The Perfect Song Blog

Thought I’d share my weekend with you because I imagine it’s not much different than yours and it’s comforting to know we’re all in this together.

Leigh’s mother has a habit of getting up at 5:30 a.m.  This wakes the dogs.  Tristan the puppy whines in his kennel.  Zeus the German Shepherd paces and wags his tail nervously.  As he passes the dresser his tail, which is like a fur-covered sledge hammer, hits it, sounding like a gun shot.

I get up and take them downstairs.  Leigh’s mom is up and wide awake.

“Good morning,” I said.  “It’s pretty early.

“Oh, is it?”

“It’s only 5:30.”

She looks surprised.  “Well, I’m going back to bed.” She returns to the bedroom.  The dogs go outside, do their business and return.  We all parde  downstairs and I sleep on the couch.

I get back up at 9:30, grab a coffee, make breakfast of sausage, eggs and home made bread.

Load the dogs into the Jeep and rush to the hair dresser for a haircut, and exchange news with Karen as she snips away.

Back home, gather the garbage and recyclable stuff and head to the transfer station where I always talk a minute with the pleasant, big-jawed, elderly gent who is always chewing gum and smoking a cigarette.  His new pacemaker, he says, is working great.  “Can’t wait for spring and plant those tomatoes,” he says.

Drive the overpass and run to Wal Mart to buy shampoo and a toothbrush.  For the first time in years I find an associate with no customers.  Since I hate waiting, this is a major bonus.

Back home.  Take the dogs down the steep bank through the woods to the creek where Zeus chases stones I throw and always amazes me how fast he is even running through knee deep water.  He leaps over a log with the effortless grace that is acquired only by genetics and practice.

Hike back to the house. Leigh’s mom is watching Batman.  I ask her if she wants to go for a ride which she loves to do.  Load the dogs and her in the Jeep and drive to Corning.  We tool down Market Street and I finally find the little deli that specializes in Texas Hots.  Somehow there is a parking space right in front of the place which is a bonus since Leigh’s Mom walks very slowly and unsteadily.

The deli is one of those great “hole-in-the-wall” places run by a short, fat, bald man who looks like he was born to  cook and serve Texas Hots.  The place is long and narrow with just enough room for the little tables for two.

The Texas Hots are perfect.

Back out onto Market St.  We leave the city and head back east on I-86.  “Want a donut?” I ask.

“Sure!”

I pull off on Exit 51, and pull into Dunkin Donuts across from the mall.  I buy her favorite donut, an éclair with chocolate icing and vanilla pudding filling.  I park the Jeep so it faces the highway and we watch traffic passing by and the hundreds of wrens that light on the lettering of the Firestone garage across the street.

She loves to watch birds.  I sip coffee and appreciate for the millionth time that it’s the simple things that are important.

We head home taking the back road past the airport, the Fed Ex building and the horses in the pasture owned by a multi millionaire software developer who has a mansion on the hill to the right, along with his own helicopter and landing pad.

I unfreeze some beef bones that are a weekend treat for “the boys” and dole them out.

Leigh has just finished a TV commercial and asks me to run it to Fed Ex.  Load the dogs back in the Jeep and head to Fed Ex tape in hand.

Inside I wait while I young couple ask the teller how much it will cost to send a box of tubes of toothpaste.  They want to send it economy. The teller says Fed Ex can only ship priority on Saturdays.  They discuss it and ask what the price is.  After several minutes the woman waiting on them says, “I don’t even want to tell you the price.”  There is a pause.  “It will be $188.”

The couple looks shocked.  I’m pretty sure I looked shocked.  If the dogs were in here with me, I’m sure they would looked shocked. That’s a lot of money to FedEx toothpaste. The couple decides to come back on Monday when the price is more reasonable.

I mail the commercial .  By now it’s 4 p.m.  I carry seven 40 pound bags of wood pellets to our basement living room to feed the stove for a week. The pellets for the upstairs one will have to wait.

Run upstairs to mix and edit a podcast for Mansfield University.

Kim calls to tell us about her week in Mexico.

Supper.

My cousin Jim, who I haven’t heard from in years and who’s a little crazy but a great musician, calls and we talk for a half hour.

Take the dogs outside to play ball.

Back in to work on a second podcast.

Nathan drops in.  We talk about the stupidity of the Don Imus controversy, the therapy of writing music. We listen to Dale Watson’s heart-wrenching number, “Every Song I Wrote is for You, which is a subject for another blog.

9:15 p.m. quit for the day, have a drink, watch an episode of Numbers that I recorded last week.

Shower.

Bed.

That’s my day.

And yours?