SandyU’s Neighborhood

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Today, while we were walking, I was thinking of a comment  Apolline had left on my Missing Strangers post about social movements and urbanization.  We turned a corner and here was exactly what I had been imagining loneliness all together to look like:

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Do you ever wonder what might have happened to people who are essentially strangers to us?   

Next door to my office building is a retirement & assisted living place -  it used to have the word "Alzheimer's"  in the name and we joked about just trading one place for the other as our minds went; usually with the assumption that too much work was going to cause such a decline.

Anyway - over the last couple of months every morning, as I've walked past, an elderly man has been outside hiding behind a pillar enjoying a cigarette.  Every morning I would say "good morning how are you?" and he'd respond with a loud and cheery: "Good morning to you and I'm great"   

The last few mornings he was not there and I wondered if he had died or been caught.  It crossed my mind that I might never know -  I don't think I would've gone inside to enquire about the health of a man having a forbidden cigarette.   

I was so relived to see him back this morning that I almost said "oh thank God you are ok"....    I really had been quite concerned about someone whose name I don't even know.

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The bike below used to appear near the office during the day and then be gone by evening.  Then it arrived and stayed.  And stayed and stayed.   If this had been anywhere near I live, it would've been stripped within a few hours.  After more than a month the rear tyre is flat but no-one has stolen the helmet or attempted to steal spare parts from the bike.  

So,  where is the owner?   Did they die at their desk?  Did they walk to the shops at lunch time and get run-over crossing the road?   Or perhaps they developed Alzheimer's and forgot they owned a bike.

I hate not knowing.....  and unlike the missing elderly man, where I could've enquired if I'd wanted to, there is no-one to ask about the bike's owner.  

October 16th -  I had walked past it for a week before I started wondering about its missing owner.

November 6th

The middle school wrestlers got to make a poster!  Cody thought it was so fun.  I just realized he's the only blonde in the whole group.

 

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Just a second ago I was looking at the shopping list I posted here on Vox last year, and thought to myself, hey, it's only 2 weeks away. I wonder if Vox is asking a question about Thanksgiving? 

So there you go. 

Yesterday was my mom's birthday.  The whole crew got together for supper down at the 40.  This is my brother and his new girlfriend.

Today at work, we did her birthday lunch with the office crew.  We go to the Cattle-Ac and have lunch, champagne, and cake!  My mom was wearing the new coat from my dad and necklace from Ray & Amy.  We got her a scarf but it didn't go with that particular ensemble.

I sure hope I look that beautiful at 65!

 

While not working on my NaNo thing, I ran across a brief and weird parody I did a few years ago of the final passage in Joyce's Ulysses. Yes, that's the sort of thing I do for entertainment, which should surprise no one. Anyway. 

I got the CD out to hear this and decided to share it with you.

(Yes, it probably is. I mean, look, I've had to give up noting the days or dates; it's pretty much an on-going condition these days. I hear that it passes away in a few years, though, and then you have to eat soy, or some such nonsense.)** 

I'd rather be doing a more complete parody or pastiche of that passage which goes like this, 

than working on my story. Or I'd rather be painting. I still haven't tried out my new brushes yet. 

**If you didn't get that oblique statement, you have not been reading enough of my blog posts. Seriously.

So then I was thinking about how many of my celebrity crushes are aging;  it's diffferent than it was 15 years ago when they were my age now. I don't want to imply that I find men hovering around age 60 unattractive and creepy. I'd rather just pretend they haven't aged so far along yet, but what can you do? So I was thinking it might be okay to very carefully cultivate a few younger crushes. This one, for example, is a possibility.  Not exactly a celebrity. But on the TV. Also, still over 40, a fine thing to be. 

Yeah, I'm just being silly. I'm going to get a text asking me if I am serious or if, you know, see above parens regarding no longer noting the days. Just trying to have a little fun, folks, that's all!

Because the story is causing me great anxiety. It wants to talk about lovestuff, and not be terribly funny, or have much to do with all the quirky stories I'd set myself up to tell. This is, frankly, pissing me off. I didn't gear up for this thing in order to fail. And how irritating is it to not be able to take control of the ideas that come out of my own head? That's just ridiculous, immature, and unworthy of a good intellect. 

Where were we? Oh, yes. I renamed my iPod. It used to be called Enterprise but now it's called The Fine Arts, after a cool vintage movie theater in Mission, Kansas that I used to go to nearly every weekend (until The Gods Must Be Crazy happened, but that's another story.) I made playlists using the titles of some of my favorite movies, to reflect the songs within them, of course. However, it's rather challenging to develop them well. It sounded like a really good idea to have a playlist called Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, but now I'm not so certain. 

Oh, I found this on the YouTube yesterday.

Isn't this guy kind of awesome? I never really thought so growing up. Mom had a thing for him back when all her girlfriends were grooving on Elvis, who Mom thought was a little icky, and she had a couple of his albums, but when I learned ladies threw their panties at him while he sang, I was so utterly grossed out, and also, there was all that hair and those sideburns. However, he's actually quite good, and although I'm still grossed out at those 1969 ladies with their polyester dresses and nylons and I don't even want to think about the panties, I am charmed by the fact that he was born on Dean Martin's birthday. That's just cool. It's probably not his fault about the panties. 

Okay, back to the thing. ::sigh::

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With us all diligently slapping hand sanitizer on our hands to kill 99.99% of everything that might make us sick.....   where do all the killed germs  go?

These have nothing to do with dead things on hands - I just thought they were pretty.  Taken on walk around the neighbourhood next to ours on the weekend:  

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Thank goodness, I picked the smallest room in the house to use this color of red in because it took 4 coats!  I honestly thought it would never turn out.  This is a 1/2 bath for guests to use.  We will have a white chair rail between the colors.

This is a view of the dining room from the kitchen.  There will also be a white chair rail in here.  The top has a gold metallic glaze over it.  It's the first time I've ever done a faux painting technique and I was very nervous but am really pleased with how it turned out.  I'll have to try another picture with the lights off since they reflect off it.

This is the dining room from the foyer.  I'm just in love with the lights.

That's the conclusion of the upstairs being painted.  I've finished Jace's room downstairs and am about to start on the den.

 

Cody's 1st middle school wrestling meet was this weekend.  I dropped him off at the bus around 7 and was surprised to find my emotions get the best of me yet again.  How could my baby be old enough to go on the bus for a sporting event?  The rest of us including my dad, brother, and his girlfriend drove separately.  Cody only had 2 matches that lasted about 80 seconds total between the two of them because Cody pinned his opponents so quickly!  It was awesome to see the confidence he has and how quickly he took care of business.  Of course, the two 8th grade wrestling managers who are adorable each had to give him a hug to congratulate him.

Saturday night, we went to the local "Food and Wine Festival".  We got to dress up and went with my brother and his girlfriend, Amy.  She just moved back to town from Missoula so it was a good chance for us to get to know her.  We saw lots of people and ate lots of food.  I even found myself a non-alcoholic wine so that was nice.  The bad part was there were no tables to sit at.  They had a few bar tables and a few very uncomfortable benches but my feet were killing me an hour into it. 

There was also a silent auction with local artwork including several photos.  I'm debating donating one myself next year.  I'd have to see if any of my favorites look good blown up.  Sadly, I've taken very few photos this year.  We didn't get a picture of ourselves but we looked just like this :)

 

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I am scared of squirrels.   Irrational I know and I'm annoyed at myself for being afraid of such a cute looking little thing. 
I'd never seen a "real" squirrel until my first day here and when I saw them I raved over their sweet little faces and bushy twitching tails. 

My second day here I met a kamikaze squirrel.  Instead of running away from me it ran straight at me and stamping feet and noise did not deter it.    It only stopped when I ran away and then, looking over my shoulder,  I swear I saw it smile. 

This fear is especially pathetic as I come from the land of more than a few of the world's top 10 deadliest snakes, the small Funnel Web Spider and the Blue Ringed Octopus. I have a healthy respect for these but am not particularly terrified of them.

But squirrels...  I give way to even if it means walking onto the roadway; I give wide berth to trees where I spot a squirrel and I never stand still in a park!

We don't have any squirrels in our little yard;  I suspect because of all the pepper (chili) plants we have around but yesterday I noticed a neighbour is actively encouraging them ....   I would never be able to leave the house if this was at my front door!

This little girl was having a feast.  Of course this was taken from well back on the sidewalk!