225 Words

The power went off at about 6:30 last night. The light and computer flickered, went dead, and then I heard a POW! I was just about to get myself some dinner. Instead, I grabbed the book I'm struggling through (Quicksilver, the first of The Baroque Cycle); the character who supposedly makes the first two books worth reading has finally been introduced. After more than 300 pages.

So, I raced the setting sun and read.

At one point, the light I left on brightened and the phone beeped to tell me the power was flowing. I raced for my alarm clock to set it when the lights flickered out again. And again I heard a POW!

I settled into reading, again.

As the sky was darkening, the lights came back and the phone beeped. Power was flowing. I waited, though. I didn't want to get excited. I was hungry and wanted dinner, but didn't want to open the fridge because the last time power went out like this (with a POW!); it was out the whole night. Fortunately that night had been a Friday and there wasn't any need to worry about when I woke up the next morning. Plus, I had already eaten that night.

Two minutes later, the power was still on, so I made dinner, ate, washed up, and to bed I went.

Read or Read or Both

I spent nearly three hours sitting in a chair in another office, reading.

Sure, I got up occasionally to mark someone off the docket (that's what they call it over in the other office, we call it a calendar) and make some small talk with an attorney or two, but most of the time was spent reading.

Let me tell you, knowing that I got paid to read for three hours has made me feel so good. Sure, it's a waste of time and money for The State, but it's a job that has to be done because we're borrowing a hearing room in that other office. Someone has to be there.

Is it my fault that there's no computer over there for me to do work on? No.
Is it my fault that I can't put files back on shelves without leaving the office? No.
Is it my fault that I can't do anything that's actually related to my normal job other than small talk with lawyers? No.
So, isn't it the state's choice that I do nothing? Yes. Yes, it is.

Besides, if I had been at my desk I would have spent a total of 30 minutes doing actual work and the rest screwing around on the Internets. That's not nearly as relaxing, nor entertaining as reading a good book.

I wish they'd pay me to read each and every day I'm here.

Where can I get a job like that?

Imagery

Not to lessen what she's feeling or anything like that, but I wanted to comment on this image she used to describe how she's feeling:

I'm rolling into one of my depressions. It's not depression in a clinical sense. Rather, it feels like an actual depression, like a bowl-shaped dip. At the bottom it's lonely and cold and sad, but it takes too much effort to roll back up the other side. I don't have the momentum.

I like that. It's this wonderful image that makes me think Sisyphus. It's also right on, especially at the beginning.

I'd never have thought of this image, though. I've always thought of it more like being on a high pole where one wrong shift in weight or a strong enough breeze will send you falling into nothing. So it's best to stay as still as possible.

Maybe that's more what it's like later on.

A Viability Question

Would anyone in their right mind buy a comic book of talking heads for 48 or so pages?

It would be two people answering the same questions about their friendship, but never hearing the others answers. Sort of a "he said, she said" sort of thing.

Not that I could draw it myself or it would ever actually exist outside my head, but I wish I to know.

Vacation Days

I mailed off applications and other stuff to Cowtown three weeks, or so, ago. The deadline for filing an application for the two positions was two weeks ago. I'd really like to hear something back.

A huge part of me is afraid that I won't get interviews there because I also asked them if they could schedule my interviews for a Friday or a Monday morning because of the long drive I have to make to get there. I left out the other reasons, like enjoying having an excuse for a long weekend. Yeah, it makes me feel better when I take a day off from work because I have an interview, how about you? Can you just take any old day off without an excuse and feel okay about it?

Along those lines, I've been thinking a lot about setting up some sort of tour vacation. Sure, I can't afford it right now and probably not next year either, but if I stay on schedule I'll have my final student loan paid off at the end of 2009. 2010 I could go. Get some package and go to Salzburg and Munich and Bern, or a cruise from St. Petersburg to Moscow, or Rome and Florence and Venice, or go to Viet Nam or Thailand or Pakistan or Egypt or New Zealand. I don't know, yet. 2010 is a long way away. Hell, I don't even have a Passport; kind of need one of those if I ever want to get out of the country.

I guess the only, realistic, thing I have to worry about between now and then is how much this sort of thing will cost me in two years. What with gas prices going up and the value of the US dollar going down by a flight across an ocean may more than double. I bet my salary won't.

I could probably start more local. You know, like Alaska or New York or Hawaii. Probably be cheaper, too. Well, maybe not Alaska. Alaska would sort of have to be done on a cruise to be able to see a large amount of the immense state. And I'd rather not do the other two with a tour group, but also not by myself.

Well, two years is a long time. Who knows what'll happen between now and then?

Right?

Stimuli

I got my stimulus check yesterday.

I really didn't expect to get that amount of money. Seemed like too much for me.

Not that I'm complaining about getting more money than I thought I would. It'll pay for all my car insurance for rest of the year and I'll be able to pay off my credit card before I get paid rather than waiting for my paycheck and I'll be able to send a little extra to the last of my student loans (that's right, I'm doing the un-American thing and paying bills rather than SPENDING the money, suck on it President Junior), but...

Well, see, I'll probably be paying it all back next year. Hell, everyone in the U S of A will probably be paying back their stimulus next year, except for those people who don't get one, I guess. I know that the president and his people are hoping that everyone who gets a check will go out and buy a Blu-ray or an X-Box or something to give the economy a bump which will, supposedly, get people excited and then will start buying over-priced homes again.

I'm not a believer, though. Sure, the Laffer Curve makes sense to me, but... I don't think it has anything to do with what I'm writing.

Actually, I don't understand economics very well. Will this help bump the economy out of the slide to recession? Not sure, but my gut says no. Will people use this money to pay down debt or save? Probably not. A lot of people who got a refund this year are going to be wondering why they owe money next year, though, and be pissed about it. I'm already pissed about it.

A Power of Money

So, I pretended I wanted to buy one and went through the phone thing I wrote about this morning to see what the plans were.

Yeah.

Okay, the cheapest one, the one with the least minutes and not unlimited minutes on weekends, was $39.99 a month, pretty comparable to just about everything out there. Then, to get the deal on the phone, you have to get the phone internet connection thing.

Yeah.

The cheapest one of those is $30 per month and limits what you can do for free on the 'net. The more expensive one is twice as much and lets you do wireless stuff through a Bluetooth. I don't understand why that should cost more if you can already access the intersblag. Is it that much faster? It had better be like 8 times faster.

Whatever.

And the at least $70 a month is all wrapped up into a nice-for-them 2-year contract.

Yeah.

I don't think that, even with the great deal on a cool phone, I'm going to be ordering one of these.

The thing is that I'd like a mobile phone. I could get rid of my land line and hold on to one phone number for a long, long time, even if I move to another city.

The problem is that I don't use the phone that much. I only pick it up like once, maybe twice, a week. The rest of the time the machine picks up and whoever called hangs up.

Right now, I pay about $17.50 each month for that honor. I'm sure as hell not going to spend four times as much to not use a phone more than a couple of times each week.

"Ah, but what about those prepaid phones?" some savvy reader may ask.

To which I'd reply, "The ones I've looked at aren't quite right either."

See, it looks like there are two deals:
1) You get a phone and then buy the prepaid time on a card. After a given amount of time, the money you put up expires.
--OR--
2) You get a prepaid contract that you re-up every six months or a year, when ever it expires and the money you didn't spend moves over to the next contract period, but if you decide to go to another company, or in some cases a new phone, you lose all the money you've spent.

Neither one seems like a good plan for a guy like me.
1) I don't want to lose money by not using the time I've already bought because I'm not "popular" or I prefer being face to face or write an e-mail.
--OR--
2) There goes any thought to having flexibility on a prepaid plan.

And here I am, mobile phoneless and quite likely to remain this way, even if I do move.

AAAAAAARGH!

HOLY MOTHER OF FUCKING SHIT!

If only it'd talk about what kind of service plans one'd be roped into!

In Honor of a Film, Released Today

When new movie version of The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe was released on DVD I pissed off a friend by asking her who the Pevensie kids were going to marry and have kids with since they're all related. I mean they don't want to go the whole incest route and have flipper babies, do they?

She told me that there are other humans.

Not in Narnia, I said.

She said that other humans lived in the other lands.

I asked her how they can be humans. How can they be humans if they're not Sons of Adam and Daughters of Eve?

I could tell she wanted to throttle me, but I went on to say that if the other people aren't Sons of Adam and Daughters of Eve, wouldn't it be like having sex with a shaved chimp that had plastic surgery to look more human? Would the God of Adam and Eve be okay with that? Or would it be more like Kirk having sex with an Orion Slave Girl? She's a big Star Trek fan.

She insisted that there are other humans in Narnia.

I asked her to show me the proof. Just because something looks human doesn't mean it is. Didn't we learn anything from the first Terminator movie?

Shut the fuck up, she told me.

They're going to have flipper babies, I said, under my breath, flapping there way through life. No wonder there are no kings and queens in Narnia when Caspian’s ancestors take over.

No matter. Never mind.

rank
diamond
appeal
mint
yearn
soft
lipid
slick
round
shelf
bumpy
ulcer
glue
sharp
zilch
bright
gloss
fold
soft
common
weak
hammer
kiln
quince
needle
down
game
theory
essence
trunk
wisp
illium
black
pin
xenon
punch
tip
stretch
band
grasp
reach
shimmer
vapid
force
jam
oxen
vet
ball
top
plant

Dear Co-Workers,

Why is it that every time we happen to pass each other on the way to the printers, or while searching for files, or any time at all that you happen to see me, you feel the need to greet me as if we didn't say "Hello" when we first got here in the morning?

Shouldn't that one greeting be enough to last us the whole day?

Sure, you've been in your cube across the room and I've been in mine and we haven't spoken for ninety minutes, but we both know that we're here. So why react as if one of us is just arriving several times a day?

And, seriously, a greeting after your or my lunch break is also unnecessary. It's a break that's mandated by the union. We both know we're coming back in an hour, tops, so why treat it as if one of us has been on vacation for a week?

Is it because you need some stimulus, other than ocular, to be convinced that I'm really here? You're too far away to touch me and hopefully you can't smell me and we're not in the kind of relationship where you should be tasting me, so I suppose you'd have to use your ears to back up what your eyes see. Do you often have problems seeing people who aren't really there? Do those people you see not respond when you greet them? If so, they phone number you should call is (718) 555-2368. I don't know if they travel outside of New York, but it's worth a shot.

Maybe you're afraid that I'll think you're rude if you don't greet me every time you see me. I won't. I promise. Do you think I'm rude when I just smile and nod when I see you the second through twelfth time in a day? Give me a smile. Nod a little. That's all the acknowledgement that I need. I trust my eyes to give me decent information, so I don't need you to reaffirm that you really are in the room.

You should trust your eyes, too.

Thanks.

Mood

The rotten mood has been compounded by a headache.

In other news, my first thought was jumping jacks, but I'm sure that's not right.

Questions

Out of a horribly morbid sense of curiosity, which is worse: 1) Children coming to realize that they aren't a parent's favorite daughter or son? or 2) Children realizing that a parent loves him or herself more than the children?

Sookie in September!

Must have HBO by September!

Hypocrisy?

It may be an exaggeration, but I hate the CSI shows with a fiery passion.

The first time I watched an episode was while I was visiting some friends. They enjoyed the show. I was pretty indifferent about it until they did something really, really stupid:

The team found a body that had been stabbed. To find out what kind of a blade was used to stab the guy, the lab person decided it was best to pour plaster into the wound and, after it had hardened, use the casting to to find the type of blade.

I need to repeat that: They poured plaster into a hole in a humans gut and got a perfect casting of a knife blade.

My brain immediately cried out "BULLSHIT!"

I've used plaster to make castings in sand and dirt and always the plaster has pushed some of the sand or dirt out from the point that I poured it. Always. And the inside of a human body is way squishier than sand. That plaster would have gone into the cut and spread out, pushing the flesh out, and then hardened into a lump that looked nothing like a knife.

Then there was the episode where a woman lined up a hundred little lasers to show where each and every bullet came from. Sure, it looked cool in the dark, dusty room, but I just couldn't believe that any police department did that, even on in Vegas.

The knife and the lasers may have set me off, but I could have forgiven the pseudoscience if the police work had been more realistic. CSI people, no matter their rank, don't do the foot work. They take pictures of the crime scene. They look for any evidence. They analyze the evidence. And they take their analysis to the detectives on the cases and the district attorney's office. They don't, or very rarely, draw their sidearm and chase suspects into abandoned building then grill 'em in an interrogation room until the suspect breaks down and confesses or at least points them to the right person. No. They spend most of their time in a lab, playing with chemicals and such to build evidence that the DA can use in court.

Now, if the show choose only one crazy thing to do, the pseudoscience or super-CSIs, I may have been more forgiving, but the show does both, and it drives me nuts.

I think I've given the original CSI a fair shake. I've watched several episodes, by choice. I watched the two directed by Quentin Tarantino because I hoped that he could bring something new to the show. He didn't. They looked and sounded and felt exactly like a regular episode. I watched the Wil Wheaton episode because for a time I actually thought I could support his acting career by doing so. I'm pretty sure it didn't, though. And there have been other random episodes here and there, but nothing has convinced me that it's worth my time.

Of the New York one, I've only seen the episode from Miami that introduced the basic characters. I have to admit that out of the three main guys on these shows, Gary Sinise chews the scenery the best. Still can't bring myself to watch the show, though.

All that said, I have to admit that I've seen quite a few episodes of CSI: Miami. I wish I could say that it was because I only get two channels that aren't in Spanish or about "God." No. I wish I could say that it's better than the others in the franchise. It's not. I can't stand the guy in charge of the department. He sucks.

The only reason I watch CSI: Miami is Emily Procter. Not only is she stunning, she has a wonderful Southern accent that tickles my fancy. (It tickled my fancy years before when she played Ainsley Hayes on West Wing, too.)

So, I will continue to hate the CSI shows, but until Ms. Procter leaves, I'm afraid I'll be watching one.

Part of the Day

Long day today.

Honestly, though, when has there been a short day?

If I ever wrote about one, I don't remember it.

Ah, well, at least the work part of the day is almost over. Soon comes the laze around watching a DVD part of the day. Next comes the dinner and more DVD part. Then the read in bed part. And finally the sleep part.

How unfortunate it starts again a few hours later.

sick, sweet, tight, wicked, crazy, dope, gnarly, sex, shit, bad, insane, phat, awesome, the shit, badass, killer

To say that I've been in a crappy mood for the past six or so weeks would be like saying only some tuna is eaten each year.

I don't know what started it, but I do know how it was exacerbated in late March and since then, I haven't been able to shake the thing.

Also, there are the people at work.

There are three guys near my age. The youngest is maybe two years younger and the oldest is maybe six moths older than me.

When our office was upstairs, I was separated from the other guys by an aisle. Here, I'm place between two of them and they like to talk to each other. That would be okay if they talked about a variety of topics, and they don't.

They talk about video games. All. The. Time.

For most of April they talked about getting new maps for Call of Duty. It was always, "Hey have you downloaded the new maps?" "Nah, I couldn't get on." "Oh, man, they are so sick." "Yeah?" "Yeah. I found this place where I could sit and snipe. I burned so many last night." "Dude?" "Yeah." And me, in the middle trying not to rip my hair out or jump up screaming before I run out of the office.

Okay, so I can occasionally join in, but it's mostly to ask about hardware and the capabilities of the machines and reaction to the controls and such. I don't care about the games.

Then, last week, it got worse. The new Grand Theft Auto came out. Now it's all I hear about. I hear lots of "Did you do... ?" and "Have you got... ?" and "What's up with... ?" and "Did you meet... ?" and "It was so sick when... ." And I am already fucking tired of it.

Yeah, I understand being excited about something. Yeah, I understand really enjoying something. And yeah, I understand wanting to talk about these things with other people who enjoy them, too. I get it. Really.

My problem is when it's the only thing these people talk about.

Well, that's totally true, they do, occasionally, talk about work, but as soon as that's over, the talk moves to a game. The talk about the game last at least three times as long as the work talk did. And everything is "hella" this and "hella" that.

And then they do it again and hour later. And an hour after that. And an hour after than. And when they get back from lunch. And when I get back from lunch. And then... And then... And then...

And then I want to drive my head through the plate glass windows.

"All The Odds Are In My Favor"

I knew this girl who loved Cabaret.

We had a class together in college. It was 20th Century American Drama, which always struck me as silly because before the 20th century, the United States didn't produce much original theater, other than Vaudeville, and that's not exactly fully scripted before the company went on stage. I mean, the US had to discover its own unique sort of prose and poetry before it could move properly into drama, and we didn't find either prose or poetry until the late 1850s and they didn't really blossom until after the Civil War. Hell, the US had to have a critic stand up and ask where the American poets were and who was going to be The Poet to lead the writers of the US out from under the shadow of Europe and into the sun so it could become its own being. Lucky for him, and us, there was a poet who was both conceded enough and good enough to stand up and say, "Hey, I'm over here, brah." But the playwrights took longer even. They had to find places to stage their visions and backers who were willing to produce the plays and actors willing to perform. With all that outside money and influence involved, it's hard to not just write what you know will sell. It happened, though, but not much before the 20th century came to pass I think if there had been a 19th Century American Drama class, it would have lasted three sessions: 1) Introduce class and hand out syllabus. 2) Discuss readings. 3) Turn in final paper and take only test on readings. You probably wouldn't get much interesting insight on the readings, either

Anyway, we had a class together, but that's not where we met. Not really.

We met in the hallway outside the classroom.

I, being me, never knew what to do between classes, especially if I had an hour or more to wait. Other people probably went and bought a snack or met friends or lounged around on some patch of shady grass or Frisbeed the time away, I didn't, though. (I was so popular that I wasn't invited to the New Year's party that was thrown in the house I lived in by a friend I'd know since we were sophomores in high school that included lots of old friends. Yeah, I was that popular.) I'd go to building my next class was in and if there was a class in the room I'd plunk myself down on the floor in the hall across from the door. Usually, I was by myself until ten or so minutes before class started, but the second day of this class, about five minutes after I sat down, a girl sat across from me.

I was reading. I don't know what, exactly. Sometimes I read something for fun. Sometimes I was doing the reading for the class before class. And sometimes I'd read stuff for the class that I just left. She pulled out some big text book that I knew wasn't for the class we shared and started highlighting. I went back to my reading. Eventually, others came and we all headed into class.

The next class I got there first again, but when she got there she pulled out the reading for our class. After a while, she asked me what I thought about some character and I blah-blahed for a bit and then said that something, I don't know what, reminded me of Cliff from Cabaret.

She looked up, and for the first time looked me in the eyes. "You know Cabaret?" she asked.

"Yeah," I said. "It's a great movie."

"It's my favorite," she said.

"Movie?"

"Anything. I mean, I love Liza, but that show. God." She looked off, sort of above my head and to my right. "The songs. Christ. It's just amazing."

"So, you've seen it?" I asked. "I mean the play? With all the songs? 'Cause I've only seen the movie and I know they cut a lot of 'em."

"I've seen it," she said, looking at me again. "We performed it at our high school."

"Really? In high school?"

"Yeah, we had this great drama teacher."

And we chatted on for the rest of the hour. Not about school, but about a play and a movie that we both enjoyed. When we got into class I sat where I liked to sit and she sat next to a guy who was, and probably still is, much prettier than me. It was okay, though, it's not like we were friends.

Then next time she got right down to it and asked me my name and major. After I told her I asked her what her major was, as is the proper procedure in this kind of college conversation.

And so, we started talking. Soon the talking turned away from school related stuff and toward other things. I probably learned more about her than she did about me. I often listened more than I spoke; it's just the way that I am. I learned why she choose her major and what she'd rather have been doing. What kind of men she liked. Her drinking habits. Her occasional job. Her current job. About the guy she was sort of/not quite dating, but they stayed up one night to watch the sun rise and he both tortured and titillated her. Where she wanted to be five years after graduation. Where she expected to be five years after graduations. And there was more.

It's not like she did all the talking. She listened to me talk about my family and friends. I told her about what I hoped to do after college. She's the only person who knew the beats of the novel I wanted to write. And other things that I didn't often speak easily about to anyone. It was okay with her. Safe.

After a few weeks, I understood why she liked Cabaret so much. She wanted to be Sally Bowles. She wanted the freedom that Sally appears to have. She wanted the ability to shut out everything that didn't have to do with her immediate wants. She wanted to be away from all the things that bothered her and be surrounded by pretty things and pretty people. Her problem was that she couldn't ignore the world around her like Sally could. She noticed changes in the world and took many of them to heart.

Some days, another girl from the class would show up and sit across from me, next to the one who liked Cabaret. When that happened, we didn't talk anymore. It was okay, though, it's not like we were friends.

One day, she talked a lot about her job. She was a waitress at a cafe where all the waiters and waitresses sang for the diners, mostly stuff from musicals because that's what the diners knew. She told me that the head piano player, who was also the guy in charge of all the music, tapped her to sing "Maybe This Time." There a light in her eyes that I'd never seen before in the weeks since we'd met. It was the first time I'd seen her truly excited over anything. It made her beautiful.

Six sessions from the end of the classes, I decided to ask her out to go for coffee or a movie or even a drink, which I didn't do. Five sessions from the end, I chickened out. Four sessions from the end, I caught her after class to ask her, but before I could, she let me know how much she appreciated me and in what way, and while she meant it as a compliment, a nice thing, it didn't feel that way to me, though. It still doesn't. I didn't ask. And for the last three sessions, I spent my hour elsewhere.

After the final, the next time I saw her was six or seven weeks into the next quarter. She spotted me as I crossed from the quad to the sidewalk by the library and called out. I walked up to her. She told me about the day the piano player turned to her, smiled, and nodded and she first sang "Maybe This Time" in front of an audience. She succeeded beyond her own expectations and I was excited for her. We stood on the corner blocking foot traffic for forty-five minutes, just talking. In the end, I gave her my phone number because she said we should get together and just talk some more.

She never called. It's okay, though. It's not like we were ever really friends.

Photo Phursday

Because I'm really 11 years old.

Photo Phednesday

The Flying Spaghetti Monster Heels made. I should get a little pirate. He can't be more than 3/4th of an inch tall, though. We want to make sure that The Flying Spaghetti Monster continues to keep all His grandeur.

Photo Phuesday

The so-called art in the lobby of the building I work in:

From the entrance.

Near the elevator. (Sorry about the skylight. Who knew it was going to be so sunny that morning?)

From the third floor.

I think it's supposed to represent birds.

Photo Phonday

Answering the question no one has asked: Where do you keep your comics?

These are the long boxes. The stack is mostly Strangers in Paradise, I think. And the brown box is all Cerebus, but not the whole series.

Comics I've read since I moved here. Some have been bought and others lost their places in the boxes.

These are the comics I've read most recently. I'm not sure how long it's been growing. At least two months

Photo Phunday

This is a painting on a bench in the Courthouse Park. It took me nearly a year of walking past it to realize what she was holding to herself.

I'm sure most of you have figured it out already, but you're not the perverts I am.

Photo Phaturday

The fake pond that I often sit by at lunch. The bench I sit on is off to the right. Usually the waterfalls are running, but I took the picture before the city guys got around to turning on the pumps. Also, in a week or so they'll come by and shovel out all the leaves, give the concrete a half-assed scrub, and add ten tons of chlorine, or bromine, to make the little park stink for a week. I guess someone on the city council doesn't like green ponds.

Photo Phriday

The building I work in. (Oh, yeah. I ended that sentence with a preposition.) Trust me, it's as ugly, or uglier, on the inside as it is on the outside.

The house that's for sale near my apartment. I've written about it before and even drew it.

Only $439,000 for two bedrooms! What a bargain!

Twitting

I don't use twitter. I don't hate it like I hate Facebook and MySpace and Friendster, I just don't use it. Sure, I'll check to see what Heels and Johnny Logic have to say (when they're not on vacation) a couple of times a day, but, other than that, it doesn't do anything for me. It seems useless.

Thank you Lore Sjöberg for explaining, in a funny way, why it's so useless.

EDIT: I should have included this Penny Arcade strip when I first posted, but I forgot about it until I read Jazz's comment.

Photo Phursday

Jesus blessing the cars.

This part of the church was build in 1900. It was closed to the public in the mid seventies because it's not earthquake safe. Regular people still aren't allowed inside.

I am my brother's biggest fan.

This was a project for his English class in 12th grade. Guess what they were reading...

I swiped this from my parents the last time I moved away from their house.

Photo Phednesday

I pass this house on my way from work. I really dig the tower thing. If only it had some crazy flag on top.

This one used to be a house, now it's apartments, or something. I mean I've seen at least fifteen different people go in and out of this place in the three years I've walked by it, twice a day.

Photo Phuesday

This house is right next to...

...this house.

I like to imagine that there used to be one house and then a child, probably a daughter, got married and was given a house... next door! What a wonderful gift!

Nice houses, though. Big, too.

Photo Phonday

Click if you want to read it.

Magnetic Poetry worked on from Jan 1, '07 to December 31, '07.

Photo Phriday

For practice, the teacher had us make a little skull. (It's only been bisqued. I don't know why I didn't put it in the high fire kiln.)

Then we got to make a big one to work toward the final project.

[Final Project Photo Unavailable]

The final project was to do the head of a person we knew. I choose to do my cousin for two reasons: 1. She's pretty symmetrical, I thought that'd make it easier. 2. I have trouble sculpting and drawing faces that look feminine, I thought this would be good practice.

In the end, it didn't look much like her, but it had her mischievous smile and it looked female. My goals were met and I was happy with my work. The instructor disagreed and ripped out the eyes and nose and mouth and cheeks and chin then rebuilt them to look more like the pictures of my cousin. It didn't have her smile, though. The only things left that I really made were the ears and the hair. I hated looking at it.

I packed it away and haven't seen it in years. I don't think I'll like it anymore now than I did then, though.

Photo Phursday

Once upon a time, I took a real sculpture class:

A hand was one of the first projects.

We only had a real model, once. He said he wasn't getting paid enough to take off his Speedo.(Although it didn't stop one woman from giving him what, in real life, would have been, at least, a foot long penis.)

He was, however, happy to show us his crack.

Fiction Friday #31

"Okay, Sonya," I said, not feeling comfortable with her name in my mouth. She'd been Mrs. Mayreux for as long as I could remember. Other kids may have been introduced to her as Sonya by their parents, but not mine. They believed that children had to show great respect to adults, especially coworkers and their spouses.

"Thank you," she said, picking up the menu in front of her.

I hadn't looked at mine since the waitress had dropped them on the table. I knew what I was getting. The Killer Burger. It was a one pound hunk of ground beef, twelve strips of bacon, and four different cheeses: cheddar, mozzarella, provolone, and swiss. "Western" style came piled with onion rings and was slathered in an "authentic" Kansas City sauce. "Veggie" style had avocado and sprouts. Me, I liked mine "classic," but with the onions caramelized and piled high. The Killer was so large, that it couldn't be held whole; it collapsed under its own weight. That didn't bother me, though.

The only question that went through my head was whether I was going to save half of it, or eat the whole thing. And that was a problem. I knew that saving some was the smart thing to do; I'd have a meal that I wouldn't have to worry about, but burgers are never as sublime as they are in the minutes after they came from the kitchen. Never again would the bun be absorbing the juices from the patty, mingling the meaty flavor with the slight wheaty sweetness. The bacon would never be as crisp. And the onions were never quite as slimy.

My stomach growled.

Sonya looked up and smiled, "Hungry?"

"I didn't eat this morning," I said.

"Why?"

"Preparing for lunch."

Her smile crinkled up and her brow furrowed.

"Just wait," I said. "You'll understand."

She looked down at her menu.

I dusted the sugar, that I had played with earlier, off the table and on to the bench beside me. I wondered how I'd get out of the booth without getting my butt all sugary.

After a bit, the waitress came back, pulling purple off her lips with her tongue and carrying a glass of water. She put the water down and asked, after her lips were pink again, "Can I get you anything to drink?"

"Iced tea," said Sonya, without looking up, "three lemons, on the side, and some of that raw sugar you have back there for the people who order espresso."

"'Kay," said the waitress, looking at me. "And you?"

"A Coke," I said.

She frowned, "We have Pepsi."

"Didn't you used to have Coke?" I asked. "I could have sworn I got a Coke in here before."

She looked like she wanted to shove her gum in my ears and push it in as far as she could. She knew I was being an ass. At the beginning of the school year, the university went and signed a deal with the Pepsi people to only serve Pepsi products on campus and at campus events. People were upset. Not because they like Coke's stuff so much or hated Pepsi's, but because they lost that choice. It was stupid, but that’s what we did there, make big deals over little things that we couldn't change but thought that maybe we could. It was easier than trying to change big things and being ignored when we knew we couldn't do a thing.

I took a deep breath and sighed. "I suppose Pepsi will do," I said, "but I'd rather have a Coke."

"Yeah," she said rolling her eyes and turning away, "wouldn't we all."

She left and Sonya was still looking at her menu, so I looked out the window and wondered, again, what was going through the head of the people who choose the design of the history department's building. It was a giant cube of concrete flanked on either side by two smaller cubes of concrete, connected by breezeways. Horribly, hideous buildings. Sometimes, though, when I pulled an all-nighter and was exhausted I imagined a giant robot made up of buildings around campus. The main history building was the body and the little ones, shoulders, with two of the silos making up arm; the tall, thin, silvery physics building made up the head, while the rec center and the main dining hall, turned on their ends, were the legs and feet.

Ah, the things that exhaustion and too much coffee caused one to see.

Only Because I Was Tagged

1. Link back to the person who tagged you.

2. Post these rules on your blog.

3. Share six unimportant things about yourself.

4. Tag six random people at the end of your entry.

---

1. Okay.

2. Okay.

3. I have a Flying Spaghetti Monster sitting in front of my monitor at work.
I throw my fingernail and toenail clippings into the driveway by shaking off the blanket they were clipped into.
I don't like bananas or shellfish or cephalopods or beets.
I only unbutton the top two buttons on my shirts so I can put them on or take them off; the rest stay buttoned.
I own three pairs of shoes that I rotate through, but none of them are "classy."
I think pesto is overrated.

4. Fuck no.

Beyond a Grunt

"How's life treating you?" he asked me.

I paused and thought about it. This question came from someone who I actually respect. So, should I give him the usual answer of okay, or an actual answer? Okay seemed to be out, because that wouldn't have meant anything. An actual answer would have been too long for the greeting/small talk he offered. The pause seemed to long to me, so I opened my mouth.

"Good enough," I said, "that I shouldn't complain about it, but bad enough that I still want to complain."

He smiled, "That just means you always have something to talk about."

Where Goes The Happy?

I came to work today filled with leftover happy from yesterday.

Early in the day, SHTK and SMSN argued over what time the main clock should be set to. SHTK then came over to me to bitch about us having to stay three minutes longer this evening (like any of us are actually working during those first three minutes of the day) and got really pissed at me when I interrupted her to let her know that I thought SMSN was right and SHTK was wrong. She's been glaring at me ever since and sort of snarls when I make a joke.

Then TMSV was working on files that were returned from storage because they couldn't fit into the boxes and she was doing stupid things, things that will make my job harder when they get shipped out again. I asked her not to do those stupid things. I know I wasn't diplomatic about it because I was surprised, even though I shouldn't have been, that she'd be so stupid. She basically told me to go fuck myself; she'd do what she wanted to do. Later, when I went over to ask her a question related to a piece of work I had, she got all huffy, like I had no right to interrupt her while she's sorting through her pile of work.

And I was so damned happy when I got here.

Grown Apart

People who need something from each other come together.

Eventually, something changes -- a job is found, a hobby is pursued, a move is made, a fight is had, a new person is discovered -- and that need isn't there anymore.

Some try to hold onto what they had. They visit when they can. They call and talk on the phone. They e-mail back and forth. They try to recapture what they once had.

In time, the visiting stops and there are less phone calls and less e-mails. The calls and letters that do happen become more terse. The conversations stay on the surface. Questions that attempt to delve are pushed aside with a joke, or are just ignored. Both do this, not to be cruel, but because they're not where they were and don't feel the connection they once did.

Then one doesn't return a phone call or answer an e-mail in a timely manner. The other waits, waits for a while before calling or writing again and the other hopes for an answer. When the answer comes, it's a sentence about being busy and a vague promise to write later.

The other waits again. After a time, the other quits waiting. Not out of spite, but because it's just not on the other's mind anymore. It's not as important as it used to be.

And the phone calls and the letters stop.

2008: The Odyssey Ends

Arthur C. Clarke is dead.

I've only read a few things that he's written, but there are many authors that I like were inspired by the man, like the guy I'm reading today, Stephen Baxter.

The biggies of the golden age of sci-fi are almost all dead now. Bradbury's still about. Who else?

Writers like Clarke have an impact that lasts far beyond their death. I just hope that the fans of the future remember the past.

Many Days

Two years ago, I wrote this about what I was going to be doing with my life: "Live my life like I'm living it until I find a way, a thing, or a person to make me want to live it in a different way."

Two years.

Funny, how little things changed in that much time.

'Course, when I think of some others, I think about how much their lives has changed in those 738 days.

Klurvopne

This year, because of the leap year, I don't have to use vacation time to not be at work on my birthday. Thank you, Leap Year.

This year, WingB and I are going to The Cartoon Art Museum. She doesn't know it yet, but later we'll be hopping onto MUNI and riding down to The Sunset for Thai food. It's totally worth it. All the stuff I've had around Market is too greasy, and I'd rather not do greasy if I don't have to.

If anyone else is around on that day, feel free to join us!

---

In other new, this is the third week without me writing a story. *sigh* Yeah I know what's supposed to happen next with the conversation. Part of me is lazy, a small part of me has been busy, and a large part of me just isn't read to put it down yet. Soon, hopefully. I know how many I've done and how many I wanted to have done by now. I want to catch-up, but I'm just not into right now. Soon.

---

Did you know that on years, like this one, when the 17th of March falls on or after Palm Sunday, St. Patrick's day falls on the Saturday before Palm Sunday?

It's true. It's supposed to help us stay true and stuff for the holy week before Easter. You know, no drunken parades and pissing in the street the week before we celebrate Jesus's rebirthday. Not that that'll stop the people of Boston, it's still an interesting thought.

Me? I'll be doing the corned beef and cabbage thing on Sunday, after I go shopping. This way the veggies won't get too soggy before I get at 'em.

I Feel Like A Dick, Again

Kalinara of Pretty Fizzy Paradise fame decided the other day to start a flame war on her blog.

I read through the first set and thought it was pretty funny. So, I left one of my own, attacking one of the commenters (or should it be commentators here?). I felt like such a jerk after that.

This morning there were more, and two aimed directly at me! I thought it was even more funny having people insult me in the flame war. I left another comment trying to burn the two who went after me and then a general insult to the whole board. And I felt like an even bigger schmuck.

The main reason I think I feel like such an asshole is because, for a moment, it felt so damned good to say horrible things to decent people.

Low Man

Last week SMSN was out of the office. She's the person called "lead clerk." She's called this because the last time they made someone in her class the "supervisor" it blew up in their faces (Of course, it didn't get any better when that person was raised to the actual supervisor class, but I digress.) She came back on Monday. Each day since then, we clerks have received an e-mail from her telling us different ways that we have fucked up.

The first one was right on. One of our jobs is to make sure certain documents have been signed. If they're not signed, we get them signed. If we just send them on, they can't be processed. And since EVERYTHING that moves a file is on a deadline, the longer things like signatures go unnoticed, the more likely our office is going to be dinged. So, we all need to be more vigilant about the signatures. (The main problem with this complaint, though, is that out of the fifty or so files that were sent to her last week that SHE's processed, only one didn't have a signature. I think for the most part, we're pretty good about this one.)

In the second one she reminded us to put the date and our initials at the top right of the front page of every document that we process. The problem with this one is that when the documents get to her, the first page she sees isn't always the front page. If we send stuff to secretaries, they readjust it. As do the judges. So, if she doesn't go through everything, how does she know that we didn't initial it? I understand, though, that it's easier for her just to say we aren't doing something, rather than actually investigating.

Today's e-mail told us that we aren't putting lien paperwork in the right place in the files. Liens have their own special brad on the backer. They all go there. Someone (a secretary) brought a file to her attention where a lien was on the main brad, not the lien brad. Her e-mail told us to remind US not to put the liens on the first brad, but on the second. 'Course, she didn't remind the secretaries to do this too. And they put a lot more liens into files than we do, since most liens come in while the files are with the judges. It's our fault, though. It must be.

Buying Books

On Sunday, after going to a movie, I spent about two hours wandering around Barnes & Noble. For Christmas, I got a gift card and I still haven't used it.

It sat by my phone in its little holder thing for about a month. One day, I thought I'd use it, so I pulled it out and put it in my pocket. That day, I was distracted by something, who can remember such things, and ended up not going to the bookstore. When I got back to my apartment and emptied my pockets, I decided that the best way for me to spend the money on the card would be to put it in my wallet. So I did. And there it has sat.

On Saturday, I took a walk. North to no where in particular. I was sort of on a quest to find the house that appeared in Pollyanna; I didn't know exactly where it is, just a general location, which was fine since my main goal was to just get out and move. myPod in my pocket and headphones on, I headed out the door and walked. After a while, I'm not sure how long, I turned and walked east and when I got tired of that I headed south because I knew south would take me to familiar ground. I saw many houses that were probably built at the turn of the century (one of which may have been the Pollyanna house, but I haven't seen the movie in a long time, so I couldn't have recognized it), many more that were built in the fifties and sixties, and was glared at by many people just my general aimlessness as I moved. Eventually, I ended up on Fourth Street and followed it into the downtown area.

On my left was Barnes & Noble. I decided to head in. I started to wander, picking up a book to glance at here and straightening a shelf there, but felt very uncomfortable. Not anxious, exactly, but bad. My head started aching and many parts of my system were screaming for me to get out. I did. I hurried, but didn't run, out and crossed the street without worrying about which direction the traffic moved. Before I knew where I was going, I turned the corner onto the street where my apartment is.

Sunday, I woke up earlier than I wanted to. Sure, the clock show 8:30, but I knew, inside, that it was really 7:30. I puttered around my apartment, cleaned up some comics, showered, things I often lazily do on Sundays. At some point, hours later, I decided I wanted popcorn for breakfast, and the best way to get popcorn, even though I have stuff that can be zapped and one of those cool stove-top poppers, was to go see a movie. I called the theater and listened to the list of movies and choose one that I thought could be interesting and also started soonish so I wouldn't be too hungry when I got there.

The movie got out a little after two and I didn't want to go back to my apartment. I thought I'd try the bookstore again. At best, I thought I'd find a way to spend my gift cart. At worst, I'd end up like the day before and leave.

Artfully, I dodged the contingent of Girl Scouts and their militant parents standing outside, hocking their disks of sugar, and went inside.

First I perused the books on clearance. The Barnes & Noble here doesn't have much in the way of novels on clearance and what it does have tend to be things I don't really enjoy reading, like mystery and thriller books. There were some fantasy books in there, but they were by authors who are problematic for me, most notably among them is David Eddings. There was a Neal Stephenson book in there; it may have been a The Baroque Cycle book, but I didn't see those words on the cover. Plus, I though the Waterhouse family in Cryptonomicon was some of the most boring stuff in the book, so why buy a book that stars one of them from the 1700s interest me?

Then I wandered through the tables with books placed on top. Most of them were in the trade style and none of the tables were completely covered. There were some interesting covers, but the only things that really popped out to me were books that I'd already read.

From there I moved into general fiction. I wandered up and down the aisles with no purpose. I looked, read author names and titles of books, and picked a few up to read the description and check the price. Nearly all the books in that section are trade size. There were several that looked interesting. I weaved my way through the section and worked my way out.

Into the science fiction/fantasy section I plunged. I started with authors I like to see what they have in paperback that I haven't read. Then I tried to find books that I'm missing and want. Then I just looked.

Next I wandered over to the humor section. There, I found The Complete Far Side and The Complete Calvin and Hobbes. Each set is $150. They sure looked beautiful, though. There were also several The Complete Peanuts books, but not the third and I don't want to go out of sequence. Silly as that may seem.

I looked at the new stuff and best sellers and crosswords and audio books. I imagined myself as a mighty chef as I leafed through the cook books. And I wondered why I shouldn't spend the money on a really nice, leather bound journal that I'd probably never write in.

Eventually, I found my way back to the fiction section and started thinking about what I should buy. Should I buy a couple of the fiction trade books at $12 or $13 a pop? That'd spend the card and I had some cash that would have covered the tax. How about some pocket sized sci-fi? That'd be three book. Or maybe use it to take a small chunk out of a big purchase? I could do that.

But if I do one of the first two, or mix the genres, what do I buy? Do I buy things by authors I know I like by haven't read? Do I buy things by someone I haven't read before, but think may be interesting? How do I narrow it down to just a few? And will I have time to read them?

I left the store. My hands were as empty as when I came in.

That was when I realized how slow of a read I've turned into recently. I used to finish a book a week, at least. Usually two or more. Now, I struggle to finish one in a week and a half. The one I'm reading now I've been on for two weeks already. I'll be finished in a day, but a 675 page novel in two weeks is way longer than it used to take me. I think it's because I don't have a comfortable place to read.

The choices in my apartment are: my bed, the wooden chair I use at my computer, a horribly uncomfortable futon, and the floor. When I was last at my parents' house, I spent most of one day reading. (Exciting, I know.) I moved from couch to chair and back. I sat up. I slouched. I rolled onto my back and then my side, sometimes propped up by the arm rest, some times not. That day, I finished one book and got around 200 pages into another.

It was a good day for reading.

I'd like more of those.

Daylight Savings

One of the most common complaints I've heard today, among coworkers, about the time change this weekend is that people are now waking up when it's still dark outside.

I don't get it. Why is waking up before the sun rises a bad thing?

We do it for months anyway, why does it matter?

It's not the lack of light that makes you more tired the mornings after time change, but is that what they're thinking?

I just don't understand.

My Interview, Questions by Johnny Logic

Ambitions
1. Whatever happened to your comic book collaboration with Michelle? Have you ever considered collaborating with Matt on a comic?

The comic collaboration was supposed to be with Michelle, Matt, and Mario. (I never realized that they're all "M" names until just now. Jeez.) The book was going to be about three interconnecting stories for at least six issues, two drawn by each artist and each artist's story focused on one character. My job was to plot each book with a page, or less, of text and then I'd work with the artist to do the dialogue when we got to that point. Two and a half years ago, Matt, Michelle, and I got together and hammered out the basic characters and the world they lived in. About two years ago Matt, Michelle, and I met and talked about the three artists' sketches of the characters and I'd written sort of detailed plots for the first three issues so they'd be able to work on a comic and when we met next, we could see what'd been done. About eighteen months ago we all met and only Michelle had actual pages penciled and had thumbnails plotting all the pages of her issue, Matt had some more sketches and a couple of thumbnails, and Mario had a few more sketches; at that time I gave them all my basic plots for the next three issues and some reference material for drawing. That Thanksgiving, Mario, Michelle, and I got together and talked about the business end and I learned that neither one of them had done anything extra. (Mario had just had his kid and Michelle figured she could slow down because the other two had done squat.) Since then, Matt has sort of quit; Mario occasionally calls or e-mails, but still hasn't worked on anything; and Michelle and I have sort of talked about just the two of us trying to do six issues for the character that was going to be her focus.

That's pretty much where we are. Michelle has some pages and thumbnails. I have print outs of all the sketches that had been e-mailed between us. I still have my notes and plots. And I don't think anything is going to be done.

Michelle's working of getting her architecture license, or something like that, so that's what she needs to focus on. Matt is being Matt and sometimes other things. And Mario's probably being a family man supporting his wife and son.

Me? I'd love to see this thing happen, but I can't draw a bean, so I can't do this on my own.

2. I know that you have written fan fiction—is there any chance of us seeing it? What was the plot?
Other than the fan fiction story based on Queenie's Punks stories, I haven't really written any fan fiction. I've read way more than I'd like to admit to. (And for the record, I prefer the hetero slash stuff, if the regular slash gets too into the squishy details, I just don't find myself reading it, I skim. Actually, I like the stuff that does the sort off "boots scene" love stuff better than any slash. I'm there to read a story about characters I like, if I want sex scene after sex scene there are other websites that have much better written jerk material.) If I ever said that I've written fan fiction, I was lying. I really haven't.

I wrote the beginnings of a Star Trek: Voyager spec script a long time ago. I think I got the teaser and the first act or two and then plotted the rest. I know it's posted here, but I don't want to look it up right now. That script I started writing to send to Paramount, but I didn't finish it and the show ended and then I never finished it, but often wished I had.

I also plotted script for how I would have started the sixth season of Gilmore Girls and wrote the teaser out and, I think, a few lines from the first act, but nothing more.

And that's all the fan fiction I've written. In a notebook there are some ideas for stories based on the Harry Potter stuff, but taking place in the USA wondering what sort of an impact Voldemort had across the Atlantic and how the wizards of the US are different from the British wizards. I have an idea that'd take place in the Marvel Universe about a young woman who doesn't want to register with the government and how she tries to hide herself. And then there are the obligatory Star Trek stories that rattle around in my brain.

Will you get to read any of them? I doubt it. Since they're not written and who knows if they ever actually will. If they are, though, they'll probably be posted as a Fiction Friday.

3. As an eighteen year old, what did you imagine yourself and your friends doing ten years from then? Does this question depress you as much as it does me?
When I was eighteen years old, I didn't imagine myself ten years down the line. I knew what I was going to school to learn, but I never pictured myself actually working. Even when I figured out that engineering wasn't the path for me, I still didn't really have a picture of myself in the future. Well, I sort of did: I was older, balder, and fatter, but nothing else. There were the occasional flashes of fame and fortune and hot, sweaty love, but I knew those were only dreams.

Friends, though, I thought I had some idea for a few of them. You, I was sure, would have your PhD and be teaching at a university slowly becoming cynical about the laziness and listlessness of your students and wishing that you could just focus on your research. Many, I thought would go on to much more creative endeavors than they did. One turned out exactly as I feared. And then there are those who I don't know how they turned out, but wish I did.

Sometimes it saddens me that my friends aren't necessarily as successful as I wish they were, but maybe they will be one day.

Entertainments
4. I love getting recommendations from you, so what are your top ten television series?
(First, thanks. I sometimes think that people ignore things I recommend until someone else says they're good or I physically force the DVDs or books on them. That tires me.)

This is an impossible question for me to answer, in the way it's stated.

I don't like doing top ten lists; that's so limiting and, I think, sort of demeaning to the people reading them, as if they can't figure out that if I list my favorite things they have to know which I like better than the other so they can find the BEST. It's especially hard when things may be similar in form, but so different in content. I don't think that's right.

Another reason is because me just rattling off my favorite shows will be full of many tried and true shows that nearly everyone likes. How many more lists do we need that have I Love Lucy and All in the Family on them? Sure, those shows are probably the two most brilliant and influential and funny sit-coms ever, but should I go on about them here? I don't know. Yeah, they're two of my favorite shows, but it seems like they'd end up on a lot of top ten lists. Or what about my love of Star Trek, even the crappy ones, or Buffy, or the new Battlestar Galactica, do I need to expound upon those? Or even the drastically under-watched Freaks and Geeks or Firefly or My So Called Life that everyone now seems to have watched? I don't think that would be worth anyone's time unless I go well into the details of why I like them.

So, what I'm going to do is list some shows from the more recent past that I can't get enough of and rank them in three categories: Shows That Weren't Watched, Shows That Didn't Find An Audience, and Shows that Made It.

Shows That Weren't Watched:
Popular.
It was, sort of, about two girls, one blonde cheerleader and the other brunette geek goddess, who were forced to live together. What it really was was a scathing satire of the teen dramas that were once all over TV. The first season, it started out seeming like a normal teen soap, but its satire quickly moved into the scripts building to the season finale that had all the finale clichés you've ever seen. It's still one of the funniest things I've ever seen on TV. The second season wasn't so good. It seems like the network decided it didn't was the comedy as much as the overwrought melodrama that's found in most teen soaps. Still, I like this show a lot and think more people would enjoy it, especially the first season, if they tried it out, too.

Grosse Pointe.
Like Popular, it's a satire of the teen drama genre, but it's a behind-the-scenes sit-com of a teen soap rather than pretending to be one. The premise basically is that the way things are among the cast and crew behind-the-scene is more like high school than the high school drama these people are working on. I also like seeing the difference between the characters on the show and the actors who are playing the character, which makes me want to know what the actors playing the actors are like in real life.

Wonderfalls.
I don't get what's wrong with the world that this show only aired four episodes. You bastards out there have to get with it. What's wrong with people?!... That's enough of that.

Shows That Didn't Find An Audience
Arrested Development.
I have to admit that for as much as I watch them and try, I don't understand people. People say they want something new and different, but when it comes, they don't go with it. Or maybe people were uncomfortable with the way that this show took the family sit-com type and decided to build it around a family of narcissists who were much more concerned with money than with each other, even though they kept on saying, "Family first." Me, I thought this show was brilliant. From the narrator to the odd bits of self awareness to the quirky characters to the running gags, there isn't an episode that doesn't make me laugh.

Everwood.
I don't think I've ever watched a show that had more heart than Everwood. Sure, some times it sank into the depths of angst, but most of the time it carefully balanced itself between the sweet and sour that shows can fall into. It was the story about a distant father moving his kids to a small town after their mother died. It was about a family trying to become a family. It was about the adults as much as it was about the kids. The producers actually came up with true reasons that brilliant kids wouldn't go to top schools. They weren't afraid to let the emotions be honest. And while I think that the series finale was too pat for such a rich and complex show, it was nice that they had the opportunity to end it rather than leave it hanging. The worst thing about this show is that only the first season's on DVD. When can I get the other three? Hell, if all of Roswell can be put out, this show deserves it. Oh, and even though it had four seasons I say it didn't find an audience because after it's second year, it was always on the bubble as to whether or not it would come back the next year because it's audience, although loyal, was on the smallish side, even for the WB.

Veronica Mars.
The first season was as close to perfect as I've ever seen. There is not a crappy episode in the bunch. The second season was less focused, but it had enough really good episodes to more than balance out the not so good ones. I still haven't seen the third season, but I'm sure it's good. I like me some spunky, modern Nancy Drew, which is who Veronica Mars was. And the supporting cast was so strong that I thought if they ever wanted to do an episode where Veronica was missing, they could have pulled it off. Not that I'd have wanted that to happen.

Shows That Made It
Gilmore Girls.
Fast paced, sharp dialogue was the reason I started watching this show. Well, the dialogue and Lauren Graham, who delivered so much of the dialogue. Back when the show started there were rumors that Aaron Sorkin was really the creator because the words popped like they did on The West Wing. He didn't, though, but it's a nice comparison for the show about a mother and daughter who were as much friends as they were anything else. All fans will agree that there were five excellent season of this show. Many will say that it went way off track during the sixth, I wouldn't, though. I saw that sixth as taking a deeper look at the relationship between mother and daughter and how similar they are. Most would say they lost their spunk. I'd say the spunk was always a cover and the other fans didn't pay attention to what the characters were really like. Most would tell me, politely, to fuck myself. I didn't see the seventh season, but I know how it started, and it didn't start happily. Still, the first six are some of the best hours TV has produced.

King of the Hill.
While The Simpsons and Family Guy started out at a slower pace, they quickly became more and more frantic until it got to the point that the beginning of the episodes didn't have anything to do with the end. King of the Hill has, to me, always seemed proud how it could take its time to tell a story. I like the pacing. I like the confused relationship that Hank and Bobby have. I like Dale's love for his son who isn't really his son. I like Bill's insecurity. I like Peggy's over confidence. It's one of the few cartoons out there that seems more character driven than plot driven because the characters are so well realized. All in a quiet town in Texas.

South Park.
Often crude, sometimes mean, but always funny. I don't really know what else to say about this show. I like it. The animation's pretty awful, but that's the point. The kids are sometimes way to smart to be kids, but I can get over that. It has scenes that are amazing, like Cartman riding an ostrich in the future surrounded by otters riding their own ostriches. It's willing to call bullshit on religion, the best example was when the boys started a church to save the souls of the kids and Cartman stared asking for money so he could get $10,000,000. Cartman is one of the most brilliant evil little bastards ever.

Farscape.
Some may have a problem with me labeling this show that it "made it," because it was cut off after a cliffhanger, but it had four seasons and a miniseries to tie everything up. Sure, the miniseries felt like it was 13 episodes worth of plot in four hours, but how's that any different than Serenity? Anyway, this is a show that I really like because of the insane science fiction, like the worms that brush your teeth, and it's willingness to make pop culture jokes. How often does the hero on a spaceship get to make a crack about Star Wars? Not often enough, in my opinion. Then there are the wonderful special effects, I'm still always impressed with the starburst effect, beautiful. Oh, and Muppets. There are Muppets. Sure, Rigel looks like a puppet, most of the time, but practical puppets are so much better for the actor to act with. The other major puppet star, Pilot, hardly looks like one; he's brilliant. And the alien make-up, by the Henson Company, is outstanding. Only Michael Westmore comes close to them, but he rarely has the mandate to use prosthetics with gears and motors.

5. What are your favorite nonfiction books?
Well, I don't really read nonfiction. Ever. I have some books on myths, but are those considered nonfiction? I don't think they are.

I've read some memoirs and biographies, but not many and I was rarely satisfied when I finished them. Do those count? If they do, then I'll choose Dancing Barefoot, by Wil Wheaton. It only has four stories and it only has a hundred and some odd pages, but I liked it a lot.

Nonfiction doesn't often tell stories. People may use them to make arguments, but no matter how good the writing is the books always seem to be broken into points. They read like: Here's what I think; Here are a bunch of chapters that support what I think and hopefully help you to think what I think; Here's why those things should have made you think the way I thought. I fought against that form of writing in college and I'm not a fan of reading it.

I bet, though, that if I picked up a book of essays that analyzed a TV show I liked, I could get into it. Like something about feminism and Buffy or the metaphysics of Star Trek. I'd rather buy a novel, though.

Beliefs
6. Are you an agnostic? If so, are you an agnostic about Zeus and the Easter bunny as well? Why, or why not?
I'd consider myself an agnostic, yes. No so much because I want to save my ass in the end, but because I'd really like to be able to believe that there was real magic in the universe. Sure, science does and shows some amazing things, but wouldn't it be nice to be able to think things into existence?

While I try not to limit my agnosticism to the Judeo-Christian-Muslim singular God, I am not an agnostic toward the Easter Bunny. If there are fuzzy creatures like the platypus and the echidna out there that can lay eggs, why not something that looks like a rabbit? Really, though, my agnosticism, toward beings, has to do with gods and such. Beings that are supposed to be omnipotent and omnipresent. Higher than us. And, in fact, looking at how messed up and chaotic our world can be, I think the idea of a pantheon of petty, asshole gods, like the Greek or Egyptian or Norse gods were, interfering with people makes more sense than one God doing it to us. I think I could only really believe in the one God theory if I took It as the clockwork type, who built the universe and let it go while It went off to do something else and occasionally comes back to see what's going on, but doesn't really care about it.

7. You have seemed pretty jaded this political cycle. Is there anything that would make you give a monkey's tit about it? What would your ideal presidential candidate look like?
I've been pretty jaded about the last several political cycles. I just don't have the idealism that I once had about our process. It really started at the 2000 election. It wasn't because Bush got the presidency because the Supreme Court decided to over rule Florida law and stop the recounts. No, my problem was how all sorts of people suddenly started to think they were politically aware.

I was in a basic writing class in college and we had to write an essay that explained something, anything. Over half the class wanted to write essays explaining how the Electoral College worked. Why did they want to use that as a topic? Because they were shocked that the President of the USA wasn't actually voted into office by the popular vote. These were students at a university, ranging from first to fourth year students, who had just learned about the Electoral College! The first time I remember hearing about the Electoral College was in fifth grade. I didn't understand how it worked until my civics class in eighth grade, but I definitely knew how the popular vote was turned into electoral votes which actually elected the president by the end of that school year. And it clicked, these people are the reason that morons and criminals get elected all the time and if most of the electorate is that dumb, how could I be surprised anymore?

The recall election here in California was the next thing that pushed me deeper into my pit of political cynicism. Recalls are to boot people who commit crimes out of office. It was not a crime to let failing business fail and die and therefore have less tax money. Yes, the deficit was large, but that's not a crime. I don't care who anyone voted for on that ballot to replace the governor, I care that more than 60% of the people voted to recall an elected official who just happened to be the man in charge during an economic slump. Even if there was a recall on the governator for the $15 billion dollar deficit, which I believe was the number that we had back then, the state's running now, I'd vote no, because he didn't commit any crime but being stupid, and that's not a good enough crime.

I guess the only way I'd really care is if I thought the average person voted based on more than sound bites, more than a smile, more than a slogan, and more than because the other choice is worse. I'd like to know that the average voter would read the slogan "Change We Can Believe In" and wonder how wanting to build more fences and increase patrols along the border is a change that we should believe in. I'd like to know that the average voter would ask if all the oil company contributions have something to do with why she's been such a staunch supporter of the war. I'd like the average voter to get "The Straight Talk Express" to actually talk straight and explain why a man who pushed for campaign finance reform no longer wants matching funds so his campaign doesn't have to deal with the restrictions he helped to create.

None of that's going to happen, is it?

As for my ideal presidential candidate... well, my candidate would have to be absolutely candid with the people. My candidate would be willing to admit that taxes are necessary to the nation we have. My candidate would forcefully speak out against the military spending. My candidate would be realistic about the bullshit war on terror and admit that there's no good way to deal with the shit this administration got us into. My candidate would say that the best way to stop illegal immigration is to help build up the economies of the Central and South American nations rather than keep then under the heel of the US. My candidate would admit that the only way to save Social Security is to make it so that all Social Security funds are only used for Social Security and not a place for the Representatives and Senators to dip into when ever they want to build bridges to nowhere. My candidate would want to rebuild the USA's reputation in the world and use that to bring about a more peaceful world. My ideal candidate would never be able to be a candidate. He or she probably wouldn't get enough money to even enter one primary.

Sad News, Everybody

Gary Gygax died this morning.

I thank him, and his co-creator, for the hours and hours of fun I've had with my friends over the years. And even though I'm not playing, I think I'll roll some dice in his honor tonight to say good-bye.

F*cking Who?

Okay, I have to preface this by telling you that I would never endorse anything that has anything to do with Jimmy Kimmel unless it's really funny. That said, I offer up:

I'm F*cking Matt Damon
-and-
I'm F*cking Ben Affleck

I hope that one day I can buy the songs for myPod.