Howard Hughes with Hugh Heffner. They have nothing in common except celebrity and the HH. Liza Minelli and Judy Garland. I know which one is which but Judy is stuck in my head as a child and Liza is stuck in my head as an old woman. I have to think about it to remember who bore whom.

The phone for the remote control. Not often. But sometimes. And then I’m confounded when the phone won’t change the channel.

I chronically sleep in. That’s why I have two alarm clocks. And when I first get up, I never know which one it is and I always, or almost always, turn the wrong one off.

Browns and greens. I am color deficient. It used to be called color blind. It’s a peculiar quality, I suppose, in someone who paints. I have a friend, a very good friend, who sings in a band. He only hears out of one ear.

The days of the week. I work from home. Days blend into each other much of the time.

Leftwing; rightwing. Liberal: conservative. Red; blue. All political labels. I have lived a long enough life paying some attention; and I still get confused about political labels. It defies reason. But there it is.

American and Canadian spelling. I use “color” here even though I prefer “colour”. I use “neighbor” here although I prefer “neighbour.” I don’t confuse those. I confuse words that might take an 壮’ or a 想’. Like self-aggrandize. I sent a manuscript once to an American publisher and they sent me a rejection letter in which they had clearly gone out of their way to amend a form letter to indicate that I should learn how to spell. Americans. P’ah. I’m not convinced I’ve spelled P’ah correctly.

The verb to wake. I woke up. I had woken up. See. Spell and dream. Is it 選 dreamt’ or 選 dreamed’? Is it 選 spelled’ or 選 spelt’? I’m never really sure.

Affect and effect. I used to teach the difference when I was an ESL teacher in Korea and in Ecuador. But I still can’t sort them out.

The Dutch masters.

Murphy. I put my head under a blanket on the couch and she can’t find me. Many seeing-eye dogs are Labradors.

Although there are not many, people from my youth who were formerly assured that I would be by now some combination of: a writer, a lawyer, rich, famous.

But never ever, good sir, my ass from a hole in the ground.

SS