De Riguer

Dog Walking, a way of life

De riguer is to carry those sassy bio degradable poo bags when dog walking. Bags bow tied onto the dog’s collar signal you care.

I admit to such virtue signaling.

Dress-wise lycra and spandex, don’t quite do it for me. My muscles ache at the soothing fabric massage. And I look kinda out of place. I prefer loose trackie daks, with pockets.

In this day and age, one needs to observe new social customs, be on trend, Strangely, one’s gotta be pc in an age of smart phones, tablets and the cloud? [You are invited to overthink this.

Walking the sea shore concrete path, I chanced on a fresh plopping trail, ample evidence of non virtuous dog walkers.

I Walked On By

I didn’t stoop, or in non-Good Samaritan style cross to the other side of the road.

Gad, I walked on by,

A couple of hundred meters behind me was another dog walker.

Decades of engineering training had prepared me. In life, especially dog walking, I continue to follow the 7P MAXIM,

Perfect Prior Planning Prevents Piss Poor Performance

Subtly reaching into trackie dak pocket I retrieved my nicely weighted dog walking accessory, one in fact I had prepared before

I was able to swing it jauntily as the dog walker behind closed in on us. It couldn’t have been us who had been so antisocial, huh?

Potential embarrassment avoided as she passed, I gently nestled the plastic bag and its contents,

In Furoshiki-Dog, thehobartchinaman wrote of the ancient art of Gift Wrapping in Japan.

https://wordpress.com/post/thehobartchinaman.wordpress.com/3920

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Prime, sub Prime

Prime Cuts

Who affords the prime cuts? Simply put, those who can. My wife and I do now, in moderation.

We used to go for subprime, for stews, casseroles and soups. Chewy chunks, long and lovingly slow cooked.

Sub Prime Cuts

Waiting for the 150gm Wagu to sear and sniffing the aroma, I tuned in to this excellent podcast on prime and sub prime.

I never quite understood what had happened in the GFC a decade or so ago.

I do now.

Interested? Listen into SubPrime Times at Country Wide.

https://www.stitcher.com/show/spectacular-failures/episode/subprime-times-at-countrywide-financial-77885116

I hope you learnt something, as I did.

Perseverance and Encouragement

Too old to learn?

Then watch, just watch.

Struggling to lift his head, he wailed objecting. Those around distressed.

It seemed too much of an effort.

He saw no need. The fluffy mat cuddled his face, echoes muffling back his plaintive crying.

And so we learn, as tiny tots.

But what of us, we adults?

With adult encouragement and his personal practice, the neck strength to move on to other developmental goals was achieved.

I learned something.

Apparently next is rolling over

I Can See Clearly Now

D’yall love a check up? I don’t. Here’s a tale of one!

“”A specialist should review your eye health,” the lab coated optometrist murmured.

For fifty years I’d been prescribed glasses of varying optical strength and never needed no specialist!

The professor specialist recommended laser surgery. Well I guessed he might, being a ‘star’ surgeon at Laser Eye Surgery Hobart, and I suspect, a part owner too.

Setting my skepticism to one side, I agreed. The right eye only.

Anesthetized, I recovered with cookie and hot sweet tea, and an eye patch. In two days the twinkling street lights across the estuary were now pinpricks of sharp light.

At the week post operative check-up, “Ok, do the other eye,” I said triumphantly.

Professor surgeon did.

Another week later, across the estuary. the Hobart casino blue lights were festively distinct. The veil of fifty misty years lifted.

Best of all, my driver’s license pic, now shows a wizened three score and ten years face, sans glasses!

Discussion – Is This a Blogging Burn Out? — My Midnight Musing

Below, in this reblog, midnightmusings writes on blogging burnout.

Got me thinking, again, why I write.

He poses no answers, just queries.

The blogosphere bubble in which I exist is English based, and in it I’m intrigued by US fascination with reviews of films and books, mostly relating to fictional or factionalized themes. Seems like living in a reality of fiction. 

So, I’ve tried to read blogs more widely than from the UK/US/AU. Limited by my restriction to those written in english, these overseas blogs have proven a source of totally different thinking for me. 

I’ve suffered the Haikuization of poetry, where the essence of simplicity is forced into 5-7-5 syllabication. Have you yet seen Japanese poets adopt the form of iambic pentameter to express their feeling for the falling cherry blossom?

Derek Mong writes interestingly on meter in poetry across languages in Iambic Pentameter Has Nothing to Do with Your Heart 

Frankly, I don’t ‘engage’ with the blogging community. What I write is, as somewhere mignightmusings says, for myself. Simply put, I think therefore I blog.

I care not if it flops, a problem which inhibits midnightmusings.

I do agree that whatever is  written should be something of which to be proud.

Such random interests and observations will last longer than celluloid or a Netflix subscription.

In the end,

To thine own self be true.

I like that.

Good evening friends. Now, in my 5 and a half years of blogging, I’ve seen a lot of changes within the community and the way people interact with blogs. I’ve also seen the shift turn to other platforms, and with all the discord about the treatment of book bloggers in the industry, which is a […]

Discussion – Is This a Blogging Burn Out? — My Midnight Musing

Jus’ thinkin’

A hazy day out over the bay,

Smoke mixed with mist riffles the waves.

This could be any other day,

But my mind can’t free them from their graves.

We see them littered here about,

On highway straights and tight sharp bends.

Some killed themselves or drunken louts,

Dispatched them to a fatal end.

The sites are marked; a sullen cross,

To memorialize a family’s grief,

I wonder if their sudden loss,

Is soothed by their religious belief?

The Christian cross, is all I see.

God sees beyond those churchy pews.

He stoops from high to lift all three

Muslim, Jew and Buddhist too

When will there be roadside commemorations of deaths marked by other than a cross? thehobartchinaman promises to put no effort into this campaign

Just a thought.

Y Blog?

Ever wondered why? Well not until I was recently asked.

Years ago I started a short story called ” Die Gum Sarn” [Big Gold Mountain]. It’s still a work un-progressed. Miscellaneous chapters lie strewn around, awaiting connection to one another.

Goldfield’s Pageantry from the time of Die Gum Sarn

A NaNoWriMo challenge diverted me. A short story, “Nude Climbing,” 50,000 words written in 30 days resulted. The feedback, the little I received, was encouraging; learning about how WordPress operated. It was educational.

“The Cake” expanded a passing mention of homebaked goodies being used by older women to seductively inveigle other’s partners.

Reading other blogs, has since taken over the place of reading library books and other commentaries. Learning from the style of fellow bloggers, has helped me find a voice of my own. The comments and criticisms, have lead me down rabbit holes I’d never have dug.

Rabbit holes I never dug

Is it a diary? To record the passing of dreary days? A tedious travelogue, of journey’s past?

Frankly, I dunno, I blog for me. It’s a written selfie. It says where I was in my head at the time, like a word selfie, a record of a time, a place, an emotion, kinda like a …. dick pic.

I reviewed what I’d written over the years. T’was a salutary experience. Humour, pathos, stupidity, compassion, questioning, railing about politics, shouting into the void. They’re all there.

Each piece, re read, can take me right back to just how I was feeling.
So, in a way, it’s a diary. A record of me, quirkiness, thoughtfulness and always true to the feeling of that time, no matter how shameful.

And I wonder, what my kids will think of my writings,

Someday,

Maybe.🤔