Zen Dinosaurs

A Day Off

 

A rare occurrence for me.  Not  a day off from work, but a day off from being a Spouse and a Dad.  So what did I do with this windfall of 24 hrs of relative freedom?  Pulled a fresh set of classic rock for my CD player, grabbed a cooler and my toy bag (towel, camera, sunscreen, other travel essentials) and hopped in my car.  Destination: a farmer's market where a good friend had scored his first paying gig playing and singing acoustic folk music.  A temporal anomaly* prevented me from actually hearing him play.  *I got there an hour after the market closed.  But back roads took me to his home not far away: http://www.woodsonghollow.com/ . So, a little visit, then more classic rock on the way back home, with a call to Lee's Hoagie House (http://www.leeshoagiehouse.com/) for a half Jewish (kinda like me).  Rounded out the day with a solo jaunt on my "mountain bike" - I use this term loosely, as the bike rarely traverses any significant terrain these days.  But I did enjoy my ride through the trails bordering the Little Lehigh (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lehigh_Parkway).

 

Nothing earth-shattering.  No debauchery.  Nope.  The payoff was not having an itinerary.  Not having to be anywhere at any particular time.  No diapers to change.  No nap to be taken.  No meals to prepare.  No spills to clean up.

 

Does anybody really know what time it is?

 

Breathe.

Evolve.

Laugh.

 

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qzen42 feels:

Yes, for fans of the latest Everyman, SpongeBob SquarePants, today is the Best Day Ever.

For those of you without pre-adolescent children, or habitating (is that a word?) below a solid igneous, sedimentary or metamorphic formation...(e.g. Patrick), click on the link below.

http://www.nick.com/all_nick/tv_supersites/show_description.jhtml?show_id=spo

Coincidentally, (and you don't have to believe this), today's wallpaper selection courtesy of Webshots (a personal file/choice) selected at random, is, you guessed it, a scan of a sheet of SpongeBob stickers.

More on Webshots here: http://www.webshots.com/ (did I just call you a moron?)

My best day ever generally involves one or more of the following: the Great Outdoors, buffalo wings, pickles, a movie theater + a big honkin' bucket o' popcorn, my family, a moment or two of stillness, and/or a favorite 70s era CD.

My Best Day Ever, although I didn't know it at the time, was the day a certain someone walked into the ballroom dance class I was taking at the time. That was about 18 years ago.

From a "zen" perspective, every day is the BestDayEver, and also the WorstDayEver. You see, gentle reader, days are just days. We make up the meaning. For example, in my world, green is good :-) and red is bad :-(
You may be thinking, silly qzen42, green means go and red means stop.

Nah. green is just some electrons striking your display according to the binary encoding from the computer and forming the shapes of letters from an alphabet forming words you recognize as English.

It's all in your head!! There is no green.

So tell me your Best Day Ever.
Figuratively. Literally. Transcendentally.

Then go out and create it.

breathe.
evolve.
laugh.

qzen42 feels

The Map is not the Territory.

I was ready to launch into an impressive monologue, elucidating the elusive nature of perception, but alas, someone (actually, a whole lotta someones) has beaten me to the punch.

So, what I think is not reality, blah, blah, blah.... There's something about Mary, blah, blah, blah...

Oh, just read this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Map-territory_relation

I'm going back to sleep.

Having just avoided T-boning a light blue late model something-or-other (LBLMSOO), I find myself sliding down the slippery slope of abhoring bad driving.  Slippery, because I too occasionally engage in substandard driving practices.  Today's adventure was at lunch time on a busy street in a busy commercial district.  I was travelling "through" when the LBLMSOO presented immediately in front of me, executing a low percentage left turn.  Presumably, the driver had waited the requisite 30 milliseconds before growing impatient.  Yet another example of what I call DSL - Driving as a Second Language.

To be continued.

(Hold this thought: conquering the condensate pump)
(Hold this one, too: things aren't always as they seem - Beethoven disguised as The Art of the Violin)

* people who stop on acceleration ramps
* Paris Hilton
* Classic Bowling on ESPN

If you get it, please explain it to my aging, addled brain.

The Fish Who Shadded Me…

A year or three ago, our family started attending a local (and national, if you fish for shad) event known as the…

Forks of the Delaware
Shad Fishing Tournament and Festival

http://mgfx.com/delaware/

This year happened to be the 24th Annual.  In addition to serious shad fishing (with serious prize money - the winner took away $1500!) there are activities for the whole family.  A friend of ours turned us on to the Doo Dah Parade, the Shad Festival's version of a more famous Doo Dah Parade (who knew?)  Look here: http://www.pasadenadoodahparade.com/ or perhaps, here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doo_Dah_Parade

In a word or three, just a little bit of irreverent fun.  In our family's case, something to do together, and this year, a little serendipity and karma.

Here' what happened.  About a week ago, we realized the Shad Festival was upon us.  Fortunately for us, the Doo Dah Parade does not necessarily entail any serious preparation.  By Saturday, the eve of the parade, we realized we had still not done any preparation, let alone register or figure out any of the essential facts, like when and where the parade would occur.  We spent Saturday much as do any other warm-weather Satudary -- shopping at yard sales.  We randomly worked our way over to Easton by way of the The Michaels & Layne Longest Yard Sale (look here: http://www.999thehawk.com/index.cfm?do=michaels_layne ), lunch @ Fuddrucker's ( http://www.fuddruckers.com/ ) and arriving at last in Easton at Scott Park, where most of the shad festivities occur…

(One of my longer preambles!)

We wandered near the "weigh-in" station to inquire after the Doo Dah Parade.  As luck would have it, the woman at the desk pointed and said "The woman you need to talk to is right over there, the blonde woman with the blue shirt."  I remarked haplessly to the kids that we had to go see the "blue-haired lady over there."  When we got over there, Calvin questions: "Are you the blue-haired lady??"

After some momentary confusion, I asked about the parade, and sure enough, she was the one to talk to!  She even had a few registration forms.  She and her hubby had just stopped in the park for a break, and we had happened upon the park at just the right time.   Serendipity!

So we registered for the "Oh Baby!" division.  We were asked for a theme (shad not mandatory) and settled upon babies & dinosaurs.  We departed for home, with our mission before us.  After some deliberation, we arrived and cave people and dinosaurs, opting for cuteness and feasibility over scientific accuracy.  By Sunday noon, we had slapped together two wagons -- one with a dino hatching out of its egg, one with a volcano, palm tree and nest of dino eggs.  We were dead last in the parade, but it was a great walk.  Nice weather.  No tired legs on the kids -- Nicky, our 16month-old (and our ticket to the baby division) rode in a cave-dweller-fashion draped backpack.

While the judges tallied their votes (we were one of two registered baby units), we chowed on Tall Cedars hot dogs and bottled water.  Then came the announcement -- the winner of the "Oh Baby!" division was our family!!  The Blue-Haired Lady asked for our entry's theme once more, and I blurted out (as I had when we past the reviewing stand) "Post-Evolutionary Shad" (for those of you who care, I would guess the shad were here before the dinosaurs, what with being fish and all).  This was communicated as "Post-Revolutionary Shad" which, when you think about it, is probably much funnier.  Calvin and Davida went forth to claim the trophy.  This was a moment of triumph for Calvin -- he was very disappointed last year when our SpongeBob-themed entry for "Under the Sea" went unrecognized.  For the next 20 minutes, you could not have hoped to pry that trophy away from him.  He even set up a little Doo Dah shrine in his wagon.

So quite a string of events -- yard sales to lunch to part to blue-haired lady to theme to wagons to trophy.  All of it fell into place, quite by fortunate accident.

So I have become a card-carrying member of the Post-Revolutionary Shad Movement.  Be on the lookout for us -  we'll be the fishy-looking ones.