Pharmacists used to count pills out by hand and dispense them in a bottle with a simple cap until that became unsafe. Then pharmacists counted pills on the counter and dispensed them in a bottle with a “child proof” cap until that became unsafe. Now pharmacists slap a label on a prepackaged carton filled with double-blister wrapped, scalloped indvidual pill nests impervious to shock, awe, nuclear explosion, and fingernails.
Not only have we quadrupled the waste stream, I have to work eight times longer to get the @#$%^ things open.
Never a curse for an editorial writer but nobody wants to read polemics today. Not even me.
I tried to get some personal interest going about the kerfuffle over the new Muppet movie. Yawn. Rufus chewed on the rugs about the increasing threshold for itemized medical expense deductions. Ho hum. Election news. Who cares?
2011 was an interesting year in Puffin Land.
The birth of my unexpected first great-granddaughter and my friend Bob’s expected second grandson added joy but we also experienced the death of Anne’s most-favorite cousin and Nancy’s father.
Bob beat back lymphoma.
Anne now has a removable cast.
I got back to North Puffin in January, just in time to shovel us out of a record snow year. We should get an average of 67.4 inches of snow each winter which means October through April or so. We about doubled that and most of it waited for me to get there. Great, white gobs of greasy, grimy, icicles, and me without a spoon — I did all the plowing with the bucket loader because my snowblower was buried behind the construction materiel in the barn.
The record snows led to record melts and record high water in Vermont’s lakes and rivers which led to record flood claims. Then Irene rampaged through the state and did it again. North Puffin was exceptionally lucky. The house is more than 20 feet above the new Lake Champlain flood stage so we merely lived on an island until the early flood waters receded. And the hurricane which devastated southern Vermont just watered our apple tree.
Anne and I did a bunch of telephone diagnosis on the pellet stove when she was next to the stove and I was next to the beach. The stove was recalcitrant in January and rebellious in November. There’s good news. The early estrangement turned out to be a cleaning issue and the Fall failure a broken brain. We were able to get the stove running both times, all thanks to the phone and pictures-by-email.
Technology helped Bob and me when I had to pack up his tons of gear down here and drive it home for him. That was my first use of Skype which meant he could see what I was describing and we got all the astronomy parts in the right boxes.
Anne and I will definitely use Skype the next time she has to disassemble the pellet stove.
Broke: I made the boat payments for our body shop when the Honda collapsed right in front of a very patient cop. Got to do it a second time when a steel pipe (the kind that supports a parking meter) jumped in front of the Camaro. Then Anne had the apple tree trip her and break her leg and we started making payments on the orthopod’s boat.
He has a bigger boat than the body shop guy.
A commercial client told me they “weren’t inclined to pay [our] bill” this fall. I’ve run both a small business and an arts council for more than 20 years and I’ve met plenty of slow payers — and some actual deadbeats — but I’ve not heard that one before. Looks like I’ll find out how collections work.
I suspect bill collectors have a bigger boat than I do, too.
My back porch project moved along nicely but slowly. I closed in the north wing and did most of the finish work. It looks good and breaks the worst of the winter winds coming off the lake.
An interesting year.
I had my toes in the ocean and my ass in the sand yesterday. It was a very quiet Christmas. The beach was overcast but the water was quite nice. A girl named Nola skipped through the waves and was part of about four generations there. A 2-1/2 year old, a young couple, their parents, and the parents’ parents.
“I already had my Christmas up to Maryland with the fambly coupla weeks ago,” my neighbor Henk told me. “Today’s just another day.”
Even the most traditional family has trouble getting everyone together at holiday time. My daughter and her husband have just one set of in-laws and one set of out-laws but her mom is in North Puffin, I’m in South Puffin, her brother lives an hour away, his brothers are scattered across a couple of states and his folks live down in Vermont’s Banana Belt…
I missed Thanksgiving at my daughter’s house because I was in South Puffin where Nancy and I had our first-ever holiday together (it was grand). We did have the traditional Thanksgiving dinner (a small turkey with stuffing, homemade cranberry sauce, smashed potatoes and gravy, and pumpkin pie for dessert). And we were together. We also had a visit to the Fakahatchee Strand, a search for the herd wranglers on Auto Ranch Road, and we lolled and beached and ‘puted and played with toys.
And today is Christmas.
“Save me, because they’re caroling in the meeting room next to my office,” Nancy texted to me on Friday.
It’s not just another day.
Oh, sure, there are carolers belting out Porky Pig tunes and Grandma is cowering under her bed if she knows what’s good for her. There’s nothing on television and I have no shopping to do. Cows are out of season, so I can’t fish. And the plumber’s going to charge you quadruple time and a half if you decide to install that new bathroom faucet today.
It’s not just another day because we build expectations of spending the holidays and holy days with our loved ones.
I’m dreaming of a Yuletide Nancy
Just like the one who had to go
When the earrings glisten,
and the red dress slips on,
Wearing her red hair in a bow…
I’m dreaming of a poly Christmas
With every Christmas card I write
May your days be merry and bright
And may all your Christmases be white.
I am, by choice, in the warmest, most comfortable spot in the lower 48. It is about 80° right now, with puffy cumulus clouds overhead, and a gentle breeze riffling the palm fronds. I shall swim in the Atlantic this afternoon.
Truth be told, I’d rather be with my sweetheart. Even if I had to shovel snow or climb mountains.
“I would like to be with you. I would also like to be with D#2,” Nancy said. “I would love it if I could be with both of you and there would be warmth and comfort and friendliness but, practically speaking, I reasonably presume there would be a tension born between the men, competitive and not being accustomed to one another.”
Drama. The polydays nightmare.
Yeah, there would be tension but a different dissidence than one might expect.
Remember Paul and Polly Dent, Evelyn and Owen McGregor, and Nicole Norris? I thought so. Heck, I have the score card and even I can’t tell who is doing what to whom in that household. Plenty of drama there, but theirs grows from the secrets they keep, not from their desire to be with each other.
I believe the competitiveness when A, B, C, D, E, F, N, and I try to coordinate our schedules comes because we must meter our time with one another rather than because we two mens might happen be in the same room with the wimmens.
In other words, people like the Dents, McGregors, and Nicole who are always in and out of each other’s houses (or house) have maybe more need for apartness than togetherness. People who see each other only part time yearn for togetherness. That means that some combination of Anne and Nancy, or D#2 and my son, or her daughter and I, we each wish for the time the other gets.
[It is worth noting some artistic license in the alphabet soup, above. I think we just included everyone who ever appeared in the blog as well as our families, friends, and lovers.]
“But, barring being with me, I wish Anne could have come down. Or the kids. Or your Aunt Dot. Or Rufus,” Nancy said.
Anne spent yesterday with the “Bs,” her other family (and a 25-pound rib roast, a turkey breast, and a Smithfield ham); she’s traveling to both ends of Vermont today for two more Christmases with the kids. Nancy is off to California to spend the day with her daughter. I’m holding down the palm trees with Henk who isn’t on anyone’s list. And we will all share the best we can.
Merry Christmas, Darling.
[Editors Note: gekko and I shared the four-part polylocution that lead up to these afterposts. Please visit The Poly Posts for the entire series and for other resources.]
I don’t have a thermometer here in South Puffin so I went to wallyworlddotcom to suss out a “Digital Fever Thermometer with Peak Temperature Beeper [and] Last Read Memory.” Just $4.88! In stock to ship to home, just 97¢ shipping (Will not arrive by Dec 24).
Like most shopping sites, wallyworlddotcom also pimps What Was Ultimately Purchased By People Who Viewed This Item:
Pharmacists used to count pills out by hand and dispense them in a bottle with a simple cap until that became unsafe. Then pharmacists counted pills on the counter and dispensed them in a bottle with a “child proof” cap until that became unsafe. Now pharmacists slap a label on a prepackaged carton filled with double-blister wrapped, scalloped indvidual pill nests impervious to shock, awe, nuclear explosion, and fingernails.
