hot, Hot, HOT, HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHot

Because here in Mississippi the humidity adds to the heat index so that a hot temperature like 90 feels like 99, because I live in an elderly trailer (read tin box), and because I'm working with a very lil air conditioner; my mid-afternoons are generally sweaty lethargic struggles to breathe affairs (not helped by my recuperating from bronchitis/pneumonia, I'm sure).

Having said all that, it would seem entirely reasonable that at this time of the night I am cooking and doing laundry.  Ya know, things that add heat and humidity to any already hot and humid environment.

So, whatcha upta?

Dandelion Wine

The title was vaguely tugging at my mind, and "Dandelion Wine" is not the volume I first found the tale in the last entry.  But my brother did and does own that book too.  This past Christmas was the first time that I had seen my brother at the holidays for about 15 years.  I remember seeing the book in his stack of reads.

Douglas's views of Green Town are more fully explored in "Dandelion Wine".  Perhaps I will read the book instead of only the handful of tales that Bradbury fashions into short stories and excerpts to scatter amongst other publications.  I'll add it to my library list.

So, what have you been reading of late?

b(RA)dbur(Y)

When I was a child, back in the mid-70s, I wondered what my brother found so fascinating about Ray Bradbury.  So I picked up one of the worn books, I can't remember which.  And I read it thru.  There were some stories that I couldn't and didn't comprehend.  There were some I just didn't care for.  And there were a few that I loved.

Last night, I read one in this volume of his "most celebrated tales" that brought back childhood memories of reading the story the first time and how I identified with it then, and still do.  "The Sound of Summer Running" is the name of the short that had originally been published in the Saturday Evening Post well before I was born.  In 1956, it ran under the name "Summer in the Air".

I think I prefer the first title, for that to me is exactly what the story was all about.  The things that confirm that yes! summer is really here.  The very air and scents and the freshness and warmness of the summer sun early in the morning burning off the misty fog signal that summer is like no other season.  Summer means freedom, from school, from rules and regulations.  Freedom to run and explore is found only in summer.

For the boy in this story, new tennis shoes always meant that summer was indeed here.  Really, summer cannot be fully experienced without new tennis shoes!  Well, to me it was slightly different.  New shoes were a sign of fall, the beginning of school.

But the actual idea of the shoes and the shoes themselves were full of nostalgic memories.  The best part of the shoes was hard to determine.  Was it the spongy lightness of the new soles that added bounce and spring to the step?  Or the wideness that allowed toes to be wriggled about?  Even the fact that the tennis shoes were NEW instead of old sprung worn-out smelly funky beat up sneaks was something to be savored.  For me, the sole of the shoe, the slight firmness with a tad give and utterly smooth unmarked unformed unsoiled canvas coolness was the most marvelous aspect of new tennis shoes.

Ray Bradbury's story focuses on "Cream Sponge Para Litefoot Shoes" and Douglas's lust for them, and his awe that he shares with Mr. Sanderson.  Even the name, cream sponge and litefoot, made my toes wriggle with glee and my feet actually sighed.  Last night, rereading this brought the same joy I remember experiencing the first time I read the story, as a child of the 70s, when children still ran about outside playing and new sneakers meant the world was right.

hunger

i've been eating like a snuffling lil piggy (pause to visualize a pinkish piggy with glasses scarfing down some serious chow).  and still hungry.  i know i am not pregnant.  but damn!  i've been eating myself out of house and home!

i'm oh so much better, breathing and lung capacity wise.  there is still some burning, just cuz my lungs are so irritated and will take some time to fully heal, but i'm one happy happy joyous camper!

better and better and better and

I'm feeling lots better!!  There is still some phlegm in my lungs, but I'm way better improved.  The situation is improving every day.  Yea!!

...i was doing what?

My guy has an inattentive subtype of ADD.  It's really quite amazing that he is the man that he is and that he has completed his third year in the PhD program.  Yea, sweetieheart!!

So I don't mean to be mean.  But I do find it to be very suitable that Psych Central has two versions of a test for Adult ADD.  There is the 'regular' 24 item quiz.  And there is the 'quick' six item quiz.  Which is understandably preferable, doncha think?

I'm just saying.

do not open

usually when my guy stumbles around in the wee morning hours before leaving my house for his (two hours away), i sleep right thru it.  but this morning, i woke up even before the nasty insistent alarm went off.  so i decided to have a piece of last night's pizza and then my industrial strength antibiotic that always makes me think that i will take this magic bullet and be transformed! into an amazingly well person immediately.  and i slurp down some herbal tea too, just to make sure i've got all the bases covered, what with all those "take with food", "take with drink", "offer up your first born to the gods of modern science" labels.

folks, there is a reason the antibiotic is encapsulated within three layers of invincible gel; as i soon discovered when it dissolved in my stomach and resurfaced with a burp.  mmmmmmmmm.  i was planning to use my throat today, but after that mishap, i'll be signing my counseling session.

so, is your week off to a good start?

gettin' better

i'm getting better, this i know because i worked myself up into a spitting tizzy of half-choked gasps of indignant protests when this afternoon's mail brought to me the latest in the dept of education's attempts of righteous repayment.  not in my house!

bRAdburY

Monday I visited the library after seeing the doctor, because they were holding a book for me.  while i was there i quickly snatched up a volume of short stories, cuz that's about how long my attention can last and my eyes can stay open.  it's a ray bradbury collection.  man, that dude has been around for a looooooooooooong time.  he is currently 87 years old.  he wrote the forward of the book in 2003, damn, i hope i'm thinking, let alone writing when i get into my 80s.

would you just quit breathing?!?

last night, my guy came to see me.  he's back from texas and i missed him so!  he has a rather hardy constitution and can be around my contagious conditions and not be affected much.  i'd love him for that reason alone, if i didn't already love him for scads of other reasons.

but last night, i think i tested his love for me.  or at least his tolerance for me at that given moment.  he was all nestled in bed, sound asleep.  and i was nestled in bed, hacking and coughing.  the dogs were outside barking and my guy was getting rather testy in his sleep.  i went to the bathroom to do the worst of my own barking, but i think the small space served as an echo chamber and magnified the sound that much more.

my guy rolled over and muttered a few obscenities  that could have been due to many things, but i'm thinking that the simultaneous barking the dogs and i were engaged in was greatly contributing to my guy's aggravated state.  poor guy.

hey, i'm breathing here!

This morning a dude in bellsouth regalia knocked on my door.  I signaled "one minute" (I had to find my pants, opening doors while in underwear is not recommended, tho i have been known on occasion to do so).  He was patient.

He asked, "so what's wrong with your phone this time?"  as though he'd been here recently instead of several years ago.  I stared blankly at him, wondering if I had been cough-syrup calling.  We finally sorted out that he was looking for my next-door neighbors who live two miles away.

I explained how to get there and sent him on his mission of the day then stood in the yard for a few minutes trying to deal with sensory overload.  The colors seemed a bit too bright, everything was a bit too sharp, the air was too moist and hot (that'd be humid, right?) and tasted bitter.  I turned and wobbled back to the steps and plopped down.  My ears were sloshing with my heartbeat and some sort of large heavy equipment drone (turns out that was my air conditioner).  I leaned forward and my head promptly popped off and rolled away, thus freeing up my lungs to gasp, rattle, and hum even louder.

I am so glad to be back inside and promise to not ever jam that much movement into a small time-frame like that when i am feeling this shitty.  it tends to stir up the sediments that are coating the swampiness of my lungs and clouds my brain to the point where i was wondering if i could just lie down in the grass to die or did i really need to get back inside whereupon i might live to see yet another day.

Here it is a few hours later, I'm feeling better, more removed from death's threshold.  now i am merely struggling to breathe deeper than a shallow pant and wondering if i will ever draw a phlegm-phree breath again.

so, how's your weekend?

discovery, happy belated birthday heather!

I've recently discovered Dooce and have been developing an absolute bonding experience, check out Heather's very long running blog, a cool commentary on life as she sees it. You might be familiar with her as she was fired for blogging, altho she didn't refute or appeal the decision, it did raise all sorts of privacy issues and such.  Heather has blogged on her marriage, her pregnancy/birth/motherhood, her Leta, her fall from religion, her mental illnesses, and all with a sense of frankness that is a great blend of humor (crude, lewd, and rude), compassion, wit.  The dudette can think.  Check it!

Yesterday was her birthday, as a kicky lil bonus.  Happy Birthday, Dooce!

laid low

there has been some crap with the dept of education and some other crap with a continuation review board and then there is the crap in counseling but the biggest crap at the moment (and for the past week) has been the inability to draw a non-musical breath.

no kidding, i sound like a 20+ year old clunker attempting to start in pennsylvania in a blizzard.  this isn't just a wheeze, it's not just a rattle, it's an entire symphony going on; we gotcher woodwinds, we gotcher clashing cymbals, hell we even gotcher bagpipes.  all right here in my chest.

i go back to the doctor in the morning.  i'm gonna request those long suction pipes they use in surgery (and the dentist's office) and have a go at my phlegm clogged lungs.  i've already had a breathing treatment (monday) and they sent me home with antibiotics, inhaler, and cough syrup.

it ain't pretty, and in a way, i'm glad my guy is in texas at the moment.  as it is, he listens to me hack up crud long distance.  it's safer than being in spit spewing distance.