trading places

gonna miss tito -- sold to club libertad in paraguay for a seven-figure sum --

i hate "updating"

they spend too much time and money "updating" this place, but here they go again -- cleaning out the beds, dirt and all --- more deck, less garden --- i'm not going to like the new view, but it'll help keeping everybody feeling prissy, i guess we got too many real estate people on our hoa board

coochie redux

semi-final comments on the sautee nacoochee history have been received from our beloved editrix, who can be a giant pain in the ass but certainly makes my writing look better in the process --- dealing with that was my day today, and will be for a good many days to come

databases

i started a book catalog using readerware fifteen years ago --- just got another upgrade and getting it up to date (1,432 book units so far, which is maybe half of what i had on sinclair ave) --- i was thinking about homeowner's insurance, concerned i might be underinsured in terms of damage to the condo itself (i have visions of all my windows being blown out in a storm or whatever) --- he thought that was fine, but thought my basis for personal property was low --- started thinking about my pile of books and updating the inventory and what not, and he's probably right

gifts that last

cousin yg sent this orchid to celebrate the advent of kuntry kenneth on the thirteenth floor, the second week of october or so last year --- it's still got a ways to go ---

words

i finished my first book of 2020: Toby Green's A Fistful of Shells: West Africa from the Rise of the Slave Trade to the Age of Revolution (2019), basically from the fifteenth through the mid-19th centuries in the run-up to the "scramble for africa" that began in the 1880s --- i won't think about slavery in quite the same way as i did ---

i don't think that i've memorialized my 2019 reading list yet, asterisks for must-reads:

***Camilla Townsend, Fifth Sun: A New History of the Aztec (2019)

Frank McLynn, Marcus Aurelius, A Life (2009)

Serhii Plookhy, The Gates of Europe: A History of Ukraine (2015)

Alistair Moffat, The British: A Genetic Journey (2013)

Stuart McHardy, A New History of the Picts (2010)

Ron Chernow, George Washington: A Life (2010)

Karen Armstrong, The Battle for God (2000)

Lars C Adams, Breaking the House of Pumunkey: The Final Powhatan War and the Fall of an American Empire (2017)

David La Vere, The Tuscarora War: Indians, Settlers, and the Fight for North Carolina (2013)

Lisa Brooks, Our Beloved Kin: A New History of King Philip's War (2018)

William L. Ramsey, The Yamasee War: A Study of Culture, Economy, and Conflict in the Colonial South (2008)

Tony Horwitz, Confederates in the Attic: Dispatches from the Unfinished Civil War (1998)

***Tony Horwitz, Spying on the South: An Odyssey across the American Divide (2019)

David W Blight, Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom (2018)

John Man, The Gutenberg Revolution: How Printing Changed the Course of History (2002)

Mark Lamster, The Man in the Glass House: Philip Johnson, Architect of the Modern Century (2018)

Kevin Kruse and Julian Zelizer, Fault Lines: A History of the United States Since 1974 (2019)

***Carrie Gibson, El  Norte: The Epic and Forgotten Story of Hispanic North America (2019)

***Patrick Nunn, The Edge of Memory: Ancient Stories, Oral Tradition and the Post-Glacial World (2019)

Anthony Doyle, Standing Peachtree: A Cold Case of Native Provenance (2011)

George McDonald Fraser, The Steel Bonnets: The Story of the Anglo-Scottish Border Reivers (2008)

Charles River Editors, The Rise of Constantinople: The Ancient History of the City . . . (2018)

***B. R. Burg, Sodomy and the Pirate Tradition (1983)

***Timothy Snyder, On Tyranny (2017)

Alan Walker, Fryderyk Chopin: A Life and Times (2018)

Charles River Editors, Petra: The History of the Rose City (2016)

James Roman, Chronicles of Old Los Angeles (2015)

i would go nuts if i couldn't read

things i know

i finished revising all i had to say twenty-five years ago (close to 40.000 words, some of them more than two or three syllables) about the crescent apartments , aka margaret mitchell house — built 1899, moved 1913, turned into apartments 1919, ruirnt, burnt up, restored, burnt up again, and restored again --- remodeled the web presentation as well ---

changing seasons

they got rid of the damn moravian xmas star so now it's just damn mardi-gras lights

the good old days

periodically in my life, i say to myself "these are the good old days" --- it just sorta happens, doncha know --- i got a high-maintenance hound who keeps me moving, an old cat that just wants to sleep all the time, flowers that bloom, and a lot of words that need typing --- plus robt, angela, assorted friends, and the view --- and all the bills paid on time

nevermind estranged friends and family, trumpistan, and what not, when i'm here at the typewriter with the sound on and the creatures about me, i can sorta stand it

remind me to quit posting nothing but dog pictures

cold day in georgia

In the secret space of dreams
Where I dreaming lay amazed
When the secrets all are told
And the petals all unfold
When there was no dream of mine
You dreamed of me

square pegs and round holes

sometimes, for planning purposes, i rehearse a scenario in my addled mind, just to see what it feels like — e.g., what would happen if i took the little shit back to the beagle pound? i'm not gonna do that, but i kinda feel sorry for him sometimes when he's pacing around looking out the windows — he drinks massive amounts of water, which has to go somewhere, and when it happens inside, it is no minor puddle — if i take him out every 3 hours, he's ok, but, law me, ain't nobody got time for that — nevertheless, because he's so stupid sweet otherwise, i guess i am just resigned to doing it and being glad to feel very well exercised all the time as a result --- we don't call him kuntry kenny for nothing

wasted days and wasted nights

i am doing other than generating endorphins by looking at this shit --- typing and what not, but nothing really comparable

kuntry kenny

he's been into the cat food twice today already, when i forgot and left the chair too close to the cat table, but he is relentless and never fkn quits --- same thing out on the streets, always dreaming of sidewalk chicken bones at every turn, which makes him a much better walking companion away from the restaurants and the qt and what not --- except at arabia mountain the other day when he got all het up for the scent of a rabbit or something and dragged me all over the mountain

he also drinks an enormous amount of water (the vet found no issues that might provoke that --- maybe he's just doing it for his health) --- i need to actually time how long he can stand with his leg up, if i don't actually get around to capturing a precise measurement of fluid, because it is a very long time

on the other hand, he loves every person and every dog he meets and fkn loves the dog park, which guinness never cared for --- at 40 lbs he goes in the big dog park, which makes him the runt, but he doesn't care --- running around tussling with the big dogs and now and then starting into one of his hound-dog baying episodes --- "where's the rabbit?" 

and maybe best of all, he and dex have gone beyond simple toleration to friendship, such as that exists between cats and dogs

i thought dex was a cozy creature to have around, but this little shit is just as good, and better inasmuch as there is more body heat involved --- dog wants nothing more than to be up close and personal, just don't wake him abruptly or he will be snappy


also too he doesn't get rank, until about three months --- i washed him the other day --- he's been in a tub before i guess so it went purty well

all in all, he is an excellent dog