Our Dumb Blog

The boss let us go home early today.  She likes to do that on Fridays before holiday weekends.

Berck was still busy at work, so I stopped by the grocery on the way home to pick up mushrooms and peppers.  Berck complains that he can’t cook ANYTHING if he doesn’t have mushrooms or peppers handy, so I try to have some in the fridge each weekend.  Then I toss them in the garbage in a week when they’ve gone bad.

Traffic was nuts, even at 2:00 p.m., so I decided to stop at the King Soopers on Uintah.  As I was walking up to the front door through the parking lot, I had to swing around the back of a giant, ancient, mustard yellow Oldsmobile Tornado, pulled all the way up to the handicapped sign.  (I now know it was an Oldsmobile because I eventually found it on Google.  Searching for “tornado” and “cars” on Google leads to a lot of photos of storm devastation, which was not helpful.)   They just don’t make cars like that anymore, with proud rear ends that announce themselves so loudly.

What kind of gas mileage does that get, I wondered.  I’m sure it was designed before the gas embargo.

As I walked by, I noticed the windows were down, and the driver was lounging in the front seat, undoubtedly waiting for his passenger to finish their shopping trip inside.

Then I caught the unmistakable whiff of cigar smoke.

Because if you’re gonna sit in your Tornado in a handicapped spot at the grocery, of course you’re gonna be smoking a stogie.

 

 

 

I spent much of Sunday cutting down dead aspens. I wore shorts and boat shoes while operating a chainsaw which I know to be a bad idea. Fortunately, my chainsaw is small and underpowered, but I have to wonder if I’m actually a rational person. I wear a full suit, gloves and helmet while riding a motorcycle, but shorts while operating a chainsaw. Which is more risky? Is my behavior consistent? I don’t even know!

I was completely sore for two days later. It’s important that when you live a sedentary lifestyle that you commit to it fully, otherwise things hurt. Also, I’m apparently an old man.

Aspens are stupid. They grow for a few years, then die. They’re the only deciduous trees we have, and they can’t even be bothered to turn colors. Instead, they all turn exactly the same color at exactly the same time. People think it’s beautiful. I think they’ve never seen proper trees. Trees are maybe the only thing I miss about the south.

I sawed the wood into reasonable pieces, and Jonah stacked it on the edges of the property. I’ve been wondering how long I can reasonably wait to deal with it. If I leave it up to Jonah, the wood will still be there when she dies. Robert & Sarah might want it, but they have lots of wood, and moving it down there seems like work. I have a barbacoa pit, but using it didn’t go well last time, and I’m pretty sure aspen is exactly the wrong sort of wood for it anyway.

So at first I was glad to see that some old person left a note on our door asking if they could have the wood. Sure! Only, I had no idea who it was, and there was a phone number. I was definitely not calling a phone number. Fortunately, I’m married.

Unfortunately, I think we’re giving the wood to the neighbor who yells at me to slow down even when I’m driving well under the speed limit. Everytime I haven’t seen her in awhile, I hope maybe she’s dead, only to have my hopes crushed next time she yells at me.