The past three days have been invigorating, demanding, and almost universally pleasant. My captain rocks and, at least for now, has been patient with my utter lack of knowledge, ability, or short-term memory. My body aches and I'm consistently and completely coated in grime, but it feels good to work again.
Dude, I work on a sailboat.
Sigsbee's maintenance and restoration is going fairly well so far. I've been painting, scraping, sanding, buffing, cleaning, and bunging since minute 1 and the time has flown. Photos will follow as soon as my loving mother sends me my camera battery charger. (i left it in the bathroom. it was one of those sorts of move.) Kate and the other winter crew had torn out the entire quarter deck and replaced it, and I had the honor (and backache) of sanding it flat with a 10" buffmaster. The effect was incredible. What had been a maze of cotton cord, blue tape, and sheets of plastic became a gorgeous, honey-colored deck. Sigs is still under her winter tent, and removing that will be a bitch i'm sure, but I think we'll have help. Both Lady Maryland and Mildred Belle have been disrobed and are getting more engine/student preparedness work done by their current crews.
I spent much of today cleaning assorted steering parts with diesel fuel and a grill brush. it was dirty, stinky work, but kinda fun. Afterwards I used a bung cutter and, i shit you not, filled bung-holes. Turns out a bung is a little wooden cork that you cover in epoxy and tap into deck recesses to cover hardware. all fasteners on deck must be protected from corrosion, so they're countersunk deep into the decking slats, then covered with the same decking material. I had to try and keep the woodgrains aligned (i think that was just aesthetic, but i could be wrong) and managed to completely coat the hammer head in epoxy paste and forgot about it. i'm a big help. I just hope that when Kate gets annoyed enough to slap me that she doesn't have epoxy on her hand.
Things are going fairly well on the home front. an Australian man of indeterminate age has moved in across the hall from me--his hair is, self-described, impressively matted. when he takes his hat off the nesting pheasant clicks her beak in annoyance. He seems nice, in that cocky way Australian ex-pats tend to be. At least its someone else to talk to. The shipkeeper, a willfully ignorant and easily confused elderly Austrian lady, complains constantly and frequently tries to Jesus-ify me. I avoid her with something approaching terror. She tried to convince me that true Atheists don't really exist--"come on, you recognize some higher power--maybe not the Judeo/Christian god, but a God nonetheless--like the Force?" I could tell her Evangelical minister had suggested using this tactic to witness to the godless--to try and lure them into a false sense of security by admitting "yeah, i guess there's something out there making it all work, yeah, like the force" so that she could spring her trap by saying "God is that force!" but I replied with "no, there's no proof of any universal cohesion. Indeed, there's no proof of anything, least of all your or my existence. Its possible we're fleeting manifestations of the troubled subconscious of a fourth grader in some far off galaxy. There is no rhyme, reason, or meaning, to anything--there's no higher objective or anything in control, there's nothing causing anything to happen except the infinite circumstances that have led us to this point, and that's just fine. it gives the individual the power to make their own life, safe in the knowledge that it is universally insignificant."
That shut her up. and it was fun to spit out. I'm like a mastery-level challenge for god-botherers, and she's not even a journeyman. (It wasn't like I brought it up just to abuse her with it. She suggested I come to church with her, as I'm new to the area, so I could meet some people and have a church to go to. I reluctantly admitted that church wasn't my scene, knowing that it was opening a big heavy, spring-loaded door.)
Oy, i have a huge splinter in my finger. I think its metal. Its probably historic.
I work on a sailboat!
Wednesday, March 05, 2008
Sunday, March 02, 2008
Welcome to Baltimore. Here's a parking ticket.
I've moved. I've found coffee shops with wifi. I've gotten settled in and am working on building a niche for myself in Baltimore's grassroots arts scene. I've got a horrible bed, but a bed nonetheless, in a private stateroom in my new floating home--a home with reasonable rules and a constant flow of tourists during daylight hours. There's really nothing quite like feeling like a demonstration of how a sailor might have eaten a bowl of cereal back in the '40s. This morning found me in the chiefs' galley, munching happily away on my organic soy crisp, occasionally being interrupted by a tap on the glass door by a visitor who wanted to know if the refrigerator was real.
The ship is old and the paint is peeling in places, the floor is absolutely a popsicle, but the shower is hot and there's ample storage for all of my clothes and crap. I'd upload photos but i realized last night that i forgot my camera charger, so i may have to send home for it. I bought a rug today--i just couldn't bring myself to put my socks on every morning balancing on my slippers. I'm located at the absolute center of Baltimore's historic tourist district, and within easy walking distance of a Whole Foods, cafes, restaurants, bars, libraries, and shopping i could never afford. I'm next door to the Hard Rock Cafe, the national aquarium, a waterfront mall, hotels, Filene's Basement, and millions of screaming babies. Prime residential area? Probably not. But its interesting to be at the hub of everything.
Several young people manning the cappucino machines around here have mentioned that they visited my place of work on school trips in their elementary days. Living Classrooms is apparently a well-reputed local institution, which is awesome to hear. I hope I'm cool enough for them. I start tomorrow, in what looks to be a painting/scraping/cleaning position, if the antics of my captain on Friday were any indicator. We'll actually start sailing after Easter, and I think i'll feel more like a ship's mate at that point.
Sheezus its cold! But it's dry and clear. SC was having a bizarre spell of cold humidity, by which i cannot abide, just on principle. The weather is honor-bound to adhere to certain rules of decorum, even in the south. If it is cold, it should be dry or raining, not humid.
Anyway. the pier manager told me to load my stuff aboard between 11pm and 9am, when ticketing was not enforced and i could draw my car up next to the ship. So I went out of my way--for hours--to comply. I parked my car 20 miles away, in Owings Mills, in a free parking deck, and took the subway into town. I had my orientation and then wandered aimlessly for the rest of the day, meeting people and essentially running into things, with just my purse and my coat. At 10:30 I got back on the train, rode out to its end, and collected my vehicle. I pulled into the lane by the ship at 11:14pm, hauled all of my stuff aboard by myself as quickly as possible, put it in my room, locked the door, and returned to my car. it was 11:36. I'd received a parking ticket for $52 at 11:32 for "parking on the sidewalk and impeding the movement of pedestrians." mind you, this lane is wide enough for two cars to pass easily, and indeed the meter maid may well have driven up in a car to ticket me and drove past. If a pedestrian were to need that amount of space to not be inconvenienced, that pedestrian would be too heavy to stand up without his femurs shattering. Moreover, there were no pedestrians in the area, on account of the closure of everything a pedestrian might feel inclined to visit. And its clearly stated on their pier policy that they wouldn't do it. So the pier manager printed off their policy information and a map of the area, and has written me a letter on company letterhead to the effect that I was doing exactly what I should've been and kindly-stick-it-in-your-nose, but i have to go contest it in traffic court. Welcome to town. Here's your summons. I don't just want the ticket to be dismissed. I want a formal apology. I want the judge to say "Sorry about that, we're really nice people here, welcome to our fair city, have a book of clip-out coupons to local businesses."
Is that too much to ask?
The ship is old and the paint is peeling in places, the floor is absolutely a popsicle, but the shower is hot and there's ample storage for all of my clothes and crap. I'd upload photos but i realized last night that i forgot my camera charger, so i may have to send home for it. I bought a rug today--i just couldn't bring myself to put my socks on every morning balancing on my slippers. I'm located at the absolute center of Baltimore's historic tourist district, and within easy walking distance of a Whole Foods, cafes, restaurants, bars, libraries, and shopping i could never afford. I'm next door to the Hard Rock Cafe, the national aquarium, a waterfront mall, hotels, Filene's Basement, and millions of screaming babies. Prime residential area? Probably not. But its interesting to be at the hub of everything.
Several young people manning the cappucino machines around here have mentioned that they visited my place of work on school trips in their elementary days. Living Classrooms is apparently a well-reputed local institution, which is awesome to hear. I hope I'm cool enough for them. I start tomorrow, in what looks to be a painting/scraping/cleaning position, if the antics of my captain on Friday were any indicator. We'll actually start sailing after Easter, and I think i'll feel more like a ship's mate at that point.
Sheezus its cold! But it's dry and clear. SC was having a bizarre spell of cold humidity, by which i cannot abide, just on principle. The weather is honor-bound to adhere to certain rules of decorum, even in the south. If it is cold, it should be dry or raining, not humid.
Anyway. the pier manager told me to load my stuff aboard between 11pm and 9am, when ticketing was not enforced and i could draw my car up next to the ship. So I went out of my way--for hours--to comply. I parked my car 20 miles away, in Owings Mills, in a free parking deck, and took the subway into town. I had my orientation and then wandered aimlessly for the rest of the day, meeting people and essentially running into things, with just my purse and my coat. At 10:30 I got back on the train, rode out to its end, and collected my vehicle. I pulled into the lane by the ship at 11:14pm, hauled all of my stuff aboard by myself as quickly as possible, put it in my room, locked the door, and returned to my car. it was 11:36. I'd received a parking ticket for $52 at 11:32 for "parking on the sidewalk and impeding the movement of pedestrians." mind you, this lane is wide enough for two cars to pass easily, and indeed the meter maid may well have driven up in a car to ticket me and drove past. If a pedestrian were to need that amount of space to not be inconvenienced, that pedestrian would be too heavy to stand up without his femurs shattering. Moreover, there were no pedestrians in the area, on account of the closure of everything a pedestrian might feel inclined to visit. And its clearly stated on their pier policy that they wouldn't do it. So the pier manager printed off their policy information and a map of the area, and has written me a letter on company letterhead to the effect that I was doing exactly what I should've been and kindly-stick-it-in-your-nose, but i have to go contest it in traffic court. Welcome to town. Here's your summons. I don't just want the ticket to be dismissed. I want a formal apology. I want the judge to say "Sorry about that, we're really nice people here, welcome to our fair city, have a book of clip-out coupons to local businesses."
Is that too much to ask?
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
nerdage
I move around a lot. In the past three years, i've lived in six different towns in 4 different time zones. This weekend i'm heading off to my 7th (but still 4 time zones). And you know what my first order of business will be, after i get moved in and get started at work? I intend to get my 7th library card. As soon as I have a piece of mail directed to me in Baltimore, I plan to head over to the central branch and get signed up. What can I say? I like libraries. They're far cheaper than bookstores (free is my favorite price) and i'm very good about renewals and due dates. I think the maximum fine i racked up in Berkeley was 25¢, which i handed over grudgingly. Big City libraries give you endless opportunities for all forms of entertainment, from books to movies to music to some, albeit dweeby, software. I love the quiet, I love the smell, I love leaving with a stack of fiction to envelop myself in. In a good book the real world melts away, I melt away, and the concerns of the characters are mine. The main character Is me--and when I look away from the page and see myself in the bathroom mirror I'm always a little startled and disappointed that its still me over there.
I love checking out of the library when there's a line--Nothing like stacks of titles to give you an impression of the people around you. It may not be an accurate impression--the whole book by its cover situation--but it feeds an imaginative mind. Some paranoid part of me wonders if some people are just checking books out to raise eyebrows, or are attempting to hide a stack of comic books with that dense tome of medieval prose. I'm always embarrassed that people are judging me when a title I'm checking out has a particularly colorful cover or is shaped like a grocery store paperback. I know most people don't notice or care, but if I'm busying myself making up lives for the patrons around me, it only follows that someone else might be doing the same. I'm a little weird.
Anyway, Teddy wants attention now. He's officially bigger than Boots ever was and he's still kitten shaped. He's teething, and has doubles of many as the baby teeth are reluctant to fall out. The bottom row canines have changed out, though, and the vet says this is normal. Interesting, huh?
I love checking out of the library when there's a line--Nothing like stacks of titles to give you an impression of the people around you. It may not be an accurate impression--the whole book by its cover situation--but it feeds an imaginative mind. Some paranoid part of me wonders if some people are just checking books out to raise eyebrows, or are attempting to hide a stack of comic books with that dense tome of medieval prose. I'm always embarrassed that people are judging me when a title I'm checking out has a particularly colorful cover or is shaped like a grocery store paperback. I know most people don't notice or care, but if I'm busying myself making up lives for the patrons around me, it only follows that someone else might be doing the same. I'm a little weird.
Anyway, Teddy wants attention now. He's officially bigger than Boots ever was and he's still kitten shaped. He's teething, and has doubles of many as the baby teeth are reluctant to fall out. The bottom row canines have changed out, though, and the vet says this is normal. Interesting, huh?
Saturday, February 23, 2008
dear valued customer
Thanks to your history of loyalty to Monopoly Local Connections, we believe you would enjoy being burdened with more crap! See, Value is all in what you make of it. We value your custom because so far you've been made to buy the whole bundle--everything we've come up with, up to the extent that we have utter control over what you see, who you talk to, and what you download. We hide the surreptitious face of Big Brother under pictures of happy models talking on phones and using their computers, but every keystroke you make is recorded and sent to the appropriate government bureau or marketing agency, every number you dial is entered into a vast database of numbers--and their affiliates--who can now bypass the Do Not Call List, and every word you say may be monitored for customer satisfaction purposes. Yes, valued customer, your local cable, internet, phone, and mobile service has been selling you out since the day you signed on, and you've put up with it, because without us you'd be even more cut off from the real world.
So now, loyal customer, we're excited to offer you a new method of surveillance, intrusion, and annoyance--the Single Ring function! With this fun option, every time a telemarketer calls the landline you've grown to ignore, your cell phones--yes, every cell phone on your plan--will ring too! Now your kids, spouse, and even out-of-town relatives can be bothered by obnoxious charities like the Anti-Choice Alliance, harassed by auto-dialed campaign messages, and repeatedly badgered by call centers in India who don't give a flying fuck what telecom laws are in the US. And Best of All, we'll pass our savings on to you!* Have your children's cell phones confiscated by their schools weekly! Be annoyed at work! On the road! On the Roof! And remember, if you smash your phone with a hammer before the end of your 2-year contract, you'll owe Us money!
Yes, we continue to value you because you've been duped so far, and you're paying us to sell your personal information--double the revenue! And don't worry--even if you don't select this fabulous new option, it will be tacked on to your bill--and your lifestyle!--next month.
Thanks!
Comporium Communications
Your ONLY way to stay Connected!
*The customer pays for all incoming and outgoing calls, text messages, and internet options at the rate of 10¢/minute or each partial minute, and 15¢ per voice message played (messages cannot be deleted without play). See? We're saving!
So now, loyal customer, we're excited to offer you a new method of surveillance, intrusion, and annoyance--the Single Ring function! With this fun option, every time a telemarketer calls the landline you've grown to ignore, your cell phones--yes, every cell phone on your plan--will ring too! Now your kids, spouse, and even out-of-town relatives can be bothered by obnoxious charities like the Anti-Choice Alliance, harassed by auto-dialed campaign messages, and repeatedly badgered by call centers in India who don't give a flying fuck what telecom laws are in the US. And Best of All, we'll pass our savings on to you!* Have your children's cell phones confiscated by their schools weekly! Be annoyed at work! On the road! On the Roof! And remember, if you smash your phone with a hammer before the end of your 2-year contract, you'll owe Us money!
Yes, we continue to value you because you've been duped so far, and you're paying us to sell your personal information--double the revenue! And don't worry--even if you don't select this fabulous new option, it will be tacked on to your bill--and your lifestyle!--next month.
Thanks!
Comporium Communications
Your ONLY way to stay Connected!
*The customer pays for all incoming and outgoing calls, text messages, and internet options at the rate of 10¢/minute or each partial minute, and 15¢ per voice message played (messages cannot be deleted without play). See? We're saving!
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
ill again
I think my mom kinda likes it when i'm sick--my semi-annual battles to the death with microscopic assailants really make her feel appreciated. The last time i felt this lousy i had a 3-day hangover, but even that didn't include a sore throat. I feel like whining.
Thursday, February 14, 2008
random musing
why do playwrights and screenwriters have such a tendency to churn out stories about or including out of work actors? every time you turn around there's another piece about the young starlet who's trying to get ahead or the dancer who's shoes are beaten to putty from practicing and still can't get into Swan Lake. I don't appreciate it. Fact is, there are a lot of out-of-work actors and dancers and theatre folk out there, and hiring actors to play in stories about them is flat-out mockery. "ha-ha, i got a job playing one of my peers who's been unemployed for years."
Typically the plight of the out of work actor is not so dire as that of the family under the bridge, but it is very frustrating to see your friends and old classmates getting gigs on Broadway or with Cirque, or even seeing a show you built go to Broadway and get rave reviews, and know that you're even getting passed up for summer stock. When all your education comes to nowt, and your experience and skill and charming personality and good contacts boil down to so much manure, the last thing you want to see is the little go-getter who just couldn't make it the first two tries finally get her big break when the hard-nosed audition coordinator sees her true potential. It doesn't work like that, it never has. With the economy in a rut and interest in live theater at its lowest since the Restoration, nobody is willing to take risks like that.
In any case, out of work actors keep the restaurant and hospitality industry running. If it weren't for them people would starve. So i don't feel too bad for them, as a cornerstone of our society. We should envy the cunning artificers who charm customers into over tipping, and they should thank their 200-level acting coaches who got them that far. In the meantime, i'm going to steer clear of any movie who's blurb begins "two out-of-work actors take a vacation" or any similar masturbatory premise. Where's the challenge in playing yourself?
Typically the plight of the out of work actor is not so dire as that of the family under the bridge, but it is very frustrating to see your friends and old classmates getting gigs on Broadway or with Cirque, or even seeing a show you built go to Broadway and get rave reviews, and know that you're even getting passed up for summer stock. When all your education comes to nowt, and your experience and skill and charming personality and good contacts boil down to so much manure, the last thing you want to see is the little go-getter who just couldn't make it the first two tries finally get her big break when the hard-nosed audition coordinator sees her true potential. It doesn't work like that, it never has. With the economy in a rut and interest in live theater at its lowest since the Restoration, nobody is willing to take risks like that.
In any case, out of work actors keep the restaurant and hospitality industry running. If it weren't for them people would starve. So i don't feel too bad for them, as a cornerstone of our society. We should envy the cunning artificers who charm customers into over tipping, and they should thank their 200-level acting coaches who got them that far. In the meantime, i'm going to steer clear of any movie who's blurb begins "two out-of-work actors take a vacation" or any similar masturbatory premise. Where's the challenge in playing yourself?
Sunday, February 10, 2008
Craputer back online
So I have this little auxilary laptop. It's old and tired and doesn't like me very much, doesn't have much space on disk, loses its train of thought, and occasionally talks to itself, but i love it and offer it tender encouragement to keep going. Today i had to solder its old-fashioned model-specific power cable back together where it had been smashed years ago and gradually worn away. (read: never trust college flatmates with chairs and technology.) I finally broke down and got it a new wireless card for when I move to Baltimore and will not have access to regular home internet. I've found what I hope will be a good internet cafe about two blocks from my workplace and residence. To all my housemates in Berkeley who used this machine in the living room, awkwardly poised between the ugly sofa and the television, I wish to apologise. I was just too cheap to update my machine until now.
The only reason this machine is still viable as a communication and storage device is, you guessed it--Google. The box is merely a window into the shiny goodness that is Gmail storage, Google documents, Google Talk, Picasa, and every other online storage venue I can find. Who cares if your programs limit you to 1gig of available hard drive space when you've got 6 gigs of storage per email account (that I trust far more than the one encased in this delicate notebook with no battery)? Google, like Cuba, keeps obsolete machinery viable for those who need it in this rapidly progressing technological age. Thanks, Google.
How It's Made is my favorite show ever. I'm writing this on the commercial breaks.
The only reason this machine is still viable as a communication and storage device is, you guessed it--Google. The box is merely a window into the shiny goodness that is Gmail storage, Google documents, Google Talk, Picasa, and every other online storage venue I can find. Who cares if your programs limit you to 1gig of available hard drive space when you've got 6 gigs of storage per email account (that I trust far more than the one encased in this delicate notebook with no battery)? Google, like Cuba, keeps obsolete machinery viable for those who need it in this rapidly progressing technological age. Thanks, Google.
How It's Made is my favorite show ever. I'm writing this on the commercial breaks.
I Heart Hospitals
Somehow, every time a virus makes its rounds about this household, it seems to be brought in by the healthcare professional.
Tuesday, February 05, 2008
guv'ment work
actual call placed to Colorado department of Revenue helpdesk:
"department of revenue"
"hi, i'd like to ask a question in regard to non-resident netfiling?"
"what?"
"non-resi-"
"yes, what question?"
"both your website and telephone service claim i can use the net-file service as a nonresident, but as a nonresident i obviously don't have a Colorado driver's license, which is required to use the service."
"you don't have a driver's license?"
"I don't have a Colorado driver's license. I have a South Carolina license."
"Well a legal resident of Colorado should have a colorado driver's license--do you need to apply for one?"
"I Don't LIVE in Colorado. But i earned money there this year. Can I use the netfile service?"
"Have you tried to enter your south carolina driver's license number where it calls for one?"
"It says its for proof of Colorado residency and eligibility, do you think that would work?"
"I dunno, it might."
"And if it doesn't?"
"Well you haven't even tried."
"And when my SC license number doesn't work?"
"You'll have to file paper."
"Then why does your department repeatedly tell nonresidents to use the Netfile service when we obviously can't?"
"Look, you haven't even tried to use your license number. Try that, and if it doesn't work, file paper." Click.
I tried it. It didn't work. I hate the government.
"department of revenue"
"hi, i'd like to ask a question in regard to non-resident netfiling?"
"what?"
"non-resi-"
"yes, what question?"
"both your website and telephone service claim i can use the net-file service as a nonresident, but as a nonresident i obviously don't have a Colorado driver's license, which is required to use the service."
"you don't have a driver's license?"
"I don't have a Colorado driver's license. I have a South Carolina license."
"Well a legal resident of Colorado should have a colorado driver's license--do you need to apply for one?"
"I Don't LIVE in Colorado. But i earned money there this year. Can I use the netfile service?"
"Have you tried to enter your south carolina driver's license number where it calls for one?"
"It says its for proof of Colorado residency and eligibility, do you think that would work?"
"I dunno, it might."
"And if it doesn't?"
"Well you haven't even tried."
"And when my SC license number doesn't work?"
"You'll have to file paper."
"Then why does your department repeatedly tell nonresidents to use the Netfile service when we obviously can't?"
"Look, you haven't even tried to use your license number. Try that, and if it doesn't work, file paper." Click.
I tried it. It didn't work. I hate the government.
Friday, February 01, 2008
toeses
so i met another kitten this weekend and his toes are similar to Teddy's. I think he's okay.
This evening Teddy was out playing with another neighborhood cat, who is frustratingly named Boots. (this Boots is white and black, though, and male) When it was time for Teddy to come in for the night, he chose to ignore my call as Boots is far more fun to play with than some lame old human. But Boots heard it and, making sure Teddy was following him, ran up on our porch, which he never does. He ran back down, and Teddy followed. So he ran back up and stayed there until I picked Teddy up, at which point he ran off. I guess our pesky kitten was driving him crazy so he was happy to drop him off at home. What a responsible older cat.
Does anyone find that they're more inclined to use pathetic grammar when talking to cats? I consistently refer to Teddy's "toeses" "feets" and "toofums." I'll ask him if he "went bonk" when he slams his head unceremoniously into a wall. I do not recall baby-talking to Boots to this extreme, even when she was young. I also don't recall talking about her quite so much. I'm sure i'll tone it down a bit once the kitten-related novelty wears off. Sorry.
This evening Teddy was out playing with another neighborhood cat, who is frustratingly named Boots. (this Boots is white and black, though, and male) When it was time for Teddy to come in for the night, he chose to ignore my call as Boots is far more fun to play with than some lame old human. But Boots heard it and, making sure Teddy was following him, ran up on our porch, which he never does. He ran back down, and Teddy followed. So he ran back up and stayed there until I picked Teddy up, at which point he ran off. I guess our pesky kitten was driving him crazy so he was happy to drop him off at home. What a responsible older cat.
Does anyone find that they're more inclined to use pathetic grammar when talking to cats? I consistently refer to Teddy's "toeses" "feets" and "toofums." I'll ask him if he "went bonk" when he slams his head unceremoniously into a wall. I do not recall baby-talking to Boots to this extreme, even when she was young. I also don't recall talking about her quite so much. I'm sure i'll tone it down a bit once the kitten-related novelty wears off. Sorry.
Thursday, January 24, 2008
Red-Headed Stepchild
I find it interesting that Christianity is so adaptable. This religion is notorious for its "if you can't beat 'em, join' em" strategy throughout the ages. Whether its the realization that the pagans have their traditions that you're not gonna shake, so you might as well let 'em do it, or the adaptation of sermons when the truth of science becomes unavoidable, the majority of this religious group has eventually jumped on the bandwagon of progress.
But that bandwagon grew a 5th wheel when Christians decided to move in on rock and roll. They ruined it! The whole Point of rock music was to let loose about sex, drugs, being bad, and being angry. I'm sure most people with a pulse know this already, but "rock and roll" was originally a euphemism for sex. Thus "rock and roll music" was an old blues reference to singin' about doin' the nasty, and that was 2/3 of its appeal.
All of the offspring of Rock and Roll, save one, have taken the original shape of rock and accentuated one aspect of it. Grunge and Punk went off in the angry direction, R&B took the sex section and ran with it, Pop only exists because it was cheap and easy to produce, and several other groups and sub-categories emerged from experimental mating within the party pad.
But Daddy Rock and Momma Roll spawned again, and just as you occasionally get a Mississippian with a tail, the music family spat out a bad egg. They'd dealt with this before--Metal spent 25 years in its darkened bedroom reading comic books and getting heavier, but eventually it moved to Iceland and the family let out a breath. This slip of judgment, however, this error had the potential to undermine the clan at its core.
It was clean. It was healthy. It was...Nice. Ever so nice. With a tucked-in shirt and modest hemlines, sparkling teeth and glassy sheep's eyes, Christian Rock was mimicking the whole family within days of its adoption. It was cute at first, as so many of these things are, following Grunge and Hip Hop around the house spouting nonsense, but as it aged Christian found that it lacked the inspiration and vitality to keep up with the family. Everyone tried to help it gain drive, even Hardcore, but Christian still stagnated. Protest had gone Soft before retiring to Berkeley, but it was never really influential anyway. Punk tried shouting at it before giving up, changing its name to Emo, and committing suicide. The singer/songwriters had gone broke and resorted to busking, so they were no help. The rest of the family was meanwhile being beaten to death under the harsh fluorescent lighting of boardrooms and was eventually buried without ceremony outside of Memphis. The only one Christian identified with was Corporate Pop, who's plastic love story and one-size-fits-all platitudes appealed it to the same mindless masses it was trying to reach. Christian gained a following--a naive and helpless, yet arrogant following--and left home with a tent revival tour of the Midwest.
The failed good intentions of Rock and Roll resulted in the creation of a monster which has left a wide path of destruction in its wake. Millions of people were blindsided by it, were wooed and eventually enslaved by it--enthralled by the rhythm until they found themselves trapped in the same rusting pipe organ that they thought they'd defeated. The nice kids with their nice instruments singing nice songs about friendship and peace would suddenly whither and be replaced by hooded monks beating drums skinned with the stretched hides of the unfaithful, demanding obedience and crushing independent thought with promises of eternal reward through glittering x-acto smiles. Like pheasants to a baited field the teens were lured, with the encouragement of grinning drones who looked just like them, into the den of the beast. Only when they realize the music is a hymn do they realize there's no way out...
Erm.. I may watch too many Buffy reruns. But seriously, in high school I was invited numerous times to "free concerts" by smiling acquaintances, with promises of food, door prizes, and lots of fun! It became something of a game to reply with "so no cover--is it BYOB?" just to bait them. I went to one with a friend who said there'd be boys there and was so traumatized that I developed a tic. The event was held in a Baptist-owned warehouse cheekily named The Shack. I'd heard of it and innocently thought it must be a grimy squat where skaters smoked weed and cool kids made out. Then I saw the punch bowls, the plastic checked tablecloths, the popcorn, the sodas, and the chaperones. The preacher of the local First Baptist let the band warm up before hopping onstage, to cheers and applause, to reassure the youths of their coolness before asking the lord to bless this fun night, that everyone involved have a great time but use this event to praise his holy name and enjoy all the gifts of...i went numb. My skin prickled and the ceiling suddenly seemed low and ominous. The air grew thick and toxic and the happy smiling nice children around me melted and blended into one horrible, leering mouth full of glistening razor blades, laughing and asking me to write down my phone number so they could call about next week's "light, informal youth-group intro night." Through clenched teeth I claimed that was my church's youth night and gripped the plastic tablecloth so tightly that the cheery checked pattern came away on my palm. Eventually I escaped to the rear of the building where the roadies were getting stoned and shotgunned a joint with the gaffer just to clear my head. When my ex-friend's dad came to get us I claimed that the orange soda had made me ill.
By my senior year I saw carnage that nearly brought tears to my eyes--most of the theatre crowd refused to listen to what they deemed "secular music" (e.g. all music except the demon spawn of a priest and a choirboy) and instead buried their blatant homosexual desires under pictures of Jesus and Jars of Clay CDs. I can only hope they grew out of it before they imploded.
The same existed in college, but there it was easier to ignore and the theatre kids were real. You'd occasionally get a free bag of "Goodies" from a table of godbotherers--maybe some candy, a water bottle, a t-shirt with something tough-looking-yet-inspirational like "Never backs down. Never gives up." printed on the back in a font like a claw mark, a cd to put in the microwave, and a book to prop that wobbly table on. They handed out fliers for concerts on campus, but that only gave my crowd an opportunity to complain about how they were contributing to the litter problem. In college I was safe from the christian rock. It was there, but its terror was held at bay by my supportive peer group. By surrounding myself with good people I never found myself tempted.
Christian Rock flourishes even now in Charlotte--the Little City that Couldn't. Not satisfied with its terrible traffic, teeth-gratingly mismanaged airport, absent arts culture, plastic yuppie bar district, and purely evil banking uptown, Charlotte had to mar its reputation even further by hosting its own Conservative Fashion Week to a soundtrack of Super Wal-Church soft rock and interviews with virginal homecoming queens who prove that its possible to be cool while sticking to your morals. (who said anything about coolness? I disregarded morals because my hormones told me to, not because I thought i was bad-ass.) Other city newspapers feature young artists and thinkers. Charlotte prints pictures of 14 year olds wearing halter tops over t-shirts. Like a coconut bra on a space suit, you know they want to play along, but they've wound up just making fools of themselves by trying.
Always cutting off the fun bits of our toys, leave it to the Christians to adapt the real world to itself, twisting and mutilating it so badly that its not fun anymore and we're forced to find something else, some new way to rebel, hoping they won't find a way to drain it of life. They (and Disney) killed Rock and Roll--what's next?
--
Odd question, to anyone who read this far--is it normal for a kitten to have webbed toes?
But that bandwagon grew a 5th wheel when Christians decided to move in on rock and roll. They ruined it! The whole Point of rock music was to let loose about sex, drugs, being bad, and being angry. I'm sure most people with a pulse know this already, but "rock and roll" was originally a euphemism for sex. Thus "rock and roll music" was an old blues reference to singin' about doin' the nasty, and that was 2/3 of its appeal.
All of the offspring of Rock and Roll, save one, have taken the original shape of rock and accentuated one aspect of it. Grunge and Punk went off in the angry direction, R&B took the sex section and ran with it, Pop only exists because it was cheap and easy to produce, and several other groups and sub-categories emerged from experimental mating within the party pad.
But Daddy Rock and Momma Roll spawned again, and just as you occasionally get a Mississippian with a tail, the music family spat out a bad egg. They'd dealt with this before--Metal spent 25 years in its darkened bedroom reading comic books and getting heavier, but eventually it moved to Iceland and the family let out a breath. This slip of judgment, however, this error had the potential to undermine the clan at its core.
It was clean. It was healthy. It was...Nice. Ever so nice. With a tucked-in shirt and modest hemlines, sparkling teeth and glassy sheep's eyes, Christian Rock was mimicking the whole family within days of its adoption. It was cute at first, as so many of these things are, following Grunge and Hip Hop around the house spouting nonsense, but as it aged Christian found that it lacked the inspiration and vitality to keep up with the family. Everyone tried to help it gain drive, even Hardcore, but Christian still stagnated. Protest had gone Soft before retiring to Berkeley, but it was never really influential anyway. Punk tried shouting at it before giving up, changing its name to Emo, and committing suicide. The singer/songwriters had gone broke and resorted to busking, so they were no help. The rest of the family was meanwhile being beaten to death under the harsh fluorescent lighting of boardrooms and was eventually buried without ceremony outside of Memphis. The only one Christian identified with was Corporate Pop, who's plastic love story and one-size-fits-all platitudes appealed it to the same mindless masses it was trying to reach. Christian gained a following--a naive and helpless, yet arrogant following--and left home with a tent revival tour of the Midwest.
The failed good intentions of Rock and Roll resulted in the creation of a monster which has left a wide path of destruction in its wake. Millions of people were blindsided by it, were wooed and eventually enslaved by it--enthralled by the rhythm until they found themselves trapped in the same rusting pipe organ that they thought they'd defeated. The nice kids with their nice instruments singing nice songs about friendship and peace would suddenly whither and be replaced by hooded monks beating drums skinned with the stretched hides of the unfaithful, demanding obedience and crushing independent thought with promises of eternal reward through glittering x-acto smiles. Like pheasants to a baited field the teens were lured, with the encouragement of grinning drones who looked just like them, into the den of the beast. Only when they realize the music is a hymn do they realize there's no way out...
Erm.. I may watch too many Buffy reruns. But seriously, in high school I was invited numerous times to "free concerts" by smiling acquaintances, with promises of food, door prizes, and lots of fun! It became something of a game to reply with "so no cover--is it BYOB?" just to bait them. I went to one with a friend who said there'd be boys there and was so traumatized that I developed a tic. The event was held in a Baptist-owned warehouse cheekily named The Shack. I'd heard of it and innocently thought it must be a grimy squat where skaters smoked weed and cool kids made out. Then I saw the punch bowls, the plastic checked tablecloths, the popcorn, the sodas, and the chaperones. The preacher of the local First Baptist let the band warm up before hopping onstage, to cheers and applause, to reassure the youths of their coolness before asking the lord to bless this fun night, that everyone involved have a great time but use this event to praise his holy name and enjoy all the gifts of...i went numb. My skin prickled and the ceiling suddenly seemed low and ominous. The air grew thick and toxic and the happy smiling nice children around me melted and blended into one horrible, leering mouth full of glistening razor blades, laughing and asking me to write down my phone number so they could call about next week's "light, informal youth-group intro night." Through clenched teeth I claimed that was my church's youth night and gripped the plastic tablecloth so tightly that the cheery checked pattern came away on my palm. Eventually I escaped to the rear of the building where the roadies were getting stoned and shotgunned a joint with the gaffer just to clear my head. When my ex-friend's dad came to get us I claimed that the orange soda had made me ill.
By my senior year I saw carnage that nearly brought tears to my eyes--most of the theatre crowd refused to listen to what they deemed "secular music" (e.g. all music except the demon spawn of a priest and a choirboy) and instead buried their blatant homosexual desires under pictures of Jesus and Jars of Clay CDs. I can only hope they grew out of it before they imploded.
The same existed in college, but there it was easier to ignore and the theatre kids were real. You'd occasionally get a free bag of "Goodies" from a table of godbotherers--maybe some candy, a water bottle, a t-shirt with something tough-looking-yet-inspirational like "Never backs down. Never gives up." printed on the back in a font like a claw mark, a cd to put in the microwave, and a book to prop that wobbly table on. They handed out fliers for concerts on campus, but that only gave my crowd an opportunity to complain about how they were contributing to the litter problem. In college I was safe from the christian rock. It was there, but its terror was held at bay by my supportive peer group. By surrounding myself with good people I never found myself tempted.
Christian Rock flourishes even now in Charlotte--the Little City that Couldn't. Not satisfied with its terrible traffic, teeth-gratingly mismanaged airport, absent arts culture, plastic yuppie bar district, and purely evil banking uptown, Charlotte had to mar its reputation even further by hosting its own Conservative Fashion Week to a soundtrack of Super Wal-Church soft rock and interviews with virginal homecoming queens who prove that its possible to be cool while sticking to your morals. (who said anything about coolness? I disregarded morals because my hormones told me to, not because I thought i was bad-ass.) Other city newspapers feature young artists and thinkers. Charlotte prints pictures of 14 year olds wearing halter tops over t-shirts. Like a coconut bra on a space suit, you know they want to play along, but they've wound up just making fools of themselves by trying.
Always cutting off the fun bits of our toys, leave it to the Christians to adapt the real world to itself, twisting and mutilating it so badly that its not fun anymore and we're forced to find something else, some new way to rebel, hoping they won't find a way to drain it of life. They (and Disney) killed Rock and Roll--what's next?
--
Odd question, to anyone who read this far--is it normal for a kitten to have webbed toes?
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
Things Teddy Has Tried to Eat
in no particular order: Styrofoam, a nickel, a blanket, feathers, tassels, a plate, his tail, a leather chair, soap, dried paint, a chunk of tile, kitty litter, dirt, dried leaves, his foot, a teabag, a newspaper, a coozie, my cell phone, my computer mouse, a carrot, an artificial ice cube (he doesn't like real ice cubes) a candle, a rock, trousers, my forearm, my mom's laptop, a chunk of drywall, a safety pin, a thumbtack, a screwdriver, 15 christmas ornaments, his foot and his tail at once, sandpaper, a spanner, a price tag, a receipt, 2 almonds, a toothbrush, a vitamin, and a Christmas Cactus.
He should jingle by now.
He should jingle by now.
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
Tis Cheaper to get a new Cat than new Carpet
My kitten is that little cold skinny kid in water wings at the neighborhood pool--edging cautiously toward the water's edge, fingers crossed, eyes squeezed shut with the effort of convincing himself that there's no sharks, that its perfectly safe... getting all the way to the stairs...and then running away at the last minute. You know the only way this kid is getting wet is by means of a reckless shove or slippery deck. In Teddy's case, its a slippery bathtub rim and a tail that is far more interested in water than his nose.
Friday, January 11, 2008
obsolete
I've come to realize lately that there's a lot of practices and rules in effect these days that, thanks to modern technology and the nature of our society, frankly shouldn't be.
I may periodically update this list as the spirit moves me.
----
Long-Distance charges. Did you know that phone companies still make a distinction between local and long-distance dialing? Calling out of your 3-digit local access zone tacks on a large amount to landline prices. While this made sense back in the day of human operators and manual switchboards, when you had to pay more people to make those connections for you, these days thanks to digital and satellite technology that's simply not done. Dialing a local call takes exactly the same amount of human effort as placing a call to China--exactly none. How is charging us extra for no extra service justified?
----
ATM loyalty fees. My bank charges me $1.50 when I withdraw any amount of cash from another bank or credit union's ATM. Frequently, the bank who owns the ATM will too. I wind up blowing $3-4 every time i make a transaction when I'm not in the same time zone as my bank. This is unacceptable. I'm paying a machine--which, i hasten to add, does not get paid--to access my own money because my bank can't or won't do it themselves. This is no inconvenience to my bank as the entire system of transfers is done automatically by mutually accessed computer systems, such as NYCE or Interlink. I know for a fact that banks do not pay per transaction to use these services because in the UK no ATM requires a service fee, even to access my US account.
I believe its fairly obvious to any reader that, if my bank is available, i would of course use my bank's ATM. If I'm Not using my own bank's ATM, its obviously because my bank has failed to provide one within a reasonable range of me. Basing my assumptions on what I'll call "expected human reasoning skills," most people aren't going to join a bank that they can't access on a regular basis from their homes. It's illogical. So if you find yourself needing to use an ATM or other service from another bank, its probably because you're not near home. Why punish your customers for straying afield? Shouldn't you be proud of them for traveling, as traveling is expensive and therefore keeps money circulating?
----
Meal time. These days people are at their desks at all sorts of crazy hours, in order to keep up with the global money market and foreign business. Every industry has people pulling all-nighters, particularly in energy, healthcare, and travel. Now, I respect most restaurants' right to keep old fashioned business hours because there still are a very large number of 9-5ers employed and its not worth the expense of staying open all night. I know that there's at least one Denny's in each town and most late-nighters are fine with their 2am fried fare. But. My tolerance ends when I enter an airport. Airport managers know good and damn well that people are departing and arriving at all hours of day and night, and that traveling does all sorts of screwy things to the metabolism. Yet every single restaurant in the airport closes by 9pm. The manager of Joe's Grass Strip can close the café at 5 if he wants--chances are it won't inconvenience too many people. But when every food joint in your wing of Las Vegas International is locked up two hours before you depart, you can't help but wonder if this is a gesture of contempt for lower-fare late night fliers.
Even more unacceptable, when you board a 6-hour flight, you expect to be fed en-route. 6 hours is a long time, and after all, you didn't have the opportunity to buy food after the security checkpoint because everything in the airport was closed. And we all know how dangerous granola bars are. But lo and behold, when you get in the plane you discover that meal-service is only provided during meal-times, and you will be fed half a diet coke and a six mini-pretzels on this flight tonight. (but hey, meal service doesn't mean a whole lot anyway when you're a vegetarian and your seat-mate is Hindu and all they have is cheeseburgers.) If the flight staff is working, it is business time. The time of day is irrelevant. Moreover, when you are in flight you are not moving with the rotation of the earth, so the passage and indeed linear concept of time becomes debatable, so how can we base "mealtime" on the land-based 24-hour clock? I've seen the sun rise 3 times in one 24-hour period--you dare to tell me that daytime is absolute?
Time zoning, and even the idea of rotational daylight phases, is a fairly new phenomenon within the human experience. It took sailors quite a while to figure out that the 3-D nature of the planet was changing the movements of navigation stars from their normal patterns in Europe, leading to numerous lost boats and scratched heads. (a full and coherent explanation of this, paired with the development of spring-movement clocks to keep accurate time where pendulum clocks failed on rocking boats, can be found at the Greenwich Observatory.) It has taken heaps of math and science to invent the standardized planetary time system we have, which is not only pathetically fallible (there are several pacific islands that are cut in half by the International Date Line, which among other problems, has led to several people missing their birthdays) but it throws the arbitrary nature of time as we've established it into sharp relief.
We are on an infinitely small (or large, given the infinite and potentially variable nature of infinity) ball spinning in circles in bigger circles in space, which as far as we know has no center and therefore cannot spin on an axis or have a central or universal time, except for one based on the hypothetical birth of the universe, as estimated through perceived planetary red-shifting in accordance with the earth-based theory of universal expansion. The only people to whom our concept of time is at all pertinent is us, and even then there are a minimum of 24 lunchtimes in a rotational day and WHY HAVEN'T YOU GIVEN ME A SANDWICH YET?
I feel better.
----
College Tuition. We all know that college is just high school II these days, and that a college degree only proves that you're as educated as the stoner on the "2-o and go" plan in the mortarboard beside you. So why are we all paying out the ass for what has become basic public schooling? Why is there competition and an application process? Everyone can get admitted somewhere, and few employers actually care where you earned your degree. Why don't taxes support grades 13-16 like the other 12? Why do we continue to break the bank and put ourselves into overwhelming debt when we know that a degree will not improve our chances of gaining employment? (indeed, it has prevented me from finding some jobs.) It is in the economy's best interest to either make a college degree mean something (if the guy next to me in line to graduate found himself playing chess against a cabbage, it could be anyone's game) or make it free. Millions of unemployable graduates defaulting on their student loans can't be good for the economy.
----
Traffic Speed Enforcement. Freeway speed limits were introduced at the time of the first oil shortage in the mid 1970's to help reduce overall fuel consumption. Now that we've started developing fuel efficient vehicles, what keeps cops ticketing cautiously quick drivers? Fast does not necessitate reckless or dangerous, as regional high speed limits will attest. If the speed limit is 75 on a flat, straight, empty road in Arizona, why do people get fined for driving 75 on a flat, straight, empty road in North Carolina?
----
The pairing of Pagan festivals and Christian holy days. Not that I mind terribly, but now that everyone knows that Jesus did not lay the first Easter egg and the burning bush was not caused by a faulty Christmas light wire, what perpetuates these unions? Its fun, but has been rendered completely meaningless by virtue of its alliance. You can't simultaneously give thanks to the Only Son of the Only God (huh?) and the Goddess of Fertility. (i love that about Christian doublespeak--"he is one god, but he is three separate entities all at the same time. it is possible because god is almighty." sounds like a typo that you guys just decided to run with.)
----
Guys, let go of the past. I'm tired of paying for employees that don't exist and quietly absorbing strains to my credit rating and patience by tolerating an educational money pit and a belief structure that has long outlived its welcome. Everything except Society is moving forward!
I may periodically update this list as the spirit moves me.
----
Long-Distance charges. Did you know that phone companies still make a distinction between local and long-distance dialing? Calling out of your 3-digit local access zone tacks on a large amount to landline prices. While this made sense back in the day of human operators and manual switchboards, when you had to pay more people to make those connections for you, these days thanks to digital and satellite technology that's simply not done. Dialing a local call takes exactly the same amount of human effort as placing a call to China--exactly none. How is charging us extra for no extra service justified?
----
ATM loyalty fees. My bank charges me $1.50 when I withdraw any amount of cash from another bank or credit union's ATM. Frequently, the bank who owns the ATM will too. I wind up blowing $3-4 every time i make a transaction when I'm not in the same time zone as my bank. This is unacceptable. I'm paying a machine--which, i hasten to add, does not get paid--to access my own money because my bank can't or won't do it themselves. This is no inconvenience to my bank as the entire system of transfers is done automatically by mutually accessed computer systems, such as NYCE or Interlink. I know for a fact that banks do not pay per transaction to use these services because in the UK no ATM requires a service fee, even to access my US account.
I believe its fairly obvious to any reader that, if my bank is available, i would of course use my bank's ATM. If I'm Not using my own bank's ATM, its obviously because my bank has failed to provide one within a reasonable range of me. Basing my assumptions on what I'll call "expected human reasoning skills," most people aren't going to join a bank that they can't access on a regular basis from their homes. It's illogical. So if you find yourself needing to use an ATM or other service from another bank, its probably because you're not near home. Why punish your customers for straying afield? Shouldn't you be proud of them for traveling, as traveling is expensive and therefore keeps money circulating?
----
Meal time. These days people are at their desks at all sorts of crazy hours, in order to keep up with the global money market and foreign business. Every industry has people pulling all-nighters, particularly in energy, healthcare, and travel. Now, I respect most restaurants' right to keep old fashioned business hours because there still are a very large number of 9-5ers employed and its not worth the expense of staying open all night. I know that there's at least one Denny's in each town and most late-nighters are fine with their 2am fried fare. But. My tolerance ends when I enter an airport. Airport managers know good and damn well that people are departing and arriving at all hours of day and night, and that traveling does all sorts of screwy things to the metabolism. Yet every single restaurant in the airport closes by 9pm. The manager of Joe's Grass Strip can close the café at 5 if he wants--chances are it won't inconvenience too many people. But when every food joint in your wing of Las Vegas International is locked up two hours before you depart, you can't help but wonder if this is a gesture of contempt for lower-fare late night fliers.
Even more unacceptable, when you board a 6-hour flight, you expect to be fed en-route. 6 hours is a long time, and after all, you didn't have the opportunity to buy food after the security checkpoint because everything in the airport was closed. And we all know how dangerous granola bars are. But lo and behold, when you get in the plane you discover that meal-service is only provided during meal-times, and you will be fed half a diet coke and a six mini-pretzels on this flight tonight. (but hey, meal service doesn't mean a whole lot anyway when you're a vegetarian and your seat-mate is Hindu and all they have is cheeseburgers.) If the flight staff is working, it is business time. The time of day is irrelevant. Moreover, when you are in flight you are not moving with the rotation of the earth, so the passage and indeed linear concept of time becomes debatable, so how can we base "mealtime" on the land-based 24-hour clock? I've seen the sun rise 3 times in one 24-hour period--you dare to tell me that daytime is absolute?
Time zoning, and even the idea of rotational daylight phases, is a fairly new phenomenon within the human experience. It took sailors quite a while to figure out that the 3-D nature of the planet was changing the movements of navigation stars from their normal patterns in Europe, leading to numerous lost boats and scratched heads. (a full and coherent explanation of this, paired with the development of spring-movement clocks to keep accurate time where pendulum clocks failed on rocking boats, can be found at the Greenwich Observatory.) It has taken heaps of math and science to invent the standardized planetary time system we have, which is not only pathetically fallible (there are several pacific islands that are cut in half by the International Date Line, which among other problems, has led to several people missing their birthdays) but it throws the arbitrary nature of time as we've established it into sharp relief.
We are on an infinitely small (or large, given the infinite and potentially variable nature of infinity) ball spinning in circles in bigger circles in space, which as far as we know has no center and therefore cannot spin on an axis or have a central or universal time, except for one based on the hypothetical birth of the universe, as estimated through perceived planetary red-shifting in accordance with the earth-based theory of universal expansion. The only people to whom our concept of time is at all pertinent is us, and even then there are a minimum of 24 lunchtimes in a rotational day and WHY HAVEN'T YOU GIVEN ME A SANDWICH YET?
I feel better.
----
College Tuition. We all know that college is just high school II these days, and that a college degree only proves that you're as educated as the stoner on the "2-o and go" plan in the mortarboard beside you. So why are we all paying out the ass for what has become basic public schooling? Why is there competition and an application process? Everyone can get admitted somewhere, and few employers actually care where you earned your degree. Why don't taxes support grades 13-16 like the other 12? Why do we continue to break the bank and put ourselves into overwhelming debt when we know that a degree will not improve our chances of gaining employment? (indeed, it has prevented me from finding some jobs.) It is in the economy's best interest to either make a college degree mean something (if the guy next to me in line to graduate found himself playing chess against a cabbage, it could be anyone's game) or make it free. Millions of unemployable graduates defaulting on their student loans can't be good for the economy.
----
Traffic Speed Enforcement. Freeway speed limits were introduced at the time of the first oil shortage in the mid 1970's to help reduce overall fuel consumption. Now that we've started developing fuel efficient vehicles, what keeps cops ticketing cautiously quick drivers? Fast does not necessitate reckless or dangerous, as regional high speed limits will attest. If the speed limit is 75 on a flat, straight, empty road in Arizona, why do people get fined for driving 75 on a flat, straight, empty road in North Carolina?
----
The pairing of Pagan festivals and Christian holy days. Not that I mind terribly, but now that everyone knows that Jesus did not lay the first Easter egg and the burning bush was not caused by a faulty Christmas light wire, what perpetuates these unions? Its fun, but has been rendered completely meaningless by virtue of its alliance. You can't simultaneously give thanks to the Only Son of the Only God (huh?) and the Goddess of Fertility. (i love that about Christian doublespeak--"he is one god, but he is three separate entities all at the same time. it is possible because god is almighty." sounds like a typo that you guys just decided to run with.)
----
Guys, let go of the past. I'm tired of paying for employees that don't exist and quietly absorbing strains to my credit rating and patience by tolerating an educational money pit and a belief structure that has long outlived its welcome. Everything except Society is moving forward!
Wednesday, January 09, 2008
hmph
i think the deciding factor in this election is going to be "who annoys me the least?" presently its the Democrats--i've deleted literally dozens of messages from Republican candidates from my voice mail and contributed to the landfill problem with hundreds of their flyers. Do you Really think that's effective? After congress was pressured by the people to establish a national anti-telemarketing list? The fact that you're in politics doesn't mean you're not trying to sell me something.
People's homes are their safe haven from bullshit like you. If you want in, just like all bloodsuckers, you have to be invited.
My motto in life is simple: If you advertise it, I don't want it.
People's homes are their safe haven from bullshit like you. If you want in, just like all bloodsuckers, you have to be invited.
My motto in life is simple: If you advertise it, I don't want it.
Tuesday, January 08, 2008
Motivated Self-Starter
I've been on the job hunt lately, and one phrase I keep coming across in postings, written by potential employers and low-paid secretaries alike, is "seeking an energetic and motivated self-starter for immediate hire."
This has gotten me wondering...what on earth is a self-starter? Do all these people really just want to rent a lawnmower?
This has gotten me wondering...what on earth is a self-starter? Do all these people really just want to rent a lawnmower?
Wednesday, January 02, 2008
Starts When You're Always Afraid
Step outta line, the man come and take you away...
The Airport Security Follies
If you read the article, my responses here will make sense.
1. I find it an excellent and coherent article written by a well-researched and eloquent journalist.
2. The comment queue cut off after 265 entries. Look at the timestamps. There are 265 responses--overwhelmingly positive--in 27 hours, yet many commentators included some reference to "the American people are too complacent. There's too many people who buy into it. There's not enough people angry enough to speak up."
3. As a recent resident of Berkeley, CA, I do know of my inalienable right to petition, peacefully assemble, and protest. I also know just how easily my government can ignore my petitions, assemblies, and protestations. Protests are pointless, (and often deemed riots by authority members and subsequently tear-gassed unless held in hidden, miles-away "free speech zones"), writing to your congressperson returns politely-worded "your sentiments will not affect your representation" form letters, voting is blatantly disregarded, and outright riots result in the immediate arrest, death, and defamation of its participants by news and political speakers. Trust me--Berkeley is ignored by the government every single day.
There is absolutely no way for average citizens to change anything except by a gross majority coming together and not spending money on whatever it is that warrants change. Which isn't going to happen. Enough people rely daily on air transit that far-reaching boycott is overwhelmingly improbable. Recall: there are 300 million people in this country, most of whom have low-paying jobs, families, and insufficient resources to attempt alternatives to the mainstream. This country is too big and run by too few businesses for a private sector boycott to make a dent in air traffic. LA and NY are just too far apart for anything except teleportation to challenge that--and even then, it would still be regulated by the TSA!
The only way you can avoid funding the antics of your government and the companies that run it is to leave, in a rowboat, hewn by hand with handmade tools from trees felled in countries that have no trade agreements with the US. Have fun.
When Big Business is in cahoots with Government by the Highest Bidder, there's no exposed toe for the common man to jump on. No matter what we say or do, as individuals, we cannot stop the corporations in charge from doing exactly what they want to us. So long as we know we're all being lied to and humiliated in the security line for the sake of generating a national threat through the power of the collective imagination, we might as well put up with it. We don't really have any other options. The world has gotten small enough for it to be controlled by one small group of people. I'm of the opinion that it's Procter and Gamble.
The Airport Security Follies
If you read the article, my responses here will make sense.
1. I find it an excellent and coherent article written by a well-researched and eloquent journalist.
2. The comment queue cut off after 265 entries. Look at the timestamps. There are 265 responses--overwhelmingly positive--in 27 hours, yet many commentators included some reference to "the American people are too complacent. There's too many people who buy into it. There's not enough people angry enough to speak up."
3. As a recent resident of Berkeley, CA, I do know of my inalienable right to petition, peacefully assemble, and protest. I also know just how easily my government can ignore my petitions, assemblies, and protestations. Protests are pointless, (and often deemed riots by authority members and subsequently tear-gassed unless held in hidden, miles-away "free speech zones"), writing to your congressperson returns politely-worded "your sentiments will not affect your representation" form letters, voting is blatantly disregarded, and outright riots result in the immediate arrest, death, and defamation of its participants by news and political speakers. Trust me--Berkeley is ignored by the government every single day.
There is absolutely no way for average citizens to change anything except by a gross majority coming together and not spending money on whatever it is that warrants change. Which isn't going to happen. Enough people rely daily on air transit that far-reaching boycott is overwhelmingly improbable. Recall: there are 300 million people in this country, most of whom have low-paying jobs, families, and insufficient resources to attempt alternatives to the mainstream. This country is too big and run by too few businesses for a private sector boycott to make a dent in air traffic. LA and NY are just too far apart for anything except teleportation to challenge that--and even then, it would still be regulated by the TSA!
The only way you can avoid funding the antics of your government and the companies that run it is to leave, in a rowboat, hewn by hand with handmade tools from trees felled in countries that have no trade agreements with the US. Have fun.
When Big Business is in cahoots with Government by the Highest Bidder, there's no exposed toe for the common man to jump on. No matter what we say or do, as individuals, we cannot stop the corporations in charge from doing exactly what they want to us. So long as we know we're all being lied to and humiliated in the security line for the sake of generating a national threat through the power of the collective imagination, we might as well put up with it. We don't really have any other options. The world has gotten small enough for it to be controlled by one small group of people. I'm of the opinion that it's Procter and Gamble.
Saturday, December 29, 2007
rubber ducky
Neither Teddys nor buggies enjoy baths. Ridding shelter kitties of Shelter Funk is not a fun or easy process, but i've found its easier to take Teddy in the shower with me than to try and bathe him in the sink. We're taking him to the vet this upcoming week to introduce him to her and get a prescription for Frontline or something. He's about 9 weeks old and in ostensibly good health (read: he's a complete nut, which is perfect for kittens) so he should be a fine candidate for a de-bugging goop. Boots did fine with it for at least 10 years (i can't remember how long she wore a flea collar, but bugs never seemed to bother her. in any case, Boots was an indoor-outdoor cat who remained healthy and happy for at least 17 years (read: nearly 3x her life expectancy) with regular flea gooping. i don't know why some people are so freaked out about it. She got worms occasionally from eating rodents but she went crazy if we kept her from going outside.
We're trying to keep him clean and keep bugs out of his fur until we can get him some goop. It doesn't help that this is the weekend and the year-change holiday is monday and tuesday, so there's not much chance of getting a vet appointment. Oh the paranoia of knowing your pet plays home to bugs! I keep thinking i see them everywhere. Poor kitty. When he's properly insect protected i'm going to wash every item of clothing I own. Bleurgh.
We're trying to keep him clean and keep bugs out of his fur until we can get him some goop. It doesn't help that this is the weekend and the year-change holiday is monday and tuesday, so there's not much chance of getting a vet appointment. Oh the paranoia of knowing your pet plays home to bugs! I keep thinking i see them everywhere. Poor kitty. When he's properly insect protected i'm going to wash every item of clothing I own. Bleurgh.
Thursday, December 27, 2007
Welcome Home, Teddy!
Teddy Kitty, born around October 8, 2007, moved into my parents' household December 20, 2007 weighing about a pound and already litter box savvy. Prior to joining our family he had been at the York animal control center for 2 weeks, so we don't know anything about his family or background. He is healthy and happy, incredibly friendly and playful, and cute enough to get away with murder. For now he lives indoors, but once he's big enough we'll start letting him play outside with the neighborhood feline gang.
I hadn't posted this till now because we spent several days trying to think up a good name for him. He seems pretty cool with Teddy. He loves pencils, laps, and laser pointers, sleeps through the night, and cries to be picked up when he's tired. In all I think he's a very good kitten and he is welcome. We're trying to discourage people food and toilet drinking from the outset, but we'll just have to see what happens. We're suckers when it comes to a cute kitty.
Note: Teddy is Not the cat we took from the hospital parking lot. That cat disappeared the first night he was here. No idea where he went, but i hope he's okay. He was just too wild to settle into living with humans.
Tuesday, December 18, 2007
I can has pardon me?
Has anyone not encountered the “I can has cheeseburger” website? Home to those lovely people who paste captions on their cats? I assumed, wrongly, that the interesting phonetic spelling and garbled grammar of the captions was a joke of some kind--perhaps a suggestion of how a cat might approach the English language. It was only later when I began reading photo comments that I realized this has escalated into a much larger phenomenon. Readers post paragraphs of this free-written drivel, comprehensible only if you sound it out like a first grader. It is no longer a joke or even a code for finding other like-minded web surfers--it is a full written dialect, in the vein of French Creole or Gullah, but without the regional, cultural, or lingual backing to categorize it as much more than a fleeting pidgin. This is not the truncated text message speech so readily popularized by 125-character limits and inattentive keystrokes, but rather a popular rejection of the constraints of standardized spelling and grammatical form. It is likely a natural derivation of English--much as French and Italian wandered off from standardized Latin--but it has emerged and evolved far more rapidly than previous dialects on account of its birthplace--potentially millions of people recognize it as a legitimate means of communicating online.
"Yes," says my reader. "You've not said anything I haven't read or thought before. I'm rapidly losing interest."
The reason it occurred to me that this may be an issue warranting some concern is it dawned on me just how much of my communicating I do online. The majority of my friends live in jarringly different time zones from me--from KST clear on through GMT, the rotation of this planet makes it very inconvenient for me to keep in touch with the people I care about. But the trusty Internet has come to my aid. I am in daily contact with friends across--or even straight through?--the world, without stamp, surcharge, or the hours of waiting endured by lonely World War girlfriends as the lines were slowly connected by hand, region by region, across the globe until their loved ones' voices trickled back to them like the last, dying ripple of an echo.
erm. I lost my place.
My point is, my intense exposure to internet-based linguistic variation has certainly impacted my relationship with my language, from casual exchanges with friends to the very format of my thoughts. And I'm not alone. Millions of people spend at least a few hours a day glued to their computers, interacting with humans and robots alike in an endless quest for information and entertainment. And this truly bizarre interpretation of an established language, made available to them, has ballooned into usage well beyond the niche group of photo caption writers who birthed it--in under two years. African American Vernacular English (AAVE), on the other hand, has been developing for centuries, providing linguists with endless glee as they discover root pronunciations and grammatical characteristics in it from all over the world and all over the timeline. Millions of people communicate effectively using this dialect all over the world, whether or not their parents use it and even if they're not a member of an AAVE-speaking community. As media technology has facilitated the introduction of AAVE to people outside its cultural community, and vice versa, the dialect has adapted and its influence has expanded, particularly since the 1960's. In the 50-some-odd years since the federal repeal of segregation law, to varying extents this dialect has become common in around half of American households.
Now, though, out of the blue and without much cultural influence, a group of--apparently--kids have coined a dialect for the purpose of anthropomorphizing cats, and in less than two years millions of educated humans around the world have taken to writing, speaking, and even thinking "Lolcats-ese."
I'm wondering, then--what does it take to make a dialect legitimate? How long will pre-teens have to practice this forced colloquialism until "i wuz en ur compootur, fixin your memorys" becomes your office's standard tech support memo? How long before grandmothers, smiling warmly as their families kick snow off their boots, hold up a dish and announce "o hi, ah made u a pie but i eated it."? The Oracle says an ongoing project exists to translate the christian scripture into Lolcats--are these the tireless monks of our age, the scholars whose pens scratch into the night over smug little treatises on the value of coherent theology? Is Lolcats-ese the common tongue of the future?
It is easy to learn and use--past tenses of all verbs are the infinitive plus "-ed," plural nouns are all the root noun plus "s." All spellings are the phonetic equivalent of a shot in the dark and need not remain consistent within a sentence. Zs and Ss, Cs and Ks, and most vowel sounds are interchangeable, and punctuation is creative at best. The easiest way to use Lolcats-ese orally is to pretend you're a recent immigrant from Eastern Europe, which could be a helpful stepping stone for actual immigrants. All in all, its a far simpler, far more forgiving variation of my native tongue that could see expanded use in the near future. I don't know if this is a good idea, how long it could be expected to last in its original incarnation, if more books would eventually be translated, or really anything about it (as i'm not a linguist and i'm hesitant to use any lingual form that could hinder my job opportunities) but the questions arise--is it likely we will see more and faster language decay as the internet increases in popularity? will we be able to keep up with the kids' ever evolving jive? how much meaning is lost in translation? how much difficulty will speakers of these new colloquial tongues have in school, college, and their careers? are we witnessing the conception of a universal language? How can that ruin life as we know it?
"Yes," says my reader. "You've not said anything I haven't read or thought before. I'm rapidly losing interest."
The reason it occurred to me that this may be an issue warranting some concern is it dawned on me just how much of my communicating I do online. The majority of my friends live in jarringly different time zones from me--from KST clear on through GMT, the rotation of this planet makes it very inconvenient for me to keep in touch with the people I care about. But the trusty Internet has come to my aid. I am in daily contact with friends across--or even straight through?--the world, without stamp, surcharge, or the hours of waiting endured by lonely World War girlfriends as the lines were slowly connected by hand, region by region, across the globe until their loved ones' voices trickled back to them like the last, dying ripple of an echo.
erm. I lost my place.
My point is, my intense exposure to internet-based linguistic variation has certainly impacted my relationship with my language, from casual exchanges with friends to the very format of my thoughts. And I'm not alone. Millions of people spend at least a few hours a day glued to their computers, interacting with humans and robots alike in an endless quest for information and entertainment. And this truly bizarre interpretation of an established language, made available to them, has ballooned into usage well beyond the niche group of photo caption writers who birthed it--in under two years. African American Vernacular English (AAVE), on the other hand, has been developing for centuries, providing linguists with endless glee as they discover root pronunciations and grammatical characteristics in it from all over the world and all over the timeline. Millions of people communicate effectively using this dialect all over the world, whether or not their parents use it and even if they're not a member of an AAVE-speaking community. As media technology has facilitated the introduction of AAVE to people outside its cultural community, and vice versa, the dialect has adapted and its influence has expanded, particularly since the 1960's. In the 50-some-odd years since the federal repeal of segregation law, to varying extents this dialect has become common in around half of American households.
Now, though, out of the blue and without much cultural influence, a group of--apparently--kids have coined a dialect for the purpose of anthropomorphizing cats, and in less than two years millions of educated humans around the world have taken to writing, speaking, and even thinking "Lolcats-ese."
I'm wondering, then--what does it take to make a dialect legitimate? How long will pre-teens have to practice this forced colloquialism until "i wuz en ur compootur, fixin your memorys" becomes your office's standard tech support memo? How long before grandmothers, smiling warmly as their families kick snow off their boots, hold up a dish and announce "o hi, ah made u a pie but i eated it."? The Oracle says an ongoing project exists to translate the christian scripture into Lolcats--are these the tireless monks of our age, the scholars whose pens scratch into the night over smug little treatises on the value of coherent theology? Is Lolcats-ese the common tongue of the future?
It is easy to learn and use--past tenses of all verbs are the infinitive plus "-ed," plural nouns are all the root noun plus "s." All spellings are the phonetic equivalent of a shot in the dark and need not remain consistent within a sentence. Zs and Ss, Cs and Ks, and most vowel sounds are interchangeable, and punctuation is creative at best. The easiest way to use Lolcats-ese orally is to pretend you're a recent immigrant from Eastern Europe, which could be a helpful stepping stone for actual immigrants. All in all, its a far simpler, far more forgiving variation of my native tongue that could see expanded use in the near future. I don't know if this is a good idea, how long it could be expected to last in its original incarnation, if more books would eventually be translated, or really anything about it (as i'm not a linguist and i'm hesitant to use any lingual form that could hinder my job opportunities) but the questions arise--is it likely we will see more and faster language decay as the internet increases in popularity? will we be able to keep up with the kids' ever evolving jive? how much meaning is lost in translation? how much difficulty will speakers of these new colloquial tongues have in school, college, and their careers? are we witnessing the conception of a universal language? How can that ruin life as we know it?
abduction update
And the aforementioned F.D. has managed to utterly vanish. Mom inspected her car thoroughly before going out, and nobody saw any four-legged renegades darting out of the garage this morning. I don't know of any cat-sized routes into or out of the house from there. Could be anywhere. Delightful.
abduction
There is a very scared, confused, but warm young cat hiding somewhere in my garage. It was living in some shrubbery outside the hospital where my mom works, and out of concern for its well-being now that it regularly drops below freezing at night around here, we lured it into a carrier, zipped it in, scared the tar out of it, and let it loose to make a nest for itself somewhere under the bonnet of my mom's car. Brilliant. nothing like killing an idiot feline with a fan belt to get your day started right.
I didn't want the cat to freeze out there, but I'm really not ready for another bewhiskered addition to my household. Especially not one so timid and apparently brainless as this one. I don't know. Its really adorable--no more than a few months old, from the look of it, most likely male, mostly white with grey ears and occasional splotches, and ostensibly in good health. (not trying to advertise, just sayin.) In the next few days we're gonna see how it/if it settles in, and if it comes around to the idea of hanging out, we'll take it to the vet and get those hateful necessities taken care of. Right now i'm pretty sure it thinks i want to eat it, but it was very friendly at the hospital--almost too friendly. It had that "rub all over the legs, trip the human, eat its brains" technique down pat. (why else would they make figure-8s all over your feet?) We'll find out if its inclined to not run away in terror after a few days. I'd hate to wind up with one of those cats that you only know exists because the food dish empties and the litter box fills. damn useless pets who never leave a safe closet.
urgh. i don't know. i miss Boots.
In other news, can anyone explain to me the purpose of religion-themed billboards? They're obnoxious and pointless--avid believers may see them and feel smug, but non-believers are going to either not see them at all or see them and find them annoying. They're hardly an effective outreach campaign. your cheeky billboard is not going to break down the barriers to my psyche and get my ass in a pew--if anything its just going to encourage rebellious youfs to tag it or light it on fire. you're not going to change anything with it--the religious zealots will continue to be zealots and the educated elite will continue to think. Why waste the money? Who are you trying to impact?
I didn't want the cat to freeze out there, but I'm really not ready for another bewhiskered addition to my household. Especially not one so timid and apparently brainless as this one. I don't know. Its really adorable--no more than a few months old, from the look of it, most likely male, mostly white with grey ears and occasional splotches, and ostensibly in good health. (not trying to advertise, just sayin.) In the next few days we're gonna see how it/if it settles in, and if it comes around to the idea of hanging out, we'll take it to the vet and get those hateful necessities taken care of. Right now i'm pretty sure it thinks i want to eat it, but it was very friendly at the hospital--almost too friendly. It had that "rub all over the legs, trip the human, eat its brains" technique down pat. (why else would they make figure-8s all over your feet?) We'll find out if its inclined to not run away in terror after a few days. I'd hate to wind up with one of those cats that you only know exists because the food dish empties and the litter box fills. damn useless pets who never leave a safe closet.
urgh. i don't know. i miss Boots.
In other news, can anyone explain to me the purpose of religion-themed billboards? They're obnoxious and pointless--avid believers may see them and feel smug, but non-believers are going to either not see them at all or see them and find them annoying. They're hardly an effective outreach campaign. your cheeky billboard is not going to break down the barriers to my psyche and get my ass in a pew--if anything its just going to encourage rebellious youfs to tag it or light it on fire. you're not going to change anything with it--the religious zealots will continue to be zealots and the educated elite will continue to think. Why waste the money? Who are you trying to impact?
Monday, December 10, 2007
A Joke with no Punchline
Two factory employees are sitting at the workbench. One puts down her brush, stretches, and looks to the girl next to her.
"Good god," she says, "we paint knickknacks for a living."
"So?" says her benchmate. "Its a living."
"But they're useless. They're intended to be useless. They're highly-detailed, hand-crafted, hand-painted useless pieces of crap."
"But people want them. If they didn't want them we wouldn't be selling them in bulk."
"But is it really worth it? We toil our lives away, painting every individual shutter on these little plastic houses, so that they can be boxed up, put on trucks, put on huge boats, shipped to America, put on trains, put on trucks, distributed to a thousand little boutiques, and eventually find themselves collecting dust on some little old lady's mantle piece? I mean what's the point?"
"Does there have to be a point? We work. We get paid. At least we know that somewhere out there, there's a little old lady who'll get excited next week when the new ones arrive, so she can add to her collection."
"But for every excited old lady, there's at least one entire case of these stupid little villages that gets thrown out because one magnetic ice skater got broken in shipping," says the painter. "I mean, sheez, our work gets thrown away because some cargo attendant in Los Angeles throws his back out and drops the box."
"It doesn't come out of our paycheck. We can still provide for ourselves."
"Yeah, tell that to the new girl--or did you forget, the girl who used to occupy her bench got fired for using the wrong shade of yellow on her windows? She used "smoky autumn firelight" instead of "cheery holiday firelight."
"Be thankful you don't paint windows. Are you going to get some tea or not?"
"I just wish I could find, I don't know, a purpose."
"Yes, well," says her benchmate. "I realized a long time ago that life has no meaning."
And the girls get back to work.
"Good god," she says, "we paint knickknacks for a living."
"So?" says her benchmate. "Its a living."
"But they're useless. They're intended to be useless. They're highly-detailed, hand-crafted, hand-painted useless pieces of crap."
"But people want them. If they didn't want them we wouldn't be selling them in bulk."
"But is it really worth it? We toil our lives away, painting every individual shutter on these little plastic houses, so that they can be boxed up, put on trucks, put on huge boats, shipped to America, put on trains, put on trucks, distributed to a thousand little boutiques, and eventually find themselves collecting dust on some little old lady's mantle piece? I mean what's the point?"
"Does there have to be a point? We work. We get paid. At least we know that somewhere out there, there's a little old lady who'll get excited next week when the new ones arrive, so she can add to her collection."
"But for every excited old lady, there's at least one entire case of these stupid little villages that gets thrown out because one magnetic ice skater got broken in shipping," says the painter. "I mean, sheez, our work gets thrown away because some cargo attendant in Los Angeles throws his back out and drops the box."
"It doesn't come out of our paycheck. We can still provide for ourselves."
"Yeah, tell that to the new girl--or did you forget, the girl who used to occupy her bench got fired for using the wrong shade of yellow on her windows? She used "smoky autumn firelight" instead of "cheery holiday firelight."
"Be thankful you don't paint windows. Are you going to get some tea or not?"
"I just wish I could find, I don't know, a purpose."
"Yes, well," says her benchmate. "I realized a long time ago that life has no meaning."
And the girls get back to work.
Sunday, December 09, 2007
Farfalle and Purple Shrimp
Instead of pinot grigio, try adding a cup of pinot noir to your garlic sauce for a bold flavored, slightly disconcerting seafood dinner. (note: i pulled the dish out of the fridge for the photo. it looked more appetizing when it was hot. just as purple, though.)
Monday, December 03, 2007
Assorted Airline Musings
I tend to get introspective and stupidly philosophical on airplanes. whether this is brought on by the noise, vibration, or the subtle nausea that goes along with air travel, i invariably find myself writing deep thoughts in the margins of my Sudoku puzzle book. most of them are completely stupid once i get back on the ground, but i don't really want to keep this tattered volume on my shelf indefinitely as a reminder of the inaneness of pseudo-intellectualism. So I guess i'll put my pointless thoughts here to share.
I gaze down upon the distant land, all distinction blurred so that entire cities become blobs of blue and green, through the most delicate filigree of ice crystals visible to the unaided eye. What a beautiful juxtaposition.
Comically wiggly rivers squiggle across the landscape like so much dropped pasta, then peter out into nothingness with seemingly deliberate intention--as though drawn by an overzealous fourth grader.
You there! Yes you, you winking reflection of sunlight speeding down a motorway 30,000 feet below me. Who are you? How do we relate? Were you looking up when I looked down? How many degrees separate us from Kevin Bacon?
Do river systems look like neural systems, or vice versa?
I attempted to avoid allowing my mind to go numb as I watched the vast expanse of my planet's surface crawl along in miniature; all of human existence reduced to infuriatingly redundant straight lines and uniform seas of both shingled roofs and soybeans. The more I looked, the less I cared to see--it is all dirt and water, just rearranged. Often poorly. Is life so remarkable? All surfaces are made up of something--is it relevant that the surface of my planet bubbles and mutates and even occasionally moves around on its own accord? What difference does this make in the long run? I am the surface of the earth.
The only thing Elite about Elite Access is the font. How is it that Elitist, a synonym for Snob, has an overwhelmingly negative connotation, but Elite is a desirable adjective?
I don't like the idea of "meal time." Meal time is any time you are hungry enough to eat more than a snack. In this age of 24-hour business, it is baffling that any industry would find it justifiable to uphold the antique concept of food hours. If your pilot is flying, he's at work. It is business time. He gets lunchtime, even if it falls at four in the morning. How Dare you use the excuse of meal time to starve me! Do you have any idea when any of your passengers last had a chance to eat? My answer is Thursday, jerks.
I love "emergency feeds" on paper towel dispensers. For when the fate of the world depends on dry hands.
Helplessly inane airport "special announcements" required by the FAA:
Don't take stuff that isn't yours
Don't leave your stuff laying around in public
Keep an eye on your kids
Tell the police if someone tries to hurt or harass you
--all things people are going to do anyway, unless they're up to no good. In both cases, the statements are falling on unreceptive ears. Shut up. If that's all you're going to use your PA system for, maybe you should donate it to an underprivileged school system.
The government is really getting their money's worth out of that reflective street sign paint--it's visible from cruising altitude.
Heh. I wonder if the camera operators had a good time making the safety video section on seatbelts--this one has no fewer than 3 crotch shots.
Interesting--our species has lived under the same sun for millions of years, yet we still can't look directly at it.
The cars on the Speedway are the only visibly mobile things on the ground from my vantage point--and even then they're crawling along.
Oh, screaming toddler. Life not all you expected? You bought the same sales pitch as the rest of us, and now you've come to regret it. Nobody blames you. We do, on the other hand, blame your parents, sitting there in comfortable numbness, inflicting you on the rest of us. Parents--if your brat has figured out how to pretend to cry, your brat is ready to learn there are consequences for being a pain in the ass. It is in your power to shut them up. Do us all a favor and do some parenting.
In other news, my sister's radiator sounds like it's flooding the kitchen. And I saw Avenue Q last night--downright hilarious. Broadway almost justifies the rest of New York's existence.
I gaze down upon the distant land, all distinction blurred so that entire cities become blobs of blue and green, through the most delicate filigree of ice crystals visible to the unaided eye. What a beautiful juxtaposition.
Comically wiggly rivers squiggle across the landscape like so much dropped pasta, then peter out into nothingness with seemingly deliberate intention--as though drawn by an overzealous fourth grader.
You there! Yes you, you winking reflection of sunlight speeding down a motorway 30,000 feet below me. Who are you? How do we relate? Were you looking up when I looked down? How many degrees separate us from Kevin Bacon?
Do river systems look like neural systems, or vice versa?
I attempted to avoid allowing my mind to go numb as I watched the vast expanse of my planet's surface crawl along in miniature; all of human existence reduced to infuriatingly redundant straight lines and uniform seas of both shingled roofs and soybeans. The more I looked, the less I cared to see--it is all dirt and water, just rearranged. Often poorly. Is life so remarkable? All surfaces are made up of something--is it relevant that the surface of my planet bubbles and mutates and even occasionally moves around on its own accord? What difference does this make in the long run? I am the surface of the earth.
The only thing Elite about Elite Access is the font. How is it that Elitist, a synonym for Snob, has an overwhelmingly negative connotation, but Elite is a desirable adjective?
I don't like the idea of "meal time." Meal time is any time you are hungry enough to eat more than a snack. In this age of 24-hour business, it is baffling that any industry would find it justifiable to uphold the antique concept of food hours. If your pilot is flying, he's at work. It is business time. He gets lunchtime, even if it falls at four in the morning. How Dare you use the excuse of meal time to starve me! Do you have any idea when any of your passengers last had a chance to eat? My answer is Thursday, jerks.
I love "emergency feeds" on paper towel dispensers. For when the fate of the world depends on dry hands.
Helplessly inane airport "special announcements" required by the FAA:
Don't take stuff that isn't yours
Don't leave your stuff laying around in public
Keep an eye on your kids
Tell the police if someone tries to hurt or harass you
--all things people are going to do anyway, unless they're up to no good. In both cases, the statements are falling on unreceptive ears. Shut up. If that's all you're going to use your PA system for, maybe you should donate it to an underprivileged school system.
The government is really getting their money's worth out of that reflective street sign paint--it's visible from cruising altitude.
Heh. I wonder if the camera operators had a good time making the safety video section on seatbelts--this one has no fewer than 3 crotch shots.
Interesting--our species has lived under the same sun for millions of years, yet we still can't look directly at it.
The cars on the Speedway are the only visibly mobile things on the ground from my vantage point--and even then they're crawling along.
Oh, screaming toddler. Life not all you expected? You bought the same sales pitch as the rest of us, and now you've come to regret it. Nobody blames you. We do, on the other hand, blame your parents, sitting there in comfortable numbness, inflicting you on the rest of us. Parents--if your brat has figured out how to pretend to cry, your brat is ready to learn there are consequences for being a pain in the ass. It is in your power to shut them up. Do us all a favor and do some parenting.
In other news, my sister's radiator sounds like it's flooding the kitchen. And I saw Avenue Q last night--downright hilarious. Broadway almost justifies the rest of New York's existence.
Monday, November 26, 2007
just over a week
It finally happened last night--I saw a bookbag on the floor out of the corner of my eye and thought it was the cat coming to check on me. So far I'd been so conscious of Boots's absence that the force of that habit was overwhelmed--all book-bags were just book-bags. But i guess as my focus drifted, the old habits returned. I wonder if i'll ever reach a point where i don't apologize when i trip over my sneakers.
In other news, a household plumbing project required me to cut away a sizable portion of my laundry room wall yesterday, reminding me forcefully of just how much i loathe sheet rock and Fiberglas insulation. urgh. but the removal went smoothly and promises an equally smooth re-installation. unfortunately, now that the hole is there, my dad is eying the aging linoleum in that room too. I hope he'll let me rent a compressor and just brad the baseboards back on once its tiled.
In still other news, i'm now certified as an advanced-level autoCAD operator. Hooray me. Now, to get a job on a sailboat.
In other news, a household plumbing project required me to cut away a sizable portion of my laundry room wall yesterday, reminding me forcefully of just how much i loathe sheet rock and Fiberglas insulation. urgh. but the removal went smoothly and promises an equally smooth re-installation. unfortunately, now that the hole is there, my dad is eying the aging linoleum in that room too. I hope he'll let me rent a compressor and just brad the baseboards back on once its tiled.
In still other news, i'm now certified as an advanced-level autoCAD operator. Hooray me. Now, to get a job on a sailboat.
Thursday, November 22, 2007
gobble!
As a registered vegetarian, the concept of Thanksgiving comes as a bit of a challenge. How to not impose upon your family to make accommodations for your silly eating disorder, while not being caused to chow down on all that unappetizing mass-produced, hormone-packed animal flesh. Thankfully, a reasonable, easy solution came to me this morning, in the form of the breakfast drink of orange juice and champagne.
Of course! Replace every potential slice of turkey meat with a tasty mimosa. By the time people think its time for the bird to reach the table, they're so tanked they don't notice its absence. That way your money doesn't wind up supporting cruel, eco-unfriendly, disgusting mass-feeding operations, and your family can tuck in early after a short day of pleasant intoxication. I expect to doze off here around 5pm, full of green beans and good cheer. Now that's a happy, healthy holiday.
Of course! Replace every potential slice of turkey meat with a tasty mimosa. By the time people think its time for the bird to reach the table, they're so tanked they don't notice its absence. That way your money doesn't wind up supporting cruel, eco-unfriendly, disgusting mass-feeding operations, and your family can tuck in early after a short day of pleasant intoxication. I expect to doze off here around 5pm, full of green beans and good cheer. Now that's a happy, healthy holiday.
Sunday, November 18, 2007
Boots Kitty, 1990-2007
12:25AM, November 18, 2007 saw the passage of Boots Kitty, aged approximately 18 years, into eternal rest. She is bitterly missed by her human companions, several of whom have scant memories without her. She quietly slipped away, surrounded by her family, after a full and happy life, spoiled rotten by all who loved her. She was an affectionate and patient kitty who tolerated all of the silly ways we tried to show her we cared, and who communicated with ease so much that words fail to fully express.
I'm glad I could be here for her as her time drew near, and I believe she spent her final days in peace. She handled her descent with the dignity and grace she brought to all aspects of her life, and for that I am grateful.
She is buried and memorialized in the back yard she reigned over all the days of her life.
Farewell, dear friend.
Wednesday, November 07, 2007
step over the velvet rope
So I spent the past week in Key West, Fla and i gotta say, that's one tourist town that you can really get stuck to. I don't know how i managed it, but somehow I saw through the sales pitch and in a lot of ways found it very real. I don't think most people do, though, and I think I figured out why.Many tourists approach the Keys and really any island area with the idea that it was somehow built especially for entertaining them--that it is in fact completely artificial and safe, like a theme park. Of course, cruise lines would like you to believe it is, as you're more likely to buy passage on their cruise liners if you do, but the sad truth of it is if you approach these places with the mindset the brochures want you to, you'll only go see what is built there For the tourists. Which means, of course, that you miss out on everything that drew tourists to the area in the first place. You'll see plenty of clear chlorinated pools, planted palm trees, narrated train rides, and expensive food. Adults may even get to try some fruity drinks served in coconuts or see naked people relaxing at the clothing-optional bars. Everyone can enjoy the 5-alarm sunsets and watch the tv screens atop the cruise ships...but they're missing something. The people. The people i met who live and work there are really, behind the eat-shit-and-die smiles and the exhaustion with the tip-based economy, some of the most pleasant folks i've encountered in a long while.
See, when I visited the Garden of Eden bar, I didn't stay with my group. I didn't cower behind a protective shield of chaise lounges and peep at the nudists behind forked fingers. I didn't gasp or giggle every time a new unclad belly appeared at the bar. I didn't, in short, treat the situation like it was some sort of Naked Human Revue. I made some friends. I didn't strip down, as my mother was there, but I found the occasional bar patron's nudity inoffensive and clean. Indeed, it was one of the most relaxed two hours I had on the island, chatting with a regular, getting hit on by the barmaid, sipping on a beer and taking in the lifestyle. Of course, it was one of the least comfortable two hours my mother had on the island, as she stared helplessly from the safety of tourism while her twenty-three year old baby got to know a very interesting blue-eyed man who happened to be nude. I obeyed their rules against cell phone use and didn't even think to bring a camera. For all too brief a time, I felt local.The same went with the dinner cruises, the lunch restaurants, the cab drivers, and even the tourist attractions. If you spoke to these real people as though they were individuals, with opinions and emotions and education and even some self-esteem, their facial expressions and even voices would change. Young men with salt-bleached dreadlocks and sun-browned backs would visibly relax as you discussed the Berkeley lifestyle or recycling incentives in Mexico.
Tour guides would surprise themselves by allowing their smiles to reach their eyes when you made an inquiry that wasn't on the FAQ list. Then another patron would walk over and the guard would snap back up--sir and ma'am would be addressed and tended to efficiently, thoroughly, and courteously with practiced smiles and live-to-serve eyes.
Maybe its because I'm used to being a smiling serf, but my best times on the island were spent in communion with the real people who lived there. I don't mean to imply that every local suddenly melted and became my best friend, as most didn't, but the folks who made the trip worth it (read: i went along to a ParrotHead convention, which is a massive, multi-national club of 50-something aged drunks, addicts, and assholes who started partying in 1970 and haven't taken care of themselves since. I didn't know such a wide variety of skin disorders and bermuda shorts existed.) were the people who didn't treat me like a tourist. So thanks. I had a blast.
p.s. the man-eating flower above grows in Berkeley, too. Any idea what it is?
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
beep
Today i was nuking some couscous and wandering aimlessly around my kitchen when i stopped to wonder--why does every appliance these days beep so damn much? In my kitchen alone there are at least 6 things that beep and holler at you--the phone, the answering machine, the oven, the microwave, the toaster, and even the damn refrigerator if you leave the door open too long. The microwave in particular is an offender--it beeps when you turn it on, input each number, start it, and then it beeps no fewer than 4 loud obnoxious times when it finishes. That's unacceptable. And the refrigerator needs a "i'm putting in groceries, asshole" function so it doesn't holler at me every time i leave the door open longer than 8 seconds. (my fridge at the Regent Hizzle in Berkeley used to slam the door on you unless you propped it open with a chair. One time it got a particularly good swing and caused me to hit my head on the frame.) The answering machine and phone beep loudly too, especially after the little arrogant computer voice tells you "end of messages"--you could have said that OR beeped, but oh-ho, how fun, you do both.
What's really irksome is that these bastards can't be reprogrammed not to. there's no "shut the hell up" user function. You can't even make the beep quieter--which seems ridiculous with the answering machine, as you Can set the playback volume. You can make it play as quiet as you want, but when its done it still screams like a dern banshee. Which sucks in my house, as someone is always sleeping on account of our diverse work schedules.
Maybe there's better answering machines out there, but mine is a bastard. When it picks up it plays the greeting aloud--like that's something you need to hear. And of course it beeps loud enough to rouse the dead to prompt the caller to speak, and repeats the din when they're done. It also doesn't help that we get called every morning by the National Pro-Life Alliance, who play a recorded message if you answer, dont' answer if you call them back, and their website is less than useless, so you can't even tell these anti-choice assholes to get off their collective high horse and leave you the fuck alone.
I guess my point is i'm tired of beeping. Come up with a new noise or shut up. Being beeped at all the time makes me wonder if i'm using the appliances or if they're using me.
On that note, thank you, Macintosh, for making your OS so readily adaptable. It was very easy to reset my computer to not make any unsolicited noise, show me any unsolicited notifications, or warn me not to touch things. unlike the copy of NannyState XP i use in class.
What's really irksome is that these bastards can't be reprogrammed not to. there's no "shut the hell up" user function. You can't even make the beep quieter--which seems ridiculous with the answering machine, as you Can set the playback volume. You can make it play as quiet as you want, but when its done it still screams like a dern banshee. Which sucks in my house, as someone is always sleeping on account of our diverse work schedules.
Maybe there's better answering machines out there, but mine is a bastard. When it picks up it plays the greeting aloud--like that's something you need to hear. And of course it beeps loud enough to rouse the dead to prompt the caller to speak, and repeats the din when they're done. It also doesn't help that we get called every morning by the National Pro-Life Alliance, who play a recorded message if you answer, dont' answer if you call them back, and their website is less than useless, so you can't even tell these anti-choice assholes to get off their collective high horse and leave you the fuck alone.
I guess my point is i'm tired of beeping. Come up with a new noise or shut up. Being beeped at all the time makes me wonder if i'm using the appliances or if they're using me.
On that note, thank you, Macintosh, for making your OS so readily adaptable. It was very easy to reset my computer to not make any unsolicited noise, show me any unsolicited notifications, or warn me not to touch things. unlike the copy of NannyState XP i use in class.
Monday, October 22, 2007
sheez dummy!
I know a deer in headlights can be paralyzed with fear, but what about when a deer decides he's seen headlights one too many times tonight and runs at them? A few minutes ago i was driving the speed limit, minding my own business, when this cloven-hoofed ruminant proffered me its ample backside as a live road-target. I slammed on the brakes and sounded the horn, but what did this walking barricade do but give me an innocent, confused look, shift to the driver's side and start running along next to the car, trying to get back in front of it. Apparently if a moving object occupies the space between you and the area you were once in, to a deer, it'll disappear unless you cross in front of it instead of behind. I screeched to a halt and my respected also-ran scampered off, followed by a friend from the other side of the street.
I can't help but wonder what effect the automotive industry will have on the evolution of these moronic animals--if somehow, by killing or incapacitating enough pre-reproductive deer, we'll eventually weed out whatever gene it is that makes them so vulnerable to traffic fatalities. This one got lucky and may live to pass on the Stupid Gene to its young, but someday the term "deer in headlights" may only remain in use as a reference to an obsolete situation, like Ring Around the Rosie or "one horse town." I say, what would the world be like if a generation of wildlife emerged with an innate wariness of long black tracks and yellow lines?
I suppose the Bayou Buffet would go out of business, but the rest of us might enjoy lower insurance rates.
I can't help but wonder what effect the automotive industry will have on the evolution of these moronic animals--if somehow, by killing or incapacitating enough pre-reproductive deer, we'll eventually weed out whatever gene it is that makes them so vulnerable to traffic fatalities. This one got lucky and may live to pass on the Stupid Gene to its young, but someday the term "deer in headlights" may only remain in use as a reference to an obsolete situation, like Ring Around the Rosie or "one horse town." I say, what would the world be like if a generation of wildlife emerged with an innate wariness of long black tracks and yellow lines?
I suppose the Bayou Buffet would go out of business, but the rest of us might enjoy lower insurance rates.
Thursday, October 18, 2007
23
In honor of my birthday today i offer you, the reader, a celebration of sorts. Presenting: Rats!
R. norvegicus
poofy rat
pain-in-the-rat
feathered rat
flying rat
dumb rat
big-eared rat
seriously annoying rats
R. norvegicus
poofy rat
pain-in-the-rat
feathered rat
flying rat
dumb rat
big-eared rat
seriously annoying ratsWednesday, October 17, 2007
food mumblings
I think the only way you could truly be a chocoholic is if you were addicted to creme de cacao.
--
The difference between "made of" and "made with" is very subtle, and marketers use that to their advantage.
--
I stopped consuming corn syrup a long time ago. At first i thought it was for my health. After a while, though, i realized it was because i'm a food snob.
--
I like going to Starbucks and ordering a small black coffee. On some level I think this is an act of quiet rebellion.
--
There are many plants that, if i didn't see them in the grocery store, i would never imagine they were edible. Like bell peppers. I can only assume ancient man chomped into one of those on a dare. Why he kept eating after the first bite is anyone's guess. Honestly I think i'm wired to be more inclined to eat flowers than most vegetables. Like potatoes. When has the phrase "hey look at this brown lumpy thing I just dug up!" ever made you salivate?
--
I like going to Starbucks and ordering a small black coffee. On some level I think this is an act of quiet rebellion.
--
There are many plants that, if i didn't see them in the grocery store, i would never imagine they were edible. Like bell peppers. I can only assume ancient man chomped into one of those on a dare. Why he kept eating after the first bite is anyone's guess. Honestly I think i'm wired to be more inclined to eat flowers than most vegetables. Like potatoes. When has the phrase "hey look at this brown lumpy thing I just dug up!" ever made you salivate?
confuse yourself!
Right Brain vs. Left Brain
After a while i could switch her direction on command by simply looking at opposite sides of the page, but this doesn't work for everyone. Don't try too hard though--at present i can't spell or type 'cos my brain is dizzy.
I think this explains why i get lost so easily.
After a while i could switch her direction on command by simply looking at opposite sides of the page, but this doesn't work for everyone. Don't try too hard though--at present i can't spell or type 'cos my brain is dizzy.
I think this explains why i get lost so easily.
Saturday, October 13, 2007
on blogging
The tone a blogger adopts for writing often is interpreted by readers as an indication of how the blogger is doing. Interestingly, though, i don't think i'm alone in that I'm generally only inclined to write when i've been feeling negative and screwed over by the Man, man. Blogging is a means of letting off steam in a less harmful way than throwing a fit or breaking things. So based on tone and subject matter, this may appear to the casual observer to be the blog of a fairly grumpy, put-upon, and socially intolerant atheistic liberal.
Ben, before you comment--it so happens that for a good chunk of the day I am not grumpy, nor do i feel put upon. a lot of the time i'm quite complacent. Indeed, i'm the kind of person that could screw up a sociopath's road to sanity as i, when nobody else is around, might as well not exist. I read, do some cleaning, work out a bit, occupy my mind with crossword puzzles, and for the most part ride around in autopilot until someone shows up to engage my attention. Only then do i become the opinionated, anti-religious, slightly sadistic tirade generator you've all come to know and be slightly annoyed by. When nobody else is around, i'm as happy as a clam.
Then again, i'm not alone all that much, and when I am i often seek out company.
...
Okay fine, this blog is a pretty accurate representation of exactly who i am most of the time. Happy?
Ben, before you comment--it so happens that for a good chunk of the day I am not grumpy, nor do i feel put upon. a lot of the time i'm quite complacent. Indeed, i'm the kind of person that could screw up a sociopath's road to sanity as i, when nobody else is around, might as well not exist. I read, do some cleaning, work out a bit, occupy my mind with crossword puzzles, and for the most part ride around in autopilot until someone shows up to engage my attention. Only then do i become the opinionated, anti-religious, slightly sadistic tirade generator you've all come to know and be slightly annoyed by. When nobody else is around, i'm as happy as a clam.
Then again, i'm not alone all that much, and when I am i often seek out company.
...
Okay fine, this blog is a pretty accurate representation of exactly who i am most of the time. Happy?
Tuesday, October 09, 2007
alumna
All Right USC, knock it off. You can't seriously believe that after costing me $30,000 that i don't have I'm gonna be willing or able to turn around and immediately start donating to your alumni association. I don't even make enough money to bother to file my tax return, let alone seek out deductions. No, USC, you did not get me the career of my dreams--in all honesty you didn't get me anything. I owe you nothing, I don't want to get hot tickets to home games, and i Certainly don't want to give you any reason to harass me even more. You must be incredibly arrogant or incredibly stupid to think that your students--the majority of whom attended because it was in-state, not because its where we wanted to go--would feel the urge to give you even More money, especially now that we've been out a while and seen exactly how useless that piece of paper we earned is. I could be here, now, doing exactly what i'm doing, with a GED. Instead i've got a BA followed by some latin gibberish and a debt that'll see me through the next decade. I know I should have taken it as granted that my school would start bugging me from the moment i walked off campus, but i had no idea you'd do it with such vehemence. The calls, the postcards, the fat envelopes full of worthless incentives and photos of smiling happy paid models...soon you'll start ringing the doorbell wearing skinny black ties and carrying a battered copy of the Carolinean Creed to ask me if i've embraced the joy of school Spirit...and just like all good proselytizers you'll never take "no, and please leave me alone." for an answer.
In other news, my cat has been gradually scooting closer and closer to me, so that a moment ago I went searching for my mouse and found it--not surprisingly--between her furry paws. She seems intent on getting as close as possible to me before passing gas, which is distinct in that it smells slightly worse than her food. Thanks, Boots.
In other other news, i went this morning to the clinic to start the HPV vaccine series and found, much to my chagrin, that i went to the wrong office and missed my appointment. I tried to reschedule and found that I must wait yet another month to get that ball rolling. As the two private doctors' appointments i've tried to have since arriving here the first of September will have taken 3 months to materialize and cost well over $300, I must pause to wonder what the same would have taken in a country with socialized healthcare.
In other news, my cat has been gradually scooting closer and closer to me, so that a moment ago I went searching for my mouse and found it--not surprisingly--between her furry paws. She seems intent on getting as close as possible to me before passing gas, which is distinct in that it smells slightly worse than her food. Thanks, Boots.
In other other news, i went this morning to the clinic to start the HPV vaccine series and found, much to my chagrin, that i went to the wrong office and missed my appointment. I tried to reschedule and found that I must wait yet another month to get that ball rolling. As the two private doctors' appointments i've tried to have since arriving here the first of September will have taken 3 months to materialize and cost well over $300, I must pause to wonder what the same would have taken in a country with socialized healthcare.
Friday, October 05, 2007
Saturday, September 29, 2007
Thursday, September 27, 2007
searchin'
I've been searching for hours for a song that i know that i know, but i've since accepted defeat and mellowed out with some Joni Mitchell. She makes me lonely for Berkeley.
What happened to the worthwhile protest song? The radio seems unwilling to play any "government, pull your collective heads out of your mass rectum and heed the will of the people" music, either that or nobody's really writing any. Are we really jaded, or have we just realized that nobody's listening? I'd write a song, 'cept i can't sing and you can't really make a statement on the oboe. that and i'm sure the republican rumor mill would churn out bullshit claims about my past and get me blacklisted. Okay, yeah, i guess its the 'jaded' option.
I'm gonna vote for whoever has the best idea when it comes to affordable public healthcare. Not because i believe anyone's going to do anything about it--even ducklings aren't that naïve--but just so, when everything goes to shit, as per usual, i can quell my frustrations with the reminder that i voted my conscience. Its either that or try to move somewhere that i can afford treatment, and frankly Canada is just too damn cold.
Not to rant excessively, but the concept of insurance has pissed me off ever since i learned how it works. "okay, so a company makes money, somehow, by gambling that most of the people who pay for their services--services they don't actually provide upon receipt of payment--won't need their services." They freely take your money and are not expected to give you anything in return unless there's a catastrophe. "so...i'm paying you...to do nothing, just in case something goes wrong." what gets me is that everyone goes along with it. and if you cancel your policy, they don't give you your money back, even if you never filed a claim. they just take it. friends, this is what we call "theft." The only insurance plan i'll ever support is socialized--a system where the poor still pay for the masses, yes, but where nobody's profiteering off of other people's misfortune. Or driving the public into paranoid hysteria in order to get customers. (have you Seen those fear-mongering Allstate ads? "this pretty house seems safe... until our pyrotechnic team burns it to the ground! Safety has a price. that's Allstate's stand.")
What happened to the worthwhile protest song? The radio seems unwilling to play any "government, pull your collective heads out of your mass rectum and heed the will of the people" music, either that or nobody's really writing any. Are we really jaded, or have we just realized that nobody's listening? I'd write a song, 'cept i can't sing and you can't really make a statement on the oboe. that and i'm sure the republican rumor mill would churn out bullshit claims about my past and get me blacklisted. Okay, yeah, i guess its the 'jaded' option.
I'm gonna vote for whoever has the best idea when it comes to affordable public healthcare. Not because i believe anyone's going to do anything about it--even ducklings aren't that naïve--but just so, when everything goes to shit, as per usual, i can quell my frustrations with the reminder that i voted my conscience. Its either that or try to move somewhere that i can afford treatment, and frankly Canada is just too damn cold.
Not to rant excessively, but the concept of insurance has pissed me off ever since i learned how it works. "okay, so a company makes money, somehow, by gambling that most of the people who pay for their services--services they don't actually provide upon receipt of payment--won't need their services." They freely take your money and are not expected to give you anything in return unless there's a catastrophe. "so...i'm paying you...to do nothing, just in case something goes wrong." what gets me is that everyone goes along with it. and if you cancel your policy, they don't give you your money back, even if you never filed a claim. they just take it. friends, this is what we call "theft." The only insurance plan i'll ever support is socialized--a system where the poor still pay for the masses, yes, but where nobody's profiteering off of other people's misfortune. Or driving the public into paranoid hysteria in order to get customers. (have you Seen those fear-mongering Allstate ads? "this pretty house seems safe... until our pyrotechnic team burns it to the ground! Safety has a price. that's Allstate's stand.")
Wednesday, September 26, 2007
wire and dance
We gave my dad a light fixture in the shape of an airplane for his birthday. I installed it in the bathroom ceiling downstairs. its cute, and goes with the décor on that floor. (if you look around the room you'll see airplanes, cars, airplanes, airships, airplanes, spaceships, airplanes, and a desk) Photo will follow if i remember.
The song "Nice Weather for Ducks" by Lemon Jelly makes me happy. its just the sound. i don't know if this version is a series of samples of other pieces, as the vocal refrain obviously is, but the whole composition makes me dance around and smile in a vague, stupid way until an outside force reminds me not to. You can listen to it Here, though the trippy flash animation that goes along with it tends to distract me from the piece itself. For some reason "Sticks and Stones" by The Divine Comedy has a similar effect on me. maybe its the key signature.
The song "Nice Weather for Ducks" by Lemon Jelly makes me happy. its just the sound. i don't know if this version is a series of samples of other pieces, as the vocal refrain obviously is, but the whole composition makes me dance around and smile in a vague, stupid way until an outside force reminds me not to. You can listen to it Here, though the trippy flash animation that goes along with it tends to distract me from the piece itself. For some reason "Sticks and Stones" by The Divine Comedy has a similar effect on me. maybe its the key signature.
Sunday, September 23, 2007
bad dreamer
i've come to realize that my subconscious generates certain trends that are almost embarrassing in their regularity. You'd think i would pick up on them by now, in my sleep, and be able to trigger a lucid dream from noticing them, but somehow i continue to be taken in every night and blindly follow my erratic (and sometimes masochistic) inner self through a maze of personal issues I didn't even know I had.
For instance, a big trigger i'm dreaming is that my hair has suddenly grown about 8 inches. I tend to look in the mirror in my sleep and see, not the self-styled twentysomething i embody by day, but the awkward fifth grader with a long blond rat's nest of a mop and mom-cut bangs that i tried to bury deep in history. This image should be stored in the auxiliary broom cupboard of my memory--behind the cobwebs, behind the futon in the musty spare bedroom of the beachfront time-share of my mind. But somehow this pint sized sci-fi dweeb in ill-fitting hand-me-downs and a day-glo pink windbreaker emerges on a regular basis to lead me traipsing through a remembered and imagined wilderness on all sorts of nocturnal adventures.
Another big hint that i'm out cold--i start bumping into people I've thought about recently, but haven't actually seen in years. Now i know a lot of people encounter this in their dreams, but what gets me is the utter dorkiness with which I approach these situations. Some old friend or historical figure will be sitting on a park bench, minding their own business, and my socially awkward avatar will pop up next to them and exclaim "oh my god! i was just talking about you not two days ago. When did you get back from the dead?" Even in my imagination Thomas Jefferson endures me with a sort of executive patience.
A clue i noticed recently is that I tend to show up in my dreams wearing whatever it is i wore to bed. In winter this is only mildly embarrassing as the wealthy patrons of my nightly floor show attempt to look away from my purple duckie pajamas, but at other times of year, when i've thrown off the covers and a warm summer breeze reminds me exactly what is exposed to the elements, i entertain all sorts of visitors i'd normally not invite to my private nudist beach in Cassis. I spend most of these dreams searching for a towel or something opaque (i distinctly recall finding a flattering open-backed hospital gown in one) and upon waking realize i've burrowed so far under the covers that i resemble a gyro and it takes a team of twenty bulldozers to excavate me.
Maybe writing this down will make it easier to spot tonight when i again find myself as a nasty-headed ten year old standing in the middle of a shopping mall wearing nothing but my Saturn-shaped earrings. Oh please.
For instance, a big trigger i'm dreaming is that my hair has suddenly grown about 8 inches. I tend to look in the mirror in my sleep and see, not the self-styled twentysomething i embody by day, but the awkward fifth grader with a long blond rat's nest of a mop and mom-cut bangs that i tried to bury deep in history. This image should be stored in the auxiliary broom cupboard of my memory--behind the cobwebs, behind the futon in the musty spare bedroom of the beachfront time-share of my mind. But somehow this pint sized sci-fi dweeb in ill-fitting hand-me-downs and a day-glo pink windbreaker emerges on a regular basis to lead me traipsing through a remembered and imagined wilderness on all sorts of nocturnal adventures.
Another big hint that i'm out cold--i start bumping into people I've thought about recently, but haven't actually seen in years. Now i know a lot of people encounter this in their dreams, but what gets me is the utter dorkiness with which I approach these situations. Some old friend or historical figure will be sitting on a park bench, minding their own business, and my socially awkward avatar will pop up next to them and exclaim "oh my god! i was just talking about you not two days ago. When did you get back from the dead?" Even in my imagination Thomas Jefferson endures me with a sort of executive patience.
A clue i noticed recently is that I tend to show up in my dreams wearing whatever it is i wore to bed. In winter this is only mildly embarrassing as the wealthy patrons of my nightly floor show attempt to look away from my purple duckie pajamas, but at other times of year, when i've thrown off the covers and a warm summer breeze reminds me exactly what is exposed to the elements, i entertain all sorts of visitors i'd normally not invite to my private nudist beach in Cassis. I spend most of these dreams searching for a towel or something opaque (i distinctly recall finding a flattering open-backed hospital gown in one) and upon waking realize i've burrowed so far under the covers that i resemble a gyro and it takes a team of twenty bulldozers to excavate me.
Maybe writing this down will make it easier to spot tonight when i again find myself as a nasty-headed ten year old standing in the middle of a shopping mall wearing nothing but my Saturn-shaped earrings. Oh please.
Friday, September 14, 2007
Rain!
A little moisture has graced my county this evening--not much, but enough to make the flowers perk up a bit. (normally even the hardiest of plants are bowing their heads, muttering about gloom and doom.) It was odd to come out of a restaurant and smile at the prospect of getting wet on the way to the car.
Trader Joe's built a branch just north of my house! Its a little more expensive than Oakland (Charles Shaw is $2.99 here) but still cheaper than anything else around here. hooray food! Unfortunately the locals have already figured out that the Jaipur Vegetables and the High-Fibre Joe's O's are the best so i guess i've gotta get there early from now on. One of the cashiers suggested I apply for a job there and i think i would if i were planning on staying in the area for a while. Part time employees get in on the group health insurance, which includes vision and dental, but it doesn't kick in until after 100 days.
Yeah, I need a job. anything at this point, just so long as its not embarrassing for them to call my references. "Hi, this is Nancy with Wendy's restaurants, i'm calling in regard to Kristen, who has applied to be a Fry Cook--do I understand you were her professor?"
Trader Joe's built a branch just north of my house! Its a little more expensive than Oakland (Charles Shaw is $2.99 here) but still cheaper than anything else around here. hooray food! Unfortunately the locals have already figured out that the Jaipur Vegetables and the High-Fibre Joe's O's are the best so i guess i've gotta get there early from now on. One of the cashiers suggested I apply for a job there and i think i would if i were planning on staying in the area for a while. Part time employees get in on the group health insurance, which includes vision and dental, but it doesn't kick in until after 100 days.
Yeah, I need a job. anything at this point, just so long as its not embarrassing for them to call my references. "Hi, this is Nancy with Wendy's restaurants, i'm calling in regard to Kristen, who has applied to be a Fry Cook--do I understand you were her professor?"
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
tri-podiatry
I've come to appreciate that there are a few benefits to having a cat with three legs. While I'm sure Ms. Boots would disagree as she's lost much of her independence, agility, stamina, and self-esteem, her amputation has nevertheless led to a couple of upshots.
For instance, she's become more "affectionate"--that is, without her hind leg to scratch her neck and the back of her head, she calls upon human assistance to hit those hard-to-reach places. And its absolutely adorable how she goes about it. True, in cat-language she's saying "you, yeah, the one with opposable thumbs. pet me. here." but it comes across as a very sweet snuggly behavior.
She's more inclined than before to be picked up and held, probably because standing can be tiresome. In wanting to be held, then, she has resigned herself to tolerating all the bullshit we put her through while holding her.
She's never too far away--she likes to be within earshot of her humans, probably for safety. While she still never comes when she's called, she can be found if you go looking for her.
While this isn't necessarily a good thing, she's gotten more talkative. She announces her presence when she enters a room, or when you do. Not sure why. But she has gotten more communicative in other ways, somehow--she uses direct eye contact, touch, sound, and nasal indication (i.e. pointing at what she wants with her whole face) to get your attention and get what she wants. She's a simple creature--she wants to be let in and out, wants food (my cat is a bit of an oddball in that she doesn't eat if you don't follow her to her food dish. she doesn't expect you to feed her there, you just need to watch her back. That's not age or senility talking, either--she's always done that.) She also, when lonely, will wander around the house, yowling pathetically, until someone comes and talks to her. (I don't appreciate this at seven a.m.)
In other news, i learned how to cast off my knitting last night. Its delightfully easy, i just hadn't bothered to learn (i've been knitting and re-balling for about six months now.) huzzah--something to show for my work.
For instance, she's become more "affectionate"--that is, without her hind leg to scratch her neck and the back of her head, she calls upon human assistance to hit those hard-to-reach places. And its absolutely adorable how she goes about it. True, in cat-language she's saying "you, yeah, the one with opposable thumbs. pet me. here." but it comes across as a very sweet snuggly behavior.
She's more inclined than before to be picked up and held, probably because standing can be tiresome. In wanting to be held, then, she has resigned herself to tolerating all the bullshit we put her through while holding her.
She's never too far away--she likes to be within earshot of her humans, probably for safety. While she still never comes when she's called, she can be found if you go looking for her.
While this isn't necessarily a good thing, she's gotten more talkative. She announces her presence when she enters a room, or when you do. Not sure why. But she has gotten more communicative in other ways, somehow--she uses direct eye contact, touch, sound, and nasal indication (i.e. pointing at what she wants with her whole face) to get your attention and get what she wants. She's a simple creature--she wants to be let in and out, wants food (my cat is a bit of an oddball in that she doesn't eat if you don't follow her to her food dish. she doesn't expect you to feed her there, you just need to watch her back. That's not age or senility talking, either--she's always done that.) She also, when lonely, will wander around the house, yowling pathetically, until someone comes and talks to her. (I don't appreciate this at seven a.m.)
In other news, i learned how to cast off my knitting last night. Its delightfully easy, i just hadn't bothered to learn (i've been knitting and re-balling for about six months now.) huzzah--something to show for my work.
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
a clean photo session
After my family elected to punch holes in my bathroom walls this summer to install a wall-mounted ironing board in the laundry room, its been my task (odd, seeing as i did it the first time too, when there weren't holes in the walls) to fix the place up. I guess this is my parents' idea of "earning my keep" while i'm home. It was some pretty straightforward plumbing, painting, and wiring work. could have done it all in one day but i'm lazy so it took about four.
Much brighter than my old 2-fer brass fixture, with lower wattages. I'm not sure how.
Look! The fixture matches the tap! Cute!
New hanging fixtures to match. Oh yes.
Note that the tap matches the stopper. The packaging didn't mention a stopper unit at all so I went all through the hardware store looking for them and eventually gave up. Turned out it was included.
Much brighter than my old 2-fer brass fixture, with lower wattages. I'm not sure how.
Look! The fixture matches the tap! Cute!
New hanging fixtures to match. Oh yes.
Not the best shot I'll admit, but its a very tiny bathroom.
Saturday, September 08, 2007
I should go to bed
I wonder what it says about me that i realized tonight that my favorite Beatles track is, hands down, "You Know My Name (Look Up the Number)" from the second Anthology album.
I'm nearly 23 years old and i still subscribe to MAD magazine.
I'm nearly 23 years old and i still subscribe to MAD magazine.
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