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So.
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Last day at work, at least at the old place. It
was rather a hellish week, really, and I'd like to think I could blame that fact
for my incipient curmudgeonliness. It could be that I've always been a
curmudgeon, and am only lately really letting myself go. But I prefer to blame
the hellish week.
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Thing is, we said good-bye last week. But we
didn't go away, because it wasn't quite time yet. Which left us with many small
comings and goings and tentative how are you's, and why are you still here's?
Unspoken. But you can feel it anyway. And, there was a non-trivial amount of:
Well, since you're still here, do you mind if we extract the last possible drop
of blood from you? Until the last possible moment? Because that would be
greeeaaaat.
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Packed up my desk today, took the pictures off the
wall, bundled it all into the auto-voiture and headed up that lonesome highway.
Which of course, on a Friday afternoon, is the exact antithesis of lonely. It's
getting so you almost can't live here.
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Everyone knows that there's going to be a horrible
snarl at the 5/805 merge, and so everyone is in a to-the-death competition to
get there first. There was a very small lady in a very large pickup truck moving
along in traffic with me, and she was a terrifyingly bad driver - I know the
type - as a motorcyclist, my spidey-senses are acutely attuned to suchlike.
She'd come thundering up at 90 or 95 mph into one or another high-speed traffic
clot, wait until the last moment before hitting someone and then slam on the
brakes, bringing the whole thing to a shuddering equilibrium just a scant few
inches behind the car in front. From that position, having cast savage glances
left and right, she'd randomly change lanes like a baseball player in the
outfield when he thinks no one is looking. This of course set all the
competitive suicidal instincts of the SoCal driving set a-quiver, and in no time
at all, we had our very own Mad Max, Beyond Thunderdome thing slashing up the
freeway. I kept a judicious distance behind, but maintained contact, just out of
curiosity. She cleared the highway a full forty-five seconds before I passed the
exit.
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Had a handicapped license plate too, which set me
to thinking...
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So, yeah. We get used to moving on in the Navy.
By the time it's time to go, you're the most tenured guy and all the folks you
grew up with are gone and you just can't spare the emotional effort to really
get to know their replacements. They'll come in your office to check in, you'll
shake their hands, give them the benefit of your wisdom in five minutes
(stretching it) and then tell them, "Don't get used to seeing me around." And
being part of the family themselves, they'll understand. Nothing personal - just
business.
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We've been here in Sandy Eggo four years, now.
Longer than anywhere else, ever, since Annapolis. Both the Hobbit and I
discovered that we were developing itchy feet - we found ourselves wondering
when we were going to move, and why we were still here. With three years to go
on our next set of orders (Good Lord willin' and the creek don't rise) I wonder
if we'll get over that, before it's all said and done...
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Stopped off at the Navy Exchange to get a bite to
eat (at Subway! Because I wanted to!) prior to heading back, and thought it
might be swell to get a magazine to read over lunch. The
Economist,
I thought we be nice. Short, perky articles (you could almost spank them!) and
larger, meatier posts. (Re-reading that last sentence leaves me feeling...
strange. But I'll leave it be, this is a Friday Musings, and you have to run
with it.)
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But anyway here's the thing: I couldn't find an
Economist.
At all. Of Maxim and FHM magazines, muscle car and sports bikes periodicals,
there was no deficit. But no
Economist.
I reflected upon the military demographic and it all made perfect sense of
course. Adam Smith's invisible hand, in microcosm.
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So I bought a
Bicycling
magazine instead. There - aren't you glad you stayed with me for that?
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Eh.
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Oh. Been reading "Queen Bees and Wannabees " on recommendation
from an occasional reader we haven't heard from in a while (probably been scared
off by all those long comments), who thought it might help me work through the
issues surrounding my daughter's adolescence. As if.
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The book is subtitled,
"Helping Your Daughter Survive
Cliques, Gossip, Boyfriends, and Other Realities of
Adolescence," but it really ought to read:
"This is a horrible time in a young
girl's life, there's not a damn thing you can do about it, and no you're not
alone."
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I leave it in the head and read no more than two
or three pages at a time, because 1) It's scary stuff, so a little goes a long
way, and 2) it's so scary that it can scare the crap out of me, and if that
happens I want to be appropriately dressed and in the right venue. You know, I
never had any idea when I was a lad that, a) girls were going through all this
madness, and that b) they could be such perfect beasts to one another. Oh sure,
I saw glimpses. But
criminy.
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And I believe that will just about do it for
alphanumeric sentence demarcation. For this posting. Thank you.
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Hey, how 'bout that "Could We Lose? " entry, yah? Forty comments and
eight trackbacks, and that was
before
James showed up :-)
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Told you all last week that I had a Very Important Post I
was stewing over. For those of you that are new, I'll tell you now that those
come every 12-24 months, so don't bother looking for a reprise. We are more than
customarily shallow here at
Chéz
Lex, although with numbers like that, we'll be putting on airs and having ideas
above our station in no time at all. Just you see if we don't.
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Look. I feel awful about that whole
"Economist/Bicycling" magazine thing. I really do. I owe you one. And because
you've all been such patient, assiduous readers up to this point, I'm going to
make it good for you. Well, half of you. And for that selfsame half of you, I'm
going to renew your faith in this country, make you realize what we're fighting
for. At least partly. For half of you.
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Actually, slightly more than half of you, based on
the demographics of folks who spend time on line, reading
blogs.-See . I told
you.-Via
the Gateway Pundit, courtesy of Glenn .
Again.-----------Ducking
and running and heading for the exit. (And yes, I'm fully aware of the inherent
inconsistency between the part two paragraphs up and this last one. Why do you
think I interspersed that chest thumping bit about last week's post? I mean, a
paean to how hard it is to be a young girl in this country next to a picture of
Jessica Simpson would be just a litttle jarring, dontcha
think?)-'A was
a man, take him for all in all
'-Y'all
have a great weekend!
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