Twosda’s Wandering Thoughts

Happy T-Rex Day! No, this isn’t about the band, who had many hits, including “Get It On” in 1971.

No, we’re celebrating the therapod in our house! Why not? Long gone — the species lived 60 to 72 million years ago — the mighty T. Rex is not forgotten. To celebrate the bipedal carnivore and its big head, we hold our arms up by our chest to mimic the creature’s small forelimbs. Then we walk around the house roaring, imitating what we’ve seen T. Rex do in movies. I find it both fun and theraputic.

Come on, get it on. Cheers

Munda’s Wandering Thoughts

I received my new medical compression sock. Yes, just one, for the left leg. The right leg was in worse shape. The sock for it is now ordered and I’m waiting for it to arrive.

Meanwhile, the new ‘medical grade’ compression sock is custom made for my limb from the knee to the the toes. So one, difficult to put on. Two, comfortable. Three, much more difficult to get off.

But what really struck me is that it has a seam down the back that runs over my calf, Achilles tendon, heel, and on down my foot’s center. As I put it on and aligned it, I was reminded of a previous era, when women’s nylon stockings had a seam down the back. I remembered movies where a woman would show her legs and ask, “Are my seams straight?” So I went out to my wife and asked, “Is my seam straight?”

She rewarded me with a mild guffaw.

Thurzda’s Wandering Thoughts

I often wear a hat. Not in the house, except sometimes to bed, but that’s another night’s tale. The hat is a wide-brimmed green Tilley. A dozen pins decorates it.

When I checked in for my medical appointment yesterday, the young guy doing my intake looked at my hat and grinned.

“I was just admiring your pins.”

I replied, “That’s my flair.”

His grin grew wider. “You can never have too much flair.”

I answered, “No, but I think I need to speak to you about your flair.”

Laughter answered me. “I know. I gotta work on that.”

We both nodded. It was all an unspoken reference to Office Space from 1999. I figured the kid I was speaking to is about 29 years old, five or take, you know. But just a child when the movie came out.

I feel like we’re part of a secret tribe. The tribe of flare.

Me? Noooo.

Daily writing prompt
Have you ever unintentionally broken the law?

Of course I have never intentionally broken the law. Unless you count speeding. Okay, I admit I exceeded the speed limit once or twice…or ten thousand…times. I had good reasons! Like, the bathroom, yeah, I had to go to the bathroom. That’s the ticket. And I was, um, I was, I was, yeah, late for a funeral. And my wedding! Yeah, I was late for my wedding, that’s it. So I had to speed to get us there on time — yeah, my wife-to-be was with me in the car, so, you know, if I didn’t speed, neither of us would have gotten to the wedding on time. So, you see, really, I had to. No choice.

And the other times it was because, um, I was picking up food! Food. Yeah, pizza, and Chinese and Mexican food. And doughnuts. So I had to speed because I was saving people from starving to death. Other than that, and those times I was speeding to get away from the cops because there was a warrant out for my arrest, I would never intentionally break the law. Oh, and that time I was fleeing the threat of bodily harm because someone accused me of stealing from them. But they were going to hurt me, so can you blame me?

But other than those few exceptions, which, you see, I had no choice about, I would never intentionally break the law. Well, except for that time I went back in time, but that doesn’t happen for another eleven years so that doesn’t count, does it? Because, if you’re gonna count that, you might as well count the time I broke out of jail on the moon.

Say, there’s no law against not telling the truth, is there?

Frieda’s Wandering Thoughts

I sometimes subscribe to Hulu for streaming content. I’m actually currently a subscriber but I put my account on hold because they’re offering anything that anyone in my household wants to watch.

They sent me a notice that they’re ‘updating our Subscriber Agreement’. Three things were specifically called out. Here is the second point, copied and pasted for your consideration.

• We are clarifying that, as we continue to increase the breadth and depth of the content we make available to you, circumstances may require that certain titles and types of content include ads, even in our ‘no ads’ or ‘ad free’ subscription tiers.

Is that not straight out of 1984? We are offering you ‘no adds’ and ‘ad free’ subscriptions but they’ll have ads.

I can imagine something similar happening at restaurants: ‘We are clarifying that as we continue to offer vegan meals, circumstances may require that certain dishes include meat and animal products.’

‘Certain circumstances’. Guess it’s the god of money forcing them to do this. “We couldn’t help ourselves.” Executives wring their hands. “It was the money. The money made us do it.”

What bullshit. I might need to change my account from ‘hold’ to ‘cancel’.

Wenzda’s Wandering Thoughts

“Watch out for those stairs.”

My wife and her friend are telling me this. Going down some steps, I’m wearing the blue and white flat sandals forced on me by my lymphedema wraps around my feet and lower legs. They’re a little clumsy to walk in but after five days, I have the measure of them.

“Be careful,” they tell me, hovering around me like I’m a toddler taking their first steps.

“Watch the snow and ice,” they proclaim as I step outside. “There’s a clearer path over there.”

Their concern strikes me as condescending. I mean, they’re with me for ten minutes; what do they think I’m doing for the other twenty-three hours and fifty minutes of the day?

“Are you okay to drive?” one asks me.

I smile and nod. I mean, I drove over there. I’ve been driving every day with these things on several times per day. Really, their concern says more about them and their fears and worries than it says about me and my condition.

Twozda’s Wandering Thoughts

I encountered a friend while I was out this morning. I hadn’t seen him in a while. Spotting my blue and white open-toe ortho sandals with their velcro straps that were forced on me for my lymphedema treatment, he asked, “What’s going on there? You okay?”

“Oh, yeah, sure. These are my new Nikes. They’re the latest in footwear. AI designed. And they are so comfortable. Really amazing. I know they don’t look like much….”

“No, they don’t.”

“No, but they’re actually this very sophisticated series of layered ‘smart’ materials that shape to your feet and adjust for your activity. Kind of expensive, too. I got these for about a hundred eighty dollars on Amazon.”

Shock rode into his expression. “Really?”

“No. I made all that up.” Turning off my brain’s bullshit center — the bullshitis centritis — I revealed the truth.

Then we had a good laugh about the fiction I’d spun.

Yes!

Daily writing prompt
You get some great, amazingly fantastic news. What’s the first thing you do?

I’ve thought about what I’d do if I got some great, amazingly fanastic news before. In fact, back in 1994, I bough a lottery ticket. The jackpot was some ridiculously high amount. A co-worker asked, “What will you do if you win?”

And I said, “I will shout, yes! Yes! Fuck yes! And I’ll punch my fist in the air for emphasis.”

That, I think is what my response will be to any great, amazingly fantastic news that I get. Then I’ll tell my wife so she can share my excitement.

Give Me Some Glycyrrhizin 

Daily writing prompt
What’s your favorite candy?

Most of us have tried glycyrrhizin at some time in our lives. Often in the U.S., trying glycyrrhizin is done during Easter. Easter is when parents give their children baskets of candy. Among those candies are frequently jelly beans. In the jelly beans are the licorice ones, which are black. Glycyrrhizin is what gives them their distinctive flavor.

Licorice is by nature a black product. Calling it black licorice is redundant. But that’s how things have evolved. While my wife enjoys ‘red licorice’ — which isn’t licorice at all because it has no glycyrrhizin in it — real licorice is my candy choice. Love the stuff. Naturally, it has its drawbacks (what in life doesn’t?); in the case of licorice, glycyrrhizin can have toxic side effects if too much is consumed. Keeping that in mind, I limit my licorice addiction, substituting bullseyes when a sugar fix is needed.

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