Things wot I Made Then Ate: Gift box, cookies and coffee

It cost $15.00 to send this box to me from California. That's a pretty good price, don't you think? I thought it would be at least $50.00 when you consider all that goes into moving them. It is a remarkable rally of resources.

I send things to my two nephews all the time usually but not always through Amazon. Every month it's something. For I love them so and I'm trying to buy their affection. This surprises them because other than that I am fairly remote. They make my brother and his wife take them shopping. They go out looking for things for me. My practice is forcing them to think about me. They're conflicted because so much of what they want to share are things we all know are not that great for us and they are more serious about diet than I am. So it all has the appearance of carelessness when in actuality I am simply impossible to buy things for. I present my family a very real problem. They don't know what to get me.

Tomorrow is my birthday, shut up, and that might have something to do with this box.

Something.

I love how my brother thinks "surprise" is a word composed of sur+prize.

It's why I adore him.

We Egyptologist types have no problem with s/z transposition. It is seen in hieroglyphs all the time. Even viewed within the language at the same time, that is not viewed from the outside, not viewed over time, even within ancient times. They did this themselves. Place to place along the Nile, although they spoke the same language, the usage differed remarkably north to south. They really did pronounce the same words differently all along the Nile, and use words differently, and that is apparent by the way that they spelled. And they say so themselves. I am not making this up. They said it. When a noble travels on some expedition or other, they are always surprised how their own language is used so differently soon as they leave their own town. They already know that nobles speak Egyptian entirely differently from regular Egyptians so it should come as no surprise, but it does. And it makes them wonder how they can manage anything together.

Where did this man come from who spells surprise with a prize? He comes from an incredibly widespread array of various public educations. He was moved school to school. He was unusually very well traveled before he graduated from High School. He is educated as electrician.

The dad, my brother, made this cardboard box that holds the smaller white origami boxes from a larger cardboard box. He made the pattern apparently, and he scored and cut it as regular box-makers do. He followed their pattern, scored and cut appropriately.

Daniel made the origami boxes and their content. His dad made the outer traveling box to protect them. He is giving me his art. He is giving me his time. They are.

The note says this is one of the first cranes that Daniel ever made.

The note is on a collapsable box. The purple thing is not origami. It's that weird finger-flip-note thing that kids wrote messages on inside then they did this rote rhyme while flipping their fingers back and forth ending on one of the messages. It's stupid as heck. But we kids do stupid things. This is our currency.

Aw. The thin chocolate wafers melted then hardened into a log.

"What's in the cup?"

"Coffee."

"Coffee isn't that color."

"With cream and sugar."

"Gross."

"I know. That's why I add so much stuff. To turn coffee into something different."

"No. I meant your additions are gross. The coffee is fine."

"What?"

"Leave out the sugar and cream. Coffee is best by itself."

"What?"

"Stop putting crap in your coffee. Coffee is best by itself."

"Coffee is the grossest shit on earth. I don't even know how it became popular when cocaine is there all along. Everything you say about coffee can be said about common OTC drugs and standard street drugs. You're a drug addict. Your tongue is coated with coffee-muck, your breath smells like a coffee-shithouse, your teeth are stained, you are jittery, your handwriting is a mess, and you have stains all over your clothes. You turn a whole office corner into a little coffee hut with all the crap that goes along with making coffee. And all the rules. And all the signs. And all the constant never-ending mess, the eternal office politics of coffee.

Add a cigarette to that and you are a very real stinking personal mess that nobody wants to be around."

"Uck. Chuh. You are wrong. Chuh. Coffee by itself is a delicious drink enjoyed by millions worldwide. Usually much stronger and more concentrated than Americans accept."

"Go brush your teeth. And scrape the muck off your tongue. Shower. I smell coffee coming out of your pores. You are all freaks. Some of you freakier than others. You are chemical addicts hornswoggled because coffee is legal even though it is so damaging and so horrible tasting. You are flat brainwashed into thinking the drink is actually palatable."

"Coffee is legal because it is essential and it is delicious. If anything were to be made illegal it would be the sugar you put into it."

"See how you coffee drinkers squeeze all the fun out of everything? You'll keep the awful ugly stinking crap and outlaw the stuff that is delicious and beautiful."

"We haven't outlawed anything."

"But you would!"

"Pffft."

Update: I had best check the packing material on top. The last box had a $100.00 taped onto the inside with packing tape right over the bill. It could have been easily missed and never mentioned.