The entire project, it is emphasized, takes place in the space of seven days, which is pretty good, since it took God six days to create the universe.

The show begins on a bus speeding toward the family to be featured on the show. The crew watches a video assumedly made spontaneously by the family, who are all included in the shot. Who took the picture? Does everyone have a video camera? Is it a requisite for being considered for the show? Someone in the bus is apparently kept busy peeling onions, for the entire crew, listening to the family's plight, have tears streaming down their cheeks by the end of the presentation. Ty Pennington, their leader, solemnly asks the rest of the crew if they think they can help the family out. I often wonder what would happen if anyone said "No"?

So the bus pulls up in front of the family's usually ramshackle and desperately in need of repair home.

The crew gets out and Ty, using a bullhorn I would love to shove down his throat, screams "Gooood Morning, Blefelenskewiczenhoffer Family!" and immediately the front door of the house bursts open and the family rushes out, jumping up and down and radiating utter surprise and stunned joy. Was no one upstairs asleep when the bus pulled up? Or in the bathroom? Or out in the back yard? Or at the grocery store? No, they had to have been clustered around the door so that by the last syllable of the word "family" they'd be rushing out to greet the crew.

After the unconfined joy settles down a bit, and everyone has hugged everyone else, Ty informs the family that they are going on vacation...immediately! No one had any plans for the day or the week? No one had to call the boss and tell them they weren't going to show up for work? On a couple of occasions, the family was told they were going to Paris--"Paris, France," lest anyone wonders what there is to do for a week in Paris, Illinois. Now, not only does the entire family have their bags packed, but they all have passports! (Well, doesn't every middle class family in Sheepdip, Nevada, have passports? Several?)

So off the family....the family who half an hour before had absolutely no idea they had been selected for an Extreme Home Makeover....goes, and immediately, coming down the road, is an army of destruction/construction workers with bulldozers, cranes, and all sorts of heavy equipment. They immediately set to work demolishing the house. One might wonder, if one were prone to do so, and obviously no one ever does, what happens to the furniture. We know it must have been removed at some point because they like to put several cameras inside the house to film the demolition. But when? Did they just pitch it all out the window? The family's only been gone ten minutes.

What about house plans? What about permits? What about building materials and supplies? Obviously they just emerge out of a clamshell, like Athena.

And wham, bam, ziggity zoom, construction begins on a home for a simple family of five or seven or eleven that would make the Taj Mahal look like a squatters' shack. Fifteen foot vaulted ceilings! Domes! Towers! Minarets! Marble entry halls, elevators (in case one of the family has difficulty getting upstairs, which is almost always the case), walk-in wall-less showers, professional-chef kitchens!

And all the children are given designed-especially-for-them, utterly-impractical-within-three-years rooms: fairy castles and secret chambers and model railroad trestles.

And the construction is ruled over by a frenetic Ty Pennington, racing around like a madman while screaming into that damned bullhorn at every opportunity. Give that man a valium, for Pete's sake!

And the family returns and somehow the kids rush right to their own rooms (how did they know which room is theirs?) and euphoria reins. And after all the tears and expressions of joy, Ty Pennington says, with the deep, heartfelt sincerity which comes from having said exactly the same sixteen words at the end of every single show: "Well, I guess there's only one thing left to say. Welcome home, Blefelenskewiczenhoffer Family, welcome home!"

And then he hands them the keys. The mortgage, I assume, comes in the mail.

New entries are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Please come back...and bring a friend. Your comments are always welcome. And you're invited to stop by my website at http://www.doriengrey.com, or drop me a note at doriengrey@att.net.

We'll be happy to post your thoughts and comments about these blogs. While we aren't set up for direct posting, if you send them to doriengrey@gmail.com, they'll be put up a.s.a.p.

Each of us bobs gently along on the surface of the river of time from moment to moment, hour to hour, day to day, without much thought or even awareness on our part. But every now and then, we find ourselves momentarily stalled in a small eddy where we just go around and around in tiny circles, going nowhere.

I find myself caught in one today. I'm sure the fact that I did not wake up until 7:11--the longest I have slept in living memory--probably swept me out of the mainstream and caught me under the limb of a low hanging tree along the riverbank. I'll break loose before long, of course, but it is a strange sensation to go around and around and watch the rest of the world go by.

There are dozens of things I can and should be doing and they're all in here, in the eddy, with me. Some of them are things I really could do if I were just able to concentrate long enough to grab them firmly. Finishing the book I am currently working on, for example. I have for no good reason largely neglected working on it for over a month now on the most flimsy of excuses that it won't be able to be published until next year at any rate, so what's the hurry?

But many other important (to me) things contributing to my "eddy-state" are frustratingly beyond my control. The resolution of my friend Norman's situation is a major one at the moment. Will he be going from the nursing home to the assisted living facility (depending on whether they decide they can provide him the care he needs) or back to his condo with 24-hour nursing care? In either case, since he is physically unable to do anything for himself and I am his closest friend, it will be up to me to do whatever is necessary for him. I'm more than willing to do it, and it is not the time or effort involved which bothers me, it's the not knowing and not being able to do anything until I do know that gets me.

And, of course, my latest book, which has been scheduled for a November, 2009 release for over a year, is still not out as I write this, and I have absolutely no control over when it will be released. "Any day now" is all I have to go by, and I've been going by that for a very long time.

As soon as the book in question does get released, I can--and assuredly will--start fretting over the progress of two other completed books I have already sitting in the publisher's pipeline. One nice thing about fretting: there is never a lack of things to fret about.

The question of whether or not I will be moving to a new apartment in a newly-renovated building considerably removed from the roar of elevated trains past my window 24 hours a day has been hopefully resolved with the "guarantee" that an apartment is being held for me as soon as the quarantine on my current building (long story) is lifted. So, if I can believe what I was told...and I far too often cannot...it is now only a matter of waiting. As those who know me, either personally or through these blogs know, I do not wait patiently or gracefully. I hate waiting.

And always, every instant that I go around and around in this little eddy, I am acutely aware of the river's mainstream flowing steadily past, and reflect on the irony that on the one hand I want to get back into it and get on with my life, while fully realizing that the river flows in only one direction, and I am moving ever closer to the point where it empties into the sea of eternity.

New entries are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Please come back...and bring a friend. And remember, you're cordially invited to visit my website at http://www.doriengrey.com, or drop me a line at doriengrey@att.com.

We'll be happy to post your thoughts and comments about these blogs. While we aren't set up for direct posting, if you send them to doriengrey@att.com, they'll be put up a.s.a.p.

...and fifty-four years come and go, and a much older--though not much wiser--Roger sits and looks over his own shoulder as he writes another letter to his parents, so very long ago:

2 December 1955

Nine-fifteen and another day shot (to paraphrase a quaint Navy colloquialism) in the posterior. I can’t get over the impression that every day spent in the Navy is a day lost. That isn’t fair, of course; without the Navy I wouldn’t be in Europe—which, surprisingly, has exactly the same type of air, land, water, and human beings as America. So let’s not say every day has been a total loss—just most of them.

An excellent example of the importance of each day may be gotten from the fact that I dated yesterday’s entry as the 30th of November. As a matter of fact, I even neglected to put down “November” and had to add it just now—after first writing December. Now you may see why my letters are addressed AN instead of N/C.

Replenishment today, and I got to watch none of it—instead stayed in the office and held a one-man field day. We were supposed to get aboard 218 tons—how many we actually got is a mystery. One full sling of provisions—about four tons, dropped off the transferring lines and into the sea, still neatly secured. Also lost were a group of movies we were sending to them, which will make them very happy, I’m sure.

Somehow, after the tallies were taken, we ended up with ten cases of rutabaga—you think my spelling is bad, you should see theirs. It took us a full five minutes to decipher it. Where it came from or where it went we don’t know, because no one had ordered it and no one has seen it since.

Always, during replenishment, there is the problem of a little fun-loving graft. Usually most of the credit goes to the ship sending it over to us. They are supposed to give us, say, 10,000 lb. of steak. We only get 9,000. Where is the other thousand pounds? You guess. So we chalk it up as being lost over the side, or some such thing. Those replenishment ships are the best-fed vessels in the Navy.

And here on board the Mighty T last replenishment, the Engineering department managed to walk off with two cases of fruitcake, one case of assorted nuts, and several crates of oranges. They were caught—that’s the only way we knew about it. Otherwise it would go on our Lost at Sea report.

Today, though, we fooled them. Someone got away with three large crates—no one knew who it was. Later, the crates were found on the hanger deck behind one of the boats; it was three crates of vegetable oil.

Mail call today-one letter from Harry Harrison, the only NavCad buddy I still keep in touch with, one from Sandy Bonne, my cousin, and only one from home.

Payday is tomorrow, and will it ever be welcome! In my pocket at this moment I have 20 Francs and sixpence—a combination hard to beat, but for all general purposes worthless.

I’ve had a book of Shakespeare’s comedies on my desk now for weeks and just haven’t gotten around to reading it—not through lack of will, but lack of time.

Think I sold my small camera today. I hate to get rid of it. I get so childishly attached to this; hate to throw anything away. I’ve always been that way.

I, I, I, I, I—focus your eyes just right and that’s all you can see. Well, how else does one write an autobiography without them?

Taps, Taps—only 284 more times will I have to hear that.

And so (candle in hand) to bed….

New entries are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Please come back...and bring a friend. Your comments are always welcome. And you're invited to stop by my website at http://www.doriengrey.com, or drop me a note at doriengrey@att.net.

We'll be happy to post your thoughts and comments about these blogs. While we aren't set up for direct posting, if you send them to doriengrey@gmail.com, they'll be put up a.s.a.p.

Because I have never been able to fully dissuade myself from the belief that the sun and stars revolve around me, I have frequently been dismayed to think I may actually, like Jim Carrey in the movie "The Truman Show", be the star of some cosmic bad soap opera, but without the hunks. Everything that happens in my life, because it happens to me, is far more profound and significant than what happens to anyone else. (Your entire family was just wiped out by an axe murderer? You've been diagnosed with terminal Jungle Rot? Lava from an erupting volcano is within three feet of your front door? Sorry to hear it. But you think you've got problems? Let me tell you what happened to ME today....)

I live in a rent-subsidized building owned by the Chicago Housing Authority, which owns a hundred or more similar buildings throughout the city. While the city owns the buildings and sets the rules and regulations for occupancy which apply to all its properties, the actual day-to-day running of the individual buildings is farmed out to several different management companies.

I like the building I'm in. It is convenient to just about anywhere in the city, thanks to the Diversey elevated station half a block away. The thing I do not like about it is that the Diversey elevated station is half a block away, and elevated trains therefore roar within 500 feet of my window every three to five minutes, 24 hours a day. I don't know if they have ever measured decibel levels in my apartment while the trains are passing, but I would think they would be comparable to being located halfway down the in-use runway at O'Hare International Airport.

After three years, I don't even consciously hear the trains, unless I happen to be trying to watch TV with the windows open...or closed. I've become quite adept at lip-reading. But I am quite sure that the noise, even if unnoticed, cannot help but be deleterious to a really good night's sleep.

Recently, a CHA facility less than a mile from my current building, and only four blocks from Lake Michigan, reopened after having been closed for three years for a total renovation. Many of its residents were transferred to my current building when their building closed, and as soon as it reopened, they began moving the former residents back. I put in an application for transfer.

Bureaucracies are of course carefully designed to quadruple the amount of time one would consider the maximum anywhere else. The situation was compounded when my current building switched management companies and fired the entire staff that had worked here for umpteen years. So I waited. And I waited, checking every now and then on the progress of my application. They of course had never heard of me or my application for transfer at the new building, but I persevered, and things finally began to move. A week ago this past Saturday I had someone from the new building come over to "inspect" my living conditions. The fact that both buildings are owned by the CHA and run under exactly the same rules and regulations (which I believe prohibit keeping more than six farm animals in any one-bedroom apartment) meant nothing, since the management companies for the two buildings are different, and therefore each is its own mini-bureaucracy within the larger bureaucracy of the CHA.

But all, finally, seemed to be moving ahead. Then last week I heard rumors that this building has been placed "in quarantine" due to a serious cockroach and bedbug problem. Now, when I moved in here three years ago, cockroaches were indeed a problem, as they are in nearly every large apartment building in any large city. However, thanks to the diligent efforts of the health department, I have not seen a single cockroach in well over a year. And a year and a half ago, there was indeed a bedbug infestation which was not only embarrassing but involved an incredible amount of inconvenience in the process of eliminating them. But it has been over six months since I've heard of the problem.

Nonetheless, I was informed the new building would accept no further transfers until the quarantine was listed. When this might be or who might be doing the lifting was unspecified. Today I went over to the new building to see if this was indeed the case, and was told it was. The fact that they had already accepted several transfers of residents from this supposedly cockroach and bedbug infested hellhole before the new management company took over (and who assumedly brought all their bedbugs and cockroaches with them) of course meant nothing.

How long the "quarantine" will be in effect, I have no idea. But I will be willing to wager a kidney that the lifting of the quarantine will be timed to the very day when the new building has rented out its last apartment.

For thus are The Days of My Life.

New entries are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Please come back...and bring a friend. Your comments are always welcome. And you're invited to stop by my website at http://www.doriengrey.com, or drop me a note at doriengrey@att.net.

We'll be happy to post your thoughts and comments about these blogs. While we aren't set up for direct posting, if you send them to doriengrey@gmail.com, they'll be put up a.s.a.p.

Shortly after I returned home from Mayo Clinic after my successful treatment for tongue cancer in 2003, I had the indescribably overpowering craving for a huge glass of orange juice, which lasted for days. I was at that point still taking all my nourishment through a stomach tube and was unable to swallow anything. I probably could have poured it into the stomach tube, but it was the taste I wanted.

And then when, months later, I was slowly able to resume eating and drink, I discovered that the acidity of that long-anticipated glass of orange juice burned my mouth.

Today, for some unexplained reason, I had an overpowering urge for a bologna sandwich...white bread, two thick slices of bologna, a slice of cheese, mayonnaise, a little catsup and mustard between the bologna slices, maybe a lettuce leaf. I fantasized about opening my mouth wide, taking a big bite, chewing, swallowing, then another big bite, chew, swallow until the sandwich is gone.

It has been six years now, and I still cannot believe that I will never again have a bologna sandwich...not a whole one, at any rate, and even then not even one single bite without having to take a sip of water to accompany the act of swallowing, to wash it down. And never with the ease and pleasure I associate with the thought of a bologna sandwich.

I know, I know, it sounds like I'm doing one of my Roger at the Pity Pool numbers. I never have been one to suffer in silence. But really, I'm not writing this to solicit sympathy. Sympathy is not called for in any event. I'm just trying to convey to everyone who takes such ordinary, simple actions for granted the incomprehensibility of suddenly being unable to do so.

I bitch a lot...a lot...about the things I have been deprived of, and how incredibly much I miss them. Yet I also realize how lucky I am compared to so very many people whose limitations are far greater than my own. Only people who have been deprived of things they have always taken for granted can fully appreciate what they no longer have or can do.

My "afflictions" are to a large extent limited to such simple things as swallowing and eating. I cannot imagine what so many other people endure without nearly so much complaint, and I know I should be ashamed of myself. I am truly in awe of what those countless numbers of people suffering fatal illness or severe physical limitations must go through every day.

But rightly or wrongly, I justify my eternal bitching in these blogs as being a cautionary tale of how quickly and how completely one's life can change, and how very important it is for each of us to realize it. I cannot urge you too strongly to take just a moment in the middle of any simple, un-thought-of daily action, like eating or running or turning one's head, and think of the myriads of tiny interactions of mind and body which are involved in and necessary to accomplish them. Of course you can't possibly stop to consciously think of every single action you perform; that's why they are for the most part totally automatic--so you don't have to. But to give an occasional moment to how utterly fascinating it is that we can do them at all can give a far greater appreciation to life.

And the next time you see a person with physical disabilities, resist the all-too-common reaction of pity, which too often is really just glorified condescension, and replace it with empathy by putting yourself, for just a moment, in their place.

New entries are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Please come back...and bring a friend. And you're invited to stop by my website at http://www.doriengrey.com, or drop me a note at doriengrey@att.net.

We'll be happy to post your thoughts and comments about these blogs. While we aren't set up for direct posting, if you send them to doriengrey@att.net, they'll be put up a.s.a.p.

I try to avoid talking about my cat for fear of being confused with those dear ladies who think if having 16 cats is good, having 27 is better. Rightly or wrongly, people seem to identify themselves as being "a cat person" or "a dog person" and it seems women, overall, prefer cats whereas men prefer dogs. I love them both, though I must admit leaning to the "dog" side of the equation. Though living in an apartment, as I do now, the balance of logic is in favor of the cat, which is far less high-maintenance than a dog. When there's no back yard for the dog to roam around in, the physical confines of an apartment are often difficult for a dog, and unlike cats, dogs must be walked a very minimum of twice a day. You can't go off and leave a dog in an apartment for two or three days. Cats take it in stride, and when you return are apparently unaware you'd been gone.

Dogs give their affection freely and without encouragement. Any attention paid them is clearly and often wildly appreciated. Cats tend to ration their attention, and it can almost never be solicited. Dogs always come when called, tails wagging, eager to share time with you. Calling a cat is like hailing a cab at rush hour. The best you'll get is a cursory and totally unconcerned glance. But when they decide they want attention, they expect you to drop everything and give it to them

I have one cat, Spirit, whom I got six or eight months ago after swearing, following the death of Crickett, whom I'd had for about 15 years, that I would never get another one. I got him at a shelter, and took him because 1) I have always been partial to black cats and he is almost totally black (I didn't discover the white patch on his belly until later) and 2) his already-given name was Spirit. As the writer of a paranormal mystery series, I took that latter fact as an omen.

Spirit is selectively smart. If he sees some advantage in indicating anyone is home behind those slanted eyes, he will let me know someone's there. If not, forget it. He will sit at my feet staring up at me and I will pat my lap. "Come on, Sprit! Come on." He stares at me without moving a muscle. (I recently read that cats simply do not understand the patting of a lap and "Come on! Come on!" to indicate they're supposed to do something.)

Each cat is completely different from every other cat in existence, and Spirit and Crickett are poles apart using any kind of measurement. Cricket hated getting her paws wet. Spirit cannot wait for me to open the shower door to reach for a towel before he is inside the stall with me, watching the rivulets of water run down the walls, and lapping water from around the drain. He likes it so well that he has learned to open the shower door from the outside, though exactly how he does it I have yet to discover. The door is flush with the frame on all sides. Still, he manages.

He will often open the door just to go in and lie down on the floor. And he frequently sleeps in the bathroom sink.

I open the door to my hall closet, and Spirit rushes inside, refusing to come out unless I get down on my hands and knees, reach beyond the laundry basket, and haul him out. Instead, after a few minutes of ignored cajoling, I simply close the closet door and walk away. I generally get as far as the bedroom when he will begin a piteous wailing. I go back and open the door. Five minutes later, I will open the closet door to get something else, and he will dash in, refusing to come out. I close the closet door and walk away. ("One. Two. Three. Four." Meeeeeeaowwwww! Meeeeeeaowwwww!)

I am convinced that it is not that cats cannot learn. They just don't see any particular reason why they should.

I do love Spirit but there are times I really, really wish I had a dog.

New entries are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Please come back...and bring a friend. And you're invited to stop by my website at http://www.doriengrey.com, or drop me a note at doriengrey@att.net.

We'll be happy to post your thoughts and comments about these blogs. While we aren't set up for direct posting, if you send them to doriengrey@att.net, they'll be put up a.s.a.p.

Over the years I have become something of an expert at self-delusion. I can honestly convince myself, short of defying the laws of physics, of almost anything. I hasten to add I am not so delusional that I am unaware that they are delusions, but they are harmless, and they give me a great degree of comfort.

My chief delusion is that I am ageless...well, actually I'm somewhere...anywhere...under the glass ceiling between youth and maturity. This delusion is quite easy to maintain except for when I am in the presence of reflective surfaces, and even then I can sometimes convince myself that I have absolutely no idea who that person is. I adopted this particular form of illusion from Don Quixote, whose ultimate enemy was a mirror.

Delusions are the armor many of us don to do battle with the world. The protect us...some to a greater degree than others...from the harshness of reality, and as long as they do no harm to ourselves or others, there is no real need to dissuade ourselves of them.

I've often used the example of one of the characters from the play The Madwoman of Chaillot who, every day, year after year, read the same newspaper--the same newspaper--because she liked the news in it. What was really happening in the world neither affected or concerned her. I empathize with her completely. I often choose to simply ignore those things which I know would make me unhappy if I were to acknowledge them. I may be deluding myself, but what does it matter, really?

Most delusions are restricted to the mind of the deluded, and it is only when they take physical manifestation do they normally call the attention of others. (The mental picture springs to mind of a 240 pound woman in a bikini, or the elderly man with a black toupee plopped atop the grey hair of his sideburns. And even then, they more often affect the viewer than the wearer.) We all see ourselves very differently than other people see us, but the more delusional we are, the greater the gap in perception.

Like most things, delusions can be positive or negative. I constantly berate and belittle myself for every perceived imperfection and flaw, and for falling far short of who I feel I should be. Yet this is as unfair as deluding myself into assuming the possession of sterling qualities not in fact in existence. I know I'm not...nor could I be...quite as worthless and stupid as I too frequently paint myself as being. But I do it partly out of disappointment that I am not living up to my own potential, or to what I perceive myself as being. And I have, as I've mentioned frequently, an odd compulsion to point out my failings as a first-strike defense against having other people do it for me. ("You don't have to tell me how bad I am: I already know.")

I honestly envy some people their delusions--specifically those which lead them to believe they can accomplish things which reality clearly says is far beyond their reach. Their delusions encourage them to get out there and at least try for something they really want, even though the odds are clearly or even overwhelmingly stacked against them. They are far better off than people like me, who don't try for something I am convinced I can never achieve.

The wondrous thing is that many of the major advances in science and technology throughout history have been achieved by people everyone assumed to be delusional.

I am really quite comfortable with my own delusions. They're like an old robe or favorite pair of slippers I wear constantly. And I truly believe the world would be a happier and less stressful place if more people allowed themselves to indulge their own.

New entries are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Please come back...and bring a friend. Your comments are always welcome. And you're invited to stop by my website at http://www.doriengrey.com, or drop me a note at doriengrey@att.net.

We'll be happy to post your thoughts and comments about these blogs. While we aren't set up for direct posting, if you send them to doriengrey@gmail.com, they'll be put up a.s.a.p.

I've been posting these cesspool scrapings for some time now, and still in all sincerity cannot comprehend how the sub-humans who turn out this crap can actually expect anyone...anyone, anywhere, any time...to open one of their messages, let alone be gullible enough to buy anything from them. That enough people apparently do fills me with despair for the future of our race.

So here, once again, are some random shoe-scrapings and my Lord-help-me-but-I-can't-help-but-react, knee-jerk responses.

"You can learn any language in 10 D" (Not enough to speak it, however.)

andrew - "Re: sending you what you wanted - yo mate, ok I'll give you my trick but if you give it someone else I'll fuckin kill you." (Yo, Andrew, this is the 15th time I've gotten this identical piece of cutsey-poo bilge from 15 different people. Enough, already.)

"Bessie will help you pack your things." (Bessie knew I was moving? That girl is a true psychic!! How can I possibly repay her?)

"Your order is ready to be shipped." (Great! May I suggest where you can put it while you're waiting for my check?)

"Congratulations! You have a $12,600 commission check waiting!" (I do? Really? That's wonderful! Thank you so much! Please send it right along! Shall I hold my breath until it gets here?)

"I waited to hear if I was going to school." (But your mommy shouldn't let you play with her computer while you wait.)

"Give her aggressive drilling! Make your banana huge...." (I'm sorry? What does being a dentist or working on an oil rig have to do with bananas? I'm afraid you're just too subtle for me.)

"Crazy Sale Prices - Your girl taken to the hospital..." (Excuse me? Can we say "non-sequitur"? boys and girls? I would ask again just how stupid you think I am, but I already know the answer.)

"Never miss a touchdown again with Dish Network!" (Don't worry, I don't miss them now. Never watch them and sure as hell don't miss them.)

"(Unknown Sender) (No Subject)" (Oh, yeah, you can be sure I'm gonna open that one!)

"The $12,000 monthly Income Information You Have Requested--Hi~~NAME~~. This is unbelievable..." (That I would request anything at all from some hack spammer who can't even fill out his own form correctly? Well, yes, that is indeed unbelievable.)

"Though home or shelter he had none - When smitten by the morning ray...." (In other words "Concentrate only on the watch. You will hear only my voice. You are getting sleepy....")

"$120,000 per year working part-time. Click here." (Let's see, that would break down to $60 per hour for a regular 40-hour week, 50 weeks a year with two weeks for vacation. Since it's "part time," that would equate to considerably more than $60 per hour. And you have to send out spam to find someone willing to work for more than $60 per hour? Gee, should I Click Here? Let me think.)

"There is no doubt that, while the metalbearing lands fell into the opened mouths of the spaniards..."

(And there is equally no doubt that you are so full of s**t your eyes are brown.)

As they used to say, "Roll up your pantlegs...it's too late to save your shoes."

New entries are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Please come back...and bring a friend. Your comments are always welcome. And you're invited to stop by my website at http://www.doriengrey.com, or drop me a note at doriengrey@att.net.

We'll be happy to post your thoughts and comments about these blogs. While we aren't set up for direct posting, if you send them to doriengrey@att.net, they'll be put up a.s.a.p.

We each live, basically, in two worlds...the tangible,"real world" of day-to-day existence, and the intangible world of the mind...and the percentage of time and effort we spend in each world varies from person to person. Most people are so busy dealing with the countless details and demands of the real world--work, going to and from it, eating, errands and chores and tasks, face-to-face interactions with family, friends, and coworkers--they have relatively little time available for the intangibles of the mind.

The intangibility of thoughts--except for those which can be directly expressed physically (a kiss, a thumbs-up, a punch in the nose, or some other universally-recognized gesture)--is why language was invented. Without words, most thoughts would be limited to the brain of the thinker.

Though words can be conveyed either verbally or through writing, I rely almost entirely upon writing as my means of communication. I write because I do not communicate well when speaking. In conversation, I seldom say what I want to say in the way I want to say it. My mind races ahead of my tongue, or falls behind it, or trips over it. My head is always full of words...finding the specific ones and putting them together the way I want them within the framework of the time available is the problem. By the time I think of just what I want to say, I've usually missed the window of time in which to say it. So rather than wait, I tend to blurt out the first thing that pops into my head.

I'm not alone in this, of course. Have you ever read a verbatim transcript of anyone speaking spontaneously without some sort of prepared script? Broken sentences, trail-offs, whiplash changes of subject; that we ever manage to understand one another is amazing.

And when someone so dependent upon communicating via the written word is deprived of the chance to do so, the results are disconcerting at the very least.

In the past week or so, I've found myself in that position. I've been submerged in the real, non-verbal world by the process of helping my friend Norm, who is currently in a nursing home with severe emphysema, move into a one bedroom apartment in an assisted living facility. He's lived in his 2-bedroom + den condo for more than 30 years. Because he is physically unable to do anything for himself, or even return to the condo, I've assumed the responsibility of managing all aspects of his move...selecting what to take, packing, arranging for a mover, then figuring what to do with everything left behind, putting the condo up for sale, selling his car, etc. I don't mind; I know Norm would do the same for me, but it is time consuming.

All this coincides with my own plans to move to a newly renovated building about a mile from my current apartment and four blocks from Lake Michigan--and also far from the constant roar of elevated trains running 500 feet from my window 24 hours a day. While I'm not sure of the exact date of my move...I haven't even gotten final authorization from the new building yet...I've been collecting and packing boxes in anticipation.

None of the above activities involve much in the way of written communication. But it has, regrettably, sharply limited my time available for writing. When I do manage to squeeze out a few minutes to write, I find it difficult to concentrate on what I'm trying to say. I start off to write a blog (and this one is a perfect example), get about one sentence and three words into it, and suddenly wonder if the box I have to pack my statue of Hamlet will be big enough? Or I'll be trying to thing of a "words" analogy that will make any sense and find myself wondering if we should try to carry some of Norm's paintings over to his new apartment rather than trust them to the movers.

Well, I take some consolation in the thought that this is temporary, and that things will eventually settle down and I can get back to writing. Exactly when, I'm not sure. And in the meantime, please bear with me.

New entries are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Please come back...and bring a friend. Your comments are always welcome. And you're invited to stop by my website at http://www.doriengrey.com, or drop me a note at doriengrey@att.net.

We'll be happy to post your thoughts and comments about these blogs. While we aren't set up for direct posting, if you send them to doriengrey@att.net, they'll be put up a.s.a.p.

On the eve of my 76th birthday--my what birthday? Utterly impossible!--I thumbed through the letters I had written my parents while I was in the U.S. Navy so very, very years ago. I found the following, and thought you might not mind if I shared it with you. I was...I am!...aboard the aircraft carrier U.S.S. Ticonderoga, just approaching Europe and the entrance to the Mediterranean sea. It was a wonderful birthday present.

13 November 1955

Sunday, though you’d never know it; the major blessing of the day was that I got to sleep until nine o’clock. At that time, Gibraltar was only 167 miles away. We dock tomorrow morning. I hope to be able to get some photographs as we approach, if it is light enough.

The main social events of the day were the official opening of radio station WTIC (original, isn’t it?) and the evening’s Smoker. The radio station will operate from and for the ship all the time we’re in the Mediterranean area, playing Armed Forces Radio Service recordings of programs heard back home. I saw them in the library the other day—stacks of them all over and around the piano—everything from Judy Canova to interlude music.

While on the flight deck this afternoon, taking advantage of the clear but cool weather to take some pictures, someone had a little portable radio tuned in to some Spanish station—the music would not go over in the U.S., I’m afraid.

Let’s hope our mail has reached Gibraltar before us—they announced today that all mail being sent from the ship had to be in by 2400 this evening—I saw guys going up to the box with fistfuls of letters—there have been more letters written aboard this ship in the last ten days than in the last ten weeks!

Not being as expert at connected and logical step-by-step thought as I should be, I neglected to mention the Smoker. We used to have them once a month in Pensacola—we were told we would attend them , and we would enjoy ourselves—or else! It consists of several boxing and wrestling matches, which I’ve always classed in enjoyment on the same scale as flower arrangement, and the nocturnal habits of the double-breasted Bluejay.

So tomorrow I’ll be twenty-two years old. It is most likely that I won’t have time to write an “entry”, but I’ll catch up the next day, when we leave Gibraltar for Cannes.

Spent the evening playing Parcheesi and blackjack, with a little double solitaire thrown in.

Fred Kobel, another X-NavCad in my Pre-Flight class and now aboard the good old Big Ti has relatives in Switzerland whom he was planning to visit. We found out yesterday, however, that no one is permitted to wear a uniform in Switzerland (or Spain, or Sweden—who’d want to go to Sweden anyhow?). Let’s hope they make an exception in Spain, since we’re going to Barcelona, and it would be nice to get off the ship.

The Smoker has just let out, and the participants are coming down for steaks, which reminds me—I’m hungry.

Tomorrow Columbus arrives in Europe….

New entries are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Please come back...and bring a friend. Your comments are always welcome. And you're invited to stop by my website at http://www.doriengrey.com, or drop me a note at doriengrey@att.net.

We'll be happy to post your thoughts and comments about these blogs. While we aren't set up for direct posting, if you send them to doriengrey@gmail.com, they'll be put up a.s.a.p.

Since today, November 11, 2009, marks my mom's 100th (??!!) birthday, and the 41st anniversary of my dad's death, I hope you'll indulge a bit of reflection on the two most important people in my life.

Our parents give us birth and shape our lives, and leave us with a debt we can never fully repay --or, tragically for a very few, with scars that can never be healed. I was infinitely blessed with the former. Each of us has (if you're very lucky, or had, if you're like me) our own parents, and our own memories. I hope you treasure yours as I do mine.

Though they've both been dead for far more time than is possible for me to comprehend, they are still with me in my heart and soul. The three of us are as interwoven as the threads in a blanket. I have only to close my eyes to see them and hear their voices. So there is no way I could cram 38 years worth of the warmth and love and happiness and sorrow I experienced with them into one blog entry, or a thousand. Still, I’d like to give you just the quickest of sketches of them, if I could.

Neither Mom (Odrae) nor Dad (Frank) graduated from high school. They met and married in 1929, when Mom was twenty and Dad was twenty-two. That they ever got together, or stayed together, is something of a miracle. Mom’s family, the Fearns, could have stepped out of the pages of a book on the All-American Family, even though Grandma Fearn was born in Norway. Think of a Norman Rockwell painting, and you’ve pretty much got it.

Dad’s family, the Margasons, was a study in dysfunction. His parents divorced when he was quite small, with the result that he spent some time in an orphanage, an event which left its own deep scars. His mother remarried several times. Margason family reunions inevitably ended in near brawls as members rehashed the same old real and perceived wrongs they’d rehashed at the previous reunion and would at the next one.

Both my parents worked hard all their lives. My mom held down a full-time job and managed to care for me and Dad and the house at the same time. Dad, I fear, was of the old school, in that cleaning, cooking, and housework were woman’s work, and Mom did it without complaint. (I remember distinctly that she always buttered his toast for him, and that she always took great pains to see that not one quarter inch of the surface was left unbuttered.)

Please don’t get me wrong, Dad wasn’t a tyrant: he was simply a man of his time, and that’s just the way things were. He was also, regrettably, something of a womanizer, which of course deeply hurt Mom. They fought (verbally) constantly and at one point Mom and I moved briefly out of our house to another small one my folks owned. They really, really should have divorced, but they didn’t. Mom loved Dad too much, and he loved her in his own way. In the last three years of his life, they grew much closer, and both were the happier for it.

The recognition of one's parents as being individual human beings apart from being "Mom" and "Dad" is, I've always held, the point at which one truly steps from childhood to adulthood. Mine were far from perfect; they were simply average, flawed human beings who did the very best they could. And despite my momentary fear of being sent to an orphanage (a threat Dad made on a couple of occasions when I was particularly incorrigible and without really realizing that, since I was just a child, I did not know he didn't mean it), and my numerous other self-imposed insecurities, I never had the slightest doubt that both my parents loved me more than anything else in the world. Dad tried very very hard to fit his own mental image of what a father should be, and I’m afraid I far too often treated him very badly. I would give the world if I could only go back and undo some of those hurts…but as you have noticed, life doesn’t work that way.

It was Mom, primarily, who gave me my love of words. She loved to read: O. Henry, Mark Twain, and Guy de Maupassant were her favorites. She had a great sense of humor and a surprisingly deep laugh for a woman of her size (5'2"). I don’t recall Dad reading much, but then I don’t think reading exactly fit his idea of what a real man should be. He worked. Work was what men did.

When I think back now on just how deeply and completely Dad loved me, though he found it so hard to express it other than by being what he saw as his “Father” persona, I truly ache with regret.

Dad died of a heart attack—his second within six or eight months—when he was 57 years old. Mom died a horrible and lingering death—partly because I refused to let her go when I should have told the doctors to stop treatment—from lung cancer at the age of 62. I have never forgiven myself for that, and never will. I am now 19 years older than Dad and 14 years older than Mom. Incomprehensible.

Should you wonder why I thought you might have any interest at all in people you never met, the primary reason for writing this blog is to remind you of your own parents and what they mean or meant to you, and establish a bridge between us, in hopes that we might meet in the middle of that bridge and, together, look down and watch our similar reflections in the waters of time.

New entries are posted by 10 a.m. Central time every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Please come back...and bring a friend. Your comments are always welcome. And you're invited to stop by my website at http://www.doriengrey.com, or drop me a note at doriengrey@att.net.

We'll be happy to post your thoughts and comments about these blogs. While we aren't set up for direct posting, if you send them to doriengrey@gmail.com, they'll be put up a.s.a.p.