A writer is a person for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people. - Thomas Mann

Now I remember, Thomas Mann is the one who wrote "Death In Venice". I have to go to the library and re-read that book. The scene on the beach when the guy is dying and he is literally melting under that beach umbrella is the image I get when our neighbors, Co-Cheese and Shim, sit outside in their plastic chairs under their plum tree drinking iced tea that they have on a little rattan table. I'm not close enough but I can imagine that Shim's make up is melting off in the sweltering summer heat. Co-Cheese on the other hand goes shirtless practically everyday and each day you can see he is getting skinnier and skinnier. When they first moved in and we became aware of his loooooooong arrest record I warned Samantha not to go around him but now I'm not worried at all, she could so take him.

Anyway I have to go to the library next week and return "An Inconvenient Truth" (after I watch it) so I think I will get "Death In Venice". I was # 175 on the waiting list when I put "An Inconvenient Truth" on reserve and it came in last Friday. I have not had any time to watch it because John's dad and his wife are in town this week. Now that John Sr. is retired they can spend unlimited time traveling around the country in their RV. This week they are at an RV park across from the fair grounds for a car show. John Sr. is always fixing up some sort of old car, then selling it and starting on a new one. This time he has a 1972 Dodge Demon with him for the show.

I find the RV park totally fascinating. Yes, I am quite easily amused. This RV park is different than the one he stayed in last year. That on had people like John Sr. with their big fancy RV's as well as people who lived there and people who summered there. I half expected to hear banjos as we drove in to visit him. I made John Jr. drive really slow so I could look at everything. But this RV park has 95% car show people who have really fancy RV's and 5% banjo slinging carnies workers. When John Sr. got there he was the 2nd one to arrive because he got here early to visit with us for the week before the show. The other inhabitant was Sweetness as we will call her. Sweetness, her husband and their dog live in their van in the RV park for 6 months out of the year and then spend the other 6 months in Florida working as carnival workers. When I said van I really meant van... it's like a 1980 Ford Econoline van... There is no bathroom so they have one of those green rented port-a-potties out back and it has no kitchen so they have a table with various kitchen elements set up out front. There is a kiddie pool, a rug of fake grass and various chairs and stuff around the van and this is how they live. Fascinating. Oh Oh, I forgot to mention the golf cart and the hover-round motorized wheel chair. (I think the whole disabled thing is more of an overweight thing than an actual handicap.) Then there is the dog. He is a beautiful Golden Retriever with the cleanest, fluffiest fur. Very very strange. There are also some other make-shift RV's with carnival workers but I lost interest in them after seeing the sea of really fancy RV'S. These "car people" go all out on their RV's which range from a couple hundred thousand dollars to the million dollar ones. And, they all have trailers in which they pull their cars. I call these their garages. So, it's like this whole sort of sub-culture. We've spent some time there visiting John Sr. and his wife, Lita this week and I am totally into the whole RV thing. I don't think I would want to travel that way but visiting is way fun. We usually sit out front on the "veranda" in lawn chairs and then we take a walk and check out everyone's cars.

Yesterday Samantha spent the day with grandpa and Lita while I worked in the morning and John Jr. went to Cleveland. When I picked her up I sat and watched 2 guys polishing the one guy's car. It took them over an hour (after an hour I lost interest) and other guys would come by and watch for a while. Then we watched other people doing RV things. One couple had a huge TV that pulled out from the under belly of their giant RV and others had kiddie pools and patio lights and flag poles.

John Jr. went to Cleveland yesterday like I mentioned. He went to a police expo to with some other officers to check out some new equipment. Well, on the way down they all fell asleep. Yup, all of them. Thank god nothing bad happened. Although, he was "on duty" so I would have gotten the big payout. You know, more than if he bites it falling off a ladder in the garage at home or something. I do have help lined up though if that happens... all we have to do is dress him in his uniform, drive him into work and plop him in a police car.

Now on to something cheery: Susan said she read in a travel magazine about a vacation to China where you can hug a real panda. You get to HUG it! Oh my god, I am so saving up for that, screw Samantha's college fund. She can do a loan or something, I'm going to China to hug a panda! I think this trip is going to the top of the list where Mongolia had been, yup, pandas here I come!

Mom and Dad are coming this weekend to visit and Mom said today that she want to go to church on Sunday. She said she wouldn't be mad if I decide I don't want to but that she wants me to consider it. Well, that is so not true. She will be furious if we don't go. It's not so much church that I don't want to go to, it's being forced to do something because she thinks I should. Going to church does not make one more spiritual than another and I don't want to go.The church right next to our neighborhood has a "drive-in" service where the service is broadcasted on the radio. I wonder if that counts. I suppose I will have to find a service somewhere to attend on Sunday because I really want to go to Lily Fest and Mom doesn't. Well, if I go to church, you go to Lily Fest. Lily Fest (www.lilyfest.com) is wonderful. It is on the most beautiful site in the Hocking Hills and the art is very very good.