Today the high is supposed to be 49 degrees; I think last week we broke a record with 80 or 81. Well, it’s not last week anymore. And it is overcast with the dampness of yesterday’s rain lingering on. That’s not so bad; it’s  a bit of time to enjoy the little firestove and read a little. I found a book at Mother’s that, I think, is titled London Transports; it is a collection of short stories. I read a few in the evening last week while stretched out on her sofa in a room lit by the reading light over my shoulder and the flickering of the gas heater turned up so it had actual flames. Mother had a tendency to heat by pilot light.

Back to the stories. One was about a 29 year old virgin who was to be married and went into a bookstore to ask for a book on, yes, I am going to type it, sex. She told the proprietor she had a niece who was going to be married and needed information. The gentleman coughed and suggested she share her experience with her niece. She she told him she couldn’t because she was a nun.

She responded to his surprised look by remarking that nuns no longer wore “nun clothes” and he said his sister was a nun and her order had them donning shorter dresses and modified head coverings. Not to fear, she blurted out that she worked in a travel agency and was supposed to blend in with tourists. His mystified look prompted her to add it was her job to arrange travel arrangements for nuns serving as missionaries.

Maybe it was a porn bookstore . . . I don’t remember. But I was thinking, “You read this, Mother? You who had me screen all videos and DVD’s so I could forewarn you about closing your eyes or, if necessary, fast forward.” I just realized I didn’t investigate the rest of the stack of books waiting to be read.  Or the stack she had already processed. Maybe on this chilly day I need to go stretch out by Mother’s gas heater again . . .

A book, a Diet Coke, Sydney sleeping on my feet, warmth from the heater and the smell of woodsmoke in the beams of the house.

No, you won’t guess. You’ll never guess.

Here it is right in front of your eyes:

Yes, I bought, today, a Honda Metropolitan scooter.

Oh, Lord, what have I done? Now I need to get a helmet and practice a bit at Hayden Honda’s dealership and who knows what I’ll be morphing in to. I am wondering if this is so not me it is the ultimate me.

Hi, this is Woo and I found a story AJ wrote a few years ago about Hayden Honda. You can see it if you want on the Stories page.

Some people believe I have lived a sheltered life – especially in the dark side of vocabulary. I think some people may have a case. Today, one of my dear Peanut Butter Cafe & Roadhouse friends took me aside and counseled me. I was familiar with the word dingbat – Archie always called Edith one, remember? So, I just always assumed dingleberry – and I hesitate to type it – had something to do with goofy behavior. I am not going to link to any online dictionary. My face is red. Although my first inclination was to just ignore what had happened, I just couldn’t let people stopping by think I used such a word. Ew,

My father would not want his daughter to talk that way . . . and that’s why I say “pass gas” instead of f–t. And why I will never use d———y again.

I suppose it is a generational thing.

The sky is blue and the temp is in the low seventies and I am savoring sucking it in. Just the feel of it. It makes me want to put on my moccasins and do a little alternating foot hop dance of  YES, YES, YES, YES, YES.

Der Bingle ordered a dark blue bath robe for me from Warm Things and it came today. YES! Although I must be careful not to dash out into the rain while wearing it or the weight of it wet will turn me into a puddle trying to edge back to the door.

Speaking of Der Bingle, I feel obligated to share: LZP has a son named Sam and Sam asked his dad if Der Bingle stood for Dingleberry. It was one of those moments when you press your lips together really tightly and wait until you can trust your voice to answer, “Well, I think Bing Crosby was before his time.”

And speaking of Bing Crosby, Christmas was different this year in a lot of stores. I didn’t hear his version of the Christmas songs very much. So I guess the deadness he experienced in, what was it? 1977? is finally catching up with society. Actually, we listen to a lot of dead guy’s composed music and to a lot of other dead singers; I suppose it reached a point when the kids asking parents about White Christmas and Bing Crosby found that their parents are also a bit in the dark.

I remember my mother calling me when he died and asking if I had seen a picture; I believe she was remarking on how bald he was. And then Mary Catherine Crosby turned up in Dallas, but JR is another subject.

Gosh, I am giddy with all this sucked in sunshine. I am tempted to run outdoors, arms outstretched, ready to embrace the day. However, it is possible I could be intercepted by men in white coats who would take advantage of my pose to slip the looooong sleeves of a strait jacket on me and cart me off.

**************************

Oh, wait, I may go willingly. As I was typing the above, I received a picture mail from the Dandelion Underground. The caption is “We are back.”

Ah, what to do today? I suppose you are having trouble picking up on my motivational vibes . . . because, frankly, I am still. Not completely still, mind you; my heart is beating and my chest going up and down – otherwise, I’d be dead. You probably figured that out. These past few days I have not been of a mood to wrestle with things; these have been my “Oh, well” days. It is not a mood of sadness or despair; no, I’m more just floating along with the breeze. And not minding it really. I feel like having fun.

And why not? There is only so much you can do for some people. Only so much.

Newfie and some of the other regulars around here have been mentioning that they feel I have been putting myself too much front and center. As I understand it, a group of them got together and by acclamation Newfie found herself spokesperson. So, for the past bit of time I have been sitting here discussion the situation with her.

This is my view from my side of the table:

Her compatriots gave her a list of “talking points” and she has been going through them one by one. At point number three, I caught the drift of their message: AmeliaJake, you are hogging the cafe and we never get to express our opinions and tell our stories. I have tried to insert a few words to address this issue, but whenever my lips part, someone* chimes in that Newfie’s list continues.

I will tell them that, of course, it was I, AmeliaJake who built this little home for eccentric refugees and I run the place and they should submit ideas for discussion to my assistant. But, the truth be told,  I am afraid. So, more probably I will humor them a little and now and then let them contribute.  Come to think of it, how did the Foo Bar get established in the PB Cafe & Roadhouse anyway. Gee, I think I even paid for the decor. Darn! How the heck did that happen.

Oh . . . my  . . . goodness. Newfie has pulled a contract out of her pocket and someone* just handed me a pen.

* Some of the someones:

Spoofie

Feisty

Spiffie

Woo

NaPoo

Spikey

Even Alien Poo and  California LemonHead

I think we have phases in life, some short and some long. I am talking about personal phases, not really those determined by outside influences. No, that isn’t what I mean; this is difficult. Okay, phases that aren’t determined by one specific event, or even two. These phases either occur naturally as a result of organic mind/body changes (perhaps aging?) and/or the constant stresses and pressures of an extended environment. Something in you changes –  a shift in mood, outlook, or whatever you want to call it. Maybe it is like the temperature falling, falling and falling and then, poof, water is ice.

To tell you the truth here, I am thinking about this as I go along and some of the ideas coming off the top of my head are smashing right on the floor; some leave me so fast they zoom right out of my awareness and all I remember is thinking I might have had a good idea. Some circle around and come back to fight for landing space with others that carry opposing speculation.

I know I often don’t know what I am talking about, but it is unsettling to realize I don’t believe I know what I am thinking about.

Yes, I am fazed . . . and no, I did not plan that pun; it just presented itself and I gave up and grabbed it and typed it.

This STUFF. I found an old bottle of it and I used it and I cannot believe I ever strayed. I am tempted to voluntarily go to Wal-Mart and get some, along with the daily use formula. But what if they don’t have it? What if I drag my tried body out there and they don’t have it? Will three dollar solar lights appease me? I don’t think so.

The smell of the shampoo – heavenly. And now my hair is short enough I can’t get it to rest on my nose. Irony, rats. I don’t know if cleanliness is next to Godliness or not, but it is on my hair and I love the feeling.

For the past two days, I have been working outdoors. Yes, painting and mowing and I also did a little inside picking up, even though I kept walking by this pillow that said, “My idea of cleaning is to sweep the room with a glance.” Actually, the painting was staining, but considering it uses a brush and a can of liquid stuff, I call it painting. Now, of course, I’m going to confuse myself by saying that I stained three sections of privacy fence. Up and down with the arm and the wood sucked, really sucked the stain in. No long gliding strokes. Because the temperature had climbed, I grabbed one of Mother’s straw hats and plopped it on my head. Supposedly I have a big head and Mother had a small head, but it fit nicely – probably because Mother had put some spongy stuff in the inner band. Yesterday I managed to get redwood stain on it and today, it caught on a branch and went beneath the wheel of the mower. It was a scary moment but followed with quick relief as I realized it had avoided the blades.

I then decided to bite the bullet and not gamble on having enough gas; I drove into town and forgot I was wearing a stained and faded San Diego tee shirt and stained and worn jeans and the stained and almost mower-eaten hat. The touristy Blue Gate Restaurant was across the street and I think the clerk thought I was not good “local color”.  Sydney hanging his head – with tongue lolling – out the window probably added even another dimension.

When I finished what I was going to mow, I positioned to drive the mower into the Wheel Horse Stable – no kidding that’s what it says above the door. Below the door the boards making up a wee bit of a ramp had rotted completely over the winter and the front wheels went up and the back wheels caught. So I backed up and fiddled with a makeshift ramp. Did it four times and the fourth time on the backout portion I caught the edge of the door frame on something and split the two by four.

So . . . I got off and thought of the Gipper speech and how I was up against it and the breaks weren’t going my way and I hauled off and made the best makeshift ramp known to man and drove that tractor right in and, yes, well, hit the mower already parked in front. GO, AMELIAJAKE!!!!

None of this was caught on film and no AmeliaJakes were harmed in the non-making of the film.

Yesterday it was chilly and rainy and at about 8:30  in the morning it was gloomy; today it is chilly and the sun is out and it is 8:30 and it’s cheerful. I feel upbeat; I actually feel like cheering for the sun. And for blue sky. We take sun when we can get it in Northern Indiana – not that it is one of the cloudiest places in the continental US, but it is changeable.

Many times you will get up to a clear sky and think oh, wow, let’s have an outing or a picnic lunch or do yard work and make things look better. Then they starting floating in – clouds. At first a bit of fluff and then as if someone spilled a box of cotton balls and then you don’t see clouds, but the tiny bits of blue sky between them. And then you are under a gauze sky. Weather.com is of some help in this now, informing your little psyche if it can’t quit holding its breath and enjoy the coming sunny day, or telling you to buck up and make certain the governor on your mood is working.

????Woo Hoo, Thanks, weather.com.

I know I have written this before, but I just have to say it again. When we moved to Sacramento when Der Bingle was in the Air Force, I was still in the mindset that if you had a sunny day, you should get out and enjoy it. Damned near killed myself – would have had I not been in my early 20’s. Day after day of sun. Nothing got done inside and nothing got read. Finally, I think, I cracked. I looked at Robert William, handed him some toys, turned on the TV and curled up in the corner of the sofa with a novel.

He had other ideas . . . short little kid in red tennis shoes standing at the door with his hand on the knob, staring at me.