I look back fondly on yesterday, when the wind blew in up to 40 mph gusts, peppering our eyeballs with dirt and sand if we were unwise enough to venture outdoors. What?, you say. Fondly? How odd!
Let me finish. I can say that only because today the wind is still blowing but now it is colder and a sleety rain is falling as well. It is all very un-Paradisic.
So I sit looking out the window with my suite of discomforts to accompany me. A couple of weeks ago I caused injury to my lower back somehow, perhaps by picking up a dropped napkin or thinking an errant thought. You know how those things happen. You do nothing that you don’t do every single day but now you are suddenly a patient and can take care of yourself only if you don’t have to bend over, cough, or laugh.
It has been slowly getting better because I was babying it nicely when of a sudden the muscles that hold my left shoulder blade to my chest wall joined the attack and began to spasm. I swear I did nothing to deserve either of these penalties.
(Unless you believe in karma, in which case I confess that I have more than earned everything that is happening to me)
So today I watch the rain and whine to Robin who is finding many things to do that keep her away from home just to get that annoying nnyyaaaahhhh sound out of her ears. I am popping my ibuprofen like a good boy, and Robin buzzes my complaining areas with a handheld electronic pounding device that could be used to drive fenceposts into soft ground.
One sunny day these discomforts will be gone, and my outlook on life will return to its baseline, which is a moderate level of crankiness.
Nothing stays the same. Everything changes. I have it on the best authority.
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From The New Yorker
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The mudslinging has begun in earnest in our presidential campaign. Each candidate is now accusing the other of age-related mental incompetence.
One good thing is that their mud-throwing arms aren’t what they used to be. If they ever get to the debate stage, I can only imagine how that will go.
Moderator: Gentlemen, if you are ready then let’s begin.
Trump: I’m ready but you better wake up Joe, I think he’s nodded off
Biden: I’m more awake than you’ll ever be, you spray-painted ninny
Trump: Easy Joe, you might have a big stroke and need to be carried off
Biden: Remember your wife’s name yet, Donnie boy?
Moderator: Gentlemen! Let’s get back to debating, shall we?
Trump: Look, he’s drooling!
Biden: His Depends needs changing!
Trump: I don’t need any help down there
Biden: That’s not what Stormy Daniels said
Moderator: This your last warning. Obey the rules or we’ll shut this thing right down
Trump: I didn’t want to come anyway
Biden: Hard getting away from the “Home,” is it?
Trump: Pedophile!
Biden: Jackass!
Trump: Senile old fool!
Biden: Peckerwood!
Ad infinitum, ad nauseam
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Each year I reach a point where I am so fed up with winter that I begin to resent all that I have to do to stay alive outdoors. And that happens even in this mild climate that the Uncompaghre Valley provides. I want to put away the puffy jackets and the flannel shirts and parkas and wear shorts and camp out and … whatever.
I’m at that place this morning.
It’s a juvenile thing, I know, but I don’t give a flying hoot if it is. I find that being juvenile at this age is much easier for two reasons.
One is that my acne hasn’t come back because of the behavior. The other is that younger citizens have such low expectations where seniors are concerned that acting childish is tolerated as long as you are continent.
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From The New Yorker
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The above New Yorker cartoon uses a coarse four-letter word, which is highly unusual for this genteel magazine. Of course it’s precisely the shock value of the word that makes it funny.
The New Yorker can be risqué, but (until now) it was nevah, evah coarse.
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Little Home In The Valley 