Today is a long entry, but let me quote Alexander Graham Bell who said something to the effect, “Make me work at anything, it doesn’t matter what, as long as I am accomplishing something.”
This is my birthday dinner this year, and verification my new camera blurs anything closer than three feet. And I do like to get closer than three feet to really good food. Yes, I was over in South Miami, where I bumped into the family at St. Jude’s. This was my meetup with Alaine and also the dry run for Xmas this year in case I don’t have my own transportation. We only had a few hours so we shopped for groceries and headed back to her place. Gals, I like to help with the cooking.We made this meal, I mashed up the guacamole from half an avocado the size of a small pumpkin. I did not know they grew them that big, we wound up giving [the other] half to the neighbor. Alaine and I get along so well when working together that we just naturally head for the kitchen as everybody else headed for the TV room. I've known lots of women like that, and besides, kitchens are for friends. She is a great cook, which is augmented by her knowledge of food and spices I’ve never seen. Like this miniature orange pepper called a “Scottish” something, a true slow burn. Yes, I read her cookbooks.
I met JP outside the church for just a few minutes. He’s reminded that we have a trip to the Keys planned if things go right next week or so. It must be a family thing how we never sit around and do nothing, hence the quote above. He didn’t make it for my dinner, so it was Alaine and I. One should remember through (and probably above) all that Alaine and I are quite dissimilar people with sometimes opposing life experiences. Our association has always been amazingly positive for two people from different schools.
Here is something probably deeper than anything she and I talked about, but you be careful to keep separate what I describe, for not everything was spoken, which makes it iffy for me to report it. A lot of this is therefore opinion. As we entered the grocery store, Alaine casually introduced me to the check out lady. Then we split up and covered the store, Alaine shops with coupons, I shop with a list. As we exited the store, I am informed the check out lady told Alaine she thought I was nice, which swelled into the following discussion.
Alaine proceeds to tell me what a wonderful person the clerk is, and that I should get to know her. But I have no intention of doing any such thing and I do not tolerate passive flirtations when I’m with one woman. It just isn’t done, my good man. (Unless that woman is Marion and we are working as a team.) Here [I am about to write] are the pros and cons, reaching no conclusion, but it giving insight into how our individualities tend to mesh. To me, the lady saying I was “nice” was a first impression, a compliment taken in context between two people who met for less than five seconds.
To Alaine, this is a signal the check out gal likes me and my not wanting to pursue it means a potential hurtful letdown. See the two avenues? To me, adult women are people first and female second. I do not enter into relationships that have to be worked at. Doing so is just plain dumb. And with that clerk, there was no spark, nothing. I’m neither glad nor sorry it was not there, but certainly it was not. Alaine wants to tell her I felt we lived too far apart, but I felt nobody should have to tell anybody anything. How can I "let down" somebody I haven't really met.
After all, we did not meet long enough to exchange any emotions so I don’t feel any explanations are in order. (Besides, what if in the future I don’t live far away?) There is also the aspect of internal spirit. A gal who stands a chance with me needs a practical adult way of making the approach. After a certain age, ladies, a second-hand “nice” is not anywhere near the level of precociousness required to get me interested.
This often brings up the accusation that men only want a beauty queen. That’s not true, but that doesn’t mean I would rule one out, either. I mean I personally have no reason to abandon hope, do I? Attractiveness is very important on any level. It if isn’t there, the only person who’s ever said it could be created out of nothing was Ann Landers. I grasp the tendency for women not wanting to appear desperate, but when you are over 50 and still single, you should know the distinction between being aggressive and assertive.
Here is Alaine in the kitchen, stirring the rice. The fact is if this new clerk had offered me her phone number, I would have turned it down. Not my type. Here’s where you can think in a circle. If that woman had taken the lead and hit on me, she would not have worried if I thought she was a tramp because she would be strong enough know she was not and what is she doing hitting on men dumb enough to get it wrong in the first place? That situation is roundabout but it does not confuse me in the least. Women who think others are supposed to pick up on “nice” should also be perceptive enough pick up on “not my type”. And that's pure logic to me.Last, the fact is that I don’t much caught on to sentimentality in older women. If she is so sensitive that she can’t deal with a simple thing like a guy meeting her and not asking her out, she would never survive in my world. It has nothing to do with lack of consideration, but I need a woman who knows it’s a jungle out there and can fend for herself on all the trivial and petty issues. Ladies, if you meet the man of your dreams and all you can muster up is a “nice”, you must be 18 years old with your sights set low.
By coincidence, I had been reading about teenagers. I finished the Clancy book “Net Force” and he is really making a play for the movies. One of the subplots he used is the stereotyped but all too common teenage boy fumbling in front of teenage girl. I have an opinion on that. Clancy builds sexual tension by describing the raging hormones when Belladonna brushes up against the geek during her computer lesson. Don’t get me wrong, I understand the roles.
But I never went through that phase myself, and I think it is probably wrong that teenage boys have to endure it most of the time. I early discovered music, so I didn’t have to go insane looking at the babes, or dreaming about them, or indulging in who knows what fantasies. But I know most guys don’t get a thing between puberty and years later. Of course, the babes think the desperation phase is perfectly fine, and I suppose I would too if the situation was reversed.
My own two brothers were the losers at that game. Mind you, they were a couple of "stupid assholes" so I never clued them in, which was evil in a way, but nor was cluing them in my job. I never intended them to turn out twisted over it. They did anyway and it serves them right. It is sad that so many young men are not trained to succeed with women and fall victim to all the little games and advertising campaigns, you know what I mean. They are horny, they think it is love and they make serious bad decisions far before they are old enough to consider the consequences. When I say bad decisions, among the worst is to marry the first girl you ever poink. That is plain stupid, unless you really are stupid and don’t mind spending the rest of your life wondering.
I tend to focus on the practical. If an older woman flicks her hair on me, I’m likely to get out of her way. That behavior isn’t age appropriate. Some could say I missed the era of sexual mystery in my life. Nonsense, a quick glance around shows that so-called mystery is a ten-minute illusion and I know more people trapped in loveless marriages than you do. It is a little disappointing to read Clancy as he pursues that angle. He seems to know a lot about being turned down. His earlier work imparted inside knowledge and super-believable plots. I’m not so sure anymore.
Divorced people and Russian spies play big in his books. Why can’t any of his heroes be Samoan or happily single? Why are they always consumed by unrequited love, office romances, and unappreciative offspring? It is bad enough all his antagonists are masters of disguise, but now he drags in the teenage lust angle. Hey, Clancy, it takes one to know one. I just don’t identify with guys who got a late start.
Clancy is also, at least in his books, an advocate of the arbitrary search. I am on the other side. Not only should files only be used for the purpose given, if the results are negative, the files should be destroyed. Clancy portrays warrantless searches as a Utopia. If he is serious, I hope to hear what tune he whistles one day after a moment’s indiscretion, a policeman recognizes him and Clancy becomes another celebrity bust. (Innocence cost OJ $8 million.)
Being part of the informed minority, I sometimes defend my viewpoint. In Clancy’s book, DNA is collected at the crime scene and matched against banks of files. Great, except for the fact the American Constitution forbids this type of search. The founders recognized the danger of a police state. In my book, such databanks would be outlawed, for I doubt any person would ever give information willingly if he was aware of the potential for abuse: that one day his childhood email could be used to profile him for a conviction.
In my world, one could only become a suspect via active, not passive, investigation. It is a matter of understanding that nothing, repeat nothing, should ever be “evidence” before any crime is committed. In other words, it is the crime that creates evidence, not some bureaucrat in D.C. In my opinion, that is why I like the British law which requires the establishment motive. No motive, no suspect.
When based on a warrant that named that person as a suspect, he would be required to give a sample under full knowledge if the results were negative, the sample would be destroyed. But keeping storage lockers of people’s personal data on file since birth is a clear violation of freedom. The whole point of liberty is civil law people willingly obey. When they are forced to obey, it is called prohibition, which encourages general public lawlessness, which leads to where America is today.
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