Who says men can't multi-task?

This morning, when I woke up, rather late for a Sunday morning, I took the dog out to do his business, made my breakfast, ate my breakfast, made Cindy's coffee, served Cindy's coffee, went to the grocery to buy items for making a side dish for church supper today, came home, made the side dish, took a shower in which I bathed the dog as well, dried myself, dried the dog, rinsed out the shower, dressed for church, vacuumed part of the bedroom where a frame had broken, tied my bow tie, watched most of CBS Sunday Morning and waited for Cindy to be ready to drive to church. At this point, someone asked me if I wasn't suffering from some mental disability because I had forgot the ice and altoids when I went to the grocery.

Afterward, I took the dog out again, packed the side dish for transfer to church, got into the car with Cindy, drove to church, removed the side dish and took it to the church kitchen and placed it inside a warming oven, drove Cindy to a parking space where she could complete her makeup, walked into church and said hello to several members of the church as I went to choir, put my choir robe on, gathered my music, went into the choir room where I practiced the anthem with the choir, sang in the choir during the service, joined Cindy afterward, went to the family center where I ate dinner, joined the adults who were involved with entertainment for the children, participated in the children's games, drove us home, separated and took out the trash, drove Kate's car to the self serve carwash and washed and vacuumed the car, got into a two hour conversation with a friend I ran into at the car wash, drove to the bank to get cash, drove to the grocery to buy food for making supper,including ice, altoids and candy for any stray trick-or-treaters who might come around tonight, drove home, made supper, served supper, including steak, salad and home made macaroni and cheese, started cleaning up supper, blew the pine straw and leaves off the driveway and front walk, readied the front for any trick-or-treaters, put the extra food away including lunch for Cindy for tomorrow, watched a little tv, went upstairs, napped for awhile, filled a foot massager with warm water and soap for Cindy, placed the foot massager on a towel for Cindy, read facebook notices, started this blog, took the dog out, continued to clean up the pots and pans from supper, tried to clean up a bit in the kitchen.

At this point, someone said that we hadn't accomplished the things we needed to do on Sunday afternoon and would need to take care of it in the evenings during the week.

Pay attention to the Little Football too, folks

Well, today started off with me waking up at 7:45 and realizing I had to meet with clients at 8:00. So I brushed my teeth, dressed, tried to comb my unruly hair and hopped in my car to go to the home of the borrowers. Afterward, I drove over to Hardees to get some breakfast, stopped by the bank for some cash, then headed home.

Afterward, I spoke with a rep from the lender and found that I needed signatures on three more documents, so I contacted the borrowers, and headed back to their home for further signatures. I got to go to the office and the post office and actually take a shower and shave.

Afterward, Cindy and I headed up to Dunwoody where we picked Kate up and drove to a Vietnamese/Louisiana seafood store on Buford Highway, the former "touch of country in the city", where we ate shrimp po-boys and drank Louisiana tea, then headed back to Dunwoody to shop for Christmas and birthdays. I picked up a pair of kelly green chuck taylors for my better coolness in dress.

Afterward, I headed back to Mom's house to find that Washington and Lee had won again, to find themselves tied with Hampden Sydney, who is undefeated and rated number 19 in the country, and guess what, we get to play them next Saturday on Wilson Field in Lexington, my old home field at W&L. I wish I could be in Lexington next Saturday, but I think Momma's birthday is a little more important. Perhaps they will win and I will be able to see them playing in the NCAA Division Three playoffs. That would be sweet.

So I know it is "little football" and the players are a little closer to being normally sized and I realize that we produce more lawyers, doctors and businessmen than NFL football players, but it will be a big game on Saturday, no matter what. And all of the players actually belong in college. Something you can't necessarily say about the guys you see on the field on your television every Saturday.

Well, that is enough. Ring Tum Phi Stickeri Bum, We're the boys from Lexington....

I wish I had a copy of The Punch Brothers playing the Washington and Lee Swing in Rockbridge County this Fall. I will just add that to my facebook page. Still one of the best fight songs in American College athletics. And the only one which is also a Dixieland Jazz song.

Friday night in the Fall

Friday has arrived which means that the weekend is almost over, which is somewhat pessimistic, but I was listening to the radio, while I drove around Griffin, and a local pundit (they are everywhere) stated that in his opinion the bulldogs were going to get beat by Florida by a few points. This was disapointing, since I had come to the opinion that Georgia would beat Florida by a few points tomorrow. I am now sad because Georgia will play Florida tomorrow and tomorrow night W&L will play Catholic tomorrow night. If I can only get one victory tomorrow, let it be W&L. They have more to lose and more to gain. So go Generals! The Falcons don't play.

I have got a closing first thing in the morning, and I do mean first thing, eight o'clock a.m. That is awful early for a real estate closing to me.

I am in need of changing into my pajamas, so carry on, boys and girls.

I do remember

There is a portly dude, who was just one of the guys at school, pretty funny, fun to be around in the dorm room, enjoyed his beer and the occasional grain party out in the country, and he had an uncle who was something for awhile, which maybe gave him the notion that he was something as well, I don't know, don't really care, but anywy he left home and ended up in California, like every other American notion, and now he is on the little rectangle and the big one and the one you bought at the movie store for $9.99, because it was pre-viewed and the damn thing has a glitch in the middle where it jerks and becomes snowy, but you can still see him and he seems lost, kind of like he did when he wandered into your dorm room that night and ended up listening to music on the floor and fell asleep and you closed the door and turned off the lights, and your girlfriend at the time was really irritated because she couldn't figure out why you wanted to let him just sleep there, but it was alright and you wonder now if he even remembers things like that, incidents when he was just a junior in the dorm and had too much to drink and fell asleep while some music you don't even listen to played and woke up and left without saying anything until you saw him in the dining hall and smiled and he nodded his head and you really think that was the last time you spoke to him until after graduation and he hugged your mother and danced away, off to California and sunshine and wine and fun with this celebrity and that one and there is probably a cute blonde who thinks he is funny and he is happy and making loads of money and partying with all the actors and television people and working on this project or that and you wonder if he remembers you as you drive into work in the morning, listening to top 40 radio and they are talking about local celebrities and his name came up and you thought, "hey, I wonder if he remembers that time he fell asleep in my dorm room?"

He looks good in the picture.

A run at the night

I love technology. I decided that before I went to bed that I would enter a post on my blog. It seemed like I had forgotten to write, although I had been entering little posts on facebook, which is fun, but doesn't fulfill like this does. This is more complex and more full and doesn't cowtow to others. I write this and you can't stop me, nah nah nah nah nah.

Then I got caught up in google-ville, where I couldn't access my blogsite, because I couldn't seem to remember my user name or my password. And I wandered around staring at the halls of electronic cubbyholes which didn't lead me anywhere except back where I started from and then I figured it out and here I am and I am now obligated to write something else and my brain is frittering.

I watched a program on a rock and roll photographer who photographed all the famous rock guitarists for the last thirty years, but is stuck trying to sell his work so he can take care of his mother who has altheimers. It got me thinking. I seem to lose my ability to come up with words from time to time and I think my brain needs exercise. The short sprints of facebook are unavailing. I need something which will require me to run for long distances. My body needs that and my brain needs that.

So here I am. I'll go to bed soon, but need to run a bit more. Its raining tonight, and I have been out in it every time I tried to get in my car. Fortunately, I am at home now and I am soon going to bed, so this is it and goodnight.

Macon-time

I drove down to Macon and had to drive up from the hospital, where they apparently have no independent computers, short of the computer system which probably has a monitor and keyboard in front of every employee other than the security gaurd who had to leave his post and go ask someone if there were any computers available. Odd.

Anyway, the borrower and I had to drive up to the north side of Macon and find our way to the Fedex Office (formerly Kinko's) so I could use their computers and download some documents for our closing.

After completing this task, I waited for the borrower to arrive. When she got there, we walked into the Panera's next door and found a table. After going through the closing documents, we bid adieu and I got in line to buy a sandwich, chips, pastry and iced tea.

I sat down at the same table I had left with the borrower and started to eat lunch. I looked around. The only thing which was ridiculous as the configuration of the restaurant was the number of laptops in the place. Almost every other table had at least one laptop, some had two.

I couldn't figure it out. Most of the laptop owners/users seemed to be using them as table decorations as they talked with each other. Was it some kind of status symbol?
I had to leave the world of laptop decorations. I got in my car and drove back to Griffin, where laptops are used on laps when one wants to compute something, rather than when our tables need decoration.

Sometimes progress is just an excuse for upgrading our statuses.

Baseball is over here

Yesterday evening, I went to bed knowing that the Braves had been eliminated and Bobby Cox had come to his last day as manager of the Braves. A year which had so much promise and opportunity, which had shown a lot of pluck and effort and a little bit of luck. But now it was over. Quite sad.

Tonight, Texas eliminated Tampa Bay. Poor Ed. He was at the game. That would be hard.

Baseball begins in Spring, when the world is recreating itself again. Soft green grass and pastel flowers appearing on the ground. Azaleas in bloom. Pure white blossoms of the dogwoods among the evergreens. There is so much possibility and newness.

But it ends in Autumn, when the year is dying and heading toward Winter and the end of the year. We want it to last another week, another couple of weeks. But the gig is up now. They had a story on the news tonight and they showed the players removing their possessions from their lockers. They were talking about who would manage next year.

Something special is over. Possibility will return next Spring.

Meantime, football is in full swing, not halfway over.

Full circle

"My thoughts are scattered and they're cloudy...."

I drove Cindy to work in the morning. The radio played as we traveled the streets to Griffin Technical College. After dropping her off, I continued to my office. The cars around me swirled around as if I were in an eddy of a river and the water was moving around me, independently, uncontrollably. The light in the morning was silver, flowing like mercury around me and I felt like I was tied to the ground, trapped in mud. My feet of mud, also.

I slogged toward my office and the car stopped and I stepped out onto the drive. Today, I received a small gift as I stepped across the parking lot. The aroma of one of the flowering bushes swelled up from off the drive. It caught my attention and I had to stand still and try to find the source of the sweet smell. In hindsight, I think I found it. I don't know.

I lurched up the wooden stairs, grasping the handrail on the stairwell. I looked above to see if someone was there, awaiting me. There wasn't. I was alone on the second floor. I grasped the small, hard key to my office from my pocket and inserted it into the lock.

I opened the door and found the mess I had left when I left my office on the previous Saturday afternoon. I sat down heavily in my chair. I turned on the computer and I looked out the window. The leaves on the trees were turning. An ambulance drove by on the street below, its siren throbbing through the windows and the shades.

I tried to do something, anything. I completed some tasks, but it was a slow, dreadfully slow day. The next day I realized how little I had accomplished, by the mass of tasks left undone for that day.

At the end of the day, I was waiting for the time when I could leave my office and go pick up Cindy. I pulled the travel bar from my bookcase and poured myself a shot of bourbon. I turned on the music on my computer and listened to Earth, Wind and Fire sing about Autumn and lost loves. It reminded me of Lexington and college days and yearning in my dorm room for someone on the other side of the continent. The same one I would be picking up at Griffin Tech in a few minutes.

And so the world came full circle in the still, dying day. An afternoon in Autumn. Again.

Ancient battles

Theseus played for the Athens nine;
The Minotaur pitched for Minos that day
Old time Giants were taking the field,
As aroma of incense filtered down
From the Olympian concession stand.
The chorus were all seated
For a contest without rival
For the reputation of this Minotaur
Was such that all of Greece
Expected goose eggs that afternoon,
But the sun shone sweetly on all equally
And the bravery of the Athenian
Was undisputed in the antique marketplace.

"Play ball," called out the ancient bard
And the contestants then took the field
The sheen of the pristine grass shown brightly
In the heat of the afternoon sun.
As the Minotaur took his warmup tosses,
Theseus strode forward, swinging his tool
And a roar from the chorus arose
From the throats of each member
No one would expect a less
Than classical result
When Theseus and the Minotaur
Took their respective places
On either end of the diamond.

And thus it began, as the Minotaur
Reared his head back and roared
As let loose the historic first pitch
But Theseus feigned sleepy indifference
As the ball made its way to the mitt.
"Strike one" cried the referee
And the chorus bellowed disapproval
But Theseus would have none of this
And waved off the crowd's haranguing.

The Minotaur shook his bullish mane
Reared back again and let loose the pill
A second pitch so hard and fierce
As to shake the Corinthian columns
Of the ancient, marble stadium
But Theseus seemed to see nothing amiss
As "strike two" found sanctuary in the catcher's glove
The wind blew out in harmony from the Athenian chorus
As Theseus offered the assemblage a knowing smile.

So the Minotaur finally took a confident twirl
And hurled the ball once more from the hill
But the weapon of choice of that ancient hero
Gave impetus to meeting of ball and bat.
The ball took flight toward Olympian heights
As the bard licked his pen and mythologized
In the marble temple their names are now enshrined
As the beast of Minos and the nimble hero
Who laid wood to ball and sent that spheroid
To float away toward Alcatraz
From the ink-stained blackness of McCovey's cove.