Tid bits

Alright. Today was a weird one. In a boring sort of way. Which is why it shall be reported in "tid bits" rather than with any sense-making narrative:

-- There was the Really Fucking Awful Traffic Jam.

All I was trying to do was buy some clothes. This is not something I normally go out of my way to do. In fact, I hate shopping for clothes. Clothiers rarely make duds I like for bodies like mine. But I was going shopping. Or I was *trying* to go shopping.

Which is when I ended up in the really fucking awful traffic jam. On a surface street that is normally my quick shot into downtown -- I was trying to go to the Columbia mothership to get some rain gear so I could walk the pup in relative comfort -- I found what I guess some would compare to a Boston gridlock. I was stuck there. Nothing was moving. Nothing was happening. Lots of time lapsed. I started getting hungry. I started thinking about the Donner Party and other humans who have run out of food and gotten desperately hungry.

I called S2, got her voice mail and left TWO explitive-filled voice mails about traffic and hunger and stupid drivers. In the middle of leaving the second one, S2 happened to call me from her cell phone on the way home from class. Somehow, traffic was moving where she was. She informed me of some kind of cataclysmic accident on the south-bound deck of a double-decker on I-5 that occurred about six hours prior, and it gave me some small shed of sense-making to hold onto while I undertook some dangerous maneurvers in my car and managed to etch my way into a drive-thru to get a turkey burger.

On the way, S2 got the front-seat version of my traffic woes, hearing me yell at some stranger, Don't honk at me you fucking bitch! You're in the wrong. Get the hell outta the way!

S2, with whom I periodically sigh in unison as we navigate the traffic on the way to school, laughed and said, "I see how it is with you today! Whoa!"

As this blog would suggest, eventually I made my way home. When I spoke to S2 six hours later, she said, "Well, I'm glad to see you made it home after all!"

And I replied, in not a terribly dishonest fashion, TEN MINUTES AGO! Because *that's* how bad the goddamned traffic jam was.

-- I walked about half the span of the St. John's bridge. And I apparently became a patron of the arts in the process.

Just as I was finally making my way out of that really fucking awful traffic jam, The One called me up and asked me if we were "still on."

Some time ago, when I was feeling rich, I told The One, who does really stunning paintings of all things industrial, that I would like him to do a painting of the St. John's Bridge for me. As artists tend to do, he waited for a while before following up. He waited, basically, until I was *not* feeling rich.

Well, whatever.

I still want the painting. The question is only whether I will feel like I can afford it. (One more reason to get a job!)

A week or so ago, The One rang me up and asked if I would accompany him out to the St. John's Bridge to talk with him about the piece I am ... uh, commissioning. (Excuse the hesitation. I'm not used to being a patron. Normally I'm just an observer.)

So we drove out to the bridge, and The One took a barrow-load of photos of it from every conceivable angle facing west. I particularly like the west-facing view because it contrasts the very Bat Man's Gotham-ness of the bridge against the backdrop of Forest Park, a solid swath of trees and nature. I simply love it.

In the process of getting these photos, The One and I walked about a third of the span from the East approach, getting to the first of the suspension arches. As with the Golden Gate, there's something of a thrill to being on a high suspension bridge with a stunning view. They are Jumping Off Places. I felt no desire to jump, but when The One pointed to a gaggle of geese flying past the gothic arch soaring above my head, I did get a touch of vertigo, to which I'm very susceptible.

So it was a modest thrill to walk along that bridge. All the more spectacular to go beneath it, to Cathedral Park, and observe the gracious gothic arches that support the bridge from beneath, in addition to those above. Really beautiful work. They don't make 'em like they used to.

It'll be interesting to see what materializes in the coming months from this project.

-- I finally got my duvet cover back.

Here's something creepy. When I was in Hawaii, S2 came into my home to do me a favor (thanks again, S2!). Her visit marked the first time that Getting To Yes, the 6 year old, had come into my place. Strangely, Getting To Yes asked S2 where my duvet cover was.

How would a 6-year-old girl know my duvet cover was missing? It's not like the white down comforter looked terribly out of place on my bed. ... She's very fashion conscious, I guess.

Anyway, WEEKS ago, I took it into the tailor to have it repaired, as it had been accidentally ripped, along a weak seem, by the enthusiastic bouncing of another young girl. The tailor took her lolly-gagging time with it, but she made up for the long delay in finishing it by reinforcing extra lengths of the seems in question.

It cost me $25 to get the duvet repaired. But given the fact that some kind of computer error resulted in me getting this $300 silk duvet for $9.99 in the first place, I'm coming out well ahead. I'd be especially pissed if I'd paid full price.

It was my trip to pick up the duvet from this tailor, before heading to buy clothes, that landed me in the Really Fucking Awful Traffic Jam in the first place. So that brings me full circle. Enough said.