3174 Now I'm getting scared.

Saturday, February 26, 2011

“The most ineffective workers are systematically moved
to the place where they can do the least damage: management.”
-- Scott Adams --

---------------------------------------------

FW is heating up, and I don't understand why. I wouldn't be surprised to find her coming at me with a jar of acid. I'm not kidding. I almost never lock my front door during daylight, but I'm locking it now. She's flat-out crazy.

I have found that I can usually let go of things by writing them out, so here goes. The history. This is pretty long, as is every study in madness.

--------------------------------

She's a member of Mid-Hudson Mensa. At a group dinner in late 2006, I mentioned that I couldn't remember ever going out for New Year's Eve. She mentioned a dinner and a good retro band, but she couldn't afford it, so we decided to go together, and I paid for the evening for both of us.

We enjoyed it. We started going to parties, dances, dinners, movies, and so on together. She and I are very different (she's a nudist, heavy marijuana user, politically involved, artistic, and she has described herself as bi in the past "but is no longer"), so I found her views fascinating. She's on disability, so I usually footed the bill. I didn't mind, because I have it and at least I was getting out.

This was also the period when Roman was jerking me around, and I needed someone to talk with. She was madly in love with a guy who was living with another woman, with whom he had two or three small children. They used to get together at a place back in the woods near Mohonk where nudists hung out all summer. (She tried many times to talk me into going there with her, but I'm absolutely not a nudist, not even close, and from the stories, it wasn't a place for people just to be free of clothing restrictions - it was more a place for gays to cruise and straights to roll around together in the poison ivy - very sexually charged.) Or he'd show up at her house and they'd roll around there, then he'd leave. He kept promising her he was going to leave the other woman, but it showed no signs of happening.

Anyway, within a few months, she was chewing me out for not being attentive enough. She informed me that she expected chatty phone calls, a minimum of once a week. I'd told her many times that I hate the telephone, when I make a call to anyone, it's brief, to conduct some kind of business or ask a question, I just don't EVER call anyone just to chat. I hate the telephone! Even my cell phone was turned on only in emergencies. She continued to castigate me for not calling. She said some nasty things to me over my not calling. (Note - she rarely called me because it was a toll call.) She said hurtful things that left me feeling bad.

Things bumped on that way through most of 2007. I, by early summer, had started turning down invitations, because it seemed that no matter what I did, how I was, it wasn't what she thought I should do/say/be, it just wasn't enough for her. She was very demanding, and vicious when things didn't go as she wanted.

In September of 2007, she decided she wanted to go to the Mensa Hallowe'en gathering in Chicago, but she didn't want to go alone. I wasn't particularly interested, but she talked me into it. What the heck, this is supposed to be one of the largest and best of the regional gatherings, so ok, at least I'd have someone to go with. (I absolutely wouldn't have gone alone, so this was an opportunity.) I said yes, and paid for my gathering registration and four nights at the hotel, and made the flight reservation.

A week later, she informed me that she couldn't afford both the gathering registration and the plane ticket. I shrugged and paid her gathering registration. A few days after that, she asked if she could share my room, since she couldn't afford a room of her own. By now, I'm already into this for two registrations, four days' room for me, and my plane ticket, almost $1,000. Either I find her a place to sleep, or cancel everything and take the loss, or I end up going alone. I don't share a room, ever, except with a man I'm sleeping with, it just doesn't work for me, so I shrugged and reserved another room for four nights for her.

Yeah, you feel what's coming next? A few days later she says she can't afford the plane ticket. I somewhere acquired some balls and wished her luck finding a courier ticket or something. No, I couldn't afford to fly her out. Sorry.

I guess she found some money somewhere, because she made it to the gathering. I arrived Thursday afternoon, she arrived in the evening, and we had dinner at the hotel. She was having new troubles with that guy, and talked steadily about him during dinner. I knew she wouldn't want to hear what I had to say about him, so I listened, I really was attentive, "uh huh"ed at the appropriate moments, didn't say anything against him, and refrained from changing the topic.

She didn't sleep in her room Thursday night. She spent the whole night in the hospitality suite, drinking and talking, and then slept most of Friday.

Friday night was the Hallowe'en party. She decided she was going to go '60s and had asked me if I knew how to do a beehive. I said yes, so she decided I was going to do her hair early that evening. At a time of her choosing, of course. It took 1.5 hours. There were two presentations I wanted to see that I blew off to do her hair. She slept in her room that night, BUT, and I'm sorry, but I found this unbelievable, she informed me that night that she was leaving the gathering in the morning to meet a blind date in Chicago, and would be going clubbing with him Saturday and Sunday nights, and would be staying with him until her return home Monday. I asked if she had canceled the hotel room for those nights, and she acted surprised.

So Saturday morning I frogmarched her down to the desk and made sure she canceled the room, and wished her luck with the rest of the weekend. So, except for dinner Thursday, doing her hair Friday, and checking her out on Saturday morning, I was there alone for the gathering. Exactly what I didn't want to do. I felt royally used. She just wanted a trip to Chicago.

Well the next week, she called me and chewed me out up one side and down the other for not being sympathetic enough at dinner Thursday! I, like a guilty puppy, just took her abuse. I said nothing. In fact, I think I may even have apologized. It was only later that I realized that I had done nothing wrong. No thank you for the registration and room, no thank you for blowing off my plans and doing her hair instead, nothing. I felt royally used.

I did nothing, said nothing. But the next time she called, wanting to go to dinner or something, I told her that I didn't think I could be around her any more, that she made me feel bad too often, that I had worked very hard to learn to like myself and I couldn't allow her to keep tearing me down, so no, I don't think our getting together is a good idea.

That was 2007.

Now, she was the president of the local Mensa group, and I had volunteered to rewrite the Bylaws. The sessions were to be held at her home, as central to the three of us on the committee. That worked out ok. We were civil. And then something terrifying happened in April of 2008. It's amusingly described here: http://thesilkentouch.blogspot.com/2008/04/1752-psycho-ex-girlfriend.html.

I had to "break up with her" all over again.

In June, another group member, John, was having a cookout and invited all the active members. When he called her to invite her, he asked for other members' phone numbers. She wouldn't give him my number. She told him not to bother calling me, she'd call me and tell me about it. She never did. When I heard about the cookout, I was a little hurt that everyone but me (I?) had been invited. Of course, no one knew that FW had told John she'd take care of it, John didn't know she hadn't, and of course no one was going to ask John why I hadn't been invited.

That was all in 2008.

In 2009, other people in the group starting having run-ins with her. There was a public incident in a restaurant which resulted in the group treasurer resigning on the spot. Other members of the governing board were accused of undermining her control when they simply did what they thought were their duties. She was getting increasingly paranoid and irrational. A possible contributing factor was that the guy she'd been involved with married the other woman and moved to the Carolinas.

In August of 2009, she had to go to the hospital for surgery, and, amazingly, called me to ask me to take her to the hospital and to help her. I did. Somehow, that's an "of course". I was still thinking we could be civil. That story is here: http://thesilkentouch.blogspot.com/2009/08/2464-day-in-hospital.html.

That was 2009.

In March of 2010, we had the public "F**k you" screaming incident, described at http://thesilkentouch.blogspot.com/2010/03/2803-buck-you-fuddy.html, in case you skipped it in the previous post.

2010 was a group election year. I was on the nominating committee, and I worked hard to get a full slate. Several of the people nominated were people she'd had problems with. She announced that she wasn't going to run for reelection, and I didn't push her to change her mind. She started skipping governing board meetings, and then suddenly resigned her position. She dropped out of the Yahoo group. She withdrew from chapter activities, which was a relief for a lot of people, because they had gone beyond finding her merely difficult to work with, and were beginning to actively fear her.

Several people told me that she had decided to no longer take her medications. She thought she could function without them. That scared ME! Not for me, for her.

Our last direct contact had been the "F**k you" thing. The next time I saw her was at the holiday dinner in December, when we ignored each other, and I got the distinct impression that she expected me to approach her first. Then there was the dinner last week, when I again did not approach her.

And now there's the Yahoo group exchanges detailed in the previous post. All I was trying to do was help her, and she attacked me and anyone who attempted to defend me.

It has gotten worse since.

Yesterday I found something amusing and posted it to the group. This is the complete text of my post:

Subject: Accepting your Oscar: A Guide

From Shoebox.com (http://www.shoeboxblog.com/?p=23859):

Thank the little people, but don't call them "little people" because they HATE that.
Thank the spiritual being of your choice. Point up/over/ wherever (probably not down).
Thank the producer, even if he's just some rich jerk who knows nothing about movie making.
Definitely act surprised. Practice this one in the mirror beforehand.
Thank significant other, then blow a kiss to him/her. Have significant other
practice "in love" face.
Use the exit music to dance your way off stage. "The Worm" would be preferable.

I thought it amusing. If you watch people accepting Oscars, that's exactly how they do it. Except for the last sentence, maybe.

Well, today I got this personal email from another member:

FYI and confidential - [the group moderator] has placed [FW] in a "Moderator must approve posts" category on our Yahoo group. One of her two most recent posts is pending moderator approval. It claims your "Accepting Your Oscar" post is actually a slew of double entendres, and the tone of her note implies paranoia.

Regardless of whether there is anything going on (which I seriously doubt), I don't think anyone else would see that and would simply assume it is "[FW] being [FW]."

[FW] will be at [the regional gathering next weekend].

(I admit I am wrong to post that note when the author has marked it confidential, but if I turn up dead or seriously injured this weekend, show this post to the cops.)

By the way, the other of her "two most recent posts" was "Subject: The excitement is Growing", and contained only this link: http://mediumlarge.wordpress.com/2011/02/24/cats-quote-charlie-sheen/. Now, how does "the excitement is growing" apply as the subject? Do you find it ominous that it's hate-filled ranting?

So. I'm seriously scared. It will be impossible to avoid her at the gathering, and if nobody shows up at her Oscar party tomorrow night she WILL blame me. That's just the way she thinks. And she WILL retaliate. I'm serious. But I can't allow her to keep me from going to the gathering. I won't hide from her. I think I'm going to have to ask some of the other friends there to act as bodyguard. Never leave me alone.
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2707 Avatar; Housewarming

Saturday, December 19, 2009

When Jesus said to love your enemies,
he probably meant don’t kill them.

--------------------------

Avatar (last night) was terrific! I do recommend that everyone see it, BUT you must see it in 3-D.

The first few minutes are story setup, then we get to see the planet. The middle of the movie is exploring the planet, the forests, the floating mountains, the animals, the people. It's all incredibly beautiful. Phosphorescent. The seeds from the sacred tree look like a cross between dandelion seeds and jellyfish, and act like butterflies. The "horses" look like a dream of what a horse should look like, without looking like a horse at all.

The last third of the movie is ruined by the army, but I guess that's to appease the males in the audience. Very destructive. Makes one angry.

This is not a spoiler, just something I noticed: The science lady made a big deal about how the trees' roots are "neurally" connected, and communicate, and how everything is interconnected. So when the bulldozers and flamethrowers start, I fully expected that the trees would fight back. I expected to see the trees reach up and bat the helicopters out of the sky, and was disappointed when something different happened. I mentioned that to the group at dinner after the movie, and everybody blinked twice and said yeah, now that I've mentioned it, yeah....

Battling trees would have been so much neater - it would say to the invaders, "the entire planet is against you, it will do you no good to come back, you cannot win." As it is, they've left it open for a re-invasion sequel, so I wouldn't be surprised if trees weren't the perfect first plan, but it got changed when someone said, "hey, we may have a franchise here".

Of all the movies I've seen in the past year, this is the only one I want to see again, because of the beauty of the luminous forest. See it if you have the chance, but it MUST be in 3-D. Otherwise, flat, it's just an ok story.

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This afternoon was a housewarming for Roman. Some people (particularly the ones coming from Massachusetts, western NY, and Albany) canceled because of the predicted snow, but we had 16 people, so it was pretty good. Roman's new townhouse is beautiful. His master bath is amazing, with both a 2-person jacuzzi and a huge shower.

I am exhausted. I made BLT soup this morning. I figured it would take me an hour to dice, shred, and grate the bacon, lettuce, tomatoes, green onions, pepper, and nutmeg for a double batch and get it all mixed together. Instead, it took almost three hours. Then when I got to Roman's, FW was making wassail, and she apparently didn't know how to whip egg whites (6 eggs) to stiff peaks, so I did that, with a fork. Yeouch. And I washed dishes as they were used in preparations. And then I washed dishes at cleanup, so people could take their things home. My hands are so dry they itch.

But, it's been a satisfying two days. And I'll be joining two of the Albany guys for bar trivia some Tuesday soon.

Something I noticed - it's better to have too few chairs than too many. Roman had a huge sectional sofa, some side chairs, and the chairs from his kitchen set in the living room, and so everyone SAT, in a big circle! (This is a Mensa bunch - I suppose if they all couldn't sit, they'd complain.) But that meant very little circulation, little opportunity for one-on-one. One of the Albany guys and I sort of flirted a little across the room, but so little it wasn't worth the attention that actually getting up and talking to each other would have drawn.

Especially if a certain gossip had intimated that Roman and I used to date. Awkward?
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2450 Blog Birthday!

Monday, June 22, 2009

“None are more hopelessly enslaved than
those who falsely believe themselves to be free.”

----------------------

Today is this blog's fifth birthday! It all started on Friday, June 22, 2004, on AOL Journals, as a way to pull myself out of the long depression I was in after Jay's death. My first ever blog entry is here.

There are two pieces - the earliest incarnation is "Moraine", which I abandoned when AOL began adding advertising to people's private journals, and then transferred the content from AOL to Blogger when AOL journals died. Moraine contains entries from June 22, 2004 to November 16, 2005. The second piece is this one.

At first I wrote a lot about frustrations left over from my work life, then I wrote about the relationship with Jay, and the brain cancer battles. In mid-2005 I started dating, accidentally, and the next year was filled with confusion and anger over Roman's perfidy. If I had any sense, I'd delete all those posts, but if I'm going to mention intelligence, I ought to balance it with stupidity. Those were some of the most exciting posts, anyway.

Well, it wasn't entirely stupidity. I predicted that when Roman's mother died, he'd break up with the other woman within months, and then he'd want me. He did break up with her three months after his mother's death in January 2007, and he did tell me that he was wrong and realized what he had lost and that he wanted me back. Unfortunately for him, I had just met The Man.

Roman and I are still friends, sort of, but the relationship pundits are right. Maybe it could work if neither of the parties wanted to start up a romance again, but when one does and the other doesn't, it is strained. And no, even if The Man disappeared, I don't think I'd turn to Roman. I see a lot of things now that I didn't see before.

The blog has evolved. I go back and reread old entries, and I marvel at some of them. I had things to say! Philosophy and religion, psychology and sociology. Passionate diatribes and arguments. I don't do that much any more, don't write much about my thoughts any more. Either I've already expressed everything I've ever thought about, or I've become more reticent (yeah, sure). I don't know what's going on.

I think this is the point at which most blogs die, when the bloggers start to think there's nothing more to say, when they wrack their brains trying to think of interesting things to entertain their readers. I'm not about readers. I'm not trying to entertain anyone. This is entirely for me. I have no desire to quit. I'm getting older, and frankly, this is my memory aide.

I do have a private diary on my hard disk, where I do explore what's going on in my life and my mind. Speculate. My original intent was to keep that one current, but I actually update it only once or twice a month. I rarely go back through entries. I don't know why. I often dig through the archives here.

(One argument I have with Blogger is that the archives are difficult to navigate. If you click on a year in the archives list, you'll get not the earliest posts of that year, but the last month. You have to use the "older posts" link at the bottom of the page to get to the prior month, 11 times to get to January of that year. I think Blogger should change that. When you select a year from the archives, it should then generate a list of months from that year. Too bad they didn't ask me for advice.)

So, happy birthday, Blog. May you have many more.
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2400 Annoyed

Monday, May 18, 2009

Frost warnings for tonight. High twenties low thirties predicted. It might get all the way up to a high of 50 F tomorrow.

I don't understand.

-----------------------

I got annoyed at the morning news. They did a piece on a woman with a "pea-sized" brain tumor who had a new, immediate, non-invasive treatment "by robot! whoop whoop" which required very little recovery time.

Of course that drew my attention.

They then showed a focused narrow beam radiation doohicky swinging around her head, shooting beams from multiple directions, all of which converged on the tumor.

Thud.

That's fractionated radiosurgery. It's not new! It's been around for more than a decade. Jay had it in 2000. The improvement is not the "robot" or the converged radiation. It's the preparation that's improved enormously.

Back when Jay had it, the radiologist had to map the beam directions by hand, so that they could enter and exit from as many directions as possible, all crossing at the tumor, without hitting certain areas of the brain, the eyes, the optic nerves, throat, and so on. He then fed the coordinates to the machine.

The big news is not the "robot". It's that now that CAT and MRI scans are digital, a computer can do the mapping, and feed the coordinates directly to the machine. That's faster, but not a great leap in "robotics".

But I guess that's not as sexy a story.

It also annoyed me that they presented it as a cure. Like, just snap your fingers, ten minutes with the machine instead of 10 hours in surgery, and voilà, all fixed. Yes, they actually said something like that.

Sorry folks, but if her tumor was malignant (which, without biopsy, they don't really know), this probably bought her six to nine months, and it can't be repeated. So she is likely to end up in surgery anyway. If it's operable. Otherwise, she's SOL.

------------------------

The Man and I were supposed to get together again this week, but a work emergency has come up, and it may be another two weeks. Hearing this, I of course got annoyed and depressed.

Thinking about it, I realized that over the past two years, almost all my interests have died one by one, and my life has devolved to The Man, Daughter, and the internet. I don't do much of anything else any more.

• The only bar in the village has closed, so there's been no afternoons of throwing the bull with the guys for a long time now.
• Since the market dip, Piper has been too busy for our walks, and manages lunch only about once a month now instead of the old once a week.
• Friends have gradually moved away, or have become much less active (I'm surprised at how many people my age have aged so quickly).
  
• I've gradually wandered away from the dance community. I find I've lost interest in shows and haflas. I went to Rakkasah Spring Caravan only because the Gypsy needed someone to work her sales booth while she rehearsed and danced. Otherwise, I wouldn't have gone.
  
• I haven't been to a Mensa activity since February, when I realized that of the ten people I'm most likely to see at functions, I enjoy only three of them. The other seven are major stressors, and I don't need that. So I see Roman, Angie, and Nate occasionally outside Mensa, and since Roman has realized that, after two years, The Man is not a flash in the pan, his phone calls and invitations to lunch have tapered off. I guess we weren't friends after all. He was just waiting for another chance at reconciliation. ('Taint gonna happen!)
• Last month I resigned as Mensa Ombudsman when I realized that there were some conflicts brewing, friends would call or email and tell me about shouting matches in restaurants, and it looked like FW would be at the middle of all of them. I don't care to mediate a conflict involving FW (whom The Man teasingly calls my psycho ex-girlfriend).
• And so on.
  

I didn't replace those activities with anything else. Some days lately I don't even bother to get dressed. When I don't see The Man, I go into hibernation. I've gained 12 pounds in the past eighteen months (that's like 20 on a regular-sized woman).

That has to stop.

Over the weekend I went looking for activities.

I have signed up for two dinner groups, two movie/discussion groups, got on the mailing list for a science cafe, and joined a group in Woodstock that takes dogs for easy hikes. Their flyer said they welcomed people without dogs, and I miss my dogs. I'm hoping I can enjoy theirs. A friend has been trying to talk me into a line dancing thingy she goes to, but I'm not sure I'd like that. It's "called", sort of like square dancing, and I can never remember what name goes with what pattern. I also joined an over-50s singles group, but only because they have interesting activities - like a dinner cruise down the Hudson next month. I'm not looking for pairing up, and I may not last long with that, anyway. I remember those groups as being more than a bit vicious (but maybe I won't get into trouble if it's obvious that I'm not competing. "I don't want your man, lady. I have a perfectly good one of my own.")

So, we'll see. I have a feeling I may have some problem getting off my butt - sometimes it seems like too much trouble to get up, dressed, and out - but at least I've found some directions I can go.
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1716 In Love with the Vision

Thursday, March 6, 2008

Free advice: Never take out a loan to buy something depreciable.

--------------------------

As you get older, you get wiser in some areas, and stupider in others. Or maybe not more stupid, just better at fooling yourself.

I have long believed that when men fall in love, it's not so much the woman herself that they fall in love with as the way they feel when they're with her, most likely strong and capable. Of course that's a trap, because at some point some condition is going to arise where he feels inadequate. Maybe that's why marriages often don't survive breast cancer.

I think women often fall in love not so much with the man, but with the vision of what they imagine life would be like with him. And that's a trap, because eventually real life intrudes on the vision.

I guess it's hard to tell, when you fall in love, whether it's the other person you love, or the trap. You probably don't know until it's over, because you convince yourself that it's the person.

Jay had abandonment issues. Some things had happened in his childhood that made him afraid that no one would care for him. He had bad dreams of his mother walking off and turning a corner and disappearing, or driving off in the car and leaving him stranded in the middle of nowhere. He was unhappy in his previous marriage because his wife pretty much lived her own life, she didn't much "do" for him. She had pretty much emotionally abandoned him. So I know that much of his love for me came from his knowing that I would care for him and not abandon him. I mothered him, and that's exactly what he needed.

Did I love him, or the vision? Well, any rosy vision was pretty much destroyed by the brain cancer diagnosis, but I still loved him just as much, so yeah, I think it was just him.

And Roman, the Roman of all the 2005 and 2006 fuss and furor? It was the vision. I was tired of being alone, and here was someone who liked a lot of the same things I did, wanted to travel, challenged my mind, and would be a good companion for the remainder of my years. Of course I liked him a lot, too, but it really was mainly the vision I was tied up in. It wasn't until I gave up on having that vision that I realized that although I do like him a lot, still, as a person, we really aren't suited as a couple.

Now I'm in love with another. (I tease him that women see him as a "fast car", after the Tracy Chapman song (see below), thinking that he'll take them out of a life they don't like and make it all better, and when he doesn't, they get mad.) I'm pretty sure it's him, not the vision that has me hooked, because, frankly, I have no vision of a future with him. I just can't see it. He's a workaholic, and nowhere near retirement, has no desire for world travel (unless the Vikings happen to play in France), vastly prefers city living, and on and on. I just don't see it. What we want from life is so different. So I'm pretty sure it's HIM that keeps me coming back for more, not the vision of a future together.

I don't know why he loves me. Of course he says it's the brains, the thoughtfulness, my itty-bittiness, and my independence, and so on, but I know I also make him feel very strong and masculine, and I'm smart enough to fully appreciate his brainpower. I don't know if it's me he loves, or the way I make him feel.

Why does it matter? Because if it's me, I can say or do or be any way consistent with me, and he'll still love me. If it's only the way I make him feel that he loves, that's REAL easy to lose. A wrong word could kill it.
-----------------------------------------

And now, for your listening pleasure, Tracy Chapman's "Fast Car".

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Orv_F2HV4gk&feature=related]

And just 'cause I love her, here's another favorite:

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjRo_CHSdt0&feature=related]
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1701 New Scheme

Monday, February 18, 2008

I'm going to try something. Instead of multiple posts per day (can you tell I have no one to talk to?) I'm going to start one post per day, file it as a draft, update it when I feel like it, and post it at the end of the day. That'll make for some long entries, I guess, but only one a day.

-----------------------

Today I went to an art exhibition, at the invitation of one of the artists. It ran for four days, Friday through today, in a historic building housing a legislator's offices. The advertised hours, both on the postcard I received and the personal email I got from the friend, were 10 am 'til 5 pm. Today was the first day I was able to go. It was a 45 minute drive, through the mountains, and I got there at 3:42 pm.

The place was cleared out. Exhibitors had packed up their cars and were leaving. A few people were moving furniture back into place when I arrived. There wasn't one piece of art anywhere. My friend said that they'd had no visitors since 2 pm, so at 3:00 they started shutting down.

He then "apologized", "I'm so sorry you were too late."

I about exploded. I looked him in the eye to make sure he understood what I was saying, "Bull. I wasn't too late. I was here in plenty of time. You guys didn't uphold your commitment to me and others like me. Your advertised hours were until 5!"

I've seen at lot of that lately - people just don't consider others. Back when I ran the monthly dinner, when we canceled because of snow, when we asked for RSVPs, I made sure everyone who had responded was aware we'd canceled. Sometimes there were no RSVPs required, just show up, and on several of those occasions I drove through a flippin' blizzard to make sure there was at least a note on the door.

Nowadays, it's not unusual to arrive at the appointed place and find no one there. I went to a dinner in Tivoli a few months ago and found the restaurant had closed suddenly a few days before. I was 5 minutes late. No one was there, and there was no note on the door as to a change of venue. I was hungry, so went to another place down the street, and found five other Mensans sitting there. They had all arrived before seven, found it closed, and moved - without leaving a note or waiting to see if anyone else showed up. One more person joined us, a result of the note *I* had left on the door. Hey folks, it really wasn't that difficult....

Bugs the hell out of me.

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Driving to the aborted exhibit, I passed an impressively huge mansion off to the side of the road, turrets and porches and bays. It was abandoned, grey unpainted wood rotting and falling, windows all broken. In person, it looks a LOT bigger than this photo implies.


(There are more of Lucas's photos of the exterior here: http://lucas-photography.blogspot.com/2007/12/bennett-college-in-millbrook-ny.html.)

When I got to the gallery I asked what it was. Until 1976, it was the Bennett College (Millbrook, NY). A very fashionable college (read finishing school) for women (no relation to the Greensboro, NC school of the same name). They ran out of money, and closed, and the building has been empty since. It's a shame. On the way home, I stopped for a closer look. I found another photo online, at http://www.opacity.us/site11_bennett_school_for_girls.htm#gallery17 (scroll UP to see the exterior photo), taken about 2 or three years ago.

Interior here: http://www.opacity.us/gallery17_close_calls.htm. Click on the first photo, then just keep going "next". Below the photos are comments, some very interesting comments from alumni.

A photo of an interior during its heyday here: http://www.hrvh.org/cdm4/item_viewer.php?CISOROOT=/mfl&CISOPTR=44, and more can be found at that Hudson River Valley Heritage website - search for "Bennett College".

I hate to see wonderful old buildings rotting away like that. The stonework is all still in perfect condition.

------------------------------

Howcum calendars that feature landscape photos always have winter photos during the winter months and summer photos during summer months and so on? When I open a new calendar to January, when it's cold and snowy and freezing outside, the last thing I want to see is a snowscape. If I were designing those calendars, I'd have snow scenes in the summer, and summer scenes in the winter.
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1697 Flirting with the band

Sunday, February 17, 2008

I went out last night with a friend (male, but platonic). Another mutual friend was singing with a band. He also plays harmonica and acoustic guitar, very well, and writes music. Back in the 80s and early 90s, when I was still going to the annual local Mensa summercamp weekend, he used to lead a sing-along around a campfire (with marshmallows!) on the Saturday night of camp.

(Since I've been more active the past few years I'd been stopping in at the camp just for Saturdays, and I've been very disappointed that they don't have the singalongs or even the campfire any more. They sit in the dining hall and play cards and board games. It's like a different group, or something. Like maybe they got older, and I didn't.)

Anyway, way back then, he had a slightly John Denver look, and every year he tried to get me into his tent. It was playful flirting, and fun. (His wife never accompanied him to camp.) One year he and his wife were separated (temporarily, as it turned out), and the flirting almost got out of hand. But only almost.

He has aged well, has acquired an almost Paul Newman look now. He's actually pretty darn sexy.

So, anyway, my date and I arrived early for dinner before the band started.

Now, something I don't understand. When a restaurant/bar has entertainment on late Friday and/or Saturday nights, why do they always put the band (or karaoke, for that matter) in a tiny room in the back, or in an alcove off to the side of the seating area? And why, when the band is in a tiny room, do they still have the volume up high enough to rattle fillings?

The place was packed, so we asked to be seated for dinner in that back room. The room had only seven two-to-four person tables, and the far end was open to the bar. I ended up three feet from the microphones.

When our singing friend arrived (oh foo, let's call him X), he stopped by the table and spoke with my "date" (oh foo, let's call him "Roman") for a few seconds. When X left to help set up, Roman asked me if I knew X other than just to recognize him. I shot my eyebrows up, and said oh yeah, I once knew him well, that I've known him for almost twenty-five years. Roman smirked.

Roman and I have pretty much settled into an understanding, so I don't know why his superior attitude still bugs me. You'd think I'd just shrug it off. I guess last night I was still a bit annoyed about the animusic thing. Two years ago I discovered animusic, and tried to tell Roman about it, I had bought the DVDs and tried to show them to him, and he wouldn't even look at it. He just knew it wasn't "his thing", and my enthusiasm carried no weight. Like I have no taste or something. Terribly low class. Last week, he called all excited about this "animusic thing" *HE* had discovered. He has no idea how much that pissed me off. When someone is enthusiastic about something, if you respect them, you at least listen to them and consider it.

So, I decided to steal X from him. I flirted. I ended up with X's playlist tucked into my décolletage, and X sitting next to me during his break, whispering into each other's ears to be heard over the band. So there. Yeah, I know him.

For your viewing pleasure, I give you Animusic:
(If the first is too mechanical for your taste, you might enjoy the second more.)

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S3vS3LGH5gs&feature=related]


[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1hqF9nqabQ&feature=related#]

And for something entirely different,

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8g5uL1Z764o]

Lots more on Youtube.com. Just search for "animusic". "Harmonic Voltage" is one of my favorites. Their website is http://www.animusic.com/, where you can buy the full DVDs.
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1617 Oil Again...

Friday, December 28, 2007

Busy day yesterday. 2.5 hour lunch with one friend, and a 3.5 hour dinner with a different friend. For dinner we chose a diner where we could sit without being rushed out after the meal, and we went through his vacation photo CD, and then some photos from a photography class he's taking. And that was pretty much yesterday.

I mentioned to Roman on the phone Wednesday that I'd run out of oil, and had got an emergency delivery, and he said the same thing had happened to him, he'd run out, too, earlier than expected.

Now, Roman has this thing that drives me crazy. He argues. And he gets very superior and condescending about it. When I said that I was completely out, and got 253.1 gallons for my 250 gallon tank, he said that's impossible, that the tanks come in 200 and 275 sizes. I insisted that my tank was 250, and he decided I was wrong. It couldn't be. Either I have a 275 gallon tank and wasn't completely out, or I have a 200 gallon tank and got ripped off by 53 gallons.

Then we were talking about the price, and I said I was getting a discount for prepayment, and he said he pays current price. I asked how much, so he went and got his bill, and oddly enough, he'd got exactly 253.1 gallons, too! (Different oil companies.)

Smackdown time!

He he! Snork!

Gee, Roman, either you weren't completely out, or....

Even better, he paid a dollar more per gallon than I.

I was rolling on the floor hugging myself.
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1578 Traffic

Wednesday, December 5, 2007

I haven't the faintest idea what has happened to today. It's 8:15 pm, I'm already tired, and I have done NOTHING all day. I think maybe it has something to do with the weather. It's almost 10 degrees below freezing outside, and although my house is reasonably tight, I feel cold. The thermostat says it's 74 in here. How can I be cold? I don't understand.

Speaking of not understanding, something is going on with other drivers lately that I don't understand.

I mentioned to a friend a few days ago that I've noticed lately that if I am on a multi-lane highway, and decide to change lanes, and there's a decent space in the lane I want to move into, and traffic in both lanes seems to be maintaining position (ideal for changing lanes), the very instant that I put my signal on to indicate the lane change, the car behind me in the target lane speeds up!, closing up the space.

Why? We could go on in the same positions for miles, but the minute I want to move into that lane, the other person speeds up. Is it a game? Is it "Oh no you don't - you can't get in front of me!" Or maybe they speed up when they see the signal because they hope I'll turn into them and buy them a new car? I don't understand.

So anyway, after I had mentioned it, my friend started noticing it too. So it's not just my perception, and not just people reacting to my little car. It really is happening a lot more.

Driving to dinner last night (1.5 hour drive), I noticed other strangenesses. I was heading down route 9w, during rush hour. People weren't paying attention to the speed limit, but not in the way one would expect. There's a section north of Highland with two south-bound lanes. The speed limit is 55, but there were two people, one in each lane, about two car-lengths apart, who were doing 45. Everyone behind them who wanted to do 55 had to pass one on the right, then squeeze back to the left to get past the second. And the guy potting along in the left lane never seemed to notice.

So when we finally got past them, and the long line of cars was doing 55, we came to a car on the right that had been pulled over by the police, nothing interesting, just an ordinary stop with plenty of room, and amazingly, everyone slowed down to 45, and then stayed at 45! Wha...? I don't understand. I didn't understand slowing down, and I don't understand staying slow.

From Highland south, the speed limit is mostly 55, with a few 40 or 45 patches through hamlets, and one 30 mph section where the village cop's radar gun is on hair-trigger. We stayed at 45 the entire way to Newburgh, even through the 30 mph section. I don't understand.

(Yeah, I did 45 through the 30, too, but it was because there was a long line of cars ahead of and behind me, and if I'd slowed down, twenty cars would have climbed into my trunk.)

Another thing I noticed was that when we stopped at a traffic light, and the line of stopped cars extended to cross another intersection, people blithely blocked the intersection, so that oncoming cars could not make a left turn into the side road. That stopped traffic on the other side, too. How stupid is that? Do they really not notice? Is everyone completely self-absorbed?

What's going on? Do we have a new generation of drivers who've never taken driver ed? My friend, back in the first example, has noticed the speed-up-at-lane-change problem in several states, so it's not a local thing.

Well, I made it to the dinner later than I meant, but still in time. I had to stop in Newburgh to pick up a friend, and I called her as I entered Newburgh and told her to go to the end of her driveway, "and hold your purse strap out so my side mirror can hook it as I pass, and then hang on tight!"

There were 12 of us at dinner, and I did manage to sit in the middle of the table, as I wanted. It was a pretty good group. Roman gave me a birthday gift of Israeli body lotion after dinner, and a CD of photos from his trip. I hadn't realized that although we'd talked on the phone several times since late October and his trip, I hadn't seen him since mid-October. How odd.

Now we have to get together sometime so he can narrate the photos.
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1485 Catching Up

Saturday, September 29, 2007

Let's see, where did I leave off? Wednesday? Today's Saturday. Late.

Thursday I met a friend (the long distance one) in Newburgh. Dinner, then we watched a movie DVD on his laptop, then a bar with music, a late snack, lots of talking. And stuff.

Friday I got home about 2-ish, returned a bunch of phone calls, potted around on the internet, some other busywork.

Today I went to the Rhinebeck craft fair with a friend. He picked me up here. The fall fair isn't as big as the spring one, but there was still lots of good stuff. He bought some venison (craft?), and some dip mixes in the foods building, and I bought a pen and watercolor rendering of the Mohonk Mountain House and some pickled eggs. I do love pickled eggs.

Then we went to dinner (it took three restaurants to find one with less than a 45 minute wait, I was about ready to suggest venison and pickled eggs for dinner), and then to his driveway where I transferred to my minivan (his car having been repaired, he didn't need my van any more), then home.

One thing about this friend - he argues with me about everything. It's goodnatured arguing, mainly that he insists on precision in everything, and I'm more relaxed, and none of it's important. Anyway, today we were looking at some sketches of the downtown Kingston area, and I said something about the Rondout area, and I pronounced it "ron dout". He said that although it is spelled Rondout, it's pronounced "round out", that he always thought, and still thinks, "ron dout" is correct, but everytime he pronounced it that way, people corrected him and said it's "round out". I said that the only people who pronounce it "round out" are people who don't know how to pronounce it, and probably don't know how to spell it. They're wrong. The people at the museum on the Rondout pronounce it "ron dout" and they should know. He said he agreed with me, and then ...

... and then ...

... he proceeded to attempt to convince me that I should pronounce it "round out"!

I flipped. I punched him and said "Damn it all anyway! Here I am telling you YOU'RE RIGHT, and you're STILL ARGUING WITH ME?"

Bedtime. I'm really tired.
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1483 Sore Throat

Tuesday, September 25, 2007

The hot spots started in the back of my throat last night. A little sinus snuffling, but no other symptoms.

Big date Thursday, and museum stuff to do tomorrow and Friday. I can't get sick!

I've been gargling Listerine (and oh, wow, it burns!) I need some of those little red cinnamon candies - red hots? Cinnamon kills germs and fungi. This is probably a virus, but at least the cinnamon will help to stave off a secondary infection.

A friend's car has popped its radiator, so while he's waiting for the part to arrive, I've lent him my minivan. The "check engine" light is on again, but the only thing that's acting up is the cruise control. I drove it to his house this afternoon, then he drove me back home, with dinner on the way.

I just wish he didn't honk the horn so much. I am of the opinion that horns are for avoiding accidents. He seems to think it's for registering annoyance. What gets me is that if he and the other driver were on foot, and exactly the same things happened, he'd never snap at the other person. It annoys me that he finds the car a wrap of anonymity or power or something. This is one of the character flaws that keeps me at a distance.
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1469 DoNotCall; Museum Cookbook

Tuesday, September 11, 2007

If you registered your number on the national 'do not call' registry as soon as it was available, as I did, then you will have to reregister soon. Numbers stay on the Do Not Call list for 5 years, then they either fall off, or you have to re-submit them. The registry was started on September 15th, 5 years ago.

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If your otherwise well-mannered rescue kitty, who doesn't really understand houses and litter boxes, has been unpotting your houseplants and using the dirt on the carpet for potty purposes, and I won't name names here (but we know who you are, Jasper!), well, said kitty also doesn't know about bubble wrap - and it works just fine.

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I went to the museum yesterday and finished up my work on the membership database. As the next set of memberships and renewals come in, I'll be handing them off to the new (old) guy.

Betty has warned me that "He won't read instructions. You have to tell him everything." Well, I'm sorry, but I spent several hours writing up a cookbook, and he WILL by damn read it! Working with that database is non-intuitive, and things can get weird randomly, and I cannot sit around and hold his hand forever. I intend to hand him the cookbook (4.5 pages, step by step for each of the four tasks) and then retire to a corner with a book. I refuse to hold his hand. He will be forced to use the coookbook.

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After the museum, I had dinner in Poughkeepsie with a friend. We talked about mixed signals and motives and, I don't know, I think we're a bit clearer on where the line is drawn. The main trouble, of course, is that I'm not completely sure myself where the line should be, so it's no wonder he's thinks he's getting mixed signals.

I'm trying. I know what's right, but it's hard.
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1450 Changing Direction

Friday, August 24, 2007

This journal is going to change direction, from personal to ... something else. Maybe philosophical. I don't know.

When I started blogging, back in June of 2004, I was just coming out of the isolation I had gone into when Jay died. I had so much I had to say, but no one I could say it to. After the three isolating years of our battle with his brain cancer, and three years of my grief, there was no one I was close to. No one whose life intersected mine. (There was Daughter, but I couldn't dump all this on her - she was TOO close.)

The journal (which started on AOL, at http://journals.aol.com/jaykolb/Moraine/) helped me to deal with feelings I needed to look at and purge. Because it was all about my thoughts and feelings, I was very open (I am normally anyway), and that openness has continued.

But now my life is different. There are other people involved now. My feelings are now bound up in the actions of and intersections with others, and maybe it's not fair to involve them so much in my journal.

I don't know how to avoid that yet, but I'll have to learn.

Now, the past three days, without mentioning anyone else (difficult!): Wednesday I went to NJ. I had a very good time Wednesday night. Thursday afternoon I visited with Daughter. Got home in the evening and found several calls on my home machine. Returned calls. Today, Friday, I went to the county fair. Met a friend at noon, and we spent the next ten hours visiting every animal barn, every display tent, every retail kiosk, and every food stand. Must have walked many miles! I was wearing walking shoes, and my feet feel like they are about to fall off.

In the antique farm machinery area they have, among other machines, a huge burping saw that makes cedar shingles. Watching it, I mentioned to the friend that I had always wanted to take some of the cedar shreds, "useless" byproduct of the shingle process, to put in net bags in my drawers and closet. Well, purely by chance, at the end of the building they had huge 40-gallon bags of cedar shavings - one fine and one coarse - for $2 a bag! I bought the bag of fine.

Next year I'll have to send out a mental request for smaller bags. 40 gallons of cedar shreds is still wood, and a LOT of wood. The bag was heavy. Maybe 40 pounds. I was lucky to have a friend along to get it to the car.

This is the first year since 1999 that I have had company at the fair. I had always gone alone.
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1447 Dear Diary - Monday

Monday, August 20, 2007

Miss Thunderfoot's annual vet appointment was today. She weighs 10 lb 11 oz, within 3 ounces of her weight the past three years, so I guess I'm feeding her right. It's a little over 10 years since we adopted her, and she was under a year then, so I'd say she's about 11 years old.

I asked the vet how I could ease her acceptance of Jasper, and he recommended a pheromone spray that calms cats. I sprayed it on the laundry room doorway, and it had an instant effect on Jasper. Ever since Thunder spat and swiped at him Saturday, he wouldn't go anywhere near the doorway. Right after I sprayed the doorway, he came right through and gingerly explored the kitchen. Thunder was in hiding, sulking, at the time.

The vet said that Thunder will need to express her desire to be dominant, and since Jasper doesn't seem to be aggressive and therefore should be willing to accept her dominance, it should work out eventually.

I hope.

The Hairless Hunk mowed my lawn while I was at the vet's, and he's out there now with a trimmer. Wearing a shirt. Boo.

Roman called today to lock in our day to go to the fair. It starts tomorrow and ends Sunday. We decided on Friday. He originally mentioned Wednesday, but I'll be seeing The Man Wednesday evening. I didn't tell Roman that. I just said that Wednesday and Thursday weren't good for me. Not that I'm hiding anything. Lines drawn and all that. None of his business, really.

I'm kind of blah today, don't know why. Stuff to do and I'm not doing it. Rebelling.
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1445 Auction / Bylaws Meeting

Sunday, August 19, 2007

Roman, FW, and I were supposed to go to the auction together last night, but FW cancelled out, so it was just Roman and me. This was his first estate auction, and I was afraid it wouldn't be "his thing" and he'd be bored. Actually, I think he was, but he's trying awfully hard these days to humor me. In return, when I looked ahead and saw that there was nothing I had marked on the last four pages of the catalog (of 16 pages total), I suggested that we could just leave early. I think he was grateful.

When I say he's humoring me, over the past two years I have twice invited him to the county fair, and both times he made a face and told me he doesn't care for fairs, and he clearly had no interest. Last night I mentioned the fair, and we are now planning to go together. Hmmmm. I may have to be careful about that. It begins to look like he's doing things with me not for the things, but for the with me part. I probably shouldn't allow that.

I did well at the auction. I bought a gorgeous blue and white Chinese vase, and a Swarovski crystal chandelier for the dining room. My dining room set is 1880s Berkey & Gay, and the chandelier that had been in there is modern smoked glass. This one will go so much better. It's not the "wedding cake" style - it's all curves of brass with scattered strings of crystals. It gives the impression of a graceful woman with long crystal earrings.

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The first bylaws revision committee meeting was this evening, and it went really well! I was surprised at how well. We all seemed to be on the same wavelength. We got through about 1/3 of the material, and so far it's looking good.

The member about whom I had been worried and I had had a small spat about a week ago, and we were being very respectful of each other's thoughts and comments. And I think my ranting in this journal two entries back really did release steam, so I wasn't tempted to push buttons (although I DID mention a few things that had gone wrong with the previous revision, and I really didn't have to do that, and I am a tiny bit ashamed that I did. I promise to control myself better in the next session.)
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1408 Dear Diary - Four Days

Thursday August 2 into Friday August 3, 2007

I have something of a much higher priority to do tonight before I go to bed, therefore I'm doing this first. The Man laughs at me because there are things that make perfect sense to me, but would make no sense to anyone else. I guess this is one of them. If I do a lower priority thing first, then I can be sure BOTH will get done before I conk out.

I haven't kept track of the past four days, and if I don't soon, it'll be all mixed up in my head.

Ok. Monday I caught up on everything I'd let slide since Wednesday.

Tuesday I wrote a very long and difficult email to FW on a topic we had discussed the day before, and then I went to EEE (Mensa dinner) at the Indian restaurant in the village. There was Angie, Jeff, John, Roman, and me. Jeff had ridden his bike in from Bard, and it got dark, and his bike had no lights, and it didn't fit in a car trunk, so I followed him all the way back to Bard at between 7 and 17 mph with my flashers on. I guess it was ok, because a police car passed us without a blink.

Wednesday I REALLY overslept. Crazy. I had wanted to go to the museum, I need to process the checks that came in during July, but I didn't wake up until 2 pm. After that, I haven't the faintest idea what I did. I do recall getting several phone calls, several hours on the phone with several people. Social stuff. You'd never guess I hate talking on the phone.

Thursday I got up at a decent hour and did some financial research, some cleaning up in the laundry room, flirting with the new kitty, bits of things. Left the house a little after 3 pm to meet Roman for dinner. We went to see Richard III at Boscobel. Last minute tickets don't get you the best seats, but they were still pretty good. This time the costumes were vaguely Egyptian, and we had great difficulty understanding the family relationships. The guy who played Richard was very good, although his very strong resemblance to my Hairless Hunk was rather distracting.

Sundaes after, in a restaurant/ice cream parlor that played wonderful 50s, 60s, and 70s music, and I didn't want to leave. I kept pumping quarters into the "nickelodeon". (Remember when you got one song for a nickel, six for a quarter? Now it's three for a dollar!) Got home a little after 1 am.

Roman and I talked about our relationship a bit. We are very good friends right now, and I don't want to screw that up by getting too involved. He's having a little trouble with that. I told him I'd like to find him a good woman, but on the other hand, I don't want to share him. We'll figure it out, I guess. I hope.

Tomorrow I have to figure out what to do with the minivan. On Tuesday I had committed to help a friend move some furniture on Saturday. I screwed up. I forgot that last week when I tried started it, the "check engine" light went on. It won't pass inspection if the CE light is on, and it was due for inspection by the end of July. Man, I blew it. From a couple of directions.

So I'll have to check it tomorrow morning. I hope tightening the gas cap will have been enough. If so, I'll get it inspected tomorrow. If not, I don't know what I'll do.

Now on to more the more important task, so I can eventually get some sleep.

1343 Complications

Sunday, July 1, 2007

The decision as to whether to go to the fireworks has been made for me. There's a gusty breeze high in the trees, and the maple trees are showing the undersides of their leaves. Sure sign of rain.


If I'm wrong, I can still see the higher chrysanthemums from my deck, so I think I'll stay home, warm, and dry.

There were actually about 12 people at NJ's last night. I forgot to count the Pilot and the Nurse. It's interesting that among so few people, there was so much going on underneath. We've all known each other entirely too long.


It was last year at this time, at NJ's, that the proverbial poop hit the fan, as regards Roman and me. I'm sure a lot of people were wondering what is now going on with us. It was obvious we are friendly, even affectionate, which I'm sure blows people's minds, given what had happened. I'm a little surprised he showed up last night. Pond scum and all.

He made a point of several times mentioning "the woman I had been dating", ensuring that everyone knew they had broken up. We left together, and if anyone had been watching from the window, they'd have seen a hug and a very small kiss. They'd have seen both cars go through the stone gateway one after the other. What they couldn't see is that at the end of the access road, I turned north, and he turned south. What they don't know is that's the way it is now. That's pretty much the way it has to be. Hello hugs and goodbye kisses, and nothing much in between.

Dirty Dave broke up with his several-year girlfriend more than a year ago, and he's not over her yet. He finally figured out that she didn't really like him at all, that she was using him. He said she has lived the grasshopper life, and has found herself in her late 50s with no savings, and all she wanted was someone who would pay for her fun.

The poor guy wants a woman.

I opened the can of worms when I asked him if he'd done any travelling lately (that was his retirement plans), and he said no, that he hates travelling alone. He had tried to get back together with a prior girlfriend, and it actually looked promising, but he said that the 15-year age difference, that hadn't mattered at all when he was still working and dating her, is now suddenly a problem, because he has all this free time, and she has none. She has a lousy two weeks of vacation, and the occasional day off, and they just can't travel like he wants to. It's frustrating.

(He doesn't know what my involvement is these days, but as he went on about it, I felt like he was talking directly to me. Yeah, I understand more than he knows.)

I reminded him that he'd always said that he prefers women his own age. Maybe he needs a woman who is willing and able to pay her own way. Maybe all he needs is a platonic travel companion (implying, of course, me). I swear I said that innocently. (I want to travel. I need a travel companion, too.)

Twenty-some years ago, DD and I'd had a very brief fling, pushed together by NJ and May, who had thought we were ideal for each other. The only other person in the room who knows I had slept with DD is Roman, and it bothers him a lot. I have absolutely no sexual interest in DD. None. I have no desire whatsoever to repeat the experience. When I saw the look on Roman's face, and the look on DD's face, I wanted to say that, make it clear, or withdraw my suggestion. Bleck. Foot in mouth again.

There was a woman there who is at least ten years older than I. Back in March, a new member came to NJ's Green Eggs and Ham, and I noticed that this woman seemed fascinated by him. The expression on her face when she looked at him, the way she engaged him in intense conversation, the way she leaned into him. Last night, it was obvious she was still fascinated by him. When he left, he hugged her tightly and asked her when he'd see her again. And later, she said something about how the night before, she'd forgotten that she had xx in the refrigerator, so he and she'd "had no dessert after dinner." She'd cooked him dinner the night before? Wow. Why wow? He's got to be 40 years younger than she.

Wow. I'd love to know what's going on there.

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Post script - The next October, Roman decided to go to Israel to visit his Daughter, and invited me to go with him, as a "platonic travel companion".  I turned him down (I wanted to go, but The Man wasn't too happy about the idea, and pointed out that he being a man himself, he knew durn well what Roman was thinking.)  Wow.  I wonder if Roman got the idea from the conversation with DD.
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1340 Moonlight

Sunday, July 1, 2007 (Late night, early morning, whatever....)

Moonlight at NJ's was nice. Naturally, I forgot a real camera, but I took two photos with the toy camera on my keyring. The first is the view from NJ's back porch. The small figure on the lawn on the left is FirstWoman, to give some idea of the scale. That hill is actually very steep. There's a bit of beach visible beyond FW.


This next one was taken from where FW is standing in the first photo. She wanted to smoke, so she had spread her blanket there. I joined her and we talked for a while, but I wanted to get back up to the group, so we moved her blanket up to near the porch, where Roman joined us a little later.


We didn't last long out there. Something was biting FW and Roman (as usual, I was being ignored by the bugs) and they couldn't take it any longer - especially Roman, who was wearing short sleeves and shorts (red short shorts - he took some ribbing for that), so we moved inside.

It was a small group tonight, maybe about 10 of us. People wondered why - I see no mystery. I figure a lot of people started their holiday at the end of work on Friday.

The moon finally came up about 9:30ish, I'm not sure, but it was full dark by then and the bugs weren't so active, so we all went outside again. Dirty Dave had brought a telescope, and we looked at the moon and at Jupiter. Jupiter's four moons were all lined up together. Kinda neat.

The moonlight shone over the water, and it was pretty, and then fireworks started somewhere across the river. Hyde Park is straight across, and the fireworks were south a bit, so we figure they had to be at the Culinary Institute. We got a good show.

Poor Roman had put a jacket on, but his legs were still getting all bit up, so we left everyone else still out on the porch and moved to the kitchen, where we were eventually joined by Dirty Dave. People started leaving, and the last hour was Roman, Dirty Dave, The Hippy, NJ, and me in the kitchen. Topics of conversation ranged from Roman's daughter's luggage having been lost on the way to Israel (she went through Heathrow yesterday, shortly after the terrorist threat there), to DD's single status, to Zig's mysterious friend in Boston, to online dating, to property easements.

They have convinced me that I have to get back the easement that I gave the guy who's building below me (for $1 and clearing the woods in my side yard), since it turns out he can't use it, but if he ever sells the land, the easement will go with it, and who knows what a new owner would do.

The Hippy and I talked about joining up at the Jazz Festival. We could, but he said he wasn't too enthusiastic about the groups they had scheduled, so he might not stay long. If he's not enthusiastic, I'm sure I won't be - that's something he knows something about. So I'm losing my enthusiasm, what little I had. And the fireworks we saw tonight might be enough for me. I don't know.

I got home a little after midnight, and on the way home I was thinking about the bug biting thing. It seems like every guy I have found attractive in "that way", has also been loved by bugs. Obie, Jay, Roman, The Man - they all attracted bugs as much as they attracted me. I don't think I've ever been attracted to a bug-repellent man. I guess the bugs and I both sense the same thing. The Man says it's testosterone. I can believe it.

That would be a cute line in an online dating profile: "Must attract bugs."
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1339 Weekend Plans

Saturday, June 30, 2007

FW just called to ask if I'd be going to NJKC's Moonlight party tonight. Yeah. Except for when Jay was sickest, and when I was incommunicado for a few years after he died, I've gone to every one for the past 21 years. (Wow! Has it really been that long?)

NJKC picks a summer weekend with a full moon, and we're supposed to sit on blankets on the mansion's lawn sloping down to the river, drink champagne, and watch the moon rise over the Hudson. It's beautiful, except that mostly no one actually goes outside. Usually everyone is inside, somebody looks out a window and says "Moon's coming up." Half the group glances out a window and says"Nice", and that's it.

Buncha deadheads.

Well, NJKC and May and a few others smoke inside, and I'm trying really hard to quit, so by darn this year I AM going to be out on a blanket! Roman and FW plan to attend for the first time in forever, so they will be outside, too, and Angie and Andi, if they're there, so I won't be alone this time. FW plans to bring "other stuff to smoke", and I can't be too near that, and I suspect it might feak out some others, so it may take some diplomacy. Or an upwind seat.

I'd like to go to the jazz festival and fireworks tomorrow. If I can find someone this evening who will go with me, maybe I will. Maybe I won't. The fireworks off the bridge are spectacular, but I noticed that they have a huge flag hanging from the bridge this year. I can't imagine they'd risk setting fire to it, so maybe the bridge won't be used this year. Ho hum. Having trouble caring, actually.
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1335 Gift Day

Thursday, June 28, 2007

Good day today.

On my way to the mall to meet Daughter, I decided to drop off the sell-off report with Piper. His "open" flag was out, but the office door was locked. I walked to the cafe, but they were closing, so I tried the tavern across the street, and found him there. Drinking soda. Really, soda. He's losing weight, and trying very hard to stick to the diet.

He's very social. When I hang with him in the tavern, I meet all kinds of people. He knows everyone. The tavern seems to be the place for the village men to hang out during the day - it's like it should have a potbelly stove or something. I sat at the bar with him and some other guys for about 40 minutes, and had some iced tea.

Anyway, he was happy to see the numbers. He'll pass them on to The Angel.

Then I headed on down to the mall. Daughter wasn't too very late, and as she was walking into Macy's, where we were to meet, her phone rang, and it was my sister. So I got to talk to Sister while Daughter went to the ladies' room.

Daughter and I had a nice visit, with a little shopping, before she left to meet her Fishkill friends for dinner. When we parted, she gave me a bag of bath salts, skin cream, and some other stuff, in lieu of a kitten.

I was headed back up route 9, when it occurred to me that it was almost 7, and I hadn't had anything but my yogurt all day. I called Roman and said, "Hi! I happen to be in Poughkeepsie, and I'm going to be looking for someplace to eat. You interested? Have you eaten yet?" So I picked him up, and we went to a rustic little steakhouse tavern for dinner.

He gave me a CD he'd found at a used book sale, one he thought I'd be interested in. I listened to it on the way home, and it turns out it is not the mid-eastern music he thought it was from the title, it's something a lot more interesting. (I want to do some research before I say anything more about it.)

I got home about 9 pm, to find a very nice phone message on my machine from The Gypsy. Not only did she know I needed a message, to get that lonely "1" off the blink, the message was to invite me to a party in a few weeks, and to watch her perform in a Kingston restaurant next week. Feels nice in my tummy.

I feel like I got all kinds of appreciation and gifts today.

At around 10 I decided to go into the village to the all-night grocery store to buy a few things.

Now, from about 10:00 on, there is almost no traffic in the village. You often won't see another car in either direction. I frequently go at night to the gas station mini-mart or the post office, or the grocery store, because it's easy to find a place to park, and there's no jam-up at the light, people trying to make left turns. I can even pull a "U" in the middle of the deserted village street to return home - don't have to go around the block. (Which is a pain, because we have so few real "blocks".)

So I was surprised to see several cars pulled over in front of the post office and across the street, and people moving around in the street. As I got closer, I realized there was glass all over the street, and the people were trying to kick the larger pieces to the curb.

Accident? No. No mashed fenders....

It was beer bottles! There was an SUV with the hatch open, and the back was full of cases of beer. It looked like the hatch had popped open, and a case or two fell out. From the looks of some of the bottles, I'd say the cars parked to the side had driven over more than a few.

Given my recent tire woes, there was NO WAY I was going to try to navigate through that mine field.

I turned around in the post office driveway, and went around one of the more awkward blocks.

When I returned from the grocery store, the police had arrived and had blocked the street. The SUV was (mysteriously) gone, but the other cars were still there.

I wonder if they all have flat tires.


If I have a flat tomorrow, at least I will, for once, know where it came from. And actually, that's a GOOD feeling.
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