About 20 minutes until prime time and I don’t know what I want to do: hunker  down with a book, grab a puzzle, get down on the floor and do some sit-ups, surf the Internet for interesting places, stick a DVD in the machine or make myself throw away one bag of annoying knick-knacks. Did an exercise thing sneak in there? I think it did.

There was a time when I did jumping jacks a lot; at the drop of a hat I would whip off 50 or more. I just wanted to do them, had this urge to do them. Now, I know I should be active, but I am not.  Has my brain’s need for action changed because of chemical changes? Don’t know. Maybe it is age – don’t know that either.

So this is an experiment I’m going to try: Close my eyes and work back a few decades . . . feel like now is then in my mind . . . and see what I feel the urge to do.

Thinking of the Shakespeare rewriting led me to recall the days I would find Henry V in the in the VCR, set to the St. Crispin’s Day Speech. I liked that speech too, a lot.

The kids in Cameron’s English Lit class are studying Shakespeare – Romeo and Juliet to be specific – and the teacher has broken the class up into twos and threes to read scenes. Or, you can rewrite the scene. Cameron is doing that because his scene has Capulet, the nurse and Juliet. He changed the nurse into a male servant, but, as he says, “I couldn’t do anything about Juliet.”

He has worked very, very hard on this venture, turning our dining room into the setting for the scene – I am to film it.

Since he re-wrote the scene somewhat already he decided to move the action to Vienna and to a more recent time. Then he told me he thought he would include the “Winter of Our Discontent” speech from Richard III and have Juliet speak it to end the scene. He likes that scene, it seems. I said I thought it would be better to just go watch the movie again.

Personally, I would have had Juliet say, “I want to elope . . . someone’s kingdom for a horse.”

I don’t know why I got up at four, other than because I woke up and thought it was Monday and I couldn’t dread it any longer, I might as well jump into it. I think there is something not quite right about that logic, but I’m not going to delve into it any further, other to say that I am certain I had the intestinal fortitude to pull the covers over my head and dread it some more.

I got up; I did some work on the computer and then I got a Diet Coke and a half a peanut butter sandwich. I put the DC in a glass with ice, even though it was already cold and then, because I felt an overwhelming need for sugar, I put in a few ounces of actual Coke. Then I worked a little more on the computer.

I have now been up four hours and I would really like to nap – because my eyes are tired and because it is a gray sky out there. It is also damp and chilly. Oh, what would be the word for that? Do you remember the incredibly hard time Billy Crystal had trying to sum up hot and humid and moist for the book he was writing in the movie Throw Momma Off the Train? (Sultry – Momma thought of it.)

The dog is sleepy. He needs company on the sofa. It is a long sofa – the two of us could curl up on each end, sort of butt to butt. And then someone could take a picture . . . Bum to Bum and Butt to Butt. Of course, if we were to assume this pose often, that someone could paint us. It might become a famous painting, maybe hang in the Lourvre. In the remake of The Da Vinci Code, there might be a message on the painting . . . probably on my butt – it’s the bigger of the two.

Oh, my gosh and catch my breath. The news story was talking about gum people, not Wrigley Field. Lordy. Then for a quick second I wondered if it were Jimmy Buffet who was buying Wrigley Field and it would become Margarita Field and everyone would wear tropical shirts and Panama hats.

But it was Warren Buffet and gum and candy. Suddenly, from out of nowhere, I have an image in my mind of Warren Buffet in a tropical shirt and Panama hat. ACK.

And I guess news guys wear topical shirts . . . ?

The picture is from this site.

About a month ago, I started buying red rubber mulch made out of old tires at Wal-Mart. I went in last week and they had none. I went in yesterday and they had none. So, I sighed and said to the employee, “Well, I suppose you won’t be getting anymore in.” He said he didn’t know, but that I was the fifth person who had asked him about it that day.

So, Wal-Mart, it’s not just my voice out in the wilderness here. Other are calling out, “Old tire mulch . . . Old tire mulch . . . ” Can’t you hear us, Wal-Mart? Am I going to have to go someplace else? Am I going to have to beg you?