An very wary orphan Christmas

I will start this blog off by listing the things I am thankful for on this day after Christmas.
1. That I do not have a hangover.
2. That I can have pie for breakfast.
3. That I have the day off and have been writing a good two hours so far. (Not at this.)
4. That my video store is downstairs and one door away, so I can treat myself to "The Best of Youth" later.
5. That I have great family and friends that know me well enough to know that this list is not made in order of importance. Well, except, perhaps for #1.
6. That I have a computer. I love my computer.
7. That I have two of the sweetest and silliest cats in history. Who also know me well enough to know that this list is not made in order of importance.
8. That I have taught myself to type without looking.
9. That I have the choice to not go to an orphan Christmas ever again.
10. Hand lotion

There, I put down ten things I am thankful for.
There are more. But ten is enough to balance out the negative tirade about to come forth.

Commence carping now.

I start my trek to my friend's orphan Christmas dinner. It is a rainy, rocky, nut and bolty laden 9 block walk to my friend's place.
I am pushing a granny cart filled with gifts, cookies, two pies, cranberry sauce, crudites and dip. The pies are having epileptic seizures along the bumpy path, and are perched at an uncorrectable slant.
I arrive. I unload.
The apple pie is now lopsided and lost some of its juice. I shift the center.

11. Thank God for crumb topping!

My friend's roommate, Mason, and his friend Darla greet me. Then my friend, Shelly, greets me. Our mutual friend, Diana, is doing the cooking even though she doesn't live there. She waves a mitted hand and follows through with a hug.

12. Thank God for aliases.

Mason is a nice enough prick of a prince, who has an artsy commercial job that affords him his superior air and a upscale boho chic lifestyle. His voice is also appropriately colored with the pinched nasality of the United Kingdom's more proper foothold in the Southern hemisphere -- the one that doesn't export extra large canned beer.

Darla is a doe-eyed doll, but with blue peepers. She is dressed a bit like a Carol Burnett sketch: gloved and glamorous; edged in farce. She smiles more often than not. Except when Mason barks at her to do her job and decorate the tree. She breaks two ornaments.

Diana is a multitalented up and coming star, whose new album made the charts. She keeps it real and is a great friend.

Shelly is a powerhouse and taking more and more successful steps in her career behind the camera. She is also a dear friend, but I am sometimes jealous of the attention she pays on her blackberry.

Diana, and I as her sous, prepare the meal while more guests arrive and the hosts shower. Mason says he blow waved his hair. I ask if that means the same as blow dry? An honest question served up honestly. But he answers with the defense of a thousand porcupine quills and an icy stare. And soon 'blow wave' will pop up in conversation throughout the night to remind me of my quaintness.

Eighteen, my lucky number, people arrive. We need another place setting! We make room. Whew!

One of the arrivals who is Jewish, atheist and gay, we'll call him Jag, enters with a saute pan in hand. It contains some pale sausages and even paler (green not white) asparagus stalks no tips. He takes a burner. He then heaps four ladlesful of rice pilaf into his pan -- he did ask nicely for the rice.

I am squeezing limes, lemons and oranges to make a citrus sauce for the scallops.
Jag seeing the scallops, has pushed his way into the job of flouring and panfrying them. He sporadically asks if he is doing it correctly.

Jag is a scary Rumplestiltskin of a man. I was repulsed and annoyed by him, mostly. I also pitied him. He has to push or he will get run over. Still, he annoyed me, at times, to a point where I wanted to do just that with my granny cart!

Dinner was great.
Dessert was devoured.
Jag had to cut his own piece of pie even though there were precut slices all over the place.

13. Thank God for granny carts and the insanity defense.
14. Thank God for yogic breathing.

Diana and I straightened up the kitchen, while Mason sincerely piped in "You shouldn't be cleaning up, you have done too much already." & "Thank You," in alternating repetitions.

My stomach was overfilled with food and the pumped out pomposity and self promotion that filled this loft.

Charles the cat kept his distance from the pretenders, and held a flirtatious gaze on me.

15. Thank God for the silent knowing of old friends and cats.

Then I hit the road.
Glad to get out of there.
Glad to get home to my two furry sillies.

Glad to drift off to a dream of leftover turkey sandwiches, and a simpler, whiter Christmas next year.

Malamood

Dusky Flycatcher
One thing I learned today is Bernard Malamud's correct pronunciation of his last name. Hence the title.

Fig Filled

Syconium.
What is in a fig.
A fig is made up of many tiny fruits that are held together by sticky stuff.
A figtree doesn't bloom. Its flowers are the tiny fruits within each pod.
Caricous means fig shaped as does sycosiform.
Other words for fig.
eleme, fico, mamme, pipal, rig, sinconus, syconus.
Fig bearing tree: Banyan

Capote

Saw it last night. Good, very good. Made me want to redecorate. Oh the slivery quilted shams, and the tiny, tall pedestal end tables, the leather bound books on organized bookshelves.
Can a writer be really that organized?
I suppose if anyone Truman could.
Ah, and the curtains and sofas.
Yes, Well.
Bergdorf's

Cloudy

caverns canyons clouds critics cold cough cough coffee cacophonous calm cause creedless calamity cyclone cozumel cancun carefilled chatter control coast cast call carry ch-ching c'mere chameleon cozy carrot casserole cassolet costume cornucopia cope counting caberet clandestine collision confide confirm confiscate confound confront conviction convulsion crusade

clear

Red Tape

At the Williamsburg post office wanted to buy stamps and pick up a package.
After I got the stamps I was told to stand in the 'Pick up' window's line.
I pointed out that had not been the case before, and it was rather unfair.
She said it wasn't her, but the managment's decision to keep the other line down.
I said I understood if I was just getting a package, but why should I have to stand in line twice?
She decided to get my package.

More red tape on the mailing front.
A package is being sent to me from Overstock.com via DHL.
I decided to see when it would be arriving.
It arrived yesterday, left at my door.
It was not.
So I called DHL.
They said it was.
I said I was here and I didn't get it.
She said she would contact the driver and call me back.
That was 6-1/2 hours ago.
So I contacted Overstock.com.
After repeating my story 3 times. And twice being told DHL left the package I finally asked for a supervisor, since I thought I was talking to a brick wall.
It took 4 more times asking for the name of the supervior before I got it.
I won't use it.
She finally understood and put out a trace and told me what that entailed.

It is really frustrating for an honest person in an age of mendacity.

Prospero at The Gates 

87 degrees

Sunday, sipping coffee, listening to music that should improve my brain.
Good medicine to counter my tequila-logging it last night.
Had a fitful sleep.
Because of too many margaritas, because of the mess in my room, because of calling myself stupid.
And then I made a conscious decision to be conscious of life from now on.
It is hard to sleep after that.
I had been trying to bend the world to my ideals and there is no surprise that it doesn't work.
I have not sleptwalked through my life thus far.
I have lived.
I have chosen paths less traveled.
I have callouses.
They are inside and outside and too many to count.
I love them.

I have friendships that are deep, honest and safe havens.
I don't like to give insincere embraces.
I have witnessed the backstabbings these give access to.

The people in my life have accumulated in spite of being (or because I am) a proud sea urchin.
Happy my poison spines keep a distance until, I feel I have found someone who will protect my tender side as I would theirs.

As I have aged, the spines have lengthened and multiplied.
I will have to shed some.

My foot grazed the leg of a brutal youth last night. His long legs were outstretched so the widest strider would trip.
He demanded an apology.
I did not comply.
I replied he got want he wanted by not being considerate of others.
He was huge.
I was drunk and spunky.
He spoke to me. I pretended to listen to my mp3 player.
He ranted to his pals, and they got off at the next stop.
But one of his gang apologized for his friend's behavior and he hoped that I would not judge the rest of them.

I lost the battery cap to my mp3.
I can't find a library book.
And I wonder if this is payment for not behaving better last night.
I could have apologized.
The brute became more of a brute.
And that is what I wanted.
Making me a brute too.

10 minutes before...

This will be short. Whatever I can think up, type and edit within 10 minutes. This is a test. Only a test. Testing 1...2...3...4.
I set up this blog to get my early morning writer fingers moving.
A Czerny exercise.
And with the action of my fingers, my mind may be wheted from pouring out the thoughts that have been released or are still stuck in dreams from the night before. Or a life before.
Czerny studied with Beethoven and taught Liszt.
Wrote "The School of the Left Hand"
In typing, the left hand isn't as handicapped.
Discipline.
An artist is nothing without discipline.
Those who aren't artists, see that life as one without structure. Without work.
Yet, how hard is it to structure that which has no structure, only the boundaries of an idea?
To have the courage to see that idea through, and then to release it to the world in hopes of a communion with at least one other.

That's it for now.