Pedestrian Subjunctives

Candies and Bonbons and How to Make Them, Oh My!

2010-12-08T04:54:00.001-08:00

We went to my mom's place for Thanksgiving dinner. As always when we visit my mom, or she visits us, she offered me stuff. I allege she doesn't want to throw stuff away and therefore won't feel guilty if she can pass stuff off on me. Or Susie. I have become discriminating in what stuff I will accept. Sometimes it makes me feel bad when I refuse to accept stuff. And I won't accept stuff just to make her feel better, only to then discard said stuff.

Sometimes things go differently. This was one of those.

She asked me if I wanted a cookbook. Warily I asked what kind of cookbook are we talking about. We must Dear Reader, now back up 50 years or so to fill you in.

My grandmother collected recipes. She clipped and copied. I have some of her old cookbooks and there are lots of clipped recipes inserted throughout them. Almost all of them. And lots of clippings. I leave them where they lie, like sleeping dogs, as an homage to my late grandmother.

Anyway, back in the early 1960s, when my mother was a student at the University of Oregon, her mother, my grandmother would sometimes accompany her to the library. Grandma would head to the cookbooks and copy down recipes. OK. Now you're caught up.

Back to Thanksgiving and the offer of stuff. The cookbook. My mom showed me a binder. A three-ring binder. It was not the collected recipes that my grandmother had copied all those years ago. It was her hand-written copy of an entire 287 page cookbook. Candies and Bonbons and How to Make Them. Neatly written on ruled paper. Wow.

I accepted the binder.

Later, I went on Amazon and found a copy for sale and promptly bought it. It arrived yesterday and I cataloged it. TX791.N4 1913 and included a note that indicated I have a second, hand-written copy.

The behaviors surrounding my grandmother's actions certainly explained a lot to me. About me and some of my behaviors. I did say that I cataloged it. Right?

O Heroes

2010-11-12T06:11:00.000-08:00

This Monday past the University of Oregon Athletic Department's O Heroes program sent a couple dozen student-athletes to my Special Olympics bowling practice. To bowl with my Special Olympians. My nearly 80 Special Olympians. My gang didn't know about it in advance, and the UO athletes had no idea what was in store for them.

Representatives from baseball, softball, lacrosse, soccer, tennis, golf and football arrived at the bowling alley and I sent them to bowling lanes. From the beginning it was pandemonium. The best kind of pandemonium.

I couldn't tell who was having more fun. The student-athletes or the Special Olympics athletes. To be safe, I'll just say that it was me who had the most fun. That is not open to debate.

I took a bunch of pictures. Of course I did Dear Reader. Of course I did. I burned the photos onto CDs for both the local Special Olympics program and the O Heroes program. I posted them on Facebook as well. Am I forgetting anything or anybody? Yes. Some of the pictures will be added to the UO Library's digital collection. And then I am going to get paid to catalog them. Talk about win-win-win situations!

On a serious note, the starting tight end from the football team, David Paulson was there. I asked him to please, please, please not injure himself. I wanted no part in jeopardizing the shot the Ducks have of reaching the BCS National Championship Game. I want to go.

Lengths and levels

2010-03-04T05:35:00.000-08:00

While not cut-throat, the battle to gain inside information on players during a fantasy baseball draft can be a bit...daunting? No. Not exactly daunting. But the good owner always needs to keep up with reports from around the league offices, as well as from Florida and Arizona. Here is an example of one such scoop, unearthed in the wee hours of a morning searching for a leg up on the competition. Background information included.

Jean LaFleur was a civil servant with the federal government of Canada, serving in some low-level post in Montreal. I never even bothered to learn what post it was. Just a post. There really was no future in it for him as far as career advancement was concerned. But he did love his work. Or more accurately where his work was located. You see Dear Reader, Jean was a huge fan of the Montreal Expos. Probably the only one. His job allowed him ample opportunity to get out to the ballpark. Generally about 75 games a year. Now that is dedication to a losing proposition.

When the Expos franchise was relocated to Washington, DC and re-christened the Washington Nationals, Jean was heart-broken. His love for the franchise never wavered though and he bore no grudge. He knew what he had to do.

Jean plunged into the Byzantine world of the federal bureaucracy and applied for a transfer into the foreign service. His eye was on the Canadian Embassy in Washington. Both eyes. He studied, took tests, applied, studied some more, re-applied, and finally, in the second year of baseball back in the U.S. capital city, was rewarded with a posting to DC.

Even before he had unpacked his belongings in his new apartment, Jean purchased season tickets to the Nationals' games. He had maintained contacts with some of the front-office people who had made the move from Montreal and found that he was back where he loved to be: a virtual insider in the day-to-day operations of a Major League Baseball franchise. His franchise.

Jean started a blog about Nationals baseball. There were never many visitors, which was fine with Jean. He didn't want casual guests. He wanted only truly devoted fans. Both of them.

I stumbled across his blog, benignly titled "DC Nationals" while I was researching for my fantasy baseball draft. I was just trying to glean some bits about pitching phenom Stephen Strasburg. I knew he'd begin the season in the minors, but for how long would he be kept there?

It seems that Mr. LaFleur had it on good authority that Strasburg would make no more than three starts at AAA before getting the call up to the bigs. Ownership need to put butts in seats, and Strasburg was the best way of selling tickets.

And so I drafted the kid to be a starting pitcher on my fantasy team, Screwballs.

The best part of this whole story is that there is not a single iota of truth to it. Except that I did draft Strasburg. Oh the levels to which a fantasy baseball owner will go to psych out other owners!

Whirr

2010-02-18T07:21:00.000-08:00

I was cataloging a digital image of the team photo of the 1948 University of Oregon baseball team. Metadenoting. Actually. In the back row, fourth from the left is the catcher, Bill Burgher. For authority control purposes I wanted to find the fuller form of his name. I needed to. I checked the index in the yearbook, the Oregana, and he was listed as William Burgher. So far, so good. Then I went to the alumni directory to maybe discover a middle initial I could use. When I searched for Burgher, there was but one gentleman. A Joseph William Burgher. The time frame was about right, but I couldn't be sure it was the same dude. Really sure. Turning the page in the Oregana, I saw a picture with the caption: "Rifle-armed catcher Bill Burgher signs with the Portland Beavers as a result of his steady performance with the Ducks." A clue worth investigating. I did a Google search for the 1948 Portland Beavers roster. I done did Google it. There was a Joe Burgher listed. So far, even better. I clicked on his name and up popped a record with the full name Joseph William Burgher. So far, best. Back to my metadenotation. The form of the name I used was, is, "Burgher, Joseph W." I used "Burgher, Bill" as a cross-reference. I love it when a plan comes together so simply. So easily. Everything clicked. Like a well-oiled machine. You, Dear Reader, can now go back to sleep, to the lilting strains...

Anticipation

2009-12-29T06:36:00.000-08:00

After Oregon defeated USC on Halloween I got it into my head that should the Ducks reach the Rose Bowl, we would go to the game. And the parade. Chances were good. Then came the first hurdle. The Arizona game could have derailed the train. But we were all relieved as we watched the Ducks come from behind to tie the game and then to win it in overtime. We were at a hockey game and one of the linesmen was in the lobby of Lane County Ice watching the game. It was between periods of course. The only real remaining obstacle to a Rose Bowl berth was the Civil War Game against the Beavers. I had already looked into Alumni Association packages and train transportation to Los Angeles. I told Susie before the game that if the OSU won, we could still go to the Rose Bowl. To watch the Beavers. Or the big flat-tailed rats as I often refer to them. She was pleased. Well, the Ducks won and the very next day I bought train tickets and the land-only package through the UO Alumni Association. I put in my request for tickets with the Athletic Dept. What could go wrong? Well Dear Reader, I'll tell you. I didn't get tickets through the U of O. Panic set in. I went to StubHub and purchased tickets there. Better than twice the face value! After the seller confirmed the purchase...nothing. Expected shipping date of December 28. It was to be 2-day shipping through FedEx. Our train was to leave at 5:00 PM on the 30th. They should arrive in time. Right? Wrong. On the 28th I received word from StubHub that the seller was unable to obtain the tickets he had sold me. What?! But, there were tickets, better tickets, one section over, that were available to be shipped immediately. Complete with an upgrade to overnight delivery. Well, OK. I took it. A few hours later, my purchase was confirmed by the seller, and a few hours after that, they were shipped. At last, I had a tracking number. But, wait for it. The origin of the shipment was, you guessed it, Eugene. Oh well. They were sure to get here in time. Finally, this morning I checked up on the tracking number. The tickets had been sent to the FedEx sorting facility in Portland? From there they will be sent back to Eugene. Delivery is still estimated by noon today. I am pretty sure I will be holding my breath as I open the screen door when I get home.

Just sit right back

2009-11-17T09:42:00.001-08:00

It's been a long while Dear Reader. It seems I've been paying more attention to Chez Paul and, gulp, FaceBook. I'd apologize, but you probably wouldn't accept it. (Nor should you). I probably wouldn't mean it either. (I probably should though). So let us simply dispense with that little nicety. Shall we? We shall. Last weekend we loaded up the Eugene-Springfield Special Olympics bowling team onto buses for a trip to Bend. Over the mountains in November to bowl two games each. A shot at being eligible to apply to go to the National Games next year was on the line for each of my bowlers. No, I did not tell them. We take a nice charter bus equipped with appropriate facilities since there are no rest stops along the way of the 3-hour drive. This year I thought ahead a little. By remembering. Remembering that the bus is equipped with a DVD player. South Park would be inappropriate. Beavis and Butthead? Out of the question. I needed something appropriate. And there it was. At the lower left of the shelving where I keep my DVDs and CDs. Gilligan's Island. The complete series. I didn't need that much. I took season one. Although it is in black and white, everybody loved it. There were times when the athletes were laughing in perfect sync to the laugh tracks on the video. It was hysterical. A little eerie as well. What was truly surreal though, was when the entire bus began singing the theme song. At the beginning and the end of each episode. What a trip. What a very trippy trip.

Metadenoted!

2009-10-20T05:35:00.000-07:00

Scratch that. Cataloged! I have completed the project to catalog all my books. A tribute to Dr. Frank E. Brown, the former minister at my grandparents' Congregational Church in Salem, was the final work. Neatly shelf-listed at BX7260.B76D7 1985. Now what am I to do? Buy more books? Certainly. Move on to another project? Already there. I did promise (threaten?) that I was thinking about cataloging my t-shirts. Do you remember that Dear Reader? It is underway. Quite the metadata template. Shirt color, text color, size, and more. Even genre terms. I know I need help. Not with the cataloging. Just help in general. I'll just leave it there before I scare you off. Both of you.

Just a guy who loves to cook

2009-09-10T05:36:00.000-07:00

Do not feel slighted Dear Reader. I started a new blog. One with a purpose. As opposed to this one? The new one, Chez Paul, is devoted to food. Preparation, preservation, etc... Certainly I am not an expert. In this or any other area. But I do love to cook. Chez Paul is simply a journal of what I do in the kitchen. There will be no recipes. There are enough of those out there already. Instead of wading through Pedestrian Subjunctives to find something edible, you can go to the new place. Yeah. Right. I mean to say, I can go to the new place. Link at left.

Saying goodbye...

2009-09-02T06:23:00.001-07:00

Some memories, connected only in that they are from Civic Stadium. That, and that they are mine.

When we were pre-teens, my brother and I found some chewing tobacco in a dugout after a game while my dad was conducting an interview. We smuggled it home and the next day, while playing catch in the yard, tried some. We didn't know what we were doing so just crammed our mouths with the stuff and chewed it like bubblegum. You can guess what ensued Dear Reader.

There once was a mechanical cow on the right field fence. When an Emerald hit a home run, the cow would light up and "gallop." Prance?

One time I sent the boy for some nachos. This was a first. Not nachos, but sending the boy. He came back and, handing me the plastic tray, told me that he didn't know if I wanted relish on them so he put it on the side. Good boy.

A few years back, a pitcher threw a pitch, the batter hit a line drive foul into the stands. For the first, and only time in 41 seasons at that stadium, I caught it. That ball still has not touched the ground.

One of the last best things from my childhood, and one of the best connections I feel with my dad, is ending tomorrow. Tonight I am going to the penultimate game at good old Civic. By myself. I am going to spend some quality time with my old friend. Dad will be there too. I just know it.

Points with the wife. I mean runs.

2009-09-01T07:38:00.000-07:00

Venerable Civic Stadium. There are so many memories for me here I couldn't begin to relate them all Dear Reader. It is sad that minor league baseball in Eugene will be moving to the University's new facility beginning next season. I am sad. Part of me, a big part of me, is being closed. Fading with time into increasingly blurry yet still golden memories. Then anecdotes. Then passing thoughts. Then just fragments of same. Sure, I have memorabilia gathered over the 41 years that I haunted the bleachers. An autographed program from the 1969 season. The foul ball the boy retrieved, breaking his arm in doing so, the blood now almost brown. That's enough. I can't go on. There are three games left and that will be it. The stadium and the players are all a lot smaller now than when I was a kid, fetching RC colas and fudgesicles for the sports writers in the press box and hanging out in the dugouts and the locker rooms after games while my dad interviewed players. July 15, 2006. Without a doubt this was my favorite game. You see Dear Reader, it was on that day that Susie and I had our first date. I don't even remember who won. Oh wait, I remember now. I did.

In time and out of season

2009-08-05T10:05:00.000-07:00

The suffocating summer evening heat has dissipated, leaving behind an unseasonable coolness. The sun waits a bit before clearing away the gray overcast and warming all. There are back-to-school sales in the papers and on the air. Campus seems a bit busier. Autumn is upon us. Like cobwebs. But it's only August 5! There are some temporal tricks afoot.

Operation Mudbug

2009-08-03T06:32:00.000-07:00

As a child at summer camp I enjoyed catching crawdads by hand. You remember don't you Dear Reader? Turn a rock and watch for the crimson flash as the little bugger flipped it's tail, jetting backwards through the icy clear water. As an adult (in the legal sense only mind you) I still enjoy the hunt for crawdads. But no longer is it the whimsically innocent quest it once was. Now it is a military operation. Crayfish traps, home-made crawdad rings, aquarium nets and hunger. You see, what I didn't know then that I do know now, is that crawdads are quite tasty. Indeed. It has been nearly a decade since my last hunt. Susie and I set off on Sunday for Schindler's Landing, about halfway between Mapleton and Triangle Lake. Had the conditions there changed? Would the sight have been crayfished out? These were a couple of the unknowns that flashed again and again through my mind among the hazy golden memories of past hunts. Upon arrival we learned that a day pass was required, available back in Mapleton. My heart sank a bit further when I observed crawdad carcasses at the water's edge. Someone had really raked in a haul. Were there any left for us? We went back to Mapleton, bought the day pass and returned to the landing. I baited and placed the big trap that would stay in mid-stream for the entire time we were there. Then I started baiting the hanging plant baskets that I had converted to what look like tiny crab rings. There was immediate interest from the crawdads of Lake Creek. I never did get all nine rings out. Five was plenty. Then we took chicken wings tied to strings to lure the little buggers out from their lairs so we could scoop them up with the aquarium nets. Besides all the fun of wallowing in the shallows, we caught 74 crayfish. Back at home, I boiled them and we ate them with grilled chicken breasts and salsa made from Walla Walla onion and watermelon. Mmmmm. The simplest joys are always the best.

Think of the implications

2009-07-08T07:10:00.000-07:00

The other day during a span of under a minute, over 20 visitors were shown to have visited this humble site. From everywhere. Europe, Asia, North America. My favorite was from Medellin. Could it have been? No. Pablo Escobar is dead. I chalked the whole flurry of activity up to some crazy haywire in Map Loco. I asked the Boss (not Steinbrenner!) what she thought. She spun a tale of a spider. Not venomous. Just a spider. No worries. And then she showed me SiteMeter. Well, that was a bell (or whistle, you choose Dear Reader) I simply had to have. I figured out (on my own mind you) how to set up a SiteMeter account, and how to add the HTML to my Blogger template. Now I can see who visits. And when. And for how long. That is unless you have some Klingon cloaking device for your IP address. After you have read this Dear Reader, know that I will find out. So why not take the time to leave a comment?

Not fish, but fowl

2009-07-06T06:17:00.000-07:00

Since we bought our house I have looked forward each year to Art and the Vineyard. Ooooh the garden art! For each of the past two years I have gone to the annual weekend festival knowing I would be purchasing another piece of garden art. Of course I never know what exactly. Only that when I saw it, I would know. There is often a cooling off period during which Susie and I discuss that which has caught my eye. This year a rock fish came highly recommended, and indeed was quite cute, and even made the list of possibilities. But then I saw her. Tall and bronze. Oxidized actually. We named her Frieda. She was worth every penny, just based on the looks and the comments of other festival attendees as I hauled her to the car.

So you don't forget...

2009-07-01T15:18:00.000-07:00

It arrived. Finally. Though "finally" seems an inappropriate choice of word. I allowed 4-6 weeks for delivery as I had been advised. It has been 26 days. I counted. I speak Dear Reader of my brick. What else? My piece of Yankee tradition. My hunk of hallowed ground. When the Yankees moved across the street to new Yankee Stadium, they moved the monuments from Monument Park from the old stadium. Of course they did. Then the remains were disassembled. Brick by brick by brick by brick. I saw an advert on YES during a break in the action of a Yankee game. I thought about it for a day, consulting with the lovely Susie. Then I placed my order.

Rendered extraordinarily

2009-06-30T08:51:00.000-07:00

Payday. And you know what that means Dear Reader. (A statement, not a question. Rhetorical or otherwise). Payday Party. Payday offering from my kitchen. This month I bastardized bread pudding, using crullers instead of bread. Cruller pudding. There will not be a photo to drool over D.R. Telling you about it is cruel enough. Showing you cruller pudding would be crueler.

Works for me

2009-06-22T06:37:00.000-07:00

Find a penny pick it up. All day long you'll have good luck. As long as it is facing head side up. And you pick it up with your left hand. And you put it in your left front pocket. (To keep it away from all those other pedestrian coins you received as change at the 7-11). If it is tail side up, simply turn it over. Yes, with your left hand. Break contact with the penny. Then start fresh. This also works with nickels, dimes, quarters, and any other coins you might happen upon. (Upon which you might happen?) Currency, however, is a whole different matter Dear Reader.

Preview

2009-06-18T06:00:00.001-07:00

Just a sneak preview Dear Reader. A retirement party today. A South of France Lemon Cheesecake with Strawberries today. Ricotta cheese is used instead of cream cheese. I think that might make it healthier. Or, at least not as unhealthy. Who's counting anyway? Oh yeah. I am. But not today.

For real

2009-06-16T09:05:00.000-07:00

Should I? No. Would I? Hard to say. Could I? Oh yeah. You betcha I could Dear Reader. And no one would be the wiser. Not even you. Yet. In my refrigerator at home right now, this very second, in this moment we now share, is a South of France Lemon Cheesecake. It is made with ricotta instead of cream cheese. And there are fresh strawberries to load on top of it. I ask again... But wait. There is more. There is also a quart of fresh homemade strawberry ice cream. In the freezer Silly. I know better than that. Even I. As if that weren't enough (subjunctive mood?), there is leftover pizza from last night's Special Olympics end-of-the-summer-season pizza party. Almost an entire pie's worth made up of three flavors. Vegetarian. Hawaiian. Pepperoni. Correction: Pepperoni! The thought came to me, as thoughts are prone to do, that I could eat it all. Yes. All of it. Cheesecake, ice cream and pizza. Just to see what would happen. Aside from Susie being disappointed about missing out on the ice cream, the department missing out on the cheesecake at the retirement gathering, and, well, no one will miss the pizza I guess. That is, if I were to survive. There it is again.

Exclamation point!

2009-06-15T06:06:00.000-07:00

Hello Old Friend. And you too Dear Reader. I don't know why I didn't order it sooner. I did place an interlibrary loan request for it a few years ago. And it does belong in my library. Criswell loves exclamation points. Especially when writing of the FUTURE! Some of the predictions in this book are hilarious. For example, that Oregon will become the site of the Federal Government's Mental Illness Complex and that, after all state mental hospitals are abolished, all committed mental patients will be sent to Oregon. Oregon? Oregon! The construction was to have begun in 1978. It is behind schedule. But we are already here. All of us. Waiting. We're waiting!

Now Playing

2009-06-11T07:50:00.000-07:00

Those were the days my friend. They were destined to end. They had to. Homogenization would have been inevitable. The edge would have been dulled. Blunted even. DIY innovation would have morphed into corporate bile. I bought a new record album. Yes, record album. Two discs. A new record from the good folks at Alternative Tentacles. A new record of old (relatively) music. Rocky Mountain Low : the Colorado Musical Underground of the Late 1970s. And it is, for want of a better word, sweet. I have nothing to do with Colorado. Nor have I ever except for a layover or two or three at the Denver airport. But the late 1970s was my golden age. Rebellious high school years. Well, year rather. Just 1979. But the early eighties were good too. The album came with a bonus CD as well: the whole album. Well, almost. Everything from the vinyl version appears on the CD except for a pre-Dead Kennedys version of Jello's California über Alles. Ah. Memory lane. Conjured images of Eugene in the days of the Nads, the Foamlords, Tender Chunx, J. Gallows & the Executioners, and the Drills. Especially the Drills. Sniffle.

4:01.09

2009-06-08T07:31:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was the Prefontaine Classic. I am embarrassed to say it was the first time I had ever attended. I'll keep it short Dear Reader. The highlight for me was the Bowerman Mile. (And I am an 800 fan). There were 16 entrants. Two did not finish the race. One runner finished with a time of 4:01.09. A good time indeed. But on this day, good enough for only 14th place. 13 sub-4-minute miles in one race. Now THAT is a classic.

Addendum to the previous post

2009-05-29T07:31:00.000-07:00

Call it spin if you will Dear Reader. Or maybe I am just looking for a silver lining. A way to minimize the errors of my ways. I did follow the recipe for the halva. Just not correctly. OK. OK. It is spin.

Sad selfy-pitying story

2009-05-29T06:56:00.000-07:00

Payday. Payday party. Not much of a party. Just a dessert. This month: halva. A Mediterranean semolina treat. Pretty easy to make. Especially when compared to what I have been making over the past few years. Really really really easy. En faît. (Don't know about that circumflex. Don't care much either). Indeed, so easy that this would be the first time things went wrong. I went to set out all the ingredients and saw that I was short of semolina. I walked up to the store and found that they only carried semolina flour in the bulk section. It was a finer grind than the Greek semolina I had. Oh well. Half semolina, half semolina flour. Things looked up when I was able to make an immediate bus connection home. Whew. Cream the butter and the sugar. Add the other ingredients. Pour into pans. Place in oven. Set timer. Life was good. After the 20 minutes baking time the halva was golden and...what? Not firm to the touch. For some reason I glanced again at the recipe. It would have probably helped had I added the eggs. Panic. Sweat. Audible profanities in an otherwise empty house. The dog didn't seem to mind. Nor the cat. I took the pans from the oven and scraped the contents into a bowl. Furiously I added the eggs. Furiously so they wouldn't cook in the hot crumbly mixture. Back into the pans. Back into the oven. Should I just start over. I'd have to soften more butter. Grind more nuts. Probably need to go back to the store for something. Lemons perhaps. No. I would just face the music. Let the chips fall as it were. It came out, twice-baked, no worse for the wear. I suppose. The syrup didn't absorb like the first (and only other) time I made halva. How many people have even had halva before? Who would know? Who would care? Now I wait for the appointed time. Should I keep it a secret or try to play it off as authentic twice-baked lemon-almond halva? Oh, and then, on my way here this morning I realized that when I added the eggs, I didn't add enough. One thing is certain, for June's payday party, halva will be served.

Dirty

2009-05-20T04:41:00.000-07:00

Dilemma. I went to scour the reliable Smith Family Book Store yesterday. Looking for Bantam paperbacks. Not just any Bantam paperbacks, but Doc Savage paperbacks. My grandmother had given me a few when I was a kid and I have decided to start collecting them. Alas. It was not to be. But, I did find Beneath the Planet of the Apes and Battle for the Planet of the Apes. I had the Planet of the Apes books when I was a kid as well. I bought them. Of course I did. And Dear Reader, I cataloged them. Here is my dilemma. I want them to sit on the shelf next to each other. Easy enough. Right? Wrong. Different authors means different author numbers which means different call numbers. What to do? I found a call number for Pierre Boulle's original work Planet of the Apes and extended the cutter, including the extension for the translation from the original French, so that they will all rest neatly, obsessively, side by side in My Library (the official name). But you know Dear Reader, they are not correctly classed. And I know it as well. I feel so...

Making do

2009-05-12T07:39:00.000-07:00

Some extra border stones. A landscaping stone left by the previous owners. Some dirt. Some pea gravel. A stepping stone. And a sophomoric inspiration. I still think I will get some cement to finish it off nicely. I think I have said enough.

Seems a bit...

2009-04-30T09:02:00.000-07:00

Payday Cheesecake, while not necessarily a thing of the past, is not a thing of the present. There was Jelly Doughnut Pudding. Then, or before that, there was......something else that was quite memorable. Obviously so. Today is payday. A day for Key Lime Pie, IMHO. Oh yeah. You saw correctly. Now forget about it. I had to quadruple the recipe in order for there to be enough for the department that catalogs stuff as well as the kind folks at Benton County Mental Health. That left me with 16 egg whites. I didn't want to just put them in the fridge with an intent to use them for something else at some other time in some alternate future where leftovers actually (THAT WORD!!!) get used in a responsibly timely manner. So I fried them up. All of them. With diced onion. A whole onion. It was one of 15 left over after I used the skins for dying eggs on Greek Easter. Here's the sweet part. Sixteen egg whites sounds excessive. Doesn't it? Dear Reader, are you still with me? In the online world of Weight Watchers, 16 egg whites is 5.5 points. They would have gone well with a Bacon Explosion.

Wave bye-bye

2009-04-23T07:39:00.000-07:00

Get Your War On and My New Filing Technique Is Unstoppable have been purged from my links. The former because there is nothing new being added. Probably the result of the change in administrations. The latter because it just wasn't doing anything for me anymore. And the name is just too dang long. I hope neither one of you will be too terribly disappointed. While on the subject of links, check out Angry Alien. Wrath of Khan. Mmmm. Link sausages.

Libary Thang

2009-04-20T08:31:00.001-07:00

The conversion of a playroom to a library. Paint. New carpet. Custom-built shelves. I am truly an itty bitty giddy. Many thanks to my brother and his son of the same name. Just some trimming out to go and then I can start shelving books. In Library of Congress call number order. Of course! What else?

Bon appetit!

2009-04-20T07:17:00.000-07:00

Woo-ha! (Sp?) Yesterday was Greek (and other) Orthodox Easter. And though I am not (insert denomination here) it was an excuse to prepare a Greek dinner. More of a nostalgia thing for me. 1986 precisely. And a wee bit of 1985. Can you, Dear Reader match the names of the dishes to the pictures? Well, can you?

αρνάκι κλέφτικο

χωριάτικη σαλάτα

ντολμαδάκια γιαλαντζί

τζατζίκι

πίτα

μυζήθρα

ελιές

κόκκινα αυγά

τσουρέκι πασχαλινό

Pop quiz

2009-04-03T07:52:00.000-07:00

16 + 16 +15 + 11.75 = 58.75. Cubic feet that is. There is approximately .6684blahblahblah cubic foot in a five-gallon bucket. So, we, or rather, I was looking at 87.896 buckets. Of plant soil. To move from the heap in the driveway to the two 4' x 4', the one 10' x 1.5' and the one 8' x 1.5' garden boxes I built. They are pretty sturdy. Made from 2" x 12" lumber. ("Lumber" is a nice word. Very useful in a variety of situations). The wheelbarrow would not be particularly helpful because I would have to unload it shovel by shovel up and into the foot-tall boxes. And the ground was pretty muddy. Still is. No, the bucket brigade would be the best way. Declining offers to borrow neighbors' wheelbarrows with, "No thanks. We have one. I have found this way to be more efficient," I began. (A better workout as well). Two at a time. Buckets. Two buckets. Every ten I would sweep up around the pile. Gotta make it a game. 84 buckets later and I was done. I had to leave a little room around the top lip of the boxes, and there were those decimals involved in my calculations. Those had been rounded to the third or the fourth place. Now all my garden boxes were filled. I had taken care of the other four last week. Two a day on two different days. I planted the raspberries. Six of them. Four varieties. Then it was to the computer to plan the root crop box. Radishes (3 varieties), carrots, parsnips, beets, turnips. Two square feet each. But I only planted 1/2 square foot each. After 1/4 of the "Days to Maturity" as indicated on the seed packet, I will plant the next 1/4 crop on the next 1/2 square foot of each designated plot. Open the spreadsheet, input the data. Calculate the next and successive planting dates. Finally, input those dates on my Google Calendar so that I will get e-mail reminders when to plant. Too much? Oh yeah. But I really LOVE radishes.

Just because

2009-03-19T05:29:00.000-07:00

The Yankees will be in Seattle for a four-game series against the Mariners August 13-16. Tickets went on sale last Thursday. Score! Home plate seats for the first game. Lower outfield for the second. First base line for the third. And, of course, third base line for the fourth and final contest. Ems' tickets are not available until the first of June. Portland Beavers' tickets not until the 27th of the current month. There is University of Oregon baseball going on currently, and I do have season tickets to those games. (The ping of aluminum bats isn't bugging me as much as I thought it might). Enough? As has been true for much of my life, not really. More would be better. The AAA All-Star game is being held in Portland this year. But those tickets don't go on sale until the 27th as well. And the game is in mid-July. Patience is not one of my stronger virtues, though I am getting better. The new high definition TV really brings the World Baseball Classic to life for me. Spring Training games too. But something still seemed to be missing. I found a solution. A little spooky to me so I can't imagine what others might think. The itinerary, Dear Reader, is as follows:
May 24
5:30 AM Depart Eugene by train
12:00 PM Arrive Seattle
1:10 PM San Francisco Giants @ Seattle Mariners
5:30 PM Depart Seattle by train
11:45 PM Arrive Eugene

Hopefully, there will not be a need for extra innings.

The color coding on my Google Calendar is so cool! But that D.R. is best left for another post. Or a therapist.

Übermetacool

2009-02-09T06:51:00.000-08:00

What if my lifetime membership to LibraryThing isn't. Not that I am thinking of my own end. But can a web site, or anything else for that matter, really promise a "lifetime?" Is there a will that bequeaths mastership of the web site should whoever it is that is in charge should, well, pass, retire, or even just quit. I mean, doesn't everything end at some point? Do you Dear Reader really believe that the lifetime guarantee on the Shamwow really lasts that long? I have put a lot of time and effort into cataloging my books on LibraryThing. Probably too much. (And there is more to do.) I needed a backup plan. It wasn't too hard to conceive. Or to carry out. In the tools section of LibraryThing I saw an option to export records. Ooooh! Yummy. I exported and saved my whole catalog as an Excel spreadsheet. But that would not be enough. Nosirreebobcattail. I opened FileMaker. You can already see where this is going, can't you Dearest of Dear Readers? I created a template for my books. Library of Congress Call Number. Title. Author (last name, first name). Publication Info. Date. Tags. Notes. Enough. For now at least. Then I imported the metadata from the spreadsheet that I had generated from the web site, into FileMaker. My mouth is watering a bit. This may have been the geekiest thing I have ever done on my own. OK. OK. It was the geekiest thing I have ever done. Hands down. No "may have been" about it.

Oh bother!

2009-02-02T16:41:00.000-08:00

Today's tasty LC morsel is G9930. I love it. I love it. I love it! Who wouldn't swoon for this seldom-used and little-known call number. More fun than a barrel of monkeys armed with super-soakers on a hot summer day. I have used this class number thrice. As of this writing. The first was a few weeks, maybe months ago. The library acquired a replica of the "map" used in the movie Time Bandits. What is one to do with a subject heading of "Time travel-subfield-delimiter-v-maps?" Well, I am waiting. Give up Dear Reader? Do you? The answer is G9930. The number used for maps of imaginary places. I had a little extra time on my hands last week and went to a map drawer in the map collection. In the corner. At the bottom. I grabbed two maps to catalog. Sweet. Narnia and Middle Earth. So if you ever want to have some fun Dear Reader, just do a call number search in any library that uses Library of Congress classification. That number again is G9930. So you don't forget, call before midnight yesterday. Oh, how I long to catalog that which is pictured here. Lame wrap-up of (to? for?) the post. I know. Oh well. Oh bother.

BOOM!

2009-02-01T16:11:00.000-08:00

Or rather BOOM!!! Super Bowl Sunday. But football seems irrelevant. I prepared a couple recipes from the New York Times dining section. I had to. Our entree shall be, is, something called Bacon Explosion. For dessert, Jelly Donut Pudding. That is all I'll say or write. I'll let the pictures do the talking.

Twinkle twinkle little star

2009-01-13T05:24:00.000-08:00

Man at bus stop to lady with violin case: "Your name is Faye, isn't it?"

Her: "No it's Gay."

Me, butting in: "Mrs. Blankenship?"

Her: "Yes."

Me: "I took violin lessons from you 37 years ago at Spring Creek Elementary School."

It turned out to be a viola that she was carrying.

True story Dear Reader. True story.

Proof.

Ack, Ack, A-Dak

2009-01-07T09:28:00.000-08:00

Remember when you were a kid? If you are about my age that is. Getting out of school and heading home for a snack and some quality (I am being serious here) television. Of course you do Dear Reader. Whether you admit to it or not is none of my beeswax. Nor would I want it to be. I have quite enough beeswax as things stand. In the corner. On the corner. As traffic flows. Back to the golden years. Afterschool television. Not the moralizing "Afterschool specials." Not they they sucked or anything. I am thinking of two shows in particular. Go on, take a guess. You know you want to. You can do it. You really can. You'll feel a bit foolish if you don't. OK. I won't press it. Gilligan's Island and The Flintstones. Did you get 'em? Just one? Were you even in the ballpark? A coupla weeks ago the Gilligan's Island DVD set arrived. The complete series. Hardly had I finished cataloging it when my brother borrowed it. He is installing built-in bookshelves in my as-of-the-present-moment-unnamed library. I couldn't say no. Maybe I could have loaned it to him a disc at a time. Like Netflix. He could pay more for additional discs. Yesterday the 24-disc Flintstones box set arrived. Maybe I should say rock set. The container is plastic and shaped like a prehistoric rock television set. Just like the one on which Fred and Barney watched the fights. It doesn't fit on my media shelves. So many memories. Fuzzy golden nimbi. Or nimbuses, also fuzzy and also golden. Both are acceptable. You do remember how to get into the Loyal Order of Water Buffaloes Lodge don't you Dear Reader? That was a good one.

Shirley

2008-12-31T04:03:00.000-08:00

It has taken fifteen years. Many, if not most of the population I work with as a Special Olympics coach do not have the healthiest of life styles. Mainly poor diet. But that, combined with a variety of physical disabilities and related health issues equals comparatively shorter life spans. I met Shirley when she was selected for Team Oregon's bowling team, and I its coach, for the inaugural Special Olympics National Games held in 2006. She was one of four athletes on the team and I was the luckiest of all because I had the pleasure and the privilege of being their coach. Shirley won gold medals in both the singles and the doubles competitions. She is pictured here receiving her gold medal from Eunice. Just Eunice. No more is necessary. Nor should it be. Just look at those smiles. Shirley bowled a 199. Those who can, do. Those who cannot, coach. Since that time, I have always looked forward to regional and state competitions because I get to reconnect with athletes I have coached in Iowa, Ireland, and China. We may no longer have the athlete-coach relationship, but we have something better: we are friends. Shirley passed away Christmas Day from complications of pneumonia. This was the first, and to this point, the only one of my athletes that has passed away since I began coaching in 1994. I know it won't be the last, but I can hope Dear Reader. Can't I? I will miss you Shirley. I already do.

Ground control out

2008-12-22T04:13:00.000-08:00

Cookies. I don't know what else to add to that. And toffee too? And toffee too. Click your heels and say "There's no place like home." I broke 900 on the season. Not as many as I would have liked. But enough. Which never was before. More had been better. And too much always seemed just right. So "enough" is good. That's what the message from the action man said. I am happy also, sir.

ゴジラ

2008-12-19T06:01:00.000-08:00

The Holiday Film Festival lineup is set. Not in stone mind you, but still... Last year we watched all five of the original Planet of the Apes movies. The year before that it was an Ed Wood extravaganza (Plan 9 from Outer Space, Night of the Ghouls, The Bride and the Beast, Bride of the Monster, Orgy of the Dead, and for good measure, Tim Burton's Ed Wood). Whew. Before that the boy and I always watched Leaving Las Vegas. It's a long story. One I won't bore you with. Sorry. One with which I won't bore you, Dear Reader. Due to a busier holiday season than in the past, the schedule has been reduced. Our featured theme for 2-double-ought-8 is Godzilla. There are two certainties. Godzilla vs. King Kong and Godzilla vs. Mothra. After that, time permitting. We'll see. I hope I copied and pasted the title for this post correctly. And that what I copied and pasted is correct. I just can't bring myself to fully trust Wikipedia.

And then on Christmas Day, we pile in the car and go to the economy theater for a buck-fifty flick. Maybe it's $1.75 now. Dang economy. But first, the Suze, the boy, and your humble blogger cram ourselves into the photo booth for our family holiday photos. Strip of four. Black and white. I think the movie we will see needs to begin with the letter B. This will be our third year doing this. First there was Borat. Last year, The Bee Movie. We all need help. Or maybe just me.

There is no new post. I am just seeing if I can do a really long title and pass it off as clever post. Or non-post as the case might be. Is.

2008-12-18T09:09:00.000-08:00

Fuzzy feeling

2008-12-18T08:54:00.000-08:00

2:1 from the Trainspotting soundtrack. Groovy tune. Über-hip-pretentious-slick-eye-liner-wearing-Japanese-girl-pop-group-mannequin infectiousness. Elastica is none of those though. Catchy hooks and pop sensibilities. That is all. That is enough. All I wanna do is tap my foot and get Daniel Boone out of my head. I am listening to their self-titled album right....wait for it...now. I am amazed, though I shouldn't be, at how much smoother verifying the first-time author headings from the December Government Publications Office batchload has gone. Thanks ladies. And you too drummer dude.

Neon Meate Dream of a Octafish

2008-12-17T07:45:00.000-08:00

The dust blows forward and... Weird are the things that run through my mind as I trudge through the ice and the snow on my way to work when only the nutrias seem annoyed that I am about. Songs mostly, the Daniel Boone Theme Song, Sweet Talkin' Woman, Anarchy In the U.K., and The Dust Blows Forward 'N the Dust Blows Back. The latter won't leave me alone. Even now. And now as well. There it went again. And yet again. I have had the album, in vinyl format, for years, and have never listened to the entire thing. Not even an entire disc of the two. Solution: buy the CD and listen to it while I pore over a first-time author headings list. It worked with Marilyn Manson. Boy did it work with Marilyn Manson! (I haven't been the same since. And don't expect to ever be so again). One-click shopping at Amazon. No trudging to my beloved House of Records in this weather. I do feel a little dirty. I hope it washes off. Like super glue does when you get it on your finger tips Dear Reader. You. Not me. OK. OK. Me too. Captain Beefheart's guitarist with the Magic Band lives here in Eugene. You only get his stage name: Zoot Horn Rollo. And really, after that, would you want more? Well, would you? He was a regular customer at the little market I worked at ages ago. Nice guy. So many track titles from Trout Mask Replica to choose from for a title of this post. One jumped out. From around the corner. In broad daylight. Sounds kinda Seussical.

Debit or credit?

2008-12-13T12:56:00.000-08:00

Do I really need to describe these photos? Frosted oatmeal cookies. The recipe came from Nana, my paternal great-grandmother. It is a 19th century recipe. Chew on that for a while Dear Reader. Now swallow. The frosting includes butter, cinnamon, powdered sugar and coffee. What more could one hope for in a frosting? There are 165 of them here. There will be 163 entered on the cookie spreadsheet. Now that's some easy math! Wait for it. Wait for it. I used the flash for the picture at left. Still couldn't decide which one I liked better, so you, Dear Reader, get two for the price of one. No personal checks accepted.

Update

2008-12-10T14:07:00.000-08:00

After almost a full week of being to sick to bake, I am back on track. You deserve an update Dear Reader. You do. All information below is current as of 2:08 P.M., Wednesday, December 10, 2008.

Holiday cookie count: 463 (several varieties)
Currently reading: Freak Like Me : Inside the Jim Rose Circus Sideshow
Music: Does You Inspire You by Chairlift (on order, scheduled to arrive on the morrow)
Video: Gilligan's Island : the Complete Series (seriously; also on order, due to arrive Friday)
Days until Spring Training: 63, not counting today (don't act so surprised).

Out here.

Game ON!

2008-12-01T11:53:00.000-08:00

Some people count words. I feel inadequate. Except when it comes to procrastination. Really, it's a solid, a good idea. I just have to sit down and write it. Maybe tomorrow. Then again... Incidentally, I am truly impressed, almost inspired. Even. I should write more. More words. More posts. More often. Sometimes I can even entertain myself. (More often not). But, it is December. There is a new (used) freezer in the garage. It is December. (I know I said it, but it needed repeating for effect here, and only here). The first December in our new house. I think it is fair to call a house new until after, I don't know, a year. And in that house there is a kitchen. And in that kitchen there is a binder. And in that binder there are...cookie recipes. A spread sheet is in order. And all the excess I can muster. I want to make more holiday cookies than I have ever made before. An obscene number of cookies. So many cookies that "obscene" is the only word that will adequately describe them all. I may not know it off the top of my head, but I will know it when I see it. As a tortuous aside, my son, the boy, who now lives with us, is gluten-intolerant and cannot eat the cookies. Poor boy. I will tinker with some recipes on his behalf. I am not a bad dad. I just won't need to worry about anybody sneaking into the cookie cans. Except for Susie. And me. But I'd blame Susie anyway. Who wouldn't?

Now for something completely different: Google "Jedi Squirrels." I told you Dear Reader. I told you.

Sound and vision

2008-11-20T15:12:00.000-08:00

I don't own an Ipod, or however the h-e-double-hockey-sticks one spells it. Never plan to own one either. Or verify the spelling of same. But the commercials are so catchy. Well, the music they employ is at least. Really catchy. Not enough to make me buy a gizmo, but enough to prompt me to Google (I know, I know) a few lyrics to learn the name of a song that won't give me any peace. Might as well learn the band's name while I'm at it. (Or in the case of Sara Bareilles, her name). As Nick L. might say: "And so it goes." In fact, he did say such. Google (again!) me wrong Dear Reader. Bruises resulting from poorly executed handstands, though not in that particular order of revelation left me with a ticket to a chairlift. Capitalized, properly. I left the building. The rain soaked the hood of my sweatshirt clean through soon after departure, but far enough along to rule out turning back. Ahh yes. The House of Records. This would be a real easy one. Right? Wrong. (Like you didn't see that coming). They did not have Does You Inspire You. I had to special order it. Probably, it will be here Tuesday. And it will probably be raining again, or still. And there will probably be a new song on a new commercial that will be making me nuts. More than I already am. At least I already have Low by David Bowie. Vinyl. You smell that? Now that is one pretentious post if I don't say so myself.

I can't write this stuff!

2008-11-07T07:49:00.000-08:00

At each Special Olympics Oregon state games that end each of the three sports seasons, there is a dinner, a dance, and other special activities. The 2008 Fall Games will be no exception. I have copied and pasted the schedule here, just for you Dear Reader. Especially for you Dear Reader. (For whom else?) Some things don't require any commentary to bring out irony. This is no exception. It's probably for the best there won't be cholesterol screening.

Saturday, November 22
4:30PM to 7:00PM Chicken Dinner provided by KFC
4:30PM to 9:00PM Health Promotions & OSU/OHSU Pharmacology BP & Diabetes Screenings
5:30PM to 9:00PM Dance

No need to whine

2008-11-04T09:24:00.000-08:00

I awoke refreshed this morning Dear Reader. At 2:00 AM. Really. Refreshed. I am wound up like a kid on Christmas Eve. It is election day. I am excited. No lobbying here. Worry not. Neither of you. It's been one of those "all over the map" kinda days so far. And I haven't even touched the pile of maps sitting on my desk waiting to be cataloged. First-time author headings. Subject headings for a biographical work on Heydar Alirza oglu Aliyev. "Hold Me Now" by Elastica. Song and album. (Check it out). An e-mail about a hold on a book for the Cat-Dept. Not me. No one at the desk knew what it was all about. And there's some kind of superunnatural thing going on with the Hold Shelf out there, believe me! I had to restore the e-mail from the garbage can, flicking off the coffee grounds that had adhered to it, to see that the message had come from within the department formerly know as Cataloging, but, like horror movies where the sinister call is actually coming from upstairs, it was too late. But then who cares? It is election day, Elastica continues to groove deliciously between my ears, links have been maintained and Drivel Head is wearing her glad rags. And I forgot all about ritual Hello Kitty scarification. Line up!

Flag on the play?

2008-11-03T11:05:00.000-08:00

New recipes are not daunting as they once were. Don't ask me why and I shall not lie. I saw a recipe in the New York Times for kasha varnishkes. The name attracted me because of the Eastern European feel to it. And Frank Costanza ate kasha. I read the narrative and the recipe. A traditional Jewish dish consisting of kasha (buckwheat groats), chicken fat, onion and farfalle pasta. Salt and pepper too, if you're gonna get all technical on me Dear Reader. I substituted olive oil for the chicken fat. Not for any health consideration, but because I simply couldn't find any rendered chicken fat at the store. A beautiful Mayan onion, a huge Mayan onion yielded the 2-plus cups of diced onion called for in the recipe. It came out very nice. Lots of ground pepper is suggested when serving and I will concur. It was a great side dish for the pork chops that Susie grilled to perfection on the barbecue. We were not being disrespectful by any means. It's not like I substituted bacon fat for the chicken fat. (A consideration I am mulling.) Is it even irreverent if one doesn't recognize it until after the fact? If it is, than it must certainly be respectfully irreverent.

Please, make it stop

2008-10-31T08:32:00.000-07:00

Not the voice in my head. I have a recycled shelf-list card in front of me. Well, to the left of the keyboard. It is a list.

IMAGE (FRONT & BACK)
COLOR
TEXT ON FRONT
TEXT ON BACK
TEXT COLOR
IMAGE DESCRIPTION
LOCATION IN COLLECTION
TITLE
SIZE
ACQUIRED (WHERE AND WHEN)

Those of you who wallow (suffer?) in the same morass as I do might recognize the crude beginnings of some metadata schema. You see Dear Reader, I have a lot of t-shirts. (Go ahead and say it. Or at least think it!) Concerts t-shirts. Special Olympics t-shirts from 15 years of coaching, and from all over the world. Baseball t-shirts. Hockey t-shirts. Alternative Tectacles t-shirts. The list does go on. And that gives me an idea: a GENRE field. I have considered this project before. And I am still only considering it. But...

You know you want to

2008-10-30T07:02:00.000-07:00

Flash. Glare. Bummer for viewers. An inkling is all that is allowed. Halloween Eve. Payday Eve. Traditions abound. Well, not really abound. Maybe simply exist. A preview for you Dear Reader. Not an afterthought. Payday cheesecake. Caramel apple cheesecake. Are you hearing me? The usual time. The usual place. Incidentally? (Apologies for the capitalization. I just couldn't bring myself to do it).

And in this corner...

2008-10-24T07:28:00.000-07:00

Should I have used a colon instead of an ellipsis? Can it even be a digression if I have not begun? It's not even in a corner. It's in the sidebar. On the sidebar? Contained within...? Ooops. Another ellipsis squeaked by almost unnoticed. That's my story anyway. License and registration please. Yes, the chase is over. It has been cut to. I have added a new link. Snugly below incidentally (where all things should be snuggled) and resting upon the typo of the day (any day, pick a day) you will find it. I had no idea. Nor should I have had.

The Shot

2008-10-13T07:14:00.000-07:00

There was a regional volleyball and soccer tournament yesterday. I coach neither. I was there because Susie coaches a Benton County volleyball team, and there were two Eugene soccer teams. The camera was my primary companion. Flitting about. Hither and yon. And back again. Then forth. It was a long day. I have attended this tournament before. A pair of eyes, a trio really. Just to watch and enjoy. I took some good pictures. Good by comparison to one really spectacular shot. As soon as the shutter snapped I knew I had caught something special. Lightning in a bottle. With a child-proof cap. And then I ducked.

The family that...

2008-09-23T07:16:00.001-07:00

Where to begin? Words are lost. Honestly, they were never found. I'm sure some kind of genitive mood should be required somewhere. But where? Enough prattle. The final roller derby match was this Saturday just gone by. Oh yeah. We were there. A round-robin extravaganza pitting the three teams that make up the Emerald City Roller Girls against each other. Is "against" the right word when so much fun is (was) to be had by all who were present? The Flat Track Furies vs. the Andromedolls vs. the Church of Skatin' vs. the Flat Track Furies. In between the first two rounds there was an exhibition by the Junior Roller Derby. Their name escapes me. Actually (crutch) it was never in my possession. Nor should it have been. There was one little girl, maybe 12, maybe 13, wearing a t-shirt with the logo pictured below. I don't deserve to describe it further. On the back was her roller derby name: Tinker Hell. Again, nothing more to add. What more could one say? Least of all me.

Fred, Debbie. Debbie, Fred

2008-09-04T06:43:00.000-07:00

As if you would notice. Indeed. As if. We are catching the train in the morning. The wee wee wee all the way home hours of the morning. The Yankees are coming. The Yankees are coming. To Seattle. Like a moth to a flame I must go. I won't score each pitch, but I will keep score. Obsessively. Compulsively. I even picked up a tiny little pencil sharpener. Just in case. The mechanical pencil works, but the characters and notations don't have that sharp appearance I want. That I need. They appear to almost bleed graphite. Tests conducted in the minors will make their big league debut. Once. Twice. Thrice. Blind mice. My line-up is set. My bag is packed. I have checked and re-checked that the tickets are there. Where they should be. It is in fact our aba daba honeymoon. Really. Yabba dabba doo! Until I return, you will get nothing. And like it.

Not counting the title

2008-08-28T07:03:00.000-07:00

Do you Dear Reader remember the episode of Gilligan's Island in which Gilligan finds a crate of seeds? The experimental radioactive seeds? Yeah, that one. And all the funky produce that those seeds, well, produced? I was reminded of that episode yesterday. Granted, it is a small cherry tomato. And it is a big blueberry. But the juxtaposition! Oh the juxtaposition!

A picture may be worth a thousand words, but this one gets just seventy-five.

PG3488.O4

2008-08-07T06:30:00.000-07:00

Finally. Incidentally. A post. Two. Precisely. Chop. Chop. Fine dice. Snake eyes. Baseball? Tomorrow. I started scoring the games I attend. Well, so far, one game. I indulged my metaself and tracked each pitch. It hurt. But in a good way. Back to where I began. This post. Not the end of the fourteenth when I was born. A technicality to be sure. But still. Lazy summers lend themselves to, well, lazing. That's the real reason I have not written lately. I'd like to say it was a quick pick-up game of cyberspace chicken, but I cannot. Though it sounds crispy enough. One of the very best books I have ever read is One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich. It should be one of the very best books you have ever read as well Dear Reader. I know I should stop shoulding on others, but, please make an exception here. Pretty please. Mr. Solzhenitsyn (correctly, Solzhenit︠s︡yn, Aleksandr Isaevich, ǂd 1918-2008) passed away a few days ago. (And the year of death has already been added to his authority record!) From his Nobel Lecture:

Одно слово правды весь мир перетянет.

It means something. It does. "One word of truth outweighs the world." A great big font is justified. I'll leave it at that.

Synchronize watches

2008-07-08T08:17:00.000-07:00

Milestone? Symptom? Both? Indeed. And I didn't even notice until it was reached. Passed by like a scary-looking hitchhiker with a suspicious-looking bag. Just over the speed limit. One thousand three hundred and one. No more. No less. The number is 1301. 1301 is the number. I am pretty sure I threw a similar reference into an earlier post. Different number. Different context. Same movie. I will cut to the chase. The end of the chase. As I catch my breath. The number will grow. There is more to be done. More to be metadenoted. There are 1301 titles in My Library. Right...now!

Unless you are so inclined

2008-06-25T06:38:00.000-07:00

Lost in a dream. Not me. Excalibur. Stolen? By whom? My Dearest? No way. Like many things, too good to be legal? Google. Google. Google. The stamp is there. Several they are. The most recent list I could find. Not there. Whew! Or as Little Wing would write, "Hu!" Ramble on. Led Zep II. There was no watery tart. Genitive case? Slavically speaking, a must. But English? Describe the absence of something that was never there, save for a cameo in a work of fiction. Do it Dear Reader. Just do it. © ™ and/or whatever else you may desire. Within reason. Or not. If only. As if. Tick, tick, tick. Tock. Talk. Talk. No way. Not the Furs. Groovy. Please beware and don't bug on that Lifto dude.

You will be. You will be.

2008-06-23T07:40:00.000-07:00

Louie brought a new bat to practice last week. Not quite a hundred-dollar bat. Ninety-nine. I didn't ask, but secretly hoped there were ninety-nine cents involved as well. And, Dear Reader, this bat is magic. Really. Truly. M-A-G-I-C. The proof is in the pudding. Large pearl tapioca. We yelled to Rusty to look both ways before crossing the street as he chased after a ball. That was new. So was K smacking one with authority out of the infield. In the air! As an aside D.R. I offer that K is not some semi-obscure pretentious reference to The Trial. Any trial. It is at it appears. Simply K. Friendly nemeses were warned of the magic bat. They reportedly scoffed. "We don't need a magic bat." The magic bat did not scare them. I am, I plea, not THAT much of a geek, but... Flashback:

“Your over-confidence will be your downfall.” - Luke Skywalker

“Your faith in your friends will be yours.” - Darth Sidious/The Emperor

Who needs friends when you have a magic bat? Or does that make me sound like a bat rastard? What would Yoda advise?

Don't stare. I'm hideous.

2008-06-18T07:03:00.000-07:00

Now I've gone and done it. Upon closer examination it is not all that impressive. Some bark. Very little bite. Maybe just some gumming. It does save me nine key strokes. Maybe ten. Maybe eleven. (I was told there wouldn't be any math). My first macro. My only macro. Precious little macro on a now unsupported system. Unsupported for a very very long time now. But, Dear Reader, it's mine! All mine! And you can't have any. Nosirreebobcattail. You may not. Why would you want it anyway? Behold the macro!

'MacroName:DeleteItemCallNo
'MacroDescription:Delete Item Call Number
sub main

dim CS as Object
set CS = CreateObject("Catme.Terminal")

CS.Send "0226\r"
CS.Send "27\r\r"
CS.Send "y"
CS.Send "qm"

end sub

OK. I went back and counted the keystrokes. It saves me eleven of 'em. I knew you were wondering. I just knew it.

Title unavailable

2008-06-10T07:41:00.000-07:00

I must write quickly Dear Reader. Before anyone realizes what is going on. I took a peek at my visitor map this morning. There was a message about it having crashed. So I went to MapLoco to try to replace the darned thing. It won't work. I have tried and tried. Then I tried again. I am very careful when I copy and paste. Especially when editing my template. Who wouldn't? I think this situation must have arisen because I noticed visits from India, Italy and Northern California. And then I had to be a smart ass and taunt them. I knew I shouldn't have tossed pancakes and sausages on sticks into a keyword searching algorithm. I hope it's not too

Enough said

2008-06-04T08:27:00.001-07:00

Enough time has passed. It is now time. OK OK. I am being a wee bit disingenuous Dear Reader. I have put off long enough sharing this little anecdotal morsel. Too long. Sweet procrastination. Tomorrow always sounds better. Especially once it arrives under the guise of today. Or worse, NOW. Enough blah blah blah blah blah. Way back when I was setting up my computer in our new house, I hooked up all the peripheral devices. OK, I'm busted. Both of the peripheral devices. Unless you count the printer. Then it would be three peripheral devices. External hard drive. Speakers. Printer. When I went to check that all were working I was dismayed to discover that the speakers were not functioning. At all. I had already pushed the desk back up against the wall so this was going to be a real pain in the ... to fix. I pulled, carefully, very carefully, the desk out just so I could squeeze my hand behind it to get at the wires and their connections. Wiggle wiggle wiggle. Press press press. Windows Media Player. Crossed fingers. Nothing. Maybe the speakers were damaged during the move. They weren't all that expensive. I could just buy new ones. I did buy new ones. Optimism peeked from around the corner. The Byzantine snake pit of wires was navigated and the new speakers were in place. Again. Nothing. Nada. Zip. I threw in the towel, resigning myself to not being able to hear anything from my computer. I thought the sound card was damaged. I had no intention of trying to fix that. Time passed and I did not really miss audio at all. Really. Then one day while tooling around a bit on the computer, I noticed a setting for the speakers: MUTE ON.

It's a cloud

2008-06-03T09:51:00.000-07:00

It rained all night. It rained this morning. It is raining right now. Softball practice this evening was in jeopardy. I always call Louie (not his real name) to consult about field conditions and such prior to canceling practice. We were in agreement. There should be no practice today. I called Peaches and sent the message to the Gummi Bears. But wait Dear Reader! There's more! Seems Louie banged up his knee at Saturday's tournament. My foot injury was aggravated as well. No, I am not done yet! To add insult to injury, Louie and I are are now tied in the Fantasy Baseball League. Tied for ninth place. Which is just a nice way of saying tied for tenth. As Louie's better half observed, we are not doing well, even in the armchair stuff. Sadness.

Let's see

2008-06-03T07:23:00.000-07:00

Hmmmm. Interesting. The other day there were visits from Italy, India and Mountain View, California. Alleged visits. Stealthy visits. Black ops. Alien abductions. Nahh. My guess is RSS feed-prompted visits. Automated. A real person wouldn't dare. There was probably some funky keyword searching algorithm involved as well. Maybe MapLoco went a little, well, loco. To test my paranoid delusion I offer a few key words to raise a few eyebrows. Che. Anarcho-syndicalism. Jihad. Venezuela. Border crossing. Pancakes & sausage on a stick. Or, I am imagining the whole thing?

To quote Leonard...

2008-05-30T07:20:00.000-07:00

Freak show. Car crash. Don't stare! Please Dear Reader, do NOT stare. Retinal damage. I was performing a wee bit of database cleanup. At work. (I need to clarify that point). Title: Nicole and the Trial of the Century, an Opera. Intrigued. Scroll down. Lions and tigers and bears. Oh my gawd. Subject heading: "600 10 Simpson, O. J., ǂd 1947- ǂv Drama." Only in America. Google google google. Track list. Oooh. "Kato the Dog" ... "Connie Chung" ... "Ito's Entry." ?!?!? and for good measure, ! I have never ordered anything from Amazon, but I did order this. I had to. I don't care how bad it might be, I had to have this in my collection. I felt a little cheap. Dirty even. An existential abyss yawned before me. I jumped in. Did a cannonball really. It arrived yesterday. I listened to a few tracks. I was not disappointed. You will not get a review Dear Reader. I remember a Dan Aykroyd character on Saturday Night Live from bygone years. Leonard Pynth Garnell. Host of such spots as Bad Ballet and Bad Opera. But that was satire. This isn't. There is even a track called "Mr. Fung." "Bad. Very bad indeed."

Switching gears. Downshifting. It is payday. Mmmm. Cheesecake. Payday cheesecake. Chocolate chip cherry cheesecake. Cleanse the mental palate.

Ooops

2008-05-29T07:04:00.000-07:00

Everybody makes mistakes. All kinds of mistakes. Good learning tools those. I bought the wrong PEZ dispenser. Not just a regular PEZ dispenser, but a giant one. I came across a giant Clone Trooper at a candy store the other day. It was to be a nice fit into the giant-outer-space-oriented robots theme that I have limited myself to when it comes to the giant PEZ dispensers. Must have limits. Or else... I have only three giants: Darth Vader, a Storm Trooper and the Lost In Space robot whose name escapes me at the moment. It isn't exactly mental gymnastics trying to keep them straight. I bought the Clone Trooper. When I returned home I looked through my catalog (I know, I know) and to my dismay, there was the Clone Trooper. The giant one. Dang it! I had mistakenly metadenoted it as a giant Storm Trooper. Dang it! Dang it! Dang it! Now I would have to go all the way back and exchange it for another. There was a giant R2-D2 that Susie had suggested I get instead. But the bad guys look so cool. I called the store just to find out what I would have to do. Should have been a snap I assumed. The Clone Trooper was still in the package, I had the receipt. No problem, right? Wrong. The lady on the phone said I should call back and speak with the store manager the next morning. I did. The store manager said she would have to speak with the district manager because they usually do not accept returns or exchanges. It is a candy store. What would there be to return? Yadda, yadda, yadda. She called back and said I could exchange it for R2-D2, which she would put behind the counter with a note. I toyed with the idea that if I were to have a duplicate of any giant PEZ dispenser, it might as well be a Clone Trooper. Works quite well. But no. I shall take the bus to the next town after work today and spend all of thirty seconds I suppose trading giant PEZ dispensers, re-boarding the bus back to this town, transferring at the downtown station, and going home. For the record, I corrected the metadata in my catalog. There is a lesson there somewhere. Mind your metadata, I suppose. Start by reading labels.

Я ничего не говорю!

2008-05-28T07:16:00.000-07:00

There is probably an easy way to upload several pictures and line them up all neat and purdy. I just don't feel like trying to figure it out. Now. Possibly ever. I made my largest (to date) single PEZ acquisition last week. It might have been the week before. I may have lost track of time as I was in a buyer's euphoria. I'll admit it is a little sad that as I opened the box they arrived in, (in which they arrived?) I was thinking about the lighting conditions for their digital photos. And then cataloging them. Metadatating them really. Or as deepfry coined, metadenoting them. It's actually better.

"To the readers of our New First Unexpected.

We alone was the face of our Time. Through us the horn of time blows in the art of the world.

The past is too tight. The Academy and Pushkin are less intelligible than hieroglyphics.

Throw Pushkin, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, etc., etc. overboard from the Ship of Modernity.

He who does not forget his first love will not recognize his last.

Who, trustingly, would turn his last love toward Balmont’s perfumed lechery? Is this the reflection of today’s virile soul?

Who, faint-heartedly, would fear tearing from warrior Bryusov’s black tuxedo the paper armor-plate? Or does the dawn of unknown beauties shine from it?

Wash your hands which have touched the filthy slime of the books written by the countless Leonid Andreyevs.

All those Maxim Gorkys, Kuprins, Bloks, Sologubs, Remizovs, Averchenkos, Chornys, Kuzmins, Bunins, etc. need only a dacha on the river. Such is the reward fate gives tailors.

From the heights of skyscrapers we gaze at their insignificance!...

We order that the poets’ rights be revered:

To enlarge the scope of the poet’s vocabulary with arbitrary and derivative words (Word-novelty).
To feel an insurmountable hatred for the language existing before their time.
To push with horror off their proud brow the Wreath of cheap fame that You have made from bathhouse switches.
To stand on the rock of the word “we” amidst the sea of boos and outrage.

And if for the time being the filthy stigmas of your “common sense” and “good taste” are still present in our lines, these same lines for the first time already glimmer with the Summer Lightning of the New Coming Beauty of the Self-sufficient (self-centered) Word."

Metadenoting it shall be. And don't get me started on The Future! The Cris either.

Giddy up! Cartographically speaking

2008-05-27T07:24:00.001-07:00

New bell. New whistle. Possibly a source for disappointment. Probably so. From a Typo of the Day to you Dear Reader. Check out the map to the right of this post. It was almost an accident. At least in that I don't think I could recreate, or recount precisely what happened. Or how. Come again? Now is when I would like to hear from Brazilian Perfumes. Or Rebecca with the cake from back East. (Rebecca. Not the cake). Maybe the truly mysterious psonica. Alas, I fear the little blue dots will only appear in the Willamette Valley. For the record, the dot that is there....right....wait for it...now, is mine. What does that say if I am visiting my own blog? At least I don't read my own profile. Except when I am lost and have forgotten just who I am. So hurry up and visit, while the alignment of this post and the map is synchronous.

Gimme, gimme, gimme

2008-05-23T14:17:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I feel like rugelach. Sometimes I don't. When I'm not thinking about rugelach that is. When I think about rugelach, I feel like rugelach. Cream cheese dough rolled up in neat little spirals and filled with cinnamon and nuts, or chocolate. Mmmm. A few minutes ago I went for rugelach. I was feeling like rugelach. I went to Barry's for said rugelach. Barry's has pretty dang good rugelach. They have other good stuff at Barry's as well (bialys come to mind) but their rugelach is most supreme. I found the plate of rugelach in the case with my eyes. Oh sweet rugelach! There were seven left. Only seven! They cost 2 dollars for three. Or 75 cents each. When the counter person asked what he could get for me, it just came out. I didn't even think about it. I didn't have to. "I'll take all the rugelach."

Old World Craftsmanship

2008-05-08T07:44:00.000-07:00

Now that's funny. Not funny ha ha, but funny weird. If you're paying attention. In itself difficult if you are near a window as the weather creeps toward Summer. Sidles really. Now where was I? Or was I? Wha? The Merry Music Maker PEZ dispensers arrived. There are six critters and a clown. The whistles suck. In conjunction with waterboarding they may serve a purpose but this ain't Gitmo. After I dutifully (read: compulsively, nay, obsessively) cataloged them and took their photos, I was struck by something. Comme un coup de foudre. Look it up if you'd like. What is the deal with the clown's eyes? I know some people are frightened by clowns and clowns have a sketchy rep in slasher movies, but...is this clown dead?

No worries (?)

2008-05-05T07:28:00.000-07:00

Ahh. Gardening. I cannot say too much about the joys of gardening. For the first time in my life, I have my own backyard. Well, we do. Susie and me. That is, Susie and I. Dang you Kilpatrick! And I have been busy Dear Reader. I have. Rather than share one of the panoramic shots of the slightly eccentric flower/blueberry patch, I'd like to show you something a bit more...gruesome. On the deck I am creating a special garden. A carnivorous garden. Sarracenias and fly traps so far. A butterwort too. I forgot about the butterwort. Well, a house fly made the mistake of entering my space yesterday. A big mistake. I tracked him. (I just assumed it was a male because he obviously wasn't very bright). I tracked him with my electric fly zapper. Whoosh. Zap. He was stunned. While he was out cold, I picked him up with a tissue. (Flies are filthy disease-ridden things!) I took him out back and carefully placed him...well, see for yourself.
At first, there was nothing. Then a slight buzz and a quiver and snap. Not really a snap. More of a purposeful closing. Steady and firm. Let that be a lesson to you and your filthy friends. It was quite a rush for me too Dear Reader. I think Susie liked it as well. Like a junkie, I needed more! I had to have more. Just a little taste. So I went to a pet store and bought some crickets. I didn't make eye contact with the clerk. I didn't want him to see my shame. (Not really. It just sounded more, um, sleazy. Yes!) I wasn't going to feed all of the crickets to my Fly Traps at once. I did a bit of research and knew better than that. I set up a little cricket container at home with a little water and some potato. Fresh food on demand. I peered in at the little crickets. Who would be first? I just picked one at random, put her (equal time) in a little glass and inverted the glass on a bar of Blue Ice. The cricket became motionless after a few seconds. I picked it up by a splayed leg and went to the deck. I placed it neatly in a trap and waited. As the cricket thawed and began to quiv... Mmmm. I thought about how cool this will be when we have guests over. I thought about the Circle of Life. Hakuna matata. Unless you are a bug. Bwa ha ha ha ha ha.

A picture

2008-04-30T07:48:00.000-07:00

is often worth a thousand words. OK. OK. Always worth a thousand words. Maybe more. Probably more. Awww. Who am I kidding? Myself? That was easy. I'll leave this at that and leave you with a glimpse of my South of France Lemon Cheesecake avec des Fraises. Bon appetit. Not!

My gang will get you!

2008-04-30T07:39:00.000-07:00

You are part of the Rebel Alliance and a traitor. Take it away. Braise it! Mmmmm. Duck. Not fatty duck either. Tender juicy duck. Ignore that little brat in the background. Cloe can be such a scene-stealer. Come to think of it, take her away too!
I really need to pad this post a bit more so the words and the picture end up even. Not OCD even. Just neighborhood even. You know what I'm talking about Dear Reader? A casual glance wouldn't notice a thing. Wait for it. Wait for it. Almost there. Ooops. Too far. Newman.

Bossa Nova, Baby, Bossa Nova

2008-04-23T07:19:00.000-07:00

Why wait for the wallop of a whim to write? Whim is my raison d'être. I'm not even going to look that up to verify the spelling. No one else will either. (Don't even think about it Dear Reader!) It's French. Not Portuguese. Which brings me back to the eternal conflict between whim and obligation. Yeah. Another comment was posted here. Well, rather, there, on (in?) my previous post. From an outsider who is now an insider. Even on a sunny Spring day. So, welcome Perfumes. Welcome to the struggle. The struggle between the ever-enticing siren song of sloth and entropy, and the do-we-have-to-do-it-now energy. The struggle to address the dearth of frivolity. The insurrection whose only goal is to exile vanilla (plain and French). At least to add some chocolate sprinkles. Maybe a cherry too. The Tidy Bowl Man and I swirling in inertia. (Just felt like it). But I needed to write something. An acknowledgement. A thank you. And a sincere one at that. If one is to believe what one reads. Could you be the fabled Girl from Ipanema?

You know who you are!

2008-04-16T08:12:00.000-07:00

One of the newly-realized nice things about having a readership that can be counted on one almost-fully-fingered hand, is that I can personalize my posts. That is, when I get off my butt and actually write one of the buggers. So, that being said, HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

Ism, ist, isn't

2008-04-10T07:07:00.000-07:00

"Time, forward march!" Another clue for you all. The walrus indeed was me. I? (Yet again.) Can you smell it? An alleged Latin link revealed to be myth. A lie. Damnable speck. Wash away, wash away, I beseech thee. (Boil that water. Boil it hard!) Mass consumption. Consumptive masses. Does Criswell belong? The exclamation point would indicate it to be appropriate. Temporal appropriation. Grand theft tense. I saw Elvis with your mother. That's right. On the snake train. Club the bastard. С хлебом. С хлебом! С хлебом!!! С Хлебниковом. Take that. And that. Here's one for the other cheek. Do not judge me. It's a trap. For you silly. Laugh it up. Laugh it out. Art for its own sake. Self-indulgent petty pretension. No initiative required for admission to the burning. You will be searched though. Dialectically. Directly. The forms of questions shall be employed in your responses. Or else! To be sure...!!! The future just isn't what it used to be. Could it ever have been? Even for a moment back at some point standing still gazing at the continuum. Two letters U. Two u's. Two ewes. (Insert kebab here.) Two yous. Two of us. Riding nowhere. On our way. Ooooh! Vacuum too. Tutu? No. Well technically yes, but not for my purpose(s). I don't think we're in Kansas anymore. Bishop to king's pawn five. It might work. Might not.

Oh Volodya, how could you?

2008-04-09T07:19:00.000-07:00

Didn't you go to Spring Creek Elementary? Mr. Shawver's fifth grade class, right? Me? Paul. From out of the blue, speeding headlong to nowhere fast. A dash of nihilistic pretension. Just a dash. You don't want too much of that stuff. Fleeing Rachmaninovian tedium. It should be underlined in red. The future was there. Well, it had been at one time. Before eating that bullet. Always wash your hands first. Boil the water. Always boil. Sing it to the heavens. Spit it on the streets. Ahh yes! PG3476. But which cutter? Hmmm. Hmmm? There is enough. Maybe too much. Cubist digression to throw the hounds off the scent. Dear Lily. Tiger. Water. Brik. Brick. Pardon. Border stone.

Filing and other f-words

2008-03-25T09:55:00.000-07:00

If you like Get Your War On, check out

my new filing technique is unstoppable

Click it and see. Not the big red letters. The sidebar. Or not. It is of no consequence. Nor should it be. Maybe you don't even deserve to click it. Now, that being said, go get all f***ing defiant and click it. What the h-e-double-hockey-sticks, you can click the big red letters if you want to. If you're too lazy to even look for the sidebar.

"Thoughts in time and out of season"

2008-03-25T07:25:00.000-07:00

An informal poll for you Dear Reader: if I were to have set my alarm for 3:00 AM in order to watch the first regular season baseball game between the Oakland A's and the Boston Red Sox, live from Tokyo, would you think

(a) I am a dedicated baseball fan
(b) I am a nutbag
(c) A and B
(d) Poor Susie

Now I must confess that my use of the subjunctive mood is erroneous. I did in fact get up to watch the game. Also, and don't take this too personally D.R., when it comes to my love of baseball, I really don't care what you or anyone else thinks, thought, or might think in the future.

Changing gears. I mowed the backyard yesterday afternoon. Big friggin' woop, right? Yes, it was. It was the first time I mowed MY OWN YARD. Thoughts and feelings about the unspoken bond between a man and his lawnmower... aw, screw it.

Hammerin' Hank

2008-03-24T07:47:00.000-07:00

Suckers! No. Not baseball's rightful home run king. Another clue? Think Damaged. Henry Rollins brought his "Provoked" spoken word performance to town last night. Three-and-a-half hours of it. Let's see, twenty bucks plus service charge divided by three.five... a bargain! I knew going in that he would have something to say that would prick my ego. Something. I was waiting for it. I wanted it. I needed it. We all get old. Rather, we all grow up. Some of us are just a little slower at doing so. When Mr. Rollins spoke of becoming less cynical as he has gotten older, and that he now saw his cynicism as "cowardly armor," I think I grew up. A little.

Dim, but still...

2008-03-21T08:44:00.000-07:00

Brief. To the point. I just now returned from remitting the first payment on our mortgage. Only three hundred fifty-nine more to go. Woo-hooo! There is a light at the end of the tunnel.

The black cars of the guardia civil

2008-03-19T10:53:00.000-07:00

It has come to my attention that I have not posted in a while. Quite a while by metastandards. I have some ideas about which to write. And some not to write about. They are more interesting. Duhhh. But I feel like phoning this one in.

Arctic Monkeys/This house is a circus
Bow Wow Wow/I want candy
Circle Jerks/I wanna destroy you
The Clash/Spanish bombs
The Damned/I just can’t be happy today
Depeche Mode/Martyr
Elastica/Connection
Fang/Fun with acid
Frankenstein Drag Queens from Planet 13/Scary song
Gang of Four/Outside the trains don’t run on time
The Melvins (w/Jello Biafra)/Caped crusader (Subway gas/Hello Kitty mix)
Metallica/Enter sandman
Midnight Oil/The dead heart
Nine Inch Nails/The hand that feeds
Nirvana/Drain you
NOFX/Seeing double at the Triple Rock
Pearl Jam/Jeremy
The Pixies/Dig for fire
Public Image Ltd./Death disco
Rage Against the Machine/Vietnow
Red Hot Chili Peppers/Dani California
The Smiths/What she said
Sonic Youth/Waist
Suicide/Girl
Tom Waits/Walking Spanish
Underworld/Born slippy
Sara Bareilles/Love song

It's the playlist I assembled for my listening pleasure as I pore over however-many-hundreds of names have backed up in the system. I have left it intact for a couple days now. It just works. Playlists can be revealing. By design. Often. Über-cool. Pretentiously so. "When in Minnesota and you got a drinking quota..." I'd better leave well enough alone and get. Rather, git.

Don't take candy from them either

2008-02-27T08:38:00.000-08:00

Winamp random play. 3031 items. "Swimming in the sound of Bow Wow Wow." That's how it began. I wanted candy. An artist search on AMG allmusic. Perusal of discography, sub-directories for regular releases and compilations. The decision was the 1996 release The Best of Bow Wow Wow. I agonized though. Their debut release was called, and I kid you not Dear Reader, See Jungle! See Jungle! Go Join Your Gang, Yeah, City All Over! Go Ape Crazy. All the way to the House of Records I vacillated. Oscillated really. Part of me hoped that the greatest hits compilation wouldn't be there and I would have no choice but to get See Jungle! See Jungle! Go Join Your Gang, Yeah, City All Over! Go Ape Crazy. (Copy and paste job, not a re-type). When I discovered they had neither, nor in fact, any Bow Wow Wow, I stepped up to place a special order. I chickened out and ordered the Best of Bow Wow Wow. It has the track "Don't Dance with Strangers." See Jungle! See Jungle! Go Join Your Gang, Yeah, City All Over! Go Ape Crazy does not.

This is ground control...

2008-02-26T15:32:00.000-08:00

I can't think of a positive employment of the word "snag." Not that I am trying particularly hard to do so. Or at all. Jumping to mind: snagging my shirt as I tried to squeeze my way through a barbed-wire fence as a child; that feeling when you know you have not just hooked into a big one on the McKenzie River, but are snagged on the bottom and are about to lose the whole rig. That's enough. I don't want to go on. I can't. I must. I will. Our move into our new house has been very smooth. Snag-free even. From the moment we decided on it, through closing, even the packing and early stages of moving in. I made an appointment for the digital cable and internet service to be switched to the new address. Heck, I even decided to go wireless. But wait, there's more! I decided also to switch to digital phone service. To bundle. I don't like the sound of that one bit. I was elated when the appointment window was two hours, instead of the old "sometime before lunch." Between 8 and 10. Ante meridian. This was gonna be a cinch. No furniture in the way. Lot's of cable outlets. The equipment all nicely laid out where it would reside. Cables at the ready. Plug and play baby! Plug and play! I could even putter around until they arrived. Get a few things unpacked. I started to wonder when I heard the clock strike 9:30. At ten I became a little annoyed. At 10:30 I decided that I would catch the 11:15 bus if they had not arrived. At 10:45 they arrived. They were apologetic, and battered from their first morning job. What could I do or say? Nothing. When the techs saw everything laid out they became...giddy. Yes giddy. Thanking me for making it so easy for them that they might catch up with their schedule, they set about hooking up everything. This was so cool! When they went to check the signal, things veered off course. Badly. The cable signal was too weak. Like totally way too weak. On the exterior of the house they found that the previous dog had chewed the cables. All of them. Cables were replaced. Signals were checked and re-checked. Etc... After every single cable in and around the house had been replaced, some more than once (I suspect), the signal was again checked. Nope. What next? They pulled up the underground cable leading to the house from the Big Green Box and replaced it. At last, we had a winner. We were all quite happy to put a really bad morning behind us. As the guys were looking around out back during the ordeal, I heard one tell the other, let's call him two, that there were "lots of balls out here." I knew of the basketball the former owners left in the back corner, but that was it. It took me a minute. Shall I explain Dear Reader? I shall. "Balls" is cable tech code for doggie-you-know-what. The previous owner's dog was apparently not only a chewer, but also quite an athlete.

Time plods, but quickly

2008-02-21T06:08:00.000-08:00

Panic. Palpitations. Pessimism. Peril. Perhaps. (I should face the peril). Susie and I signed the papers for our house a day and a half ago. The keys to the kingdom will be delivered tomorrow. Maybe late today. Maybe. Moving day bears down on me like... I don't know, it just bears down on me. Rather, moving days bear down. We shall begin tomorrow evening. Most, well, a lot of Saturday and then, March 1, U-Haul Day. (Celebrating that holiday a bit early. Maybe a bit late). The goal is to get all the things moved that wouldn't do well snuggled between boxes and furniture in the back of a moving van. Why the "back of a moving van?" Who would load the front of a moving van? Extra words for this post. That's why. Now even more. I have a plan for the move. I should probably have charted it out. Maybe a spreadsheet-slash-checklist. Nahh. Just load the stuff and go. Unload. Lather. Rinse. Repeat. Gently eddying brain squall. Must begin with the dinosaur skeletons. Not real ones mind you. Wood models. Oooh! I know! Moving day reminds me of the time, OK, times, as a child when I misbehaved. This may be familiar to you Dear Reader. "Just wait 'til your father gets home!"

Yes My Master

2008-02-19T08:18:00.000-08:00

Oh yeah! I did it. St. Basil's Cathedral offers some perspective. (Don't confuse it with the Kremlin.) He doesn't say anything. Too bad. He is only too happy to offer packages of assorted fruit flavored PEZ candy, to the tune of the Star Wars theme music. And, his eyes glow while doing so. Trick or treat for adults. Well, for me at least. Still, it would have been pretty cool if he would say "I'm your father Luke. Would you like some candy?" Or, "Candy, Princess?" OK, that was just creepy. I don't have an Ewok PEZ dispenser, but if I did, I bet Big Darth could swallow it whole. Little Darth would probably point and snicker. Better be careful Yoda.

Ruling pending

2008-02-18T09:23:00.000-08:00

I now detect an alien vibration here. I should probably have used quotes. But they would have been distracting. Although, now that I have mentioned them, it is probably more so now than ever. Ever ain't that long in this instance. Where had I been? Could I? Should I or shouldn't I? Will I or won't I? There. Of course. Maybe. You bet. I think I need to establish some boundaries. Robots, or whatever you want to call them. From outer space. Not necessarily originally. But generally associated with it. More machine than man really. What about Storm Troopers?

Request lines are open

2008-02-12T06:51:00.000-08:00

I just don't have the words. Any words. Which is convenient since the album is instrumental. This gem caught my eye at the recent vinyl show here in town. Which town is really quite irrelevant to the matter at hand. Left or right. I have not listened to it yet, but I have cataloged it. Sorry. Metadatated it. (I love typing "metadatated" because a little red line appears underneath. Oooh! There it went again!) I bought this for the cover. I have no idea what the music sounds like. Except for the Alfred Hitchcock Presents television show theme. The rest probably sucks. But who cares? Just look at the cover Dear Reader! In other words, check it out. Gaze upon it. Let your mind wander, even play a few tricks on you. Please overlook that the title ends in a preposition. Dangling. Ooops, I'm thinking of dangling participles. I think. Grammar teachers would probably make good murderers. Like totally. They could likely get the charges reduced to manslaughter. Like, if you, like, know, like, what, like, I, like, mean, dude. As for me, well, if I had to choose a soundtrack for my own demise, I suppose I would opt for something in the genre of Swedish black metal with traditional death metal progressions. That sounds familiar, and easy. Maybe something by Morphine, or just about anything from the Miami Vice television series, I suppose. I can name that tune in two notes Tom.

Fsst, fsst, fsst

2008-02-08T07:19:00.000-08:00

We are all a little disturbed. It's a good thing too. Just a little. Quirky. A little eccentric. You get my drift. I issued a plea for assistance in identifying a character whose likeness came to me in the form of a couple PEZ dispensers. At first I thought it might be My Melody, the cookie-baking friend of Hello Kitty. I was not sure though and asked for help, the first step in... Nevermind. Within hours I received an e-mail confirming that it was indeed My Melody. I changed entries in my catalog. "Bunny" → "My Melody." (As an aside, ALT + 26= →). Then the cat scat hit the fan. I received a message from a connoisseur of all things Sanrio. It was not My Melody, but U*SA*HA*NA. There was a link as well. I got the scent. But I was Shanghaid before I even began. A few days ago I received a package from Xiao Meng-qiu, bka Sophie. (I know "Shanghaid" was pretty lame). Among the gifts she sent was a bag featuring something called Charmmy Kitty. Cute. I chalked it up to some Chinese rip-off of Hello You-Know-Who. Fast forward. When I clicked on the Sanrio friends link (overkill?) what should I find? Charmmy Kitty! She is Hello Kitty's cat. Slavery? She is the keeper of the key to Hello Kitty's jewelry box. Back to U*SA*HA*NA. I scrolled down a bit, and sure enough, there was the bunny. It was, it is not My Melody. U*SA*HA*NA loves to show her happy dance. But what the H-E-double-hockey-sticks is up with those asterisks? She's not Barry Bonds mind you. Conflicting identifications. Dancing. Raquel Welch. CAT FIGHT! I'd better update the metadata.

Bite Me!

2008-02-07T13:08:00.000-08:00

On a mission. When it's over... How easy for you was that beginning, Dear Reader? There are only so many cover images available in LibraryThing. Lots, to be sure. But still. Only so many. And then there are works unique to My Library. There had better not be cover images available. That would be just freaky, man. I mean, woman. (I don't think I have any male readers. Heck, I barely have any readers.) Back up a step. For clarity. Just let me explain. There are 1260 titles in My Library, so far. I have diligently verified the bibliographic integrity of each record as I have brought them into the library of pharvey4. But there were not always cover images available for each title. Not just any image, but the correct image. The one and only image that was for the edition and printing of the book I own. So, I started bringing a couple books to work each day to scan their images and upload them to you-know-where. Is there no end to local cataloging decisions screaming to be made? Some of my books, especially older ones that have been passed down through the years, do not have jackets any longer. Should I scan the plain front? No. That would be useless in every way and more. Scan the spine? I actually did this at first. Then I decided it looked like crap, and I went back and scanned again. Scanned what again? The title page. It allows that each and every title have an image. I can live with the idea that there are title page images in a field labeled "Cover." Can you, Dear Reader? If not, well, you can...

The Capital of the World

2008-02-06T06:57:00.000-08:00

A musing. Maybe simply a mulling. After I, or anyone else for that, or any other matter, catalog a book, we refer to the aforementioned book as being cataloged. (We all scream for ice cream as well). Everybody gets it. It is clear to one and all. Hopefully. Even if it is a brief record, it is cataloged. We will not get into entry levels here. All shall be lumped together as one. A great big cataloged one. OK. OK. So I got to thinking. To pondering. Always a weighty proposition. Often a most, well, mainly treacherous time. After I have created metadata describing, say, a photograph of a hurdler, taken sometime during the 1930s, at what is now called Hayward Field, how should I refer to it? Tell me Dear Reader, how? "Done?" It is not a piece of meat. A tidy attributive adjective is attractive to me here. And now. I stumbled upon, well, actually tripped over (and skinned both knees) the answer to my own question. The image for which metadata had been created could be called "metadatated." Indeedely-doo. Sorry Flanders. A metadatated image. Yes! I am a cataloger. I am a metadatator. You might suspect a superfluous syllable here Dear Reader. You might. But metadator was quickly passed by as sounding a bit promiscuous. No. Metadatator held firm. Holds steady. Hemingway intruded. "A severed femoral artery empties itself faster than you can believe." Olé!

Vitamin?

2008-02-05T07:37:00.001-08:00

Sure, many will know that this is the robot from Lost in Space. Not the terrible movie, but the old cheesy television series. "Danger! Danger!" But who among you know the robot's name? See how helpful he is? Why would I need to show the relative size of this "toy"? Because it's not a toy. It is a big-ass, battery-powered PEZ dispenser. Yes, Dear Reader, another line has been crossed in my slow yet steady descent into, well I'm not sure into what exactly. I bet it is Danteesque though. And tepid. It does not dispense individual PEZ candies however, but entire packages. Pretty good. Pretty good. Pretty neat. Pretty neat. Here's the cool part. The battery-operated part: when one tips the head back to get candy, the robot (still nameless to you I bet, but not to me) speaks. To me. Others may be able to hear it, but I am the one who listens to it. I obey the robot. He doesn't ask for much. If anything. Just friendship. It really must get lonely at times for a 12" tall PEZ dispenser. I ordered some friends for him as well.
Extra credit: what is the name of the bunny? Seriously, I don't know. I used "Bunny Winking" and "Bunny Waving" in the catalog records. Good enough for now. Right now. Only for the moment. These cataloger-assigned names should probably be in brackets, but I don't know if or how that would affect indexing. It just feels so K-level. Smells like, like, retrocon.

Are you alive?

2008-01-23T07:44:00.000-08:00

Never you mind that I arrived right as the show was to begin instead of when the doors had opened an hour earlier. Please overlook that I was dropped off in a Ford Explorer. Eddie Bauer Edition. This instead of taking the bus and walking a few blocks. It was cold. Very cold. We discussed whether Susie should drop me off a block before, or a block after so the other kids wouldn't see my arrival out front. Nothing doing. She just pulled to the side of the road in front of the WOW Hall and I climbed out. I wasn't taunted. I wasn't even noticed. Well, maybe one of the kids out front may have wondered where my child was. Afterall, why would a middle-aged adult be here? Why? Because I was taking a little sojourn down Memory Lane. That's why. The Circle Jerks were headlining. Yes, Dear Reader, it was another one of those shows. One of those Punk Shows. One of those shows during which I considered that I had a mohawk before 90% of those in attendance had even been born. Teenagers in cute punk costumes doing what they thought was the thing to do. Or the thing, as they understood it when their parents told them about the Good Old Days. Don't get me wrong Dear Reader. Please don't. It was a great show. It's nice to see youngsters paying homage to some of the pioneers of those forces that shaped who I am. I really liked one of the opening acts. They called themselves Hit Me Back and hailed from South Central L.A. These guys were not poseurs. No spikes. No visible piercings or tattoos. Just a good old traditional hardcore band. So what if they probably get carded when buying booze? Everything is derivative. That is not always a bad thing. After the Circle Jerks had finished their set, I extracted Susie's cell phone from my pocket and called for a ride home. I am not even going to try to explain, let alone excuse myself. Then Keith and the guys came back out for an encore. Four songs in under ten minutes. Sweeeet! Then I went out front and waited for the SUV home. Oooh! I almost forgot, I bought another t-shirt.

You can have the big half

2008-01-15T11:12:00.000-08:00

Ollie ollie oxen free. Or whatever variant you may or may not desire. This is a challenge. A taunt. A dare to comment. You know who you are. Who you'd like to be. Better than Anonymous. More so than Citizen. Citoyen, s'il te plaît, peur-être. Товарищ Чувак. Even better than the uncle-killing red monkey so eloquently immortalized by the Milk Shakes. Mmmmmm. Frosty chocolate milk shakes. I digress. But that implies that I in fact, ever, even once, gressed. Doesn't it? A great name crossed my path. A 100. First indicator 0. Oooooh. You know it's going to be good when the first indicator is zero. You really do. Trust me. "Rope-dancing monkey in the Hay-market." Quotes? Mine. Italics? Mine. Boldness? We can share. The monkey and me.

Bubble-what who?

2007-12-28T07:12:00.000-08:00

For the record. Crazy Cookie Race. Tea Cup Croquet. Cup Cake Trampoline. Rainbow Garden. Beach Bubble Frenzy. Sky Bubble Popper. Bubble Gum Taxi. Pie Poppin' Dance. I should just leave it right there. Shouldn't I? A larger question should be addressed. Well, could be addressed. Are Susie and I a perfect match? Or is this a symptom of some mutually self-destructive Hello Kitty silliness enabling? The answer is clear. The former. This was a Christmas present. Really. If I were to have (note my use of the subjunctive mood!) a problem, whether it be some allergy to animated dander, or susceptibility to cat scratch fever (we'll leave Mr. Nugent out of this one) ...where was I? Oh yeah, if I were to have a problem, I would have probably played more than just one game each of Tea Cup Croquet, Beach Bubble Frenzy and Sky Bubble Popper. So there. Nyah. It turns out I am pretty good at computer games designed for six-year-old girls. À vrai dire, je les domine!

Inconsistent parenthetical Christmas

2007-12-25T09:17:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas to me. Merry Christmas to me. Last night, that is to say Christmas Eve, I finished cataloging my LP collection. Six hundred and sixty-eight albums. A FileMaker template I designed all by my lonesome. (There is no other way to catalog, or to design templates, except all by one's lonesome). Artist. Album. Year of release (or year of performance for live albums). Cover image. Notes (such as 12" single, EP, pink vinyl, 2 discs, or 3, or 5 (I don't have any 4 disc sets) and finally, track titles.) Can you dig your way out of the parentheses Dear Reader? Well, can you? Scary, I know. But what if I want to compile a list of all the Beatles' songs with the word "Love" in the title? (Don't they all have "Love" in the title?) Punctuation inside or outside parentheses? I feel it coming on. I do. (Which reminds me: I'm getting married Saturday). I still have a few, well, several, album covers to scan. And upload. A few release dates to clarify. Just a few of them. But I've already started on my VHS tapes. Not too many. Fewer than fifty. Inconsistency again. Should I follow some style book and spell out only single digit numbers? Oh well. Too late now. (Not really. I'm just feeling lazy.) Susie and the boy are on the way. Early dinner at mom's. $1.50 movie (there it is again!) Photo booth pictures at the mall. The candy store that sells PEZ will be closed. I know that going in.

Nosebleed seats

2007-12-20T06:50:00.001-08:00

Before.
After.The thinner air and occasional onset of vertigo, to say nothing of acrophobia. Warning: digression... Acrophobia is defined in the dictionary as "the abnormal dread of great height." To me, this implies that there is a normal dread of great height. Hmmm. Hey, I warned you. Where was I? Oh yeah, thin air, great height... It all would seem to me to be worth not having to peer over or around someone else. Especially Yosemite Sam and that ginormous hat of his. Hard to tell if "ginormous" is spelled correctly. Or if it's even a real word. Should be. It should be Dear Reader. And the crowd goes wild!

Quick note

2007-12-19T08:51:00.000-08:00

The chicken's water just broke. There was a witness. So, if you can't, or won't believe me, just ask milly.