Fall Falls Fast

Smoke Gets In Your Eyes

Looking Forward

What would happen if a yo-yo was discovered in a post-apocalyptic world?

4 Aug 2023, Suquamish, WA

I am wondering where to take this blog. Do I keep up with my usual random thoughts on the day? Do I throw my creative bits here for all to see? Do I simply walk away until the moss grows and overtakes the whole thing, throwing it into a place of obscurity where it will be forgotten and ignored for the rest of eternity?

I will always write. I will find a way to keep my words, whether it be in an analog place like a box or a file cabinet, or in some digital vault out there in the cloud where it will sit at the mercy of whomever is keeping it for me.

For the time being, I think I will go with submitting to these pages words from my vivid and sometimes twisted imagination based on some sort of writing prompt - or cue. It doesn't take much to get the wheels in motion. A random comment from someone at work will often have me orating some tale that is off the charts. Some are entertained by it and sort of go Hmmm and walk away. Sometimes I will see something or someone on my morning walk that will be the seed of a paragraph or a page that goes into a notebook or onto paper. And something it is a standard writing prompt from a website or e-mail. Regardless, it gets me going.

That got me thinking and I wondered what would happen if I put those writings here. You, the readers can be the ones who get entertained or go Hmmm. You might even find that you are better off running to a safe place and hiding. That's for you to decide.

A friend had an interesting suggestion. Do keep on writing from prompts, but put those prompts here for you to write on. Seemed like a pretty cool idea so I think I will follow through with it and see where it goes. So, to get things started take the cue at the beginning of this entry and write your own story or continue where I left off. Post it on your own page, or share it in the comments.

A Public Service Announcement. Blogger is an okay platform for blogs. It is easy and accepts most types of content. Unfortunately it has a long way to go with its comments section. If you can post at all, comments are limited to text only. I am not sure what the solution is. I thought about going to another platform. Substack seemed like a good place. WordPress might work, but I don't know much about it. If anyone has a suggestion I am all ears. I do insist it be a free site though. I don't plan to make any money at this so I won't invest any. I only want a place that makes submissions easy for me and anyone reading who might want to toss in their two cents.

Keep on truckin'

-Mike

***

When I woke up this morning I was lying in a pile of debris. The land was covered in shards of broken boards and twisted chunks of metal.  My clothes stuck to me damp and smelling of the bay at low tide. Something scratchy was moving across my face. I sat up with a start.

What happened last night? The last thing I remember was riding my bicycle home from work. It was a nice day, and I had no agenda. We don't get many sunny days now that the global wildfires set in. The skies were usually dusky and red and the air stinking of burning garbage. Tonight was different. The air cleared and I could see the horizon. The sun, no longer obscured in a veil of smoke, was blazing low on the horizon and the air had a sweet smell. Everything was still - too still. I remember gazing at the horizon, the bay... The bay! The water was rising, eating up the shoreline and coming for me. It engulfed me in a tremendous surge and I felt myself being lifted - carried away. Everything went black around me. I slipped into a dream.

Pushing the flotsam off me I got to my feet. What was that on my face? I pushed my hand across my eyes. Snails. They covered me. Some multi legged centipede things writhed all over me. I tore them away, but they kept coming at me from the shore. The shore? There was no shore. Heaps of broken huts from the Poulsbo Beach Resort lie crumpled around me. The beach was gone. Everything was gone, and I was covered in bugs and snails.

I walked for hours. The sky was clear, and the sun shone down hard and bright, a great white-hot ball baking everything in its light. I needed shelter - shade. I found a building that wasn’t destroyed and made my way inside. It was cooler here. Inside shelves had fallen and their contents spilled across the heaved up floor. Books were strewn about open with pages torn and matted. A headless Teddy bear, a Tonka truck, no longer fit for construction. This must be the remains of Bill's Toy Shop. Entering the shop I passed a counter crushed from a fallen beam. An old cash register was on its side, the cash drawer open. A display case lies smashed with only one recognizable item in it. The Duncan Yo-Yo Showbox was still there and a solitary Butterfly Yo-Yo sat safe in its box. I took it. 

Road Hog

Mine's Bigger Than Yours

The Gray Menace

Plans

Suquamish, WA - 19 Jul 2023 

Today for Morning Pages I managed to write three pages of fiction. I was pretty pleased with myself since this is an intention I've had for quite some time. I just couldn’t seem to get myself motivated into doing it when I got up in the morning. Today was different. 

I was sleeping pretty well last night. Towards the end of my sleep I was half waking here and there, hanging on to a dream that I just wanted to finish. Eventually I realized that was ridiculous and got up. But, right after rising while I was setting up the coffee I had this thought form in my head. It was the beginning of the story I've been wanting to write and I finally decided rather than dwell on it I would just get it started. 

So I sat down with my coffee and proceeded to write three pages of fiction. I'm hoping that's enough impetus to keep me going and that I can continue each and every morning pushing the story forward three pages at a time and then transcribe them to a document file. Eventually I expect I'll be able to start editing and fixing but for right now I’m happy to get it out of my skull and onto a piece of paper that I can work with later. So, until next time, we'll see how this journey goes. 

Keep on truckin’ 

-Mike

Birds & the Bees

Imitation is the Sincerest Form of Flattery

when I Get Older

Trees

Birds and the Bees

Kindle Has Me by the - Oh, look, squirrels...

Toasty

Put Your Back Into It

 

Random Blatherings

Head In The Clouds

Virtual Reality

Suquamish, WA - 11 Jun 2023

     Sunny Sunday and looking for ways to keep my sister in-law entertained. Today we went to see the Little Mermaid. I wasn't sure what I would think of it. The older animated version was great. Those were the days before CGI graphics took over Disney animation. Those were the days when Disney artists had very special ways of expressing themselves. I have the artwork to prove it. Anyway, the story was close to the original and the music was embellished with a few new tunes added. There was also the interesting Disney humor that could be appreciated in different ways depending on the viewer. In some scenes there was some innuendo, but the kids in the theater made it clear in their comments that they didn't catch the adult meaning. As a guy old enough to remember some of the older movies, I have to say that Disney studios still has it. 

     We wanted to take advantage of the good weather. It had been raining since Al arrived so we went to a local Italian restaurant that has outdoor seating. Since my wife and her sister ate their fill of popcorn at the theater, they opted for salad and antipasto. I, the perpetually ravenous beast, went for the house made tagliatelle. I'm a sucker for good pasta and these great wide and hefty noodles in just the right amount of bolognese sauce really hit the spot. I paired that with a nice chianti which was perfect in the breezy waterside table we had. 

     Home now and winding down. Pulled up the YouTube video of Typewriter Club live to see what their special announcement is. Looks like a typewriter themed summer camp is afoot. There is no set location. Instead a package is purchased, a kit of sorts to set up the surf camp at the location of choice. This reminds me of virtual foot races I have done in the day. The runner would sign up as in a conventional race and the race packet would be sent to the participant. The packet contained the usual finisher swag of a t-shirt and a participant medal. On the day of the race the runners would run a course of their choice. The only requirement was a valid distance. The course could be challenging or not. This would be timed with a GPS device to keep things honest and true and the results uploaded. In the end, the only thing one would have is bragging rights. I did one and I wasn't a fan. I think there is something about being present with the participants, seeing the winners receive their prizes, tossing back a beer or two and telling tales of adventure and intrigue about the competition. But, that's me. Your mileage may vary. 

Keep on truckin' 

-Mike

Come and Get It

Northern Exposure

 

Stir Crazy

Squamous in Suquamish

Suquamish, WA - 6 Jun 2023

         Off work again today. It seems lately that my life is a series of appointments at various medical clinics. Today I had to make a long drive to Gig Harbor. It seems that little piece of me that I donated to the pathologist a few weeks back turned out to be skin cancer. I wasn't surprised, but had hoped it would be something easy to fix. Not so.

         Because my dad had a number of cancers removed in his lifetime I was a good candidate for trouble down the road. Today I spent some quality time with a Mohs surgeon. Skin cancer isn't something that old people get. I probably started this back in my twenties when I was invincible and spent a good deal of time running around shirtless. When I was on Okinawa I would often go surf fishing. A good way to spend the day while enjoying the outside, ocean breeze and heat. Good times often finished with a bright rubor to mark me as having spent far too much time under old Sol. Being of Mediterranean descent and an olive complexion it took time for me to burn to the point of pain. By then it was too late. Of course, I could heal overnight. Twenty somethings have that power. In addition to that exposure I had lots of time in Florida when I was assigned there and during some tours in desert climes and the Mediterranean to continue in my sinful ways. Now at the end of my seventh decade I am discovering what all those exposures have done to me.

         Squamous cell carcinoma is not the killer that melanoma is, though it has the potential to metastasize — a bad thing. Because of that these sorts of things can’t be just frozen or shaved off. It requires a specialist, a Mohs surgeon. Mohs surgery is interesting. The doctor marks off an area where the suspected cancer lives and then marks around that where the precancerous stuff extends. This is where the fun begins. The first step is to remove a chunk where the cancer is. For me that was an area roughly a centimeter in diameter. This is taken to the full thickness of the skin. I got to see the picture... It was cool. The doctor took it all the way down to the subcutaneous layer. That chunk goes off to pathology and I get to sit and think for a long time. I read the three letters I got in the mail yesterday and a good portion of Cannery Row, my current read.

         What happens next is that if the specimen shows cancer cells in the margins then another trip into the hole in my face would warranted. This goes on until all the margins are clear. Good news for me is that the surgeon got it all in the first pass. Some fancy wound revision a pile of sutures later and I had a nice incision from the corner of my eye to my ear. I'm going to look like a pirate when this is all finished.

         Home now with what looks like a battle dressing on the side of the face. I also got a free pass for three days off and a no honey do chit. Cool. On top of that I am a member of the lifetime regular follow-up club with my dermatologist. We're going to be besties, I just know it! Meanwhile, I am outside enjoying the no chore thing and hammering away on an electronic typer with Dave Koz in my ear and a no alcohol brew at my side — Hazy IPA from Athletic Brewing. One of very few non alcoholic beverages that actually tastes like beer. 

Keep on truckin' 

-Mike

Bad Cops and Shifty Lawyers

That Run Down Feeling

Bear With Me

Pardon the mis-spellings. Eddie not Eddiw.  Stomach does not and in "k"  Oh dear.  Too many r's in that long word a few lines above.

Remember

Back From The Dead

Hills And Headwinds, Oh My

Nature Call

Pay The Piper

Beside Me Inside Me The Windmills of MyMind

Still Hot, but Prettier

Typecasting Takes The Lead

Peoria - 12 May 2023

    If I keep writing will this machine stay awake or will it crap out like it did last night?  I would like to see if I can get some sort of a blog post written for the day just to say I did.  Then I can take the old one and make something of it later.  Maybe this Neo was timing out and not shutting down.

*

    Well, this is a late entry.  I am nearing the end of our Phoenix journey and have not done well at posting the days to this blog as originally intended.
    I am not sure what the disagreement is between this Neo and air travel, but it seems that when I fly, something in the airplane mixes this thing up.  My data gets lost and the internal brains of this thing think the little coin battery that powers this unit has failed so I have to pretend I changed the battery to get it to wake up again.  This week, though, has been different.  It hasn’t worked well at all and would shut down in mid-session.  Good news, work isn’t disrupted or lost.  I have to keep powering up and uploading the words to a Google Docs account and then go back to the Neo.  That sort of sucks the typecasting wind right out of my sails.  But, in the spirit of undistracted writing, I press on.  As a note, my typewriter would never misbehave in such a way.  So the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.
    We have had no adventures on this trip.  The purpose was to spend time with my parents.  They are having difficulties in the later years of their retirement so we came in to lend a little moral support and to give them company.
    Since the onset of the pandemic their lives have been flipped upside down and what social interactions they enjoyed have been disrupted.  By coming down, we give them some connection.  It helps me too since I get to sit with them and just talk.  That lost art of conversation that has died because of things like television and social media and COVID.
    We reminisced about the old family.  The people who came before us.  Thanks to an uncle, now passed, and my daughter digging into the genealogy of the family, I got to pass along what we know and compare it to their recollections to get some detail into our roots. We had a good time with that and knowledge was exchanged from both sides.
    Those conversations are not short and we spent days yakking and thinking to get caught up.  My mother worries about her cognitive (her word) function and I think these discussions help to wake up some of those lazy brain cells.  The fact that she uses words like cognitive makes me believe that there is no significant decline, just lazy neurons.
    Today is a busy day.  We have to check in with the airline to confirm our reservation and to secure our seats.  Delta would not allow us to reserve seating until 24 hours before flight time.  That seems harsh and will guide me with future airline choices.  I am hoping my wife and I get to sit in close proximity to each other.  I guess we will find out.  I will try to check in a little early just in case I can get a leg up on the situation.  Maybe if I call and try the process in person I will have better luck.  Then it will be off to my parents’ place to have a final bit of time together until the next trip down.

Keep on truckin’
-Mike

Sunny Skies Sleeps in The Morning

Suquamish, WA - 7 May 2023

    Easy sunny Sunday afternoon.  Made a quick grocery run this morning and got in a walk.  Took a new path just to mix things up a bit.  Lots of steep hills.   I'm trying to build back my stamina and strength.
    The weather has been all over the place lately.  Cold, cloudy mornings with little temperature change through the day.  Some days of pelting rain and others offer no more than a steady drizzle for hours.  And then, we get days like today.  Cool in the morning with the sun struggling to burn a hole through the clouds. After many hours of relentless effort, the clouds give up the fight and melt away to warm spring sunshine.  Who knows what tomorrow will bring?  Not the weather guesser, that's a fact.
    But, fret not.  Tomorrow will be a day of check lists and packing for we are bound to the sunny skies of Phoenix Arizona.  It has been a long time since we ventured out to visit my parents and now the time is right.  Plans have been made and in the wee hours of Tuesday morning we will start our journey to SeaTac airport and regions south.
    The handy weather app on my phone tells me that the skies will be bright with sun and temperatures near ninety.  My wife trembles at the thought, but this skinny bag of bones is joyous in a chance to warm up my innards.  And, if I am to believe that phone app, we are going to return to steady sun and warming temperatures.  Just in time to prepare for Memorial Day.  The first unofficial day of summer.

Keep on truckin'
-Mike

Bad Coffee and Magic Mushrooms

Silverdale, WA - 29 Apr 2023 

    Today my wife has her card making class and I am tagging along. Not because I want to sit amongst the paper crafters, but because I get to hang out in the sun at the coffee shop a few doors down. This week has been a mystery. It started cold and rainy and now, on the weekend, the sun is out blazing with promises of temps above seventy. There is a car show in the parking lot so the noise levels are high as the hotrods scream by drowning out pretty much all of the ambient sounds I would prefer. I may have to move my seat. 

    For the record, the shop is called Austin Chase. The coffee is watered down and thin. I could go inside and at least thrive on the shop's ambience, but more likely I will find another, less noisy place to hang out. The chairs are metal and not conducive to comfort. Any desire I had to sit, read and write are being washed away.  

    Ah, much better. I walked to the other end of the parking lot. There is a little island set with some foliage. A little green electrical box is here and sits at the right height for me to cop a squat and write in peace even if my coffee is still thin and without personality. That little voice in my head that suggested I go to Starbucks is jumping up and down screaming, "I told you so." I have a breeze, no traffic and am once again immersed in some creative mood and not gnarled like a desert pine tree struggling to survive. 

    I am reading Tibetan Peach Pie: A True Account of an Imaginative Life by Tom Robbins. The author claims it isn't a memoir, but it sort of is. The book is broken down into chapters of varying length and each is a snippet of Tom Robbins life from childhood until the time of the book's publication. These events and stories illustrate how he became the writer he is from his early years in Appalachia of North Carolina to his final home in La Conner Washington, not too far from here. If you have tulips in your garden they likely came from there. 

    Tom Robbins isn't for everyone. I first started reading him in the 1990s and his style appealed to me. He is a storyteller and his words flow much like those of Steinbeck and Kerouac. His books are a slow read, but every word is a treat. Right now he is in Washington and discovering the beauty of the forest and an interest in psychotropic mushrooms. Under the tutelage of a University of Washington MD/PhD he is learning the gifts these sort of plants offer to the world. His guide actually recommended he start with something more pure and stable. The fungi don't always have the same strength of psychotropic agent from mushroom to mushroom and the trip can be mild to frighteningly intense. For more information look to Michael Pollan's book, This Is Your Mind on Plants. Since I grew up in an experimental decade, I have a keen interest in such things and might I say comparing notes is interesting. But, I digress and that's a story for another time. 

    Anyway, that's my offering for the day. The sun is cooking my thighs and I need to reposition myself. 

Keep on truckin' 

-Mike

Mischief Managed

Elementary

Something Wild

Life Is Good

Suquamish, WA - 19 Apr 2023

    What to write?  What to write?  ...  No matter how hard I try, I just stare at the blank page and nothing comes.  Why is that?  Why is that?  I want to write something, but there is a block.

    It was a dark and stormy night.  Nope.  The night was dark.  Stormy?  Can't work.   It's morning.  Still won't work.  I shake my head and all I can sense is the clickety rattle of the little bean flying around in the empty space of my skull.  Nary a thought to be had. 

    The thing that captures my breath on morning walks is the beauty I am blessed with here in my little corner of the world.  The developers come and threaten to destroy all that is natural in this area, but I still get to look out across the bay to the mountains in the distance.  They are still blanketed in snow and the sun rises over them painting the sky with swirls of indigo and fuchsia.  The air is cold, but not frigid.  Stimulating.  My mind opens and a million little stories play across the back of my head like little home movies.  It's a good time to be alive.

    Why can't I write like that when I sit down at night?  Does the day eat away at my spirit?  When I get home at night, I have no ambition.  I clean myself up and prepare the evening meal.  Once done with that I have an hour before heading off to bed to start the process all over again.  If I am lucky, I can read a chapter of a book before passing out to the nether regions of dreamland.

    My mornings are a mad rush to get every scrap of freedom put to some use before the toils and miseries of my work day creep in and start eating me alive.  Oh, what a wretched life.

    But there are good things.  I have strength and a never give up attitude.  I can hold on to at least a glimmer of light at the fringe of my spirit and regenerate good deeds and thoughts for the day.  Life is good.

Keep on truckin'

-Mike

Rockin' Robins

Loafing Around

Suquamish, WA - 16 Apr 2023

    So, what do you do when you get up really early and have a loaf of bread to bake for the day?  I got up this morning and wrote my morning pages.  In the back of my mind I had the swirling wheel of other thoughts that tend to churn while I freewrite.  One of those thoughts was on me baking up the loaf of sourdough I fashioned last night and put in the refrigerator to ferment.

    Pages done and I went to the kitchen and set the oven to preheat.  Back to the desk to do some of my morning admin.  Meanwhile I was salivating (figuratively - don't panic) at the thought of a house perfumed with baking bread.  Back to the oven and ... It was cold.  What?

    Apparently my oven had decided to die sometime in the past two weeks.  I don't use it for much more than bread baking.  Now what?  I had a loaf just waiting to get slid into it's warm den.  The toaster oven!

    We have a rather nice little oven.  It really isn't a toaster variety at all, but a miniature of a regular one.  What the heck.  I slid in a small baking stone and preheated the small device.  I checked and there was plenty of clearance to bake up the loaf.  The next challenge was that I needed something to cover the loaf with.  I like to use a dutch oven or a stoneware bowl, neither of which would fit in the smaller space.  Then I spied the stainless bowl I used to mix up the dough.  That could work.

    After twenty minutes I was back to uncover the loaf and let it finish.  The bread did so well that oven spring caused the bread to actually lift the bowl up.  What lie underneath was a perfectly shaped loaf of bread.  Kind of cool.  Another thirty minutes and I was blessed with a nicely browned boule.

    Will I do this again or shell out some unbelievable amount of cash to replace the big oven?  Don't know yet, but with some modifications, I think I have the perfect alternative for my bread habit.

Keep on truckin'

-Mike

Back From The Abyss

Pick Your Poison

Take A Letter

oops ... raison d'être

This Draft Is So Rough, I Cut Myself

Grasping At Straws

Spring Forward

Chip Off the Old Platen

The Whole Kit And Canoodle

Pleasin' The Feds

First One's Free

Faster Than The Wind

The Rain, The Park, and Other Things

I'm an idiot. That should be The Woman King.