Random Observations of an Amused Mind

Used Neutral shoe polish this morning, so I am going to spend the day being non-committal.

I understand technology, but am no friend of it. Because we live in the 21st century and I have just given away half the household, I have to re-stock certain items of modern technology. This does not make me happy because it invariably involves unpacking styrofoam and plastic and reading insipid instruction manuals and figuring out how this and that works.

Trouble is I want coffee made when I get up, I need to know who called and while the cable guy won't show up for another week and a half and will charge me fifty bucks to, oh, look, the co-ax is already run through the basement and drilled through the floor and plugged into the back of the set. Well, just sign this and pay me fifty bucks anyway.

So I am up to my ears in "instructions for use" booklets.

They all seem to read alike, having been written, I believe, by a family of Amish on the plains of Ohio. Nowadays, they also all start with the requisite seven pages of legal disclaimers and cautionary language on how not to use the product.

These pages, while mandatory, should be colored yellow and imprinted with the words "Instructions for Idiots".

To wit:

Coffeemaker: Do not attempt to distill crude oil in this product.

Answering Machine: Not for use in a uranium rich environment.

Television: Keep small children from sleeping in the back of the set.

Bicycle: Product not designed to fly.

And this one, which is no word of a lie: on the back of a tv set remote is imprinted:

"Not Dishwasher Safe"

Neither are humans last I checked but I am sure there is a suit pending somewhere. Maybe someone needed a wash after they spilled scalding coffee on their lap.

The other night I assigned myself setup duties for the TV set, the DVD player and the answering machine. Got the first one done even though I am, as I say, in a cable challenged environment. Still, I want the DVD player to be able to play old movies while we feast on microwave popcorn.
The answering machine needed at least sixteen hours of charging before I dared plug it into the telephone lines. Reprieve from the governor! Batteries I can load, plop the thing into its cradle and turn to technology I am happier with. Yes, the easy chair and a book. Not even a good one but paper and glue I understand and I will finish "A Long Way Down" even though it would have been better if they had jumped at the onset of the book.

Speaking of books, I long to return to my little piece of crap which is five chapters of what can only be described as a really bad home remodeling job interspersed with nooks of inspiration. The book has passages that are really beautiful tied together with paragraphs of typographic turd. Never mind though, its fun to write and I am honest enough to say that I can and will tear it apart and rewrite entire chapters and link these beautiful phrases with something nicer than turd. The book is a metaphor for the house but the problem is they both exist and both must be attended to. So on right brain nights, I am in front of a keyboard wondering if a main character tastes lipstick or cigarettes first the first time he kisses his love interest. On left brain nights I am drawing up lists of how many ten amp plugs need to be retrofitted into the living room and should I sand the floor before I paint the ceiling?

At least the book has answered the question of which bedroom will be the writing study and which the reading study. One of them was the kid's room and is decorated with Piglet and Pooh curtains and Mickey Mouse wallpaper. Since I am a Mickey Mouse writer, I will lodge myself in the Disney palace.

That only leaves a few thousand more things to figure out and work through.

Remember, today's multi-tasking is yesterday's schitzophrenia.

Life is good, though.

Bunny on, friends, bunny on.