Dateline: Newport Beach, California 
Deconstructing Saturday. 
I slept in until people called from the East Coast regarding work, forgetting that there is a three hour time difference and it’s Saturday. 5 am is early but you play the cards as they fall.
The Japanese refer to a toilet as a “beni” — and the word for flower in Japan is “hana”. That being the case, I can’t understand why they gave the popular restaurant chain the name, “Benihana”. It’s Saturday and the youngest daughter (23) craved Japanese, if you please. And since I am not a fan of raw fish, we ended up at toilet flower for lunch, followed by a leisurely desert of trifle at Muldoon’s Irish Pub. 
For those of you who don’t know, trifle is my favorite desert. I like good trifle better than bad trifle, but even bad trifle isn’t all that bad. Muldoon’s trifle is excellent. Some prefer the sponge cake soaked in liquor. I find that the taste of alcohol overwhelms and prefer it without. Some of you will think that fake Japanese food, bathed in sodium, followed by an Irish desert of pure delicious carbs is a bit odd and may be unsettling. It wasn’t. 
Death Star Fire Pit
Since the weather was warm (temp 65), a walk on the beach worked. Keep in mind that there is a practical difference between walking on the beach wearing shorts and a swim in the water. 
As WoFat would point out to you, he thinks I’m crazy as a shit house rat for making my living jumping into cold water. Who am I to argue, but those were the days of my callow youth. Today, splashing my feet in the surf on a beautiful day in the warm SoCal winter was good enough.
Once at the beach, there is no reason to leave when the sun goes down, is there? (temp 58) But it’s better with a fire than it is without a fire. Better with good company than alone. Better with a light supper than going hungry. Better with live music being played by friends and singing along than sitting there mute.
I’m getting to the sermonette portion of this missive. Hang on. 
Now for the polemic: Doing something that you like, even if it is not doing anything constructive, is better than doing something that you don’t like. I realize that it’s not profound wisdom, but think of all of the people who do things that they don’t like because they feel that they “should” be doing it. I realize that we all have to do things to keep the ball rolling — but you have to examine your motives and need vs want. So the essence of this sermonette is that I don’t want you to “should” on yourself. Life is too short.
Life’s a beach.

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15 COMMENTS

  3. People who jump – at height – from perfectly functioning aircraft have lost an important part of their reasoning.

  7. Some of you know that I work in hot glass as a hobby. But when I retire for good, I will work in metal (and glass) from an artistic perspective. There are a number of cool fire pit projects, the Death Star being the most 'out there'. The price of metal is high, but scrap metal is another matter. I think I feel a blog coming on, but my favorite thing to do is make things out of old airplane parts. It's almost an obsession. Yes, it's very different than what I've done for a living — but art is what one does for one's soul.

  9. Oh, no kidding. And swimming at unhealthy depths finished whatever sanity that I possessed, which led to me becoming friends with you and Bill… I'm glad that you're feeling better, my old friend.

  12. That sounds like a lot of fun. Now I want to go to the pricey but decent Irish pub 'round the corner from here and celebrate Holy Family with the rest of the crew.

  15. Even a wet and blustery day on the beach is better than being hassled by TSA and sitting in the middle seat on the way from here to anywhere. Glad you arrived home safely.

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