and goodbye

It's time for me to say goodbye to you, my darlings.

Since January of 2002 I've been writing here. It seems like a long time. Four years kind of is a long time, actually. I started reading a few of my old posts. How shocking! I'm much the same as I've ever been.

Old and much-hungered-for posts.

Things have changed a lot in the last year. As much as I'd like to say something profound, meaningful, and impressive about how the world works or about how much I've learned, I can't.

Perhaps that indicates just how much I have learned.

What has prompted this dereliction of verbal affection? Well, last night I found a little tidbit that was a prime candidate to be toasted over the Dotty-blog-fire last night. When I clicked to post something new, I found it had been two long weeks since words had issued from my fingertips.

So, my little geese, it seems to me that I've come to the end of my own personal phenomenon. Dotty is off to pursue new possibilities and watch the changes that are certain to come. All the brilliant wit and fabulous pondering will be funneled into new activities. And likely a lot of the old ones. When I'm famous, or if you're in town, come over for something to eat or drink. We'll talk over the old days, like old people, and talk about how things used to be and how things are and how "the more things change the more they stay the same." Groan. Old people talking.

But!

Then we can make fun of old people. "Hey Granny! Can't drive too good with all that hair puffed up around your head, can you?" And we'll say, "The old days, how the hell can they be the old days when we were young when the days were old? What kind of sense does that make?" And we'll say, "Is there any more gin? I could use a refill...go easy on the tonic."

I'll be seeing you. I won't have it any other way.

mm cakey!

Cake should make things taste good. And, often, it succeeds.

Today, it's on the wobbly edge of acceptable.

On the weekend I had ice cream cake at a party. That's good cake.

I've had rice cakes. Today I'm eating "Whole Grain Cakes". They taste a "Whole Lot Like Rice Cakes". They made me think about cake and cakes and if cake is a good thing. I was trying to quench my thirst for sweets when I bought those faux rice cakes. They had cinnamon and some kind of sweet stuff on them. And they take a long time to eat, which is good. Were they good? Good enough, I'd eat them again. And they have cake in their name. So how bad could it be?

Then I thought, "Wow. How bad can it be?"

Cupcakes. They're good.
Ice cream cake. Good.
Strawberry short cake. Yes yes yes so good so good.
Apple cake. Good.
Fruit cake. Eh.
Poundcake. Good.
Cake walk. Good.
Cake hole. What you taste if it's good with.
Chocolate cake. Good.
Vanilla cake. Good.
Pancake. Good.
Cake of soap. Not good.
Crab cake. Good.
Funnel cake. Good.
Patty cake. Fun.

Cake. It's what's for dinner. If you're lucky.

working for a living

I'm going to work tomorrow to substitute teach, fully prepared to write down a whole bunch of bizarre things that people say.

Here are my recent quotations.

From one funny guy: "European handball? I don't want to play that. I want to play hockey! She can play with her own hand."

A fellow was talking about something important to him, although I didn't understand what. He was kind of beefy. Maybe that explains it.

"I was up all day Thursday doing pushups!
"On the roof!
"Of the house!"

And then student number two made me laugh with his grasp of the kind of attitude a person needs to get ahead. (I'm not sure what the attitude is, but I would be he's right about what it isn't.)

Teacher-You don't like this? You'd rather graph? Algebra's easier!
Student 1-grumble
Student 2-You need to stop complaining. You're never going to make it with that attitude.

People are so funny! I could people watch for a very long time!

...oh yeah, I'm going to work to teach, too.

just like that, except different

Holy shnikies. That's what Tommy Callahan says in Tommy Boy, and it always makes me laugh.

It is just after 7am. I've been awake for at least an hour.

What's going on here? I don't wake up until 10am, at least! I think I'm happy about it. I think. But will I turn into a pumpkin soon? I know I look a little tired right now, but will I look like this all day? A little tired? Into a lot tired? Oh my goodness! And I'm working all day! From 7:45 until 8:30!

What the hell?

Every now and then I realize I'm just like everybody else. I work and wake and sleep and eat and obsess about silly things and then forget to do things. I feel sad at those times. I say, sigh, "I'm just like everybody else."

Then I kind of smile and think, "Just not as much."

poor little flower

There's a woman out there, a human flower. Her name's Julie. She's very smart and very clever and very a lot of wonderful things I don't know nearly enough of. You can read about her and her clever brains here.

I thought of her today as I was doing my copy edit work for my schmancy scientific journal.

I came across this plant. Lomatium triternatum (Pursh) Coult. & Rose.

It's a nineleaf biscuitroot. That's a funny root.

But Julie the human flower, she lives in Austin, Texas. Do they eat biscuits in Austin? For some reason I always picture her in Atlanta, although I've never pictured her eating a biscuit.

At any rate, she lives in the south. They have biscuits there. It's a plant. She likes plants. It's kind of a wacky name. She's kind of a wacky girl. And it grows in Texas, in some parts. Although not in Austin, I don't think. But it's a biscuitroot. And there's a peppered biscuitroot. Which would be for her being spicy and sassy.

So, biscuitroot, you're now a symbol of happy.

This picture belongs to the very copyright aware people at montana.plant-life.org/species/lomat_cou.htm who should know that this is an exercise in academic frivolity, which has, in fact, solidified my understanding of academics and their absolute frivolity.

poor bellyrub

He was training some punk at work. BellyRub wrote down something and the guy said, “Hm, that’s interesting. You know, your handwriting says a lot about your personality.�

BellyRub was offended. His handwriting is not beautiful. He never bothers to write a heart over his lowercase i. His exclamation point doesn’t have two eyes and a grin at the bottom. He never learned to make an uppercase Q that was recognizable as an uppercase Q? Well, actually, no one knows how to do that and make it look like a Q? (If you know how to make a cursive uppercase Q that looks like a Q, please send it to every grammar school textbook publisher in the world and to my fourth grade teacher who said my handwriting needed improvement. And gave my best friend good grades!)

The offended BellyRub explained that the link between handwriting and personality had been disproved many times. I think the trainee could use some more training on how to be polite. I’m ready to volunteer, too. (They’d never hire me for pay. You should see my handwriting!)

I imagine myself in BellyRub’s position. I’m trying to teach this goofball trainee and when I write down some notes for him to learn he says, “Hm, that’s interesting. You know, that says a lot about your personality.�

I’d look carefully at the paper and then look at him with a somewhat glazed and googly look and say, “Yeah, it’s kind of scattered and pointy, isn’t it?� I’d make some kind of creepy, jerky motion, and smile. I’d say, “It’s weird how people pick up on those personality quirks, isn’t it? You’re pretty perceptive.� Then I’d start looking around frantically for a pencil and stick it behind my ear. I’d say, “Oh, that’s better. Always be prepared. Thought I’d lost my stick.� Cuckoo grin.

When I was talking to BellyRub I let my mind wander in a different direction. I’d still say, “Yeah, it’s kind of scattered and pointy, isn’t it?� Then I’d say, “It warns people that I have knives in my pants.�

At that point BellyRub laughed and said, “Whaaat?� And I laughed because I realized that my sentence sounded like a foreign language translation of what I meant.

He said, in a scattered, pointy voice, “Oh! Pockets! Knives in your pockets!� So I started laughing thinking about the poor French boys and girls learning my twisted version of English and thinking that I’m talking about pants made out of knife fabric. “Oh! Pierre! Do you like my cargo-pants? They are made from real cargoes! From Brazil!�

And, of course, I must laugh at myself for writing pants. Here is the good ol’ US of A, where many misunderstandings are born and bred, we’ve got a dire pants situation. The US version of pants is trousers. Or jeans, I imagine. I’m making that up, taking liberties, yassir. But in jolly old England (not good ol’), pants are underpants. You know, underwear, skivvies, bloomers, shorts, panties, tightie whities, boxers, loincloths, codpieces, drawers, thongs, snowsuits, those kinds of things.

So having knives in one’s undies, well, that might make you have scattered, pointy handwriting if you didn’t in the beginning, mightn’t it?

you should try this

I like games. A lot.

This is a strange game I haven't solved yet, but it's pretty cool.

It's called Grow Cube. Play it a bunch of times and then a bunch of times more. There aren't directions, but it's not hard to figure out.

Spend your time making your brain feel massaged.

Aaaaah. Grow Cube.