Thursday, March 27, 2008

'Freak and' Rhymes 'With Weekend.' A History.

Easter weekend, "The One with the Vigil," as we call it these days, was packed full, pressed down, and overflowing with activity. Like most weekends around here, really. I planned on taking tons of pictures all Saturday and all night, but for some reason, it slipped my mind. So, sorry about the lack of visual aids, all of you raised in the last thirty years or so. You'll have to rely on your wits for this one. Allow me to elucidate the weekend's events. Using links to demonstrate things you might have missed. No rickrolls today. I promise.

On Friday, I had been planning to start the Easter fast at noon, watch last week's Lost on my family-provided laptop and a' that, but Nicholas IMed me and wanted to go to lunch, and who am I to refuse a man a friendly lunch appointment? "Not me," said the me. Especially when the friend's took a week's vacation (against his will, Pappa, against his will!). I tell you the truth, it was a good time.

Twice since Nick's left working at our blessed corporation, we've had a chance to go out at lunch,. The first time was a substanative and spontaneous excurstion to purchase a tie so I could participate in a late announced interview. We used to hang out a lot more than we do now, But since we moved north, those times have grown fewer and far between. Even with us working together, I think we hung out less. Back in the day (twas four years ago, even!), we lived in the same apartment complex, and besides all the poker and games we played, also sometimes Nick would drive in his black Kia with the band stickers on the back, and we would jes' go and talk abut life and relationships (although we were not Freshman at the time, if ya believe it).

This last Friday felt like all those old times. Freshnostalgic like spring. For the life of me, I cannot remember where we ate, but I think I had a little too much. But since I wasn't planning to break the fast until Sunday, it didn't bother me. I am a huge fan of what Tim Keel terms conviviality, that is, intentionally and hospitably eating meals with people. Even if I eat little (wish that happened more), I still love the experience eating food with someone. Back in high school, I had some friends who, at a party, would always go out and grab food from some fast food place (Taco Bell, ima lookin' at you) right in the middle of the thing. I'm rarely offended, but that always rubbed me the wrong way. Spend the same money on something to share, man. I'm no Slow Food evangelist, but I think the way our culture does food is too personal, too individual.

Maybe like everything else these days, we've made what and how we eat a product of being consumers. I think 'you are what you eat' equates with 'who I am is what I buy'. And that individualistic view of food, where I'd rather get something I want than something to eat and share with someone else bothers me. We need more steaming communal pots of stew, I say. Bring back stone soup. Or at the very least, a roast boar, and, like, ten onions. And partridge? Bring the partridge.

I had a good time with Nick. There's nothing like, after a long absence, slipping back into a worn and treasure friendship that fits like it's tailored. Like when we go See Harmonie and Jason in Emporia. Good friends are like good wine: the more you drink the better. Wait. I'm not sure that's how it goes.

So, that Friday night, Jill and I went to the Tenebrae service for Good Friday, and on the way in the door, everyone was handed a rock to hold, but we weren't told what we'd do with it. I was sort of hoping for a symbolic stoning, but no suck luck. Perhaps the one of us without sin should have started, but he sneaked out the back when it started, I'd guess.

While we waited in the half-light, I studied the rock. Mine was a dark gray and roughly triangular, with one corner cut off. On what I considered the back side, because it was flatter than the 'front,' I rubbed a drop of wax off with my fingernail, wondering if this rock had been part of a candle ceremony at some point - a prayer vigil, or a Christmas Eve service where the room starts dark and then as each person lights their candle from the person in front, you all learn you're the light of the world, or sumsuch metaphor, and it's beautiful and flickering.

At the end of the Tenebrae, after all the side candles had been extinguished along the spoken road to the cross, we did a kind of reverse communion, everybody shuffling out of the row instead of in, and to the back of the sanctuary on a symbolic pilgrimage, and then down and along the aisle, even going front row to back row instead of back to front like usual. Instead of taking bread, dipping it in wine (it's really grape juice) and eating, we laid our rocks on the altar to show that we were sinful, we are part of the darkness. I'm a big sinner, so I put my gray rock right smack on top of the pile, next to the Christ candle that someone finally blew out at the end of the service as part of the ritual.

That's the the Christ candle we cantors were supposed to relight at the end of the vigil to signify that he had risen indeed. But the band was warming up rather loudly Sunday morning, drowning out our balcony playing and singing, and we had to shout out out the final reading in a lull, rather than cradling it with the Christ candlelighting between a version of Page France's Chariot that Sam had added some hallelujahs to at the end, and Sam's Easter song Rising Son. Neither of which we got to sing due to the band practice for Sunday morning starting so early. So a night's-long practice of discipline ended ten minutes early in the lee of a sound check. (And yeah, that's an odd use of the word 'lee,' but I like it.)

Back on Friday, having left our rocks at the altar, and awkwardly filing into our rows from the same end we came in, only the first person to leave was the first person back, we left the Tenebrae in sombre silence, as we usually do for those kinds of things. Adam and Sam and I stood outside our house for a few minutes, talking about life and relationships (also, not Freshmen at this point. Sam went to dance, and Adam we home, and Jill went to bed early, but I downloaded and played through a game called Polarity that is a short platformer that plays with magnetism in some interesting ways. But I still got to be with plenty of time to sleep. Or so I thought.

Over eight hours later, I woke up tired for whatever reason, and Jill and I headed off to Olathe (getting gass and a drink treat on the way) to Nicholas and Martha's apartment to help them move to their new place. As we moved our center seat from the van into their apartment so we could fit in some of their longer furniture, Adam joked that his parent shoul dhave come up for the weekend, since they ending up helping Nick and Martha move in the last time. But it didn't take long to brim the vehicles we had, and we were able to just escape lugging their cyclopean bedroom set on the first trip, so we headed off to the new place. Amanda and her crowd went for their drink treats then.

Now, the new house, is a delightful place, a good location for them, and pretty roomy to boot. Because I occasionally (re: frequently) complain that the living spaces we dwell in are too small , the Jill seems to think that I'd think that Nick and Martha's place was too small if we moved in a similar layout. But I don't think I would. They have four carpeted living spaces besides their bedroom. So there's no need to be concerned about people sitting on a hard floor. And if one of the rooms got full of people, we could easily move to a second room. Plus, the TV wouldn't be in the main living space, which would rule. But Jill usually knows me better than I do, so I could be wrong about all of that. Maybe I'd feel cramped. But I still think their house is frickin' sweet.

From there, Adam and I headed to the game store (31st Century, buy some games), while Jill helped Martha paint their new yellow bedroom not-yellow, to meet Jeremy McKean and Dan and Sam for some good ol' fashioned hardcore gaming to celebrate Jeremy's Christmas. But Dan was late because his wife's Dreamcast broke and he had to go buy a new one because she had her heart set on busting out Skies of Arcadia again, and also because that is what husbands do sometimes, even if it means leaving their friends in a lurch.

After waiting a while for Dan, Jeremy and Adam and I decided to see how far we could get into a game of Starcraft: the Board Game before he showed up. Not through the first turn, it seems. So Dan finally came, but Sam was delayed in his theater furniture acquisition geas, so we decided to play the already-mostly-set-up Starcraft: the Board Game so we could play something else when Sam finally arrived. But by the time Sam showed up, and watched the last few turns, and we even ended the game a turn before Jeremy was oh-so-likely to win, we didn't have enough time to play any of the games we had with all five of us. Which is pretty much the same thing that happened the last time we played a nice, long board game - Sam had a theatre thing, couldn't make it, and so missed out on the start, only coing in over half-way through. After an hour of waffling, considering whether to buy another board game that we could play in two hours, or just call it off for this week, or whatever, Adam and Jeremy and I played one last game of Starcraft, and then Adam and I rushed off to vigil, hot the heels of Sam who had left early.

I got my aforementioned nap in, and then Austin and Jake came over to hang out for a bit before the art show at the church because the main doors were locked when they tried to get in. It's kind of an odd combination of people to show up at my house, if you think about it. Austin was my free-spirited drama class friend from seventh grade who told me in my yearbook to keep never combing my hair, she liked my individuality so much, who then became one of the Seven Muses of my Ten Percent Society in high school. As old and dear a friend as I have. And Jake is a guy who went to my church, but I really never knew that well, but he did go to Belarus on a missions trip at some point, but I'm not 100% sure I was there at the time. He hung out with Brett some, and then came to our group some, and then lives at the guys' house over on the east side of Kansas City some, a block or two from the corner street sign that Heet Mob shows in the 'KC (It Goes Down)' video as representative of "the block [in Kansas City] that might hurt you." Jill was watching Underworld 2: Gratuitous Sex Scenes, during my nap, so we turned that off and headed to the art show after getting some pictures of Austin's new cute short hair. Which you can see at her Facebook, should you know her well enough to be a Facebook friend. Which is very possible considering she is cool, and many people like her.

We had to go in the side door, it turns out, as the front one was locked, and it also turns out that I was a little disappointed in the Body of Christ art show. Most of the time, I am blown away by the quality and quantity of art at the gallery showings at church, espeially the lemental Faith one last year, but there weren't a whole lot of pieces this time, and only a couple really grabbed me. Usually there's a lot to see and a lot I love, so one off night, and I guess I start complaining.

I liked Beth's photography piece; something struck me about her choices of images and their composition, and I also really liked the concept and layout of her poem. Mostly words and phrases I am excessively familiar with, but putting them in a poetic format made me think about them moire distinctly. But that is the point of poetry in my opinion - make the strange familiar, or the familiar strange.

I also liked the interactive grid of stylized woodcut (?) prints of body parts, labeled in Spanish, and hanging on pegs. You were supposed to take one, and as you did, it revealed different other ones beneath it. So, someone would take blood, or the spirit, or the skeleton, and a pancreas, or the intestines would be be revealed for someone else to take. All to represent the different kinds of people in the body of Christ. Too many of one, and the less popular ones would show en masse, so people would take those to maintain balance. I have the skull, and Jill took the eye. We'll hang them at home sometime here. They also had a really good strawberry puree punch, and given the concomitancy of the gallery and the room we read the gospels in for the vigil, I hit that stuff pretty hard all night.

Then we vigiled. Ben Anderson was there, and Jess Lempkin was there, and Beth was there, and Phillip, and Tim Bridgham, and John Raux, and Lukas, and Dave Blattner and Sam and Jill and Adam and me, and you were there, and you where there, and Bert the farmhand, even. I made that last one up.

After the vigil, like I said, I took a nap, and Jill tried to take a nap but didn't. As she lay in bed, she decided to wear one of her fabulous vintage sun dresses from her collection. But when she got to the closet, she found they were all too small. Which is cool for her because she's been trying to gain weight for a long while now, and only this last year has she been able.

But we made it to church, and Tim gave a good sermon on what the gospel is and how he hates the pressure of preaching on Easter. Jill and I broke our fast with communion, and served communion, and then we were out, saying that he was risen and responding "INDEED."

Our house was pretty messy, so we all (save Adam who was sore exhausted) headed over to the guys' house (on the corner of holy-crap-a-bus-crashed-here-call-U.P.I. and Walrond) to have bacon and turkey bacon (from Jill and me) and hash whites (browns take forever) and pancakes (from the guys) and eggs (from Sam) and all kinds of good Easter bread (from Austin) and juice (from Dave). All of which Brett and Jake cooked (except the bit of bacon Lukas the Austrian ate) which amazed Austin who has not been around long enough to know that the guys in our group do most of the cooking. So she sang some songs because it was Easter, and asked if we knew any good Easter sing-along songs, and we didn't, except for original Easter herself songs like that hips song from Shakira or Mouth, which we didn't think were quite appropriate for the situation.

But it was a good morning breakfast with family, the kind of mornings people are always looking for in bad poetry, and Brett (I think) said that we all should pretty darn well have a community house going by the time he gets done with college in two years, and I thought it was a grand idea. At the very least, a series of community houses, I think. Not as something to seek out in and of itself, but something still worth doing. Something prophetic, maybe even, to use an overused word. Something that says that the way we do things in our society isn't quite right, and not to be too idealistic,but that sometimes God can change people and they can live peacefully with each other. That sometimes people gave give themselves up for other people as a way of life. There ya go -breakfast on the bottom, hope on top.

After that, we took Sam home, and Dave home, and us home, and slept for longer than we intended because, I think, I turned off our alarm before either of us heard it. But then we went out to Olathe for Easter late lunch with my parents and sisters and the Fords (there is an overlap here, see if you can spot it). We had deviled eggs made the way I like them (no mayo, yes mustard), and burgers and hot dogs. Then we did our Easter egg treasure hunts made by my Dad, and then he did his, which was much harder, made by Jeremy Ford hisveryself. While he was doing that, we played a game of Settlers of Catan. My dad's prize for solving his hunt was playing spades, but since we were all going over to the Fords for Reign of Fire RiffTrax watching, the decided to go there and play there, since we were getting close the time and some cleaning still needed to be done.

But since we were in Olathe, we also went over to Jill's parents house, and we watched the drama that Jill's mom had written and directed that had been performed that morning at OBC, which made me tear up, and Nick and Martha showed up, and we all hung out for a while until I started sending text messages to Jill that we really needed to go to Jeremy and Juliet's because it was time.

From there, we went back to Nick and Martha's to get our center seat that Jill hadn't had a chance to retrieve on Saturday. At first, I said I didn't want to go now, that I could go later in the week, but Jill made the very good point that we would just keep putting it off, and maybe never get it back, considering our track record of personal sundry item retrieval. And I've learned that when the Jill gives advice, it is good advice, and should be followed. So we go that back in the van, along with our two tubs of back-of-the-car stuff that someone had put in another car when we were putting big things in, but we had to take out of that car because it they were not Nick and Martha's moving crates, just our car paraphernalia. We were going back and forth carrying the seat to our van and some clothes to their car, and once we had the seat in and they were inside the apartment, we took off like banshees. Or, more accurately, like two people who were about to go somewhere else, and knew that the other people they were with were also about to go to the same place as well, so there was no need to wait or anything.

As we turned onto I-35 from 119th, (which I always, always type 199th and have to go back and change) Amanda texted me to ask if we were coming, and I foolishly interrupted Jill's and my conversation to call her to say yes. But luckily, over the years, my museJill has learned that sometimes I just do things like that when people call, and there was no argument or anything. Bring in Ripley.

So, a little after six, Easter evening, we rolled up to Jeremy and Juliet's apartment building, late, but not SO late since we'd heard that the original start time had been pushed back to 6:30. After much hemming and hawing about what to eat, Juliet came up with Runzas, and we went with it. Runzas are bread dough stuffed with ground beef, sauerkraut and onions, which once baked, you dip in mustard. And although his may not sound appetizing, to you, here on the cold internet, even Nicholas, who hates sauerkraut, likes them. We also, for the real kraut haters, decided to make some pizza flavored ones, with cheese and pepperoni, which never really turn out as good as a hot pocket, even, but are better cold than the real runzas.

I made a shopping list, and some people went to the store to buy ingredients. While they did that, my dad's reward spades game went down in the bedroom, only Austin sat in for Jeremy, while some of the rest of us played Soul Caliber III on the mode where you fight with randomly dressed characters with random move sets. Jeremy hasn't played the campaign mode much, so our move sets were pretty limited, and we didn't have as many costume piece options as we'd like, but it was still a good time seening what absurdity would come next. The highlight was a gentleman fighting with tamborines who did slinky dances as he did. Tthis would not be so bad if he hadn't been wearing pants short enough to make Richard Simmons blush.

The ingredients purchased, Amanda and I set ourselves to make the runzas. Which involved mixing by hand ground beef and sauerkraut and onion flakes in a large bowl (kind gross/cool) and then opening cans of dinner rolls (apparently Price Chopper dinner rolls are not meant to be removed from the packaging without extreme force. A couple of people helping went as far as banging them soundly on the counter edge to no avail.), flattening the rolls, filling them with the hand-mixed filling, closing them up, and then placing them on the baking sheet. The pizza ones were considerable more messy given that they included spaghetti sauce. I can't be held responsible.

The runzas were cooked, and eaten, and distributed so that everyone got their fill. Spades was won. Soul Caliber III reminded us that even after all this time, a sword still desires truth. We got to the real entertainment of the evening: the RiffTrax. Now, the Reign of Fire Rifftrax is really, really good. The best of the series that I've seen. In fact, I've seen it 4 times already. So instead of watching it with Jeremy and Juliet and Jill and Adam and Jake (but not Brett, he had a paper to write on violence in movies, which I have now read, and think is good) and Austin and my parents and Nick and Martha and Amanda , Sam and I played Arkham Horror with the King in Yellow expansion which he gave me for Christmas, but I had yet to play. But first we sorted ot the other two expansions, so we could get a real King in Yellow experience. We didn't quite finish by the time the movie was over,but we were getting beat up int he game, so we didn't mind so much packing it up.

We made our goodbyes, and Jill and I went home and crashed hard. Didn't recover until Tuesday at least. Another typical weekend done.

PLACEHOLDER THE GREAT

Had some long training this afternoon, friendsRomanscountrymen. I'll get the full thing up later tonight.

Wednesday, March 26, 2008

I wanna rock and roll all night.

Saturday night into Sunday morning, Jill and Sam and Adam and I were the cantors for the all-night vigil at church. I only say 'cantors' because that is what Phillip called us at the end of the art show before the vigil when he was introducing us and telling people that they didn't have to stop chatting, but they would need to go up to the third floor if they wanted to keep talking, and then everyone just left anyway. I sort of prefer a label like "people-who-were-there-the-whole-time". But since we did read the hourly prayers, and kept up the all-night straight-through reading of the four gospels, I guess you could say we canted. We did plan some of the specifics at a meeting the previous week. But the overall structure was already there. cantor just seems so official.

I consider it to have been a good time, but I'm not sure exactly why. We read through all four gospels, but I didn't hear even half of that because I was off manning other things, and trying ot keep awake. And I didn't get much prayer done. Even though I had a good night's sleep the previous night, and a nap at about 4:30, I spent most of the evening and the whole night using all my focus to stay awake. Prayer and meditation were not happening. But the point, I think, of an Easter vigil is to try to do what Peter and John and James did not on the night before he died, and simply stay awake with Jesus. That, also, I did not accomplish. I made it all the way to the last hour. But I willed my way all the way there.

There were three watches. Nine to midnight, midnight to three, and three to six. Each watch had an opening prayer, prayers on the hours, and a closing prayer. The third hour of the first two watches, we set aside for silence in the sanctuary. The other two had Chant and the like playing. The ninth hour, or the third, third, we decided to keep up our tradition and play and sing music in the balcony of the sanctuary. Which is where I ran into trouble. Most of the night, the church had been pretty cold. I'm not sure why. But it did help me stay awake. Until the balcony, that is. It was 62 by the thermostat, and Jill had a blanket, so I snuggled up to keep warm. And zonked out.

Now, I had another nap between the vigil ending at six and the first service at seven. But I was still tired a good portion of the day. And kind of irritable. Which got me thinking about Jesus, how that whole last day you read about, or see movies about, the whole of the Passion movie, for example, Jesus is going on zero sleep form the night before. All his measured answers and presence of mind still somehow come out of a sleep deprived guy. Which I find impressive. Guy doesn't sleep, gets beaten within an inch of his life, and still, when is asked by the governor if he's leading an insurrection against Rome, gets the governor to start questioning the nature of truth.

See, I don't operate well when I'm tired. I can do things I really like a lot, reading or playing a video game, for example. Entertaining things that occupy my whole mind, but don't stretch it. But even while I was reading the last half of Mark and the beginning of John at the vigil, I started getting a little swimmy. I just have a hard time focusing on anything substantive when my lids are slightly heavy, let alone when I haven't slept all night. I don't get how other people can do it. I just want to curl up and sleep. I can imagine Pilate saying, "Are you the King of Jews?" and Jesus being like, "Can I take a 20 minute nap first? I think I'd answer better." That'd be me in his shoes. Which is just another good reason in a long line of good reasons that I would not make a good messiah. Lack of turning water to wine skills is another.

But, oh, have I tried. When I become an x-man, my mutant power will totally be alchemy. Just you wait.

LINK OF THE DAY:
For those of you who somehow missed this, and are fans of the rickroll, here's the man himself discussing it: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/webscout/2008/03/rick-astley-kin.html.

And here's a much, much longer version with 3d charts and a monkey interpreting into sign language: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oHg5SJYRHA0

Wednesday, March 19, 2008

Why I'm not planning to teach this fall . . . I think.

Forward
Thanks for your patience. It's been a while, eh? And I know this is similar to something I wrote before, but what I wrote before was why I'm not teaching right now. This is about the future. As I look ahead, I'm trying to work out why I'm not going back.

I started writing this blog a week ago Friday, and since then, I've just been coming back to it and back to it. I'd even been planning it for weeks before, letting my thoughts simmer. A simmering that overpowered the other dishes that I could have been preparing, as it were. Parts of it have been sitting as a draft since then. I've been trying to figure out how to say what I wanted to say. Not to be dramatic (too late!), but at this point, I'm not sure I'm going to be able. But I'll try. Otherwise, I'm not going to be able to get over it and write about other things.

Chapter 1
Jill's been job hunting lately. Looking through classified ads and Craigslist and calling in favors from friends working at places with openings. She gotten some calls from a couple shady places, a couple of solid places, but she's still looking for something that feels right.

It's a tough gig because just now she's finally looking for her first real job after college, what with feeling loyal to the law office she's been secretarying at for so long, and that she doesn't have a passion for any vocation really, and tied up with all that, she especially feels like her degree didn't prepare her for the job market. Or anything, I guess; she's got this fancy purple and gold Avila-stamped piece of paper that indicates she learned how to survive underneath an oppressively political leadership clique, but not much else. Jill wishes she'd gone through with her language degree, never gone with theater, something she thought she loved, but never did. And now she feels trapped by it. She thrives with deadlines and teachers to please, but has a hard time at self study. Kind of how I have a hard time thinking things through without someone to bounce ideas off of.

Chapter 2
A week ago Thursday (originally, this said, "Last night") we had a night off because we needed one. Normally, we'd be over at the Freak Show praying, but time together is one of those things, for whatever reason, that helps maintain a relationship. Go figure. (Ha ha.) I suppose, alternately, we could be over at the Vicarage watching Lost, but Jill's off the TV for lent, and I don't think I can, in good conscience, go watch TV on a prayer night. Besides, I'm seriously in love with the widescreen HD version of Lost I can grab off the internets later Thursday night and then cuddle up with on fancy family-supplied laptop in an vacant cubicle at the end of a deserted aisle. And since I'm certainly not looking to own a TV that can play the widescreen fanciness any time in the distant future, the download-then-watch-the-next-day model will have to do for now. But I think, Lent or no, we may end up just taking off Thursdays for ourselves. Not like anyone's going to be planning anything out of the ordinary that night. And we need time to be us, says I.

So, anyway, we finally beat X-Men Legends a week ago Thursday, having spent several shots at it over the previous week, what with the last boss being annoying and shielded and all. We used Wolverine alone at the end, with the rest of the X-Men dead, and his X Factor regeneration being the old thing that would allow us to survive long enough. We were both kind of disappointed at the lack of further playability upon beating the game, though. I mean, you level Wolverine up to 35 or whatever, you want to use him at level 35 to replay the game. But, no suck reward. A couple of retro costumes just ain't gonna cut it as a reward for beating your game, Marvel. Get with the program.

Afterwards, we were talking about the job hunt, and Jill asked me what degree I would get if I could go back in time and be who I am now, post-teaching, and choose again. Now, I was pretty non-communicative having just consumed far too much gluten by way of the runzas we had just made (mmm, runzas . . .), so it was hard to come up with something at the time, but I ended up telling her I'd get the same degree. And she said, no, she didn't mean what degree would I get if I could go back in time and do it over; she meant, if I knew everything I knew now, having quit teaching and it being so much of a drain on life, what degree would I get? Funny thing is, I think my answer would be the same, still.

I don't know what else I'd like to get a degree in. Even with all the Bible and Jesus and ministry stuff I'd be interested in studying, to get a degree in that area, I'd have had to go to a Christian college with arbitrary rules for living that I don't think I could have submitted myself to. Don't watch movies! (Unless you do it in the lounge with other folks. Who knows, you might be fiddling with yourself back there in your room. Can't have that, nossir!) No dancing! I mean, like, even over summer break, ya heathens. (Unless it's in the school musical). No holding hands on campus, even if you're married. Can't be tempting the singles, now.

Instead of English, I had thought about teaching Chemistry. Part of the problem is that I'm not nearly precise enough. I know it sometimes seems to people like I have this massive fount of trivial knowledge stored up that I can just dole out at a moment's notice. And while I can draw on that sometimes, half the time I'm just working it out as I go.

Story to illustrate: I got a 32/36 on the ACT. Ten years later, and it obviously doesn't matter, but at the time I was trying to get into colleges. I know that a lot of people would be pretty freakin' delighted with the 32, but I wasn't. Main reason? Here are my scores: 36 in Reading, 35 in applied English, 33 in science. Then we go down the math section and all the little bars are stuck over to the far right side, high percentiles and a' that. Except one. Pre-freakin'-algebra. That's right. I kicked the crap out of algebra and geometry and trig and pre-calc and everything. But pre-algebra tripped me up. That means the basics. The simple stuff. The rote. And that's what I mess up on in general. Things like remembering the negative sign, and how to spell simple words, and the like. Yes, if I'm concentrating and thinking, I can do it usually, but not always. For most things, like I've said, I've got to actually make a conscious decision to engage my brain, otherwise, I don't think very thoroughly. And then, sometimes, I'm just thinking past it. So, yeah, I likely could have taught chemistry, and would have enjoyed it, but grading papers would have been a nightmare. And besides, when it comes down to it, I most like teaching about life, and English is the best place to do that. I would have been a good Chemistry teacher. I could have been a great English teacher.

And what else could I be besides academic Jesus follower or pedegogical chemist? I even enrolled at a school that I couldn't afford with a double major in secondary ed Chem/Bible. Which I couldn't afford. Only after long contemplation did I realize that I'm much much more suited for teaching English.

Chapter 3
So why am I not teaching English? Why not go back to it? Besides, of course, the fact that I am not currently certified, which I could easily remedy by this fall just by taking summer classes at Baker I mean, I have a degree. I love language. I love teaching kids reading, and about life, and about literature, and about writing. I was good at it. I still have students who IM or email me for advice or just to say hi from time to time. Deep down, I wish I was teaching. I'd even not change my degree if I could go back. Why not?

I think I am afraid.

Afraid of what my life would go back to if I taught again, my brain's rpms running in the red seven days a week for nine months, never really resting, never coming down, always tired. Afraid of the early mornings and the late nights I'd lose, needing to be alert and ready to go at 7 in the morning every day, attentive and focused, and yet needing social interaction. Afraid of consistent classroom management, loving the kids, trying to show grace, and also be firm so I can teach them how grow up. Afraid of dealing with parents who care more about their reputation as a parent than actually parenting their kids.

But maybe fear isn't the right word. This post was originally titled "why I'm afraid of teaching." but I had to change it because that's not quite the right word. And as I thought about it, I didn't have nearly enough reasons to justify a whole post of them.

I've been mulling this for a month now, trying to reason out why I don't just get the 8 hours of masters work so I can get re-certified, or heck, just go teach in KCMO without certification. Am I really so afraid of all that stuff up in that paragraph? So afraid of failing? I don't know. that's stuff I'm concerned about, and afraid of, but I don't think any of it's enough to keep me form doing something I'm so good at.

Chapter 4
Ok, ok. I wrong. I think when it comes down to it, everything else aside, I am afraid. Sorry to get all wishy-washy on you. What I'm afraid of is teaching eating my life again. The very best teachers I ever had let it be their life. They were teachers first, and other people second. They graded papers at football games. Let relationships stay secret so as not to hurt their position. gave up their evening and weekends to go on trips or coach or direct. They lived teaching school. And I'm too selfish with the rest of my life to let it go.

Epilogue
Now what? What are my 'action points?' Can I overcome the fear? Should I stay where I am? Should I go looking for a third way? It's all something I need to keep thinking about because while this job is nice, and I just had an interview today to try to get bumped up to the next level, it's not a place I see myself working in ten years. There's no meat to it, if you will. No real substance. And if I'm not here, I've got to be working somewhere.

Or not.

But that's another post for another day.

Friday, March 14, 2008

Eulogy for a Job

Friend of mine got fired here today. If you know him, you'll know who. But I don't want to blab at you before you're meant to know.

I'm generically emotional right now. You know how that is. Unless you're a girl, of course. I'm sure all you ladies have precise words for all your feelings. My emotional state is like meeting a Belgian, you know he's foreign, but from where? My emotional state, then, is high. However, the specifics are murky.

I mean, no job means no place to live. Means a desperate job hunt. Means maybe getting an interim job that will suck. Means having FIRED on your permanent record, having to explain that to everyone from here until forever. Means fighting your identity to say you're more than your job.

The dirty little secret about losing your job. What they don't tell you? Losing your job sucks.

It's hard to know how to react in this situation. What's the right thing to do? Get angry and quit? Act like nothing ever happened? Try to understand everyone's point of view? Ignore the boss's point of view and get snippy? Just hurt for him?

I think it was a customer being a jerk that did it. Complaining to a higher person up the chain. That complainer is the person I'm angry at. The guy who thought they were more important than they were. That their problems were paramount. That they were more important than someone else, and had to bring that guy down to size, man. This is the essence of a world that's broken; everyone thinks they're the protagonist. Everyone thinks they're the star.

I'm going to be missing him here. Every day. I moved aisle last week, and not being able to look over my shoulder and psst at him was one of the hurts. Not being able to anything at him will be worse.

Monday, March 10, 2008

Look for a self-revealing tie-in in the next post.

I'm cutting back.

Not today. Maybe not this week. But for my own sanity. For quality. I could write well every day. Nothing in particular holds me back from this. But I think shooting for three times a week would produce words more worth reading. And at a time like this where I have a free hours alone in the basement, nothing but rock walls and a space heater for company, I want to be working on my book. I'm instead staring at a daylight savings time induced half-finished blog on why I am afraid of teaching, realizing I have hours of work left before I can let you see it. Ergo, this.

It was a whole lot easier on caffeine. Just look back at the volume pre and post. I wonder how good it could have been on adderal. I read a story today where college professor talked about how he doubled the quality of his career on that stuff. But I've given up using chemicals to achieve mental alacrity. Occasional by-product? Fine. But I'm no user

On the way home from work today, talking to Adam about the problems he's been having at work convincing people that the widget they desperately want to get to market is not a quality widget, I wondered, non-sequiturly, about how many inactive people who eat poorly must use caffeine to feel normal. And then, because their main source of caffeine makes them fatter, get even fatter to feel normal again. The point is, I don't think I can perform every day until I get my alertness under control.

Besides you could already call some of the cheap posts of the last few weeks non-posts. I'm not interesting in throwing crap out on the internet walls and hoping that now and then it makes a Pollock.

So, expect three, and ya may get five. I'm off the triumph bus.

Friday, March 7, 2008

Jones and Eric's of a Friday

6:59: After several minutes of trying to connect to some distant open wireless network, here I am at the Jonesquist's. Brianna had a funeral in Topeka today, so she is here. Those who are here without death-related reasons: Jones and Eric and Brett and Steve and Katie and Adam and Jill and me. We are making pizza pocket things for dinner. They look delicious. Brett and I played catch with a large, tentacled, green ball. Eric and Jones challenged Jill and I to living room chicken, but it was deemed too dangerous. Pah. Eric kissed the goldfish in the tank, which is gross.

7:04: The pizza pockets are being assembled as we speak. I ask how we will tell them apart if they are all on the same tray. Apparently, Jones's is the throwing up one, and Brianna's is a Y. She says that Jill should make a knot, so it can say "Why Not?"

7:13: Finished making my pizza pocket thing. It is round and fat. Most others are burrito-esqe.


7:14: Eric regales us with a story of trying to thumbs-down all non-Beatles songs on a Pandora station. This will not work, apparently, as they limit the number of thumbs-downs you can do to a single station to 100.


7:39; We have talked a lot about baseball for the last several minutes. The conversation lulled, and Adam was reading Calvin and Hobbs and Jill and Jones sat in the corner looking at photo albums. Katie rekindled the baseball conversation by saying, "Let's talk about baseball again." Pizza pockets are supposed to be ready . . . now

8:05: Jeremy F. calls. He's been following the liveblogging, and he shall arrive soon with Juliet. The various pizza pockets came out great, and many-shaped. There was my UFO, and Eric's long john, and a couple of burritos, Brett's almost open face square, and a quad-sized pizza roll that Eric made with the last of the dough.

8:13: the baseball conversation continues near the couches/fishtank/my laptop next to the fishtank. The rest of the conversation has expanded around the dinner table to include dates that Brianna remembers and a red bell pepper.

8:18: Brianna is so mad she could poop a goat. I have no idea why. She is at the table, and I am am participating in the baseball conversation. Why, I don't know; I know little about the sport.

8:19: Eric is making a deviled egg. I also have no idea about why.


8:34: What is the Emergent Church?

8:35: I eat the deviled egg.

8:37: Even in an individual size portion, a deviled egg is delicious.

8:40: Some Fords arrive. Not shocked at Brianna's presence. Having been following the liveblog.

9:03: Haiku of the the moment:

Metal ball, spiked, dwells
in a cylindrical cage.
Find the egress? Solved!

9:24: The anti-baseball contingent wins out and we devolve to watching youtube videos. But first, we watch the light switch rave Strong Bad email. Then we watch some laughing babies, and some Pearl the Landlord.

9:34: “Hi, I'm a Christian.”

“And I'm a Christ-follower.”

9:36: Juliet she says she took a nap; she's good to go.

10:13: My tenuous grip on the neighbor's internet failed quite a while ago. Finally was able to get back going. Katie and Steve left early. We shall now follow suit as Ludo plays in the lapground.

The evening.

4:18 - We're getting together at Jones and Eric's tonight from what I hear. I'll be liveblogging as I can.

Thursday, March 6, 2008

Meta Meta

I am not interested in writing a post this late in the evening simply to fulfill the self-imposed statute of 'one weekday, one post.'

Wednesday, March 5, 2008

Remember, Remember the Fifth of Marchember

I've cleared all my things and I've put them in boxes. Well, sacks, technically. Not boxes. And some things are just stacked on my desk. I've pulled out the pushpins and taken down the dozens of line-drawn Married to the Sea comics, and my 2007 magnetic poetry calendar that is turned to the blank page past December, and the map of Zork I that I put up my first week I worked here, and the disapproving rabbit who says he does not approve of lolcats I got from a distant co-worker who was tickled by my lolcat coztum at Halloween. I stacked them flat on a pile of a sundry cubicle hangings and vaguely relevant work-related papers. My drawers are emptied of last April's review, and my scissors and tape I use for wrapping presents at work, and my orientation packet, and the packets of Taco Bell hot sauce and jars of tomato sauce that inexplicably found sitting on my keyboard two mornings the same month last Summer, and the 'Light Jazz' CD Dan made for me that's actually all video game techno, and the three minature pirates and their pirate launching gun Nicholas gave me for Halloween (the only toy I afford myself; I'm not interested in displayed who I am by what I own (if I can help it)), and the Bad Driver's Desk Calendar that Juliet and Jeremy gave me that I was dedicated to through April 19th apparently. My upper shelf is cleared of my book of selected C.S. Lewis sayings, and Amy Tan's memoirs, and the complete John Donne, and my 1931 edition Shakespeare textbook. None of which I think I've ever read more than a few pages of at work. I've also moved the clone of the cursed keyboard that's been at the desk of the last three guys who were asked to leave here.

I've said goodbyes to all the guys on my row. Phil, another guy like Sam Wright with whom I went to college but didn't know, but wish I had. And Sam, the other former school teacher whose great work here I think helped solidify my employment out of former occupational comparision. And Jeff, the new guy, father of six, genius scripter. And, of course, Nicholas, but I'll see him outside of work, seeing as how we married sisters. And let's not forget my direct supervisor Josh, the guy here I didn't know before I think I've connected with best. A good game player no matter what he's playing, with a great memory for all kinds of useful minutiae, not just trivia, and a great leader. A guy who'd I'd work with just about anywhere doing just about anything. I'm pretty egoistical, and there aren't a lot of people I follow naturally. But Josh is one of them. Usually, I have to work at it pretty hard to follow someone. Not Josh. Without exception, these are all guys who should be getting paid twice as much and immediate promotions.

That's right, folks, I'm movin' cubicles.

I know, I know, it's only 12 feet and on a different aisle. But it feels like I'm going to a new job. I've been on the central team since I got here. These are the guys who I fire up Scorched Earth 3d with, who were the heart of our KOL clan Flame Retarted (where everythign is spleled wrogn!), the guys who I laugh at the same jokes with, who I send funny and interesting links to, who usually have already seen the links before I send them and laugh anyway. The guys who do their monthly password changes before on time, and usually end up doing the other team's, too. And let's not even look at customer service, and call stats. Oh, and getting to talk to midwestern people on the phone all day? They're hecka nicer to talk to than coastal people. New Jersey, I'ma lookin' at you. Squah in the . . .

When I learned I could get the 8-5 instead of 9-6, I considered it for a day before saying yes. I knew it was a good idea, but I thought I might be tired with an earlier morning. But it turns out that with carpooling, I'd only getting to work 25 minutes earlier, but out an hour earlier. And Jill convinced me it was the best idea, too good to pass up. It means less time for Adam and Jill to wait around for me, and an earlier time home. Which means I get to hang out with Jill before seven 0'clock events, not after them, when we're tired. So I said yes.

But then I found out that it also meant a shift to the East side since Phil is already at the 8-5 for central. I almost turned it down right off. East team means a lot of east coasters with bad attitudes (New Jersey, I'ma lookin' at you, again), and dealing with a (admittedly) cool group of guys, but not nearly as cool. Ok, except Dan. Dan's a central teamer if there ever was one. And a team lead who's ok, but no Josh. Not by any stretch. And I guess Stephen is ok. But only if he ends up reading this.

But the extra time with Jill won out, and here I am, moving my sacks and stacks at 8:30 tomorrow morning. I get to keep my headset, and my computer, and my chair, which is nice. They're all what I'm used to. But I don't get to keep my team. And that sucks.

They say you can't go back, things change. But 'they' are shadowyly illuminated as a rule, and I don't trust people in shadows; they're as sketchy as they come. As soon as I can, I am so back.

Tuesday, March 4, 2008

Since I haven't written about it in a few weeks.

I was up late last night doing taxes with Adam and Sam. A tax party as it were. Doing, but not finishing, since there's something odd going on with my W-2 where income was reported to Missouri and Kansas in such a way as to indicate I randomly made a third more than I did. Also, Missouri asks for information off of my federal return that is not only literally not on my federal return, but also is nearly impossible to calculate. That is, Jill's and my separate gross adjusted incomes. Given that we compile our incomes before adjusting them on the federal return, I have no idea how to apply those adjustments to our incomes separately.

And all of that excessive math problem folderol would all go away if people would have voted for Ron Paul. He was going to propose cutting the federal budget to year 2000 levels. Which would completely eliminate the federal income tax. You heard me. Completely eliminate it. As in I wouldn't have to look up any information that doesn't exist on a form since that form wouldn't exist. Where's your McHilliBama now?

(Or, I guess, as it'll be in about four hours: Where's your JoBarack now? Baracain? Bahn?)

I didn't write on the novel this morning; I woke up late. And when I tried to write before Adam came to pick me up, and at lunch, I was not able to concentrate. I'm uber-tired for some reason. Far beyond what 7 hours of sleep is supposed to feel like. Getting short with people on the phone. I managed to stave off the fierce desire to use caffeine for one more day. Only God knows how that happened. I came very close to grabbing a 20 oz of the ol' DMND out of the vending machines several times. Unfortunately, not much else I attempted today succeeded. Especially any semblance of coherent, let alone scintillating, prose. Feel like I haven't written well since I was on the stuff. It's a lot harder to get up for a good post in the morning. Since a good post takes most of the day. I got some water at last break. That helped. But not like a chemical stimulant.

Monday, March 3, 2008

A solution of another type

I like to link to other sites as little as possible. Maybe that will change sometime soon. But this is too good not to share.

This is especially for Jeremy Ford, who has already, long ago, declared it to be so:

http://xkcd.com/391/

-SPOILER- Alphabet Cube Puzzle Solution -SPOILER-

Congrats to Chris Wood and Jeremy Ford for solving the puzzle and answering correctly. They've already received their prizes via email.

The relevant lines of the puzzle were:
puzzle:
to win an amazon gift card,
say of zambia in the comments.


The added fourth line indicated that two people could win, and the fifth that Chris was awesome for winning.

Given that the clue was "Capitals, no. Capitols, yes," one would have to mention the capitol of Zambia, Lusaka int he comments of the blog to successfully answer the puzzle.

I got the inspiration from a puzzle in Kingdom of Loathing in which there are six symbols, rather than three. In that puzzle (you can find it down the page here), the six symbols encode 25 of the 26 letters of the alphabet when one lays them out in a five by five grid marked with the symbols on both axes. So, if the symbols were 1,2,3,4,5 and 6, the letter 'a' would be 11, 'b' would be 12, 'z' would be 55, and so on. In that specific case, the one remaining letter would be singlely encoded by the final symbol 6. In the KOL puzzle, it was the letter t.

For my puzzle, I took this idea to the next dimension with a three-dimensional grid of 27 spaces, 3x3x3. I had hoped that the specific symbols I chose (alpha, beta and cube) would clue you in to this fact, as would the fact that I was encoding spaces (27 is a cubic number). The first symbol in a set of three symbols indicated the x axis, the second the y axis, and the third the z axis. So, as you can see below, in the upper left corner of the top level is the letter 'a.' For 'a,' The first row is alpha, the first column is alpha, and the first level is alpha, so, 'a' is alpha-alpha-alpha.

Congrats, again, guys.