Birthday Party Preparations LIVEBLOG

5:30. I am setting up the computer in the new location so the photo booth thing will work. Also downloaded a bunch of speed runs to show on the other monitor. Then to pick up around the house a tad and then jump full into playing with bread dough.

4:07. To-do list:

• Make Middle-Eastern-style hearty lentil soup for the veggies and anti-glutenites. Should be done around 7. So, with prep time, 40 minutes to cook until soft, and then a good 20 minutes after that, start around 5:45.
• Stuff and cook runzas. Also should be done cooking around 7. So, to cook 25 minutes, rise 15 minutes before cooking, and be able to be stuffed, start around 6.
• Fry wontons. To be ready at 7, and fry all of them, should take a good half hour to 45 minutes. Start at 6:15.
• Remember to get 2 extra selves.
• Open bags of chips for cheese dip stuff.
• Remember to tell everyone who can't make it to go to my new flickr feed starting at 7 to be able to see live picture updates every 30 seconds.
  
• Bring in noise and funk.
  

3:16. Has beef kind and doesn't has beef kind are go.





















2:52. Actually, it's time to get the cheese dip ready. Respite is off the table for now. (The saurkraut is long gone and in the runza mix, no need to freak out, cabbage-haters)















2:40. Other batch done. Eddie Izzard on the monitor. Dishes in the wash. Might have a bit of respite before I prep the lentil soup, and run the home stretch on the runzas dough.

2:05. Wonton! That's the word I was looking for. I'm making fried rice wontons. So, refrigerating the rice didn't work as well as I'd hoped; it's more mushy than I wanted, but I think it'll work out just fine as a filling. The chicken kind is wrapped and egg whited in the fridge, and the kind without any chicken awaits. Back to it, friends.









1:18. A quick peek at the two refrigerators. The first one is the downstairs. That's Jones Soda Cane Cola in the bottom left. Comes in cans now, apparently, and I know some people love cane sugar over corn syrup (and the non-fattening chemicals that sweeten, whatever those are: yikes, and wow I'm not as fat as I could be) to a degree that five years ago I could not fathom in a sweetener choice, so there those are. The Boulevard Wheat is from a few weeks ago, when a good friend of mine got good and fired for something not so much his fault, and we didn't drink any when he came over and we spent the day like eight-year-old versions of ourselves we played Mike Tyson's Punch-Out for 4 hours, but a few have trickled out over the weeks.






You may have to click on the second one to see all the pre-prepared dish ingredients sitting around in there, waiting expectantly for me to fish them out and toss them on the counter, ready to be mixed or kneaded, or cut, or drizzled, or stuffed, or sampled.





















12:47. Two batches mixed and set to chill for a couple hours. (my mixing bowl didn't seem to want to hold 12-13 cups of flour). Now on to the wraps (or, I suppose, egg rolls with fried rice instead of veggies, depending on your point of view): chicken kind, and there isn't any chicken kind.























































12:00.

























































Oh, my, yes. Food processors RULE.



11:48. So, it's cold today, and heating bills and leaky windows being what they are, the thermostat is set to 62 during the day, which is up from 58 last week, when we realized even with the both of us sitting in front of space heaters all day, it wasn't enough. But with the cooking, and the space heater at the edge of the kitchen, it's been just fine today.













11:46. Ugh, that was, like 4 hand washes. So gross looking, so delicious! The mixtures are saran wrapped (ok, off-brand plastic wrapped, which never, I mean NEVER, wants to come off the roll in a clean break) and away in the fridge. The chicken breast is cooked and ready to be shredded, which means my forearms are going to hurt tonight. WAIT! We have a wee food processor down here. Imona try that.











11:11. This batch of hamburger is done, and I've separated the three pounds into two bowls: one for the regular runzas, one for the pizza runzas. After looking at it, the bread recipie I'm making from scratch will require more fine fine timing than I thought to get the runzas out hot and on time, so I really want the stuff going inside to be standing at the ready. Stupid real life food preparation. How did The Ancients (also, most of the world alive today) do it?! Now to get all that set up and ready as the chicken for the wraps finishes cooking.

The dishwasher has been emptied, the dishes next to the sink stowed. Thanks be to Jill for getting all of that done last night while I was out carousing and living it up, er, I mean . . . at prayer group.




10:48. If you are one of the "privileged" few who have had opportunity to visit me in my job-search dungeon, you'll be familiar with the computer set up I've arranged on the kitchen counter. The orange-tinged book is the aforementioned cookbook. But, what, you may ask, is the second monitor for, recipes that require such complex machinations that you much see two pages of text simultaneously, and such? No, no, nothing so urbane. Throughout the day, I'm going to be watching various videos, DVDs, and internet phenomenon such as Look Around You: Maths.









10:25. The rice is done and off to the fridge to cool so the fried result is less gooey. The beef for the runzas (or bierrocks, as they're known in some circles) is cooking in the pan now. Although I'll be making the bread for that from scratch this afternoon, I want as much to be ready beforehand as possible.











10:12. The rice for the chicken, and not-chicken rice wraps is in the pot and boiling as dictated by our excellent Mennonite cookbook More-With-Less, an excellent gift for those of you either still tied into the consumerist Christmas lifestyle, or with relatives for whom not providing such a still-culturally-appropriate gesture of economic goodwill would cause your relationship to be otherwise strained. I will chill be pre-wrapping the rice, this morning in order to make the just-before-the-party- preparations less hectic.

9:58. I'd been thinking for a while about having a birthday party. In these latter days, with the military-birthday complex in such full stride, and the pressure on every front to celebrate in the most elaborate fashions with the most and modern methods, who doesn't wish for a most excellent celebration of his or her anniversary of emergence? And so, in the spirit of such a broad cultural phenomenon (but, may I say, not the particulars) I prepare. And all day, you, most careful RSS feed reader, and Facebook status minder, shall be kept abreast.

I know, I know, I know.

It's been a while since I've been here. Looking for work and writing fiction, mostly, should you wonder what I've been up to. And I'm not sure how long it'll be until I get back. The other things are more important right now. If I can find a way to do all three, then I'll be here a lot. I like it, and I miss it.

But I'm back just for a moment to tell you about something just read over on a blog I read sometimes. My mouth hung open for a good ten seconds thinking about it, and then I covered it with both hands like you do when you open the wrong door in the wrong kind of movie. And while it's an interesting point the author is making, this one thing stood out above and beyond, so far above, that I can't believe the entire article wasn't just two lines:

The federal bailout we gave the other day to people who got filthy rich by giving bad mortgages to people who couldn't afford them, and then selling the mortgages to people who would never get their money back: $700 billion (850, really)
The total amount of aid the world has sent to Africa since 1960: $600 billion.

As you might expect.

I had planned on spending the afternoon working on a blog about how the modern American capitalist system/corporate culture is really a voluntary opt-in feudalism, using specific examples from the company I work for. Instead, they laid me off. So, I'll have to get to that entry later. Such is the life of an artiste.

You know everybody sees it. Except you; you don't believe it.

I don't think I need much commentary on this. It speaks for itself. I mean, even The Onion sees it.

http://www.theonion.com/content/opinion/im_not_one_of_those_love_thy?utm_source=onion_rss_daily

The Shift.

We had a mid-week weekend of reprieve, but autumn is back, nipping and cozying us down into blankets and scarves, but his eyes have gone steel having been so inviting. Is it even the same one? The time shift felt weighty this year, again, as late as it comes, an hour substantial. Morning feels like mornings used to, in grade school, a bright sidewalk straight up and onto the hill on Walker, where the alien walnut eggs slowly hatched day by day, and I waited for Billy (my first memorized phone number not mine, 782 not 764) and his mom at the T so we could walk together. Evenings start more sinister, and drop away winkaflash, leaving night to stalk in the wake.

Found peaking.

I've been lost in a corn maze twice now this year. The first time was back in late September. The maze hadn't been open very long, and the corn was a good ten feet tall, maybe twelve, deep green leaves filling out right through the middle of some of the narrower paths. A machete would have been a useful accessory. It had rained earlier that day, and every now and again there was a wet intersection. But the paths were mostly firm and dry, and as yet unspoiled by people cutting through the walls. Jackets only needed to protect arms from the fresh leaf scratching.

We flat-out raced through the first maze, my second guessing costing me the win. Then we took turns being the guide for the group in the second maze, the odd configuration taking us much further than we would have needed to if we'd been willing to cheat ourselves and do checkpoints out of order. For the third, we did a team race, starting at different ends, where you had to hit all the checkpoints as a team. It felt like the sun stayed up late just for us, and the sky kept its shaded colors over the hills surrounding the valley, horizon to horizon, for what seemed like hours.

For the fourth and longest maze, we decided to just strike out on our own, winding through the two miles of paths alone. Sam dove in without consulting his map, forging ahead with the intent of getting lost and finding God out in the sea of corn. Jill went in through the exit, head down, eyes on the map, determined to find her own way. I was in a weird headspace, caught up between wanting to get lost, but not really being in the mood for it. I felt detached, the world unreal there in the long-waning light and the tall corn. Unable to concentrate hard enough to notice God, unable to ignore his presence. So I just went to do it efficiently, but breezily. Enjoy the evening. Work my way through quickly, but not worry about it. Find what I found, and let it be.

But less than 5 minutes from the entrance, I suddenly had to use the restroom, and took the shortest path back to the starting point for the mazes I could find, cutting through the end of our maze on my way. But as I came back, I got confused, and started tracing the exit path I took out on the map instead of the entrance one I took back in. And I got lost.

Not hopelessly lost, though. I kept moving away from the exit, my sense of direction was good enough for that. But where on the map I was, I had no idea. None of the intersections looked right. I kept seeing Sam from time to time, wandering steadily, but he wasn't using a map at all, so he couldn't help my find where I was exactly. And if there's one word I'd use to describe the whole experience, I'd say "relaxing."

To have no other responsibilities than to some time find my way through a maze that I know had a path that I could find. Nothing else to worry about, nothing else to think about. A single, doable, pleasant task right in front of my face. A purpose, but not a hard one. Untaxing work. That's relaxing.

Eventually, I noticed that I may have been in a particular section (the kanagroo?) a good way south from where I thought I thought I was, but it looked like if this path was that path, and that one was that, a turn here would bring me to a checkpoint. And it did.

With by bearings found, worked my way to a bridge where two paths crossed and climbed up to look around. A couple of teenagers, and a younger kid were hanging around. I thought the older ones might have been dating in that early teenage way, unsure of what to do with your bodies when you're together, somehow still living off the friendship you started the whole thing with. Attached and detached, but together.

Thunderheads lumbered along east and south of us. I felt small, like a blank face in a crowd. There were big things happening around me, great and wonderful, and all I could do was watch them happen.

I traced my way out from there, stopping once to watch the sun drop below the corn right down the center of a long straight path, finally weary of our wanderings, ready to kick us out to get to bed. As the darkness settled, a couple of buses pulled in, and kids spread through the maze, cutting between the paths, and shouting, boys stealing girls cell phones, as they do (how else at that age to be chased when you want to be?), jumping out to scare, laughing and yelling.

It was a definite foreshadowing of what it would be like when we come back, late October, the corn tired of living, ready to finally sleep. By then, the paths were wide, the leaves pushed back by so many explorers, the walls between rows thinned, sometimes so far as to be doors.

We came back with our own teenagers from church, bundled in stocking caps from our personal stash, intended to let our earlier foray inform this one. We ran the same race in the first maze, this time, the worn down corn making it hard enough to stay on the path that the first 5 people came out the wrong one maze. 4 out the wrong exit, 1 out the wrong entrance. I sent them off in teams to race the next one, but teenagers are less loyal in these situations, and some of them ended up separated, in far corners of the field, going edge to edge without finding their checkpoints, the first group coming back long after the third had done so, the sun leaving much quicker this time.

Now what? Send the kids out to get in the long maze lost themselves? No. Not a good idea. The paths were too fluid. We decided to play Sardines in the big maze. I was the first runner, so I decided to head out to the cross bridge, sit down at the bottom the stairs to one side and wait.

I had the count of 500, so I dove right in the exit, cutting through the corn to get myself hidden as quickly as possible. I knew that after a certain point southwards, I was guaranteed to be in the right maze, so I knew they could find me. But as I made my way along in the dark, through that section I'd thought I was in the previous time, I missed the bridge, and near the south edge of the field, found a crossroads to stand it, and with no idea where I was, really, other than, "south-easterly-ish," waited in the dark to be found.

So now I was lost, but not at all trying to get unlost. Only waiting for someone to find me. Trying not to scare random people as I stood there alone in the dark. The corn dry like over-bleached hair. It was less relaxing to wait, and I wasted the thinking time I had by busying my mind. Keeping it from thinking usefully. On all the subjects but the deep ones. I do that far too often: calm, relaxed, my head not engaged. I don't know why.

I waited for quite a while, walked in a circle, stepping over fallen corn stalks, kernals ground into the earth. Standing, waiting, lost but not wandering. Every now and then, the sounds of distant groups working their way through the maze. And after long enough, I decided to whistle loudly, and the main group of the guys showed up soon after, the one other crashing through the corn from the opposite direction. We waited for a while for the ladies to show up, but they eventually called and said they had quit the search So we made our way out as we could, singing Vader's theme from Empire Strikes Back, piled in the vans, drove past vast orange halogen-lit asphalt and steel industrial complexes, and had ice cream at Dairy Queen on the way home.

By-the-by, the pumpkin pie blizzard is especially good.

Remember 'remember;' it rhymes with 'November.'

Whew. That's over.

I hope.

For the last month or so, I've felt strangely detached from the hopes and yearnings and fears of a lot of the people around me. According to the news, a lot of the people in the world, that is. Crammed into a binary situation by circumstance, I took a third way and voted for a man whose name I could not even remember as I waited in line for the two and a half hours it took for the election commission to get the right voter registration books to my polling place. Who I wasn't sure I'd vote for until I'd been in that line for an hour. And I voted for that candidate mainly because another man who I respected more than any of the candidates endorsed him. A candidate who, in Jackson County, got less than twice the number of votes as there were write-ins. A candidate whom I literally know nothing about besides his name, his running mate's name, and his party. And I'm fine with that. But I was able to not vote out of fear or hope. And I'm fine with that, too. Happy even.

(I would have voted for Jesus, but I figured he's gonna take office no matter what the vote. But I came close to doing that anyway. Maybe I should have. (Thought I'd address that.))

So, last night felt weird, detached, out of body. I've voted in two presidential elections before this, and I really thought those elections mattered at the time. So, this time, to see election numbers flashing on the screen (annoyingly, and prematurely) and to not really care which way they fell was weird. I felt like a sociopath, not able to feel.

My culture says I'm supposed to care. I'm supposed to think voting is the big deal. Get out and vote. Vote vote vote. Get a coffee. Get a doughnut. Get accolades. Wear a sticker; show your patriotism. If you haven't voted, you can't complain. But voting is just one wee thing in a whole big sphere of possible political action, and while my vote didn't count anyway, I went ahead. It felt right, but I don't know if it was right or wrong. It felt good, a little subversive, but I don't know if it was worth my time. Maybe I would have been better served staying home and sleeping an extra hour and a half, been able to be more present for the youth guys I hung out with on Tuesday night. As it was, I was exhausted.

I kind of wonder if the Baldwin/Castle ticket in Jackson County had 664 votes instead of 665, what it would have changed. Maybe I could have gotten all worked up and plunked my vote into a 90k-drop bucket (either way). And then, as I always do, I wondered if I had changed my one vote, how many people also would also have changed theirs. Would me changing mine been enough to affect the cosmic unconsciousness so that others would have too? I doubt it. Same thing with economics. If I create my own little demand or supply of something, does that even have an effect? I don't know. But again, I doubt it. Is that nihilism or realism?

As far as winning goes, I kind of wanted McCain win in order to to spite the really smarmy pundits on TV, and everyone like the self-important people standing around the line at the election place yesterday, the kind of person who likes standing to the side at events, letting other people see them at the thing, but not willing to stand among the 'unwashed.' The kind of person who took running for 6th grade class president as an opportunity to make things happen. The kind of person who strongly believes in the power of volunteering to serve on boards of organizations. Also, you always get a garishly colored t-shirt, apparently. I kind of wanted Obama to win because I like when people have hope, and like when young black guys have good role models. I kind of wanted McCain to win because I think he's got a better sense of humor than Obama. I kind of wanted Obama to win because I think he would have a more policitally interesting administration. I kind of wanted McCain to win because because because. But in the end I really didn't care for most of the policies of either of the candidates. I kind of liked Mccain's more. But only just. Not enough to cast a vote.

So, I watched the Daily Show/Colbert report, saw how hard it is to be funny with short notice. Saw them call New York with 0% reporting. Saw them call the Obama win, hope in Jon Stewart's eyes, like it all finally meant something. Got ready to sleep, saw a generous and well-spoken concession, saw a triumph, cared less about Oprah, as usual. Went to sleep. Woke up.

And all that's different today is that I feel more like writing. More than I have in a month or so. Maybe longer. Like I've been under a cardboard box for a while, and now someone moved it, I can't figure how I got under there, or why I never left earlier. So, there you go. Maybe there'll be more writing. That's the impact of the election in these parts; it's over.

Now that I've chimed in on these two things, maybe the news can FINALLY talk about something else.

• The question I would have asked at last night's "town hall meeting": "Mr. Obama has said that he 'still believe[s] America is the last, best hope of Earth.' Ms. Palin has recently been quoted in saying in no uncertain terms that Mr. McCain believes, and all Americans should believe, that 'America is the greatest force for good in the world,' and has also said in the VP debate that that America is to be a 'shining city on a hill' for the world. A two-part question, then: First, do you agree or disagree with these statements now? If you disagree, how do you now see America's role in the world; and why the change? If you agree, each of you have made public claims of being Christians, why do you see America, respectively, as either a better hope for the world, or a greater force for good in the world than Jesus?"
• I like capitalism, that people can ask other people for money to invest in the capital for their business, and if the business does well, that person gets some of the profit, and if it doesn't, they don't. That lets people start businesses when they otherwise couldn't. Which is good for the community at large. I like free markets for buying and selling things, letting the demand and the supply for a good set the price, and I like there being as little regulation from an outside entity on this process as possible. So, for example, if in your part of the country, there isn't much gas, I think people should be able to set a high price for it, since there's little supply. People will deal, and they'll be fine. Of course, gas is an obvious example that doesn't work that way, because the local supply and the demand are artificially controlled by several non-local outside entities. If everyone in my neighborhood decides to stop buying gas from the Quicktrip on 43rd, and goes to the 7-11 on Linwood, it's very unlikely the price will drop significantly at that Quicktrip. Not more than 10 cents, even. That's because someone up the chain is creating a different kind of demand than I and my neighbors can: a person who is buying and selling futures and options on oil to be delivered, shorting and going long. Same thing with coffee, gold, frozen orange juice conentrate (haha, but it's true), and debt even. In fact, a HUGE part of this whole "crisis" we're in right now is that people bought and sold debt. Which is weird to me. I don't know if I would ban it, but I certainly don't like it. If you make a bad investment, you should have to pay for it, says I. And let's not even get into the ability to buy and sell money itself. But this article does, much better than I could. So you should read that sometime.

All your sanity and wits, they will all vanish. I promise!

First they took Fortunate Son, and cut out all the "it ain't me"s. Which is asinine, I agree. The exact opposite of what the song originally said. When I first saw that commercial, I laughed out loud.

Now, today, as I was watching Tuesday's Daily Show full episode online, I found another example of the same edited song absurdity. The interspersed commercial was a new ad campaign that uses this song:



to promote a web search engine. So, an angry/silly song about a guy's girlfriend starting to act senile 60 years early, loses all references to losing one's mind, and now is just a silly viral jingle for a search engine I stopped using the minute another search engine stopped providing it more detailed results.

And now a song I liked to sing at random, partially for the absurdity, and partially because I happen to like gypsy punk, has now been co-opted into commercialism and consumerism. I'm not sure if I'm angrier at the company for slaughtering the song, or the band for letting it be slaughtered. At least John Fogerty didn't have any say in his song being used.

I'd say more here, but I don't want my prose to slip into purple.

A proposal. Decide for yourself how modest.

My friend Julie mentioned to me last night an idea that she came up with for solving the current global financial crisis.

Jubilee.

That's right, follow in the ritual footsteps of ancient Israel and forgive everybody's debt. Maybe just mortgage debt. Maybe all the debt. Either way.

It's probably a really foolish thing to do. But then again, so is basing the strength of your currency entirely on debt.

Trying to be ordinary, trying to be radical.

As you can see from this picture that I cribbed from the website, Jill and I took some of the middle school guys from church to see the third showing (total!) of the documentary The Ordinary Radicals on Tuesday night. Ben and Jake are also there, just off camera to the left.

The film uses this last summer's Jesus for President book tour as a structure for telling the larger story of the changing face of evangelicalism, frequently manifested politically. How by trying to follow Jesus, and by reading the Bible, what used to be a primarily politically right group of people is moving out of general American conservatism, but not necessarily into general American liberalism, per se, moving into a kind of third political sphere. There's more than the political stuff, but that's the easiest place to see the change. Apparently, I'm part of that shift.

For me, the film was just more encouragement to live more radically, to live more simply, to love people more, to listen to people more, to really live a whole life that tells the story of God. I hope it had the same impact on the youths I brought with me. Since we're also reading The Irresistible Revolution together, I think it might. It also had some really beautiful stories about particular people who God is using to love people. I was inspired; the people in this movie are the kinds of people I want to be.

One of the difficulties in communicating what's going on to people who are still entrenched in general American conservatism is that this new political face finds a lot of common ground of praxis with anarchists and progressives (and hippies), which can very easily look like a shift to the left. Maybe it is, some, but I think that maybe it's just shooting off in a new direction, and in our country anything that's not right looks left, and vice versa.

Zack Exley is interviewed in the film, and Jamie Moffet, the director, had him stand up to help lead the Q&A afterward. Zack said something at the end that I've been trying to think through for quite a while, actually, and finally had something to say about it. He talked about how this film helps him start bridging the gap between secular progressives and the new breed of evangelicals, that both groups have a lot of similar goals. How Creation Care, for example, has a lot of the same goals as typical secular environmental groups.

I think these kinds of partnerships can be good for everyone involved, and I would also hope that this film would also help people bridge the gap between the traditional evangelicals and the new evangelicals. I'm sad, though, because I think that this latter bridge may be a very long conversation with some people, late into the night at the kitchen table, where the traditional evangelicals are like a father hearing his daughter wants to elope with her boyfriend, and he's so angered by the mere mention of the topic, that very little actual communication will take place.

But what I wanted to say at the talkback in response to Zack, but didn't, because it was awfully late for a school night, and we had to leave, is that I don't think the goals of the new evangelicals and the secular progressives are the same. It's the praxis that's similar. Not that that's neccessarily a proble, but that distinction can be confusing for everyone involved. Maybe with the secular progressives, taking care of the poor, and resisting the consumerist empire, and non-violence, taking care of nature, & etc., are the goals. Which is why you see the progressives willing to go to pretty significant lengths to accomplish these things, put aside the US constitution, or flat-out take money from people that have more to give to those with less. For them, since these other things are the goal, nothing should get in the way.

And it's not that Christians should ignore the poor, or believe the narrative of redemptive consumerism and progress, or kill people, or destroy nature in pursuit of progress, but that these aren't the goals. God is the goal. As Zack said on Tuesday, for example, the progressives don't have anything fueling their desire for equality, no underlying reason for it, other than that it seems right. The new evangelicals think everyone is made in the image of God.

And so, as one woman named Rachel was saying at the talkback, there comes a particular tension when trying to live socially just and consumerisictly ethical as a new evangelical. She talked about how much morality was overtaking her thoughts lately, and how we can do all these good works, and without morality, we're still going to be judged by God. I wasn't sure what she meant by morality. What I wanted to say, but again, didn't have time for, was that morality is way more than sex, which is what it sounded like she might have been talking about (and something we've become completely obsessed with on all fronts as Americans/American Christians). But taking care of the poor is a moral issue. Not perpetuating slavery by buying things made by slaves is a moral decision. Loving people who hate you is a moral struggle. All through the prophets, God uses sexual morality imagery to call attention to immoral uses of power and abdication of the responsibility to care for the poor (also, idolatry).

So, when I recycle, it's because I think God's story about him loving creation is true. When I hang out with people who live on the streets, it's becaue I think that God's story about his image being in them is true. When I say I'm against war, it's because I believe God's stories about beating swords into plowshards, and not pulling up the weeds with the wheat, and turning the other cheek. But for me, God's the point, not the thing that I'm doing.

Some pictures of Minsk.

Some places feel like home, even if you've only been there a short time. Even though I was only there for a couple years, Minsk will always be one of those places for me. I'll try not to over-romanticize it. Not tell you know green it is in the spring. How there is a park where every turn is just flowers and trees so you can get lost there. How the tramvi stops in Yanka Kupala square and you used to be able to walk to the Komarovski Market and there was Pengvin ice cream in kiwi and strawberry and mango.

Anyway, here are some pictures of home I found on English Russia today: http://englishrussia.com/?p=2052

I realize the irony.

Dear GreedyMortgage-Obsessed AmericanGovernment-FinancialSystem complex,

A failure to plan on your part does not constitute a crisis on mine.

I don't usually do this, but,

I don't care who you are, that's funny.

Two sides of two different coins: just simply sharing a quote from a friend. (The long way.)

Last night I went to Dragonfly with Sam and Jeremy M. Sam bought us a pot of green tea that came out perfect on the first try; the best green tea tastes and smells a little peppery and a little sweet, and this was just so.

We talked about the issue of AdBusters I mentioned yesterday, and about politics, and the failure of hipsterism, and played a game of Midgard and a game of Taj Mahal, and the wonderful Dragonfly people gave us each a massive cinnamon roll to take home. So you should go there because they are nice and their baked goods are delicious.

Jeremy said something provocative that was simultaneously the most cynical and the most insightful thing I'd heard all day. And in a given day, I read a lot of insightful and especially a lot of cynical things on the internet, so that's actually saying something.

But the problem is, I'm sure that posting Jeremy's comment here is going to provoke some people, because it relates to a pretty sensitive subject. But then again, it seems like most subjects have gotten pretty touchy lately.

Part of the problem, I think, is that when it comes to significant issues, our country has separated into a false polarity. "Oh!" a person says, "You disagree with me on something relating to issue X? You must disagree with me on issues O-T, as well. You're one of those P believers, eh? Well, I'm not associating with you. You can't be reasoned with."

Exacerbating the problem is that these two sides of the false polarity aren't even talking about the issues on the same plane of discourse.

Take something like environmentalism. One side argues that taking care of the world we live in is really important, and businesses and people shouldn't be able to pollute it since we all live in it. So, if you're disagreeing, you must obviously be for destroying nature for the sake of personal progress. The other side is arguing that the government shouldn't be regulating environmental issues because it's only a power play to get more control over people by feeding their fears. So if you disagree, you must be trying to increase the power and control of an already massive government.

It's all so obvious. How can anyone see anything any way different than I do?

But I think it's obvious that we shouldn't destroyed nature. It's also obvious we shouldn't pander to people for our own political ascendancy. So all those other bastards are obviously evil.

And sometimes they are, I'm sure. Just like me.

(Ok, fine, grammar Nazis: Just like I.)

So, when the issue of (and I hesitate to even mention it) abortion comes up, people get rightfully hacked off. One side's rhetoric is: "Um, that's killing someone, if you're on the other side, you're for killing innocent people for your own benefit or convenience." The other side's rhetoric is: "Um, that's someone's life already. Bringing a new person into their world would be tragic for them, and hell for that new person, too. Also, what if they were forced? If you disagree with me, you must hate people."

And so the arguments shoot off in completely different skew tangents, and those other people over there are demonized, and there's no conversation.

Of course, just like with the environment, where I'm sure there are people who think that destroying nature for progress is just fine, thank you, and I'm sure there are people who think that playing on the fears of people in regards to nature is a great way to increase the power of the government, there are very likely people who don't mind killing off innocent people to decrease the population so life is "better" for them, and there are people who don't care if kids get born to poor people who can't afford to give the kids much of a "good life," because, who cares?

Why can't you think that protecting nature can be done without government control, and that babies should be born and then taken care of by someone else if the parents can't?

Because you're not allowed to do that in our country. Our system forces you to choose. Republican or Democrat. Faith or science. Life or choice. But for all these issues, and so many more, we're mostly talking about two entirely different spheres of conversation here, not two bright and distinct points at the ends of the same line.

So, in order to get to the quote, which is the point of this post, I've got to say that I've got some strong opinions on things like abortion. I think the killing innocent humans argument is more important than the post-birth isn't so hot argument. A lot more important.

But see, right there, you're either nodding your head violently, or shaking it just as violently. What can I do?

I think that we should be taking care of all the people, born or not born. People close to us, and people far away.

And yeah, I'm still not sure how. Whether national organization or personal action is more required. If one of those should be put aside for the other one on important issues. Whether we should set up a system in which right decisions can get made, or just solve the problem with the system, no matter what the necessary process.

So, anyway, here's the provocative quote I wanted to share with you, as close as I can remember it:

"As long as people keep getting elected simply for opposing abortion, it's never going to be illegal."

Ramblings from a lunch time

When I started working at this job, Jill had her car, and I drove the van. And I liked to drive over the highway, go to Taco Bell for lunch, or wherever, and sit in the parking lot, listen to the radio. I like sports radio more than I like sports. Open the windows and let the air in. Or keep the windows closed, obviously, if it was winter, just let the cold creep in until it was too much, and I had to start the van and drive back, thawing on the way. If I wanted to, I could stop at Half-Price books or Borders, or whatever. One time I even spent the whole hour driving to the game store to buy a gift for a friend. Even at an easy job where you can do what you want most of the day, the ability to hop in the car and just go feels like real freedom. It's sort of how I've been conditioned. No car? No freedom. Not in a town like this, where the good buses come twice an hour.

But now that I'm riding with Adam to work, it's rare that I get a chance to just go. Most days I either stay at my computer or take the ten+ minute walk to Hy-Vee. We're down to one income with Jill being a stay-at-home-Jill these days, and when I eat out for lunch, I've given myself a budget of the price of a $2 can of soup, since that's likely what I'd get if we went grocery shopping. At Hy-vee, I can buy a really nice roll and a fifth of a pound of rare roast beef for about a buck fifty, and with some mustard that's a right fine lunch. And seeing how I'd like to lose weight, I'm fine with not having expensive options like the only slightly further Sonic.

Sometimes I spend my two bucks on drugs. A 64 oz fountain drink is a dollar nineteen. Of course, making my own sandwiches would be even cheaper. But that means keeping ingredients fresh and available, which we're not so good at. Seems like we're always either scrounging for last scraps, or throwing out food because it's gone bad from sitting around for too long.

But Adam got back from Portland yesterday, so I drove myself to work. Which meant I had options. You can eat good at Taco Bell or McDonalds for two bucks, nice and fattening, but I wasn't even in the mood to spend that, so I ate a $1.29 carrot cake Clif Bar, and given my freedom, headed to Borders with $12.87 in two-year-old gift cards.

I have said it before, and you will likely hear me say it again, but bookstores are dangerous places. It's a bit like a porn addict flipping through the underwear ads in the Sunday paper. You're still skirting the edge of realm of safety, but you've got an outside chance of going off the deep end. I'm just finishing reading Colossians Remixed again, having read Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt and Watchmen in between, while I'm still in the middle of A Failure of Nerve, and further back, Exclusion and Embrace, so it's not like there's a real strong temptation to empty the bank on books I don't need, but it still felt a little dangerous walking through the double doors with the name of the store engraved in the wooden handles. In the end, it's not owning books, that's dangerous. Not really. It's the potential of books. It's the hidden story, the one you discover, and no one else knows. It's getting lost in them.

Right at the front of the store there's a display of political books, and one of them is a thin biography of Sarah Palin with quotes on the front about her VP nomination. That's really fast. I wonder if it was fast-tracked or re-released. It had a 2008 copyright. I know there are people out there who write insta-non-fiction. Propose a book on current hot topic, write it in a week, sell it, propose another. But this one seemed thoroughly researched. So that's a mystery.

I headed over to the discount fiction. If I needed a copy of all three Lord of the Rings books, I could have had that for $8.97, but I'm already there, more than once, and there wasn't anything else I was interested in. And I didn't feel like a coffee table book, or a book on how to do tai chi, or a miniature zen garden, or any of the cookbooks, so I moved on to the graphic novels, looking for 1602, even though I know it was a cool $19.95.

But it wasn't even in stock for me to be able to check the sticker. I stood there and read Incredible Hulk: The End: the Last Titan. Thematically, it compares the Marvel superheros to the titans of Greek mythology. Hulk is created by the atomic age, and he is the first of the new 'titans.' This story is set in the distant future, the world destroyed, Hulk/Banner and huge cockroaches are the only living things left, and Hulk is the new Prometheus, now the last titan, left to be eaten again and again by the cockroaches, never able to die, even though Banner is trying to end their lonely lives. It's these kinds of modern takes on classically tragic stories are the reasons I like the comics and graphic novels I like (Watchmen and Sandman for example), and this Hulk story makes the link between old stories and new stories even more clear.

As I left the comics section, I got that rich, heavy feeling I get sometimes in book stores and almost always in libraries, walking through stacked rows of books, back cover to front cover packed in shelves, the feeling of so many words and ideas brimming in such a small space, the weight of possibility, the stretch of all that time: reading a book is days, unless it's tiny, and then it's at least hours. And just within my reach are a hundred books, thousands in view. And how long was a single book to write, even? A season of work, solstice to solstice? A year, maybe? And all that time is packed down and overflowing there in the bookstore. Moreso in the library, books upon books, some untouches for decades. That's gravitas, man. That vibe stuck with me for a good hour after I left.

I looked at some other stuff. There are a couple of Get Fuzzy books newer than we have in the Get Fuzzy bathroom. I almost got one, but I wanted both. so I didn't get any. I realize that thinking is bad economics, but that's how it was. In the end, I decided to get the latest issue of AdBusters, an advertisementless magazine that I cannot usually afford since it has to rely on sales for revenue, but gift cards are gift cards, and I pulled $8.95 off the card with the picture of the wrapped Christmas gift on it, even though I meant to use the one with The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe on it first, since it's only got 28 cents left. Almost without thinking, deliberate like in a Wes Anderson movie, I took the magazine off the counter, receipt tucked inside, in my hand so as I was carrying it face up, right side up. Words and time demand my respect, apparently.

This theme issue of Adbusters is the decline of the West and the rise of the East, which is manifesting in the US and China, primarily, it says. And the issue is a double issue, if you start and read it normally for us, left to right, you get the part about the west, and if you read from the end, right column to left column, it's about the east, and the stories meet in the middle, ask you to see the other perspective by jumping to the end and starting over. I'm not done reading it yet, and I'm not convinced the rise and fall business is definitely going to happen; I'm no oracle. But there was a particularly interesting quote at the end of an article on the east side by a guy named Martin Jacques: "America is utterly unprepared for a world in which it is no longer the dominant power: it has barely given any though to the question, not even in its nightmares."

And I'd have to agree, even if I'm not utterly convinced if the west is really in decline or if that's just speculation. It's like we think we're always going to epic-ly rule, and are planning accordingly. But what if the Fed can't keep messing with interest rates? What if the bottom did fall out of the dollar? What if China called in all that debt? I'm not worried about it, and I wonder if on a macro scale preparing for economic disaster brings it (or vice versa), but I also think that occasionally contemplating our west declining isn't a bad thing either. Maybe we'd be more humble.

So I drove back and sat at my desk, nestled in my cube, and helped the people who pushed it to bubble, try to help the housing market turn back again. And read my magazine. And wrote most of this.

I realize not doing it with a Polaroid camera strips it of some of the poignancy.

But a laptop webcam with a single take is as close as I can get. So I'm joining in:


















Before I die, I want to do something
really, really well.

From a thread.

Last week I stayed up late, watched gymnasts and beach volleyballists and badmintoners getting their job done, son. Beat the metal of your life into a pleasing shape, and if it's your day, you get a medal. Not your day? Then you aren't even shown on the camera, and so you're as alive to the world as I am here in my office chair. Dive in the water, decisecond here, you're a millionaire, decasecond there, you're a nobody from a nobody country, and the world waves its red or white and blue and you wave no banner at all. Well, unless you're American. Two teams drop two batons in two relays and I see more about them than the teams who advanced.

I watched that swimmer guy win some medals last week. That was impressive.

I almost didn't start watching, though. I hadn't really planned on it. I figured China'd be China, and I didn't want to participate in that, even from afar. And after watching, it was like I figured, China's China after all, and all the blind faith of the IOC in itself to make the world a better place by its mere presence hasn't done a darn thing to help. As of this afternoon, there are still six American protesters flat out missing. Another 12 hours or so, and the embassy can start looking. Until then their hands are tied. That doesn't count the 12 bloggers arrested for protesting. China didn't clean their air (can you even do that?), and they didn't open the internet, and it's all a big show so a red party can prove to a big ol' sixth of the world it's still worthy of ruling them. All like we expected. So knowing that kind of thing was coming from China was almost enough in and of itself to keep me uninterested.

I was also considering not watching due to not knowing how I would feel about the dominance of the American empire's Olympic juggernaut. The richest, most powerful country in the world wins athletic events, so it's no big story, right? Empire being empire. But the U.S. Olympic Committee is a not-for-profit, not a government entity, and all those athletes give so much of their own (and parents') lives and time and money (before sponsorship (sometimes it doesn't even come)) to becoming the best at what they do. So, yeah, we're all emperor here, we're all the shadow government. You buy phone service and the phone company donates some of your money to the people who go to the Olympics so they can do well so you'll watch and they can advertise phone service at you. So even though I'm also not interested in participating in the propaganda my own empire, even from afar, I still find myself drawn on by the culture around me. Kind of like how when you're a kid you think that smart and cultured people are supposed to like the evening news, supposed to be informed, but then you learn the evening news is not really for informing. Aren't I supposed to want to watch the Olympics.? Make it an us up there winning, not a them? Do my part to support the economy, er, I mean, the team?

Also, and I may be alone on this, but who cares if someone's the best in the world at something? What does that prove? What's the good? In the "kingdom of God" there's neither Olympian nor official nor spectator, neither Chinese nor American, neither sweat shop worker nor consumer; we're all one in Christ, right?

So I'd decided I might not participate at all. I would have a private little boycott. Maybe I'd even end up avoiding self-righteousness. Ha, fat chance.

Ended up, we were at Jill's cousins' house watching the opening day events, and the kids were getting all kinds of over-excited about winning. Chastising the players for not playing as well as they needed to. "Blood makes the grass grow, kill kill kill" trickles down. "Home of the Chiefs" trickles, so does "we love you Chelsea." But who am I to deny the hospitality, deny a shared experience, so I did participate then, and I got hooked and I still am participating. As I'm editing this, the women's platform diving is pre-empting the men's beach volleyball final that we'll see an over-edited version of as soon as the network says it's okay, boys and girls. [Later edit. Never mind. It's live, after all. My schedule was wrong. Whoops] But the reason I kept watching the Olympics is the same reason that I watch that one golfer some Sundays lying half-awake on the couch: I like seeing people do really well at things. Sometimes I feel like I and the world are such good buddies in failure, it's so reassuring to see someone excel at anything, even if it's just hitting a thing into a thing from a ways off so people will pay you to say their motorcars are for fancy people. Or swimming faster than everybody else in the world six times in a row and that gets your mom her own clothing line, and you a million dollar bonus. Or sometimes it's just one person proving they're better than someone else at something, even if, in the grand scheme, that doesn't mean anything. Right then, that person was good. Right then, the world wasn't so broken that a person couldn't do well at a thing.

Or maybe I just like being entertained.

Or wanted an excuse to stay up late, push myself to limits of exhaustion.

So I chased those late Olympic nights last week with morning caffeine, stretched myself out on a rack between the two, like Bilbo and butter and bread, getting more and more tired, watched one event while another played on the laptop, no commentary, just the soothing seashore of a crowd, and gulls of the stadium announcers. Got snippy at work. Cheered for the eastern European outside lanes in swimming. Cheered for people to do well, no matter what country. Skipped naps for sports I didn't care about. Cheered for people at all, when it came down to it. Good job, under-age Chinese girl, you did it even though they made you lie. You still did the best, did your best. Good job Japanese guy flying off the rings. You'll be fine even without a medal on your neck. Good job guy whose elbow went backwards weightlifting. Good job specific height-range, specific eye-width to face-height ratio medal ceremony attendants. Good job over-thirty crowd. Good job opening ceremony propagandists. Good job Morgan Freeman voice-over hiring director. Good job Georgian athletes, way to overcome what's being done to your country. Way to go Russian athletes, way to overcome what's being done by your country.

But it wore me out, and the only thing I did creatively all week was take a couple pictures (some shown in this post) on break on Tuesday. So, that's where I've been, if you've been wondering. (Also, I've got a potential new job thing on the horizon, pushed back again to the horizon, and I was thinking about that an awful lot.)

So I was glad to take the day off on Friday in preparation for going on pilgrimage over the weekend. Slept in. Took it slow. Did watch some Olympics, if ya believe it.

Every year our church takes a weekend to travel to a camp an hour away from home and eat, play, and pray together for a couple days. Prayer three times a day, food three times a day, swimming, camping, talking. Do nothing or do everything.

Saturday night, most of us spent a couple hours grouped in 20s on a symbolic pilgrimage out through the woods, stopping to reminisce about the Hebrew exodus a couple times, then through a 1/3 scale model of the tabernacle, talking about how Yahweh's right here among us, a god who pitched his tent among the people, and what that might mean for us. We talked about that for a while in our group, and how a bunch of us are more in love with comfort than most things, even a god we're trying to follow. And I watched the other groups come down the path and through the tent like a nation on the move, and then we sang some songs like we Christians like to do sometimes, and then headed back to build a fire so Sam's last year rained-out s'mores plan could come to fruition.

I ran inside real quick to go to the bathroom before we went to make the fire, and on the big screen in the dining room there was a crowd gathered watching a swimming relay race. I watched it. It was impressive, like all the others. Some of the people cheered when the U.S. won. Some of the people clapped. I saw a man earn an eighth gold medal, get turned into something more than a man in mythological imaginations, still be just a man. I ask why he is the god or the dolphin, the one going home to Sea World? Why not the Japanese breast stroke guy, or the back stroke guy, or the guy who whose name I don't know who swam under a world record time but slower than three other guys who did the same? They're still above and beyond my ability, your ability, all but one other guy's ability. Gotta be the best, or you aren't a god. Or you aren't anything, apparently.

I read an article the other day by this lady who used to be a gymnast, and she is now an office drone, and she's tired of people saying that they could have been an Olympian, could have been that swimmer, that wrestler, that fencer, if only they'd stuck with it back when they were younger, could have flipped above the beam, flipped just so -- so there's no splash, jumped a horse over parallel metal bars. And while I agree that no matter how hard you try, there are some things you won't do, some medals you won't win, not everyone could win, I also think that anyone could have won. Anyone could have been that guy. Who picked field hockey? Not good enough for soccer? Of course, some people could never be there, no matter how they trained. But it could have been anyone. Didn't the Chinese replace most of the men's gymnastics just before the games? Maybe they were good enough for gold, too. My friend Galia swam for the junior national Belarusian team. Maybe she'd be famous, I wouldn't have a friend Galia if she hadn't quit. Maybe that pole vaulter is a friend of Jill's, save a choice she made when she was ten. Maybe Jill's on that uneven bar eight years ago if her parents pushed her to be the best, rather than the Jill. Maybe none of that, maybe all of it.

Things could have been different. Some guy's dad sticks with his mom, and he never gets into after-school swimming in Baltimore, and someone else gets to be America's Apollo this year. Like in those speculative commercials where the famous pitcher is instead a famous bowler. Maybe the swimmer would be the ninth best fencer, or the fifth best biathelete (it was the shooting that will keep him home from Vancouver in two years), and we'd never know him. Or maybe he'd be some frat guy at a college, gonna be the next big thing at the law firms in New York. He'd be just as unalive to the world at large as we are. Just as unsponsered, unaccoladed, unmedaled, just as much an everyday emperor as the next guy, buying phone service. Just a cog, just a bolt in a row of bolts on top of an air conditioner behind some power boxes in an industrial park. Or maybe, he's supposed to swim, that's who he is, he's made to swim, that's how he makes the world more beautiful. Maybe he would have been there no matter what.

I'm not trying to discount the work, the mornings, the sacrifice. Those are beautiful things. Maybe more beautiful performances than the ones on the big stage. But, for what? What's the big story those small ones tell? Is it so I can say my empire's just as strong as the red one? So I can have comradery with my fellow US-ians. Because it's good for the economy? To foster peace around the world. Aren't these the reasons use to we go to war? Is this the bloodless war?

My dad is bigger than your fatherland.

I met a foul-mouthed guy named Jeremiah at lunch today who caught a ride to Olathe last night to "visit his homegirl." She's going to buy her grandmother's car, but hasn't yet, so he was trying to hop a bus downtown to get home to 42nd and Rainbow. He said that a cop stopped him as he was walking to HyVee from 125th and Ridgeview because he had an axeman tattoo that indicated he was into the Insane Clown Posse, and Olathe's having a Juggalo problem. You read that right. The cop said Olathe's having a Juggalo problem. A. Juggalo. Problem. Jeremiah said he got his tattoo in fifth grade, back when he was doing whatever he wanted, before he knew better. The cop asked his birthdate. Sometime in early 89, he said. So he's not truant or anything. Cop searched him for drugs and alcohol based on the probable cause of a "gang-related" tattoo. I helped Jeremiah find where the Olathe Connector stops, so he could get to the "great" mall, and then get on the C bus four hours later to get home. I shook his hand and wished him luck, prayed for him a little on the inside.

I wonder if Jeremiah could have been an Olympian, if he wasn't the next Adonis, but he grew up in KCK, never learned a sport he loves. Probably not, I guess. That's a specially gifted human who gets there, after all. But I do know that I care more about this guy whose life story I haven't seen in stock footage and popular music and twirling black background camera shots, and who I'll never see again (let alone for shore in four years) than I do about people who worked really hard their whole lives to win a shiny disc on the end of a wide ribbon, a shiny disc that's for their country, as much (or more than) it's for themselves. I hope he made it home.

Disclaimer: I listened to my second through umpteenth Bright Eyes songs while writing this today.

Cracked time parentheticals

But somehow (

The wall clock we bought with our wedding money at Target, the old-timey one that had the cracked face from when we moved, that is now missing a fat shard from laying on its face the last time I took it down for the batteries and (by not saying what for, I have) (and not one of the three white-plastic-thick-around-the-face clocks we got at the wedding (which we thought might have been part of an elaborate joke, given who the three people were who gave them to us (including Jordan, to whom (and Ellie) we gave white towels and a sappy card as a subtle joke at their wedding( but maybe too subtle (since they didn't get the joke))) but we later came to believe we must have registered for them, and then returned two of them, and one lives behind the blinds in the window over the sink by the canned air ("Danger: Do not open." it says.) Paris)) there's a ring (why, I don't know (or how)) on the wall where it's since we moved here. So I find myself in the absurd position of glancing at a faint circle and a nail when I want the time.

Therefore, I have no idea what time it is when I'm first writing this with one of the Bic ballpoint pens Jill bought when we ran out of pens (instead of the gel ink pens I thought she'd would buy (that's married people communication for ya)(I like the gel ones better)) on a sheet of printer paper which on the package is labeled "copy machine paper" (but when you get it for free (or, let's be honest, even when you pay for it) can you tell the difference?) using the back of a large black dictionary (not the magic dictionary, which is brown, and my friend Dan used to use for divination ("What should I do with my life" Opens it, points to an entry: "go away" in the phrase section) back in the days when our Ten Percent Society (the society we founded because we still believed in chivalry and muses) had names and faces) as a writing surface here on the arm of the couch.

I can't tell if I'm writing in it (I suspect not), but I can hear Stephen King's voice in my head. And although to most people this means something entirely different, to me it is a lucid voice, unafraid to say things that, although quite terribly true, need to be said. I have just finished reading the last 2/5 or so of Lisey's Story, up from a cool skin, soft sheets bed where I laid for an itself indeterminable amount of time, eyes happyclosed, but not sleeping (even though yesterday was spread thin like finals week and I nearly dozed several times at work, and oh yes, my excellent good friends, I went to bed early).

I suspect it is the caffeine, although my last hit was in that sweet spot, 2-3 in the afternoon, when your circadian rythyms are least affected. As I said, I'm using again, 90 mg at a time, 2-3 times a day. I once read that 100 mg in a setting is what it takes to get you high, and according to a study I read that's also the level at which chemical dependence starts. And 30 mg is enough for mood changes. But I've talked plenty about caffeine before. Moving on.

(I've reached the point in my job where I don't care enough some days to get enough sleep the night before. So I'm tired enough that I, as Dan puts it, give people "the sass." Which means that I, as I put it, am needlessly short with people and spontaneously annoyed with minor setbacks in people listening to me and following directions. Also, people being at all non-self-sufficient. In other words, combine not caring enough to go to bed early with not caring about the job, and I get rude. Dan says it's surreal to hear me being that way with people. And I agree. So, many days, it's the caffeine that keeps me civil.

Jill asks how my day went and I can only talk about what I am doing besides my job. Partially because there are only so many days you can complain about willfully ignorant rich people ("OK, double-click on that." "Double left click?"), and partially because I'm not at all proud of being unable to be kind to them ("That's the way it's usually done." "Well I'm not very computer savvy, so you'll have to be patient with me." (Is there any time in navigating a web page one must double-right-click? In Windows even? I'm only being so specific because you've needed such excessive hand holding thus far.)).

So I don't know if I should stick it out and learn to be the proverbial best ditch digger I can be, or jump ship so old ladies dipping their toes in the eastern seaboard real estate market can get technical support from someone else, someone under or over the fabled 18 month lifespan hump of a technical support I'm running up against, and not getting over.)

I read the that last 2/5 of Lisey's Story (which, as you might expect) tells its story in nested flashbacks), partially becuase the story was calling me from bed (along with Fantastic Contraption (which I played all day (you know how videos games are at the end of a day of playing them))), and also partially because although I could not sleep (tired though I was) my eyes did not feel like the light of a computer monitor (my oftentimes activity when this late night unsleeping happens (always in seasons when I'm on caffeine, ('strue)). I was afraid to bother Jill, but I turned on the lights, anyway, expecting her to complain if they did, corner floor, pillar table, curled up on the couch and got on with my better addiction. Not until I'd finished it, and the paragraph before the paragraph before this one, did my eyes feel like getting back to bed. So I did (after taking some pictures for the blog (not my favorite set I've taken)).

) I'm quite awake and doing well today at work, though, thanks. (I've even been nice.)

I got the thiiing.

Every week, as part of my workplace's continuing effort to improve our morale so as to encourage us forget the fact that our poor business model (no plans for the market ever turning down even a little, apparently) resulted in none of our workers getting our annual and expected merit-based raises this year, (that's right, folks, it's Spirit Month!) they sent around a movie trivia quiz, via email, the winner winning some delightful and sparkly and distracting from lower pay trinket. (Technically, a gift card to Target, which I do not need, nor do I really, deep down, want, given that it would only further drive my unwanted desire for STUFF and THINGS.) But I love quizzes, so I busted out IMDB and answered all the questions correctly. I was the first person to get my results in. I even went so far as to double-check my answers, if you can believe it. I know, I know.

Well, most of my answers and mostly correctly. When it came down to clicking send, or checking every single one, I decided not to check the first question, since I thought it was right: What was the other X-rated picture to be nominated for best picture besides Midnight Cowboy? The answer is, of course, A Clockwork Orange. I, however, answered Last Tango in Paris, which was nominated for best director, which is close, but not close enough, also not that great a film, in my opinion. Depressing, artistic, and bland. Not a best picture. I should have known.

So I didn't win the trinket. Which is how I figured it would turn out when I clicked send. See, when I take a test, I fully and completely expect to getat least one of the answers wrong becaue I thought I knew, and didn't check. No matter how well I know the subject matter. I'm surprised when I get them all right even when I'm the one who made the test. It's kind of an anticlimax if I do get them all right, too; all that work, and then, well, boring success.

The same happens when I create a puzzle; I expect to have to go back and fix it at some point. In third grade, we were assigned to make assignments for the rest of the class for our spelling words. I made a word search that was really complicated: some were backwards and up to the left, even. But, I misspelled about half of them, and people kept getting confused. So, things that I said were in it, weren't. And then, some of you got to see what happened when I made that puzzle for the blog. Had to redo it, like, three times. So, I figure, when I do a thing that requires precision, I'm gonna mess something up along the way. I'm much more of a creative person than an ontarget person. No excuses, fie on it, even, but it is so.

So, when this week's history quiz came along in my email yesterday, I decided to go all out, answer all the questions really thoroughly, researched on Wikipedia, the whole bit. Elaborated on Napoleon and Hitler's downfall in attacking Russia during the spring. Named 10 of the modern countries that exist within the boundaries of the Holy Roman Empire, instead of just 5. Double-checked the ones I thought I knew. Mentioned the last unsuccessful invasion of Britain in a question about the last successful one. So, then, I made it creative and precise. Best of both worlds. But when the results came back, I wasn't even in the top 2. Thought I'd done so well, too.

Today, the guy who made the quiz came by and told me I did a good job, and I asked him what I missed. I thought it might have been that I put "The Orient" instead of "The East Indies" in a question about ol' Chris Columbus, but he said that was fine. Turns out I'd only lost half a point: I left off the "when" part of the question about which two presidents died on the same day, and when. Same old, same old. Missing minor details and hitting the big picture. 'Swhy I'd make a lousy engineer. On my ACTs, I hit the 97th or higher percentile on every category except pre-algebra. Aced the college level reading, bombed jr. high math. It's my life.

But then the guy who made the quiz said he had come by, not to let me know what I'd gotten wrong, but what I'd gotten right, to let me know that I was correct: Tanzania had never declared independence, that it is a merger of two other countries that had declared independence previously, and so there is no true date of independence for Tanzania. Then, he gave me a very nice consolation prize, a leather keychain with a carrying bag(!(?)), which I won't need for the keychain which I will now use, that I may end up using for holding dice or for my sunglasses, which I am tired of losing.

So, to celebrate creatvity trimphing over lack of precision, I turned on my under-shelf florescent lamp, tore July off my desk calendar for a backdrop, and I took a picture. That I posted on my blog. And then wrote a blog post about. Which you are reading. Er, have been reading. Good day.






Oh, and for those who care, here's a link to the rest of the good pictures I took yesterday at lunch: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=62312&l=2a2e3&id=529650350