Escape from Las Vegas.

The picture is of boiling water in a dim light. I didn't see the little white squiggles but the camera did.

I am home from a beautiful Christmas.

I left Las Vegas on a midnight flight. We were herded out onto the tarmac to board our plane, but evidently there was some problem. It was 20F and the wind was blowing a steady 30mph. Across the way I could see the Luxor shooting its searchlight into the heavens. Apart from the Strip, Las Vegas was asleep, except for the streetlights, like any good Mormon town, and the empty darkness of the desert lapped around its edges. We stood in that darkness on the freezing tarmac waiting for Air Squalid to admit us to their vehicle. It was a no first class plane and appeared to have been used for troop transport in the Korean police action. The seats were khaki painted metal, the paint mostly rubbed off to expose gunmetal grey. When I sat down my already freezing butt was further assaulted by freezing wet cold. I sprang up with a cry. "My seat is wet!" The attendant was regally uninterested. Someone must have spilled some ice. No, there was nothing she could do about it. I piled those cheesy magazines on my seat and sat on them. Supposedly there was beverage service on the flight, but I didn't see any. An attendant turned the pre-flight spiel into a one act comedy and riffed on the word 'blackberries' for several minutes which was quite entertaining. I'm not sure if the plane had a pilot. It could have been a drone.

Dumped Dumpster Diving

This morning as I walked the dogs, I passed a garbage bin at the entrance to a small park. It had been knocked over and its contents were spread all over the place. Hell with it, I thought, I'm tired of picking crap off the streets. However, when I saw it on the way back, I righted the bin and picked up most of the garbage. There was still some stuff in the bottom of the bin, including two perfectly clean fleece over-shirt type garments. I took them to the laundry, gave one to Goodwill and I am wearing the other which is a nice medium grey with a turn-up type collar and side pockets and a halfway zipper. It looks really nice on me. A few weeks ago I found a little boy's winter coat in a garbage bin. It looked like a pretty expensive, trendy one. At the laundromat I asked an Indian woman if she knew of any little boy who needed the winter coat which I had washed. Yes, she said, my grandson. I gave her the coat and she was happy, I was happy and I hope her grandson was happy. It did occur to me that she might sell the coat and buy some booze, as she certainly reeked of it, but what the hell, that would make her happy too.
It does seem odd to me that in one of the poorest communities in one of the poorest states, people would so freely throw away such good, new looking clothes. I don't think they were implicated in crimes, but who knows?

Last Monday it rained two inches out of our yearly ration of around ten. Unfortunately the roof was off my living room at the time. There was a layer of barrier paper laid over the latias, but it did nothing to stop hundreds of gallons of water from slamming down my adobe mud walls and onto the old wood floor. I tipped all my clothes out of the plastic tubs I use for storage, and I raced about putting the tubs under the most active spigots. Why did I bother? The walls are still clearly damp and defaced with brown stripes. The latias are all water stained. I would feel really bad, except my neighbor has much worse damage. She is in the process of restoring her house which shares a wall with mine, and the only good way of fixing her roof was to fix mine too, so we went for it. Wrong day for no roof. I think the roofers had actually slipped over the border because of the rain. No skin off their noses I guess. No problem.
The good thing was that I took the opportunity to go through all the clothes I had tipped out of the storage tubs, and cull them drastically. I got rid of some quite nice clothes. I took them to Goodwill. I guess I could have just thrown them in a garbage can ....................

CAPITOLS

Pecan Tree Watches Moon.

WHY IS IT CONSIDERED UNACCEPTABLE TO USE CAPITOLS ON THE INTERNET? When I go to almost any website I am afflicted by grotesque little ikons that bob up and down and flash on and off and get in the way of any forlorn effort I might make to think clearly but that is fine, apparently, while upper case is the ultimate no no. Very funny to be told this by some of the most impressive rebels and tradition breakers I know.

The Itinerant Sufi Piano Tuner is staying at my house a couple of days a week. This is good because she pays enough to cover the cost of turning on the heat. I love warmth. She is also interesting to talk to.

The pecans are beginning to fall. They are late this year because we have not had a hard freeze yet. I have filled twelve forty gallon bags with compacted pecan leaves so far. Hopefully the farmers will come and pick them up to use for mulch or cattle feed depending on who you talk to. One tree has lost its leaves. Two remain fully clothed.

I went to a volunteer appreciation dinner tonight. They had a chocolate fountain. This was new to me. I dipped a cranberry and a carrot in the chocolate. Really quite good. There were little blobs of nasty cheese cake that we were supposed to use.
There was a photographer there who makes 3D postcards. When I told him I was taking a photography class next semester he said he could teach me all I need to know in five minutes, so I said 'go ahead,' and he did. Well he explained a little about thirds and points of interest and lines of sight. Is that all there is?