The Dino-Aspie Cafe (for Those 40+... or feeling creaky)

Post Reply New Topic

Dylan has been my primary obsession since my 17th birthday. I can still see my Mom and Dad coming up the stairs of my apartment with a high-fi and my first Dylan album.
Highway 61 revisited. I'm hard on my mother, but she really got that right. I don't know how she managed it, I had never heard of Dylan until that day. I can't imagine my life without his music. It's the only thing I play on the piano. Sometimes I wear my leopard-skin pillbox hat when I play.

[i]Ain't it just like the night to play tricks
when you're tryin' to be so quiet?
We sit here stranded though we're all
doin' our best to deny it.
And Louise holds a handful of rain
temptin' you to defy it.
Lights flicker from the opposite loft
In this room the heat pipes just cough
The country music station plays soft
But there's nothing, really nothing
to turn off
Just Louise
and her lover
so entwined
And these visions
of Johanna
that conquer my mind.

I do my morning medicine dance to Meet Me in the Morning. Saved, Slow Train and Shot of Love don't get enough recognition, as far as I'm concerned. Pressing On, Saving Grace and I Believe in You have brought me around more times than I can say.
In the Summertime also thrills me.

"I was in your presence for an hour or so
or was it a day, I truly don't know"

Ohmuhgoood. I'm gonna have to visit more often just to keep up.

Cosmiccat--the Dino-Aspie flag will always fly around here! And a pillbox hat? And Chuck linking to Edith Prickley--my goodness, I have found my planet! Never thought it still existed!

And tubes, and speakers, and diodes, and...oh, damn, I just drooled on my keyboard. What is this kismet? I am going to the stereo store to see what the damage would be on a system, and here are all of these audiophiles...oh, joy!

As for new music since the sixties--Queen was a biggie for me. RIP, Freddie, you died too young, but you were still beautiful. And Sex Pistols! I would listen to them at high volume, and blast my roommate out of the house, her and her Spandau Ballet loving ways...And The Ramones, and yet, I was still listening to Creedence Clearwater Revival, The Beatles, newer Rod Stewart. Warren Z., of course, and then Pearl Jam. I used to work at an alternative radio station and in the mid-eighties to early nineties, I got to go to a lot of college concerts of the latest punky bands, and then GRUNGE. I met Kurt Cobain in Olympia when I was living there, and way before he was famous. He was such a lost kid. He was playing with some friends in some all ages clubs in Oly, and the city council was closing them down as quick as they opened for liquor violations and drug use. Then he becomes famous. For a little while anyway.

Mother Love Bone played the Northwest continuously, and they play ever so often now. They were a source band for Pearl Jam and Sound Garden and Alice In Chains. That was an exciting time, and I dropped out of radio because of family needs. I wish I had never left radio sometimes, yet I hear what it's become...sigh.

That's an alternative rhododendron in the corner, Lau? I thought it was a tomato. What have I been eating? Wait! Merle thought it was the john? Oh, dear...

Ah, Warren Z. Anyone who can work a phrase like "fait accompli" into a break-up song will always have my heart.

I am beat. I have taxes to finish up by Monday (major joy), and two essays to finish up, and a poem to polish. I forgot how much work writing is.

I'm checking in first thing tomorrow just to keep up.

Metta,

and then there's always . . .







I guess Im just like a turtle
Thats hidin underneath its horny shell.
Whoa, whoa, oh yeah, like a turtle
Hidin underneath its hard-ass shell.
But you know Im very well protected
I know this goddamn life too well.

turtle blues

I hope this doesn't annoy anyone, but this is one of my fractal pieces. I do a lot of these as a stress reliever. There is no post-processing manipulation, as could be done in Photoshop - just the fractal program.

I love your fractal picture DirtDawg! The colors, the design, everything! Nicely done!! !
(Don't ever tell me how to do it, I'd get lost in it forever and never come up for air ).

I've got a rant:

Last week at work (12 midnight) a woman came to the counter and told me that her car battery had died and that she and her two kids were stranded. She had asked several men for help but they all ignored her. The flu has come through here late this year, and I had a lobby full of sick patients to attend to. I called the police and asked them to send a patrol car to assist her.

As soon as I had the crowd medicated and on their way I went outside to be sure that the lady had been taken care of. She was standing there in the cold begging the officer for assistance. He was saying "I'm sorry Ma'am. We are not allowed to "jump off" car batteries." He said the same thing to me when I walked up.

I said: "Yeah yeah, 'rules are rules', moron. Its a lady and two kids! Get your patrol car out of the way. I'll help you Ma'am."

He said: "What did you say?!"

I burned a whole through his head with the anger in my eyes, and in my best marine sergeant bark pinned his ears back with:

"Move, you waste of space!! !"

In less than a minute I had her on her way.


Last night my sister called me late. She had been to a conference in a rural part of Kentucky. She took a rural route home afterward to enjoy the scenery. Her Land Rover got a flat. Her lug nuts were put on with a pneumatic wrench, and she couldn't loosen them. She called Triple A - they couldn't locate her.

Once a police officer passed - she tried to flag him down but he didn't stop. None of the people who drove by stopped either. When it started getting dark a police officer stopped, only to tell her "I'm sorry Ma'am. We aren't allowed to fix flats."

She thought it was my work week, so hadn't called because she didn't want to disturb my sleep. I was there within an hour, my autistic sister standing there cold, wet and afraid. I had her on her way in five minutes.

It was all I could do to prevent myself from paying the local police station a visit.


"To Serve and Protect", my *ss!! ! It ain't Mayberry anymore!! !

I know a lot of you ladies drive fairly large SUVs nowadays. Please check to see what type of lug wrench they've supplied you with. If its handle isn't very long, you won't have much leverage. Hitting it with a hammer, or stomping it with your foot might cause an injury. Carry a 4 to 6 feet long strong steel pipe that's hollow (that your lug wrench handle will fit into). You'll then have the leverage to loosen them easily.

I recommend learning some car basics - the police are not going to help you. And apparently there are a shortage of real men around.

Get a "carry" permit, and "carry" I doubt the police are going to protect you either. I'm going to be spending some time with my sister at the pistol range this week. She had refused earlier. Spending the day stranded in a "meth" town (think "Deliverence") has changed her mind.

So true Chuck. Is this another AS trait? Possibly because we don't necessarily register any danger and also have scant regard for "rules".

This Wednesday, I was walking through the local town (Wincanton) and there was a woman in a motorised wheelchair. See seemed to be trying to get in the door of the local pharmacy (which is why you and your story reminded me of it). There were other people about, but none seemed to be taking any notice of her. I just routinely asked if she needed any help. To give a vague idea of the geometry, this is a weird (British) shaped place, running through some buildings and out the back after a right angle.

Thanks everyone! I'm really am glad to know that we are 'helpful' types. I would rather be counted in that group. Sorry for the rant.

It normally takes a lot to make me mad. I mean, you've got to be trying really hard. I've been in 'fights' before where they are wailing away on me and I'm standing there laughing saying "I don't want to fight". But I've got certain 'buttons' that you'd better never push (eg, mess with my brother, sister, or friends).

It pissed me off Lau, just reading that someone had attacked you (from behind, by your hair). Seems we all run in packs of one, while they travel in groups.

If I'd have been there that day I'd have had your back. You wouldn't have even had to look backwards. No one would have gotten past me. We'd have cleared the bar, or crashed and burned together .

But we're Aspies, so the likelihood that we'd ever end up in the same bar seems nil.

DirtDawg: seems the same officers that 'assisted' my sister and customer aided you as well. Ah, well. I understand your lack of 'respect' in that situation. Honestly, I normally speak to all officers with respect. I'm sure that you do too.

At least ZanneMarie seems to live somewhere civilized. I like her German Shepherd idea. Last year, a man pulled a 70 year old woman out of her car as she was getting into it at the grocery store. He threw her down and jumped in. He never got out of the parking lot. Her sleeping Doberman was in the back seat and woke up.