odds (and ends)

[In response to a blog comment:] Barry, you know I cannot fudge the photos – my rule is this: it goes up if it was taken in the last 24 hours. Unless it’s a scan of some childhood memory. So, unfortunately, I must plod on and deal with the reality of this day. Which had no Caribbean bougainville, nor flocks of green parrots flapping noisily toward the forest, nor turquoise seas and ripening green bananas. I suppose I could include a bunch of green bananas. I picked some up at Trader Joe’s today.

No, all you get is this:





It was a day of bits and pieces. Of scattered thoughts and wisps of conversation.

Did you know that if Chicago got the Olympics in 2016, Madison may then get the bicycle races?
But what are the odds?
Significant, according to some.
Fantastic!
Not at all. I’m outta here if that happens.


Did you like the movie?
Clint Eastwood played his part well.
Ah, Clint Eastwood. He has a house on Tobago. On a hill, close to where the hummingbirds congregate. But it’s not Clint Eastwood that I think about when I watch Gran Torino. It’s the scene in the barber shop when guy talk happens. Take away the swears, the racism, the guns, beer and cigarettes, and I think I have myself an occasional traveling companion who would fit right into the movie set. Ed does guy talk very very well and it isn’t a performance.

We eat one of the many soups I have cooked this season in the comfortable silence of knowing that odds are in our favor. Our lives, at the moment, are wonderfully uncomplicated.