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| Life in Des Moines, Iowa, circa the last day of May, 2009 |
| 05.31.09 (10:24 am) [edit] |
Good morning Boys and Girls.The day has just begun, and yet, already this morning I have witnessed both war AND peace. I was in the back yard here at SweetLady's an hour or so ago, sitting; relaxing; enjoying a morning cup of coffee in the glider. The weather is about as good as one could ever hope for. About 70 degrees, with the sun just having risen above the rooftop of the house next door. Her back yard rises from the house about ten feet to the fence between her yard and the one behind it, and the woman who owns the house back there has her yard done up in a tree garden fashion; truly beautiful. A retired school teacher, she works out there part of each day, even, as I discovered a few days ago, in the rain, and she's turned the yard into a showplace. A few feet from the fence on her side, she has a set of two bird feeders hanging from a wrought iron doohickey obviously specifically fabricated for its purpose, and this morning, as I sat, I watched finches, tiny black birds of some sort, cardinals and robins merrily taking turns having breakfast there. When things became too crowded, they'd each fly back to sit atop the fence and patiently wait 'til a spot opened up, then back they'd go to have some more. Their pleasant morning songs filled the air, and I sat and watched for a good ten or fifteen minutes - long enough for me to have come in to get a second cup. -A nice way to start the day; that is - before the enemy showed up. An evil presence appeared out of the sky and with a shrill voice, wrecked the feast for everyone. He was vicious, vindictive and selfish and thought nothing of getting in the way and chasing off every other little birdie soul with his annoying squawk and penchant for lashing out. It was sad. A single Blue-jay. I hate Blue-jays. Within two seconds, all the other birds - a good dozen or more - had either left altogether, or had made their way to the top of the fence, staring now at the thief who not only stole the food, but wrecked the peace for them AND me. Now those birds who'd chosen to wait out the pilferer on the fence made a whole different kind of noise, complaining loudly about the unfairness of the situation, and, to my mind at least, with good reason. I had a good mind to find a stone, or to come in and get SweetLady's son's BB gun. I've never shot at a bird, but I think I could - the bastard. Then, pretty SweetLady appeared from the side door, and I forgot about the war, other than to mention it to her a few minutes later as something she'd missed. Now, as we let our eyes go toward the fence, the Jay was gone, and a few birds; a smaller number now; were back at it, chomping away, and all was right with the world - at least here in her back yard. Right now, she's printing out her clarinet music for church. I think I'll go back outside a while, have another cup of coffee, and praise God in my own way, enjoying the world he's provided. (She, of course, thinks I'm nuts, which, of course, I probably am.) Be good to everyone. |
| A free day... |
| 05.16.09 (9:32 am) [edit] |
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Good morning Boys and Girls. Sweetlady's here for the weekend, and of course, she made it here at least an hour faster than I ever make the trip. She's a beautiful woman, but I'm quite sure her right foot is deformed badly. It looks just fine, but I'll bet it must weigh at least fifty pounds. It the only possibility I can think of that explains her ability to get her trusty mini-van up to a hundred miles an hour in five seconds flat. How it is she never gets pulled over is one of the great mysteries of the Universe. Maybe the cops already know they'd never end up giving her a ticket - once she flashes her smile and charms them a bit - so they don't waste their time in the first place. She'll still asleep, so right now I'm trying to decide what to suggest we do today once she's up and about. I didn't make any plans, since her trip was a spur of the moment decision. It's quite a drive for a weekend. At least when I go there, I get to spend a week or so before I come home. She'll have to leave by about nine tomorrow morning in order to be home by six p.m. when the kids' Dad will drop them off, meaning she'll have been in the car about eighteen hours in order to spend just over a full day here. Maybe we should go see a movie. We've only seem a couple together in the eighteen months we've been together. In fact, it seems we hardly every do "date" stuff, cuz life gets in the way. I suppose we could hit one of the museums here in town. I've lived here three years and have never been inside any of them. Good ex-roomie Dot told me she took one of her nieces to the Gerald Ford Presidential museum a few weeks ago, a place I've walked by on numerous occasions, but never had any real interest in walking through. She's said she felt the same way about it and was pleasantly surprised how many interesting things were on display there, including a sixty foot long, completely furnished replica of the White House. Might be interesting... The Art Museum just moved into a new and much larger facility about a year ago, and I haven't been there either. Wonder if SL might be interested in that? -Or maybe if it clears up a bit outside, I'll drag her to a golf course to give it a go. We went to a driving range last week in Des Moines, and by the time she'd hit most a medium bucket of balls, she was hitting pretty good. Or maybe we'll just hang out here and do nothing but relax. I know we're going to attempt making sushi tonight, something I've never done. She loves the stuff; thinks sushi is "comfort food", but she's never tried making it either, so that'll be fun. Hope it's edible! I suppose if I was a nice guy, instead of writing this post, I'd be making her breakfast... Hmmm. Decisions, decisions, decisions... Be good to everyone. |
| I'll do it tomorrow.... Maybe... |
| 05.14.09 (7:42 am) [edit] |
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Good morning Boys and Girls. For six years now, I've used this little emac as my primary desktop. It's been incredibly dependable and I've come to love the thing. Alas, it's started to lag big-time mainly due to the fact that I've almost completely filled the hard drive, something I didn't think would ever be possible when I bought it. After all, 40 gigs is a lot of stuff, even today, and since 90 percent of my time, when on this puter, is spent writing, and the entirety of my output in my entire life couldn't be anywhere near a tenth of a a gig - if that - I couldn't envision ever filling the hard drive. But, the other ten percent of my computer time is spent loading music, pictures and video which DOES take up a bunch of space, and has, by now, forced me to start removing old stuff before I add new. A year or so ago I bought a new mac and set it up upstairs with the intention of eventually transferring all my crap from this computer to that one, what with it's new operating system and larger hard drive. Unfortunately, I haven't done it yet, partially due to my crazy travel schedule, and partially because of my own propensity to be a bit lazy at night when I'd actually have time to do it. I figured that when the time came, and I was forced to deal with the situation, I would. Well, the time has come. In fact, the time came a couple of months ago, but I've yet to make the switch. In fact, AuntConi has used the new one far more than I have to play her nightly games of Literati with her sister when she visits, since it happens to be set up in the bedroom she uses when she's here. So, here's the thing. I also have a powerbook I've taken back and forth to Iowa with me the past year and a half. It happened to get wet at SweetLady's a month or so ago - the second time that's happened, though at least this time it wasn't caused by my own carelessness. Now it's at my repair guru's ALONG with my new "upstairs" mac, which Repair Guru Rick asked me to bring to him along with the powerbbok so he'd have a place to to transfer my files from the laptop if it's unrepairable - which he's afraid it is, or at least he doesn't think it'll be worth it to fix it. And, because of his schedule, I'm unlikely to have use of either of my other macs for at least another couple of weeks, leaving me to deal with this old warhorse and the annoying lags. (Even as I typed this last sentence, the letters showed up on the screen a full five or six seconds after I pushed the keys.... Grrrr.) I've been annoyed with this situation since I got home Monday night. Worse, I'm very aware it's my own fault the situation exists - which, of course, makes it all the more annoying. I done per'crastinated - and now I'm paying for it - (as I richly deserve). Don't you just hate justice? Be good to everyone. |
| We didn't start the fire... |
| 05.12.09 (8:02 am) [edit] |
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Good morning Boys and Girls. Got home from Iowa last night about 9:00 Michigan time. I always feel like I've missed the world's turning when I'm out there. No one in the household has any interest in the news, and I'm usually too busy to sit and pay attention myself anyway, unless it's late at night, at which point I tend to fall asleep before I get the gist of anything, so this morning I've been glued to the TV trying to catch up a little. So far, I've managed to see a couple of clips of Dick Cheney making a few more of his sour grapes comments on one of the Sunday morning talk shows, and I see Miss California has decided that Satan was behind the question that derailed her quest to become Miss U.S.A. God, evidently, told her to "stand up for him" but failed to suggest she state her opinion persuasively and/or with the least bit of class. Wonder why God didn't tell her that her use of the term "opposite marriage" made her sound goofy? -Probably because God didn't have any more to do with the answer than Satan did with the question, despite the apparent sycophantic glee James Dobson experienced during his interview with her on his radio show. The Pope is in the middle east visiting sites sacred to Christians Jews and Muslims alike. A U.S. Sargent killed five other soldiers at a counseling center in Baghdad after having earlier being disarmed. Evidently he returned with another weapon and carried out his murders. That elderly retired Ohio factory worker long suspected of being a guard at one of the Nazi death camps during WWII is now in Munich to stand trial. He still maintains his innocence, claiming he was a Red Army soldier who was captured and held prisoner till the war ended. Another week of excitement... Be good to everyone. |
Cost of the War in Iraq
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American Deaths in Iraq:
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