Social Hygiene: Give Blood

I haven't been back to taekwondo in over a month. I've been planning to go to class on Tuesdays and Thursdays for a couple of weeks now, but one thing or another has kept me out of the dojong. So I'd made an agreement with myself that I'd get my ass back in there today.

Last night the phone rang, and it was a number I didn't recognize. At first I thought it was a sales call, and the spiel the caller began with didn't do much to dispel that notion. But before I could interrupt her with some caustic comment I was trying to generate, she said she was from the Red Cross, and that the bloodmobile would be at the base today, and would I be able to donate?

The first thing that crossed my mind was that I was going back to TKD today, and a donation would just be more time out of my day, and my performance usually suffers the first couple of classes after a donation. (That may be all psychosomatic, but you gotta figure being a few pints low ought to affect something.) So I sorta-kinda said I'd be there, but left myself some wiggle room with some weasel-words like "unless something comes up," thinking I'd probably give this trip a pass.

So this morning I'm lying in bed, thinking about faith and fear again, and how hard it seems to be to live in faith in certain contexts. The Red Cross call came back to me, and I kind of berated myself (I'm really good at that!) because, while some of those other contexts might be hard, this one was pretty damn easy. My performance is going to suck whether I give blood or not, because I've been sitting on my lazy ass for about six weeks. Skipping the donation isn't going to make me perform any better, or make anything hurt any less. And if I'm serious about a practice of loving better, I can sure as hell spare a few minutes and a few pints of blood.

So, self-inflicted ass-chewing completed, I got out of bed and let the dog out. I'll be at the bloodmobile this afternoon. Usually pumps out pretty quick after a TKD class. Probably save myself a few minutes!

But you might consider regular blood donations as a practice for loving better.

I'd also like to thank Shelley Powers and Karl Martino for the links and kind words.

Social Hygiene: Love Better

It's that time of the year again, when we try to recall whatever it was that we once liked about ourselves. We've compartmentalized it into one particular season of the year, so that the rest of the time we can go on being oblivious to the people we've become and the people with whom we share this life.

I just tried to quickly find some statistics on the sale of alcoholic beverages by month or season, but I couldn't seem to find any readily. I suspect the period between Thanksgiving and the Super Bowl is probably the peak consumption period. I don't know, but if it is, I wonder how much is the sharing of good "cheer," and how much is to blunt the effects of being "nice" to people you ignore or otherwise can't stand the rest of the year? And how much is to dull the pain of self-awareness? Suffering being the difference between the way things are, and the way we'd like them to be. This time of year, we're bombarded with messages of how we'd like ourselves to be, and I'm sure the difference is a source of suffering for many.

I've told this story before, but this is Groundhog Day, so some repetition is probably inevitable. Five years ago I was unemployed and going through a couple of transitions, the end of my career and the end of my marriage, neither having gone exactly according to "plan." As difficult as it was at the time, (Well, for me it was a very painful experience; but I'm aware that others have had to endure far more painful experiences and I don't wish to equate my suffering to theirs.) it was a very productive time in terms of understanding some things about myself, and what life is about. One of the things I learned was about the role of faith in one's life.

Now, this should probably be a post of its own, but by "faith," I do not mean "a belief in God." That can certainly be an element of faith, and I'm not dismissing believers. I'm trying to talk about a larger thing that probably doesn't require a preposition to follow it.

At that time in my life, I felt like I had very little control over anything. It turns out that most of the time, all of us have very little control over anything. But give us a job, some material possessions, and pretty soon we convince ourselves we're the masters of our own destinies. Take those meager things away, and life can get pretty uncomfortable. So that was a good thing for me to learn.

What I also learned was that the only power I had, the only power that anyone has, is the power to choose. It's not much, as powers go. You don't see many super-heroes with that as their specialty. I learned that the yin and yang of life are faith and fear, "yes" and "no." And where you exercise your power in life is in choosing which of those two aspects to embrace, to present to the world.

But "learning" something is vastly different from living it, or putting it into practice.

So I needed a practice. There are many opportunities to practice, and I'm not saying this is a particularly good one, but it's one that occurred to me. Right around Thanksgiving, the Salvation Army kettles appear, with all those bell-ringers. Now, most of my life I hadn't given much thought to those folks. Occasionally I'd drop some change in, other times I'd hustle by on my busy errands. But they're obvious, hard to miss, and so they're an easy reminder to help one practice. So that season, when I was unemployed, separated, and often very unhappy, I made the choice that I would not pass a bell-ringer without dropping something into that kettle. That would be an expression of faith in myself and my future, and that whatever was going to happen later on, I could be a more generous person today.

I can't tell you anything great happened because of that, but nothing terrible did either. I can't tell you I'm a better person today because of that, but maybe I am. I know I was a better person right then.

A couple of years later and I've got a job and a new car payment and I'm still separated. It's Christmas time again and one day I discover myself hustling by the kettle, thinking I didn't have the money to spare. Well, that's fear, and I was kind of surprised and disappointed to find myself thinking that way. So then I made the choice that I wouldn't pass a kettle without putting something in, and if I pulled a five or a ten out of my pocket, then that would be what would go in. Twenties usually go in my wallet from the ATM, but it's not uncommon for me to have a few fives and a ten or two wadded up with all the singles and change in my pockets. I figured if I could put a buck or two in every time I passed one when I was unemployed, I could certainly do that, and maybe a hell of a lot better, when I was working.

So that's what I do now. Doesn't make me a better person than anyone else. Makes me a better person than I was, once before, at least for that moment. But it reminds me about faith, and it usually helps me remember a couple of other times in the day as well.

This isn't an endorsement for the Salvation Army. I'm not saying everyone should go throw money they may not have at something. I'm saying that love is faith in action, and you have to find a way to make a choice to embrace faith somehow, as often as you can. A practice that reminds you of your faith, helps you find it. The kettles are probably not a great choice, because they kind of disappear as soon as Christmas is over. I have other practices, not enough probably, but driving is one of them too. "Don't drive angry. Don't drive angry." isn't the tag line here just because I thought it was hysterical watching a woodchuck drive a truck on Bill Murray's lap.

But this is a good time of the year to help people get started. There are lots of good messages out there right now, but they can be a source of suffering for many too. But the only power anyone has is the power to choose. Lots of people are going to be getting those 50" high definition plasma TVs, and Sony Playstation 3s; and maybe you're hoping you can just put gas in your car. Maybe you wish you had a car. Maybe that's not fair, but you have the power to choose. You can choose where to place your attention. You can choose to embrace faith instead of surrendering to fear. And you still won't have a Playstation 3, or a 50" high definition plasma TV, or even gasoline, but you'll have something else that money, or attention, can't buy.

And you won't get it reading this blog, or anyone else's for that matter either. So go on, get out of here!

But thanks for stopping by.

Dog: Collateral Damage

The iBook is out of commission again. I had it charging on a TV tray set aside near the wall, against the possibility that Bodhi would knock it over. Well, that didn't happen. What did happen was I unplugged the power adapter and did some surfing last night while I was watching a movie, and forgot about the power adapter.

Not a good idea.

This morning, as I was watching the news, Bodhi was chasing a ball around the floor and eventually chased it over near the TV tray. I didn't think anything of it, but the next thing I knew Bodhi was shooting across the floor, and the power brick went flying after him. I thought he must have gotten tangled up in it playing with the ball. I picked up the adapter and inspected the brick a bit to see if it might have been damaged, but it looked fine, other than a couple of scratches.

A little while later, I went to plug in the iBook, and the tip wouldn't go in. I looked at it and the ground collar around the adapter tip was crushed. Evidently, like everything else around here, it went into his mouth; and now I figure he must have gotten a shock when he bit on it. So, after unplugging it from the power strip, I got a pair of forceps and bent it back into something near round, and tried plugging it in. Had some trouble getting it in, fiddled with the forceps some more and then it went in. I got the orange tell-tale so I figured all was well. I went to pull it out and heard a "pop." The little piece of plastic that grabs the cord when you wrap it around the power supply had hidden a break in the insulation right near the adapter tip. Apparently, he'd bitten through that as well.

I unplugged the power supply from the ac, and then pulled it from the iBook. Hopefully I haven't popped a fuse on the motherboard, but I'm not sure I can know until I have another power adapter. Naturally, none of my trusted retailers, Apple and Amazon, have one in stock. So I bought a Kensington after-market adapter through Amazon, and used the $3.99 one-day shipping option so I should have it by Monday. I thought about driving up to St Johns Town Center and visiting the Apple Store, but on the Saturday after Thanksgiving, no way in hell am I going anywhere near that shopping center! I try not to go there anytime, because traffic and parking are a nightmare, but this weekend is probably worse.

I just hope I haven't fried anything on the motherboard. Of course, now I'm kicking myself that I didn't wrap up the brick when I unplugged it last night, and kicking myself that I didn't inspect the whole cord more carefully before I plugged it in. I didn't kick the dog, though I'm not proud to admit that the thought crossed my mind.

This isn't the first thing that's suffered because of Bodhi. I keep a baby gate up in the door to the master bedroom. I leave it high enough off the ground so the cats can come and go (stealthily), but keep Bodhi out of the bedroom and their food dish and litter box.

While I was up here yesterday, Bodhi was downstairs trying to get under the baby gate. This involved pulling at the carpet at the threshold, so now there's a patch of carpet missing. Not huge, about the size of a dollar bill folded in half, but you can't miss it.

Then there are the cats. I used to have their litter box in the closet to my bedroom in the old place. It was the least undesirable place to put it, there being no desirable places to put a litter box in a one-bedroom apartment. Here I have a much larger place, and the litter box fits well under the vanity in the bathroom. I have a little electric sweeper that does a marginal job of picking up the litter they kick out of the box, and I keep that in the closet which is directly across from the vanity. I normally keep the closet door closed to keep the cats out of it, because they like climbing on my clothes to get up on the shelves.

The other day, I took out the sweeper to pick up some litter, and when I was finished I put it back in the closet and closed the door. I went back out and I think I was up here in the loft a little later on, when I heard something that sounded like someone banging on the closet door. I immediately knew what had happened.

I went back downstairs and opened the closet door, and there was Squeaky. She had also managed to tear up a nice sized chunk of carpet, trying to get out of the closet. Cats hate closed doors. Fortunately, there's little damage they can do when they're locked OUT of the closet, since that side of the door is ceramic tile. But as soon as I opened the door to get the sweeper out, Squeaky probably darted in to see what she'd been missing. I didn't happen to see her go in, and didn't think to check before I turned out the light and closed the door.

By tearing up the carpet, she was able to get her paw under the door, and then push and pull it back and forth, and there's enough play in the door when it's closed to allow it to bang against the jamb. They've used this technique before to get my attention. In the old place, I just never closed a door, other than the bathroom when Caitie was around. Even then, as soon as the door was closed, a paw would appear beneath the door and start banging it.

Why we love and keep pets isn't so much a mystery, but it often involves aggravation and inconvenience. Most of the time, their antics and affection outweigh the negatives. In many ways, they're easier to live with than people. But nothing in this life is perfect or ideal, so you sometimes have to put up with the collateral damage that occasionally comes your way. This is one of those times.

Cheese Sandwich: Easy as Pie?

I baked an apple pie yesterday, from scratch. Who knew crust could be so hard to make? It looked okay, but the crust was too thick and hard, and it took way too much work to make it for it turning out so bad!

I'm going to try again, but I'm just going to stick with a simple shortening crust, instead of trying to use butter again.

It was a good learning experience, but I was still disappointed.

DVD: The Lake House

A love story with a dog. Keanu Reeves reunited with Sandra Bullock. It's a bit of a time-travel story, with a mailbox that exists, like the dog, "out of time."

I've only watched it once, and it probably doesn't bear thinking about it too much. It telegraphs a punch early on if you're paying attention, and they play pretty fast and loose with causality, but it's a fun film nevertheless.

DVD: Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol

This was the first holiday cartoon special I recall watching as a kid, and one of my favorites. I don't recall if I ever knew why, but it stopped running at some point, while Charlie Brown and Rudolph and Frosty and the Grinch all kept going, and going, and going...

I spotted it at the Navy Exchange the other day and was delighted to see it. The animation isn't great, but the voices are great and the songs are simply beautiful. (A hand for each hand was planned for the world, why don't my fingers reach?) It's a wonderful adaptation of the story, and it holds up well today as an entertaining and delightful holiday classic.

DVD: The Ice Storm

This has a great cast, including Joan Allen, Sigourney Weaver and Kevin Kline, among other notables. It's kind of an "art" film, that garnered some good reviews, but I didn't care for it. I never really cared about any of the characters, other than perhaps Tobey Maguire. Katey Holmes made her acting debut in this film.

But, apart from a great cast, I didn't think it was a very good movie.

Obviously, others disagree.

Thanksgiving 2006

It's good to have a holiday that might make one pause to consider one's blessings, and to feel and express some sense of appreciation for them. It seems like it ought to be the kind of thing we do every day, but few of us do. There are only so many minutes in the day, only so much attention we can devote to things, and so apprehending the grace and good fortune that enters our lives every day is probably something most of us don't worry about. We have other agendas to advance. Cluetrains™ to push down the track, conversations to market, selves to promote, Second Lives™ to live, WoW quests to accomplish, hi-def TVs to watch, and blogs to evangelize. Really, who has the time?

The other day, a friend of mine took a new route home from work, hoping to save a few minutes in traffic. As she was sitting at a light, a bicyclist collided with her, doing significant damage to her right fender, and landing on her windshield and shattering it. The cyclist was fine, he apologized for hitting her car and admitted fault, but the police officer on the scene cited my friend because the front of her car was in the crosswalk. So she's got a few thousand dollars worth of damage to her car, and a ticket, all because she wanted to save a few minutes in traffic. Doesn't seem hardly fair. She was grateful the kid was okay, he's a college freshman.

She never saw the kid as she waited to make a right turn. The light turned green and she didn't move instantly, so the guy behind her beeped at her. Being the kind of person that doesn't like to be beeped at, she hesitated before going and, BAM!, the next thing she knows she's showered with tiny bits of glass.

Now, if you're of the very rational, scientific bent, this was only a random sequence of events and it only turned out the way it did because that's the way it turned out. And that may be true. On the other hand, if you're like me and suspect that there's more here than meets the eye, you might wonder what would have happened if she hadn't gone that way? Would the eager beaver in the larger vehicle behind her have been moving? Would the bicyclist have collided with a larger moving vehicle instead of a small stationary one? Who knows? Maybe I shouldn't have watched It's a Wonderful Life the other night either.

Competing Messages: The Consumer Game

Every year about this time you hear about some hot product that everyone "must have." It used to be these products were so desirable as Christmas gifts that parents would behave badly at retailers trying to get one. The phenomenon was even thesis for a syrupy Christmas movie starring der Governator.

Nowadays though, the internet, chiefly in the form of eBay, has "disintermediated" human greed, and so the bad behavior at retailers is mostly by people looking to cash in on the marketing and hype by buying at retail (or stealing from those who did) and auctioning them at some hugely inflated price.

I'm not exactly sure what this says, other than we're a pretty sick society. I don't know if it's a manifestation of the purest form of "markets" (competition, greed and bad behavior), or if it's just an effect of years of marketing and the rise of the consumerist culture. Either way, it doesn't say anything very flattering about our species.

I'm pretty sure it doesn't reflect the notion that "markets are conversations," and I'm not sure Sony should feel especially good about "creating passionate users."

Cheese Sandwich: Going to the Dogs

Bodhi remains a full-time job. We weren't able to get him neutered this week as we had to clear up a little parasite problem first. We're going to try again on the 30th. I'm not looking forward to managing him after the surgery. Trying to keep him calm enough to avoid ripping his sutures is probably going to be a challenge. But we'll figure something out. In the meantime, he does like to run:

Cheese Sandwich: No Knead Bread

Still busy, and part of my time was occupied by preparing a loaf of this no-knead bread that got written up in the New York Times. Apparently it's nothing terribly new, being the "ancient" way bread was prepared, but it's pretty cool nevertheless. I tried this last weekend, but the dough was too wet. I read some of the experiences others were having and learned that one and a half cups of water works better than the one and five-eighths the printed version of the recipe called for.

The video describing the process said the oven should be set for 500 degrees, the printed recipe said 450, so I set the oven to 470. The bottom crust is too thick and hard, so I suspect 450 would be better overall. I also used too much corn meal on the dough, but live and learn.

It looked very "authentic" and it tasted great. The bottom crust was too hard, and the top was may just a little harder than I'd prefer, but it was still a nice loaf of bread.

About the trickiest thing is handling a very hot cast iron pot and lid, everything else is simplicity itself.

DVD: M:I3

Mission Impossible 3 was better than 1 or 2. Which, really, wasn't that hard. The plot was fairly transparent, though there was a surprise that kind of made the movie less than what I thought it might have been.

And the exploding microcharges in the head was kind of new back in 1981, when John Carpenter put them into Kurt Russell's neck in Escape From New York. (Coincidentally, both movies earn a 6.8 star rating from IMDB users, though M:I3 has about twice as many votes. In my view, Escape From New York, though slightly dated today, in some ways it's much more relevant than it was in 1981, is a much better movie.) Kind of lame in 2006. And who would have thought that microcharges give you a really bad headache before they go off? Lame. (Trivia note: In EFNY, the microcharges are neutralized by x-rays. In M:I3, you just need a defibrillator, or you know, stick your tongue in a light socket or something.*)

Good to see once. Not a keeper.

• Safety note: Kids, don't actually stick your tongue in a light socket. It's probably more dangerous than the microcharges in your head.

DVD: Keeping Up With the Steins

I thought this was going to be kind of a farce, and there were some farcical elements to it, but mostly it was a gentle, good-natured comedy about a young man's bar mitzvah. Not what I expected, but better than I expected too.

Cheese Sandwich: Second Life

Where does the time go?

At some point, Bodhi will be mature enough, and this place will be together enough, and I'll be organized enough to go back to posting more frequently.

Not that my legions of fans have been clamoring to hear from me or anything... ;^)

I was out tossing the tennis ball around with Bodhi, who found a big stick and could never seem to quite make up his mind which one he wanted to hold onto, fortunately for me. I'd throw the ball, he'd go get it, I'd pick up the stick, he'd come back and drop the ball and try to take the stick. This would go on for ever if I could last that long.

But it was a beautiful fall day, and I was thinking that it was, you know, pretty "high definition," even if it wasn't confined to a 50" frame in my living room. We were having a lot of fun playing games, even if they weren't on an X-Box or a PS3. Bodhi did do a lot of 360s though. I thought to myself that this is kind of my "second life," and I think it's pretty good.

Bodhi goes in to be neutered on Wednesday, so I wanted to run him pretty hard today. He loves to run, and I love to watch him. Sometimes I chase him, but I have to run an intercept vector because he's much too fast for me to actually follow. Fortunately, he pretty much runs in a big circle so it's fairly simple to predict where he's going to be. He's going to have to take it pretty easy next weekend, so we won't be going to the dog park, or letting him off the leash by the retention pond.

At some point we're going to have to go to obedience school because I'm not having much luck teaching him how to behave meeting people. He loves everybody and wants to jump up on them. He weighs just over fifty pounds now, and he can easily knock down small children and many elderly people. Hell, he can pretty much knock me down when he comes flying at me at Mach 3. We're having better luck in the house teaching him to do a few things, but that first greeting in the morning, or when I come home from being away a little while is like some enormous celebration, like he'd just won the Dog Lotto or something, and it just takes too long to get him to settle down. Once he's calmed down a bit, he's great.

Still slowly putting this place together. Everything takes longer than I'd like it to. I hung a ceiling fan yesterday, and figured that'd be about a two hour effort. It turned into a six and a half hour quest. Fortunately, when I turned the power on, the fan and the light both worked. I had my doubts there at the end.

Once I get my act together here, I expect I'll be back to posting more often and opining on various things that are none of my business, just like before. For now, this will have to do as a placeholder.

Cheese Sandwich: Still here...

Woke up at 4:45 a.m. to the sound of the dog vomiting. Took him outside. Seems his twig snacks didn't agree with him. He eats small twigs like they were pretzels. I try to to stop him, but with the winds around here lately, they're pretty much everywhere so it's mostly an effort in futility. He seems to pass most of them. How I know this is one of the aspects of owning a dog where you don't have your own yard!

Things have been busy between work, the dog and getting the new place established. It's been fun too. The poor cats still don't quite know what to do, but they're becoming bolder. I bought a baby gate for my bedroom door. They can go under it, but Bodhi can't, so they can usually come and go, stealthily, as they please. Of course, they have the run of the place when I'm at work and Bodhi is in his crate.

Took him to the vet for a basic exam and a rabies shot. They pronounced him a fit pup, and we scheduled him to be neutered a week from this coming Wednesday.

Taekwondo has been put on the back burner, at first because of the move and now because of the dog. I hope to start going at lunchtime on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Mostly, I don't like the idea of crating Bodhi all day and then coming home and letting him out for an hour or so, then putting him back in so I can go to class. Once I'm confident I can leave him out of the crate when he's alone, I'll go back to evening classes. But right now he still needs a lot of attention, and if I want a nice, well-adjusted adult dog, I need to invest that time now.

It's a lot of fun playing with him. He's quite the clown sometimes. We've been to the dog park twice and he seems to play well with others. He has no problem riding in Shiva, the Destroyer of Worlds.

Getting used to a new place is always interesting. There are always a number of quirks and unusual design choices to work around. There is a utility closet cum pantry off the kitchen. The other day I was wondering why they put a full-sized door to that room, because the sweep of the door really limits what can go on the wall opposite the door. (Like the trash can.) Then it occurred to me that it had to be a full-sized door so they could get the washer and dryer in there. I'm going to put some hooks on the wall next to where the door hinges are to hang stuff I don't use very often, like the ironing board and the mop. I can rearrange the shelves a bit, and I'm thinking of getting a set of cupboards to go over the washer and dryer, though that may be more than I can afford at the moment.

I bought a kit to clean out the dryer vent. Someone, at some point, put something in the dryer that basically blocked the lint screen. I cleaned most of it out using a toothbrush, so it works reasonably well; but I suspect the dryer was run for some time with the screen out. So for $16.00, I got a long skinny brush and an attachment to put on the vacuum cleaner and Friday I spent part of the evening pulling amazing quantities of lint from the dryer vent. I think it'll work much better now. It wasn't working well at all before.

I bought a 20" TV for Caitlin's room on Friday. It was on sale, and she likes to watch TV until the wee hours of the morning. (I know, I'm a bad parent.) I also bought her an air mattress for her to sleep on for now until we buy her a proper bed. This way, I don't have to get up at 4:45 in the morning and turn off the TV. (Instead I have to get up to deal with the puking dog.) I put the old iMac in that room as well, since I don't seem to have given it away. So she's been enjoying herself in her own room this weekend. We bought probably a complete set of rubber ducky-themed bathroom accessories, and she seems pretty happy with that.

Anyway, things have been pretty busy around here so I haven't been spending much time online. That's likely to continue to be the case for some time. I've been saving a few posts by others in Bloglines to comment on when I have some time. Maybe I will, maybe I won't. We'll see.

In the meantime, all the usual suspects are trying to save the world, or save the net, or save newspapers, or make marketing into something it isn't, or to commercialize what's left of our social space for the sake of making a little more money or (most often) to increase their own reputation. I must say, Bodhi is much more pleasant company than all the blow-hards and know-it-alls, so returning to my former habits is perhaps less likely now.

Maybe that's not such a bad thing.

Woof!

Too busy to blog.