It's not the New Year yet, not here, but it is in part of the world. Unlike the year 2000, I'm neither monitoring the news for impending disasters or getting useless updates from my boss about it. That, alone, is making this a less hectic time.

I was surprised, as I often am about things relating to time, to figure out that 2000 arrived seven years ago. I was somewhat less surprised to realize that it's nearly eight years ago. That, to me, should be a much longer time than it feels.

Yes, I have my theory that explains this, about how one year is a fifth of your life when you're only five years old and one-twentieth when you leave your teens, but I've rarely been satisfied with my own explanation. Still, there's no denying that the years go by faster and faster as I age.

I don't remember my resolutions for 2007, but I'm sure they're in the archives here somewhere. Without being hampered by the specifics, I can safely and proudly announce that I think I did pretty well on all of them, assuming I made more than one.

One thing I'm certain I didn't predict is that I'd become rich and famous, so that one's in the bag for sure.

I did lose a friend or two this past year, something I can ill afford, and that hurts, but I can't blame that on anyone except the guy who's typing this now. I added a few acquaintances, however, so there's still hope for the future. I'm in no position to be shuffling off anyone.

There were no immediate deaths to report, which is always good news, but there was a birth. I'm too lazy to post a picture, but he looks a lot like a baby boy, eerily so.

Other people, other cultures, have differing days for the New Year, but I've always followed the random one that necessitates me buying or receiving a calendar right after Christmas. This year the market that's giving me one the past few years has either decided I'm no longer a worthwhile customer or ran out before I showed up, so I may have to make my own.

It's a good thing I'm good with graph paper.

If you read this, I wish you the best. I hope you have an even better life than I do.

I was momentarily frightened, but I had no reason to be.

I was sitting here at my computer, mulling over my fate and regretting that no one would ever get to see my "Decisions, Decisions" entry when I was jolted out of my doldrums by the wail of a nearby siren.

That Decisions entry, by the by, was without doubt the finest entry I've written. It was filled with rollicking humor, pathos, and not a small touch of the insight for which Crenellated Flotsam is so highly regarded. It was, in short, a work of inspired genius whose like may never be seen again.

As fortune would have it, just before I hit the button to publish it, my browser crashed and all was lost. Too bad I compose these things through the browser and not offline in, say, some manner of writing program.

But the siren intrigued me, if just for a second. It was shortly followed by a rumble, the likes of which could only come from a heavy diesel engine. My room was filled with the flashes of light that accompany emergency vehicles, and, sure enough, a large fire truck was rumbling down my street. Right here in the neighborhood, and not two hours after the rain let up!

I thought a fire unlikely, given the circumstances, but you can never tell what holiday celebrations can turn into. My excitement was dulled, however, when the loudspeaker on the fire truck began calling out "Merry Christmas!"

I looked out the window (curious beast that I am) and they slowly drove past. A few houses later, they used their PA to call "Merry Christmas!" again, and I began to notice a pattern.

I can still hear them now, both their intermittent siren and their shouts of well-meaning joy,  and I'm not sure if it's filling with tidings or not. It is, however, raising a chorus of answering dogs, so there's that.

About a month ago a new gas grill popped into my life, the first one I've ever used. It's not hooked up to the gas main or anything, but after years and years of charcoal, lighter fluid, and hickory wood chips, it's remarkably easy to use.

Turn the spigot on the big, fat can of gas, turn a burner, press an igniter button, and next thing you know there are flames, over which you can grill.

The old way of cooking, with the briquets, I still call barbecuing. I've heard there's some difference between the two terms (barbecuing uses lower temperatures), but the biggest difference for me is the ease. This grill is as easy to use as a stove top, but it's outside.

Over the past month I've cooked a couple pounds of ranchera or flap meat, two or three chicken breasts, some sausages, and, tonight, some Thai-spiced rib meat stuff that I've never heard of before. The only thing I've been able to cook well, however, is tomatoes, and I chalk that up to them being edible before they ever touch the grill.

I even looked at the instruction book, and not just to assemble the beast. In it there was some talk of what seemed to me an astronomical number of BTUs, but I have to admit I don't understand that scale one bit. In that sense, they're a lot like decibels. I know what they measure, sort of, but I don't have the same feel for them that I do for temperature.

If you tell me that it will ten degrees, I have a pretty good idea what to expect, whether you're talking Farenheit or Centigrade. I have no such base for either BTUs or decibels, but I'm not so dumb as to not know that more is better.

That means that I have no idea if the thousands, or hundreds, or tens of thousands of BTUs that this thing kicks out are a lot, although they are a marketing point. What I do know is that it doesn't cook as quickly as my old charcoal barbecues, but I guess the selling point is more control than speed with these things.

It doesn't help at all, I don't think, that most of this grilling I'm doing now is done in the dark. Oh, sure, I've got an outside light, but it's directly behind me, so when I cook I cast a shadow on the only thing I'm interested in lighting up. I haven't failed to the point of making chicken jerkey (yet), and I'm sure I'll get better over time.

As thrilling as it may be to be in step with tools and techniques of modern cookery, I miss my old barbecue. It may not miss me much, but I still feel sort of like a traitor.

I'm wearing clean underwear now -- deep blue featuring smiling monkey faces. if you must know -- and it's a good thing, too, but I'm not sure how long that will last. I'm headed to the doctor to have my eye looked at.

The web designer with whom I've been working writing content is close to settling a contract with an eye doctor who performs that Lasic thing, and I joked that if it was an eye surgeon, I could, maybe, get a discount.

As it turns out, I was told to call this guy, who may or may not be the one for whom I may end up writing. I'm not sure if I'm really getting any discount, but today's consultation is free.

There are two things that have prevented me from having my eye repaired. Two years ago I noticed that my right eye, the dominant one, was unable to ever give me a clear picture of our beautiful world. It was like looking through wax paper. I went to some nearby optometrist type guy or other and he used some instrument to look into my eye and told me that it was a cataract. You can't see it from the outside, but I can't see, either, so we're even on that.

He said it would cost between a thousand and fifteen-hundred dollars to fix, and I left it at that. Not to get political, but I don't have that kind of money to spend, not yet, so when something goes wrong, I pretty much have to live with it. I'm not old, but getting older, and things are beginning to go wrong. Since I don't have insurance, I'm pretty much stuck with dealing with maladies in the way humankind did for its first couple thousand years: waiting and hoping I recover and that it fixes itself.

Even if I had the money, I can't imagine being awake while someone slices my eye open and takes out the offending cataract. Sorry, no. Worse, they'd have to sew it back together, so I've been resigned to losing my depth perception and having only one good eye. It's a small price to pay for all the wonderful things I've seen, including undressed women.

The surgery, I figured, would be even more expensive with a general anesthetic.

I know some cataracts can be removed using lasers or sonic treatment, but that's even more expensive, I thought. That "in by noon, out by four" treatment would be great, but not if it meant someone slicing my eye open and me having to lie still.

Anyway, today I'm going in for my free consult. It may be that he can use non-surgical means and I can get my vision back. It may still cost more than I can afford, or it may be that he's planning on using a scalpel, so I don't know.

What I *do* know is that whenever I mention something, people want and expect me to take care of it.

Follow up:

Yes, I *do* have a cataract, the "Dense (traumatic) Cataract" as shown on the doctor's web page (which I, incidentally, had nothing to do with).

Yes, it can be safely and easily removed through surgery, in as little as ten minutes.

Yes, it requires me to have my eye sliced open and needles stuck it for that length of time.

Yes, people are stepping up and willing or actually helping me get this done. Everyone is eager and prodding, and I feel ashamed of my misgivings and squeamishness. Dr. Soroudi, who's strikingly handsome and reassuring, thinks I'd do just fine. I have all the trust in the world in him but very little on my own ability to remain rock still while the surgery takes place.

He wants me to get Medi-Cal, a welfare type thing, I guess, and we'll see what happens. I honestly just don't know.

I've been told that we, as human beings (as opposed to we, as jerks) are differentiated from the rest of the animal kingdom because we have the ability to empathize. When we look at scenes from the war, we can imagine the heartbreak and sorrow the devastation has caused; when we see starving, malnourished people, our instinct is to send them some ethically grown, organic carrots; when we see ostensibly poor and struggling college girls, we wish to send them some clothing, no matter how much they smile and act is if they're enjoying themselves.

I have no idea how we've determined that other animals don't share this trait, but then again, I have no idea how the other animals think. One thing I'm convinced of is that the dogs I've owned sure don't feel the same things I do. Or, at least, they don't seem to feel them in the same way, to the same extent.

I base this on nothing scientific, mind you. Only on observation.

I had a dog once, Boutros, who confounded me by laying on the floor and resting his head on some wood that served as part of the frame for a coffee table. Yes, it acted like a pillow, or perhaps a synthetic Russell leg or arm, and kept his head off the ground, but there were actual pillows nearby that he ignored. My current dog, Minardi, will invariably lay his head on the bed's footboard instead of on the bed itself or any wadded up bedding, and I tell ya, that can't be comfortable.

I know these dogs can feel pain,  but seeing their behavior when trying to rest or, in Minardi's case, after his recent run-in with that cat, whatever pain he feels isn't very similar to my own. He may flinch a bit at the moment when I apply some dressing to a wound, but it's no where near the overall reaction I'd have. He shrugs off his little sores and wounds about a minute after getting them, and I have to wonder if nature has somehow given animals a less dramatic sense of pain and injury than we humans have.

Is it worth thinking about? Maybe.

The decision by PETA to boycott Mars fills me with indecision and reminds me of my own answer to this whole animal question. It may not be a good solution, but it keeps me well-fed and still, I hope, a kind and considerate person.

I refuse to be simplistic and rally against animal cruelty. That's hardly a contentious position since there's not much in the way of an army of pro-animal cruelty. Taking that position is about as controversial as being for breathing. I own animals, I find them cute as can be, and I can't even look at roadkill without getting sad and wincing.

Still, perhaps to keep my sanity or to allow me to enjoy animal products, I seem to have developed a system. This wasn't intentional, but it seems to evolved into one that works for me.

As a general rule, I have different standards for wild or natural animals, and raised ones, though I obviously don't think either should be tortured or abused.

Wild animals, pretty much, should be left alone to enjoy their lives until they die of starvation or are killed by a larger, or more hungry, animal. I don't think we should hunt them or kill them for fur or ivory. It's okay, I guess, if we put them zoos to look at them, but I say that because everyone I've ever known who worked at a zoo is a nice enough guy.

For some reason, though, I think it's fine for us to "create" or raise animals and then kill them for food or supplies. These particular animals, I'm thinking, wouldn't have existed without our intervention, so we pretty much get to use them. If someone causes twenty foxes to exist, raises them with care and then kills them to craft a fine looking and warm coat, I'm okay with that. This isn't reducing the fox population and isn't depriving any foxes of their natural lives in the woods. These foxes wouldn't have existed without human intervention, so our removing and using them isn't really having any effect on nature.

There are a lot of people who eat meat and many more who eat plants. Simply put, both are grown by some people for others to eat. It was a tragedy and wrong for Buffalo Bill to slaughter herds from the train, but if someone is growing buffalos to slaughter, that doesn't bother me too much. There are an awful lot of people who like bacon and hamburgers, enough that producing those things is a business, and like all businesses, it becomes a matter of efficiency.

To feed the world probably takes a lot more cattle and pigs than I can count. I'm guessing well over a thousand. Just as doctors see patients more as symptoms or diseases than as people because of the huge numbers they see, or the way ambulance drivers become numb to gruesome or sad sights, I think those who deal with cows and pigs just see them as product after awhile. They become no more than an in-box of work, and while this is sad, it's normal.

I am willing to believe that people who work at slaughterhouses aren't sadists. I'm also willing to believe that mistakes do happen just because of the numbers involved, and that sometimes a killing doesn't go as easily, painlessly, and quickly as everyone wants. The large numbers involved pretty much guarantee that.

I know the US has a history of trappers gathering beavers and selling them back to Europe to make into fine looking hats for gentlemen, and I don't think we should be doing that any more. If someone wants to do that, they need to raise the beavers themselves and not take them from the wild.

I spend about a third of my life sleeping, which pretty much makes me an expert on that subject, but I really shine when it comes to falling asleep, which I do well over a thousand times a year. You could say I get plenty of practice at it, mostly because I can't sleep more than three hours without waking up.

It's not the most interesting of topics, I know, but that's never stopped me from writing about things before.

Now, calendar freaks may object, but it's officially winter here. I know this because the heater goes on, even when I don't set it. The thermostat goes down to fifty, and when it kicks in I know two things: it's cold outside and that means it's cold inside, as well.

I'm comfortable in the cold, but even I have my limits and one of my favorite things to do is go to bed. I love it when my bedroom is cold, but when I'm toasty warm under the bedding. I get a sense of accomplishment heating up that cold bed.

Then, I decide to go to sleep. At this point, one of two things results:

(1)    I'm more comfortable laying on my side, often with my knees drawn up. I'm more comfortable laying on my left side, but I've been told that's bad for the heart, so after laying on my left, I switch to laying on my left side in the same position, get comfortable, and close my eyes.

I like that part. It's so cute. It's charming. We close our eyes and then fall asleep.

(2) All the above happens, but instead of drifting off to sleep, I start thinking. This is never a good thing.

It's not that I worry, I just ... think. I mostly "write" things, blog entries or stories ideas, but most often perfectly craft sentences. Or, I think about women and how nice they are, or about people I know and if they think of me as often as I do them, and to what end. Or, really, I think about anything.

When something pops into my head that I don't want to think about, usually something I need to do and haven't, the best way for me to get it out of my head is to change position and flop over onto my other side. This often works, but between stretching my legs out and curling them back up, trying it with a single leg, and remembering that I shouldn't go to sleep on my left, I don't have very many positions to take that will cleanse the horrible thought from my mind. After two or three such rude awakenings, I'm sort of out of options.

I do have a couch I can sleep on, and there's a loveseat I can cram myself intwo, but neither of them are very good for sleeping unless there's a football game on. What I'd like, of course, is a guest bedroom, but the space for that is filled with computers and junk.

The good news is, if I don't think, I sleep. If I don't think, though, I'm not me.