RANDOM SHALLOW THOUGHTS!

...not just for TV anymore! Right here on your favorite (or not) blog!I haven't really posted a lot of significant things lately. In a way, I'm afraid that what little is left of my intellect has been drying up. Is there such a thing as "Mental Remission"? If so, that would be a pretty good diagnosis for ME these days.

This is for the birds dept.:: This section is about bird-feeding. When I've seen other people do it, they basically toss a whole bunch of crumbs and pieces out at once, and the seagulls tromp all over each other to eat bread. To me, a microcosm of society...the birds fly so beautifully, but they get ugly when they're competing. Me, I prefer to take individual bits and toss 'em to whichever seagull I think is really hungry. Some of them actually drool and salivate as they fly past me, hoping to grab a mouthful (beak-ful?). I toss 'em to seagulls near me, but if I see one that doesn't compete well, I'll make sure he gets some too.



But lately, the birds have really got me figured out. They'll hover overhead, hoping that I'll toss crumbs up to 'em. And you know, as they look down at me, sometimes I think I can see into their little bird-souls. For a brief instant, an interaction of sorts takes place. And I always feel better once I've fed the flock; I transcend my own problems as life itself zooms around me, in the form of squawking seagulls. I used to hate 'em; I think me and the birds have reached a sort of understanding. I took pity on those dumb birds, trying to survive thru the winter, and that was all it took. So, whenever life gets to me...I head for the birds.

Good thing I don't bet in Vegas dept.: Me, thinking I was some kind of Karnac-type sports clairvoyant, I thought I knew something about baseball, and as such, I posted in this blog that the Tigers would win the World Series. Can anyone say "MEOW"? The Tigers are a great team, but they basically gave the World Series away. Not that the St. Louis Cardinals are a bad team; in fact, they stomped all over the Tigers. Detroit's pitchers committed error after error; the infielders' plays just fell flat, and their hitters couldn't hit. On the other side, St. Louis took advantage of Detroit's myriad mistakes, plus the Cardinal pitchers were fierce and their hitters explosive. Can you say "Roll Over", boys and girls? I knew ya could...is it me, or was this kind-of a "flat" World Series? I love watching baseball, but this Series somehow just seemed "tortured" and "agonizing"; not at all like the year the Boston Red Sox won it all. This world series was a DIRGE in comparison. So, it's goodbye to baseball for a while. **snif**...

Soda serendipity dept.: I've noticed (or not) that the labels on pop bottles resemble each other more closely than ever these days. No, Pepsi doesn't look like Coke, but, all the varieties of Pepsi bottles look so much like each other, that sometimes I end up with "diet-fizz with a twist of lemon-iced-tea Pepsi" instead of the good ol' Pepsi that I like so well. Because the LABELS are so similar. Well, today, the same thing happened to me (it's all about me, after all) with the 57 different varieties of Coke out there. They all have red labels with the "Coke" logo. And if you don't look closely at the label, you'll grab the wrong variety of pop. Which I did. I got home today, broke open a bottle of Coke, took a swallow and thot..."hmmmm, what's going on here?" And then I realized, "heyyyy, this ain't regular Coke". But I actually LIKED the stuff. So I looked at the label, and found I was drinking a version that I didn't even know existed! "Black Cherry Vanilla" Coke. Okaaaay......

It just breaks my heart to see this dept.: Actor Michael J. Fox has appeared in an ad, aired on a TV station back east, which advocates stem-cell research for diseases such as the one he has, Parkinsons'. He had to stop full-time acting because his symptoms were becoming quite severe. And I've seen clips of this ad (which the PIG-HEADED commontater Rush Limbaugh lambasted), as well as a clip of Fox appearing on CBS' Morning Show. In both cases, the effects of Parkinsons' on Mr. Fox are heavily evident. It is so sad. Not only for him, but for all that have to deal with that, or any other gradually debilitating disease. Alzheimers, MS, Parkinsons', whatever. And, as fragile as I feel sometimes, my problems are NOTHING compared to how these and other afflictions affect those who suffer from them. And Rush Limbaugh can go to Hell! Except, the Devil would probably throw him back!

Summers' almost gone, winter's coming on dept.: Yeah, I know "Summer" is gone, but a song lyric is always a catchy way of introducing a subject. And so CDA is beginning to batten the hatches and face another winter. Once again, the time of snow tires and snowblowers awaits us all. The way I've got it figured, winter is a punishment that we are having to suffer for something bad that somebody did. The big tree in my front yard is shedding leaves faster than I'm losing hair...and that tree is dropping "seed grenades" which bomb my yard, front porch, and my car. Bonk! Thunk! Whap! Those are three sounds I now hear on a regular basis as these seed grenades strike my porch, my roof, my front door and anything else nearby. Maybe those Jehovah's Witnesses who are always leaving tracts in my door (tracts are pamphlets, basically) will get it on the ol' noggin. Hell hath no fury like a sloppy tree in a windstorm, after all.

OOPS, there goes another rubber tree plant dept.: Actually, this has nothing to do with rubber trees, but rather, the feeling I get when I see new buildings pop, pop, popping all over the place. POP! A new Mountain West bank, up thar at Ramsey and Kathleen Avenue...or, POP! The "whatever it's gonna be" building that's gonna obscure our picturesque view of the mega-box Costco Store, up there on Neider Avenue...or, POP! how about the "I don't know what it is, but it's gonna be something" building, which will obscure the demure vision of the Shopko Store, up there on Ironwood Avenue, across from Albertsons'. I'm so out of it, that I didn't even know until last week that, POP! Dave Smith Motors has now taken over the old Ponderosa Motors building in the 1900 block of 4th Street, or that, POP! the Breakfast Nook restaurant is now located up thar on 4th in a building that was formerly a Sports Bar. Long ago, by the way, that building housed an A & W drive-in, in case anyone cares about old stuff like that. No truth to the rumor, by the way, that "A & W" stood for "ask and wait".

Yeah, it's political season but I don't care dept.: So-and-so is saying his opponent said something really indecent. She is saying her opponent is an idiot. He is saying his female opponent doesn't have a clue. Plus, ads sponsored by committees sympathetic to either the protagonist or the antagonist outline how evil their candidate's opponent is. Yup, yup, yo...another political season in Idaho. Me, I don't plan on voting, so I can hate ALL politicians equally. Just remember one thing, though...it wasn't ME who re-elected George W. Bush! How about that...a vote for an incumbent Prezzident almost translated into an act of treason back a coupla years ago. Not to rub it in or anything, but the little "countdown clock" at the left of this post will tell you, to the second, how much longer we have to put up with this BOZO. Honk!!!!
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I didn't think I had it in me. Sometimes, maybe instead of "forcing" a post, it's best to incubate various irritations for a while until they transmogrify into a rambling, ranting depository of inarticulate verbage. Such as what you've just finished reading. Oh, one more thing...have a nice day. Which reminds me...I saw a bumper sticker which pictured an expressionless "smiley figure" and it said, "have an average day." So I'll go with that. Yeah, I can do that.