We read a whole stack of them to get caught up, squinting and mispronouncing for full effect.
It’s hard to see the humor anymore, though.
by James Brush
Category: Random Stuff
The catch-all category for random things about life in Austin, food & drink, politics, the occasional rant, whatever else.
I’ve been swimming laps at the pool down the street now that it’s finally sunny and hot everyday.I went three times this week and found myself observing the habits of the other pool people.
One day, the only others there were a mother and very young child. When I walked in, the mother pointed to me and whispered, “That man is going to swim.” I guess the lack of anything other than goggles and a towel was the giveaway.
Next came a running commentary on all of my actions:
“Look, he’s setting his things down.”
“He’s putting on his goggles.”
“He’s swimming laps.”
“He’s taking a break.”
“He’s stretching.”
“He seems to be drowning.”
I know little kids need that and they have questions about everything, so I consider my ability to serve a teaching tool a public service.
The next day two pairs of teens shared the pool. Two girls talking and laughing just loud enough for the two boys on the opposite side to hear just how much fun they were having. The boys, of course, were wrestling and throwing a ball at each other with just enough vigor to impress the girls. Since the two pairs were on opposite sides, I had to swim my laps up and down the middle. That was me, the human fence.
The next time I went, three women sat around one of the tables under the canopy of the pool house. There were many empty beer cans, and from the bits of conversation, I knew that these were all teachers about to go back to school the next day, gathered to toast the end of the season.
One turned and yelled at her kid, “I heard that!”
The kid yelled back from somewhere in the middle of the pool, “How?”
“Because I’m a teacher. I can hear everything you say.”
The kid paused and looked back at his mom, looked at his siblings and friends and then yelled back nervously, “Can you hear what we’re thinking?”
As a teacher myself, I already knew the answer to that one.
Yes. Yes, she could.
Last week I enjoyed my 18th year at Camp Periwinkle, a camp for childhood cancer patients and their siblings.
Here are links to two very good news stories about camp:
Camp Periwinkle Changes the Lives of Kids Battling Cancer 0n Bryan/College Station’s KBTX.com
Camp Helps Young Cancer Patients Forget Worries on MyFOX Houston
Tomorrow we head out to Burton, TX for Camp Periwinkle. This will be my 18th year at camp, and as always, I’m looking forward to another great week.
Since I have a lot of packing to do, and not just because I’m still stuck in the throws of the Coyote Mercury Summer of Not Blogging So Much, I’ll just repost what I wrote last year when I got back:
We got back from Camp Periwinkle (a camp for childhood cancer patients and their siblings) on Saturday afternoon and have spent most of the time since recovering. I’ve been going to Camp every summer since 1990, which is possible since it’s only a week long.
The underlying philosophy of camp is selflessness. All the counselors and staff are volunteers, the kids go for free, everything there is donated. For one week, and sometimes for the last time, the kids at camp get to feel normal, and they get to have fun, and they have the time of their lives.
The smiles and the laughter at Camp Periwinkle are things that keep those of us who’ve been doing it for so long coming back year after year.
It’s typically one of the high points of any given year. It’s a chance to spend a week living in a perfect world, a world of patience, selflessness, love, compassion, understanding. It’s a chance to see kids and adults truly be their best selves. Where else can you see kids in a relay race cheering on the kid in a wheelchair who will cost them the race, yet no one cares about who wins or loses? Where else can you see adults put aside every aspect of their own comfort and convenience so that kids will feel special?
I’ve never been anywhere or done anything else that focuses what life should be about and how we should interact with one another more clearly than Camp Periwinkle. It’s a place where no expense is spared, no opportunity missed, to make kids whose lives are a daily struggle feel special, feel normal. It teaches kids that they can do what no one thinks they can. It helps them survive.
In the past seventeen years, I’ve seen kids laugh, smile, dance, and play who might never otherwise have found a place to do those things. I’ve watched kids crawl out of wheelchairs to climb a wall on the ropes course. I’ve seen kids fresh from brain surgery lean on their crutches and dance.
It’s a powerful place and it changes a person’s way of thinking. It reminds me of how special life is, how lucky I am, how important it is to work everyday to make the world a better place for everyone.
It’s a chance to see what life could be like in a world ruled by love, where nobody ever wanted for anything.
Did I say it is a perfect world?
* * *
Note: This post was republished as a guest editorial in the Nov/Dec 2006 Journal of Pediatric Oncology Nursing.
You can read more about Camp Periwinkle on Burst Blog: BlogBurst Bloggers Help Send Children to Camp
After tuning out of politics for months and just living in a kind of blissful ignorance, well, actually not ignorance, it’s more the kind of sickening certainty that requires neither updates nor commentary, I discovered that there is an election looming on the very distant horizon and there are a whole slew of puppets people who would like to lead this country the rest of the way to Hell in a handbasket.
I wish I had watched the Democrats debate last night. Perhaps the performance would have given me hope, though in perusing this morning’s paper, I find that the questions came from YouTube and one from a snowman who was concerned about global warming. A snowman? Really?
“Is this what political discourse in this country has come to?” asked the blogger whose own snowman suit is at the drycleaners, thus allowing only a trace of irony.
Okay, so there’s no reason to hope. We’re good and screwed.
Looking at the D side, I think I like Edwards and Richardson, but in the interest of staying in the real world, I suspose I’ll have to choose between Obama and Clinton. I like Obama. Clinton, on the other hand, voted for the Iraq war and therefore lacks the wisdom and foresight that I and many like me possessed in 2003 when those with open eyes saw this for the fool’s errand that it is. She is therefore unfit for the office. The president should be smarter than me. I guess that leaves Obama.
On the R side, it appears that McCain has lost his staff and his mind, leaving only some actor who might or might not run, that mayor from NYC and some flip-flopper from Massachusetts. My, wouldn’t that be a delicious little bit of irony if he gets the nomination. Perhaps, I’ll watch these bottom-of-the-barrel R’s try to defend themselves against the damning arguments of that snowman.
If you use your thumb to break your fall, your fall may break your thumb.
(That’s what I get for ignoring the lesson about running up stairs two at a time in flip flops.)
I shot this as I was cruising up 610 towards the 290 exit in Houston this afternoon.
It’s a nothing shot, a throwaway of a sign, but it’s a sign I love to see.
Whether it’s coming home from an errand to Houston as today or returning from a longer trip, seeing the Austin sign makes me happy.
There’s just nothing like a sign that points to home.
The Rules:
- I have to post these rules before I give you the facts.
- Each player starts with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
- People who are tagged need to write their own blog about their eight things and post these rules.
- At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names. (You’re not the boss of me!)
- Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them they’re tagged, and to read your blog.
The Eight Facts:
- Five years ago, I painted the entire interior of our old house (including trim) and even hung crown moulding. I’m painting the interior of the new house now. It hurts more this time.
- I’m 113 pages into my next novel. It’s been called Right of Way and also A Short Time to Be There. I plan to have it finished by early July. It feels about a third of the way done.
- I was born in Newport, Rhode Island. I did my first three years of high school there. Despite that, I really don’t care much for lobster. Of course, I don’t like cockroaches either. But I do like crabs despite the fact that I don’t like spiders. Go figure.
- I’m not psychic, but one night in May 1995, I was listening to a Dead Hour and I knew Jerry Garcia wasn’t going to be around much longer. I convinced my girlfriend (now my wife) and two friends (who chickened out) to drive from Austin to Washington, DC to see the Dead at RFK Stadium that June. We went. It was awesome. Jerry died two months later.
- I have a bachelor’s degree in film production and an MA in screenwriting. Despite that, I rarely watch movies anymore. Maybe it’s because for the life of me I can’t figure out why anyone still makes movies now that Lord of the Rings has been made. Perfection was achieved. Let’s move on.
- The first rock concert I ever saw was a Cheap Trick show in Naples, Italy. I had no idea who they were, and I still don’t.
- For the past three weeks U2’s Unforgettable Fire has been in my car. I’ve had it for years, I’ve always liked it, but for some reason all of a sudden, it’s all I want to listen to. Over and over again. I’ll do that until it gets old again.
- My favorite snack is a tortilla with cheese melted on it (in the microwave) with some Vietnamese Túóng Ót Sriracha sauce (red sauce with a rooster on the bottle) slathered all over it. Side of peanuts and a glass of cold water.
The Eight Victims:
- Heather
- Jessica
- Iowa Greyhound
- Ironicus
- Panthergirl
- Mark
- Danigirl
- Anyone who reads this post
Nyah-nyah-nayh
Walking around downtown last week, I found myself focusing on the details of things. The colors and shapes that when added together make up whole buildings and even a city.
Windows are full of mystery. Things happen behind them that we can only imagine. Of course imagination creates far more interesting scenarios than reality.
Not every window will have something exciting going on behind it.
Sometimes, the only thing behind the window is a piece of wood.