Dish 2

Evening cries turned to late night cries turned to overnight cries turned to very early morning cries turned to all day cries. Maggie's preferred way of dealing with her fallout from anesthesia and surgery was to pace constantly. From bedroom to hallway to dining room to living room to kitchen. To trip outside for any number of attempted potties, all failures as far as this reporter can verify. The learning curve for driving the dish around was loud and slow. Her drugged stupor combined with her natural stupor lead to a number of stalls. "Oh, I'm stuck on the corner of the bed. Can't go forward, left or right. Not smart enough to consider reverse. Oh well, guess I'll stand here and cry. Cry." Roundabout two this afternoon she was back to her normal neurotic self and seems more or less at peace with the collar. It is a razor sharp weapon, though, and all ankles and knees in the house are on high alert. So the first twenty four hours were not the best, but she now accepts being in her cage which after last night's fiasco is a welcome development (whereas last night that only turned into a whining amplifier, somewhere between a chainsaw at arms' length and a 747 taking off on the db meter). Despite our best calming and assertive efforts, I spent more time sleeping on the dog bed than she did (25 minutes for me, 0 for her). Sleep is the top priority tonight for all. It always is. Tonight it really is.

Dish

The collar is now on the other head. Mickey's had a near monopoly on post-surgical satellite dish collars over the past few years, now Maggie's got her chance. If all goes well, she will only need to wear it for two weeks. That means two weeks of crying and whimpering. We're trying to soothe her with a great mix of music from the 70's, 80's, 90's and 00's. Right now, we've got Kenny Loggins "Highway to the Danger Zone." The whimpering continues, whether a musical protest or expression of physical discomfort, we'll never really know. Spin Doctors "Two Princes" is now filling the air, the whimpering continues. Nothing serious for the fat black dog, some pretty straight-forward surgery to fix some overgrowth in her lady region. Obviously I'd rather not discuss it, so we'll leave it at that.



Below find the first (and as it turns out, only) red tomato of the year. The picture is at least a week old. It looks quite nice. Since I took it, the ants have totally destroyed zucchini-land. A nasty round of storms knocked down one of the tomato plants as well as the bean pole and assorted vining. Total yield: 11 Zucchini, 5 beans, 4 tomatoes of varying quality, basil plant still doing well, rosemary looks a little stressed out, maybe its roots are being attacked. Some more lessons learned this year. More vigilant pest control is essential. In New York I remember worms helping out the cause in the garden, here anything I see is wishing me ill. Potato bugs, Stink bugs, fire ants, other ants, beetles and dogs. More land has been tilled and will make for a better planting next year. I give my effort a B-, result C-.



Smash Mouth "Walkin' on the Sun" is on now. I'm not sure if Maggie's crying or not, it's hard to hear above my own whimpers and cries. "So don't delay, act now, supplies are running out...

... I might as well be walkin' on the sun."

Modern English "I melt with you"... better... but the crying continues.

Hot Dog Mike

The coolest hot dog cart in Little Rock, and beyond.



Where the meat hits the street!

Restraint

The title might bring to mind a more grandiose topic, but what it alludes to is my current desire to push on past a small neurotic blog comfort zone. There has been an urge (usually acted upon) in the past where I scour over previous entries and edit, correct and cleanse. For whom and for why? It's not worth the effort. I will not go back to fix the handful of typos in my previous couple entries... I will let them stand. You know what word I meant, so it will stand. Surely I retain some of my retentive ways, but I'd like to add a few hours to my life by not trifling with such unnecessary details. Should I spend my time fixing some syntax while I could be creating something new? I think not. It's not the best use of my "talents." Create. Create. And keep on creating. Whatever it may be. This will hold true for music as well. Make something new, put it out there, good or bad, and move on to the next. How many things have I been sitting on for how many years? Rhetorical question, but there is an answer... many things for many years. I've got a wee window of opportunity and I best push out as much as I can in the time I have. That bus might take me out tomorrow (one more reason to be against mass transit) and if all my creative mojo is only in my brain rather than recorded in some form for those that would care, well, it's just lost. Bummer. Glen Tilbrook, one of the songwriters for Squeeze said in an interview If I allowed it to be some craft where I'm working for inspiration, I think I probably would have written 30 songs by now. Instead I've written a couple thousand. Not all of them are good, but I learned – again, early on – that some songs would just come to you, and that would be great. Other songs you have to work really hard at. And that can still be great. Other songs you work really hard at, and they would be rubbish. There's all sorts of in between, you know. When I wrote music for "Tempted," that took me a week. I know that Bob Dylan quote that if it's not done in a couple of hours it's not worth it - well, not in my experience. Sometimes you can labor onto something. But sometimes writing music is like creating a piece of sculpture, you're sitting there chipping away at this block of marble. And you take a step back from it and see how you can change it, and see if you make it more beautiful. But the route to getting there isn't always clear. I think that sentiment translates into other arenas as well, artistic, political, etc. For what all that's worth.

I've decided that Maggie and Mickey (black dog and brown dog, respectively) are so happy because they live in the moment. At most they know there is a tomorrow, but they don't know there's an inevitable end. We have to come to peace with the inevitable in whatever way makes us best able to live in the moment. Moe (white cat), on the other hand, he may not know of the inevitable end, but I think he hopes there is one... especially for the dogs.

Speaking of dogs and orangutans. You should watch this craziness.

Independence Blog 2010

With little fanfare the residents of 980 Northwest Avenue celebrate our nation's birthday. Perhaps I dishonor the red, white and blue by eating a salad today. But, I am no communist vegetarian, I also ate two angus hot dogs. That's right. Angus. I get hot dogs two or three times a year, so I will not buy into some meat-by-committee creation. Also, the beauty of grocery shopping late on the 4th is that you are sure to find the products you want pretty easily. Go the bread aisle, the only thing left on the shelves is whole wheat. Where normally one would have to hunt through the wonderbreads of hot dog buns, wonderbreads of burger buns and wonderbreads of wonderbreads to find the good for you stuff... today, clear sailing.

The best thing about today (and yesterday, and the day before) is that it is beautiful outside. Down into the low 70's overnight, up into the mid upper 80's with not much humidity. A/C has been off for several days. What I like most about this is the silence. Inside, just the quiet whirr of ceiling fans. Outside, no air conditioner cycling on and off polluting my backyard (and my brain) with unwanted noise and clutter. The mosquitoes have disappeared for the moment, another plus. The lawn is mowed and weedeated. The garden looks as good as it can. It turns out that another ant attack is responsible for the demise of 2.5 zucchini plants. Boiling water has been employed, we all expect a robust recovery. If not, I have been given a 13-point road map to peace that should put the ants in their place. Their place being elsewhere or dead. The myrtles have grown to their annoying stage, can't mow around them and their limbs plopped on the ground. Perhaps time again for a mid-season buzz cut. Weeds continue to propagate in the front of the house... Round-up has been purchased. Round-up will be used. Time again to prune the gigantic azaleas. Tee small gigantic ones. The large gigantic ones are beyond my ability and desire.

Dogs snack on grass clumps. Maggie made another mole-kill today, the first in a while. Her least destructive to date. No month-long stalking and extensive tunnel unearthing. One little hole and she got it. Mickey stole it away a few moments later. Soon after I tossed it over the fence. A little muss, no fuss.

I am painting our small bathroom. Step 1, remove all the grandma wallpaper from 1974. Step 2, fill the many holes from long since abandoned towel bar mounting brackets. Step 3, sand. Step 4, vacuum. Step 5, prime. Step 6, think it looks pretty good just primed, think of a way to do no more work on it. Step 7, keep thinking how to consider it Mission Accomplished.