“Recount” Bummed Me Out

The Memorial Day weekend was rolling strong and steady. Dodger game Friday. Errands and “Indiana Jones” Saturday. Then Sunday Susan and I rose early to drive out the 5 to the 126 all the way out to San Buenaventura to explore the town a bit and ride bikes along the awesome Ventura River Trail and back. I’m not one to rave about fastfood burgers but on the drive back home we stopped at Burger King and I couldn’t get enough of their new Angus Steakburger. Yumma.

We got back around 4 p.m. and a couple hours later I punched eight-year-old bruises watching Recount on HBO and yesterday was pretty much a bust in that I put out the flag and then was pretty much grumbling and grousing around the house rather than out on my bike riding out to Los Angeles National Cemetery and back as planned.

I managed to be somewhat productive. I got laundry done. I patched a flat on my mountain bike. I broke up and green-binned the quartet of fallen palm fronds that for whatever reason the gardeners didn’t touch. I cleaned up my singlespeeder — I even carved out a patch to plant the sunflower seeds I received last week as part of the Great Sunflower Project. Heck I also managed a late-inning sweep up of the backyard before Susan grilled us up a fine pair of porterhouses and we enjoyed Richard Widmark, Thelma Ritter and Jean Peters (and a young Richard Kiley!) in the highly recommendable 1953 Sam Fuller noir classic Pickup On South Street.

So it’s not like I just sat on my hands in some sort of paralyzed state as the World’s Angriest and Past-Dwelling Democrat, but the movie definitely took the wind out of my sails bringing back some bad memories on yesterday’s Memorial Day.