bugs

My cordless keyboard for my PC died last night, just as I was gearing up to finish a transcript for work that appeared on the time sheet I turned in yesterday. What a bother! I haven't had the thing for six months, but of course I don't have the receipt or the box or any paperwork on it, and I'm not positive of where I got it, so I don't know if the store will take it back. Most likely I'll have to buy a new one. I was thinking about that last night; there are very few things that I buy new. Groceries, yeah; a blender; electronics. The last two are generally all made in China. And normally I would be up early (as I was today) and typing away on a transcript -- most of my best work is done early in the day -- but the electronics stores all seem to open at 10:00 a.m. That's two hours away. What'll I do? I watched some previews on imdb; there are some movies I wanna see (or see again), among them the new Hulk movie, The Ice Storm, The Anniversary Party, Eyes Wide Shut. I don't really know why I want to watch Eyes Wide Shut; I went to one of those links that appears on my gmail page that said "Tom Cruise - 25 Years" which is a site dedicated to all the power, all the glory, all the humor the handsome little Scientologist has brought us for the past 25 years. I'm not a fan of Tom Cruise the person, not really that big of a fan of his movies, though I do love his ex, Nicole Kidman, in just about anything she's in, and it seemed to me that Eyes Wide Shut was under-represented in the movies of his career. Perhaps that because it's not a very good movie, or maybe it has something to do with their relationship. Whatever. It looks interesting enough to spend $1.50 on a rental. This was where my rabbit-holing on the internet got me last night after my keyboard died.

I had two very fine offers of other things to do last night, but no, I was gonna be a good boy and work. M and R, friends from the Dance, have been staying at A's house (she doesn't like the house being empty since J and his dog Dillon died, and M needed a place to stay, and then R showed up on the scene). A's niece, son and his girlfriend are in town as of yesterday, so M and R didn't have a place to crash (I don't guess -- I'm sure they would've found somewhere to go), so I offered to let them stay here since S is out of town. They were grateful. And they're cool, mellow young guys -- chill, as the kids might say. They came over yesterday evening and we sat around talking for a couple of hours; it was so laid back I didn't realize so much time was passing by. They kept talking about going to see some band play at Waterloo Ice House, then we'd get involved in a new subject. R had my keyboard out and was tickling the faux ivories; he's an amazing musician, having an undergrad degree in music and computer science. When Mr. Rogers came up in the conversation, he quickly switched what he was playing to play the "Mr. Roger's Neighborhood" theme, to a tee. They asked if I wanted to go see the music with them, but I declined, seeing as I was going to work. They're also night owls, and I wasn't sure I wanted to get caught out with them around the time I wanted to be home in bed. (That was a good thought because they rolled in at 3:45 a.m.)

I sat on the front porch with a cigarette (before I started working) and listened to a message from P who was going to Shady Grove with friends to hear Guy Forsythe, whom I love; she invited me along, but I left a message back to her saying that I was in for the night, getting ready to work. Yawn... I didn't really want to go out anyway because I had been out late the night before, dancing for G's new "improv disco band," she's calling it Gretchen's Disco Plague (which S says it sounds a little too reminiscent of AIDS with "disco" and "plague" so close together). It was at the Chain Drive, the leather bar down by the creek that S goes to much more regularly than I do -- that's where he gets the good pot. It was a fun show, but I felt a little sick to my stomach afterwards, because I danced non-stop for an hour in a tight-fitting sequined twirler onesy, my very warm fuzzy orange pants and yellow rubber wig. I ended up taking off the wig early in the performance, and I took off the pants for the last song. I think I hold my breath a lot when I dance, that may have had something to do with the stomach ache. There was a cute gay boy talking to G's musical partner in this band -- a straight man -- but I needed to get home and get out of my clothes and take my contacts out; all the sweat in my eyes was bothering me.

Oh, and I've got critter issues! For the last couple of days I've been pulling caterpillars off of the dutchman's pipe vine that covers the trellis in front of the porch (or used to); dozens and dozens of the beautiful burgundy- to lemon-colored critters. I've been throwing them in the wild side of the yard (the organized weeds), but I don't know if they're surviving over there; there isn't a lot of viney type stuff in that side of the yard, but I want them a little farther away from the garden than they currently are. I have no intention of killing them; if they finish off what they're working on and make their way into the garden, so be it; I just can't imagine killing them because they're eating my food...

There are wasps all about as well. The most menacing nest is two feet from the front door, which I often have propped open a few inches to let the cat in and out. Last summer I was good about knocking the nests down with a long pole. Somebody at the Dance told me about that; it doesn't kill them (probably pisses them off, if that's really an emotion wasps experience); they usually come back to the same spot and try to rebuild, but if you knock the nest down enough times, they go elsewhere. There were two nests over S's door, which I've ignored as well (out of sight, out of mind). M asked last night if they could use the back door so they wouldn't bother me, and when I told him about the nests and my intention, he got the pole and knocked the bigger of the two down; a flurry of wasps danced around the back screen door while R and I watched M disappear into the darkness toward the front of the house.

The problem with the nest on the front porch is that it is on the blade of a (non-working) fan, inside the grille, so the pole can't get to the nest to knock it down. I could take a waterhose to it (another effective method), but the neighbors have all kinds of furniture and paperwork, and now parts of a computer on their side of the front porch, which would be hard to avoid with the spray. I would just let the wasps be except that a couple of nights ago three wasps made their way into the house; they were just hanging out on the wall and ceiling and computer. They're mellow critters; I was able to take a plastic juice jar and put the opening -- which was barely bigger than them -- over them, walk it down a little to annoy them into flying into the bigger space, cover the opening, and take them outside, one at a time. The catch-and-release program. My mother would make fun of me, to be sure. Whatever.

Speaking of my mom, she was supposed to be visiting this weekend, but her aunt died yesterday so she had to postpone the trip. I was looking forward to the visit, but also am quite okay that she's not coming. We do just fine long-distance. She was only going to be here for two days, and she would be here alone, so it probably would have been fine -- fun even -- but little things get under my skin sometimes, like perhaps her insistence that I kill the wasps around the house or coat the vines and garden in pesticides to repel caterpillars, or not liking this restaurant or that that I decided to take her to.

S is in Indiana with his family right now. I think it's a total of three months, which he's mostly enjoying (though there are naturally some annoyances that I've heard about). Three months! I spent six weeks living with my mom before I moved to Austin, and my meditation practice really took off during that time!

An hour to go before I can go to the store and replace my keyboard. In looking for pictures of the caterpillars I've been tossing into the weed side of the yard, I came across a site that sounds like it's saying they're not so bad, that they only eat dutchmen's pipes, often down to the ground, but the plants survive because of their strong root systems. I'm not sure I would be around to see them replenish themselves (since we're planning a move to M&J's side of town when our container housing is built), but I will likely see the pipevine swallowtail butterflies that come from these caterpillars later this summer. And what beautiful bugs they are!