Extremism

Our subdivision has one way in, one way out. Out is Des Peres Road, and you can go left or right, but left is most common. Construction has started on a new roundabout to the left, so I was prepared to use caution going that way. Caution meaning extra diligence, going a bit slower, looking around more, things like that.

 

USE EXTRA CAUTION blared the sign. I could see right away that caution was not good enough – EXTRA CAUTION was going to be required.

 

I was mentally and physically prepared to use caution, but EXTRA CAUTION caught me inadequately prepared.

 

Make a U-turn and get geared up for EXTRA CAUTION, I thought.

 

I’ve arrived back home safely, and locked all the doors and windows. Shades pulled, lights off, cell phone on Silent. Looking. Listening. So far, no threats have presented themselves. 

 

If this cocoon I’m in lasts another few hours, it will be dark outside and I’ll go back out using EXTRA CAUTION. At least that’s the current plan. I’ll become an extremist.

Fiber-Optic OhMyGodism

 

I have no clue who/what "The Verge" is, but they have written an online exposé about the many cables crisscrossing the oceans -- cables that literally keep the world running. My god, there are so many of them, and my god, there is a ton of maintenance required to keep them working!

My interest in the subject has been sharpened by a lifetime of electrical maintenance and a shorter experience aboard ships at sea. But if I had neither of those, I think I'd still be intrigued by the Verge's article.

People in general eat online information in small bites only. This particular article is a big bellyful, but it won't put you to sleep.

https://www.theverge.com/c/24070570/internet-cables-undersea-deep-repair-ships

1964

I spent my 21^st birthday year 1964 mostly in the US Navy. I say mostly because I was a civilian for 48 days in the middle. I left active duty in July at Cape Canaveral, Florida. After my reenlistment (regrets? I've had a few), I reported to the USS Hector in Long Beach, California. At no time during 1964 was I aware of Andy Warhol.

 Warhol was most famous for his paintings (Campbell’s soup cans, anyone?), but produced and directed about 150 films along the way. No less than 30 of them in 1964 alone. They weren’t big Hollywood productions. One would have had to see them in small independent theatres.

 

Nick Offerman is probably most famous for his role in the TV sitcom Parks and Recreation. He starred in a series of Lagavulin Scotch Whiskey commercials starting in (maybe) 2019, and I found them to be very worth seeing even though I can’t stand the taste of the product. Some of the commercials were shown on TV, but there was one that ran about 45 minutes, much too long for TV. I found it on YouTube and watched it all the way through. The camera never moves. The fireplace never moves. Offerman is seated beside the crackling fire and never moves except that occasionally he sips an amber-colored substance from a tumbler. And that’s it. For 45 minutes. I thought it was brilliant.

 

Tom Robbins is an American novelist, one who captured my heart with his first novel Another Roadside Attraction back in the 1970s. His autobiography Tibetan Peach Pie came out when he was in his early 80s (he’s 91 now). In it, Robbins reveals that there was a time in the 1960s when he was addicted to “non-commercial” movies that were shown at midnight on the first Thursday of the month at New York’s Cinematheque. One such movie he saw was Henry Geldzahler, which ran an hour and a half, silent, black-and-white, and produced/directed by Andy Warhol in 1964. Geldzahler, a friend of Warhol’s, was the only person on screen, sitting for the full 97 minutes smoking a cigar. Robbins was the only one of Cinematheque’s patrons to watch the whole thing, mesmerized by the length of the cigar ash and wondering when it would fall off.

 

The Lagavulin commercial was a stroke of original genius. Or so I thought. But now I know they were just following Warhol's script from half a century before.

 

Maybe nothing in this world happens for the first time. Maybe Warhol faked his own death and inhabited Offerman's body. Maybe one person will read this little blog entry all the way through. Maybe it will win the Pulitzer Prize.

STUPID

STUPID.

STUPID.

STUPID.

 

It’s April, and I just completed the onerous task of filing my state and federal income tax forms. Every year, it is the same kind of STUPID grinder I am put through. Only every year it gets worse. More crap being demanded of me. More obscure deductions that someone, somewhere, is apparently entitled to. 

 

STUPID.

 

Hate it, hate it, hate it.

 

Gets my panties in a wad every year, gets me to wondering when smarter people will change it, make it make sense. And then I go back to living my life. Until next year.

 

Reminds me of the Electoral College. Yeah, okay, the person getting the most votes doesn’t win. 

 

Gets my panties in a wad every 4 years, gets me to wondering when smarter people will change it, make it make sense. And then I go back to living my life. Until next time.

 

STUPID.

How Bad Is It?

Judy’s car was sideswiped by another car. The physical evidence was inconclusive, there were no witnesses other than the 2 drivers, and the drivers' stories differed. The old “she said, she said.”

Surprisingly, our USAA insurance agent believed the first she, and waived the $500 deductible on our body shop repair bill. But that’s not why I’m writing this.

 

I delivered the car to said body shop this morning. Ashley, the clerk behind the desk, handed me, 1 by 1, 6 pieces of legalese to sign. Lawyers keep thinking of more stuff that protects the body shop from any and all liability arising out of any and all acts, foreign or domestic, regardless of malice or inattention. But that’s not why I’m writing this.

 

Six signatures – 3 with dates – and 3 initialed blanks later, Ashley offered me a seat in the waiting room while she called Enterprise Rent-A-Car so they could come pick me up. I asked Ashley if she would provide me copies of everything I had signed. She sighed and said, “Oh, yes, if you really want.” Ashley is not the most customer-centric employee, but that’s not why I’m writing this.

 

I sat. I watched Ashley get busy on something else. After about 10 minutes, I walked over to Ashley’s counter to remind her that I was to get copies. She looked up and seemed a bit startled, then asked, “Are you all right?”

 

The reason I’m writing this is to pose the question: Do I look like I’m not all right? I asked Ashley pretty much the same question. She looked away and didn't say anything. I thought maybe I should call 911, but then I wouldn't be at the body shop when Enterprise showed up.

Just how bad do I look?

Caliber Collision promised to "restore the rhythm of your life." They should. It was their Ashley that disturbed my rhythm in the first place.

What Will You Remember?

I like to watch Pardon The Interruption on ESPN, where 2 sports journalists discuss current events in just about all sports. One of their segments is called “Big Deal, Little Deal, or No Deal?” They introduce some recent event and give their opinions: big, little, or insignificant (no deal). The day after the Super Bowl, I expected to watch them talk about Travis Kelce assaulting his coach on the sideline. That didn’t happen. It wasn’t mentioned.

 

About 3 minutes into the 2^nd quarter, a Chiefs player fumbled the football in the red zone. Change of possession, time out, go to commercials. TV comes back to game, and a couple minutes later, CBS replays what happened on the sideline after the fumble a few minutes ago. Travis Kelce charged Andy Reed (who has a 4 Super Bowl rings) all red-faced and shouting. Kelce actually runs into Reed, who had some difficulty staying on his feet. One of his teammates pulled Kelce away, and Reed did not respond to Kelce at all.

 

When the Chiefs got the ball back, Kelce was out there on offense. He wasn’t benched. Which surprised me. I thought Reed would tell Kelce to take a seat for a good while. That would have been the minimum punishment, or so I thought.

 

If I were playing Big Deal, Little Deal, or No Deal, I would say Big Deal. Big no-no for Kelce to assault his coach, publicly showing his disrespect for his coach’s personnel decisions. Big no-no for Reed, allowing his petulant adolescent tight end to undermine the head coach’s authority in such a public and violent way. With no consequences. Big no-no for sports journalism, for not publicly calling out both Kelce and Reed.

 

It’s been said that Kelce was upset that he hadn’t been on the field when his teammate fumbled, and that Kelce thought he could have helped the running back hold onto the ball. Wah, wah, wah, you hothead crybaby asshole.

 

That’s what I will remember about this Super Bowl.

 

Thoughts Better Not Expressed

There is a bursa sac located quite close to my right hip joint. It was inflamed, so they called it hip bursitis. After a long bout of physical therapy, I got a cortisone shot in the sac 6 days ago. The pain is greatly reduced.

Which allows me to do my full workouts again. And I need to get my strength/endurance back in order to join the annual Fight For Air climb in March. That’s 42 floors, about 900 stairs. More on that later.

This morning I felt pretty good on the elliptical machine at the gym. A lot of songs playing in my ears are set to around 120 beats per minute, which is a good pace for me to work up a bit of a sweat. My eyes are free to wander, and wander they did. A middle-aged woman, in front of me and slightly off to the right, was riding what looked like a bike. Most of the time she wasn’t sitting on the bicycle seat, but standing on the pedals.

All right, it isn’t a bicycle seat. It’s labeled SPINNING, so it’s a SPINNING seat.

When her right foot went down, the pointy end of the seat would hit her right butt cheek less than 2” from her crack. Left foot down, seat hit the left butt cheek. Back and forth, with a rhythm that would rival an atomic clock.

When I got done with my 20 minutes, I stepped closer to her and said “You are missing an opportunity. A slight adjustment in your stride would make the pointy end of the seat hit your clit, and you could get more out of your workout.”

I didn’t actually say that, but I thought it.

An old (1958) song, Standing On the Corner, has a line “You can’t go to jail for what you’re thinking.” Good thing.