It started out okay with the old barn I love in the background of Wal-Mart’s spring outdoor stuff; $5 films: 20 Alfred Hitchcock, included a couple of silent films and A River Runs Through It – great book, great movie. Then we hit the check-out line. Yes, line and oh, my gosh, only two lights were on for people who had more than 11 items and couldn’t use a Fast Lane because they don’t want full cart people to do that. We waited such a long time.

When I got up to the cashier, for whom I have great sympathy, I noted that they have two automated questions on the touch screen for payment: Was the store clean? or Did your cashier greet you? There is no question that asks “Were enough lines open?” We got to talking and she confirmed they 1) have to call Arkansas if they are sick and can’t make it in and 2) have to pass a customer to another associate if it’s time for their shift to end. That’s really fun when you are asking questions about a product and then have to ask them all over again of another person.

But it’s sunny today, so that is good.

I am not pleased with my granddaughter’s attitude about Grover. She says he is stupid. What a jerk . . . she is. She found a copy of The Monster at the End of This Book on th bookshelf and was joking around with it in front of her dad. I told her that wasn’t the original book – that we had gone through perhaps four copies when her dad was somewhere around one year old. I would sit on the little cherry rocker that had belonged to me grandfather, the one that I had been rocked in, and read TMTETB over and over again. The cover, back and front – fell off of the first one; one copy split in half. They were all stained and wrinkled and dogeared. I didn’t need the book to remember the words, but I appreciated it for Grover’s picture. My memory could never do justice to his little face and gestures and the true-blueness of his fur.

Now, this twerp girl mocks him. Never you mind her, Grover. You are so very dear to so many of us here. I love you.

This fellow, while remembering things about his days in the 52’s, remarked that now he understood what the old WWII fliers where experiencing when they visited the AF Museum in Dayton, Ohio.

This museum here – the one where you can stand on the grass and stick your head into the guts of the plane – is at Warner-Robins in Georgia.

I remember when this fellow in Georgia took off from SAC bases in this model plane. The wings were so long there was a wheel on the end of each wing – because they soft of flapped when the planes rolled down the runway for take-off. We would watch one after another lift into the air when we would visit the alert visitor’s area and the klaxon went off. There was a guy who was 35 on the crew and we all worried that he would collapse after running to the airplane; the guys would tease him about breathing hard. They said he was OLD . . . hahahahahahahahahaahahahahaha!

I look at that title and even thought I was thinking of the wind that is weather – breezes, gusts, straight line and so forth, I get the image of a wind-up toy in my mind. But never mind that. Too late? Well, I should have kept my mouth shut.

It is windy here. No, do not see all the folks walking around stiffly with a little thing to twist coming out of their backs; words such as “wind” can be a problem, can’t they? Another one is polish. How much polish do  you need to screw in a light bulb? For seem reason my spirits are up right now, even though they are manifesting themselves in a juvenile fashion. I mean spirits as in attitude – not liquor, although it is up too. You knew that though, didn’t you?

Okay, really, the shrubs and trees are whipping around and I have to go out and drag a limb that came down off the sidewalk. I am hoping it is a dead one that has been threatening to come down and will be light and, obviously, no longer a threat. I was not aware of this until middle age, but the chief cause of death in the days of early settlement in these parts was falling limbs. Sometimes it amuses me to think of how residential lots are now advertised as “wooded” when back then, the draw might have been a “clearing” in which to build.

I have strayed from the weather topic – I guess the wind blew me off.

Even though the new WordPress upgrade tells you that your image did not pass the upload test, it is sucked into the Media Library, from which you can pull it out by it’s url. Sounds kind of graphic, doesn’t it. I did not know this for two days. I kept trying to upload from my computer and was rebuffed every time. But, you can work around this if you enter it with the url it has been assigned when it somehow sneaks into the Media Library. Or maybe it is Shanghaied and wakes up to find itself there.

I am tired of What Not to Wear, and A Baby Story and Miami Ink and LA Ink and all these other things I see listed on The Learning Channel. I forgot Ten Years Younger. Is the house flipping on TLC? I just don’t think these are “learning” shows; yes, I could see a few shows about tattooing and how the way you dress may not be to your best advantage. Show us a few examples and then get outta there.

Now, mysteries – both medical and criminal are interesting. How many pregnancies and births do you want to watch – even if you are pregnant for the first time. How about genetics?

This appears to be a real griping day for me. Yes, I have seen a trend here. Must think of something positive to say . . . Uh, The History Channel – it’s pretty good.

Here’s my deep dark video secret: I am drawn to watch the campiest movies you can find, such as the brain transplant where the mind of a beautiful model was put in the head of so-so looker. Oh, the made-for-TV disaster flicks. Sometimes it is so hard, but my family depends on me to maintain my reputation. Manos, Hands of Fate of Mystery Science Theater 3000 is a good example of the lengths to which I go to be the camp champ; I’ve seen Manos TWICE at least.

All by myself I found Gerry, a film in which Matt Damon starred. One scene was him walking across the desert and lasted about ten minutes . . . walk, walk, walk, walk, walk. I think that is my “career year” movie.

Say, I may have written about this before . . . so . . . maybe . . . it is rotting my brain. But, hey that movie was made five years after Matt Damon made Good Will Hunting, so perhaps HE watched Manos, Hands of Fate one too many times.

The snow is gone, probably because the temperature has climbed through the night and day to 57? and is supposed to hit 60K. Everything is wet and if you were using the moss on the north side of the tree for guidance out of this land hereabouts, you’re direction is would be well-marked. The sun is above layers of gauzy overcast and I would imagine anyone flying high up on a flight from San Diego to here would just about cry when the plane descended and entered the gloom.

I keep thinking: My ancestors settled this state – maternal in the north and paternal in the south . . . What WERE they thinking???

Anyway, I took my trusty – not really, it’s plastic – rake and went out back. It was like raking washcloths, wet ones, ones that had been used by a kid and left wadded up in odd shapes. I didn’t rake a whole lot, but those leaves were heavy and clinging to the ground. I picked up sticks too, although I really am not fond of that job; I sincerely suspect that some sticks hide and then pop out when I think I have got them all

Tonight it is to rain. And tomorrow is a high of 48? and wind. Yes!! Wind, I love it. Dear, dear wind, please dry us out. We need to dry out and have a temperature above 50? so  I can finish staining the fence. Last summer was so brutally hot that we put it off to fall and then the weather was just not good for painting. This is what happened: We painted and painted when we could and I told my grandson to just “paint around”  the one woodpile and we would move the wood and paint that part later.

We got caught and could paint no more, so we left the wood, until we needed a fire. Then as we drew wood from out variously seasoned piles, the unpainted portion of the fence appeared. It really stands out now. I’d post a picture, but WordPress has not resolved the upload problem – probably a good thing.

I am thinking of starting a fire to drive out the dampness and fill the air with the cozy and comforting (to me) scent of wood smoke. A couple of Yankee Candle tarts and we’ll be all set.

It wouldn’t be so bad in this state if at least it had a romantic and adventurous history. No one yearns to go to Indiana; to add insult to injury, we used to be the Northwest Territory. Not anymore, Oregon and Washington have that nickname – – and they also have mountains and seacoast and tales of horses and buffalo and all sorts of things. Excuse me, but I have never heard of the Indiana Trail.

Even North Dakota says rugged individual and strength of character. And it’s next to Montana, home of the Big Sky and Chet Huntley.

So why am I here? Shoot, that’s a darn good question. I don’t know, maybe it gives me confidence – I can face problems and say, “Ha! I am not fazed. I have lived in Indiana, the Great State of Non-Descript.

Have you ever heard, “Eli Manning, you just won the Super Bowl, what are you going to do?”

“Why, I’m going to Indiana!”

Oh, wait a minute . . . maybe I should have thought this sarcastic comment out.

I like having this Internet connection; I like having a word processing program that just lets me go back and delete without an eraser; I like having a printer, no having to painstakingly type each word and use thin paper so the erasures would not show so much. I love this stuff – cable TV and DVD’s and digital camera pictures going on the computer. Ipods and digital recorders, cell phones – heck, I thought cordless phones were cool. It took me forever to realize I could actually walk away from the main phone base.

However, I sometimes think I would have liked to have lived in the old days – not the old, old days, but the ones where Rudy Vallee first crooned through his megaphone and everyone seemed so cheerful singing, The Stein Song. Sometimes I sit here with old songs coming out of itunes and visions of raccoon coats in my mind.

Spring Break is over and I an sitting Indian fashion on the end of the sofa, about 45 minutes away from taking Alison to the hospital and getting kids to school – except one. The middle one, the one who is autistic, developed a sore throat and fever on Saturday and got antibiotics at the After Hours clinic yesterday. Let’s see, Cameron was sick, then Summer was sick (You don’t want to be around Summer when she is sick.), Alison was sick and some time in this Time of Germs, I was sick. I think we will be between three weeks and a month of having someone home and not at school.

I have been staying late up on some of the Spring Break nights, because for most of my life I have been a night owl.

I had to leave writing that last bit and on my return, about an hour later, I realize that for a lot of my life I was actually a night owl and an early bird. But I am too old for that now – too old to stay up to two and get up at six.

I can remember staying up all night and all day and late into the next day and not thinking a thing about it. But lately I have read that while we sleep, our brain is making more chemicals that we need to . . . oh, think. So, getting sleep is a duty; yes, that’s it – a duty. Well, I think I’ll do my duty tonight about nine.