As a man of habit, I do all of our white laundry on Wednesday and all day long I sing an ode to it in honor of Billy Idol. White Wednesday
It's a...nice day to...start a LOAD.
In this weeks installment of getting older discoveries, I woke up at 4am-ish the other morning to pee. In my haze, thought it was a decent output, but as soon as I climbed back into the sack, felt an immediate need to go pee again. That feels like some old guy shit to me, and also feel like I've related this story in this space before, which is equally unsettling.
My love/hate relationship with Facebook continues. Have been noticing a lot of postings from FB into my feed about what it is like to be an introvert. Things like 'why they don't like small talk', or 'prefer to have a night home alone'. What did I click on that makes them think I am an introvert, or is it because they feel I am one? Or am I one and they have correctly analyzed me as such?
It was Mother's Day last Sunday and a memory from Little League days came back as I reflected upon mine. While not a massive baseball fan, she was a fan of me and can't remember her ever missing a game. While not well versed in baseball lingo, she did like to cheer (loudly) and somehow landed on the perfect thing to say in all circumstances. Whether we were on defense or at bat, she would yell "Double Double". I can hear it in her tone clear as a bell. It works on defense as she wanted a double play, or at bat asking me to hit a double. It was so perfect a cheer that even in the post-game breakdown, she could say it as we drove to In-n-Out burger.
It was annual air raid siren week. Have learned to plan ahead to be indoors when it goes off. A reminder that while we live in a place that feels completely safe, that the place lives under constant threat is not far below the surface.
The Taipei City government has announced that an air defense exercise (Wan An No. 40) will be held from 1:30 p.m.-2:00 p.m. on Thursday, May 18, 2017.
During the 30 minute exercise, the trains will be operating as usual. However, passengers will not be able to exit the MRT station after they arrive on the train. Please also note that vehicles cannot be driven on Taipei streets during the exercise (highways are not restricted). If you happen to be outdoors when the alarm sounds, you (and your vehicle) will be required to pull to the side of the road and/or take cover nearby. Please plan accordingly.
Was talking to my brother-in law and recommending he check out the Midnight Oil show in his town in a few days. He said that he'd like to go but can't as he and his "buddies are getting together to sample single malt scotch and some of California's finest artisinal hydroponic grows." I think he phrased it that way to entertain me cause he knows I am a fan of coastal elite superiority speak.
To put a bow on the last couple weeks postings regarding the Italian restaurant up the street, we honored our reservation on Tuesday and had a delightful meal. They had a special appetizer of eggplant parmigiana that was as good as I've ever had. While the furor around their alleged racism against Chinese was proven to be just the opposite, we learned that there is a whistle blower industry here that is quite interesting. Have long observed that there is little government presence on the streets and that it doesn't feel that the authorities are aggressive in monitoring businesses. The way they keep tabs on scofflaws is to pay citizens to rat on businesses that are breaking the rules. A buddy is involved with an organization here and he spent a few days last week with investigators going through his books. They found a ticky-tack violation and that there will be fines involved, but they were apologizing at the time cause it was so minor. They went on to detail that the reason he was called to their attention is that someone alerted them and that if they find something, that person receives an NT$70,000 (about US$2,300) reward. Many people make their living doing this. While my initial reaction was one of disgust that your neighbor would be secretly watching you in a Stalinesque manner, maybe this is more efficient than paying tons of officials to go on hunting expeditions. Can see this being abused, but that this place feels totally safe yet free, maybe they are onto something?
On our commute to work, we drive by a hospital and see some weird shit from time to time. While stopped at the traffic light yesterday, was able to catch this image of a patient, freshly bandaged and hooked up to an IV, breaking out to grab a smoke. Classic Taiwan.
Last weekend was the High School's sports awards banquet. We had never gone but they told us the Boy was getting an award. Was a fun night, we went out for a cocktail with friends afterwards and Boy-o received the baseball teams MVP award.
A motley crew. Very deserving cause he was one of the couple of kids that know how to play. Was also a decent opportunity put on a jacket and get our photo taken.
Gawdamn...my hair looks totally white
I made reservations for dinner at the Italian place (I don't say the name cause anyone that searched for it would be given this diary as a search result, and just don't need the local community being a regular reader) so the family could have one of our last dinners together. Betty was working with his friends to give him a surprise b-day party and this was the only night where it worked for them. I'm not proud of this, but I have this thing where I don't recognize birthdays. For me, I don't want a party and would just assume no one knows. One day, think it'd be interesting to find out the underlying reason for that, but what I'm not proud of is to not make other people's birthday a big deal too. I gather that Betty is still peeved that I didn't do a big thing for her 50th. Boy-o turned 18 this year, which is pretty big obviously, and I barely remembered. Fortunately, Betty stepped up and arranged to get all his local buddies together for a dinner.
Clockwise from the Boy (I think): Joe, Evan, Carmel, Fred, Ethan, Oscar. Mike, Chad, Catherine and Katie. OK, I totally made up at least three of those names as I have never seen them before. He was surprised and it sounded like a good time. I told him not to be like me with regards to birthdays and that he can't tell his future therapist that his parents never gave him a birthday party. Hey wait a minute, I never had a birthday party growing up. Could that be the source of my hang-up?
That was Tuesday. Last night was senior prom. As I write this, it is Saturday morning and he has not come home. He asked the young lady next to him in the above picture to be his date...her family lives in the building across the street from us, so we had the opportunity to get the obligatory photos.
Here is a question that needs answering but I won't spend researching. I know the boy is responsible to get a corsage for the girl. but who is responsible for the boutonniere? Betty says the girl, but others say the boy gets his own.
Anyhoo, we had a friend who was a chaperone at the prom and said she'd spy in him for us. Haven't had a full download with her, but she reported some slow dancing and got this photo at some point.
Am looking at Facebook this AM, and one of his buddy's moms posts that she went down to pick up her son at 2AM after a post-prom clubbing session. She puts some pics of that group up on-line, and there is Boy-o hamming it up with a different girl.
Doubt he's gonna do any sharing, but definitely a story that I'd like to hear one day. Regardless, from what I know of him, he seems like a gentleman when it comes to the opposite sex. I know I have spent his first 18 years subtly infusing a respect for girls into his mind. A consistent message is to make sure that they look out for those that are in danger of being taken advantage of. For Babydoll, always keep your girlfriends close and never leave without them. For the Boy, was able to run through the details of the Penn State frat numbskulls that abused some freshman and ended up killing him. It is fine to have some drinks, but when the goal is to get you as drunk as possible, those are not the types of people you want to throw down with. And they are also the ones that won't think twice about trying that trick on some girl. There will be a time when he is going to have to put himself in danger to protect someone else and pray that this muscle twitches naturally.
Finally in Boy-o related news, this week saw the news out of Charlottesville, which is the town where UVA is located. They got in the news as the town was taking down a statue of Robert E Lee (it is up for sale, not to be scrapped), and a couple of dozen of America's finest went to the Pier One imports, got tiki torches and went out to declare that they didn't want their "heritage" taken down, and then littered their chants with "Russia is good" and some thinly veiled Nazi slogans. Happen to listen to Ezra Klein's podcast this week, which had on a Black author who gave an impassioned and powerful interview about why these monuments are so offensive. That one is so worth your time. Anyway, for those racist white bread pieces of shit, you should strive for something better.
No comments:
Post a Comment