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2011-10-11T17:14:00.002-06:00

The Brothers Warner

2010-03-09T02:34:00.004-07:00

I am watching the long version of a documentary on the Warner Brothers by Cass Warner Sperling, The Brothers Warner, and I'm being recalled to history as ethical text. Harry Warner was a great man in many ways, and he insisted on following his moral conscience in his film-making. In 1934 he pulled Warner Brothers out of the highly profitable German market. 1934. Years before anyone else dared to put their profits on the line.

I was impressed by this but I was more impressed by his thwarted attempt to make a movie called Concentration Camp that same year. Though most people never suspected the extent of the horrors of these camps, people knew the basic outline of what was happening, but ignored it in favor of ease. They never made the movie becasue they were censored by the production board. In fact the production board refused to let them make any anti NAZI films before Confessions of a Nazi Spy in 1939.

My personality profile places me firmly in the group of people who have no particular desire for change, or challenges to the status quo. When it comes to most issues, I feel only an ambivalence toward such things because my focus is on relationships with people and fighting the man inevitably means putting relationships at risk. Oddly, I am more comfortable with personal change and I enjoy moving between cultures and sub-cultures for the same reason: I see intercultural movement as relational in nature and adapt quickly because it fosters relationship.

Now, I think I should apply the insights of theological hermeneutics (or perhaps the hermeneutic of suspicion) to the ethical reading of history. In the story of the prodigal son, we must read ourselves as the inhospitable older brother, in Anna Karenina we must read ourselves in the degenerate cast, in the Gospels we must read ourselves on the side of the murderers of Jesus, in Gulliver's Travels we must be both the Yahoos and the transformed Gulliver (but not the Houyhnhnms). If I read the ethical text of history with this suspicion of self, I must come to the conclusion that I would be an isolationist; therefore, I must beware of my tendencies and fight them even though my position seems perfectly logical to me.

Does that constitute advocacy of actions against logic in the name of ethics?

Hello Christians, You Need to Read This:

2008-11-28T09:16:00.004-07:00

"If Vanier is correct that within France within the next few years there will be no children born with Down Syndrome because they will all have been aborted, then something is deeply wrong with our society. As my friend John, who has Down Syndrome, puts it, 'That doesn't make us feel very welcome, does it.' And he's right. Stanley Hauerwas correctly points out . . . that one of the real dangers for people with disabilities in Western cultures is compassion . . . How odd"

What was the scene in heaven like when God chose those people with disabilities to incarnate. Did his voice boom through Heaven, "Who shall I send and who will go for us?" A humble soul squeaks, " here am I . . . send me"

"Go and show this people who I am, show them that my power is made perfect in weakness. Give flesh to Jesus in the lives of his people."

"How long, O Lord?"

"Until they have driven you from the Earth."

Couldn't this be considered genocide? Killing a type of people because of their genetic material? That is the same reasoning that led to the dehumanization of native peoples all over the world, and aren't we ashamed of that? Have we only relented and stopped heedlessly killing "primitives" because we were wrong about their intellectual capacities? One major excuse for American slavery was that black people could not become civilized, that they lacked the same capacities as people of European descent. Was their argument right? Is it okay to devalue people because of diminished capacities? Are they less "human" than us? What about sentience? People with mental disabilities are, in my experience, capable of feeling as deeply as anyone else. And self-awareness? Arguing this way is stupid and wrong-minded; the truth is that we do not kill from right-minded good will, but for misguided compassion, from self-interest, and from fear.

We reflect on the horror we would feel to have our capacities diminished, but we do not ask those who actually live in those bodies if they wished that they had not had a chance to live. Instead we let our instinctual fear of difference drive us. We let our fear of having to give too much of ourselves, of having to be burdened with people made in God's image who are less able.

I am misguided, selfish, and terrified too.

My Favorite New Books

2008-05-16T23:58:00.002-06:00

I am about to start even more hours at my second job until August. Please pray for me: I need the extra hours so that I can afford to do all the stuff I need to do when I finish my thesis, but the deadline is coming up and I need time to write too. So, I'm keeping my warehouse job until August (or so I have planned) so I can save more, but I'll need a lot of blessings to help after that.

Here are my favorite new books:

A Patristic Greek Reader by Rodney A. Whitacre is helping me get my Patristic Greek into better shape so that I can be more accurate with Epiphanius.

I don't currently need the Greek version of this except in Hebrews (but that is mostly because I'm not a big fan of Hebrews (it's my least favorite biblical book) so I don't read it as often as the others, but I do need A Reader's Hebrew Bible by A. Philip Brown II and Bryan W. Smith so that I can follow along in church even though my Hebrew is not half as good as my Greek. Now if only I had one for Latin.

103.4 AM

2008-04-06T18:10:00.001-06:00

So, TANK has a fever. I discovered this, and a much lower fever of my own, at about 3 AM. What a fever means to him is that he wants to play harder and all the time especially when he should be sleeping. What it means to me is that I need to work harder to keep up with him.

The Art of Presentation

2008-03-14T08:57:00.004-06:00

My friend, Chris, and his wife, Ally, are ministers in Brazil. I was reading their blog and noticed the fine art of presentation at work: Chris is preaching in two towns blah- blah- blah . . . he's starting a new certificate program for people there blah- blah- blah . . . so-and-so was baptized blah- blah- blah . . . Two gunmen broke into our home and robbed us . . .

We also need to share something unpleasant that happened at the beginning of March. As we were arriving home after going to the mall on Saturday with Junior and Patricia and Ally’s other sister Priscila and her husband Jefferson, and Liduina, Ally’s mom, two guys pulled up to our house and held us at gunpoint. They forced us into the kitchen floor after taking all our wallets, cash, and wedding rings. One searched the house looking for cash while the other held us in the kitchen at gunpoint with their .22 revolver. After going through the house they began taking the microwave, TV, stereo, DVD player, and anything else they could find.
They continued to threaten us and ask for more cash. Patricia remembered her purse was in our bedroom and went in to get it, followed by the older one. She soon returned to the kitchen and joined us on the floor.

When Jonathan and Stephanie began to cry, the one with the gun began to threaten to shoot them in the head if they didn't shut up. Ally and Liduina did a great job keeping the kids calm. Jefferson at that point began to cry and moan as if he were really scared in order to take his attention off the kids. Jefferson is a trained actor, and did a great job. He then convinced them that there was a purse in his car. He led one outside to the cars, which were still parked outside the house with the gate open, all the while holding his hands in the air and begging the thief not to shoot. Even though he had no gun, he didn't think to ask Jefferson to stop. Jefferson opened all the car doors and let the guy search both vehicles, and then they returned inside. The one who was holding us with the gun told us that if we didn't give them more money in 30 seconds he would shoot someone.

Suddenly we heard scuffling noises and someone shouted “Police!” and I grabbed Ally and the kids and we all hit the deck in case there was going to be a shootout. The guy with the gun threw it on the ground and was tackled by two officers. Jefferson and Junior shouted that there was another, and the police searched the house and found him in our bedroom, unable to escape through the bars on the window.

The police took them into the living room and beat them for a few minutes before taking them to the cars. We began to calm down slowly. Liduina has high blood pressure and was suffering a lot. We made her lie down and tried to keep her calm.
We began to tell the police what had happened and what had been taken. They went to the thieves’ car and found everything there, plus a stash of cocaine the thieves had been using. One of them was 19 years old, the other 17.

The police beat them outside again after the youngest one told them he was a minor and would get off without doing time. Then they drove them off to the police station, followed by Jefferson and Junior who would make statements and bring the evidence home again. They arrived at about 5 am and told us the outcome. Both would go to jail for 2-4 years, one in Juvenile in São Vicente or Santos and the other in prison in Guarujá. Because they were caught in the act, in Brazil, there is no trial or wait time. The next day they stood before the judge and then were shipped off.
God was with us through the whole ordeal, which lasted about 45 minutes. We were amazed that the police arrived and caught them in the act, which is a very rare thing in Brazil. We asked them how they knew, and they told us that one of the neighbors was an angel and called them. As it turned out, the neighbors across the street heard the robbers yelling and saw what happened from the beginning, and called the police the whole time that we were held inside. Their names are Roberto and Elizabete. We believe that God will use what happened to bring us closer to this couple. They are wonderful neighbors and have a daughter that is 2 years old who is partially blind. We hope that through our growing relationship that we can help them see that God has a plan for everyone, o matter what the circumstance. We are forever in their debt for the help they gave us.

As we tried to calm down afterward, we realized how much God had been in control even as we feared the worst. Even though police procedure in a case like that is to wait outside and either negotiate or catch the bad guys, we were told later by one of the two officers who are evangelicals that when he saw the guy with the gun through our front window, they decided that they couldn't wait. They were very quick, secure, and professional. I don't think we could have had a better response even if we were in the states. Later the two christian officers came back by the house to make sure we were OK and answer any questions or concerns we had.

We continue to recover, and try to go on.

We were very blessed in that things ended up about as well as they could in a bad situation like that. Bad things happen to good and bad people alike, but the difference is that God is with those who believe in Him and in His power.

Wow! I am so relieved that they are all right, but they should have at least led with a teaser.

Bizarre Similarities

2008-03-10T19:09:00.002-06:00

Which one is the preacher, which the fighter?

Happy Birthday Arwen

2008-03-04T20:43:00.000-07:00

Arwen's blog wont let me comment so:

When else are you going to get a credible excuse to eat all the cheesecake you want?

Happy Birthday --Did you know that the British use the phrase "it's my birthday" as a sarcastic way of saying, "what just happened to me stinks," but I guess that they usually say it on a days which are not, in fact, their birthdays.

Tomorrow Looks Good

2008-02-28T17:19:00.002-07:00

In January my hours at work got cut in half and Steve's company eliminated his twenty hours of overtime a week. God has blessed us, though, and we've been (barely) making it. Today I got word that I will be starting my second job tomorrow. The competition was fierce, but they think that I am the right person for their business.

"What is the business?" you ask: the business is what you give to someone when you want to tease them, but that doesn't matter now. My new job is at a small book store. They . . . We sell new and used books of various types. I frequent the bookstore already and I love it, so I really want to help make it a success.

Here's the deal: I may be helping to plan future acquisitions in the religion section (Christian is the largest section, but Judaism, Islam and various "Eastern" religions are also represented). So, I'd like you to give me your religion suggestions and wish lists: authors, books, and subjects. You don't have to answer right now, I'll do a separate post soon where we can discuss your answers. Maybe I'll give my "wish I had time to read it" list.

6:30

2008-02-26T07:13:00.002-07:00

That's right, it was 6:30AM when the construction workers started hammering outside Bennett's window this morning. Furthermore, I could find no specific noise provision in Boise City Code that would apply. I realize that they have to finish a house per day, but they are currently going home at 3pm, couldn't they make it 4 and let us sleep?

Killer: Pumpkin

2008-02-25T17:16:00.003-07:00

So, Gina and I were at the doctor's office with TANK this afternoon when Killer got home. He ate pumpkin pie. We had half a pie left (Gina and Bennett ate two pieces and he had four yesterday), he ate the rest. Half a pie. All at once. Wow. And he sees nothing unusual or embarrassing about it.

Wake up and Go Home

2008-02-18T15:54:00.000-07:00

What do you do after an opera? Well today I listened to Haydn after listening to some Wagner on Pandora. No, I'm not especially cultured or anything, being a musical moron (I know less about music than almost any other mainstream field of inquiry), I just happen to like the variety and depth of textures presented by classical music. It seems like no one but the great composers has discovered that silence can be more moving than noise, that the drum need not run the show, that variation in volume is as important as change in tempo.

Some people like Haydn because he wrote such an amazing variety of pieces (104 symphonies) or because he was an outstanding person (just read a little about him), I like him because he wrote his Symphony 94 with shocking changes just to wake up the people who normally fall asleep at the symphony.

Prayers

2008-02-12T20:37:00.002-07:00

Hi people,

Please be praying for Killer's dad. He has cancer and was supposed to get an operation today, but when he got there he had blood clots in his lungs, so they have to put it off for two months (in addition to the month or so they waited already to get into the hospital they like best).

Lectionary Readings

2008-02-09T21:01:00.000-07:00

Hi People, Over on Blogum Nemo Legit I am trying to start regular translations of the lectionary for our new Wednesday night church group. Right now the notes and introductions to the passages are very limited, but over time I hope to expand them based on the comments I receive. Tell me what you would like to know about the passages and translations. The translations may not be perfect either, I am only spending short blocks of time on it so, ask if you think something might be questionable, or if you see a real difference from what you're used to. I'll probably spend the most time on Psalms because they have some special concerns related to their poetic and illocutionary content (see no. 4 in Lefevere's factors in translation below).

Book review: Andre Lefevere's _Translating Literature: Practice and Theory in a Comparative Literature Context_.

Watch out if you are offended by coarse language and sexual situations. Lefevere handles these issues well, but he does include translations of passages concerning things like ancient pubic depilatory practices and Cattulus' use of the F-word. His point seems to be, if you are going to pursue translation, you'd better be prepared to approach texts that offend you. When you do, you should have already considered your responsibilities and commitments in these situations before they arrive and become insurmountable.

The offence and embarrassment factor aside, Lefevere presents a clear and systematic introduction to literary translation, and insight into the reasons virtually all translators who produce significant volume will violate their stated goals and rules.

According to Lefevere, there are four factors in translation:

1. Ideology (the guidelines by which you live; personal worldview)

2. Poetics (how to render poetic devices: rhyme, off-rhyme, meter, etc in culturally appropriate ways)

3. Universe of Discourse (cultural differences between source and target cultures/ Author and modern society etc.)

4. Illocutionary Language (language used primarily for effect, like the use of formal and informal dialogue)

They actually come in this order of priority, regardless of translators expressed intent. Translators tend to find it imposable to move on to poetological considerations if they have to break their own ideological commitments to do so. They will, should the conflict of ideologies be dealt with, minor or absent, be unable to reflect the historical considerations before making (expressly or not) decisions on how to render any poetry/ form/ genre in the text under consideration. Should they fail to make a decision (again, this is seldom done consciously) about if or how to reflect the source culture's context (such as the literary parallels in the minds of the author and readers) in the text, translators will be unable to deal with the problems caused by the fact that language has connotations and implications that go beyond the unit of the word. Rather than giving pat, easy, and, therefore, wrong solutions to these problems, Lefevere tries to help the reader consider what types of things might cause issues and gives open ended options to the reader.

His advise is basically, decide what your ideological and poeticological commitments are and let them guide you through the problems of different worldview and the gap between languages.

Cavities

2008-01-09T21:03:00.000-07:00

The surgeon was kind. I explore the cavities with my tongue. These cavities in my gums are much more pleasant than those that destroyed my wisdom teeth. Gina needed a week for recovery: she had to have stitches in her gums; healing was slow in coming. My teeth were mostly exposed, so little invasion by Dr. Cook was necessary. I was back at work the next day. the sockets are still there, but they have healed over in the week since surgery. Just a few days and the gums were closed. Four days of minor bleeding, I take my last antibiotic tonight, and I only needed two or three pain pills, other than Tylenol and Ibuprofen.
My parents footed the bill, Thank you Dad and Mom. I only got out the bottom two because the others are still okay, and because I didn't think the price increase within my budget (no matter the giant donation of my parents. What a relief!

Cutting Edge Technology

2007-12-28T10:57:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago I was sitting in The- Coffee- Place- Which- Must-Not- Be- Named because I had dropped Killer off at work at 4:30 and my shift didn't start until 6:30. I was quietly slurping a Carmel Apple Cider and looking out of the front window when I saw it; the sign that would forever change my perception of just how far technology has advanced:

Safe Protected by Time Control Device.

Evidently The- Coffee- Place- Which- Must-Not- Be- Named can now control time itself. I was unable to uncover the details of just what aspects of time they control, or the rules they have placed upon its use; the science behind this discovery surely remains top-secret, but their very possession of such a breakthrough signals the extent of their power over humanity.

I wonder . . . what type of system do they have in place to protect the Time Control Device?

LOST?

2007-12-02T20:19:00.000-07:00

Well, actually, lost: my phone. If you can't reach me, that's why. I'm pretty sure that I just set it down in the wrong place, I don't think that it has been stolen.

In other news: I've had three different viruses in the last week- and- a- half and I think that I've finally gotten rid of the fever that I've had (off- and- on) since Thursday of last week.

bad week.

The Wrath of the Conformists

2007-11-17T10:22:00.000-07:00

If you know me, you know that I have more bouts with stupidity than I do with genius (and I know it). You also know that the people I value are those who care about others, have dreams that they are pursuing, and care about becoming better people (even if they don't know it). Yeah, I respect genius and I can even be intimidated by it, but I'd rather say that I had helped people than say that I was smarter than them.

I'm getting sick and tired of people thinking that, just because they think that I'm smarter than them, I somehow think that that makes me better than them. I know a lot of random stuff --random stuff is fun for me-- so I share random knowledge when I hear something connected to it. Actually, I think that my interests and my way of talking tend to intimidate people, but should I change everything about myself just to avoid the wrath of the conformists? I may not be typical punk, but I'm too much of a punk for that.

Setting a Questionable Example

2007-11-15T20:16:00.000-07:00

I'm sure that you have all seen , or perhaps used, the family window decals that are so wildly popular on mini-vans and SUVs right now. First a warning from Gina: DO NOT PUT ACTUAL NAMES ON THEM, your friendly neighborhood child collector might just use this free knowledge about your family to convince your children that he is a family friend sent to, say, pick your kid up from school.

Now on to our story: A few days ago I was at the Sonic drive through when I discovered the following decal (or one strikingly similar, instead of a bat, the boy was holding a bow and arrow)As you can see, Mommy is dead and she was pregnant when she died, and judging by how happy Dad is, and by the firearm in his hand, he's the one who did it. It looks like junior is about to follow his dad's example and off one of his sisters.

Please, set a good example for your kids: don't kill your spouse and, if you do, don't print a happy note about it on your car window.

Courage

2007-11-13T21:10:00.000-07:00

Ambrose Redmoon, whoever that is said, "Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgment that something else is more important than fear."

I think that most of the time, though, we'd be more accurate if we said, "Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather of judgment." Most of the time courage would be stupidity if someone else's life or liberty were not on the line.

Exhaustion and Diogenes

2007-11-06T08:49:00.000-07:00

Sorry about my absence from Blogatopia; lately whatever time I am not spending at work I'm spending with Tank. I've made no real progress on thesis work in more than two weeks and I'm exhausted a good share of the time. The thing is, I find it very difficult to resist spending time with Bennett and Gina needs the help. Steve works 10 hour days and he worked the last two weekends (that means more than twenty days of work in a row) so he can't be around to help as much as he'd like, and when he does get any free time he wants to play video games and study in the hope that he'll get an interview in the aviation industry (I'm guessing that he is an introvert, in the sense that he "recharges" and feels refreshed only after having some time alone).

Now, on to a post:

My favorite philosopher right now is Diogenes, the Cynic. Diogenes wasn’t into writing, he just taught people out in the middle of the city. He thought Socrates was a hack and, when Plato defined man as an animal with two-legs and no feathers, he plucked a chicken and named it “Plato’s Man.” He was always up for insulting the elite, for instance, when he saw a prostitute’s kid throwing rocks at some rich guys he said, “Careful, you might hit your dad.”

Really, the thing that I’m not so happy about with Diogenes is that he always seemed to expect to be helped by others but no record exists of him helping a lot of others.

Cooking: It's All about the Cheese

2007-09-12T19:32:00.000-06:00

Sometimes cooking isn't about unusual ingredients or the right spices; sometimes it is about using the normal ingredients to their best advantage. If you make a chili dog, you might use mozzarella or add some sour cream or cottage cheese, and you might add some black beans to the mix, sure, but a change in ingredients is not necessarily the way to go.

Why not take your chili (with pinto beans) and pan fry it, like refried beans, though mashing the beans is probably not the best idea, if you decide to try this, be sure to serve small amounts of chili with your dogs, the oil can be a little too much. Better yet, in my opinion, do what I did tonight:

While you are heating your hot dogs and chili, cut a slab off of your block of Tillamook cheddar cheese; it should be just a hair narrower than the length of the cutting surface on your vegetable peeler (potato peeler), shave enough slices from it to cover the surface of your hot dog buns. Put the cheese on the buns and broil them until slightly crispy. Now put a hot dog on each bun and then another layer of cheese. Now pop it in the oven again until crispy on top. This makes your chili dogs seem like a real meal, which is worth it, even if it does take a few extra minutes.

O Henry, . . .

2007-09-11T19:01:00.000-06:00

Today was the birthday of one of my all time favorite authors of fiction, O. Henry, or should I say William Sydney Porter. His stories are a must read for anyone interested in learning about plot construction. His most famous short story The Gift of the Magi is, in my opinion, not among his best, but you should decide for yourself; one of O. Henry's collections of short stories, The Four Million, is available for download as an audio file at Librivox.

You might also check out other writings, like those by Oscar Wilde, which are also on my "must read" list for hopeful authors. Wilde had the best dialog in the business, it is now dated, but any fan of The Gilmore Girls or Boston Legal ought to appreciate his works.

On the lighter side, they have copies of one of the first authors of science fiction that I ever read, Edger Rice Burroughs. A quick listen to A Princess of Mars will show that his work was written before much of the scientific knowledge that we take for granted, but it will also reveal the art of the cliffhanger. Burroughs strove to create anticipation when he wrote each chapter as a short story in a magazine. He was preoccupied with anthropology and seems to call upon the "Orientalism" of his time as a major informant.

If you've never read other great authors (like Mark Twain) you might also give them a try and see if they're there. Among the authors I'd suggest are Frank Baum, who wrote an entire Oz (as in Wizard of) series that is far trippier than the movie; I'd compare him to Lewis Carroll (Alice in Wonderland), who is also featured. Then maybe go for some Tolstoy, Poe, or Shakespeare, and continue to the Avonlea series by Montgomery (which I have yet to read, but which Gina loved). Of course, I should probably listen to some James Joyce (since I avoided him in High School) and the braver of you should try Kafka, and the Christians among us, and those who are interested in such things, might try Brother Lawrence's Practice of the Presence of God (BTW - Lawrence authored one of my favorite prayers).

Have fun, kids . . .

That's Just Mean

2007-09-07T20:59:00.000-06:00

Ty's been working a lot, and referring to himself in the third person a lot. In the last month, if I haven't been working or helping Gina and Steve keep the house in sale-worthy condition, I've been helping my friend Jon get rid of some computer viruses (a work still in progress) or I've been reading my book for the Science Fiction Fantasy reading group down at the Rediscovered Bookshop or I've been translating passages from Epiphanius' Panarion (also still in progress), so I've not been to bloglandia nearly enough, and I think it unlikely that I shall return to my former level of activity in the foreseeable future. I suggest that you get an rss reader, like bloglines, and subscribe to all of your favorite blogs (except Laila's, 'cause she disabled that feature) so that you don't have to keep being disappointed after going to all the work of looking up my blog. That's right, I'm suggesting that following a link is too much effort.

****

Now, back to our story: I just came from the kitchen where Gina had just made Tank quit eating before he was done so that he'll nurse at the right time, about which he was not happy. She was eating in front of him. Ice cream. That looks like his baby food. Niiiiiice.

Poor kid.

(to be fair, she was there because she wanted to spend time with him)

Dear Mister Potter

2007-09-01T12:08:00.000-06:00

Dear Poor Blind Mr. Potter,

I am sorry that you've lost your legs, I'm sorry that your sight is going. I'm sorry that you are lonely and bitter and angry. I am sorry that fear of helplessness consumes you, as does your greed for power.

It is no sin to be rich, Mr. Potter, but it is a sin to buy people to use against Bill Baily. It is not a sin to pay for the vacations of the Building and Loan office staff, or to pay for them to adopt children, those would be noble actions. But, letting them know where the money came from and then using the loyalty that you've bought from them to help gain you sole control of the Building and Loan IS a sin.

I fear that you have been misreading the words of Jesus, Mr. Potter: Jesus said that one should use one's possessions to help build friendships with those in the world so that, when persecutions come, they will hide and protect us. Jesus did not say that we should buy the loyalties of people so that we might persecute each other.

May God save you, and all of us, from your greed,

--George

Trash Day

2007-08-22T20:23:00.000-06:00

I just stopped to think about trash day and I realized, for dogs, every trash day is Boxing Day.

A Little Marxism

2007-08-12T06:21:00.001-06:00

Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend. Inside of a dog, it's too dark to read.

--Groucho Marx

Tank's Reviews

2007-07-21T22:02:00.000-06:00

Tank, how do you feel about the 1952 version of The Importance of Being Earnest?

How about the book (well, actually it's a play, but if I ask that, you might think I mean a particular version of the play)?

How do you feel about Hemingway?

Yeah, me too.

Recipes: Taco Meat

2007-07-13T16:15:00.001-06:00

I'm trying to spend most of my time on thesis stuff, so I thought I'd leave you with some more food ideas

Praiseworthy dispositions for the discipline of kitchen management: The art of Simplicity Makes the Spice of Life Come Alive.

Taco Meat: taco meat should not be over spiced. One or two spices is all you really want in there, otherwise your flavor becomes less powerful and loses its identity. My favorite taco spice is cumin, but you might want to try a little chili powder, chipotle powder, or cayenne, or you might want to make a sauce of your favorite hot pepper and add it immediately before serving.

Never add a sauce that is supposed to be hot too early. Sauces lose some of their heat, and worse, their flavor to evaporation.

Prep the hamburger by cooking it throughly, but do not let it get very brown. Now I'll tell you the secret that makes the texture of restaurant taco meat so much more attractive to most of us than the chunky blah you usually get when you cook at home: chop it in the food processor, use a salad shooter or even a blender, if you have to. It is so worth the extra ten minutes of prep and cleanup. I warn you, though, do it once and you will never be happy with the chunky junk again.

1 lb hamburger (prepared as above)
2 Tbs cumin
and salt to taste

Put that in a taco, on nachos, or on a tostada and you'll wish you had twice the appetite.

The Discipline of Kitchen Management

2007-07-12T13:43:00.000-06:00

I've been the head chef here at Chez Kortan for about two- and- a- half years, during this time I've learned a lot about managing a kitchen and I think it only wise to pass down some of what I've learned. After all, many of you have little time and less money and need cheap, fast, and easy ways to keep you kitchens working well. Managing the kitchen is the key: if you step into the kitchen and think that you are going to cook, you'll leave a mess that will take longer to clean up than the meal took to cook and eat. Walk in with the goal of making that kitchen work as efficiently as possible, as well as producing a quality product.

Praiseworthy dispositions for the discipline of kitchen management: Look for Opportunities to Improve your Future.

Yesterday was a typical night: Spaghetti. I started the hamburger on medium heat, sealed the meat contaminated waste immediately, washed up (20 seconds, soap and hot water, twice after meat), and --here's what I'm trying to push here-- I looked around to see what else I could possibly do to prep the next steps of the meal. The options for spaghetti are: put water on to boil, open cans, set table, clean up any residual mess, and (at that moment) empty the dishwasher. I chose to put water on , because it always takes longer to boil than you think, with some olive oil (to keep the noodles from sticking) and salt (because it helps make the water boil and because it gives the noodles a buttery flavor) then I opened cans.

Praiseworthy dispositions for the discipline of kitchen management: Never get Angry at the Things Others Have Left Undone.

Just a little aside: It is a waste of time, harms your relationships to get angry at other peoples failures, and it doesn't actually get anything done. If people failed to do what they were supposed to do, if they are courteous and kind it was a mistake, if they are not talk to them later and impose appropriate sanctions. If you live with discourteous or irresponsible people (like I was until recently) and must force them to improve their character and abilities then you must be willing to remember for them and to remind them of their responsibilities long before their oversights become your problems. You might want to remind them that in the past they have tried to put things off and failed to do them, so it is necessary for them to do them promptly or they will forget entirely, which is not fair to anyone else. Such talks may be necessary, especially for children, but make sure that you have mastered the art of cleaning up after them with a smile on your face first, otherwise your nagging will not result in anything but resentment.

Okay, so I had the burger on and the water on high, I had the cans opened and waiting to go in. I checked the burger and had a few minutes so I got out a second pan for Gina (she just likes tomatoes and hamburger with some added tomato juice, not spices, olives and mushrooms). I checked the meat again, emptied the dishwasher. By the time I finished, the hamburger was just right, so I put in the tomatoes. At this point, I should have put Gina's sauce aside, but I forgot and started to put in olives, so I had to pick them out with a spoon. When you have to pick out an item, use a large surface (in this case the skillet), if the surface is too small, the ingredients stack and then it will take forever. Okay, mission accomplished, I put in the mushrooms and spices, turned the sauces to med-low heat, and then and the water was boiling, so I broke in the spaghetti, turned the burner down a few notches, picked up trash, wiped down the counter, and set the table.

Praiseworthy dispositions for the discipline of kitchen management: Never Put off until Later Tonight what you can do now.

By the time I was done, so was the meal. Steve needed to watch Bennett while Gina and I ate, so I put some water back in the spaghetti pan and put it on med-high with the colander of spaghetti staying warm in the steam on top. Then, while Gina started eating, I put all the other dishes not used to serve into the dishwasher.

In the end, I had a skillet and two pans, in addition to utensils and dishes left. I convinced Gina to let me put her pans in the washer a few months ago because it makes the psychological task of cleaning easier (even though it only takes a few extra minutes). It also insures that our dishwasher will be full by the end of the day so that I feel better about running a load. If I were Ryan, if I didn't have to sanitize things for Tank or if I'd read this article before last night, I would probably hand wash everything and then set the dishes in the dishwasher to dry.

Praiseworthy dispositions for the discipline of kitchen management: Always Check the Kitchen later.

So, I had to go upstairs to work on Epiphanius stuff and I asked someone to let me know when they had finished so that I could clean the last few items . . . no dice. I walked down a few hours later to find stuck on tomato sauce on a skillet. I need to remember to set an alarm when I have to leave before everything is done.

Appearing in Portland June 15th-July 8th

2007-06-13T19:15:00.000-06:00

Hi People, we're coming to Portland for Fathers' Day and my dad's retirement, and staying for camp and Rachel's wedding. I hope that we'll get to see a lot of you, but we have a schedule, and so does Tank, so call and book us. If you don't have our numbers, try emailing me at pdxtrip@email.com, --yes, I did get an email address just for the trip, but I don't know how often I'll get to check it-- and leave your number and stuff.

Fiction

2007-06-03T23:07:00.000-06:00

heart racing in his ears, breath coming in ragged gasps: he has to hold back. If he doesn't stop soon, he knows that his addiction will devour him. That little voice is there, that voice he hates --that voice he loves. It tells him that he's weak. "Resist if you can," the voice whispers, "but you know that you can't."

The voice is right, he is weak. He is always weak. He never had a chance. "The counseling doesn't work." His heart is now beating in time to the voice of his little satan. "Pain didn't work," the hours of self flagellation, the looks he gets from his peers, from his family, from his heroes, they never did more than drive him underground, and then only for a few weeks at a time -- and afterward the craving got worse, the self-indulgence more ostentatious, the demands of his desires more bizarre. "Nothing works" -- something in him chafes at that idea, but he ignores the momentary lapse, "this is what I want anyway."

He sneezes into an overworked tissue and hands the teenager behind the counter his credit card and his identification. In return, he gets the substance of his dreams.

He bursts through the door of his apartment, looking for his scissors. "How'd your shopping trip go," Janie asks, through a mouthful of stale Cheetos.

"It was perfect," he strains to say, as he pries off the packaging and guides into the place of honor, using a cookie tin to raise it above its inferiors. "I found the perfect treasure, an Official African Elephant," he makes a final inspection, removes the "Made in China" sticker, and steps back to admire his new love. He knows that the tchochkes, trinkets, and memorabilia will eventually consume him, but he is helpless to resist their charm, "after all," he thinks, "I am weak, I can't resist them when they call to me . . . and it only cost two dollars and thirty-five cents."

RE: Vinge

2007-05-26T21:28:00.003-06:00

Rainbows End by Vernor Vinge

Read Vinge, read Vinge: If you want to know what the future of technology is going to look like, open up Rainbows End and yes, the apostrophe is intentionally truant.

Robert Gu and his grand daughter, Miri are having some issues. After nearly dying from complications associated with Alzheimer's, Robert is back and ready to resume his stunningly successful career as a poet and professor . . . well, almost ready. You see, Robert is in a new world full of virtual realities, and he has has lost his edge, his killer instinct, and --most importantly-- his natural ability to compose poetry. Frightened and in shock, Robert strikes out and emotionally eviscerates Miri, living up to his cruel and heartless reputation.

Forced onto the road to redemption, Robert is confronted by Mysterious Stranger who pops in with the offer of a lifetime: take non-violent action against a book shredding information company and get your poetry back. What could go wrong . . . other than global mind control, a catatonic Daughter- in- Law, an attack on American soil by his marine son, the destruction of the UCSD library, charges of treason, and failing his class presentation with his lab partner, Juan? Plenty, including Miri's death, if he doesn't do something to stop it, and quickly.

My one objection: the time-line: Vinge places the story only 18 years in the future, but many of the breakthroughs seem much farther away than that (especially the medical breakthroughs), while others (wearable hardware) might very well develop beyond the stage in which he pictures them by 2025.

Comments
(I wrote this post for the title --yes, I know that "RE:" is pronounced ray, but it looks like it should sound like "revenge," and that's funny enough for me)

Dear . . ., I Got it Wrong

2007-05-25T18:13:00.000-06:00

Dear BOD,

To avoid equivocation, I'll make this short. I got it wrong. I'm sorry. I'll try harder to do my, homework before I fly off the handle in the future. I'm sorry for the picture I painted. I painted way too broadly in those colors: you deserve for me to paint such things individual events, not typical (of person or group) or related to the general population of the group.

--T

P.S. Thanks, Kev

Comments

A LOST Plan

2007-05-25T00:01:00.000-06:00

Okay, so here's the plan: if anyone tells you that they missed a LOST episode, you say, "Oh, you didn't miss much. That was the one where Jack got hit on the head and they did a Gilligan's Island thing for the rest of the episode. I really think that they should have found someone other than Locke to hit Jack on the head with his hat, but Matthew Fox did a great job of faking Gilligan's voice, I was really surprised. But not as surprised as when the Globe Trotters showed up and challenged them to a game in the Stadium hatch."

Comments

2007-05-24T22:58:00.000-06:00

Beyond The Cotton

Comments

An Interesting Quiz

2007-05-24T16:49:00.000-06:00

The fun part was the picture section:

Your Score: Very Well-Rounded

You have:
62% SCIENTIFIC INTUITION and
70% EMOTIONAL INTUITION

The graph on the right represents your place in Intuition 2-Space. As you can see, you scored above average on emotional intuition and above average on scientific intuition. (Weirdly, your emotional and scientific intuitions are equally strong.)

Your Emotional Intuition score is a measure of how well you understand people, especially their unspoken needs and sympathies. A high score score usually indicates social grace and persuasiveness. A low score usually means you're good at Quake.

Your Scientific Intuition score tells you how in tune you are with the world around you; how well you understand your physical and intellectual environment. People with high scores here are apt to succeed in business and, of course, the sciences.

Try my other test!
The 3 Variable Funny Test
It rules.

Link: The 2-Variable Intuition Test written by jason_bateman on OkCupid Free Online Dating, home of the The Dating Persona Test

A LOST Question

2007-05-23T23:19:00.000-06:00

(This is really mostly Gina's question, but I'm with her) Why did chuck bite it? I know, I know, because he wanted out to do other things and the producers were okay with that; really though, in the story, why? It made no sense, he could run out of the room and swim for it with Desi. Please, someone, tell me, 'cause if Charlie died because he's too dumb to run for it, I'm disappointed in the writers. The only excuse I can find is a writers' purpose, but has no motivation for hobbity-joe: they want to use that hatch in later episodes. Has anyone figured it out yet?

BTW - the clip show totally set us up for a flash forward with the directors' commentary: «this story has a past, present and future, and by the time we're done, all of those areas will be filled in.»

Shark Messiah?

2007-05-23T09:36:00.000-06:00

That's right, a shark gave birth without the aid of male genetic material (parthenogenesis). I suppose that there are a few things that we can take from this beyond shock:

1. According to the article, mammals are now the only vertebrates who have not conceived via parthenogenesis in controlled situations (confirmed by the virgin birth of Komodo dragons earlier this year. For those of you to whom such things matter, this adds a whole new level of plausibility to the virgin birth narrative: though it has not been confirmed that humans can reproduce this way, the evidence of several other, related species doing so tends to support the possibility. Note: this is an outsider argument for possibility, from the inside, it just explains the possible workings of a miracle which still needed divine guidance. It is for explanations to people who believe that all we believe was a hoax: the next time someone says that the virgin birth is impossible, you say, "it isn't impossible for sharks and Komodo Dragons," --make sure you say "Komodo," otherwise, they'll just think you're crazy, you might also want the articles to be on-hand.

2. This answers the area of my greatest lack of understanding of the evolutionary theories that I learned about years ago. There were two (basic) ways in which scientists said that vertebrates appeared on the scene: 1. many of them appeared at once in various places, in independent cycles of development or 2. one developed and then reproduced. I always thought that the first (though it fits what we know about the unexplained leaps in development that are obvious in archaeological finds) was rather implausible, and that the chances that would bring a male and female into being independently and that they would find each other and reproduce were astronomical (bars being far in the future). The second was that only one member of a species would develop and that species would die out with that single member.

So, I suppose that it is plausible, even for those strict creationists out there, to believe that God did something that made this rare form of reproduction commonplace in the beginning stages of species development so that the earth could produce more than the small animal population originally present (check Gen 6-9, ain't every species gonna' fit in that!). After all, Gen 1 indicates that God created animals, it doesn't tell us the details. This was actually just about what Darwin (a Christian) had in mind in his earliest works: he proposed a few original creatures that developed into the vast number that we have now. And, for you less strict creationists, it helps to explain one of the tools God used to produce animals in the first place. There is still a miracle here.

If you're a more through-going evolutionist, an unknown cause for the proliferation of these incidents at each major period of development, accompanied by a (thus far not in evidence) similar proliferation of inter-species evolution, would give evidence of one possible road to species development.

2007-05-22T21:30:00.000-06:00

I think blogging will work better than spamming, and I refuse to send these things via email so here:

Stop Price Gouging

Here's a brief letter you can send to your email circle. Please send it along right away, but please only contact people who know you personally. Spam hurts our campaign.

Click here to open a new e-mail and invite your friends, family and colleagues to get involved:
Invite friends and colleagues.

Or, you can cut and paste the text below into an email message:

Subject: Help stop summer gas price gouging

Hi,

Can you face another summer where a day trip to the lake or the beach costs you an arm and a leg? It's shaping up to be just that if we don't ask Congress to stand up to Big Oil now.

But there is a bill in the House this week that could make gas price gouging a federal crime, so we don't pay more while the oil companies rake in record profits. I signed a petition to urge my representative to pass this bill this week -- can you join me at the link below?

http://pol.moveon.org/stoppricegouging/

Thanks!

Goodwin's Law

2007-05-17T21:14:00.000-06:00

No this is not a LOST post.

Godwin's Law (proposed by Mike Godwin) states that as online discussion goes on, the chances of a comparison being drawn to Hitler and the Nazis approaches statistical certainty. In other words, if your blog gets enough comments, eventually one of them will draw such a comparison.

Godwin believes that such over use of Hitler/ Nazi comparison weakens the impact of such statements when they are truly appropriate. If Godwin is right, we really ought to figure out which arguments we really don't want to be powerful, or which characters we really wish had less impact, and then comment using ridiculous comparisons all the time.

My preliminary suggestions:
Pat Robertson - "You're just a bigot like Pat Robertson"
Joel Olstein - "Joel Olstein totally understands poverty."
Using rational (sounding) arguments to support non-parallel lines of thought - "an egg hatches and a Chick is born, so astrology works."
Rick Warren - "Rick Warren built such a big church, don't you wanna' be like that?"
Paris Hilton - "Paris Hilton may be a _____ but at least she is honest about it."
Ozzy - "All they need to do is look at Ozzy: he still rocks and he's been high for decades."
Quotations (real or fake) used to by-pass logical inquiry - "Albert Einstein said 'Imagination is more important than knowledge,' so why should I have to spend all my time reading?"

Lost in 1985

2007-05-15T00:22:00.000-06:00

When something real happens, when something really real happens, you leave part of yourself with that event. For better or worse, part of who you are stays forever attached to those moments in time. That is why our emotional development sometimes stops as a result of severe trauma, that is why victims of abuse become trapped in that moment, compelled to relive the past.

When something real happens, when something really real happens, it never seems real; it lives in a acrid fog, chewing little holes in your soul. At the time, it seems ironic and perverse that the very things that have the greatest impact on our lives are never quite in focus. I don't know, maybe they are in focus, it is just that we are not, or maybe it is the nature of life that important things are in the gap created by a paradox.

*****

The day that Kermit died, I lost it. It just doesn't seem right to lose all composure because a kitten dies, when a kitten that you are pretty sure cannot survive dies, but, at 24 years old, I sobbed my eyes out for hours. He was the greatest little animal I've ever had as a pet, and he only lived a few months. I wish I had a picture of how small he was, and I wish I had tape of him following us around the house. He was so cute, he just loved to be around his people, and there he was one afternoon when I got home from my summer session at Cascade in 2000; dead in the litter box of his little cage. I reached in, hoping that he was just asleep, but he wasn't. He was gone.

*****

Dad didn't stop talking. It was early in the morning and he kept talking. Usually a phone call lasts only a few minutes when it comes in the morning, but this one kept going; Dad's voice kept talking in that calm voice that he has, the voice he uses when someone is hurt, the voice he uses to solve my problems, the voice he uses when he can't solve the problems.

". . . called the police yet? Okay, you need to do that first and then call me back, okay?"

Okay, so there's been a crime of some type, probably just something stolen. Why would they call Dad about that? Dad and mom mumbled to each other, mom's voice was quietly frantic. The phone rang again and Dad picked it up on the first ring.

I couldn't go back to sleep, so I went downstairs, where Dad was on our family phone. For some reason, I didn't want to make noise, so I shoved my feet against the walls on either side of the stairs and walked on the diagonal boards there, the way I did when I wanted to listen to the television after bedtime so that my parents wouldn't hear the stairs squeak and send me back to bed.

Mom was on the couch and I sat on the piano bench. Time stopped as I listened. I still had no idea to what, but I listened, and time stopped; bored and scared and curious and wondering why I couldn't get an answer. I'm still waiting.

I know what happened, but I know what happened on that day like I know what happened in a dream: the knowledge is there, but I have no memory of finding out. Did dad tell us when he got off the phone? Did mom tell me when she realized that I was becoming very disturbed, and feeling neglected? The only thing I'm sure of is that I didn't figure it out on my own.

*****

You know how family is: you have relatives, who live far away and for whom you care, but in reality, they are little more than acquaintances who have an almost legitimate demand on your attention; then you have family: people who go out of their way to spend time with you and love you in clearly demonstrable ways, even when you don't deserve it. Well, I have so many relatives that I would go hoarse before I could name all of them, but I have a fairly small family. Among those in this smaller group of family, I had two aunts and three uncles, one cousin, and my grandparents (both my mom's parents and my dad's mom). No matter what their failings, and they have them, they always went out of their way to be family: they moved to the same city, or they invited us over whenever they could, or they came over to help when we needed it, or they took care of us kids for awhile.

My cousin Todd was our hero. He could eat a full meal (enough for three) and then be hungry in two hours. He used to go woodcutting with us when we lived in a house that only had wood heat. He had the best rants ever. In fact, when I really want to express my anger in a humorous way, I channel Todd, "O come on! Can't believe . . . just, aaaakhkh!" Print can't really do it justice, either in its tone or in the humor we found in it, but he was our hero, and he was on the phone to Dad.

*****

"Here, I'll give you my knuckle-ball," uncle Ed said as he pitched the wiffle-ball for us. It was one of the best days of the summer, and Uncle Ed kept pitching to us after all the other adults had gone to do adult things. It meant a lot to us that he kept pitching, but it means a lot more now. Uncle Ed had to be hurting, he was partially paralyzed on his left side and couldn't walk without dragging his leg, but he kept pitching, and we all had a great time.

*****

The neighbor boy ran up to the house through the little pathway between fences while Dad talked to Todd again. He was carrying something in his shirt . . . kittens, he put them on the ground, they were wet. I don't remember how many there were, but they had been ours until we gave them to the neighbors, after their momma said that they could have them. I don't remember how many there were, but one was dead and another wasn't doing well. He said that he'd tried CPR, or maybe he did CPR while we were watching -- it's fuzzy-- that saved the second one, but the first one never woke up.

We took them to Mom; to this day I can't think of anyone who is better of taking care of sick kittens. She was raised around animals and I guess that prepared her for kitten emergencies. She wrapped the dead baby in a towel for Dad to bury when he got home. My dad is my hero.

She had us wrap the wet kittens in towels too, but only until they were dry, then she took the little one who had to be revived and kept it near her neck so that her body heat would comfort him. I think we fed him from an eye-dropper for a week. I don't remember that he died, but I suspect that is just my memory trying to protect me from it; we all put a lot into trying to save them. I think we needed them to be okay.

*****

I think that was the last time I remember seeing Uncle Dan when he wasn't angry. He took us to Dairy Queen for Blizzards, a new menu item at the time, and one which I will never like. I talked to him a few years ago and found out that he liked Uncle Ed and that his death hit him hard, I didn't even remember that the two men, from different sides of the family, had even known each other.

*****

I hate someone, I don't know who, but I hate them. Dad went and helped to clean up. He went to help Aunt Net and Aunt Sue clean Uncle Ed's grey-matter from the walls of his bedroom. To this day, I don't know who it was who decided to abdicate their job and force a widow to do that. I guess that she wouldn't have needed to, if his insurance hadn't expired a day or two earlier, but as it was, she could not afford to hire anyone for the job, or to pay the deposit.

*****

We were in the back seat of Uncle Ed's car. Aunt Sue was driving, we were looking for animals on our side of the road (part of the game Uncle Ed had made up to entertain us while we traveled to Multnomah Falls Lodge for lunch). He had assigned point-values to animals and you got to add up the points of any animals that were on your side, as long as you declared that you had seen them. Most animals had a 5-25 point-value, I think, but horses were 200. Uncle Ed didn't even try, and we were a little bit frustrated. Then we passed a horse farm on his side, he had made up the game and assigned horses such a high value because he knew about the farm; what he did not know was that the farm had either shut down or had moved the horses to greener pastures. It was great.

When we got to the lodge, at which my aunt and uncle had intended to buy us fantastic gourmet lunches . . . we ordered hamburgers: we went from the far side of Beaverton to Multnomah falls for hamburgers . . . and we loved it.

Comments

So Relieved it Wasn't Luke

2007-05-13T23:22:00.000-06:00

You scored as Yoda. One of the last jedi masters. You are very wise and think much on every decision that you make. You believe that tradition and values are important to follow. Now if only your swamp hut had a de-odorizer.

Yoda

100%

Han Solo

75%

Obi-Wan Kenobi

75%

Anakin Skywalker/Darth Vader

69%

Leia Organa

63%

Darth Maul

50%

Luke Skywalker

50%

Padme Amidala

50%

Boba Fett

44%

Palpatine

38%

Which Star Wars character would you be? (pics)
created with QuizFarm.com

I Hope that this is Just a Joke

2007-05-11T14:01:00.000-06:00

Please tell me that this is a joke. Tell me that it's like the Daily Show and that the people interviewed were either trying to sound stupid or the questions were switched for fakes 90% of the time. Okay, so I had no idea what "the coalition of the willing" was, or who all was included in the Axis of Evil, though I know what was intended by the term, I just discared it as an attempt to steriotype people.

A LOST Theory

2007-05-10T23:45:00.000-06:00

If you are planning to watch LOST but haven't yet, don't highlight the following text (WARNING SPOILER stop reading if you are using an RSS reader). Thank you Arwen for the idea.

When John was walking up to see Jacob, he crossed a line of stuff that looked like rocksalt mixed with ash. I don't know exactly what it was, but I do know that some ancient magical practioners used circles of salt to seal a spirit in the land of the living. Most often this is accomplished by drawing a circle and enclosing a pentagram within it, using the salt (which, in some ancient cultures, represents elemental Earth), and whatever other ingredients are called for by the spell (I'd guess that the ashes of the dead [slaves?] would be best, since "the greater the cost, the greater the power" seems to be a common belief connected with magic).

So, maybe most of the Island is a giant pentagram (see: blast door diagram, which shows an almost complete pentagram) enclosed by a circle made out of some magical mixture (hidden on most of the island), and what John stepped over was one of the lines of the pentagram. The "monster" might be the spirit that the "natives"/ "others"/ "hostiles trapped and are using for something (on the nature of which I speculate below). Also, if you die within the pentagram, your spirit too may be trapped (which is why Richard asked Ben if his mother died on the island, with a worried look).

Also, I think that the current others, sans Ben (those called the "hostiles" by the Dharma Project) might be the crew or descendants of the crew of the blackrock (I say crew because Richard didn't age in between conversations with Ben as a child and now); BTW - the Hanso foundation has a "life extention project," and Magnus Hanso was the captain of the Black Rock, a slave trader that is on the island. Maybe the hostiles are the Black Rock's crew and they killed M. Hanso, and that is why the Hanso foundation was out to get them.

I'm pretty sure from the diagram that The monster is called "Cerberus," ironically pronounced "Care- Bear- oos." And, I think that the monster/ trapped spirit is tasked, as others have said, with sorting out the subjects for the Dharma project. Here's my theory: the monster is used to kill off "bad" people (though I'm not sure yet just what constitutes "bad") because the Dharma project's aim is to make people immortal and bad people must not be allowed to receive immortality. That is also why killing bad people is good by others' standards (cf. Locke's and Ben's dads).

Oh, and I think John will be fine because of his marvelous healing powers.

That is all.

Comments

A Link in the Chain

2007-05-10T00:24:00.000-06:00

Right now, one of my favorite series is the one written by Scalzi and beginning with Old Man's War. It is Sci-Fi, so most of you will probably not go out and buy it, but Scalzi is an excellent author, and his work is among the most gripping I've yet read. I find myself criticizing other books for wasting my time on a boring intro since I've started reading him.

Anyway, Scalzi recently wrote an interview with Pluto that is short and humorous, and I thought that, at the very least, Trey would enjoy it.

Parental Caution: Scalzi is rather vulgar at times: in his books, he's writing about war and, in an attempt to avoid romanticising it (I assume), he tries for realism in the language used by soldiers and in certain of their sexual behaviors (though I don't remember anything more graphic than an episode of desperate housewives) not to mention graphic violence: as usual, you should read it (and take notes on anything to which you object to your children reading, so you can quantify it) before you hand it to your kids. I suggest reading books with them and discussing how they can make better choices than the characters portrayed.

Okay, So, I Know That It Doesn't Count, But . . .

2007-05-08T17:06:00.000-06:00

Uncle Ty likes to play with Bennett and, when he gets all happy and smiley, Uncle Ty says, "I like you."

We were in Target today and Bennett said it back. That's right, three monthes old and he answered as clearly as can be, "I like you." It was very loud and clear and Gina almost dropped her gourd. It was SO cute, and I'm rather pleased that he decided to say it to me. Yes, I know that it doesn't count, since there is essentially no chance that he knows what he is saying, but he did sort-of say his first word (and sentence) to me today.

Comments

Google-rific

2007-05-07T21:44:00.000-06:00

So, I just googled my name again today: I now share my name with a minor character in a role-playing universe, you know, like D&D. It figures, I'm totally nerdy enough to be in a D&D type of game, and uninteresting enough to be a minor character. It looks like I'm not human (but remain unaware of it), have no ambition, attract crazy women, and work part-time in a supermarket. They did get a few things wrong: I do too have ambition, and I don't work in a supermarket . . . yet . . . and I was born long before the year 8200.

Comments

Humorous Homilies

2007-05-07T09:50:00.000-06:00

Okay, so in the last several months, I've heard some good sermons from the most unlikely people. I was so busy working on preparing for visitors a few nights ago that I didn't remember that the TV was on until I heard a Carlos Mencia sketch where a preacher was talking about all of the reprehensible things that he had done and then he'd say, "and JE-sus . . ." and everybody seemed to forget about the horrible things he was doing and cheer when he said "JE-sus." It soon became obvious that he was doing terrible things and then using Jesus as a way to manipulate people into letting him get by with it. Then Jesus came in and tackled him. Go Jesus!

I don't regularly watch Mr. Mencia, and I'm not suggesting that you do (he tries to be as offensive as possible) but I think he was right: I'm sick and tired of people thinking that Jesus is just a way to manipulate other people, and I want it to stop. Can't somebody run out and tackle Pat Robertson, and that moron evangelical leader with the drug-dealing prostitute, and anyone else who uses the language of faith to get out of taking responsibility for his or her actions?

Before that I heard Christopher Titus' End of the World Tour. The critique of American Christianity (Catholicism) was very good, but I can't find a clip, but I did find the section on racism, responsibility, and apologising. Note the interplay between comedy and horror when you see it for yourself:

Finally, Craig Ferguson gives an autobiographical monologue on his own experiences as an alcoholic, which someone (I don't remember who) posted a few months ago:

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Copyright Madness

2007-05-03T23:48:00.000-06:00

A story from Ed Felten (I found it through Making Light), says that certain online entities want to copyright numbers: dibbs on 0-9, and all combinations thereof.

I'm sick of copyright laws going wild. We give preferential treatment to companies by allowing them to renew copyrights much longer than actual people can, and we've allowed the laws to extend copyright benefits until long after the creator has died (in most cases, until long after his children have died) and cannot benefit from the proceeds. This is ludicrous, once the author is dead and his children have reached adulthood (not including children made from his frozen . . . assets, after he is dead, since they would likely be made for the very purpose of extending copyright by money- grubbing companies), the copyright should expire and the work should enter the public domain.

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Tag - I have Characters

2007-05-01T22:13:00.000-06:00

Josh Brown at iamjoshbrown.com inadvertantly tagged me (I'm more of a lurker than commenter on his blog, and it was a general tag)

Three Characters I’d Like To Be:

Corran Horn (Star Wars Expanded Universe™):

Tom Sawyer:

Tyrel Sackett:

Three Characters I Would Like To Be Real So I Could Meet Them:

Bean (Ender's Game, and the Shadow series by Orson Scott Card):

Galadriel (LOTR):

Cadsuane (Wheel of Time), I'd settle for one of Amys, Bair, Melaine

Three Characters That Frighten Me:

Jageng, the DreamWalker in The Sword of Truth series (couldn't find a pic, so I used Auger from EFC, since I always imagine him in the part):

The Lord of the Nazgul (LOTR):

furies (no picture because of nudity so here's one for fun):
-

I tag everyone who has finished more than half-a-dozen books since January.

Is "Before" Your "After?"

2007-04-30T18:04:00.000-06:00

Maybe there is truth in advertising.

I visited The Moon, a diner here in town to grab a shake to answer Gina's cravings, induced by my in vetro nephew. I edged my way past the greeting cards, the tchotchkies--ceramic pigs, an Elvis dinner set, you get the idea-- and up to the counter.

After the owner's introduction, which was a cross between a tour of the Grand Coolie Dam and Disney's Jungle Cruise, I ordered two shakes, to-go, and moved toward an out- of- the- way table. I began to read my Egyptian History book, as was my practice at the time, and waited.

Soon, I was surprised by the entrance of the ultimate poster- child- for- heart- disease, shuffling past me from the back. He paused beside me. "I'm sorry, did I take your seat, sir?"

"No--" catching his breath, "--I'm not sitting down." At this point I felt a little uncomfortable, realizing that his pause had nothing to do with my table, it was the pause he took every four or five steps to catch his breath as he worked his way to the kitchen, to fix himself a fried ham and cheese and a shake before he started his shift as chef.

As I sat there, I looked at him and realized that he looked like one of those "before" pictures in the Super Metabo- Skinny Juice commercials and I wondered, what did his "before" picture look like? And would he have ever eaten here, let alone taken the job, if he could have seen the after.

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I Demand a Recount!

2007-04-29T22:12:00.000-06:00

This is wrong, my nerd score should be in the mid-nineties, at the very least!

For James

2007-04-28T22:52:00.000-06:00

This is a comic for James that I found at XKCD: A Webcomic of Romance, Sarcasm, Math, and Language.

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You Say you Want a Revolution?

2007-04-28T09:51:00.000-06:00

Comments (this is a double post on TBINU and Blogum Nemo Legit, since I'm not sure anyone still reads it, so comments will be combined on BNL)

Recently, Dr. Ben Witherinton, one of the best authors in the field of biblical studies and the backgrounds of the Christain New Testament and early Christianity Christianity posted about gun control; I'm not a fan of more gun control, not because it wouldn't be good to keep guns from the hands of homicidal crazies, but because I could make weopens in my garage if I wanted to, guns and ammo included, and because in Great Brittain, where gun controll is off the charts, people still kill eachother all the time, but now people who would use weopens to resist the violence of others , people who would step in to defend others, cannot. I also disagree with his interpretation of the constitutional right to bear arms; it was not, by what I've learned in my studies, to let them hunt, it was so that they could overthorow the government if the government became tyrannical, like the government they overthrew.

Here's the deal, though, I have that opinion as an Ameerican citizen. My reasoning, my ideals are shaped by American thinking, not by scripture. I am still in disagreement with Doctor Witherington, though (which makes me uncomfortable, 'cause he's wicked smart), it seems to me that the Christian opinion should apply to Christians, not to our entire country. Christians should not, as far as I can see, try to form the secular world in the image of Christ by using the power of government; Jesus refused that temptation when Satan showed him the kingdoms of the world and offered him power. Rather, we should change the world the way that Jesus did, by being different and by thinking differently and by acting differently. So, rather than activism, our response is to live lives that are free of violence and domination and manipulation and we should speak in ways appropriate for students of the prince of peace.

What does this say about the American Revolution? Or the Civil War? Would the world be a better place if these conflicts had not taken place? On the surface, it seems like it would not, but maybe, if we had tried submission to unjust rulers, as my ancestors of faith, Barton Stone, David Lipscomb, Benjamin Franklin (no, not that one) and so many others did, but resistance through reasoned speech that discouraged violence but encouraged us to love our enemies and to pray for those who persecute us, maybe then it would have still turned out okay. Maybe if we had been willing to oppose slavery like so many white people did in the civil rights movement: by joining the slaves in their suffering, and being murdered for it without regret . . . maybe if we had put ourselves in a position to die for our brothers and sisters, rather than to kill for them . . . maybe if we had been willing to suffer the evil of a Brittish king, we would have had slavery ended on our shores when it ended in the UK.

Now, I am not a pure pacifist: I can imagine no world in which there is never a need for violence to oppose violence, and I respect people like soldiers, who put their very souls on the line to protect others, but maybe we put that stuff too far up the list.

Comments (this is a double post on TBINU and Blogum Nemo Legit, since I'm not sure anyone still reads it, so comments will be combined on BNL)

Sad News

2007-04-27T21:34:00.000-06:00

Okay, so it isn't sad news, it's happy news. Gina gets to come home early! Hoooray for Gina! And I'm sure Bennett will be very glad too. Of course, I think I might go through some baby-withdrawl, having had him for about eight hours a day . . . that's the sad news --Bennett- and- Uncle- Ty- time has been severely curtailed 8~{(> Oh well, I'll still get to play with him a lot :~{)> just not quite so regularly.

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I've Won!

2007-04-27T07:15:00.000-06:00

Yes, that's right, over the last week, I have been informed by email that I have won more than a dozen lotteries. Whatever will I do with the winnings? . . .

In other news, a Chinese bank manager has asked me to let him use my account to redeem unclaimed money, several members of African royalty want me to help them claim their inheritance and an Afgani immigrant with terminal cancer wants to give me alms to distribute.

Hot Weather

2007-04-26T00:09:00.001-06:00

Here's one from the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, via Making Light:

You may have noticed that March of this year was particularly hot. As a matter of fact, I understand that it was the hottest March since the beginning of the last century. All of the trees were fully leafed out and legions of bugs and snakes were crawling around during a time in Arkansas when, on a normal year, we might see a snowflake or two. This should come as no surprise to any reasonable person. As you know, Daylight Saving Time started almost a month early this year. You would think that members of Congress would have considered the warming effect that an extra hour of daylight would have on our climate. Or did they ?
Perhaps this is another plot by a liberal Congress to make us believe that global warming is a real threat. Perhaps next time there should be serious studies performed before Congress passes laws with such far-reaching effects.
CONNIE M. MESKIMEN
Hot Springs

Why Doesn't Someone Do Something?

2007-04-25T23:29:00.000-06:00

Why doesn't someone do something? Yes, I guess that has become a rhetorical question.
The following was posted by Laila and borrowed from

Okay, so we know exactly what Israel is going to do: continue what they are doing until the Palestinians leave or die. Most of us know that nothing we can do or pressure anyone else to do, within the boundaries of legal and advisable action will change that.

Here is my question: why do the surrounding countries refuse Palestinians a place as citizens? Why do they refuse to let them immigrate as refugees? Why do they put them in what amount to prison camps? Why do they treat them like criminals and have them report in like they are on probation? Why are they brothers when Israel does evil, but poorly-treated foreigners when they are not in Israel?

We all know that what Israel does to Palestinians is wrong, but why don't we all know that what all the governments of the region are doing is wrong?

What can we do? I don't have a good answer, so I'm praying and maybe I'll send a note to a senator; see, I believe in God, so I'm sure about prayer, but I don't believe in my senators.

Worst Case Scenario: Baby Edition

2007-04-24T07:17:00.000-06:00

The following constitutes an imaginary scenario based upon actual facts:

Situation: Baby has a diaper blowout while you are downtown. Your shirt gets ruined in the mix, but you need to stay downtown. You have a diaper bag, a jacket, and a stroller: What do you do?

Answer 1: take off the shirt and wear the jacket to a store where you can buy a new shirt.

Answer 2: Traipse through the mall without a shirt and hope security doesn't catch you before you get to a Punk clothing store where you buy a new one.

Answer 3, My Answer: Put on the jacket, but, rather than buying a new shirt, buy a gold chain, unzip your jacket 'till it shows, and embrace your retro-loving 80's self.

Why is Racism Wrong?

2007-04-18T11:31:00.000-06:00

By now, everyone knows about Don Imus' stupid racist lapsus linguae and his subsequent apologies and firing. I must admit to being disturbed by the stupidity and ignorance of such an error, and that I've never liked Imus' show. In listening to the larger context of what was happening on the program, though, I think that he was just adding to what someone else said and attempting to make it funnier; he did not seem to realize at the time just how offended people would be by it, or how racist it sounded.

The night after he was fired, I had trouble sleeping, in part because I could not identify the reason for my discomfort with his firing: I think that racism is a terrible evil, I think that stupidity deserves consequences so that people learn to avoid it, and --though I don't consider his comments particularly mean-spirited or racist-- they are certainly not acceptable, or good for the company f0r whom he worked.

As the answers to most of my difficult problems, I found the answer in my sleep, where my subconscious sorts out the issues: the firing of Imus was not wrong because the company should allow such speech, it is wrong because it was motivated by public offence, not by the inherent evil of such actions. Racism is not wrong because it offends people, racism is wrong because it demeans people and leads to a process of dehumanization that has historically resulted in atrocity after atrocity; therefore, if a person (Imus) deserves to be fired for saying racist things, he deserves to be fired not because people were offended but because he has helped to create an atmosphere of oppression. In this case, though, he was willing and able to turn his actions around and use it as a teaching moment; he took what opportunities he could find to do these things, but then he was fired.

So what lessons is our media teaching us with these actions? 1. Racism is wrong because people are offended by it, not because it results in evil actions 2. There is no recovery from stupidity, thus if a person does something stupid, she or he might as well continue, or escalate, the cycle of stupidity, because there is no redemption from it.

What do you think?

What Offends You?: Prelude to an Imus Post

2007-04-17T20:31:00.000-06:00

[I started this post more than a year ago, but it just didn't seem complete, now I'm posting it because I want to deal with similar issues where Imus' stupidity is concerned]

What, if anything, offends you? This might surprise everyone but Trey: I am not offended by very many things. I have high personal standards, but other people have to decide for themselves what they are going to do and to believe. Don't get me wrong, I believe that we should stand up for what is right (for whenever we can be relatively sure is right) but how does my offense help?

I also believe that easily offended Christians are Christians who can't interact with non- Christians, and therefore limited in their sphere of influence. I think the worst bane to Christianity is the extreme behavior of fundamentalist Christians, triggered by their overly sensitive offence reflex

Beyond that, there aren't very many things that are so obviously wrong that I can expect other people to come to the same conclusions as I have. So, I'll disagree with people, I'll discuss people's behaviors with them, and I'll occasionally argue with people about how they choose to act, but I don't see any advantage in being offended. So, when I can help it, I don't get offended.

To quote the Apostle Paul: "⁹I have written you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people— ¹⁰not at all meaning the people of this world who are immoral, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters. In that case you would have to leave this world. ¹¹But now I am writing you that you must not associate with anyone who calls himself a brother but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or a slanderer, a drunkard or a swindler. With such a man do not even eat."

In other words, Christians should ignore even the biggest issues that they might have, at least when it comes to non- Christians (you might also note that the categories mentioned are habitual --people who are so involved in a behavior that they have become synonymous with that behavior . . . these are not just people who have been drunk but people the lives of whom embody drunkenness).

Recently (last year, now) I discovered an offensive book that I've really been enjoying. I could do without the offensive parts, but it's the kind of book I've been waiting for: an honest story of a relationship with Jesus by someone who isn't necessarily a Christian but understands Jesus pretty well.

The book is titled Lamb : The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal by Christopher Moore. In an interview Moore said,

I handled the material in the funniest way I could conjure, while still maintaining the identity of the Jesus as laid down in the Gospels. As a vehicle for the humor I created Biff, an irreverent best friend of Jesus, and the narrator of the story. This sort of allowed me to goof on the whole story a lot without outright attacking someone’s faith. The book was under the radar for most of the religious community, but I’ve gotten letters from hundreds of Christians, a score of non-clergymen, and a Rabbi, and all really seemed to like the book, some even have said that it strengthened their faith, which probably had a lot more to do with their faith than my book, but it’s still positive. I’ve had one negative reaction. Last week a Fox News channel in St. Louis cancelled an interview at the last minute because they were afraid of the book. The only other negative reactions have been to my humor, not to the religious context. Some people thought that the humor was too adolescent. They, of course, are right. I was writing about adolescents.

While he did get one or two small details wrong, for the most part it is evident that Moore did his research. If you know what to look for, you can get a better picture of the ancient world from it than from most text books.

One last note: I was offended by one part of Lamb. Angered is more like it. Like any good student of Anthropology, I was taught to respect other cultures and religions, but in the case of religions that practice human sacrifice, especially the sacrifice of children, I'll make an exception. At one point in his book, Moore recounts some of the atrocities committed by Hindu believers in ancient India. When you read this section, you might just understand the real God's wrath. I couldn't help wishing that God would strike dead those who were responsible, if only in the book.

If you are offended by ANYTHING, you might not want to read this book, but if almost nothing has ever offended you, or if you like to be offended, give it a read.

Here are a few things to remember as a Christian reading this book:

1. This is fiction and the author wants you to see it as fiction.

2. Biff represents regular people, with all of the flaws and sinfulness of every person included in (some might say condensed into) his life. Think of it this way, how easy do you think it is for Jesus to see what we say and do? This book proposes that Jesus could walk alongside humanity without letting his holiness create an impermeable barrier. Biff's sexual fixation isn't something I wanted to read about, but it accurately represents the sexual overindulgence characteristic of our age (and the Roman, though not Jewish, culture of Jesus' time).

3. Biff is writing the story. Once you get to know him, you'll understand that Biff is the type of guy who makes up the dialogue of the past in his own idiom, swears and all, so be prepared.

Let me know how your book club goes :)

Comments

And Hours to Go before I Eat . . .

2007-04-14T15:54:00.000-06:00

6:05 PM -
Scene, the K-- living room

Gina [talking on the phone]: Hello, I'd like a large "Duke Tristam Platter" (the real name is trademarked) Pizzano onions, green peppers, or Linguise.

[Hexagonal Eating Surface Pizza Company (this too was trademarked) answers her, unheard by all but Gina]

Gina: Yes, that's the correct address.

[Hexagonal Eating Surface Pizza Company responds]

Gina: Okay, 30 to 45 minutes. Great.

[Waiting by the phone . . . ]

7:30 Pm -

Gina [talking on phone]: Yes, it's 7:30, and I ordered my pizza at 6:05, it hasn't arrived yet.

[Hexagonal Eating Surface Pizza Company responds]

Gina: Yes, that's my order. Okay. Thank you.

Ty: So?

Gina [to Ty]: it "disappeared."

Ty: If it came to my house by accident, I'd pretend it was my order.

Gina: they said they'd make it and rush it out immediately, and that they'd charge half price.

[Waiting for pizza . . . ]

8:15 -
Gina [on phone]: Okay, please hurry.

[to Ty] at least they arn't going to charge us. Do you have cash for a tip . . .

9:15 -
[Doorbell]
Gina [to Steve]: It's been too long, that has to be at least partly the driver's fault, don't bother with a tip.

[Switch scene: some time later, Ty is driving in the car and listening to radio]

Radio Personality: okay, caller, what's your complaint?

Caller: People in this valley don't tip pizza delivery guys. I moveds here after working the same job in two other states and no one tips as badly as Boise.

Ty: Oh COME ON!

False Advertising by Capitol One?

2007-04-13T15:00:00.000-06:00

I don't have a credit card, but the credit card company that uses pillaging Germanic tribes in their advertising just sent me an application . . . ironically on the same day their 5%, that's right 5% rate hike takes effect. In their commercials where the Vikings or Visigoths or whatever are put out of business because they (representing rate hikes) don't happen there. WRONG! Now the pillagers are working for the company. It would normally not bother me that there was a rate hike, but because their commercials indicate that they don't hike rates like other companies, most of which have not yet hiked their rates, this, in my book, is false advertising. I don't know that I am important enough to do anything about it, but I intend to write in to news programs and talk shows and see if I can't convince people to make life hard on them. Listen, people, if you say that you are going to be different, we expect you to keep your word, even if you are rich, and if you lie, we'll do our best to let the whole world know.

Hey Baby, you Doing Anything between Now and Pentecost?

2007-04-10T21:49:00.000-06:00

So, Easter is past and, by the ancient Christian calendar, Jesus has, in some way, risen to life again. What does that mean? Okay, for most people, absolutely nothing, but I hope that some of us can begin to think differently.

So, Jesus died on passover on Friday and was raised from the dead on Sunday, and that is what Easter was originally intended to celebrate. It was supposed to be a time when we start our lives over and forget everything we skrewed up in the past, right? Then, if you look in the book of Acts, Jesus stayed around for 40 days, evidently just spending time with his followers.

Alright, so, I'm from a Christian background that is very uncomfortable with Christian holidays because many of them have pagan elements, so I don't really understand why other groups act the way they do. Why is Lent such a big deal to some people (by choice they stop indulging in certain things for 40 days, and complain about it), but after Jesus rises and we get him back and he is with us, we don't go out and enjoy life to celebrate his pressence? It seems much more Christian to go out and celebrate (in responsibile ways, of course) over these 40 days during which we are (symbolically) in his pressence than to go out and binge on everything, no matter how self- destructive, on that moronic invention, Fat Tuesday.

Following some very good military advice: only give orders that your soldiers will be willing to follow; I want you to go out there and give me 40 (okay, 37 and 1/2) days of acting like your best friend is hanging around with you before he goes very far away. I wish that you were all here with me, we could do this together, but go out there and enjoy life and I'll be with you in spirit. Live like it makes a difference.

P.S. I kind of think we ought to live joyfully every day, but 40 days is a good start.

"What does P-U-L spell?"

2007-04-08T11:28:00.000-06:00

Have you ever really wished that you could faint? I mean really dead-away fall flat and not wake up for a few . . . weeks? I suppose I've felt that way often enough, but seldom have I ever felt the need for a mild concussion when a girl was not involved. Where those of the fairer gender are concerned, I might just as well fall to the ground when I come within range, because, heaven knows, I'll wish with all that I have that I had been unconscious on the ground, with only drool coming out of my mouth, ten days later, when the realization of what a fool I was force me into paroxysms of mortal terror (mixed generously with sad whimper-giggles of self-deprecating humor) at what I've done.

I try to keep such self-derision under control, since such things can lead to more embarrassment, when the cashier (the non-mutant cashier, who is actually quite cute) at Walmart's smile falters ever so slightly as she motions you to her empty counter when she notices your crazy-man mumble- under- your- breath ("idiot.can'tbelieve you-- uh-oh, shut up, moron"). Instead, I try to save my self-loathing for my morning routine-- after all, it's easy to muster up negative feelings when a mirror is only a few feet away, and only occasionally indulge in the Walmart crazy- mumble.

The first time that I can remember such guilty terror was long before girls were a cause for terror, though their cooties were.

My daddy was a basketball coach, but he wasn't one of those coaches who abandon their children for the players, he was one of those coaches who makes a difference in the lives of kids and brings his family with him. I always wanted to be around my dad more, still do, truth be told, but he spent more time with me than most fathers ever spend, and I knew that he wished it could be even more.

So, dad took us with him to the games, and we liked watching them, for about a quarter, and then we liked to find quiet places to play, and occasionally lose control of a basketball, which would inevitably end up rolling across the court, or bounce into the stands, or trip an already clumsy-looking adult.

Dad was coaching the B team, and the main event (the varsity game), was in the final quarter when Dad went to make sure everything was cleaned up and everyone was out of the locker rooms. The visitors had evidently had a tough time with the lights, because Dad left me outside the locker room while he went to find the switch or breaker that had been turned off.

As I waited outside, I examined my environment, looking for entertainment. The stairs were fun, but I was not yet old enough to consider jumping them, as I did when I grew older; the vinyl on the walls offered little entertainment, and it was purple, a dreaded "girl" color, so I knew I must find fodder for my imagination elsewhere.

Suddenly, I saw it. The answer. The unknown. A puzzle. It was red and round and, evidently, stuck to the wall. It looked ever- so- slightly like a giant red door-knob to a hidden door. Not only that, but it had the beginning of the magical inscription placed on so many tantalizing entrances. P- U- I recognized this. Of the six words with which I was familiar, two began with these same two letters. I knew what to look for . . . either an ess and an aitch and I would push my way to adventure, or two els and I would pull adventure to me.

Unfortunately, what awaited me was wholly unexpected, P-U-L. "P-U-L," I said, "I don't know that one yet . . . DAD!," I said, loudly enough for dad to hear me above the sounds of running players and cheering fans, "What does P-U-L spell?"

"P-U-L doesn't spell anything," he said, blissfully unaware of the context from which I spoke, "but P-U-L-L spells pull."

Just then I saw the other el.

Let me pause right here to say that anything that one puts at kid-height should be either kid-proof or able to be fixed by a kid . . . the fire alarm that I pulled was neither. Not only was it kid-proof in all the wrong ways, it turned out that it was perversely adult-proof too.

As the spectators ran past I did my very best to press my body into the purple wall, actually, I was trying to press my body through it, all-the-while struggling for breath against my crippling panic. You may not believe me, but I quite clearly recall thinking, 'shouldn't I have fainted yet? am I not working hard enough at it?'

Dad came out and told me that it was not the end of the world, and the janitors came to tun it off, but they didn't have the key, so the alarm rang on, and my heart beat in great THUMPS until I escaped . . . and it still does, whenever that scene invades my thoughts.

Dissertations, Desert Fathers, and Desserts

2007-04-05T23:13:00.000-06:00

If you become bored with the following, just skip down to paragraph three for a recipe:

I. Sorry I haven't been blogging much; it seems that my thoughts are not currently fit for a general audience. I'm reading about Bakhtin in my tangentally- related- to- my- thesis reading time, so I find myself thinking things like, "Bakhtin's thesis defense should be written as a narrative parallel to Kafka's 'Trial of Joshph K,' (or is it called 'the Trial?'); it would be even more fitting if someone would compare Kafka, Swift, and (Bakhtin's hero) Rabalais (since they all seem to have similar creative imaginations, though Kafka and Rabalais are generally seen as unique) first. Actually, you might even draw a parallel to the trial of Socrates, like Acts does with Paul's defense before the Areopagus. I'd like to read that, actually, I'd like to write that, if I had time. It's classic GvsE stuff: the genius at odds with the state is refused the title he deserves because morons, who gained their credentials (if they had them at all) because they pandered to the party, to The Man."

II. I'm also quite interested in the Desert Fathers of Egypt, I only have ten more chapters to go in my Coptic grammar (though I need to review chs 8-20 again, since I've not been working on it for a few weeks). On Google Earth, I found Sketis, which was a very difficult place to find in antiquity, but now is home to many monasteries and has a highway running right past it, but I could not find Nitria, since it was, according to the information I could find, destroyed in ancient times, and any goods were carried of by others passing through. I did find out that they believe that it was inbetween the modern Sadat and Damanhur, and then I find myself saying things like, "That isn't right. It should be much farther to the west, more like between the monastery of St. Makarios and Alexandria; that would make much more sense, considering the narrative about Apa Zacharias contained in the sayings of Apa Carion, where he, as a child, is not well accepted by the monks and so, to prove his worth and ascetic zeal, he goes and stands in a nitre filled lake --like the ones between Alexandria and Sketis-- and comes back looking like a leper becuase the nitre eats into his skin (it's a really sad story and it makes me angry at their lack of understanding, they should have felt worse about their behavior).

III. Finally, I like to cook, I like to bake very much, and I like to make dessert. Do you have a good poundcake recipe? Neither do I, but I do have a recipe involving poundcake. I can hear you being intrigued. First, make some poundcake in a breadpan, make it from a mix, if you want, I used an almond flavored mix from the Oregon Coast. Now, cut it in slices at least one inch thick. You can either leave them out for a few hours, which will help keep them in one piece, or increase the risk of crumbling and use them right away. Now, mix some eggs and milk or, preferably, cream and make french toast using the poundcake; be gentle, don't saturate the bread, don't get too impatient --turning it before it is done on the first side-- or it might crumble. Serve with strawberries (or your favorite french toast topping, fruit, fruit jam, or preserves is best) and whipped cream. then tell me that you liked it.

In other news, I've posted a few more pages of my thesis on "The Thesis I Never Finish," for those who are interested.

Ahhh -- the Sounds of a Fake Ocean

2007-04-01T22:33:00.000-06:00

Tank is sitting up with me now. A few minutes ago, nothing would console him . . . then I turned on the whitenoise I use when I need to sleep but someone (the builders next-door, the cats, my brother- in- law chasing the cats and yelling "RWOWwww SCreaches") is being noisy . . . now he is asleep. He stopped crying the minute I turned it on -- AMAZING.

The De-Nationalizing of Christianity

2007-03-22T23:10:00.000-06:00

I'd like you, my fellow critics of Christianity (inside and out) to let me know what you think about this essay.

Is it logical to conceive of patriotism as a positive value? Doesn't it depend on the way in which it is conceived: a blind patriotism cannot be any better than the worst practices fostered by a country, but a critical patriotism might be able to rescue what is good without buying in to all of the bad things.

Thanks for the Recipe; Do you Happen to Have a Napkin?

2007-03-17T21:46:00.000-06:00

Do you have those all- too- frequent moments when you realize that you are doing something that has every chance of resulting in bodily injury or social disaster? The opportunities for social disaster, though quite promising, are nevertheless becoming less common as I age and the people in my social sphere learn to pretend that their laxity in enforcing the standards of society in is actually maturity, graciousness, insanity, or some other virtue.

Perhaps the opportunities for physical disaster, or “comedy” (as the ancients named it), have not actually become more or less numerous as time sweeps us toward our telos, or perhaps our proximity to that comedy which finds its purpose in our demise, and our awareness of the propinquity between ourselves and the reaper, simply twists our perceptions until children all become too fragile to use pointy scissors, and adults can all be trusted with alcohol, rusty hammers, fireworks, and flammable liquids in the privacy of their own garages.

Tonight I had one of those moments; not exactly a hammer swinging at an m-60 sitting in a pool of WD-40 sitting in a pie plate in my lap in an attempt to light a sparkler held in my teeth, this time, but good ideas were not had by all.

I must thank Alisha for the lovely Viennese Goulash recipe (if I had not capitalized “Goulash,” would it just mean that it was a recipe that came from Vienna for goulash rather than for a specific type of goulash that has gained the title: Viennese?). I had cooked the meat in Hungarian Paprika (Sweet Hungarian Paprika being in short supply here in Idaho) and I had just finished boiling the Spätzle (ʃpɛtslə) and had discovered that I had already used my favorite colander (the smaller metal one, which is easier to control with one hand) and that I had used a pan with two handles on the sides rather than one long handle (that also allows single-handed use) to boil the Spätzle. Upon this discovery, I found the larger colander and discovered that it came rather close to fitting over the mouth of the pan.

I know that you have probably begun to reason along the same lines which I found myself following: it’s fate. They are about the same size; one goes over the other in the process of their normal operation; my hands fit perfectly over the two sets of handles as I hold the colander over the pan, ergo, it is good, right, and perhaps admirable for me to clamp the two together, walk to the sink, and flip them as fast as I can . . . and here comes the moment to which I referred, where I realized that possible disaster had snuck up on me . . . it didn’t turn out as well as you might think, or maybe it was better. The entire front of my body from the waist down was suddenly and almost inexplicably covered with boiling water. I’m quite all right, just embarrassed and a little red over my right quadriceps.

In closing let me suggest to those of you who are considering trying this at home: skip the middleman and just use your pockets to strain the pasta, it works better and allows you to use a pair of pants which you are not currently wearing.

Comments

Dear Center for Disease Control, I Hate You

2007-03-06T17:08:00.000-07:00

So the flu is gone and now I have what appears to be Strep Throat. Yay. As if that weren't bad enough, I can't find a clinic that will accept me that will answer my phone calls, and, to make matters worse, the CDC won't allow a docter to give a prescription for antibiotics without a throat culture, which means I have to find the money for: 1. an exam with a docter, 2. a throat culture, and 3. antibiotics, and I'm alergic to Penecillin, so it will probably be a more expensive medication. As the british say, it's my birthday.

Let me get this straight, Strep is dangerous, but I can't get antibiotics without an exam and a culture, neither of which I can afford, so I have to stay sick until I can find one that I can afford and while I'm sick I will undoubtedly infect countless others, some of whom will also be too poor to afford treatment. And you think this is PROTECTING people.

So CDC, until I can get treated, I'm going lick my hands and shake hands with any of your employees that I can find. May whoever made this decision be too poor to afford a visit to the docter too.

[I took a picture of my throat, but I decided that it was too gross to post]

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No, I am NOT Pinching the Baby

2007-03-02T21:38:00.000-07:00

Tank is having what I can only describe as severe (but normal at this age) stomach trouble. He gets really angry and screams and screams and screams. Well, a few minutes ago I was holding poor little Tank while he screamed his head off, you parents probably know the scream I'm talking about "wa-waH-WAH-WAHWAH," followed by a very slow "WWWWAAAAAAA," descending into a very low and croakey "AHHHHHHHHW." My sister's oldest cat, Pookie, who decided a few weeks ago that crying must be okay, since we were okay with it, decided, very sensibly, that this crying was not. So he first came over and gave me an accusing stare . . . stare, stare, stare . . . then he put his paws up on the couch . . . stare at me, at baby, at me . . . hop up on the arm of the couch (something I've never seen him do, and which he is not allowed) . . . disturbed look, sniff the baby, recognize that I'm being nice to the baby . . . hop back down and leave the room.

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Somebody Stop the Ship, I Want to Get Off

2007-03-01T21:12:00.000-07:00

So, I have what I affectionately refer to as the stomach flu -- both ends fighting the middle until exhaustion, not enough fluids, crackers, and water. Sorry, Gina, no babysitter today.

I was watching the Travel channel, usually I just watch No Reservations, and Gina watches the Europe shows, but today I watched shows about different cruiselines. I especially liked the one where monsterously wealthy people live on the boat, but then, half way through the third one, I started getting seasick (not kidding) so I had to switch it. Oh, and while the food channel is one of my favorites, it was absolutely out of the question today . . . I'm glad there is a Spike TV and that I like bad Sci-Fi; really, when you get past the poor acting and mediocre writing, StarTrek Voyager isn't that bad.

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I'm Still Alive

2007-02-16T23:02:00.000-07:00

I am so happy to be here, uninjured and relatively safe after Valentine's Day. You see, the 13th, 14th, and 15th of Feb have often been very bad days for me. For instance, I decided to jump into bed on Valentines Day when I was 6 (I think). I had jumped into bed before but, this time, I made the nearly fatal, obviously dangerous error of turning the lights out first. Out with the lights, two quick steps, a dive and . . . the metal support that belonged under my matress, under my eye. That was my first set of stitches. Yeah, good times, good times.

And falling off a cliff . . . the 15th. Yeah, Gina actually listed a lot more a few years ago when she advised me to: "Hide in a safe place, with good ventalation, wearing a helmet, with a lot of pillows taped to you with duct tape, and avoid sharp objects until the 16th."

. . . and I don't think that she was joking.

2007-02-05T11:49:00.000-07:00

Of Babies and Whatnot

2007-02-02T19:46:00.000-07:00

I love Tank. He is so perfectly wonderful and sweet and he only cries for a few minutes at a time (and then his mom gets him if he doesn't stop). He looks up at me with his deep blue eyes that don't see very well yet, and gives a wonderfully accurate Pop-eye impression (I supply the laugh).

I must admit, though, I don't know anything as terrifying as an infant. He's so small and fragile, what if someone trips while carrying him, what if he throws himself off the changing table, what if . . . well, what if anything happens to hurt him? I don't think I could bear it if he was seriously hurt or in danger.

You see, I have a lot of perfectly valid reasons to believe in my own ability to survive, but this little guy doesn't have that kind of cred. I can count on my physical strength to save me, and on my intelligence, but all he has is mommy and daddy and any of the rest of us who might be present during a given moment . . . and that terrifies me more than anything that could happen to me.

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No! Don't make me! Please NOOOOOOO!

2007-01-28T22:08:00.000-07:00

Blogger just violated me. That's right, I was minding my own business and blogger forced me . . . I'm having trouble saying it . . . it forced me to move to the new blogger. I don't care how much better it is, I should have a choice. I really hate them now, maybe I'll get a Word Press blog.

From the Waiting Room

2007-01-25T22:17:00.000-07:00

Gina is pushing now. Get ready, cause Tank is onb his way.

Correction: Tank is here. I'd tell you his real name, but I'll bet Gina wants to do that herself. So far Unculatude is great.

A Quote I Wish had been Mine

2007-01-25T01:17:00.000-07:00

“When I started getting interested in politics and national affairs, I once again was brought up short by the claims of Jesus. To affirm that Jesus Christ is Lord is to acknowledge that no political leader, party, flag, nation, or ideology can share lordship over my life. The one who confesses Christ alone as Lord cannot simultaneously affirm utmost loyalty to another idea or person.”

David Gushee via Mike Cope's blog

Still Waiting

2007-01-25T00:38:00.000-07:00

Gina should pop after 7 am and before 6pm (I hope) tomorrow. I put the car seat in the car and now I wait: an insomniac in front of the computer, soon to be "Uncle Ty." I'm really nervous for Tank and for Gina.

Sorry that I haven't gotten the pics up yet, the camera has to stay in the car, just in case.

May you Never Run out of Branches: A Story for Arwen

2007-01-22T17:24:00.000-07:00

When we moved from Paradise to Milwaukie, we left behind the joys of childhood, the thrill of adventure, and an unfinished tunnel to china we had begun to excivate using garden trowels. In return for my greatest joys and dreams, I found a tree and a pole.

The rusty old pole, the lone survivor of a forgotten age when wind roamed freely on the earth and dryed those garments suspended between her and her long-forgotten partner, before the light of progress pushed them aside.

The tree was dark and intimidating at first: a blackwalnut apparently cold and severe, but for his closeness to the cedar that held him tight. I often spent the afternoon in his branches, a shelter from the noise and silence below, and from the rain, for a while at least.

The greatest gift of that kind old tree was not the spiritual retreat of his branches, but the branches themselves. It is the service of the pole, though, more intimate and enabling than the simple loss of a limb, that carried me through the age of abusive peers and insensative teachers, to stand on this side, bruised and scared, but strong.

For years she stood, my demons' proxy, as I struggled through the pain. My ritual beatings left her marked, but never dented by countless blows with branches, the sacrifice of the tree. All my fears, my angers, focused -- swinging, smashing, till at last they broke, leaving me worn and panting, but stronger than before, still hurting, but moving on.

So, my friend, keep on swinging, with all your pain, and hurt, and fear, and may tomorrow find you moving on, healing, changing, a better you, scars and all.

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Can I Borrow an Ice Skate?

2007-01-05T19:04:00.000-07:00

So, I've had a bad day, not as bad as Gina's, but she probably shouldn't talk about that. So here's how my day went:

1. Got up early, went to the OHSU Dental Clinic, they took X-rays and left me waiting for a tooth extraction . . . they came back ten minutes later and told me I need to find a dental surgeon because the tooth is too close to the nerve (whatever that means).

2. Mom and I called dental surgeons and dental organizations, in the process we discovered that it will probably cost more than we thought and that the Oregon Health Plan, for which I just applied, will probably be worthless, since an OHP employee told mom that they don't actually have funding for adults. Yeah, that does me a lot of good. Jerks.

3. I was really excited about getting to go see the Dead Sea Scrolls exhibit in Seattle . . . the tickets are sold out . . . I guess I'll have to wait until next time.

4. I called Gina to whine, and she's having a worse day than I am. If it wasn't bad enough that I have no room to complain after hearing about her day, I also feel upset, angry, and defensive of her --I'm glad Killer is such a good guy and can be there for her. Maybe it's good that I'm gone, I don't take mistreatment of my sister, by people who should know better, very lightly, I doubt I'd bloody anyone's nose, but I might just try to make anyone's life more miserable than it already is.

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Great Modern Poetry from the First Century BCE

2007-01-04T22:35:00.000-07:00

We read some Catullus in Latin class, but I'm sure I missed this one back then; I'm glad that I saw it today in Burton Raffel's essay, "Translating Midieval European Poetry," in The Craft of Translation (eds. Biguenet and Schulte):

odi et amo: quare id faciam, fortasse requiris.
nescio, sed fieri sentio et excrucior.

My translation (poetic licence obvious):

I hate.
And I Love.

You must wonder why I do.

I don't know,
But it is happening.

And I do know that it is tearing.
me.
apart.

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A Rush Request

2007-01-04T17:25:00.000-07:00

I just received an email from my good friend, Rush. You might know Rush or his dog, Sharkdog, from their insightful, sometimes sarcastic comments on my blog, or for the work his team is planning to do with the Vienna Team's missions project.

Rush wrote:

I was wondering, if you wouldn't mind, if you could maybe put a post on
your blog about Whit and Adrienne Gatewood. maybe just link to their new blog so
your bloguminity will be aware of them, pray for them, and offer them
encouragement. They need it. Whit and Adrienne are dear friends of ours and what
they're going through is breaking my heart...it's breaking me. http://seekthefather.blogspot.com/

I'll
let you read their story for yourself.

loverush

So, if you would keep the family in your prayers, I'm sure the family would appreciate it.

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Time for a Visit

2006-12-30T23:50:00.000-07:00

I should be down Portland way for a week or more starting Sunday evening, perhaps we'll see each other there.

2006-12-28T22:50:00.000-07:00

Merry Christmas

2006-12-26T09:35:00.000-07:00

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Anything Seem Wrong?

2006-12-19T00:23:00.000-07:00

So, I'm very good at most things in the kitchen. I cook well and I bake very well. I've even won awards for my pumpkin pies (okay, so it was at church, but I did win first place over more than 20 other bakers). I've rarely had any trouble with a recipe unless there was an unusual factor involved (like having to cook for more than a dozen people), I even have a good rate of success with delicate and exotic recipes and some of my best creations were adaptations I made of an existing recipe on a whim.

So, what I'm saying is, I am usually a good baker. I enjoy it and I'm good at it. Tonight, however, my baking skills might be compared to the skill of Colin Farrell at remaining celibate, or Kevin Federline at singing, or Kermit the Frog at commitment; in other words, I burned the cookies.

As if that were not embarrising enough, I ruined the Rice Krispies® Squares, which I believe, needs an apostrophe after the ess on Krispies®, since they are composed of Rice Krispies® and always contain more than one. To be perfectly honest, I didn't understand the instructions until after I ruined them. The box said to "melt the butter and marshmallows:" Done. "Mix in the Rice Krispies®," I can do that, or I thought so until I got to the line, "until well coated."

Now, let's do the math: the recipe calls for 40 marshmallows and one LARGE box of Rice Krispies®. The 40 marshmallows create about two cups of marshmallow gunk. Two cups of marshmallow gunk will hold approximately three quarters of a box together, if you really work hard and don't care about the taste. If you want it to taste good, two cups of marshmallow gunk is enough to hold about a dozen individual Rice Krispies® together (I think that this might be my first exaggeration in this entry). So, as you can see, if one follows the recipe on the box, one will get just what I got, a lump of loosely adhered and almost completely unsweetened Rice Krispies® "treats." That, my friends, is NOT treatastic.

One happy note: I've rekindled a love of mine. I learned to love burned cookies when my mom would spend the day baking cookies for my cousin, Todd, who used to visit frequently. Todd was very picky about his cookies, so mom would bake several batches until she got one just right. While some of those rejected batches were perfectly good and would be doled out as dessert, some of them, on rare occasion (I remember two instances), were the victim of an unpredictable oven's whims. These victimized cookies were then made available to the child population of the house to consume as they wished.

Gina, always a character of refined taste and of too much pride to stoop to eating the seconds (when she could procure the cookies of highest quality through bargaining, theft, or subterfuge) would leave the burned cookies to me, after removing the portion of older sibling tax that was her due, and which consisted of any cookies which escaped enough damage to have edible portions, would allow me to eat the largest portion of the remaining cookies (and would additionally allow me to hand over any "good" cookies that might come my way).

[I believe I shall let the previous paragraph/ sentence run-on as it wishes, for the sake of the fans, from whom I receive many encouragements in this regard]

Because of this method of cookie distribution, I became accustomed to the burned cookies. I cannot even say that this happened over time, for it seemed that I loved these extra- crispy rejects from the beginning. I loved their dark and sultry flavor, the crunch as I bit down on them, even the smell of sugar exposed to heat greater than its want. Because those were always chocolate chip cookies, I thought it was only their sinister appeal that drove me to distraction (yes, I, who regularly refuses dessert, I, who would rather bake dessert than eat it, I, who eats ice cream more often as a social lubricant than for enjoyment), but such was not the case. I just ate half- a- dozen burned gingerbread cookies, and was compelled to drink three glasses of milk (to which I have an allergy, and to the lactose of which I am intolerant) in the process.

I am sick (and my physical condition will soon match the condition of my disease, due to the milk).

Comments

Mom

2006-12-14T23:12:00.000-07:00

Warning: This will be a random set of rambling.

Yesterday was my mom's birthday, I don't know which one (and wouldn't tell if I did). My mom is one of the sweetest people whom I have ever had the pleasure to know. She will try to help anyone, and she doesn't really want anything in return (except maybe a courteous response).

It is not hard to figure out where she got all that caring; my grammie, the Christmas party of whom I had the pleasure of attending tonight at the Sunbridge Care Center, is the same way. They both always look out for other people before themselves and spread love around where ever they can.

Mom always wanted us to call her "mommy," but both of us just skipped that stage. Mom was mom or momma, but as I get older, mommy seems more fitting.

When I was three, Gina went off to school. I, who had never been parted from my sister for more than an hour or two, was miserable. I felt like I was being left out of all the good stuff. Gina, on the other hand, was perhaps even more miserable, stuck in a classroom all day and longing for freedom.

Mom, recognizing just how much I wanted to be doing something important, like Gina, decided to help me out. She planned special times each day to do something special, just the two of us. I don't remember what we actually did, but it was important.

Poor Gina. She came home from her unjust confinement (after all, she had already taught herself to read, and read she did: Tom Sawyer was her first book) and she discovered that while she was forced to where she didn't want to be and do things she didn't want to do, I was at home living a better life than she had gotten to have before her daily exile.

Seeing just how miserable Gina was, my parents decided that it would be best to take her out of school for a while and teach her at home; and that is what Mom did. Mom had learned a lot about education when she helped Dad get his Masters of Education, and on her own, and, let's face it, she was a natural teacher. I can honestly say that the most important lessons that I learned in our educational situation were not academic: we learned responsibility, the love of service, and the importance of creativity. We were treated with love and respect, and we needed love and respect. Gina and I have a lot to live up to, and I hope that TANK will have as wonderful a childhood as we did.

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I Can Stop Any Time I Want to . . .

2006-12-13T01:32:00.000-07:00

. . . which, evidently, means 1:34am, when I put it on pause until tomorrow.

Perhaps that is even more pathetic than the situation of the game site's name as outside the confines of good grammar.

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Wisdom from Robert Jordan III

2006-12-11T00:50:00.000-07:00

On his blog, Jordan says:

To all of those of who have posted that you are praying for me, thank you. For all of those who say you don’t believe, but you send good wishes, thank you, too. You think good wishes; God hears prayers.

Is God too proud to accept the prayers of unbelievers? I once tried to convince a Portland-area preacher that his sermon on how God doesn't hear the prayers of non-Christians was unscriptural. I was ready with several scriptures, but he wouldn't even entertain the idea that he might be wrong. If God is better than an idol, he must be good enough to hear the prayers of all people. The Hebrew prophets made it clear that God was not merely the God of Israel, but the God of all nations, whether they know it or not; he cares about pegans and Christians and Jews, and Muslims and it would be a bizzare and unmitigated lack of faith in him to believe that he only hears the prayers of one group. It would even be against the basic tenants of salvation itself if people who were bad could not pray that they might become better, if those who were idol worshipers could not pray that they could leave behind their gods.

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Hit a Nerve?

2006-12-11T00:40:00.000-07:00

Have you ever looked forward to dental surgery? Well, I do.

Every day I look forward to having my bottom left wisdom tooth cut out. Nature has already started the process. I have a hole in the tooth about a quarter of the size of the exposed area of the tooth, thogh it feels like it takes up a quarter of my body, especially when something hits the nerve. My beloved water pick has been very faithful in cleaning out anything that got itself wedged in there, but, and I am just speculating here, something sharp got in and pierced the thin piece of material that was keeping me from pain. I am currently using a temporary tooth patch, and waiting for Christmas, when I go home with my parents and they take me to a dentist and the dentist takes out a drill and cuts that puppy out. I just hope I don't have an absess or nerve damage or whatever.

Well, tonight I had to change the patch because it had broken. I had to wash out the hole . . . you know, the one with the live nerve. it wasn't so bad with the luke-warm water, but when I rinsed it with cold mouthwash I had to brace myself and pray for it to be over. All that trauma has me up until the current hour, but now the tooth-deadening stuff in the temporary filling is finally starting to work, maybe I'll get some sleep afterall.

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Clif Story Part VI

2006-12-07T12:01:00.000-07:00

I know, here's another Rockey movie, who needs that, but this time it is starting to get exciting, really. If you haven't been keeping up with the story, here are the earlier posts: Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV. Part V.

As you remember, I was just returning to verticle after a slip on the cliff.

When I was back at the correct angle, I continued my descent rapidly, counting on Chris and Theresa to let me know when I was approaching the ledge; as it turned out, neither of them had counted on my descent progressing so rapidly. I just caught a glimpse of the ledge as I passed it. They had not yet noticed, being involved in a conversation and gazing at the view to the west. I asked if what I had just passed was the ledge and they confirmed it. I was about two feet from the end of the rope and only inches from the first safety knot. The good news was that I was less than ten feet below the ledge, the bad news was that I was not a good climber and the face of the cliff, called “Jungle Cliff” by area climbers, was what climbers refer to as a dirty cliff, meaning that it has dirt, rocks, and brush that break off in your hands when you try to climb. I even tried the old climbing trick of working my way to the sides. I thought of climbing the rope but I could not get a decent hold on it with my gloves on and I was worried about burning my hands if I removed them and, if I did get my hands rope-burned, how would I get out of this? I tried climbing until I was worn out, then I decided to rest on that first safety knot while I considered options.

While I was resting, I made a very disturbing discovery. The knot in the rope that was intended to keep me from slipping off the end of the rope was slipping, ever so slowly, through the rappelling device. I just so happens that two minor mistakes added up to a big problem for me. First, we were using a rappelling device called a figure eight. As it's name implies, it consists of two joined circles, through which rope winds in a way that slows the fall of the person rappelling. Though a figure eight may be used to rappel, it is most often used for mountain climbing and rescue applications; the device that is best suited to this type of rappelling is called a tube and gives the user much greater control due to how snugly it fits around the rope. This snug fit causes the tube to stop when it encounters obstacles, like the square safety knots we were using. Second, a tube might be stopped by a square knot, while a figure eight will appear to stop for a few moments, but the knot is merely working its way slowly through the figure eight. When rappelling with a figure eight one should tie a loop in the rope and insert a clip. None of us, however, knew any of this at that time.

I watched the first knot wind its way through the only thing that held me aloft. I saw that there was a small ledge, just a jutting edge, a few inches of rock sticking out from the cliff face. It was just an inch or two beneath my feet; when I stretched my foot out I could just brush it. It wasn't close enough to give me any support but all I needed was a few inches. There was about a foot between the two knots in the rope so, I figured I could let the first knot slip through and rest on the second knot and the little ledge while I waited for Chris and Theresa to send down my prussic ropes.

All right here goes . . . I jiggled the rope just a little to push the knot the rest of the way through and . . . oops, BOTH knots slipped through.

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Wisdom from Robert Jordan II

2006-12-05T21:47:00.000-07:00

(N)ever give up. No matter how bad things seem today, you just don’t give up. You don’t do it. As long as you believe that things will get better, they will. I don’t know why or how that works; it defies logic; but work it does. It is when [I] begin to believe that there is no hope that things start going bad. So DON’T GIVE UP! . . .

. . . When you are sure there’s nothing left, then you tell yourself, “I’m not giving up! I won’t quit!” And if you have to crawl into the ring, then you . . . crawl, man. You make the bell any way you can, and if you have to pull yourself to your feet by holding onto Liston’s trunks, you . . . do it. I know the pain. You can beat that. You can. It is surprising how you can make friends with the pain when you have to. Somehow, it doesn’t hurt so much then. It just is. But don’t you give up. . . .

--Robert Jordan

There've been a lot of people over the years I wish had listened to advice like that. It's good advice when you're shivering in a cold operating room, but it's even better advice when you don't know how you're going to make it through one more day without going nuts.

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On Writing

2006-12-04T12:29:00.000-07:00

I am a writer at heart, but not by nature. I love words and phrases, figures of speech and idioms, narrative devices and hooks. I have even been known to indulge in allerative interludes and color my speech with mondegreen and spoonerism; for all of that, though, I will never write naturally, I will likely never have an acceptable first draft, I will probably never feel that what I've written lives up to my standards, and I will, quite probably, always wish for one more revision before I have to surrender my work for criticism or for print. I would like to lay blame for all of that on my writing disability, but I think that such a stance is simplistic in the extreme.

You see, I do have a rather severe writing disability, and it does effect my work in all matters, from formulation to the way my fingers miss the proper keys; from skipping or repeating words, thoughts, or ideas to reading what I thought I wrote, rather than what the page says; but these things are more the origin of my problems with writing than the sum. Because I struggled to learn these tasks, which I will never master (barring an absurd miracle, like Jesus healing a hangnail and ignoring a leper), I have developed an almost insane desire to retype every sentence I write, never until it is up to my standards, but just until it is a little less . . . unrefined. This tendancy, in combination with a perverse and shatneresque inability to write without pauses, which if reflected in print, would engender more elipses, parentheses, and em-dashes than words, makes it unlikely that I will ever write half so beautifully as I believe that I should.

I am sure that you can understand, then, why I admire good writing, or writing that strives to contain the artistic value which legitimizes its existence. So I thought I'd share with you two of my favorite narrative bloggers; people who take the time to do what most of us do not even consider: conceive of a blog as a literary form, with every right to the artistic details and imaginative language that that one should expect of good narrative. I shall include a few links below to these writers, the skills of whom are still growing, but for whom the trajectory of their current work promises future excellence.

Warning: Some of the following contain infrequent, but decidedly objectionable content. Also, the author of this blog does not necessarily agree with the views expressed by these bloggers, he just recognizes the qualities reflected in their forms of expression.

Fight Club, Why Worry and Scenes from A Restaurant from Gary James at The Big Side Order. James is rather consistent in his quality, with a quirky sense of humor, and amazing aesthetic sensabilities (and a strong notion of when to violate them). I find his wit and openness worth the

I went to the County Fair, The Glass Seems as Dark as it Can be, and Ridiculous and Awkward from Steve at The Underground Railroad of My Mind. Steven is a thoughful and insightful philosopher. He often questions society, reality, Christianity, and his own intentions, and seldom lets the humerous or absurd pass unmarke.

If I were to compare writing to art, mine is architecture. The lines are generally straight, the construction designed primarily to hold weight. I wish I had the time and talent to develop the brush strokes and exhausting intricacy that writers like these bring even to their most informal utterances, making them nuanced paintings of the human condition.

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Story of the Year

2006-12-03T00:26:00.000-07:00

Click the pic to read the story.

Amazing. I love that it worked, but I hope the kid gets a good psychologist before he tries it again.

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100th Post

2006-11-28T00:51:00.000-07:00

For my 100th post I was going to do a top 100 list, but I decided that that was too much so I decided to do a top 10 list of the top 100 lists I thought about doing:

10. 100 foods I want to eat right now
9. 100 reasons I hate winter in Idaho
8. 100 "stars" I wish would go away
7. 100 things I didn't want to see at a family reunion
6. 100 things you don't want to overhear your chef say
5. 100 things you don't want to overhear your surgeon say
4. 100 things you don't want your surgeon to say to your chef
3. 100 words that are always funny
2. 100 people I don't want to sit next to me on a plane
1. 100 things Jesus wouldn't do

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Now, Back to a Story (or Eight Stories)

2006-11-16T22:54:00.000-07:00

Gina reminded me that I started a story and have yet to finish it, so here I go. You might want to catch up on the posts about the earlier episode (I'm going to ask some of you, especially Sparky, to pretend not to read these, in other words, I really don't want to have to talk about it again just because I'm writing about it): Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV.

In the words of Prophet Bill Cosby, "I told you that story to tell you this one."

A few years later, after I had gone to OC, in February, Chris asked me if I'd like to go rappelling with him and Theresa and perhaps a friend from work. I wasn't sure about it. He wanted to leave at eight in the morning and I had Greek until nine but he agreed to put it off for an hour. He had all the equipment and a car and I enjoyed my last rappelling experience so I decided that a few hours wouldn't hurt my school work too much and I went along. As it turned out, the guy from Chris' work that Chris invited didn't meet us at Cascade, he was running late for a reason that I don't know, but he told Chris that he would try to meet us there.

So Chris and Theresa and I drove out to Louis and Clark Park, just outside of Troutdale, Oregon, near the place where the Sandy River joins the Columbia River. It is just inside the famous Columbia River Gorge in one of its most beautiful areas. On the East side of the park, there are train tracks which boarder a field scattered with clumps of trees and park facilities. There are trees of various types and bluffs with zigzagging trails that rise into cliffs, sheltered by the trees on the West side of the park, looming above the small road that stretches south beside the mouth of the Sandy River. We parked and began getting the gear in order. Chris' other friend, the name of whom I either never learned or have since forgotten, had still not arrived so we decided to go without him.

We hiked up the steep trail bypassing the right-hand path that wound below the cliffs; we took the other path, the one that led to the farms and woods that stretch south of the gorge. I was a little apprehensive about hiking on someone else's property but there was no evidence that they wanted to keep us out, no fences or signs, just damp paths through scraggly brush and along the edges of fields.

At long last we found a spot where the trail came close enough to the cliffs that we would not have to break our own trail in to them and we began our preparations. The first sign of a problem was the height of the cliff. Chris had a one hundred foot rope but the cliff was a hundred and fifty feet and tying it to three anchor points, as safety training demands took even more rope. Chris was not happy about the situation but none of us wanted to spend more time searching for a better spot so we decided to rappel to a ledge about seventy feet below the rim. Since it is hard to look down when you are rappelling, the people on top would tell the one on the rope when to slow down in time to land on the ledge. Chris put two knots in the end of the rope to keep the rappelling device from slipping off the end of the rope with one of us down onto the ground.

I went over the edge first. It is hard enough to rappel of an abrupt edge but this ledge sloped steeply down to the sheer face more than ten feet below the beginning of the drop off and it was still a little damp from the morning drizzle. During the transition from slope to cliff my feet slipped and I was hanging upside down by the harness that I had tied from webbing moments before. Luckily, when Chris had taught me to tie a harness, back in Trout Lake, he told me to make it as tight as possible without cutting off my circulation to prevent such a slip of the foot from causing me to slip from my harness as well. So, there I dangled, at a breathtaking height while the Chris and Theresa worried. In order to get upright again you have to spread your legs apart without letting go of the rope, like you are trying to do the splits, and, getting some traction on the rock, rock back and forth from foot to foot, moving each foot back a few inches at a time until you get back to an acceptable angle. It took me a minute to get my feet under myself enough to walk my legs down near the level with my head and start down the cliff face again.

Stay tuned for our next exciting episode of: Ty Does Something Really Stupid and should Probably have Died

A Thank You to Boise Graffiti Artists

2006-11-13T12:43:00.000-07:00

I grew up around "street art." It isn't like I'm from the inner city or anything, but when I was a kid, I used to like to look at graffiti when we would drive across town to church or to see my aunt and my grandma. My favorite example was that building near the junction of I84 and 405. Someone had painted an elaborate piece of art that took up the entire top story of the warehouse, but, after several years of improvement, the city (I guess) had it painted over. I totally understand their decision, but I do miss the painting.

When I worked at Pamplin Music, I got to know the destructive nature of tagging. We had to have the building repainted a few times in my four monthes there to cover the graffiti and discourage more tagging.

Now, it seems that Boise has taggers who have defeated the most difficult problems with their art: in Boise, they have been tagging pieces of paper and then taping them up, that way admirers can take them home and the city can just cut them down. Maybe Boise should start a campaign to provide graffiti artists with giant sticky notes.

Wisdom from Robert Jordan I

2006-11-11T21:47:00.000-07:00

I've just added Robert Jordan to my blogroll. He is a great author and I think it ashame that he has not received the recognition he deserves for writing one of the most popular series ever, even if it is Fantasy. I just thought I'd share an entertaining quote that sounds like Gina:

. . .(T)hat Dancing with the Stars baloney . . . is strangely entertaining, one might (say) weirdly entertaining, much like a train wreck involving Borat and Rush Limbaugh in clown makeup.

While I don't find it that entertaining, that description helps me understand why Gina keeps swithching the tv back there. It might also explain why some of my friends like to go dancing, skating, or bowling with me: "It's so horrible, but I can't look away!"

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Google-rific

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I Demand a Recount!

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You Say you Want a Revolution?

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What Offends You?: Prelude to an Imus Post

And Hours to Go before I Eat . . .

False Advertising by Capitol One?

Hey Baby, you Doing Anything between Now and Pentecost?

"What does P-U-L spell?"

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Ahhh -- the Sounds of a Fake Ocean

The De-Nationalizing of Christianity

Thanks for the Recipe; Do you Happen to Have a Napkin?

Dear Center for Disease Control, I Hate You

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Somebody Stop the Ship, I Want to Get Off

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