Milk and eggs and butter and cheese

I still maintain that I’ve never known a vegan who was happy, or who wasn’t a pain in the ass.

This time last year

my sweet granny was breathing her last.

My grandmother died over 20 years ago.

Two wonderful women, completely different one from another, each amazing in her own way.

Everyone should be so lucky as to have had them both.

 

Sweeping generalizations

I have a problem with them.

Don’t confront me with my failures, I’m aware of them.

I did, indeed, meet Gregg Allman.

I got there just as they were running out of books and got two of the last ones, then commenced the waiting. I was in line for about two and a half hours before I got to him.

It was worth every single second.

He was lovely and gracious and gentle.

I told him that I had I had played “Laid Back” until the mid-tones just fell out and replaced the cassette and CD I didn’t know how many times. He smiled and said that album was his baby. I told him I can’t carry a tune, but I know all the songs by heart, in order, and he said, “It don’t matter if you can carry the tune, darlin’.”

Gregg Allman and The Allman Brothers have been the soundtrack to my life.

If I never meet anybody else from here on out, it’ll be okay.

Things I have stood in line for

I don’t like standing in line, and there are very few things I will do it for.

I stood in line for hours for the lottery to buy Stones tickets after working all night once and we got pretty good seats, and I’ve stood in line for Buffet tickets. I’ve also stood in line to get Jimmy Buffet to sign a book, and it wasn’t even for me.

Notably, I camped out overnight at Peachtree Battle once to draw a number to get to stand in line to get Bill Clinton to sign a book for me. That one was way worth it.

In Monroeville, Alabama one cold Saturday before Christmas, I nearly froze my yayas off to get a signed copy of To Kill a Mockingbird (also worth it).

I’ve been to parties and receptions and milled around and gotten signed books. I’d like a copy of Hillary Clinton’s book to go with my Bill Clinton, but I figure I can get that online, and besides, it was in the middle of the day and I had work to do.

I’ve got a book signed by Jimmy Carter, and I once surprised him and Miss Rosalyn on Cumberland Island and shook their hands and hugged them before they could stop me. Then to make matters worse, I called them Mr. Jimmy and Miss Rosalyn.

I’ve met Jerry Lee Lewis, and his former child bride has screeched at me over the phone that I’d better run her ad, so I’m flush with celebrity experiences

But today, Gregg Allman is signing his book at the Barnes & Noble up the street at lunch, and I just don’t see how I can miss that. I mean, it’s Gregg Allman. I played “Laid Back” in the car until everybody was sick of it. I know all the words to every song on it, even though I can’t carry a tune.

What a drag it is getting old.

Lately I’ve been tired.

Well, maybe not tired, but inclined to nap.

If I have something to do, I will do it and be happy to do it, not get tired or worn out doing it, not dread doing it.

If I don’t have something to do, I will read a book for a bit and then look at the dog and say, “Puppy! We’d better take a nap!”

I do this more often than I think decent people should.

So it’s been on my mind a lot, and because I am an Internet Doctor, I looked it all up and decided I’d better do some preemptive diagnosing.

My blood pressure is always low, and my blood sugar was 82 the last time I checked. My cholesterol is fine. I checked my resting pulse rate several times yesterday and it was never over 68. Why, I’m practically an elite athlete!

I don’t have any swelling of any extremities and I’m not short of breath. No nausea, no fever, no arm or jaw pain. My glands aren’t swollen. My hair isn’t flat.

I figured I’d better call my friends in the medical field and describe, in great detail, what was going on and ask what kind of specialist I should see immediately.

They listened sympathetically, each of them, and then kind of snickered a little before reminding me I’m just old.

At least they didn’t suggest I’m just lazy.

 

 

Awful things I have said

Today I took a rare lunch out with a friend to a local Thai restaurant.

The restaurant itself is up an elevator, and there’s a Thai taxi, called a tuk tuk, in the elevator lobby.

There was a younger-than-I-am couple who arrived seconds before I did, and the gentleman was explaining to the hot blonde about the tuk-tuks.

When the elevator arrived, he stepped in after her but before me and said to her, “Don’t you think it’s funny in Thailand that they have a city called BangKOK and another one called PHUKet?”

I lifted my brows and looked at her in the mirrored door and said, “Last date?”