Flip-Top Frenzy

This past Monday, I talked to Dr. Press and he said that Hammett’s urine is now in the normal range of concentration, though not ideal, and that I should keep doing what I’m doing with the watery food and the glucosamine. He wasn’t worried about the five-ounce weight loss, but said to recheck Hammett’s weight in a month. He doesn’t have to have another urinalysis unless symptoms recur. That was good news, on the whole.

The lucid dreaming project continues. I dreamed this week of a giant snake I allowed to starve to death in its cage. Starving things in cages, starving things in cages—what could it mean?

My book on lucid dreaming advises jotting down dreams each time one wakes up, so I now have a little flashlight, paper, and a mechanical pencil on both sides of my head and hope I won’t lose an eyeball during this endeavor—one is on a night table, but the other is under a pillow.

Unfortunately, it’s nearly impossible to get myself to do this during the night, though I do wake up now and then.

While you’re awake, you’re supposed to review the latest dream mentally until you have it memorized, and then alternate doing these two things: telling yourself, “Next time I’m dreaming, I want to remember to recognize that I’m dreaming,” and visualizing yourself being back in the dream and realizing that you’re dreaming.

Last night, I saw on DVD Heading South, about three white women who go to a resort in Haiti in the late 1970s to have casual sex with young black men who receive gifts and money in return. One of the women is played by Charlotte Rampling—what an amazing face she has. All of the women appear to be self-deluded to a greater or lesser extent, making more of the relationships than their companions do.

Today I put the finishing touches on a short essay about conspicuous cycling and got my tape deck hooked up again. Doing more would probably have required arising before 12:45 p.m.

In the late afternoon, I took my old PC and monitor via cab down to GreenCitizen at 2nd and Howard for recycling. The monitor, behemoth though it was, was free; the PC cost $10.

I’d gotten this darling little shiny flip-top trash container for my bathroom, and saw that they had one a bit larger at The Container Store, which I thought would be perfect for the kitchen, but when I went back to the store, they were gone.

I looked at the website for the company and didn’t see the item, so I called them and they said they don’t make such a thing. I concluded maybe it had been a different brand, but after visiting the recycling place, I stopped by The Container Store again, and there, in a different spot, were two of them, made by the same company that makes the small one. I snapped one up—another customer saw me with it and asked where they were kept—and brought it home in another cab.

While I was watching the DVD last night, Hammett stuffed himself between the bed and the comfy chair, as he does now and then, but for the first time, I heard the unmistakable sound of fabric being clawed.

This morning I could hear that he was down there again and leaned over to peer into the crack, whereupon a little hand attached to a long skinny arm shot out and took a swing at me. His paw brushed my eyelid. It was funny, but I was also glad he didn’t scratch my eye, which would have been my fault.

I achieved a modest savings milestone this week, which probably doesn’t matter, because I fully expect that for one reason or another, I’ll find myself broke at 65—the stock market will crash and never recuperate, or China will buy the entire country and appropriate all the assets, or something—but I was still pleased and called my parents to ask, “Guess how much money I have?”

Yet another great thing about parents is that they’re the only people on earth you can ask that particular question of. My mother hazarded a guess: “Thirteen.”

When we hung up, she offered this parting piece of advice: “Don’t ride a bicycle.”

I was telling my mother recently that I’d like to put more time into my blog, that I think it could be better. She said, “Your blog is great! After all, it’s all about me.” She is a good sport about being quoted so much.

My father is nearly as quotable, in a different way—he is also very funny—but I noticed that when I considered including something here verbatim that he’d sent in an email, I thought, “I couldn’t do that.” It seemed as if it would be a breach of trust, but I quote my mother all the time. I’m not sure what the difference is. I suppose it's just one more way mothers are treated unfairly.

I'm also extremely hesitant to quote friends, or say too much about their lives; consequently, it may appear that the only people I know are Tom and my mother, which is not exactly the case (though pretty close).