This morning I was reading the first essay in A Detroit Anthology edited by Anna Clark. The author, Aaron Foley, used one of those twitter abbreviations that I usually have to look up: TL;DR. Too long; Didn’t read. I like the semicolon in that. It occurred to me that I often write my disjointed essays here that are TL;DR even though I keep an eye on the word count and shoot for around 500 words in an entry.
It’s been a weird week. I have been thinking about retirement. My morale has been oddly low. Everything is going well. But I have been more glum than not. I can ascribe it to needing more time off. Also my ring finger on my right hand has been giving me trouble. It sort of locks up. It may be that eventually this is why I have to quit my church job. I think that will be easier for my boss to accept than just that I’m tired of it.
If my finger problems persist I will have to contact the hand guy again. Unfortunately, it’s my understanding that if surgery is the only way to address this it comes with a high risk of loss of function. I would rather not risk that, quit my job and continue to be able to play my piano (harpsichord?) and compose. I don’t think I would have problems finding things to do with my time that’s for sure.
But why in the world is this on my mind when I have a new beautiful instrument and a dream boss?
Eileen and I spent some time sitting by the channel at the State Park yesterday. I made up some tomato sandwiches and celery cream cheese sticks for myself. We stopped at Subway for Eileen to grab something. It was relaxing. I got some reading in. I’m on page 64/227 of Olio by Tyehimba Jess and loving it. It turns out that he hasn’t made anybody up, only fictionalized some fascinating people. Plus the poetry is excellent. He is a real craftsman.
I have proposed that Eileen and I do something this afternoon, either a State Park repeat or go see a movie or something.
This morning we are working on a lengthy task list which includes stopping at Gordon’s to buy ingredients for gorp for Sunday’s recital. We plan to serve it afterwards. Eileen wants to buy two more fans for the house. My clip on sunglasses are still at the Sight Eye Clinic.
Our task list has some other stuff on it that we will probably put off until tomorrow.
My mom has the same finger issue (as do I). She recently had surgery and now her finger is straighter and bendable still. If you have a hand guy telling you it may be a lost cause, might want to get a second opinion. Just FYI.
David J
I haven’t talked to him since this began happening. And it’s very sporadic. He was referring to the uDpuytren’s contracture that he diagnosed me as having. The finger may be connected to this.
TLDR is used to summarize something too long for people to read. For example, the the TLDR for Trump’s NYT interview is : “Holy Shit. he really has no idea about anything .” People often append TLDR to a thing they post on Facebook. Or someone could say, “Can I get a TLDR?” to ask you to tell them the salient points of a long article or email or whatever.
Interesting. This is helpful because Aaron Foley was probably using it like that in his article on Detroit. He said he was attempting a TL;DR regarding the city and its bankruptcy and its spirit.