Life is, basically, fun.  Basically.  There’s sad, and sometimes a bit o’ mad (both varieties, unless there’s more ‘n two?) and occasional drudgery, tho’ less now than before due to the change in work/employment status.

A late autumnal/early winter? reign-bowing, not long before …

Our valley’s version of “Alpen-glow” though we’re certainly not the Alps ~

Looks like a wake, eh?  My nephew-in-law, my favourite niece, son-in-(out)-law AND son pose with someone who looks … uh, mostly dead?  Barely alive?

Books since retirement, and some just before :

Only been (w)retired a half-year now, and had few plans, but did plan to READ MORE.  For the past few years I was lucky to read perhaps 3 books in a year.  Against the Day took the better part of two.   And so, I sped that up, finishing Thomas Pynchon’s Against the Day in time to pick up CHINDI, by Jack McDevitt.  Excellent!  Almost as excellent as the two Pynchon’s I’ve read.  Then, why not?  I had ordered a signed-by-the-author copy of Compendium for Betty — as she is what I’d consider a voracious reader — participating in two book clubs.  And, this book was written by her/our niece, Alia Luria.  I read most that book on vacation in Sayulita, Mehee-ko, reclining in a lounge chair puffing on a cigar sipping raicilla (sort of like tequila) looking out over the sea.  Probably all books are better in circumstances like that!

Then … I made the effort to finally finish Finnegan’s Wake (James Joyce) and had to ‘bribe’ myself to do it.  You see, this was the first book I finished AFTER the retirement date, and I had fallen into the (bad) habit of computer-solitaire to the exclusion of getting many things needing accomplished, accomplished.  So, I forced myself to forego the mindless clicking on virtual cards UNTIL AFTER I had read at least 10 pages of FW that day.  I often read more than 10 pages in my feeble effort to display some discipline.  I finished the last 400-some pages in about a month-and-a-half.

Then … noted that Pynchon had written something more recent than Against (& Gravity’s Rainbow) –>  Bleeding Edge, so I got a copy of that.  Not as gigantic and mythic and convoluted and intertwined as those other two, but still very “Pynchonesque.”

My daughter gave me a copy of Christopher Moore’s  2^nd-hand souls (Secondhand Souls) recently, and that was a quick and enjoyable read.  Being inherently and fundamentally (I am officially of the religion) lazy, I eschew reading books of which I’ve seen the movie of, but Betty convinced me to read The Martian (Andy Weir) and I’m glad I did.  Now … so much to consider …

All the while, during my reading sessions I concurrently scan a coupla pages of something allegedly spiritual/whatever … recently Tao Te Ching and now Chuang Tsu/Inner Chapters  (same authors: Gia-Fu Feng and Jane English).  And, recently found my copy of the TORAH while perusing bookshelves at our friend John Fleming’s house in Boulder!  He said he didn’t need it, has a more-portable paper-back copy …

Mid-afternoon last Sunday Dec. 11, I was feeling sorta like Tom Wolfe’s title character in “A man ¾ in Full”.  (No, I didn’t read THAT book (which had a slightly simpler title), but did read Wolfe’s “Elektrik Kool-Aid assid-Test” and “Bonfire of the Vanities”.)

This (feeling) was sparked/motivated/transmogrified in no small part to us having watched the movie “Genius” recently – about the writer THOMAS WOLFE (not to be cornfusulated with Tom Wolfe).  So, again, I was thinking, considering, the two similar names yet dissimilar niches in the literary milieu so occupied …  and why somewhat “full”?  Sonny-boy and girl-friend had dropped by mid-morning, breakfast, the footbawl game (Denver losing to Tennessee) and, astonishingly, we did NOT drink a whole lot. 

Above, our son, his girl-friend, Betty, and the front half of Betty’s NEW CAR!

Also “full” somewhat in part to our (wife and me) defiance of the RETIRED-SENIOR-CITIZENS-ON-A-LIMITED-INCOME” (RSCOALI) scenario.  New car, indeed.  Although I did see an ad that we could have, instead, spent the $10k down on a penny instead!  I have wanted to own an 1856 Flying Eagle 1¢ piece ever since I started coin-collecting, some 55 years ago!  If we had purchased that, eschewing the probably-muchly-necessary new car (Betty’s trusty Subaru was pronounced soon-to-be-on-the-deathbed by our trusty auto-mechanic), would our kids have made an effort to commit their parents to the “old age” (loony bin?) home?  To which experts would have replied “You mean you haven’t already tried?”

We saw the latest Gaim uv Throwns, in which, at the end, “Blondie” stands on a ship with THE DWARF alongside, bound for the New Whirled to begin 2 conquer it.  What could possibly go wrong?

Recent hazy lazy sunset ~

and this year’s (mostly Betty’s doing, I cut, prune, set up the undecorated template) “Hanukkah Bush”.  More-tree-like and less bushy than usual.  Note my clever stabilizing by carefully-chosen firewood logs ~

Wacky birdhouse on garage at sunset ~

and heron-on-ice.

And … when we go to the grocery store, we check to see if …

Yes!  chocolate is frequently 50% off!  So we gotta stock up ~