Mourning Doves



Kitchen Window

Growing Lonely

 

 Hope Street



Crab Sandwich

 

Hold the onion

Yesterday's News

No Title Required...

They Never Saw it Coming

Possey Rental

$12.50 per hour

New England Clam Sandwich

with cheese



Early Zippo



Olive or Twist

Four-Four Time

Birth of a Martini



The Fourtune Cookie



So What's With The Hat?

I don’t remember her name.  In fact, I didn’t even meet her until much later in life.  She had been married and had one daughter.  The only reason I knew this is because they were working at the same place when I met them.

It had been an ugly, nasty divorce; both sides saying things, harsh, mean-spirited things.  Possessions and friends were divided, keepsakes damaged and feelings hurt.  Whatever love there was had been completely lost in the flurry of accusations.

            The lawyers, I’m sure, were the only survivors of this painful event.  It had left her with a very bitter feeling towards men.  I don’t believe I would be too far off saying that she actually hated all men. 

 

           You could hear her feelings surface in general conversations no matter who she was talking with.  Somehow her agitation level had never tapered off.  This was simply who she was now; a very hurt and angry lady, who at this late stage in life had to rejoin the workforce to keep things going.

 

            Unfortunately I did not know any of this.  My encounter happened on a Saturday.  I was in need of a haircut and her little sign was lit up:

 

 

            Walk-ins Welcome

All in Favor...

This past week was loaded with things to tell you about.  Some of course, weather related, some involving poltergeist, and a couple personal observations.  I’ve selected one that has a little of all those things, except the poltergeist.

It doesn’t start at the beginning of the week, but rather just an hour ago.  I woke up thinking about art museums.  I enjoy going to art museums and seeing the great paintings, but more than that, I’m impressed by the monumental event that it represents.  Here is a very large and graceful building with marble floors and velvet ropes, housing wandering guards and the whispering public, all enjoying paintings that the majority of Earth’s art viewing population has agreed upon is the best of the best.

It is that agreed upon  part that captivates me.  Paper or plastic is a major decision for a lot of us and to get a small group of people to agree upon anything usually takes a well-polished orator with a cliff full of ocean view condos and the promise of a continental breakfast.  So how in the World did the art viewing population ever agree that Goya is good, he can stay, but Perchburger doesn’t cut it, he’s out?  And where and when did this take place?  Really, I’m curious.  I don’t want to sit through a semester of art history to find out but I think it is a monumental event when looking at humans and their struggle to make decisions.

(for example)

We arrived a bit early yesterday at a wedding reception.  Because of the weather we had left ourselves plenty of time to get there.   When we walked in we had our choice of where to sit from approximately 80 large tables.  This was tricky; the longer we took to decide, the more variables we came up with.  We wanted to see what was going on,so we didn’t pick the far back corner but hen again we didn’t want to be right next to the dance floor.  The far left of the room was too far from the music and the wedding table and well it just got more and more complicated from there.

We finally chose a table in the center of the room but back against the wall.  This spot seemed central to everything without being in the way of anything.  Mentally exhausted, we plopped down in our chosen seats feeling proud of our decision.

We chose wrong.  The tables filled up quickly and soon the place was full with everyone settled in.  The table right next to us lit up their cigarettes while the HVAC system gathered their exhaled fumes and pumped them into a cloud that hung suspended over our table.  Had we not been busy gagging we probably would have been very impressed with how this cloud defied the laws of physics and didn’t waft away to any other part of the room.

(OK, back to the topic)

I guess each of us likes or dislikes art for our own personal reasons. All of the variables that affect our decision making process are not constants.  They change as our mood changes.  They change with different types of lighting or the use of one color over another. 

The next time I’m in the art museum I think I’m going to work my way over to one of the wandering guards.  They spend hours and hours, day after day in there and over the course of their working life have run the gamut of various human emotions.  They have seen those painting well lit and in the dim of closure.  I’ll simply ask one of them,

“So when you go to a wedding reception, where do you like to sit?”  

More a Warning than Selling Point

 

 

            When walking in the forest one of the first things I notice is the absolute quiet.  The moment I stop walking and the crunch, crunch, crunch of underfoot leaves and twigs stops, there is nothing but my own breathing and maybe, just maybe the whisper of a slight breeze tickling the backsides of leaves - just enough to make them giggle.

 

            So imagine my surprise when I discovered the hardwood floors throughout my house were made from Squeakwood Trees up in the Thunderous Mountains, in Areyouawakeyet County.  Each and every step alerts the entire household that you are up and walking around, including the cat who immediately thinks its time to get up and make noise of his own.
 

            I can’t help but wonder what a walk in the woods sounds like in Areyouawakeyet, where everything around is Squeakwood.  Just the noise from scampering squirrels would be heard for miles.  And running deer… forget about it.

 

            I only mention this so you’ll know when shopping for your next house.

 

            “Hardwood floors throughout…”



Cooking with Mittens

There are many things they neglect to mention on the cooking shows, important things that had I known - may have saved me a bundle.

 

          When making cookies from a recipe that calls for a stick of butter, it is important to let the butter soften completely before attempting to blend it into the mix.

 

1.       Burnt out mixer:            $63.95

 

          Whenever flicking something off of your sharp kitchen knife into the sink make sure the blade of the knife does not accidentally whack off a chunk of the faucet.

 

2.       Kitchen Faucet:      $278.50

 

          Placing food sprinkled with olive oil into a 400° oven will fill the kitchen with smoke.

 

3.       Kitchen curtains:              $27.00

4.       Smoke Alarm:                 $31.00

5.       Smoke Alarm Battery:     $2.79

 

Of course, there are many other things that I have discovered; however, I shall share those on another day.

 

I will mention that peeling hard-boiled eggs is my least favorite thing.  In searching the Internet for an easy way to peel them, I found a video showing this person breaking off both ends of the eggshell and then blowing the hard-boiled egg out, using his mouth.  Talk about disgusting.  You will never see me going to his house for egg salad. 

 

As long as I am on the subject of germ-fest 2000, let me tell you…  We were walking through the store last weekend when we saw this.  It is one of those stores that have people stationed at various end-caps handing out food samples.

The person was wearing gloves as they should but unconsciously, as they were preparing the snacks, they were bringing their hand up to their mouth and licking the excess cracker spread off their fingers, and then reaching down to the tray and fixing the next one.   OMG!

 

I may be an expensive person to have around the kitchen, but rest assured, the place is spotless before I start cooking, and after I am done.  I have always had a clean as you go policy, which has eliminated the large clean up at the end of cooking.  Being ever conscious of germs and proper hygiene practices it just comes naturally.

 

So when you come in the house please remove your shoes and put on one of the portable sneeze-guards that are stacked on the entryway table.

 

 

Thanks

 

 

 

 

         



Why did the Chicken Cross the Road?

Thank you for viewing my blog.

I hope you enjoy my photography, stories and real-life adventures.

zobosticc@gmail.com 



The Silly Factor

I sat in traffic last week long enough to watch part of some neighborhood baseball game.  The pitcher wound up and put one right across home plate.   The batter popped it up; it hung there momentarily and then plopped back into the waiting mitt of the pitcher.  I wanted to watch some more but the rusted and smoking Pontiac in front of me began to move so the last glimpse I had of the game was of the proud pitcher turning to the outfield and taking several bows.  I hadn’t seen that much ham since Easter.

 

         For some odd reason I know I’ll retain the image of that pitcher taking bows.  The silliness of it seemed to add a spark of humanity to an otherwise unmemorable event.

 

         I think that it’s the silliness that I see every day, at work, on the freeway, and just about everywhere I look, that fills my empty brain cells.  Cells, that in others, are already full with tiny bits of math, science, current events and proper comma usage.   Everyday Life is like thick syrup, ever so slowly pouring over my brain, filling millions of cells with silly observations.

 

         It doesn’t take much effort to see the silliness.  It’s almost everywhere.  At the new mall, just down the road, they put up a huge building and they call it, “Outdoor World.”   I know that sounds fine to most of you but...  IT'S A BUILDING! and they call it outdoors?

 

This is ZC suggesting that if you are out of school and don’t have to take any more tests, go and flush the Political Science and Calculus out of your brain and make room for a little silliness.  Just go out and look for something, then write and tell me what you saw. 

 

 

(Don't stop me now, I'm on a roll)

            Without an office manager or an editor I still manage to get this gibberish out each week.  There is of course the understanding that I have not promised (you) the customer that it would be here at any specific time, so I haven’t created any arbitrary deadline; there are no pressures of schedule and certainly no concerns about potential disappointment.  My competition is non-existent as this publication is non-profit, undisciplined and generally superfluous.  All the better for me because this allows freedoms not found in America’s workforce. 

 

            I can sit and write this in bits, stems and pieces over time or I can whip it out in one fidgetless sitting, spending the rest of the week picking cooties out of vegetable soup.  There are no employees to monitor, praise or chastise and obviously no dress code.  I can, should I decide to do so, write an entire paragraph leaving one shoe untied, although I’m sure it would mentally fester but none the less I have that option.   Your expectations remain low as history has taught you to expect at least 50% peanuts.  I’m not suggesting that I do not aim high but only that over the course of time the pointer on the quality scale has leaned closer to zero than it has to one hundred.

 

            I like to think that humans, in the absence of monitors, would still be productive, and generate forward motion with respect to the greater good; understanding that there will still be some going about with one shoe untied, but pure of heart still the same.  It’s important to believe in the positive aspects of each other even when language barriers, political convictions or attitudes towards vegetable soup may be worlds apart.  I like to think there is a collective underlying belief that in the face of global adversity, mankind would unite.  Not simply for self preservation but just because.  Yes, you heard me right; just because.

 

            I’m sure you heard it as a child, “Because I said so, that’s why.”  No reason, no logic, just because.  The existence of all human life could ultimately hang in the balance and we will boldly defend ourselves with, “Because, that’s why.”

 

            I like to refer to that as the silly factor.  We all have it.  It is in us when we are born and it’s still there when we finally say good-night.  It may not always surface but trust me, it’s in there.  It just may be the silly factor that makes us human.  It exists without regard to language or geographic location, religious affiliations or window treatments.  It can lay dormant for years and then something will trigger it; a word or a situation, something will cause you to flash back to that point in your life when some authority figure was, in excessive decibels, telling you that you had to do something – just because.  

 

            It is in the absence of logic that I write these blatherings, for they are void of direction and missing the mark completely when it comes to worthwhile hobbies.  Repelled at the thought of hunting, immune to the lure of fishing and lacking the mental wherewithal to don a helmet and slam repeatedly into someone else in pursuit of a football, I am drawn towards the manipulation of thought.  It remains a passion without bounds.  I am free to contemplate the sounds of a harmonica as it might be played in outer space or to reflect upon the knee joint of an ant.

 

            There isn’t a uniform to wear, no recipes to remember and although grammatical rules and guidelines exists, I am free to ignore them.

 

 

            Because I said so, that’s why. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

           

 

           

 

 

The Green Dodge

 

          The story you are reading is true.  It took place in San Diego, California, in 1978.  Our street, Prospect Avenue had a minor slope to it and back then it wasn’t a very busy street at all.  The City of Santee was beginning to grow and housing developments were competing with the dandelions for their piece of the countryside.

 

          Our neighbor and the owner of the green Dodge was a single mother named Diane.  Our encounters with her consisted of lending her various things each time she showed up at the door.  Usually food items but on occasion she would ask our advice or opinion on whatever was the issue of the day. 

 

          Once she had come home late only to find her front door wide open.  She came to our house and asked if I would go in and search each room to make sure no one was in there.  And once she came over and asked how she could get rid of her green Dodge.  It no longer worked and now just sat out at the curb, quietly rusting.  Had there been an intruder in her house I would have been more successful at getting rid of him than I was at removing the green Dodge.

 

          Of course once I had accepted the challenge of assisting her in the removal of the car, I couldn’t give up.  It became quite a challenge.  I’ll explain.

 

          Back in 1978 the City decided that junk cars could no longer be put into landfills.  Hazardous material (Asbestos) was in the roof linings, in the seats, and throughout the various pockets of quieting insulation.  This didn’t even take into consideration the remaining oil and gasoline, on which the removal of, California has written volumes.

 

          It didn’t take me long at all to run into several brick walls.  Junk yards wouldn’t take it, towing companies refused to haul it away, and phone calls and letters to the Mayor were treated with a standard form letter explaining how sorry they were but how compliance to the law meant that the green Dodge had to stay right where it was.

 

          It was the, Compliance to the Law, which caught my attention.  I knew that as massive and convoluted as the California laws were, there must be a contradictory law in there as well.  I began to search, dig and question in an effort to find it.  What I came up with (if I don't say so myself) was brilliant, although what followed, you’ll never believe.

 

          Remember I mentioned that Prospect Avenue had a bit of a downhill slope to it?  Well as rain and water from people washing their cars and watering their lawns ran along the gutter it came to a halt when it hit the rear tire of the green Dodge.  The tire was right up against the curb causing a tiny dam.  This resulted in a constant puddle of standing water right behind the Dodge and in front of my driveway. 

 

          I called the Environmental Protection Agency, (EPA) and reported that there were small children passing this standing water as they walked to school.  I also reminded them that it is just this type of water that breeds mosquitoes.  Now what could be more hazardous than this?  Innocent, little toddlers carrying their crayon drawings home to show Mom, and ZAP!  a swarm of bloodthirsty mosquitoes attack them. 

 

          My thinking here was that the EPA would force the City of Santee to remove the green Dodge.  Much to my dismay, however, the EPA sent Carlos out to treat the standing water for mosquito larva, which he did.  Then Carlos followed up his visit with a formal letter informing me that the standing water had been treated and was now safe.

 

          It wasn’t until years later that we heard that a fellow across the street and down a few houses bought the green Dodge from Diane.  He took what parts he wanted from it and then buried the rest of the entire car in his back yard. 

 

          I won’t tell if you don’t.

 

 

 

         

 

         

Zelda

            The following article was written by Zelda Fitzgerald, in 1928.  I added it to my blog because I thought you’d enjoy it.

 

 

 

The Changing Beauty of Park Avenue

 

            Beginning in the pool of glass that covers the Grand Central tracks, Park Avenue flows quietly and smoothly up Manhattan.  Windows and prim greenery and tall graceful, white facades rise up from either side of the asphalt stream, while in the center floats, impermanently, a thin series of watercolor squares of grass – suggesting the Queen’s Croquet Ground in Alice in Wonderland.

 

            It is a street for satisfied eyes.  A street of unity where one may walk and brood without being distracted by one’s own curiosity.   Through the arches and open gates one sees paved courtyards big enough to convey a cloistered, feudal feeling.   It is the guarantee made by realty barons that people under their protection will always have enough air.  For Park Avenue has the essence of a pen-and-ink drawing of Paris.  In the morning, when it is hot noon and lunch hour on Fifth Avenue it is still nine o’clock on Park.  Even the crisp translucent New York twilight, hovering high above the city, seems here to drift along in order to conceal the missing afternoon.

 

            There has never been a faded orchid on Park Avenue.  And yet this is a masculine avenue.  An avenue that has learned its attraction from men – subdued and subtle and solid and sophisticated in its understanding that avenues and squares should be a fitting and sympathetic background for the promenades of men.

 

            In the bright gusty mornings, Park Avenue is animated with sets of children, slim and fashionable, each set identically dressed and chaperoned by white and starched English nurses or blue-flowing French nurses or black and white maids.  They clutch in gloved hands the things that children carry only in illustrations and in the Bois de Boulogne and in Park Avenue:  hoops and Russian dolls and tiny Pomeranians.

 

            There is a lightness about these mornings.  Nobody has ever asked a geographical question on Park Avenue.  It is not “the way” to anywhere.   It exists, apparently, solely because millionaires have decided that life on a grand scale in a small space is only possible with as tranquil and orderly a background as this long, blond, immaculate route presents.  It is a fitting resting place for the fine and glittering automobiles that browse the curbstones under the patronage of gilded concierges.  Even the traffic here is aloof and debonair with an inch more freedom than it enjoys in other streets, and seems to progress by a series of hundred-yard dashes.  Taxi-chauffeurs wave gaily as they rush by with empty cabs – the result of too much morning air and too much reading of the Social Register; and newsboys roller-skate under the smartest motors.

 

            High in the air float green-blue copper roofs, like the tips of castles rising from the clouds in fairy tales and cigarette advertisements, fragile points and crags and sturdy shelves suspended on a fortress.  There is even the drawbridge in the Grand Central runway, so that sweeping off into the Avenue one experiences the emotion of entering a stronghold – the stronghold of easy wealth.

 

            Little shops, like sections of a glass-fronted doll’s house, nestle in the corners along the lower avenue – shops of the boudoir sort, where one may buy an apple with as much ritual as if it were the Ottoman Empire, or a limousine as carelessly as if it were a postage stamp.  These crystalline shops, lying shallow against buildings, exist on sufferance so long as they are decorative.

 

            Park Avenue is first the New Yorker’s street.  It is full of nuances and suggestions of all New York, but they are shaped and molded into an etched pattern.  There are disciplined, cool smells – the smell of hot motors and gusty dust – of violets and brass buttons – globular lights through an apologetic mist – gay awnings in the rarefied sunlight - Sunday bells and rows and rows of icy windows.  It is the place to walk, which means that it is an international street – where the tradespeople are accustomed to a clientele who need nothing, want nothing and buy freely because they have large leisure and filled purses.  Here shopping is pleasant and expensive and holy.  There are foreign chemists with remedies for French-speaking germs, and Dutch florists with bulbs grown only on dikes; and there are corners stuffed with hunting-print hatboxes.  Yet there is none of the atmosphere of the bazaar that colors Madison Avenue a block away.  These shops are yourself in Paris – in Rome – wherever you’d like to be, without being incontestably reminded that you are somewhere else.

 

            It is a street for strutting.  It is a street for luncheon in impeccable French restaurants.  It is a street to use when in a hurry, and it is a street for dawdling down.  It is a street to have friends on at teatime.  I suppose a street could be other things… but in the immortal words of Ring Lardner, “What of it?”

 

            Late at night, dignity departs not from the reproachless lane.  It even lends a majesty to the great revolving broom that polishes away imaginary dirt between the hours of three and five – invests the functioning of the Street Cleaning Department with the isolated and pink-lit smallness of a Whistler London night.  Occasionally a flying police car or sometimes a fire engine tears past, lost in the black and misty light before the sound is out of your ears – mysterious night riders hastening to a destiny other than their own, disturbing the peace of a street too alert ever to give a sense of repose.

 

            At one time we have known in a single apartment house, a moving-picture star, an heiress, a famous amateur athlete, a publisher, an author, and a friend.  It was very convenient and we were sorry when cornice trouble or a delinquent summer or bankruptcy caused them to scatter along the street.  Such is the flaming street – widened now until it has become the most colossal thoroughfare in flaming Manhattan.  It is known the world over.  And yet we heard a well-groomed and cosmopolitan-looking young lady say one day, “Oh yes, that’s the street next to Madison, isn’t it?”  And she lived in New York.

 

           

Blueberry

    Had I the time and talent I would learn to strum and old front porch guitar.  I would make up songs as I went along, entertaining anyone who happened to linger.  If I had the resources, I'd travel down south.  I would sit in a local café just to listen to the slow, southern accents, feeling my own blood pressure and stress level calm down.

(And I would have some pie).

    Somewhere in the back of my mind I have this running list of things that fall under the category of, one of these days.   Over the years some of the items on this list have changed.  Even the ones that have held on the longest haven't always kept their original position.  As my personal likes and dislikes change, my list makes priority adjustments.  The time of year also affects these items, for as July and August draw near my desire to head to southern states diminishes.

    I have no inclinations towards space exploration, sailing, mountain climbing, or exploring religious philosophies.  The items on my list have always been the simple pleasures, like finding the perfect cookie, learning Italian, to photograph someone's face for a chance of capturing unsullied human expression, or simply sitting with friends and hearing about the things on their list.

    As most of you know, the one thing that has never fallen from my list is to take a little time every day to play with words.  The written word to me holds all of the treasures found within human thought.  Its bounty extends beyond all margins in soft, colorful strokes, or can be as sharp as a single word expressed in a harsh, regrettable tone.

 

   Words, when arranged just right can evolve into brilliant stage plays that pull us through rivers of emotions even though we never once leave our chair.  Words, when sinisterly manipulated by advertisers, can gnaw away at us, forcing us to remember their product.  

     I believe there to be an agonizing plight in the Hearts of true poets.  It is a weight never lifted, a passion fueled by both love and rage.  It is perhaps their very soul slowly leaking through the tip of their pen, leaving behind what some would see as excess droplets of ink but are in fact small fragments of momentary items that once resided on a list.

 

 

 

 

 

The Jerk - A True Story

            There are a few stories I have written on this blog that have been designed for children and young adults.  They are simply cute, little adventure stories for entertainment. This story, however, is an episode taken right from the pages of my life.  I have shared it with a few people and will now place it on this blog for the entire blog-seeing world to view.  It is a true story.

 

            The time was a little after five pm.  I had just gotten off of work and was driving home.  It is approximately a 22 mile trek from Rochester to Clarkston.  The snow was piled along the sides of the freeway but it had been cleared from the surface of the roads.  The traffic was thick but moving at a rather brisk pace, considering the conditions.

 

            I was in the far left lane, (usually referred to as the fast lane), when my little Chevy S-10 pick-up truck hit a patch of ice. It immediately began spinning and as it spun it was making its way in, through and around all of the cars around me.  I was holding on for deer life to the steering wheel and all I could see flashing before me was headlights, fenders and a general blur, like you might see while on an out-of-control merry-go-round.

 

            I kept waiting for a crash, some sudden impact followed by a news-breaking 500 car pile-up, with horns blowing and people screaming and helicopters filming it for the six pm news.  But there was none of that.  My truck came to rest on the opposite side of the four lane freeway.  The gravel had kept me from sliding completely off into oblivion.

 

            I couldn’t believe I had not hit a single car as I spun across all the lanes of traffic.  It was absolutely amazing.  My heart was pounding and I just sat there for a minute trying to catch my breath and calm down.  I released my grip on the steering wheel and said a private little “Thank you” to whoever it was watching over me.

 

            Now, as my heart rate was getting back to normal, I had to figure out what to do.  It was dark, I was facing the on-coming traffic, sitting on the shoulder of the freeway.  There was no possible way to turn my truck around so it was facing the right way.  I couldn’t go any further left or I’d slide down into the ditch; and immediately to my right was all the freeway traffic that was once again whizzing by me only inches from my passenger door.

I knew my headlights must have been causing them a problem but there was no way I was going to turn them off.

 

            The only option I had was to stay along the edge of the road, keeping on the gravel and back up until I reached the next off ramp.  Then I would have to merge onto the off ramp while driving backwards; Continue driving up the off ramp backwards until I could find a big enough spot where I could get turned around facing the right way.  So that is exactly what I did.  Trust me, if you think getting people to merge is difficult, try doing it while you're driving backwards.

 

            OK, so about halfway up the ramp I figured it was wide enough for me to get turned around.  Fortunately the car behind me (or in front of me) saw what I was trying to do and stayed back a ways, giving me enough room to make my maneuver.

 

 

            Now that I was once again facing the same direction as the flow of traffic I had to get right back onto the freeway as the exit to my house was still one mile further north.

 

            I merged into the flow and as soon as I did I noticed a car off on the side of the road.  I didn’t see anyone in it.  Just a little further ahead I saw a lady trudging through the snow towards the next off ramp.  She looked well dressed and obviously wasn’t prepared to be tromping through the snow.  I pulled off onto the gravel and rolled the passenger window down.  She looked over at me and I asked if she needed a ride. 

 

            She smiled and was excited to get in out of the cold and snow.

 

            “Where do you need to go?” I asked.

 

            “Thank you.  I just need to get to the gas station at the next exit.  There is a phone there and I can call my friend for help.”

 

 

            “It looks like your car broke down back there.” I said.

 

            “Yea, some jerk was driving backwards down the freeway and has traffic backed up for miles.  My car overheated.”

 

 

 

            I dropped her off at the gas station and then headed home.  I couldn’t bring myself to tell her that I was the jerk.