Well, dear readers, we’re having a heat wave, a tropical heat wave and one of the results of the tropical heat wave is that it’s hot. I hate when that happens. In fact, it’s too darn hot. It’s almost like steam heat. It’s so hot it gives me fever. And tomorrow? Yep, it’s gonna be another hot day. Well, I think we’ve exhausted most of the heat songs. Did you hear about the post office guy in some town that stole thousands of packages over a few years, selling the items in the packages for over $85,000? For this, this nice fellow gets a year in jail and a $4,000 fine. Considering the grief he caused to thousands of people that seems tame. I’m not for throwing people in jail when they’re first time embezzlers or stuff like that – and yet they do, and with much worse sentences – yes, they’ve done a bad thing, but usually those people only hurt the companies they work for. That’s bad, of course, but not quite as bad as causing grief for thousands of normal people. He said it became addictive. I’ll bet. I must say, the USPS is practically at their nadir – they take responsibility for NOTHING. We sent a priority box to a dealer. The helper took it to the Studio City post office, where it sat for FIVE days, before being sent to Santa Clarita for sorting. The people there could not have cared less – they took no responsibility, they had no excuse, they had no reason for it sitting there. And they were kind of rude about it. Is it any wonder that people are using any possible alternative available? Since much of what the USPS worker stole were packages from Amazon is it any wonder that Amazon mostly uses UPS and Ontrac now? Who can blame them? And then, despite the terrible and getting worse every day service, they raise their prices all the time. You want to raise prices, provide better service. End of rant and screed. Do you know that Word doesn’t know what the word screed means? How can a writing program not know what a simple word like screed means? That’s just going to set me off on another screed, frankly or even georgely. Screed is a real word with a real meaning and how DARE Word not know such a word as screed. It knows the word “obfuscate” but not screed. The word obfuscate makes me want to vomit on the ground, but that word they know. Screed, which makes me indescribably happy, that they don’t know from Adam. And they don’t even know Adam, frankly, or Frank, adamly. I no longer have any clew as to what the HELL I’m talking about other than this paragraph has been a bit of a screed with no obfuscation.
Wow (wow, spelled backwards), that was a paragraph. That was, in a word, a screed. Well, that’s two words but who’s counting. Yesterday was a perfectly pleasant day except for the ridiculous neighbor waking me up at eight-thirty by noisily cleaning his patio. Nice of him to come home after four weeks just in time to have a few noisy guests over, too. So, I got up, answered e-mails, printed out orders, then went and had a sandwich and onion rings. After that, I took a forty-minute stroll. Then I came home, did some work on the computer, and then had a delightfully delightful hour-long telephonic conversation with Miss Jill O’Hara, the star of the original Promises, Promises production on Broadway. She’d gotten the remix but never talked to me about it, and she found an old e-mail I’d sent her at the time of release, which went to some address she doesn’t check. So, she told me lots of fun Promises stories, and she’s sending me a couple of CDs that she’s done recently. After that, I sat on my couch like so much fish.
Last night, I watched two Beck episodes (or films) – number four and five. Four was terrific, five was a little convoluted for my taste. These early Beck episodes were shot around 1997 and you can just start to see the hints of what would become shows like Wallander and The Killing and The Bridge and Maria Wern and Irene Huss. Again, lots of familiar faces from those other shows show up here. Then I wrote a little note to send to someone tomorrow (by real mail – hopefully no one will steal it), and I sent off a Christmas song that the East Coast Singer had asked me to write. It took quite a while to come up with something to write about, but I think it’s somewhat amusing and it has a pretty tune. I have no idea if it will be to her taste or not, but even if she doesn’t do it, I’ll put it in our December Kritzerland Kristmas show.
Well, why don’t we all click on the Unseemly Button below because thanks to the noisy neighbor I am still overtired and must get a good night’s beauty sleep.
Today, I shall do a lot of errands and whatnot, start a new set of liner notes, jog, eat, hopefully pick up some packages, and then in the evening I’ve promised myself that I get a treat – a foot massage from the local foot massage place.
Tomorrow and the rest of the week is very busy. I have a lunch meeting on Tuesday, a rehearsal on Wednesday, and lots o’ stuff on the rest of the days. On Saturday night, I’m seeing a production of that Spelling Bee show, which I’ve never seen – done by youngsters. I’m looking forward to it.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, do some sort of jog, do errands and whatnot, eat, hopefully pick up some packages and get a foot massage. Today’s topic of discussion: What are your favorite Knock-Knock jokes (the sillier the better) and what are your favorite jokes period? Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, where I shall undoubtedly dream of the unknown screed. The Unknown Screed – that’s the title of my next novel, a tale of horror about an unknown screed run amok amongst the citizens of Pacoima, California.