All aboard. People I very much appreciate:

Friday, April 27, 2018

Plumbers!

Yesterday, we called the plumbers. They came out to our crazy old farmhouse and needed to get underneath it. I had to saw a two-foot by two foot hole in the floor of Norma's studio!
I sawed down to the sub-floor, then continued,
all the way to Hell!
Between floor and subfloor were newspapers acting as insulation. They were from 1957:

Comfy slippers, Dad's overcoat,
 And Mom's downtown suit:
From my two days with plumbers, 5 days of cold showers, and the promise of a weekend without further assistance, I have been given special insight into an enigma. If, for any reason --before we lie down in the echoes of our lives-- we need to visit Hell, I can now capably saw a hole in your floor or mine of regulation size.

Your regular pastor will return when it is not Friday and the plumbing is fixed. Go in peace.
 

Friday, April 13, 2018

Readership Drive

There is a noticeable decline in comments lately. I don't follow stats closely but it would suggest a commensurate lull in readership. So I will use a photo that Norma took a few hours ago in hopes it will attract followers:
I didn't know she was photoing me or I would have tried to look less like I was peeing on the walkway --I was not. But it gives me opportunity to quote a favorite Latvian stage comedian, Gatis Kandis: "To those of you who would like to follow me, this is how I look from behind."

Yes, I know, I am a 68 year-old man you probably shouldn't walk in front of, but under that frosty hair a poem composes:
                    Each day comes, goes
                    As days do, and those
                    I spend with you
                    Contain a sum of me.
                    Those rare days gained
                    Here and there in
                    Existence sustained
                    Me since, and trained 
                    Me to be kind -- now,
                    What was it? Oh,
                    What was on my mind?

Wednesday, April 11, 2018

Babel



I haven't thought of a theme for this post yet, but reckoned this 20-second miracle of pronunciative skill would help. Listen:


Liam Dutton pronouncing "Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgoggogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch"

If we consult the Bible, Genesis 11: 1-9, we find the whole world had a common language which moved eastward with Earthlings to the plains of Shinar, where they settled. They built a tall tower to celebrate, but used materials --brick instead of stone and tar instead of mortar-- which offended the Almighty and other investors who accused humans of hubris and inferior materials then responded by collapsing the tower and confounding the languages of the planet. The Welsh were suddenly overwhelmed with consonants while the Hawaiians got stuck with all the vowels. It was around this historical calamity that vowels became a fungible medium of exchange.  

My own ancestors came from Portugal in the 1800s with family names that had scads of vowels, like Azevedo, and were encouraged to sell them in exchange for prosperity in the new world --they became the Browns. 

But all the brave abbreviations various families made  fade faster into history when we run across a weather report like Liam Dutton's. He ran through the 60(+or-) letters of a Welsh town with accuracy and nonchalance. He is my hero.