I guess I have to re-blog this old Valentine’s Day post. It is getting a whole lot of views today. People seem to really like these weird old Valentine’s Cards.
Today I needed some chocolate to make it through Valentine’s Day. Chocolate covered peanuts are perfect for diabetic depression. Chocolate to bring me up, and peanuts to help me not spike or drop in blood sugar levels. Depression and Valentine’s Day have always walked hand in hand in my recollection. Maybe it was the Valentine’s cards that we used as kids that did that to me. You know, the ones where your parents buy them in bulk, and after you pick that one for the special someone, you just put your classmate’s names on random cards from the pile for the rest. And then later that special someone gives you an obviously random card in return. Blues City!
I was, of course, a kid in the 60’s, in the Space Age of Mercury and Gemini Missions. Those were the cards I picked from for her.
My daughter the Princess often disses my cover designs for my novels. The one I created for my half-written manuscript, displayed above, is really too yellow by about 500 degrees. I wanted to write a yellow book about sea stories and island magic set in Iowa, a State about as far removed from an ocean in any direction as a State can be (Well, maybe tied with Kansas and Nebraska). But yellow is not the right color. In fact, the green accent color makes me a bit nauseous next to the yellow. So, I vowed to my critic I would try again and do better.
Take a look at these alternative designs;
Really? What a maroon!
Maybe something more woody?
Will this one attract woodpeckers, do you think? Or is that too racy an idea for a novel about a young girl growing up. Woody Woodpecker is a sex symbol, isn’t he? No? Whereever did I get a fool notion like that?
So, how about something more purple?Or is a combo of purple and wood better?
I could really use your input. If you wanted to vote, you could choose a cover name from this list to tell me about it in the comments;
Banana
Maroon
Woody
Purple
Purple and Wood
Something better, Stupid!
I promise not to get mad about any commentors who choose the last one. But I don’t promise to make any new ones either. It is, however, quite easy to make changes using computer programs. I don’t have to redraw anything. Although I could be slightly worried that the Tiki totem could be viewed as racist, even though his race is “little men made out of wood.”
Mom had breakfast ready and on the table. Eggs and bacon on stoneware plates, one for
Val and one for Daddy Kyle. She was a
great cook and loved to stuff her small family with what she made. That was probably the reason she was
watching over a second pan-full of sizzling bacon.
“Your father isn’t ready yet?” asked Mom, left eyebrow
raised.
“Oh, he had to change his pants again for some reason.”
“That man can find more excuses for dragging his feet than…”
“Mom? Is something
the matter with Daddy?”
“What do you mean?”
“Last night I thought he was crying in the machine shed.”
“Well, you know your Daddy Kyle. He loves his machinery, and that big old
combine is broken down again.”
“It shouldn’t be.
It’s only two years old.”
Mom looked at her with unreadable eyes. Was she mad?
Sad? What?
“He says he can fix it.
He says the problem is just mechanical and you know how handy he is with
tools.”
“Sure.” He did love that combine. Maybe that was what made him sad. He
loved Valerie and he was always sad when she was sick too.
Valerie gobbled eggs and bacon. It was good, but even better eaten fast so
you could enjoy those bacon burps for the next half hour.
“You eat like you’re starving. I wish I could eat like that, Val, and stay
as thin as you do.”
“Mom, I’m only eleven.
I’m not supposed to be a fatty at my age.”
“I thought you were ten, dear. Where does the time go?”
Valerie was still thinking about yesterday, the holiday Monday…
and why did so many people have to feel sad?
“Do you know what makes Ray Zeffer so sad, Mom?”
“Ray Zeffer? What
brings that up?”
“He and Danny Murphy walked me all the way home last night
from town. He’s such a gentleman. But he always seems sad.”
“Well, I would guess that losing your father the way he did,
such a short time ago… well, it might have something to do with it. I know his mother, Donna Zeffer, is sad a lot
too.”
“Yeah, I suppose.”
“And there was a brother that died… older brother… Bobby, I think. His family has been through a lot.”
Valerie buttered a piece of toast and then sipped her milk
from the mug that Grandpa Larry had given her years ago. The mug had a big red heart on the side of
it.
“I didn’t know about the brother. Younger or older?”
“Definitely older. More than ten years ago.”
“What was more than ten years ago?” asked Daddy Kyle as he
came in to breakfast.
“Valerie was wondering about Ray Zeffer because he and the
Murphy boy walked her home from town last night. How long ago did Bobby Zeffer die, Kyle?”
“Oh, at least sixteen years ago. But what’s this about boys walking Valerie
home last night?”
Uh-oh. Dad radar had
picked up a boy-alert… a potential boyfriend/trouble/rock salt alert.
“Danny and Ray were just being gentlemen,” said
Valerie. “They wanted to make sure I got
home safe.”
“And they didn’t have anything but your safety on their
little minds?” Kyle asked with a skeptical smirk.
“I suppose now you want to shoot Ray?” asked Valerie.
“Who said anything about shooting Ray?” asked Mom.
“Dad did. He wanted
to shoot Pidney and Danny last night, and now he wants to shoot Ray!”
“Kyle!” Mom’s
scolding stare could wither flowers that were otherwise in full bloom.
“I was just kidding around!” said Daddy in a defensive voice
that sounded a lot like a little boy who’d been caught pulling his sister’s
hair. “I wouldn’t really shoot
anybody… It’s a dad thing.”
“I’m sure it is,” said Mom.
“But let’s not joke about that anymore.”
“Yes, ma’am.” He was
thoroughly chastised, and Valerie marveled at how Mom could make him so
instantly repentant, like a Baptist preacher preaching Hellfire or something.
“The bus is here, Princess,” said Daddy Kyle while peering
out the window.
And
it really was. Valerie had to
hustle. The old yellow bus driven by
Milo Volker was waiting at the end of the Clarkes’ lane, and he wouldn’t linger
if she didn’t show up fast. Still, it
made her grin to see the look of relief on her Daddy’s face as he realized the
dangerous conversation was at an end.
Kong captures a cheerleader to eat and falls in love instead.
There is so much I need to get done. I need to finish mending my yard’s retaining wall before the city decides they can no longer put up with my old-man, do-it-yourself stubbornness.
I need to do my taxes. My wife insists we do them separately now because Trump’s new tax policy costs retired people so much more than previous years that she can no longer put up with my crippling tax burden. I need to know how much Uber-slavery I will have to do to make the IRS less miserly.
Action-Figure Gandalf is upset with wimpy-wizard Mickey.
My status as a wizard is called into question. A wizard should be able to solve problems and overcome anything.
A dragon is ravaging the suburbs? No problem. I can imprison it in a fire-proof giant soap bubble. Aliens invading the DFW metroplex? No problem. I just show them my psoriasis sores and they will worry about getting infected from eating Earth people so they will run back to Zeta Reticuli as fast as their spaceships can fold space.
The Cowardly Lion and Student Witch Hermoine steal the last of my pretzels.
The problem is, it is raining. My old diabetic and arthritic bones are aching from the cold Texas rain. I can’t Uber-drive today. I can’t work on the wall, or let my son work on it either (wet bricks are too easy to drop). I can’t even eat pretzels and write blog posts. My pretzel jar is mysteriously empty. So, you can see, I have no choice but to stay in the nice warm bedroom and play with my dolls… er, action figures. They like posing for photographs and are really good at holding still while I snap the pictures.
I don’t actually write in darkness… well, not always. The computer screen was just too bright for the camera.
My computer was hacked last week. I clicked on a link from a Russian I didn’t know well on Twitter. It was supposedly a YouTube video link in response to my recent YouTube videos. But it was a wicked, warty virus from the sleazy side of Computertown. It forced me to log into my Google Chrome account again as it downloaded spyware to capture my password. Once logged into my Google account, they could look at all my saved passwords. The potential for disaster was clear. I did not know how much control they had over my computer at the time, or what they were actually doing. So, I used my McAfee security program that I bought as a result of the previous hack by a disreputable security company to clean away the spyware and trackers. I then got a McAfee technician to remotely go in and find any lingering Trojan Horse viruses and eliminate them. It turned out that I had already eliminated all bugs with my initial cleaning. All that remained was to solve the revealed password problem. Which wasn’t hard. All my credit card accounts are closed due to bankruptcy. Those passwords were all useless to the stooges who were looking at them. I had a bank card password on the list, but it was the password previous to the current one. I changed it and stopped saving it on Google the last time I was hacked. There were a few other passwords to change, but there was no way for them to steal anything from any of those unless they want to pretend to be me on the nudist website I wrote blog posts for, though that is not linked to any possible payments or funds. I will know if they decide to post things for me. And who knows? Maybe they will join the nudist community online. I do know some Russian nudists from Twitter.
Hopefully, that puts an end to my bout of Russian computer flu. I hope you are taking precautions too. Google Chrome is NOT a secure place to store passwords. I learned that the hard way. Take the easy way and learn from my mistake, because the fakers will get you too eventually, and you don’t deserve to lose any money to criminals.
Francois is now an orphan. He was in the car with his mother and father and twin sister when it went over the edge of the cliff, but somehow he survived. The only survivor. And even worse news, his only living relatives able to take him in live in Iowa in the United States, not in France, the only home he has ever known. So, what can a boy do about such a tragic situation? Well, Francois puts clown paint on his face and starts to sing. He can sing only sad songs. His heart is broken. But people hear his beautiful voice and begin falling in love with him. Soon the only one who does not love Francois is a secret serial killer who stalks young boys, leaving their poisoned bodies with a teddy bear for comfort in their coming life as a ghost. It is safe to say this is not exactly a happy comedy. But can despair be overcome by sheer beauty?
There is a certain amount of satisfaction in this publication effort. When I retired as a school teacher, I promised myself I would at least get to the publication of this book before I left this Earth and became a ghost writer… literally. So, now, if I can publish the next novel, Fools and Their Toys, it will be a step beyond my original goal. My legacy for my family will never be a monetary one, but at least I have this to leave behind.
Yesterday I temporarily solved my computer problem with the Russian hacker with the help of the technical support people of McAfee Anti-Virus software. My computer works again. But I have had loss of personal data, and I am not yet sure that they didn’t take control of my Google account. It seems like I can change my password safely, but having been broken into, I have to wonder if the Russians are able to read this as I type it. I know I sound like a crazy, paranoid old man. The technician thinks so too. But it is harder than ever to have faith in a system when so many bad actors seem to have more control over things than I do. I am the novelist. I should be able to control the plot and the dialogue and the happy endings in my own story. But I can type on my computer again and my machine is cured of the Russian computer flu.
One should have positive thoughts as often as possible, even if you can only find them in a warehouse of old memories, impressions, and poems.
The point I wanted to make today, now that I have my word-mulching machine back to word-mulching form, is that I have always been a solver of problems, both simple and complex. It goes with being a teacher hand in hand because being a school-type teacher-man means solving problems for the little people and teaching them to be problem solvers too.
The big problem with problem-solving, however, is that there is always one more problem to be solved… unless there are ten more. Life is a matter of problem-solving, and you cannot be happy until you learn both to solve problems, even hard ones, and be reconciled to the fact that there will always be problems you have to live with and cannot solve.
Among the ten more problems I am now faced with is the problem of not having enough money to cover all the bills as I and my children continue to do things that cost money, like getting sick, eating, living in Texas, wearing clothes, wearing extra cold-weather clothes, and getting hacked by Russians. I want desperately to get a part-time job I can do. I am thoroughly qualified to be a substitute teacher. But I can’t do that job because I am in poor health. One more bout of the flu picked up in the germ farms that are Texas public schools will end me. Besides, if my health were sound enough for the classroom, I would still be teaching. It was a job God made me for, and I love teaching.
I was earning extra money the hard way through driving for Uber, daily risking an onslaught of shady clients, thoroughly unpleasant back-seat drivers, and Texas killer grandmas driving Lincoln Town Cars through stop signs at every other corner. And then I got hit in the driver’s side door by a goof who was talking to his passenger instead of looking as he turned across traffic. He didn’t see me until he clobbered me with his car. There was no way at all I could have avoided that collision. It cost me money for a deductible even though he was totally at fault. It cost me six months of driving time. I have been able to drive for other purposes, but I have not been able to drive for Uber since the accident. My driving-for-money confidence is missing. I have looked for it everywhere. It isn’t in any of the closets in the house. I guess I will simply have to make some more and get out and drive again.
So, living a problem-solving life ain’t easy, but it is necessary. It will get figured out, through persistence if nothing else. Because we all have to. And I can already see ten more problems headed towards me down the thorny garden path that is my life.
This old word-wizard is having a spot of trouble with his magical tools. More than just the usual cussing at crazy computer antics too.
I like to move the cursor as I write with the mouse pad on the keyboard, rather than the actual mouse. And this preference often leads to unintended zooms and shrinks when my thumbs stray too close to the hyper-sensitive zoom spots on the edges of the pad.
My alternative theory is that the laptop became both sentient and crazy because I dropped it on its micro-chipped little head one two many times. It now likes to mess with me constantly because the tiny computer fairies that move its thoughts around inside its dented brain are vindictive and vengeful.
So, yesterday it got way worse. Some Russian hacker sent me a link in the messages section of Twitter. I clearly saw that supposed YouTube video link was fake with the word “account” embedded in it. But the fairies took over the mouse pad and clicked on the evil little bugger without me even touching it again.
To make a long story short, so to speak, my computer is now sick with Russian computer flu again, and my anti-virus program is locked in the 26th hour of a life-or-death struggle.
I swear, of course, that this is all true just as I said it. And hopefully I come through it with all my passwords still secret. I am too old to be doing wizard war via computer. It makes me long for the old days of wands and potions. I had to write this post on my phone today.
Catch a Falling Star 
The Problem-Solving Life
Yesterday I temporarily solved my computer problem with the Russian hacker with the help of the technical support people of McAfee Anti-Virus software. My computer works again. But I have had loss of personal data, and I am not yet sure that they didn’t take control of my Google account. It seems like I can change my password safely, but having been broken into, I have to wonder if the Russians are able to read this as I type it. I know I sound like a crazy, paranoid old man. The technician thinks so too. But it is harder than ever to have faith in a system when so many bad actors seem to have more control over things than I do. I am the novelist. I should be able to control the plot and the dialogue and the happy endings in my own story. But I can type on my computer again and my machine is cured of the Russian computer flu.
The point I wanted to make today, now that I have my word-mulching machine back to word-mulching form, is that I have always been a solver of problems, both simple and complex. It goes with being a teacher hand in hand because being a school-type teacher-man means solving problems for the little people and teaching them to be problem solvers too.
The big problem with problem-solving, however, is that there is always one more problem to be solved… unless there are ten more. Life is a matter of problem-solving, and you cannot be happy until you learn both to solve problems, even hard ones, and be reconciled to the fact that there will always be problems you have to live with and cannot solve.
Among the ten more problems I am now faced with is the problem of not having enough money to cover all the bills as I and my children continue to do things that cost money, like getting sick, eating, living in Texas, wearing clothes, wearing extra cold-weather clothes, and getting hacked by Russians. I want desperately to get a part-time job I can do. I am thoroughly qualified to be a substitute teacher. But I can’t do that job because I am in poor health. One more bout of the flu picked up in the germ farms that are Texas public schools will end me. Besides, if my health were sound enough for the classroom, I would still be teaching. It was a job God made me for, and I love teaching.
I was earning extra money the hard way through driving for Uber, daily risking an onslaught of shady clients, thoroughly unpleasant back-seat drivers, and Texas killer grandmas driving Lincoln Town Cars through stop signs at every other corner. And then I got hit in the driver’s side door by a goof who was talking to his passenger instead of looking as he turned across traffic. He didn’t see me until he clobbered me with his car. There was no way at all I could have avoided that collision. It cost me money for a deductible even though he was totally at fault. It cost me six months of driving time. I have been able to drive for other purposes, but I have not been able to drive for Uber since the accident. My driving-for-money confidence is missing. I have looked for it everywhere. It isn’t in any of the closets in the house. I guess I will simply have to make some more and get out and drive again.
So, living a problem-solving life ain’t easy, but it is necessary. It will get figured out, through persistence if nothing else. Because we all have to. And I can already see ten more problems headed towards me down the thorny garden path that is my life.
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Filed under autobiography, commentary, education, feeling sorry for myself, humor, insight, Paffooney, poem