BoldUlysses.com

1. Note to self: Take Rain-X on next skiing trip. When the precipitation falling is a mixture of freezing rain, sleet, and snow and progressing down the slopes through it means I have to make regular stops to breathe on and wipe off my goggles and/or glasses, it’s no fun. I think something water-repellent (like Rain-X) on my goggles might have helped, but then, maybe not. Obscured vision on the slopes didn’t dampen the fun of the weekend overall, though–the resort was not crowded at all and the snow quality was stellar, with hardly any ice. Thanks for letting me use your skis, David–they worked great.

2. Finally saw Napoleon Dynamite on the bus on the way home. Fantastic movie, and one of the most emminently quotable (and re-enact-able) I’ve seen in a long time. Probably helped that I saw it with a bunch of folks who were really into the movie as well.

3. I got the cd player for my car over the weekend. I’ll install it tonight, I think. Tunes for the upcoming ski trip to Snowshoe!

4. I have a small headache this morning. Not too pleasant. I think it’s because I had too much fast food this weekend.

For the longest time I thought it was just one person. Hmm.

Tailgating = Number one pet peeve whilst driving. Especially if it’s a four lane road and they’re seemingly incapable of using the other lane to pass me. If you tailgate me, I will slow down, be forewarned. On a four lane road with a speed limit of 45 mph I made it all the way down to 20 mph before the idiot got off my bumper and sped around me. No other traffic on the road, mind you. Amazing stuff. If you are less than one and a half car lengths behind me, you are tailgating. Why oh why can’t I just live in Germany, where they know how to drive…?

Going skiing as a chaperone with the youth group this afternoon. We’re headed to Winterplace in WV. Not great, but it’s close to the best we can do here in central NC as far as resorts within a reasonable driving distance. Should be fun, provided I can find the two or three guys on the bus who actually know how to ski reasonably well. Nah–it’ll be fun regardless. I’ll be back on Sunday.

If you want some freelance graphic design work in central NC, e-mail me now. For serious–we’re going to start reviewing portfolios very soon. Really good money. Great little college town. The works.

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This cracks me up, specifically the theme song. Careful, one listen and you might want to move :)

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Been reading T.S.Eliot lately. I get the feeling that I don’t understand much of it. I could pretend that I pick up on all the references, the symbolism, the structure of his poetry, but I don’t. But I still love it. His poems are of course rife with classical imagery, obscure academic references, quotes in about half a dozen other languages, and I can feel the structure of the poems as I read the words, but he still manages to construct a seemingly stream-of-consciousness flow through the verses, making the poems almost seem “imperfect,” and thus more accessible. They are obviously in reality imperfect, as many critics have pointed out, but it’s the engineered quality of imperfection that I know is present that makes them appealing–it makes them more “human” because of the stops and starts, the repetitions and whatnot, mirror the way our subconscious mind operates… For me it’s almost like pulling on a surrogate inner personality–so much of it reflects the way I talk to myself, deliberate in my mind, experience the push and pull of my emotions and will:

In a minute there is time
For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse. (from Eliot’s …Prufrock)

Also, he creates metaphors and doesn’t seem affected by their complexity or frequency in the least. I love this. So many times I’ll experience a song, or a poem, or a work of prose, that loves to exult in the clever metaphors it assembles, the little similies sprinkled into the piece. I’m not sure if there’s a way that I could point out when it’s occurring–it’s more just a general sense I get when I read a particular book or listen to a song. Sometimes there are more pauses around the metaphors the author/songwriter wants us to dwell on. Sometimes they’ll be weighted towards the end of sentences. Sometimes the artist in question will come up with a fantastic metaphor around which he’ll build his story, and pillage it to the point where it’s lost all meaning by the end. There are lots of ways…

But Eliot (and Joyce does this too, admirably), will simply toss off the most expressive and descriptive metaphors imaginable and just carry on:

“When the short days of winter came, dusk fell before we had well eaten our dinners. When we met in the street the houses had grown sombre. The space of sky above us was the colour of ever-changing violet and towards it the lamps of the street lifted their feeble lanterns. The cold air stung us and we played till our bodies glowed. Our shouts echoed in the silent street. The career of our play brought us through the dark muddy lanes behind the houses, where we ran the gauntlet of the rough tribes from the cottages, to the back doors of the dark dripping gardens where odours arose from the ashpits, to the dark odorous stables where a coachman smoothed and combed the horse or shook music from the buckled harness.” (from Joyce’s excellent Araby)

Eliot’s poetry has a similar timbre to me. There’s a precision to his words that I adore. The gait of the piece and the construction of the verses reflects for me an extraordinary amount of care used in selecting the words and the sequence that would most accurately convey the emotion or thought or feeling in question. And with the almost haphazard, “imperfect” quality running through the poems that allows them to speak to our subconscious… I don’t know of many equally complete poets or authors.

The only time I’ve ever been remotely scared flying in an airplane was a little over ten years ago.

Our airliner was flying into Nice, France, from Paris, and the weather was abominable. The clouds were grey and as thick and opaque as clam chowder just outside the window, and the turbulence on the final approach was unlike anything I’d felt. We’d plunge suddenly for what felt like hundreds of feet before stopping the descent abruptly and racing back upwards. It went on and on…endless cycles of up and down, unpredictable and sudden, for what seemed like forever. People were pasty-faced and ill all around me, and more than a few airsickness bags were used. I even started to feel a little queasy, and all I could do was to stare out the window and hope for the ground to appear beneath us, signifying that landing was imminent. Time dragged on. The engines would rev sporadically, pushing us back in our seats for a moment before relenting, and the pitching up and down went on and on. The windows are either side of the plane were still walls of grey mist, no sky, no ground…nothing. My brothers looked miserable, as did my mom. People were complaining audibly by this point, and in an effort as much to make myself feel better as a feeble attempt to reassure my family, I quoted some inane statistic about the safety of air travel and got a few words into my explanation of ILS and glideslope and landing procedures before my voice tapered off. The rest of the family gave me death-stares before re-focusing on their own misery. I turned away and looked outside again as the plane heaved around in every axis imaginable. I looked up to try to catch a glimpse of sky–no luck. I looked down and the consistency of the clouds was exactly the same. Suddenly, as I was looking down, ground appeared not twenty feet below us. Before I had a chance to turn around and tell the family, the main landing gear hit the runway with a resounding thump that shuddered through the airframe. The nose rotated downwards, touched the ground, and the pilot kicked in the thrust reversers. We slowed to a crawl as the most palpable sense of relief I’ve ever experienced permeated the air in the cabin. Some people clapped, but most just sighed great sighs. We taxied to the terminal. I don’t think I’ve ever seen people disembark more quickly than they did that day.

When I think about my response to the experience, though, it wasn’t even one of fear. It was more just intense discomfort from the inability to situate myself relative to my surroundings outside the plane, and the unexpected movements as the pilot kept us on course for the runway. As soon as the nausea lifted my enthusiasm for flight returned to full strength.

Man has wanted to fly for thousands of years, and it would seem like in ages past we’ve had the desire more collectively than just the small percentage of folks nowadays who actually enjoy the experience, if prose and poetry from the last few centuries are any indication. I think it was just a fantasy, though, and in the fantasy the intrinsic risk and danger are gone, because it’s a perfect thing, an expression of an ideal. But I still have a hard time grasping peoples’ fear of it.

What’s your response to flying? Fear? Joy? Mild displeasure and inconvenience? Utter and abject terror? Thrill beyond the dreams of Icarus? I’ve been pretty interested in this subject lately.

At home doing laundry…what joy is mine. The laundry machines at the apartment complex are on the fritz again. I am ready to be out of there, even if it does mean coming home for a few months. I can swing it.

I’m ready
I’m ready for what’s next

I always have to make these things more complicated than they should be, don’t I? If you don’t know what I’m talking about, good.

Time is a train
Makes the future the past
Leaves you standing in the station
Your face pressed up against the glass

I worked at the Gazette office all day today, as predicted. I did a better job this time around, instead of just phoning it in like last issue. This one’s going to look really good. Susan had this great idea for the move to the Gazette redesign, something we’ve been wanting to do for a long time but have always needed (or felt like we needed) the blessing of the higher-ups in order to implement. All the elements (new fonts, banners, subheadings, etc) are there; it’s just a matter of making the shift. But without a permanent editor at the moment it’s unlikely that the change will be made soon, and even when they bring somebody on board the prospect of them taking to the pre-chosen elements of the redesign (as they stand now) is even more unlikely. So Susan hit upon the brilliant idea of making subtle shifts in the design of the paper every issue, starting now, until the transition is complete. For instance, next issue I could casually, inconspicuously drop in a new subhead or two. Maybe the issue after that I’ll incorporate a new banner. And if we’re still operating below the radar screen by this point I may spring for a new font for the stories themselves. We’ll see what happens. But the insiduously subversive means of revolution, as far as the paper’s concerned, appealed to me a great deal.

I need sleep. Finish drying, dumb load of laundry. Eventful day tomorrow.

I’m just down the line from your love

I should’ve gone into work today and worked on the Gazette. I don’t even have a printout for tomorrow morning… It’s going to be crazy in there for the first few hours; I know it.

It’s freaking cold in here. Even several layers didn’t avail me today as the wind just up and blew right through me. Didn’t spend more time outside than I absolutely had to.

The weekend was fairly good. My birthday proper was yesterday. Thank you to everyone who contacted me with well-wishes–it really, really made me feel great. Verbal affirmation is one of my big means of receiving appreciation, so know that your words meant a lot, possibly more than you know, if words aren’t as much of a conduit for affection for you as they are for me. I hope that made sense.

Hung out with the family yesterday evening. My mom cooked me a celebratory dinner–I requested chicken in a white sauce with cooked carrots, mashed potatoes, broccoli, and a nice white wine to tie it all together. My dad had a bottle of the Biltmore Estate white left–it was strong, but good, and it complemented the meal well.

Tired of these little bullet points. I feel inexplicably rotten. Gonna go figure out why that is.

The opening progression of chords in Seals & Crofts’ “I’ll Play For You” is exactly the same as the old Meow Mix jingle (one the repopularized by the first Austin Powers film).

Freaky.

“Oh, how I love the snoo. Snoo falling from the sky, covering everything. Lovely, wonderful snoo.”
“Don’t you mean ‘snow?’ What’s ‘snoo?'”
“Not much. What snoo with you?”

And… I’m an ass.

The cars and parking lot are covered by this point, and more is falling. I’m not terribly worried–ze German Carmachinenfrügenvaselumphsterpoop (a.k.a. the Audi) has AWD, so traction is never really much of an issue, and can even be quite entertaining in open parking lots with a nice dusting. The thing to remember is that while forward traction, and to a limited extent lateral traction (i.e. turning), are superior to the average car’s, as far as braking is concerned I’m just the same as everyone else, since all cars brake with all four wheels. This knowledge should temper my overconfidence a bit.

My birthday is this Saturday. I want to go out to eat or something equally social with a bunch of people. Maggiano’s would be nice but I kind of lean towards something a little more cozy, and besides, not all of my prospective guests are friendly with Italian (though I enjoy it muchly). We’ll see. More brainstorming ensues.

In anticipation of the movie version of Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy coming out this year, over the weekend I rented the DVD set of the BBC television episodes. I haven’t read the book, but since I move almost exclusively in profoundly nerdy and geeky circles, I’ve been peripherally aware of all the characters and the jist of the book. The TV series is really low-rent, with special effects that look cheesy even for early ’80s television, but somehow it’s really entertaining. I think part of it is the British nature of the humor, which tends to revolve around witticisms and absurd situations rather than more broad-stroked guffaws, but the part that really endears it to me are the montages out of the book itself, with the clever, deadpan observations about the galaxy and all the little existential philosophies therein.

Picked up Stephen from the airport last night at 1 a.m. after his flight was delayed by several mechanical issues. After going 100 mph all weekend, I’m dead tired.

My roommates and I are in the end-of-lease limbo concerning the state of the apartment. We all know that we’re going to split in a couple of months, so any desire to invest in the quality of life in the apartment, at least as far as permanent fixtures and whatnot, is completely gone. We still keep the common areas like the living room and the kitchen clean, but the organization in my room, for one, has completely disintegrated. There are some days when I wish I didn’t own hardly anything so I could be endlessly mobile, move anywhere and feel very soon at home because I wouldn’t have much to establish. But then there are days when I just want to buy a house, get a permanent graphic design job, and just invest myself in the community in the area and my little hobbies. I know how much the discontent would grow after even a short while if I took the latter course, though. I’ve been given so much in terms of experiences and capabilities–I have to use it; I have to extend myself into the moving stream at least a little.

Okay. Working outside in the garage on the car for three hours in ~20° temps with only two layers on = not recommended. The worst part was the fact that not only was I working on the fuel system, and thus on my back the majority of the time (so the blood receded away from my hands, which were held above me), but gasoline evaporates much more readily than water or sweat does, pulling even more heat away from my hands in the process… I wore those plastic gloves, but they only do so much (mainly keeping gas out of the cuts).

But the Audi’s fixed. I have something I can drive to work tomorrow. This is the essential thing.

Well my hands are completely trashed. Six bandaids between the both of them, and possibly more to come. Wouldn’t be so bad except for the coldness and dryness outside. Working on the car out in the garage for several consecutive days, and moving a friend of a friend yesterday for several hours solid took their toll… to the point where the slightest nick this afternoon would bleed. At least I’m not using Super Purple degreaser on anything while my hands are this torn up, like I did a few years ago before I knew any better. That stuff burns almost as bad as brake parts cleaner does. Yeah.

The exhibit at the NCMA was fantastic, even if it was really crowded (last day of the show). It’s amazing to look at the paintings and drawings and realize that it some fundamental way, conscious or subconscious (probably a combination of both), the artists really understood visual balance, the language of color, and the way form and shading implied the structure underneath. One look at the ink and charcoal sketches confirms it. Observing the artwork, I was also struck with the thought that because of all the art courses I’ve taken and what I’ve gleaned from them, I know a little of what they knew so profoundly, as far as the elements I mentioned above. In other words, I can recognize elements of what I’ve been taught in the pieces I was looking at. It did make me think, though, after I overheard myself repeating some of the lessons in my mind, how much of the kinship of understanding that I feel with the artists has to do with what I’ve been taught and am just reciting by rote, and how much would I have just known without having taken the courses that I have? The latter is the deeper understanding, I think, since it speaks to what’s in us intrinsically, but I had to conclude that there was no way that I could see to separate the learned from the instinctively known, at least not in the mental time allotted to that train of thought. It didn’t lessen the beauty of the artwork in the least, however.

My upper right arm is twitching something fierce, and has been ever since mid afternoon yesterday. You know those muscle twitches you get when a particular one or group is tired (I think)? That’s it. It’s more annoying than anything else, especially when I’m trying to fall asleep at night.

I ran last night before the front’s squall line came through. Actually, it came through around 4 in the morning, so I guess that’s not saying much. But even at 11 I could feel it bearing down, what with the wind and choppy night clouds overhead. It was still warm, though, and about halfway through the run I took my shirt off. It made for a much more exhilarating experience. I think I can honestly say it’s the first time I’ve been shirtless outside on January 13th.

I spent too much money last night. After having a great steak dinner at home (my dad bought too much steak and invited me over to help them finish it), I stopped by B&N to look for an album by the late great Eva Cassidy, an artist that Susan and I had been listening to on someone else’s iTunes playlist earlier in the week at the Gazette. Found it, and on it is possibly one of the best cover songs I’ve ever heard (right-click save-as). It’s not often that a cover invites me to contemplate the meaning and poeticism of a song in a deeper way than the original.

I also (finally) bought the Flanagan U2 tour bio (a.k.a. the “Flanagan bible”). Good stuff so far–very insightful.

My arm is still twitching. This is getting really annoying. If I eat something will this go away?

1. I really, really need to see Napoleon Dynamite. And The Aviator. It’s tragic.

2. Ate outside at Quizno’s with Betty and David today. Driving back to the office, stopped at a light, Betty opened the sunroof. The movement of the clouds against the frame of the opening made it seem like the car was moving and not the clouds…kind of like looking up at a skyscraper in a big city downtown.

3. Does anybody out there read The Onion? Some of it is over the top, sure, but most of it is really funny, and their movies and music reviews are quite good too. They have “columnists” that write regular commentaries every few issues, among them an incredibly white “accounts receivable supervisor” who talks like a gangsta, the decrepit founder of the newspaper who goes into way too much detail about his physical ailments, a hard-luck stoner who goes on about his latest burger flipping job and complains about how “weak” his “stash” is, and my personal favorite, Smoove B (warning: pretty racy prose), an oversexed would-be Valentino with obviously ulterior motives behind his sweet talk. I don’t know why, but I find his articles absolutely hysterical, to the point where I had to suppress my laughter yesterday to avoid attracting attention in the office. The part when he pledges to neither massage his lady too hard nor too soft “to be ineffectual for massaging purposes” killed me. Man. What is wrong with me?

4. I drove Stephen to the airport today at 5 a.m. It sucked to get up that early, but on the other hand I do get to drive his truck around, which is nice while my car’s fuel system is still giving me fits. I think I’ve finally decided to ditch the stock fuel tank and go with an aftermarket fuel cell. I’ll leave it at that–let me know if you want more details.

5. I have two tickets to this exhibit at the NCMA. Let me know if you’d like to go with me this weekend–the exhibit closes on Sunday.

Lots of upheavals here today at work. Turns out that Betty (our beloved interim director) is going to be leaving to do freelance stuff in about a month, and of course we knew that David was going to head back to Costa Rica in February…so I took the oppotunity to let everybody know that I was going to be leaving at the end of the summer, which means that there will be three graphic design positions available here, not including the directorial position. So if you want a great graphic design job in central NC, contact me.

In other news, I don’t eat very well. When I went in for my physical about 4-5 months ago, the doctor was completely baffled when I told her my eating habits. She was very pleased with everything else, including my exercise habits and the fact that I stay away from toxins, but she said, “I can’t figure out what you eat.” I don’t eat a lot of fruits or veggies or dairy, to be sure, and I probably ingest more than my share of energy bars and hummus and pita bread, but I feel fine. But it did get me wondering–I feel well at the moment, sure, but is this really as good as I could feel? Who knows how my alertness and productivity would be affected if I just ate better and got more sleep at night. Have I gotten accustomed to feeling 70-80% (if indeed that’s the percentage) as good as I could feel? I don’t get sick often at all, but I still wonder sometimes if I’m self-aware enough about my health. I mean, just 6 or 7 years ago I wasn’t even self-aware enough to recognize the effects of caffeine on my energy levels, or to connect after-dinner sleepiness with the fact that I was digesting, or to recognize specific cravings for specific nutrients. Food for thought (zing!).

car stuff

I watched Anchorman last week. I can say without hesitation that it’s the sort of movie that would have been a better show with more people in the room. I watched it during a rare night when the apartment was empty and I was bored. As it was, it was amusing (the weatherman is a hoot), but not uproariously funny. At one point during the movie there’s a sort of gang war between the various news teams from the local stations, and the scene features cameos from several other comedic actors, among them Luke Wilson and Ben Stiller. The lead anchor from the public television station showed up, though, and I couldn’t figure out for the life of me who it was. He was wearing a curly blond wig and looked initially like a tall version of Flea (from the RHCP). Then he looked sort of like Kelsey Grammer, and then I finally realized it was Tim Robbins. The wig made him all but unrecognizable.

Friday night was occupied by a friend’s wedding. It was held at the Forest Theatre in Chapel Hill, an outside stone theater, something most of us thought was a bad idea at the beginning of January, but as it turned out the evening was quite temperate and nice. I had been commissioned earlier in the week to burn several cds of music to play during the reception: background music for the social part, and more upbeat stuff for the dancing. I don’t really have much (read: any) in the way of background music (think Sinatra or Armstrong or Nat King Cole or the like), so Stephen had to come through for me with his computer reserves of music of that genre. As for the dance-y stuff, I lucked out when I realized my mom (in conjunction with my brothers) had burned me a couple of cds of Motown hits–always crowd-pleasers–so I just used those. All I can say is that if anybody in that crowd is coming to my future wedding (as I’m sure some will), they’d better enjoy their oldies while they can, ’cause they’re probably not going to find much they recognize when it comes time to dance. Muahahaha.

The bride and groom, Hannah and Michael, had known each other for about 7 or 8 months, I think, and had been engaged for the better part of that. I don’t know if I could do that. I don’t think I have hard and fast limitations on the amount of time I should know someone before we get engaged, but I’m fairly certain it’s longer than that. How long should you have known/date/be engaged to someone before getting married? Does it matter?

It still smells like gasoline in here. I hung my shirt up on the railing outside to dry and I took a good shower, but the smell still lingers.

I tried to drive up to Williamsburg, VA, today, to visit Emily, who’s vacationning, visiting some family friends. It was to be the first substantial road trip in the Audi, and I thought I was well-prepared. I packed food, maps, a good assortment of tools, the few spare parts I had lying around (fuel pump and driveshaft support bearing), fluids, paper towels… I was in good shape, and making good time, too. Even the cruise control decided to work for me.

Then I crossed the border into Virginia, and everything started deteriorating. Well, not everything, just the car’s fuel tank. To corral a unavoidably long-winded explanation, the fuel supply line inside the tank was partially clogged. The car started bucking, cutting on and off, when going around the slightest corner and when going over 60 mph or so–but only when the fuel level dropped below about 7/8 tank. But that of course meant that I’d have to top off the car every 30 minutes or so, assuming the problem didn’t get worse. I had had the problem before about 9 months ago, and fixed it then, but it exhibited the exact same symptoms today (as it had been, to a lesser extent, for several weeks before now), so I knew exactly what was wrong.

So…I called Em and limped back home, pausing every 45 minutes or so to top off the tank–the car would definitely let me know when it needed it. I stopped by the auto parts store and bought parts for a solution which I think will work, but it involves JB Weld, which needs 15 hours to fully cure, so I think the trip north is out… It really sucks.

I finally got home, pushed the Supra out of my garage, got the Audi in, up on jackstands, and pulled out the fuel tank (full of fuel, mind you–an interesting experience) in about an hour. I can go into more exhaustive detail about my solution, but I have a feeling nobody really wants to hear about that. But that initial part of the process is the reason for the all-pervasive smell. Not fun. Neither are gasoline burns. Yummy.

There’s a pecan log roll in my office. It was donated by the powers that be who deposit food in the kitchen and then decide that no one’s going to eat it so they pass it off to people who they feel like have a healthy metabolism and/or omnivorous roommates but who don’t really want it and would probably either try to pass it off again or light it on fire and throw it in the pond with all the other rejected holiday eats. Anybody local want it? It’s yours.

I’m ready to go skiing. I’m chaperoning the youth group ski retreat at the end of the month (28-30), but I want more than just that this season. David just got new skis. Maybe I’ll hijack those for a daytrip.

I am really tired and have been in a foul mood for most of the day today. Not a great combo, but I’m going to bed in a minute.

I am so tired of feeling. I’m tired of these stupid mind games I play with myself to have a particular attitude about something in order to motivate me to do it. I’m so tired of getting so wrapped around my own thoughts and justifications in a particular situation that I don’t do a thing. From now on I just want to operate out of what I know and if I don’t know I want to find out before I act. And act I will.

I think I’m just tired of being myself.

I just want a decent conversation with somebody. Is that too much to ask?

1. Brain is still on the blink from waking up (yes, it takes me this long most days).

2. They’re coming to fix my computer today. Hopefully sooner rather than later.

3. I acquired the new Green Day album yesterday, so “Are We the Waiting” has been going through my head all morning.

4. Here are some pronouns: I She We They Us Them He.

5. The idea of a tree is a magnificent thing. I want to climb one.

6. I find myself apprehensive about more things and situations in this life than I really care to admit. Part of that might be my utter social ineptitude, part of it might just be the nature of the beast (the beast being whatever particular situation I’m facing any given day).

A few months ago I was really apprehensive about teaching the auto fundamentals class to the kids, even though I was prepared and of course I knew what I was teaching through and through. But isn’t it interesting how rational explanations never seem to quell our emotions? Nothing I told myself made the knot in my stomach disappear. Driving there, I felt the nervousness mounting, and it reached the point where I just had to disengage my will from my emotional state, utterly and completely. In other words, I was just determined to move forward and to do what I set out to do without missing a step. And throughout the experience of teaching the class, it was almost as if I was outside myself, watching myself write on the white board, and answer questions, and pass parts around, and everything else the class comprised. Was I less nervous? Not really…but that emotion took a spectator’s view and watched the will carry me through. And the funny thing is that I really did my best–I could feel myself go for it, as it were, in certain situations, which seems a little counterintuitive knowing that my feelings were secondary, by and large. My preconceived notion of situations in which I would just do something regardless of how I felt about it was that it would end up a passionless ordeal, going through the motions by rote–but that experience opened my eyes that it didn’t have to be so.

I think there’s something to that. Last night I read more than a few Psalms that contained the phrase (or a variation thereof), “Praise the LORD, O my soul.” It’s almost as if the psalmist didn’t particularly feel like worshipping at that particular moment, but his will, his decision, was to do it anyway and to exhort his emotions to participate. And I can’t help feeling a sliver of recognition in that verse when I think about my experience teaching the class. It deepens the psalmist’s words immensely to be able to associate them with something I’ve been through.

Yeah, it’s definitely January 2nd. Certainly feels like it outside. Heh.

Took a post-lunch nap today while the guys were upstairs yelling at the television (read: watching the game). Lots of dreams. In one in particular I was suddenly in the middle of an epic expedition in what seemed like the Tibetan plateau in the middle of a blizzard. Everything was white–the air, the ground, the sky… The snow was deep and just moving forward was laborious. The most eerie part was the sky, though–because of what I surmised at the time was a bizarre form of atmospheric refraction, the sun was repeated in three pairs. In other words, there were six suns grouped in pairs, moving around the rim of the sky, a la arctic circle. It was the most unsettling thing about the whole experience because it gave the environment even more of an alien quality than the climate.

We trudged through the blizzard for hours before finally coming down off the plateau into one of those valleys that seemed like paradise in the middle of the cold wasteland, hidden away from the rest of the world. A walled city on an impossibly green ridge took up the bulk of the clearing, and we came down out of the clouds and cold, leaving all that above us. Walking into the city, we saw Roman architecture and temple-like structures all around, and we went into one. It was arranged theater-style, seats on steps receding up into the rafters through a 180° arc. It seemed almost like a classroom, since there were a few people studying intently scattered throughout the immense room. A professor moved from one to the next, giving each personal attention for a time. I remember the darkness of the upper reaches of the space, and columns all around.

There were other dreams that had thematic ties to our time in France and walking through the old city of Cagnes-sur-mer, but I don’t remember any details of those.

This album flat out rocks (Sixpence None the Richer, This Beautiful Mess). I don’t know why it didn’t get the recognition it deserved back in its day (circa 1995). It’s head and shoulders more musically and lyrically innovative than anything the Christian music scene was putting out then (with the exception of JOC). It’s an art grunge/pop mix that was to its contemporaries roughly what the Smashing Pumpkins were to mainstream music. In any case, it’s mystifying. I had lost my copy of the cd for a long time (still had the case and liner), but a friend’s fortuitous forgetting of his cd case gave me an opportunity to burn the album to the computer, and listen to it in the process for the first time in years. So good. I still associate memories of the trip out west to Yellowstone and Glacier, eastern Washington state and the Oregon coast with the album–it provided the part of the headphone soundtrack to the sensory experiences. I think that too might be a reason why I enjoy it as much as I do.

The annual multi-family get-together on New Year’s Day was earlier last evening over at my parents’ place. Four families, ours included, have a big, evening-long potluck grill out affair every year on the first of January. They’re families that have been friends since literally before I was born, so over a quarter century, and it’s always fun to see everybody again, to catch up and enjoy the familiarity. It’s like an extended family gathering without any of the awkwardness. It was great to see Michael again, too. He and Paul have been great friends for years and years and in spite of the fact that Michael lives in Greensboro now, teaching high school math, they pick up every year without missing a beat.

I talked to Michael a good bit too, specifically about visiting his place out there, since he lives in the general vicinity I’ll be moving soon. Lots of plans in the works along those lines, all the more because our lease here at the apartment is up in April, and it’s good to lay everyone’s plans out on the table sooner rather than later. I’m actually seriously thinking about moving back to the parents place for a few months before heading out to Winston-Salem for school. It presents a lot of advantages: Free/less rent (they may prefer that I pay them at least a little bit), moving and thus the opportunity to pare down the amount of stuff that I have to lug to the next stage of my life, and besides it’s not like I’ll be languishing around–I have a well-paying, steady job, and I’m moving towards a goal. It makes sense on a lot of levels when I consider it objectively. Lenin said it best, I think: “In order to take two steps forward, we shall have to take one step backward.” Of course, he was talking about the implementation of communism in a war-ravaged country, not the merits of moving back in with one’s parents, but I don’t think the main thrust of his words is diluted by the shift in context.

“The mark of perfect Friendship is not that help will be given when the pinch comes (of course it will) but that, having been given, it makes no difference at all. It was a distraction, an anomaly. It was a horrible waste of the time, always too short, that we had together. Perhaps we only had a couple of hours in which to talk and, God bless us, twenty minutes of it had to be devoted to affairs!”

The Four Loves, C. S. Lewis

1. My office computer is on the fritz. Has been since yesterday. I’m still at the office, but typing on the machine we use for all our utility stuff like scanning, cd burning, etc. Quark won’t open on this computer and I can’t get files and notes off my office computer to do some work that I could be doing, but isn’t imperative, so…I’m basically useless today. I did stop by Lowes and pick up some drywall screw anchors so I could fix the shelves in my office that have literally fallen off the wall. But that’s done now, so…short day, methinks.

2. The likelihood that I will consider a girl a possibility for a relationship is inversely proportional to the perceived likelihood that she will collect Precious Moments™ paraphernalia later in life (or heaven forbid, does now).

3. It’s incredibly nice to be driving my car again. Monday morning I dropped John and Kristi off at the airport for their trip to St. Thomas for New Year’s and drove their Nissan XTerra (SUV) around for the rest of the day. My Audi needed a headlight switch (being a German car, it was $50) and while I was waiting for it to come in I drove the XTerra around. It’s a stickshift and it has a cd player, so things weren’t all bad, but it just feels so…tipsy, rubbery, over-isolated, disconnected, as opposed to the linear, stable, precise feel the Audi has down closer to the road. Not to mention the fact that I saw more than one identical green XTerra driving around. That’s a weird feeling–I’m not used to seeing similar cars on the road.

4. I bought Blade Runner on DVD a couple of days ago (the director’s cut, of course). I watched about half of it last night. There are very few more visually poetic movies. And there are still lots of things that I don’t understand, lots of symbolism I don’t quite get, even if I can grasp some of the overarching themes of the film as a whole. But I like that I don’t understand all of it. It doesn’t need to be understood to be beautiful. Of course it doesn’t keep me from wanting to understand, but…sometimes the process is more rich and meaningful than the end realization.

Have you ever fallen asleep while driving, even if just for a split second? I did last night. I had to drive from Chapel Hill to Cary, about a 25-minute jaunt, and while I was wide awake upon departure, somehow about 15-20 minutes into the drive I couldn’t keep my eyes open for the life of me. I’m starting to think it was a momentary attack of narcolepsy or something. I rolled down the window to the freezing cold, turned up the music, pinched myself, hummed/sang along–nothing helped. Well, nothing that is except nodding off and scaring myself silly in the process of snapping back awake. Even have the experience that the more you try not to do something, the more prone you are to doing it? Yeah.

Weird. The only culprits I can think of were:

1. I had just had a good 4+ mile run about 45 minutes prior to departure.
2. I had just eaten (not a lot, but still).
3. The music was somewhat hypnotic (early Aphex Twin ambient stuff).
4. Cruise control was in effect.

And by the time I disabled those last two, the damage was done–my body was thoroughly convinced that it was bedtime. It even took me about half an hour to snap out of my grogginess at home group.

Live and learn.

So now I’m hooked on Quizno’s. Heading over there for a late lunch in just a few.

Theology group last night was fantastic, as usual. There’s something about the group dynamic of the half-dozen or so people we have attend that’s just…irreplaceable. We can knock the hard questions around and still maintain a sense of coherency within the context of the theme for the night. It’s great. Going ice skating tomorrow night, an activity I haven’t indulged in for literally years. Won’t be pretty, but…should be more fun than, say, bowling :)

I feel…conflicted. And I don’t even know what about. I hate not being able to pinpoint the emotions or even the thoughts and circumstances that bring about the emotions that are present in me. It’s frustrating.

The images and accounts of the devastation in Asia are just…overwhelming. Staggering. I can’t even begin to wrap my mind around it all.

Pray for everyone affected by the disaster.

Got my RAM in, along with my 80GB HD. Just needed to buy a IDE splitter cable for the hard drive, and…bingo. No more “Your hard drive has no space left” messages. So nice. And we’re cruising on a whopping 384MB of memory too… Not a lot–but certainly enough for what I do (which doesn’t involve any computer games). My seven-year-old Mac is purring contentedly at my feet.

Just finished The Da Vinci Code. What a silly book. I mean…it’s not even a very good work of fiction, let alone the controversial powderkeg that everyone’s hailing it as. I’m a little disappointed. More on this later.

Now I’m off to Leslie’s to fix her car before she comes back from Florida tomorrow. I have to buy an OBD-2 code reader so I can pull the CEL code, but it’s something I’ve been needing for a while now. A worthwhile investment.

Here are lots of random pictures.

I’m bored out of my noggin and nothing’s open. Somebody come over. I’ve already put away all my Christmas gifts and cleaned up the apartment. Suppose I could always read…

I can’t believe this is my fifth Christmas update. I never thought I’d be on this thing for that long, and here it is, still occupying that same little corner of my life. Heh.

My mom hit the jackpot this Christmas, gift-wise. She got, among many other things, a nice digital camera, a cd player and car adapter, beautiful pearl earrings, a diamond ring from my dad, a swivel chair for the computer room, assorted multimedia, sweets…and the list goes on. She was very appreciated.

I received most of the items on my list, including the nice shortwave radio, the 1/2″-drive breaker bar and sockets, several records, socks and other clothes, a couple of DVDs, calendars, a vacuum pump for bleeding the car’s brakes, an OXO™ spatula, and a pair of tickets to an art exhibit at the NCMA, and a pair to a pops concert at the symphony, memory and a new HD for my computer, and other goodies.

I feel completely neutral. Not in relation to the events of the day–those were great–but just in general. My mood isn’t positive or negative, just completely in the middle of the dial. Doesn’t make for compelling journal entries, that’s for sure. I’ll stop here.

This apartment must have the worst insulation ever. It’s not like I don’t have the heat turned up, too…although I don’t want the apartment to be a furnace either (and pay the electricity costs needed to provide such a state). Just a nice happy medium…

Drove Leslie and her sister to the airport this morning. Their family is in Florida, so she’ll be staying with them until Tuesday, at which time I’ll retrieve her from the airport. Their flight was at 6 a.m. and I needed to pick them up at 4:45, so I just stayed up… Drove them there, did a little grocery shopping on the way home, and conked out around 6:30…slept ’til noonish. My sleep cycle is pretty out of whack.

Now to go find a faucet so I can run warm water over my hands… They’re a pair of giant heatsinks in this environment–not what I need.

Merry Christmas, everybody!

I ran tonight under the low, thin clouds. The moon was visible through them, and the veil between it and the ground gave it a wide, milky white ring, appearing for all the world like a gentle supernova halted in mid-exhale. As my run progressed contrails began to crisscross the ring and gave the spectacle an almost iconic quality. Closer to earth, the wind blew unabated through the naked trees flanking the street, bare trunks jutting from the cold ground, receding into darkness. It was a singular experience.

I thought my power mirrors and door locks were broken in expensive and/or time-consuming ways, as in the switches or the actuators. I even discovered that the door lock vacuum pump from the trunk was missing altogether, got one from a parts car and was confused as to why it didn’t do a darn thing when I plugged it in.

Turns out all I needed was the 10A fuse.

It was completely missing from the under-hood fuse box, and it protects both systems. There was evidence of a good deal of fuse box chicanery when I bought the car about a year ago, so I’m not entirely surprised.

It’s nice when you can “repair” two of your car’s systems for $2.50 (for a 6-pack of 10A blades) and 3 minutes.

That made my morning. Just thought I’d share.

Originally posted here.

1. Cool word of the day: ardent.

2. Why do groups of girls spontaneously break into song when they hear a corny song in a movie? Maybe not in the movie theater, but it certainly occurs when watching DVDs at home or whatever. Mystifying.

3. Coming back from lunch today, I saw a handwritten sign by the side of the road: “Free wood for sale.” I think it’s safe to assume their profit margin is pretty killer.

Here are some from the Europe trip six months ago that we’ve just recently gotten to downloading off Donald’s camera.

P.S. — If by some weird chance anybody wants a higher-res version of one or more of these, I have them.

LOTS of pictures. If you’re on dialup you’ll be waiting a while.

What an interesting movie. I will say it is hard to watch. Bad theology through and through, but it gets points for really going for the gusto and not taking the easy Hollywood way out. For what it’s worth, C.S.Lewis’s The Great Divorce is a much more in-depth, interesting, and compelling examination of what amounts to basically the same thing–peoples’ responses to the Biblical concept of the afterlife.

and now for a couple of pictures

Favorite word of the moment: chintzy.

I fixed the bathroom fan for good yesterday, lubing it up with what it should have been lubed up with in the first place: premium hi-temp disc brake wheel bearing grease (or so the can says). In any case, it’s held out much longer than the silicone spray I used the first time, good as that was. Grease doesn’t have an overly good relationship with dust, though, something the bathroom fan sees a lot of, so we’ll see how it holds out over the long term.

Up until recently, Stephen had a pair of fruitcakes. He’s the only guy working at his bank branch up in Hillsborough, and as such they must think he’ll eat anything, since he inevitably comes home with the bulk of the leftovers from their holiday parties and lunches and whatnot. Last week he somehow got hold of a pair of shrink-wrapped fruitcake “bricks” that he deposited on the counter in hopes that some kind soul would take a shine to them and eat them. No such luck. Once we realized that the fruitcakes weren’t going to get eaten, Stephen and I immediately put our heads together and examined the options, whereupon we decided unanimously that the best option for disposal was throwing them into the “lake” just outside the apartment’s back deck. It was perfect–we’d feed the fishes and get rid of the fruitcakes. It was a win-win situation for them and us. So a couple of nights ago Stephen ceremoniously unwrapped one, and holding his nose, chucked it into the pond. The second one actually sat on the counter until just last night, when we had the revelation that the only thing better than actually throwing fruitcakes into the lake would be throwing flaming fruitcakes into the lake. We were hoping that the fruitcake would have a reasonable amount of alcohol in it so it would burn better, but no luck–it didn’t have any, just some “artificial rum flavor.” What a crock. We did manage to set it on fire anyway by starting with the paper inside the wrapper, and the fruitcake traced a nice flamboyant arc in the night air before going *BLOOP* in the pond. This was immensely satisfying for some reason. I hope the fishes like it. If we’re lucky we’ll have mutant fish crawling around the countryside in a matter of days. It could happen. Well, you’ve never fed fruitcake to a fish, so how do you know how they’ll respond? Yeah, that’s what I thought.

You know it’s getting close to winter when taking a shower is as much an exercise in thawing out as actually getting clean.

I rocked the full set of long underwear this morning. It’s amazing what just another layer between pants and skin can do for one’s warmth. The only problem is that it’s not easily removable like a coat or a scarf, so if it should warm up a little outside, the situation could get uncomfortable. I’m all about clothes that fit closely against one’s skin, no flapping around or looseness, but I also like layers, since they allow me a greater adaptability to ambient temperature. Those two clothing attributes are at odds more often than not.

We got a tree yesterday! Finally. It’s about a seven-footer, so it’s only a bit taller than me, but it’s full and thick and well-proportioned. I bought a couple of strands of lights and a tree skirt afterwards and we decorated it with the meager number of decorations we have. Stephen tried repeatedly to attach a hook to an empty beer bottle and hang it on the tree, and every time I took it off. The beer bottle was on the tree when I got up this morning. I took it off. If I get the chance I’ll take a tree picture when I get home tonight.

Brandi, you’ve inspired me. Quizno’s for lunch today.

1. If there’s any doubt Clive Owen has the chops to be the next Bond, view any of these. “Star” is especially good. The car’s not half-shabby either. Heh.

2. There is a one-pound box of almond chocolates sitting on my desk next to me. Christmas present from one of the print reps. I’ll have a few in just a minute. I really don’t want them, though. I think I’ll take them home and let Donald and Stephen plow through them in half an hour.

3. It’s the time of year to start thinking about the big trip for next year. Last year it was Boston for a long weekend. This year we got ambitious and went to Europe for two weeks. I’m not saying we have to up the ante every year, but we’re taking nominations. A ski trip to Colorado is the only serious contender so far.

4. Has anybody seen The Rapture? I rented it a few nights ago after hearing Tricky sample a clip from it in one of his songs and wondering where the sound bite came from (I love Google). Looked up the film and it intrigued me.

5. Still haven’t done any Christmas shopping. Not a bit worried.

Interestingly, the standout thought that ran through my mind in the aftermath of the movie viewing last night was a paraphrase of something I’ve heard someone else say, in the context of a discussion on men and women’s respective approaches to long-term relationships: “Women want to marry their best friend.” Hmm.

Of course I can’t vouch for its veracity, but it’s certainly food for thought.

It was absolutely freezing in my room this morning. The heat was on and I had a thin blanket or two, but anytime my hand or foot would protrude from under the covers it was met with quasi-icy air. I guess there is a disadvantage to having huge windows and a 15-foot ceiling, namely lack of insulation, and well, convection.

Worked on the car a little more last night. Found some parts that I thought I’d have to dig around for, not an appealing prospect at 11 p.m. in the world’s messiest garage with only a shoplight. I hooked up the fuel supply line and sorted out some of the sensors and vacuum lines that snake around the intake manifold.

I watched All the Real Girls last night too, kind of an indie romance/drama thing. The director grew up in the mountains around here, and that’s where the movie is set, so the locations and vistas were very familiar indeed. The cinematography was really breathtaking, capturing details here and there instead of grabbing the scene all at once as a means of establishing place, and it worked to slow down the pace of the movie, reflecting the themes and the nature of the area in which the movie is set, small-town NC, where time crawls by out of sync with the rest of the world.

I think my familiarity worked against me as far as the analysis of the dialogue. For at least the first half-hour or so, I was so concerned with whether they were going to present regionally-correct characterizations that a lot of the lines and the nuance just walked right by me. But once I got over the fact that the film isn’t an exercise in cinerealism, I really enjoyed it. I doubt anybody in small-town NC would speak the way they did, or at least they’d take a lot longer to do it, but it doesn’t mean the things they express aren’t accurate, and maybe I’m just not giving local folks the benefit of the doubt. In any case, some of the lines and monologues are incredibly poetic.

Good film. Familiar enough to hit close to home in a lot of ways, but aloof enough to distill the vulnerability and motivations of its characters and crystallize those into compelling interactions.

1. I watched Elf earlier tonight. What a sweet movie. Classy entertainment. Then Stephen and I watched rented episodes of “The Family Guy,” in which the quality of the humor was diametrically opposed to the previous program. But good gosh, it was hilarious.

2. I finally got my letter of acceptance to PBC! Winston-Salem, here I come (in about 9-10 months, that is). It’s all overwhelming at this point, but time and diligence will sort things out.

Pathetic. Absolutely pathetic.

I ran in the “Jingle Bell Jog” today, the university’s annual faculty/staff run/walk. I thought it was going to be a 5K, but instead the run was closer to 2.7 miles. I came in third overall with a time of 19:10, which equates to a 7:05 mile. Fast, you say? Well, thanks, but my pace for the 10K a month ago was almost identical for more than twice that distance, and I actually had a little bit of reserve left at the end of that race. This one, though… I don’t know what happened. I just never got in a rhythm, never hit my stride. My breathing was always disjointed, and my gait was laborious.

*sigh*

Time to really start digging in and pushing harder. I know I’m faster than that.

In other news… really crackheaded weather patterns today. Last night thunder and lightning and rain sheeting against the side of the apartment woke me for a bit around 5 a.m. There were flashes outside every five seconds or so, nearby too. This morning and early afternoon, though, and during the run, it was the most beautiful day imaginable, cool and breezy. And just a few minutes ago rain and wind lashed the building again and the sky was dark grey. Feels for all the world like it did in central Germany when we were walking through downtown Wiesbaden and we waited out the shower underneath a tree.

Great editorial. Part of me can’t help thinking it’s a bit simplistic…but on the other hand, what great visions for the future aren’t “simplistic” in certain lights?

My head’s been in a vise ever since the beginning of the week. Lack of sleep and too much sugarless gum I think are the culprits.

On the positive side of things, I slept with the window open last night and the ceiling fan on. It’s been breezy and cool and dry lately. Makes me want to take a few days off and go camping.