Nine Eleven after 25 years

Yes I remember exactly where I was when I heard a plane had hit one of the World Trade Center towers. News about the attack flowed out. Much of the horror only came before my eyes in the following days.

More than two hundred of the people in the no-exit top floors of the World Trade Center decided to jump to their deaths rather than suffocate or be burned alive.

The death cult that continues to perpetrate terror attacks (you know the one I mean) delenda est. Hopefully the elimination of that evil will not take the 1200 years or so that it took to get to this point. But I feel like our response in these past twenty-five years has been much too soft. 

No Nutmeggy Anything Please

The-Whiteboard.com is a web comic I have followed since way back when it was in black and white! 

In this frame Pirta (the snow leopard) is at the coffee shop run by Cara (the polar bear). Pirta's order for plain black coffee is what prompts Cara's question. 

Oh how I can relate to that rejection of "Pumpkin Spice" season! Pumpkin spice should be reserved to pumpkin pie. Even the pie should remain forever free of nutmeg!

How does my garden grow?

One of the healthiest plants I see around Casa Crowndot is spurge.

The Euphorbia genus is one of the most prolific and successful kinds of plants on Earth. They grow just about everywhere -- at in my yard.

It's frustrating: when I try to grow the more glamorous (to me -- can I help it that I like thorns?) varieties of Euphorbia, they end up dead. But the ones that plant themselves? Thriving. Simply thriving. Even in the heat!

My body is trying to kill me.

In diverse ways. For years. Sometimes the world really is trying to kill me -- like in a near-miss traffic situation. What happens is, once I am well and truly out of that situation, the stress-response hormone (adrenalin?) kicks in, and the brain and gland chemical firehose starts going full blast, with all the secondary symptoms of pulse and blood pressure and probably a headache. Not fun. I would much rather the world just left me alone. 

I'm Retired, Don't Bug Me

When I don't feel up to anything else, I play. On my phone. 

Spider Solitaire (one suit).

Or Freecell (I'm getting better at that one).

Or crossword puzzles.

I guess we'll see, won't we, whether this activity helps keep my brain from aging. Or whether this activity is a sign that it's already too late!  😅

Manual Transmission

I took my driving test in 1974 in my Dad's V8 Fordamatic, but truly I learned how to drive in my Mom's 1972 Toyota Corolla rear wheel drive with the long shift knob that went down to the drive shaft hump between the bucket seats. 

I have a preference for manual transmissions that was only strengthened by some years driving a Ford LTD company car station wagon that had a vacuum-advance carburetor spark adlustment and a slow responding automatic transmission. When you tromped down on the gas pedal because you needed to get out of a tight driving situation, you could count on several long seconds before it downshifted. 

The Wall Street Journal (link) says that right now in the USA only a dwindling fraction of drivers can drive a car with a clutch. To make matters worse, the WSJ article says, "In 1980, some 35% of cars produced in the U.S. were manuals. Today that figure is closer to 1%..." 

Yikes! When it comes to that, maybe putting an unreasonable amount of money into auto repair on my stick shift 2007 Mazda3 will be a good investment. ...Assuming there will be any mechanics left that can work on it!

(Ichi, ni, san, shi, go!  -- my Japanese shift knob!)

Lucky Cat Dish

Sometimes Neko-san holds my teabag. These days I use more loose leaf tea than teabags.

But lucky cat is not unemployed. Most evenings he holds my dinnertime medications and supplements. Having a happy friend hand me my pills makes me happy.

Also I have it on good authority that the cuter the food, the better it is for you. That *must* be true for the health benefits of medication, right? 

Thank you, Neko-san. 

           ☺️