All posts by X Teri

Toilet Photos (Update)

08/03/2014 X Teri Leave a comment

One of my previous hobbies involved taking pictures of the toilets (or a toilet) in a place I visited. (I didn’t take a picture if the place were filthy.) At the apex of my hobby, I had at least a 100 great toilet pictures. I’ll bet you’ve never read that sentence in your life before, have you? Say what you will about the foolishness of such an endeavor, it was certainly inexpensive to collect such “mementos” of the places I had visited. I would even take them back when all I had was a traditional film camera. Imagining what the people printing the pictures were thinking was no small part of the fun of the stupidity I enjoyed.

Whether I sauntered into the Imax in Tulsa, Oklahoma, or Liberace’s private bathroom, I would take a snapshot of the toilet. Doing this rarely failed to give a me a burst of laughter. There were times someone might walk in during my shot. More than once, I had looks of outlandishly bewildered expressions thrown at me. On one occasion, I took a shot and the flash must have bewildered someone in an adjacent stall I thought to be empty. I heard a very quiet “What the f$%^” come out of the supposedly empty stall. Explaining what I was doing in these situations didn’t seem to sate the curiosity of those who walked in during these photography sessions! No, it usually inspired the inquisitive people to march away quickly, very quickly.

A few years ago, I had visited Olive Garden in Fayetteville with my cousin Jimmy Terry. He wanted to “see me in action,” so to speak. He accompanied me to the bathroom and as I opened the stall door, he couldn’t control his laughter. “I can’t believe you do this all the time!” he giggled. I let him take the picture but his giggling resulted in all 3 of the pictures coming out looking like he had a seizure while trying to take the picture. More than once, Jimmy would later ask me if I took a picture of any toilets while I went to Vegas or to a new restaurant. He liked to joke that I should get a photography service started and do the photo shoots ONLY in bathrooms. He said it would be easier to clump everyone together if they were all crammed in a stall together – and that they would be more inclined to not waste time, especially if the stall were “between users,” so to speak. He added that since people were always running off to the bathroom, doing the shoot IN the bathroom would be thereby eliminated as an excuse, too.

When going through old photo albums, you could have seen two dozen pictures of the Air Museum only to be thrown off guard halfway through by a full-color shot of one of the toilets residing there. Every once and a while, I would throw in a picture of one of the toilets in the dvd picture slideshows I loved making. (From my perspective, there was just as much recognition of my visit having seen the toilet as the front of the building housing it.) Including toilet pictures in a person’s slideshow is a quick method to determine how much of a sense of humor someone might have.

(I used to joke that such a book would make an excellent coffee table book. The novelty of such an item should have been enough to achieve modest sales, even as a gag gift.)

Sometime not too long ago, I thought I was doing myself a favor by culling the toilet shots out of my photo collections. I think by doing so that I excised a portion of my wonderment and amusement toward the world. It would be a great pleasure to laugh at some of those pictures again and to test how many I could identify without any context.

Newser Story Containing a Couple of Links Directly Related to This

Entertainment

08082013 Deadwood (TV Series)

08/03/2014 X Teri

STOP reading now if your sensibilities are injured by profanity. You have been warned!

(By way of preface, I love this show, at risk of darkening my reputation and maligning my own character!)

Deadwood is an older HBO series, one which sometimes gets overlooked against stalwarts such as “Six Feet Under” or “The Sopranos.” I recently started re-watching the entire series. It is a much better series now that I’m older. There were some themes that I didn’t quite understand through my first viewing many years ago. Now that my wife has been exposed to so many accents and strange modes of speech, she doesn’t find it a chore to decipher the complexity of Deadwood with me. I’m so glad that she’s watching it with me.

Despite its frontier setting, Deadwood is one of those rare shows which owes much of its appeal to the subtle words of wisdom littered throughout the dialogue. Many of the characters are on the show are so apparently ‘gross’ on the surface that we sometimes forget that intelligence and wit don’t always arrive in pretty containers. (They are quite often covered in mud and guarded by a snarling rat.) Many fans of the show don’t know that the creator originally was to use the same themes in a show based in Roman times but due to HBO already sponsoring “Rome,” the creator adapted the ideas to a similarly-themed time and place. The series at its heart is supposed to detail how any group of people move away from chaos toward organization.

Ian McShane had the meatiest part, the one of Al Swearengen. Some might argue that Timothy Olyphant had the best role as Seth Bullock, but I disagree entirely. Al’s character is one of the most authentic roles I’ve ever seen in television. Al was also a real person historically and is reputed to have been brutal. Whatever the real reach of his tendency toward anger, I much prefer the television-inspired version HBO brought to life. Al’s villain in this show is at least consistent to his nature, as well as having an astute understanding of the what drives people (and it usually isn’t what they say it is.)

One reason I linked to my original profanity blog is that Deadwood has one of the highest cursing frequencies in television. The “F-bomb” is used so often that it almost gets ignored. At the time, the creator, David Milch, got a lot of attention for such blatant cursing. Personally, I think it makes the show much more credible. If you watch the show and listen attentively, you’ll note that much of the true message is conveyed by those who tend to speak the most coarsely.

The real word of surprise in Deadwood is the word “cocksucker.” This is not your typical dinner party word. In Deadwood, it is used incessantly. “Cocksucker” was on of my dad’s favorite words. A few of my earliest memories involve my dad convincing me to go approach one of my religiously-inclined elders and utter the word in their presence. While no match in style, my dad would have agreed that he had much in common with Al Swearengen. He certainly had some physical attributes in common.

A Few Quotes from Deadwood…

Al Swearengen: Pain or damage don’t end the world. Or despair or fucking beatings. The world ends when you’re dead. Until then, you got more punishment in store. Stand it like a man… and give some back.

Al Swearengen: In life you have to do a lot of things you don’t fucking want to do. Many times, that’s what the fuck life is… one vile fucking task after another.

Al Swearengen: Announcin’ your plans is a good way to hear god laugh.

Calamity Jane: Maybe I will have a fuckin’ drink, for sociability’s sake and ’cause I’m a fuckin’ drunk.
Joanie Stubbs: What’s your preference?
Calamity Jane: That it ain’t been previously swallowed.

E.B. Farnum: Some ancient Italian maxim fits our situation, whose particulars escape me.
Francis Wolcott: Is the gist that I’m shit out of luck?
E.B. Farnum: Did they speak that way then?

Hugo Jarry: And you, Mr. Wolcott, I find you the most severe disappointment of all.
Francis Wolcott: Often to myself, as well.

Miles Anderson: God bless you, Mr. Swearengen.
Al Swearengen: Well, not likely. But my prospects have just improved.

Cy Tolliver: Sayin’ questions in that tone and pointin’ your finger at me will get you told to fuck yourself.

Al Swearengen: I wouldn’t trust a man who wouldn’t try to steal a little.

Al Swearengen: What’s your partner so mad about all the time?
Sol Star: He’s not mad.
Al Swearengen: He’s got a mean way of being happy.

A.W. Merrick: Why did you strike me?
Doc Cochran: To secure your attention.

Holiday

Thanksgiving Meal Is Dinner?

08/03/2014 X Teri

This year, I read several more articles and blogs from writers insisting that the meal served on Thanksgiving day is “Thanksgiving Dinner.” I don’t call it that. Many people do, but I don’t, and nor do quite a lot of other people. Perhaps I’m out of the loop with most Americans, but almost no one I know serves the Thanksgiving meal late in the afternoon and anything after 6 p.m. would seem barbaric to most of my world.

If I’m inviting someone to eat the meal with me, I would say “Would you like to come over for Thanksgiving?” After the initial question, there might be follow ups to nail down the exact time frame. I don’t need to add the word “dinner” to my invitation to make it understandable. Regardless, there is too much confusion resulting from the words “dinner” and “supper” being used interchangeably, when they shouldn’t be.

(“Dinner” is earlier in the day and “supper” is always later, regardless of time frame.)

In times past, ‘dinner’ was served around 1 and 2 p.m. As technology and industrialization progressed, dinner crept up into the afternoon. With commercialization and sports becoming intertwined with the eating traditions on Thanksgiving, the reality is that most people wouldn’t dream of waiting late into the afternoon to have the holiday meal. But, there are purists, East Coast residents, and wealthy people who would eat later, even though they are going to be snacking nonstop up until the holiday meal commences.

If someone were to offer for me to eat Thanksgiving with them at 6 p.m. I would certainly think it to be a joke when first uttered. I might accept the offer but there is no way I would wait until that late to celebrate the holiday meal. You would catch me 5-6 hours earlier, eating cranberry sauce from a can if necessary.

But while I’m writing this lazy post about eating, I’ve never enjoyed the labor-intensive part of this holiday. Sure, turkey breast is great. But to have 19 sides items, 7 desserts and 3 types of bread? Someone is working too hard. Invariably, the person doing too much work will be very irritated after the fact.

Despite tradition, the meal should be about companionship and company, not so much about the food. People today use the holiday as a reason to watch football, socialize and be around other people. And that’s a good thing. Trying to force a ritual of “gratitude” on top of the day is just foolish. Let family and friends get together and enjoy themselves. (And maybe even the in-laws.)

Personally, I would rather eat spaghetti, pizza or even finger foods all day than concern myself with a traditional meal. For those who insist on tradition, that is certainly their right. I’ve just found that the traditionalists many times steal the ‘fun’ and spontaneity that is possible with holidays. I get tired trying to get people to do it differently, even once, to see that it’s not necessary to kill a large bird and cook 22 other dishes to accompany its sacrifice.

Ancestry, Biographical, Personal

08022014 Macaroni Afternoons With Grandma

08/03/2014 X Teri

As I was finishing off a delicious can of V-8 this morning, I had one of those surprising memory associations assail me: one of the many reasons that I love V-8s might be that the overall taste is evocative of summers at my grandma Nellie’s house. I’ve consumed a few thousand V-8s in my life; I can say that without fear of exaggeration. To have just now made the connection between the tomato aftertaste of V-8 and being at my grandma’s house was a nice surprise for me.

One thing grandma loved to fatten me up with was plain macaroni. After cooking it, she would add tomato sauce and/or paste to the water and let the macaroni continue to soak up more water. The heated concoction would pass the aroma around the kitchen and house. Even if I had recently eaten, I would tell myself I could eat a big bowl of macaroni and tomato sauce as “just a snack,” as if an entire box of any kind of pasta is anything less than a ridiculous challenge to most people. The legend that I could consume a dozen adult portions at one sitting was no exaggeration. It was an easy, cheap food to make for me. It just so happened that I LOVED macaroni cooked this way. There were many afternoons were I would eat the entire pot of macaroni by myself, usually washing it down with Coke from a 2-liter bottle.

I drank a second V-8 later today, this time deliberately thinking about how much it reminded me of grandma’s macaroni, sitting on a rough wood floor, watching a very poor tv signal, enjoying myself as if I were a king.

It is hard to imagine anything simpler than those moments. No amount of complexity and choice would have made those bits of macaroni any more delicious.

Were it possible, I sometimes would choose to be able to go back to one of those summer afternoons, with nothing except a bowl of macaroni, a glass of coke, and a small house on a small rise in the road, looking out toward the big world with my grandma and granddad. I never noticed how scarce my tv options were and I never felt poor at their house. And I would never have thought I wasn’t well-fed.

Entertainment

” Pre-Cap” for TV Shows

08/03/2014 X Teri

While watching some shows, I get annoyed by the way they are segmented, especially around commercial breaks. I admit that I don’t watch much TV that includes commercials, even on DVR.

A growing trend that bugs me is what I have named the “precap.” I know this word already exists, but not in the sense I use it. A “precap” is the tendency of a show to show us what is going to happen after the commercial; after the commercial break, we then see what happened before and what is yet to come. Sometimes, the same material is referenced several times before being shown. Ugh!

I have to learn new ways to stop noticing this trend, as it is slowly killing the little enjoyment I can glean from a few TV shows.

Whimsical

A Fun Boost For Tourism and Our Highways

08/03/2014 X Teri

I think that having giant dinosaurs concealed in the foliage along I-540, Hwy 412 and other places would be an awesome addition to our scenery. Perhaps have a large T-Rex head poking out from behind billboards and large trees, or King Kong’s head peering over the top of a small hill. It would draw attention to the advertising and make life visually interesting for everyone.

General

01082012 You Can Be Too Helpful…

08/03/2014 X Teri

Two instances where it is possible to be “too helpful” —
(1) Throwing a drowning man BOTH ends of a rope (2) Mopping all the floors – even the carpeted ones…

Art

Taken For Granted

08/03/2014 X Teri

Black Hole Sun

The same sun, yet

filtered by negligent eyes

renders darkly all that shines

(X Teri)

It is our inevitable nature to marginalize and forget the people, ideas and things that we hold most valuable. “Familiarity breeds contempt” is a well-known cliche that I would modify: “Familiarity breeds neglect.”

Even when we think we are being mindful custodians of our lives, the fatigue and incessant throng of daily living distracts us. Sometimes, the distraction threatens to make us so inattentive that our lives begin to orbit eccentrically, threatening to hurl things and people away from us.

The above painting is one I asked a friend to paint for me as a surprise gift for my wife. It’s a woman in silhouette, sitting near the top of a hill on a bright, sunny day, near a gorgeous tree. Yet, to her, the sun is a black hole. Even she is black against the beautiful backdrop. In a similar fashion, we incrementally fail to appreciate things of beauty or exquisite nature, so much so that their presence seems to almost become the opposite of reality.

(Sidenote: my friend who painted the work doesn’t think of herself as a painter. It’s obviously not true. If it gave me an inspiration and I was willing to pay her for her time and effort, then by definition, she is a painter.)

Ancestry, Biographical, Personal

08152013 First Time I Was Read My Rights

08/03/2014 X Teri

Another amusing hallmark in my distinguished life involves the first time I was read my rights.

I attended junior high school. Southwest, to be specific. Life was a mess. Another trailer had burned and so my family moved to Tontitown to live with a paternal cousin, Leta. I had left behind my best friend and his mom, who had saved me from my family more than once. I was still infrequently wetting the bed, mom and dad’s alcoholism was at a seeming crescendo, and my dad and his cousin Leta were having an affair, which they thought was secret. I was getting one horrible beating a week, minimum. (I think maybe my dad had a quota that only he knew about!)

I don’t remember which class it was but I was facing South, looking out the window and doodling. The classroom was on the outside of the building, on the front near those horrible holly bushes with thorns. (I was thrown into those horrible bushes more than once by bullies.) I was chewing grape Bubble Yum gum, which I had just bought on a payment plan from Bobby. Honestly, I was in a funk and not paying attention to anything. The teacher interrupted my thoughts by saying my name, evidently more than once. I was expecting to be in trouble for not paying attention and doodling. Instead, someone had knocked on the class door and asked to see me in the principal’s office.

I was confused. I didn’t know if meant I had done something bad. As I got close to the office, I could see a couple of police in the office. Due to my parents, my idea about the police up to that point was mostly distrust and anger. But what flashed through my mind was the hope that my dad was dead. I can’t help how that sounds -it is true. The image of the police officer almost convinced me that he had finally gotten so drunk that he had died driving. I knew that if dad were dead, I could get away from my mom, too. (Dad had been in several terrible drinking and driving incidents. He was driving the car in 1970 when my cousin was killed. He totaled a truck while we were living in Tontitown with Leta. Etc.)

When I was escorted into the office, they started asking me weird questions about my name, where I lived. They probably assumed I was an idiot at first because I didn’t want to answer questions without knowing where it was headed. I jumped to the erroneous hope that maybe someone had reported abuse at home. Instead, they started reading me my rights, one line at a time.”Do understand these rights?” No, I didn’t, but I said yes. I wondered where my brother was or where another adult might be. It seemed odd that no one on my behalf was present.

They began asking a lot of strange questions about checks, mailing addresses, alcohol, whether I had ever smoked cigarettes or anything else. There were a lot of questions. I could see that they were changing from aggressive to a little perplexed. They could clearly see that I was confused and way out of my element.

As they could see I was very confused, they finally told me that someone had stolen a stack of checks from my cousin Leta and had written several hot checks on the account. One of the police asked me, “Do you know who stole them or could have stolen them?” I looked right at him and said, “Probably (insert name here), she usually is at the bottom of everything like that. But it could be my mom and dad – they are always in trouble for drinking.” I’m paraphrasing, but that’s basically what I got out of it. The two police looked at each other in what I thought was surprise.

They then asked me at least 25 more questions about (insert name here), who her friends were, did she smoke, do drugs, etc. I was as honest as I could be. As the interview was about to end, one of the policemen asked me if there was anything else I wanted to tell them. I almost cried but instead of saying anything, I just said “no.”

I remember later mom and Leta have a screaming fight about the checks but I went out into the woods across the fence to get away from the nonsense.

I felt dirty, like I had been accused of something horrendous. I doubt whether they thought I was really involved. I think it was more of a fishing expedition. But it was strange being questioned by the police without someone else present while I was still in junior high school.