Re-in-Tarnation

Say out out loud. It’s Bubba’s way of saying, “Ah, we seen this crap before.”

astrofish.net/shop

Pink Cake: The Quote Collection – Kramer Wetzel

Pink Cake: A Commonplace Book

• ISBN-10: 1434805751
• ISBN-13: 978-1434805751

San Pedro Creek (temporarily free e-book)

Thersites

“Lechery lechery! Still wars and lechery. Nothing else holds fashion.”

Thersites in Shakespeare’s Troilus and Cressida (V.iii.231-3)

• cf. Aries

Two-Meat Tuesday

Two-Meat Tuesday – Kramer Wetzel

San Pedro Creek (temporarily free e-book)

#Shakespeare

Mercury Retrograde Baggage

Many years ago, I was shopping and I happened across a piece of gear I thought I would like. It was a little zipper bag, from a well-known outdoor gear purveyor, and the bag looked cool. Zippers, light nylon construction, straps, bells, whistles, figuratively speaking, and pockets galore, as if it was designed for tactical tech deployment.

It is a cool looking gear bag. Next to useless, but really cool looking. What happens, sorting through my bin of currently unused baggage, I find this bag, been several years now, and I bought the bag when Mercury was Retrograde, so it turns up, when Mercury is Retrograde, and I toy with that tactical pouch.

Mercury Retrograde Baggage

There’s a series of elastic bands, over-pockets, and the little clamshell-type of case has a second zip compartment in it, and it all appears well-thought out. For what? I don’t know.

Part of this deal is that I purchased this baggage when Mercury was retrograde. Part of this, though, is that there are bunch of appealing appearing appendages, but none of this is functional in a manner that works for my style.

I’m more “grab and go” and this is a “zip it, lock it down, and lock it away” kind of accessory.

I carry various cables, chargers, adaptors, plugs, and assorted technical crap I used to carry most near every day. Think “grab and go,” rather than “grab and stow.”

My grab-bag has to have, as of this moment, a cable for a phone, cable for a watch, and a cable for a tablet. Then I’ve got to include a slim dual-port USB wall-charger. Seems like all of that would fit into the tactical (looking) gear-bag — yeah, no.

Might miss it this time, but then, maybe not. I streamlined my work requirements so I could perform at a maximum level with a minimum of fuss.

As an exercise, it works, and as a mental relief, thinking through what I need, that helps, too. Mercury Retrograde is always good time to review. Amusing, how that stow-and-go baggage pops up when Mercury is Retrograde, as a subtle reminder.

If only there was a manual.

the Portable Mercury Retrograde

Portable Mercury Retrograde – Kramer Wetzel

Options

“When you have options, you can make better decisions.”

• Capricorn (Austin, TX)

Two-Meat Tuesday

Two-Meat Tuesday – Kramer Wetzel

San Pedro Creek (temporarily free e-book)

#tuesday

#HashTagsSuck

Ephemeral v. Enduring

The image is simple enough, it’s an old business card. From early in my career. I know exactly what I was aiming for with its simple design. Gold lettering on a black background, a throwback to the old John Player Special colours, from an era gone by.

But the colors were more than that, they were an attempt to glamorize and accentuate the nature of my work. Poignant in that there was a minimum of data and contact.

Website: www.astrofish.net —

Phone and e-mail, then Fax?

Yeah, “fax” was a thing, a point of contact, a way to connect from narrow and limited time-frame. It was important, well, at the time it was. Showed a certain kind of dedicated connectivity.

What stands out, more than anything else, the website — the web address is still valid. The phone number, the old rodeo voice mail is long since been disconnected, as has the fax machine. My main number is a mobile, now.

Two items still remain, the site’s address, and the email.

This is about consistency when all else seems to be falling apart. Some things remain the same, despite the long odds against them.

When Mercury is Retrograde, weird old memories pop up and demand attention. If only there was a manual….

The Portable Mercury Retrograde

The Portable Mercury Retrograde – Kramer Wetzel

Portable Mercury Retrograde: astrofish.net’s Mercury in Retrograde

The Family Fang: A Novel

The Family Fang – Kevin Wilson

Dated novel, completely missed it, but popped under the radar on one of the digital book sources. I started reading, entranced, as it were. Family.

My family was weird, still is, but not that weird, as described in the opening the novel, so there is that. “Normal” is merely a setting on the washer.

But every family is weird, right? There’s a theatrical quality to this one. Having it follow the latest Stuart Woods collaboration, which was set in Hollywood? Just adds to the sense of reality. Not like “reality TV” but what what it might be like, what’s going through their minds?

“On the bus to St. Louis, a man with a ukulele stood in the aisle and offered to play requests. Someone shouted out, “Freebird,” and the man sat back down, visibly angered.” Page 77.

Life, a novel, like a long non sequitur. Fits.

“His writing had become, like a stash of rare and troubling pornography, something that must be kept hidden, an obsession that other people would be mystified to discover.” Page 121.

Only writers understand?

The Family Fang: A Novel

What is art, especially since the central family is engaged in performance, guerrilla “art.” Writing about writing is dangerous, and borders on a kind of mental masturbation in my mind. So this is a delicate blonde and extends trope, difficult to negotiate.

The beauty of the novel is that it’s about a family, starts with the patriarch, and he’s an “artist.” Eventually, married with kids, the kids are performance pieces, too, wherein the, like a snake eating its own tail?

Difficult metaphor to carry on, but, the credits suggest it was a movie, too.

The metaphor might be sustained.

While I gratified at the end of the book? I’m not sure if it was comedy or tragedy?

The Family Fang: A Novel

The Family Fang – Kevin Wilson

The Family Fang: A Novel