Experimenting with Roman numerals , day V + V subtract I

I apologize for all the stupid stuff .

I've been talking to some people , or maybe they are imaginary people , but they have the craziest ideas about living .

You know how some people will say about other people , "They're kind of different," ? well , according to these people i have communication with , EVERYBODY says that about everybody else .

yea , yea , i know ! It's true . So take a step back and try to look at yourself from some whacko's side of the street and see what they see .

My splenic nerve has been in constant communication with me for 14 years , now . It speaks to me mostly in dark places ; it makes me see fruit bowls in odd circumstances . Sometimes there are monkeys , too , and they are always throwing the fruit into corners and wearing wooden bowls over their heads , so i can never see their eyes .

Also , i'm thinking of trading in my lawn mower for a goat . Not for the reason you're thinking of , though .

Not that i don't care about the environment , or gas prices , or the exercise issues : Of course all those things are imp-ortant.

Here's the best reason : To annoy the neighbors ! The same neighbors who play loud music and let their dogs bark all night and poop on your lawn . The neighbors who party too late and set off fireworks when you are asleep and park in your spot and throw beer bottles over the fence . The neighbors who are unfriendly to the point of not only not smiling and waving and borrowing a cup of sugar , but instead they spew foul language and exude foul odors and steal your newspaper .

I'm not sure how a goat will upset this sort of person , so it's a stupid idea . Never mind .

I like potato chips . It has got to stop . But what is a good substitute for potato chips ? I ask you ; i ask all my friends , all my imaginary earthly cohabitants . What is better than a chip ?

Nothing .

pathetic .. that's all for that .

... these are some monsters that i know . They enjoy sitting and veging and being lit up .

Experimenting with Roman numerals , day IIX

There is a place , somewhere , where everybody has but the one finger and they can curl it around and point it and make it do all sorts of things that mean all sorts of different things . In that place they point at one another's faces and wiggle their finger . In that place they can itch a scratch or pick a nose . In that place dialing a phone still isn't easy , but everyone has push button these days ...


That place is a sad place ; having one finger makes it awfully hard to write a poem .


Another worm poem , because this blog is for the worms :

On a day full of menace the clouds cast a gray
Pall oer the lawn of a trim wormette called Fey
That crawled past the shoots of grass tall as the pines
From the nor‘ western woods ere fond away times…
A year ago spawned of slime eggs under dirt
That she squirmed away from and topside as alert
As a newborn could be she denied that blue jay
Until now, season’s hence, a feast on her birthday…
Sweet, sweet
Bon appetit


Today may count as a continuation of the last post , as it may possibly be stupid , but I am recently having a problem distinguishing between stupid and unstupid .

Experimenting with Roman numerals , day VII .

I think I will just write some things that are stupid , then maybe comment on the stupidiousness of the things .


I'm pretty sure that I can come up with something relatively stupid .


As for toads , they are surely obnoxious and there ought to be a rule against allowing them access to the public libraries .


I know , I know ; seeing eye dogs ARE allowed inside of public buildings , as long as they are actually leading blind people around , but not if they are playing Frisbee with the kids . I have NEVER heard of a seeing eye toad , or frog .


However , if the toads can actually read , then an exception might be made . This could be left to the discretion of the librarian . Now , that is pretty much settled .


Speaking of libraries , why can't they offer more books that I might want to read . Often I go in and just can't be motivated to pick up a book . Maybe there should be more pamphlets because they are lighter and quick to read . At night you could have your snack and brush your teeth then read your pamphlet and fall asleep . It is too much trouble to open up a book of a lot of pages then be too tired to read more then a paragraph when you look ahead and see the next chapter is two or three pages away and your eye lids are drooping and 'oh hell , Jughead will still be there tomorrow , zzzz .' More pamphlets , and maybe some bubblegum cards . And funny horoscopes and obituaries for fake people and little dogs , too .


And little dogs are more convenient than the bigger ones for lots of reasons . #1 : little dogs eat less and can't jump up and knock a person over just because they walk in the front door . Big dogs on the other hand can not only lick your face when you are standing up , they can also grab your burger right off the counter top or even off the grill . And if they can do that they can take your car keys off the top of the fridge and drive around .


#2 reason is not required because #1 reason is enough for never , ever needing to have a big dog , unless you are a farmer and need a big dog to eat more of the food that you a growing , which will help to increase prices to us consumers , and also so the big dog can drive the tractors around .

And #3 reason isn't really sufficient . There you have it , 3 reasons for having a little dog ; I'll be thinking there might be more , comments are welcome from little dog haters who just hate the littler dogs because they are little . I know you are out there , little haters !

Do you hate vomit ? Many people have phobias ; some are afraid of tall things or being enclosed by cardboard boxes . I am phobic of spiders jumping off the ceiling onto my head , or out of boxes onto my head , or off of tall things onto my head , and vomit . Also , i will never leave my socks out doors because a spider would probably get into my socks and then jump onto my head at some conveniant moment .


O.K. No more supid stuff today , don't want to use it all up at once .

Here's another sort of stupid cartoon instead ; sorry if it's not as stupid as the rest , I got tired .

Experimenting with Roman numerals , day VI .

No pictures today , so just a life experience and maybe a cartoon or two : NoteBook guy .

So…

I’m running through this neighborhood and three people end up swearing at me . There are no sidewalks , which actually turns out to be a good thing , for me , as a runner , right ? The streets are asphalt and that is a much better running surface ; better on the old knees . Sidewalks are usually concrete and concrete is bad on the knees . Honestly , if you care all that much about your knees then running is probably not a very good idea ; try checkers .
The first person to swear at me is some guy in a pick-up truck . He pulls past me then starts backing up right in front of me into his driveway ; I slow down , then he stops and then I speed up and run by . He honks at me and of course I call him a dumb **** . So he swears at me . So I say something like , “Go ahead and run me over you over-large Oprah-loving couch hugging poor excuse for a Frito dipping Bandito , and yeah , I really like your goat .” I’m not sure if I was referring to his stupid beard or the woman who was busting out the springs of the passengers seat next to him . He probably would have chased me down and squished me if she hadn’t grabbed the steering wheel and waved ice cream in front of his face .

The second person was on a skateboard and she was trying to fly a kite while pushing off backwards and she was on the wrong side of the street . Actually , so was I ; but walkers and runners are supposed to be on the wrong side of the street so they can keep an eye on oncoming traffic … so as not to be squished unaware . It is better to be squished aware . That way you can utter a quick prayer as you are being squished . Something like , “Our Father ,” splat . It’s the thought that counts right ? Of course , I’m pretty sure my last thoughts before being violently squished under some warthog SUV’s wheels will be more like “Oh s**t !”
Anyhow , this skater/flyer chick turns around just in time to see me attempting to avoid her and then she swerves right into my/her path --I’m being magnanimous here -- and she screams right into my face with full frontal spitting furry , “you stupid **** !” Well , that was rude . I kind of giggled , which actually was a full-out chortle , which gave me a Charlie horse so I had to bend over a bit as I ran on down the street . That’s when the squirrel with all his nuts came out from under a shrub and nearly tripped me up . What a psycho-day ! Punk/skater/girl caught a gust in her kite , and that whipped her back around ; I glanced over and saw her overtaking me ; she reached into her fanny pack and I jumped three feet : thought she was reaching for a heater ! No , she starts hurling smurfs at my head . Then she laughs and flips a tattooed mid-finger at me and zooms off down Wisteria in hysterics . Wow , what a dame !

Ouch ; I looked down and find baby smurf is biting my ankle ; I shake it off and come back around the block . It took eight point three five minutes and nineteen tenths . I had beaten the old block record by a tenth of a second . Not bad considering all the distractions . The pick-up truck couple were still sitting in the cab , but the doors were open . He , Mr. Lean-on-the-Horn-Honker-doodle-doo, had one pale leg out replete with crumbs and then he spots me : “Hey, blankety blankety blank ! You suck !”

“Yea , you too , Burger King ; can I help you to your front door ; I know where I can borrow a skid loader ?” Sure , we can get you there , but then only explosives will get you through the door into the three bedroom food court built on bed rock with double two by four support beam construction .

The guy’s keys rattle , but he’s not coming after me because he had ketchup on his chin and he pauses too long to lick it off . This is where the third swearing person comes in : An old lady across the street , sitting on her porch swing , swinging , with last weeks T.V. guide . “You *** , **** , **(*****-*****) . This is the umpteenth time you’ve circled this block ; you’re making me *****-eth tired .” She knew some old school curse words . Biblical stuff ; in bible-tongue ! I couldn’t even respond , other then to blush , so I pick up the pace and head across the street to Pigeon Street ; the tulip poplars are in bloom there and I had less chance of being mauled . “Ouch ,” I slapped my neck and saw on my hand what I had squished with my strike : Smurfette , squished and oozing blue sap , had crawled up my shirt and started pulling out my neck hair . “Yuck ,” I tossed her into the median strip and jogged away to the Aviary Lawns subdivision and whistled a happy tune .

Experimenting with Roman numerals , day V .

Did I mention that my cherry tree flowered this year ? Oh , and yeah , it fruited , too .

And because of all those gazillions of little sour cherries popping out so abruptly like neon store signs , I have seen things on my lawn that I never knew existed . Mostly funny looking birds with crests and racing stripes . And some fat ground squirrels that scrounge around in the mulch picking out the leftovers . The strangest creatures of all , though , are the neighbors .
Imagine the sight ! For this I rummaged through the coat bin for my binoculars . You should have seen these crazy people . They would sneak into my yard under the cover of dusk camouflaged by pith helmets and tied on leafy branches , just to disappear into the folds of that cherry tree . One guy actually had big red cherry spots stamped onto his brown and green mottled skin . He wore a bear skin Speedo .

They all of them carried Tupperware bowls .

A grandmother smuggled in her daughter’s kids and hoisted each of them up onto a branch then scuttled into obscurity behind a yew .

Strange , yeah . If I had known that the little ten dollar tree I bought on clearance was going to fruit out and attract such a diverse crowd , then I probably would have opted for a more expensive specimen tree that would merely sit still and look pretty . Then maybe the usual worm eating birds would hang around its branches tweeting and at most people would drive by and roll down the windows to ‘ooh and ahhh’ , then drive off to wherever they drive off to .

Car people .

This got me to thinking … I need to design my own tree . A tree that will look and behave the way I want it to ; no surprises . And I don’t want to wait 25 years for it to grow into whatever form I desire it to appear in . That makes sense , to me : twenty-five years is a long time when you’re already starting to be on the edge of getting old .

First , this tree needs to be bio-engineered to grow fast , yet strong . Who wants a big tree that is only going to break apart every time a strong wind blows through ? Some math person can figure this out using Einstein’s theory of relativity : The tree’s chromosomes or whatever will cause it to jump forward into time --maybe two weeks , or a month -- every couple nights until at such a time it gains sufficient girth and height , while all the while seemingly staying in our present time . At that point there should be introduced some stimulus to halt its rapididity . That’s a new word I coined to explain its rapididity . See rapididity .

I’m sure this rapid growth might cause some problems … like the area around the tree might be so depleted of nutrients during the rapididity that the area around the trunk might become a sinkhole , what with the root system sucking the life out of everything in its range .

Way 1 to deal with this problem : Stockpile dirt and fertilizers and mulch to continually supplement the feeding cycle of the tree .

Way 2 : keep pantry and refrigerator full and easily accessible to foraging tree roots that make their way into your kitchen for late night snacks .

Actually the best way to engineer this tree would be to build a spaceship and send all of the earth’s people into an orbit beyond our galaxy for , say , 6 months , then come back to earth . It will be a nice vacation and all the folks will see stars and stuff and get to swim at the in-habitat pool and walk upside down on upside down Tuesdays , then they will land back on the earth and everyone will have a nice big bio-engineered tree in their front yard ; because while they were away on vacation the earth will have aged 50 years .

That was the easy part . Now the harder , but funner , part . If you are going to the trouble of engineering a new tree , then you may as well design it from bottom up : trunk , bark , branching structure , etc .

I prefer my tree trunk to be rather huge , and ridged kind of wavy-like . Like Ruffles . And the bark may as well be salty and good with dip . It should be branchy like some sort of locust tree , or a wild African Baobab that looms over the plains ; big enough to shelter a herd of elephants , or at least keep the rain off of picnickers .

Good structure is fine , especially in the off season , when the leaves fall and snow covers the bare branches . Come springtime we all want leaves , and flowers . The leaves should be rounded and lobed , some combination of a red oak and a mulberry and maybe a sweet gum . Asymmetrical at times , but not always . A little diversity is a nice touch . Also , the leaf should be multi-colored , like a European tri-color Beech , but more or less golden on the underside , which would turn up in the evenings and shimmer as the sun sets .

The flower should be a good compliment to the leaf , blending in attractively much like the Tulip Poplar’s bloom does . I think perhaps I’d enjoy a pale silvery rose-like bloom , hanging in clusters like a Japanese cherry blossom .

Last I must address the seed pod , which in some trees is nothing but a menace . Take for example the silver maple tree , which we have many of and can be quite attractive trees , and fast growing , which is why there are so many thousands and millions of them all over the land and maybe even floating through space . But their whirligig little helicopter seed pods can and will flit and flutter and land everywhere until every square inch of the earth is covered an inch thick with them and then to make things worse , two weeks later there are maple seedlings growing out of every nook and cranny including your gutters and the sneakers you left out on the porch after mowing the lawn last night .

My new tree will have seedpods , how else will it propagate , by mitosis ? I don’t know what that is . The pods should be otherworldly , like the sweet gum’s funny little monkey balls , but mobile , like the cottonwood , and absolutely unobtrusive , like a … like a Snickers bar . Because the second the seed pod falls it will either bury itself into the turf or get eaten up by a squirrel or some winged thing , or a wandering naturalist . Maybe it should be a tasty nut with feathery red and yellow tendrils that catch the thermals and floats hither and yon until it drifts into some open car window , whereupon the driver , while detained by a red light , will snag it from the ether , shell it quickly and snork it down , then look around for more tasty airborne treats , manna from heaven , and probably cause a fender bender .

All that is well and good , but what about a name ? This is new tree variety , so of course Oak and Fichus are out ; we need something original and perhaps slightly archaic . Greek-ish , or French-ish , or Hawaiian-ish .

I’ll think of something , maybe you will . Toodles ; I’m going to sit out and dream of my tree and how it will look standing majestically in my yard . And I need some interesting bushes and flowers to go around it … and groundcover , and some kind of hummingbird to help with pollination …

Experimenting with Roman numerals , day IV .

The weather here has been no surprise . People will say , “Gosh , this has been a crazy spring ,” or “It has certainly been a wet summer so far .” You know , every year it’s an odd spring , and every year summer is either hot and mugly right off the bat , or it is wet . The weather is the weather , and it’s always the same or it’s different .

The really funny thing about this year are the multi-cultural gnomes living in my garage .

I’ll explain : Usually by this time of the year I have my garage and backyard shed emptied out and cleaned from top to bottom . Dust , leaves , spiders , dislocated nuts and bolts , etcetera , etcetera and so forth . This year I don’t know what happened . Either the extremely wet weather or my abject laziness has kept me from my duties . I vote for the weather , because , damn it !, I’ve been working hard and I’m tired , and I really did need all of those afternoon naps , and all the extra rain had me mowing the lawn more often so every dry moment was used up by the mowing of said grass , and golly gee , can’t a guy just be lazy now and then ?

Stupid garage … the cars don’t care if the garage is dirty , do they ?
Anyway , I guess it was time to clean the garage out at least . The wife was out of town for a few days , and it’s not like I was going to have a party or invite over some dancing girls . I don’t know any dancing girls , and I’m down to only a half dozen beers in the fridge , and they’re about 6 months old . I’m saving them for a nice dry night off when I can start a fire out back and kick back to watch the embers glow and slowly get stoned on stale beer and not worry about dragging my butt out of bed at 4 in the morning to stumble into work . Time to make the donuts . Gahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh . Kill me .

Clean the garage , right , OK . Maybe I should trim the shrubs first . No ! Clean the garage . It’s a pit ; you can’t even walk out to grab a can of pop any more without getting something wedged between your toes , or tracking dirt and cottonwood seeds into the kitchen . Cripes all mighty !

Forget the damned shrubs … forget the shed , leave the weeds alone for a couple days , what’ll they do , grow 6 inches over night and uproot the coreopsis ? Well , maybe …but forget it ; clean the garage !

Sure , it’s due . First thing is to move everything mobile out into the driveway . Then pick up all those boards and wood you were saving to re-floor the shed . Shift everything else to one side of the garage and sweep out the edges and corners , then grab the dust pan to collect the debris and chuck it all .

First thing I noticed was there was a big crack in the plastic dust bin that sat by the work bench . Probably because I was using it as a gauge to park my car . When I would drive into the garage , I would see the swimming noodle move the second my bumper made contact with the bin . At that point I would stop and switch off the engine . Sure beats running into the work bench .

Inside this dust bin were the following : A swimming noodle , 3 strands of Christmas lights , various screws , a bag of bird food ( put there because the chipmunks were getting to it on top of the workbench ) , and some Miracle Grow that had fallen off the work bench and caused everything in the bin to turn a faint shade of blue .

It was a motley collection of crap , it was . And because of the crack in the bin , now the chippies could get right into it and feast on the birdseed . And they did . And they chewed the swim noodle , and they nibbled the electric cords and licked the colors off of the bulbs , and they stuck the nuts and bolts into their cheeks and made goofy faces at each other , and all of it was coated with a thin film of chemical fertilizer so they ate that up , too .

You’d think it was enough to kill the poor little varmints , and it almost did . Man , I don’t relish the tummy aches they must have suffered . But they came out of it OK , and then went back for more . Don’t you know , they ate it , and hoarded it , and passed it on to their neighbor ground squirrels over a couple of three-day weekends until it was all gone . Then they went back to digging up my crocus bulbs and eating those .

Of course , the little creeps ended up having babies . They thought ‘why not , times are good ; there’s all this blue food laying about , so let’s have a peck of ‘lil ones .’
Good idea , bad execution .

Back to the garage . I‘m moving stuff around and sweeping and such , and I get down low to sweep under the workbench and hear this chattering and what sounds like cursing . You can always tell when someone is swearing , just by the tone , even if the words are in a different tongue . Chipmunks swear pretty damn good . These guys were letting me have it with both barrels . I was disturbing their dust . Geez . Anyway , I grabbed a flashlight and lit it up and pointed it under the bench . Holy … Unbelievable .

These guys were a furry , sparkly , cushiony conglomeration of raging , toothy , chipmunk-gnomes and they were living in my garage and building a miniature city out of spare hardware and stolen scraps . There were piles of empty soda cans that they were linking together with vacuum hose to build some kind of underworld sputnik station . I could smell the petrol they were collecting in a small vat , and a can of lawnmower oil was laying on its side . The things’ eyes were blue , like a native Arakin’s , and every hair on their body lit up like a fiber optic party lamp .

I would have seen more , but the whole bunch of them were brandishing the wrenches that I had lost earlier but never really missed because I didn’t actually have any use for wrenches .
Needless to say , I left them to their business and got along with mine . They can have that little portion of the garage , and I’ll be sure to keep mine clutter free for now on . I’m hoping that they finish up with their project and move out of my neat and clean garage . The neighbors , I’ve noticed are kind of slobs ; maybe their sloppy garage will be more appealing to the chipmunk-creatures that I have in my sloth created .

Last night I spread a trail of birdseed over there , and left the open bag inside the overhead door . Don’t tell .

Tree lust , Day III

I think I am going crazy . The first indication of moving over to the ‘slightly off’ side is talking to yourself . Usually , when I hear people talking to themselves , I pretend I don’t . They might be carrying a weapon , and probably wouldn’t think twice using it on whoever or whatever might answer them in their ‘state’ . So far I only talk to myself when I am really miffed , and then it is loudly talking and I am prone to throwing things , too . So I don’t believe I am totally crazy yet , just going there .
My craziness involves trees , which I am finding fascinating more and more every day . It started with wanting a tree in my backyard . Until I had a backyard of my own I could have cared less about having a tree around . Now I had to have one . I dug up a small maple , probably just a season or two old , and stuck it in my yard . Maples are really common ; everyone knows a maple when they see it -- for goodness sakes , its leaf is on the Canadian flag , it’s a hockey logo ! Wow , look at that maple !

So , now my maple is looming over my porch ; soon it will by looming over the second story and dropping whirligigs into my gutters and I’ll be swearing at the damnable maple tree ! Still , I love it and anticipate the shade it will lend to the sun-baked porch and the wind break it will provide through the long winter months .
But it’s a maple ! So what !
Now there is a cherry tree next to my driveway . It was in a five gallon tub when I bought it for ten bucks . Now , for the first time , it is bursting with ripe red cherries . It bloomed like a wild thing this spring . Really , I don’t care for anything cherry , except maybe cherry Kool-Aid , but the birds are happy . There is a different cherry tree behind the house ; it bloomed these great big blossoms , like roses in triplicate , but so far no cherries ; maybe it is an ornamental cherry and won’t have fruit . That’s fine … don’t like cherries

Then of course , there is the little birch tree ; it is growing slowly . And the red maple ; also slowly growing . And the two crab apples that came from the Arbor Day Association -- the only two trees of the ten they sent that have survived . They are fruiting this year and I am looking forward to biting into the miniature , tart little apples .
Still , they are all pretty mundane , everyday trees . Common . Not weird in any way whatsoever . I wasn’t impressed .
Wandering around a garden shop I spotted an odd tree . It wasn’t very well developed , but looked great on the tag … a weeping mulberry . Fantastic . I waited for a sale and pounced . After a couple years it has flourished and looks like a giant Cousin It , standing tall over my garden , crowding out the coreopsis and the mounded cranes bill geranium .

A little ash was growing by the front walk , under the burning bush . That was last fall . Now it’s about three feet tall and star of a new garden bed at the yards west end . In 4 or 5 years it will doubtless be littering my yard with a deluge of fall leaves . Where am I going to put all those stupid leaves ?
Ash trees are boring as well , fast growing , possibly a bad choice as they can be devastated by insects from the orient , but lovely … all trees are .

After surfing around the net I came across another strange little number , a corkscrew hazelnut , also called a Harry Lauder’s Walking Stick . This is a peculiar little number . It’s branches twist and curl around and in and out and around themselves quite curiously . And every year they do so all over again until eventually I imagine the thing will look like a giant optical illusion of branches that will cross your eyes permanently , unless you avert your gaze . Now it is shrub-like , but in time it will mature into a great , crazy behemoth of insane Halloweeny proportions . Can’t wait .


Of course I’ve seen more trees about and in the shops , and on the internet , that I covet . Take for example the Chinese dogwood , or the yellowwood tree . Also , the tulip poplar , with it’s softly shaded and perfect tulip-like spring blooms . Across the street are two awesome sweet gums , complete with their alienesque seed pods , sometimes called monkey balls , that will eventually mature and drop to the lawn and probably get stepped on by bare feet to cause surprised yelps . I want one ! I am running by them every few days on my way back from neighborhood jogs to monitor their progress … how long does it take to grow a sweet gum by seed ? An eternity , I suppose .
Now I have found another little thing growing in my yard , and I dug it up and moved it into an empty spot , a place once occupied by a dogwood bush that had started looking rather seedy -- like a tramp that thought to homestead next to the quaint brick walkway . Like a heartless landlord I evicted the poor sucker . The new renter is quiet , and unobtrusive . Sure , now he is , but in a couple years what will he be like ? I know nothing about this guy , don’t even know if he is really a tree , or just some shrubby thing , or maybe even a shiny weed ? Who knows ? Not me !

My wife says I’m crazy . I tell her there’s a little room over here , between the maple and cherry for a little specimen tree . She says , “You’re nuts .” She’s probably right .