Doing What I Know

essay

Sunday July 18, 2010

At 5:30 last night I said 'bye to my friend and his kids. At 6 his house was straightened up. At 8 both his and my laundry were done. At 8:05 I threw together a little dinner for myself (beanie-weenies). At 8:15 I made a list of everything that needed repair or improvement at his house. At 8:30 none of his doors squeaked anymore. At that point I briefly considered finding an establishment to party in, then retracted the idea. I know what can happen to a stranger in town. They put an APB out for any stranger driving with a BAC of .01 or more-- it's easy pickings. I opted to drink at home with my pal Bush. Bushmill's.

At 8:31 I made myself a Bush and soda. Don't let anyone tell you I work and drink. No. I work, THEN I drink.

At 9 I made another. Did you know Bushmills began in Ireland in 1608?

At 9:30 I made yet another. Smooth and mellow, I can honestly say that whiskey still tastes like battery acid -- after 402 years, you'd think they would have figured out how to filter the bitter out. Nope.

At 10 I watched Hulu until my eyes bled. Then I crashed.

Then I woke and disconnected the exercise wheel from the hamster cage. Noisy nocturnal buggers. They think they're smart, making all that ruckus while seemingly safe in their cage. Maybe I'll stretch the bars wide enough to let the cat's paws in… then watch the action. Well, first GET a cat… then watch the action. Maybe I'll sell tickets.

First, sleep.

Up early again. I could watch the sunrise, if it weren't overcast. But just 'cause I'm in the land of woo-oo doesn't mean I have to act like it. SO, no crystal meditation for me. My magnets are only used to hold stuff on my refrigerator. I dye only my hair, and then only brown, not multicolored. And DEFINITELY no tying.

What I DO do (heh-heh, I said doo-doo) is go into Arcata (pronounced, I was emphatically told, ar KAY ta, not Ar CAH tah… nor even Al Queda), find about 6 stores to buy everything on my list. It can be confusing. One store sells a pound of rice for $1.79, the other sells it for $5.69. Eventually I've hit a grocery store, a supermarket, a food collective, a hardware store, another hardware store and a lumberyard (which sold the $5.69 rice).

Now loaded with purchases (I'm like a girl that way) I staggered back to get busy. First breakfast (the most important meal of the day). No details, just good advice. Then I get started in earnest. Several hours later, I've finished it all. Busted fixture, replaced. Skinny fluorescent bulbs, installed. Unlockable back door, lockable. And I was most proud of the small carpentry job, because I made it happen with ridiculous tools. The front porch has turned posts holding up the little roof. One post was missing its 'shoe', exposing all the ugly connections.

My job: wood cobbler. And I had to do it with nothing but a pair of scissors, a rasp... and putty. Somehow I made it come together, and look serviceable at that.

I always wanted to put an addendum to the old saw 'Poor workmen blame their tools' that related to the opposite situation, where GOOD workmen accomplish miracles with even crappy tools... but, ever the budding wordsmith, I could come up with nothing snappy.

Poor workmen blame their tools, but good workmen call them fools? Nah.

Poor workmen blame their tools, but just need to go to school? Uh-uh.

Good workmen use good tools? Yech.

Like I said, nothing.

Now I'm done and I can relax. The problem is, I've BEEN relaxing. Everything I've done is fun for me. What to do now? Maybe something I don't like?

Nah, that's stupid.

Or is it? I don't like walking -- I think I'll take a walk. My friend's back yard is not so much a yard as an old lumberyard, only designed by a frustrated skyscraper architect. Acres of former storage buildings were laid out behind his house, which was probably the front office once (since an old faded sign above his door says 'Front Office'). Now devoid of anything building-like above ground, all that remain are concrete pads and sawed-off I-beams. But some of the concrete pads are three feet thick (when normal pads are 4 inches), and the I beams could have supported Godzilla's nest. All leveled and discarded, I wondered why the buildings couldn't have been kept and used for something, like storing brown star remnants, perhaps (alluding to the overbuilt quality, again… hah, hah).

Anyway, I thought I'd walk through it. Oddly, the concrete floors are not at all level, like the buildings came as an afterthought. No matter. I walked until I had to climb, and then I climbed, level after irregular level, and then I reached the gravel.

There was a pile of gravel in the middle of all this, three to four stories tall in places. Why it was there baffled me, but I was tired of second-guessing the past, so I tried to run up it like I used to as a kid. Panting and wheezing moments later I had to admit I wasn't a kid anymore. Plus, not only couldn't I get up the pile, I couldn't get above my own head -- just kept sliding down again. Next challenge… after I empty my shoes.

A hundred or two yards away, standing strong and forbidding, glared the treeline. It stood foreboding and would not be breached, and so of course I had to try breaching it. I strode with confidence away from the ruined lumberyard, through the scruff and towards my goal. The land dipped and a muddy lake stood between us. Not to be outwitted, I walked the shore until I stood on the other side, triumphantly. For a very short moment.

For what I thought were closely entwined bushes between tightly growing trees were in fact closely entwined BRAMBLES between tightly growing trees. Nah, I wasn't going in there… the forest had won, and I hadn't even put up a fight. What a pussy.

Back at the front office I relaxed in a steaming tub. Man, that wore me out! That was one busy 38 minute walk. I wonder how much weight I lost?