Today in mild lysdexia

This small Pennsylvania school wants to be the Notre Dame of escorts (NOPE)

Kim Jong Un rides white horse on scared mountain – and plans ‘great operation’ (NOPE)

Your wrist

That scene
in Pippin.
Where Catherine sings paeans
to the arch of his foot.

In high school, that was illuminating
and silly...
and I liked it and laughed at it,
though not because
I understood.

Today
the picture of you
Your face is always visible from its place
but today
I saw only the line of your wrist
and for a moment
it was unfamiliar
wrong
but I stopped, I looked at it
and was reassured.

Your wrist is elegant. As are your fingers.
Long and lean, immaculate, powerful.

Your wrist.
I miss it.
It held me once.

Missed.

Just this for now ...

Thought

I am a living binary of faith and skepticism.

Nope, still not posting ...

... still not writing either. Sigh.

But tonight, I pulled up Over the Edge to watch, and this woke up one of the happier memory parts of my brain.

Cheap Trick is OSUM, man.



But (... for now ...) that is all.

See you some time soon though, fella babies. I can't stay shut up for but so long.

Random Title

Mis-reading a sentence at lunch today, I came across a phrase that made my brain think, "The Chance of War" and I thought, ooh, neat, using chance in both its senses would make a cool title for an interesting story.

But I'm not going to, which is a shame, because I have such trouble coming up with titles for the things I *do* write.

So it's free for anyone who likes it. Have fun!

Hiya

For the dwindling few who read this blog - and I'm not actually sure about any readers at all, save one (hi, Cute Shoes!) - it is perhaps apparent I haven't had much to say here, or even just link here, in the past couple of months. There actually are some Draft posts I thought were in the works, but which are ageing and getting no attention. And there is one post on my mind, but which I have not sat down to write. The key words to remind me what I want to say haven't faded from mind (a good sign), but that's not progress.

Yep, family has had my attention. When someone spends close to eight years dying on you, it can come to absorb the focus off and on. Crises even arise; and yet, bizarrely, nothing seems to happen. If this seems a contradictory statement, please understand that you are blessed; for those who understand, my prayers will be with you.

Work, too, got hairy there for some months. At this point, that's neither excuse for not writing (which is fine, as I have been - at least, some) nor not cropping up here, so I'm not sure it signifies. It's just one of the usual excuses we see from writers online.

The house is fine, as far as that goes. And Penelope and Gossamer are SPLENDID, which goes very far indeed.

Weather has been a bummer. Far from six more weeks of winter, it seems to me what Punxsutawney Phil gifted us this year was just six more weeks of RAIN, or at the very least, grim weather indeed. This is not to say it's been cold. Far from it, we've had alternating temps from the 70s to the 40s for weeks, which is almost worse than extended cold, because (a) people have sinuses, thank you, and (b) it's not a pleasanter day when the rain goes from "dank" to "muggy" in twelve hours, sinks back, and then swells again, over and over. One hardly knows what to wear out the door. But, more than anything, the unrelenting DRAB of it all is wearing.

I candidly admit, recent years of drought - given the privilege of an unstinting clean water supply - seemed to me, if nothing else, *prettier* than this by comparison. Okay, maybe unrelentingly heated, particularly a few years back when 100+ got to be too frequent in summertime. Sure, I wished we had rain then. But this isn't normal either, it's not the natural seasonal barter present in the Piedmont/just-shy-of-Tidewater region.

There comes a time in every season, when they behave normally (my memory is long), when you look at your rows or hangers or what-have-you of sweaters and stylish, warm coats and things, and think, "Ahh, yes, it will be good when springtime comes" and you remember the way it feels not to have to lug out a load of outerwear just to walk outside. Or when you are hot and sweaty, look at the endless sleeveless tops and things, and think how cozy a turtleneck will be, some starry evening soon while you contemplate holidays.

What we have right now, though, is more despairing and less sparing. It's been a pitiless year for many - the storms a SUMMER ago in Puerto Rico still have not been dealt with, and here we are on the brink of another storm season. Knowing how much worse than merely "grim" the weather has been for so many, it's out of proportion for me to complain.

Still, the depression of weather becomes the low-pressure system in life itself. A winter's slog, family time stolen by illness, smaller celebrations dragged wanly through rainstorms, the hundred things not even bothered with under leaden skies. The constraint upon enthusiasm or enterprise.

Blogs fall by the wayside.

But I haven't forgotten this place is here, even if there IS nobody really reading these days. One assumes people have better things to do, too - goodness, I certainly hope so. I'm only even here myself, prattling a bit while some electronic business tediously feeds itself slowly to fruition while I wait for it.

Stay tuned for me to actually *have* anything to say. It'll be more poetic, and even contain actual substance.

Hoping all my readers, (Reider and otherwise) are well and coming through winter with loved ones, inspiration, and outlooks all intact.

Barbarity

We use the word Barbarian to presume ourselves better.

It's all about ourselves.

Aside

Ran across the following phrase today, and realized I haven't done an "aside" post in a VERY long time. This rates it:

thoroughly half-baked

Okay, carry on.

Muaaaahahahahahaaaaaaa!!!!!!

Bufforty

It's weird. Being 49 doesn't wig me out, but my age in comparison to others is what gets me sometimes. Years ago, with Daniel Craig's first Bond outing: finding out I was several weeks older than James Bond gave me a turn. That one's still some cognitive dissonance for me.

Finding out today that Sarah Michelle Gellar is turning FORTY. Well. I pretty much can't deal with this at all.

Buffy indeed lives.
Image: Wikipedia, duh.

Thank heavens Tony Head is still older than I. It's the little things.

Quote

Even if the good old days never existed, the fact that we can conceive of such a world is, in fact, an affirmation of the human spirit. That the imagination of man is capable of creating the myth of a more open, more generous time is not a sign of our folly.
— Orson Welles

States Rights and Wrongs

Today is the 156th anniversary of the first secession leading to the American Civil War.

Even I cannot be facetious enough to call this a happy anniversary.

But it is a good and right thing to remember.

LL Cool R

One of the reasons I love old movies is the truly bizarre things you can find in them.

Ricardo Montalban, in Latin Lovers, is a bit of a surprise to those of us who grew up knowing him from Fantasy Island; perhaps less so for those whose formative experience of his work was as the original, inimitable Khan Noonien Singh.

As he romances Lana Turner in this movie, he is one of the wittiest and most attractive men I've ever seen on screen. For anyone who likes that sort of thing, I'd give this a high recommendation!

Stats

204,444 page views, according to Blogger. (Which, by the way, tonight began SPAMMING my comments on really old posts ... am I the only one?)

Now, I know Bloggers stats are utter tripe, but I do love a nice line of four fours in a row. #FakeAccomplishments

79

We miss you, dad.

Richard Nixon's Phlebitis

Dena Pawling has a great blog not only reviewing a lot of books, but throwing around some of the legal facts of life, often to amusing effect. We have her to thank for this link.

Well worth a click should you need a laugh at the expense of a super-rich sexual harasser in his undies. Right now, I can tell you, this was a much needed distraction for ME.

Fair warning, though: there IS a photo of the plaintiff in said (black ...) underpants. Pure comedy black gold. But worse to behold even than a man in black socks and mandals.

In Other Positivity ...

... Janet Reid has offered herself up as a Redshirt for her community of writerly fans. Now, that's giving.

Life is Ghastly.

So.

I proffer this instead of the short story inspired by events in the life of someone I care about a lot, because it would be ghastly of ME to let that thing write itself, and because it's not even my own story. Yet.

This pup is chosen in tribute to the GOOD things happening in the lives of some OTHER people I care about a lot. Who recently adopted a little blond of their own (this is not she). Plus, I really do feel this is like my Penelope, 1/60 scale. Which is adorable.

Searches

Today's search strings: Diane Major death and Diane Major obituary.

Sorry: still breathing. I don't do it especially well, but I haven't quit yet.