Next Echo

September 9, 2019
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2019 0909 next echo

Last night I had a sensation in my chest that was identical to one that sent me to the Emergency Room a couple of years back. Then as (most likely) now, electrocardiogram was normal. Nevertheless, they referred me to a cardiologist, who recommended a CT scan with contrast, which the insurance company denied, and we appealed to no avail, so they gave me a “nuclear stress test” instead, which disclosed that my heart’s “profusion”–blood-pumping action–was on the high end of the Normal range, and so they pronounced me Normal. That didn’t reassure me any too much, because “normal” people with a history of cardiac disease in their families (my dad died in 1983 at the age of 49 from “massive myocardial infarction”) are walking time bombs, despite all efforts at weight control (I’m a whopping 218 pounds now, or, to be euphemistic, “less than a hundred kilos”) and avoidance of contraindicated activity such as smoking (I don’t smoke, but sometimes succumb to the Gamblin’ Fool urge, and hang out in one of the local casinos, where smoking is not only permitted, but with the ubiquitous ashtrays, encouraged) and healthy diet (I am eating more yogurt and using more olive oil lately). So every day is a blessing, and every sign that all will be taken from me in a non-heartbeat is a curse. And last night I was Accursed.

What to do? Distraction to the rescue! I set myself a challenge at the stroke of 10:15: go from Blank Card to Completed Acrostic Poem with Image as FAST AS POSSIBLE. And when I finished, including signature and date, I looked at my watch and it said 10:35. And my chest had quieted down.

The above card, therefore, and to be the Drama Queen I undeniably am, May Well Have Saved My Life. That’s my Spin and I’m sticking to it.

And–the poetry is pretty darn good for so few words, and the image illustrates the poem serviceably, if not all that eye-pleasingly. Two people, one a stereotypical Busty Blonde and the other a stereotypical Busty-Blonde-Ogler, are both wearing X-Ray Spex, a novelty item which through light diffraction gives the illusion that the viewer can see through things, especially clothing. Both are dismayed that their Spex do not actually let them see through things, and they feel as if they have been suckered. Meanwhile tanks (and I had to rely on my memory as a 6th-grader sketching a tank from a big, thick book entitled Weapons, which I had to get special permission from Mrs. Bailey to check out) rumble in the background.

It’s a fairly nifty synopsis of the toxic absurdity that passes for Current Events today, what with all the saber-rattling and distraction and fakeness and accusation of fakeness–almost Biblical in the “wars, and rumors of wars” aspect–whoops, Friends, that’s the Drama Queen talking again…

…or is it? Faced with a personal crisis, my “distraction” seems to have been a focus on a more dire, impersonal, global crisis. I may be a Drama Queen, but the Bureau of Atomic Scientists DID quite recently move the minute hand of the “Doomsday Clock” one minute closer to midnight.

“Courage is our greatest present need,” my friends.

Next Echo

Now a ROBIN may be Thicke
Entertain with Vid or Pic
X-RAY SPEX were full of Pooh
Tanks & Silicone are too

blissy kissed

September 8, 2019
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2019 0908 blissy kissed

Something happened at work that was so delightful it must be recorded, yet professionalism demands that I walk a tightrope of discretion. So this account will contain Truth, but not the Whole truth. As for “Nothing but the Truth,” my honesty is up to that, but my spotty specific-memory isn’t, so some of this will be inexact.

Three exuberant ladies stepped up to the host stand. We will call them 4, 5 and 6, based on the number of letters in their first names. One of them, either 4 or 5, said that they had been here before, and they were back because they had gotten crushes on me from last time, because I’d given them a poem. (I sometimes offer a poem or a joke for parties waiting for tables, by way of distraction through light entertainment.) I smiled and seated them at one of the most popular tables, a four-top with phone-charging capability and plenty of elbow room.

While I continued hosting, I started composing a limerick. No one watching me work would have suspected I was multitasking, nor was I shirking: I was getting people seated and bussing tables without missing a beat. But at a lull I passed the ladies’ table and caught an eye. “Hey, I have a limerick for you, [4],” I told her and them.

“Oh, let’s hear it!”

“There once was a lady named [4]
Who made her regard for me plain
As she dined in plain view
Of her cast and her crew
She was gracious and kind, in the main.”

Then I quickly said, “GEEZ, that’s lame,” and at that they laughed.

More tables, more diners, then a lull. I wandered by the fateful table. “Got one for [5].” “Good!”

“A fine-dining person named [5]
Is mostly a dignified lady,
She sings like a bird,
And does fine Spoken Word,
But she discoes like it’s 1980.”

I do not exaggerate when I describe their response as a Burst of Laughter. They had been polite the last time, but at most mildly amused. I think I made up for it with this one.

But now I had a problem. The third member of the trio had a brain-buster of a name to come up with two limerick-rhyme words for. I could cheat and not end the line with her name, but a) cheating b) inconsistent with the other two c) how fine it would be to MEET that challenge. As I took dishes to the Dish Pit I got Rhymeword #1. As I seated a party of six I got Rhymeword #2. As the ladies waited for their bill to be generated by the server I approached their table.

“Well, I didn’t want [6] to feel left out…”

They beamed.

“I know of a lass named [6].
Don’t EVER suggest she’s a Playa,
For at that very notion
She’ll rage like the ocean,
And you’d better BACK OFF–or she’ll Slay ya.”

And by golly, the response at the last was best of all, with not only hearty laughter but NODS–I inferred that I had stumbled on some Truth.

Most important for me was feeling that I had turned my gratitude for being the reason for their return to Matt’s into a reward in the form of…more Poetry. I walked on air all the rest of my shift.

And I hope they’ll be back. They are The Three Graces to me. My little card above would fully reveal my regard for them, if all the words could be read.

instead he drank whatter

September 3, 2019
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About fifty years ago I read Cool Hand Luke by Donn Pearce. I was a teenager in Glendale, Arizona. I may have been trying out for the track team at the time. (Alas, I had no talent, but they let me “compete” anyway.) A phrase from that fine, gut-slamming book stuck in my head from that time to this, and I invoke it every time I try to turn over a new leaf and be healthy.

Luke had made a bet that he could eat fifty eggs. Sometime between the time he made that bet and he (spoiler alert) won the bet, he drank water when everyone thought he was going to do something else, specifically vomit. “Instead he drank water…” So when I’m tempted to eat a bag of cookies or a Philly Cheesesteak, I stave off temptation by being, briefly, Cool Hand Luke himself, and have some water instead.

The acrosticist’s problem, though, is that “instead” has seven letters, as does “hedrank”, but “water” has only five. So to fulfill an outlandish acrostic requirement my drinker is drinking “whatter.” I was forced to conceive a backstory about a sports drink called “Whatter You Waiting For?” rich in electrolytes and laced with a psychotropic substance that enables focus and intensity.

2019 0903 instead he drank whatter

instead he drank whatter

it pays to hydrate–ask athletic people in the know
needs include an anaesthetic dream of sandra oh
suck down that nutriented drink that you may be grade a
then find a righteous probiotic product like yoplait
ecclesiastes says to eat and drink as if au fait
and merriment is on the menu lest the tempers flare
delicious drink and kitchen sink make such a lovely pair

Apologies to Yoplait and to Sandra Oh. I am a big fan of both but consulted neither. Yoplait helped restore my digestic tract’s “good bacteria” after I was bombed with antibiotics. Sandra Oh was a huge reason I got such a kick out of the movie Sideways. Also she had a minor but unforgettable role in the pornstar-funeral episode of Six Feet Under. She is gifted indeed. –So my hope is that both parties consider my reference to them respectful and admiring. (Realistically, though, this post will overwhelmingly likely be unnoticed by both.)

CATastrophic CAT acrostics #1

September 3, 2019
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20190903_122401

This was hard enough to do in itself, but there is more rough road to bump over, because this is just one acrostic, yet the acrostic is “Catastrophic Cat Acrostics”–plural. So at least one more is forthcoming.

The other issue is “Catastrophic.” Where is the catastrophe? Well, the default will be that Cats have a reputation for living on the edge They are rumored to require nine lives because of their endangering curiosity. In this version of the poem, the third line reads “Tomcats who leap off a roof so often land intact.” But in an early draft the line read “Toss Tomcats off a roof and they so often land intact.” Catastrophic scenario, but what a horrible thing to do!

CATastrophic CAT acrostics #1

Collectors know that Kitties go beyond mere bric-a-brac • And soothsayers regard the Black-Furred key to the Arcana • Tomcats who leap off a roof so often land intact • And Prowling after Plummeting becomes a tom’s Nirvana • Successful integration of a cat in story’s arc • Takes understanding of the Cat as Empress/Angel/Boor • Rejuvenator/Savior yet a l o o f when you embark–O • Oui is Yes & Non is No & Always is Toujours • Peut-être is Perhaps and fot Eat Well Bon Appetît • Here almost endeth our leçon for Boredom is Ennui • It suits a Cat as does most French for there Cats are très chic • Comprenez-vous Lautrec, Toulouse un chat avec précis

Another three arguments for the Catastrophe of this acrostic is the degenerative use of the French language, the clumsy sometimes-iambic-sometimes-trochaic septameter, and the stifling crowdedness of the text. As to the first, French is useful when an endword must end on a certain letter AND rhyme.

The good news is the next one can’t help but be better.

neat heat feat. heat neat

September 2, 2019
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2019 0902 heat

Modern music of the Hip-Hop variety will often see one artist enhancing another, as for instance “Eminem feat. Rihanna.” “Feat.” is of course short for Featuring. Since this page is one acrostic enhanced by another, and all the acrostic words rhyme with “feat.”, it was irresistible to use “feat.” in my title. There’s also the tendency in poetry events to “feature” one or more poets, with or without “open mic,” which is of course short for “open microphone,” though often there isn’t a microphone.

The stereotype of Canadian speech is to end a sentence with “eh.” Comic book legend John Byrne, himself a Canadian, once quoted another Canadian who scorned that stereotype, but he said, “We don’t talk that way, eh.” Canadians also have a perhaps deserved reputation for being quite nice and quite polite.

There is a Canadian whiskey called Fireball, laced with cinnamon and like the alcoholic version of Red Hots, a hard candy popular when I was growing up. So a subfeature of this page might be called “heat neat feat. Fireball.” When a drink is ordered “neat” it means don’t add ice nor water nor a mixer to it.

“Cafe au lait” is French for “coffee enhanced with milk.” On the page I made circumflexes and accent marks, but writing in English we often do without. “Santa Fe” is sometimes written with an accent mark over the e–Aldous Huxley did so in Brave New World–but overwhelmingly its written form dispenses with the accent mark. It would have stuck out like a sore thumb on the acrostic.

The Seine is a river running through Paris, France. Once upon a time “the Left Bank” referred to creative types, because they tended to congregate on the left bank of the Seine.

A lot of people from France ended up in Canada. There is a ghost of a chance that “eh” is a direct descendant of “n’est-ce pas?”–French for “Is this not so?”

.
neat heat

nylon in Toronto, eh
eagle feathered Santa Fe
ash on 56th and Shea
time for some cafe au lait

heat neat

h i j k l m n
eventide upon the Seine
a b c d c b a
taken with cafe au lait

Catlover and Phone Battery

September 1, 2019
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Last week I struggled to charge up my phone. The plugin, an Android for my Samsung J3 Galaxy Prime, is loose and I have to wiggle it around to achieve the telltale lightning bolt.

My friend Sandra Snow, cat-lover beyond compare, sent me a phone battery, hoping it would help. Through no fault of her own, it didn’t. For her valiant effort I wanted to reward her with an original drawing of mine, so I started two car-related images, thus:

She chose the big close-up kitty over the several-catted acrostic. An hour later I showed her this:

20190901_163640

Barring last-minute changes, this will be on its way to Sandra on Tuesday, since tomorrow is a holiday.

Again: thank you, Sandra!