October 1, 2019

Yesteryear
One year ago today: October 1, 2018, the ideal radio voice.
Five years ago today: October 1, 2014, except the tribal aspects.
Nine years ago today: October 1, 2010, clearing the print queue.
Random years ago today: October 1, 2004, where is October , 2004?

           Yep, time to change pharmacies. Here I am, a day later, waiting for my one-hour service. That lady who took over from the Russian guy has undergone some acute personality change. She was a bit of a babe and now an almost complete bitch. Trouble at home, is my guess. No, lady, you did not tell me to phone the prescription in 48 hours in advance because I would have told you I don’t have a phone. (I do not give out my number to medical people because their offices leak like sieves.) Checking my records they have not had a prescription ready in an hour for me since early 2018. This time, their excuse was no inventory of a very common pill and had to order it overnight from Orlando. If so, they are changing the system to be convenient for them and not for the customer. I won’t say millenialized as I know how the truth offends those people.

           Some conflict in the records now means I have to stick around another day. So, I drove to the coffee shop on Dixie Hwy and began reading what is almost a good novel, “Book of the Dead”. No, I’m not into hieroglyphics, this is a paperback co-authored by Preston and Child. A bit of an interesting twist on the curse of the mummy’s tomb and the criminal mastermind. Well-written but fails on character bloat. Over 40 names to memorize in the first 100 pages, and new characters still cropping up beyond page 250, where I quit for the day.
           I maintain authors who do this are hoping for movie rights. I’ll let you figure out the connection, and why they tend to choose weird or hard-to-remember names. I call it the “Hannibal Lecter Effect”. Here’s an ornamental tree from Hawaii. This is at the Pinecrest Library. Florida is America’s official home for invasive species.

Picture of the day.
Balloon bird.
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           This is your blog treat for the day, mostly for my longest-term people. Remember the triple-wide, Wally’s Folly? I drove through the area today to look at the development. Whoever owns the old trailer court is holding out for their price. The old grounds of the casino are being replaced by strip malls. The old Frenchie flea market is long gone. It was too hot to tour the place, so you get drive-by videos. The place is cleaned up a lot, about the condition it would have been in so many years ago if Wally had kept his word. Except I can’t imagine what the place would be rented for, using my cabin as an example of hard work.

           There is some records mix-up with my medical records, and of course, who gets stuck? I have to wait another day. So, JZ, who will drive across town if the beer is a nickel less a glass, suggests we go to Corbett’s. I don’t like that place because the Karaoke jockey bumps. That’s the place that told me I’m third, but meant I’m third unless somebody pays him to bump. If you recall, I walked out. Anyway, there is a rumor that Hooligan’s is open again. I doubt it, once those old married-couple watering holes lose their clientele, they never recover. But that’s when I heard they had country music.
           It took some strong-arming, but I got JZ to head over. Yep, it’s country, called “Little Hoolies” and Tuesday is line-dancing night. We stayed until midnight, what a riot. Allow me to explain that even though I’ll never again get what I want, I still prefer to go to a place full of active, happy people. This joint was full of gorgeous babes in blue jeans. What a show on that dance floor. As usual, there was one above and beyond the rest. Blue eyes, natural pout, beautiful hair past her waist, and wearing low-cut jeans. The one I’d be after in my prime. Completely outclassed the room but I can’t describe her shape because, well, look what they’ve made illegal in the past few years. Soon, merely looking will be a crime. Even if they are all nothing but a bunch of little hoolies.

           Let’s just say if they were not scrupulously checking everybody’s ID, she did not look like she could get in there. Mind you, later in the night, she went squeezing between the tables and brushed against my back. I turned to see and was surprised because she was not at all as firm as she looked from a distance. A bit mushy, actually. For the first time in history, JZ finally agreed with me that it is better to spend more on drinks and go to a fun place. Beer prices are not the product to go shopping over. Plus, it is walking distance from his condo.
           Later, another call-back means they want more blood samples, so I won’t get out of this town until late Wednesday if I’m lucky. It’s a record hot spell, enough to get the climate change people wagging their fingers. These trips remind me of how bad Miami traffic is, how it takes twice as long to get anywhere as planned. Thinking I’d be out and back in one day, I didn’t pack a lot of gear. I bought groceries and baked a “yuge” tray of chicken. That’s the events of this day. Oh yeah, we talked about treasure hunting a bit. His family knows the Fishers of deep-sea fame. JZ is versed on maritime law and I still have the idea of a seabed crawler than can metal-detect a grid by GPS control.

ADDENDUM
           This is your typical scene of Dixie Highway in South Miami on a nothing weekday night. Contrast this with bumper to bumper chaos just a few hours earlier. We had thought to zip over to my bank maybe thirty blocks away only to get caught in traffic so thick it was easier to park across the highway and use the pedestrian walk.

           That was not fun in the afternoon heat, another 99 & 99. That’s 99° & 99% humidity. The picture is later, after dark, looking northward across Dixie toward Dadeland shopping plaza. The area has become an attraction for today’s college crowd, those who borrow enough to rent condos. In my day, most poor students rented rooms, something I had never liked. I wonder if the old student loan housing trick still works. I’ve told you about that, but it justifies saying again. This was common when I was in university.

           The student loan is tax free until after graduation, nearly four years. Usually a male student, his parents put a down payment on a four bedroom fixer upper near campus with a ten-year mortgage. He takes out a student loan which includes an allowance for rent. (Both methods work, sometimes the student loan was the down payment, or back then, the price of the house if you borrowed to the max.) Or he uses this tax-free money to make the mortgage payments. The other three rooms he rents out for cash to campus babes, using the unreported rent (very common back then) as his spending money. Most guys who got anywhere with campus women got it this way. The others, myself an exception, never got any, simple as that.
           Seven years later, the house has doubled in value, the first half of the mortgage is nearly paid, and sonny gets a fancy job. He now has the option to take over the house or flip it for one massive (by comparison) head start in life. There is a little more to it, but that is the idea. As you have guessed, when I suggested the same plan to my parents, they went bohunk. “We never heard anything so stupid in our who-o-o-o-le life.” That much turned out downright to be once they were telling the truth.

Last Laugh