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Who’d’ve Thunk It?

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I’m gunna say something here that will sound totally off the wall given the L.A.-style city that I live in. Hang onto your hat!

I could probably do completely without a car of my own.

None.
No car.
No wheels.
No insurance bills.
No maintenance bills.
No gas bills.
None. Zero. Zilch.

CAN you imagine?

A week or three ago, I sure couldn’t have.

My son, who grows more paternalistic as the days pass, decided I shouldn’t be driving from pillar to post. Or even from the front yard to the garage door… 😀

So he has pilfered my car, leaving me with…oh yeah: an empty garage. 

After I got over the urge to grab him around the neck and throttle him (that took awhile…), it began to dawn on me:

Y’know what?
If you live in Phoenix, you don’t really need a car.

That assumes you have half a brain and can figure out how to use Uber and how to use the public transit system.

Here’s why:

* The ever-annoying City of Phoenix did one UN-annoying thing: it created a usable public transit system.

* Buses now show up on time and are no longer haunted by bums and lunatics.

* And the city installed, of all things, a light-rail system that passes within a block of my house and will take you to Tempe (where Arizona State University resides) to the downtown commercial district through the mid-town Yuppie precincts through uptown ritzy-titzyville and then onward to the middle-class suburbs to the north and west.

How’s about that, eh?

The present fad for running do-it-yourself taxi services complements that handsomely. A guy who lives right across the street from me(!!!) is doing exactly that. And I think a few others here in the ‘Hood are doing the same. Once I have a list of these worthies’ names and phone numbers, I may never have to ride another bus again. Or drive another car of my own!

Hmmmmm…

Just imagine never having to drop another $20 bill into a gas tank! Never having to haul the contraption to the local repair garage for its regular maintenance. Never having to fart with getting a driver’s license from the state.

LOL! I probably will keep on with the driver’s license nuisance, because a plastic card bearing your photo is a key, standard piece of identification. Can’t cash a check without one, eh?

But otherwise….about 87 gerjillion nuisances and expenses are about to go away. 

How about you? If you could get rid of your car, would you?

Hotter than the Hubs

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Doorbell jangles. It’s along about 3:30 p.m.

Outside: a kid. Looks to be about 10 or 12. Articulate and well-spoken, he explains that he’s lost a football. Thinks it may have gone over the back wall into the pool.

Hot diggety: a MISSION!

We launch into a search. And man! Is it hot out there.

Explore through the jungle vines. Examine the trees. Search the drink. Eyeball the roof.

But nope. We can NOT find it.

Where the heck it went, I can’t imagine.

But…it is sooooooo hot in that back yard. As we scribble: 110 degrees. In the shade.

****

He goes on his way. 

I plunge into the drink. That pool is a godsend, expense and hassle or no expense and hassle.

Heh! Okay, okay: it does have to be said that you could accomplish the same cooling effect with a shower. 😀

But a shower is nowhere near as much fun or pleasure as a dip in the pool.

It really does feel monstrously hot out there, even though 110 is just not THAT hot, objectively speaking. Must be a little humid. Or something.

Wonder what happened to the kid’s football. It must have bounced into Terri’s back yard. We tried to roust her, but she wouldn’t answer the doorbell. Like many women in these sylvan parts, she won’t open the door unless she knows who’s on the other side. That’s prob’ly smart. But…yeah. Tells you something about life in Phoenix, doesn’t it?

Wish I could move away from here. But…

But…

But where would I go???? 

Seriously: other than the San Francisco Bay Area, I sure can’t think of many places that would be worth uprooting my life and moving to a new home. And I can’t afford to live in the City. So…really, there’s noplace else to go, surely not anyplace that would justify a move.

Especially not with my son living here.

Now if he went someplace else, I might very well follow him. Especially if it didn’t snow, wherever he went. Truth to tell, though, he doesn’t seem even faintly interested in moving. His family and friends are here. He has a decently paying job that allows him to work out of his home(!!). And his home is a very pleasant house in a very pleasant, centrally located neighborhood. Unless some company offered him a truly fantastic deal, it seems unlikely that he’d take flight.

Sometimes I think I’d like to move back to Berkeley, where my mother’s family lived. They had such a pretty little house there, in a beautiful neighborhood on a steep hill. You got your exercise walking the block or two up to the grocery store!

But unless someone offers my son a phenomenal job, it sure doesn’t look like he’ll move. Don’t reckon I would, if I were him.

hmmmm…..  Would I want to work out of my home, five to seven days a week?

Really?????

Well. That’s exactly what I did, when I was teaching at the Great Desert University. Yes, I had an office on the campus. But I sure didn’t kill much time there…mostly, it was just a landing patch for when I was out there between classes. Which wasn’t long, that’s for sure!!

About half my sections were night classes. I’d have a couple of daytime sections each semester, plus of course I had to trudge out there for faculty meetings and to confer with the occasional student. But truth to tell, most of the time I was working from home.

M’jiito does most of his job over the phone, wrangling insurance agents. I personally prefer to spend at least half the day, maybe more, in the company of coworkers. Plugging away in a home office hour in and hour out, day in and day out is…depressing, IMHO. And he does keep his nose tight to the grindstone, that’s for sure.

Nice, though, not to have to commute. His house is centrally located, so over the lunch hour and for certain break periods, he can bop around to various stores and chow lines. Or go for a walk. Or whatever.

****

Kid on the phone! 🙂

He just arranged to take me shopping tomorrow. How nice!!!

My car is kaput. And frankly, it’s beginning to look questionable whether I’ll replace it. I can walk almost everyplace I need to go, and with an Uber driver living right across the street, I can foist the chore of driving through Phoenix’s gawdawful traffic on someone else.

Jeez. How amazing is that, anyway???

In addition to Uber, we have lightrail trains zipping up and down Main Drag West, all the time. If I can’t rope in a human to drive me around, I can stroll over to the train tracks and grab a ride there.

Heh! Phoenix is beginning to behave like an actual city! Can you imagine?

Kinda makes me miss San Francisco even more, though. One thing about the City: it was never hotter than a two-dollar cookstove outside. 😀

But…it did tend to rain on one, as one stood around a bus or train stop.

Y’know, it is interesting to think I might never replace the car. Just imagine that!

For one thing, imagine not having to diddle away dollar after dollar on a rolling tin can. How kewl would that be? 

What on earth would I do with all the cash saved by not having to buy gas every time I turn around, and by not having to get the car serviced? Or licensed and registered? Hot dang!

In due course, I’ll talk with my son about this idea. He’ll think I’ve lost a few more marbles, of course… But seriously: I really am thinking that it may be reasonable to do without a car. The Funny Farm is within walking distance of a place that rents cars: if anything comes up that I really need a car, I can get one quickly and easily. But at least two people here on the street hire out to drive people around. Plus of course we have cabs, cabs, and cabs.

If the idea flies, then we have the question of what do we do with the huge, two-car garage?

Got an idea: Turn it into an art studio. 

No kidding. It’s huge. Its walls are lined with cabinetry. Why not put a couple of art tables out there and invite friends to come over to draw, paint, or make pottery?

Would that be fun, or would that be fun? 

Hmmmm….  The idea begins to sound better and better…

Report from the Department of Weird Experiences

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Good grief! If it hadn’t been so funny — so goofy — I’d be hiding under the bed right now.

Did you know there are people in this world who cannot imagine why anyone would want to buy a chilled bottle of white wine? Some of those folks reside behind the customer service desk in a certain beloved nearby liquor store.

No kidding!  Hey!  What’s wrong with this fine room-temperature swiggle of white???

This has been one of those days when your fellow citizens are SO goony, SO ignorant, SO far out in left field that you simply have no clue how to respond.

Seriously: Every which way I’ve turned, lurking there has been another wacksh!t experience, another goofball customer “service” clerk, another inexplicable weirdness…to the point where it all comes out kinda hilarious.

But y’know…you hafta love them all! Think how boring this world would be without them! 😀

This morning I hit my favorite local strip mall, right up at the corner of Conduit of Blight and 19th Avenue.

And yeah: you DO have to love Latino culture to love that mall.

Yeah, you DO have to be White Trash yourself to appreciate how cool, how fun, how slippery, how smart the merchants up there are. Yea verily, you need to be such WT that you wish your Daddy were here to blaze the trail through that place for you. Ohhhhh dayum, do you wish your Daddy were here!! And would you love to hear the (hilarious) opinions he would’ve formed, after a day among the locals.

I’d love to be able to say I’d be as entertained as Daddy would’ve been by today’s antics of the locals. But you know…when he was alive I couldn’t read his mind. Now that he’s deader than a doornail, I have no idea whe he would’ve thought.

Well. I have an idea. But I sure as hell could have not been able to guarantee he would’ve thought that.

But ohhhhh… Yeah. He would’ve been…

amused
pissed
wilied up
out of patience
and telling his daughter to get the f*** outta there.

😀

But when you’re my daddy’s daughter, watching a$$holes dig themselves into a$$hole ditches is…well…damn funny.

 

Life with…Other Humans

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See…this kinda thing is THE reason I do NOT wanna live in an old-folkerie, elbow-to-elbow with my fellow senile humans, taken care of by folks who can’t get a better job anywhere else:

Apparently, WonderCleaningLady unplugged the microwave, which resides in the garage.

Unplugged it…WHY???? Gaddamm it.

This a.m., I go out there to heat some potatoes for breakfast, and find the damn thing doesn’t work.

Moment of panic: hooooleeee sh!t!!! Do I have to run out and buy a new micro today? And then tote it home or have it delivered…and then get it set up and working right?

AAAUUUUGH!

Well…I finally figured out that WCL must have pulled the plug and then never plugged it back in. Okay. Problem fixed.

But…goddammit! What IS the matter with people?  If you’re going to sabotage something in the course of doing some chore, f’rcrapsake UNsabotage it before you wander off!

grrrrrr grrrrrr grrrrrr grrrrrr grrrrrr

My problem is, I just don’t get along all that well with other humans. I have next to zero patience with Humanity, dammit!

And THAT is why I don’t want to spend the last months or years of my life locked up in an institution with a bunch of other old buzzards.

* * * * * 

Argha. It’s after 7 a.m. Before it starts to get hot, I need to get off my duff and walk up to the stores on Main Drag North by way of buying a few more cans of dog food for Ruby, snabbing some more fresh berries and melon, and roping in some bread and bacon. Blech! Just what I wanna do, the first crack off the bat in the morning.

Well: the second: Ruby and I have already circumnavigated the ‘Hood.

* * * * * 

One thing I need to do — well, plan to do more than need, actually — is to hop on the lightrail train and ride down to 19th and Glendale, where I can visit and explore the dreaded Beatitudes old-folkerie.

That’s the place where my son would like to foist me. The place where, thankyouverymuch, I do NOT want to live out the last months or years of my life.

My father consigned himself to one of those places. It was called Orangewood. And it was a pleasant enough place. It’s just that…well…it ain’t home, folks. It’s like living in a motel.

And no. No, I do NOT like motel living. No, I do NOT want to spend the final slab of my life in a prison for old folks, eating bad food turned out of cardboard and plastic packages onto steam tables.

Ugh, ugh, and ugh. Not to say UGHHHH!

The Beatitudes, in addition to multi-story structures filled with motel-like rooms, also has free-standing, single-story patio homes. These might be tolerable, primarily because they do provide a little space between you and the neighbor.

Whether these little castles are reserved for married couples or whether they’d let an old bat and her little dog occupy one, I dunno. Pretty quick, though, I intend to ask.

oooohhhhh gawd. 
The horror!

The HORROR of having to move into one of those warehouses for old folks!! I just do NOT want to live like that.

Ohhhhhh well…  It’s after 8 a.m. I’d better get a-hiking if I’m gonna get up to the grocery store before the morning gets unnavigably hot. Blech!

And so…AWWWAAAAAAAYYYYY!

Hotter Than a By-God

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Crimmineee. It’s only 2:00 in the afternoon, and the temp in the shade of the back porch is 104. 

Welp…I had things I needed to do. But I ain’t goin’ out in that!  Especially not without a car.

Should’ve gotten off my duff at 7 or 8 this morning, when the local shops opened. If they opened then. Some of them stay closed until a more traditional 10:00 a.m.

What a place! Why do I stay here????

Well, the main reason I stay in Arizona is that the kid is here.

Secondarily, I dunno where else I’d go.

Locally: Arizona just ain’t that glamorous a venue. There really isn’t anyplace else much better to live around here. Outside of AZ… back to California, maybe?  Helle’s Belles! I sure can’t afford to live in the East Bay, whence my family emanated. Hate Southern California and would rather put up with Arizona’s 100-degree-plus temps than go back there.

Ya can’t win for losin’, eh?

Lately, I’ve been contemplating the possibility of moving into an old-folkerie called the Beatitudes. Very nice place. Brain-banging expensive: basically, you fork over everything you have in exchange for their promise to care for you through your last years.

It’s just down the road, though, so it’s no further from M’hijito’s place than the Funny Farm is.

But…ugh! I’ve never been into communal living. And I don’t figure I’d get used to it now. Sure don’t wanna try. 😀

Seriously: I really dislike an institutional environment!

As places to live go, Arizona is overall kinda ugly. Unless you want to live in the Grand Canyon, I guess. Mostly it’s dusty, dreary desert or shaggy, under-watered forest land. Or Southern California style urbs and suburbs.

So…no reason to move out of the city, which at least sports a few decent grocery stores.

Where WOULD I ‘druther be?

Well, the San Francisco Bay Area, I reckon. 

My mother’s relatives emanated from the East Bay: Berkeley and waypoints. I did love those parts, for sure. But no way in Hell could I afford to live there these days. Or any days…

Trying to imagine what it would be like to live with Ruby in the hotel-like environment of the Beatitudes. Heh! I can tellya: that dawg would have a rabid sh!tfit every time anyone walked past in the hallway. Holyeee mackerel, would she go batsh!t in that place.

So would I. Truly, I do loathe, hate, and despise communal living.

Jeez. What a depressing day: what depressing prospects.

Ruby and I could stay here in the Funny Farm until I get to the point where I truly can’t manage it anymore. (That won’t be much longer, to tellya the truth…)

Or we could move to the Beatitudes, a secure but deeply depressing old-folkerie.

We could move into the old-folkerie where my father chose to live after my mother died, a single-story spread called Orangewood. Worst food you’ve ever had in your life…and you’re required to eat in their dining hall, so they can check you off their rolls and be sure you haven’t croaked over during your hours in your dreary little apartment.

Or…

I could sneak out and Ruby and I could run off to the backcountry of northern Arizona, maybe head up into Utah. Wonder how long we’d get away with that?

Ugh. None of these are attractive options. The least dreary, I think, is to stay right here.

And good luck with that…

SDXB moved to Sun City, where he has taken up happily enough with New Girlfriend. It’s not a bad option for an elder, especially one with stuffy tastes. My parents liked it there. I never cared for it…but then, I wasn’t an old bat at the time.

Honestly…I can’t think of anyplace much more depressing to live than a ghetto for old folks. WhatEVER, though.

Ohhhhh Freakin’ MG!!!!!

Just stumbled in from the mailbox, where I found an obese envelope full of old reports from the Mayo Clinic. Mygawd, there’s over 500 pages of this stuff!!!!! 

Why in the name of hevvin did they send this crap to me??  And what on earth do they think I’m gonna do with it?

Jayzuz. Just what I needed to cheer up my afternoon.

Backcountry. Northern Arizona. Utah boondocks. Lookin’ better and better!

She Knew. Oh, Yes: She Knew.

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Dunno why, but for some reason my idle thoughts seem focused on my parents, and on their marriage.

My father was deeply, passionately in love with my mother. She was a good, obedient wife, and yes: I do believe she loved him as much as he loved her.

They met in California, where my father – a Merchant Marine officer – shipped out of Long Beach. After they married, he got a job in Saudi Arabia: a handsomely paid one. He figured the salary would allow him to retire good and early. And so off we went to the shore of the Persian Gulf, where we spent ten years in Hell.

During all this time, she smoked.

She didn’t just smoke. She smoked constantly. She smoked and she smoked and she smoked and she….on and on and fukkin’ on. You knew when she woke up in the morning, because you could smell the stink of her first cigarette of the day. She would light up before she even lifted her head from the pillow.

And all the rest of the day, anytime you were in the house, you would have the stink of her cigarettes up your nose. The AC system, the furniture, the carpets, the walls: everything stank of fukkin’ cigarettes.

He smoked, too. But nothing like she did. He might have taken in a half-dozen cancer sticks a day. She smoked constantly. She was never awake when she wasn’t puffing on a fukkin’ cigarette. Made her kid sick? Tough. Puff puff puffety. Word came down that smoking tobacco causes cancer? Nahhh: that’s just Big Brother trying to control us. Puff puff puffety. Made the walls, the AC vents, and the furniture stink to high heaven? She didn’t even notice. Puff puff puffety puff puff puff…..

I’d say it was incredibly stupid – especially after we knew  that for sure, smoking causes cancer. But no.

No worries: just Big Brother trying to control you.

Not surprisingly, the habit killed her. Hideously, we might add. The cancer those fukkin’ cigarettes induced put her in the hospital and killed her in a slow, ugly, agonizing way.

****

The frustrating thing is that she wasn’t a stupid woman. She wasn’t an educated woman, but she wasn’t at all stupid.

She had simply made up her mind that she wasn’t gonna give up her cigarette habit, and nothing anyone said was gonna change her mind. And it literally was true: she smoked constantly. Nor did the fact that I was sick all the time make the slightest bit of difference to her.. She smoked and she smoked and she smoked and then she smoked some more. The first thing she did in the morning, before she lifted her head from the pillow, was light a cigarette. The last thing she did in the evening, before she turned out the bedside lamp, was puff one last cigarette. All. The. Way. Down. To. The. Filter.

And she apparently didn’t care that her miasma of stinking smoke made me sick. I was sick all the time I was growing up, until I left the house to go off to college.

I’d like to believe she didn’t know better – that she didn’t know she was wrecking my health. But she did. You couldn’t miss it.

No: the facts were published in every magazine, every newspaper, on every TV news show. Smoking causes cancer. Smoking makes you sick. Smoking makes your kids sick.

She just didn’t care.

I’ve long thought her smoking behavior was deliberately suicidal. She might not have understood how long it would take for the habit to kill her. Or how much it would hurt to die of that tobacco-related cancer. Or just how much and what kind of Hell it would put my father through. But she certainly knew that smoking would eventually kill her. You couldn’t miss that. Not even back in the 1960s, when everybody who wasn’t a Mormon smoked as a matter of course.

She had watched her mother die of a different self-induced cancer. She knew the agony that cancer can cause, and she knew that smoking was likely to bring it on.

She knew. Of that, you can be sure.