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Okay: so you have your new car which has a jack for an MP3 player, and you have your MP3 player that apparently holds tons of music, and now you can play endless Yanni or Madonna or Sibelius for hours in your car and life is good.

But…where does this music come from? Your own cds? Illegal scooping off the web? Do you buy the music off the web? Stick a microphone up to your turntable, drop the needle, and hit “record”?

Yeah, yeah, I hear all you technophiles snickering…but really: how does this all work?

A week or so ago, I finally did it: traded in the big beloved truck and drove away in a vehicle about half the size, if not smaller. The new car, a Honda Fit, gets more than twice the gas mileage of the truck; it’s a certified low emission vehicle (and I’m sure the truck wasn’t). The Fit (apparently known in Europe as the “Jazz”) is one of the cars which will soon be built in the new Honda plant in Indiana. Mine was built in Japan, one of two which sat last week in the lot in Richmond, Indiana. The salesguy on the Honda lot wove a long complicated tale about how hard it is to get a Fit out here in Indiana. I don’t know whether or not that is true, or part of a sales pitch. But it didn’t matter: one test drive of the Fit was the real selling point. It handles like a little sports car, responsive and quick, hugging the road, turning on a dime, going from 0 to 60 in about 9 seconds. And all that on a four-cylinder engine.

The Fit I drove home has only a few bells and whistles: a nice sound system, a gajillion cup holders, a groovy little spoiler which does what I have no idea, and most importantly a thingy where you can plug in your MP3 player. This will necessitate actually owning an MP3 player and understanding what MP3 is, of course…but that can come later.

For now, I’m enjoying the little car, the fun of driving it, the ease of parallel parking, and not least: knowing my environmental footprint is that much smaller.

Note to potential car buyers: While a larger and newer dealership in Richmond, Indiana, may boast a nail salon and a coffee bar to entertain you while you wait, I’d pass on all that in favor of the Honda dealership in Richmond which offers low pressure sales, fair and reasonable prices, efficient service. And no baloney.

Enormous thanks to the generous and patient Dennis at Deerfield Hosting for bringing back this blog from the brink of death.  The near death experience of all this writing was a little unnerving, but it did provide an opportunity to think about the ephemeral nature of blog writing.  When I thought all was lost, it really was, at least for a while, okay that all that writing might have been lost forever, gone wherever blog writing goes.  

More on all that soon…but for now: just thanks to Dennis.  Big thanks.

I took yesterday afternoon off and used the free hours to do errands.  Not exactly a holiday, but certainly a break in routine, and a lot of the errands were things that had been on a to-do list for a long time.  After running a bunch of assorted necessary errands, I stopped in at Goodwill.  This store is an acquired taste, I’m certain, but it’s one I’ve come to appreciate over the years.  And over the years, I have noticed that there are probably three kinds of people who go to our local Goodwill:

1. College and high school kids looking for weird cool cheap stuff to wear, usually for an event, usually on the very day they are shopping.  The college and high school kids shop in packs or pairs, exclaiming over their finds and modeling for each other in the aisles. 
2. Unrepentant Yankees like me, who revel in finding great stuff at cheap prices.  You can spot us by noticing that we look at the labels, and can often be heard muttering things like: Eddie Bauer.  Two bucks.  Awesome.  We usually shop alone, but sometimes we bring a similarly minded cheapskate friend, someone who speaks our language.  Awesome.  Wicked awesome.
3. The working, or not, poor, who come to Goodwill for bargains because bargains are what they can afford.  A new dress for a rapidly growing seven-year old costs two or three or four dollars at Goodwill, not twenty-five or forty at Dillard’s.  These folks usually shop in family groups — Mom, sometimes Dad, the kids in tow. 

In each of these groups of people, I’ve noticed a certain presence, or absence, of civility. 

1. The college kids are usually just having a good time, playing what is essentially dress up.  Sometimes, and I really get annoyed by these moments, sometimes I’ll hear a college kid, probably one from out of town who doesn’t really get the Midwest yet, if ever, say something snooty, like:  “Did you see this?  Oh my god, I can’t believe someone would actually wear this.”  The “this” usually being a pair of pink polyester pants with an elastic waist, or a windowpane plaid wool blend suit with killer shoulder pads, or rayon blouse with a big poofy tie.  Then the college kid and her — yes, it’s always a her — friends will snicker in a haughty, heavily ironic, smarter-richer-cooler than thou kind of way. 
2. The unrepentant Yankees are usually intent on getting the biggest bang for the buck.  We’re usually polite, happily and quietly puttering through the racks of clothes and stuff.   But we have been known to be a little impatient with the snickering out of town college kids, giving the evil Yankee eye and maybe even muttering something cranky.
3. The families are as families are: kind to one another, or seriously miserable, or some variation in between.  Happiness doesn’t seem to be a function of prosperity.  I’ve hung around the swanky purse section of Dillard’s, where purses cost the equivalent of a month’s rent in some parts of town, and observed some seriously bratty behavior, dysfunctional family dynamics, and just plain meanness in very well-heeled people.  Money doesn’t make you nice. 

But lack of money doesn’t make you nice either. Yesterday in Goodwill, I watched two little girls and their grandmother as they checked out.  The girls had saved their quarters and dimes to buy things that little girls like: a sparkly blue purse, a red and white dress, a little plaid skirt with pleats, picture books about dogs and fairies and cats.  It should have been a pleasant outing.  But it wasn’t.  Grandma snapped at the girls, telling them to hurry up, hush up, behave. From where I stood, they were behaving.  Like little girls excited about getting new stuff, like little girls carefully counting out quarters and dimes to pay their share, like little girls asking the same question over and over again: “Gramma can I wear my new skirt tomorrow?  Gramma can I?  Gramma?”  Grandma hissed: “Stop asking or I’ll take it away.”

Yeah.  You know?  Be nice Gramma.  Did you see your granddaughter’s stricken face?  She was trying really hard not to cry. And you did that. So be nice.  I don’t care how pissed off you are at having two girls in tow.  You are a grown up.  Be nice.  Be an example. 

And you college kids: you be nice too.  Stop snickering at what you think is beneath you, below you.  Did you know that the last place it’s acceptable to be a jerk is making fun of the poor? You wouldn’t make fun of the poor in a third world country.  Would you?  Well don’t do it here either.

And you Yankee bargain hunter: you be nice too.  And yes, you can still be annoyed at the grumpy, the haughty, the bratty.  Just be nice about it.

I’ve been told a few times lately that I really ought to check out YouTube more often.  Cool stuff on it and all that.  So, okay, it’s whatever time it is on Saturday morning, I’ve been up since I don’t know — four?  four thirty? — miserable with springtime allergies.  I’ve written, read my email, blown my nose a thousand times.  Needing distraction, okay, I take a look at YouTube.  Some silly stuff on the front page about pitbulls and baby chickens.  A snoring pitbull.  A pitbull wrapped in a blanket snoring.  Other goofy pet videos and innumerable assorted people doing forgettable dorky things.

Uh huh.  So far, I’m not impressed. 

But, okay, let’s give YouTube a chance.  Do a search for something interesting.  Let’s try, oh, horse.  Type this in, and a gajillion horse videos come up.  I click on the top one.  Oh cool.  It’s the 2006 World Equestrian games.  Even cooler, it’s Andreas Helgstrand and Blue Hors Matine, a nine-year-old Danish warmblood mare.  Check it out: LINK. Oh my, as the announcer says, “what a performance.”  Gorgeous horse, fluid and light.  What a pleasure to watch, even the swinging tail which could be interpreted as irritation (maybe) or happiness at the work (maybe that too).  And this performance puts them in first, of course, but then he is followed by Anky van Grunsven, and predictably, she sweeps the darn competition.  I don’t know about you, but I’m Anky-ed out; it’s almost too perfect, really.  And her horse lacks the fluid movement of Matine, who is really a more talented animal than Anky’s.  I think.  But you take a look: LINK

Well.  Here it is 45 minutes later, and I’ve watched the silly videos several times, surfed through a dozen other horse videos — Dancing Horse Dinner theatre anyone? — accomplishing little more than maybe picking up a hint or two of how I could ride a little better (okay: a lot better). 

But really, honest, there’s so much junk on YouTube.  A glance at the top viewed videos gets me, among others:  David Hasselhoff intoxicated, Flirting with a Gay Protester, Breaking up is Lame, Genie in a Wine Bottle.  Oy. I realize there is good stuff on YouTube.  Finding it, however, is a little time-consuming.  Call me old-fashioned, or probably just plain old, but I still would rather read a really good book.  Or, yes, see a well-crafted film.  Or, yes: write a good book or make a well-crafted film.  There you go.  I’ll just go do that, and let you tell me when something good crops up on YouTube. 

And then I promise I’ll watch it and say nice things.

Check out the latest on our Production blog: LINK