she slept overnight

Well, the red car is still in the driveway. Not only did she stay, she slept overnight.

They came in sometime between 11:30 and 2:30, without waking me up. Pop didn't play his country & western music, and I didn't hear a peep from them, save when Pop got up at around four to watch TV in the big room.

So, this wasn't costly to me, at least not yet. I have a suspicion she might stay here all day for Superbowl Sunday. Good thing I made Chili.

January 26, 1991

I gave the dog and myself a good romp in the outdoors. Jack and I played catch to extend the time spent outside with the dog.

The afternoon was spent acquiring and mastering an electronic chess-set.

It occurs to me that the way to get Jack to exercise his mind is to use such spatial-skills games like chess; he also enjoyed Rubik's cube. However, the chess-set should entertain his energies for some time.

==============

February 5, 2012

The dog is Princess, of course, having only the one. I perked up with the idea of Jack and I being brotherly and playing catch, but I wonder what we played catch with. A frisbee? I don't think we had a football, nor baseball gloves, but it could have been something else.

I think the chess-set was the grey-ish number, costing in the vicinity of a hundred dollars, I think. If my memory is not playing tricks, I used my last stipend check from my studies. Isn't it sweet how nurturing I was toward little brother? I was presumably pretty interested in the game myself. In spite of how little money I have had over my adulthood, much less than I had in my high-school years, I will waste over the years much more than what I expended for this chess-set, not counting the happy illusion that I had a brother.

1984 (2,5) Like a Damned Soul Grasping

Our doomed lovers savor their stolen happiness, knowing that it is only a matter of time before they lose everything. This is one of the reasons that I am inclined to think of “1984” as being a romantic novel, minus the happy ending, being informed by the reality that love does not conquer all, yet dramatizing that a little love may be worth sacrificing everything, even life, even though Orwell goes so far as have Big Brother get them to voluntarily and passionately renounce this love as well. You cannot really erase the past.

_ _ _

Both of them knew -- in a way, it was never out of their minds -- that what was now happening could not last long. There were times when the fact of impending death seemed as palpable as the bed they lay on, and they would cling together with a sort of despairing sensuality, like a damned soul grasping at his last morsel of pleasure when the clock is within five minutes of striking. But there were also times when they had the illusion not only of safety but of permanence. So long as they were actually in this room, they both felt, no harm could come to them. Getting there was difficult and dangerous, but the room itself was sanctuary. It was as when Winston had gazed into the heart of the paperweight, with the feeling that it would be possible to get inside that glassy world, and that once inside it time could be arrested. Often they gave themselves up to daydreams of escape. Their luck would hold indefinitely, and they would carry on their intrigue, just like this, for the remainder of their natural lives. Or Katharine would die, and by subtle manoeuvrings Winston and Julia would succeed in getting married. Or they would commit suicide together. Or they would disappear, alter themselves out of recognition, learn to speak with proletarian accents, get jobs in a factory and live out their lives undetected in a back-street. It was all nonsense, as they both knew. In reality there was no escape. Even the one plan that was practicable, suicide, they had no intention of carrying out. To hang on from day to day and from week to week, spinning out a present that had no future, seemed an unconquerable instinct, just as one's lungs will always draw the next breath so long as there is air available.

-- 1984

"Black Scorpion"

While the rest of America watches the Superbowl, I break out the DVDs and watch episode eight of "Black Scorpion". That's just the way I roll, and haters are going to hate. This was also one of my favorite episodes, featuring Frank Gorshin as the guest super-villain Clockwise.

Gorshin, it may be recalled, played the Riddler on the classic Batman television series of my childhood. He died in 2005, so it looks like this may have been his last gig on TV. It is a masterful performance, helping to make "Black Scorpion" classic TV in its own right. Love those high-kicks!