Three Coins in the Fountain

This promises to be a busy week: Muriel has an annual checkup tomorrow, I’m getting a neck full of toxins on Wednesday, my next review will (eventually) be posted, and the hobby site is functional and awaiting its first post. The link will be shared here once it’s ready for primetime, but keep your expectations low — it’s unlikely to appeal to anyone outside of the Parkinson’s sphere.*

Nothing that’s worth reporting has happened these last few days, which has been nice. Over the weekend I noticed Crankenstein’s TPMS indicator light was flashing, which prompted an exchange quite familiar to us in spirit if not subject. “A tire probably just needs air,” she said dismissively, groaning when I replied no, the light would be solid if that were the case. Flashing means the problem is with the monitoring system itself.

She has a tendency to act like there’s no greater misery or inconvenience than taking care of our possessions or performing any mundane task that threatens to consume free time she’d rather spend painting, running, and scrolling through memes. When she sighs or snaps in response to these things, I long to menace her with a Nerf bat. That we don’t own one is for the best; as she’d joke, I drop things frequently enough that she’d grab it and immediately gain the upper hand.

Though she possesses countless traits I find admirable or attractive, Crankenstein often makes me daydream not only of Nerf bats but reenacting angry diatribes from Carnal Knowledge. She cleans nothing in our home besides her own body; stacks her dirty dishes atop the dishwasher for me to place inside of it; and deposits her excessive recycling atop the kitchen counter — rather than open the cabinet directly beneath it that houses the waste bins — for me to dispose of later. But if, after washing and folding her laundry, I ask for help putting it away, she huffs and groans and acts like it’s the world’s worst imposition.

While biting my tongue during our low-stakes TPMS conversation, I assumed she was also biting hers; surely she has default resentments of her own that spring to life and get down like James Brown in such moments. We avoided an argument, knowing it’s extra pointless when she’s in the throes of a serious depression and I’m frustrated by my own issues, and had the problem — a dead sensor — fixed.


See, wasn’t that unbearably boring? I’ll spare you the aborted bickering over an invasive plant that recently appeared in our yard and leave you with a couple photos of objects I’m tidying (they’re prints with rough edges), assembling and gluing for future use. As Basil’s pals would crudely quip, he knows his way around an organ; my desk might spontaneously burst into flames if I ever tried to build a model church, but it reminded me of distant Sunday mornings spent reading in empty pews while Crankenstein rehearsed with the choir.

The fountain will be the modest stage for his Anita Ekberg moment; a Trevi recreation isn’t currently in the budget.

* For the last few months I’ve been working on a separate project that’s probably more your speed; we’ll discuss that in the fall.

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