Musing

Phone Memories

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Dialing 503-555-1212? Or any three-digit-prefix-555-1212? This pre 4-1-1 information line. Before that you had to call 0 to get an operator for assistance.

Or writing down phone numbers as (503)555-0110? That, for those that haven´t had the pleasure of knowing you could just dial seven digits. And earlier five or four digits. But life got more complex, or too numerous, for the earlier times. All the way back to calling the operator and asking for who you wanted. Small exchanges in those days.

I´ve wondered about phone numbers. How long will the pool of them persist? Before we have too many unique places to call and there is no longer an available number. Like IPv4, it is inevitable for us to outgrow the system.

Or being able to call a number, wait for the answer, and hang up quickly to not be detected. But that´s a different set of memories to follow in another post.

Social Security Day

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Well hot dog. I´m 62. I can now collect Social Security payments from the US Government. If I want. Which I don´t. So far I do better at living off of my savings at a rate of perpetually sustainable withdrawals.

It´s a great feeling to have my savings investments growing faster than it is depleted. WARNING: past results are no indication of future returns. But still, I´ve the happy feeling today.

Other than that, there is nothing special about turning another year older. Well there is the marveling at people who do not know about what seems commonplace. Like rotary phones. Or library cards, getting filled up. Or life before computers. Or being able to call up your crush and hang up in being scared, and they couldn´t know who had called. Or clams for a buck a pound. Yes, so many bits of my past. About to fade into no longer memory.

I have a couple more decades. Looking forward to them.

List of Lists

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A To Do lists in not one that I have. But there are a few. Like these.

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  • Areas of Obsession
  • Authors
  • Bad Influences
  • Cars Owned
  • Celebrity Crushes
  • Countries Visited
  • Earworms
  • Fall Foods
  • Frission Songs
  • Irritations
  • Lessons Not Learned
  • Movie Moments
  • Nostalgic Items
  • Photographers
  • Pivitol Life Events
  • Places I’ve Lived
  • Scars
  • Spring Foods
  • States I’ve Lived In
  • Summer Foods
  • Things Found After Buying New
  • Things I Adore
  • Things I Dont Do Well
  • Things I Dont Share with Peers
  • Things I Dont Understand
  • Things I Wish I Liked Better
  • Things That Make Me Cry
  • Tribes
  • Trivia About Me
  • Why I Like
  • Winter Foods
  • Women Mentors

2019 Aug 1

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In early July I read, or saw, a post from Angela Fehr celebrating World Watercolor Month. It seems most (every?) activity has a month. 30 Days of Biking in April. November is National Novel Writing Month. There’s Inktober, for those that draw. A Ukulele group went beyond with 100 Days of Ukulele. And there are start anytime 30 Day Challenges, for example for fitness.

“Yes! I’ll do that,” I thought. And I started. Doing Angel-esque free things that didn’t look like anything, even the ones that started out intending to look like something. As a month of watercolor, it was kind of bumpy, I hadn’t gotten started. But August, it is here for a new adventure.

Somewhere in mid month I decided to do something each month. Writing, or playing an instrument, or riding my bike, or some new thing to try out. Now that it’s August, I’m free to choose something else. Well, I’m new at this and haven’t chosen something yet.

I’ll let you know in September.

Practice of Watercolor

Reading: Keep Going

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Keep Going, from Austin Kleon, is about making things. It is an easy read for those of you interested in making things. Actually, those of you not interested in making things, in the art sense, may find it worth reading.

But that is not the point of this posting. You can see the summation below. (Easy for 10 chapters all of them titled.) This is something I started after my heart attack. How to get through a book? How to return to reading?

I started with Agatha Raisin and the Quiche of Death. Read a chapter, make a summary. That process got me through the book. I don’t understand why this enables me to ready. But it does. I’ve continued. A two-page spread, fill it up with chapter numbers, some bits of summary follow. I’m reasonably sure I understand that I read.

This works for fiction and non-fiction books. But, Poetry? That does not seem to work. The collections, Sailing Alone Around the Room, Newspaper Blackout, and Queen of a Rainy Country, are three recent examples, are all so atomic that summaries would fall to individual poems.

So I must read without the crutch of summarizing. I hope I understand/

Notes from the book