the view from a room

monkeys!

nobody@vox.com(homebody) — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 12:44:13 -0700

This post is for M-----l.

This painting is currently in the window of a gallery in my neighborhood, showing Monkey World (art by Matthew Porter) through the end of the month:

on the monkey's back

This photo is from a wacky yard art store in Half Moon Bay, California (close to where I saw those baby seals I couldn't get close enough to photograph):

just no 25.-

This song is from Jonathan Coulter's Thing a Week Series:

Code Monkey

Jonathan Coulton

Incidentally, on the off-chance you might wish to acquire any rubber stamps while you're here, this store is only a block or two from Easy Street Records: http://www.monkeyloverubberstamps.com/

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every neglected injury does not have a silver lining but you can buy one instead of a monkey

nobody@vox.com(homebody) — Wed, 14 May 2008 17:33:58 -0700

What I'm carrying home today instead of the computer:

fuzzy little cloud (with silver lamé lining)

Notes:

Source: Schmancy on 2nd Avenue. I went in today looking for a monkey but they were all out of monkeys.
I am not a pin person or a jewelry person of any kind really (except for tiny earrings and sometimes a fun watch). Little cloud will live inside my backpack, sheltered from the rain.

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Now why didn’t I decide to do this before?

nobody@vox.com(homebody) — Wed, 14 May 2008 11:56:10 -0700

The shoulder injury has prompted a change of routine effective immediately: the laptop stays parked at its docking station at the office, at least on weeknights.

The smart person would have decided to do this the day the Dell boxes were delivered. The smarter person would have requested a lighter-weight notebook or a desktop to begin with. Instead, the foolish person decides she can tough it out and add intensity to her daily hike and uses this as an excuse to spend $140 on a flash messenger backpack that is proportioned for someone taller, makes her stoop a bit to get the full advantage of the waist support, eventually realizes this is not good for her spine, reverts back to the shoulder-hugging urban commuter pack in which at least she can stand upright, and pushes on by golly until something is clearly damaged.

The smart person would also recognize an injury for what it is, go to a doctor, get physical therapy, etc. soon after it occurs. The foolish person relies on self-diagnosis of mere underutilized muscle soreness, stretches it vigorously for a week before realizing that is making it worse, and persists in dancing “through” it anyway, takes on new yoga classes, continues to strap on heavy backpack, etc. for weeks and weeks. Then, one day, she can’t raise her right arm.

In case you are in any doubt as to who the foolish person is, let me tell you that once I stuck my finger in the beater-bar of a vacuum cleaner (in the “on” mode) that I thought I wasn’t working. It was. In addition to the pain of the shredding of the fingernail, there was the added humiliation of the witnessing of the seven-year-old I was babysitting at the time. She knew better than to do that. (She probably learned quite a few useful life lessons by observing two years of babysitter foibles.)

Anyways … I will leave the computer at work tonight and I will see a doctor at a sports medicine clinic next Thursday and I hereby cease the self-flagellation right this minute.

Now I just have to get used to having no more monkey (i.e., Internet) on weeknights. This will no doubt do wonderful things for my reading, art-making, housekeeping, and living. I might even start riding my bike to work again. Hurrah! I feel better and lighter and freer and more productive already. And a bit wiser.

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