That’s not accurate. It was twenty of three when I first work up and a quarter of three when I got up to go to the bathroom . . . and ten of three when I decided I would probably be in sinus pain and sleepless and got up to clean up the kitchen after the late night rangers. Now it is 3:51 am.

I have scanned the headlines on the Internet news and am propped so my sinus cavities will drain and my pain is but a nose ache now. Here’s to gravity – a toast of aspirin, Coke and Diet Coke. The cure.

Oh, a sneeze  . . . that helped.

This seems detailed and I think I am basically blogging the clock. I could blog the dog – he has been in and out and had a drink, but he is sleeping now so not much plot there.  I could talk about the cat but we don’t have one, which is fine with me and fine with Sydney. He can sleep free of the fear of feline ambushes.

I may look and see if rain is predicted because, if not, tomorrow will be a day to mow and get creative with weed management in my new natural garden/lawn endeavor. You see, though, weed plot sculpting is negated psychologically if I call the outback a “yard” – which of course it is.

All of a sudden, I thought of gnomes. I think that would denote a yard, too. Now, why am I snobbish about gnomes and I leave rakes around and have the type of mutt ground cover that doesn’t have a name? I don’t know. I am waiting for the era of the inflatable gnome. And speaking of inflatables, this is July’s first week which means there are three left in the month and four in August and then Christmas things will start sneaking into the box stores. Hey, wait, maybe we could get an inflatable cow and put lights around its neck. I think I can back away from that idea.

I remember Bing Crosby being alive, but I think he’s been gone for about 36 years now. Still, I don’t think, “Oh, listen, a dead man is singing,” when I go shopping in the season’s music-filled stores. I wonder what people think whose lives did not overlap his. I have noticed that during the past three years or so, his songs are mingled more with other more . . . well . . . alive artists. So I don’t know if he is getting deader or not.

Ah, then there’s Jimmy Stewart and “It’s a Wonderful Life.” It will be a long time before he’s dead to even the younger generation thanks to the years of the no royalties on the movie and constant broadcasting that started a Christmas tradition. Just a couple of years ago, Walgreen’s had a deal on the movie and it played continuously in their stores. I asked a clerk about a shift’s worth of angels getting their wings, Mr. Potter and Clarence, not to mention Zuzu, and he gave a shiver/shrug. Gee, it’s kind of odd that a trend didn’t start of naming little girls Zuzu. Or perhaps not.

I believe my nose/head/sinus situation is better and the head pain is gone . . . but maybe yours is starting to hurt, given all this rambling about George Bailey and White Christmas stuff. Well, if it is, just grab a Coke, a Diet Coke, a couple of aspirins and delve into your own calendariffic out-of-sync ramblings. Like that Wizard of Oz thing . . . or Gunsmoke . . . mini skirts, tie-dyed shirts, VW vans with psychedelic paint jobs.

We have this tradition – when Grandpa’s here, we make home made pizzas. Last night we made seven and I made the dough for all but one. This could be on youtube as “horrific crust accident when amateurs tried crusting at home”.

Mother with a Samuel Adams Cherry Harvest Ale and a slice of Pizza Hut Bistro pepperoni pizza – the first of 2008.

Summer on rope swing.

Yes, we are heading up Indiana 9 to the Howe Military School corner where a left hand turn and about 8 miles will take us to my first home. I guess I’ll take my camera and maybe my granddaughter, but we’re not sure on the latter.

No, we’re not going to have any down home heartland Methodist/Presbyterian food – the Presbyterian influence coming from my grandmother, whose mother was of Scottish descent. We are going to stop and pick up a pizza at the Pizza Hut just north of LaGrange . . . and if we take Summer, we will get her a personal pan cheese pizza ’cause she’s a pizza wimp.

Guess we’ll be putting together the wagon Mother bought at Winfred’s to tow behind on of the lawn tractors. It’s red and that’s about all I know about it. Hooking up her TV converter boxes too. The PBS station in South Bend lost its analog tower in a storm and decided to just go digital now. Don’t blame them.

Mother could get cable now, but I doubt she will; she reads a lot, dontcha know?

I have my list of stuff to take up there: a book; the fancy, but slightly broken articulated large wooden bird that if repaired correctly will flap in the wind. I got it a rummage sale – she likes that sort of challenge; Diet Pepsi because we have a sale; a bottle of beer. She still has the one she took home at Christmas and stuck in a snowbank and then moved to the refrigerator, but doesn’t know if she wants to drink that one. So the Der Bingle friend is taking her a variety carton of 12 Samuel Adams beers. He likes to do things for her, such as when 30 years ago she decided she wanted to smoke a pipe like mountain women, he bought her exotic tobaccos.

I will have to get a picture of the two of them; she will gripe about because she says she will just be working out until we come. She doesn’t mean working out as in a gym; she means working on the other side of the house door. Outside. And she wears raggedy clothing when she does so. Ask her to leave the premises, however, and it’s Jones of New York or Pendleton or Talbots . . . purchased at Goodwill, of course. She is a small size and gets stuff for 50¢. You see, up here, people who need inexpensive clothing won’t buy it and so the money she spends goes to the fund. Ironic, but true.

To tell the truth, which she often does, she never wanted a kid, but here I am. My daddy and my grandmother were the ones who hugged me. She wasn’t that way, but once driving to Indiana University, my father told me she had always done the best she could for me. Now, Daddy is gone, and here we still are – Mother and I.