Slackjaw's Forum

The first frost of the year arrived this morning, heavy and hard to scrape due to the fog that had settled under the Cedar branches. For some reason the only ice scraper I can ever find is the one so badly warped that it only clears two small half-inch strips at a go. Takes a long time to clear the window that way. The fog made for a dramatic sunrise this morning on my way to work though. Hanging low over the bay making the whole sky the color of peach sherbet. The fog was so thick that you could look straight into the sun without squinting. The mill is barely humming this morning, which is just fine with me. I spent every night this weekend staying up far later that anyone with kids should. I did manage to get the garden cleaned out finally, picked up the remaining bricks that the older boy left in the yard and did some raking. Ike hung out in his stroller watching and laughing every time I put another sunflower stalk in the yard waste container. Afterwards, when our ha...

Yesterday, Sweetie got it into her head to start counting Ike’s scars. Though he’s only a little more than two, in a lot of ways he’s more the grizzled veteran who, though haven gotten his lions share of Purple Hearts, has not let this affect his overall outlook on the world. In fact he seemed more than happy to be on the receiving end of Sweetie’s epidermal version of connect-the-dots: laying on his back at the far end of the couch, trying to both watch the fire in the fireplace, and pay close attention to Sweetie, to make sure that she wasn’t putting any undue pressure on his latest scars, the ones that live on both sides of his left leg. His body reads like the pages of a diary annotated and footnoted for that little added kick, when the reading gets too dry. “Remember his first scar?” She says and I can honestly say I don’t. But Sweetie knows that if you put your fingers on his soft skin the scars act like a roadmap back in time. Like returning to any house you’ve eve...

It’s been a mostly wet weekend these past few days, and though I spent a good part of them in the older boys room painting and putting in carpet, it was really more the weather to spend in front of the fireplace drinking hot coffee and playing cards. Weather for reclusion not inclusion. I finished mixing down The Prairie Dogs show I recorded when we played last month at Shakabrah Java. I’ve put one of the songs up right below the notes area so if you want to hear it, feel free to download it. Sometimes this causes me to exceed my data exchange limit (whatever that means) and they shut down my site for an hour. I’m hoping that doesn’t happen but all they’ve done so far is to send me a nasty letter. If it happens to you just come back after a bit and try again. I don’t think we’ll be releasing the whole recording for public consumption. It turned out ok, but the performance on some of the songs leaves a bit to be desired, so I think I’ll just put a few of the better songs...

I have won the battle. Though there were many skirmishes along the baseboard line that he won, in the end the battle was mine. He was an inventive mouse: Capable of infiltrating the dishwasher to eat un-scraped dishes and still-dirty silver. He eluded the mousetrap more than once, by painstakingly licking off the peanut butter until the trigger was bone dry. It was sharp Cheddar that got him in the end. Cheddar that I pressed tightly against the triggering mechanism so that he would have his work cut out just to free a few bites. I haven’t killed many mice in my life. I’ve killed an enormous rat that lived in the basement of our old house, but not, I think, a mouse. Unlike rats, mice are rather delicate creatures. One can’t help but think themselves a cartoon cat, full of evil and death. Hating them not so much as carriers of disease but for their independence and cunning. But the mouse had to go. My friend Michael sent me this poem by Alan Dugan as conciliation and I thought I...