Feckless Ramblings

A Note to Anonymous

2011-02-25T13:22:00.000-08:00

Just because you worked hard doesn't mean that the product of your effort meets the standard. If your work is shoddy, it must be re-done, either by you or by someone else. I know that you didn't want to hear that I cannot let our clients see what you produced. Believe me: I didn't want to have to tell you that.

I'm still not going to let you show it to them. Tell your friends that I'm mean and unsympathetic - after you've produced something I'm willing to put my boss's name on.

18 years

2010-05-01T12:58:00.000-07:00

It doesn't usually occur to me until days or weeks after the event, if at all, but I realized a few minutes ago that today is the 18th anniversary of the shooting at Lindhurst High School.

Duh!

2010-04-22T21:29:00.000-07:00

Imagine this:
You're standing in the office supply store awaiting your turn to get to the mechanical pencils.
Access is blocked by the teenage girl there with her parents.
You hear the following:

Daughter: "Dad, I need more mechanical pencils."
Dad: "I just bought you a whole bunch. What did you do with them?"
Daughter: "I used them up."

Dad explains the concept of refillability as it pertains to mechanical pencils and you realize that you've discovered a new depth of ignorance.

Tell Everyone You Know!

2010-04-15T05:54:00.000-07:00

http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com /
I like this alot.

Taxes

2010-04-04T08:22:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, we got in to H&R Block before they closed and we got our taxes knocked out. They were helpful and efficient and we got an $800 credit that we might not have gotten if we had been forced to do our taxes ourselves.

That said, we both miss Judy Baldonado. I asked her if she could do our taxes this year, even thought we're out of state, but she never got back to me.

Recipe

2010-02-14T07:12:00.000-08:00

1 part Nutella
1 part mascarpone

blend completely and use as imagination inspires. (e.g. on Nilla wafers)

Another Webcomic

2010-02-13T06:49:00.000-08:00

Another awesome webcomic: check out The Doghouse Diaries - right now.
(You have to click on the image to really be able to read the comic [unless you have really outstanding vision {which I don't}])

BOLC B

2010-02-07T12:18:00.001-08:00

Basic Officer Leadership Course II has been done away with. I was scheduled to take that January-February of this year.

Basic Officer Leadership Course III has been replaced with/renamed BOLC B.

I start BOLC B February 16th, and should finish sometime in June. By then, I'll have orders and we'll know where we're headed next.

Since we arrived at Ft. Sill in October, I've been on what is known as "casual duty," mostly serving as the Executive Officer of a Holdover Battery for the Warrior Transition Course. Prior service sometimes attend WTC instead of Basic Combat Training. When, in the course of WTC, these soldiers are hurt or when they prove to be unable to complete the physical fitness test, they come to us to heal and train.

I've been working with an outstanding group, dedicated to their work and to the soldiers they train, and though I'm glad to be getting on with my training, I'll miss being at Fox 1/79.

Peace through victory.

A Cool Site

2010-02-07T12:13:00.000-08:00

Shel's dad, Vernon, introduced me to a website I really like. It's called FamilyLink. It's a genealogy site associated with Facebook. I've managed to put together a decent little family tree just from what Shel and I could remember off hand and what I could copy of Vernon's work.

I've always thought that genealogy was fun, but it can be a tremendous lot of work - not just to create, but to peruse and enjoy even. This is pretty simple and intuitive, so I'm sold.

A Webcomic

2009-12-23T19:37:00.000-08:00

I've discovered a webcomic I really like. Check it out.
http://xkcd.com/

Happy Halloween

2009-10-31T22:14:00.000-07:00

update for no one?

2009-09-28T08:38:00.000-07:00

I think that everyone who ever reads this blog knows that I have now finished OCS and that I am now tremendously enjoying some much needed time at home with my wife. We're packing up to move to Oklahoma, where my school will be. In the meantime, I'm doing hometown recruiting duty in Yuba City with an outstanding group of professionals.

32 Days to Go

2009-08-16T11:13:00.000-07:00

We just finished our first of three weeks in the field and are headed out to our second. Fun in the sun, U.S. Army style.

Branch Selection Complete - Field Artillery - King of Battle

2009-08-09T06:59:00.001-07:00

"Ultima ratio regum" English: "The final argument of kings" - Louis XIV's inscription on French artillery
"Do not forget your dogs of war, your big guns, which are the most-to-be respected arguments of the rights of kings." - Frederick II of Prussia
"The artillery lends honor to that which would otherwise be a vulgar brawl." - Frederick II of Prussia
"God is on the side with the best artillery." - Napoléon Bonaparte
"The first shot is for the Devil, the second for God, and only the third for the King." - Napoléon Bonaparte
"The best generals are those who have served in the artillery." - Napoléon Bonaparte
"I do not have to tell you who won the war. You know, the artillery did." - General George S. Patton, Jr.
"Brother, your best friend ain't your Momma, it's the Field Artillery." - A sign at Fort Benning, US Infantry School
"The Guns, thank God, the Guns." - Rudyard Kipling
"Renown awaits the commander who first restores artillery to its prime importance on the battlefield." - Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill
"Artillery is the god of war." Joseph Stalin

An Updated Picture

2009-07-27T17:14:00.000-07:00

So, I've just started week 5 of Officer Candidate School. It's tough, but it's going well. I have some studying to do and could probably find any number of things to accomplish, but it's been a long time since my last update, so I thought I'd put in a quick note.

As I said, Officer Candidate School has not been easy so far. It's been difficult in many ways. My whole army enlistment has offered challenges thus far, but it's been rewarding, too. I'm in the best shape of my life and I finally feel like I'm getting somewhere again professionally and fiscally.

Now, I'm just impatient to finish my training, get a duty station, and settle in to a home of our own, and hopefully get to enjoy some time with my wife before I get deployed to some foreign land somewhere.

Norway's Fastest-growing Sport

2009-01-12T09:46:00.000-08:00

Thank you, Levi, for sharing this.

Star Wars According to a 3 Year Old

2009-01-08T22:08:00.000-08:00

Maybe I'm the last one to see this, but I thought it was worth sharing.

Grocery-mobiles

2008-12-22T17:40:00.000-08:00

Levi took this picture.

Those are snowmobiles.

The building just behind them is the Albertsons/Save-on near the Mill Creek town center, just half a block from the office.

More Snow

2008-12-22T16:46:00.000-08:00

So, after the first snow pictures, my mother suggested that the snow should be cleaned off of the patio cover. I did so, and more snow fell.

I cleaned the snow off again after taking the picture above, but the snow keeps falling, so it's stacked even higher now.

Snow

2008-12-14T09:44:00.001-08:00

Insurance Quotes

2008-10-25T11:34:00.000-07:00

I just finished my first week selling insurance and I have to say I think that it went rather well. I met a lot of very nice people and I believe that I'll be able to do a lot of good for them - and make a decent living of doing so.

The people who work in the insurance field are likable and friendly, generally bright and considerate. The customers run the entire spectrum of the human race and have needs as diverse as one could imagine. There are enough prospects available that I never need to chase or cajole people who don't know they need my products, and the products I sell are affordable enough that they fit in just about every budget.

I can honestly say I feel good about what I do. That feels nice.

So, you ask, what's with the picture of the former prime minister? Well, we have two quotes posted in the office. The first is from Winston Churchill:

“If I had my way, I would write the word ‘Insure” over the door of every cottage, and upon the blotting book of every public man; because I am convinced that for sacrifices that are inconceivably small, families can be secured against catastrophes which otherwise would smash them up forever.

It is our duty to arrest the ghastly waste not merely of human happiness, but of national health and strength which follows when, through the death of the breadwinner, the frail boat in which the fortunes of the family are embarked founders and the women and children are left to struggle helplessly on the dark waters of a friendless world.”

Winston Spencer Churchill
Manchester, England May 23, 1909

The second is from JFK:

THE LIFE INSURANCE AGENT

I can think of no more effective person in advancing our freedom to live as we choose than the insurance agent. This person knows the economic and human pulse of the country as few people may, for they walk all streets of American life and they sit down and talk with the youth and the mature and the aged. They know their wants. They help them to help themselves in times of need. They build, for they help others to build. They insure the future. They are respected, and they are friends.

- John F. Kennedy

Self Determination

2008-10-08T18:49:00.000-07:00

Charles Darwin to receive apology from the Church of England for rejecting evolution

2008-10-06T07:16:00.000-07:00

The Church of England will concede in a statement that it was over-defensive and over-emotional in dismissing Darwin's ideas. It will call "anti-evolutionary fervour" an "indictment" on the Church".

The bold move is certain to dismay sections of the Church that believe in creationism and regard Darwin's views as directly opposed to traditional Christian teaching.

The whole of the Telegraph article from which this is reprinted may be found here.

It Is By The Smallest Increments We Take The Biggest Steps

2008-10-04T16:06:00.000-07:00

I registered to vote yesterday.

This means that I am now a resident of Washington State.

I've been here four months, but I wasn't a resident. I'll get a Washington State license soon, and re-register my car. Soon I'll have a job. And a place to live. At some point in the not too distant future, I'll own a home in this state.

None of those things are what will have determined residency, though. The fact that yesterday I filled out a voter registration card and mailed it make me a resident of Washington State.

Since before I could conceive of distinctions like states and borders, I've been a resident of California, and I still have an abiding affection for the state. I knew as soon as I arrived in Washington that this is where I belong, but I felt the strangest sense of disloyalty and guilt in filling out that voter registration card.

That feeling of guilt is gone now, though, and I am glad to finally make it official. It won't really be home until my wife is here, and I won't be settled until we have our dogs. I won't be truly content until we have a home, but at least now I can be counted amongst my people - the people of Washington State.

Core Capacities Index

2008-09-30T10:03:00.000-07:00

As part of an online application today, I took a personality profile-type test. I find these endlessly fascinating. This one indicates that I'm especially good at inspiring others and taking inspiration from them, that wisdom is a chief value for me and that I'm seen (or more likely, if you think logically, I have come to believe that I am seen) by others as showing wisdom, that knowledge is a "cornerstone value" for me and that I have a desire to see right done in the world, but that I am not as pragmatic as some people.

I like the almost-condescendingly diplomatic language in which these personality test results are couched. I am endlessly fascinated by the value in further introspection provided by their insights. The people-don't-fit-neatly-into-boxes-so-we-made-a-differently-shaped-box attitude which necessarily underlies their creation is tremendously amusing to my heightened sense of irony. Most of all, I love graphical displays of data - this foreshortened square allows me, when queried "What kind of a person are you?" to respond "I'm a purplish-blue person with strong hints of green, but hardly red at all."

Low-Res_Photos

2008-09-22T14:10:00.000-07:00

I found some shots on my phone that I had never transferred over to the computer or deleted. These three were among them. I cleaned them up a bit in Picasa and thought I'd try out the "Blog this" feature built in, since I'd never done so before. The one on the far right, of both dogs, is the one I use as a wallpaper on my phone. Amazing, isn't it - what low resolution is tolerable on a 2" screen?

Sept. 12 Round-Up

2008-09-12T09:48:00.000-07:00

I haven't posted in a while. I've been busy.
Microsoft came out with a new ad, featuring Bill Gates and the creator of a-show-about-nothing, Jerry Seinfeld:

Blogs, interviews, news commentators, and folks at the water cooler all seemed to agree that it was dumb and pointless - that Microsoft was crazy - that they didn't know how to advertise. This meme, Microsoft's dumb new ad, seemed to be pretty pervasive. The ad executives seem to agree that that's a pretty good start to an ad campaign.
Now there's a sequel. It's wacky, too.

Patriot Day was yesterday. I heard no mention of it. Seven years gone and now it's passe. That's interesting to me. I remember where I was September 11th, 2001, sort of the the-day-Kennedy-was-shot of our generations, but the impact has been more drawn out, I think, and therefore, perhaps diminished in some way.

Wow, it has been a long time since I blogged, hasn't it? The Democratic and Republican National Conventions have come and gone. The tide of the election seems to have changed, shifting notable toward the right since before the conventions.

I worked at the Pan Pacific Hotel for about two months. It's a beautiful hotel with a wonderful staff. I'm still kind of sad that there wasn't room for me to stay. The next time I'm there, it will be as a guest. I thought for a bit that I might get a job at the Fox affiliate, but that didn't pan out, either. I keep plugging away, though. Things will pull together at some point.

I'm unemployed at the moment. I'm interviewing today for a job, though, which I hope will be a better fit, and which I hope will be much more lucrative. Keep your fingers crossed. I'm ready to move on with life - to get my wife back and my dogs back and have a place to call home. I'm ready to get out of my host-family's hair and be more neighbor and less nuisance. I can finally say that I'm hopeful that Shel will be starting school soon, which is better news than I've had in recent memory.

I did a single set of bench presses at low weight and was sore for almost a week. Maybe that means I should continue to work on that. I have cut way back on calorie intake, and at least while I was working, I was climbing stairs every day, so I continue to lose weight, which is good.

Now that Shel and I both have working computers (knock on wood), we've been able to use Google Talk and hang out together online and play World of Warcraft together. It's not as good as face-to-face interaction, but it's a whole lot better than isolation.

I've been learning some more features of Microsoft Office, which has been nice. I'd still like to learn more about computers, and IT specifically, but it's something that will have to go on the back burner for the time being while life normalizes.

I responded to a phishing email today to explain to the phisher that their attempts were fairly ham-fisted and to offer helpful advice.

I'll try to update again soon, hopefully with good news about new employment, and maybe with a photograph or two. I've discovered all of the best blogs have lots of terrific original photography.

Sundeck Panorama

2008-07-12T19:57:00.000-07:00

I haven't posted too many photos lately, what with the broken computer and all, but now that I have the beast running again and (since late last night) even have the card reader working which lets me transfer photos, I give you a panorama of the sun deck where I ate my lunches these past two months - a beautiful view of Lake Union.

(Click on the photo to see it more clearly)

More General Updates

2008-07-10T13:36:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow's my last day here at the station. While the bosses are all sorry to see me go, they just don't have an opening for me right now. I have been assured that I'll be the first one called if something suitable opens up, but that doesn't pay the bills so, hopefully, one of the positions I'm being considered for now will materialize. Things look good so far, but I'd rather have chickens to count than the number of an egg hatchery.

On the upside, my computer seems to be working! I got on the phone with a Dell Support Technician named Prosune in Hyderabad who helped me download and install the drivers I needed to make the computer run after installing Windows. Shel's computer seems to be working, too, after much help from her mother, so life on the tech front seems to be looking up for the moment.

I contacted Les Schwab about the hubcaps, and they have them on hand. I might have time one day to pick them up before they close up shop for the night.

I have been busy - super busy - since I arrived in Seattle. It's been a bit overwhelming, but it's also been good. Once we find a place and get settled in here, things will be at least as busy as they have been so far, but they'll be twice as good, too.

General Update and a Noteworthy Turn-of-phrase (with prepositions and pronouns)

2008-07-08T09:13:00.000-07:00

Shel's computer:
is working again after a series of increasingly catastrophic minor glitches with Windows Vista, and a complete re-installation of the OS, but there are still plenty of bugs to work out - you know, like getting the computer to remember the wireless connection at the house, navigating Vista's labyrinthine menus, and convincing the OS to play nice with the anti-virus software. We'll see how thing go today. Shel's mom is helping us fine-tune settings, and I have hoes that it will run smoothly soon. The irony here is that when I bought the computer, I had it shipped directly to me, paying Washington State sales tax, and installed the software, arranged settings, and basically broke it in - all to avoid forcing Shel to do exactly what she's doing right now.

My Computer:
I have hopes that my computer will work again soon, too. Keep your fingers crossed for me. I took the beast to a computer repair shop in the university district whose staff were able to retrieve my data and put it on an external hard drive. I called Dell back and ran through the same rigmarole I had already run through before taking the computer in to the shop, and Dell's tech support finally decided to send me a new hard drive with the OS already installed. It is supposed to arrive in two business days, counting from Sunday. As I said, keep your fingers crossed.

Les Schwab Debacle (long):
With finances as tight as they were while I wasn't working, I have put off have the brakes on my car looked at for some time. When I took my computer to the repair shop, I parked on a hill, with my wheels turned in toward the curb and couldn't help but notice that my front tires where balding badly, so while I sat waiting for my data recovery, I took the car to Les Schwab to have the tires replaced and the brakes repaired. I arrived early on a Saturday morning, expecting to wait all day and take my car home that night. I even brought a book to read. Les Schwab offered to take me back to the house and pick me up that night. At about 5, I get the call: "We're only half-done. can we keep your car and finish on Monday?" (All Les Schwabs are closed on Sunday.)
Me: "No. I need my car to get to work."
Les Schwab: "Where do you work? Maybe we can drive you."
M: "Westlake." (about 45 minutes to an hour away from this particular shop)
LS: "Oh. Well, can you find a ride to work?"
M: "No, my friends are out of town. I'm just visiting. I need my car to get to work."
LS: "Oh. Okay, we'll stay and finish it, but we may not be done until 8 or 8:30."
M: "Okay. Give me a call when you're done." So, half an hour later, I get another call:
LS: "Sir, I'm sorry. We're not going to be able to finish tonight. We need to keep your car on Monday. Is there any way you can get a ride to work?"
M: (never mind that this we'll leave me stranded at the house all weekend, unable to run my other errands, like grocery shopping)"I don't know. Let me call my friends and see if they can come back from out-of-state early. I'll see what I can do and call you back." (granted, I knew that I wasn't going to ask them to come back early - they were planning to come back late Sunday night - but if they agreed, they were going to have to turn around after four days and 1500 miles of driving and get up early to run me into town."
LS: "Thank you, sir." Well, I called my friend, and, unsurprisingly, she agreed to help me out, whereupon I offered profuse thanks and promised a bribe of coffee (the standard currency throughout the greater Seattle area.)
M: "My friend has agreed to drive me to work on Monday, but I'll need you to come get me from work."
LS: "Thank you, sir. When you're off work, just call a cab and we'll pay for it when you get here."
My friends call back again and I learn that there are other plans for Monday and she may or may not be able to drive me. Fuck! Now, I'm irked. Now, Les Schwab has put me out, hosed my weekend, fucked up my friends' plans, and quite possibly screwed me out of a day of work.
Another call from my friends (late Sunday) and I learn that she will have to rearrange herday, but she will be able to drive me. I take the cab to Les Schwab, tip the cabbie, explain that somewone will be out to pay him, walk in and immediately let the first available employee there know that there is a cab outside waiting for payment. She calls for a manager who eventually comes in and deals with another customer's complaint. Some employee's mill around for a bit, attending to their duties, and a receptionist eventually comes to help me, bill in hand. I explain to her that before I resolve my bill, I'd like to talk to management. She calls in a manager, whom I tell about the still-waiting taxi. He rushes out and attends to the driver, pulling money out of the till to cover the fare. When he returns, I explain the situation and express both my disatisfation and my embarrassment at being told by my friend "Never go to Les Schwab! it's not like it is in California. Next time, come to me and I'll steer you right, but everybody here knows - you can't trust Les Schwab here." eventually, I walk out with a paltry 10% discount on parts. Perhaps I ought not to have accepted this. Maybe I should have pushed for more, but the fact is, they had me over the barrell and I can't afford not to take any discount I can get at this point.
Fine. Lesson learned - never go to Les Schwab again. I take my car and leave, still pissed, but resigned.

The next morning, as I'm leaving for work, I notice something about my car that I hadn't noted before: my hub caps are gone. Les Schwab stole my hub caps! This is the icing on the cake, but between computers failing left and right, job hunting, work, house-hunting and the myriad other concerns, I just never took the time to call them, so I will do that when I'm done blogging and let you know how it goes.

Job Hunting:
Friday is to be my last day with the TV station where I've been filling in for almost two months. I have an interview scheduled this afternoon with another staffing firm and I have applications in with several firms, most recently, with a major insurance underwriter. I'll apply with a well-known internet content provider later today or tomorrow and with a big aerospace firm today.

House Hunting:
Shel and I now have our own Realtor and our own mortgage broker. I'm scheduled to meet with the mortgage broker tomorrow, but I need to get some paperwork together, so I'll likely reschedule that meeting. After she and I jump through some hoops, Shel and I will, hopefully, be pre-approved for a home loan and I can begin touring the countryside with our Realtor.

The field I hope to soon be entering, corporate training, should be substantially more lucrative and immeasurably more interesting than the one in which I currently find myself, so I'll likely have to update our loan pre-approval soon, but getting started on the home-buying process feels good - like progress. I am ready to have my wife back, my dogs back, and my life back.

Long-Suffering Hosts:
I'm sure my hosts are ready to have their house back, too. I've been in their guest room (or on their couch) for two months now - and while these are very dear and very close friends with whom I have a lot of history, I'm all too aware of the fact that anyone can wear out his welcome after a while. They have other guests (you know, like "guest"-guests, rather than extended-stay-with-his-own-daily-grind-guest) to attend to; their oldest has been sick for a couple of days, at least; they have a still-nascent start-up business to attend to - in short, they have a life of their own as well, and I will undoubtedly make a better friend when I am a fellow home-owner than I can be as an adult dependent.

Turn of Phrase:
Finally, I promised you a turn of phrase. I was combing through various online news sources this morning and happened upon a wonderfully, visually evocative metaphor. If I don't share it here, with you, I'll forget it.

"…why force buyers to swallow the entire buffet in one sitting?" - Matt Peckham, Tuesday, July 8, 2008

Computer Not Work

2008-06-12T08:01:00.000-07:00

Not happy.

Me telling friend yesterday "Me like computer when work. Hate computer when computer break."

Computer break.

Me blog at work now.

Me have registry error can fix with original XP boot discs.

Not have boot discs in Washington.

No can fix.

Now talk like caveman in protest.

Computer still not work.

Now me feel dumb for talking like caveman and computer still not work.

Not happy.

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Clapping Crowd

2008-05-25T14:38:00.000-07:00

So, yesterday, I went with my host family to the Alderwood Mall to see the latest installment of the Indiana Jones series. I enjoyed it. We all enjoyed it. It is the perfect example of what a film adaptation of a comic book take on pulp-noir serial adventures ought to be. This was a fresh take on the series, yet it also felt completely faithful to what has come before.

There - that's my movie review. I recommend you see it if you enjoyed the other movies in the series.

I don't, however, recommend that you see it at the Sutter theatre, at the Movies 8 in Yuba City, the Peach Tree Theater, Marysville State or Tower theaters or at the Marysville Drive in. Some of the listed locations have the excuse of having been out of business for several years. The others have no excuse for the misery which they inflict on their patrons.

I recommend the hexadecaplex theater where we went.

The seats are comfortable enough that after an hour and a half, I was not in pain. These seats are mounted securely to a non-sticky floor set at roughly a 45-degree grade, moderate enough to avoid feeling precipitous while steep enough that a short viewer seated behind a tall one should be able to see the (large and undamaged) screen without impediment or distraction.

Before the movie began, we sat and enjoyed first commercials like one might see on tv, including a cute Iron Man-themed LG spot and a hysterically funny ad featuring Michael Bey, and then we saw trailers for upcoming movies like Hancock and Kung Fu Panda, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and Pixar's newest offering: Wall-E, all of which looked appealing.

Before the trailers, though, the last commercial that aired was a recruiting spot for the U.S. Marine Corp, an ad which the audience applauded. This is when I remembered reading something, I believe it was on Monte Cook's blog, about Seattle-ites applauding and the end of movies.

After the trailers, but before the movie, I was delighted to see a reminder from the theater to stay quiet during the show so as to allow others to enjoy the movie too. I was delighted to see this, and more delighted to see it honored, for the most part, during the movie itself.

The sound was terrific. The movie was very good. I had a good time and I think that though I haven't been to the movies even a dozen times in the last ten years, I'll have to start going again once Shel gets here.

When the movie was over, the audience did applaud, and I applauded with them, but I don't know if it was more because of the movie or the theater. I love this place and still can't believe that it's taken me this long to get here.

Some Updates

2008-05-13T20:59:00.000-07:00

So, we went on our vacation and then safely returned. I did forget part of the power cord for my CPAP machine, but our hosts were able to provide a cord that covered the need, so it all turned out in the end.

We visited a sci-fi museum, saw some locks (like stairs-for-ships locks), attended a little-league game in the rain, visited several excellent restaurants, and visited with good friends we hadn't spent more than a few hours with since the last millennium.

We had a great time. Well, at least I had a great time and Shel tells me she enjoyed it as well, though by the time we were headed home, she had come down with a sudden onset virus and allergies at the same time on top of the stress of travel and the malnutrition endemic to eating out frequently.

On our way home (a 700+ mile drive), we stopped at Shari's restaurant. They serve deep-fried cheese ravioli and some tasty, tasty pie.

They also claim to sell Gardenburgers. Unfortunately, what they bring instead when you gullibly order a Gardenburger is instead a generic soy patty.

I contacted Kellogg foods, the owner of the Gardenburger name, and they have assured me that they will destroy all vestiges of the Shari's Restaurant enterprise burn their employees at the stake (I think that their actual phrasing was something more all along the lines of "We'll look into it," but I figure that one has to read between the lines).

Now, I have returned to the home of the friends we visited. I don't want to give away their location because I don't want the rest of you to overrun the metropolitan area, but instead I will refer to the city as "The Emerald City."I haven't wanted to whine too much here about the troubles I've had job-hunting, suffice it to say that I had been looking for work in the twin cities since February and haven't gotten so much as an interview. (Only one employer even acknowledged my application.)

I've been here since Saturday night. I started job hunting on Monday (yesterday, for those keeping score.) and I got a placement with a temp agency today.

The job is filling in for an administrative assistant to an exec at a local television affiliate and the chief apprehension amongst my new supervisors is that I will be bored at this new job. I assured them that if it becomes necessary, I will bring a novel, and they agreed and offered me the job.

I have a lead on a house to rent - they're cheaper in this market then they are in the depressed little twin cities from whence I so recently hailed. I'm loving the weather here, since it's 20 degrees cooler than what I would otherwise be forced to endure.

Things are going swimmingly. I feel at home in a way that I never have before. This is the goal and the means.

I miss Shel.

I miss my dogs. I miss my family. I miss the comfort and familiarity of home.

I never want to leave.

I'll try to keep you posted, but I'm productively busy to an extent that I have too long missed. Things are lookin' up.

Packing

2008-04-29T19:06:00.000-07:00

So, we're going to go visit some friends for a couple of days. We leave in the morning. Now, I should be packing instead of blogging. Besides the constant of procrastination, there are two truths about packing:
1. I will pack more than I need and be made fun of for it.
2. I will forget something crucial.
oh well,
at least the trip will be fun.

I Love the Whole World

2008-04-23T06:56:00.000-07:00

Those of you who watch Discovery Channel have already spotted this ad. For the rest of you, I just had to share.

I was just saying to Shel the other day something to the effect of "The best media is that which can make me laugh and make me cry - simultaneously."

By the way, for those who recognize, but cannot place the melody, this is the traditional camp song "I Love the Mountains."

Thank you Mosker

2008-03-25T09:26:00.000-07:00

I have changed the self portrait at right, courtesy of Mosker.

Another Mention of E. Gary Gygax

2008-03-13T19:15:00.000-07:00

He's worth mentioning again.

"But it's only wafer thin, sir"

2008-03-06T10:17:00.000-08:00

I know, I know, I'm usually the one defending Microsoft, but I will admit that The Monolithic One does seem to have a tendency to add features first, and release products later, oh and then fix problems after that. Oh, oh, and to listen to use feedback at some point. The bloat, bloat, bloat, POP! cycle reminds me of a scene from Monty Python's The Meaning of Life in which a ludicrously obese, laughably imperious man eats until he quite literally explodes, leaving gory chunks of vomit-soaked viscera all over the restaurant.

Audacity

2008-03-06T09:59:00.000-08:00

Sometimes known as having "big, brass balls," and epitomized here.
An Australian man took a AU$40,000 (US$37k) Honda Accord on a test drive. 2000 miles later, he was picked up for failing to pay for gas. In his defense, the dealer does usually pay for that - at least during the test drive for Pete's sake.

Requiescat In Pace Gary Gygax 1938-2008

2008-03-05T20:41:00.000-08:00

"Now Do a Little Dance!"

2008-03-02T07:54:00.001-08:00

Shrieks Gir as you patiently await the promised bathroom (photos).

These are as close as you're going to get for "before" pictures.

Please note in the picture below the location of the light fixture wiring high on the wall, as that is where it has been for 30 years, but not where it is now. For that matter, all of the plumbing for the sink and for sewer access has been moved left, too.

OS Stands for Operating System

2008-03-02T06:37:00.000-08:00

That's one the half-dozen IT (information technology) terms that I know.

I don't need to know any though to know that I like Windows XP. I know that it's not for everyone, and I know that the debate over which OS is better is as ubiquitous and arbitrary as the Coke vs. Pepsi debate once was and is far more heated, but I'm pleased to have found one which I like and which will run most software I want to use.

I already knew that I'm not "Vista Ready," but a recent article in the New York Times cements that in my mind by reporting that Microsoft knew about serious problems with Vista before launch but chose to move forward anyway under a shroud of customer confusion.

I retract my italicized text below. It is an unkind joke that I leave up only so that other readers understand the context of the ensuing comments. Follow the link and you will see for yourself that my sister is not a proselytizer, but a knowledgeable professional and a talented photographer.
(And please, while I love comments, don't try to convert me to the Cult of Apple. My sister Mosker is a Maccian, and I still love her, but the cult in general creeps me out just a little.)

Sleep Study II

2008-02-29T11:20:00.000-08:00

So, since I've been taking the dopamine for my periodic limb movement, Shel and I have both been sleeping much better, and Shel tells me that she no longer hears me stop breathing - ever. Still, the initial diagnosis was of both of periodic limb movement disorder and sleep apnea, so I last night I went in for a second sleep study and remembered to take my camera. Meet Melissa. She's works nights at the hospital's registration desk and reports that her husband snores a lot, but that they still haven't gotten a sleep study scheduled for him yet.

I had a different polysomnograph technician this time. I guess it was Matt's night off, so Mohammad, who works full-time at another sleep lab and fills in for Matt when he isn't there got me set up and monitored my sleep and also served as my photographic assistant for this entry.

While we talked about the pros and cons of polysomnography as a career, Mohammad plastered a bunch of wires and sensors on me to monitor breathing, oxygen saturation, limb movement and brain waves. To do this, he used an adhesive paste. I didn't think to ask what this paste was made of and Mohammad probably doesn't know, but I think that it's probably equal parts beeswax and sovereign glue. I had Shel cut my hair the other day, but the beard still had plenty of length to grab.

Then, the piece de resistance: the CPAP mask, which blows air down my gullet all night to keep the airway inflated and open. Let me tell you, if the pressure is high enough, it feels like having one's eyes shoved out of their head from behind.

Boy, what a miserable night's sleep I had! Every time I adjusted, I'd spring a leak in the mask and it would start blowing on my eye or on my lip. These leaks were significant enough that Mohammad thought that I had my mouth open and threatened to come in an put a chinstrap on me to keep my mouth closed. Wearing the CPAP mask on meant I was able to sleep on my back - something I normally avoid to minimize snoring, but unfortunately it also meant that I couldn't sleep in any other position. The jury's still out, and by all reports it takes quite a bit of getting used to to before a person feels comfortable wearing the mask, but I'm starting to think I might not be completely sold on CPAP. Obviously, if the apnea is still a problem, I'll adjust and use the thing, but from what Shel says, the apnea may have been primarily caused by the periodic limb movement. My mother-in-law is worried about me building a dopamine resistance as sometimes happens with Parkinson's patients, but for now, I'm just stoked to feel rested in the morning and making it through the day without a nap or a breakdown.

The gas gauge was on empty last night when I drove to
Woodland, so Ithought I'd fill up before I tried to get home. The petroleum fairies came in the night and added a little fuel, but I thought that it might be nice to have a full tank, literally and figuratively and stopped by AM/PM for hot chocolate and a donut. $45 later, I was back on my way.

I'll post some more pictures later, of the ongoing bathroom remodel and my lovable dogs now that I've purged my camera onto the computer.

In the meantime, sleep well.

I Love Reuters

2008-02-28T12:32:00.000-08:00

They have the best stories: the thieves who tried to rob a bar hosting a biker club meeting and the baby born into and through a toilet on a train to be picked after Mom stopped the train and went back for her baby are just the two I saw today. They're always reporting stuff like that.

I recognize the value of a public forum for the announcement of public events like marriages, births, land sales, and bankruptcies, and I get that there are thing we need to know for pragmatic reasons: Baghdad is not a great tourist trap right now, etc.

What I don't understand is the type of alarmist reporting that often preoccupies American reporting.

Whee! It my birthday!

2008-02-26T18:07:00.000-08:00

So, I was going to blog this morning about syntax and a recent NEA message indicating that some public school district somewhere will soon begin separating students by gender despite parent protest - I'm interested not by the issue or the pedagogical implications or even the controversy as I am by use of the word "gender" when the word intended, "sex," is too laden with naughty overtones. Nathan Lane, Charlton Heston, Rock Hudson, Brett Michaels, The-artist-again-known-as-Prince, Carson Daily, Dog the Bounty Hunter, Woody Allen and I all perform very different genders, but are all of the same sex.

I didn't, though, because I had to go to Woodland to visit the head shrinker. As expected, Cymbalta discontinuation was the root of my dysphoric vertigo/nausea/tinnitus. I got a scrip for a taper-down dose of the Cymbalta and other cool scrips, too, but the cool thing is that I feel human again. I even helped a little with demolitions today in the bathroom.

I'll post some "during" pictures later since I was too late to capture a "before" shot, but the long and short version is that we tore the cabinets out of the bathroom today, took down the mirror and the vanity ligh, pulled out the toilet and scraped and washed the crud off the walls in preparation to repaint, lay down tile, possibly re-plumb the sink, and put in new cabinets. When we're done, it will be much improved.

Finally, as we were working (okay, Shel was working. I was watching), FedEx showed up with the coolest birthday present EVAH! Trixie is a total BADASS and this gift is so cool that I'm in doubt as to whether it's even appropriate for me to explicate here what I got. I am so fully stoked! While the market value is of tertiary importance at best to me, it does give you a clue, so I will say that I estimate the retail value of this gift at about $520!

Shel and I just got back from the grocer and she's making her awesome spaghetti (okay, cellantani ragu) and her awesomer garlic bread, and I'm going to install the full version of WoW on my computer and begin spending some time geeking out.

Withdrawals

2008-02-24T12:16:00.000-08:00

I'm suffering from withdrawals, or "discontinuation syndrome."

I switched anti-depressant meds. I was taking Cymbalta, a combination seratonin- and norepinephrine-reuptake inhibitor. Because it wasn't cutting it, I've recently switched to Wellbutrin, which is a norepinephrine- and dopamine-reuptake inhibitor. The timing is fairly unscientific, as I just started taking the med for the periodic limb movement disorder, so it's hard to sort out various impacts of various pharmaceuticals, but I need to get all of this sorted out before my coverage expires at the end of March.

Anyway, as I'm learning is characteristic of discontinuing a seratonin-reuptake inhibitor, I have this nearly perpetual lightheadedness, low-grade nausea, and a throbbing vertigo similar to the severe dehydration one might associate with acute inebriation. It's fine as long as I'm lying down and not moving, but it sucks while I'm upright and moving about.

Basically, it only sucks while I'm awake.

That's not what this post is really about though.

I've recently started playing the MMORPG World of Warcraft with a ten-day trial account. The game is lot of fun and helps pacify my long-aching desire to play D&D again. Shel even tried it and enjoys it.

That trial account has expired. I really can't justify buying a video game, especially one which requires a monthly subscription, while I'm unemployed, but a dear friend (the chief influence in getting me to try the game in the first place) has sent me a copy of the game via snail mail for my upcoming birthday. I am anxiously awaiting the arrival of this package.

I know it's Sunday, but maybe USPS will make an exception and deliver today. I suppose it's worth the swimming, pulsing nausea to go out and check the mail to see if there has been a total breech of normal policy and the letter carrier will find a way to wedge the software and manuals in the little mailbox.

or not

Sleep

2008-02-22T14:06:00.000-08:00

My wife has a sleep disorder: me.

As I wrote about recently, I don't sleep well at night and my primary care physician referred me to a sleep specialist who conducted an overnight sleep study to analyze my sleep patterns. I had a follow-up visit with this sleep specialist yesterday and learned that I in fact have two sleep disorders: like many people, I have sleep apnea, an intermittent interruption of breathing while I sleep. While I'm not consciously aware of it, this cessation of breathing causes me to wake up, keeping me from entering into, and staying in, the dreaming, restful period of sleep.

We've all heard people snore, and the fact is that most people can get used to someone else's snoring and sleep through the noise. My snoring isn't what keeps Shel up at night. I toss and turn throughout the night, flopping my limbs, twitching and flailing. Anyone who has ever had a "falling dream," one in which they experience a sudden and unexpected sensation of falling, knows that the normal response is to jerk all of ones limbs upward as though to catch themself. Shel says that this is the best comparison for the movement that I exhibit all night long, every night. This is called periodic limb movement disorder. Imagine for a moment what it's like to try to sleep while somebody bounces on the bed.

The doctor, when reviewing the results of my sleep study, said "This is the fun part: how many times do you think you woke up during the night?"

Before I tell you what my answer to him was, I'll ask you, my readers, to ask yourself how many times you wake up during the average night.

Knowing that my estimate would be low, I said "Three," since I remember waking up three times during the study. It turns out that while I slept on my back, I woke up an average of 55 times per hour. When I wasn't on my back, I only woke up an average of 7.5 times per hour.

I'm going back for another sleep study next week, this time wearing a cpap machine while I sleep to address the snoring

In the meantime, the doctor started me on a drug which is basically a proto-dopamine which my body needs to produce the dopamine that will keep me from twitching. I never expect any drug to perfectly effective, and certainly not right away, but last night was the first time I took this stuff and Shel reports that I didn't twitch at all last night, moving only in the way that people normally do when they sleep, and that my snoring was even reduced dramatically.

The real bonus in all this for me (other than not keeping Shel awake all night) is that I think I feel more rested today than I normally do. I haven't had a nap today and I don't feel like I need one, and that's unusual.

A great start to a new future? Maybe. I'll keep you posted.

Cloche de Beurre

2008-02-22T13:58:00.000-08:00

This is neither the first nor, I am sure, the last time I will reference Interesting thing of the Day, a cool site I visit regularly. Joe Kissel has discovered and written about yet another elegant solution to a common problem. He and his wife also write about cool stuff that I don't take enough time considering.

Happy Belated Valentine's Day

2008-02-22T13:33:00.000-08:00

For those of you who have not stopped to consider the beauty and romance of this special day, please check out this link. Thanks, Trixie.

Old Glory Insurance

2008-02-15T13:45:00.001-08:00

Denice

2008-02-13T12:20:00.000-08:00

My dear friend Denice, a lifelong friend of Shel's, wrote me a long, thoughtful, and encouraging email dissuading me from leaving teaching asking for a token mention here - just a sentence, just a phrase, but she deserves more. She deserves her own blog, her own web-ring.
Thanks, Denice.

The Latest News

2008-02-13T11:44:00.000-08:00

Various people have told me for many years now that they thought I would make a good teacher - a very flattering remark, but one I still think was meant sincerely.

I didn't.

I made a lousy teacher. What I've discovered is that the profession of teaching, at least in my brief experience, has less to do with actually teaching people stuff they want to learn or which the teacher wants to teach than one might expect, and more to do with a whole lot of other bullshit.

As my regular readers know, I was teaching at a middle school in the Sacramento area this school year. Now I'm not. I resigned last Friday. It sounds reckless when it's put that way, but the truth is that the axe was already falling and I got out just before it found purchase. Officially, I have "left to pursue another opportunity." Actually, as glad as I am to be out of there, I'm still looking for that other opportunity.

I really didn't like teaching middle school. I liked teaching high school and I'm sure that if I'm to continue teaching, it will be at that level. The thing is that for as crappy as the kids could be sometimes, they weren't the problem. The problem was a sixty-hour work-week for two grand a month. The problem was the lockstep curriculum design. The problem was my fuckhead administrator. (by the way, Blogspot's internal spell check thinks that fuckhead is misspelled [and "Blogspot" and spellcheck too] but I double-checked and it's [they're] right).

I enjoy teaching the kids stuff that they need to know when they enjoy learning it, but, c'mon, who doesn't enjoy that, right? The kids at a middle school need baby-sitting as much as they need instruction, and that's a problem for me. I don't want to work as a babysitter. Either behave as you're supposed to or go the fuck home and ask Mom and Dad to beat you some more. I hate that I have to teach decorum to children who have parents. What I hate more is not having the time to teach them decorum because it takes away from teaching participial phrases only to learn later that nobody else is teaching participial phrases because they themselves don't understand them and they're "too hard." I hate then having to keep it a secret that I taught kids what participial phrases were because nobody else in the department taught their kids that (by the way, a participial phrase is when a verb is used as an adjective, e.g. the running dog, the tanned hide, the infuriating fuckhead).

I had some terrific coworkers. I had some terrific kids. I'll miss both even if I don't miss everything about the job.

Now, I need to find "another opportunity" worth having left my job for.

Joe Versus the Volcano

2008-02-11T11:21:00.001-08:00

I just finished re-watching this movie again, and I think that it is probably my all-time favorite film. Tom Hanks characterized it as an "existential comedy with adventure and romance in it." That's probably a fair assessment. There's so much to say about this film, and so much has already been said about it, I'm not sure what I can add but a recommendation. I saw new things on this viewing that I had never seen before, but I see new things each time I see it. This time, it was the shape of the lightning bolt that destroys the Tweedle-Dee, and Joe's pronouncement to DeDe, Angelica, and Patricia that, upon first meeting each of them, he felt like he had met them before.
One day, Shel and I will have to renew our vows, and when we do, I want to go all-out with a Waponi-style wedding. Our first wedding was, as those who were there know, a Florin-style wedding, and that was comically memorable, but I'm convinced that the Waponi way is better.
I guess what I love about this film is the fact that it is so thoroughly enjoyable on so many different levels - if all you want is a brainless comedy, that's there (e.g. the Waponi gong ringers swinging into their instruments and kerflopping down to the ground, the fake testes on Mr. Waturi's desk), and if you want something deeper, that's there too.
The dialog is an example:
DeDe: "What's with the shoe, Joe?"
Joe: "I'm losing my [soul]."
The subtle, yet pervasive symbolism is another, e.g. the lighting bolt shape, (again) the fake testes on Mr. Waturi's desk, the shedding of a hat each time 'finishes' a stage of development.
The movie is super quotable: "[Luggage] is the central preoccupation of my life . . . . If I had the need, and the wherewithal, this would be my trunk of choice."
"Okay, I'll take four."
"May you live to be a thousand years old."
"Yeah, you too."
Joe is supposed to be an "everyman." That's his express purpose in the screenplay - to be the generic everyman, and to be the protagonist. He is loving, kind, generous, flexible, and long suffering - due chiefly to his own unwillingness to force change. He is a hypochondriac. He has a terrificly thankful sense of awe and wonder. He is able to enjoy irony and humor, even at his own expense. Some might argue that these qualities flout the "everyman" mold, but I believe that they exemplify it. Joe isn't who we each want to be - Joe is who we are.

enough.

I love this film.

It's a Shame

2008-02-08T19:56:00.000-08:00

F**K Me Pumps Lyrics She'll probably be dead soon - at least if Bradley Noel, Janis Joplin, Kurt Cobain, or common sense are any indication. Until she is, though, or at least until she makes a good start on a regular,-running-joke-on-The-Soup-disaster-of-Britney-esque-proportions downward spiral, I'll continue to enjoy her hot, retro, sultry, voice.

I know now that I'm late on this, but her music is new to me.

My Hospital Stay

2008-01-24T07:58:00.000-08:00

Sorry, I meant to take pictures during my recent, brief hospitalization, but I forgot.

I just checked out this morning from my first stay in a stateside hospital.

Thats right - I spent the night in the hospital and none of you came to see me.

Don't feel bad, though. It's better that you didn't.

I went directly to the sleep center, where I had an appointment for a sleep study, and where I was redirected to the registration desk.

I checked in to Woodland Memorial Hospital at about 7 last night for a sleep study. I arrived to find a Jessica, a beleaguered, but friendly, hospital receptionist trying to cover the lunch-break of the hospital operator and find three different obstetricians to deliver or consult on four different deliveries, reroute patients from the emergency room to the intensive care unit, and track down a back-up X-ray technician to help the on-duty X-ray tech already overrun with patients.

Jessica eventually managed to get me checked in and sent me back upstairs to the sleep center, where my polysomnograph technician, Matt, explained the routine to me, had me fill out some forms and watch a video, hooked me up to more than a dozen different sensors, had me try out a couple of different CPAP masks in case I needed to be fitted with one in the middle of the night, and sent me to bed. (My sleep number is 100.)

I tossed and I turned. I listened to Matt greet and explain the routine to another patient whose appointment was an hour later than mine. I fell asleep. I woke up. I fell asleep. I woke up and called Matt in to disconnect me from the machine so I could use the restroom. I fell asleep. I woke up. Matt came in to reconnect a sensor I had removed in my sleep, but I assumed that morning had already come and that I had to get up. I asked "What time is it, anyway?"

"Uh. . . about three."

"Sweet!" I went back to sleep, and when Matt came in again two hours later, it was because it was time for me to get up. He disconnected me from the sensor array. He had me fill out a survey about the previous night's sleep, and I was able to shower there at the sleep center and wash from my hair and beard the glue out that had held the various sensors in place.

All in all, it was a fairly restless night's sleep and I think that I was right to take today off of work, despite the extra work that creates, but I look forward to learning the results of the study.

Will I have one of the eighty different known sleep disorders?

I'll find out in four weeks.

Genetic Engineering

2008-01-19T18:19:00.000-08:00

I support genetic engineering and believe that its inevitable risks will be outweighed by its benefits. Further, I believe that our long-term survival as a species, like that of any species, will depend upon our ability to adapt to our changing environment. Further, I endorse reading Richard Dawkins.

Whack-a-Mole

2008-01-19T10:13:00.000-08:00

Remember the arcade game you played as a kid, before everything was digital? Plastic moles pop up from apertures in the play surface and, armed with a foam mallet, the player is tasked with quickly smacking each mole as it appears before it can retreat unharmed.

Some days, teaching reminds me of whack-a-mole. Johnny, get quiet. Sally, sit down, please. Javier, get to work. Louise, don’t punch your neighbor. Paul, raise your hand. Beth, please write on paper instead of the desk. Johnny, get quiet. Sally, sit down, please. . .

I don’t think I’ve seen whack-a-mole in an arcade for a long time. I guess it must not be a big money-maker. Perhaps some people think it’s stupid and futile. Maybe they just tire of the monotony and wish that damned moles would stay where they belong and cooperate long enough to actually learn something.

Those of you who know something of pedagogy may now be foolishly shouting at your computer screens. If so, stop. I can’t hear you. I know that teaching doesn’t have to be futile – that if students are engaged, they will learn and they will be eager to do so. They will be eager to come to school and eager to work hard toward a real goal.

The difficulty in this is teaching engaging lessons – teaching creatively – while adhering to rigid, often arbitrary, standards designed to demand (but not support) mastery of increasingly outmoded skills of the lowest cognitive order. Our current system, overly scripted and nit-picky, often does only a mediocre job of preparing students for late-nineteenth-century factory work, and almost never does a good job of preparing them for the ever-changing challenges of the early-to-mid twenty-first century.

I don't claim to have all the answers, but I do know that No Child Left Behind is not the solution. Moreover, I believe that tighter regulation is not the answer. The best parents want the best education for their children and will insist on it. Teachers are creatures of conscience and work hard to do everything they can for their charges.

I know that not every teacher is great. I know that not every parent tracks their kids' education as they should. I also know that this is a reasonably self-policed system and that the money spent on enforcing NCLB would do more good spent in the classrooms.

The number one change needed: smaller class sizes - fewer students per teacher. Every student needs one-on-one time with an adult every day. They need someone they respect to listen to what they say.

Students don't need me scolding them for talking out of turn. They need a turn to talk.

Granted, it wouldn't hurt kids to have enough books for each of them. Furniture with surfaces unmarred by graffiti would be okay. If we actually aspired to prepare kids for tomorrow, we could integrate computers into all of their work, and be sure that they each have free access to a computer at home and at school.

We could give kids responsibility for work that really needs doing and the recognition that they have done it.

Rumor has it that some children can see the bare breasts of the Venus de Milo or hear the words "shit" and "damn" without their heads exploding. We don't need to Nerf the world. Kids will punch each other. They will call each other names. They will learn that there are better alternatives and they will grow.

We don't give our children enough credit. We don't give them enough time. We don't afford them the resources they deserve. They don't get what they need because we don't have the time right now, or we don't want to spend the money.

Guess what: when they rob a liquor store, we'll find the time, won't we? We'll send them to court and appoint an attorney and we'll prosecute them and send them to jail where they'll be supervised and fed and sent to bed until they can be paroled, supervised, work at a job which does not satisfy so they can buy things they don't need, go broke, run out of options, and go rob a liquor store.

Coddling, scolding, insulating, berating - we've tried these tactics and demonstrated that they don't work.

Now, let's try teaching.

Photo copyright 1999-2003 PrintingForLess.com and Creativepro.com

Bambi Meets Godzilla

2008-01-16T19:49:00.000-08:00

Just in case you've never seen it. . .
I've loved this movie since I first saw it, in part because of the creator's name, and in part because I have a profoundly dark sense of humor.

Wishes

2008-01-16T19:30:00.000-08:00

We've all seen motivational posters, either in an actual office, behind a pointy-haired boss, or in the popular media. You may have seen spoof versions. I found some and wanted to share them with you. You can see a whole slew of them here.

Today

2008-01-13T14:13:00.000-08:00

I went to visit the Yuba Sutter Center for Spiritual Awakening, a local branch of an international organization, The United Church of Religious Science. They are an amicable group, and certainly interested in doing good, but not a perfect fit for me. With strong trappings of Christianity, and profound, and fundamental contradictions in their doctrine. I've long longed for a group of community-minded people with sensible ideas about religion. These folks are good people, and definitely open-minded, but their practice is too formal for me.

I came home after this and watched the dogs play. Please to enjoy. This is more my speed of religious practice. Beyond all of the learning and theorizing and good intention, enjoying the moment is the kind of practice that makes life good.

There are wonderful resources for investigation of the beyond within - Carl Hall's Philosophy of Religion class at Yuba College was certainly both engrossing and edifying, and I have met individuals with whom I have shared profound conversations. I try to post here occasionally, but have yet to illicit a response. I enjoy reading and listening to Alan Watts. These are all good, but I have hoped to find a group with whom to meet regularly, with whom to talk about religious ideas, with whom to perform community service.

Perhaps I'll still find such a group. Perhaps I'll forge one myself. Perhaps I'll just get over the impulse. We'll see.

Rhonda!

2008-01-12T12:06:00.000-08:00

Reuters reports that a seven-year-old macaw foiled a burglary when he hear a disturbance in the pet shop where he resides and started shouting for his former owner.

A New Look, a New Link

2008-01-12T04:24:00.000-08:00

I updated the look ( as if you hadn't noticed. Let me know if you hate it. I also added another blog to the links at left: Rude Cactus. I think it's somewhat interesting, which is a fair site better than what you've found here lately, but hey, I deserve proper credit - I'm back at work and still updating, not one, but two blogs.

Rules for Clear Writing

2008-01-09T17:22:00.000-08:00

Verbs has to agree with their subjects.
Prepositions are not words to end sentences with.
And don't start a sentence with a conjunction.
It is wrong to ever split an infinitive.
Avoid cliches like the plague. (They're old hat.)
Also, always avoid annoying alliteration.
Be more or less specific.
Parenthetical remarks (however relevant) are (usually) unnecessary.
Also too, never, ever use repetitive redundancies.
No sentence fragments.
Contractions aren't necessary and shouldn't be used.
Foreign words and phrases are not apropos.
Do not be redundant; do not use more words than necessary; it's highly superfluous.
One should never generalize.
Comparisons are as bad as cliches.
Don't use no double negatives.
Eschew ampersands & abbreviations, etc.
One-word sentences? Eliminate.
Analogies in writing are like feathers on a snake.
The passive voice is to be ignored.
Eliminate commas, that are, not necessary. Parenthetical words however should be enclosed in commas.
Never use a big word when a diminutive one would suffice.
Do not use multiple exclamation points NOR all caps for emphasis!!!
Use words correctly, irregardless of how others use them.
Understatement is always the absolute best way to put forth earth shaking ideas.
Use the apostrophe in it's proper place and omit it when its not needed.
Eliminate quotations. As Ralph Waldo Emerson said, "I hate quotations. Tell me what you know."
If you've heard it once, you've heard it a thousand times: Resist hyperbole; not one writer in a million can use it correctly.
Puns are for children, not groan readers.
Go around the barn at high noon to avoid colloquialisms.
Even if a mixed metaphor sings, it should be derailed.
Who needs rhetorical questions?
Exaggeration is a billion times worse than understatement.
The passive voice should never be used.
Do not put statements in the negative form.
A writer must not shift your point of view.
Place pronouns as close as possible, especially in long sentences of 10 or more words, to their antecedents.
Writing carefully, dangling participles must be avoided.
If any word is improper at the end of a sentence, a linking verb is.
Take the bull by the hand and avoid mixing metaphors.
Avoid trendy locutions that sound flaky.
Everyone should be careful to use a singular pronoun with singular nouns in their writing.
Always pick on the correct idiom.
The adverb always follows the verb.
Be careful to use the rite homonym.

And last...

46. Proofread carefully to see if you any words out.

Music Box

2008-01-06T22:42:00.000-08:00

This is neat. Turn on the sound and check it out. Now.

Big T, Our Tree Guy

2008-01-05T12:15:00.000-08:00

This guy is awesome for all the reasons you don't think about until after you've been through a few contractors:
He charges reasonable (or better) rates.
He is personable.
He shows up consistently and dependably when he's needed. (About a half-hour after the appointed time, but he usually calls to explain why he'll be late.)
He's no-nonsense.

Free As A Bird - The Beatles

2008-01-05T08:41:00.000-08:00

It's been too long since I celebrated these musicians here.

Panoramas

2008-01-05T08:04:00.000-08:00

A cool feature of my new camera, one I forgot to mention earlier, is that it helps me take photos which can later be stitched together into a panorama.

Blogger Discovery

2008-01-05T06:46:00.000-08:00

I just realized that the order in which I publish blog posts is meaningless. Only the order in which they are drafted matters: First drafted = first posted. Ah well.

New Camera

2008-01-05T05:29:00.000-08:00

I was pretty happy with my old camera for the most part. A Samsung Digimax S800, Shel bought me the camera almost two years ago. It was easy to operate and with 8.1 megapixels, I could just shoot the general area where my desired photographic subject appeared and zoom in after the fact. It was small. It had a whole grip of special features, bells and whistles, and built-in editing capabilities. I liked the camera.

Until it died.

We were at a friend's house for New Years and it stopped. It wouldn't turn on. It wouldn't retract. It wouldn't do anything. I replaced the batteries and still got nothing. I took it to Sam's Club, where it was purchased, and they just asked for the stuff that went with it. We went home, found the geegaws and the receipt and took it back. Sam's club took back the "defective" camera and gave me a gift card. I turned around and bought a new camera, a Canon Powershot SX100 IS. So far, so good. I shot some test shots and am learning to use the thing. This has only 8.0 megapixels, but has a 10x optical zoom instead of the 3x of the old Samsung. I even took some footage of yesterday's weather and if I can get the internet to cooperate, I'll post it.

Sturm und Drang

2008-01-05T03:08:00.000-08:00

While the wind subsided a bit, but before it got really bad, I decided to try out my new camera.

Great what a power-outage will encourage one to do, isn't it? Above is just a short view of what happens when the wind and rain pick up at our house. Later, the wind picked up some more, knocking down a 50' Italian cypress and the weird willow-like plant monstrosity in the most-distant corner of the yard, taking out several sections of fence, and prompting us to ask the tree guy take down the giant sequoia my father foolishly planted in the back yard. Shel sometimes expresses a wish that my dad were still alive, just so she could berate him for some of the decisions he made. Tree felling is not cheap, but it's a lot cheaper than the deductible on the homeowner's insurance. If the sequoia comes down on its own, it will likely take out the neighbors' garage.

My sister Suzanne doesn't have the tree problems that we do, but she's gotten her share of fun out of the storm as well.

Yum (potential)

2008-01-05T02:35:00.000-08:00

In need of a metaphorical market-leader for a recent post, I happened across something tantalizing. I hope to taste these soon. They sound delicious.In fact, I encountered a whole realm of products for which I had never meant to search. What a fascinating world we live in.

Poison Well Before Drinking

2008-01-05T01:53:00.000-08:00

Apple computers, though argued by their fans to be a vastly superior product to PCs, represent a relatively small portion of the personal- and business- computing market. I don't know enough about them to make an argument regarding their virtues or shortcomings, but I have long believed that the reason Apple computers didn't long ago go belly-up is their forward-thinking move to put MacIntosh computers into a whole slew of public-school classrooms. I used them in school, both as a student and as a teacher, but I believe that I might never have heard of them if Apple had not chosen this particular brand of advertising. Note also, that a long-employed tactic of drug-pushers is to give away their product until the hook is set, so to speak.Intel has recently chosen a different tactic and it may take some time to evaluate the relative wisdom of their plan.

In short. One Laptop Per Child, a non-profit program designed to distribute cheap computers to the third world entered into a partnership with Intel wherein Intel would give the organization money and would work on designing a computer for them using an Intel processor instead of one from competitor Advanced Micro Devices. Intel sales staff are reported to have then told the representatives of foreign governments buying the One Laptop computers that they would be better-off buying a competing (and more expensive) device directly from Intel, and even disparaging the product they were to have been endorsing. One of these government officials is a long-time acquaintance of the founder of the One Laptop Per Child movement.

A falling out has ensued and Intel has now withdrawn from the program. Intel is an industry juggernaut, leading their field in market share for a long time. I am suspicious, though, that a long view might have lead them to play this one differently.

I have been given the impression that growth in any market most benefits the company which leads that market. If I work for Frito-Lay, and I give away Bob's Potato Chips to people in the third world who have never before tasted potato chips, I can expect those people to eventually develop a taste for potato chips (lower case) They will eat potato chips whether they are free or expensive. They will consume potato chips from every manufacturer, but mostly they will eat Frito-Lay potato chips - because Frito-Lay leads the market.

Every new market helps the industry leader.

I don't know if consumer resentment has an impact on long-term sales or if this move will even breed resentment towards Intel.

How to Prepare Absinthe

2007-12-28T13:26:00.001-08:00

Per Trixie's request, I will explain briefly how to prepare absinthe in the traditional manner. Be warned: no matter how much you like licorice, nothing will prepare you for your first glass of absinthe. This liquor may be as much as 80% alcohol. Enjoy conservatively.

You will need
Absinthe (available from fine U.S. distributors and from more than one bottler)
A perforated spoon, a dripper, or brouilleur
A drinking glass
A 1 ounce shot glass or a willingness to estimate
A sugar cube
Ice-cold water

Pour 1 oz of absinthe into the drinking glass. Place your absinthe spoon atop the glass and place the sugar cube atop this spoon. Slowly drip 3 to 5 oz cold water over the sugar to dissolve it into the absinthe. (Some purist absintheurs abstain the spoon and sugar.) The water will cause the absinthe to louche, releasing the essential oils therein and becoming opaque - a milky yellowish green.

Rats!

2007-12-27T22:59:00.001-08:00

That's all. I just thought that this was a cute picture. I'm trying out Google's news reader and it brought me here, to File magazine.

Reading Level

2007-12-27T19:35:00.000-08:00

Kajukenbo

2007-12-26T22:42:00.000-08:00

Since I haven't had time to train, I've really missed my twice weekly martial arts sessions. I hope to get together with my teacher again before I have to go back to work. In the meantime, I've been watching and rewatching this short video demonstration of Kajukenbo techniques.

Eerie silence

2007-12-26T22:28:00.000-08:00

Several posts back, I turned on comments again.

I realized that there were two reasons I haven't been blogging.

I haven't had time.

I find the blog more satisfying when others read and comment on it.

My students don't read this blog, or even know about it.

My colleagues don't read it.

I write what I want.

I look forward to reading your retorts. . .

Yule Absinthe

2007-12-22T19:52:00.000-08:00

I so wanted to share this with you before now since I've been bursting to share - I bought Shel a bottle of absinthe for Yule and gave it to her today. She was completely surprised.
Long thought to be illegal in the U.S., absinthe is 124 proof liquor distilled from Grand Wormwood, anise, and other herbs. Mistakenly believed to be a poisonous hallucinogen, absinthe is a distinctive drink with an elaborate ritual in its consumption. Playing on Shel's belief that absinthe was illegal, I managed to keep this one a complete secret. I gave her a package of half-a-dozen absinthe spoons first, and she instantly recognized them, compounding her puzzlement. When she pulled out the bottle, she asked how I had gotten it - given that it was illegal.
Interested in a bottle of your own? Check out the Lucid website, or that of BevMo, which sells both Lucid and another brand of absinthe, Kübler.

Neat Site

2007-12-15T14:57:00.000-08:00

I found this neat site through an advertisement - though, come to think of it, that was a pretty poorly targeted ad, given that I was looking up the meaning of the word moue and an etymology for exacerbate. The site is called Black Jungle and they sell carnivorous plants, terrarium and vivarium supplies, and pretty, oxymoronically non-poisonous poison-dart frogs.

I Should be Working

2007-12-15T14:41:00.000-08:00

I should be working, but I'm not.
I have papers to grade - what a chore.
Niacin flush makes my skin hot.

Powerpoint learning a little more,
But mostly just surfing instead.
I did find a site I adore.

Called Blogger Play, it is said
To have photos from all over.
And they quickly fill my head.

Gods, that's bad!

Anyway, neat site linked above. I'm turning comments back on and killing the link that points here from my school web page.

Back to work. 130 essays, 38 hours, 0 time to sleep.

I'm a new man

2007-12-11T15:29:00.000-08:00

I retook the personality profile test at MyPersonality.info and this time, I got different results.Truth be told, I actually took the test twice and both sets of results were different from each other and from the original results. I think most folks' Myers-Briggs results are pretty consistent. I guess I'm just weird.

Coolest Advent Ever!

2007-12-01T05:37:00.000-08:00

Yes, I'm blogging at 5:30 in the morning.

I got up to feed the dogs and discovered what Shel has been hinting at for weeks. She made me an Advent calender! This is the coolest thing ever, and I am very excited.

I love Advent. I always have. (Yes, it's a Christian tradition, and perhaps in its relative obscurity, should be regarded as even "more Christian" than Christmas - if Christianity is a sliding scale.) The anticipation of that which is to come is heightened by the gradual parceling out of goodies. I grew up with the little chocolate-filled paper advent calenders and, once or twice had calenders without candy but with carefully-placed doors which opened to reveal nativity scenes. When I heard about Suzanne's kid getting a Lego(r) advent calender, I felt some envy - I must confess. When Shel got annoyed at having to stop me from buying myself an Advent calender at Cost Plus International Market, I began to get excited.

As any of you who has ever received a handmade gift before know, hand-made is better by far than store-bought. No, I don't want a hand-made Tag-Heuer watch. You know what I mean. A gift assembled for you by someone who knows and loves you is really something special. This gift is a perfect example.

Shel knows I love Advent - or at least that I love Advent calenders. She knows that I prefer high-quality, durable things over disposable crap. She knows that I enjoy Lindt chocolates (Not rocket surgery, that - fish enjoy water, too. Who doesn't like Lindt?) Most of all, though, Shel knows that I have a deep and abiding nostalgia for G.I.*Joe. I spent many of the most enjoyable hours of my life playing with, posing, writing about, drawing, yearning for, talking about, arranging and rearranging, organizing, caring for, and destroying my G.I.*Joe toys and file cards. I even wrote letters to Hasbro suggesting new characters. While other kids were moving on to Michael Jackson and Tiffany and methamphetamines, I was typing file cards into the computer so I could quickly and easily select characters by their primary and secondary military specialties. When other kids were making jokes about Christa McAuliffe, I was plotting Destro's takeover of Cobra and trying to figure out how he would transform it from a terrorist organization into a profit-making enterprise. I loved me some G.I.*Joe.

This morning, I came into the den to discover the Advent calender below. I opened the door marked "1" to find Cobra Commander curled up in the fetal position inside next to a Lindt dark chocolate Lindor truffle! The fetal position!

Anyone who's ever played with G.I.*Joes knows that the old ones could never assume the fetal position and would not last long if one tried. This little guy is far better articulated than anything I played with as a kid. The sculpt is painstakingly done. The paint is almost perfect. It is too cool!

While the toy has been re-imagined to allow freer movement, the concept is the same, and the sculpt is obviously based on the same concept art that governed the creation of those toys all those years ago. Only one of the sibilant one's hands could ever hope to hold anything - the left one is curled into a fist, and his windswept hood is hard plastic rather than the fairly firm rubber or old, one can peek under this one's shroud to see some skin-tight red garment covering his neck. He still has the gig-line to make Tim Gunn cry and the silly leggings that strap under the heels of his boots, but now he also has ankle joints. Gone is the in-torso rubber band and the funky metal hip joint thing. CC now has a ball joint in his lower torso. The arms will lay flat against its sides. The sculpt is a little thin - his pants look like those skin-tight chick pants that kids wear now, but let's face it - if anybody was ever emo, it was Cobra Commander.

If I was bent on world-domination through terror and intimidation by the employment of overly-complex and needlessly public and hyper-dramatic plans that Dr. Evil himself would scoff at, I'd hope to be this cool.

COBRA!
(I think I might hire somebody to come up with a more imaginative war-cry, though)

Frustration

2007-11-22T13:47:00.000-08:00

A coworker recently complained of his "fustration"[sic] with my work, explaining that, "Ray, I'm *fustrated - it's very *fustrating - and I'm not the only one. Your colleagues are *fustrated too."

I behaved myself. I didn't say what I wanted to. This was at the end of a long, hard day, and in the middle of a dressing-down sprung on me more-or-less out-of-the-blue indicating that dissatisfaction with my work has been kept from me by several intelligent, well-educated people with demonstrated communication skills and responsibility for helping me succeed as part of their team.

I refrained from saying "FRUSTRATING! IT'S 'FRUSTRATING,' YOU FUCKING MORON! I will not stand here and be told my business by a bucket-mouthed idiot who can't speak the fucking language! Your talking privileges have been revoked until you can demonstrate the ability to use them responsibly. I want to punch you in your fucking piehole for your assault against my language! Don't talk." That might have turned out poorly had I not exercised restraint.

By the way, prefacing a word or an utterance with an asterisk is a linguistic convention for indicating or acknowledging that the word or utterance is non-standard.

Some people need to be prefaced by an asterisk.

As promised

2007-11-18T12:43:00.000-08:00

The Yolo county Fair was fun. It's the last County fair in California (and possibly in the country) with free admission, and we met up with some friends who live in Woodland and had a nice time wandering around, eating funnel-cake, and just generally enjoying the company of friends.

Policy Change

2007-08-21T12:12:00.000-07:00

Sorry things have been quite around here for a few days - they haven't been quiet in real life - school starts tomorrow. At some point, I'll try to post some pictures of our visit to the Yolo County Fair this past Saturday.

School starts tomorrow and other teachers at this school encountered problems when students posted to their MySpace page.

As a result, I have changed the settings on my blog so that all comments are now moderated. Sorry. It's not a change I like and perhaps one day things will change, but for now, this is needed to keep me safe and fully employed.

Please keep commenting. I love comments! Just don't be hurt when the comments don't appear right away. Thanks for understanding.

Olive Cheese Crescents - First Draft

2007-08-13T20:08:00.000-07:00

This occurred to me earlier today, so I tried it out tonight and it was a hit.

Slice some black olives.

Open a can of crescent rolls - I used garlic-flavored ones. Open them up and separate out into triangles as directed.

Spread them with cream cheese - as much as I like Garden Vegetable flavored, I used whipped regular cream cheese. It's the same price and it's easier to spread.

Arrange some olive slices on the cream cheese.

Roll up the crescent rolls as directed. Bake as directed.

Enjoy.
Like I said, they were a hit - but, to be honest, I was a little underwhelmed. Next time, I think I'll add some shredded Sargento Mexican Four Cheese Blend, and maybe some Italian seasoning. . .

I'll let you know how it turns out, but if you come up with an innovation, please do share.

Mule Racing in the Desert

2007-08-13T09:45:00.000-07:00

*Sorry, if you're looking for news on the Democratic Primary or the California State Fair, this isn't it. Go back and refine your search.

The Pentagon is developing autonomous battlefield robots for combat.
I worry that
1. Americans will be over-eager to accept anything they think will diminish the need to put soldiers in harm's way.
2. Target designation is at least as significant stumbling-block as autonomous overland navigation.
3.Once technical difficulties are worked out, we will still face the moral and ethical difficulties of employing an expendable fighting force against human foes.

You have undoubtedly heard of the Pentagon-sponsored race in the desert where university researcher, gearheads, and hackers compete to get a car from point A to point B without driver or remote control over a designated route.

The idea is that the military wants an autonomous vehicle to navigate unknown terrain in battle. The races started in 2004, and for a while, no entrant managed to even finish the course. Some died of engine failure ten feet in and some wandered away from the course half-a-mile from the finish line. Eventually, though, some entrants did finish and it has since become a genuine race. Last year, five entrants crossed the finish line. This year, first place gets a US$2,000,000 prize. The top twenty (of thirty-six entrants) go on to compete again in November.

Turns out, the Pentagon is looking for urban navigation capabilities as well as desert.

The robotic vehicles will have to follow California traffic law while performing such tasks as merging into traffic, making sharp turns and avoiding obstacles such as utility poles, trees and parked cars -- without the help of humans or remote control.

At this point, maybe you're wondering where all this is headed - what the pentagon intends to do with the winners' technologies?

Meet MULE - (Multifunction Utility/Logistics and Equipment Vehicle) I found this on IGN, a gaming site. The Pentagon means to put robots in combat alongside conventional infantry. Some of you may have the initial reaction "Hurray! Robots can take the risk so our soldiers don't have to." Note, though, that these robots will be fighting alongside conventional soldiers.

These descendants of technology that was running off the road not so long ago are now being sized up to wear machine guns and anti-tank missiles. Friendly fire is already the biggest killer of our forces overseas and I worry that this technology may take a while to get the kinks worked out. Moreover, assuming that we can quickly develop a means to designate allied soldiers so that the MULE won't shoot them, how much longer will it take to teach them to differentiate between crazy old ladies with George Bush effigies and teenage boys with rocket-propelled grenade launchers?

Don't get me wrong - I'm in favor of technological development and in favor of military technology in general. I believe that the United States' absurdly overwhelming military might keeps us from having to wipe out unwitting followers of a bunch of dictators who might otherwise do dumb stuff they shouldn't. I even like that the Pentagon sponsored a contest and made a gameshow of military technology development. This will undoubtedly save us all some money.

I also feel though, that autonomous target designation is a scary bucket of worms. The robot must choose enemy combatants from an array of friendly forces, bystanders, enemy combatants, inanimate objects, and more. With the perennial uncertainty of cheap farm labor, robotics researchers have been working for years to develop a machine that can identify and harvest ripe apples without damaging them or picking green ones.

The problems are by no means insurmountable. We will put robots on the battlefield. There will be technical problems that cause unwanted deaths. We will overcome those technical problems. These are things I'm sure of.

When we've worked out all the kinks, though, I fear that we will have a fighting force we can quickly dispatch to any part of the world which will suppress resistance and allow us to impose our will on our neighbors without fear of losing U.S. lives. I fear that we are on our way to a guilt-free conquest force.

My reading of science-fiction literature has trained me to consider the moral and ethical implications of unlikely situations brought upon civilization by the advancement of technology. Now, the U.S. military is forcing me to apply that training.

I ask you to consider this: If we'd had MULEs in time for the first Gulf War, wouldn't we have used them? Would we have used them in Vietnam? How much sooner would we have entered World War II if we hadn't feared for American lives? The Spanish-American War? The Mexican-American "War?"

More importantly, what wars have we simply not fought because we couldn't afford the loss of life?

What wars might we fight in the future because - well, Hell - why not? We got the MULEs!

Battlefield robots will soon be a reality that some people will rejoice in and others will bemoan. Technical difficulties will arise and be overcome. Ethical concerns over their use will outlive all my readers.

*I made the disclaimer at the outset that this was not an article about the Democratic Primaries or the mule racing at the California State Fair. Likewise, if you were looking for stories about a (non-military) combative mule, you were probably looking for this.

Dang I'm Hungry

2007-08-09T12:44:00.000-07:00

And this looks good.
Oh, yeah, and Veggie Meal Plans has moved and spruced up. Your old bookmarks and links should still work, though, so no effort, just salivating.

Revision: I just realized as a looked at the published post, it actually looks kind of gross if you don't know that it's Black Bean Tostada with Mango Salsa and Fresh Veggies.

After After Patio Pictures

2007-08-08T22:57:00.000-07:00

So you've already seen the before, during, and after pictures of the new patio, both here and on my Mom's blog, but now I have two more to show off:
We picked up the canopy at Wal-Mart yesterday for about $300.

My New Classroom

2007-08-08T22:30:00.000-07:00

So, I met with one of my department heads this morning; got my class schedule; got a brief outline on the year plan for the department; got some helpful advice, and I got some time (And some help, thank you Mom) to put together my classroom. I'll have tables this year, and while that was less than a stellar success last year, I have higher hopes this time around.

I'm excited about this year for a number of reasons: I have my own classroom, and I have it before the kids show up. (Last year, for those who don't know, I didn't start until the second day of school.) I get to teach a whole curriculum this year, including literature, instead of just grammar, spelling and vocabulary. That's cool. I'll get to meet a whole new group of kids and work in an environment totally new to me, and in a way, that's nice, too.

I have a mix of Hispanic and Anglo kids - no Hmong this year unfortunately, but I'll have a mix of struggling kids and kids at grade level. I'll have mostly eighth-graders and one section of seventh-graders. Best of all, from all that I can tell, I'll have a group of co-workers genuinely committed to working together as a team. I saw last year just how effective that can be and I wouldn't want to have to be without it again - though, with a greater number of kids who are academically successful, I can only imagine the potential for terrific things.

It's an hour away, and that's already a drag since I'm not a fan of commuting, but maybe I'll try an audiobook or something. I look forward to a great year and I'll try to stay close enough to being on-schedule to give you an occasional update.

Stay Tuned

2007-08-08T09:18:00.000-07:00

I'll try to post later today with new patio pictures and an update on the new school.

300

2007-08-06T17:05:00.000-07:00

It's been almost a week since we saw this, and I just can't get it off my mind. I think that I'll have to watch it again. The action, while stylized, was mind-bogglingly impressive. The story was clear without being simplistic. The characters were engaging
- and beautiful. The theme (freedom good, tyranny bad) was familiar and delivered so convincingly that I mused to Shel that perhaps every Marine should be required to own a copy.

Oh, yeah, and while Rodrigo Santoro is only 6'2", Xerxes is terrifyingly large.

Cooler Weather

2007-08-06T11:15:00.000-07:00

Some really good friends from Seattle just stopped by for a visit en route to Disneyland on Saturday. It was wonderful to get to catch up with them, since we don't get to see much of one another since they moved up there. They got to enjoy a bit of our California heat, which I'm told is a nice occasional treat.

Now, we get their weather, and I couldn't be happier. It's 60 degrees out and it's delightful. The AC is turned off. I'm really pleased. August is usually my least favorite time of year in the valley, despite vacation, because it's just so bleeding hot - usually.

I think I'll throw on a sweater and take the dogs for a walk.
Update: The sun came out :(
Oh well; it was nice while it lasted, and Winter will be here soon.

To Be Like Trixie

2007-08-05T21:26:00.000-07:00

Trixie posted yet another personality test and multiple-intelligences profile.

So before you ask, yes, as a matter of fact, if Trixie jumped off a bridge, I think I might look into it too. Who knows? Maybe it's just underrated. As an aside, Shel's came out INFJ (Confidant) and it turns out, unsurprisingly, that she is a Bodily/Kinesthetic, Naturalistic, and Verbal/Linguistic learner.

Before and After Patio Pictures

2007-08-05T20:27:00.000-07:00

Before. . .

And after. . .
This has taken all Summer (like as in March 31st through today), but I think it looks pretty good. Tomorrow, we begin looking for a patio cover.
Update: My mom scooped my story! Worse, her pictures look better than mine.

Selling my Body

2007-08-02T21:31:00.000-07:00

$4875.00

The Deathly Hallows - No Spoilers

2007-07-25T08:04:00.001-07:00

So, I finished Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows on Sunday and have spent the last two days reflecting on this book in specific and on the Harry Potter narrative as a whole. I have to confess that one or two minor continuity details nag at me and there are, perhaps, a few minor questions that go unanswered, but overall, I feel tremendously satisfied with this conclusion to the story that has so pervaded the international consciousness these last few years.

The plot and themes are thoughtfully resolved and the reader has a chance to bid farewell to most of the well-loved characters. As for the setting - well, I did indicate that this would be a spoiler-free post.

I Grow Impatient. . .

2007-07-21T10:39:00.000-07:00

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows is due to arrive today.

I want to start reading now.

I could actually just run down to Wal-Mart and pick up another copy and start. . .

No, three copies is too many

I'll wait.

Don't expect updates for a bit, and when I return, watch out for spoilers.

. . .waiting. . . waiting. . . waiting. . .

Food Miscellany

2007-07-20T20:22:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, I mentioned Veggie Meal Plans. On the subject of food, I really ought to mention the naturopathic food cravings table upon which I recently stumbled and also the Vegetarian Resource Group, which I've had bookmarked for some time, but which it never occurred to me to blog about.