A Message For The Queen

The man looked at me and asked if I was in some kind of hurry, “do you have a message for the queen.”

I couldn’t tell if he was being snarky or serious so I paused for a moment to see if he would follow up with something that would provide context.

He didn’t so I asked him why he didn’t ask if it was for the king.

“You passed me so quickly I figured it had to be really important.”

Still unclear on his intent I asked if he was familiar with the Lord Of Tailors and Emissary of The Royal Shmata Maker Ben Wilner?”

He scrunched up his face and said who is “Ben Wilner and what is a shmata?”

“Ben Wilner is my Great-Grandfather and if you hadn’t been more interested in checking out your phone than paying attention to what is going on around you my passing you wouldn’t have felt like such a surprise. You’re part of a bigger world.”

“I still don’t know who Ben Wilner is or what that other thing you said means.”

“It is ok sir, you don’t need to. Have a nice day.”

I didn’t tell him I was trying to get to a local bakery called Hive before they closed or that I had two other stops I wanted to make.

Nor did I point out the sidewalk at Parker Square had some narrow spaces and that his unexpected crab walk to the right caused me to sort of jump past him.

Fifty something year-old Josh can’t just stop on a dime. I walk pretty quickly and when I am on a deadline I walk even faster.

It was pretty clear he wasn’t done speaking but I wasn’t interested in a ridiculous conversation so I pushed on to my car.

It’s An Oven Out Here

It is hotter than normal and that sometimes makes people more short tempered than normal.

Though I really didn’t think anything ugly was going to come from the exchange I had no interest in finding out.

Didn’t want any blog fodder in which I could reference the wind from the Santa Anas and Raymond Chandler, not that we get said winds here, but I remember them.

Truth is I didn’t necessarily want anything from Hive, got too many carbs around me as is but I support local businesses that are pushing for the right changes.

Can’t know, don’t know if giving a couple of bucks here and there will do it but it can’t hurt which is I why kick a few towards Beto every now and then too.

Worst that happens is the changes I hope for don’t come about but as some say,  if you don’t ask you don’t get. Or in this case if you don’t give you let others control your destiny.

I hate called third strikes and or losing because you didn’t take the shot.

Always easier to try and fail than to fail to try or at least it is for me.

****

My children have heard me say more than once it is hard to be a good player when you don’t know the rules of the game or have the details to fill in the gaps in a story.

That is part of why the January 6 committee is so important. We know what the short term objective of the insurrection was but we don’t know all of the how and the why not to mention the who.

Without that information much is left to speculation and sometimes speculation is a bad place to live when you need specifics.

Been thinking about that quite a bit as there a few things going on where I have a broad base of knowledge but lack depth.

Those particular things are significant and very important to me so I want to fill in the gaps. So I made my interest clear and have been waiting for more.

Though if you put it in perspective, democracy doesn’t hang on whether I ever get answers. Makes it all easier…mostly.

Given I have a big meeting coming up there would be some practical benefits in knowing more in advance, but I can roll with the status quo or additional details.

How Many Parts Are Required?

My kitchen sink backed up so I spent about 30 minutes taking things apart so I could clear the clog and clean things up so that we have a functioning sink.

The goal wasn’t to prevent all future clogs but it certainly was to try and prevent and or limit them.

I suspect the garbage disposal may not be grinding things up as effectively as I would like it to.

For a brief moment I thought about taking apart the disposal to see how it works. I figured that it would be more helpful than actually staring at schematics or YouTube videos.

But I asked myself a simple question, ‘how many parts are required to make it work?’

That is my shorthand for will you remember how to rebuild it, especially if there a zillion parts. It also encompasses the overall question of what happens if you break it while trying to learn how things operate.

It’s not like I don’t have a basic understanding of the operation but there is a difference between understanding and knowing.

A difference between being able to say I think there is a squeez-it and a chop-it that come together in a particular way to make objects into smaller, ground up particles and the motor connects to the grinder.

Truth is I don’t have experience with machining things and though I could learn I don’t have any intention to do so now.

Nor do I have an engineering background that I can apply with the goal of figuring out how to make a better product.

So I let that idea go, especially since it was 10 PM.

But I do find it interesting to look at various objects and think about how many parts are required to make them work.

To consider how many different companies might be involved in procuring those as well as thinking about how many people are involved in all of the different aspects.

That doesn’t count the number of people who were involved in figuring out how to build things and how they came to be able to build these particular items.

And you thought this was a post about an encounter near a bakery.

No sir, no ma’am. It is just a series of random thoughts and recollections about moments in time, same as the piece about tires and tech.

Never know what you’ll get when come to these parts.