February 7th:
Slept a long time. Nothing unusual in these Revenge of the Plague days. Woke up from a dream in which someone was warning me not to go into the water, because I would probably be eaten by a demon. The demons were out in force, with long snaky bodies banded with melon and pastel colors.
The people they ate became bronze statues in the ocean. The sandy floor was littered with metal monuments to the unwary.
Yes, I did go into the water, what of it? There's no Darwin award for cussedness in dreams.
February 8th:
Finished Hard Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World. Undecided as to what I think of it, but Auntie likes it. It has that sort of dichotomous feel about it.
I explain to my erstwhile mother-in-law that there is an ant infestation. She asks what kind. I answer that they're tiny and black. I make a "very tiny" gesture with my thumb and forefinger. She nods wisely and proclaims "I think those are called pissants." I agree with her and hit the wine bottle again. Good Merlot.
Auntie is very, very grudgingly thinking about working on her book again. This would be the third time, the theoretical charm. And this after she did her annual pilgrimage to the sulky John A. Nickles. Like so many men I've encountered lately, he is a man after my own heart, but so thoroughly detached from my context that he might as well be dead.
February 9th:
I hated salad when I was a kid. It was among the most disgusting things somebody could try to put in my mouth. Now that I'm, at least nominally, an adult, I've been craving salad. Right around my birthday I started craving salad. I tripped some psychic brain switch that said "Uh, yeah, now that it's a pain in the ass for her to get it, make her want it." My brain's done that before, but not usually with food.
The Big Green Beastie still exists, moreover, it's almost ambulatory. I haven't seen it in years; in fact, when I last saw it, I'm not convinced it was even green. Dixon, dahling, what happened to your hair?
The net is getting spookier every day. Last time I saw Dixon, I swear he had more hair than that. Then I thought about it a while and realized I'd seen him last about five years ago. Yet I can go to the Land Rover web site and see pictures of him. What's next, self-updating yearbooks? Some kind of weird search engine spider that seeks out information on alumni so it can provide new data on what they're really doing, not just what they claim they are at reunions? You'd have to diet all the time, not just every five years.
February 10th:
The author of the week is cartoonist Jan Eliot, a fine, funny lady who writes the excellent Stone Soup strip. Auntie did hot chocolate with her prior to getting communally rained on. She eased Auntie's mind about something that has been bothering her for ages: the flagrant merchandization of one Charles Schultz. Apparently Schultz devotes a great deal of his time and effort to charitable outfits, notably Canine Companions. Canine Companions is a non-profit organization that trains dogs for the handicapped and provides them free of charge. If the money Snoopy generates dancing for Metropolitan Life is really improving other people's existences, more power to all of them.
February 11th:
Just take the cough-spawned vomits as a given. They're a daily event. Soon there'll be paparazzi following me around, waiting to see if I'm about to make a hopeful dash to the bathroom. People will sell souvenirs. "I Saw Auntie Vomit and All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt."
February 12th:
Found a passage in a Phil Dick book, Dr. Bloodmoney, that I suspect is the origin of Brin's The Postman. I feel sorry for Brin. It's not his fault that Costner can't act. Although I'm somewhat reminded of Joe Haldeman talking about Hollywood buying the rights to a Forever War movie. I believe he said something like "It'll probably be terrible, but I got a pile of money from it, so that's alright."
Good attitude, Joe.
February 13th:
The suits are drawing closer, oh my brothers and only friends. Your humble Auntie and narrator is going to be snatched up, like some inverse Rapture, by the corporate weasels and borne to stifling, airless heights that have thus far only shown in Geiger prints. Yes, up, winged weasels. What will they think of next?
So if your friend and Auntie seems a little distracted, recall, it's Friday the 13th and there are men bearing gifts.