So what did you do with all the daylight you saved over the summer? It has a very short shelf life–I hope you spent it wisely.
I haven't really tested this out, but I have a suspicion that many of my favorite films, low-brow comedies like The Blues Brothers, probably fit very nicely into Joseph Campbell's Hero's Journey. I know The Wizard of Oz (or more accurately the heroine's journey does, but I'll have to look more closely at Raising Arizona, Miss Congeniality, My Cousin Vinnie, The Producers and Legally Blonde, among others, to see if they fit the model .
Moving.
The people living in the Alhambra moved out a couple of days ago. We watched as the packers put all the soon to be former residents' belongings in two trucks to take their stuff to the new digs, as they drove off for the last time.
They hadn't been in the house long, maybe a couple of years, so they were reversing a recent process of taking stuff off trucks and putting it in the house. Soon, the new residents will appear, moving van in tow, to start a new cycle.
As I was watching the movers scurry back and forth from truck to house, it struck me as such a curious process. Take out a bed–put in a bed. Take out a table–put in a table. Take out towels–put in towels. It all seems so fruitless and unnecessary.
Now, I understand the concepts of taste and style and possessions identifying oneself with what one has and I sure wouldn't want to live in a Late Baroque home with everything gilded and puffy and overwrought. And we certainly couldn't abandon Mr. Snuggies, Granny's rocking chair or other personal or one-of-a-kind items.
I get that. It still seems strange, though, watching from afar. And we wish our neighbors Godspeed.
Just so you know, too.
Twinkies have a shelf life of 65 days.
Writer and audience.
For the first part of my writing life, I was deep in the academic/transactional/persuasive end of the writing pool, where the writer wanted things to happen, to effect change. Later, I moved into the 'creative' end of the pool, where thoughts and feelings ruled, and expression was king.
Oddly, in spite of the 'hard line' drawn between the 'creatives' and the disdained 'non-creative' (or 'duh') writers (who can't hear the disdain because of the sound of their bank accounts growing), there is one area where part of the duh writers' toolkit could come in handy, and that's in using the audience to make more compelling documents/novels/poems.
Audience can be especially helpful if you specify your audience. What do they know? What do they expect? What can the writer do to get this person to keep reading?
Whatever happened to...?
- ebita
- pumpkin spice frenzy
If it can happen to Sir Mick...
Mick Jagger Says It ‘Happens’ While Discussing Getting Ghosted.
I've been ghosted (suddenly having all contact with a person cut off by that person with no explanation. It's a coward move), and it ain't fun. But usually after some thought, I realize it's no great loss.
But I thought ghosting happened only to mere mortals, not to galactic luminaries like Mick Jagger.
Worldview shattered.
Primo Understatement.
Vice magazine does the job with Bryan Johnson's Quest for Immortality Hits a Snag as He’s Diagnosed With an Incurable Disease.
We could probably include hubris and Schadenfreude with snag, but understatement is enough.
Nature is marvelous. Did anybody besides Bryan Johnson want him hanging around anyway?
In my world, that is gender-neutral.
Huffpost floats Instead Of Saying 'Hey, Guys!' At Work, Try These Gender-Neutral Alternatives.
By the mid 1980s, 'hey, guys!' was already in place as a universal salutation. On the campus where I worked, a woman joining a group of all women students would say 'hey guys!' routinely. And if I'm pushed to the wall to declare a personal pronoun, 'hey guy!' would be my choice.
But we'll give Huffpost a chance. To be acceptable, the new greeting should be as short, upbeat, expressive and memorable as 'hey guys!'
They offer maybe a dozen alternatives. They all start with 'hey,' so we're good there. But then they propose peeps, folk, y'all, people, everyone, pals, and friends to fill the gap. But these are too folksy, generic or presumptuous to replace guys.
And personally, when I say 'hey, guys!' it's not like I'm thinking, 'I'm really only addressing the males in the group,' or when in a mixed gender group and someone comes up and says 'hey guys!' I'm not going to think 'how insensitive! Do they not realize there are people of the feminine persuasion in this group? Or have they evolved so much that they have transcended all placing people in categories?
So for me, no– I'm sticking with guys. I don't care how much you stir it–this pot ain't gonna boil.
To read or not to read.
I keep a pad of post-its next to The Chair, upon which I write notes to myself. With any luck, I can read them and make sense of them when I come back to them.
So it was the other morning. I saw a note that read 'Eric the Incorruptible.' Hm. A TV show I should watch? The name of the hero in an Icelandic saga I had forgotten I was going to write? A mystification indeed. So off I hie to my trusty search engine. How it was supposed to help I didn't know, but hope was springing.
The first half-dozen or so references were to Eric Ries' Incorruptible. Mystery solved–it was suggested in an article I was reading, and I wrote it down in a might-take-a-flyer-on-that kind of way. Amazon was the handiest checkpoint, to see how big it is. It's 452 pages, and costs $29.00 $27.10 at Wamart). Suddenly, the book went from take-a-flyer to maybe-if-I-trip-over-it-at-the-library. Now, I know that $29 is pretty reasonable for a book these days, but the cost/enjoyment ratio wasn't looking good.
Another thing stood out: the paperback was $2 more than the hardcover. Curious.
Now I have to decide what to do with/about Eric the Incorruptible.
Speaking of ¢, common or other.
The Great Penny Panic of Early 2026 turned out to be 'not a thing,' as I'm getting and giving pennies all the time. Life goes on.