Adaptive Curmudgeon

I’ve gone into left field with this thread but it’s my blog and my dog is sleeping. Until the dog wakes up I have no editorial bounds.

The eclipse is about more than celestial visions and meatloaf. At the moment it’s about Carly Simon. She’s in my head and it’s pissing me off. There is no reason my head should have anything to do with Carly Simon!

I’ve always thought of Simon as an average vocalist from the 1970’s with a tragic penchant for future catlady whining. I especially dislike “You’re So Vain”. Now it’s an earworm and it’s killing me. Among the lyrics is the word “eclipse” and my mind has latched on to it. There’s nothing worse than bad lyrics. It’s as if squirrels are afoot!

As a form of exorcism, I’m going to discuss the song “You’re So Vain” and list the incontrovertible reasons why it should be stricken from the record and replaced with something better… which is pretty much anything that doesn’t whine so much.

For your homework you may listen to the song below (there’s a “remastered” version as well but the synonym for “remastered” is “fucked up” so I’m linking to the original):

Let’s start with the positives, there’s an excellent initial lead in and a nice beat. Then Carly Simon jumps in with the lyrics and I begin to foam at the mouth.

Argument #1 why this song pisses me off

Here are some of the lyrics:

“You’re so vain, you probably think this song is about you
You’re so vain, I’ll bet you think this song is about you
Don’t you? Don’t You?”

Uh… yeah! The fucking song is entirely about him. There’s nobody in the song but the vain bastard that dumped Carly Simon on her ass! There’s nothing about the girl’s hopes, dreams, future, job, hair color, car, favorite food, or sexual proclivities. It’s all about him. The song describes the color of his goddamn scarf (apricot) but doesn’t say anything about the girl. Is she a redhead? A professional bowler? A heroin addict? You can’t tell because it’s not important. She made it all about him and then challenged him with “you probably think this song is about you”. Who the hell else is it about? Ghandi? Robotron? The neighbor’s cat? An oak tree?

It’s completely dismissive of the whiny bitch who’s singing; so yeah, it really is about him!

Argument #2 why this song pisses me off

The eclipse line that is stuck in my head.

Here are the lyrics:

“Then you flew your Lear jet up to Nova Scotia
To see the total eclipse of the sun.”

Holy shit, what a great idea! Is there a better use for a personal Lear jet? If you’re rich enough to have a Lear jet and you use it to enjoy the beauty of nature… that’s bad? It’s vain? Where else should he fly? Las Vegas? Portland? Bhopal?

The song describes a handsome sexy dude that’s richer than God and can have anything he wants. So he goes out to look at the sky. Yeah that’s real jackass behavior there.

For that matter, what does one do with a Lear jet that could be perceived as humble? Rescue kittens? Deliver pizza?

If I had a Lear jet I’d fucking see every eclipse in my lifetime. Also I’d use it to haul elk haunches from British Columbia; which is why guys like me don’t have Lear jets.

Argument #3 why this song pisses me off

It fails to make me identify with the sufferer.

The lyrics are about falling for the dude’s sexy apricot scarf and how they were a pretty couple but she wasn’t unique. Indeed “all the girls dreamed that they’d be your partner”. So the singer had the same aspiration as all the other women and even got to live the dream for a while; because she was pretty. Then it went away.

I’m supposed to feel bad about that? Is she saying that nothing is such a tragic loss to humanity as rich pretty people who are sad?

The singer’s not curing cancer, not building bridges of love and peace, not caring for a child, not even delivering a truckload of grain to the elevator; just a pretty girl that’s got the sads because she’s no longer part of a pretty couple. First world problems bitch!

Argument #4 why this song pisses me off

It’s self deluded and clearly so.

The song drones on about how he “gave away the things [he] loved and one of them was me”.

I call bullshit. He didn’t give away the Lear jet did he? Unless he gives away the Lear jet there’s no indication he gave away anything that meant Jack shit to him.

The song indicates he kept the things he loved; the confidence, the cool hat, the sexy scarf, the Lear jet, the works. He’s not living in a mud hut is he?

Fix this! If you want me to see this cad as tragic, write a few lines about the lost sexy scarf. Tell me how it wound up dumped in a gutter by a fading loner. Describe how he wanders around the streets of Hoboken, back hunched against the weather, scarfless neck exposed to the rain, a broken man accidentally spilling cloudy coffee on his formerly fashionable pants. He should be doomed to walk the world regretting his moment of self-destruction and wondering where he left his Lear jet keys. Absent that I’m going to assume the singer was a stalker and her boyfriend bailed out of the situation before she keyed his Learjet.

Argument #5 why this song pisses me off

It’s an endless stream of negativity!

It sucks to get dumped. We get that. However, hopelessness is not uplifting. It’s ugly.

Everything about “You’re So Vain” is so negative and hate filled that it goes past the event horizon of sad and circles around to blaming the world for your sorrows. Would it kill Carly to end the song with a round of recovery. Something like “but I’m hot and I just did the gardener so I don’t need your fucking Lear jet.” I’m all about people overcoming sorrow y’all. Fuck it, add in some heavy metal drums and really get your freak on. Enough of this sitting in the corner sighing.

How to fix this shitty song:

There’s nothing wrong with sorrow. It’s cathartic. But if you’re going to sing about misfortune you have to do it right. Weeping wont’ cut it. Here are alternatives:

• Embrace the suck and go down the rabbit hole. For this I present George Thorogood from House Rent Blues:

“I ain’t seen my baby since a nigh’ and a week
Gotta get drunk, man, till I can’t even speak
Gonna get high, man, listen to me
One drink ain’t enough, Jack, you better make it three”

• Throw in a twist. For this I present B. B. King from Never Make Your Move Too Soon:

“Three days of snow in Birmingham
Thought you would wonder where i am
Rang our number all night long
It’s no comfort on the telephone
Ran out and caught a midnight flight
Thought a little love would make everything all right
The landlord said, “you moved away”
And left me all your bills to pay”
Look out baby, you might have made your move too soon

Left me with a keno card
This life in Vegas sure ain’t hard
I ran it up to about fifty grand
Cashed it in and held it in my hand
That kind of word can get around
And make a lost love come up found
I hear you knocking baby at my door
But you know you ain’t living here no more
It’s too bad
I think you made your move too soon”

• Make a horrid joke. For this I present Guns and Roses from I Used To Love Her But I Had To Kill Her”

“I used to love her
But I had to kill her
I had to put her
Six feet under
And I can still hear her complain”

• Indulge in a revenge fantasy. For this I present Carrie Underwood from Before He Cheats:

“I dug my key into the side
Of his pretty little souped-up four-wheel drive
Carved my name into his leather seats
I took a Louisville slugger to both head lights
I slashed a hole in all four tires
Maybe next time he’ll think before he cheats”

Hey, it worked! I got that damn brainworm out of my head. Brilliant! Thanks for joining me on this trip and if anyone needs a lyricist I’m available for hire. I work for beer and/or Lear jet fuel.

[Has it been a week since my last post? Damn it! I just left it sitting there, in the eerie twilight of mid-day, when all that is normal is not and the air is pregnant with the magic of an eminent eclipse? An accidental celestial cliffhanger? What an asshole!

I’ve been busy with a schedule that’s redlining and the blog took it in the shorts. In the meantime, my ponderings become obsolete… like me. The eclipse has been forgotten and there have been two hurricanes. At least the kids are in school and PAWIRNEATT (Project About Which I’d Rather Not Elaborate At This Time) progresses to my satisfaction.

As I remember an eclipse that’s the definition of “yesterday’s news”. I’d like to send a special thanks to Dorthy Grant who encouraged me to take as long as I need to write the story. “Thank you!” Also a note to Dr. Mingo who said I should shut the hell up and get back to the squirrels. “Patience, friend. Winter is coming.”

So, where was I…]

I deliberately did no “homework” about the eclipse, preferring to just experience it. Even so, thousands of photos have led me to expect a reddish ring in the sky. A halo, a ring, a circle. Nothing could be further from the truth. At the precise moment and totally to my surprise, my goggled view dimmed to almost nothing. Removing them with some uncertainty (I wasn’t sure what you can and cannot look at) I glanced skyward. The heavens had lit up with a cold white burst of… glory.

I’ve thought a lot about how to describe what I saw. I know millions of others saw it too. As far as I can tell they’ve never come close to describing the thing I witnessed. Maybe I’m a romantic dipshit? The kind of guy who’s read too much, thought too deeply, and is prone to looking at an odd sky and declaring it Dulcinea before firing up my Dodge to tilt at windmills? Soft headed and more affected by beauty? Or is everyone else too busy fucking around with cameras and cell phones to actually see what they are looking at? I don’t know. All I can say is the bubbleheads on TV make the sublime sound like the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade and that’s missing the point.

Everyone was silent. Then there was the involuntary “Ooooohhhh” we’ve all heard at a fireworks display. But not a loud raucous cheer, more like a hushed intake of breath.

With goggles on it was hardly visible, but with the eye alone it was astounding. I had no idea of the risk to my eyes. I finally decided that if the eclipse was the last thing I saw, it was probably worth it. Have you heard anybody ever say that? No? That’s because they’re talking heads reading a text written by some otherwise unemployable English major or because they haven’t seen the real thing. The eclipse on an LCD screen in your living room is not the real thing.

I saw veil of the universe pulled back. I saw eternity. For something like two and a half minutes, I peered past our atmosphere and beyond the ubiquitous yellow haze of normalcy and reached out into the firmament. I saw infinity.

The human senses are not equipped to process this thing. Our vocabulary is inadequate to describe it. There are things you cannot witness second hand.

Then, it was over. Perhaps that’s for the best. Possibly such achingly strong beauty is best perceived in glimpses. A few minutes per lifetime being the maximum dose primates like us can endure. As if by design, it was too fleeting for us, the most cynical of creatures, to grow cold and cast it aside as just another pretty thing.

When the first sliver of the sun returned, the goggles went on, and the real magic blinked away. The foreplay remained; it was still eerie, it was still a land of strange crescent shaped shadows and David Lynch foreboding, but the sky had closed and it’s secrets were behind the glare.

Nobody was unaffected. In the first few minutes, people in the little mixed group started extolling to each other the virtues of what they just saw. Ever the loner, I let it sink in and enjoyed the shadows. The effect didn’t last long. On the empty road two big rigs drove by; the timing such that I’m sure they were in motion during the event. They had their headlights on. I can think of nothing sadder than driving straight through the zone of totality and stubbornly refusing to come to a full stop for even the three minutes it would take to see… everything. How much can a shipment matter? Is arriving 5 minutes sooner on the one day among thousands in the one place on earth where this moment had just passed worth it? Could they really know what they missed? Those two drivers may be among the most tragic creatures living.

After perhaps a quarter of an hour Mrs. Curmudgeon approached me, still staring at the 3/4 missing Pac Man shape though goggles, “Ready to go?”

Car were being started. The lot was half empty. In my mind I imagined Flo fretting over a ketchup bottle. Americans, for better or worse, can see heaven and almost immediately switch to their earlier issues. The road was already packed. Fifteen minutes after totality, when the skies were still dim, the road was packed! Somewhere ahead the two truckers were probably stuck in the same traffic… maybe a half dozen miles from here.

“After that?” I leered. “Shouldn’t we cuddle or something?”

“Perv!” She laughed, “Get in the car.”

And so we piled in the car, with Mrs. Curmudgeon at the wheel, and headed out. The road was totally blocked heading away from the zone and utterly empty in the other direction. I do not follow herds so I navigated us in the contrary direction, deeper into the place we wished to leave. It took me 30 seconds to formulate a plan of escape. If a thousand idiots block a road it’s time to change course… duh.

Now it was the battle of the traffic, which I would win. Continuing gradual fading of the dim skies or not, the celestial moment was over as a practical matter and the consensus was clear. We were back to acting like lemmings on pavement.

Regardless, the trip was worth it. If you have not seen an eclipse, do so before you die.

[Perhaps I’ve gone on too long. Everyone and their dog wrote about the eclipse a week ago. Rather than a news report (as if news exists anymore) I’m trying to capture the spirit of the thing. If I failed, chalk it up to me being a lame ass blogger stumbling under a topic beyond his ken.]

Are we a people who have seen too much? Have CGI and 50 channels of shit on cable jaded the world? All I know is that I was near ecstatic to see (through goggles) a tiny nibble torn from sun but nobody else seemed that enthused. (The alternative, that everyone else is normal and I make mountains of molehills, is equally reasonable.)

I stood there, baking in the heat, and watched. It moved ever so slowly. Periodically I’d remove my goggles and glance around. No sign of anything different. Interesting! (I’m such a nerd that “nothing has happened” can be a fascinating observation.) The sun looks the same even when it’s partially gone. Like a politician’s soul, it can be mostly eaten away and yet you can scarcely tell.

Mrs. Curmudgeon and the teenagers arrive. They’ve brought my lunch in a Styrofoam box and I’m grateful.

“Did you give Flo a big tip?” I ask.

“Huge, I think she’s going to need therapy after today.”

“Did my ‘to go’ order cause issues?” For some reason I’m worried about Flo; as if I’ve known her for years.

“Nope, the cook handled it. The cook owns the place by the way. She didn’t seem worried about the crowd.”

“I hope they take a few minutes off to see the eclipse.” I’d hate to think of someone slinging meatloaf and mashed potatoes during the only two minutes of totality in their life.

“I’m not sure Flo could handle it.” Mrs. Curmudgeon chuckles.

Since the eclipse is moving slowly I pause long enough to put the styrofoam box on the roof of the car and…

“Oh. My. God!” I’m shocked.

“What is it?” Mrs. Curmudgeon is at my side in a flash.

“I ordered a bacon cheeseburger on meatloaf Monday?”

“Yeah, we were wondering abut that. You feeling OK?”

“What have I done?” I shudder.

But the cheeseburger is adequate and I’m starving. Ignoring massive buyer’s remorse I chow down while Mrs. Curmudgeon and the teenagers stir themselves to take their first goggle clad glance at a partial eclipse. It’s 1/4 gone by now. The teenagers are chattering about the mashed potatoes and I wonder if I’ve missed the true meaning of this celestial event.

Is God telling me to savor meatloaf on Mondays and leave the celestial for a different time? I ponder this as I finish the greasy burger. It’s a pretty good burger after all. But it’s not meatloaf and can never be meatloaf. Unforced error!

Some of the folks nearby are looking through a glass plate, they didn’t make a goggle order in time. I pass out several of our spare goggles and they’re somewhat reluctant to take them.

“You sure you want to give these out?”

“Yeah, how many sets can one man wear?”

“But…”

“How about this, next eclipse you buy the first round of goggles?” This works and everyone smiles. They can see a lot better through goggles than passing a glass plate back and forth.

Whew! It’s never easy for me to put strangers at ease. I have a theory that I look like a serial killer and act like I might break out into a monologue about meatloaf… it scares the squares. This time I did well. Everyone’s happy. Like the Boy Scout I once was, I’m always happy to check “good deed for the day” off my list. (Finding a little old lady trying to cross the street is a rarity y’all!)

There’s a feeling of camaraderie in our spot. Some folks came from 50 miles away, others (like me) came from almost a thousand… and all we’re doing is watch the sun dim. As activities go it’s self-motivated, completely voluntary, and it can’t possibly be twisted into opposition to anything. We could use more such events.

I find myself trying to ascertain what my human senses can tell me about the diminishing sun. You can’t look at the sun (without goggles) and the day is still very bright. Without goggles you’d never know an eclipse was drawing nigh. It’s still hot but when I bask, arms outspread in the light, I feel a little less radiation than before. It’s subtle. The sun can be half gone and you’d never know unless you were paying attention.

After a while I return to the shade. It’s hot out there, half a sun or not. The teenagers are in the car “chillin'”, by which I mean they’re hyper-extending the reclining seats and mashing Cheetos into every corner of the interior. (Kids do to a car’s interior what a herd of wildebeest would do to the living room.) Mrs. Curmudgeon is quietly reading a paperback.

I return to standing in the dirt, arms extended, as if I’m waiting to be stuck by lightning. The sun doesn’t fade gradually like a dimmer switch or youth. It’s still there, but eventually the world becomes different. I’m soaking it in; looking at shadows, goggles on, goggles off… observing. Around 2/3 gone the effect has become noticeable everywhere. The shadows are weird. The birds are disappearing. Some of the insects are suddenly quiet.

That’s the threshold. When the sun is 2/3 gone you’re in a David Lynch scene.

I’d promised myself to ignore my phone and camera. Others will take photos, I’m there to experience. But I can’t help myself. I badger my cheesy phone to take photos and the poor thing is out of it’s league. I have dozens of hazy blurry photos of a red dot.

It dims more. It’s twilight. Everyone is silent. The light looks oddly focused and eerie. Everyone is silent. Someone’s car radio has been playing the local radio station, which has been punsterifically playing Bonnie Tyler’s “Total Eclipse of the Heart”. The radio is silenced. This is not the time for puns.

Traffic has stopped. Nothing moves. The streetlights come on. If there ever is a complete reset of all reality… this is what the first moments will look like. I’ve forgotten the meatloaf.

Mrs. Curmudgeon has put away the paperback. The teenagers are watching too.

The air is cool. It is neither day nor night. This trip was worth it!

[Stay tuned…]

No shit, there I was…

So it’s T-minus something or other and I’m beside myself with excitement. I’ve never seen an eclipse (how did I let that happen?). Now I’m in the right place at the right time and it’s gonna’ be awesome! Cars are drifting in ones and twos off the road until there are about two dozen of us in the non-descript dirt lot. We are the ones that decided the skies right here are good enough and dinking around in traffic to see the skies over there is bullshit. We are kindred spirits. This is my people! There is electricity in the air!

Folks are setting up folding chairs and digging sandwiches out of coolers. I keep glancing at the sun (with goggles on) and getting fidgety. The skies are mostly clear. It’s very hot. You couldn’t ask for a more perfect viewing setup.

Meanwhile, my family has abandoned me.

I find them inside the cafe where an aged waitress, lets call her Flo, is freaking out. There are perhaps six people in the joint, which is apparently the biggest crowd Flo has ever seen. Flo makes sure to tell every single customers, all of whom are waiting patiently, that this is “chaos… just total chaos“. Then she takes their orders and goes to the kitchen and loudly repeats the order. “Two for meatloaf, it’s a madhouse out here!” I look around. The happy half dozen people in scattered seats don’t seem to have the slightest hint of chaos in them at all. Everyone is smiling and mellow. They’d make an Amish library look like Daytona Beach after a Jose Quervo truck overturned during spring break.

The cook emerges, spatula in hand, and glances at the sparse crowd; then at me. Flo scampers by carrying a glass of water muttering something like “zone of totality, it’s a zone of exhaustion I say!” We look at each other and shrug.

My family is parked at an ancient Formica table. They’re seated in some of those old school chrome tube seats with the sticky vinyl seat cushions and reading menus that probably haven’t changed since the 1970’s. Flo and the seats are probably about the same age. My family is completely relaxed. I’m practically vibrating and they’re totally chillin. They’re reading paperbacks and waiting for Flo to manage the huge crowd and take their order. The only one who is even mildly agitated is me (and Flo).

Flo finally shows up in a flurry of complaints and everyone orders meatloaf. It’s meatloaf Monday y’all. It comes with mashed potatoes but one kid gets onion rings. I’m staring out the window. Flo harrumphs that I haven’t yet ordered. I can’t focus. I’ll be damned if I’m going to miss an eclipse because I’m too lazy to go outside! Absent mindedly, I place my order. Googgles or not I can’t quite see the sun from this location. I can’t stand it. I grab my goggles and go. I pass two people entering as I leave. In the background I hear Flo rant about the “massive crowd that is totally filling the place and also…”

I miss the rest. Three paces past the door I’m staring at the sun.

There is a tiny nibble out of the sun! Holy shit! It’s now. Awesome! Jörmungandr has risen. He’s going to eat the sun and give rise to Ragnarok… Or at least it’s going to be a rare display of solar weirdness. I’m delighted to see the show. Sweeeeet.

Then I realize I’m standing in the dirt, staring at the sun like a madman (with goggles) and nobody, and I mean nobody, gives a shit.

What. The. Hell?

T -30 hours: We depart Curmudgeon Compound in Mrs. Curmudgeon’s hatchback. Due to her influence we’re on time (my “give a shit” about schedules has stopped working). The car is great but I miss my big diesel security blanket. If I can’t have my truck I probably need a teddy bear (or a bottle of bourbon). I don’t have a tent, my kayak, or fishing poles! I’m carrying less than seven guns, had to travel without my chainsaw, and don’t have a full set of tools. What if I need to shoot my way though a wall of zombies, catch a fish, and build a log cabin?

Mrs. Curmudgeon is happy we’ve left my toys and lumbering walrus of a truck behind. Regardless, I insisted on bringing coffee, beer, a stove, and Mountain House. While I ponder a brief moment of inadequate preparations (which is what most people call “every day”) Mrs. Curmudgeon is fretting over her car’s tires. They’re making a weird sound. Honda engineers are amazing but they installed low profile tires (the work of the devil!). From my point of view this is taking engineering advice from ghettoized low-rider Chevies. The car is perfect but the tires are problematic. Then again Honda’s bad tire choices merely make funny sounds while Dodge’s engineers created a machine that will lock up its steering geometry at highway speed. Japan wins!

We inspect the tires and I declare the weird sound to be caused by Russian hackers. We continue. In the back seat, the teenagers are playing video games and grunting. They have forgotten why we’re traveling.

T -29 hours: The pavement changes and the tires sound much better now. Good news but I still hate low profile tires.

T -20 hours: We stop early. In keeping with my philosophical bent of “avoid any crowd doing any thing for any reason” we’ve stopped well short of the Zone of Totality. Because I’m awesome (and it’s a family trip instead of solo), I’ve booked an en route hotel that’s much nicer than my usual preference.

We’ve seen no sign of anyone anywhere caring about the eclipse. Since I’ve mostly avoided the news I’m mildly concerned there’s some reason nobody else is traveling to this awesome event. Did I misread the calendar? Rather than think about it, I lounge in a chair and engage in a guilty pleasure; six consecutive episodes of South Park. This teaches the teenagers valuable life lessons and new vocabulary. It nearly causes Mrs. Curmudgeon brain damage.

T – 19 hours: The weather report looks sketchy. Tomorrow is the big day and some folks (like us?) are going to get hosed. One news report suggests the eclipse will cause traffic jams everywhere. I doubt that. I turn back to South Park before they can blame lunar cycles on Russian hackers who created impeachably racist orbital practices. Cartman seems to have a tighter grip on reality than CNN anyway. We have beer and twice as many eclipse goggles as we’ll need so I put a dent in the extra beer but can’t watch South Park through the goggles.

T -9 hours: It’s time!

T -8.75 hours: Fuck this. Snooze button.

T -8.74 hours: Mrs. Curmudgeon, who is a morning person, reminds me that it’s a celestial event. Nothing anywhere is more punctual than the orbit of the moon. This is all Newton’s fault! Him and his uppity Calculus are ruining my vacation day! I’m not a morning person. If I see a sunrise it’s because I was drinking the night before or about to shoot a buck. I only had a few beers and I’m not in a tree stand. As I crawl out of bed my back sounds like trolls stomping on bubble wrap.

T -8.50 hours: In the parking lot I take a sip of hotel coffee and hurl it on the pavement. What’s with shitty hotel coffee!?! Curmudgeon wants to kill! I take the wheel and point toward a coffee shop I visited for five minutes several years ago. I can’t remember my zip code but I have a mind like a steel trap when it comes to fishing holes and proper coffee. I navigate like a cruise missile and find it quickly. I’m pleasantly surprised when our little Honda squeezes into the parking lot. Last time I was here it was a hassle to maneuver the truck into their postage stamp sized lot. The joint is hipster territory but they do coffee well. I order from someone who looks like he could use a few weeks working in a hay mow. The coffee is excellent. I give him a huge tip. Urge to kill fading.

T -8.25 hours: On the road and (because Mrs. Curmudgeon anticipated my slow motion wake up procedure) on time. The teenagers are wide awake and chirpy. I’m tolerably conscious. Unfortunately, it’s very cloudy out.

T -4 hours: We’re in the middle of Bumfuck nowhere… my kinda’ place! If I had my stuff we could stop here and start a homestead. The land smells like cowshit and freedom. The harvesters are out. I fuckin’ love harvesters! Not for the first time in my life I wonder what kind of scratch it would take to start a career as a custom harvester. Would I make money or just slave away to make a John Deere payment? It’s still cloudy.

T -3 hours: We’ve passed from Bumfuck nowhere to further out. The clouds are thinning but not going away. I guess them to be cirrocumulus stratiformis but I could be wrong. They’re thin and the sun shines bright and hot. This might be OK. (Which is good because I can’t see any better alternatives to be had by shifting east or west.) There’s slightly more than virtually no traffic. My spidey sense thinks it’s eclipse people. Mrs. Curmudgeon doubts my observation. “How can three cars and a motorcycle mean ‘heavy eclipse traffic’?” I’m pretty sure the proper amount of traffic at this time and place is a haybine on Wednesdays.

T -2.5 hours: The skies are looking clearer, the sun is frying us in the car and we’ve got the AC cranked. Traffic has slowed from 75 to 60. I order a nagivational change and soon were on a smaller road. Still paved though. We’re making good time.

T -1.9 hours: I had a plan to hit the center of the Zone of Totality just before the beginning of the event but traffic is building again. We’re already in the zone but not at my designated target on the centerline. As I understand it… which is dimly because I’ve carefully avoided the press… there’s an hour plus of the sun getting eaten by the sky-dragon, then a few minutes of total eclipse, followed by an hour plus of the sky dragon barfing it back up. I want the whole show. We’re already within the zone of totality, which I take to mean we’ll see parts of the sun disappear and reappear but we’re not on the center line, which is where the real eclipse happens. (Clearly I didn’t do my homework on this.)

T -1.8 hours: Meatloaf! We pass a dusty, unremarkable, greasy spoon with a sign. “Meatloaf Monday”.

T -1.75 hours: A mile or so later the traffic comes to a halt. No shit! This is a tiny town that probably hasn’t had halted traffic since the first Model T scared the horses. Fuck this! Curmudgeons don’t do traffic jams! Everyone in the car agrees that the right, true, and proper way to handle this is go back to the meatloaf.

T – 1.70 hours: Back at meatloaf central I park in the shade. Traffic on the road has backed up this far already! It’s crawling. I suspect we could sit in an idling car and make the last few miles to the centerline in time but not with a time cushion like I’d prefer.

The huge parking lot is basically empty. One guy is there with a Jeep. He’s fretting over a smart phone. We strike up a conversation and he explains that everyone in the Zone of Totality will see the full monty. If we fight the traffic the last 6-8 miles the only reward is a longer duration of totality. That makes sense to me. He’s disappointed about lousy cell service for his data plan (I look around and think “we’re not at war, there’s electricity and meatloaf… that’s sufficiently civilized for reasonable men”). He shows me on his phone where we are and there’s a nifty calculation of durations. The last bit of traffic adds up to 30 seconds or less of “totality”. I glance at the lemmings on the road. This (still empty) dusty parking lot is good enough for me. Mrs. Curmudgeon and the teenagers are already in the cool of the restaurant. Meatloaf is a powerful draw among my people.

[Stay tuned…]

T -08 days: I have a plan, a hard-target, non-negotiable deadline imposed by the universe, and hotel reservations (I usually don’t do reservations to anything). Therefore, my truck, the Death Wobble Express, decides it needs an infusion of money.

T -06 days: I drop my truck off at a mechanic to install the n-th steering fluid hose. I leave it there all day. At the end of the day the mechanic calls and tells me the part didn’t arrive but he can keep it all week and through the weekend and then fix it on eclipse day. I thank him but immediately retrieve my big red security blanket. I might not sleep well knowing it’s beyond reach. If I have to I can use it in the meantime. Proper steering is for wimps.

T – 05 days: Mrs. Curmudgeon can’t get time off work. I sympathize. We’ve all been there. I’ll be sad that she’s not with us while I go fishing after the eclipse. The kids have forgotten there’s a trip. Mrs. Curmudgeon has a 5 pack of eclipse goggles (she somehow avoided the Gladys based shipping rigmarole). I had no idea she ordered them. That’s the sign of a great life partner! She assumed I’d fuck up (all women suspect their husbands are idiots) but instead of hassling me she just bought a spare set. When the zombie apocalypse comes she’ll have my back. (Or at least a few pounds of coffee I didn’t know she’d stashed.)

T -04 days: The press reports that hordes will descend on Madras, Oregon causing a shortage of herbal teas, hand carved bracelets, and patchouli. Also, the traffic will back up and cell phone towers will be overloaded. Therefore many thousands will surely die. (This confuses me. Smartphone withdrawal is fatal? Or is it traffic?) I ponder my target area of [Redacted], obviously a place where nothing happens. The local infrastructure could be overwhelmed by six families in minivans and a teenage girl on a cell phone. I decide to bring coffee, beer, and a can of Mountain House; just in case. Mrs. Curmudgeon can get time off work again. Huzzah! The kids have forgotten there’s a trip coming up and grunt noncommittally. I make arrangements for the dog and hurl some food on the lawn for the goddamn cats that refuse to die. I schedule a post on my blog with the wisdom of esteemed philosopher Dave Barry.

And that’s it. I’m done prepping. I’ve deliberately read virtually no press except to know where it’ll happen and when. I’d rather just experience whatever happens. I have no idea what an eclipse is like. Is it worth all this hassle? Secretly, I expect to get caught in traffic en route to an occluded rainstorm and be blamed for everything sucking from the time we leave until the time we return. Such is the risk of a family vacation.

[Stay tuned…]

T -12 days: Mrs. Curmudgeon reports God himself couldn’t get a hotel in that area. She also reports she is not a kid anymore and only idiots sleep on the dirt at our age. Plus, there are no open campsites so don’t even try to talk her into it. I’d been daydreaming of sleeping in the truck bed under the stars. I keep this to myself. The trip is back to the air-conditioned box I reserved in the land of tumbleweed and coyote shit.

T -11 days: Change in plans, I have to be in [Redacted] on [Redacted]. Too far to get there from eastern Oregon in the allotted time time.

Mrs. Curmudgeon, “So the trip is cancelled?”

Me, “Hell no, it crosses the continent, let’s go to [Redacted] instead.”

Later, I wonder if there was hopefulness in her voice when she said ‘cancelled’. I’m dense about such things. I shuffle hotel reservations to a different but carefully “wife approved” hotel chain. Once again it depends on my “super Voltron powered, ultra, mega, snob level, membership” in whatever data harvesting loyalty program some faceless monopoly has instituted.

T-09 days: No sign of the glasses. Yet the tracking number reports they’re already at my house. USPS has hosed me again!

T -08 days: I drive to the post office during its secret rotating schedule of being open for a 2 hour window on even numbered weekdays during months that don’t have a prime number for their last day and the reverse for months with even numbered last days… except for February on leap years which end in a prime number but everybody knows it represents the even number 28 so shut up and beg for your mail loser!

There I meet “Gladys” once again. She is really good at not delivering packages. We engage in the ritualistic dance of me getting weird packages and her disliking my very existence.

We’ve done this before. Whenever Gladys sees a package that looks “foreign” or has warnings about hazardous materials or (God forbid) is FedEx Smart Post (work of the devil!) she takes the cautious route of throwing it in the back room and refusing to think about it. Then I show up with a bad attitude and an internet tracking number that says “your shit has already been delivered”. I seethe until Gladys “unexpectedly” finds it in the “fear pile” which is exactly where she put the package in the first place. Then we smile at each other in a passive aggressive way and I leave mumbling about FedEx.

This particular package has German language on it. She’s in a time warp and probably thinks it came from the Kaiser. The exchange follows our pattern:

“Where’s the package?” I say.

“There’s no package for Curmudgeon” she insists.

I hand over a printout with the tracking number; including the false information that it has already been delivered. She doesn’t type the number into a computer or anything. She simply takes the paper into the back room and retrieves my package from the shelf where she put it. It takes her 40 seconds. I wonder how many things I’ve lost to the deadly shelf? She only looks in the back room if I have a paper trail and show up in person with the printout. Maybe there are spiders back there? She does this all the time. If it weren’t for FedEx I’d have moved by now!

She eyes the German language packaging like it’ll bite her (the English address is as clear as a bell). She doesn’t like strange squiggles from weird places. You should have seen her face the day I got a Baeofeng HAM radio direct from China. Today’s package is doubly scary because it has tariff stamps that look impressive and someone wrote ISO 12312-2 on the back in blue marker. This led Gladys to store it in the back room where they lock up distant ideas and strange technologies.

“So, what did you get from Germany?” She asks.

“Not sure. Stuff. I guess.” Teenagers have trained me in this type of answer.

She’s curious, “You sure get a lot of stuff.” (Last week I got chemicals that were properly shipped from a commercial supplier but came with labels like “don’t drink this shit” and “spill this on your cat and it will grow an extra tail”. Nope, I didn’t explain that to her either.) I suppose nobody else in town orders cool things?

“What’s it all for?” She prompts. (She’s fishing for gossip. Something like “that freak Curmudgeon got product X in the mail… he’s probably in a cult”.)

I shrug. “I’m a spy.” Then I slip out the door.

[Stay tuned…]