I spilled water on a laptop and now it’s dead.  It was the laptop I started using when this one — the one I’m writing on right now — died.  Now this laptop — let’s call it ”Bob” — is back and the other laptop, Fred, well Fred is still dead.  But maybe Fred just needs to die for a little while and then Fred will come back, too.  There’s data on Fred, I’m a little concerned about it.  But one anxiety at a time, let’s just move on.

Custard had hamplets, eleven of them.  I forgot to tell you.  Or if I did tell you, I forgot I’d told you and now I’m telling you again, anyway … they’re all pink.  Last night Custard leapt out of her cage and ran into my room and stopped right in front of the mirror.  She stayed there and stared at herself for several minutes, as if she wondered what she’d become.  Where had her life gone?  I let her run for a good half hour then scooped her up with a kiss and “hang in there.”  And then I set her back down with her kids.  Eleven of them, and that bastard father who knows where. 

There’s a book report due tomorrow, I just learned of it today.  And there’s practice and a meeting, Wednesdays kind of suck.

If you need a hamster, you know where to call.

Oh, here’s some video:   Custard’s Surprise

Watch closely and tell me if you think she’s eating them.  I’m going up right now to recount.

Yesterday I went to a farm, yes Anna’s.  The kids and I went to Rogersville.  I don’t farm around, people, this is the only farm I currently frequent, I’m a one-farm woman.  When I find a good farm I’m loyal, I expect however one or two things back.  I expect Anna to greet me, for instance, and Craig to be around, too.  And I’ve come to expect a drive around the property with an open bottle of wine.  It’s blissfully rebellious and carefree, if only we’d had shotguns and shot up varmints as we raced around. 

Please note the shameless product placement Mr. Hamina.

I have more to say but not now.  Technical troubles this morning have drained me of all but four-letter words.  I’ll let a couple more photos speak. 

Last night I took Nyquil, it changed my world.  Sometimes you abandon a thing then go back to it and find the thing is completely different for you.  That’s me.  That’s me with Nyquil.  It’s been years I’ll bet since the last Nyquil stupor I had, I’d grown tired of it.  And last night I expected very little, but Nyquil was very good to me.  I took a chance on Berry flavor and I was out just halfway through the small plastic cup.   Not one cough, wheeze or feverish gasp until 7 this morning, not one.  Golden. 

The Sunday Times was tossed on my doorstep at 1:44am my time Saturday night.  It’s night, you know, until you’ve slept and woke up, that’s my rule.  So I got the Sunday Times Saturday night, I had no idea they were out throwing it around so early.  I was up because I hadn’t taken any sneezy-wheezy-stuffy-head-so-I-could-sleep medicine and was wide awake coughing and bored when voila — the paper.  Who knew.  From now on it’s what I’m doing Saturday night at 1:44; I’m reading the Sunday times. 

There was nothing all that interesting in it that I remember. 

I bought steer manure Saturday day for my beets.  The steer manure salesman, though, said I should let the beets get older, before I spread it around.  These are the beets and assorted other foods that Anna planted in my garden all Michelle Obama-like, do you remember?  I have a ceramic frog in charge of watering them now and I have steer manure on the way.  Right now the steer manure is inside my car — we forgot to take it out — but the outside of my car is shiny and manure-free because I washed it for the first time in eras. 

M.’s small hometown of Auburn, New York is in this week’s New Yorker which there’s no link to online, but I found my way to it by Digital Reader.  The Digital Reader is the New Yorker’s sort of awkward way of letting subscribers read content online.  Have you used the Digital Reader M.?  Am I missing something or is the Digital Reader completely stupid?   Regardless.  In the piece there’s two women from Auburn and if you’ve got the 4/20 New Yorker, then go read it now.  It’s under Annals of Adventure.   I’d tell you all about it but I’ve just started and I’m wishing M. would put his own colorful tales about Auburn onto paper, or at least into the Notes app on his iPhone.

I made two thai soups over the weekend, one was perfect but then I got cocky and mixed up a different one today and that one sucks.  I’ll be okay, though, because it’s 81 degrees and I have a pool.  And even if I don’t jump in the pool, I can put my sunglasses on and work from the lounge chair that is sitting in a place they call “poolside”. 

… while the rest of you suckers … hey, wait, come over!  Come over and work poolside, too, I have four lounge chairs, they’re all yours!  Just please bring Diet Coke, I’m out.  I know, Diet Coke’s bad for my cold, but that’s how I roll, Baby.  I’m bad. 

Cheers.

Megan is on Facebook, she’s overdue.  Megan had Randy Powell for band, she played the trumpet like Kelly and Trace.  And really that’s all I’m going to say.  She showed up briefly last year — was it last year — and made fun of my underwear and I’ve heard little to nothing from her since but today she’s on Facebook and that’s that. 

In other news my throat hurts but no one seems to care.  An ant crawled up my leg but I’ll ignore it.  It’s the Yankees’ home opener and Cleveland’s up 1-0 as of this writing. 

And here’s a little something from the Jenks’. 

Ellen spotted him out the front window, to the left of the volcano.  He was in front of the house but not facing it, he was in the street eyeing Howard’s car.  Howard was parked on the street.  Howard never parked on the street, not once.  Ellen didn’t think she’d ever seen him park on the street, Howard did not stray from routine.  But there he was.  He was parked on the street and he was facing the wrong way. 

Ellen felt a pain in her chest, like someone had poked her with a sharp stick.  She opened the front door and stood in the frame of it and Gary turned around to look at her and he grinned.  He was delighted with this windfall.  He pointed his phone at Howard’s car.   

“You want to play?”  He asked not looking at her, but watching his phone.  “This is how I play.” 

Gary punched the same spot on the phone over and over with one short thumb as if he weren’t quite getting it, Ellen had a strange urge to help.  It took her a moment to understand.  He was taking pictures of Howard’s car, which was never parked on the street, which had never faced the wrong way but was unfortunately tonight, facing backwards.  There was a city ordinance about this.  Howard was technically breaking the law. 

She shut the door and raced, adrenaline-charged, into the great room where Howard was seated watching SportsCenter.   

“He’s here, he’s outside!”  She huffed, though there was no reason she’d have lost her breath.  “He’s taking pictures.” 

 You can see now, where this is going and you can probably see it might have stopped.  It was silly.  So Gary was taking pictures, so what.  The ticket, should one even result from a random photo, which was highly unlikely, was all of $110.  It would reduce down to fifty if Howard paid at City Hall.  No one need have gotten up from a chair.  But the sad truth of lives like those unfolding on Barnsdale, where the cars in the driveways are all the same, and the dogs are at every other house, and the sprinklers run on timers, and the children ride the same bikes — on chipper streets like this where the barbecues round up the same people year after year with their same plastic and constant smiles.  Well, the sad truth of lives lived in sunny new neighborhoods with small talk and cheap cliche is that there’s an unfulfilled longing, it’s chronic.  And the occasional small drama does something, however brief and pale, to quench it.  So Howard got up.   

I made some coffee I’m very happy with today.  Though I have to confess, I covet another’s coffee machine.  It’s C.’s.  And I shouldn’t covet, I’ve got the Keurig you know, sent to us from H.  And in a pinch I could bring back the espresso machine A. got me that’s in the garage.  The coveting is because C.’s model is the newer sleeker upgrade machine from mine in the garage.  Her steaming wand is sturdier and she uses the espresso pod packets you just drop in, there’s no tamping.  I always thought I liked to tamp, turns out I don’t miss it at all. 

Anyway, I made okay coffee I’ll just be happy with that. 

Yesterday I went to the state capitol (here it’s in Salem) with some kids who were 9 and 10.  We sat in the House chamber for awhile, and then the Senate, and we watched the men and women who work there vote.  It reminded me of the book fair in Austin, which is the capitol of Texas, which also reminded me of Jay, but he’s an entirely separate post. 

The book fair in Austin is held at the capitol.  Writers read from right where the gavel is banged and the year I went Rick Perry chatted C. and I up (he lives next door), and my boyfriend Bill read in the Senate chamber.  But why yesterday reminded me of all that was the chairs.  The chairs in Austin were amazing — you know, the ones at the desks where the legislators sit.  They were big leathery puffy things, I’ve never sat in better chairs.  The ones yesterday, in Salem, were wooden and severe.  Maybe they’re meant to reflect the hardships of pioneers.  In Austin the chairs very clearly reflect the oil. 

Either way, we’re most all of us back at work today.  If the bagel cart comes by, grab me one with cream cheese, thanks. 

Oh, this has nothing to do with that, but a Duchenne smile is a predictor of marital success, did you know that?  I just read about it today.  Ellen had a Duchenne smile in the beginning of her marriage, it went Pan American on her later on.  I’m going to go check out my own smile right now. 

I don’t get gas.  And I mean that in several different ways.  I don’t tend to be pestered by it in a digestive sense, that’s one.  But also here, in my home, with the gas people running back and forth on my street for two weeks digging holes in the ground, I don’t understand why they keep asking me over and over where the gas is when I’ve told them over and over I don’t have it, why do they keep asking?  Don’t they have CRM software? 

I tend to generally not pay attention to what’s going on.  Not just in my home or on my street, but everywhere.  Things will catch my attention, but they’ll be odd useless things.  So the gas people running around, for instance, I’ve not paid attention to.  And I find this curious because doesn’t gas blow up?  I mean it can, I think, I’ve seen it in movies, but here they are with all of their trucks all over the road and directing me to Stop or Slow with their signs, and digging holes through the street and knocking at my door to say my gas will be off, and I haven’t bothered to ask any one of them what they’re doing.

I don’t have gas, so I guess it’s not so crazy I wouldn’t care.  Still, I have a main, which is why they keep coming.  They knock, I say, “I’ve not got gas,” they scratch their ears and look puzzled and tell me, “No, no you do.”  They insist there’s a main, they ask me to show them where it is.  I point in the direction all the other gas men have traipsed off to and then get back to my work.  I haven’t thought once of following the gas man – and it wouldn’t be so terribly awful, some have been cute — around to the side of the house to see the “main”.  If I just did that once I’d be prepared for the next guy, but, well … I haven’t. 

There have been truck noises and the clanking of tools today, none of which I like.  And as I said, I’ve asked no questions so have no idea how long it all lasts.  They seem, though, to be spending an awful lot of time on the side of the house and I don’t even use gas.  Maybe it’s a sign, maybe I should.  I miss a gas stove, dreadfully.  Our plan is to one day have gas and then maybe no one will scratch their ears. 

The weekend was mostly lovely, even the rainy part, I can say the same thing about today.

Well, “lovely” might be strong.  You choose your own word.

Do you like the line?  It’s from Crane Flies, I have more.

Anna is making mozzarella, if I didn’t have appointments today I’d drive there and eat some.  There’s no school because the school is Catholic and today is Good Friday.  And oh dear, oops.  The children had bacon for breakfast.  Let’s pretend it was the soy kind and move on. 

The Great Gatsby was published today in 1925, it was 48,000 words.  I didn’t know that.  In fact I just learned that right now and I’m not absolutely sure I believe it — 48,000 words?  It can’t be.  Will you go get your ripped paper copy from college and count the words for me, please.  Right now  I need a fact check.

Besides that, there’s sun and blue outside it looks like.  I’ve got work to do and plants — did I tell you? — in my garden to watch grow.  Easter baskets, too, to put together, and trivia cards to make up for plastic eggs. 

I’m reading Caitlin Macy‘s short stories because in New York I eavesdropped on a woman who was friends with her.  I love that about New York.  That I can stop in a restaurant with the tables pushed close and eavesdrop on gossip about Audrey Niffenberger’s advance or Eric Simonoff leaving Janklow.  Somewhere in the village was a nice restaurant where I had the salmon and stole a marvelous hour-long eavesdrop of someone who knew Caitlin Macy.  She was with a man who was British and had just got into town.  In thanks, I’m reading Macy’s stories.  Which are wonderful, by the way.   I’ll be back there in May, Caitlin, let’s get coffee. 

M. is writing something to get banned by Steve Martin.  Or maybe banned by La Grande.  Or furiously condemned by both Steve Martin and La Grande, with shades of Picasso, but the details elude me.  Keep an eye on him here. 

Happy Easter Egg, that’s all I’ve got.

The hamster’s name is Custard, she’s a girl.  She’s furry, with some yellow.  She likes to run in her wheel at night and sleep all day.  I think.  We haven’t had a full day yet together, I may have to report back. 

Rocky, one of the tadpoles in my book, has trematodes.  It’s a parasite and it made his legs all grow on one side.  Three, in his case.  Humans can get the parasite, too, check your legs.  Custard shows no sign, so far, of deformity.

I have leftover Thai food for lunch and I don’t want it.  Will you trade lunches with me?  I want your lunch.  I want your lunch especially if it’s something with roast beef.  Or a big chopped salad.  Or chicken livers, what do I care.  I just don’t want Thai.

I need new postcards.  My postcard supply has dwindled and I want to send you one.  C. is listening to Hammer, H. is finding a studio, L. made me a fabulous lunch last Friday and I want to have postcards.  I also want to watch a movie.  I’ve rented Nora and you’re invited to come watch it.  I like to watch movies in the guest house on the wall because my projector makes them big.  The problem, though, now … is the rat.  I’ve been told by some of you they live in large groups.  There could be 90 of them over there and all dirty with three-foot teeth. 

These things are inhibiting me today — rats, lunch and where to watch Nora.  If you’ve got inhibitions of your own, send them here. 

And find a studio for H., I mean it. 

We’re getting a hamster today, don’t tell A.  Very Tall Vet is the sort of doctor who gets boxes of animals dropped on his porch — yesterday it was hamsters.  And because Very Tall Vet has helped me out of a jam or two and is generous with gruesome animal stories, I’m taking a rodent off his hands.  He has three more if you’re looking. 

Speaking of rodents, we have a rat.  So now I’m also in the market for a cat.  Our beloved family cat — A.’s for 17 years — passed on last week.  Three days later there’s a rat.  A rat!  There’s a rat right this moment rooting around with his slimy little rat nose and rat teeth in the guest house, the place I sometimes work.  Scruffy could care less.  I need a cat.  I need a fearsome, coldhearted, brutal rat-killing cat.  I want the killings to be swift and violent, I want terror to invade the entire Portland Metro rat community.  I want word to get out that we torture.  I’ll have bloody grasshopper heads put in all their little rat beds.  I’ll need someone reliable. 

Good Lord, a rat.  A. says I should be calm, he said it was a small rat.  “Oh, a mouse?” I asked hopefully.  “No,” said A.  “A rat.” 

It’s okay.  It will be fine because it’s Wednesday, and no small rat ever burrowed through a human woman’s brain on Wednesday as far as I know.  It’s tomorrow I’m worried about.  Thursdays have never been any good.  So I need a cat by tomorrow, to kill my rat, and I need to clean the hamster cage before the kids are home from school today.  One rodent I’ll cuddle, one I’ll kill — don’t look at me like that, I didn’t make the rules.

Anna came to my house while I was at soccer yesterday and planted my garden.  I think more of you should be like Anna.  It’s too late to plant my garden, of course, but you are welcome to bring over lunch — I want thai today.  Something with coconut and lemongrass and shrimp.  See you around noon.

The Wittgensteins were crazy, you knew that right?  They’re the sort of family I might have liked if I were in the market for large crazy families.  There was a philosopher, a one-armed pianist, a whole rash of madness and suicide.  The stuff of lively Sunday dinners. 

I only mention it because the sun’s pouring in through open French doors and I’m reading samples of the Wittgenstein, Cheever and O’Connor books on my phone and thinking it’s great to be me because this is work.  All of it to jump-start creative energy about dogs. 

There are tools that I require and I’m missing some, one is caffeine.  That’s the only one, actually.  There is no coffee in the house, there’s no Diet Coke.  It’s not that I find myself so dreadfully boring I risk dozing off intermittingly, it’s just that … well … yes, I suppose occasionally with the sun and porch and all that, yes I’m in small ways a bore.

So I’m off briefly for coffee, I’ll be right back.  Then I’ll read about crazies and I’ll write them.  I’m leaving the door open while I’m gone and hope that the bluebirds fly in.  I’m sure you have your own little rituals in your workday that aren’t any less strange than mine.