Thoughts distract from real life

Time sure flies. July is half over already. The spring rains have never stopped.

Every day I read about another community where the lakes and rivers are exploring new territory as they flow well beyond their usual boundaries. The hurricanes and tropical storms have already begun scouting out locations to determine where they can do the most damage. 

In addition to weather abandoning its usual patterns, the places that we expect to be warm are cold, the places that should be cool are hot. Alaska is posting record highs. Heat loving deadly animals such as snakes are moving farther north, sparking television shows that feature crazy, I mean brave,  people catching snakes that are longer than the men are tall.

Speaking of crazy people leads me to comment on the plan to storm an Air Force base in Nevada to look for aliens. This is supposed to be an act of satire. Satire is defined by Merriam Webster as “a literary work holding up human vices and follies to ridicule or scorn” or “trenchant wit, irony, or sarcasm used to expose and discredit vice or folly.” In other words, the organizers realize that the chance of aliens actually being at Area 51 is practically zero. Plus, they aren’t really suggesting that people storm the base.

If there actually were aliens there, I’m sure they would have been moved to a secure location prior to the upcoming event.

When I was younger and lived in the Dayton, Ohio area we had our own rumors about aliens. They were said to be held at Wright Patterson Air Force Base. The exact location varied, as personnel were said to have moved the remains of the aliens frequently.

Yes, I said remains. It seems that the Ohio aliens weren’t alive. They were stored in freezers and experimented on. I remember that whenever the newspaper sent out a reporter to investigate the creatures and found nothing it was because the personnel would have moved them to somewhere the reporter did not have access to.

My uncle Don worked for the post office at Wright Pat. He never saw any aliens. Then again, he may have been sworn to secrecy.  Anything is possible.

With all the diversity of life on earth, what makes us believe we would recognize extra terrestrial life if we saw it? The variety of sizes and shapes of ocean dwellers look nothing like us but every concept of alien life form I have ever seen follows the basic design of a person. One head atop a body with two arms at the top and two legs at the bottom. Extra arms and legs are optional but rare.

Entertaining thoughts of aliens is a lot more fun than dealing with real life. Real life involves taking almost an entire bag of cat treats over to the neighbor’s house because Gracie has decided she no longer likes that flavor. Real life is finding a very capable kid to cut the lawn. Thankfully, it only took one phone call. Real life has ups and downs, small victories and small defeats. It is being unable to remember someone’s name until two days later. It is loving the sound of thunder and rain while hoping that it doesn’t add too much to already full waterways.

Real life is cringing at the commercials for candy or hearing aids while knowing that the ads last less than a minute. Real life is panicking at the realization that book club is tomorrow and the book remains unread. Time is flying by and I have a book to read.