Tine's Ramblings on Rameses I

As Tine and Rubob set out on their walk Thursday, the world continued to be in disarray, as it had been the day before. A tree had lost a limb, and Tine speculated that it had probably "thrown it out," as it were, when pitching snow bombs at passersby two days ago. "One of the hazards of the sport," she thought, "though it isn't very sporting to throw snow bombs." Tine had nearly been bonked on the head by a snow bomb in a previous walk, as you may recall.



Rubob appeared to have lost interest in the subject of snow bombs. He was lagging behind, looking a bit downcast on what has already been described as a gray and dreary day. So Tine, hoping to perk him up with a bit of historical fodder, as it were, introduced the topic of mummies. Tine told Rubob the story of "The Mummy Who Would Be King," about a mummy at the Niagara Falls Museum that had lain neglected for nearly 150 years, until a student of Egyptology had happened upon it, been taken by its noble bearing, and reached the conclusion that it was a pharoah -- in fact, Ramses I. Rubob is fond of history, and Tine -- and Rameses I -- had piqued his interest.

A British scholar got in on the investigation, as British scholars often do, and after some initial skepticism, he told his colleagues about it. They weren't prepared to think that a royal mummy would want to spend an eternity in Niagara Falls, and thought he might have been overindulging in gin (as British scholars often do). But after all sorts of scientific investigations, including those by an American orthodontist who was permitted to take X-rays of the pharoahs' skulls at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo decades ago (it's never too late to straighten one's teeth), it was determined that the mummy was, indeed, none other than Rameses I. The orthodontist had developed a program on his computer to trace the lineage of royal mummies based on their skulls. "He was a phrenologist in the digital age," Tine thought, wondering whether any of this was penetrating Rubob's skull.

The key bit of evidence was an old article that the scholars had discovered -- some "ephemera," as Rubob would call it. The article fleshed out the details, so to speak, of how the mummy had been snatched from a grave by tomb robbers in the mid-1800s and sold to a Canadian for seven pounds sterling. He'd brought it home and sold it to the owner of the museum. Rameses I then spent a good many years with other eternal curiosities such as a two-headed calf, a five-legged pig and the barrels of daredevils who'd gone over the falls.

Rubob apparently was listening to Tine's ramblings on Rameses, surprisingly enough, because when she asked him whether they might find a mummy in their own village, and if so, where, Rubob pointed to a museum they'd just past and said, "Maybe in the museum basement, Tine."



"There was a story not long ago in the newspaper about all the decaying, corrupted mummies in the basement of the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, Tine," Rubob said.

"We might find an English mummy in the Day-Lewis Museum," Tine said, "but not an Egyptian mummy. English mummies might not be as corruptible. " (The Day-Lewis Museum is devoted largely to the letters and work of an Englishman, Horace Walpole, as Tine and Rubob had discovered several years ago during an open house that featured free cookies and fruit punch.)

In fact, I have an English mummy," Tine continued," and she doesn't strike me as all that corruptible."

Rubob muttered something (entirely in jest, understand) about the preservative properties of alcohol.

The topic of mummies soon exhausted itself with the appearance of the house with the pendants. Rubob stopped to take note of something he'd never taken note of before. "What makes the the house with the pendants look nicer, Tine -- and not the pendants, and not the settled frame?"

"I don't know, Rubob -- what?"

"The fact that the trim is painted white," Rubob said, very satisfied with himself over this observation.



The topic of mummies was revived again by Tine, when she saw what appeared to be a sign offering a clue as to where they might unearth a mummy in the village.



"I think it might be saying there's a man down there," Rubob, "and if he's down there he could be frozen and mummified. They've removed his extremities as part of the embalming process. Very sensible of them: He can't dig himself back out, as Rameses I might have done."

"There are no royal mummies around here," Rubob said -- "only the princes of commerce."

The two then turned toward the shopping center. In the store, Tine thought at first that she'd been presented with such an array of red pencils that she'd never be able to decide which kind to get:



But the curious thing was that there wasn't one red pencil among all the writing implements on the wall. There were only pens -- pens of all colors.

"You could buy a red pen, Tiny," Rubob said.

"No, I want a red pencil. I need something that'll allow me to erase my mistakes, like my red pickles," Tine replied.

She inquired at the counter where the red pencils might be, and she was very surprised to hear that they were down another aisle entirely.

"Shouldn't all writing implements be together, Rubob?" she asked.

But Rubob didn't presume to second-guess the princes of commerce. He did try to dissuade Tine from buying a package of colored pencils that included only one red pencil. "You have a red pencil at home, Tine."

"I need a new red pencil, Rubob, and they don't sell them singly. Pencils are sold as families." Tine tried to win Rubob over by saying, "Red and green pencils might be 75% off because they're the colors of Christmas, and all Christmas items are 75% off."

Rubob, who calls all vehicles on the road "vehicles," calls all items in stores "items." Tine thought the word "items" might placate Rubob.

"It's just one or two items I'm purchasing," Tine said, picking up a Christmas tree stand and some wrapping paper."

Rubob was evidently reflecting on the disarray in his finances again, because he sighed. He seemed downcast on the way home, what with all those unexpected household expenses, and Tine endeavored to cheer him up with a favorite topic, yellow houses. She pointed one out that was almost exactly the shade of the tin shop (which they'd passed on yesterday's walk):

"That's not a house, Tine. That's a barn," Rubob said.

"But do you like the yellow?" Tine asked.

"It's fine, Tine."

"Why do you like it there, and not so much on the tin shop?" Tine asked Rubob.

"The barn is made of wood, Tine; the tin shop is brick. And the tin shop was white before, and now it isn't."

Tine reflected on this, and allowed that Rubob might have a point.



"There's something else made of bricks that used to be white," she said, pointing out a chimney. But Rubob had moved on, has he often does, and Tine hastened along to catch up with him.



They crossed over the busy thoroughfare, placing their lives in the hands of the Baby J (as Tine had yesterday), and Tine said, "Let's see where that road goes, the one you wanted to explore." She was endeavoring again to boost Rubob's lagging spirits (though it was Tine who was lagging behind Rubob at this point). "Do you think it goes all the way behind Pilgrim's Path?" Tine asked, referring to an estate on the main road that had a pond and fields in back.

"Yes, I think it does," Rubob said, with renewed interest in the walk.

But this detour turned out to be -- or nearly turned out to be -- another failed effort on Tine's part. When they reached the bend it the road, it was clear that the sideroad went nowhere. Rubob stared down the road, looking very disappointed. Tine started back to the main road, briefly glimpsing a stream out of the corner of her eye but continuing past it.

"Look, Tine, " Rubob said, as he reached the stream. "This is the stream we passed the other day, on Hatter's Lane. This is where it comes out. If we could follow it back, underground, we could trace its lineage. In a sense, we have discovered its lineage, on Hatter's Lane. " Rubob stood gazing down into the stream, filled with the sort of wonder that streams always inspire. "This is our mummy," Tine. "It's come up from under the earth, revealing its lineage."



There was something to be said for what Rubob was saying, Tine thought (even though she wanted to circle her own thought with a red pencil, something Tine had taken to doing in the blog's previous entry today).

"The eternal life-giving water," Tine thought, "rising up from a wellspring beneath the earth. There is something noble about it. Maybe we could follow it all the way to Niagara Falls."

"Yes, Rubob, that's our mummy," she said, "just as the gravestone of the 49'er was our gold nugget last week. "You've unearthed our Egyptian mummy. It's too bad there's not a waterfall here, too, because then we might have barrels of daredevils as well."

As they turned onto Hatter's Street and wended their home, Tine thought:

"All in all, a very pleasant walk."

Tine Purchases a Red Pencil

Tine's walk was a purposeful one again today. The view from the window was a rather gray and dreary, and a look at the digital barometer confirmed that view, though the pictograph added some rather pleasing snowflakes that weren't, in fact, to be seen outside. "A pen barograph wouldn't have done that, Tine thought, but this is the digital age and one must adapt. In any case, the snowflakes are rather nice."



Despite the uninviting prospect from the window, Tine prevailed on Rubob to put down his newspaper (also gray and dreary, after all) and join her on a shopping trip for a red pencil, a very sharp red pencil.

"You have a red pencil," Rubob said.

"I need a sharp red pencil," Tine replied.

"We have a sharpener, Tine."

"I would prefer a new red pencil," Tine said, decisively. When Tine decides to do something, there's not much that can be said to dissuade her, and the proof of that is in the picture below, showing Tine carrying a red pencil home from the shopping center.



The photo below shows the actual snowbanks mentioned above, minus Tine (or perhaps Tine was too small to be seen):



Tine was determined to set things right in her life, to confront the disarray Rubob had brought to her attention the previous day, and she thought she might start with a red pencil.

“How’s a red pencil going to help with the disarray in our lives, Tine?” Rubob asked.

“We can circle things that are amiss, Rubob.”

“It would take more than a red pencil to fix the disarray in our lives, Tine.”

“I think that’s the weak passive voice, Rubob, and I’m going to circle it, but I’m not really sure. I can’t see how it could be said otherwise – or even how I might say it otherwise. But I think circling it would be a good idea.”

Here’s one of tine’s circlings:



“That looks a little more like a pickle than a circle, Tine,” Rubob said.

“Maybe we’re in a pickle because of the disarray in our lives, Rubob. But it's going to be fixed, starting today,” Tine said.

“You should put a red pickle around that, too, Tine -- or say, 'I'm going to fix it, starting today.' "

"That does sound a little more determined, doesn't it, Rubob?” Tine said.

“But it’s our finances that are in disarray, Tine – not our grammar," Rubob continued, quite drearily, in fact, bearing out the barometrical forecast, minus the pleasant snowflakes. "Finances are more important than grammar. "

“If grammar’s not important, why are they cutting children’s heads off and hanging them on the trees outside the grammar school, Rubob?” Tine said, harking back to a walk she took earlier this week.

Rubob looked at Tine uncomprehendingly (as he is wont to do). Rubob had taken that walk in spirit only, as a shadow participant, as Rubob might say, and shadow participants don't always pay attention to things, especially not things only Tiny tends to notice.

But to get back to Tine's red pencil. The truth of the matter is that Tine had come up with a plan to help Rubob with his finances, which were, as you know, in disarray. "If I can't help out by doing sums and baking pies, like the restaurateur who used to live in the house with the Christmas lights, maybe I could help out by doing something with words," Tine had thought. She'd been mulling this plan over for quite a while, in fact. "I'm partial to words (though I don't much care for grammar). I'll order a large package of words and buy a red pencil."

Tine wasn't exactly sure what she'd do with the package of words and the red pencil, but something would come to mind, she thought. "Perhaps I could rearrange them, maybe winnow out the best ones, like apples, and resell them to others with a fondness for words."

Things happen very quickly when Tine sets her mind to, well, things, and yesterday evening a box of words arrived on her icy, snowy doorstep. (There was a bit of slush, mush and sludge on the doorstep, too, Tine thought, reflecting once again on her pleasant walk with Rubob's shadow.) It was an enormous package, and Tine thought she might have to return to the store for more red pencils before long (which would make a nice interlude, as a walk always does).

"What was in that cardboard box in the hallway, Tine?" Rubob asked, seeing the empty carton and thinking about his finances.

"Nothing, Rubob, just some words."

Tine is eager to relate all the details of her walk to the shopping center today, but she'll have to do it later, because she's already begun work with her box of words and her red pencil. Many of you might not be inclined to return to the blog, having little interest in a quest for a red pencil, but as it happens, Tine's walk didn't turn out to be simply, or solely, a quest for a red pencil.

Walks often start out with a very practical intent ("and so they should," Rubob thought, reading this incomplete entry to today's walk) , but they soon venture down unexpected pathways. The pathway that Tine and Rubob took was not only unexpected but it led to a singular discovery -- well, actually not a singular discovery, because something was found in addition to a red pencil. It was more like a dual discovery.

Perhaps we should have a tease for a later blog entry about the walk, Tine thought, a preview, like they do for 11 o'clock news stories: "Egyptian mummy discovered: More at 11." That's not as preposterous an idea as it sounds, because Tine and Rubob had indeed stumbled on an Egyptian mummy. It might not have been Egyptian, and it might not have been an actual mummy, but Tine and Rubob had found something very much like a mummy, except for a few important particulars. The story, however, will have to wait for Tine's "Nightbeat," as the 11 o'clock news is called hereabouts. "Mummy at 11!" Tine thought. "I'll stick with the cartoons and commercials," Whiny thought.

Whiny was home from school, watching TV ads and eating a pancake left over from breakfast, with nearly a half jar of grape jelly on it. Her rag doll, little Wilbur, had a spot of grape jelly on his nose. "Which would you rather do, Whiny: run a mile, jump a stile or eat a pancake in a field?" Tiny asked. Whiny was too engrossed in her pancake and her television to reply. Tine thought she might have heard Little Wilbur say, "Eww!!" but that could have been because Little Wilbur had Whiny's grape jelly on his nose.

Tiny, looking up from her words, which were still in disarray, and her red pencil, said she would get to the particulars of today's walk, eventually. She added, by way of a preview: "All in all, it was a very pleasant walk."