'I Want Your Sex'

I wonder how it went down. The sex on the road thing, I mean. It was a striking coincidence that I should find a pair of Playboy sleep pants and a Durex condom wrapper within a few feet of each other while George Michael’s “I Want Your Sex” was blaring in my ears. So how did they do it? Did it happen right there on the terrace north of the Farnham Street bridge? Were they in a parked car? Were they in a moving car? Back of a pickup?

Maybe there’s another conclusion to be drawn from the close proximity of these random finds. My train of thought may be influenced by the musical selection that was playing at the time of discovery (among other factors). But think about it. Holmes (Sherlock, not John) might deduce the same history from the evidence at hand. OK, probably not. You make up the story then. Oh, it was just random trash coincidentally in the same vicinity as each other? It was, after all, garbage pickup day, so the condom wrapper fluttered out of somebody’s trash can and the pants fell out of the laundry basket and blew into the street? Boring.

Further coincidence: After “I Want Your Sex” came “Prove Your Love” by Taylor Dayne. Now, close examination of the lyrics still allows for interpretation of Ms. Dayne’s meaning. “Show your stuff, ’cause words are not enough / I want to hear your body talk to mine.” So, she’s saying actions speak louder than words. Right? Then she’ll make love to her man. Or is she saying prove it by doing it? Hmmm. Women. George was pretty forthright in his plea. No guesswork in determining his meaning.

Today's Stats

Temp: 76 degrees F

Distance: 3.8 miles

Weekly Total: 12.3 miles

Treasure: 1 pair Playboy Underwear sleep pants (size large); 16 cans.

iPod Playlist (On Shuffle):

Just Like a Pill – Pink

Life Uncommon – Jewel

I Want Your Sex (Parts 1&2) – George Michael

Prove Your Love – Taylor Dayne

Taxman – The Beatles

Father, Son – Peter Gabriel

Latin Tropical – Santana

I'm at a Payphone

I imagine that could be the case for the poor mope whose phone I found this morning. Well, I actually found only half of it, the keypad side of a Samsung SCH-R630. That’s one of those slider models, where you orient the phone horizontally and slide the screen up to reveal the qwerty keyboard. 

Sad to say, the phoneless one probably hasn’t been to a payphone because they’re pretty scarce these days. Obsolete in the cellphone era. That’s what technology does, makes old technology practically worthless. Of course the resultant rarity of the outdated objects can also lend a desirability to those odd bits of history. Friends were fawning over the quaint rotary dial phone on the wall of a small-town bar last weekend. One reminisced about the matching model in her childhood home; another said she would love to have one again.

I hardly think, though, that nostalgia accounts for the existence of 3.25-inch floppy disks on a shelf in the Monmouth College bookstore. What’s with that? History of the Home Computer 101? And the box wasn’t full; somebody had bought a diskette or two. Huh?

The other question remains: Why was half a cellphone lying in the gutter on North Seminary Street? Did it simply fall out of the garbage, having been discarded because it died or was replaced by a sexy new iPhone? Did an angry lover grab her cheating boyfriend’s phone and chuck it out the window as they drove home from Buffalo Wild Wings, where he repeatedly texted his mistress? Maybe it just slipped from the back pocket of some kid on her way to school.

Such are the mysteries of the streets.

While I found only a small emblem from a Toyota today, the stylish oval-around-T design, I have in the past picked up entire wheel covers. I learned last August how those end up on the side of the road. It seems obvious, but they seem pretty well fixed on the wheel. I was surprised then when I hit a good pothole on the Eisenhower or one of those big name expressways that circle Chicago and watched as the left front wheel cover of my daughter’s Corolla went rolling across a lane of traffic and into the median. Unfortunately none of the covers I’d collected would fit her bare wheel.

I’ll keep my eyes peeled.

Today's Stats

Temp: 65 degrees F

Distance: 5.25 miles

Weekly Total: 8.5 miles

Treasure: 1 Samsung SCH-R630 phone keypad (missing screen, back, battery); 1 small Toyota emblem (plastic); 15 cans (including 1 Country Time Lemonade)

iPod Playlist (On Shuffle):

My Need – Janet Jackson

Junk – The Beatles

Just What I Needed – The Cars

Don’t Cross the River – Garth Brooks

I Wanna Be a Cowboy – Boys Don’t Cry

Mutineer – Bob Dylan (Zevon cover)

Easy Lover – Phil Collins

Come On In My Kitchen – Steve Miller Band

Heartbreak Warfare – John Mayer

Come Away With Me – Norah Jones

More Than a Feeling – Boston

Dirty Life &Times – Warren Zevon

Rock You Like a Hurricane – Scorpions

I’m Game – Christophe Beck (“Angel” TV soundtrack)

All My Loving – Jim Sturgess (“Across the Universe” soundtrack)

Another Return

OK, so Lost & Found has been on unscheduled hiatus for nearly a month. That’s a longer letdown than any of my previous lapses and I apologize for the withdrawal. Lack of motivation is a lousy excuse, but it’s all I’ve got for you. 

Today, though, I sort of started over. Maybe it began last night, or over the weekend in general. I got a new attitude, as the song goes. So, while I didn’t get up with the alarm at 6:40, I did manage to edge out of bed at 8:15, do some crunches and pushups and go for a little jog. It was rather the minimum but it was a good start to renewal.

I decided to make it an errands run. Who doesn’t like to run errands, right? Well, sometimes they’re a pain in ass, but at least if you actually “run” to do the errands or ride a bike to the store, there’s a benefit beside the task at hand. In the case of today’s run, the errands involved returns: a book to the library and a DVD to the video store. Guess I’ll have to add “Skinny Legs and All” by Tom Robbins to my Facebook note on “Books I Can’t Read.” I’m not proud of the list and I don’t like leaving a book before it’s finished. I made it halfway through “Skinny Legs” but lost motivation and, frankly, it’s overdue for the third time and it’s time to move on. The Sunday Night Movie was “Wanderlust,” which was pretty funny. Here’s an inappropriate scene to capture your interest.

Believe it or not, the summer drought has been paralleled in the Lost & Found department. It’s been no treasure trove out there on the streets of Galesburg this summer, with a couple of notable exceptions (tire iron, unopened beer). It was a sweet return to the road when I happened upon a blue and white cloth on Cherry Street this morning. Thought at first it might be a baby diaper wrap. Now I think it either a burp cloth or a polish cloth. It’s plush terry on one side and a smooth polyester on the other side. The towel is from a company called Greenbrier International Inc., which appears to be the parent of Dollar Tree stores.

Random note: It occurred to me as I rumbled along Fremont Street past King Gyro and made a right onto Cherry Street that some songs just make you want to dance. Now, it must be understood that I may be a lover but I ain’t no dancer. Oh, I got rhythm, I just can’t put it into motion in a visually appealing way. But that doesn’t stop me from doing it occasionally. More and more it seems in recent months. Anyway, “Walk Like an Egyptian” by the Bangles is one of those songs. As is Ben Lee’s “Catch My Disease.” Today it was “Egyptian” that had me on the verge of making a spectacle of myself along one of the Burg’s busier roads. One of these days, though, watch out for the flash mob of one.  

Today's Stats

Temp: 67 degrees F

Distance: 3.25 miles

Treasure: 1 fancy cloth (blue and white, burp cloth or polish cloth maybe); 7 cans.

iPod Playlist (On Shuffle):

Over the Hills andFar Away (live) – Led Zeppelin

The Camera Eye (live) – Rush

Castle Attack – Robert Kral (“Angel” TV show soundtrack

Tumbling Dice (Live ’72) – The Rolling Stones

Walk Like An Egyptian – The Bangles

Desperados Under theEaves (live at Wheeler Opera House) – Warren Zevon

I’m On Fire – Bruce Springsteen

Like a Hurricane – Neil Young