Cleaned My Keyboard

            On Monday morning I was trying to post “J’suis snob” by Boris Vian on my Christian’s Translations blog but the text was showing in different sizes. It’s probably because I originally copied the French lyrics from a site and the html for the different text sizes was written underneath even though it was formatted a certain way on my document. There would be too much to adjust by simply changing the html bit by bit and so I just deleted everything and pasted the text directly into the html. That way it comes out in a generic block of text that I have to adjust from scratch by adding indents and italics all over again but this way would not take as long.

            I started memorizing “Oh mon amour baiser” (Oh my love to kiss or Oh my love to fuck) by Serge Gainsbourg. It’s basically a chanted list of different ways of kissing and body parts to kiss. It probably won’t take me long to learn it.

            I didn’t have time to wash my desk but I did clean my monitor and my keyboard. For the keyboard I used alcohol on paper towels and a toothbrush so it would evaporate quickly and washed it upside down and vertically so the liquid wouldn’t seep in. It didn’t seem to damage any of the keys other than to totally erase the letter “e”, which was almost gone anyway and part of the “r” and the “t”. But I still know where the “e” is because it’s the one that was e-rased.

            Seagulls one by one fly off the Dollarama roof heading for the sky as each of their shadows plummet like lemmings over the edge and smash into the concrete before sliding their flattened bodies after their flying masters.  Bird shadows never fly at noon.

            I had the salmon jerky that I got from the food bank for lunch. It was okay but nothing special.

            I did some exercises and then took a bike ride to Bloor and Bathurst, south to Queen and home.

            I worked on my journal.

            I had three potatoes, a sautéed orange pepper and onion, a re-heated steak and some gravy for dinner while watching Wagon Train. This story had an interesting story and an interesting mood.

            It begins with a man named Les Rand being released from prison after seven years and is heading for his home of Little Fork, Nebraska. Meanwhile in the wagon train the cook, Charlie is injured when a wagon falls on him. Flint heads for the nearest doctor, who is in Little Fork. After two days Flint reaches the town he finds the few townsfolk hanging out in the saloon. They are not very friendly or helpful about finding the doctor. They say Doc Rand is away on his rounds and could be gone two days or two weeks. At first they say that he should go back to the wagon train and they would send the doctor out there when he gets back but then suddenly Ray Tarback, the owner of the saloon changes his mood and tells Flint that maybe he should stay after all. They give him a room tired from two days in the saddle he goes to sleep. The next morning he gets up and finds the whole town abandoned. A rider approaches and it’s Les Rand returning home. Flint and Les have breakfast together and Les casually tells him that he’s come to kill the doctor. It seems that the citizens of the town knew that Les had been released and they figured that since Flint needed the doctor and Les wanted to kill him, there was a chance that if they cleared out their dirty work would be done for them if Flint were to kill Les. Despite the fact that they know they may have to fight when the doctor returns, Flint and Les remain friendly. The only friendly citizen of Little Fork, Evie Tarback rides into town with a little boy named Mike Rand. Les is indifferent to the child but Evie reveals to Flint that Mike is Les’s son and that the doctor is Les’s father. He blames his father for the death of his wife Akiya. The rest of the townspeople come back. Ray’s wife Lottie begins to verbally attack Les. He is indifferent until she refers to his “Indian squaw” and then Les slaps her. Les gets too drunk and Flint helps him to the doctor’s house. When Les wakes up he meets his son Mike and they talk in a friendly way but he doesn’t tell him he’s his father. We learn that Akiya died giving birth to Mike after Les was sent to prison for murdering one of the Tarback boys. Les’s father and Evie have been taking care of Mike and fixing up the homestead that Les had started with Akiya. The doctor arrives in town and is warned that Les wants to kill him but he doesn’t believe he will. The doctor had been an alcoholic throughout Les’s childhood and was drunk the night he tried to save Akiya but hasn’t touched a drop since then. Les still blames him and is angry that he’s no longer a drunk. He wants to see him drunk before he kills him but his father refuses to take a drink. Vie tells the doctor to tell Les what really happened. One of the Tarback boys draws a gun but Flint shoots him. The doctor tells Les that he had sheltered Akiya against the wishes of the bigoted Tarback family. One day when he was out hunting they came and beat her ad drove her off. The doctor found her in a field where she gave birth and died. While the doctor is telling the story the Tarback family hightails it out of town. Les stays and it looks like he’s going to be with Evie and Mike.

            Evie was played by Sally Brophy who became an acting teacher at Rider College in Princeton.

            Lottie was played by Linda Watkins, who was an acclaimed stage and radio actor but didn’t get much work on the screen until television.