SongO’TheDay

My girlfriend bought me a banjo for my birthday, which will take some getting used to. I don’t play music enough any more, and miss it.

It’s raining again in Seattle today. It was a nice summer though; we had at least a week of sunlight. People were starting to complain about the 90 plus, so I suppose it was high time the sun went back to bed and allowed the clouds to gray everything out afresh and drip water on the pages of my book while I wait for the bus.

I was sitting in a restaurant last night when a young woman, maybe in her thirties, walked in looking very frail and sick, perambulating with both cane and ostensible husband as aid. She seemed fairly confident and able, though still like deathly ill, either recovering from something big or else, you know, slowly fading away. I saw all the people enjoying themselves around her, drinking beer, eating, confabulating and whatnot, and I thought that seemed pretty unfair. You find yourself in a situation where you’re dying of cancer and you really realize how much you’ve taken life for granted. But what’s the alternative? I sat there for a minute going Man, this is great. I’m very appreciative to be alive right now. This is just…so great. Type thing. Like Man, I’m super glad I’m not dying right now.

Later on, over a German Pilsner, I thought up an invention to keep your beer perfect to the last drop. It’s a hollow cone of metal filled with an advanced chemical composition, a liquid that never freezes but that stays cold for a very long time. You keep the device in your freezer and then when you want a nice frosty pint of lager you drop the thing into your glass and it acts like an ice cube that doesn’t dilute/ruin the beer. Similar to the Guinness widget but only vaguely, in a mechanical sense, minus the spinning. The metal would be the sort with which they make shakers; stainless steel. Thin but strong, gets frosty real quick. Guaranteed to stay cold at least until your beer goes flat. It’s called N’ice^TM, the N standing for Non-, like Non-ice, but it’s also a very catchy and marketable pun. A magnetized disc goes on the bottom like a coaster (which it is, too) to keep the cone from tumbling around and into your mouth, in case you were wondering about that issue.

I sort of want a dog. A black lab which I’d name Augie. First thing though I need a house with a yard for him to live in, and I’d barbecue out there when it was sunny, play some music while stuff cooked, like maybe I’d know some banjo chords by then, and we’d drink cold pints while we played. The theme of the party would be how good life is, but it would be an unstated theme that need not be mentioned.

-Paul Barrett

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