Vampire Bites the Dust

Turns out you don't necessarily need a wooden stake to rid yourself of pesky vampires... you can just wait for them to die of old age - or complications from a fall.

As substantiated by the recent passing of Barnabas Collins, centuries old matriarch of the Collins family.

Hey, I never said old age came early for a vampire.

But if you're fortunate enough to be born in the 175th year of the neighborhood vampire, well then don't sweat the lack of a sharpened stake because you have a fifty-fifty chance of surviving the undead.

My musings of the life span of vampires was prompted by the recent passing of Johnathan Frid, the actor who portrayed Barnabas Collins in the Dark Shadows television soap opera and made vampires "all that".

Seems Mr. Frid took a fall in his eighty-seventh year and died from complications.

Hmmmm...could those complications have included landing on a broken piece of wood when he fell?  Maybe I better rethink the whole old age thing.

Baby Talk

There I was, one of only two males in a room full of women who were talking about babies.

It seems the introduction of a baby into a comfortable gathering spurs a need to recount the trials and tribulations associated with being a member of the female persuasion.

Labor pains, water breaking, length of labor, breast feeding, bodily functions, there were no filters on the conversation. 

I must admit I don't quite understand.  Even in familiar settings, folks gathered together are not inclined to recount the blow by blow details of their latest battle with influenza or diarrhea.  So why the necessity of comparing... well, I'll leave the details to your imagination.

The next time I'm invited to attend a function involving a baby, I'm going to demand a head count of male vs female before accepting.

Have Brush Will Travel

His attire wasn't anything out of the ordinary... for a guy on his way to work in a casual dress office environment.  What piqued my interest was that the man crossing the street carried a gallon jug of Wawa iced tea in one hand; and in the other hand carried a four inch wide paint brush - the kind of brush used for serious house painting.

Okay, so maybe he was a well dressed painter. But without a truck of supplies or at least a gallon of paint, I wondered just exactly what he was going to accomplish with his brush.  He was crossing the street at a point where the only nearest anything was a centuries old cemetery.

Could it be he was a researcher?  Is the acid content in Wawa iced tea sufficient to cut through layered grime on headstones?  Was he going to "paint" the tea onto the headstones to make worn lettering readable? ... Or was he just a guy out for a walk with his favorite brush?

I guess I'll never know.

Rippled Reality

A lot going on today so I offer the following:

To see your reflection in a pond.
To drop a pebble in the water.
To see your reflection ripple.
Is to see the lie called reality.

It Looks Like an Outhouse

And all this time I thought the wooden structure was an outhouse. In my defense, it did meet all of the requirements - four feet square, six-and-a-half feet high, sloped roof, weathered boards, narrow door. An outhouse.

 I passed the thing every day and never once questioned by assumption of the building's purpose despite it being situated mere feet away from the shoulder of a divided highway.

It was the new door with a glass insert that caused me to reevaluate my assumptions. After all, a picture window is not a typical feature for a privy. That bright, newly hung door started me wondering just what purpose the small building served.

Today's morning rains brought the answer to my question. Just as the yellow lights of a school bus started flashing, the "outhouse" door flew open and a youngster with a bulging backpack darted from his shelter.

I thought back to the many mornings I was had to endure wet weather waiting for the bus and found myself envying the boy with his personal waiting room.

Sounds of Comfort

Rhythmic patter on the rooftop.
Steady gurgling in the downspouts.
Rushing whispers of damp leaves stirred by wind.
Contented chirping of birds calling from nests.

These are the sounds that send us to comfortable chairs where, wrapped in warming afghans, we lose ourselves in the writings of favorite authors and drift into daydreams.

Messages and Amazement

We associate phone calls at 3:00 a.m. in the morning with bad news.

But I suspected the text message I received in the wee hours of Monday was the equivalent of a stork making a practice run with baby bunting.

My instincts proved to be right.  Once I fumbled my eyeglasses onto my head, I read the news that Media Girl was in labor.  A little over three hours later I was on the phone learning that baby Myla had entered the world...and hearing of the agony of labor that led up to her birth.

Now that everyone is home, I'm amazed on multiple fronts.  Amazed that something over 8 pounds can just slip out of a person (although Media Girl may take issue with the word slip). Amazed that a person can be so small as to weigh less than 9 pounds.

Fingers barely thicker than pencil lead, toes smaller than erasers, and ears little bigger than the q-tips used to clean them. I had forgotten people came in this size and am amazed to think that Myla will one day stand at least chest high to me.