Sunday: Some days, I have a specific topic to vent about; other times, I have no idea what I'm going to say when I begin writing. The past few days have been peaceful and uneventful. Paul has no classes on Friday, and he "made" me watch four or five recorded episodes of Cold Case, a show I love even more than Law and Order even though I really have to suspend my disbelief that five or six detectives 1)work only one case at a time, which is the illusion the show portrays 2)are ardent about solving cold cases as far back as the '20's or '40's. Since I am capable of suspending disbelief for far more than those little flaws, I like the show immensely. I particularly like the visual time transitions in one quick whoooosh! A character who was 20 in the 1970's whooshes into a middle-aged woman of the 2000's, and back, as the story line requires. So we watched those episodes, and I puttered around, doing very little, or at least very little that shows because at the end of the day, many of the housekeeping tasks aren't really visible to someone walking in the door at night. . . managing the needy pets who need food, walks, and loving every five minutes, throwing the laundry into the washer and dryer, ironing, filling the dishwasher, shredding the piles of unwanted mail. I always read those articles on de-cluttering and watch the show Clean Sweep, but I don't have the energy or persistence to clean out the whole house single-handedly, once and for all. The "experts" all say you should toss the unwanted mail, such as credit card offers and other baloney, directly into the wastebasket as it comes in. The fools! Don't they realize that you have to shred everything, or someone will go through the garbage and steal your identity? It's true. On television, I've seen the experts badgering older people to throw away sentimental objects. "You'll be honoring him more to have a clean house than to keep his shirts," one of them will say to a widow. Sometimes, I think these cleanliness experts are a bit too blase about other people's favorite objects. No skin off their teeth if a widow throws away her beloved husband's shirts, and the experts will have achieved their goal of de-cluttering the house. But keep in mind, the experts, like everyone else, have an agenda!
On Saturday, Liberto and I went to see Mamma Mia. The scenery was wonderful. The story takes place on a Greek island where the sun was always shining and the ocean was sparkly blue-green. The house was gorgeous, with lots of light and flowers. I loved the light aqua-colored stone walls of the interior rooms. But a little too much suspension of disbelief was required for the plot, such as Pierce Brosnan's character bursting into song (Simon Cowell would have sniffed that he was "pitchy"), or all three potential fathers of the daughter, who didn't even know there was a daughter, coming to an event held by the woman they'd merely had quickies with 20 years earlier. I shouldn't compare genres, but I have no trouble suspending my disbelief for Cold Case because the mystery and the tension of whodunit outweighs the little incredulities, but Mamma Mia's plot, though very feel-good, was not feel-good enough to outweigh the gaps. Nevertheless, we still had a good time. I was tapping my foot to the beat of ABBA with every song.
We then headed to Home Depot to buy a rug for Paul's newly floored room. We agreed that it should be coffee-colored. Why? Because it's going to be splattered with coffee. It's inevitable. Paul is a coffee-freak though he doesn't actually drink that much of it. I find half-filled cups all over the house. But he seems to enjoy the ritual of preparing it, pouring it, sweetening it, adding the flavored creamer, and taking a few sips before abandoning the cup somewhere in the house. So we bought a cafe au lait colored rug with some design in it, so that the spilled coffee will flow right into the colors. Maybe that sounds defeatist, but as they say in Venezuela, "The potato is already peeled."
Now it's Sunday. This morning, Paul and I went to the gym. I'm improving on the elliptical machine (or the cross country ski machine, whatever it's called). I'm up to six minutes on that. It's a killer. I count the seconds when doing that one.
I just remembered I told Shawn I'd call him at about noon our time, so I'm going to go and do that now.
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