Synchronicity

[cranefly]

Two Days Ago:

I'm halfway through Giraffes on Horseback Salad, and it's so nice to be revisiting Dali after a lapse of many years.  But I don't want to rush it; I want to savor it, take my time.  Besides, I need some exercise.  And LCF wants to go for a walk.

So we head off on a long walk through the neighborhood.  We play the dodge-aerosol game, taking turns with other pedestrians sidestepping out into the street or even crossing to the other side.  But there aren't a lot of people, and mostly it's just a quiet relaxing rdirectionless walk.

Suddenly LCF looks aside and says to somebody, "Wow!  That's nice!"

I realize she's looking over a hedge into someone's front yard.  A late-teen boy is interrupted looking at a painting.  It's a head-and-shoulder portrait of a moose.

"Did you do that?" LCF asks.

He gives a negation, then nods aside and behind at what I presume to be his sister, maybe 12.  She's giggling, embarrassed by the attention.

"N-i-i-i-i-c-e," I say.

The boy holds the painting up so we can see it better and says rather needlessly, "It's a moose."  Of course it's a moose.  What else could it be, with those antlers?  Then he adds, "On fire."

Only then do I realize that above the antlers the sky is filled with red and yellow flames.  I can't help myself.  "Dali!" I exclaim.

Both of them are by now retreating, embarrassed by all the attention, and we move on.

But I'm certain Dali was an inspiration.

[Dr. Ivor Yeti]

Some people just want to see it all, including moose, burn

[cranefly]

I'm checking the news on google.  I check it way too much these days.  But there's an unsettled something in the air, a sense of impending.  Something big's on the horizon.  I'm anxious to see it, whatever it is.

Anyway, I see an article on sugar's role in covid-19 infections and I click on it.  At a glance, sugar's role is two-fold: it makes you more susceptible, and it can greatly worsen the symptoms.  But before I can read further, my cell phone rings.  Not that I would normally answer, but it's from LCF.  I answer.  She's calling from inside Costco, and she's got some really bad news.

"They don't have any pies.  None of the big ones you like.  And not even any small ones.  I don't know what's going on, but they just don't have any pies."

That IS bad news.

"And they don't have any ice cream either."

"Really?"  I'm genuinely surprised.  We've never gotten ice cream at Costco before, because it's over-priced; but I thought that maybe just this once I'd try it.  It's got a higher vanilla content and is supposed to be delicious.

"But they do have strawberries," LCF says.  "I could get you some of those.  Oh, and they have heavy whipping cream, so you could make whipped cream for the strawberries."

"Yeah, that sounds good."  I can work with that.

So she says she'll get those, and clarifies some other items, and we hang up.

As I go back to reading about sugar's deleterious effect with regard to covid-19, in the back of my mind I'm planning to make a yogurt cake to go with the strawberries and whipped cream.

Meanwhile, even further back in my mind, there comes a strident voice asking what kind of idiot I am.

[cranefly]

The Expanding Sore Ribs Club

Last weekend, LCF and I socialized with some writer friends via ZOOM.  We touched base on many things, but the topic that dominated was Doug's recent bike accident.  He was biking home when he took a spill.  He's 65, by the way.  Getting up, he seemed to be all right, just banged up some, and he walked the bike the rest of the way home.

But that night he got to hurting more, and by morning his chest was hurting fierce, and he was having trouble breathing.  So his wife called an ambulance.  They gave him some badly needed painkiller and took him to the hospital, where he was diagnosed with two cracked ribs.

That was a couple weeks ago, and his recovery has been slow.  His wife Lisa had to learn to work through his intermittent moans coming from the bedroom.  But he's on the mend now, and still hoping to retire in November, though it will require them moving out of Oakland to a more affordable place.

Anyway, that was their first ambulance experience, which set me to wondering what my first ambulance experience will be.  I'm fast approaching 70, and though generally fit and strong, my hips are trash and make me incredibly clumsy.  There's no flexibility in them, making me even more vulnerable because my body still believes it can do things it can't.  It's been years since my last good fall, and I'm way overdue.  When it comes, speaking realistically, it could be an ambulance occasion.

Fast forward to the following night (Monday).  LCF and I go for a walk at dusk for a first attempt at seeing the comet.  We venture onto the grounds of Crittendon Middle School, which if I'm not mistaken is where Stacy went to school.  They have a nice new track, which I wish I could use, but my running days are long over.  As dusk settles in, we wander about the infield, having a mostly clear view of the northwestern sky.  But there's a few trees, and buildings, and we can't be sure if they're blocking the comet.  It gets darker and darker still, and the few runners dwindle until we're almost alone.  I doubt we're supposed to be there after dark.  The field isn't meant for night activities, for sure.  We keep moving around in the infield, hoping to see something, but no luck.  Then LCF points to some shadowy bleachers outside the track and suggests we use them to gain some height.

So that's where we head, LCF leading the way, with me stopping to look back a couple times.  I've just turned forward to look at LCF when it happens.  She's past the track, on a bit of sidewalk, and very close to the bleachers.  She looks back at the northwestern sky just as she steps off the walk into a spot of blackness.

Into a hole.

She stumbles forward, trying to catch her balance, only to accelerate into a head-first sprawl towards the corner of the bottom-most bleacher.  She hits it directly, horrifically, and goes down hard with a groan.

I rush over to check on her, wondering if I need to call an ambulance.  I didn't bring my phone.  Meanwhile, she's slowly getting up, and maybe I should have told her to stay put, but I'm in a bit of shock.  And she gets up.  And she's hurting, especially her ribs.  But she says she's okay.  Slowly, unbelievably, she continues onward to the bleachers, and we climb them, but they don't gain us anything.  And eventually we walk home.

That night and the next day I have these little stifled outbursts of cursing under my breath.  It's something I do, okay?  But more than usual right then.  "What's wrong?" LCF asks me a couple times.  I tell her nothing, just muttering.

But I'm seeing that horrific fall all over again, accelerating straight at that sharp corner of bleacher.  Headfirst.  That could have been so devastating.  It should have been devastating.  But she seems to be okay.  From her cuts and bruises we've pieced together how she likely hit.  There's a deep depression/cut on her left forearm near the wrist.  That's what caught the very corner of the bleacher.  This forced her forearm into her chest as she fell, momentarily compressing ribs with all her weight (she's still very sore there).  I vividly remember her putting a hand to the ground to further catch her weight -- an ideal way to shatter the wrist or forearm.  But her wrist and forearm are okay.  She also has a deep-purple bruise four inches in diameter high up on her right thigh.  That might have been where she made a secondary impact on the bleacher corner.

I'm still incredulous that she's okay.

And very very disappointed that we didn't get to see the comet.

The next night, of course, we're thwarted once again, this time by the theft of the catalytic converter.

P.S. I've been very critical of movies that attribute some supernatural happenings to the appearance of a comet.  I remain critical of those movies, though perhaps less so these days.

[Drunk Monk]

Ouch. Hope she's on the mend. Hope she has some ditdajow handy.

I used to pride myself on my night vision. Now it's all about the flashlight function on my iPhone.

[Greg]

This morning I was writing about my adventures on Tremors. The subject of "Bad Day at Black Rock" came up since we filmed Tremors near where they filmed BDABR.

First movie that came up when I turned on the TV? Bag Day at Black Rock.

[cranefly]

It's dinner time, and I've got youtube up on the TV.  There's a lot of track and field clips, because like Greg I've been hungry for sports -- and I just happen to like track and field.  So, yeah, I've been watching some races.  I keep hoping they're new, but most aren't, despite being recently uploaded.  The uploaders seldom make this clear.  So it's mostly old crap from years ago.  But occasionally there's new stuff from European nations, such as Czechlandia or whatever it's called, and some other places.  These have cardboard cutouts for spectators and masked officials and workers setting up hurdles, etc., while the runners are sequestered off in the grass to the side, and then the officials and workers clear out and the runners take the track, and yeah, it all sort of works, and it gives me my fix.

But here's the thing.  My recommended videos are now heavily Track and Field, and a lot of the still images on these feature female athletes, and focus on their butts.  I mean, it's rather blatant, and photoshop is alive and well in these, such as the female hurdler in mid-leap, and no, the butt wouldn't bulge upwards like that when the legs are stretched out.  Jeez.

So LCF is appalled at these disturbingly voyeuristic images of female athlete butts, and she's chiding my viewing habits, and I'm trying to defend myself, because I'm not responsible for the images they choose.  And then we watch a bunch of cat and dog videos because that's what LCF is into, and these totally flood my recommended feed.

A short time later, as LCF is feeding Halvah, I venture over to Kanopy and am doing a search.  LCF peeks in from the kitchen.  "What are you searching for?" she asks.  I'm too busy to answer, laboriously keying in letters with the damned Roku remote.  Squinting, LCF gives a disgusted groan and ducks back in the kitchen.  What I've typed is "BUN".  Again I have to defend my tastes, and I insist she look again a moment later after I finish typing in "BUNUEL".  Because our library has reached its borrowing limit on Hoopla, so I'm checking to see if Bunuel in the Labyrinth of Dreams is available on Kanopy.

Which it is.

[That donkey.  Ahhhh, that poor donkey...]

[Drunk Monk]

So LCF is appalled at these disturbingly voyeuristic images of female athlete butts, and she's chiding my viewing habits, and I'm trying to defend myself, because I'm not responsible for the images they choose.  

Hold the phone...all these years and LCF is chiding your viewing habits now because of athletic booty? That's worse than the dwarf amputee donkey porn?

[Dr. Ivor Yeti]

My colleague, Dr. DM, has a valid question.