Don't let the men in the white coats frighten you... a tale without pictures

Apparently, there are people in this world who naturally remember their dental routine and have a good and noble relationship with their dentists.

Then there are those in this world who express public disdain for all dental convention yet maintain a pristine dental landscape with seemingly nary a care.

And then there are people like me.

---

I was only thinking, tonight (while on step eleventy-hundred and five of my mainly theoretical dental movements in D major).

I do that – think while going through the motions.

It often distracts me from the task at hand, but I have found it can be quite useful.


Anyhow,  I was only thinking, tonight that while I am on occasion accused of being an over-thinker,
the majority of my over-thinking is concerned with worrying that I only think that I am over-thinking,
and the rest of humanity is having a bit of a guffaw at my expense,
and perhaps it is an extremely obvious amateur performance of life-skills that I cumbersomely wield
and the reason that they don’t appear to be thinking is that,
to them,
no thought process is actually required?

You think that you’re confused?

---

Anyway, one of the OTHER things I was wondering was how it was determined that it was to be thirty minutes before putting anything in your mouth after a dentist visit.

I have an enquiring mind that takes a scientific bent at times, so this immediately took me to the whole process of making that decision.

Do they heighten the rats heart rate;
give it the adrenaline rush equivalent to that of overcoming dental phobia (and the maths involved in that dosage must be boggling);
make whirring and grinding noises and perfume the air with occasional whiffs of ground enamel;
give a few shots of the good stuff through the roof of their little mouths after making their nerves jangle dangerously close to “holey frack fat cat, do we want to take this outside”
and THEN put the smells of good caffeine or sunflower seeds and illicit cornflakes around the poor little rats to entice them and document the effects at various intervals to determine the moment when it becomes safe to shove anything into your gob after torture?

---

I can see that there are those of you who are thinking “she’s talking about LAB rats.  We shouldn’t joke about LAB rats.  It’s NOT FUNNY.”

You may be right.

But again, I have an enquiring mind that takes a scientific bent at times, so this immediately took me to the whole process of making that decision.

I mean, how do you really know?

Have you read a report where someone has had my work read out to the poor little rats to entice them to react and documented the effects at various intervals to determine the moment when it became safe or was it indeed torture?

And then did anyone think to document whether this was worse than going to the dentist in the first place?

I have an enquiring mind.

Well will you look at that - an obligatory end of year overview, tidings and reso - reso - R - E - S - O - lutions...

2015 was a bizarre year for us.  A lot of life doesn't get blogged about because it is the minutae of getting by.  A lot of life doesn't get blogged about because it is personal.  A lot of life doesn't get blogged because it is boring...

 We started the year on the other side of the world and it was strange -

- then we came home January and it was stranger...

February we embarked upon strange new routines... (unblogged was a rather tough go-round in circles of medical hell for another)

March saw us all climb a few mountains (and probably rolled down a few slopes)...

April was another interesting month (and in unbloggable news, V got kneecapped by an expert!)

May and June will forever remain mysterious, as they were completely uninspiring.  They were there.  We got through.

July and the long run downhill at the end of the year began.  I even blogged it.

August?  

September?

October and I got along a little better.  Of course, that is all relative...

November started to tune up the "busy" in our lives...

And December - well, it was good all told, but the fact that it was still officially in 2015 was its main drawback.

But - I just saw the fireworks for 2016 - and 2016 is going to be a better year.

None of that pithy little "I don't do resolutions" BS - its reload and get out there territory here!

To achieve this, I am definitely toning up a few things (including muscles).

Attitudes are going to change.  Life is going to be better.   Eat better, sleep better, be more conscious and less anxious.

Try not to sweat the small stuff but maybe break a sweat working on the larger me.

Value time better - and make it matter.

Value friends and family better.

Value me.

Be more present.  Step up (which is different to "volunteer for everything").

Think more.    Thank more.

---

How is 2016 going to be different for you?

I-I-yi-yi-yi - or "The Scrabble Game that Had to be Blogged"

I am currently in a paradise that is away from Paradise, sharing a house with a dozen old friends of an old friend.

In other words, I am on a five day, four night cruise away from responsibility and care – by the beach.

So - to set the picture - a lot of food, a lot of laughter, a lot of libation, walks along the beach, fishing, being tempted by the ocean - and a few games.

---

 And - well - there was this scrabble challenge, see. 

A lady called J~~ – J1 and a lady called J## - J2 – and I – well, I generally refer to myself in the first person – sat down to play.

And in this scrabble challenge, perhaps had life been kinder in its tilt of the tile bag towards me, this post would not have been writ.

***

I started well.  J1 drew a B.  A B is pretty good.  

I drew an A.  An A is even better.  

J2 drew an N.  An N is not.

***

Now, I must admit that I was pretty cocky at that point in the game.   I could consider it IN. THE. BAG.

I began my combat with a modest 16.  Making 16 points out of a 7 point hand is pretty impressive for an opening parry.

And then both Js responded with the EXACT SAME scores. 

***

Do you know that slow, comfortable lethargy of friendly competitiveness?  Yes, well, I thought THAT is what fell upon the game.

***

My next thrust was a triple-word score (I almost typed “tripe-word) 24 – to be rebuffed with two mid-thirties jabs.

***

Now, I would hate to say that I am any colour of sore-loser, but when I reviewed my options at the next juncture, I knew that it was all over, red rover, for this little black duck….

Yes folks, that is a J, an E, FOUR (count them) Is and an O.  For Oh my goodness, I have nothing...

 I had started to corner the market on the second-most useless vowel in the modern day alphabet – neatly accentuated with the letter J.

I will tell you one thing about a J (the letter, not the two ladies I was playing).

It does not occur naturally without a U.  

Or An A.  Or on its own.  Or in anything.  Or at the end of anything.

The sudden realisation that the limitations of my lot would lead to my scrabble purgatory. 

***

Do you know that slow, comfortable lethargy of friendly competitiveness? 

Yes, well, THAT was gone.  There was a momentary panic, followed by an attack of the giggles.

***

I did try.  

I contemplated inventing a totally new language to incorporate the possibilities of such a range. 

The Js were forgiving enough in their refusal of such blatant abuses of the rules as they could see from my demeanour that it was useless to be stern.

***

In the end, I managed to exchange one I for a paltry 4 – and even that 4 was a better placement suggestion by J1 than the 2 I had found…

***

I then got to observe the most gorgeous battle between the Js, with my role being to make about zero per cent influence on the game outcomes.

There were spelling and meaning challenges.  There were two- and three- way word solutions, there was even a 7 tile-word on a triple-word score.   The 50 point was regarded a bonus and not a word-score.  

This mattered much less to me – whose words occasionally got a little bit more than 5 points – than it did these two goddesses of scrabble.

***

In the last sweep of the bag, I managed to find something to save me from a double-digit demise.

I bet it was the biggest effect the rupee has had on the outcome of an Australian game

(although cricket die-hards would possible argue that).

Not that sort of poet...

If you are someone that thinks poetry requires rhyme, then I'm not that sort of poet.

If you require obscure rules to be followed and scans to be precise, then I'm not that sort of poet.

If you like a punchline at the end of each verse and do not wish to think outside of any box, "Thank You Very Much" - then I'm not that sort of poet.

---

Maybe I am a proset?  Or would that be prosette?

I like to use the sounds that words make to paint pictures.

I like to make patterns.

I sometimes even try to snowflake in little devices to make my sort of receiver take note and grin the inner grin that generates the warmth of knowing that there is another human being in the world that gets what you wish that you could say in a way that you wish you could say it even if you had never been in that particular situation or realised that it needed to be said?

I know - its true, there are very few of those types of people in the world.

That would be why there are very few of my sort of poet.

---

How is the weather in your neck of the woods?

I wrote a poem tonight - a rare enough event these days.  Ah youth, when I used to have a dozen to choose from each week at various readings.

Still, one.  Better than where I was at yesterday...

So - here is a poem about the weather...

---

Weather Wail

We live in a house
That is the wind’s harmonica.

This wind has gone out,
    got drunk
and is whistling its way home tonight.

It’s a dance, a lament
An aria
    A smattering of raindrops
The sawdust for its soles.

The flashes of lightning are disco balls reflecting
    Lurid suits cutting the dancefloor.

The thunder a stomping of boots
A rumble of mirth
    A delicate chunder
Behind the garden fence.

Class act, I know, but this weather cares not for your sensibilities.
Its charged
and quite the adolescent anarchist tonight.

---

So - give me your own weather update in whatever sort of poet (or not) you may be...

Eddie-you-cation

The cat and I have a non-verbal relationship.  

He is able to bend my will with mind tricks and careful placement of his weaving body in geographic locations most likely to gain my attention by the sudden clarity of imminent danger.

Take tonight, for example.  Tonight I went out in pursuit of my electronic vessel of dictation*  and he desired me to attend a matter of some importance in the kitchen. 

 He herded me expertly over to the light switch before an imperceptible manoeuvre had me facing his food bowl.

 I eyeballed him and reached for the plastic flask of kibble.  He nodded his satisfaction.

Then looked towards the other bowl.

“Yeah” I managed to convey with a sideways-tilt and a “thxt”-click against the upper palate.  “I get that you don’t like the f’ing fish, but you’re not going to starve.”

I have the feeling that our next encounter will not be so silent, for as I was leaving the room I could see the thought bubbles floating up from his ginger head, 

plotting his pre-dawn revenge with the meow he reserves for interrupting me while working on the computer or when he is shut in – or out – of an unexpected room. 

 My money is on 4:12. 

 Too early to be a useful time to get up, too late for the remaining sleep to be of any value.  Some would call it abuse – we just call it being OWNED by a cat.

---

* my computer