A scene that's never going to play out, is it?

    (Looking at pictures) "You two were obviously very happy together. I see why you miss her."
    "I never had her. We had us. I miss us."

    Yeah it's short. I'll call myself a writer when I can do it without italics.

Baroque or rococo or something

    It was really cold last night, at least for here. Meaning it went below freezing. (Yeah, I know, cry me a river.) So I basically went to bed in footie pajamas, or more literally, in my clothes. This means that I was actually comfortable and between that and the white noise, I was actually able to sleep really well. And my brain really went to work.
    Yet again you get cut a break because I really don't recall any details. But the dream was a masterpiece of construction, baroque or rococo or something. It started out being a dream about my life or anyway about first person singular, not necessarily me per se but a male. Then it was about a female. My brain apparently decided that I didn't need a sex change so it shifted to a third person point of view. Her life was really complicated. I mean in terms of plot points and villains and whatnot, probably the result of listening to a lot of old-time radio yesterday as well as finishing Andrew Vachss' latest (which is very odd indeed in its turn).
    Then it became a video game with plug-ins. I mean literally; you would plug them in when a specific word came up in the dialogue and new plot turns would appear. Really literally; while there was a story going on, there was also this object like a giant snowflake Christmas tree ornament and you would plug red triangles into it.
    THEN it became a movie about a video game, and then fortunately I woke up before my brain produced any further removes from reality. Hey, I was just relieved that it wasn't a nightmare. First time I can recall not being able to go back to sleep due to sheer befuddlement.

Libel

    I committed a little libel on Facebook yesterday. For years, since quitting gluten and more especially since quitting dairy I have been vitally curious about a boxed macaroni and cheese like product called Road's End Organics Macaroni and Chreese. In the gluten-free world, convenience foods are few, far between, and expensive. Also, a rule of thumb about prepared foods or easy to prepare foods in the gluten-free world is that they almost invariably taste like ass. So although I always wanted to try this item, and bought it with a certain degree of excitement that maybe it could be my emergency food of choice, there was also an element of trepidation that it might not be as wonderful as the text on the box suggested.
    Unfortunately, it lived down to expectations. And I let the world know to the extent I am capable via Facebook. (Something about "it wasn't actually the road's end; the road-builders just gave up in despair." The box indicated that it contained two servings, so I ate about half and left the rest for today's lunch. I dreaded it. I must have put lunch off at least a half hour. Finally giving up on inspiration ever hitting, I just added chicken broth, salt, pepper, sunflower seeds, Crystal hot sauce and Pickapeppa sauce and turned on the heat. And ya know what? The awful crap turned out pretty good!
    So we learn a valuable lesson: the rules are the same for gluten-free soy-free casein-free as they ever were. If you add enough stuff that tastes good to something that tastes like ass, you'll probably wind up with something that tastes good. So yay, and my (limited) apologies to Road's End Organics; your product, though awful, is not irremediable. (Did somebody say "damning with faint praise"?)

Clickers

    At the moment, there are car-counters all over town. Those double tubes that snake across the road, counting the vehicles that drive over. I assume that they are double so that somebody just stepping on one wouldn't count as a vehicle, but perhaps I'm way off the beam. I also don't know how they factor in 18 wheelers and other vehicles with extra wheels, but since they on average do a lot more damage to roads than cars do, I guess they're worth counting as extra cars.
    Seeing them reminded me of the days of full-service gas station, when such devices would ring a bell or bells and bring out whatever you were supposed to call a pump jockey back then. A service technician, maybe, though that sounds more 21st century. And what occurred to me is that very few people very much under 50 would even be able to remember such a thing as a full-service gas station. I mean, there are still a few around, but not enough that most of us have visited one in any recent decade. What I remember about the car-counter is that we, being wonderful well-behaved children, would jump on them to try to make the bell ring. Of course, maybe an adult stepping on one would make the bell ring easily, but a little kid jumping makes a lot of force. So I conclude that I don't know if a person stepping on a car-counter today would register or not. But if not, I REALLY can't make any sense out of there always being two of them. Once again, I could look it up, but once again, I sort of dig the mystery.

The electric kitty

    It's that time of the year again. For one glorious day (or so), the heat pump finally dries out my dank apartment and it's comfortable. Then we go right past comfortable to too dry. I've had a hygrometer (of sorts; it's from Kmart) for a year, so I know quantitatively, sort of, when to set up the humidifiers. But I don't really need it. Because when the kitty starts giving off shocks whenever I pet her, THAT'S the time to set up one or both humidifiers. I still think it would be better if humidifiers were built in, or failing that, if you could get a combined humidifier/dehumidifier. But I guess I'll cope.
    The hygrometer says that 40% humidity is Dry, but it still feels dank to me. But it's definitely getting towards Electric Kitty territory. So far, though, she is pettable without any associated shocks. (All info I've seen says the shocks don't hurt her, and they certainly don't seem to. She just jumps because I jump, as far as I can tell.)
    It has been suggested that I skip the humidifiers and instead turn out all the lights and watch the sparks come off the kitty. While I think this is a brilliant suggestion, it probably isn't workable. It just doesn't get that dark in here. Why do you think I sleep with a sleep mask?

Overly reliable narrator

    We've all heard of the unreliable narrator (or if we haven't, just fake it). But then there's the very, very, very reliable narrator. In the first Harry Potter book, Harry has a bad dream. Then when he wakes up, he can't remember having had a dream at all. So who told the narrator? Who has this narrator been talking to? (I suspect Snape.) I dunno, I almost think that there might be a limit to how omniscient I want my narrator to be. I mean, sure, it's a book about magic and everything, and I guess it's a good idea to break down my disbelief in order to help me suspend it better. But this stuff is just impossible.
    Yes, it's true. Now I'm posting about somebody else's fictitious nightmares. Hey, for once I don't have any of my own. Apparently, all I need to keep them away is for South Carolina to beat Clemson at football. I'm sure both schools would be happy to arrange the schedule such that they play daily in order to keep my bad dreams away. Right?

Jonny Quest, Private Eye

    It's just not the same anymore. Life used to be an endless adventure, outwitting supervillains, flying in a needlejet. No more. Nothing like that anymore.
    It started with Dad. Poor Dad. He never learned to specialize. He thought he could go on and on, the Great Scientist. But nobody wants to hire a professor of Science. You've gotta do Physics, or Chemistry, or Biology, or something. Dad just couldn't cope. He turned to the bottle and crawled in. When he couldn't pay Race anymore, we knew it was the beginning of the end. Without a white-haired judo expert bodyguarding him, he had no protection from his enemies. What a way to go! Torn apart by Komodo dragons. Dad really should have taken those judo lessons more seriously.
    Race is in a nursing home now. Talking and talking and talking about how he used to fly that jet. That and how he's going to kick those Komodo dragons' asses one day. And talks and talks and talks. I don't visit all that much.
    Bandit. Poor Bandit. He never could figure out that when we heard that slow building brass fanfare, that meant danger. Sweet little guy got eaten by an anaconda. I still miss him.
    Hadji went back to India to star in Bollywood musicals. I just saw his latest, "Sim Sim Salabim." I thought it dragged a bit.
    And me? All I inherited from Dad were two broken jetpacks and a couple gallons of rotgut. I sit at this desk and wait for the phone to ring. I'm trying to make a living as a private eye. It's going slow.

Killer joke

    Don't you hate it when you come up with the absolute perfect joke, but then forget it before you can write it down? Yeah, me too. That happened this morning; thus, you're stuck with this, poor things. I think it has been observed before that misery produces good literature, while happiness produces crappy literature. This has been a happy couple of days, so cut me a break. I got to meet my grandniece, who is a perfect little angel at four months old. And miraculously, the dialysis facility was able to get Dad in and out about three months early, so he was able to participate in Margaret's family's Thanksgiving celebration and meet his great-granddaughter, too. A good time was had by all, except for the losing football teams. So yay.
    Oddly, with all this happiness going on, I still generated one astonishing nightmare. For once it was even set in Columbia in my own car. But I did manage to move some streets around. And introduce a mountain suddenly appearing in the center of town. Which I, or rather my car, then hurtled down backwards. Did you know that putting the car in low gear backwards doesn't slow it down, but instead speeds it up? Of course not! It makes no sense at all! But it did in the dream, and boy was I ever alarmed. (For some reason, my feet wouldn't reach the brake.) I don't know if I was somehow saved or if I just woke up. Regardless, I'm sure the married friend I was driving with will be very relieved.

Tame

    I've been considering just how domesticated these domesticated animals are. Judging by the ferocious beast I live with, it might be simpler just to consider them tame, rather than domesticated. (OT, but I made a great typo, and Ferocious Beats might be the best band (or hip-hop collective) name ever!) She's sweet and everything and in most instances would probably be too timid to survive in the world outside, but on another level, the wildcat is still there and not far below the surface. There is no question that if I let her out, there would be fewer birds and squirrels outside. I kid about her ferocity, but it's really there.
    The same is true of dogs. They're friendly and nice and loyal to a fault, but that may be the fault. The wolf is never far away, and the tendency to want to defend the pack can lead to very unfortunate consequences. Granted if the wolf in question is a toy poodle, the consequences are not likely to be very bad, but a bigger dog can do a lot of damage, particularly to other dogs. Much as the cliche is about cats and dogs fighting, it seems like cats mainly fight other cats and dogs other dogs.
    I suppose we truly domesticate the animals that we want to eat. If we want to use the animal to protect us, either from criminals or from rodents, it behooves us to tame them rather than truly domesticate them. The Monkey would agree with me, but she is ferociously napping.

Jazz town

    So at the jazz sessions last night at Conundrum, I wasn't able to talk to Glynis, the bass player I blogged about last week regarding the stroke he just had at 53. But I was keeping a close eye on him and he appeared to be able to control both thumbs. So he seems to have already made a full recovery from his stroke. He also snuck "Master Blaster (Jammin')" by Stevie Wonder into an unrelated jazz number, showing a) that he hasn't lost his Detroit roots and b) that I was correct in asserting that he was BORN to sing Stevie. Jam on.
    The drummer's little sister came up to do "My Funny Valentine." Pure nepotism. She sounded like a blend of Flora Purim, Diana Ross and Christina Aguilera. You really should have been there!
    Lee Bailey demolished on keys. My friend Marty, more frequently seen at Bill's Pickin' Parlor, said to me, "You didn't know you were coming to church tonight, did you?"
    The reason I didn't get to talk to Glynis was because the band never really took a break. Anyway, the instruments didn't. A guy from the crowd took over the keys and another hit the mic, free-styling old school. Anyway, he mentioned the Last Poets. Lots of fun regardless.
    Before I pooped out, another keyboard player did a faithful but still jazzy version of "That's the Way of the World. Glynis and the drummer sang a bit, but the guy on keys was killing it so thoroughly I think they just wanted to let him at it. A great night, and I STILL don't know why these guys aren't famous.

Writing when the squirrels let me

(Editor's note: This is Amelia the cat's blog)
    Oh boy! The sun's up! I gotta go look out the window! There might be squirrels or birds or other kitties!
    Hey, it's cold. Big Stinky Man Thing isn't up yet. Maybe if I yell at him, he'll let me under the covers.
    Hey, it's dark in there! Gotta go look out the window again.
    Time to lick my tail.
    Hey, Big Stinky Man Thing's up! Maybe he'll give me new food!
    Hey, maybe if I claw his suitcase up Big Stinky Man Thing will come and brush me and give me scritches!
    OK, now I can eat.
    Time to lick my paws.
    Is that a squirrel?! Gotta get to the window and see! OMG OMG OMG! It is! I'm gonna get that squirrel! (Editor's note: Cats don't understand so well about windows.)
    Big Stinky Man Thing is walking to the front of the house. MAYBE WE CAN PLAY WITH THE BOOTLACE! Darn it, he just grabbed his book.
    Big Stinky Man Thing is in the little room with the flushy thing. He can't get away! I get scritches! Oh boy!
    Time to lick my ruff.
    Big Stinky Man Thing is putting his boots on! Bootlaces! I get to play with bootlaces! Big Stinky Man Thing loves it, too; that's why he keeps saying, "Straight back to the kitty store!"
    Time to take a nap.
    Oh boy, the bad kitty's outside! I gotta scare him off! That's right, run away!
    I'm gonna find a kittyball and kick it to Big Stinky Man Thing. He always loves to play Kittyball!
    Time to take a nap.

All good gifts

    When I was teeny, I went to Heathwood Hall Episcopal School. However, the elder siblings started at Duke and Yale and at the same time Heathwood started adding all these construction fund charges (having no doubt NOTHING to do with desegregation and white flight) so I started 3d grade in public school. This turns out to be a neat dividing line for the purposes of today's tune-related anecdote.
    Years later, I heard the musical "Godspell" for the first time when my high school girlfriend's Lutheran church put it on. I don't remember if "All Good Gifts" made an impression on me, but the rest of the music did. Eventually I bought a copy of the original Broadway cast recording, though this was probably a decade of more later. And that's when I noticed "All Good Gifts," and remembered that they used to sing it in chapel at Heathwood. Also a kid at Rosewood named David Krassky sang it in a school program.
    Turns out that it's a very very popular Anglican/Episcopalian hymn called, I think (I looked it up, but don't feel like doing it again) "We Plow the Fields and Scatter." (Well, "Plough." I looked it up anyway.) I only spent 3d grade, 1970-1 at Rosewood, and never saw David Krassky again. Turns out that "Godspell" didn't even open on Broadway until late 1971. All these years I thought retroactively that the Episcopalians and young David were being infinitely hip doing this Broadway tune. Turns out that Broadway was being hip swiping an excellent Episcopalian hymn. The things you learn... eventually!
    PS: Happy Thanksgiving!

White noise

    I can't decide whether white noise is good for sleeping or not. Last night I slept straight though until 6, but then couldn't get back to sleep. Of course, this may have been more because yesterday's Ethiopian food disagreed with me than because of the noise. One difference that blog readers will appreciate is that though I have vivid dreams under white noise conditions, I can't remember them at all when I wake up. I don't mind either, but I feel a lot less rested than I do on mornings when I've in fact slept a lot less. So I'll keep experimenting and see how I feel about it after a few more days.
    One thing I'll say is that the second Droid app I downloaded, Relax & Sleep, is vastly better than the first one (White Noise). It is creepy that it seems to run 24 hours a day, even when the smart phone is sleeping. But I don't think it's anything dangerous. (Knock on wood.)
    One thing I'll say about the drive on US 21 yesterday that wasn't fun: we got stuck behind a truck that was loaded with wood chips. I say "was"; most of them seemed to fly off and hit me in the windshield. I think there was supposed to be a net over the top, but I guess that would have been too hard. Paul took a picture, but I don't know how it turned out. Memo to Joel & Ethan Coen: woodchippers aren't all that fun even when they're used for their intended purpose. Fortunately, the road widened to four lanes after what only seemed like 100 miles, and we left the truck behind. As this was the only bad part of the whole cool day and even it was funny, I'll still call it a win.

Highway ironing

    Night before last I noticed that I sleep a LOT better when the heat is running as much of the night as is possible. Or to put it another way, that white noise puts me out. After a brief, exhausting bout of thinking, it occurred to me that I might be able to find free white noise apps for the Droid. And I did! The one I tried first didn't have a lot of choices and few were good. I tried Airplane Ride, but it was too loud, and Crickets. The latter I could sleep with, but wound up having odd (but strangely, non-outdoor) dreams. I've found another app with vastly more choices. I'll try it out tonight.
    When I was a lad, a theme park opened near Charlotte called Carowinds. At the time, I-77 didn't run from Columbia to Charlotte, so we had to take US 21 to visit. I remember a wonderfully rolling highway, almost as fun as the roller coasters we were on our way to ride. Today, just for a hoot (and to avoid getting locked in in Olympia for the last USC home game of the season), I went up to Charlotte, bringing Paul and taking US 21. Those weasels ironed it out! It was hardly rolling at all. The part that's still fun was the stretch between Ridgeway and Great Falls, but the rest was no more fun than the interstate.
    On the other hand, it was an absolutely perfect autumn day and the colors were glorious almost the entire way, so it was a whole lot prettier than the interstate. And traffic on I-77 is a lot more rugged than it used to be, so it sure was a lot more restful than the interstate. But for roller coaster fun, I guess I'll have to shell out for Carowinds. Since my neck got better, that'll be a lot more worthwhile place to visit than the last time I went.
    In Charlotte, we ate wonderful Eritrean food at Meskerem, bought CDs we aren't going to admit to at adjacent CD Warehouse (OK, I got Best of Al Stewart, John Mellencamp's eponymous, Robert Earl Keen #2 Live Dinner, Life's Rich Pageant and a Jimmie Lunceford compilation. All for $10.) And hit the Giocometti exhibit at the Bechtler, free for both of us because they honored their reciprocal agreement and Paul's Cola. Museum of Art membership. It was awesome, too. So a brilliant day, and still a show to go to tonight. The Monkey will eat me alive!

Madurodam

    What this town needs is a cheap, compact tourist attraction. Something like the Corn Palace, except we don't have much corn. Something, say like Madurodam. Madurodam is an ultra-cool little attraction at The Hague, The Netherlands (the country with all the definite articles). It's a miniature version of the entire country, or rather, it's a miniature version of the most popular attractions in the country. Well, not the hookers and not the reefer, but of the attractions likely to get put on a picture postcard. Cathedrals and towers and such like.
    Admittedly, South Carolina isn't overflowing with scenic attractions (Rainbow Row, Table Rock mountain, an aircraft carrier) but hell, neither is The Netherlands. What we are overflowing with is artistic talent. All we would need is a little space and adjacent parking. It ought to be cheap, fun, and finally something that'll bring people to Columbia besides Tunnel Vision and the Zoo. I can sure see it!
    (Amusingly, Google reviews for Madurodam are fairly grim. All I can say is it was really cool 25 years ago. I can't actually see the reviews; Google just sends me to Google Maps. They say that 17/30 = Good to very good, so maybe it isn't as tough a crowd as I was thinking.)

Why are tennis balls fuzzy?

    Dreams have been odd lately, as usual, but you're lucky that I don't remember much about them. In fact I've been sleeping really well lately. The big sleep issue was night before last when I woke up with pins and needles in my arm ('cause it's silly to say my arm was asleep when my whole body was asleep) and it took ages to get it to abate. I think I hit a nerve, something not unlike the funny bone, except not funny. But I got back to sleep no problem, which is a nice change.
    The tennis ball dream featured a gas station except that once you got inside the convenience store part it was more like the checkout area of a Walmart in that there were untold numbers of kiosks each with a checker and a cash register. And above the cash register at each kiosk there was a locker, or maybe more like an overhead compartment on an airplane. And nobody was bothered that I went and checked them all out. And inside all of them were giant fuzzy tennis balls. But what bothered me, and continued to when I woke up, was why are tennis balls fuzzy? Were they always fuzzy? When the kings and queens of France played jeu de paumes, did they play with fuzzy balls, and if so where did they get them? Did they knit them from fleece?
    I could look it up of course, but I'm much more enjoying being bewildered by it, and prefer to leave it as a rhetorical question. That and the related one: why aren't all balls fuzzy? If you can serve a fuzzy tennis ball 130 miles per hour, maybe fuzzy is best. Or the other related question: how fast would serves go if tennis balls WEREN'T fuzzy? Makes ya wonder, don't it?

A hero

    Last night at Conundrum Jazz Sessions, we were chatting with Glynis the bass player and, like you do, asked how he's been. And he said he had just had a stroke and was in fact just out of the hospital. We sympathized and marveled that he seemed to be doing so well and asked him to tell the story. He said he was driving and he just passed out. His 8-year-old son reached his foot across and hit the brake to stop the car, then got Glynis' cell phone out and called 9-1-1. I gotta say, that kid is my absolute hero. And Glynis', too, no doubt.
    Glynis is only 53. He had spent the last decade or so in Japan and only came back because they were burning radioactive waste in Tokyo and handing out dosimeters. He's from Detroit but his wife is from here. He had thankfully little lasting effects from the stroke, though at the moment his right thumb is dead. But it's early days yet; hopefully function will return fully. But if he hadn't told us, we never would have guessed or noticed. It didn't affect his playing an iota. Best wishes to Glynis, and I hope to meet the 8-year-old hero one day.

Humidifier

    No doubt I complained about the exact same thing in the exact same words a year ago, but you would think that houses would have built-in humidifiers and dehumidifiers. (I mean BESIDES windows. Smart alecks.) The heat invariably dries the indoor air out, and one can't seem to drink enough water to keep up no matter how tolerant one is to running off to the bathroom every few minutes. It isn't any problem for me. Whenever I start getting shocked when trying to pet the kitty, I figure it's time to start running the humidifier and do so.
    However, for older folks, especially if their mobility is compromised, this can get to be a serious problem. Moreover, they tend to feel the cold more and so keep the thermostat set higher, thus making the air dry out even faster. Margaret just went to the emergency room the other day due to vertigo which cleared up when she received IV fluids. I don't know anything else you could call this but dehydration. Now I can get her a humidifier and then go over a few minutes early when I'm picking up Dad for dialysis and fill it up for her, and that would help. But it just seems that it would be so much more sensible to have automatic systems for this. Of course, one might risk Legionella, and maybe that's the reason why not. Still, it seems a shame.

Virtual page-turner

    A buddy sent me his novel to read with the idea that I might give him an enthusiastic review on Amazon. This won't be a problem; it's really good. Only fly in the ointment is that I want to call it a page-turner, but I'm reading a PDF file. Does that make it a virtual pageturner? An electronic pageturner? (A turner of electronic pages?) I'm stumped. Tried to google but google doesn't believe in synonyms (or possibly portmanteau words) but my memory came through: "compelling"! There's a good word. ("The narrative pull pulls" probably would not be adequate, but I like that one, too.)
    Speaking of novels, I wonder how far I could go with one where a Southern family speaks in murmurs and whispers about one family member, and a visitor, suspecting madness or perversion, finally asks what's wrong with the black sheep. "He's RATIONAL!" one old lady confides. Probably not very far.

Born to laugh at tornadoes

    A long time ago, nearly 30 years, Was (Not Was) put out a record called "Born To Laugh at Tornadoes." It passed neatly under my radar. I had their first record (which was eponymous), because I had found it for 50 cents or so in a discount store. (I passed over a Gang of Four record, and am still kicking myself. As a sort of punishment, I've still never heard them. Crazy, no?) I really liked that one, and when I eventually found BTLAT, I liked it even better.
    Thus I was very surprised to learn in those pre-Internet days that it had been just lambasted by critics. Reviled. Body slammed. I didn't understand it then and I still don't understand it now. The first record had been hook-heavy, Motown-like and highly commercial, only with weird quirky lyrics. The second one was exactly the same, only with guest artists. Most of them had heavy Detroit connections (Mitch Ryder, Doug Fieger) or might as well have (Mel Torme, Ozzie Osbourne). Apparently, having Mel Torme croon about a guy choking to death = selling out. I just can't see it.
    To me, it was all a big joke, a parody of a concept album. It was called "Born To Laugh at Tornadoes," FFS. (Still my favorite album title ever, by the way.) I still think it's a delightful record, if dark around the lyrics. If you can find it, get it. If not, look it up and find the songs on YouTube; most are there.
    Ironically, on their next record, they really did sell out, and very successfully. I don't know how the critics felt about that, but I know which way I'm betting. But on that one, the fellows came up with "Somewhere in America (There's a Street Named After My Dad)" by which they expiated all their sins in my book. Rather like Bob Dylan with "Hurricane."
    I appreciate that I sound like a guy writing jazz liner notes in the '60s and I should erect some categories for Was (Not Was), like Neo-Motown or Sardonic Funk. (Sardonic Funk would be a great band name, but wouldn't everything?) But the source of "fan" is still "fanatic"; if I sound like a fanatic, I guess I can live with that. (Also, it's a lot of fun having "Born to laugh at tornadoes" as a subject line.)

Don't bogart that smart phone

    On election night, we got together in a bar to bite our nails and watch returns. Some of the fellows were standing together around a smart phone, or maybe a tablet, checking no doubt on Nate Silver's last second projections. And I couldn't help but notice that they looked a lot like kids in the schoolyard back in the bad old days standing together surreptitiously sharing a cigarette. Or like fans at a rock show sharing a joint. We decided that smart phones are 21st century cigarettes. It's a gateway technology, isn't it? Or is that the iPod?

A bit alarmed

    Dad's sweetheart Margaret (who is also 91) has been sick lately and today was very sick. Her daughter has taken her to the hospital and Dad is on his own. I brought him breakfast from a restaurant, forgetting only the coffee (dang my lazy brain) and am on call otherwise. Hopefully everything resolves itself quickly, easily and happily, but between us William and I can keep an eye on him or at least an ear out for him. I need to contact some nursing homes just in case, but (there's that word again) hopefully nothing of the sort will be necessary.
    Haven't had any update as to Margaret's condition. Going on past experience, she may still be waiting to see a doctor. Anyway, hoping for the best, and we certainly accept all good wishes, warm thoughts, prayers, white light, or whatever you've got, really. People who know me can call, email or check Facebook for updates.

Most delighted update: Dad called to say that she just had vertigo, and it responded immediately to an IV. One assumes that she, like me, doesn't respond too well to electric heat. Anyway, she's on her way home or will be soon. Call it a win!

Vegetarianer

    I find as I get vegetarianer that I have considerably more energy and verve. I wish I could say that this is because of eating less meat, but I have the strong sense that it has more to do with taking my B vitamins, which I do whenever I'm having a vegan meal. Since I'm eating less meat the rest of the time, too, my B vitamin levels might easily be a little down. Since B & C are water-soluble, you can't overdose, so the more the merrier I figure.
    What I particularly notice is waking up before the alarm with a certain "Oh What a Beautiful Mornin'" ebullience. Granted, brain function is not at its best, but eventually the mind wakes up, too. So this might be a B vitamin thing. Or maybe this is how I REALLY feel about the switch from Daylight Savings to Standard time!

Average

    Obverse of yesterday's excuse, as exuberance and giddiness are impinging on my brain function instead of stress and anticipation. Apologies if again I've got nuthin'.
    One thing I noticed while waiting to vote I have noticed often before: if I am of average height, or a little under, how come I'm taller than practically everybody? Is this just a really short state? Do I only pay attention when I happen to be among people shorter than me? Could it be a pandemic of bad posture? Or am I levitating again?
    See? Nuthin'. I'll try harder tomorrow. Hell, I'll try harder today. A frustrating thing in my life right now is that I'm the host for a drinking and discussion group, and somehow in a metropolitan area supposedly composed of 600,000 people there just doesn't seem to be a single quiet restaurant with decent drinks and safe, convenient, free parking. Particularly you would think this in a college town. You would be mistaken.
    Of course, I may well have posted both these points already. After almost two years of this, I'm probably repeating myself a lot. Sometimes you feel like going back and checking the files and sometimes you don't.

Another approach

    Hey, it's Election Day and I'm more than a little frazzed owing mostly to anticipation and partly to getting up at 6 to go vote. So don't expect a lot. I've mentioned now and again about adding EV olive oil and honey to my assorted muffins or cookies. For some reason, I always seem to use two tablespoons of the former and four of the latter, and to avoid having to wait a week for the @#$#@ honey to vacate the measuring spoon, I added one T of olive oil followed by two of honey, then repeated.
    Today, I decided to vacate this approach and instead add approximately 1/2 a tablespoon of olive oil, one of honey, and repeat four times. It's embarrassing yet again to admit what an idiot I am. MAN did that work better! Granted, my approximating skills are pretty iffy, but then if I were going to get worried about precise amounts I probably would have started a long time ago. The honey drops right out of the spoon all four times, whereas before this usually only worked on the tablespoonful right after the one of oil. Sure makes cooking more fun!
    Last night's dreams again left little memory, you lucky ducks, but the memory I have is very funny. Seems I was running with mobsters. However, this was only online. Apparently, instead of having cool nicknames like Joe Bananas and Vincent the Chin they all had Twitter handles instead. Which leads me to wonder: do they? And do I really want to join Twitter just to find out?

Daylight saving

    My buddy Paul was most peeved about the end of Daylight Savings Time. He (and I, to a lesser extent) is/are annoyed about having the sun rise before it's time to get up. Nobody we know is going out to plow the north 40 at 6 a.m. and it seems an open question whether we really need dawn's early light quite so early. He remarked that it's actually more pleasant getting up in the morning when it's still dark and I noted that that might be because the sun isn't waking you up earlier than you had intended getting up. I recommended getting a sleep mask, though even mine is imperfect defense against a determined sunrise.
    We also hate it getting dark at 5. It was what made me crazy in England back in the day, though that was more like 4. I dunno, but the more I think about it, even though most studies I see suggest that Daylight Savings doesn't really save much or any energy, I still wouldn't mind too much if it were just converted to year-round. We could just call noon "noonish."
    And another thing! I'm fed up with the months with the names meaning Seventh, Eighth, Ninth and Tenth actually being the ninth, tenth, eleventh and twelfth, dangit! Let's ship July and August to the end of the year. I'm pretty sure Caesar and Augustus won't mind. (More essential issues of the day.:P)

Crazy people on the Internet

    I've made assorted gags over the years about getting all my nutritional information from Crazy People on the Internet. Given my dietary restrictions, I don't think anyone has any reason not to believe me. However, lately I've been supplementing this information with material from less crazy people on the Internet, specifically the celiac researchers at the University of Chicago. They indicate that a litttle gluten now and then is unlikely to harm a celiac, that the only danger is constant or at least steady ingestion. They also note that cancer is only a rare outcome of celiac disease. I am starting to believe them, and starting to relax and breathe a little bit. Who wants to go out for pizza?
    Last night's dreams were odd, elaborate and an hour longer due to the end of daylight savings time. I don't recall details except that I was on a long train trip around the peninsula of America (either America was Florida-shaped or Chicago and San Francisco had moved to Florida; take your pick). I had to abandon the trip because I had left my smart phone at home and this was the part I liked: my smart phone was the size of a stick of gum! I can't wait for the day when this one comes true.
    The previous night's dream were more vivid and I still remember elements now. In this one, my dad's house, always large in my dreams, was truly colossal. Truly. There was a shopping mall on the second floor. I'm sure Dr. Freud would have a field day somehow, but I thought it was pretty cool.

Sugar Bear

    When I was teeny, Sugar Bear was a character on a Saturday morning cartoon show. The way I remember it is that this came first, then he became spokes-cartoon (OK, mascot) for a breakfast cereal. However, Wikipedia says that the characters on the cartoon show were all, or nearly all, mascots for various brands of Post cereals. Wiki doesn't mention it, but I'm pretty the FCC came down on the network and forbid having cartoon characters do both Saturday morning TV shows and commercials. Anyway, Sugar Bear (whom I had liked a LOT as a character on the show) was exiled to commercials only for a cereal that changed its name every couple of years (Sugar Crisp, Super Golden Crisp, etc.)
    If, like me, you cut back your TV watching during the '80s and '90s, you should probably read the Wiki entry. There was some pretty weird stuff going on on those commercials. I never knew that Sugar Bear had a sworn enemy. (Should have been Vinegar Weasel, but wasn't. You really should go look it up.)
    What got me, though, was a realization 45 years late that Sugar Bear was supposed to be Bing Crosby. That was in fact what sent me to Wiki in the first place. Only to see that he was supposed to be Dean Martin. I I I just couldn't believe it! The very idea! Nah, seriously, I can see it. Then again... maybe Dean Martin was trying to be Bing Crosby! Ever think of that Wikipedia?!

These third-person dreams

    I've been having a crop of extra-vivid dreams these last two nights which, you'll be relieved to hear, I don't remember particularly well. However, I do recall that at least one featured a complete absence of me, or rather didn't feature me. I've had those before, and mentioned it, but it's still odd and confusing. It's especially odd since I hardly ever watch movies or TV anymore, so it's a bit peculiar to have a dream that's like a movie. I wish I could remember it; maybe I was Batman!
    (Now I've gone and done it to myself. The subject line has stuck "New York, New York" in my head, ineradicably it seems. At least it's a good one.)

Height maybe?

    A long time ago, I was talking to my friend Lee about a study we'd heard about regarding female self-esteem. To give an idea how long ago this was, he had too toddler daughters then; now they are lovely young women, one starting college, the other finishing high school. The study indicated that girls scored similarly to boys on measures of self-esteem until about the age of 11, then their scores plummeted. The authors appeared to be mystified as to what might occur around that age that might be causing this. We more wondered what planet the authors might be from and felt that puberty was the obvious answer.
    However, it occurs to me that height might explain it equally well. Girls hit their adult height younger than boys do. Thus, there are a few years when most girls are taller than most boys of the same age. Maybe girls lose self-esteem by feeling gawky during the years when they are relatively tall, then the low self-esteem is reinforced when they are suddenly left behind by the fast-growing boys. I've seen other studies indicating that taller men are more successful and better paid than shorter men; perhaps this needs to be generalized to everybody. Just a thought.