Not a Fan

While everyone around me is getting ready for the holidays, or just getting over them, I'm stuck here wondering about the human condition.


It's no surprise that there are things I like and things I don't care so much about, but it might be surprising that I don't really consider myself to be a fan of much of anything, not even of those things I really, really enjoy.


I see this all the time on the Internet, people rushing to the defense of things they like or cheering on their teams, and I just don't get it. In sports, it looks like when you root for one side you're required to see nothing your team does as deserving of a penalty while everything the other side does is wrong and a flagrant foul. In books, games, movies, and literature, people who are fans seem to go out of their way to justify what others see as flaws, and fanwaking takes up most of their time.


Fanwaking, of course, is one of my favorite words, and might even be a real one. It's pretty much the term used to describe going out of one's way to explain something that any normal person would see as a plot hole, but mostly just reflects our human need to justify.


I don't know why, but I can't feel this need, and I can't even call myself a fan of just about anything. Maybe I am, but just stubbornly refuse to admit it, or maybe I'm lacking what it takes to commit myself wholeheartedly to things.


I'll be among the first to defend something or someone if they're being wronged, but I'd like to think my support isn't blind. When someone criticizes something I like, I can get hurt, sure, but if there's some value in what's said, I have to consider that. Maybe it's part of it, but when someone or something I claim to love is criticized, I don't feel personally threatened and usually don't take it personally.


It may be, though, that I'm so reluctant to defend others because I'm not often defended and never learned that's how things are supposed to work. I do know, though, that if I say anything bad about Dragon Age or some other popular game that I'll be attacked up and down the Internet by fans of the game who will dismiss and diminish anything I say without even considering it.


And I can't do much about it. Maybe I'm built in such a way as to always first attempt to see the other side and not just instictively close my mind to anything and everything said by those with whom I disagree. I don't much care for Sarah Palin's views, but I don't hate her, and whenever she comes up with some new pronouncement, my first reaction is to try to understand where she's coming from.



This entry is rambling, at best, but it's mostly just a test to see if this blogging software works with my updated Wordpress. If you've read this far, enjoy the holidays!

More of the Same, Only Different

It's about time I remembered this blog.

Before I write anything, I had to upgrade my installation and, as they always do, the end of the upgrade directions contains the helpful advice that I should consider "rewarding yourself with a blog post about the upgrade." Well, I'm not sure how rewarding it will be for me or anyone else, but here it is.

It's quite an extensive upgrade because I haven't done one in quite some time. This new version has a way for me to add not only pictures to my entries, but video and audio, as well. I can only hope that means that the music comes on automatically when people load the page and plays all the time the page is open. It would be even better if I can find some of that old MIDI music we loved so well on the Geocity pages!

The good news about those enhancements, which may have been incorporated a few years ago, is that I don't have to bother with those annoying ways of including pictures I had to use in the past. They involved special coding, which I invariably forgot, but I'll have to check where these uploaded pictures are stored, if they appear as thumbnails, and all that.

Also, I have no reason to believe any of the old images will show up, not unless I move them.

See, this is what's great about living in this day and age. Computers allow us (me) to spend roughly forever completing tasks that were once unheard of. We think they're faster, more efficient, and let us be more productive, but that's not true at all. Sure, they let us do more, but we spend far more time managing them than we ever had to spend changing typewriter ribbons.

The good news is, this is a new post. Maybe I should try to get back in the habit of writing here, using it as a way to warm up for other writing I need to do during the day. Maybe I can even say something interesting some day.

Or, add a picture.

NaNoWriMo Fever

I think too highly of NaNoWriMo to make a mockery of it.


In years past I remember being thrilled by the prospect of writing a novel and simply amazed that I was able to do it. I looked forward to November with eager anticipation and traditionally wrote a page or so at the stroke of midnight on November first before settling off to bed.


When I got up the next morning, there it was: the start of my novel and it was as if fairies had started it for me while I slept!


I've finished enough novels during NaNoWriMo to know that I can do it. That's no longer a challenge. Now, none of them are what you'd call good by any stretch of the imagination, but they were all over fifty thousand words and most of them even had a hint of story or character development.


A few years ago, when I quit, it was because I was mocking NaNo, and that made me feel bad. The idea, and the wondrous joy I shared in when I first became aware of the project, was fading quickly as I realized all I was doing was a typing exercise. Instead of writing a story I needed to tell, to explore my writing abilities and strengthen them, all I was doing was writing for the sake of writing, just so I could say I won.


In the first year I participated there was some guy who finished the first day or so and did so by copying and pasting one word 50,000 times. I hated that then, but my last couple efforts weren't really any different and I hated myself for that. I was taking something wonderful, something that everyone else was excited about, and crapping on it by just tossing words onto the page and calling it a novel.


This year I still don't have the sense of adventure and excitement I felt those first couple of years, but I hope to make the best out of what I have. I don't know if I'll win or not, but NaNo has never been about winning or bragging rights. I hope to be strong enough to put aside any silly sense of obligation and come up with a draft of a novel during November, one that meets the threshold.


What I won't be doing is demeaning the project I hold so dear by showing I can type enough words to win.

Empty Progress

I know I'm aging, and not all that gracefully. It disturbs me that an increasing part of my life revolves around afflictions and even more that I sometimes find myself lapsing into "when I was growing up..." thinking and questioning change.

I don't like to think of myself as stuck in the past, but sometimes the reasoning behind progress leaves me scratching my head (and being thankful for the hair that remains there).

Just the other day my Internet provider, AT&T, sent me yet another e-mail discussing upgrades. I say "yet another" because this is the kind of thing I've received regularly over the years going all the way back to when Pacific Bell was my provider.

This latest notification, once again, as always, promises that I'll have to do nothing to continue receiving the quality service I've enjoyed in the past. That's a good thing because when it comes to doing nothing, I'm right up there at the top. It's one of the few areas that I can honestly say I excel at, so it's great to see that this update is one I can master.

This update, however, reminds me that many people use the Internet, or their ISP, much differently than I do. They're making some changes to their web e-mail client or server, a feature I have to admit I've never used. As long as I've had any ISP I've done all my e-mailing through a client that fetches the mail from their server and deletes it. What mail I've gotten has always been stored on my computer, and I see no reason to change any of that.

Most of my e-mail now is sent to my host, half-dozen, and they've screwed me up by no deleting messages they forward, but that's another story for another time. That service, by the way, is one I can enjoy again if I wish to upgrade my account and spend more money, something I'm loathe to do.

The other big change that AT&T is rolling out is a change to my homepage! As long as I've had them as my service provider, and Pac Bell before, I've had available to me the possibility of creating a home page. This goes all the way back to the Geocities days, and while I *did* have a Geocities page, I've never taken advantage of this generous offer.

When it comes to home pages, I guess I have to say this is it.

I've never met anyone who has some AT&T hosted page for their home page, but I guess there must be enough of them out there clamoring for new features that AT&T is answering their gripes. Maybe the new one lets you embed YouTube videos or something, and I'm sure the kids will be all over that.

There's more than enough real stuff to do. These upgrades that do absolutely nothing I'm interested in either remind me that I'm missing something or make me think I'm out of step with the current, hip world.

Still, I guess any effort on my ISP's part is some indication that they're not totally ignoring their market. But instead of home page advances, I'd rather have reduced costs or increased bandwidth.

NaNoWriMo 2009

I've signed up to join the NaNoWriMo effort again this year, mostly just to see what direction my writing will take this time around. Last time I got an unexpected and somewhat frightening insight into my creative process, but I'm not sure how concerned I should be.


I was lying in bed, it was late at night, and that's a traditional time for me to plan things that I will never actually get around to writing (such as blog entries or witty responses to something I read on some message board hours earlier). Last night I was thinking a little about my upcoming novel, and I realized I was recoiling from the very thought of constructing a plot.


It occurred to me, I almost always do that when faced with a story.


Instead of coming up with a story in my head and then putting it down on paper like most people, good writers, do, I limit my thinking to things about the characters, other people with whom she or he may engage, and tiny scenes that interest me. Oh, I come up with snippets of conversation, but those are quickly forgotten. Mostly what I do is imagine quirks that character might have, how I might show them off, and scenes where they would be exploited.


What I don't do, hardly ever, is develop the story. In fact, I conciously avoid doing that, and part of the reason may be that I want to be as surprised as I hope anyone reading the story will be about what happens. I guess I don't see my role as writer as telling the story so much as describing it as it unfolds.


I don't think is a good way to write at all, but it usually keeps me interested enough to finish. I find I'm not all that excited about transcribing events I know about, but I'm pretty much interested in seeing what happens next or how something plays out. I don't know how most people plan for NaNoWriMo, but from what I've read on the boards there, it seems there's lots of outlining (mental or otherwise) involved. I know I could never match the impressive results of those who write 10,000 words in one sitting (whom I guess know what they're gonna say), but that's because my way of writing is mentally and creatively draining. I just can't think for five to ten hours straight!

Very Important Day

According to a local news channel, nine is the second luckiest number in Asian cultures, something I don't think we have in the West. As far as I know, we have seven as a lucky number, and that's it.


Anyway, today's one of those "special" days (9-9-9) that rarely show up and it seems to me we've had quite a few of them lately. Between that and ones involving time, it feels like we get at least one of them a year, but I think a lot of that is lucky chance involving the end of the millenium.


Some people, I guess, make a fuss out of these things. 9-9-99, 8-8-88, and the like were all mentioned, briefly, then passed. I would give these special days a lot more credit if they were memorable, but sad to say I honestly don't remember anything about any of them now that they're gone.


Which is to say, I couldn't for the life of me tell you what I did or what heppened on any of them. I think I was aware of them all and maybe even honored them with a tiny celebration, but nothing of any lasting value.


It's my fault, I guess, since I should have had some wonderful, noteworthy celebration for them all. The days, themselves, aren't memorable: it's what we do with them.

Vet Visit

Today I took my dog to the vet, and he's in good health.


It was a follow-up to see how he responded to last week's visit that was prompted by fear and uncertainty. He'd been shaking his head a lot, which I took to be sign of an ear infection, but his total disinterest in sniffing the results of my cleaning his ear had me puzzled. With my other dogs, they were fascinated by how the dark streaks on the napkins smelled, something I could only help to sense.


Turns out he had an infection, which has been mostly fixed.


He'd also been panting a great deal, running out of breath, and his jaw sometimes clicks or pops. I think those are all just normal aging things now, and the vet reminded me that he's like a seventy year old man.


The visits, as always, are nearly as entertaining for me as they are a mystery to him. I got to hear one of the office staff read off a list of about a dozen cat names to one of the clients to determine which of them were still around. The answer was eight.


I think eight is a very large number of cats to have.


Today's visit also featured a truly sad and disturbing black lab whose fur was shaved to the skin in three or four places and who had more stitches on her right hip than I've had in my entire life. One of the other people waiting and I talked about it quietly, and we were both reluctant to ask the dog's owner what had happened. The two of us felt the dog, maybe, had been hit by a car or something, but we were afraid of bringing up the subject because it might create a whole host of issues, including highly emotional responses by the owner.


I like looking at the other owner's brand new puppies and am always happy to be sniffed.

Another Test Entry

I'm trying a new way to blog, a third one, not that I use any of the other ways very often.


I'm hoping to find a way to keep my inspiration and motivation up because I do like to write here even though this isn't a popular blog for others to read. I know the world's moved onto social networking, but I don't like always having to write just short little things.


Mostly, I want to see if the "add pic" works easier than what I've used in the past, so here's a pic of nature finding a way in spite of humanity's best efforts.


test


 


I'll soon see if it works!

Relatively Absolute

Sure, I make a lot of problems for myself, but I want to get things right. This bad habit shows up whenever I take one of those surveys that attempt to determine what I'm qualified for, how I think, or how I respond to whatever it is they're checking.

I, frankly, just don't know how to answer many of the questions, and since I'm determined to be truthful in all of my responses, I'm rarely happy with my answers.

The questions, themselves, are simplicity itself and are written to determine my feelings. They often ask me to decide how I feel about something and give me the chance to strongly agree, strongly disagree, or take some less dramatic stance or, by using some similar scale, to mark down how important something is to me.

Like I said, the thing is, I just don't know.

My problem stems from my uncertainty. I may think I'm strongly opposed to something, but I worry that my strong opposition may, in fact, only be a moderate dislike. I think I strongly support some pronouncement, but since I only have my own mind to judge these things by and no true absolute, I'm hesitant to mark an answer that may, in fact, be incorrect.

This sort of thing comes up all the time when I talk to doctors or dentists, too. "How much pain are you in?" seems like a pretty straightforward question, but I have no independent scale upon which to base my answer. I worry, a lot, about if what I consider a lot of pain is something everyone else just shrugs off, so I usually limit my answer to the truthful "I notice it."

This answer, of course, helps the attending doctor and myself not at all, but at least I don't worry if I'm misleading him or her, blowing things out of proportion, or acting like some macho asshole.

Mountains and Molehills

Pretty much everyone figures out that people really like excitement and drama, and they figure it out pretty soon in life. Some people thrive on drama and do everything they can to make sure their lives are always full of it, but most of us just gravitate toward it.

Study Problems

There's all kinds of things I find fascinating, and many of them remain so in spite of my best efforts to study and analyze them to death.

What I've discovered is, it's damn near impossible for me to enjoy them the way I did at first. Physicists will tell us that you can measure anything without affecting it, but there's a lot less talk about how you change everything just be learning more about it, even without getting embroiled in conversations about the nature of change.

Speaking of which, I'm one of those who don't usually believe in change. It's sloppy language as far as I'm concerned since, for example, if I change my clothes chances are none of the original clothes are still being worn. I've taken them off and replaced them with an entirely new set of clothes and to my way of thinking, unless something stays constant, it's senseless to talk of it changing. I can change my hair, sure, since what I have left of it is reshaped when I change it, and it can be argued that water changes to ice in the freezer, but in most cases I get rid of the old stuff and replace it with completely new crap.

When I say I change the chair in my computer room what I'm really saying is I moved the old and put a new one in its place. There's no "chair" that underwent any change at all.

But, as usual, that's not the point.

I noticed this changing of subject first, I think, in literature and movies. I, like most everyone else, like movies, but when I began studying them I began seeing them in a whole new light. My original, innocent, and ignorant appreciation was lost when I began understanding the craft and could see how plot elements were added to aid in making up the story. It didn't take me all that long to see how a character was introduced simply to move the plot along, and when I began seeing movies and books this way, a lot of the magic disappeared.

Instead of simply enjoying the work, I found my appreciation for it changed, much like I might if I saw 137 magicians all performing a trick that I knew how to do. The first magician would surprise and astonish me, but once I learned how the trick was done, my appreciation of it would depend more on how it was performed than on what it was.

Years ago I read a good book Zen Mind, Begineer's Mind by some Suzuki fellow that talked about this sort of thing at length. I guess it was a Zen instruction book, but his point was that it's downright difficult to keep our sense of wonder if we let our knowledge get in the way. His metaphor, if I remember correctly, was that you can't add anything to a full glass and to get away from that, you have to try to approach things as if you are experiencing them for the first time. If you don't, and pile all your prejudices, familiarity, and understanding onto something, you'll most likely miss quite a bit.

I'm not sure I have any point here other than to note that the more I learn about anything, the more it changes. Things usually change so much that I hesitate to call them by the same name, but there's only so many nouns in English and I usually use them up during my introduction to something. The good news, I guess, is that this sort of change has been a constant since Adam, and just goes to prove that while we can't step twice in the same river, we keep the river's name the same as it stops being a plaything and becomes an example of gravity, climate, and biology.

The biggest downside is that our experts have forgotten their initial joy and wonder and what they can teach us is usually pretty far removed from what we see at first. It's the nature of the breast, I suppose, but it's still a shame that we go so quickly from tickled pink to jaded and cynical.


Piss and Vinegar

It's not just me: lots of other people are wondering about businesses and how they do things.

One thing that concerns those who care about quality is how little of it there is in today's marketplace. Instead of creating or selling goods that we'd be happy to consume, companies from the very largest to tiny cottage ones aren't taking the time and effort to produce much of anything worth having. There are exceptions, of course, but just like politicians, pretty much everyone is gravitating toward the golden mean and just making stuff that most people will find palatable.

I don't have any solid evidence for this, not even anecdotal, but anyone making anything quickly learns to cut corners to increase profits. Engineers determine just how little strength is necessary for the product and its shipping, which means we get flaky cardboard boxes instead of the stout ones that could be used as a fort that I grew up with. Buttons, levers, and housing are much weaker than they used to be, back when I guess people made things that felt "about right."

There's no need to use costly ingredients such as sugar or specially grown hops when generic or produced replacements will do since few people will notice the difference or refuse to buy the cheaper product. Yeah, you may lose 5% or so of the market, but those numbers can easily be made up through marketing to those who wouldn't know the difference if it was presented in a Power Point presentation.

Worse, even if you want to sell to the discriminating, corners are invariably trimmed. If organically produced ingredients are desired, they'll often save money on wages, shipping, or some other aspect. If some small percent of goods will perish if kept at a certain temperature, that will be considered acceptable and no attempt made to lower the temperature to ensure a higher survival. Bland fillers will be used to bulk up the volume, or the package will contain a lesser amount to stay competitive, and the consumer is always the one who suffers.

Years ago when Microsoft was introducing some collaborative software, some astute writer noticed that, despite its benefits, it took no account of the actual business world that is inhabited by humans. While being able to share information and documents is no doubt beneficial, most offices are filled with politics, petty disputes, and the quickly-learned realization that one only receives rewards for what is done and who knows it. Having the ability to share information is one thing, actually giving it up or doing so is quite another entirely. I've little doubt that more is hidden, kept private, and restrained than is ever divulged no matter how many tools are available for disseminating it.

People are unwilling, unable, or at least reluctant to ever question their own motives. Sadder, most who even take that step comfort themselves with some rationalization instead of looking brutally at their reasons for what they say or do. Even if someone has a great idea for improving a product, by the time it makes it through the bureaucracy, the defining edges have been cut off, the soul compromised, and ways developed to produce a more widely acceptable result.

It's not anyone's fault: it's the way the world works.

[Note: When I came up with the title, I expected to include a deep and meaningful discussion of high-end vinegars to make my point. Instead, I rambled aimlessly, and I'm uncertain if I made any point at all, salient or otherwise.]

A Victim of Humanness

I suspect I'm like many people when it comes to following the 80-20 law, at least as I understand it and keeping in mind that many refers to twenty or so. This law prevents me, of course, from accomplishing very much because it's much easier for me to live in the future than it is to see most things all the way through to completion.

Take now, for instance.

On my projects list, which never gets all the attention it needs, by the way, I have some shelving ready to go up, some fence repair stuff, and various and assorted cleaning and organizing projects. Instead of working on any of those when I catch a minute or hour of time, I'm planning, wondering about, and researching mortar to build an elevated brick planting area. It wasn't my idea, but my sister took my plan, expanded and changed it, and this is what she came up with.

I'd love to have such a thing. Earlier attempts at growing rosemary and the like pretty much ended in disaster when the dogs discovered the fragrant herbs growing in the yard. The smell, naturally, draws them in and they proceed to do what dogs do on things they find noteworthy, rendering the herbs pretty much useless for human consumption. Those that weren't chewed up, dug out, or otherwise thrashed beyond recognition smell like nothing more than dog piss.

So, an elevated bed might help. Since I'm thinking of only a foot or so high, it's not like they couldn't get to the plants, but maybe they'd give them a pass because there's easier places to go, ones that don't involve jumping.

While I have brackets, two screw guns, assorted levels and hardware components ready to put up the shelves, that project no longer interests me. That isn't to say it's no longer a necessity, just that I've grown bored with it now that it's reached the hairier final step: completion.

The replacement boards for the fence are all freshly painted and ready to go, but plugging in a saw or two and trimming the various pieces to fit must be a herculean task because I'm putting it off. Part of that may be, of course, because cutting the pieces might be inexact or even ruin the perfect plans that I hold in my head. I'm frequently hesitant to pull the trigger and see what the reality is.

So, while things pile up that are almost done, I avoid doing them and concentrate, instead, on what's next.

The Stuff of Nightmares

The modern earwig contributes a great deal to our world by eating dead and decaying plant and animal matter, one that arguably rivals my own efforts to better this world. Even so, the little critters give me the heebie-jeebies, and I don't like them one bit.

According to the wisdom contained on the Internet, they don't attack or eat people, at least live ones, but I have troubling memories of receiving bites from them when I was a kid. Now, as far as I know, they've yet to climb into my bed, sneak into my ears, and much on my warm, delicious brain while I slept, but I wouldn't put it past them. They could be the reason why I'm becoming increasingly forgetful.

Years ago, when I was living at the beach, they would occasionally show up in great numbers along a small concrete wall where we'd gather to barbecue and celebrate the warm weather with massive amounts of cheap beer. It was then that I discovered a helpful chink in their armor -- their complete lack of defense against swung hammers -- and exploited it, sending many of them to the great beyond.

Now, however, after years of hiding and not bothering me at all, they've returned, and one could say with a vengeance without exaggerating in the slightest. They seem to love the comfort and concealment my new car cover provides, and every morning when I unwrap my car, a few dozen are found lurking within its folds.

Although I've learned to expect them there, seeing their masses so early in the morning startles me into wakefulness in a way mere caffeine cannot. I jump. I nearly shout. I get shivers both up and down my spine.

It certainly isn't moist inside there, so I have no choice but to discount all that talk of them seeking those types of locations. As far as I know, there isn't much in the way of decomposing animals or plants there, either, so I can only assume they only do it because they enjoy seeing my reaction.

I let them, mostly, scurry away, something they're quite good at, after punching the car cover to dislodge them, but a dozen or so end up on the hood of the car and as often as not get a free ride until they blow off or choose to jump. I'd like to think they've learned not to leave the embrace of the lawn, but these stubborn earwigs must be as adventurous as early American explorers.

I'm not sure what to do, but I still own a hammer.

Duality Day

I'm not sure I have any credence as a religious scholar, but that doesn't prevent me from thinking about religious things. Religion is fascinating, and not least because of the following possible conversation:

"In our religion, we don't eat pork."
"Hah! In ours, we celebrate with a ham dinner, just to keep people like you out!"

Well, a conversation along those lines might have happened once.

I was raised Christian, specifically Lutheran, but I'm not too sure what that means and, in any case, it doesn't seem to have stuck. Most of the holidays in my family were secular ones, with bunnies replacing break-of-dawn trips to church and chocolate eggs taking the place of communion wafers. Mom and I once traveled to Forest Lawn, a decadent local cemetery, to see Da Vinci's Last Supper recreated in stained glass, but I don't think we were there for any religious reasons.

The point is, I wasn't raised as a Catholic, although I had as many Catholic friends growing up as I did Jewish ones. I know the names of some Catholic things, if not the reasoning behind them, and this year I followed some tradition by avoiding eggs for Lent just to see what it was like. The experience, in the end, was awkward, if not particularly religious.

Yesterday, the day between Good Friday and Easter Sunday, was also my niece's birthday, although she's of an age where her kid's birthdays are more of a big deal than her own is. The day, also, I think, falls into some religious Black Hole, by which I mean I have no idea if it has a special name or significance or not.

I pick "not," but I spent a good five minutes yesterday thinking about it. In the possible footsteps and manner of Jesus' followers, I went out for Chinese food yesterday, something I can envision them doing to deal with the grief I'm sure they felt. I know it's difficult for me to cook, or to be bothered with shopping, when I'm feeling down, and I have no reason to doubt such an emotional time calls for some Kung Pao chicken or, perhaps, a healthy portion of beef chow mein.

Then, it occurred to me. Like I said starting out this entry, I'm no scholar, but I think a case could be made for the day between Jesus' death and resurrection as being the only day since Christmas when there was no Trinity. I have no idea what the religious significance, if any, of Saturday is, but the way I see it, if the Trinity started with Jesus' birth and continues until this very day because he came back from the dead and is riding shotgun in heaven, Saturday he was well and truly dead.

So, after some thirty or forty years of there being a father, son, and holy ghost, for that one day only there was no son looking over the world and tsk-tsking at all the people in judgment. God was still there and the holy ghost, of course, was up to whatever holy ghosts do, but the son was dead and if that's true, there was no Trinity that day.

So, until the day I die, I'll give it it's special place, respect the two legs of the triangle, and call it Duality Day.

Unexpected Keys to Happiness

It's no surprise that I've lived my life wrong. If we consider getting better things, having better things, eating the best food, and having a manageable life success, I've failed on all counts. If I were a Sim or a character in a video game, I'd finish the game just about exactly where I started.

I'm not complaining, mind you. It's just that it took me beyond halfway through my life to see all the attitudes I should have adopted early on.

Like being sentimental, for instance.

I'm not sure how to change that, and at first blush it would seem to be a pretty rewarding thing. Looking at pictures or copies of old cards and correspondence invariably causes my heart to pause, get a wee bit warmer, and cause me to either sigh or wince. The trouble is, I tend to save everything that causes these reactions, which means I have tons of stuff that has no practical value.

I think the truly happy people maintain their possessions at a decent number. They have memories they can pull up without the need for any sort of physical prompt, and, while I guess I do, too, maybe I don't rely on my ability to do that as much as I should.

Maybe it's like most other things and comes with practice.

Imagine My Disappointment

I have no idea how long the last car cover lasted, but it didn't make through this year. I got it for the car before the one I have now, so I imagine I got my money's worth. A simple, unlined car cover, however, will eventually disintegrate after a few years of absorbing dew and rain, but I wonder if my spraying it with some camping version of Scotchguard contributed to its demise.

In any case, the old one began shedding pieces like a mangy bear, so I looked all over the Internet and ordered a new one. It arrived just in time for the next rain, too, so my timing couldn't have been better. It is, of course, too long by about a foot to properly fit my car, but it's the shortest car cover I was able to find. It has a distinctive inside and outside, the inside being covered with what reminds me of the world's thinnest Saran wrap, but I'm happy with it so far.

Nonetheless, there are a few things about it that sadden me. One, it came with what's titled a "User's Manual," complete with accurately placed apostrophe. On the down side, this manual is, in fact, no more than a single sheet of paper with printing restricted to one single side. The paper itself is thick and glossy, so maybe that counts for something, and the writing on it is broken down into five bulleted and bolded categories:

Before Using This Cover
Installation
Cleaning and Care
Important Safety Information
Caution

I'd guess there's, maybe, 200 words, total on the whole thing, and only two typos.

The manual warns me about thoughtlessly using the cover on vehicles with sharp bumpers, hood ornaments, or molding and mentions more than once that I should be careful if the tailpipes are hot. Other than that, very little useful information, although it's good to know I can wash the entire thing at a Laundromat (their capitalization) that has a commercial unit without an agitator.

The saddest thing about this purchase, however, isn't that they didn't include bungee cords to prevent ballooning, it's that the big box the cover came in didn't have a catalog. There was the user's manual, a length of string, and the car cover itself, enclosed in a bag of car cover material and fastened with a strap that resembled a dog harness. But, no catalog to entice me into buying more goods.

Not every company, of course, has a catalog that you can peruse at home for hours on end, but one of the reasons I got this particular car cover is that it came from ... you guessed it ... JC Whitney. I hadn't thought about them for years and was overjoyed to see that they were still in business, but I was really hoping to look through one of their catalogs again. I can't tell you how many hours of my youth I, and just about every guy I knew, wasted on looking through JC Whitney catalogs, planning and imagining using one of their products on our cars.

It wasn't just the steering wheel knobs, either, that captured our fancy. I don't think any guy, ever, was unaffected by the thought of an exhaust system dropoff (not for use on streets). Imagine having a chain-operated device you could operate from inside the car that would disengage everything from the exhaust manifold on back! How noisy! How powerful! How much fun!

But no catalog. I guess I could go back to their site and order or buy one, but if they'd included one with my purchase I'd rate them A++++ ... would buy again!

Falling Out of Favor

This year I didn't watch the Oscars, but it's not like I missed them by accident. It was easy to give the annual award ceremony a pass this year because of a few reasons, not the least of which is that I hadn't seen any of the films that were up for best picture.

Added to that is my increasing annoyance with most things Hollywood. Now I know that's blasphemy, especially considering where I live, but to be honest if all the Access shows fell off the air I wouldn't even notice. I do watch some late night shows, especially Craig Ferguson's, but I also routinely fast forward through them once the monologue or skits are over and the famous people show up to plug their latest. Whatever movie stars or celebrities think about anything doesn't matter to me one bit.

This year lots of people applauded the return of political speech to the Oscars, and, again, whatever value movie starts have, for me it's not their political persuasion. I happen to agree with them on most of the issues, but it's one of the agreements that makes me cringe when I hear them mention them, sometimes even to the extent of making me wish I held the opposing view.

Anyway, everyone involved in the entertainment industry (the "business") already gets plenty of rewards. From what I've seen, they spend nearly as much time congratulating and fawning over each other as they do actually performing, so they can certainly live a day or two without me. Yeah, a lot of it might be envy, but I performed my job for years and years without having Jon Stewart give me a high five or having those around me break into applause when I completed a program or developed an addressing scheme.

So, I didn't see the Oscars, but was able to see the results the next day and they were as un-exciting as I expected. I did, however, watch Obama and Jindal's speeches, and felt buoyed and annoyed, respectively. It was sorta fun seeing the followers of various websites take credit for the Jindal-Kenneth association, but not as satisfying as it could have been.

I need to get to work and stop this drifting.

Doing As The Romans Do

Now, I'm about as Catholic as Osama bin Laden, but that doesn't stop me from celebrating Lent. It's not as if I believe they're right or that they've grasped some handle that eludes me, or even some worthy display of solidarity, either, it's just that I believe it's a good thing from time to time to go without.

That's a good thing, too, because if there's anything I can claim to know, it's doing without.

Lacking even the most rudimentary of Catholic educations, I don't claim to exactly understand Lent, but I think it means that for the next month and a half I'm supposed to give up something to make it easier for me to get into heaven or something. Worse, what I'm supposed to do without isn't supposed to be something easy like sit-ups or pickled eel that I wouldn't even notice I wasn't avoiding, but has to be something I'd really like.

The simple answer, of course, would be cigarettes since that melds nicely into something I'm doing anyway, but I think that disqualifies it from being a Lent-worthy sacrifice.

I could give up lamb, which I enjoy quite a bit, but since I only get to indulge in that particular passion once or twice a year, I'm not sure passing up on lamb until April 11th would be very much of a stretch.

I suppose I could be selfish, not give up anything, and just go on living like normal, but I'm not very happy with how self-absorbed that would make me. Oh, sure, I could claim a religious exemption, but if I'm to be a member of society, I can't just go and willfully ignore what a decent percent of the population is going through. That would be as dumb as refusing to acknowledge the importance of kosher food.

I have a couple left, but I think I'll give up hard boiled eggs. I like those a lot and have them whenever I think of them or get a new dozen of the eggs from Trader Joe's that have some sort of egg information lasered right onto their shells, but I hope I don't forget how to boil them during my short time away from them.

I also hope I don't get thrown into any jail and be forced to make my mark there without my calling.

Grrrr--rrowl

It's been over six weeks now since my last cigarette, and I only have myself to blame.

About nine hours into this process my breathing improved. And, while the passageways to my lungs got better, I still don't have any more lung capacity than one of those premature octuplets, so it's not like I can be any more active than when I smoked like a wildfire and looked way cool every waking moment.

I've been using these patches and am now down to the final step of the three step process. The patches, which began nearly the size of baseballs, are now about as big as a nickle, though they cost about the same. These last step patches, which deliver a whopping seven mg of nicotine a day, are the equivalent of smoking four or five cigarettes a day, a number I used to easily knock off before waking up in the morning.

Whenever I go to the next step in this process, I've learned to expect a couple things. One, of course, are nasty headaches, but continual annoyance with the world around me is nearly as certain. I can also expect to spend a few days thinking a great deal about smoking, and I guess it's good news that the last time I'll need to go through this is the end of next week. That last step, being patch and cigarette free, should theoretically last a lifetime.

Because of these nicotine patches, most of the info I find on the Internet is wrong. All of the health benefits of living without nicotine are, of course, lost on me because even though I'm not smoking, I'm still getting more nicotine than anyone in the world who isn't a smoker. Then again, no one who isn't a smoker ever gets any nicotine anyway, so that's not saying much.

All of that blood pressure or heart or circulation stuff to the extremities is still at least a month away, so I'll need to be patient. One disappointment I have is not hacking up large chunks of lung. In fact, I haven't really coughed at all, and I've spent years looking forward to bringing up black chunks like my friends talked about when they quit. It may be that my time is coming, or they may have been lying about it, but if it comes I'll be both ready and happy.

Still, it may be to my benefit not to be doing that yet. While those around me are catching the flu or coming down with colds, bronchitis, or allergic reactions to land, sea, and air, the thick, protective covering of tar I've built on my lungs is performing as advertised and keeping all the bad things from infecting me.

Still, I gotta admit I'm still uncertain about never having another cigarette, and I can see it going either way. I know the only way to quit is to consider oneself a non-smoker, but I'm still fascinated by the prospect of not smoking. I know I can avoid smoking, but I'm still not sure that I never want to.

A Common Complaint

While I've come up with answers to most of life's big questions, that's not to say that I've run out of other interesting ones. Some of these still don't have any satisfactory answers, while others are fun to wonder about for days on end.

The answers, pretty much, are never as interesting as the act of questioning, which is another of those entertainments that's falling out of favor. As much as ever, I guess, people think that just because they can ask something that there's an answer, and, worse, that every question has a simple answer.

I, along with just about everybody else, have long since found answers for all the simple things. The trouble is we've all gotten spoiled by those and have come to believe every question has a simple answer. While some things may result from a single, identifiable cause, I think we expect too much when we think everything should be so easily solved. It makes sense that a brick breaks because we hit it with a very heavy hammer, but why we fall in or out of love isn't quite so simple.

And, yet, we often look for a single, simple answer for all of our questions or problems. Worse, again, is that if we're faced with a problem, we'll stop asking once we find an answer that isn't impossible. If we ask why some jerk drives like a maniac, we'll stop asking once we come up with an answer we find satisfactory, the same way we stop looking for the match to an orphan sock once we find its mate. When we look for something physical, like that sock or missing car keys, we stop when we find it (usually in the last place we look), and we carry that practice into intellectual questions even though the two activities aren't really analogous.

When we find an answer to why someone acts like a jerk, we haven't exhausted the possibilities or even come close to doing so. Things like that may have one cause, but there's no reason to believe that any more than that there's a single reason why the Jews and Arabs can't stop fighting long enough to raise a single season's crops.

Some things, some activities, and nearly every human one, can't be reduced to single cause, and yet we constantly seek the answer and hope to be the first to mention it on one of the Sunday morning talk shows. I have no idea what incites some people or what causes them to act the way they do, but one thing I'm certain is that they rarely even consider why the act the way they do, either.

It's better to speak, act, and write in a way that makes you look awesome than it ever is to wonder why you want to impress everyone anyway.

Waiting for Rain

By this time tomorrow, with any luck at all, I'll be done with my latest batch of chili and onto finishing up the Chinese Food.

According to the little pamphlet that comes with the nicotine patches I should be enjoying food more now, which I very well may be. This is around the time, they say, when food begins tasting better, and if it weren't for the sheer quantity of it that I've been shoveling in, there's a good chance that I'd notice something like that. As it is, what I'm noticing is that this batch of chili isn't one I'm likely to mention ever again.

I screwed up with the tomatoes, which are pretty important. I used a can of whole tomatoes instead of crushed ones, or diced ones, and spent a good part of the simmering time trying to cut, slice, and halve the floating red eyes with the side of a wooden spoon, which was about as effective as you can imagine. I even tried mashing them, hoping to turn them into a thick paste, but the mushy red eggs stood up pretty good to that assault, too.

In the end, you could easily count the number of tomatoes that were in the can since each was a spoonful unto itself. The rest of the stuff in the chili wasn't bad and the pot didn't end up too hot or spicy, but I'll go to my grave before I learn anything about how salty or not it was. All the time I was cooking it -- hell, for the past month -- I've been supplementing my breathing with sunflower seeds, which may also explain why I may not be able to taste anything. Even the "lower sodium" variety, which I mix with the ranch, BBQ, or jalapeno flavored bags, is pretty salty judging by my sudden fondness for all things liquid, so I don't know if the chili is too salty, not salty enough, or just right.

I may not make chili during the rainstorm scheduled to begin tomorrow because I also splurged on some Chinese food. It's been about the only prepared food I've had in the past year or so, a bi-monthly delicacy woven with a handful of lunches, and I'm well enough known by the women at the Hunan Kitchen or whatever it's called, that they smile big and wave vigorously when I approach to order. I mangled out my best imitation of a white guy saying Happy New Year in Chinese this time around, but I don't trust my accent and they may have thought I was asking about their scarves or the color of the wall tiles.

Anyway, I don't know. Maybe I'll just give up making chili.

Tenuous Humanity

It's been over two weeks now since I last smoked a cigarette, and that's not very long at all. Normal people, of course, can go a couple weeks without smoking or drinking and not even notice it. Their lives are filled with exasperations, delights, and pleasures, just like mine, but lack the drama I slather on every human condition.

Even after this admittedly short time without cigarettes, I'm noticing some differences.

Not smoking pros:

Breathing is easier and quieter than it used to be. I don't need to breathe through my mouth, and I can make my way up 100 stairs without having to stop and catch my breath. I've also saved a little bit of money, but that isn't the same as getting any more.

Not smoking cons:

It's actually possible to spend well over three-fourths of every day thinking about cigarettes and smoking. That's not to say that I'm frequently wishing I had a cigarette, only that I think about them quite a bit. I have a new respect for those who can go months and even years without smoking.
Boy, am I getting fat. I haven't owned a scale in decades, but I think I'm gaining weight, mostly an unexpected result of continually eating. I rarely want a cigarette when I'm eating, so I'm doing nothing but that now to make it easier on me.
I have the attention span of an annoyed gnat. I cannot sit, watch TV, write, read, or damn near anything for longer than ten or fifteen minutes without having to find a new amusement. I cannot imagine how anyone who doesn't smoke ever accomplishes anything. I'm also just on the verge of losing it in a fit of rage at every waking moment, but I think that's due to nicotine withdrawal. I can only imagine how much worse I'd feel if I wasn't wearing a patch that constantly dumped nicotine into my bloodstream.

I've hardly smoked at all this whole month, but I keep interrupting my stream of days. I know I'll never make it to one month without smoking if I can't make it through, say, day fifteen, but I'm driving myself nuts. The good thing is, it's only me that's being driven mad, but it won't be much longer before I snap at my innocent dog and make him wonder why he didn't bite me years ago.

Taking deep, satisfying breaths isn't very satisfying, but the novelty of it may keep smoke free for a little longer. It's also supposedly a way to calm down, but I think I need to learn how normal people react and deal with life. A life without cigarettes, drinks, or drugs is normal, and it's about time I learned that.

this ancient and hopeless struggle

New Year's Morning, 2009

After a couple hours of looking around the Internet and sending greetings to Croatia, I settled in front of the TV to watch the Tournament of Roses Parade. The first thing I saw was the Wells Fargo logo, and things have gone downhill ever since.

Maybe I'm getting old, but I'd be content to die this year. The way things are going isn't to my liking and I'm convinced it's unstoppable. Even the Rose Bowl game, which held out against commercialization, is now "presented by Citi," which is the same thing as renaming it.

Anyway, back to the parade. I'll see if I can update this as things appear...


Hydrogen car -- I wonder how the total energy to build, fuel, and run this car over its life compares to others.

Marine marching band -- Leaving aside the military aspect, I'm impressed. The other bands in the parade always look sloppy compared to these guys, who know how to march in step!

Weather -- The hosts on TV always mention our weather, and I always picture people in Michigan packing up and moving here.

"See the floats after the parade!" -- I couldn't help noticing that there's a $7 charge to see the floats when they're parked. Making money is the defining characteristic of life.

Honda Asimo -- Hooray for corporations!! (commercial sponsors are everywhere) Crowds cheer!

"Hats off to entertainment!" -- The theme for this year's parade is as controversial as ever. I predict a massive backlash from the anti-entertainment crowd, always huge fans of parades.

There's a veterinarian riding along with the skateboard-riding dogs, just to ease PETA's expected outrage and calm everyone's concerns.

National Assn of Realtors float -- "Celebrating home ownership." In today's economic climate, using the broadest possible definition, I suppose you could say owning a home is entertaining.

Kaiser-Permanente Float -- Proving that repairing members of your species is economically rewarding!

...I should probably check to see what percent of the floats win some sort of award...

...I wonder about Lou Dobbs' reaction to the Mexican marching band...

...I hope it wasn't too hard for the Broken Horn Ropers to find a black guy to twirl a rope and dress up like a cowboy...

Big cheers for firemen and police. No comment.

Thanks to this year's parade, I've been able to see the world's tallest horse. After it walked by, it sounds like the American's Horses Network drops the parade coverage.

...and the parade's over. Seeing the dancing girls sleeveless is much more rewarding than last year, when it was rainy. Still, I prefer flowers over big balloons (sorry, Macys).