Simple Pleasures

I'm enjoying my first week of the summer away from the house, slopping up the "down time" from my usual routines.  I miss the scooter and my travels on it, but not so much that I plan to go running back a minute sooner than I need to.  I miss the PC by my desk as well, but between the laptop, netbook, tablet, iPod, and my phone, all of which I have with me, it's not like I'm cut off from the world.

Having taken typing class in high school 40 years ago my fingers are well accustomed to the usual sizes and shapes of keys on a keyboard and to the typical distances between them.  The netbook and laptop give me just a little difficulty until I'm at one of them for a while and get into the different feel of each keyboard.  I tried writing part of the dippy eggs entry two days ago in the dark, in the car while my host was at a chorus practice, but I didn't last long.

Eventually, after having had to bend the viewing screen downward to give some light to the keyboard each time I had to backspace over an error or try to edit and improve a thought, I gave in, braved the rain, and used the lobby of the church in which the chorus was practicing to finish writing.  As luck had it, there was a tiny table, just big enough for the netbook to sit upon right beside a big, wooden rocking chair.  It was like being in heaven compared to the passenger side of the car!

Every time I encounter or pass by the sight of people working I feel as if I'm being infused with blessings in the realization that for the next bunch of weeks I'm on hiatus from the rat race.  Then again, work is a relative term.  I might be able to stand around watching another guy work as many of the gentlemen on a road construction crew often appear to be doing more so than actually working themselves.  Is it any wonder why I seem to encounter what I call "stop sign monkeys" on every road I travel?  If all that watching got put into actual labor, the road projects would take less time and save us a bunch of money!  Yes there is a bit of tongue in cheek there, but honestly, I'm not sure how much.

Hardly any of the foods I've eaten since I left on Monday morning have been of the kind that I get on a daily basis, so I've been taking advantage of the varied offerings with relish.  (No, not THAT kind of relish!)  Breakfasts, in particular, have been out of this world with corn fritters, dippy eggs, and today, buckwheat pancakes!  I woke up this morning to the amazing smell of those buckwheat pancakes being made.  Some years back in the home of the gentleman who I mentioned in the "Dippy Eggs" post I had the opportunity to smell the batter from which these pancakes are made.  There was no way I ever imagined myself eating anything created from that glop.  A year or two later I was bullied into attending a buckwheat pancake dinner at a fire hall out in Western Pennsylvania to which I went most grudgingly.  Before I was finished I was practically being dragged away from the table.  Did I mention that it was an ALL YOU CAN EAT buchwheat pancake dinner?

I've noticed that my thoughts here at the blog are quite scattered.  I know they're like that much of the time, but they seem to be more so than ever this summer, although perhaps that observation is strictly subjective because I gave myself the whole school year off from writing.  It doesn't really matter, though.  If Blogger is still around when I'm in a nursing home spending half of each day in trying to remember who I am, perhaps the varied memories I'm recording here now will put an occasional smile on my crinkly lips and help me to remember some of the best days of my life.  I'm living them now, and thanking God for each and every one of them.