Rainey Blogs on Some Days

In honor of 2012 being the final year Car Talk would record new shows, I have decided to launch a car advice column in 2013 to take advantage of the strategic opportunity due to diminished competition in the auto repair advice space. Who knows? Maybe I will finally get my big break. So here goes with some of my best advice. Get your child an old car when he or she gets a driver's license . Too many parents nowadays buy or lease the golden child a new car. Why? Learning what to do when your car breaks down is a valuable life skill. Plus, with cell phones it's just not that hard. The engine dies. You pull out the cell phone and make a call. The tow truck comes within 45 minutes or so. It's not that big of a deal. Back in the old days, breaking down was tough. You stood by the road and hoped someone would pull over to help you. Usually they did, but it was usually some rough-looking guy with a beard because those are the people who know about cars. He would get...

In recent years, I've noticed that I do not readily jump up in October, run upstairs and pull the air conditioners out of the windows, and take them down the stairs into the basement to store them away for the winter. I had realized this last November when I took those burdensome boxes out of the bedroom windows and carried them down. This made me think that I was in pretty good shape, especially since our bedroom air conditioner was about 30 years old and was huge, heavy, and unruly. My body managed to get the AC down to the basement by myself (a drawback in life of having only daughters), but my mind kept telling me with each precarious step down the stairs “you're getting older, you've got nothing left to prove, you don't need this, so just stop using this ancient old heavy air conditioner and replace it with a new, lighter one.” This annual rite of passage with the air conditioner is a way I've watched myself age over the past ten years. There were years whe...

Original Draft of "Barbecue Grill," from Touching Other Worlds, pg. 1   Original Draft of "Barbecue Grill," from Touching Other Worlds, pg. 2

Now that my book has been out for over a year now, I've gotten lots of good feedback by email and in person at book and poetry readings. Here's what people are saying about Touching Other Worlds : “ Not horrible . . .” “ Brave . . .” “ Better than I thought it might be.” “ He'll be a good writer some day!” “ Finally some manly poetry for a change.” “ Not half bad, especially for a descendant of Midwestern farmers.” “ Very rare collection, indeed . . .” “ Liked it better than I thought I would.” “ Moved me to tears . . .” “ This poetry is definitely other-worldly . . .” “ Rainey's poetry is unbelievable . . . unimaginable” “ Reminded me of buses and diesel fumes . . .” “ Woven in transluscence throughout . . .” “ Lifted me out of the doldrums” “ Waiting for the German translation.”

The winds started in on Monday and apparently gusted to almost 90 mph. Our big tree survived in front in the high winds, but power went out Monday evening and still hasn't been restored. Just in case, I tied my leg to the bedpost during the height of the storm because it was really windy. We are partying like its 1899, playing board games and sleeping good in the deep darkness without light pollution. It gets a little chilly, but not bad. Water heater works--notice I didn't say "hot" water heater!--so we do get warm showers. My work has been up and running since Tuesday, so I made it in on Wednesday and can get on the Internet from here. I drove 24 miles to work this morning and saw only three gas stations with gas. Each had lines of 1/4 to 3/4 mile long. I've heard the people were acting really nice. I've been fortunate since Marcia sat in the car in line on Wednesday for an hour and filled up my car. It looks a little like Russia here, or at least what I i...

My first book, Touching Other Worlds , a collection of poetry, is vailable for free downloads on Amazon on Sunday, 10/21/12 and Monday, 10/22/12. I got mixed up on the start date. You can go to http://goo.gl/1MkrG to get one starting tomorrow. There is no catch. This is a free promotion. If you like it and want to review it, feel free to do that on the Amazon site. If you "like" the book, go to the title of the book link above and like it on Facebook. Here's what people saying about my book: "It's not horrible." "Not as bad as I thought it might be!" "Better than a lot of stuff I've read."

A local Northern New Jersey man from Leonia  reported that he was sternly rebuked at the Ramsey (New Jersey) Public Library recently for throwing two empty plastic water bottles into a garbage can rather than a nearby recycling container. “I work near the library, but hadn't been there in a few months. On a whim while driving back from the gym, I decided to stop in and look for some jazz CDs. As I was getting out of my car, I noticed a couple of empty water bottles and an old Wall Street Journal on the rear floorboard of the car." (Actually, he said this is true of nearly every time he gets out of the car.) “I struggle with unread newspaper guilt, so it is very difficult for me to throw out a newspaper that I've not read, let alone opened. But the bottles were a no-brainer,” said the man, who preferred to remain anonymous. The man reported that he walked toward the recently-renovated library and was surprised to find no garbage cans outside. “I mean, c'mon, ...