One year ago today: August 18, 2015, astronaut pay.
Five years ago today: August 18, 2011, all music philosphy.
Nine years ago today: August 18, 2007, cat psychiatrists?
Random years ago today: August 18, 2012, Marion’s house, Aurora, CO.
MORNING
There’s no way I can be the only person who notices that people who don’t have enough money also have a different set of priorities. One of those is waiting until we are due on the road before stopping to put new tires on the car. “It’ll only take twenty minutes.” Yeah, per tire. We finally got on the road and headed toward Lakeland around 11:00AM. This is the first time Agt. M has seen the area and the first time he has driven out on the open highway in around ten years. This makes it a holiday, since I know all the stops and thrift stores along the way.
Georgia pines, long-needle pines, real forests and green everywhere. And the relative wealth of the countryside, where every ranch is a rich survivor. There are no small ranches left, no sharecroppers. The big outfits have long since absorbed all the smallholdings into massive acreages with millions in farm equipment.
Same microphones I use.
NOON
Most Floridians never see this sight. It is an orchard killed by the citrus blight. I don’t know if you can see much, but the dead trees are visible in this car window shot. The leaves gradually drop off until the tree is dead. This shows a single row of dead trees, but there are countless acres of this devastation. In the background, you can see newly planted trees, which I believe have been converted from orange groves to peaches. I heard peaches were more resistant and are they a citrus fruit? Don’t ask me.
We off loaded the car into the house and shed. Of course, he absolutely goes from thinking the place is a shack to asking if I have left it to anybody in my will. Yep, young feller, long gone. And sorry, this was the last bargain in Florida. Ah, now everybody is saying they wished they’d helped me look back in the day.
Since he was so taken by the area, I showed him around which of kind of bragging rights. Everything here is simply build to a better and higher standard than Miami. The Florida coastal areas were mosquito swamps until the Interstates were built. So where everything in Miami is maximum fifty years old, there are lots of hundred year old houses and farms in the interior.
Somebody should tell me the term for this effect. The simplest robot design impels you to look at it fifty different ways before moving, and another fifty variants on that. This always carries over into real life. And that’s what’s happening here. Two brains better than one, so I’m waiting for him to get inspired and design my new kitchen.
He’s convinced the floor is two inches out. No way, you would not be able to stand on it. (Oddly, the floor, warped as it is, does not creak.) Hence, it was out for an extended coffee break where we completely went over the potential for the new laser level. This is where teamwork pays off. He is focused on what the laser can do, I’m more concerned with what we will do with the laser. It was really on my own I developed an operational plan.
And I based that plan on a disproven theory of how the Egyptians kept the pyramids level. The old tale goes that they flooded the layer, and drained water slowly. Each “high spot” was chiseled down until flatness was achieved. I adapted this idea to the laser, on paper. Neither of us has used such a device before.
NIGHT
Ha, since Agt. M habitually speeds, we arrived in record time, allowing for three stops instead of two. Long before we arrived in the Lakeland area, Agt. M is envious of the place. Me, I had to move, I was growing old and nothing else in Miami. I’m not looking for constant party time any more, and I’m well-past the age where you even bother pretending to be young any more. Not so with M, he actually took a break and went to the local pub to meet women. And meet them he did, three of them.
To be fair, there was a good-looking gal of my type in the place, but within moments it was easy to spot she had some screws loose. Agt. M says in that case, just get a screwdriver, but I’m not keen on head cases. Too much damage that needs un-doing.
So while he wasted time and money (he got nowhere, whereas I will give up at almost any point that I meet nonsense or artificial resistance), so I spent the time listening to country on the juke box. And sketching out the plan to use that laser level. Don’t hold your breath. One of my conclusions was to no buy the device before end of the month or at least not right now.
A few women bushed against me enough to look up and smile, but nothing I’d move on. There was a blonde babe at the end of the counter who spent minutes of each hour swirling her locks into a ponytail, but I correctly surmised she was teasing the boys. There was no live entertainment and I still managed to spend $38.
Last Laugh
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