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Friday, November 26, 2004
Making the World a Nicer Place From Which to Go to Hell
Years ago I heard a sermon, part of which was a heap of scorn laid at the feet of those who spend their lives making things better here on earth. "All those people do is to make this a nicer place from which to go to hell," quoth the minister. "Better they should work to change the minds of those around them who are making the world bad and ugly. Fix the hearts of the bad guys and the conditions which are made miserable by bad guys' badness will automatically improve and stay better." Well, you can't argue against that. No. You can't. Not unless you call merely spouting drivel an argument. I, personally, can argue endlessly for or against every possible side of every issue, and I can't argue against that thinking, so you can't either. The man was right. ON THE OTHER HAND... the efforts of do-gooders may not add anyone to God's Kingdom, but I like them. I would rather live in a community of do-gooders than in a place where people like that don't roost. For example, what possible difference does it make whether a neighborhood contains a few individuals who pester the rest about property upkeep, issue warnings and issue award citations, get ordinances passed that make junky properties expensive to own? Aren't those characters just wasting their lives annoying the slobs of their world? Probably, but they're OK with me. As a matter of fact, I have two home-owners upon whom I wish them to turn their attention. Yes, in even this ratty, flea-bitten ghetto there is a self-appointed homeowner committee which issues nasty letters to those who fail to cut the grass on time. Without them, weedy refuse-strewn yards would be everywhere I look. Although their strictures do not have the force of law, no one likes to get a cut-your-grass letter. So there they are, whoever they are, making pests of themselves, wallowing in self-importance, taking pictures of ugly yards, sending out mean letters; I bet they are a pain-in-the-backside bunch of bossy bozos. I like them, though. They aren't getting anybody to heaven, but this area could look a lot worse...and no doubt would, without do-gooders. For all I know, they may not even believe in God and so would not be candidates for the job of regenerating the hearts and minds of their generation. Hey, they might live, die and splash into hell like a frog in a pond, but in that case it would be a deal like Martha Stewart in jail...the hell improvement committee. No, I know that isn't funny but I'm just saying...there's something to be said for do-gooders. And this was it.
Wednesday, November 24, 2004
Cause and Effect
Horrible story on the news. Tomorrow is Thanksgiving; warm fuzzy stories predominate. One bad story though. Six families stand on the sidewalk, kids and moms, evicted from the homeless shelter behind them, right out into that warm southern air...yeah, yeah, but it is sad. They cluster like a team in a huddle as a reporter intones, "Nowhere to go on Thanksgiving. Mothers and children sent into the cold at the 'warmest' time of year. How could it happen?" Really.
I'm upstairs lying on the bed in a spare room, watching a big-screen TV, all cozy and comfortable and just ashamed of it. "Lord," I pray silently, "why do I have so much and these have nothing? Should I call the police and volunteer to take them in?" Selfishly I cringe to think of all those huge fat people blobbing and flumping around my old frail house, but maybe that's what the Lord expects of me, and who am I to start scheduling the world? I go downstairs and start to tidy up, wipe out the sink, windex kitchen surfaces, put garbage by the door, fluff pillows. Back upstairs I put away this and that, vacuum here and there, set lavendar hand soap by the sink.
Now I'm back down watching TV and it's the homeless people again. Lined up this time, looking truculent, chins out. Reporter says, "It's hard to imagine how anyone could put these folks out at this time of year. We interviewed the head of the shelter here in Suffolk. She tells her side of the situation."
A beautiful and quiet-voiced person speaks, "We have learned over many sad years that compassion is not enough. In order to keep this facility on the map, we must live by hard and fast rules. As shelter personnel, we have high standards for ourselves. We must be quiet. We must be courteous, here and on time, willing to listen, clean and efficient. We keep the place sanitary and orderly. We provide necessary education and counselling to all those who must live here for a while. On the other hand, people using this shelter must abide by our rules. Those rules are; first, be respectful of shelter personnel and others living here. Second, use our services. When we schedule training, classes, counselling, we expect our clients to be there and pay attention. Then we expect our clients to use what they have been taught. The women and their children whom we have put out on the street have failed to meet any of those standards. They are extremely rude and disrespectful to everyone, even to one another. They do not attend classes. They ignore times for training and counselling. What we have managed to teach them, they do not use. Worst of all, they think their behavior is funny. They encourage one another to do the wrong thing and they laugh in our faces. They actively urge their children to break rules, to be loud, profane and vulgar. Many, many times they have been warned, 'What will happen to you if we need to put you out? What will happen to your children?' Anytime someone tries to reason with them along those lines, they immediately turn abusive, threatening. In short they have made this place mean, scary, loud, and hard to bear for the employees and for other clients living on the premises. After months of warnings and patience, they must now go somewhere else. Maybe a few nights out in the cold rain will do them some good. They need a reality check."
Well, honey, they sure aren't coming in MY house!!!!
Posted by doubledog at 11:11 AM
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Updated: Wednesday, November 24, 2004 11:23 AM
Tuesday, November 23, 2004
Ghetto Groceries
Two weeks in a row, now, I have spurned the lah-dee-dah grocery store my daughter goes to and I have patronized the ghetto grocery where my neighbors go, a joint that jumps all around the clock. I do this in rebellion against prices at the historic district store, easily 30% more per check-out total. That's one reason. The other reason is that I like to think I CAN get into and out of the ghetto grocery and make it back home alive from such a very chancy place. A gigantic security guard patrolled the store yesterday, one hand resting on the butt of his gun, beady eyes hard-staring at the customers. He had that, "Go ahead and make my day," look about himself. When I asked the (also armed with a gun) bagger what might be a less-busy time to shop, she said, "Six A.M., ma'am. Not so many criminals out here tryin' to steal they menu. They sleepin' in. You try six A.M. next time, a old lady like you." She softened this advice with a beautiful, white-teeth smile, but I got the idea. I was taking my life in my hands shopping after dark. So the ghetto grocery is cheaper, and it's got kind of a zing of danger that makes buying diet coke and roast beef more interesting than it usually has been in my past. The best reason to shop there, however, is the entertainment value. Going in I watched a woman give an academy award worthy performance as "Royal Person Bestows Her Presence On The Peons". She drove up in a falling apart old rust bucket. Parked right where you go in and out of the store in everyone's way. Although it was after dark, she put on a pair of sunglasses with such magnificently stylish gestures that I stood in my tracks to see the whole show. She reached into the back seat for a jacket and put it on with endless little fussings and adjustments, all in a manner as haughty as a rock star except that she was ferociously chomping gum. Once into the store she grabbed a cart and stepped directly in front of me so that I had to back up to get out of her way. I thought of going around her but she seemed to anticipate that I might try this and she turned her cart sideways across the aisle. Looking around in the air over my head, she still received the plaudits of thousands of invisible fans. I'm a pretty haughty person myself and was just about to give her the clue about making way for others when I realized that so-doing would deprive this poor soul of her fabulously imagined experience, and anyway I was in no hurry, and besides, it was fun to watch. After a while some of her fellow ghettoites came along and told her loudly to move it. She did and I got past in their wake. Less than a minute later, she said in the loudest voice possible, "Get yo'sef out mah way!!!" I jumped. She was chastising me for holding up her royal progress. I humbly cringed myself into the pasta shelf to give her the entire aisle. She thundered, "Ah thank you!" sailing by me with her nose in the air. Rich and rare. Then there was the bent-over little old woman with a cane across her cart and no teeth. She tooled around like there would be a prize for speedy cart maneuvers, accidentally-on-purpose bashing into others with her cart and chirping out, "Escuse yo'sef!" When I finally got into one of the loooooong check out lines, I observed her going back and forth across those lines just for the heck of hitting people and watching them jump. The long wait to check out provided opportunity to see a lot of sad but silly behavior as person after person tried to buy alcohol or tobacco with some kind of assistance verification. One woman,especially determined, tried four different lines in an attempt to get a six-pack of beer without using money or a credit card. In the fourth line she put the beer under her jacket and sidled up to a man in front of her as though she were just along for the ride with him and not trying to make a purchase of her own. The big guy with the gun got her by the arm and led her out of the store minus the beer. She made a feeble effort at creating a disturbance but the big guy was fast. He had her out the door sooner than it would have taken her to work up a rip roaring carry-on. Several groups of young men trying to herd through the checkout together and so avoid paying for the items secreted under their clothing...they too were grabbed and shucked like an ear of corn, then tossed into the parking lot where they laughed merrily as though that had been pretty good fun. Besides the goofiness of my fellow customers, I found the available products an experience of cultural diversity. At the pork counter, I found great big white packages with see-through tops. Above that section of the meat cases, I read, "Precooked, ready-to-eat pork stomachs." Somewhere along that meat area, every part of animals both familiar and not...it was all there somewhere, cheap and horrible. The bread section had only one kind of the brown multi-grain bread I eat. The rest of that side of the aisle was white bread, lots of kinds, all junk. Later at the check-out I saw that every cart had several loaves of this useless stuff. Many carts held white bread, a big-box brand of mac and cheese unfamiliar to me, weird meats, big bundles of greens that I have never tried, giant boxes/bags of store brand kiddie cereal, milk, chips, and beer. I was in line behind two of the sort of people who live in the ghetto briefly after arriving in America, while they get computer degrees, two Indian gentlemen, extremely quiet in this loud, crazy place. They were trying not to tailgate, leaving a cart length between themselves and the rowdy gang in front of them. Bad idea. Person after person insolently cruised right up the line, sized them up as not likely to raise a disturbance, and slid a cart between them and the one ahead of them in line. I watched their frustration as this happened again and again. They just could not bring themselves to say something to those rude ghetto rats taking advantage of their courtesy. Finally, taking pity on them and myself, I saw another group approach the gap in front of the Indians, caught the eye of the goon pushing the cart and gave him my famous, freeze-a-charging-rhino-at-40-paces eye. The whole bunch scuttled back to the end of the line. Surprised, one of the Indian chaps turned around to see what had civilized his tormenters and saw only little old me. I gave him a big wink which must have been an indecent thing to do back where he came from. He looked terribly embarrassed, said, "Whatever you did, thank you. This happens here all the time." So besides getting some entertainment with the groceries, I had a chance to be a humanitarian. I might get bumped off some day shopping at the ghetto grocery, but until then, I think that's where I'll shop.
Sunday, November 21, 2004
Leaves
A month ago, driving south, I decided that down here in Cox Cable Land, leaves haven't figured out about fall. Now they're getting it.
I like to have morning coffee on my porch, and that's a good thing about being here. It's just before Thanksgiving, but I can sit on my nice, spacious porch and drink coffee while waiting for the crippled, three-headed, refried paper boy to deliver my Sunday paper into the flowers. Anyway, I'm sitting there drinking coffee and thinking unflatteringly about the paper boy when I notice the nearest tree...and it is so lovely...all red and orange and yellow. This truly is an exemplar-of-the-splendor-of-fall tree. Gorgeous actually. Finally not green any more. Getting those colors going. MmmHM!
Just in time to edge in front of the Christmas tree in the parade of life. Last night was the annual Christmas Parade immediately after which downtown lights up for "the holidays". After the parade, after those holiday lights went on for the first time, fireworks exploded and it sounded like from my back yard. I was watching TV like any other right-thinking parade avoider, and KABLAMMY!!!! Rocked me right up off the sofa. so I guess that's it...now it's the "holiday season".
And the leaves finally show some red with the green. Up north where things are more thought out, leaves give themselves a chance to star, to be alone on stage, to get a big hand, to make three curtain calls and receive tributes from the fans. Down here, autumn leaves scamper onstage shyly behind Santa. Doesn't seem right. I watched them, though, while drinking a whole cup of coffee...which for me is a long time.
Wednesday, November 17, 2004
This House Has No Upstairs Outside Walls
The south is different. I'm just ashamed of the USA for having a south. On the other hand, it's warm here and my flowers I planted look great. My lovely and intellectually advantaged family lives, here, too. I'm still running around in sandals and otherwise bare feet. However habitual southerners-from-birth can be an intellectually underprivileged subspecies.
I still do not have a phone in my upstairs. After Dan barked at the phone company even, no phone. The last effort went like this. Two men showed up and stood on my porch talking and yakking and apparently enjoying the lovely weather as viewable from the porch at Joanna's house. They were out there for over twenty minutes until I couldn't stand it any more and threw open the door.
Me: "Hey! Come in here and install my phone jack."
Guy: "We were talking about that."
Me: "Up the stairs. Go. Take a left at the top."
Guy: "Well, actually we aren't going to be able to install a jack up there. We only install on outside walls."
Me: "Fine. Install it on an outside wall. Start 20 minutes ago."
Guy: "Well, you don't have an outside wall up there." (I know you don't believe he said that. You have to be in the south to believe the south.)
Me: "Yes, dear boy. I do have outside walls upstairs at my house. That's how you know you're looking at a house. It has walls all the way around from the ground up to the roof. Come with me while I point one out to you." I put my hand on the spot and said, "All I ask is that you do not install the phone jack high up on the wall like the cable guy last week did with that ugly black cable you see. He, too, said that he could only install on an outside wall, and, as you see, he found an outside wall and did install a cable jack there."
Guy: "No, you don't get it, ma'am. We can't just take your word that it's an outside wall. I'd have to go outside and look at the wall in order to know that." (No, you think I made that up, but I didn't.)
I felt my blood pressure going out the top of my head right through my hair which was on fire, so I said, "OK, OK. Go outside and look at the wall. Just get it done. I'm going downstairs and lie down on the sofa until it's all over. I hope I survive the operation."
They followed me downstairs, went out the front door, got into their work van, and left. Period. That was three days ago. No phone call, no explanation. They just left. They were not about to be bamboozled into believing that the upstairs of Casa Joanna has an outside wall. That was the fifth appointment during which someone from the phone company was supposed to install a phone jack upstairs in my bedroom.
Sunday, November 14, 2004
Beware 38th and 37th Streets
Yesterday the Cox Cable Company finally favored me with a visit from two freaks of nature apparently employed by them to install two cable TV outlets, a fast internet jack, and another phone jack upstairs. They arrived at 2:00 P.M. The only one left went away in his truck at nearly 8:00 P.M. The phone jack hadn't happened because as big freak said, "I don' know how to do a phone jack." Small freak prior to leaving asked me to sign a statement that he had done a good job.
Said he, " I know I don' know how to do this job, but I guess I kin keep it unless somebody tells 'em I don' know what I'm doin'. See, it ain' my fault because I cain' read and I cain' do math and I failed the test to work for Cox. But then Cox hired Baker Company to do work for them. And Baker hired me because I tole 'em I had experience but I didn't have no experience because I don' know nothin' about it. And that other guy with me, the one ran away? Well, he suppose to train me, but he don' know nuthin' neither. Could you sign right here?"
You want to know, "What's was that about the other guy who ran away?"
Yes. Well, here's how that happened. He didn't want to put a TV jack into the upstairs back bedroom by going up a ladder and drilling through the outside wall. He's afraid of ladders. This might have seemed funny to you had you been here to see the man who is, himself, quite frightening to look at. He's about 6' 5" and has an out-of-control unibrow. His mouth hangs open, way down. One ear is too tiny. The other ear hangs down to his shoulder getting fatter toward the bottom so it seems to be sort of a horrible meaty ear ring. When speaking, he blub-grunts through that wide-open mouth. He looks pretty scary, but he was afraid. Of a ladder. After me tearing into him on and off for over three hours, he finally grabbed the ladder and went up, drilled, installed the jack and then came in to say, "Yall done." I said, "Let me see."
Instead of going upstairs with me, he ran out the front door, down the porch steps, and down the street into the night. His partner went out with him and returned to say, "He run off."
"What?!?" I asked, incredulous.
"Yep," responded the small freak, "He run off." Must have been afraid that I'd find fault with the upstairs TV jack and make him go back up the ladder. The small freak later finished the job upstairs and eventually left...alone.
Finally able to watch TV news, I heard these words on the 10:00 P.M. newscast; "This report just in...a man was shot in the 800 block of 37th Street. He is alive and on his way to the hospital. A homeowner shot him as the injured man attempted to climb a back fence into a yard with several pit bulls. The homeowner feared that the man may have planned harm to his dogs." Well, there you go. Run away from a ladder at Joanna's house on 38th Street, and you can get yourself plugged by a dog owner over on 37th Street. Joanna on 38th Street. Gun-happy pit bull owner on 37th Street. This neighborhood is enough to scare even scary-looking people.
Friday, September 10, 2004
All Part of the Package
Sometimes you have to accept a certain amount of trouble in order to enjoy the good stuff that is part of a package. For example Morgan park horses...the most thrilling horses, the ones that don't so much seem to walk as to repell the earth, rocketting up off the ground with each effortless step, nostrils flared, eyes hyper alert, ears up, tails up, heads up, knees up to their ears as they trot...wow, what a sight. It reconciles you to the normal pace of life on earth. It's OK about the coffee taking 10 minutes to brew. People ahead of you in line at the checkout may need to get in depth personal counselling from the cashier. You may have to wait two weeks for the Sears service guy
to fix the riding mower while your lawn grows out of control...all those miserable things that just make you wonder once in a while if there isn't a better deal on another planet somewhere. That's all OK, though, as you watch your Morgan park horse show what it means to be 100% alive. I have cried watching park horses trot. I also have run for my life as a park horse headed my way seemingly out of control. Those horses may not intend to hurt their handlers. However, handlers need to be pretty light on their feet. One time I had a horse that could only be hitched in motion. That horse would not stand, could not stand. That enormous energy just exploded out of him at all times. It could wear you out to watch him sleep. So, when it was time to do up all the straps and traces, a couple of us ran along beside him wrapping and buckling as we went.
The trainer ran at his head to sort of steer him until she could hop into the buggy and get his attention via the bit. We called it "aerobic hitching" because by the time the horse was ready to go, his crew was sweaty and exhausted. Was he worth the trouble? Absolutely. Once safely in harness he was a sight to lift the heart. His craziness was just part of that fabulous park horse package.
Another example of a good stuff/crazy stuff package is grandchildren. Haven't we all know some children who are shockingly beautiful, and lively and inventively intelligent, whole heartedly happy, funny, sweet??? Right. Those same children, however, need to be told a million times, "Put your shoes on." "Turn off the Playstation." "Shhhh!" "Sit here." "Don't get up until you finish eating."
You have one of those children with you at the Mall and you are ready to go home, tired, back hurting, needing a cup of tea. You say, "Let's go, Bubba," and Bubba runs the other way faster than an Olympic track star. Do you scream, "That's it, you little maniac! You're fired! Go be somebody else's grandchild!!!!" No, you don't. The bad stuff is part of the package and you wouldn't do without any of the craziness because it would mean not having the wonderful things.
Saturday, August 28, 2004
diet
If you REALLY want to lose weight, the best plan is to have an operation. Although not pain-free, this method has the advantage of taking away your appetite. A couple of bites is about all you can handle. You do not want a snack. As a matter of fact you don't really want to eat your meals at all. The weight just goes bye-bye. No nonsense about aerobic exercise, you can just lie there taking codeine and morphine shots and losing weight. The worst part is whatever got you into the hospital in the first place. If that was painful, then, of course, you had a rough time...but the silver lining....yahoo! I am recovering from a gall bladder fiasco and have lost 21 pounds so far. Is that good or what?
In case you would like to copy off me, here's the plan; after a lifetime of eating things that cause gall stones, in one meal consume every single gall bladder annoying item known to the human race. Then go to sleep and wake up yelling that you're going to die. After EMS drags you to the nearest hospital, a gastroenterologist removes your gall bladder. Then you have miserable gas pain, incision pain, and diahrea for a few weeks but eventually you are newly thin and brisk...and you wouldn't eat a piece of key lime pie if someone paid you by the bite.
Wednesday, August 4, 2004
Go to the beach. Lose a body part.
"What did you do on vacation?"
"I lost a little chunk of my digestive apparatus."
After a week of misery I am about to lose my gall bladder...in a hospital here in a vacation paradise surrounded by sand and palm trees...smiling faces and beautiful places, to quote a passing license plate. That will give me two more weeks here to recover..if I'm alive when the doctor with the knife says, "Okeedoke. All done."
I want to keep my gall bladder. Going to tell the doctor to put it in a jar of alcohol and get it back to me. Why not? Even car repair places have to do that in order to prevent them from charging you for things they did not do. It's ugly to get back into the car and find that you have to throw away a bunch of spark plugs, etc, but it means that you did get something for your money and that long wait by the way-old coffee machine. So I want my gall bladder complete with stones, all in a small jar. I'll have it made into a necklace.
"Oooh. What's that"
"My gall bladder."
"Oh, gross. How disgusting."
"Yeah? So's yours and so is your mother's. You'll never find a surgeon to remove yours if needed, because it is so hideous there's anti-ugly ordinances in every municipality in this country to prevent the mass hysteria and horror which would accrue to a shocking exposure of something that ghastly to the light of day. So there. Mine was sick but it's small and cute. Look at those little stones. Each one speaks to me of ice cream and bacon and cheddar cheese and yummy things I have eaten in the last 60 years. There's a whole history of gastronomic enjoyment in those little objects..while in your case, gall stones are simply an ugliness beyond the scope of human imagination."
Consider yourself warned. If I catch you making oppobrious remarks re. my gall bladder and stones, you will hear some fresh, new rhetoric!!
Monday, July 12, 2004
Yes, Paper Is Work
Who works harder, loggers or computer programmers? Neither. The worst job is doing paperwork. As in answering mail, filling out forms, explaining in 250 words or less what is the matter with your new appliance, paying bills. That's back breaking work. I would rather chop down a forest with a wet noodle than write a check to the electric company, slide it into an envelope, put a stamp on it and take it to the mail box. Recently I got a big brown envelope full of forms from the state retirement service. Knowing how subject to mistakes I am, I thought I'd fill everything out in pencil and then overwrite in ink. That was going pretty well until I came to these words somewhere on the fourth form, "Any signs of mistake or erasure will invalidate this filing and will require that all forms be refiled." Well, how was I supposed to write pen over pencil without making the whole thing look like erasure or signs of mistake? Oh, brother! So I went to Kinkos and had all the forms copied. That made the pencil look pretty good. I signed and sent everything. Now you just wait...I'll get it all back with a message that it looked mistaken and erased. Then I get a letter from the probate court that if some form I'm supposed to file isn't in and correct by Thursday, I'll be in contempt of court and subject to fines and imprisonment. I go all crazy and fill out the form. The problem is that the form has two parts. I painstakingly did part one to the best of my information and belief, but about part two I had no clue. Eventually I got it straightened out, but it took hours of grief and woe. Finally I sat down with a mile high stack of bills, opened and paid them all. That may sound trivial but if so, why am I so tired and where did this horrible headache come from?
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