Links, Blades, and Scooters

Tags

Humor, life in New Mexico, life in the foothills, short stories, the Contrariran

I’ve tried to explain that living with the Contrarian is an experience hard to describe.

It’s not for the feint of heart.

It’s not for the seriously humorless.

It’s not for your average joe-ess.

Plainly, you must be slightly off your rocker.

Since I am, it all works fine.

When I say I am off my rocker, I mean in that way that to the outside world doesn’t show, but  is only known to myself and my inner workings which are one hellofva weird chaotic mishmash of circuitry with a whole lotta cables hooked up to nothing and just there “in case”. If you get my drift that is. If not, I suggest you skip reading further and return to old issues of Cosmopolitan which are probably more your speed. (Make that Sports Illustrated if male) I was going to say Popular Mechanics, but I have no idea whether that is still published or what made some mechanics popular while others were apparently not. Could be the chest hair.

In any event, which means nothing but takes up ten letters and about an inch of space, I am married to The Contrarian, which is the prototype for all contrarians, though I don’t think anyone has ever asked for the plans.

I just thought I’d catch you up on some of his escapades, or adventures in our fair state of New Mexico, which is as they say, neither “New” nor “Mexico”, which makes it a great place to hide out as both Billy the Kid and Walter White would tell you if they were (a) still alive or (b) real.

As pointed out on previous occasions, my dearly beloved has some sort of “balance” issue, which causes him to walk while weaving like a drunken sailor, which is half right since once upon a time he was most assuredly drunk but not a sailor, wearing the insignia of the army instead of a rubber ducky. Now, he has been probed, examined, MRI’d, ear-peered at, and all the rest numerous times, only to discover that by golly-g, he has a brain and there is some sort of lesion there, which is as they say “organic” which basically means that “we have no clue and try the auto lube joint down the road”.

So to avoid having to go around the block, always leaning to the left, to get across the street, he sometimes uses a walker, which doesn’t walk at all, but rather rolls (comes with hand-brakes!). He doesn’t use it all the time, but only when the “wobblies” (as we call them) are bad. On his steady days, he runs marathons. (just kidding).

So one of his true delights has been discovering the motorized shopping cart. He loves those buggers. Not all said ve-hick-als are made the same. The K-Mart one’s are too speedy and have you racing down narrow aisles at Indy speeds, without a small enough turning circumference to make the intersection turn (think riding lawn mowers). The one’s at Lowe’s tend to run out of juice too soon, which is a real pain since that store holds about 14 football fields within it’s confines. The Walmart (we make our customers comfy so they spend more) is of course, “just right”, having  speed, dexterity, and staying power to make your shopping experience a deep pleasure.

What the Contrarian has discovered is that with the cart, and the proper expression of sadness, mixed with frustration, and a sip of melancholia, presents the perfect picture for lots of ladies to offer their assistance in getting things off the shelves. No matter than he can stand and walk almost normal, why do that when a bevy of women are there to fetch for ya. (It helps to extend the arm to it’s natural length and wiggle the fingers just a bit, and sigh of course while doing so).

Shopping has become a joy and one that he relishes each week now.

To that can be added of course the “accident” which makes him all the more helpless and pathetic.

The accident was the culmination of a lifetime spent using power tools with blades all without incident. Years of chains saws and tree toppling, slicing and dicing, and splitting all without injury. Until the “sled”. Now, I don’t know exactly what a sled is, except that it “slides”, somehow managing your piece of wood to it’s destination with the “blade”. He somehow designed it in such a way that a blind spot occurred wherein his finger resided (thumb actually), and before you know it blood was flying and he realized it was best to shut that sucker down.

Now, no animals were hurt in the making of this tale, other than the cat gut used to sew up said digit (and I think all that stuff is synthetic these days). Cats are grateful. He cut no bone, and no tendon either, just the big fat part of his thumb wherein his identity lies. Doc says that part of his thumb shall be forever no more, once the healing has finished and the dead skin is flushed. So I figure a life of crime is a good second career, since he can’t leave a print with his left thumb any more. Which makes working in a super accelerator requiring thumbprint identification impractical, or in the heart of the mountain where the big button is located that will end the world. I figure it too requires a thumbprint to make sure you have the au-thor-ity to doom the world.

Which all leads to the exceedingly boring story of what a baby men are when they have a little boo-boo. I mean seriously, the moaning never stops.

He had it checked at the hospital on Monday, and there was no infection, but he was thoroughly upset because the doctor made him “look at it”, which is akin, in his mind to making him look at two-headed snakes and other such unnatural and “icky” things.

So, I took out the trash for him, and made his breakfast (once), and open his candy bars at night. I told him he need not cook on Friday, but he said as long as I made the batter, he could probably flip a pancake. He can’t break an egg, because he can’t without both thumbs, so he says.

He pouts a lot.

He’s says it itches.

He complains that the lady nurse rewrapped it much more stupidly that the guy who did it the first time.

Diego sniffs it every day and will alert us if he finds anything worth eating in there. So far, no, and given Diego eats EVERYTHING, that’s sayin’ something.

So, I asked him, do you want bacon or sausage with his pancakes on Friday? and he said patties, which I took to mean sausage, which he meant to mean sausage but not links but patties, which makes no freakin’ sense since they both TASTE THE SAME.

And he thinks he should have a body cam so that he can play back our conversations because he is sure I asked him links or patties instead of sausage or bacon. And I’m really sure I didn’t, because I never think of patties versus links and only decided to do the links because I like Johnsonville and they don’t make patties at least as far as I saw, so that’s why I got the links in the first place.

And he just purses his lips in that way that men do when they are thinking, “I’m right, but what’s the use?”.

And I’m thinking, “You’re right, there is no use, since I’m right.”

And he’s off to get my oil changed which came out all wrong, since I don’t get oil changes but my PT Cruiser does, and he has my girl in his custody.

He wants a new bandage put on his thumb, but decided to wait until he got back, because he’s going to the “filthiest place on the planet” after all, so there is no use getting his thumb all spiffed up before THAT. And, no he was not referring to the Jiffy Lube, but rather to WalMart.

My eyes, were examined by an expert the other day, and they came off with an A+.

No wonder, all the eye-rolling I get to do living with this man. Exercise is very good for your eyes they tell me.

If you can beat any of these stories (which are true I swear with just the slightest hyperbole to make it interesting), I’ll roll my eyes for you too!

 

 

 

 

Da Hoomin Chronicles

Tags

Diego the dog, Humor, Johnny Depp, life in New Mexico, life in the foothills, short stories

Hey der, Diego heres. I’s the dog. Wellzzz, not so really on that last point.

Ya sees, mi hoomin guessed the truth. I is a re-carnation gone cablooie.

Lets me explain.

Sees, my real name is Louis as in IV and I was makin’ ready to zoom back to earth in a new personal, when that silly girl Mother Theresa, she shot me with her pea shooter just as I was standin’ next to Albert E. who was headin’ back as a geisha girl in the Playboy Mansion. Well, anyway, I fell back into his arms, and poof, it all went wrong and well, here we are together, Louis and Albert that is, in a dog suit of all things.

Believe me, it’s takin’ some getting used to.

But, I was gonna catch you all up on the doin’s here. See, I talk to Nate Silver most every day, and so I was not surprised when the nice lookin’ dude with the biggish ears won the ‘lection. Now I have had to put up with a lot from my hoomins who were worried, ‘specially the momsie one. She’s a handful I tell ya.

So we won’t have that Willard fella to kick around any more, which I kinda enjoyed in a sick sort of way. Anyways, we did goodly across the country pretty much. We got rid of Batman’s bastard son, Alan West in Florida, which is something given that that state is chock full of people who can’t remember whether they have both shoes on let alone who is running for any particular office.

We got rid of Walsh that creep in Illinois who don’t pay his child support, and we are done with the rape experts Mourdock (the name sounds right out of Harry Potter), and Akin (my brain is achin’).

Marriage equality won in all states where it was on the ballot, which will drive the insanely crazy religious right to go back to adultery to soothe their inflamed hearts and organs.

Canada is closing the borders to keep out all the crazies who swore they would head north if the President won again. I don’t blame Canadians for not wanting those types in their country.

It was a bad night for old white men. Serves ’em right.

So, anyway, I let my hoomins stay up pretty late to enjoy themselves but I got my momsie up pretty darn early to take her for her walk. Mind you, she’s not my real Momsie, since of course, hoomins are a bit lower on the umm hmm, evolutionary scale if ya’s know what I mean.

Anyway, she does good walkin’ and I let her off’in her leash most of the time. She obeys real goodly and I can trust her. When those infernal match-chines with their loud noises and hoomins sittin’ in them goes by, I put her back on her lead until it’s safe. By the looks of some of those hoomins that I sees gettin’ out of them contraptions, they could use the walk instead of riding.

I keeps me a neat and tidy house here in New Mexico, which of course is not New, but that’s history and I’m not feeling like lecturing you on that right now. I makes sure my hoomins puts away their stuff, expecially shoes, but also napkins and those funny plastic toothpicks. I grabs ’em when I sees ’em and breaks ’em all up.

My popsie hoomin’ uses lighters and I steals them too, cuz it don’t look good to blow smoke out your butt, I mean eatin’ hole. I smash them with my Jaws of Steel, and Popsie says I’m gonna light up my mouth one day, whatever that means. But he is learnin’.  Popsie also says that I am better than Fagan whatever that means.

I keeps my momsie cleaning up the place and I make sure she spends lots of time in the food room making me treats of all kinds. I likes gravy and bones, and hotdogs and bones, and peanut butter and bones, in that order.

I don’t like to go places much so I stay homes when my hoomins have to go sumplace like Texas. I don’t go there. I like to keep my mind clean. But I has my own pad that I hang out in when they go. It’s nice so I can lock myself in–keeps the monsters from gettin’ me. They is monsters I can assure you. I has it all tricked out with carpeting and water, and plenty of bones.

It’s the only time I can get any rest; taking care of hoomins is a full-time job.

So any hoo’s if’n any of you guys gets to Casablanca, stop in at the gin joint okay? That jokin’ girl Theresa, she went back there to work serving drinks and yellin’ out “play it again Sam!” Give her  a slug for a tip for me.

Don’t get me wrong, these hoomins is nice and all, I couldn’t ask for better peeps to care for, but I had other plans. I was headed back to Earth with the intention of being the love child of  movin’ pitcher star, Johnny Depp and his new squeeze. It was gonna be heaven I tell ya, before that witch Theresa hit me with the pea shooter.

Diego, signing out!

 

Not Every Reincarnation Goes By the Book

Tags

Diego, Humor, life in the foothills, New Mexico, short stories

Before you start, I know.

Everybody is most assuredly sure that their pet is the most intelligent, most adroit pet in the entire world. Nobody can match their sweet gerbil, rabbit, dog, cat, turtle or canary at tricks, cuteness, or intellectual perspicuity.

But no, really, Diego is different! HA!

Okay, he looks perfectly normal. And he acts fairly doggish most of the time. But there is something weirdly, nay, creepily human about this dog that gives pause.

I have come (in the moments of lucidity) to believe that this creature is a human trapped in a dog suit. And believe me, when you realize that, it makes you relate in a whole different way. I mean, you can hardly be childishly cooey to a grown man can you? You cannot wag you finger at a possibly elderly woman and cluck, “bad dog!”

I mean ya just can’t. You feel, and should, vaguely guilty at such condescending crap.

You see, we thought Diego was unable to speak. Other than a whimpering whine, he seemed mute. Then he developed this thing we call “the growl” which is not a growl in the sense that other dogs growl. It is no warning to “leave me be”.  No, it is a long, drawn out series of syllables that are not always at all the same and resemble something like “ohhh rah rooo rooo, rum”.

This typically happens when he comes running into the room you are in and looks up in excitement:

“Rooah, roo roo rah roo!”

You see?

He speaks in complete sentences.

I’m considering contacting a linguist to pinpoint the country or region which speaks this particular dialect. I’m looking for a translator. I figure he has more to say than “Timmy’s in the well again!” It’s probably got to do with his advice on how to bring the Palestinians and the Israelis back to the table to negotiate a two-state solution.

Okay, so we have this “dog” that talks in his own language.

So, we are sitting the other evening in the living room and Diego has taken up his post out on the patio listening to the night noises (other dogs yapping mostly) while taking a chew on his rawhide, enjoying his new comfort mat that covers the stone floor.

Suddenly we here two very sharp and very loud barks: “WOOF, WOOF!” Clear, deep, manly BARKS!

It seems our Diego does not favor the sound of a siren, which is an infrequent occurrence in our environs. The next night, another siren, and the same clear, bell-ringing sound, WOOF, WOOF!

Just two. Just enough to register his dislike of such noise.

Now this raises a whole new issue to life with Diego.

Diego is the “sweet boy” of the neighborhood. He is seldom on leash any more, and often lays in the garage doorway when the Contrarian is out sawing and sanding, and finishing and all that woodworking dovetailing thing. When Rosie, from down the street goes by, he fairly faints with happiness. When the girl across the street heads off to catch the bus, Diego runs into the street, collapses at her feet, and wiggles happily as she rubs his tummy. When anybody moves, Diego races to them and demands they feel how soft his tummy hairs are. Then he trots home, happy that he has like State Farm, “been a good neighbor.”

Diego, when confronting other dogs, is often (Rosie is a clear exception) met with howls of growling barking warning him to come no nearer lest he lose his nose and one leg. Most are little shits with no hope of success, yet they blather with a bravado which attempts to sound big. Diego calmly looks on, standing still, and sometimes even requests them to rub his tummy too.

This makes all the owners of those dogs feel down right embarrassed by their dopey belligerents, and apologize profusely for the poor manners of their canines. Diego smiles, and come home.

Now I ask you, what dog takes this kind of abuse lying down? It’s as if he is saying, “what in the world are you fools yapping about. You smell and I wanna get a closer whiff. No doubt if you would shut up long enough to check, you might like to take a whiff of my equipment too.” Then he shrugs and goes on his way.

He does the same thing to those dogs we find at the far reaches of our walk who sometimes greet us from their pens with slathering threats. He stares, and then shrugs, and then moves back to the scent he was on in the first place.

He doesn’t bark by choice.

This is not a dog.

This is a guy who  KNOWS he’s been reincarnated in a dog.

Trouble is, I don’t know how okay he is with it.

He seems okay with it. He wiggles and kisses a lot. He comes at you and throws himself in your arms and then looks up at you with tender affection, surely saying “I’m really cute aren’t I?”

If you know of a translator, let me know. I’m getting a bit nervous. I just went to the patio and a bunch of stones, surrounded by four disemboweled unstuffed animals,  seemed oddly scattered in a pattern that looked an awful lot like MED SCH. Diego looked up at me and smiled.

Boy, I guess we better start saving for college.

 

Oh Paulie Come Wash My Clean Pots and Pans!

Tags

Election 2012, fact and fiction, Humor, Paul Ryan, satire, short stories

In the best tradition of the privileged and  entitled, Paulie “lyin’ Ryan stopped in at a local soup kitchen. He hoped you all would notice. He made sure to wait for the media to get along with the cameras and such just in case they feel the need to show Merika what a fine and compassionate dude our Paulie really was.

Problem was that Paulie waited so long for the media types to git there, that all those creepy icky, sometimes smelly poor people had already been served and headed out mostly. So Paulie, said, “shucks, I didn’t know they ate at noon! We usually have cocktails at 1 and a Cobb salad (hold the ham, hold the cheese) at 1:30. But I can wash some dishes! Oh, all washed? Well dang, well no one will ever know, give me a pan and washing thingie and let’s get those pictures!”

I few minutes later, Paulie was seen directing his handlers to a guy walking slowly down the hallway. “Hey, he looks like a homeless man, that jacket is definitely not this season’s Ralph Lauren!” Whereupon the gentleman was stopped and urged to come talk to the next Vice President. “Vice President of what?” the man growled.

Whereupon Paulie, strode up careful to not touch anything that might be infested with crawling insects, and said,

“Hey dude, how’s it going? I’m Paul Ryan,  running mate of Mitt Romney!”

“Huh, Gloves? I don’t need no gloves, not yet anyhow. Still pretty warm. Hey what’s with all the lights? I know my rights, are you the police? I want a lawyer.”

“Nobody here to arrest you my good man. Can you tell me what it’s like to not have your own bed to sleep in? Are you cold at night? Must be hard to keep up with episodes of Masterpiece Theatre huh? Do they have big screens in the shelter?”

“Ya got a buck man? I could use a smoke?”

“Smoke? No. Bad for your health man. Do you work out? I work out. You probably saw the pictures of me, pretty buff don’t you think?”

“Well a buck then for some coffee? Anything will help.”

“Oh sorry man, I don’t carry money with me. Why do you need money? The shelter has a bed for ya, and this kitchen feeds ya. I mean what else do you  need. Oh, wait, I can see by the look of them teeth, that you could probably use a new toothbrush–where do you keep it dude? in your pocket?”

“Are you nuts? Get away from me you fucker, and take your damn lights. Who are all those guys standing there with microphones? “HEY, what you lookin’ at?”

“Whoa, easy now guy. Well nice talking to you. I feel your pain and all that. Vote Romney, Ryan!”

That was the conversation you didn’t hear, because Paulie’s handlers kinda knew it would go about as it went. But hey the media saw him actually speaking conversationally with a bona fide poor person. And he washed a pot in a bona fide soup kitchen. Mission accomplished!

It’s all about appearances ya know. It’s only about appearances.

My dirty pots are waitin’ for ya Paulie. I also got some doggy poo in the back yard that needs picking up.

 

Related articles

• Why Ryan would wash a clean pot (maddowblog.msnbc.com)
• BUSTED: Charity Prez Objects To Ryan’s Soup Kitchen Photo Op (occupytvstations.com)
• We Tried To Remain Non-Political But How Far Is Too Far? (eagleradio97.wordpress.com)
• Paul Ryan’s Compassionate Conservatism (crooksandliars.com)
• Paul Ryan Busted For Staged Photo-Op At Soup Kitchen Where He Pretended To Wash Dishes (businessinsider.com)
• Paul Ryan washes clean dishes in cynical soup kitchen photo op (tv.msnbc.com)
• Paul Ryan Scrubs Already Washed Soup-Kitchen Pots Because That’s How Much He Cares (nymag.com)
• Ryan Accused of ‘Barging’ Into Kitchen (abcnews.go.com)
• No soup for you: Ryan makes unauthorized stop at soup kitchen (timesunion.com)
• Ohio Photo Op Flop: Paul Ryan Pretends to Wash Already Clean Pot in Empty Homeless Shelter (pensitoreview.com)

Ugh, Is It Another M-Word Day?

Tags

Humor, life in the foothills, New Mexico, short stories

One of our friendly bloggers had the mendacity, yes I mean it, mendacity to say that since he was retired he liked Mondays as the best day of the week.

Nay I say, Nay, that is mendacious and wrong-headed. Monday shall forever remain the worst possible day in the week. To give it up to another poor day would be akin to giving up on the idea that the earth is flat—wait, a minute, I think I’m confused.

You see what Monday does to a person?

If you had not noticed, I’m a morning person. I’m also what’s known as a double front loader. Of course you know what that means. No? Living in some cave or something?

All the best people are double front loaders. It’s true. I swear. Here are the rules for being a double front loader. But I warn you, the requirements are very tough and only the strongest of you can ever hope to attain this high plane of existence. So if you can’t do it, don’t feel bad, you are in the pathetic majority. *SMIRK*

1. You must get up early in the morning. Every morning. Without fail. Trust me you cannot be a double front loader and lay around until daylight. You will never get out of bed if you say, sleep until 7 or 8 in the morning. You will give up and jellify in bed, requiring to be fed by a tube and watching old re-runs of Mayberry RFD. Get up! I start my day at between 5:30 and 5:45, depending on who wakes who up. Diego is proving to be a good clock with a fine sense of time. His whine and tinkling toenails on the wood laminate would wake the dead.
2. You must sort out your day immediately into the things you want to do and the things you MUST do. Must do is not peeing and brushing your teeth. Must do are the nagging things that one OUGHT to do and therefore MUST be done in order to maintain a reasonable level of comfort. DFL-people do NOT eat dessert first, and do not put off the laundry to read the next chapter in a great book. The TO-DO list is mandatory doing before anything frivolous, even eating! Eating, reading, play of any kind, are REWARDS to be dangled enticing before the synapses promising a rich thirteen minutes of pure bliss at the end of a long grueling day of SHOULDING/MUSTING.
3. You must front load your week as well. So the worst of the Should/Must list MUST be done on the first couple of days of the week and as the week progresses, the should/musts get milder and more quickly accomplished, and less awful.
   It all leads to the crescendo of Friday and the glorious weekend!

Still with me?

See this is all very important to one’s state of mind. In other words, if you don’t do this stuff this way, you will flippin’ go out of your expansive grey matter and dissolve into a puddle of disjointed robotic movements that repeat themselves indefinitely with no apparent point.

So.

So?

Well it’s rather obvious isn’t it?

MONDAY cannot be a great day. It cannot be a good day. It cannot be an even day. It’s the day from hell, because you have placed all the worst things you must do on its shoulders and guess what? It’s pretty much gotta be done by noon. Or close to it.

My Monday so far has consisted of walking the dog 2.3 miles through the cold desert air, whereupon he pulled me forward as if I were a sled  and he were a Malamute traversing the frozen tundra. That is, he did so, until he had to stop to smell in detail that amazing bush, and that amazing pile of dog/coyote poo, nose that bug, leap in ecstasy at a trail of horse poo trailing down the middle of the lane, or stop and stare down the pit bulls who snarl menacingly on the OTHER side of a fence that looks none too sturdy while he prances and sends dog signal “I’m out here and you’re in there, and I am walking where I want to” all sung to a doggie-singsong gurgling growl.

This is followed by getting home, and immediately letting him out the backdoor where he can leave his poo, because he realizes that I enjoy picking it up twice a week. So he leaves lots and because you know, it’s all about keeping our “natural places pristine!”

This is followed by getting out my newly-made-for-me cleaning cart where I can pack all my brooms, dusters, clothes, cleaners of various kinds, hand vac–all with casters to push it and a handle to guide it. Now I don’t just get to push that baby around, I get to use the stuff on it to actually CLEAN things. And I get to do it with a smile on my face because I am so lucky as to have a hubbster that would make me one of these contraptions to make my cleaning experience top of the line.

Following all this stuff, and hours later, I’m ready to clean up the poo, only to discover that there is a hole in my plastic bag, and my fingers have touched some still-fresh poo, as opposed to my more favored type, the hard-dried poo. Diego of course supervises this event, all with appropriate commentary about the quality, size and location of each piece.

Then I cleaned out the wastebaskets, the one’s at least that Diego hasn’t “cleaned” out first, showing me his work all over the library rug. He tears paper brilliantly before you ask.

I still have a few more minutes before I get to get started making that gourmet meal. I’m writing this. A Should/Like–sorta of shouldy, but also sorta likey.

What is the Contrarian doing all this time? Oh, reading the paper, checking out the Internet, and playing with his new toys–routers and saws and bits and shop vacs and sanders and crap like that.  He is not a DFL. Makes me bloody pissy.

I suppose lots of interesting political things are happening. But frankly, I don’t have time. It’s Monday.

 

Workers of the Household–UNITE!

Tags

Humor, life in the foothills, New Mexico, short stories

Somebody in our house didn’t get the memo. It was not me. Alas, I must confess, that like many people in this country, I long ago came to view Labor Day as the last hurrah of summer, and that continues into retirement. Some things do not change, any more than the vague grumpiness that accompanies every Monday, even though I no longer work (outside the home).

Inside the home is a different story, and, since I don’t think it’s much of a holiday (though I deeply respect the moving force behind the economy–workers), and it was Monday after all, I decided to put shoulder to the plow mop and carry on carrying on.

So we started the day as usual with our 2 1/3 mile jaunt through the Chihuahan desert. I was in the midst of taking a picture of the dawning rays of sunlight, when I heard a howling to my left and looked up to see one of the now common hunting dogs moving like a mountain lion was on its tail.  I feared it had been hit by a rattler, when I saw its companion running hell-bent for Purina alongside him/her/or neutered it.

In that split second, I shifted my view a few yards ahead (a lot of yards actually) and spied a rabbit hippity-hopping its way to safety. It had a substantial lead. It crossed in front of us, and as I had dropped the leash in order to focus my attention on my camera work, Diego spied the rabbit and made a break for it. A stern NO brought him to a screeching halt and he meekly returned to my side. This of course only fueled the thinking of where he had come from. It’s a rare dog that responds to a command that instantaneously against such a powerful inducement.

So after than mildly amusing incident, we returned home. Now the dog lounged and the Contrarian tinkered with spray painting a chair, while I dug into the housework which consists on Monday of “doing” the floors and dusting the house. Doing the floors used to be easy before said Diego started dropping bits of hair hither and yon and tearing apart every toy that he receives into micro-pieces for our enjoyment.

So I dust mopped, then I tried the latest (try 5th installment) of some damn shit that will make my laminate fake wood colored cherry bedroom floor look shiny and bright. Everything looks good until it dries then it looks dull and streaky. Dust mopping, or moping which is just as good an explanation of how I feel when I do it, only works so-so. The dusties float and you end up swiping at them in the air, which makes everyone run for cover.

I got an area rug for the library which looks forlorn and bare (the library that is), and looks better with the 5 x  7 + rug, and so I went out to the garage to finally haul in the vacuum cleaner (which we had no need for before, but would now, just not right now, but next week and I thought I would put it into the closet). So, as I’m pushing that in, I realize it’s the old vacuum and it works like crap and we apparently left the good one in Iowa. The things you screw up when you are packing!

So, I finished, after seventeen hours of back-breaking elbow greasing labor (solidarity!), and it’s on to the next task of the day which is to make a poppy-seed chiffon cake with cream cheese frosting. The thing was I was going to make it Saturday, but I didn’t for some reason which I can no longer remember, then I was going to make it Sunday, but decided not to because we were going to Lowe’s to pick up a chaise lounge and the aforementioned rug.

The reason this cake thing was such a pain, was that the poppy seeds were supposed to be soaked overnight. Now that raises the spectre of what exactly “over night” means. Is that 8 hours? 10? 12? Certainly not any more right? Thus based upon the things I had to do, I didn’t want to over soak the damned seeds. (which cause a false positive on a drug test, should you be headed for one–fair warning. Which I used as a defense once upon a time which caused the judge to laugh his ass off and give my client a break on his supposed “violation” but that is an entirely different story and it happened 4 states back in my past.)

So I got that damn cake made, but I was grumpy by now, so you can imagine the fun I had making chile rellenos for dinner which require that you roast the chiles, cool the chiles, remove the blackened skin of the chiles, slit the chiles, remove the seeds and membranes without damaging the chiles, stuff the chiles with cheese, roll the chiles in flour, dip the chiles in partially beaten egg whites to which you have added the yolks and carefully folded them in so as not to “deflate” the whites, and then fried the chiles, all without breaking them, letting the cheese fall out, or burning the hell out of them. Then you removed them from the oil, place the chiles in a baking dish, slather then with salsa verde, which you saved three chiles for, then cover them with cheese and bake them until bubbly. Got that?

So like at 6 pm, I am making the damn cream cheese frosting, and putting away the dishes, and (SOLIDARITY FOREVER) I feel like I celebrated LABOR DAY as well as could be expected GIVEN I’M FREAKIN’ RETIRED AND SUPPOSED TO BE SITTIN’ ON MY ASS ENJOYING LIFE!

So, how was your day?

I’m Bad, Oh I Am So Bad

Tags

Humor, life in the foothills, New Mexico, rattlesnakes, short stories

Every day but one, my day starts the same–I go out into the desert and test my courage against the wild creatures that inhabit it.

I do this with a certain fatalism I admit, for sooner or later the odds will catch up with me, but I’m a cheery sort, so I whistle Dixie in the hopes that that will confuse them.

Anyway. . .

I was walking on the home stretch, a bit before 7 am, on a mostly cloudy day, with the rays of the sun having just topped the summit of a peak in the Organ mountain chain. I had given up on the Dixie melody and switched to a catchy Beatles tune from the 1980’s. I was groovin’ to the Pandora-picked selection and not thinking about much of all except that I was gonna love the feel of the pool, later that morning.

When. . . .

I came to a screeching halt. I mean my tennis-shoed footsies actually slid to an audible halt. Ignoring the niceties of game protocol, I did not say “mother may I” before taking two giant steps backward.

I looked down and out at a sly and wily creature who flicked his tongue seductively at me, but nary moved a muscle (if indeed such demons have muscles). No clicking of rattles were to be discerned either, though I can not be sure, since my ear pods stayed securely in place while John crooned about things I could imagine. (I of course had a few things he could imagine too at that point.)

I stood perfectly quiet, and amazed myself, feeling neither the warm wetness indicating I had peed myself, nor oddly, my throat was not raw from an animalistic primal scream either. My heart was thumping a bit unnaturally, but heck that happens a lot at my age, so I paid it no attention.

We eyed each other in a knowing way, sure that we had met in other universes in other time eras. While he bore no resemblance to any relative of mine, alive or dead, one can never be too sure about these things.

He spoke not a word but went straight to his work. . . .oh wait that’s something else again. No he remained so quiet that I feared he might have passed on from the sheer joy of beholding a human for the first time in its life.

I figured we could stand around all day, or I could do the polite thing and grant him the right-of-way. Or her, it could well have been a her, but I had not the stomach for rolling her over to determine if a vagina was in sight.

I tipped my hat, and sidled gently to the right for about three nautical miles, or until I could smell the Gulf coast, and proceeded upon my way. I was not prepared to grant any greater right-of-way, even though etiquette might suggest that I had not given enough ground.

She/or he, did not bother to shrug. When I resumed the road, I could just see it, still in the road, basking it seemed in the first rays of sunlight.

Now you may think this made up, but I can assure you, I have no such imagination. It’s the God’s honest truth (does God have dishonest truth?), I swear.

No doubt any New Mexican who had witnessed my encounter would doff his/her hat to me, as a native-born. I was that good.

It was only when I arrived home, locking the door behind me, that I began to call for my mommy.

When this epic adventure is made into a blockbuster film, I’d like Angeline Jolie to play me. It’s cuz we look so similar of course.