One Follow
Tuesday. The waitress who generally serves me breakfast at my morning café has, for the years I've been eating there, taken Fridays off, her one day off in the week. This morning she mentioned she was now taking two days off as business was slow and they were having to reduce everyone's hours. An indicator of the economy in Oakland. No one believes what anyone says about the economy on the political scene: how long this may linger, whether we're at the beginning, the middle or approaching the end. The suspicion is we're at the beginning (unless it's the middle or the end), but wherever we are, we know we won't know until it's over and maybe not then. I myself am watching how the ladies will be doing at my café.
Still, breakfast was good, the head tractable, the sky hazy but free of clouds. The sun is rising over the building next door and I'm ready for another Tuesday, the last Tuesday, as it happens, of the year 2008. I don't care how that sounds - the last day, the last week, the last year (oh dear) - what references like these might portend as we get further into this gothic novel I'm writing, as long as they're not thought of as ominous. Ominous is something you find outside in the real world west of Oakland, my buckos, in places like New Orleans and Washington D.C. We'd just as soon keep “ominous” out of the lexicon here near the end of the rainbow, don't you agree?
It sounds pretty ominous for your waitress.
Well, it does carry a certain gravitas. We're talking basics, here, breakfast: the survival of my waitress and my morning café are not to be treated lightly. How many times do I start an entry with the word “ominous” anywhere inside? It's ominous.
You've beaten this beyond belief. You sound like a mechanical rabbit with the batteries running down: clump, clump, bump!
I'm tired and I'm afraid writing becomes more complex as I grow older. I can usually go back and make modifications to make it whole, save the copy from itself, but it takes more time.
Later. So, no driving over to see Wilson this afternoon, that will happen tomorrow (I found the not impossible to follow route to the hospital with Google) and that should be it for the year. Always good to finish a year and have another one follow.
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