Carol's Corner

Hmph!

2012-01-26T20:06:00.000-08:00

Have you tried to buy a five-pound bag of sugar lately?

Or a quart jar of mayonnaise?

Then there's graham crackers. Don't get me started.

Oh, you can buy the package of sugar that sort of looks like the 5-pound bag you've been for buying your whole life--and your mother before you--but no such thing exists any more. Not even the off brands make a 5-pound bag. It's four pounds now . . . at the same price, or higher, actually.

And the jar of mayo looks about the same as it used to, except the bottom isn't flat. Not by a long shot. And it's a 30-ounce jar now. And if you buy the name brand, Best Foods, you'll pay about $3.50 for a jar.

But I am started on the graham crackers. I have a recipe that calls for 12 graham crackers, which used to be what you found in one of the packs inside the box. Handy. Then one day, the inner pack held 11 graham crackers. Now it's down to 9. And it's not cheap.

How do they do it? Isn't it expensive to keep redesigning and re-manufacturing packages? Oh, yeah, that's right. It is. And guess who pays for it.

What goes around comes around, eventually

2012-01-19T12:36:00.000-08:00

On my way to Curves this morning I stopped at the red light at Boise and Apple. There's a bus stop on that corner, and a young woman stood in the rain (she had an umbrella) waiting. I thought to stop and offer her a ride but was in the wrong lane.

I went down the street, made a couple of turns, then came back to where she was. By then a young man had arrived. I offered them both a ride while the car behind me honked. The young man refused. She accepted. I took her to BSU and learned she comes from Kodiak, Alaska, and is in her second semester at BSU, a Sociology major.

I dropped her off and headed down Broadway to Curves. Stopped at the red light at Boise and Broadway, then proceeded on the green light. I saw the police car pull out back behind me, saw the flashing lights, said to myself, "It can't be me; I'm going the speed limit, under it, in fact."

He kept coming. "It's me," I decided and turned in at the Curves parking lot. He followed.

Did I know how fast I was going? Yes, I thought I was going 35.

"You were going 32 in a school zone with a crossing guard and those flashing yellow lights."

I must have accelerated fast. I didn't think I had reached that speed until down by the LDS church. But I didn't say that to him. To him I said, "I'm sorry."

He took all my documents. Five minutes later he did not give me a warning.

I have just written the check for $151.50 to Magistrate Court.

The First Snow Fall of the Year

2012-01-18T09:27:00.000-08:00

10:30 and already a lotta snow, I'd guess about 4 inches, and, to quote the old song, "it shows no signs of stopping."

Yes, we need it. Need the water it will produce next Spring.

And I think of those people at the nearby ski resorts--Bogus Basin, for one--and how happy they are today. If they haven't already gone out of business. I hope they haven't.

Skiers, tobogganers, sledders, a happy bunch.

It's beautiful, too.

It was supposed to begin at 9 a.m. so I went to Curves at 6:30, thinking I'd be home ahead of the snow. But it had already begun to fall when I left my house, and in the 50 minutes I spent at Curves enough came down to make driving home scary. Borderline treacherous.

Glad I did a little shopping last night, because I don't plan to leave my house again today.

It's warm in here; my sheets are clean; I'm clean; plenty of food and water, things to do. I sound like I'm planning to stay in the rest of the winter. I hope not.

I write simply to mark the day and acknowledge the snow.

Lay, Lie

2012-01-13T16:24:00.001-08:00

We've been through this before, but its one of those pesky problems that will recur, you know. You must know that.

This morning at Curves Marcia said, "Say, English teacher." She was addressing me.

Me: Yes.

Marcia: The lay/lie thing. Can you tell me something that will help me know which to use when?

Me: Don't know.
I mean, there is only so much one person (me, or I, if you're a stickler) can do. I can tell her, but that doesn't mean she'll remember and forever after get it right, you know. You do know that. Right? But, of course, I had to do what I could for her.

Me again: I'll try. Lay, in the present tense, takes an object.

Marcia: A bit blank.

Me: You lay it down. But you lie down.

Marcia: Oh.

Me: But lay is also the past tense of lie, and that may be what . . . (I was going to say, confuses people. But she cut me off.)

Marcia: Oh, don't tell me about that. I don't want to hear that.

Me: Okay. Here it is. You wouldn't say, I'm going to lay down, unless it's a book. I'm going to lay the book down. But you would say, I'm going lie down.

Marcia: Okay, yes. I see. That helps a lot. My husband is always correcting me, you know.

Me: (I didn't know, but he's a lawyer, and so maybe I should have known.) So get this right, and then he won't know . . .

Marcia: He'll have to find something else to correct me on.

Me: No doubt he will. (But I did not say it out loud.)

So there you have it. Another soul set straight on the lay/lie path. May she ever stay on it.

That's what we English teachers live for, you know.

Today's Wiki How

2012-01-12T11:34:00.000-08:00

How to Be a Hairy Woman (and Proud Of It)

Enough said.

A Little Family History

2012-01-11T07:48:00.000-08:00

My maiden name is Brimley. My dad's people came from Scotland and England, with names like Kirk (Scottish for church) and Southworth (English for south worth, I would guess).

I have seen Brimley spelled Brameley and Bramelea. It means by the brim of the lea--edge of the meadow. Which likely indicates where these people originally lived. My dad's Grandfather was from Lancashire.

In the mid 1800s the Brimley family left England, from Liverpool, and sailed to America. My father's father was on the ship. He was just a boy then. His name, William Jedediah Brimley. They came to live in Utah, Zion to them, because they had joined the Mormon church.

The ship was old, slow, and leaky. It took six weeks to cross the Atlantic, with the older boys and the men bailing water around the clock. But, obviously, they made it. When they got to Salt Lake City they began life there in a small adobe house.

Eventually the Brimley brothers became butchers and had a store on State Street in Salt Lake City, Brimley Brothers' Meats. Started by the first Utah generation, it was passed down to their sons. I remember my dad telling that when he was young he would carry home the meats that didn't sell each day, like the organ meats, the tongue, and beef neck bones. Soup from the bones was often their dinner. And my dad prized beef heart and liver.

Actually, I also like the organ meats. Thanks, Daddy. But you can have the neck bones. And you can have the tongue. I tried. Really, I tried, but I just couldn't like eating a tongue, and I don't need to even see one on a plate again. Ever.

But I served beef liver (and chicken livers) to my kids. I don't know if I should say occasionally or often. You'd have to ask them how they feel/felt about that. I'm pretty sure none of them eat liver in their own homes.

Very hard to find these days in the grocery stores anyway.

Tangent. Sorry.

I have seen the store on State Street--a fine location, as my dad would say. It was many years ago when I last saw it. (Does anyone know for sure how long it lasted?)It was a few blocks west of Uncle Vern (his name was Laverne, poor kid) Brimley's house, as I recall, like around 26th South and State.

The store is gone now. So are all those Brimley brothers and sisters. My dad, born fourth, was the the second to last of them to die, as far as I know.

Their names:
Margaret Ann, named for her mother Margaret Ann Kirk, my grandmother whom I never knew. The daughter was Aunt Margie to us, 1886-1983. Born first, lived longest, 97 years.
Lulu 1888-1888.
William Ray 1889-1891
Wilford Charles 1891-1981, my dad, 89 when he died. Preceded in death by his wife Lola, our "little Mama," as he often called her. Daddy sold life insurance for New York Life Insurance Company, up and down the length of California, mostly on the military bases.
James Clyde 1894-1978, Uncle Clyde, a butcher. He took his large family to Mesa, Arizona. His children were the only cousins I knew. I loved their visits. He was a Navy veteran and had stories to tell.
Elsie 1896-1967
Laverne 1898- 1976, I met him a few times.
Wallace Gerald 1901-1935

It seems this post decided it had a life of its own, almost got away from me. It began so that I could say I like my name, Brimley. It's a good name.

Today's goals

2012-01-09T18:47:00.000-08:00

Eat no sugar
Spend no money
Use no gasoline

I did it

Another scrumptious dish

2012-01-09T12:47:00.000-08:00

How to Deep Fry Eggs
from WIKI HOW

While fried eggs may be your favorite, once you try deep fried eggs, it's possible you'll find them hard to resist. Deep frying the egg results in a caramelized sort of taste with a runny center. The egg also looks great, somewhat like a fried poached egg with crunchiness that seduces you straight away into wanting to take a bite.

What I want to know is this: Does that picture match the description below it? Does it really look great? Would I ever be seduced into taking a bite? And are those croutons? Fried eggs with croutons?

Gross, I say. This could get a person over her food addiction.

It's serious

2012-01-06T13:34:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I heard a report given in that voice reporters assume to let hearers know that this is dangerous stuff. It was telling that there is such a thing as a FOOD ADDICTION.

Yikes! Oh no!

I mean, you could be addicted to food. Some people are, said the report.

Well guess what. I think I'm one of them.

It's like this: I want food every day. Almost like I have to have food every day.

Every day.

That's it. Addiction.

Those were the days,

2012-01-05T08:20:00.000-08:00

I guess, when things were simpler, nicer. TV wasn't all murders, rapes, other and various crimes, and the fascinating lives of celebrities. Not that there is any connection. Oh yes, and fake reality shows.

And that's what I'm talking about, what was on TV. Shows like Space Patrol and What's My Line? and Believe It or Not, and we, the viewing public, liked them. We thought they were good entertainment. My, but weren't we simple?

I remember the host of Believe It or Not, Art Baker, a handsome white-haired man who always wore what looked to be a white suit. (Black and white TV.)

I fell in love with Art Baker. He was smooth and pleasant and had a wonderful speaking voice. (Later, when I saw him in one of his early movies and he was the bad guy--smooth and subtle but really bad--I fell out of love. So disappointing. I was just a kid, remember.)

I might have stopped watching Believe It or Not.

But here's the kind of thing the show featured. Drum roll, some kind of lead-up-to-it music: a man who could tear the Los Angeles phone book in two. Amazing.

Wouldn't you like to see that?

Something to consider

2012-01-04T13:17:00.000-08:00

Writing is best done in the morning, before the mind has the day's marks on it.

Who said that? I did.

But I suppose it depends on what you are writing. Maybe you want the day's marks in the writing. Maybe that's what it's all about. The day.

Sticked on a pick-up, yes, that's sticked

2012-01-03T09:23:00.001-08:00

We're into bumper stickers these days. Here are the two I saw today as I pulled up behind a pick-up. Both on the same pick-up.

1. NUKE IRAN
Then Hollywood

2. KEEP HONKING
I'M RELOADING

Both quite Idaho appropriate, I thought, so I looked up to see the driver, expecting a guy with plenty of scruffy hair and a baseball cap. But no. It was a woman. Hmmm.

Or so I thought, until he turned the corner. A man, plenty of hair, not scruffy but rather neatly combed into a page boy, and no cap. Well, it takes all kinds to make a world. And I guess that's true of Idaho, too.

Wiki How Makes My Point

2011-12-26T08:26:00.000-08:00

How to Celebrate Kwanzaa

Kwanzaa is a holiday invented in 1966 by Ronald Karenga (founder of the Black Power group "Us Organization") through which black Americans can connect with their heritage and culture. It's celebrated from December 26 through January 1, with each of the seven days focusing on one of seven core values (Nguzo Saba). A candle is lit on each day, and on the last day, gifts are exchanged.

Since Kwanzaa is a cultural holiday, rather than a religious one, it can be celebrated alongside Christmas or Hanukkah, or on its own, although Karenga wished for it to be celebrated instead of Christmas and Hanukkah, as he felt these holidays were simply symbols of the dominant cultures in America.

The above is a direct quote, but the bolding is mine. And I repeat, I see no reason for my grandchildren to celebrate it in school. If teachers want to explain it, okay.

Christmas Sampler

2011-12-22T08:58:00.000-08:00

Christmas is a'comin' and the geese are flying over my house every day, from the river to any quiet body of water. Some likely fly all the way to Lake Lowell, but I saw about 100 glide down onto the Park Center Pond yesterday.

They do not fly in tight Vs, as we have been led to believe, but there is no doubt an organization, with trade-offs, almost like relays, so the tired ones in front can slip to the back for a breather--less wind makes an easier flight--and with scouts on the outer edges of their formation.

They honk as they fly, calling out messages and instructions, I'm guessing.

* * *

In elementary school we sang Christmas Carols, had Christmas programs and plays every year, which I played the leading part in always. Can't help it; it's true.

All directed by Mrs. Schultz, our Jewish music teacher. Many Jewish children made up the list of my friends: Marilyn Kreitzman, Robert Fine, Martin Goldman, Alan Epstein, Ruthie Ashberg, and so on. We lived in the Ocean Park part of Santa Monica, a very Jewish place, but all of us sang the Christmas songs together in school.

One song that Mrs. Schultz taught us, in 1st grade, was

Christmas is a'comin' and the geese are gettin' fat.
Time to put a penny in an old man's hat.
If you haven't got a penny, then a ha'penny will do.
If you haven't got a ha'penny, then God bless you.

I gave no thought to what my Jewish friends were thinking. Most had Christmas in their homes, with trees and stockings hanging on the hearth. At least that is what I believed, pretty sure it's true. Hanukkah was mentioned, probably, but I do not recall.

I do not say that was right, just that it was.

Not so today. The high school program last week included Hanukkah songs, and Charlie's 1st grade program in Pennsylvania was about half and half, said his mom. I have no objection to that. I'm just glad we can still hear the Christmas songs in the school. I do think it is a bit much, however, to ask that my grandchildren "celebrate" Kwanza. That happens here at the elementary schools.

* * *

My friend Joan sent a cartoon today. Three boys sitting in the Principal's office, explaining the reason for their punishment.
Boy 1: I said the S H word.
Boy 2: I said the F word.
Boy 3: I said Christmas.

Funny, huh.

* * *

Last Saturday night I heard the Boise Philharmonic and the BP Master Chorale in performance of Handel's Messiah. I heard it last year, too, but this was a much better performance. Lola says thanks to Robert Franz, BP's conductor, who made them work hard in rehearsal.

I gave thanks for the performance and for that timeless oratorio (written, by the way, in 1741), that we can attend such programs publicly performed for our pleasure and inspiration. I gave thanks for Handel, for the inspiration he received as he worked on the music, which turned out to be glorious music, for Charles Jennens, who gathered the scriptures together to provide the perfect libretto, for the performers who, it seemed to me, sang from their hearts, and for Jesus Christ, the center of it all.

Conversion

2011-12-19T03:15:00.000-08:00

My friend Jennifer, a tall striking blonde, married Dick, dark and curly headed, slightly shorter than she. Both were trying marriage a second time around. And they were fun to be around, mostly. He could be brittle and short with her, which I disliked.

But there was a lot of laughter, there was intelligent conversation, and there were shared beliefs.

And this post is less about them than their beliefs.

Dick was obviously a person of power and persuasion, because when I knew Jennifer before she married Dick, she was a Nazarene and a political liberal from Nampa. Dick is from Chicago, Jewish, calling himself a Jewish atheist. And he is a conservative.

After their marriage, Jennifer converted, which means she changed from one thing to a different thing. (Well, thing isn't quite the right word.) She became--in her thought, her "belief system," as she used to speak of it--a reflection of Dick. And it seemed the conversion was wholehearted.

I didn't wonder about the politics. I mean, anyone can grow up politically, which I believe she finally did. But the religion. A life-long Nazarene becomes a Jewish atheist. How is this possible?

Well, she really loved Dick, and that answers a lot of questions. You know, what we do for love.

And, it turns out, she had given up her Nazarinity, if that's a word, long before she met Dick. For one thing, she liked to dance, and Nazarenes don't dance. She used to tell a joke about that, which in my sense of delicacy and propriety I will not include here, but which underscored the Nazarene disdain for dancing.

So, for a long time, she was Nazarene in name only. The big reason for her leaving her faith, she said, was her dad, the Nazarene minister. She hated him, found fault with his sermons because she hated his at-home behavior, particularly his treatment of her mother. Called him a hypocrite. Was occasionally cynical about other people's belief systems, knowing that many come up short in living what they claim to believe.

And I think to apologize for that, for not being all I ought to be. And I wonder if we who profess a faith are all hypocrites, saying one thing, living another. Some folks would say so.

But I say no. Not all of us. Unless being a flawed human being makes us so. I think being a hypocrite involves some willful deceit, and I don't think we're all willfully deceitful.

I thought of my dad as having no deceit in him, no guile. There was love at the heart of him. And yet I know he also fell short at times. He could lose his temper, for instance.

So can many of us. And we all do have our weaknesses and foibles. And we have our sins, having stepped off the narrow path. But most of the people I know are doing their best to get back on it or stay in the first place, and they steady themselves by their faith and their testimony of it.

That is, as far as I can tell. And it came to me the other day that I am really glad I don't have to judge other people. I just can't. The thing is, my real concern is with me and my attempts to live as I believe, which requires some effort, you know.

Oh my, Part today

2011-12-16T15:35:00.000-08:00

So today I went to the big Hastings store, spent some time looking, and then was asked by a managerial type if she could help me.

"I hope so," I said.

She looked totally (as everyone says, as in totally) confident until I said I was looking for a CD of The Messiah.

Blank look.

Then she recovered and sent me to the information desk over in the CD/DVD section of the store.

A young man asked to help me, assuring me he knew everything there was to know about this section of the store.

"I'm looking for The Messiah."

"Isn't everyone," he said.

This was encouraging to me, but as he typed stuff into his computer for about five minutes and came up with nothing, I became worried. I said, "You do know what I'm talking about. Right?"

"I assume you're talking about the movie."

"No," I said quite patiently, "it's music, an oratorio, written in the 1700s. Now do you know what I'm talking about?"

"I don't even know what an oratorial is."

I explained quite patiently. "Oratorio. It's sacred music for orchestra, chorus, and solo voices. This one is about the birth (I left it at the birth) of Jesus, written by Handel."

"Oh, Handel."

"So you've heard of Handel's Messiah."

"No."

"Oh."

"But now I can look under Handel.

"I see. Well at least you didn't ask me if The Messiah was the name of an artist."

He said, "I was about to until you said Handel."

I do not make these things up. And, while they're all mildly amusing, they are also very troubling.

Oh my

2011-12-15T14:14:00.000-08:00

I stopped in at my local Hastings--entertainment store: DVD, CD, books, etc.--looking for a good recording of The Messiah. I didn't hold out much hope but thought I could at least ask.

A young woman was putting CDs in slots, so I asked her, "Do you know everything here?"

"Yes," she replied.

"Good," I said, and went on, "do you have The Messiah?"

"Is that the name of an artist?" she asked.

Enough said.

What to make of these

2011-12-13T20:38:00.000-08:00

Dr Burr: (Looking very closely at the left medial eyebrow on my face) You've been picking at that, haven't you.
Me: (Thinking, Wow, he didn't call me kid this time) No. (And that was the truth.)
Burr: Hmmm. (He looks again at my sizeable file.)
Me: (Silent.)
Burr: Oh, we did surgery on that, didn't we.
Me: Yes.
Burr: (Again looking at my files) Hmmm. (Then again at my eyebrow) Looks like it's coming back.
Me: (Silent but full of thought and dread.)
Burr: (Again looking at my files, saying nothing.)
Me: I don't want it to come back.
Burr: Oh, it won't.
Me: (Silent, but thinking, Huh?).

* * *

Sunday I was admiring someone's hair and said to the person seated next to me, "I wish I had hair like that, so beautiful, and so much of it."

She said, "Your hair is (did she say?) beautiful."

I said a half-hearted thank you and felt sorry about the half-heartedness of it.

She said, "We do the best with what we were given." It was kind of a little lecture just for me. And she repeated it.

I felt a bit ashamed. Actually hung my head.

I thought about it most of the day and figured I needed to repent and take her words to heart . . . until I remembered this one thing. SHE HAD HER NOSE "FIXED."

You Probably Know This Already

2011-12-13T10:24:00.000-08:00

I have done some reading up on Higgs Boson and bosonic mechanism in particle physics. Because it is in the news today. Physicists are hoping to see Higgs soon, meaning any day. Higgs is also known as the "God particle." It is a sub-atomic particle, of course.

In short,
Wait, it isn't short. Let me quote:

Higgs Boson is a key component of the "Standard Model" - the all-encompassing theory developed by physicists of how the cosmos as we know it works at its basic level of particles and forces.

But until now, in the four decades since it was first posited, no one has convincingly claimed to have glimpsed the Higgs Boson, let alone proved that it actually exists.

At an eagerly awaited briefing on Tuesday at the CERN research centre near Geneva, two independent teams of "Higgs Hunters" were widely expected to suggest they were fairly confident they had spotted it.

But not confident enough, in the physics world of ultra-precision where certainty has to be measured at nothing less than 100 percent, to announce "a discovery."

In the jargon, this level is described as 5 sigma, which would exclude the possibility that the results recorded by the ATLAS and CMS teams at CERN - the 21-nation European Organisation for Nuclear Research - are a fluke.

Not the end of the story, but the end of the quote.

You can thank me later.

School Lunch, Part 4

2011-12-11T13:03:00.000-08:00

In high school, lunch time was still a social occasion, though the actual food we ate seemed to have regained some importance, probably because we were mature people with discriminating taste.

Of course, there were certain places on campus where the important people gathered to eat. And, of course, I gathered there.

Only Geeks ate in the cafeteria, even if it was underground and called The Vike’s Inn, and it should go without saying, but it won’t, that in the three years of high school I never knew what they served in that place.

Trading food has tradition behind it, but I did not like to do it, not ever, knowing that the worst my mother fixed was better than what anybody else had. But in high school, everyone wanted my sandwich when my mom sent avocado and bacon on her homemade whole wheat bread. In elementary school such a sandwich, especially on whole wheat bread, would have laid me open to ridicule, but in high school it gave me status. I was proud to share, even if I ended up with bologna.

Oh, and I would not be caught dead with a lunch pail then. Might as well wear pink and green together and paint a target on my butt.

Okay. On my back.

Under the Darkening Moon

2011-12-10T08:42:00.000-08:00

We went out to Eisenman Road at 5:45 a.m. to watch the lunar eclipse. That's where Janice said we would see it best.

We did see it, and we did freeze our little selves, too.

But there is much more life and many more lights out there than either of us knew about. Bright lights. Trucking places, Shopko's distribution center, Brasher's Auto Auction, WES--whatever that is--and others, not to mention the Outlet Mall lighted brightly.

We went down the road a couple of times, then out Gowen. Lots of lights out there, too.

Back to Eisenman, where we backed up a short sloping driveway, parked, and where Janice got out all of her scopes and cameras and settled in.

I thought it was private property; I had walked up, seen the address by the door and the mailbox by the door.

When the dogs began barking, I told Janice I was pretty sure we were on private property. She said, "No. It's the storage office."

"Well," said I, quoting, "then, Who let the dogs out?"

"Don't worry," she said. "They're fenced in." Apparently Janice doesn't know the song.

I got back in the car. I was freezing anyway.

Janice is hard of hearing, you know, and did not put her hearing aids in this morning, so she didn't hear the woman at first. And because she was bending over with her face in her scope, she didn't see her either.

That woman was not happy and not nice. She made clear we were on private property and she needed us to leave. Janice's apology fell on, as they say, deaf ears. Sorry, Janice.

"I need you to pack up all your equipment and get out of here." And that was the nice part.

We left.

An observation about the eclipsed moon. You can see its roundness better than at any other time. It looked just like a ball and like it might fall at any second. Fascinated me. I took many pictures. Haven't looked to see if any might be satisfactory.

I am glad I went. I loved the moon. And I always like an adventure, especially if I'm only watching it from inside a car.

School Lunch, Part 3

2011-12-09T16:46:00.000-08:00

In Jr high lunch was a social thing, in the cafeteria or out, and mostly I ate out. What I ate I don’t know, whatever my mother fixed. What we did, I’m not sure of either, beyond sitting and talking. We certainly didn’t run out to a playground, too grown up for that. All I remember about lunch is that every day someone was not speaking to someone, and I never figured out why or how they kept it all straight.

No. Lunch was not the Jr high issue. Showers were. Daily, after PE, overseen by the teachers. Whoever designed those showers was a sex pervert. That is what I might have said if I had the nerve to say such a thing to a teacher in 1952.

Here’s how it worked:

You left your clothes at your locker, wrapped—ha!—in a very small, thin towel, then waited in line to run through the shower. The teacher checked off your name and watched you as you stepped in, removed your towel, held it over your head and ran—but not too fast—ten feet or so between weak streams of water coming from both sides of the tiled-in corridor. At the end of the ten feet you turned right, turned right again and came back the other side, put your towel on, stepped out, and dripped all the way back to your locker.

If you didn’t look wet enough, the teacher would send you back through.

Nobody ever looked up while in the shower because it was likely some boy had climbed up the outside walls of the gym and was peering in an open window.

Everybody took showers. Every day. And I’m pretty sure everyone hated it and tried to get out of it. There were only two ways of doing that.

“I can’t take a shower today, Mrs. Nibley. I’m having my period.” I hated to announce it, but it would get me excused for three or four days.

“Okay, Alyce,” (my school name).

Then in three weeks. “I can’t take a shower today, Mrs. Nibley. I’m having my period.”

This time I was lying, of course.

“So soon, Alyce?”

“Uh, yes. It came early.” So, they really do keep track. I wouldn’t be able to use that one again for a month.

Or “Mrs. Nibley, I can’t take a shower today. I still have athlete’s foot.” Lying again.

“What are you putting on it, Alyce?” Miss Cooper chimed in.

“Uh, campho-phenique.” Still lying. Campho-phenique, the little green bottle of smelly stuff Mama put on Sterling’s cold sores. It would probably work on athlete’s foot.

“Oh that will never do,” Miss Cooper clucked. “You have to use . . .” whatever she said.

The next day my athlete’s foot had cleared up on its own, as if by magic, and I was back in the shower line.

School Lunch, Part 2

2011-12-08T13:54:00.000-08:00

Inside the cafeteria, there was almost the same order that persisted in the classroom. We could talk and mess around a little, but we weren’t supposed to raise our voices. One day Neal Treadwell stood behind me in line and told me to look down inside my blouse and spell attic. Dumb me. I did it. A T T I C. Neal laughed out loud while I turned red. I think he was born knowing stuff like that. Of course, I couldn’t slug him or even yell at him, or I’d get in trouble.

I didn’t always eat in the cafeteria. Sometimes I brought my lunch from home in the standard brown paper bag, my sandwiches wrapped in waxed paper with my mother’s neat way of folding the paper and twisting the ends.

I remember wanting a lunch pail, the kind with the round lid and thermos that some of the other kids had. I never got one like that, and if I had one at all, which I don’t remember, it wasn’t the kind I wanted. Not quite. You never got quite what you wanted. I think our parents lived by a code. “Don’t ever get your kids exactly what they ask for. It’s good for their character.”

In sixth grade I worked as cashier in the cafeteria, so I got to know the cooks. They called me Bette because I looked like Bette Davis, which they said was a good thing. Sometimes I went to the other side of the cafeteria and worked at the window, selling ice cream cups with their flat wooden spoons. Five cents for ice cream or a fudgesicle or a bag of peanuts or milk in a carton.

That whole year I got my lunch free, which was also a good thing. I could eat early, no on-duty teacher watching. And I gladly gave up recess for the prestige of being cashier. It meant I was smart. It also allowed me to engage in small talk with teachers, which made me feel smart and was more fun than volleyball or four square.

School Lunch, Part 1

2011-12-08T07:47:00.000-08:00

It must have been good or they would have fired the cooks. Right? Actually, we did get new cooks when I was in 5^th grade, but I don’t know if the previous ones had been fired. I liked the cooks, especially Mrs. Brecken, a wide, dark-eyed, woman in her fifties, and so it was sometimes hard to look at her when I went through the line and saw canned spinach. Again. Yuck.

It was probably just the vegetables I didn’t like. That and chow mein or chop suey, whichever it was we got. Somebody said one was better than the other. I don’t remember which, but I’m pretty sure we got the other.

It was celery, meat—I think—and bean sprouts in clear gooey warm stuff poured over rice. There must have been meat. I can’t believe anyone would have eaten it with only the celery and slimy bean sprouts, which I thought were worms. Really.

Of course, I like bean sprouts now. I'm grown up.

But if I had known the word gross back then, that’s what I would have called it. I just couldn’t eat the stuff. If this was what Chinese people had to eat, then no wonder my mother always told us to think of the poor starving Chinese.

When you went through the cafeteria line, you couldn’t choose what you wanted. You had to have everything, and then you had to eat it. If you didn’t eat it—all of it—the on-duty teacher would not excuse you and you would sit in the cafeteria while everyone else went out for noon recess.

A lot went on out on the playground at lunch time. There were always some kids who just ran around with no apparent purpose, maybe chasing each other, but some played more organized games like softball, basketball or volleyball. There was paddle ball, hopscotch, tetherball, marbles, and four square.

That’s why the eating part needed to be done quickly. Some kids tried spreading their food around the plate to make it look like they’d eaten a lot. It never worked. I suppose if you could throw up on your plate, that would be an excuse not to eat your lunch. Maybe some kids did that. I think I gagged over spinach once. But if you wanted to get outside with any time for play, you just held your nose and ate fast.

Sometimes recess wasn’t worth it.

About the Peanut Butter Soup, Who Knew?

2011-12-06T08:20:00.000-08:00

Linda said she was going to make it. Her son loves peanut butter.

I said, "But peanut butter soup? Did you see the picture of that stuff?"

"Yes. I'm going make it today. You know I loved the root beer float cupcakes. Keep posting those recipes."

I may, because I find them not appealing. I'm sure she knows I post them to ridicule them.

In fact, Ann and I did ridicule the peanut butter soup recipe, especially the part that calls for cinnamon or celery salt, like they are the same. Ha!

Yesterday, Callis mentioned going home and having a peanut butter sandwich because his wife will be at her mother's. And he was happy about it--the sandwich.

So I told him about the peanut butter soup and was about to engage in some ridicule when he said, "I would love that."

"What?"

"I love peanut butter. Anything peanut butter."

"Yeah, but soup?"

"Yes, I'd like to make it."

"Wow."

"Do you like Nutella?" he asked.

"It's okay."

"I love that stuff," said another woman in his office. "Take a graham cracker," she said, "spread peanut butter on it, then Nutella on top of that. It's wonderful."

"Even I would like that, I think, because I like peanut butter on graham crackers." That was me talking. But I don't know if anyone heard because Callis was excited to tell this next part.

"Every night I take a spoon, and not a little spoon, a big one, and I swirl it around in the jar of peanut butter until it's full of peanut butter. Then I swirl it around in the jar of Nutella. Then I take it upstairs and eat it while I'm reading."

This is serious with him. He said every night. That's EVERY NIGHT.

"We have two jars of Nutella open at a time," he went on. "One is for the family. The other is Dad's. It's the one with traces of peanut butter in it."

"What kind of peanut butter?"

"Doesn't matter. Skippy or Western Family or Maranatha or Kirkland or Adams. I just love peanut butter."

I was starting to understand.

Speaking of

2011-12-05T16:58:00.000-08:00

bad poems. I call this one, by a well-known poet, bad. And it wasn't on purpose.

For you, Ann.

Ridiculous

This is ridiculous
said the literary old woman
nobody gives us any respect
the young in one another's arms
are talking on their ipods
the politicians are lying through their teeth
and our husbands are taking a nap

this is ridiculous
said the tulip
all those genetically altered blossoms
those stupid long-lived orchids
that are practically plastic
and those fancy designer grasses
getting more than market share

this is ridiculous
said the dog
now they not only have to walk me
they have to rush up with their
sanitary plastic bags
what is it but old-fashioned
imperialism

Alicia Ostriker

Bobs, epilogue

2011-12-05T08:34:00.000-08:00

Bobby Blake was on our Santa Monica High School varsity basketball team. He married Donna Pennington, who was a cheer leader. They were what we called back then "a cute couple," and they married right out of high school. I invited them to my wedding reception a few years later, and they came.

I knew little else about them until about 30 years had passed.

Donna was at the high school reunion alone. I asked about Bobby. They were divorced, she said, and he lived in Laughlin, Nevada, worked in a casino there as a card dealer.

Next time I saw Donna was at our 46-year reunion (our class really liked getting together). She found me, told me Bobby had emphysema, lived with their daughter in California. In fact, their daughter and her husband had built an apartment onto their house for him.

Donna gave me the phone number, said she was sure Bobby would like to hear from me. I called once, spoke to his daughter, then him. I did not know his voice, but why should I? Our conversation was pleasant enough, even though he said he knew he was dying, probably wouldn't last long.

A while later, like a year, I sent a card with the poem I had written about him. Not sure why, maybe just to keep the friendship.

He died in 2008 or 2009. Donna told me the card and poem were among his few things.

That's nice.

So, why have I written so much about this one Bob? That's the question I ask myself.

Perhaps it's because he was one of those people we keep in our hearts. Something about that person makes us do that.

Perhaps it's because I really liked him, and he broke my heart. First love, first heartbreak.

Who really knows why?

One last memory from when we were eleven:
Bobby was seeing me home after school one afternoon. A boy rode by on his bike, doing his paper route. He was a year older, did not go to our school, but I knew him from church, although I had not seen him there for a long time. Not since Primary.

I might not have paid any attention to him that day, except that Bobby, who knew him from YMCA sports, made a disparaging comment about his athletic ability. I did not like that. Not sure why. Maybe just because I knew the boy from church. And because that's the first unkind thing I had heard from Bobby.

Funny what things stick in your memory.

About ten years later, that other boy and I got married. And it had nothing to do with Bobby.

Bobs, Part 6f

2011-12-05T08:24:00.001-08:00

The word love may have occurred to me in connection with Bobby, but I don't remember. It did occur to him in connection with me, and if I had ever wondered about it, on Valentine's Day I didn't have to wonder any more. Bobby gave me a large heart-shaped box of chocolates and a very grown-up romantic card with a satin heart and a verse I must have memorized on the spot. I still remember it.

Sweetheart, you're the dearest thing in all the world to me. You are ever in my heart, always, constantly. In all my dreams, in all my schemes, you play the dearest part. And I will always love you, from the bottom of my heart. (See, grown-up.)

And under the verse, in pencil, Love, Bobby.

We never kissed. By the end of the school year Bobby had lost interest in me. I never knew why. He just stopped liking me. And though I saw him give special thought to what he should write in my autograph book as the school year closed, he ended up writing the same little sing-song in my book that he wrote in everyone else's. "I oughtta cry, I oughtta laugh. I oughtta sign your autograph."

I don't know where I learned to be stoical about things, but stoical I was, although my heart broke a little that year. When I was eleven.

Bobs, Part 6e

2011-12-04T16:06:00.000-08:00

The truth is that I don't know if Bobby ever invited me to come to his house. If he had I would not have gone, and the reasons have to do with where he lived. I'm not sure why, but I was scared to go down there, just down the long steep hill from where I lived.

And Bobby came from what my parents would call a broken home. One of the few people in the whole school who did. And that marked him as very different indeed. He may have lived with his grandparents, as I recall. Maybe I needed to learn that being a child of divorce was not to his shame. I'm not saying it very well.

He did not belong to my church, which from my earliest years was an important difference, a separator.

But no denying it. I liked him. He was lean and tan and athletic, easily the best athlete to come out of Washington School. (That seems to matter to me.) He was handsome, even in sixth grade, with blue eyes and brown hair. And he was, to my mind, quite daring and independent. He could stay up and even out later than anyone else I knew. Including me.

Besides, of all the boys I knew or who had said they liked me, he was the first who seemed to know what to do about liking someone. Like walking your girlfriend home and calling on the phone and actually paying attention to her.

Bobs, Part 6d

2011-12-04T15:34:00.000-08:00

But that was not that. Bobby was persistent.

And he must have really loved me. He didn't come around my house anymore, but he would ride his bike along with me as I walked home, turning back just before we got in sight of my house.

And he telephoned. Kind of a big deal, I thought.

But when my brother Bill answered the phone, he would embarrass me about it. "For you, Carol. It's your boyfriend. I can tell it's your boyfriend because he sounds like a girl."

Well, he was only 11. But it's funny. He did not sound like a girl to me.

One time Bill said,"Why does he call? Does he ever say anything?"

Actually, he didn't ever say much, and neither did I. The phone calls were mostly long silences. But even so, the silences were not uncomfortable. Besides, what would either of us know to say? We were children, after all. I guess the silences were speaking for us.

The realization, or the understanding of Bobby's feelings gradually made their way into my consciousness over the next several months, and I stopped being afraid. I liked being liked. He wasn't the first boy who had liked me, but he was different.

Isn't that what people always say about the person they love? He's different. So be it. He was. And I could describe him and tell about him, and I will, but that would not tell the reasons for liking him. Reasons for love are sometimes hard to tell. Hard to understand.

Okay, are you up for this?

2011-12-03T13:15:00.000-08:00

How to Make Peanut Butter Soup

This is a very old recipe originally created by author Carolyn Keene famous for her Nancy Drew Mysteries. The recipe uses peanut butter and milk to make a very rich soup that serves 4.

Ingredients

1 cup (8 oz) milk
4 teaspoons peanut butter
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon, or celery salt

Very rich soup indeed. Just look at the stuff in that bowl. Want to dip a spoon in?

The instructions do say to heat it. Heat it until nearly boiling, then simmer. And, no joke here, serve with saltine crackers.

Go ahead. Make this. You probably have all the ingredients in your cupboard.

I dare you.

Bobs, Part 6c

2011-12-01T17:16:00.000-08:00

On the corner of Fourth Street and Raymond Avenue, directly across the street from the gate to the Washington School playground, sat a very large estate with a retaining wall around it. I say estate because of the size of the place. It took up most of the block. No one could see the house itself for the tall hedges.

The wall was low, about 18 inches in some stretches. On that wall Vivian Hagosky sat beside me holding me by my wrists so I could not move. Bobby Blake sat on the other side of me. Every protest that I had to get home, every plea to let me go brought a "No. You can't go," from Bobby. Every attempt I made to stand or to run tightened Vivian's grip on my wrists.

Bobby wanted me to stay where I was. That was clear. And since Vivian was the biggest girl in our grade and the strongest, she was the right person to keep me put. He was planning to kiss me, but I didn't know it. And he didn't do it.

I was half frightened. Of being held there, of Vivian, and a little frightened of Bobby. When I finally made my escape--they probably just let me go--and ran home, I found my dad waiting at the back door, something he had never done before. Likely it was my mother who worried about me, because it was getting late, and set my dad to watching. She would have been teaching piano lessons in the front room.

Bobby followed me home, but he should not have. I betrayed him, told my dad it was that boy's fault I was so late. My dad yelled at him, as only my dad could, and scared him off. I might have thought that was that.

Bobs, Part 6b

2011-12-01T10:12:00.000-08:00

At least that's what I remember. No liaison as yet.

But it's hard to be sure. I didn't write all these things down as they happened. I wish I had. This Bob, Bobby Blake, was the only Bob I really loved, and it would be nice to remember more.

And don't be thinking I want to talk about old times with him. Can't anyway. He died a few years ago. But I'll get to that.

So some things are simply not in my memory anymore. Clearly I do not remember the day to day things between Bobby and me. We went to the same school, so there were day to day things. However . . . we are talking about 60 years ago. And if you think I liked writing that, you are wrong.

But some things stand out, and those I want to write about here. This I know: as soon as I write them, they will be fixed in my memory the way I have written them. Isn't that your experience?

Now. In the meantime, here is the poem I wrote about Bobby. When I was 40something.

The Wall

Bobby holds your wrists tight

to keep you next to him, wrenching free

you run but know he'll catch you. You like it,

though you're afraid. Father stands

just inside the back screen door

rubbing his hand over his bald head,

watching for you, wondering

why you're so long coming home from school.

What will you tell him? It can't be smiling—

Bobby held my hands, his eyes are blue,

he likes me, Daddy. It can't be that.

There's some kind of shame in love at age eleven.

You tell it this way, never saying Bobby’s name.

A boy held me hard against a wall, Daddy,

he grabbed my arms, wouldn’t let me go.

It isn’t all a lie. You wish Bobby

wouldn't follow you home. You know Father will

yell at him, frighten him away. You can only hope

Bobby will come back and love you after that, love you

three more years and kiss you by the wall.

Bobs, Part 6a

2011-12-01T08:55:00.000-08:00

Bobby Blake. That's who this is about. But I have a little back story to tell first.

The Washington School playground was my summer home until I moved on to Junior High. During the summer between fifth and sixth grades, I pitched the softball game Washington School played against Grant Elementary.

This was not done. A girl on the team, and the pitcher.

It would be unusual enough if I played on the team in our own summer softball games. But this was a game between two schools in the city. Not done.

Maybe I was a pioneer. I know I was scared. But Coach Hillen talked me into it. He knew I could do it, he said, and I had just enough guts to try. He was the real pioneer, an enlightened man, ahead of his time--whatever else I can say to show the absolute unheardofness of it. I never knew of any other girl being given such an opportunity in 1951.

Grant's team got two hits off me and no runs. Probably I pitched so slow that they were through swinging before the ball reached the plate. Actually they did hit the ball, but the team behind me was very good. Martin Goldman, Chick Epstein, Louis Gradillas, Bobby Clark, and others--they were good and good to me. They were my friends.

Bobby Blake was also on that team, and he started liking me that summer. Before that game, I think. That's the way it happened, you know. Someone could start liking someone, or stop liking someone, just like that. I did not know how Bobby felt about me, but he started showing up on his bike at places on my walk home from the playground.

That should have told me something.

And I think he invited me to come to his house, but I would never go because he was new in school the year before and because he lived down on Marine Street. I never went down there before I knew Bobby, and I wasn't going now.

Summer ended with nothing established between us.

Yawn

2011-11-30T15:42:00.000-08:00

Comes a certain time in the afternoon, and I'm done. I may as well unroll my sleeping bag and crawl in, because my mind has pretty much checked out and taken with it any gumption. As you may have guessed, that time has arriven.

Actually, I have just now arisen from a 15-minute lie down which turned into a troubled hour and twenty minutes. Troubled because I kept opening my eyes and saying, "Okay, I'm getting up." Which I did not do for several of those eye openers.

Daytime naps are a rarity for me. A waste of time. As if I never waste time otherwise. Hmph.

Something happens to me if I sleep too long in the afternoon, besides the regular "it's that time and I'm done" thing. It doesn't seem to make me feel rested. Contrario, I feel logey (I don't know how to spell that word which I learned from my mother) and slow. And perhaps I get a little stupid, as the tone of this post seems to indicate.

And besides, I woke with a song in my head, where it remains--stuck. And why this song? "Sioux City Sue." I could put the lyrics here, but I won't.

A note on the day, this day. WINDY. Very, very. Temperature mid 40s. Although we have had some sun.

There you go.

Just Wait, Please

2011-11-29T13:57:00.000-08:00

Writing a poem requires lots of thought and some considerable effort. But when you get one right, which happens only occasionally, it is very satisfying. I've had that happen.

I've also had the experience of finishing a poem, then finishing it again some time later, then fussing with it again after years have passed and wondering if it will ever be to my liking.

Sometimes I just want to write a poem. That doesn't mean I'll be able to; it just means I want to, and so I might try at such a time. But usually a poem is the result of something that has come into my mind and sticks there, something I find striking or intriguing, and I work it around and put words to it and see if I can write it the way it seems to be in my brain.

That is the considerable effort part.

The inspiration can be something I see or hear or remember. Or all of those working together.

I don't remember who said that a poem doesn't have to mean (as in mean anything), it only has to be. Whoever said it was a real, published, money-making poet, as I recall.

Which thing I am not.

But I have never quite agreed with the statement. Oh I have written poems that just play with language. But, usually, for me, a poem ought to have meaning. So my poems have meaning, and some even have significance. At least for me.

Now, something else.

If I base a poem on something from my memory, that does not mean I am trying to replicate an event or incident. I may simply use a moment and work it around to get a certain feeling across to readers. Or a picture, or at least a sense of something.

So there.

I do not intend here to address matters like the rhythm of the language or the look of the poem or line length or the ends of lines or the beginnings of lines or rhyme, etc., etc. So I will not address those matters.

All of this is preliminary to my saying there is another Bob. And I wrote a poem based, in part, on an actual incident involving him and me. The incident occurred when I was 11 years old--and so was he--but I wrote the poem in my 40s.

I like the poem. But it is one that I have tinkered with over time. Partially because people who knew a lot told me I couldn't write it the way I did--in second person--so I changed it several times, finally coming back to the way I wrote it in the first place.

One thing I think the poem does is show something innocent, childlike. Another is that it seems to make the whole thing a lot more serious than it really was. I can live with that.

Which are probably things I should not say about it. I mean, the poem can speak for itself.

Which it will do when I write about Bobby.

Bobs, Part 5

2011-11-28T15:31:00.000-08:00

Then there was Bob Goon.

He and I were a couple for part of our junior year and all of our senior year in high school and for part of the following summer. He was tall, blonde, good looking, smart, on the track team, and his dad played the spoons, which is irrelevant.

Bob became a very successful attorney. Still lives in Santa Monica.

My three girls met Bob in 2004 at a high school reunion. He came over to us. I introduced him to my daughters, and then he said--and I'm not kidding; ask my girls--"I was almost your dad." And he kissed me on the lips. Was that before or after he said that?

Who was more flabbergasted? Me? Or my daughters?

Of course, it was not true. I never even gave marriage to him A THOUGHT. NEVER!.

And it had nothing to do with the fact that I would have been Mrs. Goon. Although that is something to think about.

It had to do with I didn't love him. I already knew who I was going to marry. I never even let Bob kiss me--in all the time we went together. And he could say a thing like that?

Really! Some people!

I just thought of something. That's probably why he kissed me in 2004. Our first kiss.

Bobs I Have Known, Part 4

2011-11-27T14:03:00.000-08:00

Robert Fine and George Carroll made an odd pair, but they were friends, almost inseparable. This was sixth grade at Washington School.

Robert was Jewish. George was not. Robert had black woolly hair. George's hair was string staight and brown.

Robert was soft, kind of flabby. George was just skinny. George had one eye that turned in a little. Robert did not. People sometimes made fun of Robert, maybe George, too, but I'm not sure.

Neither was athletic in the least way. In fact, if you get a picture in your mind of an athletic young boy, Robert was the exact opposite of that picture. Feet turned out, arms kind of flailing when he ran. George was small and perhaps not interested in sports. Maybe his eye made him so.

They had a few other things in common. Both were very smart. Both clever. Both easy laughers. Both in Miss Meister's class. Both in love with me. Go figure.

In-class behavior was more or less circumspect, although they sometimes lingered at my desk on the way back from the pencil sharpener. One at a time, of course.

At recess, they may as well have been in my pocket or glued to my side. I mean, they stayed really close.

They liked to chase me. I was not so fond of that. Such a waste of a good recess.

If I played hopscotch or four square or whatever, they were there watching, heads together, talking about me. They actually made up a language so they could talk about me and not risk my knowing what they were saying.

One phrase I heard a lot was "ugga blugga." One of them might say it and then the other might say it louder, then grin or run off. George told me later--I don't know how much later--it meant I love you.

They probably never knew it, but I loved them, too. Just not the same way.

I do not know what became of George. Robert, when last I saw him at our 30-year high school reunion, was Bob Fine, disc jockey for the dance that night and holder of a very good day job: math teacher at Santa Monica College. He wasn't still in love with me, but he was interested.

Oh Yes You Can

2011-11-26T07:47:00.000-08:00

And I'm not kidding.

This Christmas you can get the long-hoped-for Chia Obama. At least that's what I'm calling it--long-hoped-for.

Oh yes.

You Can put Obama's head on your desk or display it in some prominent place in your house. You know, to honor him.

Just spread the seeds and watch it (his hair) grow.

Here. Watch the commercial for it at
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fCiTAJi1yRk

Also available at Amazon.com and elsewhere.

Note to my Elfster friends: This is not, I repeat, NOT on my wishlist.

So There!

2011-11-25T13:36:00.000-08:00

My brother Bill (Wilford Brimley, you know) was on The Late, Late Show Wednesday night. It's a show I don't watch. Too crude and stupid. But Wednesday I watched.

I missed the first part of his appearance, came in just when Craig Ferguson had asked Wilford what kind of a horse he had.

"A brown one." Off to a good start, I thought. Exactly what I would expect from Bill. Exactly what I would want him to say.

But I found the whole interview awkward; Ferguson appeared tense. That sounds right. Bill can make a person tense with his customary one-word answers and a touch of sarcasm. All in all, though, I liked it.

Bill asked Ferguson's nationality--duh, Bill--and, when he learned it was Scottish, mentioned our grandmother Margaret Kirk. "Scottish for church," said Ferguson. Duh, Craig.

My brother looked okay, not great but okay. Less hair than when I saw him last--like in a TV commercial. But with that great mustache. When Ferguson said he could never grow a mustache like that, Bill said, "It's a gift."

I wonder about rehearsals for an appearance like that. I can't see my brother putting up with a rehearsal. I wondered how they got him to come on the show at all.

At one point--and it felt like Bill was ready to be done with the whole thing--he said to Ferguson, "You're a nice young fellow, and I've enjoyed our conversation." Condescending? Maybe. But I don't think he meant it to be.

At the end, Ferguson said, "We have three options for our guests as we come to the end of their appearance. One is to observe an awkward silence; another is to give you a mouth organ; and the third is . . ."

But I can't remember what the third was, even though Bill, who seemed not to understand the whole concept (I couldn't blame him), asked for a repeat.

"Oh. Okay. Give me the mouth organ," he said.

So Ferguson plopped down a little box and, as Bill opened it and removed the mouth organ, Ferguson said, "We offer anyone who can actually play the mouth organ a gift of the Gold Mouth Organ."

Meanwhile, Bill put the thing to his mouth and made a few weak sounds. Ugh.

Then, and this is the best part, he launched into Oh Susannah, slick as could be. And perfect.

Ferguson shouted for joy and surprise, jumped up and ran from the stage, and returned carrying something on a red velvet pillow.

The audience was loving Oh Susannah, and so was I. As Bill finished it with a nice ritard, the audience cheered, and Ferguson handed Wilford the Gold Mouth Organ.

"This is for me?"
"It is."
And Bill held it up for all to see.

Was that rehearsed? I wonder. Whatever. I really liked it.

See! He's not just an old actor with a big mustache who now does diabetes commercials. He can also play the harmonica.

Duty

2011-11-24T10:02:00.001-08:00

Yesterday I worked at the cannery--4 hours and 15 minutes. And, yes, I watched the clock.

Wouldn't you?

It's hard to stand in one place and turn pears over in the cans that are moving along a belt. Makes your back, legs, feet, shoulders, and mind sore. And if you get an itch somewhere, tough luck.

The pears are supposed to be round side up in the cans. Well, most ended up that way but many did not. Some got past me, and even got past the woman next to me, the end of the line woman.

The two young women on the other side of me were responsible for getting the pears into the cans. I thought that was easier, but it all has to be done fast.

There is no eating allowed on the line. If I thought ahead of time I might be tempted, I was wrong. And I certainly wanted nothing to do with the pear cobbler which was prepared for us workers to eat after our shift.

Here's the best part. It's over and I'm done.

Bobs, Part 3c

2011-11-23T15:51:00.000-08:00

It's a mystery to me how junior high school kids could know so much about a boy I didn't know well yet. What I knew is what I have already written, and I believe he and I thought he was my boyfriend. But know stuff they did. And there was talk.

I was never in on the talk, because I did not gather with the talkers. But word would always get to me. Someone would make sure of that.

The talk was that Bob Small already had a girlfriend, Paula Knudsen, who was about a year older than I and who also attended John Adams Junior High. I have to say that news shocked me. He certainly didn't act like he had another girlfriend. Talk also was that Paula Knudsen would "go all the way," however they might know such a thing. I probably had a hard time believing it, because I knew her. But I did begin to look at her more purposefully, trying to see that in her, I suppose.

Soon there was other talk: Because Bob was paying attention to me, because he came after school to meet me, not her, I was somehow to blame. That is, some people might have said he was two-timing Paula, but most, and especially Paula, would hate me for it and accuse me of taking him away from her. A terrible thing, apparently.

But if I took him away from her I had little to do with it. Our meeting was just as I have described it, and I never asked for any attention or affection from him.

Poor me. Innocent. And naive.

I don't know how long it took me to--what--come to my senses? Realize that a 13-year-old Mormon girl has no business keeping steady company with an older, "experienced" boy? Allow the talk and disapproval of others to influence me? Be fearful of that moment by the garage? Maybe all of the above.

Maybe Bob would one day want from me what people said he got from Paula. I'll never know. But I do know that he never even came close to suggesting it.

I also know that it had nothing to do with my mother, because I never mentioned Bob to her, and if she had ever looked out of her kitchen window and seen us holding hands by the garage, she would have been out there in a flash. I think. And my dad? Never would I mention it to him. Actually, I never had personal conversations with either of my parents. That would be another story.

I guess I just decided I wanted nothing to do with the whole thing. So I stopped seeing Bob. I don't know what I told him, but I believe I hurt his feelings. Then he stopped coming to the dances; he stopped walking me home. No use now to talk about what might have been. That's the way it was. Just over.

Bobs, Part 3b

2011-11-22T13:12:00.000-08:00

Editorial note: Because my children do not know me and likely cannot see me as anything/anyone other than their mother, these next parts may be difficult for them to read. Of course, they do not have to read them. It is difficult enough for me to write, although it is all quite innocent, just not motherly. But, hey, I was 13.

Bob Small gave me, or got from me, my first kiss. It was about 4:30 in the afternoon. We sat on the retaining wall and talked. He was holding my hands, telling me something. I wasn't listening. The way he held my hands was sending something electric and quite shocking into me. I could feel whatever it was move in my blood, but I couldn't move. I certainly could not look at him.

"Your hands look like a little boy's hands," he said.
I stared down at my hands. "They are, " I said, without knowing what I had said until he responded.
"They are?" It wasn't exactly a question, because he knew they weren't, but it startled me awake.
"Oh no. They're not." And I tried to laugh. Then I looked up, and I know now that he could see what was happening inside me. He said he wanted to kiss me.

I was terrified, but I did not say no. I think I didn't say anything. We stepped into the garage, away from my mother's kitchen window, and kissed. It was quick.

And here's the truth. I didn't know how. I don't remember if he laughed. He probably didn't, but he could have.

Bobs, Part 3a

2011-11-21T14:34:00.001-08:00

When I think of Bob Small I think of my lavender dress with the wide belt at the waist. He liked it, so did I, so did other people. Good color for me, and so on and so forth.

We met at a Saturday night dance at church. I was 13. I know, I know. But times were different then.

The night Bob came to the dance was the first time I had ever seen him, but I knew right off he was not the church dance type. The smell of cigarette smoke said so, too.

But there he was, and it was like he came looking for someone. He said he came looking for me. But I couldn't be sure of that. I'm never sure of things like that.

The fact is he headed straight for me, and throughout the whole dance he acted like I was the one person he had been looking for for a long time. Other boys asked me to dance, but when they would walk me back to the side of the hall, Bob would come over to where I was. If I went into the restroom, which is where I heard other girls talking about him, when I came out he would be waiting for me.

Bob Small was older, 18 or 19. He combed his blond hair straight back into a duck tail, turned the collar of his shirt up, and wore khaki pants, pegged. These things made a statement, and I could see a certain knowledge in his pale blue eyes. The talk about him said he was experienced, which always meant with girls, and he had been in jail.

Dangerous.

After that dance, Bob would meet me after school every day. Or, if he couldn't meet me, his friend would meet me and tell me Bob would be there tomorrow or whenever it might be. I took this behavior to be a sure sign of experience, to let the girl know. Other boys might show up or might not and never say a word about.

Normally a boy Bob's age would have a car, but it was apparently part of his probation that he could not drive. No car. That was good, safe. It meant we walked to my house, a couple of miles from school. On those long slow walks we talked, got acquainted. When we reached my house we would lean again the retaining wall near the garage and talk more.

What I learned about Bob during those times was, jail or not, he was nice, he was gentle. He did not seem criminal in any way, though I hardly know what I expected.

Bob was always polite to me and interested in what I had to say. That was clearly different. Other boys, those my age, might be polite or they might ignore you, and you never knew which to expect. Other boys liked you to listen to them. I got to be very good at that.

But Bob would ask me about myself and listen and respond and chuckle when I spoke. How could I not like him?

But then . . .

2011-11-20T17:19:00.000-08:00

Here's one other thing she said: My own grandchildren are afraid of me.

I said something about how sorry I was to hear it.

Then she said: I mean the grown up ones, not the little ones.

And we both laughed.

She still has a sense of humor.

No Denying Now

2011-11-20T12:47:00.000-08:00

"People say I'm different." That's the first thing she said.

My turn to speak. I can't see her face--we're on the phone. But I know her face, and I also know what she would like to hear from me, that she is not different.

I couldn't say it. Instead I said, "I'm different, too. We're all different. You can't get older without changing." Well, that is true, and it seemed to be good enough. She agreed with it. Maybe it was comfort enough, too.

The truth?

She is different. More different than just that growing older different. Now, all conversations are about her, how this all began, how she's doing, that people are afraid of her, the medication, etc. Same ground covered again. If I bring up a topic, we move through it quickly, but then we're back. I do not blame her for that. No one is to blame for that. And I do not mind talking about her, except that . . . it's different.

I just had a thought. Her husband is in the room as we speak. Perhaps if we could go to lunch, just the two of us, she could relax a little. I think that's part of it; she sounds not quite herself. Oh, right. That is what we're talking about here, isn't it.

But also I think on those in-person visits, when he has left to run an errand or whatever, she has been more relaxed in our conversation. I think.

I wish I knew more.

Bobs, Part 2

2011-11-18T15:23:00.000-08:00

It might have been third grade or second, we went on a field trip over to Bobby Clark's house to see his dad's motorcycle. His dad, also Bobby Clark, was a motorcycle policeman.

It was actually a very exciting thing for us, at least for me. Who didn't love a field trip? And there was something very special about knowing someone whose dad was a policeman. A motorcycle policeman, better yet. But, I mean, we were 7 or 8 years old.

Bobby and I were friends from kindergarten on. We graduated together and see each other at high school reunions. That's not very often, you know. Still friends, though.

Time was he liked me, as in "liked" me. And some people used to say things like we should go together, whatever that meant back then. You know, a friend of his would come up to me and say, "Bob likes you." Okay. I'm sure I thought it was nice. Was I supposed to do something? Sure, I liked him, but . . . And all this was before junior high even.

Some time in high school Bob Clark and Edna Cobb became a couple, which is what they are to this very minute.

Bob was athletic, smart, good looking, polite, honest. Know what I mean? A very good boy.

It's not as if we have kept in touch over the 50 years since high school, but when we see each other we know each other.

And I like him, not as in "like."

Bobs I Have Known, Part 1

2011-11-17T09:42:00.000-08:00

There was Bob Carroll, and he "liked" me in junior high. Problem: I didn't like him. Still, I was polite, and in ninth grade went out with him. Where we went I don't know. School dance probably. Some adult must have driven us to wherever it was.

The part I remember happened when we came home and sat on my front porch to talk. He did the talking. "Alyce," he said (Alyce is my first name and the name I was known by all through public school). So are you still with me?

Here is what Bob Carroll said to me.

"Alyce, you're not the best looking girl I've ever known, but there's something about you."

What is that? A compliment? A criticism? Was I supposed to be grateful? Besides, he wasn't handsome, you know. Had he taken a look at himself? No mirrors in his house?

No, I did not kiss him goodnight. Wouldn't have if he'd said I was gorgeous.

I think it wasn't long after that that I told him I couldn't go out with him any more. I said nothing of his looks.

This was in the 1950s, so such a thing on my part took some courage. At least for me it did. After all, if I wasn't so good looking, was any other boy going to find the "something about me" attractive?

I shouldn't have worried.

Twinktella

2011-11-15T06:57:00.000-08:00

Love Wiki-How, don't you. Here's today's

Love Nutella and Twinkies? How to Make a Nutella-Stuffed Twinkie

Go ahead. Try it. I don't even need to know how it turns out.

Speaking of Arms

2011-11-11T15:06:00.000-08:00

Part 1
Years ago--before Ann was married--I shared a poem with her. Written by a student, I think (Ann might remember the circumstances better than I do), it contained an image that did not work for me. A love poem, no doubt, since it spoke of "the long arms of your eyes."

That's the image. Maybe I'm too literal--see part 2--but never could that image work for me.

I talked to Ann about it. We chuckled. She decided to write a poem using that line, and I don't remember if I challenged her to do it or if she just took it on. Here's what she wrote.

The long arms of your eyes thrust
themselves at me, and I just
melt into a pool of clear
mirrority, like your eyes, dear,
whose superiority surpasses
my wildest dreams, trespasses
into my heart of hearts
and leaps across my meadows, darts
through corridors of melodious woe
that follow me wheree'er I go.
Like your eyes.

She calls it a bad poem, and it is. But it's a really good bad poem.

Part 2
Speaking of arms.
It's a poem by a fellow graduate assistant--also years ago. She wrote about a sleepy student, but her image didn't work for me. (I've used these same words to describe both poems. They are code, of course, for what I really thought.)

Describing her sleepy student she said something about "your pillow arms." I thought she asked too much of me, of any reader. What came immediately to my mind was a picture of Popeye and his arms. Now those were pillow arms.

I can't remember her name, but I remember this: We both entered a poetry contest at Boise State University. She won with the pillow arms poem. (Should I mention other factors? Maybe, but I won't.)

My poem placed 2nd. It's called Physics Lesson.

Slipping in the back door,
I see mother silent, unmoving
against father's shouting,
his voice of rushing waters,
the voice of God, calling her names.
I hide upstairs in my books,
waiting for quiet,
not wanting to see father's face,
his thin mouth, his one dark eyebrow.

After he goes out
I start down the stairs.
Mother does not move at first
then quickly ties her apron,
plunges her hands into suds water,
hums the same three-note tune
as always.

When he comes home in the night
I hear sounds,
like the sounds of unoiled machinery,
push under the crack
of their bedroom door,
and move across the hall
to my room. Is this
why she stays? Or
is some force working here?
I hold my hands over my ears
and read.

Of course, I thought mine the better poem. Of course.

I would think that.

Hooray!

2011-11-10T19:00:00.000-08:00

New carpet in family room, writing room, stairs, hall, and upstairs bathroom.

Carpet layers were four brothers and a cousin, all from Mexico. We spoke a little Spanish. They did good work. You should see the stairs. That was the hard part.

Andrew, Paul, Peter came tonight and moved the furniture and other stuff--and I do mean stuff--back. If you've been in my house, you know how much "furniture" I have in these places. Imagine all that in my living room.

Yes, I did thank them.

And, obviously, I now have use of my computer again. Three days without it showed me my dependence upon it.

Is that a good thing?

But it's about the carpet. I want everyone to come and see it. But not to step on it.

The Old Neighborhood

2011-11-03T06:57:00.000-07:00

I grew up in Santa Monica. On Ashland Avenue, 609. My friend Joe still lives on Ashland, 520. Same house he grew up in.

He sends out reports now and then. Keeps up with house renovations, changes in demographics, and trick-or-treat numbers. He sent this year's number: 15. Down two from last year.

Here is another part of this year's report.

"Back in the 50's, the enrollment at Washington Elementary school was over 400 students. [Joe and I went to Washington Elementary School from kindergarten through 6th grade. That would have been from 1945 through 1951.] Now the school, and its bridge-linked "East Campus", [sic] is closed, along with the John Muir School Elementary school at Lincoln and Ocean Park Boulevards. The remaining elementary school-aged population has been consolidated into new and smaller buildings on the site of the old army base at 5th Street and OP Boulevard. The "new" bridge over 4th Street to the "East Campus" is gone, and that facility's 6-classrooms have been leased out to a private children's school."

I don't know what private children are, but I know what Joe means.

And I love getting his reports.

Here is my reply:
"Joe,
Thank you for the report.
I was thinking of Washington School just this week and our Halloween costume parades and subsequent carnivals. Good times.

"My husband Wayne went to John Muir. He told of a terrible incident there. The kids watched, Wayne included, as their 1st grade teacher ran across Ocean Park Blvd--as they had been told not to do--and was hit by a big blue bus coming down the hill. She was killed. Not something you would easily forget."

Solemn note to end on. Nevertheless . . .

A Kinder, Cheaper Kindle

2011-11-02T14:34:00.000-07:00

If you're me--and you're not. (Okay, I know it should be if you're I, but I can't do it.)

So. If you're me, you bought a Kindle, but you don't use it as much as you think you should because after paying nearly $200 for it you hate paying more than $1.99 for a Kindle book and really believe all Kindle editions should be free.

But they're not.

If you're me, you figure if you're going to pay $13.99, or even $7.99, for a book you ought to get a book for the money. An actual book with real pages and page numbers and a cover and maybe even an illustration, although illustrations would just be gravy. It's the book. Yes, it's about the book.

My very recent email tells me that Amazon.com has sent me a list of 100 Kindle books under $3.99.

Okay. I'll look through the list. But that's still $4.00.

I Ask You

2011-10-21T07:07:00.000-07:00

Where can a person buy a good peach?

Who is growing these beautiful-on-the-outside-dry-flavorless-on-the-inside (where it counts) peaches?

What are they doing to them to make them so nasty?

For two years I bought no peaches. Even the nectarines were nasty. This year I bought one nectarine--chancy--and it was a miracle. Good, juicy, full of flavor. Hallelujah, I thought. So I bought more nectarines, all just wonderful.

I should have left it there. But no.

I went to Utah. Too late to enjoy the peaches from my sister's tree, I was recipient of her neighbor's peaches. So delicious.

I came home and bought three peaches. They were big and peach-colored and promising. They looked a lot like the ones I ate in Utah. Oh boy! I thought.

BUT NO!

I ask you, What is the deal?

huh? resolved

2011-10-19T07:22:00.000-07:00

It took 27+ minutes this morning on the phone with CableOne, but my email migration and the subsequent problems associated with it (like, I got no emails) have been fixed.

He walked me through it, step by step. And I'm not stupid, after all. He even said it was complicated. Yes, I know, that could have been to make me feel better. So? I do feel better.

I asked him, "Now, why did I need to migrate?" The new format or setup, or whatever he called it, (and I guess Google is managing it) allows me to send and receive many more messages than the old plan.

See, I don't know everything about it, in fact, not very much. But I know my email is now functioning the way I need it to. That is sufficient.

I thanked him, whatever his name was. He told me his name at the outset, but, you know, they say their names as if you already know them, but you don't. Another subject. Sorry.

huh?

2011-10-18T07:07:00.000-07:00

I have completed my email migration process.

I have read the tutorial. Well, sort of.

I have a new long password.

I don't know if I know what it all means.

All my emails now go to gmail? No, I checked. They used to, but now they don't and I can't find the page that I saw when I was migrating. They still show up on my cableone email page. So what does migration really mean?

Is this something good? Did I need it? It seemed to be mandatory. Right?

It's partly because I don't want to sit here all morning and memorize the tutorial. I mean, I read it really fast. What I come away with is the little gear symbol is important. With it I can do stuff. Do I want to? Do I need to?

Okay, so maybe technology is passing me by.

Oh well.

At least T-Mobile has nothing to do with it. Or Salt Lake airport TSA.

Everything makes me nervous these days.

And my ribs hurt today.

Misc.

2011-10-15T09:12:00.000-07:00

Aunt, gaunt. These words should rhyme. In parts of the country, particularly the South, they do rhyme. But out here in the west, where I live, aunt rhymes with can't.

The young couple across the street went out for a walk this morning. I'm glad to see it. His right arm had no sling today, but he held it close to his body with his left hand.

If someone gives you home-grown tomatoes, you have to buy bacon. Right?

Sign on a local business: Why is abbreviation such a long word?

Watch out for your ribs. They can hurt you.

In the Night Last Night

2011-10-09T11:38:00.001-07:00

I've just come from my neighbors' house, the young couple across the street. I went over to see if I could help her in any way. Just to lend neighborly support.

He answered the door. Surprised me, because he was the one on the stretcher, wrapped and strapped and loaded into the ambulance. After that, the fire engine left. After that, she came out of the house with a bag, got into their car, and followed the ambulance.

When I saw him--with his right arm in a sling--I said, "Oh." Then he told me he's fine. Sleep laundering at midnight, fell down the stairs, broke his arm, staples in his head, concussion. And he felt none of it. Remembers going to bed. Next thing he knows he is surrounded by firemen. Never walked in his sleep before.

They're fine, and thanks for my concern.

See. It's easy to tell. And it sounds pretty simple.

But when you're up at 1:30 in the morning and the lights from the fire engine and the ambulance are flashing on the walls inside your house, and it's dark, and it takes about half an hour for them to emerge from the house and another 10 minutes before the neighborhood is just dark again with no flashing lights, and you don't know what has happened in that house, and the world you live in makes you think many wild things--besides, it is the middle of the night--well, then you spend the rest of the night praying for your neighbors and feeling you need to go over and offer help.

So I did.

I'll get over it

2011-10-05T09:07:00.000-07:00

Much of last night I spent thinking about the degrading, insulting experience of going through Salt Lake airport security yesterday. I composed many-a letter in my head about the whole thing, especially about Gary Derbitch or Durbich or however it is spelled. He is TSA manager at the airport, at least in terminal 1. He had to be called in on the case. Yes, I refused to be patted down.

Gary is about 6'5" and every inch (and every one of his 280 pounds) rude. He was probably a classroom bully in his younger years.

His purpose is to intimidate and threaten. I do not know if he has the power to do what he threatened to do--put me out of the airport and make me find another way home. I believe my worst offense in his eyes was that I was not intimidated or frightened.

A few things:
1. I heard that little voice early this morning telling me not to send the letter, email, actually. They already took down every bit of information on my driver's license and boarding pass so they could "write up the case."
2. Ultimately, of course, I did comply and submit to a total body pat down--which he decided I should have because he hadn't scared me sufficiently. I submitted because he might have been able to put me out of the airport, and I couldn't take a chance.
3. I believe the scanning machine puts up images of possible explosive sites on a person's body randomly. I say it because the woman before me insisted on being scanned twice and passed the second time. I should have done that.
4. I am 71, white-haired, no doubt a terrorist.
5. A patriotic American--I love my country--one who has always voted, paid taxes, and pledged my allegiance to America, I have no rights in an airport.

At one point I said to Gary. "You know I am not carrying explosives." He replied, "That's what they said on 9/11."

Enough. You know I could go on.

Another Visit

2011-09-23T21:36:00.000-07:00

A few days ago I visited my friend in Caldwell. The one I knew so well. We had our children together, you might say. We sang together and went places together. She was my daughter's piano teacher. But all that was years ago.

That day, Tuesday, we spent three hours together and talked. Mostly about her and her condition/situation. I don't know what to call it. She has no hesitation in talking about it, seems to want to talk about it.

She has dementia or maybe early Alzheimer's. They go together.

Actually, she seems pretty good. Still has a sense of humor, still looks good. And when I asked her to play the piano for me, she did it. That is good. She does not play the way she used to, but I don't know how much she has practiced. Not enough, she said.

I don't sing the way I used to. But I never practice.

Some Chopin, some Rachmaninof. That's what she has been practicing.

She played Chopin. I was very happy to hear it, even with the occasional--"oh I'm just going to skip that part"--a gap or two and one time just lost. That moment when she was lost followed immediately upon a section she was playing beautifully and it was clear that she was really lost in the music, which was wonderful to see and hear. Then she became aware and simply couldn't find her place on the page.

She made a couple of apologies. But I thought it was great, great that she can still play.

We walked around the block--she and her husband walk four miles every day--and around the yard and ate the peaches she had cut up for us. Home grown peaches.

Fruit trees and raspberries and strawberries and a wonderful garden. Her husband takes care of all that, she says. He takes good care of her, too, she says.

Yes, she repeats herself. So do I. So do a lot of people. She does it more, I suppose you'd say.

She can't always come up with someone's name. Neither can I. But the names she struggled with were names of family members, so it is worse, I guess is the word.

She has lost her self-confidence--she used to have a lot. But it is natural she is unsure because she knows what is happening to her. She says there are gaps in her memory. She'd like to fill them. And I see some anger, too. I believe I would be angry.

It has been three days since I was there, and I have thought I should write something about it, but that has been very hard to do.

Well, here it is. At least it's recorded, so to speak.

I have remembered something she wrote to me years ago. "You and I are friends, and friends are rare." We are still friends.

You Try It

2011-09-17T09:32:00.000-07:00

This is something I have had fun with. And I include one of the several little things I wrote using words someone else gave me. It's called Bouts-Rimes. (Probably should be an accent on that e, but oh well.)

The words mean rhymed ends. It's a challenging game, really, and an exercise in writing something with an imposed poetic structure. Someone makes up the rhymed ending words for a fourteen line poem and gives the words to someone else to use in writing the poem. The original rhyme scheme was that of a Shakespearean Sonnet: abab, cdcd, efef, gg. That's the scheme I have always used.

You can create poems with meaning or nonsense poems using this form. The stranger the list of words, of course, the more challenging the game.

His Last Gift

These mountains she loved were no longer brown.

Cold, grey they stood in the day's fading light.

She was running away, away from his town,

careless of the approaching night.

If hearts truly break, hers was broken.

Tears froze in her eyes. Her lips, stone

like the cold hills, let no word be spoken,

but inside her brain, words were thrown

against walls she was building. "Lift

up your heart, my dear." His words. And under

the words, a smile of deceit--his last gift.

She drove toward the clouds, not hearing their thunder,

wondering why he had said that her kind

would never know love, except in her mind.

Today's stuff

2011-09-14T14:51:00.000-07:00

Waste not, want not. You know the saying. Not always true, like today.
I wasted not. Used my going-sour milk to make bread. Good for me. In fact, good girl.

The want not part, it has failed, because I want my bread to taste good,but it doesn't. It seems to taste a lot like sour milk--duh--a taste I've never really liked, so why did I think it would be good in homemade bread?
I don't know.
Too soon old, too late smart. That one is true.

* * *

My neighbors across the street, the young couple, are having new windows installed. As we speak, so to speak. It's an old house, but they have painted it inside and out and are trying to make it look good and be a good home. It's working. I won't mention the lawn or the dandelions.

* * *

My other across-the-street neighbors are gone, maybe for a month. Took their travel van and left. They've been trying to do that for about four years. Dying relatives have stopped them.
Anyway, Jan said I should go over and pick her tomatoes, if I want. I do. They're cherry tomatoes. She also has some nice little roma tomatoes, which I like but not as much.

Jan also said I could water, if I want, while I'm back there. So Monday I did, not that I really wanted to but that it looked like the garden needed water, and I put the hose back the way it was. Today I saw that the hose had been left not the way it was, but I couldn't see that anything had been watered. So I watered again. And so I wonder . . .

Who else is going back there to pick my tomatoes?

* * *

And, oh yeah, as of Monday, my lawn, which had seen no mushrooms, now has two huge swaths of mushrooms, like Johnny Mushroomseed stopped by Sunday night and left his gift. I hate them. There must be at least 112 of them, and they grow bigger by the hour. I hate them. I said that.

Wiki-

2011-09-12T20:29:00.001-07:00

How has this recipe today.

How to Bake Root Beer Float Cupcakes

But I'm not interested.

Finally

2011-09-11T17:23:00.000-07:00

11.

Here goes.

12.

I am a shingles blister. I have blossomed on your lower lip, but then I don’t need to tell you, do I. In case you’re wondering, I have sisters. (Clever, huh. Blister sisters.) Some have come with me now; some will appear later.

Today I am red and only slightly raised above the surface of your skin. You feel an itchiness and a mild burning sensation where I am. Ha! Wait until tomorrow, the next day, and days on end. I will cause all flesh surrounding me to redden up and burn. Soon your entire lip will feel tingly, almost like numbness, but it will not be numb, believe me. You will have constant pain accompanied by recurrent twinges of pain, although the word twinges doesn’t do justice to the intense pain you will feel—like short electric shocks.

Eventually, I will swell and fill with fluid. Itchiness will increase. In fact, I will itch until you think you cannot live unless you can scratch me. But beware. Scratching will spread the virus, bring more of my sisters, and cause me to grow larger as well. Yes, scratching will prolong and deepen my hold on your skin. And if you scratch, you will scar. Do you hear me? SCAR.

You will not sleep well because of pain. You will not rest well when awake. You will cry for pain medication, for topical medication, for some relief. But nothing you use internally or externally will be anything but transitory.

You will count days and watch them turn into weeks. You will think to be well in a month, but you will be wrong. Four months will find you up and out, but you will not be well, and your affliction will show on your face. I am on your face, and I am powerful. Never forget that.

13.

Get the picture?