August 21, 2015

This is my second post-summer blog post (my post-post). I'm on a roll -- I might even write a third one if my brain can stand it.

Last Saturday I decided it was time to start thinking about housecleaning, so I walked down the street to Fanci Freez to think about it over some ice cream and a cherry Coke. The conclusion I came to is that I don't have to think about it again until next week.

My mom never had to think about housecleaning because she was already doing it. She never stopped. Every Saturday morning she chased my sister and me from our beds so she could wash the sheets. Then she tossed us outside (not literally but almost) so she could clean the place from top to bottom. We'd hear her call for us sometime after 3:00, when we'd remove our shoes before entering. If our shoes were muddy, they didn't come in with us. If we were muddy, we didn't come in with us, either. Here's how clean she was. She had hundreds of books shelved in bookcases with sliding glass doors. At least once a month, she'd sit down on the freshly vacuumed carpet, slide open each door, and dust every book. Did I say the books were behind glass? I'm talking clean here.

Is it awful for me to say that the Soda Fire, which has consumed thousands and thousands of acres so far here in Idaho, is making for some spectacular sunsets?

Lily Taylor plays Corey, a songwriting high school student, in Cameron Crowe's Say Anything (1989). Corey and Joe have broken up. In an early scene that takes place at a rowdy kegger, she sits on a sofa with her guitar and announces to the room, "I wrote sixty-three songs this year. They're all about Joe, and I'm going to play every single one of them tonight." I thought about that scene this week because I've been listening to Adele 21. Great CD, great voice. Great songs. But after the first five or six, I started to feel like the Best Pal who sits with you on the edge of the bed handing you tissue after tissue and telling you it's not the end of the world. Still, though, great CD.

After 18 months and four ophthalmologists (or was it five?), I finally have new prescription lenses. No more eyestrain or headaches. I should sue all of them for my co-pays. The night before, I dreamed I was telling a friend that I was finally getting back my "sight for sore eyes." I wish I were that witty in real life.

On film violence: As much as I revere The Godfather, I never found that street fight between Sonny and Carlo to be entirely convincing. On the other hand, what Woodrow Call did to that soldier for whipping Newt in Lonesome Dove really shocked me at the time -- I couldn't help but wonder whether CBS had had any qualms about airing the scene uncut.

The other night I had my first dream about Madonna, but it wasn't a nightmare.

I once got on an elevator in the office building where I worked while holding a copy of Hemingway's short stories. An executive standing beside me saw the book and said, "Taking a class?" Another time, I was working on a story on the porch of the apartment building where I lived. A girl who was probably no older than 14 stepped outside and saw me. "What are you doing?" she said. "Writing a story." This was her reply: "Do you have to?" Both times I wondered whether I should apologize for being literate or just do my reading and writing inside my little blanket fort at night.

It's Opening Day for the Western Idaho Fair, so I went this morning with my friend Tami and her two impeccably behaved boys. (If there's a Hall of Fame for Perfect Children, they're shoo-ins.) Tami and I enjoyed looking at the photo and quilt exhibits, but nothing really stood out for me. I was much more enamored of the Special Award ribbons themselves, which are a burst of primary colors. If there were an exhibit for ribbons, the Special Award ribbon would win itself. Because of the outlying fire, Boise's air quality level today was code red, or level red -- anyway, something red, red being bad. It didn't seem to affect us, though. The boys rode all the rides about 200 times and were still spinning upside down in the back seat when we left the parking lot to go home.

P.S. I tried my first-ever corn dog this afternoon. Let's just say I don't plan on waiting another six decades before having another one.