Oh, I Think So

I went to the post office and was going to go to the library but decided I needed nothing at the library and where I wanted to go was work so I could save my hour of personal time for another day.  But before I decided I'd do that, I went into Federal Plaza and here was Young Love having a picture taken by a pro.  I joined in, of course. They're in love and hired a guy to document it PLUS reflection of Flamingo It's become a habit of mine to dash down to the library on a Sunday when I've no plans or wind things up earlier in the day.  Since my lovely vacation in Tokyo, I've been wanting to learn to do origami.  The first book I got was for too complicated except for the tiny drinking cup I mastered.  I could not get past the rhombus part of crane.  Today I went up to the 8th floor and got a book called Easy Origami  which may do the trick.  Even better was the modele of Chicago's fabulous landmark in Millennium Park called "Cloud Gate," by B...

I went to Asakusa, in eastern Tokyo, across the Sumida River from Tokyo Skytree, to see Senso-ji, the ancient and enormous Buddhist temple.  It is huge and hugely popular. When I got out of the station at Asakusa, all the way at the end of the Ginza line, I exited the station and saw many, many young men, well muscled, wearing sleeveless shirts and shorts that had the legs rolled up, in the traditional Japanese style, to allow them freedom of movement as they peddled rickshaws around Asakusa, showing tourists Geisha Town, the temple, and the shopping arcades where the locals shop.  I stopped by one of them to ask directions to the temple and he showed me on a map everywhere he would take me adding, "This is where the Sumo shop."  I asked if he could guarantee me we'd see Sumo and he could not, so I asked him if he could please give me directions to the temple.  "About five minutes in that direction.  Look right and you will see it." Thirty seconds later, I c...

I vacationed in Tokyo and walked a lot (at least a third of it underground, changing trains) and ate some very tasty noodles, some pretty tasty noodles, noodles that were not that great, and some excellent sushi from a grocery store -- not a food hall in a fabulous department store but a grocery store a mile from my hotel. I walked into a pet store and saw breeds of cats that I've only otherwise seen in magazines, all of them in kitten form.  Some of them were asleep but a few were paying attention.  The Bengal was one of the especially lively ktitens and that little asshole was ripping his little cardboard cat hut slowly apart.  He would claw it and bite it and rip off a piece and play the hell with it until it was played out.  Then I got his eye.  What a charming little fucker and we played hide and seek.  I told the young woman who worked there that I was seeing most of these breeds in person for the first time and the only one I was missing was a Sing...

I am having a vacation in two weeks.  I am visiting another land where I don't speak the language and I am not going to speak the language except for maybe a few words.  But off I go and it will be great and I am mentally prepping and so ... four weeks off for me. When I get back?  Photographic evidence! Don't cry 'cause you miss me; cry because you're a crier (but, at your age, why you cryin' all the time?).

There's a lot of grafitti in this town.  Some of it is unintentionally hysterical, some is scary, some is just a "Kilroy Was Here" of some gang member or other, it always mars a surface and makes us look. At times it's just some misspelled what-the-fuckery that make one go, "Huh?" And so some what-the-fuckery came in the form of a Sharpie on an illuminated plexiglass surface. ??? It's a sign that give the web address for 250 locations in town where one can use a computer for free. What the person wrote has nothing to do with that or, really, anything else. "Don't wake up ty [ sic ] Sleeping GOD "Bom Bom "Murders Pschopeisis [ sic ] Menstruill [ sic ] Rpase [ sic ] Childmolestos [ sic ] Insanity "Real or not" This was done in the middle of the night in a bus shelter by someone carrying a red Sharpie. Something was going on in that person's head whether he/she was drunk, drugged up, or simply, w...

I am hating the hot, hot heat.   The sinus infection has backed off but sinus flushing and Mucinex will be part of my life forever because they do the job. Alas, that's how it is. The hot, hot heat makes me feel oppressed.  I am not a fan of oppression of any kind but I can't much do a thing about this, can I?  As they say, "Everyone talks about the weather but no one does anything about it." Eventually it will be done and it will be autumn and then winter.  Then there will be some major complaints because snowfall makes me not at all pleased.