Only available in Kenya. Act now while supplies last.
(Thanks, Jaymi-BoB. Thanks a lot. *grin*)
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I am Jack’s fresh scent of pine.
Long overdue, tonight was Take Down The Xmas Tree night. I set myself that goal for Wendi’s first day in Arizona, figuring that if I accomplish nothing else while she’s gone at least I’ll be able to show that I can keep house on my own. While the kids picked up the living room, I ran a load of dishes, then took on the tree chore.
Wendi had cajoled the children into de-tinseling the tree on Friday, and the ornaments came off over the weekend. Lucky me, I got to unstrand the lights. This wouldn’t have been so bad but for the fact that Wendi had lovingly, carefully wrapped the strands around limbs as well as up and down along the trunk. (I’ll be the first to admit that the tree looked very pretty when lit up. But.)
The job took me forty minutes, folks. I have scratches all up and down my arms, and I smell strongly of pine. Occasionally I considered taking the pruning shears to the light strand that wound along the trunk. Oh yeah, I wanted to. I persevered, though. The tree’s finally gone and we have our living room back. Huzzah.
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There and there and back there and back again.
On Saturday, Lilith and Geoffrey and I travelled north to Seattle. The impetus was a party thrown by the proprietors of the forum called Pool, but as a fringe benefit we were invited to visit some new friends Lil’ and Geoff’ had made online recently. First we stopped there for sandwiches and lots of fun getting-to-know-you conversation, then Lil’ and I took off for the party.
Pooligans, and friends of Pooligans, are some of the nicest, cleverest, most interesting folks to spend an evening with. Jak and Karawynn’s “ReLease” shindig was one of the nicest parties I’ve ever been to, no question about it. I even managed to operate quite far from my normal comfort zone, and yet lightning didn’t strike me dead on the spot. Good times indeed.
Lil’ and I finally started zonking out about half past midnight so we very reluctantly said our goodbyes and exchanged lots of hugs, then trekked back to our hotel room for the night… or morning, if you prefer. After some mild amusement involving the fact that we’d both forgotten to pack toothpaste, we finally conked out.
We hooked back up again with Lil’ and Geoff’s new friends the next day for a tasty brunch (you can not go wrong with eggs, bacon and toast, you just can’t) and another few well-spent hours of chit-chat and comedy. Mind you, at one point early on I pulled a stupid move: I doubled over laughing at a joke, fell over sideways… and conked my head but good on the wood trim part of the armrest on the loveseat I was sitting on.
Ow. Yeah, I gave myself a nice little concussion. The pain went away after about an hour, but I sort of faded in and out of coherence until we were almost home that night. Ow.
Even with the stupid headbanging moment and not enough sleep, it was a fabulous weekend during which I met a number of damned nifty people. Not bad, not bad at all.
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Past, Present, Future – Round Forty-nine
PAST: The quality of our thoughts can only be as good as the quality of our language, for words are the very core of thought. How diligent were you at building your vocabulary, when you were a youngster?
PRESENT: What’s the most recent addition to your vocabulary?
FUTURE: What word would you like to see added to the general lexicon… and what word would you like to see removed?
Word up, baby.
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Blogging As Punk
Via that canny state-of-the-blogosphere watcher Snappy the Clam, a rant you simply must read if you maintain a website that could fall under the category of “blog.”
It was, for a while, as if we were all fans of the punk, you see, together out there on the floor, drenched in sweat, pogoing, hurling beer cans, singing along, not really caring which band was up on the stage, just loving the hum and the throb and the tribal feeling of it all. Now it feels as if many of us have become fans of various specific bands, or have started our own and are struggling to gather our own crowds, or have decided to just keep it in the garage where it belongs, and damn having an audience. We don’t have time to go to each others’ gigs anymore. When everyone is in a band, there’s no one left to watch the shows.
That almost inevitably leads to irrelevance, though. Survey says. You sell yourself to the record company to try and get a distribution deal, you start to watch what you say, you suck up to the Big Boys, and try to be seen in the right places with the right powder dusting your nostrils. You lose the holy fire, you start thinking in terms of ‘product’, you tell yourself you’re going to ‘change it from the inside,’ but you’re part of the machine now, and it’s too late for you.
It’s some gonzo writing, mate. Never Mind The Bollocks, Here’s The Wonderchicken
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The Audience Is (not) Listening
I don’t delve into this territory very often, and that’s likely to show in the quality of this little piece of writing. I’m going to do it anyway. It’s just a nagging train of thought that won’t leave me alone until I tell someone about it…
Something’s been bothering me lately. I read rant after rant about how “we’re not allowed to criticize” the current President, usually in prefix or suffix to a critique of said President.
Do you know why we’re allowed to say “negative” things about Dubya? I mean, aside from the First Amendment (however much that’s worth anymore)? It’s because nobody really cares what anyone says. The people who might otherwise be concerned that the truth about the misdirections and FUD and outright lies is coming out are people who know they have nothing to worry about. The only people listening to the truth are the people who already know it.
What’s really bothering me is the utter, complete lack of accountability at the highest levels. Checks and balances? What’s that? Somehow we’ve achieved a level of collective apathy that condones by inaction what should be unforgivable actions in a head of state, let alone the head of what state presents itself as the beacon of the rule of law over any one man’s power.
So let me get this straight. I use clever sleight of mind to distract my wife, outright lie to her when I can’t quite get away with half-truths, and when the truth comes out all hell breaks loose. The most prominent figure in this country uses sleight of mind to distract us, outright lies when his back’s to the wall, and when the truth comes out… well, you certainly hear and see enough from the unimportant, the emasculated and the tiredly bitter. But nothing actually happens.
Gee, it must be awfully nice to be filthy rich and utterly devoid of conscience.
I don’t even have the luxury of faith in karma or God to see to it that justice is eventually done to the sort of people who perpetrate lies, bigotry and hatred at the top levels of a government supposedly based on ideals like freedom, equality and accountability.
And you wonder why I can’t listen to those “proud to be an American” ditties on the country station I now work for?