The Sweet Sense of Later

Why does the internet seem so much more interesting when I have something else to do? I'm doing my research to decide about my character analysis for my writing class, but all of the sudden, as I try to decide if I'm going to do a real person or a fictional character, everything else seems so much more crucial. Do I really care how much fat is in a hamburger from Chili's versus some other giant chain restaurant when I don't even eat hamburgers and I stay away from chain restaurants? Do I really need to know if opposites attract or just pretend they do? Must I dwell on the cat nursing the puppies or the dumbest criminal in Philadelphia who mugs a cop in a bathroom stall in a hotel full of cops at a convention?

I mean, these are interesting items but two days ago when my assignment deadline wasn't looming, the same - pardon me - crap was out there and it wasn't nearly as interesting as it's been tonight.

I'm thinking Atticus Finch, because I love "To Kill a Mockingbird" but that's a little obvious. Maybe one of the more obscure fictional characters would be more intriguing. Or I could just do one about myself, and why, or how, procrastination seems to make my life more endearing to me. No, that's autobiography, that's next semester, if I stay with the program.

I do like having something to look forward to. Maybe it's that simple. Selma Rae says we should plan a vacation. But with the floorboards creaking in the fifth and sixth steps the way they are, I think we need to spend our hard earned money on more practical items.

The Maxiverse

The haiku got an A! Roberta (instructor) said she loved the content, but had to also grade on its structure and how well I stuck to the concept of a haiku, which is it's sort of a riddle, the punch line, or last line, pulling it all together. She said she had to think about mine because the fact that she lost five thousand dollars in one day on a stock market account made her want to give me the A "without using any of my critical thinking skills at all!" She'd bought tabletops. She thought that was a pretty safe investment, tables always being necessary. Turns out they may be necessary, but they are very commonly outsourced - well a combination of outsourcing and importing for manufacture, but more lately, just stuck together in China and brought over here on a slow boat and sold cheap.

So, first assignment and I got an A. I'm glad I went back to school. It's much easier when there's a little wisdom behind the curiosity! Now I'm getting cocky. Next assignment is a character analysis. I can choose fiction or someone from real life. Thinking about it til Saturday. Then I start writing.

It's not like I hang around fixing things and going to classes at the community college. I have a job - I just don't feel certain how much of my personal information I'd like to divulge on this thing, so I'm just sharing what comes up. Okay, I'm censoring myself a little, but this is the maxiverse, so I think a little thought should go into the presentations. Maxiverse. Hey: I made a clever joke. I think I'll use it for the title of this entry so it's copyrighted!

Economy Haiku

I'm taking a writing class at the community college. Here's the haiku I wrote for an assignment. I don't know what my grade is yet.

Greedy CEO's
calculators set on stun:
economy wrecked.

-MM

Decisive Hinges

Hinges are fascinating things. Hinges open doors. People give credit to the doorknob, or the foot in the door, or the presence of anything on the other side of a door that opens it, but really, what determines whether or not a door will open? Hinges.

Without hinges a door is a prop, a plank, a board, which, without working hinges, is an obstacle. You might be able to move it out of the way, but it's not as easy as opening a door.

I like the expression that this or that "hinges" on a decision. That's the kind of decision that makes or breaks a possibility. Hinges need to be even and well adjusted. A good decision hinges on the same things.

In Good Repair

Selma Rae made fruit preserves. They're orange. Marmalade. Had me singing in my head that Pointer Sisters song all day. They were ready by dinner. She put most of 'em in to jars for - well they're preserves, but we had some with dinner and so she made biscuits. Not the kind you break out of the tube, but with flour and baking powder which it turns out is different than baking soda, and eggs and salt and butter and delicious!

We were old fashioned today. She cooked, I was the handy man. I fixed the doggie door. It was stuck on in. If Childress goes out, the flap shuts after him, but if he comes in, the flap stays up. This invites the racoons. The oranges had been boiling down on the stove all night and Selma Rae got up about 4 and turned off the stove so they could cool, and when we got up at six we had two raccoons.

Our timing getting up was luckier than lucky, because as one raccoon innocently drank out of Childress' water bowl, the other was up on the counter, whipping his little hand at the edge of the lid to the pot (still hot) and about to knock it off. If she'd knocked off the lid the next move would've been to knock the pot to the floor.

Instead, I yelled, "get outa there!" and Childress sprung to his feet growling as his claws tried to grip on the linoleum and barking when he got traction he chased those racoons to that doggie door and the first one hit the flap that was sticking horizontal into the kitchen and the second one hit the first one and they tumbled and scrambled a little and Childress, well he didn't really want to catch 'em so he stood there barking at 'em. He was scolding those racoons for missing the target but he kept his eyes on the racoons and turned his head toward me like to say, "When are you gonna fix that dog door?" Childress wouldn't be the kind of dog who would say "doggie."

The racoons got their bearings and slip-skulked through the doggie door and ran off and Childress ducked his head out the dog door standing wide stanced in the kitchen and barked a few more choice phrases then he hopped outside to go pee.

So today I fixed the flap on the dog door which meant replacing a few springs and a bolt and I had 'em in the garage and Selma Rae put the marmalade in jars and we had mashed potatoes and string beans and salmon for dinner and biscuits butter and with fresh, delicious slightly bitter, sweet marmalade. So I said to Selma Rae, "Voulez vous couche avec moi, c'est sois?" and she said, "Oh you know I love it when you fix things!"

Man as Fighter

I haven't said my age yet but I'll tell you now I'm fifty six. As a man gets older, he mellows some, but he's still got fight in him, if he's lucky. I'm lucky. Now I'm not a squabbler, much. And I'm not a complainer, much. But sometimes I just need to run ragged on some such or other. I can't help it - it's like the involuntary reflexes of my youthful exuberance have metamorphosized into a need to rail about something from time to time. I found out today I'm talk radio's favorite demographic.

And it pisses me off.

I need to fix something. Now I know why I put off fixing that gate last winter. I needed it to look forward to.