Random Thoughts on a Snowbound Day

Well, it's happened. My flight this morning has officially been cancelled...fortunately, I anticipated it yesterday afternoon and rebooked. Unfortunately, I can't get out today, and am booked out Saturday morning. So here I am, surrounded by roads that are sheets of ice, blowing snow, and generally yucky conditions. Good thing I have plenty of books, my crossword puzzle magazine, and my ailing laptop.

A few random thoughts for a blizzardy morning...

Sean Penn has apparently been cast to play, of all people, Larry in the upcoming Three Stooges film. Jim Carrey and Benicio del Toro are rumored to be playing the roles of the other two Stooges, Curly and Moe. With the exception of Jim Carrey, this is some of the oddest casting I've ever seen...the movie should be interesting, nyuk, nyuk, nuck.

An article in yesterday's USA Today talked about the proliferation of Local/State/National _____ Days/Weeks/Months. For example, did you know that March 27th is Medical Biller's Day in New York, or that August 1st is the start of Clown Week in Wisconsin? September of last year was Indoor Mold Awareness Month in Georgia; April 8th-11th of 2008 was Tumor Registrars Week (?) in Nebraska, and this month - March, 2009 - is Certified Government Financial Manager Month (one hopes they know that they've only got a few more days to get the economy straightened out before their month is over). And of course, this coming September 19th-28th will be Ballroom Dance Week in Virginia. All you lady readers who come to our studio during that week can dance with me for no extra charge!

This morning's Writers' Almanac from Garrison Keillor offered this wonderful poem: Meditation on Ruin, by Jay Hopler:

It's not the lost lover that brings us to ruin, or the barroom brawl,
or the con game gone bad, or the beating
Taken in the alleyway.
But the lost car keys,
The broken shoelace,
The overcharge at the gas pump
Which we broach without comment — these are the things that
eat away at life, these constant vibrations
In the web of the unremarkable.

The death of a father — the death of the mother —
The sudden loss shocks the living flesh alive! But the broken
pair of glasses,
The tear in the trousers,
These begin an ache behind the eyes.
And it's this ache to which we will ourselves
Oblivious. We are oblivious. Then, one morning—there's a crack in the water glass —we wake to find ourselves undone.

And, thinking about ruin, I move on to figure out how to maximize the value of a day stuck in the hotel. I guess I'll finish Amanda's letter, write the long-overdue letter to my daughter (whose birthday is today), and start my new book - Inferno, by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle.

Who knows? If I'm bored enough, I may even post again later.

Have a good day. More thoughts coming.

Bilbo