Good Morning Sunshine

Yesterday started differently. The time I normally spend blogging was instead spent hanging with Lisa as she prepared to head off to Breckenridge to spend some quality time with my daughter Jackie, recently on the links with the Hobbit fairy god mothers’ playing golf.

Jackie has just returned from an extended business trip in the far east and is spending some mountain chalet time with my grandson, Lucian, and her husband Zach, who are up there through the end of the week.

So Lisa wanted to visit – and since I am chained to the land by my beasts, and really hate the mountains, she went solo.

But, I sent Lisa up with a very special gift for Lucian.

When I was very young and anti-intellectual, I didn’t naturally take to reading in public. Not at first. The Public library sorties came a little later.

However, my lifetime love for reading actually began with me reading ridiculous and absurd materials that we – the Riverdale Regulars – swiped off the shelves of “Vinnie’s” on our way out of the shop after swinging by the back of the store to check on the latest edition of Playboy Magazine. I told you I have a very visual imagination. It needs to be fed.

You see, we didn’t have TV shows like Family Guy or South Park to give us that kind of intellectual stimulation.

One of my favorite monthly’s back in the 60s was Alfred E. Neuman’s Mad Magazine.

The shit they would write had me laughing my ass off.

And each month, I could not wait to devour it. Complete mind crack.

It was the kind of magazine one could roll up and jam into a back pocket, and you would never be embarrassed among your street peers if you were spotted reading it on a park bench in the Courts or on the Rocks behind the baseball field. Indeed, being spotted with MM increased your social rank dramatically among the street denizens, especially if you read the really funny and/or double entendre dirty bits out loud to the crew.

Now, I don’t have any old school Magazine shops around me in NoCo, like Vinnie’s or Choi’s back in Riverdale, and I do most of my reading either on line or otherwise delivered to my door by Amazon. And I never go to doctor’s offices, so I rarely see a printed magazine. However, the other morning while I was on-line at Safeway, I happened to glance up and spotted this classic.

Now, Lucian and I have spent a lot of time together laughing our asses off while streaming both Family Guy and South Park, so I know we share a genetic appreciation for that kind of dark and bawdy humor. So, I wanted to give him something similarly appealing that would stimulate a love for reading that will carry him successfully through life. Kids today rarely take their eyes away from their iPhone screens and their attention spans have suffered in the process.

Lucian is turning 13 in a few weeks, so I sent this classic beauty up with Lisa, along with some of her other more appropriate selections of expensive acknowledgements of his special day. However, I’m hoping that this present has a lasting impact on his view of the world and his ability to experience and advance in life through the written word.

Time will tell. Happy Birthday Lucian!

Anyway, no sooner was Lisa off on her two hour drive into the mountains, that I was off doing weekend chores. Given that we are hosting a birthday party next week, I figured I would get some of the big monthly chores done, that would aesthetically impact a human social gathering, like draining, cleaning and refilling the troughs, which is always a back breaker.

I have to say that the copper pipes in the troughs have definitely reduced the amount of accumulated algae, but it doesn’t eradicate the need for a monthly wash, rinse and repeat cycle.

But the work didn’t bother me, because I knew that Lisa was not around to add to my Honey Do List, so my suffering was measurable and finite.

And once the work was done – along with some mule muffin shoveling and shifting – I got to spend some time with my Casa Claire creatures, like giving Claire a good brushing.

Always paying additional attention to the Famous Ass’s Ass.

And then making sure that the other water resources were topped off and ready to enjoy.

And afterwards, while finally enjoying some kip and conversation under The Old Man, talking briefly with Pete Sheridan, I spotted another dead branch that just had to come down.

But it didn’t surrender without a fight.

And that is just fine, because anything of value has it’s cost.

But I did get to end the day binging BBC detective shows. And that was a perfect way to wrap up the Lord’s Day.

However, Monotonous Monday has arrived full of annoying energy and craving for my attention, so I better get moving.

You fine, five readers gulp down that last cuppa and get out there. We are in the last third of our summer, so we need to make sure we keep as much of each week’s end free from any interference, which means we must front load the heavy lifting at work. So, let’s get at it.

And no matter what else we get up to, let us make today a great one.

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