Stinking Groundhog

It would appear that winter will indeed linger for a while before decent riding weather is back with us. Though we missed the huge storm over the weekend we paid the piper sufficiently today. The BV will sit silently once again till all this new stuff melts and evaporates. It does sap the spirit some when one can't hop on the bike and just hit the road when the whim strikes.

I find myself wondering what I did for all those years, before I got my first taste of scootering, when I needed to unwind and introspect as I do when I'm out riding. I can't think of a thing I ever did that gives me the same kind of cerebral and emotional satisfaction as I get when I'm cruising around on the scooter and wrestling with issues and concerns that need pondering, kneading, and juggling. If I'm sitting in a stationary chair it's too easy to be distracted by the computer, the TV, nearby conversation and the like, and once I'm distracted, there goes whatever focus I might have been giving to some idea.

Riding demands concentration and steady alertness. That same hyper vigilance that I'm giving to staying upright and out of contact with other vehicles or the ground seems to be transferred to my thought processes in general. Aw, heck! I just pay better attention to myself when I'm on the scooter. It's not the same when driving the car. Though that needs concentration too, I don't think it's nearly the same kind as when you're as vulnerable as your precious cranium is when you're on two wheels. Ergo, what you get out of your head isn't of the same quality on four wheels. And more than four wheels? Forget it! I think there's an inverse correlation between the number of wheels and mental activity, ability, and quality. (Luckily, the folks whom I might have insulted here won't know what "inverse correlation" means and won't come gunning for me with their rigs.)

So, here I sit unable to get my brain in the right gear 'cause the snow has the scooter grounded. Whatever will I do with all of these thoughts that demand pondering in the mean time? Perhaps I'll assign them numbers based on priority and wait for the thaw to hit. Big, chunky, stinky ones to the front of the line. Feeble little pellets, to the rear. Or is that from the rear?

Snowmageddon

I heard one of the local newscasters yesterday refer to "Snowmageddon" but I was only listening over my shoulder while I was here at the computer, and only half listening so I couldn't even figure out what the heck he was saying from context.  It wasn't till this morning when I read the invented term on CNN that the light went off in my head and I realized what the guy had said yesterday.

For the first time, to my conscious knowledge, a major snow storm tracked far enough to our south to leave us unscathed.  Two feet of snow in Washington, D.C. and this is what I awoke to yesterday morning...

What I didn't sweep with a broom was melted by noon and we were dry!  The car didn't even need to be brushed off.  The wind was sufficient to clear the light amount of snow that had fallen from its smooth surface.

Another storm is headed this way for Wednesday.  I'll hope for a rerun of this one!

Keeping the Werewolves Out

I don't know if this post attempt is going to work from here. We'll see...

Instead of just hanging out alone at the house as pathetically as I did all day I came out for the sake of getting out. I'm at Panera Bread with a pecan twist resting comfortably in my gut and a chocolate pastry on its way to rejoining its old plate buddy. A cup of decaf's keeping me warm along with my winter coat that's still zipped, and I imagine that the fireplace about six feet away is helping too. It's COLD here in Pennsylvania.

A college girl with "MANDA" across the back of her sweat pants makes me yearn for that time in my own life, 30 years ago, when I'd have made some substantially different choices if I could have known then things that I know now. But Thomas Wolfe was right. You can't go home again. The best you can do some Saturday nights is to sit with a bunch of strangers all around you in a warm place that, if it were darker and served stout, warm ale, might have been one of those English inns of yore where the heavy oaken door was the only thing keeping the werewolves out on the moor.

I have to pee. Do I carry this iPod in with me? I don't want to pocket it and risk losing all that I've typed with my nose picking finger so far. And I need more coffee. Am I supposed to take the mug in with me too?

I'm back. I refilled before I hit the head and left the full cup on the table to keep my space. I slipped the iPod into my loose jacket pocket only long enough to use the urinal and wash my hands.

The place was hopping when I got here but it's emptying out. The conversations aren't really worth trying to latch onto. A woman a while ago was telling her friend firmly, "Stop being the mother!" She repeated to punctuate it. I hear myself often saying pretty much the opposite to somebody I love. Maybe I should just be more grateful that I got to be a daddy and never had to be a mother. Hopefully I'll never have to be the focus on some therapist's couch. Oh! Wait! I've already been that. Dear, God! Where my thoughts go when I type with one finger! This sure ain't the piece of writing that might have come out of me if I were back in my usual chair.

It's nearly an hour since I got here. I didn't write much because of the slow input pace but I like the different style of prose that came out of my fingertip. It's a stream of something, though not necessarily consciousness. I'm sending this and hoping it'll hit the blog as intended; if not I'll fix it at the PC later.

That's it. I'm out of here. Now I gotta fart and if I dare do it on this faux leather I fear I'll bounce like a jackhammer.

[I did have to fix the post when I got back to the house. All the text south of the picture was missing from the original post. Good thing I had the presence of mind to e-mail the whole post to myself. In addition, I can't seem to be able to justify the type now. Maybe if I try to edit the HTML... Yeah! That did it!]

[Oh! As for the picture. I took it with my phone, e-mailed it to the iPod, and then inserted it into the post. Any kludge in a storm, right?]