No St. Patrick’s Day parade picture. I never made it. By noon I was still repairing gear when I got calls to appear on the beach and a 4:00 PM paid gig. Really, I had my heart set on seeing that parade. All my gear is set up here so I won’t have time. My bass cut out on stage after I thought I’d fixed the jack. (We finished playing the song, faking it all the way, proving again this show is far from music only.) That’s the part that Teresa is finding so amusing, and understands why I originally thought she could be playing rhythm guitar by now. It turns out she gets stage fright, something she forgot to mention until after her guitar lesson. Women.It took nearly an hour to go to the beach and back, a total of just under three miles. Mostly bad traffic and drawbridges. Every third set of plates is from Quebec, with that slogan “Je me souviens” or something similar that nobody knows what it means. The party was a birthday for Pat up at Jimbos, and they had around 50 pounds of food, all of which I could not touch. I didn’t get the call until after I had already made a huge breakfast (French toast with all the trimmings.) Too bad I missed it, they had cabbage rolls.
Speaking of diets, Pudding-Tat is going to have to go on rations. According to the vet chart, she is getting too much. I know even well-fed cats whine like they are starving but I have to learn it is an instinct, not hunger. I feel sympathy but I’m going to have to view it like these stories you hear of people who are a hundred pounds overweight but feel famished all the time. Trivia for today, I learned that cats cannot taste anything sweet. They don’t have the correct type of taste buds. So now explain all those cat treats for sale at the pet store.
I’m into another book of short mystery stories, this time about a troupe of actors who are also smugglers. Everybody should read plenty of these tales before deciding to write. They expose the predictable aspects of mediocre writing, and while a large part of writing is necessarily repetitious, there are things new authors should avoid. There is no reference list so it all has to be learned the hard way. Mystery writing lets the reader examine how a variety of authors have dealt with cranking out material. Some stories I read are so cheesy it hurts, especially the versions of how the cops operate. You almost want to tell these people that television is probably not a good place to get your notions.
I’d like to record another fact. Electricity is an expensive utility in Florida. There is no real basis for comparison such as square-footage because many buildings are poorly insulated. I did identify a trend that is useful. Electric costs around $2 per day per person in the winter, and $2.50 per person per day in the summer. I don’t think enough people factor in this cost because every time I go to pay the bill, the clerk asks if I want to pay all of it, duh.
This last month my electric was $58 despite being careful. I have not used the air-conditioner in over a month. FPL raised the prices when gas was expensive a year back and did not lower it afterward, a trick so old for a moment there I thought I was in Canada.
A progress report on “The Sopranos”. I’m beginning season four and the authors have kept up the momentum and character development. No doubt watching the series again and again would reveal plenty of missed items. Too bad it is only coincidence I have time between when I started and the 23rd of this month to finish as much as I can. One disturbingly realistic aspect is how well the authors portray the police as cause of own misery. One side blackmails, the other side plea bargains. Don’t whine that your enemy operates undercover when you are doing the same. Quite the series, you should watch it.
