I'm easily entertained...

...but also easily bored.

In the presence of words (almost any book, magazine or newspaper will do but spare me the Sports section with no news of tennis and Romance novels) I am almost always be entertained. I may be distracted by something else and lose track of the reading, but I won't be bored. I read the program at concerts and events before they begin (assuming I haven't taken a magazine). I read ads. Pictures are nice, too.

Give me a keyboard and the right mood and I can type until the cows come home. My dad used to whistle for them to do that on the old 60-odd acre home place at about dusk. But I could type on until midnight. I may not say a thing but I will produce a stream of letters formed into English words but the sentences may make sense, alone or together. I will even invent initialisms like HQWF (How Quickly We Forget). Even though I hate them. Laugh out loud! Not going to abbreviate it.

I can people watch endlessly, browse the WEB and, even, read old online and handwritten journals by yours truly for hours on end.

Unless I get distracted.

I am easily bored in some ways. Playing tennis the other day with someone who never runs after an errant ball and who strolls into position to receive, back turned, holding up her hand and saying 'wait a minute' strains me. So I start observing things and entertaining myself. Noticing how the uniforms (all red outfits, all white visors) on some players down the way look, wondering what weeds have opportunistically poked through the cracks in the awful court we are using, considering the resemblance of the Lacrosse player practicing on the half court behind us to a send-up painting of a kid with a backwards cap on the cover of The New Yorker a few years back on the anniversary issue. (Supposed to be a Gen X version of Eustace Tilly he was.) And so it goes until I get a chance to touch ball to strings. Or to serve. I like serving because I get to hit more balls. Two aces Tuesday. I don't hit hard but I move it around. I've been writing a poem in my head about math, tennis and boredom. I work on it sometimes while I'm bored at tennis.

Fractal branches cast fractal shadows against the order of the lines.
Perpendicular lines and partial lines carving the court into rectangles.
Spaces of in and out and fault and ace. Rules about touching and missing.
Why twenty-seven feet? Or twenty-one? A three-foot net at the middle.
I see a pattern and yet not. Only one prime in sight. But I digress, interrupted
By caroms in three space, arcs predictable except for spin and striking
Nails in the tape to hold the lines to the clay surface. How far apart?
How distracted and yet focused the math makes the tennis and the ennui.

No, that isn't the poem. It's just random lines I constructed just now to illustrate.

I have been writing a short story in my head (although it might be a novel or a novella or a part of a novel) for a long while about a guy hitting tennis balls on the very court where I played Tuesday so I thought about that when things were going. too. slowly. I like how some online writers invented the technique of adding extra periods to slow you down as you read. The story has a bicycle rider and an SUV and so when I see a bike go by and then an SUV I visualize what the protagonist (a guy from Odessa, Texas, I'm not sure why) sees through the fence and wind screen.

Yeah, I'm easily bored and yet, sometimes, when I flip from running my iMac as an Apple to the window running XP under VMware and it has gone into a screen saver mode and is showing my own picture collection to me I just sit there, watching pictures I've already seen over and over for a few minutes. But in front of the TV with the satellite hookup and a DVR with captured episodes of this and that I can be so completely bored and unable to be engaged that I have to get up and get something to read.

I watch a lot of TV and movies at home. And sometimes they are pretty exciting and encompassing. But I get bored if I JUST watch them. And not just because of commercials which we usually skip anyway. I almost always read as well. Newspapers usually. So I'll be reading about Somalian pirates, Taliban areas of Pakistan, Obama's dog, Broadway revivals of "Hair" and "West Side Story", whatever, and sort of watching with one eye and listening. Makes sub-titled movies (which I love especially if they are French although German is sort of amusing, too) hard to follow. I also like to work puzzles while watching TV. I will learn a new word in a crossword (e.g.: marten; toque meaning a woman's hat instead of a chef's tall one) and not be able to contain myself until I look the word up in a real or online dictionary.

There is infinite entertainment in this apartment and yet I get stir-crazy to leave it now and then. Then when I'm out I get eager to come back and settle down with my computer, newspapers, books.

I stay engaged with movies, in a dark theater, although I like to have some food and I hate the food except for the Alamo where drinking beer and eating fried things and actually watching the movie keeps me there. Unless my mind wanders.

This restlessness, dare I say bordering on attention-deficit, makes me anxious. So, I guess I go from being entertained by many things to boredom to anxiety, all in the space of minutes.

When I was in school or at work in meetings with presentations by others, I had to write something to stay focused. It might be about what was being presented. It might be a 'to do' list or a grocery list or a doodle. It might be an idea only peripherally about the content the lecturer was presenting. One such segue produced an idea which is one of the few ideas that both received a patent for some of us at the company and actually made a bit of money in the marketplace.

I see people who are really focused on something. Maybe it is a very BIG thing like running a company or non-profit or a tiny thing like a very focused hobby or sport. Nothing gets my attention like that. I'm used to starting on things and never following up. Blogging and posting pictures online is something I've been pretty faithful doing (if that's the proper word) but, let's be honest, the form is constantly changing. And it isn't a thing you finish. It's the equivalent of notebooks full of non sequitur musings created during lectures and other entertainments that did not fully engage my dilettante mind.

Lately I've been watching people who focus closely on something, shutting out distraction. They are creating businesses, fighting for causes, writing books and plays. That will never be me, I guess. And my accomplishments will always be brief breakthroughs: an idea, a sentence, a paragraph, the short essay, the clever bon mot. The other day on twitter I said:

viswoman found blogging reduced her writing to a few paragraphs. Twitter to 140 characters. New service: Heartbeat. Nine letters or less.

I thought I was so clever. Heartbeat. In some techie worlds it is a notice that some process or service is there, working, alive if you will. And the word has nine letters. And yet when I tried to label this post, selecting from labels used on some of the prior 638 posts, I ended up with more than two hundred characters which, apparently, is the blogger limit.

What the 'L?'

Every place on Second Street has a S-A-L-E and that's the L from Estilo (with LB in there somewhere). I've been missing since Saturday from this space, it seems. I've been doing things, though, really.

We saw Austin Lyric Opera's "Rigoletto." I enjoyed it immensely. Well, as much as I enjoy any opera which is to say as much as I'm equipped to enjoy it. A lot anyway. I especially liked the soprano. I think it's so difficult to get stabbed and stuck in a tow sack and still sing an aria. I'm just saying. Yeah, I'm opera stupid but I'm working on it. Great production in our lovely new Long Center.

I watched TOO MANY sports on Sunday. I'm sports weary. I watched the Aussie Open Final (Federer-Nadal), a UT women's basketball game and the Stupid Bowl. I'm giving up sports until the French Open. I think I saw Roddick practicing on the fake clay tonight. Maybe not.

I did Dad duty. I took him to lunch, to church, picked up prescriptions, worked on his taxes, shredded stuff, took and picked up shirts at the laundry, got his garbage and recycling out, took his picture with his monster amarylis. I told him his sister died. I have been to his house three days in a row this week. I was out there a few days last week. Somewhat of a record during a time when he is doing OK, really, pretty much, health-wise. On Tuesday during my every morning call to him he said "My horoscope says 'The methods that helped you get through the day yesterday won't carry you into the future.' So I will have to do things differently." I didn't know he read his horoscope. I also didn't know he watched a string of old M*A*S*H episodes in the afternoon, but I happened to be there to catch him at it this week. Or maybe it's something new. Maybe he's fallen out of love with Rachel Ray and FOX news commentators.

I went to a memorial for a former co-worker who died.

I ate a bag of those Necco conversation hearts they have at Valentine's. I'm a sucker for those. They are crack cocaine for me. But I was disappointed because they have no quality control and half of them had no saying or had it printed in an off-center or in a blurred fashion. So, never again.

I cleaned our bathroom and did a few other chores.

I attended a board meeting at my country club. I'm going to slide off the board. Three years is plenty.

I played tennis. Yeah, of course. But I'm taking a break until next Tuesday and hope my strained back improves.

I attended an education thing about Ballet Austin's upcoming production of Stephen Mill's "Hamlet." I love this production. I loved the education thing where we saw some of the dance and heard about it. I bought the Phillip Glass music for it for the iPod. I like that there is an iTunes mix on the WEB so I can just buy the music. I never have enough time to listen to music. I also became a fan of Jeff Lofton and downloaded a CD his wife gave FFP. He's not on iTunes yet. He played a tune at Austin Cabaret Theater's open mike production with Jim Caruso and Billy Stritch. (Cast Party.) We are now lining up to hear more from him.

FFP and I walked down to South Congress and came back stopping at Vespaio, Cissi's Market and Taste and having some food and a glass of wine at each one. That was Tuesday.

I've been busy. Yep. I caught up most of the financial stuff for now although my taxes loom. I'm behind on reading. I think I'll go read some now. Just as soon as I see how many labels I can attach to this post.

Stopping to Reflect

Time for reflection has been largely missing until the last week or so, but finally there has been time to slowly and calmly ponder things. I've even had time to go through a few old photos and receipts and try (and fail) to catch up on my newspaper reading. I've been nervous the last two days while lighting was installed. That's almost done, though, and the condo is peaceful and calm. Over my shoulder, FFP is typing either a column or an e-mail and making a phone call. My desk is neat as a pin. I've done my daily checking of financial stuff. I have a couple of hours before a dinner date and can read or watch TV. Or, you know, blog.

There has been much going on in the world while we worried our little corner of it. The Olympics and that little dust-up between Russia and Georgia. Now the U.S. Open of Tennis and the Democratic Convention. I've satisfied myself with random bits of the programming, mostly consumed off the DVR. I'd be trying to clean up something or follow a workman around or fret over where I'd hidden something and I'd walk by the TV and see a bit of synchronized swimming or whatever, watch and marvel and go on. They repeated Michael Phelps' feats (and that of his relay teammates) endlessly so you couldn't miss those. I'm going to keep up with the U.S. Open similarly. I caught a few shots today between the times the electricians cut off power to the living room.

It's feeling comfortable here (although I really wish my comfy office chair would come in). I have stuff to catch up on that I've let go while trying to move out, move in, fix up, change address, etc. A teeth cleaning, a car maintenance and a haircut come to mind. Always something more to do. The Austin social season is cooking up also and events are starting to edge onto the calendar from September to May. I'd like to plan some trips.

But, hey, right now I think I'll catch a little tennis and finish reading the Sunday newspaper.

The Most Difficult of Subjects

No. It's not hard to write about shop windows. Sometimes family and love are a little difficult. But...money. Yeah, that's a tough one. Worked on a little essay about money for this space, but I haven't posted it. It's a gnarly subject. And today the stock market is crashing so it's an even more sensitive subject. Can you say recession?

This shop window reflection is from 2004. I can't see where I used in on my blog back then but I probably did. There are several things I like about it. Maps and globes, of course. But also the possibility that my hair is visible and wild. Of course, it could be a tree or bush!

The rain fell and while the weather was depressing it quelled my cedar fever. It left even the clay courts unplayable for tennis, however. I was bad about exercise yesterday, though. So I need a great workout today to make up for it. And I need to accomplish more than watching a zillion minutes of tennis, a French DVD and a program about how man made things would fall apart without man. (Yeah, History Channel. Not that great a show.) And reading papers and working crosswords. Because that's about all I did except for doing a few chores for my dad, lunch with a friend and a walk through Best Buy looking at things I didn't want. It was a Holiday for some working people and I took a holiday myself, I guess. But not today. Today I'm all about accomplishing things.

From Too Little to Too Much

I had written about it before but I spent twenty minutes searching for the words. Amazingly, although I wrote the words over ten years ago for WEB posting, I did find them. One day, way back then, I was feeling pressure to enjoy all the books, magazines, newspapers, movies, TV and such that was readily available to me. Not unlike, um, now.

Today some Holidailies participants are donating to First Book, an organization that gets books into the hands of children who would not otherwise have them. As I teeter (on a stack of books) at the other end of the scale, it isn't that I don't remember being on the other end of that spectrum. I do. I never want to be without words, pictures and tunes. Without input. I especially don't want to be without books.

But I still wonder when it went from too little to too much.

Here's what I wrote in 1997:

MEDIA ASSAULT

It's a media-rich world. There's never been more to read, to see, to hear. Or is it an assault, a river that is roaring by with no time for us to grab something and understand how to stay afloat?

I keep trying to decide when the input went from not enough to too much. I still remember when I was a kid, hungry for input. We never had enough books to suit me and I even 'played school' with some ancient school books that had the scribbles left there by my own mother and aunt. When we went to the State Fair in Dallas, we'd collect a sack full of automobile, agricultural and kitchen appliance brochures. We'd carefully review the bright pictures and fill our dreams with them. Once the Sears catalog had been put to use by my mother, I made paper dolls out of the clothing ads and gave my cutout kids the latest toys. (One of those thirty- or forty-year-old catalogs or a sack of those brochures would be an interesting view of my world at the time.) In those days, my mother bought a few magazine subscriptions with our meager budget. It was usually LIFE or LOOK, but once she tried to order Harper's but got, instead, Harper's Bazaar and our lower middle class household (where we mostly wore clothes made from Simplicity patterns) suddenly had a monthly view of the fashion world. A handsome high school boy delivered the 'Sherman Democrat' on foot. It was a skinny paper, but it was the only one we usually saw. I remember sitting on the porch waiting for his arrival. I can't remember, however, if I wanted to read the paper or was interested in how to get a paper route when I got old enough. (I don't think they ever let girls do it in my time, though.)

The TV signed off at midnight or so, I think. We did have all the major networks, but that's it. No remotes and how much fun is surfing three channels anyway? When we got our first TV we still lived on the farm. Mother bought it with bingo winnings at the American Legion hall. My favorite show was 'Sky King.' Hit Parade or something like that had settings and singers do the top songs each week and had to try to keep 'Davy, Davy Crockett' fresh for most of a year. (I got the girl's version of the coonskin hat which was a more feminine rabbit fur and happily the decidedly unfeminine pocket knife.)

In college (North Texas State, now U of NT), I worked in the campus bookstore. Suddenly there were plenty of books and magazines around, the huge library was close by on campus. I was pretty broke, but money wasn't necessary to get input. We had some lulls in the textbook department where I worked. When there was no one to wait on for long periods of time, we could read books and magazines and then put them back on the shelf. It was during this time that I became addicted to 'The New Yorker'--an addiction that I haven't been able to shake to this day. Often, I had to actually pay the quarter of fifty cents (I know it was less than a dollar then) so I could take the magazine home and finish it. Doesn't sound like much, but I think I only got seventy cents an hour. Fortunately, they let us run up a bill and charge everything until payday.

A little over twenty years ago, I was still watching a few channels on a black and white TV, and still couldn't really afford as many books as I would have liked to have around, if unread. At this time computing wasn't exploding and changing so fast either and I thought I might one day feel masterful in my work. I could only dream of having my own computer. An independent San Antonio station picked up a nightly soap opera about this time called 'All That Glitters.' Norman Lear had followed his 'All in The Family' success with 'Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman.' Less successful and very edge, this was followed by 'All That Glitters.' It never even got aired by a network, I don't think. I bring it up because we watched it every night, enthralled at its radical concept: women were powerful in society and men were weak. From this premise, it was easy to put episodes together, the most everyday thing becoming twisted. I bring it up because we had so little to choose from compared to the late '90s, but here was this gem, too radical for its time. Actress Linda Gray was there, pre-Dallas, playing a woman who used to be a man in an upside down world. Sometimes we think we dreamed this TV show since so few people saw it. In fact, I recently spent a half hour or so on the WEB looking for something else on this show. Found a wonderful story about the making of 'Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman.' But 'All That Glitters' seems to have vanished from consciousness. In contrast, I have seen one 'X Files' from beginning to end and no complete 'Ellen' shows. But I saw many episodes of a TV show that seems to have never existed.

One day in 1977 we bought a color TV. It was small, but had a good picture. Tennis was starting to be televised more widely (i.e. not just on public television) and Wimbledon was on. I could actually almost see the ball on this TV. I carefully planned to be in front of the TV for tennis events then. In 1997, I did not manage to see more than a couple of shots of the French Open. This in spite of having a color TV in almost every room. As I write this, a tiny Sony with a two-inch screen is showing a crisp picture of this year's Wimbledon. I imagine I'll soon be distracted from watching rain delays and tapes of the week's matches, I'm sure, by some other activity like this WEB page, or doing my real work---my work machine is sitting nearby as an affront. In fact, we have several dozen channels of cable, mostly unwatched and mostly deserving it, I guess. When we surf, we end up on 'The Simpsons,' an old black and white movie or the history channel; sometimes the sound track is a selection of jazz and classical CDs. Late at night, we might be taking in British sit-coms or old episodes of 'Perry Mason.' We are, however, usually asleep in our chairs as they play. We've recently discovered the Mike Judge cartoon, 'King of the Hill' but funny as it is, it's hard to get in front of the TV at the appointed hour.

Today I own unlistened to CDs, unread books and the unread papers and magazines are piling up. Meanwhile there is information on the WEB that I'm dying to read and study. I simply don't know where to start. I think people who aren't readers, who aren't naturally curious, are happier today than I am because they aren't torn about what information to consume next. Sure maybe surfing channels is getting more confusing, but as an input hungry person, I'm truly overwhelmed. It reminds me of a robot in some movie without, for me, a name (because I've watched it in randomly ordered fifteen minute increments from cable and missed the title). 'Input!' says Johnny Five in a pleading voice. Then he consumes every book in the house and sits up all night consuming TV. I want to do that, but I keep falling asleep or daydreaming. I don't have the robot's stamina.

Well, off to read a book or a magazine or surf the WEB or look at that great shot Venus just made!

Is that funny? I still feel this way, overwhelmed by books and magazines and media. Things once precious to me, still precious to me that I have so much of that I literally can't consume them. Books still call out to me and, when I listen, satisfy something deep inside me. I feel for people who don't desire books and information. And I feel for kids who don't have enough books! Once I was that kid. Somewhere along the line, I reached a tipping point. I'm not sorry either. My worst fear is to be trapped somewhere without words. Even without Internet access or TV, I could be happy if there were enough books and magazines. Better too many than too few.