At last a confirmation. Always hoped there were extras around somewhere. (Posted as part of the Weekly Photo Challenge.)
humor
Infinity at the Dude Ranch
This is the symbol for infinity, a concept that gives me a headache and makes me feel privileged to be part of the universe. Even at its most routine and mundane, daily life takes place in this astonishing place that must go on forever, else there would be an outer edge with nothing beyond it. (Ow. Headache.) Infinity doesn’t induce headaches in mathematicians, though. Math, for all its rigor and precision, very comfortably accommodates infinity. There are infinities everywhere in math. An infinite collection of numbers exist between 0 and 1, for example. Also, you can do a calculation and get a result that goes to infinity but you can still know the quantity well enough to engineer a bridge based on that calculation.
When I look at the symbol for infinity I think, what goes around comes around. I think of the mobius strip. I dwell on karma. So many westerners including me wield the concept of karma as revenge. You’ll get what you deserve. Lately I’ve been attempting to exercise my very under-used sense of compassion. From this effort I realize that karma, viewed from the perspective of compassion, takes on a very different meaning. We are all in this together. You must face your karma just as I must face mine.
This symbol also suggests the Lazy 8 Dude Ranch. When I was a kid my parents took me on a Dude Ranch vacation. So mortifying. I couldn’t control my damn horse. It kept taking me back to the barn. (I never got the horse appreciation thing.) Recalling this, I speculate that perhaps memory loss increases with age because our brains become cluttered with pointless recollections like my dude ranch horse. And of course, with TV theme songs from the ’60s.
This post topic comes from The Daily Prompt.
Do Grown-Ups Get Bored?
Childhood was long ago but I clearly remember the pain and horror of boredom. Nothing to do, no one to play with, can’t go outside, and so forth.
I can’t remember the last time I was bored (except at certain work meetings or airports). Have I learned to embrace the moment and appreciate every day? Or have I dropped my expectations?
I no longer remember boredom but surely I must get bored. Tedious conversations and situations abound. I mean I drive in southern California, people. I must get bored but the boredom is no longer memorable.
Or maybe there’s a guilt component. I can’t be bored, I have too much to do.
Or maybe I remember childhood boredom because it was such a novelty. Maybe nowadays it is my status quo.
Maybe the boredom at work meetings is a key to understanding. Maybe what underlies boredom are issues of choice and control. Surely I still stream boring movies, start boring books. But – ha and aha – nowadays I don’t have to finish them. And if the opening act is no good I can always go play with my phone in the lobby.
I don’t seem to be coming to closure on this. How about for you? Are you more bored or less bored than you were 10 years ago? Than you were as a kid?
The Right Nickname: I Keep On Searchin’
My name, Suzanne, has never inspired me. As a kid, I hunted for great artists and thinkers with the same name so that I could pretend they were my namesake. I found the minor league actress Suzanne Pleshette. Throughout my life I’ve been called Susan by mistake.
Once I got sprung from high school I ditched Suzanne except on forms, and I’ve been Sue ever since. That isn’t more fulfilling, but it doesn’t remind me of childhood. My grandmother used to call me Susie and I bet it would be fun to be a Susie but I don’t think it’s me. Maybe on a long holiday I should try it out, somewhere among strangers who could say it with a straight face.
For a while in high school, somebody called me Sudsy. Glad that one didn’t stick.
I was sort of mistaken for a Susie for a while. Back before cell phones, when we had names in curious artifacts called phone books, for a while I got a lot of calls from guys looking for a Susie. Apparently she met guys pretty much everywhere – bars, restaurants, laundromat, in line at the bank – chatted them up and then when they asked for her number she told them she was in the book. Except she wasn’t in the book; I was. Thanks Susie. One time I got a terribly early morning call from a distraught woman.
“Is this Susie? Susie Sunshine?”
“No this is definitely not Susie Sunshine.”
“Susie, this is serious. Listen carefully. Your brother has got a gun and he – ” In retrospect I suppose I regret stopping her before she got to the punch line.
But I digress.
I would love to have a great nickname, and I keep searching. Well. Without lifting a verbal, mental, or physical finger, I keep searching. I remain open to the possibility.
The closest I’ve come so far was also back in the day, when credit card companies sent unrequested cards in the mail. One of them mistyped my name. Suzane. We assumed the correct pronunciation was [Sue-ZANE] and a friend called me that for years. But the usage never spread.
I do enjoy all the names my kids have for me. Madre, Mumsters, Short Stuff are a scant few examples. I heard somewhere that numerous nicknames are a sign of love, so the more the better.
This post topic comes from The Daily Prompt.
Steps to An Hilarious Video
Sorry to say you’ll have to make your own video, or picture it in your head. Whenever I grab the camera the moment is over.
- Acquire a dog who likes cats.
- Introduce kittens to the dog.
- Repeat 2) until kittens cease to hiss at dog.
- Make dog happy (praise, pats, treats – it’s all good).
- Dog wags tail.
- Kittens play with the wagging tail.
- One hangs off a table, batting alternate paws at the tail: left right left right.
- One moves its head in sympathetic rhythm: back forth back forth back forth.
- One grabs at the tail, which alerts dog to the tail play, which concludes the session. (Dog fears kitten claws.)
Impromptu Rorschach Test (4)
What do you see?
Profile of an old man in a sock?
Life is Good, part 3
CORRECTION: Life is not good when they make you wear antlers.
I am not a reindeer.
I am still not a reindeer.
Yeast Bread: Invention or Discovery?
Nowadays I’m not much into cooking but I do like thinking about how recipes and techniques got started. I assume many of them were happened upon, along the lines of gee, nobody in the Singh family ever seems to die after they eat and they sure love spicy food …hmm, maybe those spices can help with spoiled meat.
The capper, for me, is yeast bread. Think about it. You’re a baker like me so you get distracted and when you wander back – yikes, the dough is a monster, over the sides of the bowl, WTF
…So you hit it – why? Fear maybe? Frustration? Popping an air bubble? Oh that looks okay again… but why are the kids screaming? Is there a sabertooth loose in the neighborhood?…
… and you wander away again and when you come back: not again! You hit it a few more times and you decide, better get this thing on the fire before it really gets out of control…
What do you think? Is that how yeast bread happened? Or did someone say, these tiny organisms promote certain chemical reactions, I wonder how they will interact with wheat…
Fear of Blogging, part VII
What Is It About Dogs and Skunks?
Our dog got sprayed again the other day, chasing a skunk in our backyard again. I can’t decide whether she…
a) still does not understand the connection between chasing the skunk and getting sprayed?
b) thinks the risk is worth the reward?
c) likes the smell?
d) likes to get that special bath?
I’m pretty certain the answer is not d), given how little she likes baths.
The last time she got sprayed, I was covered in it by the time we figured out why she was foaming at the mouth. In line at the grocery store, people around me were sniffing the air and saying, ‘smells like burning tires.’ Heh.
A couple days later, I was still emitting eau d’skunk in the 110 degree room of a Bikram yoga class. Turns out the instructor was one of those one in a billion who loves the smell. (Dog in previous life?) This, however, did not make me less of a pariah during the class. But for once I got the floor space I deserve.
Required Writing 