22-XI-2024.
Yesterday, after lunch (sarma, fourth day!) she made me take a nap, because I got very little sleep the night before, and when I woke up, I completely forgot to go and pick those bills... In the evening we tried the first tutifruti of the year and nope, not ready for prime time, needs to sit more, as if the fig is in the way, retry after new year. Poured apple... In the morning, it was the genuine november shit of a weather, single digit temperature, wind and persistent rain. Okay, by 11 the wind stopped, so I went, by car this time, and lifted [cash] again and picked up those bills - the lad already had the envelope in hand when he saw me coming.
After the nap I saw it white outside. Could it be the first snow of the year? (nope, there was some token cover last winter, just to fill the formality). Well, have a nice štamarenje (v. house dictionary), it's been a while since I last drove on snow. Around that time Lena called, so we saw Tanja, and we wouldn't ever be the wiser had not Milan suggested „and if you took a sick leave?“. Then she said how she started having fits of rapid hartbeat, it was actually her coach in the gym who suggested she should just quit the works and check her thyroid gland. Seems to be she was not the first with those symptoms. Then we analyzed the circumstances and arrived, as per dr Hamer, to it being caused by the next big dilemma, baby vs work. Because she's due to return to work next week, and the nanny has some training course in the mornings, so she can come only in the afternoon, and that will stay so whole month, what now, how to attend the meetings at the office and be there when baby needs something. And our perfectionist can't allow herself to do a shoddy job on anything, so what now.
Going to a [live] theatre tonight... At half seven Borče calls to see when to draw himself at Dragana, I said 19:23. How precise you are, just like my grandson... Well I know all the routes by heart, know my timing. And in this winter we better be precise than have to wait, it always blows around Lesnina, that's where it blows when it blows nowhere. That is, it blows around the corner, while five meters away you just get in the lee of the shop window and you're fine. And they waited perhaps for two minutes, because I got snafu'd by the lights at the cemetery, there was a bus in the queue, which made it too long to just run out and drive by it to reach the left lane. Which one nutcase behind me actually did and got away with it.
Commented during the ride how the new novogradnja on the lot which belonged to that guy from VIII2, I took a shot last summer as they razed it, tore down the house and kotarka, and now it's up to the sixth floor and needs only the insides done. And what's the matter with shoving a multistorey between the low houses, all of a sudden a fence isn't enough, now you have fifty first neighbors who can peek into your yard from above on a whim. Dragana said that this will face her terrace straight, but then it won't matter - there's the trees of the park between them and she ain't walking naked through the apartment. But there's one on Bagljaš, on some sixth or eighth floor, who really got sloppy, god forgot when she passed above 80 kilos, looks like nothing, and when the heat hit she undressed into just a slip and bra. Her husband said she could ease down with the experience, and she „well yeah sure half of Bagljaš jerks on me“.
We dropped the ladies by the Dom and went to park behind the gimnazija, bare 100m away. By the time we made them, I realized that I was breathing a bit faster. I walk fast, but he's crazier. So I didn't even join them for the last cigarette before the show, we just went inside. Of course, it didn't being exactly on time, they opened the auditorium at 19:55, and it takes at least 20 minutes to get in and find their seats. She said she saw Joška, carrying some papers, passed him in the crowd at the entrance.
The „Tears are okay“ show. I have no clue who the author is and since when is the text, if it's american (easily possible), its transplantation passed swimmingly. Tanja Bošković plays and old singer, forever a backing vocal on the radio, a boozer, striving to look fuckappealing, the Beth Davies on steroids, and doesn't try much for any showbiz success, for her it suffices to be heard by her poet, of which she always has one at hand, and the plot follows her final months with the latest specimen.
Two matters. First, this is not a theatrical space, I couldn't hear half of the dialog, and heard someone three rows ahead of us also complain of it. This needs mikes and amps, it's such a building, the echo comes only from back of the stage and the sides, everywhere else there's carpet, no wood. And the actor playing the young poet should learn to pronounce the consinants audibly, I had most trouble understanding him.
Second, Tanja Bošković. While it's true that she's over seventy and still looking well, but no big deal. That's my daily nadscape, and as the joke went, that one of ours is prettier. I made no shots during the show, only before and after. We split by 23:00, drove them home alright, then we had a shot and a half and hit the hay.
Five rows ahead of us there was Sredljak with [his] wife. Her I never saw, but my lady knows her from youth, that's Groš, walked by her house every tim she went somewhere. We made them while exiting, and there he got quite confused when she addressed him first. He didn't recognize her (who knows if he ever saw her, and how many years ago was that), neither did his wife, so he was out of sorts for a few seconds until we three came into the frame and brought context.
On saturday, 23rd, did nothing much all day. Charged the battery for eos70, will need it... Because that evening too we went to Dom, this time for a concert of zrenjanin filharmony [orchestra]. Borče picked us around 19:30, then we swung by Dragana. The tickets were free, and he picked them when he was buying the theatre tickets (which cost 1500 apiece). Well, if there were some thirty vacant seats, now there were almost a hundred, but this still counts as a full house.
While we smoked the last one by the entrance, I saw some nice chick being happy to see me, while not quite sure it was me, and I didn't recognize her at first either - Zina!. Then it was time to go in, so we just greeted briefly, and with her father as well.
The sound is phenomenal, even the late jaybieell couldn't conjure it. Well maybe it could, had I ever dialed it loud enough. There it was, heard all the instrument. Okay, out of some fifteen violins one discerns perhaps two or three different tunes, but I heard distinctly even the triangle and the xylophone. The young flutist, ouch, excellent and she even looked excellent. To spread on bread for breakfast and supper. I specially liked that they played Beethoven's seventh (and why did I think it was the first, specially as I know the first movement by heart).
During the break the ladies went out for a smoke. I left my jacket on the seat, didn't feel like going out into the chill, rather used the time to gloss over the exhibition - DC-99 still riding strong. Joška had lots of his works exposed, and so did a few of old members or their offspring. Brlja had one, with just a commendation. Škrba had one, with the northern star sky twisted by some 30°... though, I'll have to ask him how he did that, that's about two hours of exposition, and the traces of the stars are thinner on one end... I emailed him the question the next day, and a shot of how his shot was displayed, with the tag on which there was the only typo in the whole room, he came out as Grdivoj. Meanwhile the girls met Zina again, and she asked whether she can get her photos from my archive, she fondly remembers my mom and dad and has no photos with them. Okay, deal, send me an email to send you the link when I put them together.
Got home as early as around ten, so I had the time to process both days' shots, and put together this autopatch... just had to try that, and I like how it turned out. And we had time for saturday entertainment, until unknown hour. We're quite at ease with using the privilege of having no must dos, so we get up when we get up.
On sunday we buzzed around house, doing more or less nothing. I patched the bug in mrz, so it doesn't get into a loop when looking for the next song after an error (just as I thought, I forgot to turn the timer off when such an error occurs, and I set it to fire on 140 milliseconds, so if by that time it didn't start playing the next one, it fires again and still reports the same error on the same song... until it starts the next one faster than that). It still happens once or twice a day that it simply stops; click on next and it plays for hours again. I'll have to try to catch the errors in the events of the player itself. Fun for the whole winter.
In the evening, just when we poured that apple, turned off the monitors and the light, Go called. The last call from the yellow house, we guess. The move is by and large commencing. Stanley sold another car, and the grand Toyota is off the table in a few days. He even found the time to work on the incredible Bentley, showed us his phone again to see what it's like, what a contraption of tubes and hoses, as if designed by Giger. The textbook example for „maam, whom did you have do this“. He's taking this week off, so they'll move beds and kitchen in the end, then into a fresh start. Neša was, of course, in his „do not move me“ state, feels like going nowhere, but at least this time he came into the frame so we could see him, stayed almost three minutes.
Monday. Lena is back at work. Got a raise, just the annual catch up with the inflation. Asked her how it was, said same as before, as if she didn't pause. Good, may it stay so. Later we recalculated that raise, turns out it's about equal to our pensions taken together.
Sent to Sredljak both shots where I had him, he said „Have no time now, am cooking. Tomorow I'l consultanc with my lawyer“. Replied „If he wants to buy the pictures, charge him at least three times more than I charged you“. Eh, when were those times when my photography had a cost to it, and the crowd was ready to order and pay. Since it went digital, I'm not charging at all.
In the afternoon, Linda and Sanda called, so we chatted for a while. Mom's at work, Alisha is still present daily, Mark is by the desk in the bedroom, working, Violet had her hair cut short, only of the brother we heard nothing. And, ah, yes, Mark's cat is also named Linda. I asked who responds if someone calls, said „if it's Mark calling, cat comes, otherwise we both“.
On tuesday I have more or less (discounting for a three hour nap after lunch, the excellent cardiological gulaš with, of course, our noodles and fresh pickles from rasol) read the documentation and code in various places, to see how to have a popup in the mrz on the rightclick. Turned out I need not do that at all, it's already a part of the Dabo, just need to fill the ready empty method to add the lines into the popup and bind them to code to run on selection. Put just one line so far, bound it to the same code that reacts to the „stop!“ button, and it worked right away. All the kudos to Ed Leafe, Paul McNett and John Fabiany, you got your drinks waiting, boys.
By dusk, as usual, Lena called, so we saw Tanja as well. She really grew big... or is it that we got used to those two being so small in their first year. And she's lively, the little legs never at peace, wants to stand, straight if not quite upright, and doesn't try to keep balance, but when offered two index fingers, grabs them and pulls up to lift herself, all ready, body stiffened... The thyroid thing, maybe the hormone permeates into milk, influencing Tanja, she's quite restless, and the endocrynologist said he can't do a thing while she's brestfeeding, she'd rather just rest, this phasa usually lasts just a couple of weeks, it happens often after pregnancy, and is usually followed by a few months of hypothyreosis, relaxation. We have a coffee can full of lemon balm, to make tea of, it helps. We have it growing by the tap in the old house, and have a bush of it by that motorcycle in the back yard, can't be lacking.
Just as I wrote this, so I remembered that I wrote nothing about that motorbike, i.e. moped, so found when was that and how it ended and why is it sitting there in the corner for eleven years now and why don't we ride it. And added the story here.
In the night between 29th and 30th I didn't feel like sleeping again. I went to bed around half three, full of hope that I was tired enough, at least in the head as I did nothing physical all day (i.e. I troubled myself with mrz for a while, why does it always begin with the zeroeth song on the list, which in this ordering is some Šostakovič's symphony, and then switched to watching stupid fail videos, the revenge of ay students upon the dummies who know no physics and keep falling, starting grease fires which they don't know how to stop), and I almost got myself sleeping... until the moment when I wasn't. Stayed relaxed in bed but didn't sleep and then gave up by half six. Got up, washed [my] face, ate a cube of gužvara (pretty much like gibanica but with the dough mostly wrinkled, from a new recipe which she picked from the yoochoob bible) and the last pancake (the pekmez we can't possibly guess what is made of, it hints to blackberry and figs, there are seeds of both but it doesn't resemble either by taste, which is uncanny). In the pause of the concert, when she went out for a smoke with Dragana, the latter's cigarette went out at the time when the former's was just one third gone. I tried to measure the time before sleep, but I let my phone fall asleep, which then also pauses the stopwatch, so the four minutes it measured was just wrong. This morning I took to measuring the length of a cigarette while keeping the phone awake, touching it at times... result, seventeen minutes. Wow.
And then a video arrived, of Linda and Sanda dancing in circle in the study, which was empty. There was something on the floor, leaving a three inch margin around itself, and the cables were raised up the shelf. Mark standing to the side and watching. It seems they are using the black friday weekend to make that room their common study, as by the new year she will also be working from home, and the plan to make a study in that room in the garage seems to be postponed. We'll hear about it when we hear about it.
Mentions: DC-99, Dom omladine, Dragana Vitas (Dragana), eos70, gibanica, gimnazija, Gorana Sredljević (Go), Goran Staković (Brlja), Gradivoj Sredljev (Sredljak), Gradivoj Škrbić (Škrba), Groš, house dictionary, Jelena Sredljević (Lena), Joška Apro, Lesnina, Linda Sredljevich Aquilla (Linda), Mališa Borkovski (Borče), Mark Anderson, Milan Nastić, mrz pladžer, Nenad Berger (Neša), novogradnja, pekmez, Sanda Sredljević Aquilla (Sanda), sarma, Stanley Berger, Tanja Nastić, tutifruti, VIII2, Violet, Zina, in serbian
23-XI-2024 - 16-IX-2025