Making their way... the only way they know how...

I fear that my blog has turned into The Life and Postings of Sidemoss and His Dog. I will do my best to rectify this, but I am not sure that it can be helped. Originally, my life and reflections were based on the movies I watched, but I hardly watch anything anymore. I always wanted life to be like this, where I read and write and enjoy life making observations day to day. I have wanted to minimize the TV experience as much as possible, since true adventure usually occurs outside the realm of TV.

The idea is to become more creative and less critical. More productive and less producer-minded. Wow! I have been watching TV a long time. I think this writers' strike was the best thing that could have happened to my world...

Here we are
Face to Face
A couple of Silver Spoons...

Is TV creative? Or is it embarrassing? Is it there for escape? Or is it there to steal our time?

I am ready for diapers...

I am ready for diapers...

I think I am anyway. The other night was extremely cold, so I let Forrest sleep in the garage. I set up the Heat Dish in there and tied his leash to the railing. We bought him a $10 pillow from Cal Ranch, so it seemed like everything should work out well.

I had a tough time sleeping, mainly because of the Heat Dish being on all night. It was pretty safe, but still with Forrest, it made things unpredictable. The next morning I got up and let him out as soon as I woke up. I really did not notice anything out of the ordinary. His pillow looked a little wet, like he got real slobbery on it. I turned off the Heat Dish and went back to bed.

A few hours later, I decided to go shovel the driveway. When I passed Forrest's sleeping spot I noticed that he had in fact chewed off the corner of the pillow. On closer inspection, I discovered that in the night Forrest had crapped. The slobber all over the pillow was not slobber, but poop. It was on the underside and fused with the cold cement garage floor. It was a moment of anger and frustration with how a dog can be so lame...

Now, Forrest is a pretty big dog, so when he goes to the proverbial restroom, it is usually a double or triple flusher. After a week, when I scoop the poop in the backyard, we need to rent a backhoe to lift the poop bag out and place it in a trash can. So this garage dookie was all over the place.

When I assessed the situation later on, I realized that I really did not give Forrest a whole lot of options. In my effort to save him from the cold, I put him on a very short leash with a water dish in walking distance, a pillow, stairs and not much else. I was not even thinking about the bathroom situation. Thinking back, the time I went out to see him before I went to bed, he really wanted out. I think that was the signal that he had to go and not that he wanted to escape. How could I know this since he is an outside dog? But now, it does make sense. So, the situation is not without logic. Maybe I am the lame one.

So I scooped up as much as I could with a towel and threw that away. Then, the pillow. I threw that away. Paper Towels. Threw away. But the fused poop to the cold cement? What about that? I had to go in and get a bucket of warm water with a rag. This I did a couple times. It is now the cleanest spot on the whole garage floor.

How does this make me ready for diapers? My thinking on this is that I have a big fear of the whole dirty diaper concept. It smells. It's gross. It gets all over the place. I have had a tough enough time handling my own #2 visits... So here I am face to face with dog crap which is the equivalent of probably a week's worth of newborn infant poop. And I overcame it! Even though I wanted to run and hide in a closet full of baby wipes. I can only compare this to the scene in Batman Begins where he embraces the thing he fears the most by being in a cave surrounded by bats.

I am not sure what I am getting at exactly. Am I saying that I am going to be a super hero whose power emanates from the stealthy qualities exhibited by poop? I don't think that is what I am saying, but I think there is definitely a principle here in fighting fire with fire...

Or maybe I am just going to be the best diaper changer ever. People will call me from miles around to change them. Actually, I do not want to be so much of an overachiever...

DreamViewer

In the movie Until the End of the World, the characters reach a point where they get these handheld devices which allow them to see their own dreams. They become so addicted to the device that they do not do anything, but just spend their whole day watching their dreams. It is kind of a mistake for the movie, because there is a pretty compelling plot up to that point and the movie nosedives when the dream viewing comes along. However, I like the idea that it conveyed, that the people could not (or would not) do anything but continue in their own self-absorption with this little mechanical device. And their relationships just fall apart, because they can only exist for their dreams.

I just received one of these little devices for Christmas and I caught a glimpse of myself staring into the void of the view screen, while my wife spoke to me in the background. With these types of wonderment, we need never be bored again. Now, we can access information at the drop of a hat. Videos, Music, Phone Calls, Internet. When I go to the bathroom, I can continue shopping or researching or sending text messages to friends. No longer do I have personal time to reflect on life or new inventions. I have my dreams before me and I can just continue accessing all that it will allow.

I am not sure what the resolution was for them in the movie. I think they ran out of batteries or something. I do need to come up with ways to keep myself from being lost in the void of my own dreams. I am going to seek out boredom because I need to take away the control I feel like I have to have. I will leave the device in my room and go shovel snow. I will watch the DIY channel and come up with dreams on my own.

The DreamViewer is a great tool. I cannot imagine something today being so cool and useful. It is a means. It is a means. A means. Not an end.

Round 2... Fight!

The results are in.
The votes have been counted.
And, the unit has spoken.
The W name lives on.

My wife is carrying a son.

Resolution #683

Do you ever look back on a time and wish you had been more like George Costanza?

Yesterday, we were dining at Carrabba's for lunch. My friend, M, orders a smoothie. It came with a straw. The waiter left for a few minutes and then came back for our orders. When he returned, M asked him for a spoon. The waiter's response was this: "We only provide spoons when you order soup." Then, he left and never brought us a spoon the whole time we were there. We ended up paying for our meal and giving him a decent tip. We also made excuses for the guy saying things like: "Well, he's new." Or "It's the company's policy."

At the time I actually mentioned that it would be nice to have someone with us who has a confrontational personality. Now, that I look back on it, I should have said this: "Are you really not going to bring him a spoon? What? Were we supposed to bring our own spoons? I didn't see a sign outside that said: Unless you are ordering soup, no spoon will be provided. How is a smoothie not soup? It is like a fruit soup!"

This was definitely a get the manager over there and cause a scene type situation. Maybe it is a manners thing and the fear was that he would slurp the smoothie. But wouldn't there be a greater fear in someone slurping soup? I would think that the policy would be to not bring out the spoon unless requested. I seriously doubt that they only have 3 spoons back in the kitchen and they are rationing them out to just soup buyers...

We all sat there being whiny, sarcastic programmers making fun of the situation, but doing nothing about it. So, from now on, I resolve to make situations uncomfortable in the name of ridiculous policy...

You make the call!

In less than a week, I find out the gender of my first child. My wife wants a girl and I suppose I want a boy. I keep denying this wish, but I guess it is there, deep down. I think it is somewhat natural to want to have a child of your own gender so you can have some trace of identifiability. But perhaps there is a myth in thinking that there will actually be this link of understanding between the two of us. I have great nieces which help sway me to the female vote.

But, isn't there something to be said about teaming up against Mom in the cause of spilling food on our shirts? Won't it be better for us both to have innocent looks on our face when accused of the poor condition of the front of the toilet? We could shift the blame on each other and have an understanding that the vagueness of who is actually guilty matters little in comparison to the comraderie of having the same ailment. And won't it be great to have someone with the same "competitive spirit" to take games, puzzles and tv watching into the wee hours of the morning?

Yeah, I guess I do want a boy. It's what I know. And I think my wife wants a girl for the same reason. But I know that whatever, whoever our baby is, there will be a newness to it all that makes the experience joyful.

However, I suspect that being a boy is not the same as raising one, so I can say it is what I know, but I am a fool for making any such assumption.

So let me restate: I want a boy, because I am a boy and I think that sometimes I will be able to look into his eyes and know that he has crapped his pants, because I have been there. I feel safe with that.

Case Study Junkie

I just finished The Road Less Travelled by M Scott Peck. I think it is my first psychotherapy book. I took Psychology in college and I had a mythology class too, but this is the first time I have read something by someone who almost seemed to be professional. I want to say that he was completely professional, but I would need to read another psychotherapy book. Or at least 2 others by different authors before I could come back and say that this sounds genuine.

I do like this book, but I have a concern that it is "pop psych". That was a term a psychology friend of mine used the other day. So much of the book appeals to the general Christian public that I was concerned he was pandering a bit. And, maybe the reason the book is so popular is because of this notion. Much of it seemed familiar. I would definitely recommend it to people to read.

Peck goes into some cool ideas, like the fact that life is difficult and that people often shy away from difficult things. He explains love and what is and is not love. He goes into talking about how all people have religion, though they may not attend or think they are religious.

I think I am a "case study junkie". Whenever Peck would introduce someone as a patient, suddenly I would get really interested. I guess that is one thing I love in life, being able to assign someone a particular problem and then going through the process of having it be discovered, worked on, resolved, or not. I am almost like the kid who calls people names and suddenly a girl bows her head in shame because I accidentally got it right for once. There I am making the girl feel bad for having a problem so easily recognizable...

I think case studies are kind of like chick flicks. In this book, there was an attractive girl who grew up in a strict, Catholic background, who married early and suddenly had these panic attacks after she realized her gay husband did not want to have sex with her anymore. I realize that I am oversimplifying an oversimplification, but it works. It fits together in this neat bundle and there is this total chick flick reward. And we cannot argue, because we have not sat there through session after session of mundane problems.

When I was younger I used to do character analysis of the people around me. As I have gotten older, I realized that people are much more complicated than just what an analysis could cover. Usually my analysis only covered a half page. But it was all I knew about the person, so I could not really go into more detail. I had a lot of fun with that. It appears that these case studies are an extension of that. However, the ones mentioned in the book are more like the CSI version of people. The case study where the villain always admits it in the end. They are just too powerless against the forensics.

I think that is my major issue with the book and possibly any psychology book I read in the future. The kind of stuff that appeals to me directly are the unpredictable things, the real things. Like, a man has a habit of going to church each Tuesday and the doctor discovers that he is off 2 days in his thinking, but cannot adjust. The deviation is that he does not check his mail on Sunday. So even though there is this compulsion on so many levels and the case falls into this two day off problem, there is still a glitch in him which knows that the day is Sunday. Something like this would be used in a CSI episode to show that he is a fraud. The psychotherapy author would not include it in the book, because it does not fit with what he is trying to say. But here I am saying it is still there and we cannot explain it, but it is kind of cool, because it has no real place.

And perhaps people would expect me, if I was the author, to have an explanation for the mail thing, but I wouldn't, or wouldn't want to. The deviation is demonstrated. The people notice it and we are left to conclude nothing, except that it is there.

The Student

The other day I was walking Forrest. We were passing this house from across the street and he started to whimper. I looked over there to see if there was a dog or a cat or something, but I did not see anything except for a couple of lawn animals. I thought for a second and it occurred to me that he was afraid of this polar bear looking thing.



I think many of us have this wish inside us that when our students are confronted with something they are frightened of or very unsure about that the sudden enlightenment of what the thing actually is will cause an Aha moment to occur. It would be at this point that the student would slap the hand to the forehead and say something like: "What was I thinking?"

So, I pulled Forrest over there hoping that when he met up with the polar bear, he would in fact realize his mistake and feel the dominance so necessary in our young canines today. We got closer and Forrest went right up to the beast and sniffed at it. I was feeling confident that my young Padowan learner was indeed feeling the light within when all of a sudden, Forrest jumps back right into my legs almost taking me out. He is a big dog and that is a ton of force coming all at once. It was as if the polar bear had actually lunged at him and Forrest was so scared that he just had to get away.

The fear was still there even though this was not a real animal by any means. I suppose it represents something very frightening to Forrest though. Looking at it, it is a lot smaller than a real polar bear and a little smaller than Forrest. But, it does almost seem to be in an attack mode. I guess when we see certain images in movies we are frightened. Or, when walking through a haunted house we will be afraid of things we know are not real. I know that having my lifesize pinatas in the house would scare me when I saw them out of the corner of my eye.

I am trying to make excuses for him, because this seems so ridiculous. He is way bigger than most of the dogs we come across. So why does he not have that swagger? Maybe I ought to buy one of those polar bears and leave it in the backyard with him. Then, he can show it who is boss. That would probably be a very weird day.

The Tree Party

We visited the Festival of Trees this year. I was not sure what to expect. I thought it would be outside and there would be ents guiding people about. I also thought the decorations would be solely on the trees and would not be creating a room theme all over the floor.

The idea is that people decorate a Christmas tree for a loved one who has died tragically of a disease or something else. I think they like to stick to the tragic theme even though it appeared that some people pictured there lived to ripe old ages. They decorate the tree with certain themes, presumably a theme related to the person who died. Like, if a man was into hunting giraffes, they would have some giraffe legs sticking out with a head on top. Or, if a child liked Disney (what child does not like Disney?), then the tree would have all sorts of Disney ornaments all over it. Then they sell or auction the trees to the rich. The proceeds go to Primary Children's Hospital, which is up in Salt Lake.

So, as I was in there, I had to say that every tree was amazing. Really, when it comes down to it, there are no ugly trees. Maybe a couple had colours which were not my favourite, but for the most part there was lots of creative energy in the place. Row upon row of trees. And then they had small trees and gingerbread houses and kids performing in costumes. It was quite an ordeal.

But, after looking at all these trees, I suppose I got into a mode of wanting to see something that was in fact, unique. There were a couple, but not many. For the most part, the trees all fit in. They were each overdone with as many repetitious decorations as they could muster. I was looking for the tree that spoke to me. I wanted there to be something that caused me to go Wow!

Now, can I just go in and criticize without doing anything myself? Of course not. It is not until we pick up our own swords and chop something in half that we can really call ourselves butcher, right? So, it is at this moment that I decide... Well, actually I decide that I could do something truly unique, but that would require some real effort and time and engineering skills.

Blind Boscoe

A legend from my childhood died this week. At 12 years old, I was introduced to the world of Heavy Metal. My cousin was 2 1/2 years older than me and always knew what was cool before me. So, what he had was what I wanted. He had Candy-O by the Cars and Freedom of Choice by Devo. So, it would only follow that when the heavy metal craze hit in the early eighties, C would be right on board, and I would be tagging along.

As I look back on it, I was not fortunate enough to own any of the so-called truly cool heavy metal bands of the day, because they were a little too centered around Satan. I cannot remember if this was my choice or my Dad's. Or, if it was the influence my Dad had on me to make that kind of choice. I may have requested Iron Maiden - Number of the Beast or Motley Crue - Shout at the Devil as a birthday present, but I know that I did request Quiet Riot - Metal Health and got it. What a great album. It was total poser heavy metal. Wannabe heavy metal. Almost as bad as Christian Rock... but not that bad.

There were a few heavy metal bands at the time who qualified to be listenable, because they did not subscribe to such blatantly satanic themes. Quiet Riot seemed to be the king of these groups opting for the spotlight of popdom with Cum on Feel the Noize, a song spelled in a way which suggests sex instead of satanic influence. Way better for kids! The other groups were Def Leppard and Twisted Sister. Twisted Sister was a major one-hit wonder. Def Leppard never seemed that interesting to me. I would probably like them more if I listened to them now.

Quiet Riot's lead singer, Kevin Dubrow, died yesterday. He was only 52. I wonder what kind of life he actually lived. I heard a quote of his one time about how he wanted to live a life of a quiet riot. I think it was on one of those 80's Has Been shows. It was funny in his videos from the early 80's, Kevin's hair was really thinning, but in the photo on the news he had really long, curly hair with no sign of aging at all. Did he honestly wear a wig all these years? That just does not seem like what a true rocker would do... So maybe he wasn't.

Quiet Riot was important to me if for no other reason than that they were there for those early years when I was trying to fit in to a world which was full of cross-dressing, over-the-top, screaming-their-heads-off, big hair dudes. And now I wonder why I wanted to be a part of that...

I blame my cousin.

The Descriptive Niece

One can never assume that any one year old is going to be interchangeable with any other. I have 3 of them in my life right now and each is as different as the other. This past week I got to spend it with the descriptive niece, the tour guide niece, the prepositional phrase niece, the action verb niece. She was absolutely hilarious as we continued to shower her with praise and affection.

I wonder just what people are capable of when they have nothing to prove to anyone but themselves. Isn't that the goal? Don't we all ultimately want to have the confidence to achieve anything? And shouldn't we be able to get there knowing that we have the support of those around us?

I realize that not everyone grew up in homes where the parents were loving and supportive. But I would like to think that most people would seek out those who would be giving and nurturing in their lives. Wouldn't people figure out that they would want to be around those who care about them?

I feel pretty fortunate to have grown up with great parents who cared about me and listened and were part of my life. I think it was difficult to be single for as long as I was, but it was always meaningful for me to have their support and know that I was not crazy. All the woman I was dating were. Okay, not all of them. But, having that kind of parental support should be enough to propel anyone forward, to believe that they can accomplish anything.

But what holds us back? What keeps us from dreaming? Is the disappointment of failure too much to want to take more chances?

As I look at my descriptive niece, I wonder what it is that could hold her back. She should be able to tackle anything. She should be able to be anything she wants. With loving parents who want the best for her, what is there to stop her? She should be able to be the tour guide who people look to for guidance through the city. She should be the teacher who sees the demonstration with proper vocabulary words. Or she could be the scientist who describes the procedure for a new method of space travel.

And there we will be clapping in support, because no matter what she accomplishes, her very existence has already touched our lives in more ways than she could possibly know.

Criticism

Some people that I sort of respect in the entertainment industry really get down on critics. I guess it comes down to not wanting to be criticized for work that they do and may be proud of. Or, maybe they just do not want to be criticized for putting forth the effort. Perhaps they know what they do is bad, but it is still their passion.

But I still find a need to express my own opinion when it comes to the work that others may do. I figure no matter what it is or where, something needs to be said about it. It could be the train conductor who blasts his horn as he goes through the neighborhood in the middle of the night. Or, it could be the waitress who does not know how to kiss butt well enough. Maybe it is the old person who does not know how to drive. Shouldn't all these people be criticized for their poor performances?

And so it goes with actors who take lame roles or cannot act. Producers who make the same movies over and over again. Or, they come up with a lame script which cannot be rewritten because it already has all the basic producer elements it needs. The dopey main character dude, the hot chick who goes beyond her stereotype, the incompetent government, the dense parents, the clever mouse, the cute robot. We have seen it all before! Help!

But what good am I doing by criticizing? What am I doing to change it? Am I writing the script for the movie the way it is supposed to be written? Am I coming up with the next big thing, technology, way to look at things?

Not yet.

Barefoot in the House

In the movie Die Hard, John McClane's chauffer tells him that when he gets up to his room to take off his shoes and squish the carpet in his feet. This is meant to be some sort of relaxation technique, but if you see the movie, you will notice this is an interesting plot point as he spends the rest of the movie barefoot. Now, it seems that everytime I take off my shoes and I am on carpet I think of that scene.

My wife and I were at a sort of reunion party with some old friends from my single days. Somehow, the subject of using a squeejee to wipe down the shower door came up by this woman and her husband. They went to Home Depot and picked up the industrial size one. Now, every morning as I use our stupid little squeejee I think of them with their big squeejee!

When I get on a plane and buckle my seatbelt, I think of Seinfeld's bit on airplanes "Oh, you lift up on the buckle..."

The Cars' Panorama and Oingo Boingo's Only a Lad albums will always remind me of Uncle M.

Is this what makes these people or items famous? Some people you can associate with many things. But there are others who have hardly anything to connect them with. What am I known for by the people who have come across me? I was the guy who shook all the time or barged in without knocking or said rude things to people because it seemed more clever to insult them rather than compliment them. But I did some good things too... I think.

A friend of mine at work named R has decided to no longer be Negative R. He is now going to be known as Positive R. This is amusing to me, because I never thought he was negative. I kind of just thought he was funny. Now that he has pointed this out to us, I guess we need to take notice. We need to start doing Negative Watch. We need to keep him away from dull objects.

What is our responsibility at this point when it comes to R? Do we need to be more negative ourselves so that he can show us his true positive nature? What exactly does he want from us by telling us this? Couldn't he just start being positive and then we would notice?

But we don't notice because he was never negative to begin with. Well, no more than anyone else.

So, now R is going to be the guy who went from Negative R to Positive R by virtue of his declaration. Hmmm, I prefer to think of him as the guy who helped write the book on hiking in Utah. He is also the guy who took the pictures at our wedding. I wonder if R likes Die Hard. He did not put it in his top five. Nor should anyone...

May I Introduce...

We got ourselves a dog this week and it is killing me that we cannot let him in the house. I think it is killing him too. He really wants to come in. Unfortunately, I am in no position to even have him come downstairs with me as my newfound (last 10 years) allergy to dogs has taken root. Also, he is fairly big and has been known to be a little slobbery.

The dog's name is Forrest and he has been a friend of mine for almost as long as I have known my wife. He came with us on the family campout last year and was a pretty easy going dog. Once he knew that everyone else was essentially sleeping outside he no longer had any jealousy and just enjoyed everyone else's company.

So the last couple days I have been familiarizing him with the neighborhood. My contingency is that if he happens to get out of the yard then he will be able to find his way back when he recognizes certain landmarks. Dogs are like teenagers. They escape when one is not looking and then go hog wild, chasing cats, eating garbage, sniffing butts, etc. Well, sort of like teenagers... But eventually they have to come home. So, they slink back after you call them and as they walk in the gate, that is when you give them a swift kick in the butt.

The Illusion of Saturday

One of my favourite things to do in life is sleep in on Saturday. I guess I should not limit it to just Saturdays though. I like sleeping in most everyday, but since every other day of the week has some sort of responsibility associated with it, Saturday becomes the only allowable day to do so. I think coupled with this sleeping in concept is the idea of staying up all night on Friday night.

It seems that the last couple Fridays I have done this. And in doing so, I have watched some rather silly shows. Having a DVR makes life much more simple. No, it is not simple, just convenient. Actually, that is not the right word either. The word I think I am looking for is... Let's come up with that word based on these ideas.

1. Pointless shows which would have been better to miss.
2. Time wasted watching contrived plots.
3. A feeling that you owe the tv/satellite your time because you pay so much money to have it.
4. Wishing that you could be reading books instead of painfully viewing society's garbage.
5. Putting off an assignment I have for work until the last minute.
6. As a positive note, there is an escape associated with silly tv shows.
7. Catching up with all of my recordings.

So the word has to do with the idea of saving lots of time and effort throughout the week for one particular night in which the flood of all waste gets absorbed. It is sort of a catch-all concept based on unfulfilled escape during the week. Maybe we could combine two words to make this work. Trash pickup? Garbage Day?

Well, I need to go back, because trash and garbage imply that I do not like what I watch and part of the problem is that I do like it. I do like the characters and their horrible plots and their interaction with the oddities of life. A term that they use for music which one loves to hate is: guilty pleasure. So, we need to combine the idea of leaving the garbage out for the trash man to pick up once a week with the fact that the truck likes the trash he is picking up and later dumping out.

Perhaps, I should just pick the show which best represents this love/hate relationship. The shows I watch are CSI, CSI Miami, Numb3rs, Life, Journeyman, Survivorman, The Office, Scrubs, My Name is Earl, Law and Order SVU, etc. Numb3rs is probably the worst out of them all, but SVU is the one I have the least interest in watching. Maybe I could just call it Subtraction (or Subtraction Night), since that does have a mathematical concept in it and we are subtracting shows from the DVR list. Also, I am subtracting knowledge from my head since I do become dumber after watching them. And, I am subtracting time from more worthwhile projects and endeavours. Not to mention that sleeping in on Saturday subtracts from the only non-work day of the week.

I like it. Subtraction.

Graveyard Guess

Growing up, my Mother's family threw the best Halloween parties. They were very elaborate. We had a haunted house, haunted path, haunted talk show, and a freak show/carnival. I love parties like this and the sky is the limit when it comes to ways to entertain people. My family had that. One of the items that was featured at each of these parties was Graveyard Guess. I am not sure who thought of this, but it was a classic way to enjoy Halloween Trivia and to see who kept up on things like this.

Rules:
a. 10 headstones with clues on them, which relate to a celebrity who has died.
b. No googling or searching on the Internet for the answers.
c. Death occurred within this past year.
d. Example: Clue says "Superman's Earth Father". The answer is Glenn Ford.
e. First and Last Name gives one full point.
f. I suggest using notepad to put down your answers before you post your answers, since others will have posted theirs.

1. 
   


2. 
   

















3. 
   


4. 
   


5. 
   


6. 
   


7. 
   


8. 
   


9. 
   

















10. 
    

Then my tauntaun will see you in hell!

My friend at work, B, and I quote Star Wars pretty much all day. I told B yesterday that his lines were sounding a little wooden and were not matching up to the proper emphasis that was used in the movie. So we had a little practice session.

+ You must learn the ways of the force if you are to come with me to Alderaan.
- Alderaan? I'm not going to Alderaan. I'm in for it as it is.
+ She needs your help, Luke. I need your help. I'm getting too old for this sort of thing.

So each day B makes me laugh with some quote interjected into everyday conversation. Like, when L asks us to go to lunch with him and I am mulling it over since I brought my own lunch... "You must do what you feel is right, of course."

Or when M is not in his cubicle, you will hear "TK421, why aren't you at your post?"

Actually, these examples make a little too much sense. Usually when B does it, there is no context at all. We will be in a meeting with other people in the company and from out of nowhere he will say: "And now your highness. We will discuss the location of your hidden rebel base." Or "...heaaa you will be. You will be." Or while tapping his notebook "You want thissss."

Rat Pack Jacob

So I guess I am a packrat.

I have been trying to clear out a room upstairs to make room for a new roommate. But, I cannot throw things away.

I have this conch shell which has a big gaping hole in it. Not the natural kind of hole. It is the broken kind of hole. I picked this up when I was in the Bahamas. And, I suppose I illegally took it off the island. But I really like it. Well, I really only like it when I go through my stuff trying to organize. You see, I do not use it or even put it anywhere to view, except in a box. Its primary use for me is to remind me of the Bahamas trip and the symbolism of a broken shell of a man who walked around the island by himself because he had no friends with him. The fact that it was broken made it much easier to take with me. I was not sure of the law, but I am sure no one would object to a broken conch shell.

Back to the room. I also have lots of tv cable. I have speaker wire and a shoebox full of various wires, connectors, and old electronic things. Some may think this stuff is actually cool electronic gadgetry. Not even close. I am not that type of guy. I just have this inane sense that I will need something in this box one day. Like, a giant Nokia cell phone is going to come in handy at some point... The crazy thing is that I have lived all these years and never once have I used anything in there since it got stowed away. Not that I am old. It just seems like if I was a MacGyver type person, this box could have some purpose. And, I suppose that I am thinking that one day I will be like MacGyver. Why am I thinking this?

Earlier this year I dug out a spot for a tree and I kept all the dirt and rocks. One day I was sorting the rocks into respective buckets and my wife came over to ask what in the world I was doing. And somehow, it made sense in my mind that we may one day need lots of little stones and rocks for some sort of area in the yard.

It is almost like I am coming out of the Great Depression. I do this for everything. I have papers and software at work from 6 years ago. It is stuff I will never use. I get these magazines and I think that one day I will have the desire to actually read them. MSDN and SQL Server magazine! Woo hoo! Bring 'em on! My parents went through their attic a few years ago and counted 17 boxes that were mine. What am I clinging to? There were homework assignments from high school up there.

This is kind of freaky. The more I think about it the weirder it gets. I suppose in a way, it is some sort of tracking mechanism. Because I do not take enough pictures and write enough down, I have to preserve my memories and identity within other items. But those things are starting to tie me down. It is a pain to have to decide what to do with all this stuff.

I need to start coming up with rules. This will require some deep thought. Basically, if I cannot foresee some way of using the item, I need to throw it out. However, I need to really think about it before I toss it. I do not want to get careless. I do like to be prepared for things, but I think this stuff is becoming junk.

And a Good Morning to You Too.

Blue walls surround me
Blades coming to get me
Stretching before the day
Right angles all covered in layers of squares

Red walls surround me
Boxes enveloping me
Striving to join them alongside
Horizons and lines give barriers of motion

Grey walls surround me
Planes stacking beneath me
Sitting in motionless stare
Plastic stones shed light, darkening my world

New

I just watched 50 First Dates with Adam Sandler and Drew Barrymore. I had seen it before and when I first turned it there I thought: No! This is kind of depressing. I don't want to sit through the pain of it. But after a couple minutes, it proved to be pretty well done and Sandler's demeanor is so cool and calm he brings you along for a fun ride. The idea of the movie though has an interesting theme which is reminiscent of Groundhog Day.

What if you relived the same day over and over? Wait a minute! Who says we are not anyway? The repetition of our lives is what makes us feel monotonous. How often do we come home and just sit in front of the tv? How often do we grab the laptop to get updated on the latest happenings outside of our own stale world only to realize we have done this same thing everyday for two years? Do we take the same road home from work each day? Do we sit in the same spot on our sofas each day? Our repetitious, static world is keeping us from having a day unlike Groundhog Day or Lucy's Head Condition.

The scene in Groundhog Day where he decides to learn how to play the piano is an interesting idea. If we want to progress, don't we have to take the time each day to learn something new? Adam Sandler had to start each day at square one where he helped Drew Barrymore to fall in love with him all over again. 50 First Dates. Is it too farfetched to think of ourselves as one who needs to start each day with the attitude of getting our spouses to fall in love with us again?

But then, this idea extends to so much more. How much in the world is new? I think people give up on what is new. They view themselves as old, so they can no longer experience new things. They get in their rut and stay there. And, they hate new things. They hate new music and new movies and new everything. They do not realize that when they were young, their music meant something to them because it was new for them at that time. Why would they not want to experience that again and again with the changing of the times?

Perhaps it is juvenile for a guy in his fifties to have spiky hair and wear new style jeans or for a woman in her forties to have a choppy haircut with a tight shirt. There is a certain prejudice young people have for those who continue to try and look young despite age. I am not sure that there is a great solution for anyone when it comes to appearance. Seeing people in wigs and toupes bothers me and I am bald. Should I care? I understand the desire for that. So, I would imagine the important thing is the inner feeling. If wearing hip clothes makes one feel young, then why not?

I know why not, but the important thing for people is to experience newness. That is what it is more important to me. It would seem that many older people feel like they have to have an outward expression of newness to experience a younger feeling. That is definitely a way, but I would prefer them to express it in a different way. Find the newness in life by not reinventing your youth with plastic surgery and silly clothes, but with the inner expression of communication and cleanliness. Read a new book or watch a new movie. Take a new way home. Meet a new person. Tell a new story. Have new desires and make new goals.

And if there is nothing new for you to experience, then invent something new. Do something new, please!...

Presence

I have been working with a couple guys on my team on the art of volleyball. I have been working on this concept of "presence" when hitting the ball. Too often when people are learning to play volleyball they try to adapt to the ball rather than making the play come to them. Going up and hitting the ball needs to be a very personal thing.

When these guys go up, they are lunging forward, using their arms too much, not using their core enough. It is frustrating to see, but it takes practice to get it right. I know that I have plenty of issues myself, getting too far under the ball, leaving to early, not swinging my arms back far enough.

We worked on technique yesterday. I set them as they hit. Many of their hits went into the net. Perhaps most of my sets were terrible. My uncle first taught me the game of volleyball. We used to play at the beach and before each game, we would warm up playing pepper. Then, we would set each other to get our timing down. Uncle E was not tall, but he could jump high and he had good form. He was a great example of how to hit. Later, I learned more about technique from my volleyball coach in high school. That was when the techniques got refined.

I have been playing with this group from work for a couple years now. While there is general improvement across the board, I notice that many of the players still have no technique. They have been playing the same way for two years now. I wish I could help everyone improve their technique. Unfortunately, it does not work that way. So, these guys from my team at work get my instruction. They seem to be okay with it.

Back to the idea of "presence". Confidence is part of it. How does one convey this idea of presence. And how does that help someone hit better. The flaw that I am seeing with one guy is that he is not jumping straight up to hit the ball. The other guy has a problem with only hitting with his arm, not with his body also. Both of these guys need the full presence feel in order to take control of the ball.

We get sets and without a good setter, the ball is all over the place. When I go up to hit the ball, I am expecting a perfect set. But, we also have to be ready for a truly awful set. We do all sorts of crazy things when it comes to bad sets. We do what we have to do to make it work. So, the idea of presence comes with the confidence of a great set. That is what this comes down to. These guys do not even know what a great set is.

I know that I am very picky when it comes to sets. It needs to be perfect for me. And if it is, I can do damage. With certain setters, you can feel that confidence and then your presence takes over. I am still wondering if that is the right word...

And then, once we know what our perfect set is, we can start adapting better to the not so perfect sets. I think that is where our guys need to get to. They need to find their perfect set. Whatever is their perfect set is what they use with their hitting presence. I think that great hitters demand a specific location for their sets. And, of course, really great hitters do not have to have it in a perfect location everytime, but they still need it to be close and somewhat consistent.

Dignan... Why?

When I heard the news that Owen Wilson tried to kill himself, I was extremely sad. He went through with it. He actually committed the act.

Sure, I do not know what he is going through and I probably never will. Ultimate fame and fortune for being both a great comedy actor and writer. With movies coming out left and right, and a schedule which is probably just insane, where does a person go to just reflect? He has these romances with famous women.

He portrays that dark side of himself in movies. In the Royal Tenenbaums the character that Luke Wilson plays slashes his own wrists, but somehow still survives. Does life imitate art? Owen's character has a drug problem and runs away from everyone literally. How can these scenes within movies not be a cry for help?

I hope he is okay. I hope he can change enough to have a specific direction to help him be happy and able to enjoy his success. He has gone that successful Hollywood road and now he knows that it is empty. Let's hope he finds the meaning he needs to and love.

Reflections on a Birthweekend

Today is my birthday. I should probably watch Return of the King today and see Gollum greedily grasp for the ring. Since it is his birthday, he is entitled to whatever he wants. How does one not have that attitude on his birthday?

My wife bought me a cd, a dvd and a camera. Now we have the ultimate power in the universe, a small camera which can fit in my pocket and yet take photos the size of a movie screen.

Goal!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I play goalkeeper for our coed soccer team. It is the worst job on the team. I am not saying that I do not enjoy aspects of it. I certainly do. But, it brings with it a certain amount of anxiety and angst which do not seem as prevalent in other team members.


My brother-in-law, K, was goalie before and he used to get quite upset. We would try to tell him to just calm down and relax. He would hit the wall with his hand or yell out some primal scream when a goal would go in. One time he picked up another team's player and body slammed him (the guy had done some cheap shots). I could not understand why K was feeling like this, since the rest of the team was doing much worse than he was, but was not expressing the pressure as much. Now I do.

Being goalie is basically the idea of being Customer Service at a company. You take all the crap people can give you. And, it just keeps coming. The other team is constantly trying to get the ball past you. Some of them are nicer. Like, some do not kick you when you go for the ball. Some say nice things when you make a good play. But some are not so nice. Some are just trying to score at all costs.

It is also very physically demanding and requires a tough mind to be able to constantly out-think the other team. Some pointers have come my way too like sticking to the post and making the opposing player kick to the outside. When cradling the ball on the ground, don't land on top of it causing it to bounce out from underneath you. Keep the hands up. Keep the knees bent. Drop a knee down to make sure the ball does not get past.

But they keep coming anyway. And after the same customer has come in to score for the tenth time, the frustration mounts up. Suddenly, it is not fun anymore to be doing it, so you just start mouthing off. The other team appear to be poor sports and are just running it up.

So, it requires quite a lot of toughness which I need to demonstrate more of. Our last game of this two month season is this Saturday. Hopefully, I can stay focused and concentrate on the good plays and feeling better about myself despite the rude phone calls which keep coming my way.

Mowing the Lawn in the Dark

Tonight was a rare opportunity where I actually got to mow the lawn in the dark. I suppose I took too long at work and we ate sort of late, so I had to mow at sunset and beyond. There is something very fulfilling about doing this in the dark. Like, I could be doing it completely wrong and getting away with it. No one is going to know until tomorrow and then it is too late...

Is this a common practice? Do we think that cleaning the bathroom enough to show effort will actually yield a response of: Oh, look! He really tried!

Or how about vacuuming? Does making the sound alone count?

And yet they seem to discourage us taking three 20 minute showers a day.

Food Ailments

Rice Krispies with Rice Dream is perhaps a little redundant. I have one of those stomachs which is quite a burden, both on me and those who care about me.

Everyone loves cheese. I love cheese too. And milk. But I can't digest them. For some reason though it is not as simple as just avoiding dairy products... Apparently, I have IBS. So, anytime I get stressed I have problems, and it seems that it does not matter what the food is.

Lately, I have taken to avoiding chocolate, because I am pretty sure that that has very adverse effects on me as well. It helps, but with the IBS, there are still those days where it seems like it matters not what I eat.

I would like to make it so that there is no excuse for my body to act this way at all. Something in my mind tells me that if I did not eat any crap at all, my body would handle it much better. I have thought of having salads and vegetable meals, only fruit and bread, a little meat. But people do not make food like that. Unfortunately, we live in a society where people need food to taste good.

I have discovered that I like food the way it is. I rarely add dressing to my salad. I can eat potatoes without anything added. I can eat broccoli and rolls without butter. I think this is an excellent gift, because I do not need to add unhealthy items to my food. If only I could channel this more into something like health.

The food struggle is a long, hard fought battle. Everytime I think I make progress, I will have a bad day. When going on trips, I have to be extremely careful. When having dinner at someone's house, I need to be cautious. And, sometimes, that means eating less.

I think if I put the effort into a very conscious daily plan of healthy eating, I would do much better. It is all about thinking in advance and planning. That would be very nice for me and others too. I could have little meals planned in advance so that I could carry them in bowls and when people decide to order pizza, I can just pull out my little salad... Kind of depressing, isn't it?

Harris Potter

After my Dad has vehemently opposed the whole phenomenon known as Harry Potter, I feel like I need to say something about it. I don't hate Harry Potter. I do realize that as a phenomenon it is a little lacking. Its hype does give it a little more momentum than it deserves. JK Rowling has been able to transcend generations though and get adults as well as children to embrace a story of a child. It is fun to read the books and be a part of something which has meant so much to so many people.

The story of Harry Potter is something most everyone can get behind. There are too many different things going on at once though. Rowling dug a hole for herself by having so many characters and so many new things to introduce to each book. The subsequent books got so long and burdensome. But, people read them and find things they like. Whether it is the Weasley family celebrating Christmas or the werewolf aspect or just a love of snakes... There are plenty of evil under and overtones to deal with for that crowd. It covers a lot of bases.

And we, the audience, love all these different mythologies. Wizards and witches, goblins and trolls, evil forests and trees. Before Harry Potter came along, no one would dare make these dark things declaratively good. And, it is entirely mainstream. I figure that the idea of Hogwarts School outside the realm of regular school is very good. They keep it in its own realm. It is obviously make-believe. It does not have the children sloughing school so that they can go join some cult elsewhere. And, the school is set up to be just as tough as a regular school.

The movies are interesting to have, but they could have done without them. Why not leave Harry Potter up to the imagination of people? I suppose they have to make movies though of everything. Why is that? I have this idea of creating a miniseries for classic books, so that they can cover every aspect. But, still that is absolutely unnecessary. A movie is a snapshot. That's it.

As far as the criticism of magic and how it affects children and the dark nature of it all. It has some evil to it. There is the notion of the misunderstood aspect of wizards and witches. Our familiarity with magic has told us that witches are evil and wizards are kind of cool. Why not tell a story that says that witches and wizards are just the same except for their gender? It is a fun idea to open a world up to a child who thought he was just a kid in Great Britain.

The main argument I have heard against Harry Potter is that it empowers the nerd aspect of our civilization. It trains and emboldens the awkward, weird, and outcasts to continue on that road. Instead of embracing the tougher aspects of childhood like sports and being disciplined they are embracing the namby-pamby lifestyle which says that one can accomplish things by reading and casting spells. But that is not true within the books themselves. Harry and his friends are constantly battling all types of conflict while in school. Sure, some of it is contrived, but that makes for fun reading.

I do think that we have a culture of namby-pamby parents raising namby-pamby children, but Harry Potter does not really contribute to that. Harry Potter falls into the realm of good escapism just like Lord of the Rings or Xmen comic books. Sure it is over-hyped, but so is everything.

Environmental Cause to Fight

How come there is no middle ground when it comes to the climate and the global warming debate? Liberals want the awareness and the taxes. Conservatives deny it. There is the cause and the fight. And there is the denial and the rhetoric.


How do we know who to trust? The scientists converged and said it is definitely happening. Then, some others denied it. Do we have to have a definitive answer about the Earth to know that we are doing horrible things to it? I am not the only one who shudders when I see black smoke coming out of a car or a structure like a refinery or steel plant.


I am sure these scientists are guessing at this point, because they really do not know. They just want to error on the side of major damage since it may be too late by the time they really get some good data. But from the looks of things, they definitely see problems.

The funny thing to me is that both sides represent perspective. There is nothing wrong with not wanting to throw a bunch of money at something we cannot prove is absolutely happening. Being conservative means being smart with your money. We are not going to just throw money at it in hopes that it goes away. To tax the people who do not contribute so much to it as the big businesses and industry in third world countries is ridiculous. People do leave lights on in their house. People do throw away cans. People waste water. But they do not contribute to the pollution that is so prevalent in our world.

But, we are aware of major pollution that man has done before. It does not take a genius to see that big factories and refineries and steel plants really pollute the atmosphere. And there is so much more. Do we tax these companies? What good does that do? Why not help change what they are doing? Why not change the process? And that means more regulation which is more burdensome on small business, but even so, there must be some best practices here.

The only thing I can think that would really help is education. Not hype. Not taxes. Educate the people. Present people with facts on both sides. Concerts do not really help people unless the lyrics have facts in them. There is all this awareness, but how do people trust these wackos on either side? A musician is a musician. A radio talk show host is an entertainer.

I just want to pick up. I want to start small with my house. Then, my neighborhood. It goes from there. Campaign with education, not hype. Enough with the hype...

Practice Never Made Perfect

A friend of mine the other day said that he did not like golf because of the lack of achievement one gets with it. You can master a video game, but with golf some new problem is always developing. After practicing and playing volleyball yesterday, I realized that this is true of all sports that I have played and it is just a fact of life.

True, I have seen people who have natural ability for sports, but even though they may be a notch above, they still have their problems.

So, I had my friends work on hitting the volleyball being given good, consistent sets. I was trying to help them work on technique.

When I first learned to play volleyball, I learned the basics from my uncle, who had me play pepper with him at the beach. We used to play 2 on 2 and that was about it. Then, I played church ball and we were good. We had a basic system, but we still had not really developed any technique. That came later. My Senior year in high school I finally got to play. I had wanted to play every year before that, but the club team was kind of secretive.

So, my first try-out practice came for the high school team and there were a lot of kids out there. I remember not doing anything very spectacular the first day and my Mom giving me a hard time about that. So, the next day, I was intense. And, I remember just doing what it took. I think that was a turning point for me in volleyball. Making that team was huge. Then, I got to learn how to play a 6-2 and how to hit the proper way. I learned where to stand assuming you have a decent block up there.

We had an okay year, with some nice highlights. We had two major tournaments. The first one, we went up from San Diego and played in Pacific Palisades against a bunch of teams in the LA and Orange County areas. We even lost to the JV team. We were so outmatched. But then, something amazing happened. We had another tournament a couple weeks later in San Diego and we took it. We beat all the teams. We took our experience from up north and used it to win down south. I constantly marvel at that. But then our games throughout the year were not so great. We won a couple, but then lost most of the important ones.

I went to college after that at Long Beach State University, which is of course, one of the best volleyball schools in the nation. The workout routine for the summer to make the team was insane. I think the routine frightened me away before I even looked into it. Once again, the players to compete against were native to that area. If I had stayed at San Diego State, perhaps I could have been more equipped to compete.

Since that time, I have had various volleyball experiences. A group of guys from work would get together on a Saturday at about 7am to play. I played with a couple guys for a three man tournament at King Henry apartments and we took that.

Then, a miracle happened. A guy on my team at work used to play all the time with local guys who are good. We went and played one day and I did terrible. It had been years. Then, we found out there was some guys at work who played an indoor game two times a week, every week. The guy in charge grew up in San Diego and had a passion for technique and playing properly. He talked to some other guys at work who wanted to play, but did not want to play jungle ball.

So, I started going once a week. It was nice to play again. It's always nice to play. The guys in this group are hit and miss. Some are good, some not so good. Some have technique, some have no technique. Some learn from their mistakes. Some never learn. Some play smart. Some play defense. Some play offense. Most have improved.

This game has been going on for about 3 years now. The organizer and I have talked about various aspects of it. His intensity helps me to want to continue to go and play. I enjoy it because it is volleyball, but it is nice to have the competition aspect too. We have talked about the idea of winning versus losing. We have talked about technique. We have talked about keeping it simple for people to keep the interest alive.

These guys have gotten good enough to start learning technique. But, we may never get there. And that has to be okay, because some people always complain about making it too good. Some people like to not be very good. They like to play for exercise sake. They want to keep tempers from flaring, which can be one of my problems. Volleyball is such a team sport. And, getting 12 guys/girls to come out week after week takes a tremendous amount of skill. I could not even get one of my friends to play one game in the heat yesterday. How could I convince 11 others to do it? But this organizer does and hats off to him.

As I was working on hitting technique with my friends yesterday, one of them commented on how the ball will never come in that perfect in a real game. I thought of the days of baseball and going to the batting cages. We go to the batting cages to practice technique, getting our timing down, getting our swing just right, working on those things that we can control. Golf has the driving range. Basketball has the standard in front of our house. Rock climbing has the rock wall.
And, we practice things, not to be perfect, but to maintain. We practice so that we can constantly improve. We practice to perform. We practice to get our bodies in line with the activity. We practice to get technique. And we can learn so much from practice that the activity does not have to be where the mistakes are made.

Pirates and Parades

I think I just did the same thing two days in a row. I went to see Pirates of the Carribbean 3 on Tuesday and then went to a parade on Wednesday. Both were too long. Both had too many characters to follow. Both had a little something cool.

What would it take for a parade to not be so commercial? What would be wrong with having a float that was just creative? No sponsor. No pioneers. No community involvement. No direct purpose other than to be really neat looking. That is the kind of float I want to have. I really want to create a float. I think it would be so much fun. It would be expensive, but wouldn't it be nice to have people come away thinking: Wow! That was really creative.

And it might confuse people. Like, why was that float in that parade? It did not honour any war veteran. It did not shuttle the city council. It did not have pretty girls on top waving to everybody. What would this float be? Would it reflect history or the future? Or a great movie? It certainly would not reflect Pirates 3.

So what was wrong with Pirates 3? I had fun. It is definitely silly and Keira Knightley is the most annoying actress on the planet. It goes on forever in 12 different plots which take forever. Why are we rescuing Jack? Why is Barbosa in this movie? For the life of me, why did they bring back Barbosa? It was like having this gigantic Garfield balloon at the parade. Well, we have this extra Garfield sitting there that we never use, so let's pull it out even though it has no connection to anything and is extremely outdated. Garfield had his day as did Barbosa.

We definitely escaped into the pirate world. The pirate lord concept was interesting albeit powerless and pointless. What did they do other than look like pirates? Adding another dimension to the movie helps it because now we see that there is something greater than just a bunch of thieving, raping, and pillaging people. And that is what is lost in these movies. Road Warrior was a good pirate movie. Waterworld had at least something we could follow. Pirates 3 was just creating nonsense for nonsense sake. And that is okay in movies like Blazing Saddles, because at least you are laughing.

The whole finale scene in Pirates 3 is so long and loud and confusing. Let's just twirl around and have everybody fighting and while we are at it, let's get married. Oh, and let's have a bunch of insignificant characters die with swords and have no one else get hurt or have their legs blown off...

If someone has millions and millions of dollars in their budget and all they have to do is make it back, then what do they do? They go and repeat everything from the last one (or the first one), have all kinds of action scenes and intrigue and bring back as many characters as we can. I see movies which totally flop and I think: I respect this movie for going in its own direction. Sure, Pirates 3 had mass appeal, but it had no soul.

The only thing it had was going to look for Jack and what they had to do to overcome that. That was creative. That was fun. It was new, but then they went back to the real world and it became boring because we knew what was going to happen. As we do with the parade every year. Old people in old cars. The same thing year after year. Do what the people expect and nothing more. Get them to come. Don't challenge them. Just honk your horn as if you are in traffic as you go by in your giant suv and wave and it will all be okay.

Excess

There is all kinds of excess in our society. I don't object to it in any liberal way. If people enjoy the excesses of life, then so be it. I just find it offensive for me.

Last night at the Stadium of Fire, there was an onslaught of excess in the fireworks. Now, many people would say they insist on having tons of fireworks, that the show would be somehow less without having three separate themes of 20 minutes each.

This is not just the case with fireworks. Movies have become tremendously excessive. Pirates of the Carribbean 3 was just so unnecessarily long. As was all the Lord of the Rings movies as was the new Star Wars movies as was the new King Kong and so many other movies which insist on being over 2 hours.

I really do believe that no movie should be over 2 hours. In a way, it is amazing that they are able to keep the audience that long in the theaters. I can understand the DVD concept and the idea of pausing a movie to break it up. The two disc set for the Lord of the Rings movies makes sense. Movies are not books. We understand that going in. We know that it will be condensed.

Now, excess can extend to a lot of things. My problem is how it gets in the way of entertainment. There is hardly ever a "less is more" scenario anymore. More is more is more. Like, concerts most of the time are over the top. The creative mind is no longer available, because a large tv screen has to show us what the song is about. The music does not get to speak for itself.

People need to have the annoyances. The flashy stuff has to be there. Why? There was a reason why the original movie was good. The remake uses excess and fails. Show me an example of where this is not true.