July 30, 2006

           The day did not turn out as planned, JZ and I did not get out on a boat for a little fishing. That is only the fiftieth time or so we never made it. I drove over an hour before noon and we pretty much decided we didn’t have the energy on such a day. A hot day, although not unusual for summertime in these parts.

           We drove over to his dad’s place to drop of some flashlights visit a little bit. Those palm trees he took out of the north hedge have come back again. Anyone who tells you that palms need to grow in sunlight from a coconut should try to explain how these ones come back after the roots have been dug to a depth of over a foot. Plus that black olive tree we trimmed in the spring is back with a vengeance. JZ does not like the tree, his dad does.

           I’m uncommitted but I think it is too close to the house for a tree that can grow that fast. JPZ is walking toward the tree across the front lawn. We cut nearly half those branches off not four months ago. The folks informed me JZ did have a bicycle but they are unaware it got confiscated by the city because he chained his security lock to a handicapped parking signpost. Nobody knew that was illegal. I had thrown my bike in the car in case he was not home. The backup plan was to cruise the neighborhood.

           Instead we rented some videos, I chose “The Cave” and he got some obscure but new work about British, American, German and renegade soldiers trying to heist some stolen Dutch paintings due to be shipped to Berlin. It hopped all over the place with around thirty characters in undefined roles and a corresponding number of sub-plots. “The Cave”, however, was an adventure classic with all the ingredients. Such as the twenty-five year old brunette doctor who is a world famous expert and the tough cool black guy typecast for the part.

           The premise is an encounter with a parasitic life form that evolved in a cave in Carpathia. It evolves by adapting the host to survive in the cave. I warned people twenty years ago that "Alien" was going to be a hard act to follow. There was a clever implied connection to old legends of dragons. I liked it.
           That is it. We sat around watching movies, our usual Sunday pastime when there is nothing to do. He made chicken breasts with barbeque sauce and I kept the coffee on and made popcorn. John is the only American I know who does not drink coffee. Good, more for me. He said he tried some of that dollar store coffee. That stuff is bad enough to make anybody quit. I rank it way down there with Folger’s and dishwater. So really, I got nothing done today. If the objective was to slow down, then it was a success.