Poem of the Day: Twas the diet after Christmas

In bottom of a drawer that used to be my drawer, in the the back of a desk that used to be my desk, in an office that used to be my office, was found a pile of random documents, including this funny poem on the back of a sheet from the fax machine ... from 1999.

[Yes, I cleaned out that desk before it wasn't mine anymore. Yes, other people had too. We just hadn't taken the drawer out of the desk, disassembled the desk, turned the desk literally upside down, and removed the desk parts from the office.]

"Hey wait!" she said, as the pile of random papers was about to be discarded or refiled, or shredded, "I think .... I think I typed that one sheet right there. It certainly looks like a font I would've used. Can I have it back?"

Please enjoy this blast from the past. Maybe it will resurface in another 15-20 years or so.

Twas the diet after Christmas

Twas the day after Christmas, and all through the house

Nothing would fit me, not even a blouse.

The cookies I'd nibbled, the eggnog I'd taste

At the holiday parties had gone to my waist.

When I got on the scales there arose such a number!

When I walked to the store (less a walk than a lumber.)

I'd remember the marvelous meals I'd prepared;

The gravies and sauces and beef nicely rared,

The wine and the rum balls, the bread and the cheese

And the way I'd never said, "No thank you, please."

As I dressed myself in my husband's old shirt

And prepared once again to do battle with dirt --

I said to myself, as I only can

"You can't spend the winter disguised as a man!"

So away with the last of the sour cream dip,

Get rid of the fruit cake, every cracker and chip

Every last bit of food that I like must be banished

'Til all the additional ounces have vanished.

I won't have a cookie - not even a lick.

I'll want only to chew on a long celery stick.

I won't have hot biscuits, or corn bread, or pie,

I'll munch on a carrot and quietly cry.

I'm hungry, I'm lonesome, and life is a bore --

But isn't that what January is for?

Unable to giggle, no longer a riot.

Happy New Year to all and to all a good diet!

Quote of the Day: Unexpected Memories Lingered Beneath Words

As I work my way back to semi-regular blogging, I'm going to share some of the quotes from books I've been reading ... some of the random things that have perked my interest, and persuaded me to keep using this forum to share things, family history, etc.

"Over the years, Aunt Ailis had tried to lure Finnegan into the world of computers, the lines of software code that she studied as if they would give her a key to the inner workings of the human brain, if not heart. Finnegan understood the satisfaction she derived from the act of coding, her ability to aim for and achieve something she already she knew she wanted -- but for Finnegan, his interest in people's stories was always the unexpected memories that lingered beneath the words, waiting to come out. As far as Finnegan could understand, the purpose of coding was to create a form of stable perfection, a series of commands that could reproduce every time exactly what was intended. The opposite of humans, who were interesting to Finnegan precisely because of the way their narrative changed, hid other meanings, shifted with time and perspective.

 So he reached out and took the stories in, knowing that they had nowhere else to go, unable to refuse safe haven to memories that otherwise would disappear unnoticed. And yet, at times, he was overwhelmed by the weight of other people's lives, the stack of notebooks that surrounded his bed.

"You could publish them," Aunt Ailis suggested. But Finnegan knew, somehow, that wasn't the answer. What he had experienced in the transfer of these stories was as intimate as touch, a table for two in a crowded restaurant. Still, he didn't know what to do with them, didn't know who he was without them.

...

And so he sat in his room, surrounded. ... He sat on his bed and picked up one notebook after another, reading."

~ From Erica Bauermeister's The Lost Art of Mixing, pages 231-232

Emphasis throughout my own.