Queen Mediocretia of Suburbia

Thursday Paint Progress: 12/1

There are many step-by-step paintings I never did because they were too challenging.

I think I’m ready for this one now.

Ozark 809 Crash

I vaguely remember blogging about Gary's experience with the crash of Ozark flight 809, but I can't find it. I apologize if I am telling you this story as if you haven't heard it before.

It comes up because last week Gary told me the story as if I hadn't heard it before. The first time I heard it we had just started dating, and I was skeptical. I was skeptical because I was 19 and in college, and I knew everything, yet somehow this crash was news to me. 

Of course, it had happened when I was 11, so I asked my Dad, and he confirmed that there was an awful crash by UMSL grounds and this Gary fellow was not lying to me about this one specific thing.

It happened when Gary was working at Normandy Osteopathic Hospital. He said the staff was all called into the emergency room because there had been a plane crash right across the street.

Gary said he remembers the rain blowing into the ER, because as an orderly his job was to mop it out. At first he was mopping, and then he got a push broom and just started shoving the water outside. After a few hours he was shoving more blood than water through the open door. 

Now, forty years ago I would have been skeptical, and kept my mouth shut so as not to sour my budding relationship, but last week I said, "Are you telling me the storm kept blowing the doors open? Weren't they automatic doors?"

"The doors never closed, because the firemen and police kept carrying in bodies on the airplane wings and parts of the plane fuselage."'

"Oh, come on. There is no way an airplane wing would fit in an ambulance."

"An ambulance? No, they just carried them across campus."

"That would be crazy. That would take too long." 

"There was no rush, they were all dead. They just stacked them up in the hallways when the morgue was full."

You can see why this sounded iffy to me, especially since I didn't have an iPhone and Wikipedia to check out the full story, minus the dramatic details.

For the full story, with a slightly lower body count but additional dramatic beagle-related details, check out this article from the Post-Dispatch archives.

Dave Haul

I relocated a few of Dave’s things to Saint Louis. There was Jerry's final draft (which I am still reading), several old Mad magazines, and then two other things.

Mom's Whale Mugs.

Mom, as you may remember, had limited use of her arms because of the polio. One arm had a good elbow but a hand that didn't work, the other had a bad elbow but  a good hand. When her friends bought her a heavy mug for Christmas, she explained that perhaps they could enjoy the mug when they had their regular breakfasts at her house, but it was too heavy for her. And then they bought her the heaviest whale mugs imaginable for years and years, the end, until she died. They took some of the whale mugs, and Dave and I divvied up the remainder. 

So now my collection has doubled.

The NASA shirt. 

I didn't even know Dave had a NASA t-shirt until I was sorting through all his clothes, and I saw it, and immediately said "Mine."

This thing is gossamer. I believe once it was a normal t-shirt and then all the warp wore off, or the woof. (Wooft? Weft?)

I wore it to work during one of our rebellious roundneck Fridays. (Every day is casual Friday now, so on Fridays we can only relax by wearing t-shirts.)

I said "Check out my cool NASA shirt."

Half the team has the same shirt. I thought I was special. 

Rewriting the Novel: That New Draft, and Again, May I Say, FFS

One of the reasons I had trouble closing my suitcase on the way back from Albuquerque was because I was carrying Fave's ashes and Jerry's evidently-finished novel. If you recall, a few pounds of Dave had to stay behind, because I wasn't going to trust Jerry's novel to UPS.

But then, when I got to the airport I realized there was no way I could get the extra weight of Dave and Jerry into the overhead bin. I risked a Hemingway novel railway situation and checked the bag. 

Based on the first 25 pages, I shouldn't have made any Hemingway comparisons.

Well, to be fair, the first sentence is good:

"Duke Pritchard did not like the sound the rotary table was making. He did not like it at all."

That is followed by three and a half pages describing the specific actions Duke takes to correct the problem. From "He kicked in the clutch on the rig's drawworks and reached up in back of him with his left arm until his hand found the engine throttle" to eventually "Dude maneuvered the drawworks brake up and down until he eased the bit back on bottom."

I would have written, "Duke fiddled with the drawworks and corrected the problem." 

Speaking of Hemingway, I thought my writing was tight, but perhaps it's just tight in comparison. I ran my third draft through the Hemingway App and evidently mine is bloated as well. Also, I use the word "just" every other sentence. (See above.)

This Year's Christmas Ornament

Usually I have bought a Christmas ornament by this time. 

I was debating with Gary what might make a good ornament symbolizing the the year.

I don't know if they make tiny little wig ornaments, bur that didn't happen to "us."

On review, all that happened was that we sold Mom’s house. (I mean, of course Dave died. A little vial with Dave's ashes was the first thing I thought of, but that's just a little too morbid, even for me.)

So, no vial of Dave. Focusing on Mom's house.

Gary, on the other hand, is so enchanted with Dave's Apple watch that he's dedicating his ornament the Minnie Mouse watch face.  I can see the appeal. She's the only female who giggles at him.

Death Food

When I was at Dave's it was just too easy to Grubhub all the food. Sure, it was ridiculously expensive (like fifty bucks for Taco Bell), but with the terminal agitation and the expired food from Shipt, it was easier.  

It was also easier when I came back. I had enough stuff to do with lawyers and catching up on work that I didn't want to spend any time making butter chicken from scratch. 

After two weeks back I realized that there are frozen pre-made meals at the grocery, and that would be almost as convenient as Grubhub. It isn''t as tasty, but it's handy.

It's also pretty fattening, even though I really did make an effort to skip the ones with starch. This plus Thanksgiving and Christmas - I'm pretty sure I'll have put back all my Covid weight by the new year.

Sometime I wish I were a little bit of an alcoholic. I doubt I'd be fat if I didn't soothe with food. I could never drink all the calories in a Thanksgiving dinner. Plus, I'd have more friends. My god, the friends Dave had. They're still calling his phone to leave messages even though they know he's dead (which is disconcerting).

But I suppose a dozen-donut-hangover is better than an booze hangover. 

Infrastructure Nonsense

Two days ago I saw a truck in our subdivision marked "U.S. Infrastructure" and I thought that was pretty cool. 

Yesterday I noticed that an area on our street was marked off by cones. 

Today I noticed a large pile of gravel blocking our driveway. 

Could have put it where they parked their trucks, but no.

I walked out to the driveway and employed some pretty loud body language to say, “When is this nonsense going to be over?” It was over when promised, in less than fifteen minutes, during which of course Gary’s phone rang. Luckily, no one was summoning him.

It amazes me that if a roof is to be torn off or a door or fireplace repaired Gary feels it in his bones, but if the street is torn to bits he loves it for the entertainment value.

It amuses me that as he day has gone on it is evident this nonsense is so that AT&T can upgrade their cables. ATt&T trucks everywhere. It would be especially amusing if they were putting in individual landlines for us old folks. I canceled my landline service, since my biggest landline user died. What if I was the user that tipped the scales, though, early last month? Poetic justice.

Weekly Paint Progress; 11/24 Happy Thanksgiving

I put so little effort making this:

... out of this:

Rookie / Cookies

Rookie. Every synthetic wig wearer does this once: opens a hot oven and scorches the nylon that her wig is made of. I went a whole two months without doing it. Technically I could take that wig to a stylist and have her clip out the scorched hairs then use mild heat to re-route the ones that remain, but it seems to me that with supplies and practice I could acquire that skill. In the meantime I just bought the same wig again, and because the floodgates were opened I bought a different style. Just to see how it looked on me. 

I was on the fence but Gary surprised me by being very positive about Shirley. 

Cookie.

Speaking of frying ones wig, it was a dutch baby in a 425 degree oven that got Chimera 1.0.  Even 350 degrees will cook any wig, so I have slapped a cautionary post-it note over the pre-heat button in preparation for this year's Christmas cookie bake.

Good Things / Bad Things: Big Delete

Now that Dave is gone, I keep coming across things I no longer have to hold on to, and I've been getting rid of them.

A list of movies David insisted I must watch. Dave and I differed on what made a good movie. For years he insisted Veronica Guerin was the Best Movie Ever Made. After I resisted for years, I watched it, and I told him that that while it was okay I did not agree. Over the years he claimed these were the Best Movies Ever Made: American Flyers, The Negotiator, Executive Decision. I kept a list so I would not waste time on these movies.

All Bookmarks for Dealing with Borderline Personality Disorder. Don't need those anymore. 

The Landline. I was keeping the landline so Dave had an assigned phone to call that wasn't my work phone. During his manic moods he could call up to twenty times a day. 

On the down side - Artemis is on the way to the moon, and no one would be more excited about that then Dave. 

Bad Things: Dust and Mysteries Part 2

So, now I have honored Dave's wishes and distributed some of Dave's ashes to his friends. (I assume his AA sponsor really did this at the remembrance ceremony they held for Dave.)

I kept the rest in my luggage and flew it home. (To be honest, first I sprinkled some in the backyard of his house in Albuquerque. Because he did love that house, and Albuquerque, and because my suitcase wouldn't close. This is why we love cremains: so practical.)

As I said, I kept some for my garden, and I also kept some because I had a vague memory that at one time Mom instructed me what to do with Dave's body, should he die. (I don't remember what Dave was doing that prompted this.) Mom told me there was a spot in the family plot for Dave, because the plot was divided into two plots of three: Her mom, dad, and brother, and then her, her sister, and then one where Dave might go. I had sprinkled some of Mom's ashes in the plot where her body was meant to have been buried, so I thought I should do the same for Dave.

Only then did I realize I have nooooo memory of what cemetery the family plot is in. I also have no record of it in my files. I don't visit Mom's grave because very little of her is there; she's mostly in my garden.

"Try one of those Find a Grave web sites," you say. Nope. For that you need the name to match, and my family is full of divorced women, so who knows what name they are buried under.

I had one relative who never married, Aunt Dolores, and in a hunt for her middle name I found her death certificate, and then I found that the last line of the death certificate records where they should send the body. Sunset Cemetery. Whew.

(An aside: Sunset Cemetery has some bad Yelp reviews. Good thing I'm giving my body to science.)

So, I may take a day during Thanksgiving week and sprinkle some of Dave across the family plot, and then wait to put him in my garden when the ground isn't frozen. 

For those who think I'm being disrespectful: a) always, and b) we have eight billion people on this planet now, and they all need real estate. At some point there will be a New York Catacombs, and the New York cemeteries will be dug up and the bones will be the foundation of the gift shop. Even today if you are in a crypt in New Orleans there comes an anniversary when your remains are pushed to the back and a fresh body goes in front. 

Ashes to ashes, people. It's the way to go. 

Bad Things: Dust and Mysteries Part 1

Per his wishes, I cremated Dave. Part of Dave will join part of Mom and part of Dad in my back garden. (To be specific, I'd say it's 2 cups of Mom, one cup of Dad. I'll make sure that Dave doesn't overwhelm them.)  

After Mom died I followed most of her directions: I amended her last name on the headstone, then I sprinkled some of her cremains on the plot, dug up some of Dad's ashes from her garden, and mixed hers and his for my garden.  So now part of Dave will join the mix.

Only part will stay with the family, because per his wishes, I divvied him into baggies for his AA friends to put in their gardens "to help things grow."

Let me tell you, while it may be practical to distribute ashes among friends, and relatives, and friends you love more than relatives, Dave's friends do not necessarily relish the responsibility of a baggie o'Dave. Maybe they think it's gross, or maybe they think he's out there expecting them to take him to Europe or something. I was surprised how taken aback they were by the suggestion. Eventually I found one sympathetic ear and gave him a dozen baggies of Dave to distribute how he saw fit. Will it happen? Who knows?

Bad Things: Selling Things I Don't Own

A few days after Dave died I woke up in his bedroom and noticed the window. 

"Well that's cute," I thought. "There's a little window seat there. I've always wanted a house with a window seat," 

I sighed. Then I realized: I'm Dave's only relative, so technically, I do have a house with a window seat.

Only I don't, because of probate. I spoke to a realtor about repairing and selling the house, and that process can't start until probate is over. I can't even get the locks changed. Because it's not my house. And fair enough, I can see the sense in that. A probate lawyer is working on it.

The lawyer is also working on this:

As I was driving Dave's cute little convertible, it occurred to me that I am not insured to drive that car, and more important, I was driving a car I don't even own. New Mexico makes you wait a month before you change the title after a death. And even though I won't end up with it, and I know who gets it next, I have to get it first so I can sign it over.

And I know it's tacky to talk about such things with Dave only three weeks gone, but those three weeks felt like three months.

Good / Bad Things: Finding the Ex

One nice thing about Dave's death was that I got to reconnect with Dave's last real girlfriend. 

He's "passionate," as one of his friends said. I think I've hinted at David's ugliest side. If he gets close enough to a woman, he spits on her and slaps her, and feels that isn't abuse because he doesn't close his fist.

The last time this happened, Dave called the police because he thought the woman had stolen his dog and car, and of course the police came and saw the marks and put David into jail for a weekend. Oddly, when the woman told me (apologetically - also odd), I immediately said, without thinking, "Well, technically I have to be on his side."

Only, no, of course not. I'm a human, then I'm a woman, and then way down the list I'm a sister. I didn't correct myself to her at the time, but that was the day I vowed I'd never be in the same room as Dave again. 

So I got a chance to tell that woman that I regretted saying that, and that I was wrong, and that she deserved far better than him. Too late, probably, but done.

As for not speaking ill of the dead, I've done enough damage by not warning every girlfriend what was in store for her when he was alive.

Somehow I need to find the original ex, the least favorite girlfriend, the one who fought back, and let her know his final albeit addled thoughts were of her.