Willful Misinterpretation

Yesterday I did a LOT of driving. Daddy sailed with a couple friends from Portsmouth to S. Darthmouth, MA, on his friend's boat. I'll call the friends Abner (the boat's owner) and Frank (Abner's friend) simply because it can be so much fun to come up with aliases that have some very slight connection to the originals. Anyway, I was supposed to meet them in Dartmouth, drive with them to Portsmouth, and then drive home alone while Daddy followed in his car.

For the sake of fun and convenience, I spent several hours at a friend's house in Rhode Island, a mere half-hour from the marina where Daddy & Co. were to dock. I had a great time there, and my being so near to Daddy's destination enabled him to more accurately estimate when he would need picking up.

Daddy called around eight, and I headed off for Dartmouth with a flair in my shifts (driving a car with a standard transmission's version of walking with a spring in one's step). I came to the marina with very little trouble and was introduced to Abner and Frank.

Abner was (and presumably remains) around fifty-five years of age. I believe he is rather wealthy, but my only supporting evidence is that he owns a $200,000 sailing yacht. As to physical appearance, he reminded me of King Cole, from Wee Sing's immortal classic, King Cole's Party. Those who are familiar with that movie will have a better idea of how he looks than I could probably ever conjure with my own words.

Frank was about ten years Abner's junior. While this may not be entirely fair to him, the movie character that almost immediately jumped to my mind upon seeing him was none other than the infamous toy reseller (Al?) of Toy Story 2 - the one who steals Woody to sell him to a museum in Japan or something crazy and immoral like that. He described himself as part-time massage therapist, part-time chef, and, at one point in the trip, he moaned for about five minutes about serving 220 people "all by himself."

"All alone? Are you serious?" Abner queried with some incredulity.

"Yeah, seriously! I only had four people to peel and cut vegetables, four to serve, two to run the grills, three guys to help set up the tables, and the rest I did all alone! It was ridiculous."

Much of the trip I was rather put off by their conversation, which consisted mostly of bashing policemen and teachers, and which was unfortunately often crude or profane. Daddy changed the subject several times. I tried to absorb myself in my current book, Northanger Abbey, but I could not ignore the steady stream of words from the back seat.

Not all of the conversation was obnoxious, however. The discussion of politics made me laugh quite a bit - even out loud once, although I'm not sure either of the two passengers noticed. This conversation made such a good story that it was actually my impetus for writing this blog post. It all started with Abner talking about the presidential candidates.

"I STILL think that Romney will blow everyone else out of the water!"

"Nah," replied Frank. "Have you seen him up close and personal? He's too much of a slick frat boy."

"Well, I still think he'll win. He's got the most money."

"Yeah, if that's what it comes down to."

"I don't know, I bet Thompson will change things pretty quick," Daddy interjected with a laugh.

"Oh yeah," Frank replied. "Isn't he the guy who isn't really a politician, but acts one?"

Here I put a rare word into the mix: "No, he was a politician before he was an actor." That was probably one of only two or three sentences I spoke the entire journey from Dartmouth to Portsmouth, NH. Abner and Frank probably thought I was a very taciturn individual.

"What's this world coming to when we elect actors for our leaders?" Frank mused. I was going to point out Reagan's magnificently successful presidency, but Frank's next sentence checked me. "Schwarzenegger has been OK, but REAGAN! Reagan was a DISASTER!" Ummm, right.

I don't remember the immediate details that followed in the conversation, but I think Abner was criticizing one of the candidates when Frank replied, "At least he's not from Texas!" He chortled at his joke.

A short pause ensued. Then Abner asked, "Where was Jimmy Carter from?"

"Georgia," Daddy replied.

"That guy - that guy was the most paTHETic president in history!"

"No," Frank replied with meaningful tones, "I don't think HE can hold that title anymore."

Silence once again reigned, but only for a moment. "Yep," countered Abner, "Bill Clinton deserves every bit of that title!"

It was here that I let out an audible, albeit quiet, chuckle.

I think Frank was slightly taken aback. How could his meaning have been so misconstrued? Did anyone in his right mind really believe there could be ANYONE worse than Bush, or was his friend insane? He decided to take things from a different angle.

"Well, maybe things will be different with a new attorney general."

"How so?"

"Well, if someone who's actually interested in JUSTICE gets in there, there are going to be a ton of investigations!"

I'm afraid I don't remember any more of the conversation beyond this point. It may be that some random circumstance, such as the truck that almost ran us off the road, changed the subject back to the rudeness, pride, cruelty, etc., of the nation's police officers ("They all think they're above the law!" "Mmm-hm."). Or it could be that the mention of the justice system turned the conversation to the incompetence of "that court in South Carolina" ("They're all jerks there." "I know: I've BEEN there!"). At any rate, the talk lost my interest, and I decided to learn more of the adventures of Catherine Morland instead. But not before I had had a good laugh.

For Kimberly

In Kimberly's recent post, "You Gotta Love Paul and His Sentences," she suggested writing out the sentence from verses 3-14 of Ephesians 1 "if you're bored someday, or want a challenge." I decided to give it a whirl. Not having done any diagramming in well over a year and a half, I'm not sure I got everything quite right; however, I don't really care. It was a fun late-morning activity, and I present it to you, my audience, now in all its black and white glory:



I'm not sure how much that will make you understand the sentence structure, KJ, but feel free to study it all you like. :)

Someone get a senator on the line, quick!

Washington ought to pass a law against poorly manufactured technology. It causes so much hassle.

On the night of Saturday, August 11, I purchased myself a brand new desktop computer: a Compaq Presario with 2GB of RAM, a DVD-RW DL drive, 250GB of hard drive space, and an AMD Athlon 64 X2 4000+ dual core processor, for those who understand such specifications. It also came with a 19-inch LCD monitor and a printer, and it runs Windows Vista Premium. I like it very much.

Don't worry: I plan to clean my desk this week!!!

As I was adding some of my music to this wonderful new piece of technological equipment Friday morning, I was surprised by the computer crashing.

"That's odd," I thought to myself. "Brand new computers with Windows Vista and such fancy specifications as this computer has are not SUPPOSED to crash, at least not before they've been purchased a full week."

I restarted and continued with my work - at least, I tried to. It was not fifteen minutes before the computer crashed again. In fact, it continued to crash every five to fifteen minutes for the next hour while I ran diagnostic tests of every variety (Compaq desktops with Vista have a LOT of diagnostic programs). Well, I was running a test on the memory in my computer when suddenly - pffft. The whole machine breathed what appeared to be its last and lay lifeless on my desk. No matter how many times I tried to resuscitate it with the power button, all my efforts could elicit were a few mournful beeps. I was sad.

I called the computer hospital (a.k.a. HP support) and explained the situation. (Oh, another law should be keeping Spanish speakers from operating English support lines. I had to ask the support guy to repeat himself so many times that it was not even laughable.) To make a fairly long story short, he figured out that one of my memory cards was bad. I took the bad one out, and voila! The computer roared back to life, and all was well.

All, that is, except for that I now have to wait for a box to arrive; then I have to send my PC's bad memory away; then I have to wait for another box to arrive; then I have to put the new memory into my PC. THEN all will be well. But all this hassle could have been avoided if it were not for POORLY MANUFACTURED TECHNOLOGY!

Judd Gregg? John Sununu? I DEMAND a change!

Oh, and while you're at it, enact a Comprehensive Rebate Reform Bill, please. Thank you.

Sincere Flattery

Have you ever thought about how easy it would be for someone to impersonate you on Blogger? I mean, the sign-in is quite secure and everything, so your blog is safe; but what about your comments? It occurred to me a while ago that anyone can easily impersonate a blogger on comment pages that allow the "other" option. Just look up the impersonatee's profile link, type it into the webpage box, type their display name in the top, and presto! You have a comment that looks completely authentic. So if your best friend comments on your blog to say they hate you, or if someone you admire calls you fat and stupid, or, for that matter, if someone who is usually vehemently nasty says something unequivocally nice, you might want to take it with a grain of salt.

This danger is not limited to Blogger. Did you hear about the lady whose house was put up on Craigslist as having a free moving sale? I think I read about it in World magazine, but it might have been online. Anyway, she came home and found her abode in complete disarray, with most of her belongings AWOL.

Stories like that, combined with good old logic and common sense, have convinced me to take all my comments with ample grains of salt.

For instance, should I receive a comment on this post from Ryan saying something like, "You stupid, fat, bucket of lard! I don't see YOU making any high school Soccer teams! I am so much better than you! Hahaha!" I would not be mad at Ryan because Ryan is too nice to say something so degrading. I would simply think, "Some weirdo is impersonating Ryan on my blog." Then I would sigh and forgive that person because of the wonderful spirit of kindness that is deeply ingrained in my personality.

Self-Analysis

Have you ever felt that your life was monotonous but at the same time not wanted to do anything about it? Have you wanted your room clean but not wanted to clean your room; wished something exciting would happen but not been especially active in bringing anything exciting about; felt that you really should be doing so much more but at the same time felt utterly apathetic? Have you sat for minutes at a time just looking at all the work that surrounds you, knowing that it must soon be accomplished, reminding yourself of the time, and making lists of what else needs to be done, but quietly refusing to apply yourself to the task?

Because that's how I feel right now.