I have to admit: I like pens. I'm thinking of founding a twelve-step program called PFA--Pen Fetishists Anonymous. Okay, maybe it's not a fetish per se, but I do like my pens. I like to doodle, to draw, to cartoon, so I've always liked the roller ball-style pens, preferably black, preferably medium-tipped. Art pens with the scritchy-scratchy needle-nosed tips don't do much for me. How to get a consistent line with them--to be thick when I want thick and to be thin when I want thin--is a mystery to me; my lines seem to be spider webby when I want bold and gummed up when I want fine. And when I'm trying to get an expression on a character's face and it comes out looking like a Rorschach reject, well, my goat has been gotten.When it comes to writing words, don't insult me with a Bic or a Papermate (although Papermates aren't too bad, come to think of it). What I look for in a writing utensil is a smooth line--imagine using a knitting needle to write words on a stick of butter, soft--and a comfortable heft in the hand. I want the scribing experience to be like writing on a cloud: no herky-jerky motions, no tearing of the paper.
This need for smoothness extends to Cousin Pencil, too. Fine-point barbarians that, when used, lend an almost shivery mojo to the page are not allowed admittance to my digs. In fact, I may even call the boys in blue to roust them from my front porch. Like that old song says, "Freaky needle-nosed nuisances need not apply." No, what I'm looking for is, again, smoooooothness.
Just some background, the preceding drivel, to let you--my one or two reader(s)--know why I was pleased, earlier tonight, when I ventured into the back room, the cat room, to root around for the wireless router disk. I was pleased, yes, to not only find the disk but to also run across a few blasts from the past: a Cross mechanical pencil that writes like it's made out of silk, a black roller ball pen that is smooth and has, also, the added bonus of a laser pointer button and a blue LED light button, and the PC game No One Lives Forever, a first-person-shooter set in 1960s England, the protagonist a sexy brown-haired spy named Cate Archer. I hadn't been in that room for a while (I'm slightly allergic to felines) so it was nice to find some old friends. Oh. And I also discovered my Social Security Card, tucked safely away in the bosom of Cate Archer's CD jewel case. The SS Card: always a damned good thing to keep track of, eh?
***
I have a son who either cares not to listen to me, is deaf, is set in his ways, is stubborn, is untrainable, or is just plain stoooopid. I truly don't believe that he is the latter, so it must just be a conglomeration of the previous attributes that affects our poor Oliver, the cute dear little orphan. We got a new sofa and a new recliner about a month ago and I have been doing my damnedest to convey to the boys that they are not welcome on the furniture anymore, damn it. I've put gates and my guitar on the cushions and blocked off the recliner with a TV dinner serving tray and Louie seems to get it but Oliver? He seems to be totally oblivious if said guards are not in place. See, the couch that I had before, a nice newer piece of furniture from my passed uncle's estate, was virtually--hell, was--ruined by the dynamic duo o' dogs. Their smell, their dirt, their weight all served to age the sofa before its time and make it virtually unsittable. Oh, and dear Ollie had the penchant for pulling and prying with his little teeth the stuffing from the cushions and their backs. Great fun, huh? Dogs destroying. So, the rule was set: No dogs on the furniture no more. Well, Oliver hasn't seemed to have gotten the memo. I've caught him a few times on his favorite old perch atop the left back cushion at the window. This way, I presume, he can get his stink all over the new couch and ruin the cushion and gaze out the window at his whim. I caught him today, as I was walking up the stairs with my basket of freshly-laundered clothes and I let him know, in no uncertain terms, that it was his bad, his blow, his ill. Perhaps I was little forceful with the pear-plump dude, but, hell, between his mastication foibles and his overactive Inside bladder (though I let him and Lou out late at night, every night) and his cushion-destroying peccadilloes, he pushes my buttons in the wrong wrong wrong way, sometimes. I still love the little guy, though, perhaps because of his idiosyncrasies.
And Lou remains The. Best. Dog. Evah.
***
Michigan: You don't like the weather, wait five minutes. Yesterday it was 84 and sunny and today it is windy and damp and 50 degrees or so, making yesterday feel like summer and today feel like an early Fall. And it's only the 16th of April. Confused yet?
No comments:
Post a Comment