34 replies to this topic

[Luminosity]

What did you see, hear or experience, that you want to share?

[Luminosity]

There was a guy at the beach with a birdcage strapped to his back. There were two parrots inside. He was just out for a walk with his parrots, his family and a dog named Snickers. He also takes his parrots for a bike rides.

[Luminosity]

I walked into the dive bar where I get burgers. There were two clumps of drunken older males talking loudly about very little. I usually try not to engage with anyone in this bar. It is the divest bar in the nicest neighborhood. Nothing bad usually happens, but you never know. This is probably a good policy, but every now and then there is an attractive man who might have been interested in me, about once a year on average. That's what it's like when you are 49. Being open to that is like keeping a restaurant open all year because one day a year a customer might come in. It happened again. I was sitting there waiting for my burger and there were some drunken contractors making their way out of the bar single file. I was thinking what I think of drunken contractors, but one of them was tall and well built and handsome, about thirty. He had beautiful cheekbones and looked like an Indian brave, but he was probably half Asian and half white. He saw me looking at him and he looked back and I immediately looked away.

Sigh. Now that doesn't mean he was interested, but I'll never know. I thought a lot of people were looking at me that night. When I got home I discovered that my hair looked sort of like Bozo the Clown. I don't even know how to flirt with anyone in a bar anymore. I am shielding myself from negative feedback which seems more likely now. I don't even know how to take advantage occasional nibbles if that's what it is. The whites of his eyes were completely red, and that is usually bad news, but he was fine.

[Luminosity]

I want to drink brandies and listen music but I don't know where to go, so I'm here. That sucks. Don't want to be in my head right now.

"Where can a woman go when she's feeling low." --song lyric

[Luminosity]

It wasn't good this morning but I got some Greek food and that went well. I got to the mall and it was all parked up. Strange for a weekday. When I bought a paper, it was Saturday. That explains the fireworks last night. They normally have them on Friday, except when they randomly have them on other days too. Got some raspberries. Now I'm in the Apple store.

[Luminosity]

I was at a crowded food court. This guy started talking to me. He looked sort of homeless but he had a way with words. It turns out we are both writers. So I talked to him. He wanted to know what I did. I was sitting in my wheelchair and he looked homelessy so I thought, do you really want to get into THAT conversation? But I said, "Nothing" and asked him what he did for a living, which seemed like a faintly ridiculous query. He said he was writing a book and mentioned a professor. He looked forty. Still the conversation was going well even though he just seemed too into whatever I had going on, including my vitamins. There's a vitamin bottle I take liquid vitamins out of and he wanted to hold it and look at it. I said can't you just look at it from here? I just didn't want a random stranger holding something I drank out of. He suddenly grew very offended and said he wasn't going to steal it. He pretty much left in a huff.

How did I cross a line? In what world would his course of action have ended without some kind of rebuff? Hello?

[okay]

I'm pretty sure he wanted to steal your vitamins, or worse. Those homeless people.

[Luminosity]

Positive feedback only please.

Please don't critique, debate or make fun of posters on this thread. No advice. Thanks.

[Mind]

Here is the most awesome thing I have done in years: http://addins.waow.c...t-awesome-thing

[Luminosity]

It looks like a special place.

[Luminosity]

.

Edited by Luminosity, 22 September 2012 - 05:02 AM.

[Luminosity]

I came to the mall on Friday afternoon, the first day of the new iPhone. The traffic was backed up on the freeway for thousands of feet from the mall exit. Wow. People in this area have created a thing where they line up on the shoulder of the freeway and inch forward. I went into Whole Foods but I saw that arrogant pot head guy who just hates me because I use a wheelchair (true). Then I saw two more people I have had bad experiences with. I felt bad. What's going on? I walked through the whole mall and ended up on the other side at McDonalds. I hardly ever go to McDonalds but I had just had it. I got a Frappe and a Big Mac. I had to sit near these teenage boys. There was a lot of swearing but then they started talking about how they and their friends escaped from the police on various occasions. I know what bullshit sounds like but this was not it. Something their friend was supposed to have done sounded real bad and was "probation violation." I wanted to alert the police but where I live, somehow the person you reported always seems to know it was you. Very little happens to them. I'm also very indentifiable. I sometimes used to try to help the police in a neighborhood watch sort of way but I'm not going down that road anymore if there's a risk to me. I looked at them on my way out just in case I would learn anything that at some point I could pass on the police in a safer way. I had gotten a couple of of unusual first names and specific locations from their conversation. I thought I was being subtle, but one of them looked right at me like he knew what I was thinking. He knew I heard everything they said. Outside the McDonalds I saw a marked police car. I just kept going. God will have to take care of this. I'm not him. Does walking away from something like this make you feel weird? Yes, it does. But the justice system here is that dysfunctional and they created this.

I got a Coke Zero which I never do. Lately I've been craving caffeine and chocolate. It's something to do with not sleeping through the night for a year and a half. Now I'm in the Apple store. I was going to stay away for the iPhone weekend but I didn't. There's plenty of space at the computers actually. The bouncer guy from the larger Apple store is here to control the iPhone purchasers. At the other store he makes you get off the computers after fifteen minutes. He greeted me cordially. Yeah, nice to see you too, Darth Vader.

Edited by Luminosity, 22 September 2012 - 05:06 AM.

[Luminosity]

Every time I come on this site now, ads for Astroglide come up on the screen. What are they trying to say?

Edited by Luminosity, 22 September 2012 - 06:04 AM.

[Luminosity]

It's been voggy. I stopped somewhere nice and prayed. It worked. The next day, I got a call that there had been an emergency cancellation with the doctor I had called for an appointment. I got into see a doctor who was booked up until March. She is the most well-respected specialist in that area but I was in there in less than 24 hours from my original call. I had an hour and a half's notice this morning but I was in there. Whoa, no caffeine! She was really nice and helpful. She only charged my forty dollars for the visit and gave me free samples and told me where the cheapest prescriptions were. I went to Wal-Mart. I've never been there. I got some decent parking and I got my prescription. Before I saw there were chairs I asked them if they could bump it up because I could not stand up for half hour to wait and they did. I was grateful. I had breakfast at a coffee shop because there had been no time to cook at home. A waitress who isn't really waitress material was on duty but I asked the hostess to switch me to a different section and she did. I came to the mall to keep out of the vog. It was a good day. I was cutting through the world like butter. I am trying to keep this going, listening to the voices. I submitting a guest editorial to a publication. The regular editor was out of town and it said to submit stuff to a deputy editor so I did. Maybe that was for a reason. I edited the editorial and send it off. I put the guy's full title and all that. Who doesn't like to hear that?

[Luminosity]

I went home to swim and lift weights. I really felt like doing more, going to the library and writing. That didn't work out so I came back to the mall. At least I'm out of the vog and out and about. Would have liked to do something but you can't always.

[Luminosity]

Saw the roofline of a house moving down the freeway accompanied by police cars with sirens. They should warn you before they do that.

[Adaptogen]

nice keep going i wanna know more!

[Luminosity]

They decided to pick up a whole house and move it somewhere. They never do that here. To make it even more surreal, it was one of the few houses in my area with that old-fashioned child's drawing of a house shape: you know, a steep pitched roof, a door, and a window on each side. So they drove it down the highway and away it went. To where, I know not.

[Adaptogen]

i meant more things in general that you heard, saw, and experienced..but that one was pretty good. i like all the topics you have started

[Luminosity]

Thanks a lot. I will see if I can oblige. Here's a link to my blog here, if you haven't seen it already:

http://www.longecity...minositys-blog/

Edited by Luminosity, 12 December 2012 - 04:27 AM.

[Luminosity]

Rock stars on CSPAN/public access TV. I turned on our local version of CSPAN. There was a government hearing, the usual set up, then the camera took in, a major rock star. Whot? Took a minute to process it. He was there, in the local government building, to testify on a law he was trying to pass, with his lawyer. On the other side of him was another rock star. They have homes in this region. They did well, and the bill is being well received. Written testimony was submitted by a a number of famous names. For once, the whole panel of lawmakers was in attendance; no empty chairs.

[Luminosity]

It is a beautiful sunny-lit day. I'm driving down a side street graced by orchid trees laden with purple flowers. I see this thing in front of my car. It looks like a leaf, but it's moving. It was a Jackson's Chameleon. It looks like a mini-stegasaurus. Very slowly, it lurches in front of my car, a few inches a second. I put on my flashers and waved the cars around me. Thankfully, they were not bad tempered. I could scarcely believe that this prehistoric-looking creature was crossing a city street. It was like a miracle that it had traversed the opposite lane safely and that I happened to be in front of it. I love animals and would notice something like that. Good one. I hope he has a good day.

Edited by Luminosity, 03 March 2013 - 03:12 AM.

[Luminosity]

Snack praying.

I was in a special place praying. Someone sat on a bench and started to pray. I heard a sack rustling and a soda can being opened. I heard chips being eaten. The person was combining praying with snacking. Snack praying.

[Luminosity]

I parked in a nice neighborhood last night to enjoy the peace and clean air for a while. It felt habitable. Then at home, there's been a rash of noisy mopeds that sound like weed wakers. Back to that. Why are they only in my neighborhood? It's like being bitten to death by mosquitos. I HATE them. One thingsafter another. And a lot of it is preventable stuff that we are a society should do differently so people can have enough peace to live. I feel so alone with that knowledge. I act reasonably but I really want to scream and yell and throw things about that. This world is ruined and they won't let us live in it.

Then I was trying to inhabit my space, feeling as good as I can and I saw a notice of something--Bam--back to the joyless zone. Always a background of idiots ruining the environment. I HATE them. They suck. I should have been centered but I was of two minds driving downhill in the harsh white late afternoon sun (since when is it supposed to be like that?). I drove down to the big mall for my "me" day. I was furious and panicking. Writing letters in my mind, and faxes to idiots who don't listen to them. I drove into the big mall. Ordered salt and pepper shrimp and ate it mechanically, kind of angrily. They shorted me on the vegetables. The mall isn't as crowded today. Now I'm using a computer.

[Luminosity]

"How's your chair doing?"

I am sitting in a wheelchair in a bookstore reading about what's wrong with Obamacare. I look up to see a man about my age with black hair and a goatee. He is dressed in all black in the middle of the summer His clothes are a couple of sizes too big.

"It's good." I respond.

"Most of my friends are in chairs due to extreme sports." he says. " I'm the last survivor."

"What extreme sports?" I ask.

"Well, extreme sports, and . . . heroin. . . . I start every day at the coroner's office and I see who's there." His manner is that of a street counselor. The kind who appoint themselves to take care of other disenfranchised people. His voice has the cadence of sixties. I can almost hear a "man" at the end of each sentence. He says something I don't get about people smoking ice. Mercurially he switches to disclosing his age. "I'm pushing sixty."

"You don't look it." I reply, truthfully,

"This beard was white this morning." he says, pointing to his black goatee.

Subject changes issue out of thin air. Next he's onto the handcrafted necklace around his neck. Necklaces like that are made of materials gathered on the shore here. In the seventies they were popular with people who spent a lot of time at the beach. Fingering the necklace, he says, "This thing is worth more than my house." [Not sure he has a house] "When I go to [a rough area] in my black mustang, this keeps my car from getting taken apart."

"Cause they know you're from here?"

"Yeah. . . . How's your chair cause you got your feet taped up."

"It's personal." I say.

"I like your hair."

"It's . . . .um . . . I let it go. . . thanks." I mumble. [I have six inch undyed roots but I know what he means.]

"You got someone looking out for you?"

I laugh. "It's just me." I'm in a very nice mall in a nice part of town.

"You got to have someone lookin out for you, especially with the ____________ [bookstore] closing."

It is an hour before closing.

"I'm not worried about it." I respond.

I appreciate the solidarity. A lot of the time the other people in this neighborhood don't even seem to want me to pet their fluffy little dogs. I like this guy, but having a man I don't know escort me to my car doesn't seem like an improvement. Also, his judgement doesn't intersect with consensus reality as often as it could. He sees dangers where there are none. His thoughts follow a trail no one else can follow. He and his friends seem to be reeling from self-created dramas. An extremely industrious bookstore employee starts shelving books next to us. We part ways.

As MIB encounters go however, this one was better than usual.


To read more, go here: http://www.longecity.../cat-6-personal

Edited by Luminosity, 02 August 2013 - 05:58 AM.

[Luminosity]

I'm hungry. I should have taken a dinner break but it is such a productive day at the library that I didn't want to interrupt it. I got a letter, some signs and some other things taken care of. Grrrrrrr my stomach is growling. All I had this afternoon is some dragon fruit (dragon eyes?) and I'm not sure that's really food. I spoke too soon. There's an odd looking woman next to me sterilizing the computer key board with an alcohol wipe. Now the desktop is getting sterilized. Hope that doesn't go any further. A black woman with Heidi braids. Now a heavy smoker sat on the other side of me. He's so smoky sitting next to him is like smoking a pack a day. Now "Heidi" is picking up the laptop computer and looking under it. Now she's taking something else is coming out of a bag, earphones.

SPOKE TOO SOON. It's never a good day at the library. But it was for a while. I guess it's dinner time. You know what, I'm taking their pencil with me. Adios.

Edited by Luminosity, 14 August 2013 - 05:25 AM.

[Luminosity]

Still getting over a thing and trying to deal with another things. For three weeks or more I was run around by a problem that turned out to have a simple origin. Whew. Can't believe that. Seems to weird. Now trying to deal with the other thing. The noise in the mall is getting to me. The clerk in the store was snotty. I think he was the one that beat up my produce before. Then I thought I heard him saying something about me. He doesn't seem to be in any way afraid of consequences. That's not good for the store. It's wierd to give all that money for food and get that nonsense.

[Luminosity]

ㅂㄷㄱㄳ쇼ㅕㅑㅑㅐㅔㅋㅌㅊ퓨ㅜㅡㅂㅈㄷㄱ쇼ㅕㅑㅐㅔ
ﾀﾃｲｽｶﾝﾅﾆﾗｾﾁﾄｼﾊｷｸﾏﾉﾂｻｿﾋｺﾐたていす巣果敢なにら世知とし都市はきくまのつさそひひこここみみみみみも

Guess where I am?

In the Asian computer cafe. The owner is illegally smoking outside the back door and the smoke is in here. Ugh. Before that it smelled like fish. I hear the gambling machines in the front of the house. They sound sort of like music; sort of like eighties computer games. They keys on the white Samsung keyboard are loose like lose teeth . . . and I'm rolling.

[Luminosity]

It's a hot summer day but it didn't get uncomfortable until I got to this huge mall. I shot down the 100 foot 45% angle ramp in my wheelchair, that was fun. Then there were humans everywhere. Still, the 40 foot ramp in the foot court was clear, whoosh!. Got some pizza but I was sitting under the sky light. It was brutal. They don't really air condition the food court, cause this is one of the most expensive, largest, slickest most commercial spaces in the world and why would they want to do that? The wait for the elevator was hot. They piped in muzak to the hallway but no air conditioning. Then when I emerged from the lower depths to the designer row of the mall, there was an elderly couple with a baby stroller full of chihuahuas, each smaller than the next They were stashed all over the stroller, reclining in perfect comfort. Some were under the seat in the mesh shelf, some were on the top level, some were where the baby goes. It was precious. Then I saw a line of Japanese tourists line up outside a Tory Burch store, with a bouncer in a suit at the door. What's Tory Burch? I saw the same thing before at the Mont Blanc store next door. Pens? Ohhh Kay. I'd rather have chihuahuas. I'd line up for those.

Now I'm here. I wolfed down my pizza because the sun was uncomfortable. The side of veggies were undercooked and somehow, that made me wolf them down too. I'm trying eat my food more slowly but this isn't helping.

Edited by Luminosity, 02 September 2013 - 02:16 AM.

[Luminosity]

Yesterday it became clear I had do a certain thing. About 1:30 p.m. I packed up my stuff and at 2:08 I was on the road to the Courthouse downtown. I got some parking, remarkably. It was a long walk to the front door if you needed the ramp. Think about that. There's a huge unused concrete-floored space in front of the Courthouse for no reason I can see. Skateboarders use it on the weekends. Walking to the Courthouse that day I really hated that. I found the Records Room in the back of the Courthouse. I had my case numbers. I had to learn the routine. The last time I did this, there were no computers, and it was better. You have to hand over a picture I.D. and fill out a form etc. You have to put your stuff in a locker. Most of the cases I wanted were in storage or on microfiche. I did get one and a half case files. A judge was looking at the other half of one. The files I found had some relevant information.

There must have been a dozen cases against the person I was researching in that courthouse. I was surprised to only get one and a half. Only an hour later I was back to my car and in the downtown traffic and one way streets. I parked in a garage. I have to say the building the garage was in was beautiful, with a courtyard with a fountain. I walked across the street the the lower Courthouse. As I passed a bus stop everyone was staring at me because I might have looked sort of homelessy and/or what I was wearing didn't hide my assets very well. It was disconcerting. It was like they wanted to look but they didn't want to see, and the women had narrowed eyes like I was vermin. Maybe the old backpack on wheels I was dragging behind me didn't help. That thing got whipped around within an inch of its life. I thought it was Friday and I had two hours to do some legal research. (Actually it was Thursday, explains why everyone was relatively good-tempered and the traffic didn't suck that much.) I didn't get that reaction earlier that day. I guess it was that particular area of downtown is getting closer to where they have homeless people and prostitutes. Anyway, I went through their eye gauntlet and got to the lower Courthouse. Once again, if you needed the ramp you had a much longer walk. I went through the metal detector (for the second time that day). I asked the Samoan guard where the records were. She said, "Third floor." She didn't seem to think anything of me, but there's all kinds of people in that Courthouse.

At the third floor, it was typical of this place. You just had to stumble around to find what you wanted. I went up to the likely counter. It wasn't the right place. A homelessly-looking man snapped at me for talking to the clerk. He was apparently wanting to fill our a restraining order and I was interrupting. I went to the next counter. It was the right one, not that you could tell. I asked the clerk how I could get case files. I said, "I have the case numbers." He informed me that it would take a week to get them because they were short-staffed. I'd have to fill out a form. I've never heard of it taking a week to get case files. Typically, the form really had no place to request case files. The clerk also informed me that before 2001 there were no case files, only final verdicts. The Chief Judge of our area just decided to wipe out all the court files before that, which all the information therein, not to mention the history. Whoa. I was staggered. Decades before I had spent many happy hours perusing those files when I was a freelance reporter. There was so much there, on the manila card files in their wooden drawers and the manila dockets. You didn't even always need the case files. I accidentally found out half my friends had almost been evicted. At the time I could just go up to the file drawers and get the stuff. Those days are gone. The information age isn't better for these sources. Wow. I spent some time in the courtyard near the fountain, then got in my car and went home. It was 4:08. It seems like time had speeded up because I was able to get so much done is such a short time. It was a trip. I went to my pool and swam. My hips hurt because of the walking.

I felt regret because I could have gone into the back door of the first courthouse, if I knew, and saved the extra walking. I thought that was a staff-only door but they somehow found a way to put a metal detector in the narrow hallway. And then I went to the second Courthouse for no reason. I had no idea they would ever take a week to get you a file.

I did everything I could. It was remarkable that I could get to two Courthouses after 2:00 p.m. on Friday (or Thursday.) I was proud of myself. I rock.

Edited by Luminosity, 14 December 2013 - 06:28 AM.