Hmmmm . . . .

Police: Drunk drove lawnmower to liquor store.
(in the snow)

Associated Press. ADRIAN, Mich. --

Authorities say a man ran through two bottles of wine, then cut through a snowstorm on his lawnmower, riding down the center of the street to reach the liquor store. Adrian police say they found 49-year-old Frank Kozumplik homeward bound on a John Deere tractor Saturday night, toting four bottles of wine in a paper bag. He told officers his wife had taken their car to work, and the mower was the only way he could reach the store two miles from his southern Michigan home.

Police told WLEN-FM Kozumplik's blood alcohol level was 2 1/2 times Michigan's legal limit of 0.08 percent. They arrested him on a drunken driving charge and confiscated the mower.

Kozumplik declined comment when reached at his home Monday night.

Sgt. Pepper Taught the Band to Play . . .

I had just read a weblog's headline, "It was 26 years ago today," a slight change to the original line, but still my response was to continue with line two of that famous Beatles song. And that got me thinking (dangerous).

Words, phrases and images, like these, become a part of a common culture in many ways, today most often through a medium other than the traditional words, music, paintings and architecture of our forefathers. That is, today our common images are received through TV, movies, mp3 files and the like. I'll make a lot of enemies by adding and I think we are the worse for it. I think there is a qualitative difference between watching a play in a theater and watching a movie on a screen. Or watching a live piano performance, versus listening it on an iPod. Don't ask me to prove it, I can't, but I do observe it. That's not the point of this essay, and regardless of what I think, we live today, not yesterday and our common understanding of the world is audio-visually inspired.

We complain about the presidential election being overly influenced by photo-ops, TV commercials, and debates that are non-substantive. The truth is, we are moved by them more than we realize or want to realize.

Every family or close group of friends has common words and phrases that mean something special to them and them alone; towns, nations and even the broader cultures do, too. These words and phrases are loaded with meaning and shades of meaning and provide parallels to reality that help these groups commonly relate to the world around them. We remember great lines from great movies, songs and books for the same reason that Hellenic peoples remembered Homer's stories of Achilles and Odysseus. Theoretically, I may prefer their method, but their way and ours are both ways of enjoying a story and of identifying ourselves with the story.

Images are important, metaphors are important. Every once in a while I read of someone referring to the mind as a kind of memory chip, and I cringe with fear of that becoming the accepted metaphor for man. I could moralize here and say that this is why it is important to have good books, music and literature in our homes and around our children, but that's not really my point of this essay and I'm not sure I like stories with morals.

Truth is, the lack of a point in this essay, reminds me of line from the movie, Trains Planes and Automobiles: said Steve Martin to John Candy, "...When you're telling these little stories? Here's a good idea - have a POINT. It makes it SO much more interesting for the listener!"

Pillow Talk?

I refer, not to the conversation between a man and woman as they are lying in bed -- but to the fact that the older I get the more important it is to me that I sleep with my pillow. The skinny, non-descript, fiber-filled, K-Mart pillow with a plain-blue, cotton cover. It fits neatly in the hollow between my head and neck when folded in half. If I don't have this pillow or something very close, I get a neck ache and can't sleep. When I'm traveling and leave it at home, which I recently did, I'm doomed.

My thin pillow is running counter to the big pillow trend. Beds that once had one pillow per person, now are laden with pillows of many shapes, sizes and fabrics all designed to give the bed a boudoir look. This wasn't true when I was first married. Pillows had their place hidden under the sheets and blanket at the headboard. Today, the female inspired pillow boom-cycle make the pre-cleared bed uncomfortable for anything but looking at. Our bed at home has no less than 8 pillows. And they have migrated from bed to coach to comfortable chair. There are more pillows in my house than places to put them. Where' does this end?

My sleeping needs are modest, I don't need sheets with 400 stitches per inch or feather comforters or matching pillows; but I do need my thin pillow, I wish I didn't but I do.