Saturday, December 3, 2011

Muddlers Meet

I am not alone. I met another admitted muddler today.

My wife and I dropped in briefly at our town's “Fair in the Square,” an outdoor sort of flea market in our municipal square. She spotted a fellow senior exerciser and began chatting. Introductions were made and the friend identified me to her husband as the man who blogs as Muddling Marv.

Hey, he said, I'm a muddler, too. And so we commiserated briefly about muddling through the modern world. He said his printer was busted. That was proof enough for me that he was one of us.

I told him where he could find me on line if he was so moved and we parted colleagues in confusion about the world swirling around us.

Muddlers love company.

Friday, December 2, 2011

A Techno Leap

We have a friend who still uses AOL on her computer. Whenever I try to send her a new picture of a great-grandchild, she can't open the attachment with the picture.

Earlier this evening she called to tell us she treated herself and her husband to an iPad. Her grandson set it up for her (naturally) and lo and behold, she was able to see the most recent picture we emailed her. She was thrilled she could do it and also made the appropriate noises about the new baby.

This is a person I always considered way behind the technology curve. Now she is laps ahead of us. Time will tell how well or often she uses her new toy. But the mere fact she bought it has me thinking.

Am I next to tiptoe into the modern world? Right now it's enough to have a PC, a laptop and a cell phone. I use all three regularly for email and searches and, of course, to write my blog.

Yet I feel the hot breath of modernity on my neck. For the moment, I'll just turn up my collar.

Thursday, December 1, 2011

The Bad Seed

For days my wife had been complaining about an irritation on her gum line. She was certain it was a remnant of the delicious corned beef sandwich we shared a few days ago.

You know how corned beef can melt in your mouth, to say nothing of getting clogged between your teeth. Yet we still indulge. Wonderful on rye with mustard. Death to those who corrupt corned beef with mayonnaise! On white bread, yet.

But I digress. Back to the painful back tooth. After days of dithering, she finally called our dentist. He could see her in two days. She didn't think it was an emergency so she agreed to wait.

Today was the day. He examined her mouth and extracted a tiny object that had scrunched down just below the gum line and against a back molar. The corned beef was exonerated. The object was a tomato seed. He asked if she'd like to keep it. She declined.

How much did removing this potato seed cost us, I asked? $62, she said.

I would have framed it. At those prices it qualifies as art.

Borrowing a title from novelist William March, I would have named it “The Bad Seed.”

Is Someone Peeking?

Yesterday I wrote about our tennis group called The Muffineers. Suddenly, there appeared on my blog page three items related to muffins.

How did they get there? Is Google scanning my blog for commercial opportunities without telling me? I'm not selling muffins or anything else, for that matter. I write for fun despite Samuel Johnson's exclamation “no man but a blockhead ever wrote except for money.”

I used to get paid for writing when I was a reporter, then editor and later radio and TV producing. But I never considered that pure writing. I was communicating information in various media and enjoyed doing it. I think I was pretty good at it.

This is different. This is me commenting on whatever I feel like. I try to make it interesting and, if I can, entertaining. And if the only one entertained is me, that's OK too.

I'm aware that many bloggers succeed in “monetizing” their stuff. I read about them all the time. I wish them well. I don't have that kind of ambition now. I'm happy if I can turn a neat phrase to make a point.

And if anyone out there is reading me, how about saying hello?

Maybe we could share a muffin sometime.

Tuesday, November 29, 2011

The Muffineers

Four of the five original Muffineers reunited this afternoon for lunch. The fifth guy had to work. There was no swordplay, just forks and knives attacking our respective dishes.

Here's why we call ourselves Muffineers. The core of our tennis group was five regulars, one of whom was always unavailable to play for one reason or another. So four of us would convene post-game at a local coffee shop for coffee and, yes, muffins.

Being conscious of our waistlines, however, we never ordered a muffin apiece. Rather we shared two muffins, usually one corn and one blueberry, which we cut into quarters.

We sliced the muffins vertically rather than horizontally so we each had a top and bottom of each muffin. You can imagine the delicacy of this operation, four pairs of eyes carefully watching the slicer.

(If you're interested in the math, two muffins became eight quarters. Each man ended up with a quarter of a blueberry and a quarter of a corn muffin, a top and bottom of each. Made us feel very virtuous.)

Although we enjoyed our weekly tennis, there were times we looked forward more to our coffee and muffins. Once or twice a year The Muffineers would spring for dinner with our wives. Mostly, though, it was just the guys.

While injuries have depleted our ranks they have not depleted our appetites. So it wasn't much of a stretch to gather four of us, including two walking wounded, together to catch up with each other and enjoy a leisurely meal.

It was fun. And no, we did NOT have any muffins.

Monday, November 28, 2011

Uninspired

Taking the night off.

All the best.

The Muddler

Sunday, November 27, 2011

When opposites are really opposite...

How often have you said one thing and meant the opposite? If you're like us, quite often.

Example: The other day my wife uttered this beauty, “I never did that again.” Of course she meant “before.” I'm hardly immune to this trait. In fact, I'm famous for saying “no” before I say “yes.” I caught the habit from a tennis friend who is congenitally negative.

Unquestionably it's the “speak-before-you-think” syndrome (SBYT, in scientific parlance).

While the symptoms are confusing, the polite thing to do is to gently correct the speaker. Ignoring it could lead to strange consequences.

You might actually believe the person meant what they said. That could be awkward.

Muddling is easy. Getting through is hard.