ARCHIVES - 1996 to FOREVER

Death is dirty and ugly and horrible for the living, but clean and beautiful and absolute surcease for the dead.

And yes, today was the absolute opposite of yesterday at work....

There was never a time from 08:00 on that we weren't at least three patients behind. RunRunRun, all day. Except that I had an APC meeting that took a turn for the better. There's a lady on the committee that had an idea that was 180° from an idea that I had on how to solve a problem, and since the last meeting I decided that well, yeah, her way was better than mine, but a lot more work.... which is what I originally liked about my idea. But then, there is a very worthy goal, and work is what's really needed to fulfill that goal. So I conceded gently, without losing any face, I think. And if her idea fails, we have mine as a back-up, heh.

Got off pretty much on time, and after work Karen and Mom and I went over to her apartment and I hooked up the phone to check it out. The phone did work, but I'm gonna get her one that has two handsets so she can have one by the bed... there's only one line coming in, of course.

The "apartment" is mostly a 16 square-foot room, with a bathroom and a kitchen... the kitchen is the room that the door from the hall opens into, and the bathroom is to your right as you come in. The room faces the south, with a view of her church and the grounds... she's on the third floor.

After the excursion, we went to Kentucky Fried Chicken, we were gong to do the drive-up window, but there were bushes and signs obscuring the menu ( WTF is that about?) so Karen and I went in and ordered.

Came back and watched the news... then I went down to the basement and listened to some oldies. I think that 1957 was *the* golden year for music. The majik was still there, and the songs were by individual artists, not by bands....

I never thought that that made a difference, but yes it does.

The Ink Spots, for an example.... they're still singing. Not a one of the original group survives, of course.

Frank Sinatra? Dead. Dino? Dead. Sammy? Dead. Elvis? Dead. Sonny James? Hmmm... who knows?

Beatles? Half-dead. Nat King Cole? Dead. Dead, dead, dead. Sonny James? Sam Cooke? Chuck Berry? Ferlin Husky?

I have a little piece of each of them in my collection, and I love them all.

And yet, when I hear their songs, I'm infinitely sad.

The loss of innocence makes me sad. *My* innocence, not theirs. The innocence of an age, of a past. Once I thought that love was forever, before love made me more cautious. Once I thought that girls were more virtuous than boys. Once I thought that the world could be perfect....

Then John was killed, and bobby was killed, and Martin was killed, and I knew that perfection was out of our grasp.

There are evil people out there, mean, mean people, mean-spirited people, who will stop at nothing. People, mostly, who believe in gods, and believe that they know what the gods want.

God wants to smell the smoke from burning flesh... yeah, right.

Goat, cow, virgin female human... he just loves that smell, yes he does.

And it's late, too late for me to really get into this. There is always tomorrow... well, until there isn't, heh.