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Stops Along Holiday Road

Michael Leave a comment

It’s not quite here but if you haven’t already, you’re probably at least in the planning stages for your summer vacation. Have you noticed how we change our vacations through the span of our life? You may be still on your great journey so let me use my life as an example of one who has already journeyed the various stages of vacationing.

I was a kid during the time that station wagons ruled the roads and roads ruled vacation travel. Our vacations typically were to places where branches from our own family tree reached. Which worked out since we became their destination on their vacations. Most summers we loaded up the family sedan and set out on a day’s drive east or west. (There were no relatives south and a day’s drive north would have taken us out of the country.) Major attractions were riding lawn mowers and shopping at department stores different from the ones at home.

The teen year vacations were pretty campy. You know- boy scout camp, baseball camp, band camp, football camp. The camp years. The locations changed but the group didn’t. Later in life these were the memories that would make you appreciate the phrase “familiarity breeds contempt.”

During the college years there were no vacations. With kids in college for a dozen years running, my parents claimed the school year to be their vacation while we would work through the summer so we could all do it again the next fall.

Adulthood finally brought the real vacations. We travelled to exotic places like Los Angeles and Boston. For us that was exotic. One was actually sunny for five days in a row and the other had people who spoke in some language that wasn’t what we were used to hearing at home. Upon the arrival of my daughter vacation spots once again resembled family gatherings. Fortunately staycations were becoming the in thing (even if we didn’t have that catchy name for them) right up until her camp years began.

There was a brief period after my daughter graduated and set out on her own that vacations became exotic again. Since I was actually working and had some discretionary income, exotic actually included locations that required air or sea travel to reach.

And that brings me to the cusp of my “golden years.” Retirement, no commitments, no worries, no work, no time clock, no shirt, no shoes, no income. Every day is a vacation. And as long as I don’t travel too far out of the city I should get to spend quite a few of them on Holiday Road.

So, plan wisely, enjoy your summer vacation, and remember… oh heck, I forgot.

That’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?

Conserving Colorful Collections

Michael Leave a comment

Yesterday was International Museum Day. Museum, from Old Latin meaning home of the muses. Seriously. Well, they had to live somewhere.

Museums are good places. I can say that now but there was a time when, to me, they were no more than where they keep the dinosaurs. In fact, I thought that “museum” was from Old Bedrockian and really meant “where they keep the dinosaurs.” Fortunately I didn’t pass that trait on to my daughter, nor did any of the rest of my generation pass that on to their offspring. I can tell because there are indeed museums without a single bone under their roofs.

Although our town has a terrific natural history museum with a dandy collection of bones there are others dedicated to art, local history, and scientific accomplishments . But don’t stop there. Anything can be museumable. If your town is the home of something there is probably a museum dedicated to it. Trolleys, hand puppets, kitchen appliances, and carpenters’ tools have multiple museums devoted to them. There are other permanent exhibits dedicated to matchsticks, roller skates, and the moist towelette. And don’t forget the living museums such as Colonial Willimasburg or Salem, Massachusetts. There is actually a living history museum exploring places replicating history and historical events called, appropriately enough, the Living History Museum.  Anything can be, and has been enshrined for current and future devotees.

Whether as large as the Louvre in Paris or as small as Manhattan’s Mmuseumm, as diverse as the Smithsonian or as single minded as the Hammer Museum in Haines, Alaska there is probably a museum out there that you’ll like. What would you want to see memorialized in Greater Museumland?

Somewhere along the way I missed International Museum Day on my personal list of special days. Otherwise I would have posted this last week so we could all have some time to plan on visiting someplace special given to something special. Go ahead and mark yesterday’s date down on your 2017 calendar so we don’t miss next year’s celebration. But please, don’t wait until May 18, 2017 before you visit a museum. This weekend will do.

That’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?

Saying What You Mean

Michael 1 Comment

My television is on its last one. It is one of the first high def sets from way back when. I don’t remember exactly when way back but it was back enough that they still were stamping “HD” right on the plastic case. That was to remind you why you paid so much for it every time you looked at it, even when it is off. But I like it. Crisp picture, good sound. What more could I want in a TV? Unfortunately it has developed a bad habit of turning itself on and off and I just can’t have a household appliance with a mind of its own. So, its time has come.

Since it was raining and I had nothing else to do I thought I’d do some Internet window shopping. Once I narrowed down things to the price and size ranges both in my comfy zone I turned to the finalists’ specifications pages. I soon discovered that I apparently know little about today’s TV specifications. In fact, I’m not even sure what some of the specifications specify. VE SA (As opposed to MasterCard?) EPEAT Qualified (One-peat, Two-peat, Three-peat, E-peat?) Optical Audio (A measure of how well you can see what you hear?) Color Category (Isn’t that against EEOC rules?)

So the specs didn’t help. How about user reviews? Well…  I’ll let you decide. Mind you, these are actual statements by actual reviewers.

“In one month of ownership, we’ve gotten good image quality and sound.” Stay tuned for results from Month 2.
“I have not had the chance to familiarize myself with the many features of my new TV but hope to in the future.” But I just had to submit a review now because the world is waiting for my opinion.
“Nice appearance” I know that’s number one on my ‘Things I’m Looking For in a Television’ list.
“I ended up buying two of them for my man cave.” Maybe it’s a real cave.
“Multitasking issue notice bcoz lack of quad core processor.” Huh???
“You have to turn the sound up to here (sic) the audio.” Ah, hence the volume control.
“This product replaced an old tube square flatscreen in our bedroom.” My kind of buyer! If the old one ain’t broke, don’t fix it (yet).
“Still learning it as it’s still learning me.” And love grows.

I think I’ll just go down to the TV store and check out what’s on the wall till I find a picture that looks good with audio that sounds good. I know it’s a ridiculously old-fashioned way to buy something but, if it ain’t broke…

That’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?

 

Making a Connection

Michael Leave a comment

Have you seen that commercial where everybody does everything with their phones? Check bank balance, pick airline seat, buy donut, trade stock, start car. Do anything as long as you never ever don’t have your phone in your hand. That commercial. Or was that real life I saw that?

Yesterday I did something I hadn’t done for ages. I stopped at the bar yesterday. Not too long ago it would have been a rare day when I couldn’t say I stop at the bar yesterday. Nowadays it’s an event. I think it came from being in the hospital for 7 months. They don’t let you drink there and if there should ever be a place where drinking is mandatory it’s the hospital. Instead they turned me into someone who can say that now when I go to a bar it’s to pick up a sandwich that I ordered. And this place has killer sandwiches! But that’s a different story.

Anyway, I got there before my sandwich was ready so I sat and had a drink, joining the dozen or so people similarly spending their mid-afternoon. I noted that there were 14 other people there and 11 of them had phones in their hands. Eight were actively typing, tapping, or swiping. The other three were, I suppose, on standby.

You know how ubiquitous cell phones are but when you see it clustered in one spot it really hits you. Just a couple of years ago if there were 14 people sitting in a bar some afternoon there would have been a couple conversations, a few people checking out the TVs hanging from the corners, somebody at the jukebox, and perhaps a card game. Today I saw 8 people more connected with somebodies not there than there. And three on standby.

I’m not sure how I feel about that. Whether they were talking among themselves or conversing electronically I still would have been there just waiting for my sandwich. Still killer. Thank God some things don’t change.

That’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?

Call It What You Will

Michael Leave a comment

I read an article in the paper last week that would have made go “Hmm” had I not been struck speechless, or even hmmless. The U. S. Department of Justice will no longer refer to people who have completed sentencing and released from prison as a “felon” or “convict.” Instead the terms “person who committed a crime” or “individual who was incarcerated.” will be used. The announcement included the comment that the newly forbidden words are disparaging. Hmm, we are talking about convicted felons – I’m sorry, I mean we are talking about people who committed crimes, aren’t we?

I have to expand my daily reading to include papers from around the world. I see the headlines and whatever American editors determine are newsworthy enough for U.S. media to re-report, but what might I be missing. Is the appellation of formerly incarcerated individuals high on justice departments’ priority lists worldwide?

If it catches on it will be the biggest “they said” since “they said” someone is a person of interest when the police want to talk to said someone about a crime and that it has nothing to do with being interested in someone. This person is not to be confused with a suspect whom police would want to talk to about a crime or a material witness who is presumed to have information about a crime. It seems that one shouldn’t call a suspect a suspect until all suspicion is removed in the favor of certainty less the person of interest is disparaged in the event some doubt remains.

It all reminds me of another article I saw a while ago about some organization now using the term “companion” rather than “mistress” when referring to a prominent person’s person of interest.  Now that would be disparaging. Not being a companion, nor even a mistress. Being said to hang around with someone who passes for prominent. Now that may be most disparaging.

That’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?

 

The Case of the Missing Drive Thru (sic)

Michael Leave a comment

Last night I wanted Chinese for dinner. When it comes to Chinese I’m flexible. It can be General Tso Chicken, Orange Chicken, Kung Pao Chicken, Lemon Chicken, Hunan Crispy Chicken. I’ll even make it myself. I can make a chili-based sweet hot sauce, I always have some spicy orange glaze in the fridge (don’t ask, I’ll write about that some other time), I can do a lemon sauce. I even have rice and lo mein noodles on hand so the side is just a flip of the coin. I even have a couple of fortune cookies somewhere in a cupboard. If I only had chicken.

That scuttled the whole Chinese thing. See, in addition to me not having chicken, it was raining. If it wasn’t raining I’d have been happy to drive to the nearest Chinese restaurant and pick up dinner. But since there are no drive through Chinese restaurants I was forced to eat leftover pork chops, assemble and bake a pizza, or get a Quarter Pounder. Why are there no drive through Chinese restaurants?

If you look at what we have driven through, drive thru General Tso shouldn’t be that hard to pull off. Just in the food category we have burgers, tacos, gyros, donuts, deli sandwiches, and hot dogs. We can get chicken sandwiches, chicken nuggets, chicken wings, and chicken eggs scrambled or poached. What’s so different between a chicken nugget with your choice of sauce and fried chicken pieces tossed in a spicy glaze to commemorate some long forgotten military leader from the nineteenth century.

We have drive through pharmacies, drive through banking, drive through coffee houses. There are drive in movies, drive in oil change places and drive in car washes. We live in a time that we can eat, drink, bank, be cured, and get our cars serviced and washed without ever getting wet. (You know what I mean.) It wasn’t that long ago before photography went the way of digital that we had drive through photo processing. But when it’s raining and we’re hungry for what we don’t have on hand we better not have Chinese on hand. Where’s the outrage here!? (or here?!) Am I the only one who feels it!? (it ?!)

So that’s my rant for today. Sorry it’s not as conscience raising as transgender restrooms, American presidential candidates’ lies and mis-speakings, or international internet censoring but I still haven’t gotten my General Tso.

That’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?

 

The Sporting Life

Michael Leave a comment

Life is made of moments. There are the “aha!” moments,” the “you wouldn’t trade for anything” moments, the outright epiphanies. And then there are the things that make you go “really?”

Saturday evening I was out shopping and the couple in the check-out line in front of me was in full on, game day football garb. Replica jerseys of two of the biggest names in local pro football team history, team hats, scarf around her neck, logo emblazoned leather jacket for him, right down to the NFL licensed wristwatch. Their cart held beer, mixers, pretzels, crackers and cheese platter, and a custom made football shaped chocolate chip cookie. These guys were set for some serious football watching.

The problem with this picture is that it is the end of April. Football is as far out of season as deer hunting. The local hockey team is in the second round of the Stanley Cup playoffs. The local baseball team was that day on a six game winning streak. The city’s annual marathon was due to step off the following morning. Basketball, golf, soccer, and lacrosse were going strong. Football?

I wasn’t the only one wondering. The clerk at the cash register noticed it also. “You guys are set for a party.”

“Yep,” football man fan replied. “A draft party.”

“Oh yeah, I forgot about that. I heard the..”

“Don’t say it! We recorded the draft and we’re watching it tonight. All we need now is to make it home without hearing any about it and we can enjoy the whole thing at one time.”

Now, the NFL draft was just winding up its third and final day at the time this conversation was going on. I know I’m not the world’s biggest fan and even I have at times not wanted to be made aware of the result of a particular event because I was recording it for later viewing. The women curling finals from the 2014 Winter Olympics comes to mind. And this part of God’s green earth is such a football fanatic’s fantasy to the point that a cable network has presented a series about the excesses that pass for local little league football. But I have never encountered a devotee so zealous that taping the sport’s entry draft qualifies as appropriate accompaniment to cheese and crackers.

They say it takes all kinds. I’m certainly thankful of that. Otherwise how would I be able to carry on the fine tradition of blogging about the real reality that is out there for five years now. Let’s keep those kinds coming. Go reality! Go team!

That’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?

Happy Birthday To Me

Michael Leave a comment

Just in case anybody is wondering, today is my birthday. Thank you. Now, on with today’s post.

If you should be one of those young’uns who believe age is just a number, let me introduce you to my spam folder. Most of the time, I don’t even think about it. I’m not sure exactly how it works and who decides what is junk and what I want to see in an e-mail, but it works pretty well. So much so that most of the time, I don’t even think about it. (Did I already say that?) (Sorry.)

Every now and then I take a look around in there just to make sure that whoever is running things doesn’t toss out any babies with the bath water. I’ve discovered something about the junk mail I’m getting. It’s getting older with me. Let me ‘splain.

Once upon a time I would get solicitations to buy hot tubs. Now I get messages encouraging me to consider a walk-in tub. I used to get pleas to buy this miracle weight loss pill. Now I get messages offering me ways to reverse twenty years of bad eating. When I once got offers for low interest signature loans I now get offers for reverse mortgages.  And then there is the one transition no man wants to see in his mailbox. All the ads for penis enlargement concoctions have been replaced by advertisements for erectile dysfunction remedies. (If there is an equivalent female harbinger of old-age I can’t imagine what it would be.)

Yes, age may just be number. But to the junk-mailers of the world it is a number still preceded by a dollar sign.

That’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?

The Not Quite So Bad Smelling Pot

Michael Leave a comment

My last post was the bad side of a potpourri of encounters at the local retailers. This post is the better smelling side of that pot. It’s still a bit rotten but it has a less pungent odor about it.

On top of this list of things that don’t smell quite right (or if you prefer, things that make you go hmm) are shopping carts. Shopping carts themselves are not new fodder for the RRSB. Type “shopping cart” into my search bar and you can relive tales of shoppers with carts, carts without shoppers, crazy people with carts and crazy carts out to maim me. (My personal favorite that one. Relive it specifically at “Handicap Hate Crime,” (June 19, 2014)). But what put shopping carts on this particular list is that they officially are now everywhere, and some of it is intentional.

An intentional, yet questionable placement of shopping carts is now at the greeting card store. I’m ambivalent about greeting cards. I like them well enough. I like the idea of sending and getting real mail even if some far afield professional has written the sentiment. They fill a void that mere mortals like me could not and I for one feel accomplished just putting my name after somebody else’s perfectly chosen words. But I’m not so enamored with greeting cards that I feel the need to greet every occasion with a professional acknowledgement. Apparently the greeting card store people feel differently. So differently that they believe so many people will be buying so many of their cards in a single transaction that they have taken the step to make one’s shopping experience less physically exhausting and are now providing shopping cards in which to haul about your selection of selections as you go about selecting their cards. It is clearly just another overstated case of exaggerated hyperbole. Indubitably.

On the other hand, at stores where shopping with carts is advisable and often indeed a necessity, we are now faced with a decision as we pass through the doors that open automatically (and just in case you were unsure of that they are clearly so labeled but that’s a post for a different day). Of course I am talking about our basic supermarkets. At my closest go-to store the vestibule has 6 differently sized wheeled carts (one motorized) and two carry basket variants. For some reason the sporty compact models seem to be the most popular and never about when I need to pick up a dozen or so articles. Thus I am forced to wobble about poorly balanced (as if I wasn’t to be begin with) with a too small basket held in the crook of my arm or to reach deep into the void at the checkout line as I rummage for those 12 items in the bottom of the cart sized suitably to carry a month’s worth of groceries for a family of 4 (plus 2 pets). Where are all the cute little carts? They are being wheeled about by the family of four (pets safely locked in the over-sized SUV idling at the end of parking row 3) sagging under the weight of the soon to be purchased vittles and the pair of matching mini-monsters (aka 3 year olds who prefer to be at home in bed). It is clearly a case of bad choices. Several.

The last petal in our pot comes at the consideration of the local home improvement store. Today my needs that can be satisfied at a lumber, hardware, plumbing, electrical, lighting, appliance, paint, paper, carpet, and appliance store and nursery (the plant version, not the refuge for 3 year olds taking a break from mom and dad) can be met at that very nursery (the plant version). My biggest takeaways from the lawn and garden department begin at the garden half and end on my patio in the forms of plants, pots, and potting soil. Plants or seeds that will someday grow up to be young strapping plants and pots with a simple stand for the pots after the plants have been therein potted are light enough that a supermarket style shopping cart handles them with ease. But then there is that bag of potting soil. First I shouldn’t be lifting anything heavier than a five pound bag of donut holes and second I don’t want to be lifting anything heavier than a five pound bag of donut wholes. A flat bed cart that I can drag the bag of soil onto from the stack o’ bags would be ideal. But no, even though there is an entire store of wood, concrete, and refrigerator-freezers that have their own special carts, in the garden center you have only the extra-large version of the supermarket shopping cart that just ate my twelve items (no waiting) in the preceding paragraph.  It is clearly a choice of too many choices inside and not enough outside. By design.

At here you have it, today’s mélange just this side of rotten.

That’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?

 

The Rotten Pot

Michael Leave a comment

The potpourri – a quite lovely arrangement of highly scented dried flowers used to decorate and perfume.  Or collection of songs or poems, or a mélange of thoughts, ideas, or fact.  Whatever you want to make of it, or make it from, it is a beautiful order of otherwise unrelated things. In fact, I have often used it in post titles when I have too little of any one thing rummaging around in my head to add up to a couple hundred words of lucid thinking thus keeping that post from getting too ugly. Until now.

Now we have the not so flattering side of the potpourri – it’s otherwise disagreeable origin. From seventeenth century French it is literally the “rotten pot.” And today is a collection of the rotten side of reality that stuck its ugly face in my path this week.

The major ingredient in this pot is “some people’s children.” Not once, not twice, but three times just since Sunday did I get to witness not one, not two, but three little monsters disturbing the peace and leaving it in pieces.

There was the 3 or 4 year old girl (or boy, at that age does it matter) who made her own potpourri while seated in a shopping cart and systematically pulled petal after petal from the bouquet of flowers I suppose that her mother left with her to keep her (the child) occupied while she (the mother) gave her order to the deli counter clerk (and who couldn’t contain herself (the clerk) and pointed out the impromptu de-blooming). And then there was the 6 or 7 year old girl who at the local party store walked through a full aisle of piñata, punching one after the other until she got bored with that, realized that mom was not within arm’s reach, and wailed at the approximate pitch and volume of an ambulance siren.

But the killer (could we wish) was the around six-ish boy (I think) who stood (yes stood!) on the conveyor belt at the supermarket checkout line while he (I think) systematically threw every item in the impulse rack above the belt onto the belt to his (hers?) mother’s chorus of “Please get back in the cart, get in the cart, get back in the cart, I’m telling you get back in the cart, this is the last time now get back in the cart, get in the cart, get in the cart.” When the cashier had the nerve to say “It’s all right,” I couldn’t just stand there idly at the next check-out line. I said “No, it’s not alright. It’s rude and disgusting. And it’s why I’m in this line because I’m certainly not putting my food on that belt and if I were you (now directed to the cashier) I’d have someone get over there and clean that up.” And I actually felt good about myself having said something until the mother said, “Like that belt was any too clean before.”

And that was my mélange of otherwise unrelated urges to kill.

That’s what I think. Really. How ‘bout you?