What’s that I smell?

If you are Family you know that allergies have pretty much done away with my sense of smell. I tell people that I couldn’t smell gasoline if you stuck a bucket of it under my nose, and most days that’s true. I’m rather used to that condition and it doesn’t bother me all that much. I read today (in Fast Food Nation – outstanding book) that smell accounts for 90% of what makes food appetizing. I’m not sure that’s right; I think I would weigh significantly less if it were so. I seem to be doing pretty good on just 10%.

What I’m not used to is smelling things. Like walking into Chuy’s and being overwhelmed by the good cooking odors. Or opening the coffee container and smelling the promise of a good cup of coffee. Or cooking some eggs and hash browns for breakfast and realizing that I’ve stunk up the house. And that’s what’s going on these days. I go through smelling (smelling, not smelly!) periods from time to time if I have been given a good dose of steroids for some medical condition or another. When the treatment stops the odors do too.

But I’m not on steroids at the moment. I did take a round of antibiotics for a sore throat last week, but antibiotics in the past have not affected my sense of smell. Perhaps the combination of my resuming the allergy shots and the antibiotics and being constant with my nasal spray regimen has brought this about. Maybe it will continue. Maybe not. In the meantime, I’m exploring all the wonderful (and not so wonderful) scents that fill our days.

My that fresh bread is making me hungry!

Oh, by the way…

First, I confess that I swiped the picture I used in this month’s header. And then I have to tell you it’s an old photo – you won’t find such bluebonnet abundance around Austin this year. In fact, we didn’t even see any bluebonnets at all until Easter Sunday this year, and the patches we see even now are really disappointing. Bluebonnets need appropriate amounts of rain at just the right times in order to really put on a show and that just didn’t happen here this year. Other wildflowers are contributing to the show, but bluebonnets didn't make it this year.

We did notice that you can buy flats of blooming bluebonnets at Home Depot. We considered getting some, but we didn’t know where we would put them. Knowing our lawn crew, they would probably get mowed down, anyway.

The bluebonnet almost wasn’t the State Flower of Texas. There was an acrimonious battle between the groups that proposed the cotton boll, the prickly pear bloom and the bluebonnet – and when they did decide on the bluebonnet the Ledge named Lupinus subcarnosus, a rather plain variety that grows only in a few places in Texas (because that happened to be the species that they had a painting of). So many people preferred the showier and more wide-spread texensis, in 1971 the Legislature made any species of bluebonnet the State Flower. Aren’t you glad to learn that?

And oh, by the way – it is not against the law to pick bluebonnets along the right-of-way. State and National Parks, yes; right-of-ways, no. You may get a ticket for parking illegally, but you can pick away.

Things you don't want to hear...

After an allergy injection, you are required to sit and wait for 30 minutes so that the medical staff can determine that your arm has not swollen to the size of a telephone pole, or at the very least you are not foaming at the mouth. So at any given time there are 4 or 5 inoculates (inoculees?) sitting around in the waiting room, well, waiting.

That was the scene the other day when we heard a shriek from the nurse's station.

"Oh. My. God!!!!"

There are a lot of looks of shared consternation as we each wonder if we have received an injection of some deadly poison.

"Look at this!!!"

Okay. Someone has just gone in to be checked and their arm fell off. Is mine next?

"The Texas Showdown Saloon down on the Drag is closing! Oh, no!"

I'm thinking malpractice suit.

If you can’t sell them – give them away

I have mentioned before that I actively sell books at Amazon.com. It started with two large boxes of teacher books that Mom had left over from her long and illustrious career. Since then, I’ve added to the sales inventory from the endless supply of books that mysteriously show up here at our house and through today have netted (after accounting for everything but my time and the trips to the post office) enough revenue to purchase 2 iPods (mine ships Thursday). Usually, when I describe the condition of the book I put “Book is in pristine condition. Read once by my wife, who then gave me the book to sell so I would quit griping about how many books she buys.” It seems to do the trick.

But there are some books I cannot sell – mass-market paperbacks, for instance. There’s just not enough profit margin. Or those books that have flooded the market and other volume sellers on Amazon are offering them for 1 cent, willing to earn only a few cents per book to maintain their volume status with Amazon.

So I give them away. The other day I picked up a card that referred me to BookMooch.com. The premise is simple; list books that you want to give away and are willing to send at your expense to someone else. In return, you can ask for (or mooch) books that others are willing to send you. It works on a point system – if you give away a book you earn a point. If you mooch a book it costs you a point. There’s a bit more to the point system than that, but not much. If you are willing to ship internationally, you get (and spend) more points.

Why would you want to go to the trouble of packaging up your books and taking them to the post office and spending good money to send them to Piscataway New Jersey? Why not take them to Half-Price where they will pay you oh, about .75 cents each for them? Actually the economy works this way; it will cost at most about $3 to package and ship a book and it can cost as little as $2. So you can get a new (to you) book for an outlay of $2 or $3 dollars. You can send a one pound book for $2.13 media mail rate. Even if you buy a fancy bubble wrap mailer your total cost is $3.00. A lot of paperbacks weigh only 7 or 8 ounces. Put them in a 12 cent manila envelope and send them First Class Large Envelope rate for a total of $1.92.

The down side? You go in the hole early on. You must list 10 books to begin and you will immediately get 6 or 7 mooch requests that you need to send. Then there is the problem that a lot of folks want the same books as you and you will end up pretty far down on the “wish list” for that book. Or if it is an old or obscure book, it may be a long while (if ever) before some one lists it. And then there is that trip to the post office.

But hey! If you don’t have anything better to do… What’s that? Yes, dear. Coming dear.

Definitely a mixed message

Not just the street corner any more

Today I stopped by my Allergist’s office to get my twice-weekly shot. I had forgotten to bring a book so after checking in I was looking for a magazine when someone tapped me on the shoulder. I turned, and a man said to me, “I thought that was you. I came in because I was sure I recognized you.”

I’ve never seen this man in my life, so I’m sort of looking like, Huh?

He then asked me, “Where were you working fifteen – no, sixteen years ago?”

I was still rather taken aback, but I said, “Renaissance Systems.”

“Yes, that’s right. I was sure I remembered you. I did janitorial work for them back then. Are you still working there?”

Small alarm bell begins ringing. “Uh, no. I retired last year.”

“Well, I’m at the Wal-Mart on Slaughter now. Started there Monday. Looks like you’ve put on a little weight” he said, patting my stomach. “’Course I have too,” patting his.

Ding! Ding! Ding!

“You know, I lost my Mamma two weeks ago. Lung cancer. It sure has been hard on us.”

Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding!

“And I just started my new job, and I haven’t been paid yet, and I remember that you’re a good man…”

“Uh, excuse me. I think they just called my name. I have to go now. Goodbye.”

It's a mystery

Recently Google added Austin to its controversial "Street View" - the feature that not only shows you a map of your selected address - it lets you see the buildings, houses, and (especially in the downtown areas) even people. Of course, being curious, I immediately entered our address, only to find that Google doesn't know where we live. They think we are located some 56 street numbers up the way. But with a little navigation, I was able to locate our house.


View Larger Map

From this view, it's easy to come up with the approximate date that the Street View Crew drove down our street; late December or early January. If you zoom in you can see the little Santa that Julie gave us Christmas standing in the front flower bed. And from the shadows you can tell that it is early morning.

Now here's the mystery. What on earth was the car doing parked headed out on Mom's side of the driveway? I have absolutely no recollection of parking like that. Occasionally we will back in on my side of the drive to load something, or park the car in the drive to make room in the garage to do something. We had not been out and about that day - the light above the garage is still on (you have to navigate to see that). I know that we didn't leave the car out all night - this was during the rash of auto window shootings. And the garbage can is out beside the house. What were we doing?

It's a mystery.

How big an iPod do I need?

Since Mom is gracious and lets me listen to her iPod while I am walking on the treadmill, I have been thinking that I need an iPod of my own. For one thing, she doesn't like the same music as I do, and though she generously encourages me to add whatever I want, it just doesn't seem quite right to take over her iPod.

I'm saving up, and with a few more book sales, I'll have earned enough for my iPod as well as hers. Mom says she'll make up the difference for my birthday. I think she's tired of having to re-find her place in the Alexander Scourby Bible narration each time she walks on the treadmill.

So I'm looking at the Fry's Weekend Sales Flyer in the paper today, and I notice that they make a 16-gigabyte version of the iPod Nano. It says it holds 40,000 songs. Mom asked if there were 40,000 songs in existence, and did I think I was going to live long enough to listen to 40,000 songs?

That got me to figuring. The first (and greatest) problem would be paying for 40,000 songs. I estimate that my not-that-extensive CD collection currently stands at 600 songs. Let's be generous and say 1,000 songs. That still leaves 39,000 songs to purchase at .99 cents each, or $38,610 to fill my iPod. I would have to go back to work! Does iTunes have a payment plan? (Yeah, it does. You buy, you pay. That’s the plan!)

Now let's say the average song is 5 minutes long (I just scanned a number of CDs and that seems about right, if not a little low). So 40,000 songs at 5 minutes each is 3,333 hours of music. Right now I am listening 30 minutes a day while I exercise, on the average of 6 days a week. That means it would take me 21 years to listen to all 40,000 songs! Dang - she may be right! And if I stop and repeat songs that I really like (as is my custom) we may have to play the rest of them during the funeral service! Bring a snack - it may take a while.

Oh wait, I need to factor in the amount of time needed to choose, download and sync 40,000 songs. How many years will that take? And there is apparently no shortage of songs to choose from – iTunes claims to have more than 6 million of them waiting and ready for me. Now let's see, how big an iPod would I need for 6 million songs?

Never mind. Does Apple make a 1-gigabyte iPod?

Who's the April Fool?

Most of you know that nighttime is usually a restless time for me. And that sometimes during the night I get these "revelations." Okay, more accurately they are aberrations of consciousness caused by sleep deprivation. Last night - all night - it seemed good to me to concoct this elaborate blog entry about Mom and I having breakfast at Frans when Brad and Angelina come into Frans, guests of Harry Knowles, the guy here in Austin who seems to have the ear of all the important film stars.

They would, of course, sit at the table next to us, accompanied by some guy in a suit - press agent, publicist, whatever - and he and Harry would have all the conversation while Brad sat moodily and Angelina.... ( I never worked out what she was to be doing during breakfast). I was going to describe how nobody else in the place recognized them (Fran's is not a place that many "with it" folks frequent). I worked out a lot more detail but you get the drift. And then at the conclusion of the piece I would remind you that that's how our day started on this 1st day of April and from that you would recognize that you had been duped by my hilariously elaborate April Fool's joke.

Well, thus far morning has always followed the night and in the cold light of day my great gag is looking a lot like last week's fish. I tried, but I just couldn't get it to compare to the cleverness I felt while tossing and turning last night. So, the joke is on me.

It is true that Brangelina is in town; he's filming "Tree of Life" over in Smithville, and they have rented a big ranch house out there somewhere. And they have been spotted in town from time to time (and at the Smithville Wal-Mart!). She's actually great with child at the moment so I'm sure she's not up for greasy eggs and hash browns and cream gravy at Fran's anyway.

So never mind. Have a great April 1st. No joke.