June 3, 2023

Yesteryear
One year ago today: June 3, 2022, so many like this . . .
Five years ago today: June 3, 2018, suspending in oil.
Nine years ago today: June 3, 2014, because it is difficult.
Random years ago today: June 3, 2013, show me the printer.

           News from back at the cabin. Growing season was double this year and my yard is knee-high in weeds. That means my birdfeeders are empty. The Reb got in around ten, by which point I had already been working in the yard for a few hours. There is a huge intertwining of non-social “stuff” when we are both at work. This can ignore the doggies, who get feeling neglected and the big doggie shoved her near the porch door, causing a nasty tumble. But what can you do? I piled them in the van and made a quick shopping trip. I do not like Tennessee prices. This whole trip has been busy and yet I have not gone to the post office box or checked the business account. Work expands.

           My bank (I have a commercial account) is half-way to Nashville, so I took the doggies again, they have learned there are three fans inside the van and share accordingly. We stopped at the plantation, or that’s what I call the place on Old Lebanon Pike out near Donelson. It’s got acres of lawn, but we no longer bother with the museum part. Over the past few years they’ve changed the presentation into a big slavery issue. The place as still being farmed in the 1940s, but them bastards are on this kick that slavery is the only damn thing that ever happened there. It’s disgusting.

           This picture represents a bit of the situation with the Reb and I. We were simply apart for so long that I find myself identifying with what this photos shows. Things are quiet and peaceful, as long as everybody has things mostly to their liking. The doggie is getting in years and just wants to be left alone for long hours. The cat now outweighs him and can easily bat him around which he seems to know. That’s why I call this picture “An Uneasy Truce”. When the doggie lies down, he gets a cat curling up whether he likes it or not. He knows there is no place to hide and knows better than to object. He will not try to climb over the cat. He’s aware that sooner or later that’s my reading spot and I’ll shoo them both on their way.

           The Reb is aware of my predilection for Fridays off when I have no gig and I was subconsciously moping around the house. Out, she said, out for a Saturday, which thank you, is exactly what I did.. No women and all that, because I went to Shooters. Like my chances there of meeting Taylor are about nearly her chances of meeting some hero. Consider it complete trust in a voluntary format. Our relationship is not complicated.

And I’ll tell you a bit about why I do not like doing business with non-Whites. Because to them the sign on the door (business hours) means little. They act like all the losers you met back in grade school. So they closed early, they never asked you to take an hour off work and drive 30 miles to get there before closing. You should be smarter than that, you know, appreciate the Spanish way of how business hours work. I mean, look what a sheer financial powerhouse Spain and its colonies turned out.

Picture of the day.
Home made variable capacitor
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           At mid-afternoon I zipped over to the library. Funny, there were no Afro-Cuban-posse types pounding on the drums this time. The library also attracts dumpy older women who are not very good at it but will go along with any form of virtue signaling. My new camcorder battery arrived but the camera itself is aging rapidly, it’s a process to keep it working. Here is a view of the finished product of an evening of letter-writing, the lost art. Our decision not to go out for dinner means quieter items like letters take the lead. There are four letters here, I’m reminded when I was a kid I liked to write. (My family, “What are you doing?” Me, “Writing a personal letter.” My family, “Neat, who’s it too and what’s it about?”)

           {Author’s note: now I got to thinking, you might find that funny. But don't fancy yourself clever. The reality is much more crude. You had to be ready with a cover story. You cannot refuse to tell them because that’s what “personal” means. If you refused to tell, you’ll find things go wrong for you very quickly. Your mail disappears, you stop getting phone messages, etc. I mean, if that’s the way you want to be, why should they do things for you? They’re not your slave.
           And you thought my line about "designing a chicken coop" was of recent origin?]

           Where was I? Writing. I also called the latest guitar player, but no response. He has a concept of a larger band, but with clearly no experience in what’s involved with that. There’s a chance, but usually people with pre-conceived notions are not partial to reality. The time to play in a band for free and for fun is your teens. The odds of finding three or four adults who just like to jam are nearly zero, although there is always tons of talk about that. I’ve seen it once in Polk, over at Bradford’s six years ago. And that went nowhere. I don’t report most jams or when I stand in just for a couple tunes, but now that I think about it, the rest of them never even get that far.
           My latest song list has no definitive “new country” tunes. Going over it with the Reb, she notes that it is not defined as radio material. She means my list has a more “country pop” feel than a bunch of twangy love songs or that crap on the radio. Crap? Yeah, I refer to it as “cliché chanting”. Find some dumb old saying, write a chorus, then go back and make up some verses. She’s right, the component of “pop” is a leaning toward near-country music like Dwight Yoakum and an avoidance of that disco-feel coming out of Tampa these days.

           This was a great visit, a lot got done. I’m quick to associate what gets accomplished as a big component of what is fun. The Reb is what I’d call conducive to this, in contrast to so many other women I’ve known who find so many things a chore. Instead, chores around here are more visiting, take a peek at the Reb working the mower that took me ten minutes to start. Try that with some women, guys.
           She also reports the doggies miss my baking. I suppose it’s possible. I tend to bake more than I can consume and I’m catching on to gluten-free. I’m more cakes and muffins than bread but the aromas are similar and the doggies do tend to sleep nearby when I’ve got the oven working. Since I also bake chicken, maybe they are just associating. What do you think? Can pets miss the scent of things like pies that they don’t eat?

ADDENDUM
           My book on the Pacific is still in focus. The chapter on native islanders is, I think, largely based on elaborate storytelling, which seems to be their major historical tradition. While they point out somebody went ahead of the crowd and took coconuts and chickens to many of the islands, the islands were mostly uninhabitable without these items. And nothing explains the 1500 year gap between the first wave and second wave of migrants. It was their navigation, how they found these tiny specks in the ocean, that both interests and bores me. Huh?
           It’s fascinating how they did it, but stop and think. They had no precision instruments. So I went over what little material I found on the process. It’s primitive, so much so that I wonder if it’s factual. The story goes that they could read the signs. Things floating in the water, the flight of birds, cloud formations, and underwater light flashes. While I don’t dispute that, I won’t bother learning it because such methods take a long lifetime to get any good at. What makes more sense is their use of an imaginary island as a reference point. That part I could believe, but I’ve seen how big that ocean is. And they never talk about anybody getting lost.

Last Laugh

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