HACKING UP ONE FOR WARHOL

I have a chest cold.  It hasn't gripped me completely yet, but for the last three nights I've made many impromptu visits to the cough syrup.  As a matter of fact, we're on such close terms that I keep the bottle next to the bathroom sink along with a spoon I rinse off several times over the few fitful hours I attempt to sleep.  Believe me, very little tastes as unpleasant as cherry syrupy medicine fresh after a fluoride rinse.

There is one good thing about having a cold, though, and that would be SOUP.  Soup, the only four-letter word that one can speak happily when not feeling well.  Soup, soup, soup.

Tonight I decide to skip the chicken noodle soup in favor of the tomato soup.  The only thing better than making tomato soup is making tomato soup with milk.  And the only thing better than tomato soup with milk is tomato soup with milk and crackers (saltines or oyster crackers).  If I added a grilled cheese sandwich, I'd be in heaven, but this cold just makes me want soup, only soup, and nothing but soup.

Okay, and maybe tea; I also want tea, but I'm too lazy to boil the water.  I mean, I just tuckered myself out opening the Campbell's can.

Campbell's soup reminds me of my childhood, including the time I wanted it even though I knew I'd throw it right back up again because I had the flu.  My mother made it anyway, and I ate it, and I re-puked it, and damnit if it didn't taste almost as good coming back up as it had going down.  Soup is like that sometimes -- doubly comforting.  Unlike fluoride and cough syrup mixing on their way down, regurgitated soup really isn't half bad making its way back up.

Speaking of soup, I saw Warhol's Campbell's soup can painting (print) when I was in Washington, DC., or at least I saw one or two or three of them.  It was at the National Gallery of Art, one of my favorite places in the world.  If only the Institute of Contemporary Art had comforting pieces like Warhol's (instead of disturbing shit like Mary Reid Kelley's work), it might be worth visiting more than once in a nightmare.  And when other than in this blog has anyone ever used the words Warhol and comforting in the same sentence?

Anyway, the soup has digested, and now it's time to brush teeth, and double-shot the fluoride and cough syrup.  With any luck at all I'll sleep for at least two hours straight before I hack my head off and wake the entire neighborhood, which is difficult to accomplish since half my neighborhood consists of two cemeteries.

No matter how I feel, though, I'll probably have to hit the store again soon.  You see, I'm running low on soup, and that will never do.

ICE FISHING THE FISHERMEN OUT OF THE LAKE

It has been warm for three days.  Well, warm by Polar Vortex standards, anyway.  It has been in the thirties and forties, meaning it's almost bathing suit weather here in New England.  Oh, it won't last; it never does.  It's the typical January thaw, although that's not official until we hit sixty degrees.  Okay, by official I mean officially declared by the old folks who live in the hills, not by the meteorologists who claim to know all.  We still consider anything from -59 degrees to +59 degrees to be normal January weather.

The youngest returns to college today.  We pack the car with everything he brought home for December break, plus important things he will need to get through the remainder of winter:  work boots, gloves, a jacket, and shorts.  That's right, shorts.  The shorts are the no-brainer.  It's the coat that takes some convincing.

We decide to avoid the highway.  The last five out of six times we've made this trip, multple highway traffic back-ups occur due to random accidents.  I don't want to go through that a sixth time in as many weeks.  We decide to go the back way, up Bypass 28.  A few miles before we arrive at the school, there is a massive lake the spans acre after acre on either side of the road.  The views are, for lack of any more expressive adjective, spectacular.  Mountains can be seen beyond the tree line from the top of the hill, and patches of ice float far below in the melting waters of Massabesic.

We pass cars and trucks and vans parked along the roadway.  At first I assume people are snowshoeing or cross country skiing around Massabesic Lake.  But there are far too many cars.  As we turn the final corner, we see dozens of ice fishing tents set up in various parts of the lake.  The slosh-covered lake.  The lake with the open water flowing under the bridge, mere yards from where people are ice fishing.  The lake that may be a few short hours from safe crossing.  The lake that hasn't seen freezing temperatures for days.

Yeah, I'm a chicken.  I see the open water and I see the soft spots, and I also see the thirty or forty people out on the thin ice fishing away, and there's no way I'd go out there.  Not a chance.  After dropping the boy off, I decide to come home this way, as well.  Several people are packing it in just after noon as I drive by.  It seems like most people are still safely on the soaking wet ice, but it also seems like some wiser ones know their limits.  It's exceedingly warm for ice fishing.  I have windows rolled down in my car, it's that warm.

A few miles up the road, just beyond the crest that opens to the mountainous panorama, an ambulance flies by, lights flashing and siren blaring.  Oh sure, this is one of the ways to get to the nearest hospital.  My brain knows this.  But my brain also knows that some dumbass might have ventured too close to the bridge, too close to the open water, too close to danger.

Look, it's 48 degrees today, and the temps are planning on hovering around there for a few days, so do me a favor.  I've already abandoned the highway because of idiot drivers who cannot seem to manage the two lanes of 93 north without causing mayhem.  Please, please don't ruin the beautiful views of Massabesic with people knowing you floated face down for a few hours while firefighters tried to fish your body out of the channel like some scene from The Omen. 

Besides, the lake feeds into the water treatment plant.  It would make me feel a lot better knowing my son and his college roommates aren't siphoning out what's left of your rotted guts every time they turn on their faucet. 

But other than that, enjoy ice fishing, folks! 

CHRISTMAS CRACK-DOWN

Okay, okay, already.  I'll take it down.  Geez.

I was going to leave up my tree and the holiday decorations for a couple of more days, but after too many shamings, I'll just dismantle everything.  I feel like the Napoleon Dynamite of Christmas: "I'll do whatever I feel like I want to do.  Gosh." 

I start the purging with the garland that hangs above all the doorways.  Down all the lengths of silver and gold shall come.  All of the Christmas candle holders migrate under the tree.  All, all, all, leaving behind nothing, nothing, nothing.  In a matter of minutes, there is a pile under the tree, a pile of random ornaments and wooden Santa statuettes and a string of sleigh bells and a couple of the fourteen window candles I have to finish collecting.

The tree still stands, albeit awkwardly as it has started to lean, which is unusual since it's a fake tree and will pretty much withstand the apocalypse.  I have to de-garland, de-ornament, then de-light the fake one before I can stuff it back into its box.  It's turning into an arduous process. 

Apparently Christmas is going to come down as slowly as it went up.

It's okay, though.  I'm sure I can find things to do to slow down the process.  I have papers to correct, stuff to write, books to read, dishes to wash, and thesis chapters to submit.  I could also spend time with Napoleon's uncle in Alaska hunting wolverines.  Maybe I'll even wrap it all up with a moon-boot modern dance.  With me, you never know.  Gosh!

FUN IN THE KITCHEN -- SORT OF

Tonight my youngest son learns the difference between cooking on a gas stove and cooking on an electric stove: Smoke detectors.

Luckily with two doors wide open, some rapidly well-placed fans, and a strategically waved bath towel, we manage to avoid setting off the wired-in alarms, which blare like air raid sirens when activated.  The house, however, still stinks.

Honestly, he hasn't done anything wrong.  He mixes up some scrambled eggs, gets out the correct pan, and heats everything up, just like he does at school.  But when he adds some butter to the pan, he damn-near sets himself on fire.  The stove at school is electric; the stove here at home is gas.  The difference is that there is no slow heat build-up to a gas stove -- it is almost instantaneously up to temp.

Voila!  Smoke show.

After some scrubbing, the pan is ready for a second attempt, and I help him along, cooking the eggs while he watches out of the corner of his eye, muttering about the fact that I am cooking over the exact same flame, all the while carefully putting away random condiments. 

Truly, he is correct about the cooking temperature. 

The difference is that I started the flame lower and also added the oleo early on, two mistakes he never makes at school since it takes forever and a day to heat up the electrical elements on his dorm stove.

The house still has a slight haze, and the wafting stench of burned butter hangs in the air, but at least we are not smelling burned clothes stuck to young flesh.  Crisis averted; cooking lesson learned.  Everyone survives and the eggs smell and look delicious (son assures me they are).  He even added his own flair to them (some cinnamon).

Small price to pay for a valuable lesson for him, and for mom to see that the kid is going to be all right after all, at least once he gets the hang of the kitchen appliances.  Next time we might stick to baking, though, since he makes a mean chocolate chip cookie.

NEW MATH AND A 12-PACK

I encounter New Math this evening.  It scares me so much that I run away like a baby.  The strange thing is that this New Math doesn't cost me a dime.  As a matter of fact...

I stop at the grocery store after work today, determined not to spend too much money.  The total bill comes to around $45.  I check my wallet and decide that I should probably grab another $20.  I'm going out after work tomorrow, and I want to make sure I have enough cash.  After paying my bill and grabbing the extra money, I have $40 plus some ones in my wallet.

After throwing the groceries into the car (not really that strenuous since I only spent $45), I collect the empty beer bottles that have been rattling around in a bag in my car.  After turning in fourteen empties, I grab another 12-pack.  It's Thursday evening, and I figure my eldest will be stopping by after his train out of Boston while he waits for his wife to finish a class nearby and pick him up to go home.  That's my excuse, anyway. Bottle return receipt in hand, I bring the beer to the front of the store.  There's no line, but there is a young man at the registers, a clerk I haven't seen here before. 

The total after the bottle return, comes to $11.90.  Now, truth be told, sometimes I like to fuck with the cashiers' heads.  My father taught me and my sister, at very young ages, how to make correct change, and we have always been math geeks.  It doesn't take a rocket scientist, though, to figure out that if I give the kid $21.90, I can get $10 back.  This, to me anyway, seems like simple, basic, un-fuck-able math.  I pull out the crisp $20 I have just gotten at the grocery store, and seven quarters, a dime, and a nickel (that's an addition $1.90 plus the original $20, which equals $21.90).

When the clerk hands me money and says, "Ten dollars change," I am relieved.  Either he is very bright, or the register has managed to help him calculate the correct change to give to me.  As I start away from the counter, the kid holds a $20 bill out to me and says, "Here. This is yours."

I don't say a word.  After all, this is the same $20 I just handed him.  Isn't it?  The woman behind me says, "Yes, that's your twenty."

At this point I open my wallet and count my bills.  I have a few ones, plus I have the original $20 I had, $10 he handed back to me ... I am positive (aren't I?) that I only had $40 (and change) when I walked in to the liquor store.  Now I have $30, which is what I should have after spending $10 of that $40 on beer.

The clerk and the woman wait for me to take the money.  I slowly clutch at it, knowing I shouldn't take it.  I really shouldn't.  But maybe I screwed up.  I'll figure it all out when I get to the car.  And this is exactly what I do.  I recount my money.

Nope.  I swear I'm telling the truth here:  I go into the packy with $40.  I now have $50 in my wallet plus a full 12-pack of long-neck beer bottles after exiting the packy. Word problem!

It's this damn new math. You know, it's when I hand you $20 for an item and you hand me back $30 change plus that item then you get fired and I have to pay for you to collect so I lose that money I gained anyway.  That new 20 - 10 + 20 + a 12 pack = someone's an idiot.   

That math.

A better person than I would leave my phone number with the manager so that when/if the register cashes out under its total sales, I can come down and give them the money I owe.  But I'm not a better person.  I am still confused.  Did the clerk make the mistake, or did I really have more money than I thought and two of the twenties stuck together when I put them on the counter?

I don't know anymore, nor do I truly care.  All I know is that it's flipping cold here, colder than a witch's teat, and I am not about to trek back into the store and risk severe hypothermia, $20 not withstanding.


That's my defense, your honor.

IT'S STILL THE MOST WONDERFUL TIME OF THE YEAR

It's still Christmas at my house.

Some of the decorations have migrated to the living room, some are even under the tree awaiting re-packing.  I have washed all of the Christmas glassware and it too is awaiting the re-wrapping and re-boxing for the next ten months.

For some reason, though, Christmas wants to hang around this year.

I'm not the only one who still has garland and tinsel and a decorated tree and candles in the windows (though I am running low on batteries for the candles, so they sit in the windows but are not lit in the windows at this point).  I have a friend across The Pond who is remarkably intelligent, an astrophysicist, and she still has her tree up.  As a matter of fact, she and her husband "forget" one or two strings of lights and garland every year so they "accidentally" have a little Christmas all year long.  I am thinking that's a mighty adoptable tradition.

I go out to dinner with a friend tonight, and we notice while driving around that many people still have lights on their houses and in their trees and bushes.  The restaurant is playing holiday music a clear two weeks after the official holiday.  Usually this would annoy me.  Usually I have Christmas broken down right after the New Year.  But this year for some reason Christmas wants to stay and stay and stay.  This year for some reason I am willing to allow it.

Perhaps it is the fact that there isn't mayhem in my living room.  I moved the coffee table out of the small room, and two-thirds of my children no longer live here, so there isn't a pile of gifts sitting haphazardly under the tree.  There is room for company and television viewing and chatting.  Perhaps it's the fact that I spent so many days, weeks, months prepping for the two fall weddings that I'm enjoying even more celebratory sensations, prolonging the inevitable new year by spreading some of the previous year into it, Old Father Time walking hand-in-hand Young Child Time as the stroll through 2014 together, at least for a while, rather than handing over the gauntlet at 12:01 a.m., January 1^st, and expecting a clean slate.

I'm not lazy.  I promise you that is not the reason Christmas still exists in my world right now.  It just seems like once I make it past that initial flurry to organize my life and be rid of 2013 as soon as possible, I find myself really enjoying it all, truly comfortable with the whole seasonal display that continues thriving.  Even the holiday toys are still out and working.  The barking dog still barks out songs, Santa still reads the Christmas Eve poem, another Santa still snores, the penguin still waddles, the snowman still lights up, Yukon Cornelius still yells "Wahoo!", and on and on. 

Most amazing is that even after writing about this, admitting my delayed reaction to the whole hauling back of the holly, is that none of this bothers me.  I don't find myself thinking, "Oh, I wonder what the neighbors think about the tree still in the window…"  I honestly don't care.  I don't care that I still have to pack everything away, I don't care that decorations need to be taken down, and I certainly don't care that every time I open or close the front door, the long string of sleigh bells jangles and chirps. 

Correction:  I do care; I care a great deal because right now these things bring me joy.  What I don't care about is whether or not you care.  My house; my tree; my rules.

But if you find yourself missing Christmas at all or wishing you could see the lights just one more time, I'm thinking I'll leave everything up at least until the weekend and maybe even until next weekend.  It will definitely be down by Valentine's Day, though, so feel free to stop by for some time with me and with the tree before then if you are having seasonal withdrawal symptoms. 

Maybe I'll even light the window candles for you.  With me, you never really know.

(P.S.  This morning during the 5 a.m. news broadcast, the two anchors are berated by the weatherman because they both have up their Christmas decorations and trees, but Todd the meteorologist believes everything should be gone since we are one-third into January.  Todd, you're a GRINCH!)

 

WATCH OUT FOR MY CHEERY DISPOSITION

Well, if today doesn't beat all, I don't know what the hell will.

It starts out sub-zero.  I'm not even kidding; the news people are calling this a "polar vortex."  My car windows are completely iced shut, so the quick stop to the post office to mail out some bills turns into an episode of Keystone Kops as I try to find a way to get the envelopes into the drive-by mailbox.  I finally give up, get out, and walk through the damn polar vortex of a parking lot to mail them. 

I have to text youngest in the middle of teaching a class to make sure he gets up for his dentist appointment.  He does, but the dentist notices he has two early cavities that need attention.  Doc claims son needs to gargle with $22 mouthwash for a few weeks and come back, and the bitch at the front desk makes an appointment for February.  Son explains he will be away at college in February, to which the royal bitch screams to everyone in the office and to the offices that adjoin them, "He can't come back for FOUR MONTHS!!!!"  Guess what, bitch?  I'm going to change dentists.  Since the nice receptionist left and the non-masochistic hygenist left, I don't know why we come to this freak show of an office anymore, anyway.  Guess what, son?  Those cavities better not get any worse during lacrosse season.

During another class the vice principal walks in with the head janitor, who is carrying with him a carbon monoxide detector.  The go from my room to the room next door.  Frowns are exchanged, and within ten minutes my entire side of the building is being evacuated to the gym while doors, windows, and fans bring the polar vortex right into the school with us.  Figures.  It's the first damn day I've actually had heat in my room that lasts more than the first hour of the day.  Sure, not only is my heater working, it's trying to frigging kill me.

On the way home I stop at CVS to pick up son's RX for the $22 dental rinse he supposedly needs before they will supposedly fill these early cavities he allegedly has in his mouth.  He dropped the RX off at 11:00 a.m.  I am at the pharmacy at 3:00 p.m.  The pharmacist tells me it's not ready yet.  Not ready yet?  Sweetie, you've had four flipping hours to take an already-mixed solution off the shelf and slap a label on it.  What in the hell is wrong with you people?

I decide to file my first shot in my thesis.  Yes, my thesis.  At my age the only thesis I should be looking at is a misspelling of these.  Sending the paper off isn't the issue.  The issue is that I am working with a newer version of Microsoft Office, and it totally sucks eggs.  It blows chunks.  It is the most un-user-freindly program I've ever encountered, and, considering how techno-dumb I am, that's really saying something!  I finally manage to create pages, fix the header and footer, and save it, and attach it as a file on the fifteenth attempt.  I hit send and start praying my ass off.

Then someone has the nerve to tell me that a man who drinks fifteen or more alcohol drinks per week is considered an alcoholic.  For women, then number is seven drinks per week; that is the true tally of determining whether or not we are alcoholics.  I don't know about you and your friends, but for me and my friends, this pretty much means we've been drunkards since junior high school.

So please excuse my pissiness.  Between the iced-shut car windows,the idiot dentist with his shrewish receptionist, the heating system at work trying to take me out, the ineptitude of the CVS pharmacy, Microsoft Office, and being a damn sot, I'm not really in the mood to be cheery and retain my typical star-dust-sprinkled attitude.

Or maybe it's just me being my usual self.  Sometimes it's really hard to tell the difference.