On TV

Last night I realized that Sergeant Hathaway needs eventually to take the mantle from Inspector Lewis and carry on the series, just as Lewis did from Morse. I mean, how much more obvious can anything be? In "Indelible Stain," which was repeated last Sunday, the scene went something like:
Professor Rand: (dripping with condescension) I am sorry you gentlemen are not able to see the whole picture.
Sergeant Hathaway: (drily, with restraint) Perhaps that is because it is not being sufficiently framed.

Thoughts?
In other news, last night I also remembered that The Muppet Show had a segment called "Animal Hospital" -- I think it was rather a mash-up of MASH and General Hospital. "The continuing story of a quack who's gone to the dogs." When I look it up online, some sites say it was called "Veterinarians' Hospital." Either way, it was fun.

Only the echos of my mind

Why is "he's afraid of his own shadow" disparaging? Shadows can be really scary.

Recently I was in a department store's shoe section and overheard a young woman chatting about her earrings and fiancé. She said, "I found them online," but I thought she said, "I found him online." I thought that sounded funny -- the next version of match.com will have a screen full of men (or women, as the case may be) where you can click for alternate views and compare prices.



A cat food commercial would be funny if it were from the cat's point of view. Sort of like modern commercials for Prozac and Viagra. In recent years we've had "Meow meow meow meow" (classic!) and "Kibbles and bits, oh boy, oh boy" (not cat food, but same concept). I would like to see a cat food commercial where you're watching a cat skulk around an 800 sq. ft. apartment and hearing the cat's voice-over narrative: "You know, Cynthia and I moved to the city and things were difficult -- I'm an indoor cat, and it was rough leaving that farmhouse. I liked to stalk the mice and then nibble on a tail as I basked in the morning country sunlight streaming through the kitchen window. I was a sad cat in the city until Lila set the first bowl of Purina Cat Chow down in front of me. (Cut to cat sitting with Lila and purring; passing cars heard faintly outside) Now, thanks to Purina, I am a changed cat. Lila, thank you for giving me Purina Cat Chow and giving me a second lease on life."

My mother and I recently were sitting in the 100-degree garage, in the unstarted Cavalier, debating whether to zip over to LGO or wait to hear from Neil and Paul, who were finishing a hike.
Geri: I can't sit here if we don't at least roll down a window.
Diana: Yeah. (Rummages for key) Actually, you can just roll it down -- we don't need to start the car.
Geri: (Genuinely delighted, as she rolls the window down) What will they come up with next?!

Last week Neil and I were getting ready to run an errand. I was feeling rather trollish, but I decided to make an effort. As I touched up my blush and added some lipstick I noticed that it was making not one whit of positive difference in my appearance -- quite the opposite. I thought, "It's kind of like 'gilding the lily,' but in reverse. What would be a term for that?" No sooner had I asked the universe than the answer fell into my mind: "Painting the cow."



How come people say that being dead is like being asleep? Clearly, nobody who has experienced death has reported back as much. If someone is dead they may look to the living as though they are in repose, or vice-versa, but that is what it is like from the outside. Perhaps there is an element to life that has nothing whatsoever to do with the mechanics of the body and brain, and that therefore will not alter upon death? Sometimes we talk about the soul or the spirit being bound to the body, and then after death floating elsewhere. Maybe the soul/spirit/other element to life (not that they are necessarily interchangeable, depending on one's religious outlook, but it's arguably the same general concept here) is not tied to the body. Rather, our sensory perceptions are tied to the body, but our interactions with the universe are influenced by our sensory perceptions and also the "other element," which has neither death nor location.

I heart OMD

Last week I was thinking about swear words, particularly those that are uttered during an instant of urgent pain (whether physical or emotional).

If we lived in the land before swear words, how would we express the impact of a dropped hammer on our toes? It's visceral. It would be, to my imagination, like screaming bloody murder at the top of your lungs for quite some time and possibly grabbing the nearest living thing around the neck or punching it. (Which might cause the second party to issue a similar response; moral = dropping a hammer in a crowded room could cause WWIII [although I suppose since we're in the land before swear words, it would be WWI].)

So nowadays, when we confront a sudden and desperate pain, we take a split second to register that hurting others is bad and yell F*************!!!!!! or some appropriate variation. This may be indelicate to the ears of those nearby, but one or two swear words usually serves to encapsulate the trauma of the moment and allow the sufferer to gracefully move on to the next step (checking for blood or whatever) without having to bruise his vocal folds or the neck of his friend.

I think the bottom line here is that swear words are actually a mark of refinement.

Unrelatedly, 45 minutes ago I was thinking about one of the differences between life now and life in memory. Now vs. memory is looking at the same thing from a different perspective. (So is now vs. memory vs. the future, in a weird way.) And sometimes looking at something from multiple perspectives reveals that an element crucial to one view is quite unnecessary to another.

Specifically, I was thinking about how I feel now, which is anxious about how I am perceived, how I am performing, how I will perform, how I will be perceived, blah, blah, blah.

I think about it in the shower, I think about it while I am at work, I think about it while people are perceiving me and I am judging my own performance to be wanting, I think about it while I'm watching Dancing with the Stars. It is like the most boring thing to think about. And yet.

So I was walking outside and the air is crisp and nice. And I saw myself (from the inside) walking and it was just me, walking, just like I would walk to Erin Killoran's house when I was 6 to see if she wanted to roller skate and walk through Manhattan when I was 22 to work at Vanity Fair wearing khakis from Old Navy (!). And suddenly I got a perspective on my anxiety. I mean, I already knew, with my brain, that such perseverations were largely a waste of time, but so do smokers know that they're killing their lungs, right? (Maybe human behavior as a whole can be reduced to a study of the right hand not knowing that the left hand is cutting off the nose to spite the face, but I digress.)

Anyway, I saw myself walking, forever, and thought about how I probably had various anxieties circling in my brain when I was 6, 22, etc., but that they didn't matter, and don't matter. At each point in my life, I am whole and beautiful. And I am walking the earth for a short time. I can be whole or I can deny what I have been given and wrap myself around the axle.

Love, D