have many ideas about what it is. Now we have Catheter Gate & Bag Gate. This is based on Trump’s leaning forward walk, like something is irritating his ass, and photos which seem to show a catheter installed in his johnson area. Since he’s our elected official, don’t we have a right to know? To employ the voice used when Republicans are demanding answers from Democrats, WHAT ARE THEY HIDING FROM US? IS TRUMP DYING? Well, of course he’s dying — just ask Sen. Joni Ernst. But is he dying so fast that he’s failing to do us job? Is he a liability? We the People demand to know the truth about what’s protruding in those photos. Snopes claims they investigated and Trump isn’t wearing a catheter but the Trump Regime may have gotten to them. We want answers and we won’t accept anything reasonable until Trump takes off his pants on national TV and shows us that he’s not wearing a catheter, bag, or diaper. Even then, we probably won’t accept it because that could be Trump clone or a Trumpbot, or AI creating a wholly fake television event.

Trump fled the G7 conference in Canada. He claimed it was because of Mid East tensions but many believe he was just Taco Always Chickening Out again. In this case, the meeting was structured, they weren’t deferring to him, and he wasn’t getting the attention he wanted and kept being quoted saying stupid things, so he fled. That’s so TACO!

Today’s music is “Tough Guy”. It’s a 1980 Reo Speedwagon song. Don’t know why The Neurons plugged it into the morning mental music stream. I was just reading the news online about Trump fleeing the G7 when that song kicked off in the stream.