A story of numbness

The numbness began with the apartment.
It turned into numbness between us within a few months.
Now she has become so numb she never leaves anymore.
And I’m hardly ever there.

– Leonard Blumfeld

Written for 3WW using today's 3 words: apartment – began – numb.

Ruby Tuesday Meme Invitation

Introductory question:

Does the blog world need another meme?

Multiple choice answers permitted:

A. Like the plague, there are enough of those useless things.
B. Why not, count me in.

If your answer is A., then please proceed with whatever you wanted to do in the first place.
If your answer is B., then please be invited to participate in Ruby Tuesday.

What are the rules?

A. Create a post that has the word or color RUBY or something else RUBY-related or TUESDAY-related in it.
B. In your post, create a link to this Ruby Tuesday meme invitation.
C. Leave a comment here.
D. That's all!

How'd I come up with the idea for this meme? That's simple:

A. Today is Tuesday.
B. I was thinking of participating in some meme – preferably a Tuesday one since today is Tuesday.
C. Somehow, in my always musical head, the Rolling Stones song Ruby Tuesday started playing:

Ruby Tuesday

She would never say where she came from
Yesterday don't matter because it's gone
While the sun is bright
Or in the darkest night
No one knows, she comes and then she goes

Goodbye Ruby Tuesday
Who is gonna hang a name on you?
When you change with every new day
Still I'm gonna miss you

Don't ask her why she needs to be so free
She's gonna tell you it's the only way to be
She just can't be chained
To a life where nothing's gained
And nothing's lost, but such a cost

Goodbye Ruby Tuesday
Who is gonna hang a name on you?
When you change with every new day
Still I'm gonna miss you

"There's no time to lose", I heard her say
You gotta catch your dreams before they slip away
Dying all the time
Lose your dreams and you may lose your mind
Is life unkind?

Goodbye Ruby Tuesday
Who is gonna hang a name on you?
When you change with every new day
Still I'm gonna miss you

Goodbye Ruby Tuesday
Who is gonna hang a name on you?
When you change with every new day
Still I'm gonna miss you

Goodbye Ruby Tuesday

– Written in 1966 by Keith Richards (and possibly Brian Jones)

For added inspiration, here's a clip of Melanie performing the song:

Experiment involving ladies, leopards and a juniper tree

Lady, three white leopards sat under a juniper tree in the cool of the day
– T. S. Eliot

And now four Blumfeld variations, to be accompanied by lute and shawm:

Leopard: three white ladies sat under a juniper tree in the cool of the day
Juniper: three white days sat under a leopard tree in the cool of the ladies
Cool tree: three juniper trees sat under a leopard in the white of the day
Cool ladies: a juniper tree sat under the leopard in three whites of the day

Posted in honor of Sunday Scribblings #101 - The Experiment as an experiment in/with/on modernist poetry.

T. S. Eliot, when asked the meaning of the line 'Lady, three white leopards sat under a juniper tree in the cool of the day...' from Ash Wednesday (1927), said "It means 'Lady, three white leopards sat under a juniper tree in the cool of the day...'".

Questions as to the meaning of the Blumfeld variations are welcome.

Photo courtesy of Snow Leopard Trust, an organization that has been helping to save the Asian snow leopard for 25 years.

Perfect playmates ...

... and yet so different.

For Wordless Wednesday.

"We’re wordless every day, and we’re like potato chips — you can’t just have one day!!"

My kitchen, right now

It's all about kitchens in Inspire Me Thursday this time around. My contribution is a razor-edge-of-time snapshot of my kitchen's current but no so unusual state (messy).

What you see are primarily the yet unwashed containers of last night's and today's foods and drinks and some utentils. The pièce de résistance, however, is my grandma's flowered coffee pot in the background.

And yes, it was takeout last night. My daughter came over, and we ooled* Chinese while watching a rental DVD - Because I said so with Diane Keaton as the high-strung and meddling mother of three girls. The movie has its moments but isn't the greatest ever made.

* To "ool" - family speak ever since we watched Ringo Starr's Caveman way back when the kids were little. Even our dog knows what the word means. One of our all-time family cult movies.

The I should not be writing fib

I
should
not be
writing this,
I should be working.
That is the message of this fib.
In fact, you should prob-
ably not
be read-
ing
this.

– Leonard “Reluctant Workhorse” Blumfeld

Nothing terribly new or revolutionary, I'm afraid. More along the lines of same old.

For those relatively few of you who've read this before and are surprised that it has changed shape: I added the lower half of the diamond just now, feeling that something was missing.

How tasty was my cereal this morning

Wordless Wednesday

Zapping the remote control

Zemi, one of the characters I met during my time zap travels.

These are some of the places and times where blind zapping curiosity took me …

Zap: Ah, it’s mighty damp here, I’ve got sweat running down everywhere after just a sec, and it’s so misty I can hardly see a thing … and what’s this ugly furry creature there that’s eying me from the front (or back?) of its furry head … about 27 feet tall … and feet on both sides of the foot if that makes any sense … now marching towards me through the swampy terrain … don’t like his/her approach …

Zap: I’m in a desert on some planet … surrounded by insect-like robots about 100 times the size of the biggest terrestrial insects … what the hell are these guys doing? … I see, they’re sifting the sand for something … gold? plutonium? planetarium? … I feel hungry, nothing edible around … better leave before they discover me and put me through one of those sifters ...

Zap: I’m in Charles Dickens’ room, looking over his shoulder as he’s scribbling on and on about Mr. Micawber … he gives me a distracted look, but doesn’t really register … let him work … I love David Copperfield the way it is, no sense in interfering …

Zap: I’m in a trench … soldiers that look like frogs, literally, they’ve got these things over their heads that make 'em look like … my God, let me get out of here before there’s a poison gas attack …

Zap: What are these four gigantic columns around me? And that above me – is that someone’s gigantic belly? And those egg-shaped things the size of helicopter cabs … are those balls? Don’t let that plesiosaurus or whatever sit down (on me!) while I’m looking for my RC in the grass …

PS: I made it back home – to my own modest time, my own modest place – as you might have guessed because I managed to survive and post these exploits.

– Len “Time Zapper” Blumfeld

Written for Sunday Scribblings' #100 prompt "Time Machine"

Synonyms for never

• one of these days
• eventually
• when I get around to it

This topic came up as a result of listening to a piece by Bill Frisell (from "Nashville") in which the lyrics "One of these days I'm gonna sit down and write a long letter" are repeated again and again.

Please feel free to add any other never variants you can think of.

– L.B.

See you lator

I still likes my amplificator
but now also wants a magnificator
before heading down to the equator
with my magnanimator
to avoid the torpiditator
with his pet alligator,
an eradicator
by trade, a voluminator,
pollutinator,
terrificator
and terminator by effect.

– Len "Procrastinator" Blumfeld

Note
That one came out of the blue. I only felt exhausted and depleted when I started a list of words, existing and invented, ending in -ator. Now I feel much refreshed. Ain't that sumpin'!