The great thing about being at my mother’s place, besides the notion that it’s the most peaceful place imaginable, is that I get a lot of slack cut for when I do my post. So it’s now late morning and I can sit down and tell the world that
1. Nineties music videos are not really all that great. I mean, I watched part of the ‘top 90 music videos of the 90’s’ and thought that I feel sorry for the aliens trying to piece our culture together from this whale dreck.
2. I really like Tommy Lee Jones and Cate Blanchett. Now you can guess which movie I watched. Also, Ron Howard actually knows how to direct children, which is really no surprise when you think of it.
3. Keith has fled to ‘the club’ being his uncle’s place. There they can grunt and scratch and be manly.
4. One of my relatives is expecting a baby. Unfortunately I can’t say who yet because her mother in law doesn’t know. My grandma’s saying My Family Can Never Be Too Big comes to mind.
5. I have now read the story that “It’s a Wonderful Life” is based on, and wow is it corny.
6. Remember that history is not always written by the people who were there. I have now seen what happens when a cruel and selfish man is turned into a saint in his old age by a well meaning historian, while the nephews that he worked half to death raise their eyebrows and chorus, as one, “b— s—!”.
7. I come from a long line of people who do kindly things on impulse, and who believe that when something’s meant to be, the way will clear.
8. I get to look more like my great aunt Elsie every year. This is a tragedy, but at least I don’t have facial bumps. And she was a nice lady.
9. My mother is working on the Siberian portion of our family history. During the collectivization and the Great Patriotic War, a lot of Mennonites including my kinfolk died, mostly of starvation, typhus and firing squads. For anybody reading this, no matter how hard your life is right now, you aren’t watching your 16 year old sister die after giving day to a child conceived in rape by the party stalwart running the local collective (the child lived a day). And if your life is that bad, you are likely not living in Canada.
10. Yes, I’m feeling somewhat grim.
11. To lighten the tone somewhat, I should mention that Katie and I walked down to the beach yesterday with our cameras, and I wish to god I had a USB cable or I’d show some of the pix I took yesterday; some of them are actually not bad. It was a lovely walk and Katie was in a really good mood (made better at the end of the day by a call from the D-man) so we were bopping up and down the beach scaring seagulls and taking pictures of driftwood and I was playing with the exposure settings, etc. I hope the picture of the burl comes out okay.
12. I would be feeling pretty good today but a HOWLING wind blew up and as I was attempting to sleep in the sunroom I got to lie there calculating which parts of my body would be obliterated by Douglas Firs. There are some damned big trees close to my parents’ place. I was thinking how funny it would be if I got staked by a branch from a Douglas Fir like something out of Buffy. So I am inadequately rested.
13. Debuted the Tapioca Song for my parents. Quit after the second chorus, as the expression of rising horror in my dad’s face was quite reward enough for my efforts.
14. Soon, the ferry, and home. And laundry. And a return for the complete lack of normalcy that passes for family life. Pic is something random.
