Casa Del Pavos

It's snowing in Cincinnati, and tonight the wife and I are making the drive back East in a four-wheel-drive pickup truck for a holiday with the family.

With the move into a new (old) home I've been occupied with the finer points of home maintenance and furniture assembly. These activities are timesinks, and everything else is has become secondary - my relationships, career, weblog, even my half-assed fitness routine. Now I wander the house in search of a tiny plastic baggie that contained obscure, irreplaceable screws and bolts that are necessary to finish the Scandinavian-style bunk beds. The baggie cannot be found. The retailer has been contacted. The parts can be ordered but at great price. I imagine some fjord-side blacksmith in a frosty hut. He's cursing in Finnish and pounding out tiny scraps of metal while the International FedEx truck idles expensively outside.

In other news some neighborhood kids offered to rake my yard. They were about 10 or 12, one with a gigantic afro that added about a foot to his otherwise-smallish stature. They raked until they ran out of lawn bags, got paid, and disappeared. One small corner of my yard is still covered with leaves but I don't really mind. I'm always eager to encourage young capitalists and act neighborly. On my street we've also discovered theology professors, several families with different varieties of children, and, er, volleyball coaches. It's a natural diversity that isn't pre-ordained, and it's been the character of this neighborhood for many years. The bells ring at the Presbyterian church on one side and the Catholic church on the other.

Happy Thanksgiving to all you readers. Reflect, for a moment tomorrow, on the multitude who are in need.