Today I'm going back to my old neighborhood. It was Deet's idea and we tried to do it last year, but nobody's schedule worked out. This time we're all going to have a picnic at Virginia Road School and then walk around the place where we grew up. There should be at least a dozen of us walking around like we belong there. I was back around the way a couple of weeks ago when I took Boy for his haircut, a pastrami and the drum circle at Liemert Park. But it has been a year since I spoke to anyone over in 90016.
I burned a CD full of funky music to remind us of the Ffun we used to have. Deet collected about 70 trivia questions from all of us about the old days. This is going to be great. Damn, now I have to wash the car.
School Boy Crush - AWB
Jungle Boogie - Kool & The Gang
Ffun - Confunkshun
Indian Summer Love - Confunkshun
I Got My Mind Made Up - Instant Funk
It's All the Way Live - Lakeside
Wide Receiver - Michael Henderson
Skin Tight - Ohio Players
Mega Medly - Zapp & Roger
Slide - Slave
Tak Your Time - SOS Band
Thank You - Sly & The Family Stone
Thighs High - Tom Browne (he's one ordinary guy)
Watching You - Steve Arrington
That should be funky enough for one afternoon.
The pace is slow around the house. I've been gaming like a teenager and I finally OD'd last night, but I did rank up several times in Big Team Battle. I hooked up my wheel and started driving on Forza 2, but in my first online game I got into a huge pissing match with some bitter old 'grown ass man' who felt it necessary to tell me that if he'd kill for Uncle Sam he'd surely kill for himself. Sounds like a DD to me. Strange that some people get more aggro in racing games than in shooting games.
We still have some BBQ left over from Monday, but I think we killed the last of it last night. I brought the First Daughter a quill pen & ink set back from Houston. I know it's cliche, Dad bringing back presents from out of town, but I miss the family. Just the smell of them. LA is my home town, it's a funky town, and the Baby Girl, with the Morris Day expression on her face, has completed her California project. You've got to admit it's a change from Missions. Yes of course she got an A. She always gets As. I'm recognizing how brittle it makes her. See she has no musical talent, so she needs a very strong rationalization for that. She used to cry when people wouldn't play with her, now the only reason she cries is if she discovers there's something she can't master. Fortunately, she's goofy and doesn't get stressed out over such matters
I keep fighting the idea of moving to cheaper digs. I keep wondering what exactly it is that Los Angeles gives me. All I can think of are schools. Oh yeah and this recruiter who keeps calling me about a job around here. It has been hanging over my head for months now, but it's such a huge job that it has got me all crazy. I shouldn't even talk about it. This is what happened with the China deal. I talked too much about it and people started giving me the distant eye which didn't draw nearer when the deal fell through.
But I must confess that people have been saying good things about me at LinkedIn. Yeah I do know a thing or two about Managerial Computing. I'm a little weary of being a practitioner, though. I need to consume an industry vertical or two. I'm thinking energy or biotech. Biotech means that I stay in California. Energy means I go back to Houston. A colleague and several other offhand comments tend to highly recommend The Woodlands. I am forever moving in my head. Too much of my life is contingent. I should have been a surgeon. I could have focused on one part of the body that never changes and carved my way to riches. But no, I had to harness reality through philosophizing and computing. Somebody told me that I was a generalist last month. I didn't know how to take it. I thought that being a Renaissance Man was a good thing. I need to see what C.S. Lewis has to say about that.
I've had a choice between Lewis and John Standford and I keep picking up the murder mysteries. My new indulgence. I'm doing a lot more reading of, how shall I say, more disciplined writers than those in the blogosphere. It makes me want to read more books and fewer blogs. That's what's going on vis a vis blog volume.
Tomorrow is my birthday, for which I am prepared to make absolutely no preparations or big deal. A weird thing happened though. I suddenly realized that I don't own any cowboy boots. Every American man should have a pair of cowboy boots, Levi's and a leather jacket. The ones I liked in the Houston Airport cost 450 bucks. It's way down the list. Daughter needs to go to camp.
That's the news from the Yellow House.
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