Tuesday - 2008-0729-2030 - Rain - Paris Impressions; Saturday - Too Much Work; Sunday - Lunch, Dead Zone; Monday - Very Dead Zone; Tuesday - Early Morning; Tuesday - Ichiban Lunch; Tuesday - Is Ichiban a Chain?; Tuesday - Is Ichiban a Chain? Definitive Answer; Tuesday - Lowe's - Views; The view to the south - ancient grudge; The view to the south - possible solution; The view to the east; The view to the north

Rain - Paris Impressions Larger Image An image from the Paris Impressions by Michael Painter (Places Visited - France)

The heat index was above 100, and I did a tad too much. Something I must not do again.

Early I raked a portion of the back near the patio and was stung by a yellow jacket. Then mowed part of the front.

At my Ichiban lunch I had a rich dessert. It was a pastry shell that included pineapple and some other ingredients.

After lunch, when it was very hot, I decided to finish the front yard. And then I covered some sparse areas with top soil.

I took a nap and woke up feeling tired and achy as if the yellow jacket sting, hot sun and rich dessert has all decided to disagree with me.

In the evening, I tried to figure out how to deal with the two electrical cords for the electric lawn mower. I'd been hanging them as separate units to the left of the washer, but it was difficult to get to them. I nailed a board into the studs near the door, but managed to get it unbalanced several times and had to redo it. Then added the cord storage organizer which is a semi-circular piece of plastic about 4 inches deep.

Then it was fairly easy to hang the cord in long loops of six feet or so.

But at the end of the process, I was drenched and feeling semi-nauseous. I took a variety of pills but the achiness did not subside.

Obviously, this was the result of moving too many muscles in an unaccustomed manner in a high temperature environment. Absolutely must not do that again.

The heat index was 107. Golly!

Lunch with a friend. Our adorable server was not available when we came in, though he did show later. Gawd! He is delicious. My luncher partner said, "Calm down! Don't me get another restraining order!"

If I did anything else exciting, I don't remember it. I think I felt so blah that I didn't do anything.

The heat index was 110. Shit!

Another day of muscle aches and pains. It's one of those situations in which you're really not sick, you've just done some things you don't do normally. So your body has to re-cycle.

I actually did not even leave the house save to bring in the newspaper, check the mailbox and put out the trash.

A wee bit cooler. Heat index of 103.

I woke up to the phone ringing, and I actually answered - very much a rarity. And I'm so glad I did. It was friend of my mother's who has has been kind enough to keep in contact with me. She is a wonderful person. She said she'd sold her house recently and moved to a gated neighborhood. She's in her early 70s, and she mentioned what a traumatic affair it was to get a mortgage at her age. It was great to hear from her. One of the few people that I greatly respect.

I think I did some more raking around the patio, was able to place the debris in containers, and get them out to the street before the garbage truck passed. I counted a total of eight containers.

Lunch at Ichiban. The owner dropped by my table as usual, and I told him I saw him last week inside his new restaurant.

At lunch Sunday, my lunch partner and I had had a discussion as to whether Ichiban was part of a chain or not. I'd glance at the web before and found many listings by that name and jumped to the conclusion it was. Not thinking about the fact there might be just a lot of places with that moniker. (Moniker is a great word that I learned from reading "Variety.")

Sunday evening, I looked Ichiban up on the web trying to get a more definite answer if it was a chain like P.F. Chang's China Bistro. Here's what I wrote to my friend:

Well, after 30 minutes of searching, I'm still not sure if Ichiban is a national chain or not.

"Ichiban" means "first" or "number one" in Japanese.

One wonders if there are Japanese "love" songs with lyrics like. "You're the top, you're the Mona Lisa, You're my Ichiban."

(1) I can't find any info about an Ichiban corporation in the US. However, many cities have multiple restaurants with the same name. So for that location, they are a local chain- well, maybe.

(2) Tokyo Ichiban Foods Co Ltd - The Group's principal activity is to operate tiger blowfish restaurants. The Company operates 34 tiger blowfish chain restaurants under the name Torafugu-tei. Its stores are mainly located in Tokyo, Kanagawa, Saitama and Chiba.

Blowfish are part of the family - Tetraodontidae. Some members of the family contain tetrodotoxin, a poison approximately 1,200 times deadlier than cyanide.

The poison variety are eaten in Japan and considered a great delicacy. But only special licensed chef are allowed to cook them.

(3) Sapporo Ichiban is a brand of instant noodles (most of them ramen) made by Sanyo Foods and rivals to other Japanese ramen brands like Nissin. Ichiban is also a small chain of Japanese Noodle Bar Restaurants in Glasgow, Scotland.

In my brief conversation with the owner, I did get to squeeze in the chain question. His answer was , "No." So now I know.

Well, it's been a few days since I've had a Lowe's fix, and I was beginning to have withdrawal symptoms.

I'm faced with three interrelated problems that deal with a particular view.

The people to the south have a carport that is directly across from my bedroom window. But they park next to the carport within a few inches of the property line. There is no shrubbery on the property line, and I'm tired of the really ugly view.

(As a kid, in pre-air conditioning when their carport door was always open, as was my bedroom window, any noise from that side was funneled directly into my bedroom.

The couple who lived there were crazy. She was up at 5 am, and never stopped screaming all day long. One morning, I got up, went over there, and asked them to please close the door. Oh my gawd! The husband told my father that she was upset for days! Oh, give me a fucking break. Shut up, you fat bitch!. And he never would call me by name, he would always tell my parent, "your boy." Idiot fucker.

At some point, I put up a bamboo screen fence about six feet inside our property. The dolt came over and said, "I see your boy is building a fence...!" Jesus Christ. It's on our property, Go fuck yourself!

Another one of the many events from the past that conjures up foul, hostile, degrading memories.)

Another problem is that the area along the property line floods whenever it rain. So I really would like to plant running bamboo. But I've not found a nursery here that has it. I need to talk to the yard guy about any thoughts he might have.

In my house in Jackson, I had running bamboo in the back and along one side. It was the perfect screen. And as I recall, the back flooded there too. Actually, I didn't plant the bamboo. It had sorta wandered over from a house on the street behind me. Not directly behind me, but three or four houses over, It literally would grow a foot a day.

There are three splendid windows in the living room which faces east. I've first got rid of the heavy, ugly, curtains mother had put up. Three layers - a sheer against the windows, outside of which were curved valances, the draw-string full closure drapes. Against this was a couch. Talk about claustrophobic. To look out the window was a major undertaking. But that was the style when they were installed. And mother was not big on looking at things from a different perspective.

While she was still living, I took down all the drapes and left the windows bare. I also moved the couch perpendicular to the window. And she actually like it.

The problem is the morning heat that pours in with a fierce intensity. I toyed with Venetian blinds, but they had to be mounted on the frame. So I took them down. Then I think I tried a single matchstick blind, but again I didn't care for that.

While I was in Lowe's I found some garden trellises that looked promising. Too expensive. I thought of close-weave diagonal slat trellises nailed directly to the outside frame. Still an option. Same kind of trellises constructed like an awning at 45 degrees to the house. Appropriate powers tools are a problem.

As I was browsing through the bamboo and matchstick blinds, I found what may be the least of evils - an exterior dark brown heavy-duty vinyl blind. Something I'd never thought of before. One catch the three windows measure almost nine feet. However, the blinds only come in 8-foot and 10-foot varieties. Still a very viable option.

This is the open side of the carport. I want to do something with close-weave diagonal slat trellises which come in 4-foot by 8-foot sections. The best idea I've come up with is to hang them from the top within some kind of framework. And paint them the same color as the front door - a high gloss rust color. But the top-to-bottom height is 8.5 feet. So this is still muddled in my brain.

(In Tuesday - 2008-0729-2030 / Out - 2008-0730-2300) This entry was written in multiple settings.

Pax! Erin go braugh! Je accuse...