Bits and Bobs, Part Deux

[wayfaringwordhack]

Thanks to a comment by asakiyume, I remembered some more of what I wanted to post.  My brain disappointed me by not forking over the info without an external prompt.

3.  I have a very morbid mind. Every time I'm walking or riding my bike in a wooded area and come across bits of clothing or shoes, I always imagine there is a murder victim nearby. The worst is when the articles belong to children.  I try to stop myself--and have gotten better the past couple of weeks because there are a lot of lost/discarded clothes*--but I always have to do a quick search to make sure there really isn't an undiscovered corpse in the bushes or beneath the ferns. I don't want to find a dead body, but I always think it would be better to find it and alert the authorities, who can contact the family and end their agonizing over the Unknown.

4. Some people name packrat** tendencies "having a magpie mind." A magpie mind is poetic and evokes lovely images for me, but I can't claim to have one because I don't just collect the shiny. No, I'm more like the rat, packing things--any and everything--away for its someday potential. That is why I've decided to collect the dryer lint that no one else can be bothered to take from the machine.***  There are lots of things you can do with dryer lint.  I may end up giving it to the birds, but at least I'll feel like I'm doing something useful with it, transforming my irritation at people's sloth into positive action.

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* To date, I've seen not only expected things like gloves, hats, scarves, but a rubber boot, jackets, sweaters, socks, button-down shirt, pants, a skirt...

* Actually, packrats collect shiny stuff, too. :P

***I'm still appalled at how beastly people act when they are living in a community. I'm not the world's neatest person, but you can bet your bottom dollar that as soon as I'm part of a collective, I make an effort!  Not so for a lot of the others residing here. I can't believe they are so thoughtless with their own property in their own homes; yet here, they feel free to leave things a mess and disregard anyone else's needs, comfort, or safety. Very bizarre.

Re: the music I was listening to while making this post, Soëlie started doing her bobbing baby dance when the Pearl Jam song came on.  It took me back to the days when I was a little girl, sitting with my mom, grandmother, and eldest sister in said sister's room, listening to the version of  Last Kiss by J. Frank Wilson and the Cavaliers.  I loved to cry to that song.  In looking up a YouTube link, I found a Spanish version that reminded me of my first trip to Jaurez on a mission trip to an orphanage when I heard some then-popular USA song on the radio playing in Spanish. It opened my teenage mind to the way things cross borders--not just food!--and cultures appropriate and transform them for their own.  And it is not just USA entertainment exported elsewhere. Did you know the Schwarzenegger film True Lies was a French film first?  One without all the over-the-top effects. :P 

Comments

[frigg.livejournal.com]

So weird with the clothes. A glove or a scarf yes, but jackets, books, skirts, and pants? I would be looking for the victim as well!

[mnfaure.livejournal.com]

You are my pea!

[frigg.livejournal.com]

And your pea just noticed that she wrote "books" instead of "boots", but yes, if someone had left their book, that would be a sure sign of something wrong as well. Bwhahahaha.

[mnfaure.livejournal.com]

:)) I didn't even notice.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

I like the idea of spinning the dryer lint into new yarn--it can be an eternally renewed resource :-)

(actually, I always liked dryer lint as a kid, especially when it was dyed by a non-colorfast garment)

[mnfaure.livejournal.com]

Yeah, yarn is what I would like to do with it, but since we are leaving the apartment soon and don't have a dryer ourselves, I doubt I'll ever have enough.

[frigg.livejournal.com]

If you want to spin dog-fur, I have a good supply. ;)

[mnfaure.livejournal.com]

*lol* Wellllll, don't YOU need another project.

[frigg.livejournal.com]

nooo, I don't. :p

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

That was one of my mother's best friend's war stories (I mean, literally: her story of World War II.) She was Danish and talked about how, during the war, they spun and knitted dog hair to stay warm.

[frigg.livejournal.com]

Some Danes are still doing it. :)

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Once you try a doghair sweater, there's no going back to wool?

[frigg.livejournal.com]

lol...I wouldn't know, since I never tried one, except for the vast amount of hair shedded on me by the dog, but rumour has it that the fishermen of old preferred dog hair mitts over wool mitts.

[mnfaure.livejournal.com]

Wow. I wonder how hard that is to do...

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Yeah, we don't have one either, so I never see dryer lint anymore....

[mnfaure.livejournal.com]

I've asked my mother-in-law to save hers for me, but she hardly ever uses her machine. :P

[renakuzar.livejournal.com]

My wife has been wanting to collect lint for years, it is so soft. It has been one of the few things that I've begged her not to do.

[mnfaure.livejournal.com]

*lol* And why don't you want her to do it?