I forget a lot of stuff. Sheltering in place doesn't help. Sometimes I go to the grocery store and forget what we need. So I write a list ahead but, with remembering to wear gloves and mask, I often forget my list. I find myself surrounded by choices but sadly listless. Now Norma orders our supplies and I go pick them up at the loading dock. Listlessness is a big problem generally, and sufferers must marry people like Norma.
I believe I've gone off-subject, whatever it was, something about something's got to restock the shelves our memories fell out of --and pumpkins. If pumpkins really contain demons, be sure to bake the Hell out of them before consumption.
That is one creepy pumpkin plant, Geo. Maybe that is why we celebrate with them on Halloween.
ReplyDeleteI love lists especially when I remember to write one and recall where I put it. Small victories!
Dear Arleen, You're right! It's a first attempt at a pumpkin vine doodle and I have resolved to continue my education away from creepy-looking ones. Remind me, ok?
DeleteThat does look like a face, perhaps from the film Fern Gully. :) I always forget one or two things at the store, even with my list!
ReplyDeleteThank you, Margaret! Fern Gully is a very kind comparison.
DeleteHow fortunate that the demon chose to reveal itself to you. Now you can protect yourselves. You have a need to keep your mind occupied. I work puzzles to try to enhance my memory. I also do a surface research of a new subject every day. If it is sufficiently interesting I can then look further. Of course I always look for the fairies that rush various leaves or pieces of paper across a street. Always alert... that's me.
ReplyDeleteDear Emma, I too do puzzles to exercise memory and cognition --crosswords, cryptoquotes and lately "7 Little Words" ( https://www.7littlewords.com/ ) on the computer. I click 9 spaces down on the site to hide the clues --somehow it's more fun that way. And yes, stay "always alert"!
DeleteI downloaded the 7 little words game. I'll play it first thing in the morning. Thank you.
DeleteHave fun with it, Emma. I find it gets my brain working, sort of, in the morning.
DeleteThat's funny but your dreams must be terrifying with pumpkins out to get you. Personally, it's always been green beans, the type that grow up poles, that I've feared ever since I was forced-fed them as a kid. Some days, when I am really brave, I'll steal an onion ring off a bowl of that terrible "green bean casserole" that people think is so good. But most of the time, I keep my distance, which is how evil should always be handled. And, to brush with the political world, is it just pumpkin that is demonic or does it have to do with the color orange?
ReplyDeleteDear Jeff, you made me laugh in 103f. weather --thank you! Our eldest son (50 this year) is orange and, from childhood, preferred to be called that instead of redhead. He's a senior editor at Viz Media in San Francisco now because we turned him away from growing up to be a demonic president at an early age.
DeleteThat's a Poe story, Geo. (Not to be confused with a poor story.) Pumpkin vines conjure up visions of pumpkins, which everyone knows, conjure up visions of The Headless Horseman, who was memorialized by Washington Irving. But wait! How did Poe get in here? Oh now I'm totally confused. Where did I put that list?
ReplyDeleteDelightful romp in our literary heritage, Bruce. Neither Poe nor Irving was a stranger to mystery --both frequent passengers on the Trainride of The Enigmas.
DeleteAs a kid I saw things in our patterned curtains, and I still see things in our wallpaper, and not all of them benign, so I understand about seeing vine people! I hope your pumpkins are less scary when they arrive :)
ReplyDeleteJenny, I had a feeling your pareidolic perception would be quite refined and active. I think it is part of Nature's Grammar and we're supposed to have fun with it --sort of an indirect object attended by a transitive and hallucinatory verb.
DeleteI love the line “Listlessness is a big problem generally, and sufferers must marry people like Norma.” I too have that malady.... and my own wife “helps” me to combat it too. :)
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Dear Prof., There are worse fates for lazy boys like us. I'd say we're a couple lucky ones.
DeleteYou proved my point. I just knew that those pumpkin plants were invasive plants...just look at the face and waving hand of the pumpkin imp. That pretty funny!!!!!$
ReplyDeleteThanks Maddie. Crazy vines aside, I kind of like pumpkins as a cultivar of winter squash. So far as invasive, bloated, round orange things go, they're among the least annoying.
DeleteDuring my new admission interviews at work I always welcome when patients start talking "off topic stuff" … as it helps me understand … them as well as myself … smiles … cat.
ReplyDeleteDear Cat, you have always impressed me as one who can gain insight via peripheral --off topic-- conversation. It is a mainstay of humor and compassion. As you suggest, it is also a practical skill conducive to understanding. My compliments, and thanks.
DeleteDear Geo., I see that pumpkin-demon at one glance (being a visual person - and if you allow I will make a drawing of it )- it seems utterly suited for a children-book -- even as my grandchildren, the triplets, just become 1 year in September they already have books (books without many words, but little felt flaps to hide something, or vegetarian fur to feel something like the back of a cat...)
ReplyDeleteListlessness I feel too - honestly -- sometimes I feel like Baron Münchhausen, who managed to draw himself by his own hair out of a bog or swamp -- bit he was a famous (though wonderful) liar, and I sometimes wonder if I want to do that drawing every day - "How taresome" my friend Georgie from Mapp & Lucia would say...
I wish you strength - the practical Netherlanders say that: "Sterkte!" - and it helps, especially as you have such a wonderful woman as Norma by your side.
My favourite song at the moment is "Roots" by Alice Merton - she sings, in a way uplifting. I wish you the best, and buckets of energy!
Dear Britta, Thank you! I could use some (Dutch?) Sterkte right now. Let's hope we'll feel more lively when summer withdraws. You stay safe and well, Britta, and don't let the wind send any more flower pots to smash and scatteration.
DeletePost script: Yes Britta, please do make a drawing of pumpkin imp!
DeleteThank you for you PS: I did it, look at my blog. And: i wish that you feel better soon!
DeleteI delight in your drawing and feel better already. Thank you, Britta!
DeleteDemon pumpkins... for people who thought 2020 couldn't get any weirder.
ReplyDeleteStill, I think Linus would feel vindicated.
Oh my, hadn't thought of Linus in the pumpkin patch for a long time, but you're quite right.
DeleteI played Linus in our class play in the 5th grade. He's never too far from my mind...
DeleteI hope that those demon pumpkins don't pay me a visit when I'm stoned. I would be forced into calling my gnomes to protect me. They really get into that kind of hoopla so it's no telling what they'd do. I guess I'd be okay with their shenanigans just as long as I didn't have to scrape pumpkin seeds off my house the next day.
ReplyDeleteDear Mildred, Pumpkins have a revealing etymology. Their name, sanitized by modern philologists, comes from the ancient Greek(pépōn) meaning,"big mellon" or "pée-upōn"-- depending on whether you prefer Uralic or Austronesian vernacular. My overtaxed semantic abilities pretty much stops there but it's rumored pépōn was sometimes used as antecedent to the word morpheme, meaning stem or root. Now I need to go lie down.
DeleteAll vines are (literally) creepy. My grape is pretending to pat me on the head everytime I venture into the polytunnel, I know it's up to trickery. We are on constant alert... except in shops where one lets one's guard down and that's how the list falls out of your mind.
ReplyDeleteDear Lisa, I find your posts and comments so consistently delightful, surely Grapevine pats your head out of affection.
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