You're Doing It Wrong

Twice a year I flip my closet meaning I either bring the winter stuff forward and bury the summer stuff or the other way around.

Normally I take some time to do it and even write notes like: need new black pants. Take bags to Goodwill.

But because of the trip this year I ended up doing it really half ass and in a hurry. Then we had that early cold snap.

So I’m still finding clothes that I consider winter wear that I forgot about. And random lighter wear that is still mixed in. I still haven’t fixed the hem on the pants of doom. Maybe this weekend.

Today I made our pumpkin pie, from pumpkins I grew myself. Spatchcock turkey tomorrow. That reminds me, I better check on the thawing turkey’s progress.

When I was a teenager I chipped one of my front teeth gnawing on a pull top from an aluminum can. I have no idea why I had it in my mouth. Why do we do anything when we’re teenagers? It got it fixed and at least one other time the chip re-chipped and I had to get it fixed.

Just recently I chipped my front teeth again. Not the precise same chip but part of it. I was a little snaggle-toothed. I don’t think it was really noticeable but I wanted to get it fixed so I asked the dentist and for once asked what it was going to cost before I did anything. And it wasn’t expensive so I had it fixed last week.

The end result is lovely. My smooth, pretty front teeth.

But the procedure was incredibly awful. Imagine a sand-grinder against your two front teeth and then sandpaper floss between your teeth. I’m shuddering just thinking about it. Luckily it didn’t take too long.

This is from a comic book I found in Montreal in this weird book sale in a church. We actually went in there to use the bathroom but we ended up digging around and we both found something.

I wanted to scan and then write my own dialogue but I’m having trouble making the scanner do what I want at the moment. Every time there is a major OS change all my peripherals go to hell because no one will support them for the new operating system. The world would end if we didn’t throw away all our perfectly workable stuff and buy new stuff every three years.

Right now I’m using a work around but I’m having a few challenges. Who knows if I will revisit it.

I tried adding a few new shows to see whether I liked them. But then everything started when I was in Germany so when I came home I was already several shows behind. I tried one episode of Flash and thought it was terrible. I missed the pilot for How To Get Away with Murder but I watched half of the second episode and deleted it. I thought about that show with David Tennant called Grace Point that was a UK series called Broadchurch but I feel like I’ve seen enough gloomy detective shows about a small town murder so I didn’t even try that one. I tried Scorpion but I didn’t like any of the characters. Bob says Jane the Virgin is really good so I’ll see if I can catch up during the holidays.

I always find shows I think are decent but it’s been awhile since I found a show that I want to make time for. Did I already tell you I gave up on Sons of Anarchy? It’s always been a tough show but this season felt like it was just an excuse to kill people in terrible ways. Colleague updates me after each episode to tell me who else is dead.

You can see I’m already running out of steam. But I’m going to type words and press publish every day this month like it or not.

This is Shy Boy, the cat that lives with my parents. This is his happy face. He wants to come in and rub cat hair all over me and sit on me in the exact spot where I want to put my book or magazine or laptop.

I don’t understand why man hasn’t turned to cats as a food source instead of making them pets.

Every once in awhile I will be interested in more information about a company. Maybe for work, maybe personal. Maybe just curiosity.

And sometimes I run across these websites where I want to send them a note to tell them how worthless their site is.

I want to say that I suspect for some companies that is the strategy but why have a website that reveals absolutely nothing about you?

It will be filled with generic stock photos of multi-cultural people who look thrilled to be watching a power point or handing pieces of paper to one another. And then the copy will say: Super Systems International: An Innovation Company.

What does that mean?

Huh. Well if you put “an innovation company” into a search engine all kinds of stuff comes up. So I guess it does mean something. But sometimes the copy says other things like: “Established Leaders in Industry” or “Cutting Edge of Fresh Solutions.” My point is you can’t tell what the company does by looking at the website.

Did I already write about this?

Awhile back I had this weird situation with someone cold-calling at the office. As in coming into my office to sell me something. Later I was buying something at a local store and visiting with the store owner and when he asked how my day was going, I told him about this creepy salesman at my office.

He said: all salesmen are creepy.

Then he went on to tell me about the people who come into his shop to sell him things and how problematic the entire situation is – that you’re being asked to discuss this while you’re working in your store.

Later Bob and I continued the conversation and Bob said, or make a decision while you’re standing on your porch.

I thought I could make this more interesting but that’s all I have.

This is nature people. Can you see those fish hanging out in the pool? They are headed upstream where they are going to spawn and die. There were some dead fish in there already but I didn’t get them in the photo.

Does anyone else think cookbooks are getting out of control? Every time I log into my food site or the NYT food section it seems like they are reviewing a stack of giant cookbooks. A celebrity chef. A food blogger. Some random celebrity. Some random theme. A whole giant cookbook about fennel or Van Nuys regional cuisine or paring knife cookery.

People must be buying them because they are churned out so fast. But it would seem hard to profit on a giant book filled with glossy photos. What do I know? I’m trying to be a new cookbook free zone because I already have some nice fatties that I haven’t used nearly enough. But every once in awhile I’m tempted.