Nothing in particular

I haven't biked at all this summer. What the hell happened to summer anyways? It's been freaking cold for the past few days. Leaves are already falling off and shit. Is it global cooling? Or is the dark dank despair of the Republican convention weighing on mother nature's mind? Or perhaps it is Rudy Giuliani's shiny white toothy smirk that's been reflecting sunlight into space and onto Mars where they need it more? What is wrong with Giuliani anyways? He sounded quite demented the other day on stage. And why all that giggling? Rudolph, would you have giggled thusly when the towers came down on 9/11? There, I said 9/11. That, of course, is in response to your bitter complaint that the Democrats didn't mention 9/11 even once during their convention. Happy now? Oh fuck, there are those blinding white teeth again. By the way, why would you show the New York skyline at a Republican presidential convention? The skyline of a city, 80% of which requested you to kindly go fuck yourself in the 2004 presidential election?

But anyways, fuck politics, I haven't biked all summer. My folks are here, visiting me. For the first time in the past 8 years or so. Their attitude towards life has changed quite a bit. They used to be big on traveling and seeing things. Now all they want is to go to malls and department stores. But I guess they've already seen most of the world and there's nothing that can excite them anymore. Now my dad's idea of a nice day out is to hang out in Home Depot gawking at toolboxes. My mom's day is made when we visit the Indian grocery. I would like to take them somewhere through the use of brute force, but it's a challenge for me to think of something they haven't already seen. I'm hoping for some geological oddity to suddenly appear in this part of the world, like, say, a volcano in the Poconos or maybe somebody could find a hitherto undiscovered tropical rain forest in south Philly. I am entirely out of ideas.

So we go to the Indian store. They have decent frozen chapatis.

My garden has blossomed under my dad's regime. He is a garden guy. One result is that my lawn looks awesome because he waters it everyday, come rain or shine. The other day it was about to rain and I yelled out to my dad outside, watering the lawn. "Dad stop watering, it's gonna rain". Dad yelled back, "It's okay, I have an umbrella". I did wait a couple of months hoping this would actually happen before making it up. Sadly, it never did because it would have been a great anecdote to narrate to random people on the internet.

I also have a tomato forest growing on my deck. Back in spring, I purchased a packet of tomato seeds and planted them all, believing that with my vast experience in killing healthy plants, I would be lucky to have but a single one alive by the end of summer. But with my dad in charge, all of them managed to grow and stay alive and now it's like a daycare center out there, only with juvenile tomato plants. They are a rowdy bunch. They fight with one other for the sunlight, block out each other's rays, fall onto the jalapeno who gets needlessly dragged into the fight. Man, they are a handful. I can't wait till they mature, sprout a few tomatoes and move out into their own soil.

I bought a bird feeder for my deck. It is my way of giving something back to society. The Republicans, with their free market-based poverty, don't care about feeding indigent and homeless birds and the Democrats are too busy feeding "people". I have been told that the birdhouse has been embraced and well patronized by blue jays, cardinals, chickadees, goldfinches and in my father's words, "black bird that was definitely not a crow"s. I haven't seen a single bird. Apparently my birdhouse only sees action during the early morning hours.

I guess that's it for now. Thank you, come again.