you are simply striking

There is something about drinking dry champagne that is less like drinking and more like trying to quench something other than thirst. I think about what made someone bottle those first bottles in France so long ago, what made someone come up with the concept of wine or beer or whiskey in the first place. I like to know the source of things. The whys.

I'm really an outdoor girl at heart. I fell in love the first time at a place called Pine Hills. It was a nature preserve, basically untouched at the time, where you could hike backbones and ridges all day, but had to be out at night. There was a stream in Pine Hills that you could follow up to its source... a spring bubbling out of the side of the Indiana Limestone. Felt like going back in time.

Now my outdoor locale of choice is always a beach. I'm not a sun worshipper, I just need the water. And the woods seem so far away these days. Hard to climb to the source of streams with knees like mine. They are getting stronger though. Soon.

I started to look up the history of the seven dirty words, because I wanted to type them all out and add the term "alternative minimum tax" right there with them. But then the seven dirty words aren't all that dirty anymore, so that took the fun out of that little tantrum.

I don't feel like I've stretched myself with words for weeks, and it is necessary to get back to them. For one think I've got deadlines coming up that I want to meet, and for another I feel less detached when I write. It's good to loosen up here, because some of the junk gets out of the way and then I can proceed. I like that word. Proceed. The judges say that when you've won a point of law… but I also was always fond of the phrase "move to strike" which takes whatever language offended you as litigant from the record. I always want to use it in conversations when people say something that just isn't good. "I hate that person" "move to strike" "he's a fat slob" "move to strike" "she sure bumbled that opening" "move to strike!"

Anyway, time to proceed.