Thursday, April 21, 2016

Old and Random



Does anyone besides me remember typing correspondence on a typewriter?  Remember when fax machines first became available, and they seemed like a flippin' MIRACLE?  "Waaaaait a minute, you mean I just feed the document in here, dial a number, and it SHOWS UP SOMEPLACE ELSE?!"  Remember when printers used tractor feed paper?  Yes, I am old.

There's an old City DPW garage around the corner from where I work which is about to be demolished.  I wanted to get a picture of the Sign Shop door before it's gone, because it makes me smile:




Two reality TV shows I can highly recommend:  "Alone" just started its second season, Thursdays on the History channel.  This show takes a bunch of outdoorsy people and drops them, one by one, into remote Alaska locations where they have to survive on their own.  They are equipped with video cameras and have to transmit videos every day to the people running the show.  Some of the people crack and give up right away, some last for a few weeks, and last season's winner lasted for something like sixty-three days before he was the last one standing.  Watching the people start their downhill slides is absolutely fascinating; I probably shouldn't like this show as much as I do, but man, it's some pretty compelling watching.

On that same track, "The Last Alaskans" has started a new season, Tuesdays on the Discovery channel.  I've written about this show before; it chronicles the last people allowed to homestead on a remote Alaskan wildlife refuge.  Very, very good.

Riverdance is apparently coming to this area, because ads for it have been all over local media.  Riverdance is one of those events that I can say with confidence I would not attend even if it were free.  See also:  Any type of Renaissance Festival.  *shudder*

I've had a sore thumb joint for a few days, and I couldn't figure out what I'd done to it, until I went to take my Celexa this morning.  The package the pills come in is this funky thing where you have to press down on one end and then pull the pill card out from the other end, except I always get it wrong and have to wrestle with it (relaxing!  not at all stressful!), and this morning I realized that the reason my thumb was sore was from struggling with pulling the pills out of the package.  I have a brand-new medical condition, heretofore unknown to science!  "Celexa Thumb".  Ha.

There was a panhandler in front of the Dollar Store where I went on my lunch break this morning, and I always tell those dudes "nope, sorry", and then I feel bad about it.  I mean, I KNOW they're just going to use the money for drugs and/or alcohol, so I don't know WHY exactly I feel bad, just that I don't feel bad enough to give them any drug money.

I dropped a makeup pencil down the bathroom sink this morning.  I guess I'm going to learn how to take a sink trap apart tonight. *sigh*

 And finally, a ticklish kitten:


What's old and/or random with you?


4 comments:

James P. said...

Here's what I love about your "random" posts: It's just like sitting down next to a bag lady on a park bench.


The photo of the kitten nearly made me faint with joy. Are you naming them yet? Do you need readers' suggestions????

I have to roll my aging eyes when a fifty-something somebody talks about the "old days". More on that later. Had paying jobs typing on typewriters. Still alive to tell it.

rockygrace said...

Ginny, I am NOT a bag lady. Yet. Sheesh. :)

No names yet. I'm still not sure if they're boys or girls! But fire away if you've got suggestions!

And I'll talk about the old days if I wanna. Rotary phones! Video games didn't exist! Our family's first microwave oven! Ahem. :)

But yeah, it's all relative. My Grandpa Wallace was born in horse-and-buggy days and lived to see the Jet Age. Now there's a guy who saw some changes.

Becs said...

RG, my step-grandmother-in-law was a farmer's wife in Ukraine when the Nazis were coming one way and the Soviets were coming from the other. A German soldier on the run pulled into the farm yard and begged them to cover his car in their barn. They did and gave him some non-Nazi clothes to wear. Not long after that, the Soviets (not all of them, just maybe 50 or so) showed up in the barnyard looking for said escapee and they pled innocence. Then they told the family to get their luggage together and show up at the train station on X date at X o'clock or face the consequences. During the ride, one daughter's hair froze to the size of the boxcar and had to be chopped off with an axe. In Moscow, grandmother's mother died of starvation. Step-gmil miscarried. The son learned how to take bricks from the back of a bakery oven so they had enough food to survive. From there, they were shipped to Kenya, then to England, and finally chose to come to America at the British government's dime. Tuppence. Whatever. She lived to be 99 and thought that movies featuring battles and wars were the real thing. Like Genghis Khan was still alive with his Mongol hordes. And she was an absolute fanatic about "All My Children." RIP, Apolonia.

rockygrace said...

That is fascinating, Becs.