Gold.

Brief thoughts programmed directly into my head from the ether.

Going to a baseball game with my wife, mother-in-law, daughter and future son-in-law on a perfect weather night was great last week.

With seats behind home plate.

My girth fit far more comfortably in the seats than I remember. The food was excellent. The team, our own South Bend Cubs, smote the other guys. And this is the only situation where I can truly get excited about a victory by a team called the Cubs, being an avowed fan of the Southsiders. My anxiety about being in crowds even stayed completely out of the equation that night. It was a great time.

And then...

You make the last payment, and then it doesn't start when you're downtown after dark. With your mother-in-law.

Yeah. The car died. Wednesday night. It's now Monday and I just got it back this morning.

This is neither here nor there and I'm not really bitching about it. I'm just saying that from some perspectives...things seem to calibrate in weird ways. You never go out and do things, and when you do it can appear that you're being punished for it with a major hassle. I refuse to believe that's the case. Shit just happens. The Universe doesn't give a shit how my Wednesday night went.

UPDATE: Moments after I wrote this, part of my ceiling collapsed in the living room. I'm not kidding.

See?

So now I don't know what the hell to believe anymore.

STATUS REPORT

What I'm Working On: Everything not related to my job, including this blog and -- sadly -- any hope of a new Item Podcast, was put on hold these last couple of weeks. I've been working on a family project for the reunion next month, and prepping the new novel that went up for sale on Amazon a couple of blog entries ago.

What I'm Listening To: Podcast obsession at the moment is Ephemeral. I was disappointed by the last few episodes of that Blackout series with Rami Malek. The writing went to pot and went there hard at that point.

In the car, I've been spending time in Ozzy's Boneyard on XM.

Here are two reasons why.

What I'm Watching: Kim and I are almost done binge-watching Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, an arguably unsuccessful TV series that went up against 30 Rock in 2006 with roughly the same premise and resulted in the handing of his own ass to Aaron Sorkin. I remember seeing perhaps the first episode of it, and not returning. It got better. A lot better. It's a shame it only lasted one season.

Yes, the little box has the ashes of Trevor, our late cat. He enjoyed watching the TV.

I blame a conversation with noted Rat Bastard Carl Stutsman for this, because he reminded me of its existence, and I had to absorb all of it as quickly as possible.

We also watched Cajun Navy on the Discovery Channel.

It will make you feel happy about people in general for a couple of hours.

So should you.

Perfectly normal people who didn't wait for the government to give them permission to help people who were trapped in an impossible situation. It was nice to see people who give a shit about other people.

What I'm Reading: A book my son gave me for my birthday:

It's very thorough.

I need to go to bed, so I'm going to. Be good to one another, and whatever you do DON'T say pithy things about The Universe and its potential disinterest with you. It might make you fetch the ShopVac.