The Blog I'm Not Writing

Department Of The Partridge Of The Week

It’s that time of the year again. As has become a tradition much maligned anticipated in our neighborhood, moiself  is hosting a different Partridge, every week, in my front yard.   [1]

Can you identify this season’s final guest Partridge?   [2]

 

 

 

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Moiself  likes to start off the new year by sharing the most profound sentiments ever sung.  [3] – they transcend space and time; these words go beyond words, what can I say?

Na, na, na, na na na na
Na na na na
Hey Jude

 

 

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Department Of Preparing For The Inevitable

Dateline January 1, 7:45 AM-ish.  I go through the same ordeal very year:  Maybe, if I say nothing, he’ll forget….

But noooooo.

This year, we made it to 8:32 am before MH abruptly looked up from his crossword puzzle, put down his pen and exclaimed, “Do you know what day it is?!?!”  He scurried toward the very large cardboard box by the back door – the box that was on its way to the recycling bin; the box that, from my seat at the breakfast table, oh-so-conveniently blocked my view of our television.  “Here,” he said, “I’ll move this, so you can see….”

My head slumped to my chest.  My ordinarily kind, sensible, sane, dedicated life partner – who otherwise never watches morning television – had just realized the date, and informed me of That Which I Knew All Too Well: “It’s Time for The Rose Parade!”

I don’t know if it’s the Pasadena connection  [4]  or what, which explains MH’s interest in the parade.  As for the or what, I’m just not a parade person and MH knows this (which, of course, increases his delight in turning on TRP’s broadcast).

So: for the next however many interminable hours, The Rose Parade was on in the background as I did other NY day things and was vaguely cognizant of the TV being on in the background.  When I occasionally glanced at the screen (often at the behest of MH – “Look at that marching band’s dancing drum majors!”) moiself  had to admit that the parade afforded the rest of the country a beautiful view of a certain slice of SoCal: it was a morning of gorgeous, crystal-clear blue skies (amidst a timely in the series storms hitting and forecast to hit the region).  Still, the whole idea of watching a parade….  You sit there, whether in person or in front of the TV, and other people and massively adorned platforms built on trucks (i.e., the parade floats”) just…pass by?  Someone please explain this to me, she said rhetorically (because people have tried, and it has still never made sense).

The parade’s floats’ raisons d’etre were divided amongst local publicity, charity promotions, or other “causes” – perhaps the most publicized was Ft. Lauderdale’s attempt to lure the tourists back to their city   [5] with their not-so-subtle,  we’re-not-THAT-Florida  theme.  Meanwhile, the ever-present droning of the parade announcers’ float descriptions provided an almost surreal background (each float’s sponsors and representations apparently had to be described in 30 seconds or less). 

“…represents The Hopi tribe’s butterfly dance…
Now we have The Core Kidney Foundation’s tribute to renal health….
Next up, Fort Lauderdale reminds us Everyone Under The Sun is welcome in their fair city….
the whimsical UPS Store entry shows The Beat of Achievement…
The bees on this float remind parade fans that you can BE the solution to…”

 

 

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Department Of Nice Timing

Moiself  appreciated the fact that one of my best memories of 2023 came from the very end of the year, on the day when MH, Belle, K and & I played a new (to us) game that Santa Robyn left under the tree for us.  In Ransom Notes, the self-described “ridiculous word magnet game,” a player reads a prompt from a card, and everyone (including the prompt card reader) has to craft answers to the prompt using their limited pool of ~ 75 words (a mélange of pronouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions) each player has drawn from a pool of word magnets.  Players read their answers aloud; a Judge for the round is randomly chosen, and Judge decides whose entry is funniest/best, and that person wins the round. Everyone replenishes their word magnets, plays another round, and whoever wins five rounds wins the game.

A sample of the prompts:

* Tell someone you’ve clogged their toilet at a party
* Write a letter informing someone why they were not accepted into college
* Summarize Greek mythology
* Write a theme song for a TV show about loneliness
* Get someone who’s been in a coma since 2014 up to speed
* Explain to a store employee why you must be accompanied by your monkey

 

 

We were doing fine, enjoying the game, MH was in the lead with four wins…and then came what was to be the last round.  The prompt read:

* Whisper something seductive to your date during a movie.

The four of us were all groaning as we crafted our responses, everyone muttering about what they were being *forced* to make with their limited word resources   (MH and I in were having the most trouble keeping upright).   [6]  K read his answer, Belle read hers, both were good for some giggles.  After three attempts I was able to choke out my own answer, prefacing it with, “This is *not* your mother talking!” as my offspring roared with shock and delight to hear their mother’s…well… (there’d no other way to describe it ) soft porn creation.

“I can’t read this.” MH buried his head in his hands, and held out his answer to me.  “What, yours is worse than mine?” I said, when I was able to catch my breath.  Turns out, yep.  After four tries I was able to wheeze out 80% of MH’s answer before I dissolved into a breathless mess, sobbing with gut-twisting laughter. Looking around the table I saw my entire family doing the same – all four of us with tears of  Did-MH-and-Robyn-really-say-that ?!?!  laughter streaming down our respective faces.

Too much fun; when was the last time that happened?  And don’t y’all wish you knew what MH and I had written?   [7]

 

 

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Department Of An Open Plea To All The Merchants…

Whose products moiself  has purchased, intentionally or otherwise (translation:  our 30+ year old dryer broke down for the last time), over the holiday season:

Stop asking me to tell you “about my purchases.”  Do you just ship your products randomly  to people?  Of course not.  I bought it; paid for it; received it – you know all of this, and you don’t need to know anything else.  If it’s crappy, I’ll let you know.  Ditto if it’s the best damn humidifier on the planet.

 

 

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Department Of Why We Can’t All Just Get Along

Dateline: last Friday (12/29/23).  A clue in NY Times daily crossword was, “Word on a common bumper sticker.”  I snorted when I filled in the answer, “Coexist.” MH, hearing my derisive reaction, commented, “I’ve seen that bumper sticker a lot.”

So has moiself; so have all of us. And I’ve never really liked it.

 

 

I’ve seen it accompanied by icons representing a variety of the world’s religions; in rainbow form, with the flags of different nations….

Moiself  imagines that it purports to be a suggestion or call to action, when it’s just a passive statement of a fact.  Whether or not you are actively seeking a world where everyone gets along, the fact is that all of us coexist with other beings, be they those of our own species or the flora/fauna around us   [8] .

C’mon, people,

 

 

Coexist.  As a suggestion, or even a call to action, it’s about as motivating to moiself  as such bland but equally important prompts as

* Hydrate
* Eat
* Floss
* Breathe

Increasingly I see the coexist bumper sticker accompanied by its differently-abled cousin:

 

 

Excusez-moiself?  (translation for the French-impaired:  WTF !?!?)

Believe in it?  Why?

Tolerance exists; believing in something doesn’t do anything to increase the amount of the something.  How about *work* for tolerance…or something better.  Moiself  don’t know about y’all, but the idea of being tolerated doesn’t exactly flip my roller coaster.  But, sometimes that is all you can get, and if acceptance is lacking, then toleration will have to do.

 

 

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Department Of The Date Mistakes I’m Not Making

Many years ago, I noticed moiself  got into a pattern after the change to the new year: I always got “it”– the new year – correct.  Whether writing checks or dating letters or doing whatever other activities required a date entry, I would never mess up the new year…until I’d have a relapse, several months down the line (April or May), and I’d write the previous year on, say, the electric bill.  For some reason, the petty corner of my mind which keeps track of such things noted that I haven’t done that in at least three years.  The reason why?  It’s not due to some new cognitive improvement/memory technique or anything else I’m practicing; rather, it’s likely due to the somewhat pedestrian fact that moiself  does so many logistical things digitally now.  Translation: I write very, very, very, few checks; thus, the opportunity for mis-dating something has dropped precipitously.  Not exactly the most interesting factoid, but still…

 

 

 

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Department Of The Best New Definition I’ve Heard So Far This Year

OK, so the year is young.  Still….

What are pickles?
Pickles are just cucumbers sitting in their own piss.

 

 

 

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Department of Employee Of The Month

It’s that time, to bestow that prestigious award upon moiself.  Again. The need for which I wrote about here.   [9] 

 

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Freethinkers’ Thought Of The Week     [10]

 

 

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May you coexist with tolerance but live with love;
May you try to get that definition of pickles out of your mind;
May you remember, when times get tough:
Na, na, na, na na na na,
Na na na, Hey Jude;
…and may the hijinks ensue.

Thanks for stopping by.  Au Vendredi!

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[1] Specifically, in our pear tree.

[2] Season as I arbitrarily declare it to be:  Partridge-in-our-pear-tree season runs to after Thanksgiving through the 12 Days of Christmas.

[3] Yes, we – as in, all of humanity – voted on this years ago, don’t you remember?  Or did you forget your absentee ballot?

[4] He’s a Caltech alum and thus spent four years in Pasadena.

[5] Along with many other tourist-dependent Florida towns and attractions, Ft. L has taken a hit, what with boycotts from both organizations and individual tourists due to Gov. Santos’  aggressive attacks on LGBTQ and reproductive rights.   In 2023 18 conferences pulled bookings from Broward county (home to Ft. Lauderdale) in response the state’s conservative stances (the “Don’t Say Gay” bill, e.g.) on human rights issues.

[6] Yes, we were all sober!  And it was only 11:30 in the morning.

[7] I briefly considered taking a picture of our respective answers, then realized, NO WAY am I documenting this future blackmail material: “Ya wanna see what my mom‘s/dad’s/idea of a romantic suggestion is?”

[8] And inside of us.  Do some research on your gut microbiome, and be impressed (or cringe).

[9] Several years ago, MH received a particularly glowing performance review from his workplace. As happy as I was for him when he shared the news, it left me with a certain melancholy I couldn’t quite peg.  Until I did.

One of the many “things” about being a writer (or any occupation working freelance at/from home) is that although you avoid the petty bureaucratic policies, bungling bosses, mean girls’ and boys’ cliques, office politics and other irritations inherent in going to a workplace, you also lack the camaraderie and other social perks that come with being surrounded by your fellow homo sapiens.  No one praises me for fixing the paper jam in the copy machine, or thanks me for staying late and helping the new guy with a special project, or otherwise says, Good on you, sister. Once I realized the source of the left-out feelings, I came up with a small way to lighten them.

[10] “free-think-er n. A person who forms opinions about religion on the basis of reason, independently of tradition, authority, or established belief. Freethinkers include atheists, agnostics and rationalists. No one can be a freethinker who demands conformity to a bible, creed, or messiah. To the freethinker, revelation and faith are invalid, and orthodoxy is no guarantee of truth.”  Definition courtesy of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, ffrf.org