Random Thoughts #39
During the months when the boxes and pots were all empty, birds would often come to rest in our boxes. Blue jays were notorious for digging them up (there was something edible buried in there they loved to dig for) and spreading dirt everywhere. Mourning doves like to sit there and do little more than coo.
These birds deposited seeds in my boxes, as birds doo (spelling error intentional) and I had a few small plant sprouts already growing. I had to uproot them so I could plant my flowers.
I couldn't stop wondering what would happen if I let them grow. What kinds of plants were they? Would I be able to identify them if when they matured? What would my balcony look like if let my plants go wild?
Curious as I was, I chose not to find out.
***
For most of my life, the colloquial term for marijuana was pot. If you smelled something funny, you said you smelled someone smoking pot. The kid in high school got in trouble for smoking pot. I knew other terms existed such as bud or weed or doobie or blunt or spliff or Mary Jane, but generally everyone called it pot most of the time.
Now I noticed everyone calls it weed. I call it weed. I don't even know when I started calling it weed ("Yuck, our next door neighbor is smoking weed again and it's wafting into our apartment.") All I know is at some point I stopped calling it pot. How and when did that happen?
I also noticed it's weed when you smoke it, but if you eat it, everyone becomes more formal and scientific and calls it cannabis.
###
There are many way which modern society can complain about how technology dominating our lives in the twenty-first century. Now I have a new one to put out there. I am overwhelmed by the constant need to charge my devices. Every day I need to charge multiple gadgets. I have to charge my phone, my tablet, my earbuds, and my watch. It seems hardly an hour goes by in my home when I don't have a device sitting in the charger. I have to go through a daily routine of deciding what needs to be charged first. What outlets are available (after all, there are two of us in the house needing to charge devices)? Do I have more than one charger that is compatible with everything?
One of the reasons I resisted getting a cell phone for so long was because I knew I would be careless with it and forget to charge it or take it with me. While I rarely forget to charge it, I do drive myself crazy making sure it's charged every day, constantly checking the charging status.
Is this any way to live?
###
Lately I feel more nostalgic than usual about my college years.
What I miss in particular about those halcyon days of academia, was how my biggest political fear was if George H. W. Bush dropped dead, it would leave Dan Quayle in charge.
Imagine being so naïve I considered President Dan Quayle to be the worst political situation imaginable. I had no idea what I would be in for in 30 years.
###
What if I used asterisks instead of hashtags to separate my different random thoughts? Would that change the entire look and feel of this blog? Would my readers (both of them)look at the page and feel uneasy. Should I try this radical act the next time I made a Random Thoughts post?
###
If we need proof that advertising exists to make the masses insecure about trivial situations and provide unnecessary solutions to the problem, it's this new trend of whole body deodorant.
I understand the desire for underarm deodorant. Armpits have a lot of sweat glands and they stay warm and enclosed all day. One doesn't have to do much activity throughout the course of the day to have sweaty, stinky pits. I don't think that's true of other body parts. It's probably true of our feet, but even that isn't much of a problem if we have our shoes on. (Besides, unless it's an actual anti-perspirant, deodorant on our feet isn't going to change the fact that we sweated in our shoes and our shoes may still smell.) Places like our butt cracks and crotches aren't going to have a problematic scent unless we engage in heavy activity. If we sweat hard enough to cause that much of a noticeable smell on those areas, we're probably going to change out of our sweaty clothes and take a shower soon enough.
I think for the most part, the part of our bodies these deodorants are meant for are not going to have an obvious scent to most people unless they go up to us and sniff us directly. We're not dogs. We don't go around sniffing each other's butts as greetings.
Now please, Lume, Dove, and whatever other body deodorant companies are about there, stop making me worry about whether or not everyone in the vicinity is truly offended by my possible swamp crotch!
###
Every year I manage to successfully grow a few plants. Does that mean I have a "green thumb"? I never think of myself as much of a gardener.
At the same time, most, and often all, of my plants survive. I wouldn't say I have a "black thumb" either.
Through trial and error I have figured out what I can and can't plant on my balcony and the spots places on the balcony to place them. I keep them alive with minimum effort.
I decided to say I have a "khaki thumb". There is some green in my thumb, but it's not bright.
###
Now that Pat Sajak is retiring from Wheel of Fortune, I am wondering if there will be a total cast overhaul. In other words, what will become of Vanna. I mean no disrespect to the woman, but does Wheel of Fortune still need Vanna? Back in the 80s she would physically turn the letters when contestants guessed them. However, that's no longer the case. The show makes it look like she has to touch the letters to make them appear, but sometimes it's obvious she didn't touch the letter and it still appeared. The lightning rounds don't require her assistance.
When the show first aired, Vanna was meant to play the role of the sexy bimbo assistant. The cultural zeitgeist has shifted and treating women like window dressing is (thank goodness) no longer considered in good taste. Now audiences consider her more of a cohost, but her main role is still to reveal letters. Let's stop the pretense. We all know the letters reveal themselves. Wheel of Fortune doesn't need a cohost/letter revealer. Vanna White is retirement age. Relax and take it easy, Vanna. You earned it.
Comments
Post a Comment