Author: Dave

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my lungs were made of glass


Tuesday and it was another 8am-5pm blitz at work, but I’m home now and four beers better and ready to write a couple stupid paragraphs.

There used to be this commercial on TV where the subject was a guy stuck in traffic, and you could hear his thoughts. He was in a shirt and tie, obviously on his way to some office job with the others of the throng. Headed in the opposite direction, he spied a car with a kayak tethered to the top, going away from the place where all the other “suits” were headed. His thoughts went something like “Wonder where he’s going? Mountains? Ocean?.” The point being that he was questioning the routine, him dressed in a monkey suit headed in to push paper for the man, this other bloke in shorts and t-shirt headed out for a day of recreation.

Today on the way home from lunch I saw a gruff looking man in one of those smallish SUVs that are popular now – his vehicle covered with that ashen stuff that shouts of time spent having fun in the snow. That sheen of snow and salt and dirt that grays up the exterior made me wish that I was headed somewhere better than home for lunch and back to work (although since I’m not a big snowports guy, I imagined a hiking or camping outing instead). And speaking of camping and hiking, I’m getting pretty geared up for our first year of “with baby” outdoors activity. I’m excited to adapt, and get Keaton outside and in tune with the Mother.

Last night I had a dream that my lungs were made of glass. Eight-sided glass “cylinders,” like 3D stop-signs. They were made of square plates of glass, and the joints were made of the thick grey solder you see holding stained glass together. Each lung was an octagonal glass cylinder like this, and inside each one there were “floors” or separate chambers. When I would breathe, I could see the air fill each chamber sequentially, like it was tinted in some way. I have no idea what this means, but I thought it was one of the coolest dreams ever – re-imagining my internal organs as some Tiffany-esque artsy glass contraptions. I woke up and immediately went to the computer to write a note about it (“8-sided glass lung/chambers”) so I could recap it for today. And then…

Goodnight.

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gators got that ramma-jamma


Congrats to my alma mater, who won the National Championship last night. Too bad we couldn’t have done this while I was actually at the school – but it was great watching it happen nonetheless. A great end to a busy Monday, almost makes it feel like a weekend or something… with the beer and the pizza and the bare-breasted women. Yeah, got me feeling right-fine as of now. And yes I will have another sip, thanks for asking.

Keaton’s 1st birthday is coming up fast, just a little over a month away – and when I really get down to it and start thinking about what that means, it’s amazing to me. For one, the fact that a year’s gone by, not to mention just how much she’s grown in that time. I can honestly look back at pictures taken in those first few months and say that she’s actually grown, I can see how her facial features have become more defined, her eyes brighter and seemingly more understanding, and her head full of wispy blond hair. I love the fact that we’ve been able to watch her grow, but am also a little scared at how fast it all happened – and have this irrational fear she moves from one point to the next so fast that I’ll “miss” something and not be able to remember it later on. But, in the end, it was a great year and I’m super proud of the way Sharaun and I have adapted to parenthood. I know we’ve faced but a mite of the challenges to come, but, so far, I think we’ve done a damn fine job.

Today I finally got all three new Arcade Fire tracks on my iPod in a decent format, and I did my duty as a fanboy by literally listening to them most of the morning on repeat – one after the other until they were imprinted on my brain. I must say, with every listen my anticipation for this album grows. Add to that the outstanding “internet age” pre-release marketing the band is doing (the YouTube video, the call-the-album thing where the band actually answers the phone, the iTunes exclusives) – and the froth is forming at the corners of my mouth. With the release date now semi-confirmed as March 6th here in the US – I’m counting the days until the inevitable leak. I’ve decided that I’m certainly going to beat the street and grab the leak as soon as it’s up – but I’ve also decided to purchase the album via iTunes when it’s officially available. This way, I’ll feel a little less guilty about the illicit download – and I can jadedly think that my financial contribution may enable the ‘Fire to continue making good music. I’m sure I’ll also break the “have a baby now” concert moratorium if they come to the city again. C’mon Neon Bible… leaky leaky…

In various airports over our Christmas travels, I saw more than a handful of US Army soldiers in those “new” fatigues they have. You know what I’m talking about? That “digital” looking camouflage pattern? I always wondered why the new camo is all pixely looking, and tonight I happened to think about it whilst online. So, a couple Googles later and I was reading this neato article all about the modern-day standard-issues. Turns out the digital pattern “suggests” shapes and objects without actually being shapes and objects, and therefore helps modern soldiers blend into the “flow of space.” Kinda cool.

Goodnight folks, this is just the rut I’m in.

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weekend on the carpet


I spent most of this weekend laying on the ground playing with Keaton. It was fun and gloriously lazy. Now it’s time to close it out, sadly, as the clock ticks towards midnight on Sunday. It’s gonna be a tearful goodbye, as a desk in a cubicle is nothing compared laying on the carpet with my daughter.

Last Thursday, on the way back to work after lunching at home, I decided I felt like smoking my pipe. So, I pulled out one of the smaller-bowled ones I got years back in a batch of estate pipes I got on the cheap from eBay and packed it with my favorite tobacco, Frog Morton On the Town, and happily puffed my way back to work. It was nice, and I think I’ll do it more often. I have less guilt about stinking up my truck because, well… that truck is a piece of work as it is… a little stank won’t really kill its curb appeal or anything. Also last week on the work tip, in the unfortunate bits of work sandwiched between waking, lunching, supping and sleeping, I was quite busy and really pretty productive. Good for me, as I’m still coaxing all the hamsters back into their wheels after coming back off vacation.

A third track from the Arcade Fire’s pending album hit the internets this weekend, this time through the official website as a goodie embedded in a flash page (of which the source was quickly decompiled in short order to get a direct-download link). Again it’s a little darker sounding, and again it’s been getting a fair amount of “can’t hold a candle to Funeral” flack around the water cooler. I dunno, that’s three finished tracks now, and yes they sound good – but I’m not sure anything can live up to my expectations. I fear I’ve doomed this album to the sophomore-slump before even hearing it, and that just ain’t right. Hopefully, I’ll eat my words when the full thing leaks. Maybe it’s just because I haven’t taken the time to really put on my headphones and listen to them – I’ll make it a point to do that soon.

Finally, I feel the need to express my thanks for my wife and friends – who setup not one, but two 30th birthday parties for me (one being a surprise party on my birthday, and one being a joint party with Kristi). Furthermore, special thanks to Cynthia – who not only made both my cakes, but decorated my 1st one in a “Pink is the New Blog” theme, took my picture with it, and sent it over. (For those unfamiliar with “Pink,” it’s one of the ‘net’s most popular gossip-blogs.) Anyway, turns out I made Trent’s Saturday post (scroll down towards the bottom for my cameo). Now, don’t go thinking I’m a huge gossip-blog guy or anything… I’m more of a casual fan (I go there mostly for pictures of Scarlett Johansson and Jessica Alba) and the whole thing was Cynthia’s idea – but it is cool to see your mug on the internet. Way to go.

Goodnight, until the next time.

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the list


A real hodgepodge today, folks.

When Sharaun and Keaton and I were home in Florida the past couple weeks, I had some time to hang out with my stalwart buddies Andy and Kyle. These are guys who I’ve known since my initial days in Florida after moving from California, give or take. You can get a bit of history on them here on my now-defunct and no-longer-linked anywhere “cast of characters” page (the page got too outdated and I always felt I was slighting someone with their “bio,” so I scrapped the whole idea). Anyway, one night we were sitting outside at a little brewpub on the beach, amassed around a table enjoying beers and conversation, and the topic turned to the shenanigans of our past (it often does). Andy mentioned that, at some point when he and I were in college (at arch-rival institutions), we’d bounced an e-mail back and forth between us called “the list,” in which we tried to document some of the funnier and more memorable events from our “wilder” youth. What’s more, he said he still had “the list.”

Well, here we are just two days back from Florida and Andy lived up to a promise he made to me when I heard he still had the list – he scanned it in and mailed it to me. Seems like he printed it on an old dot-matrix printer way back then, and reading it now I was surprised to find how many things I actually remembered quite well. In fact, I’ve even written about some of them here on the blog. My long-term goal, though, is to write a paragraph about each line item on the list (at least the ones I can remember). Anyway… you can check out the list in it’s entirety here: page1, page2, and page3. There are some hilarious stories hidden behind those little one-liners. (Actually, I just looked again at Andy’s scan, and the dates show we did it in June of 1996 – a mere year after graduating high school. So, at that point I was still in junior college and not true university, as I stated above (just trying to be factual here, folks)).

Got turned onto the newish “Tapers Section” feature of the Grateful Dead’s massive meandering website from a music forum the other day. Every Monday, a new bloglike entry is posted, and each post is chock full of MP3s representing snippets of shows played during that week in Dead history. A stellar concept if you ask me, but I’m not surprised the Dead are, even posthumously (as a group, at least), on the cutting edge as far as digital music – I’ve written about my respect for their progressive distribution ideas before. Anyway, if you’re a Dead fan, or just want to get an idea of what the whole Dead “thing” is about, the “liner notes” style of the posts accompanying the music lend a lot of contextual goodness to the aural experience. So go ahead, feed your head.

Over Christmas I mentioned to my brother-in-law that our digital camera hasn’t been working right ever since Sharaun dropped it into the cat’s water dish at 2006’s Halloween Bash. He asked what kind we had, and when I said Canon, he mentioned that when he called Canon customer support when his camera’s flash crapped out after the warranty period expired they offered him a “upgrade.” Turns out that Canon runs something like a loyalty program where owners of older model digital cameras can get cut-rate prices on newer models as part of an official “upgrade program.” There’s scant information on this program on the web and it’s not to be found at all (at least by me) on Canon’s official website, but if you call 1-800-828-4040 (in the US) and tell them you’re current make and model they’ll let you know if it’s upgradeable and to what. In my case, my S400 is upgradeable to an SD450 for $159. Not bad compared to the Amazon price of $317. Another buddy called about his A30 and they offered to upgrade him to an SD550 for $189. A better deal for him, to be sure, but the $159 price for a working, newer camera sure is enticing to me. Haven’t jumped on it yet, but likely will soon.

Goodnight.

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stronger than zyrtec


After some flight re-routing and multiple-hour delays, we finally made it home to Northern California yesterday. Draggin’-tired and zombified, I decided not to blog and instead give myself a nice easy comedown before an early ~9pm lights-out. Vacation was wonderful – reinvigorating and restoring for my spirits. The time spent with friends, the time spent with family, the mid-afternoon catnaps and warm weather: all of it worked like a trip to an old-timey “sanitarium,” shaking the white-collar dust off my boots and reminding me what life’s pace should really be like. Well, OK, perhaps that’s a bit romanticized for a mere two-week respite from the millstone, but it certainly did improve my outlook (I give work three days max to settle the clouds back ’round my head, though). Seriously, though, Florida was great and we had a splendid time there – but it’s also good to be back.

Before I get into it then, I’ll go ahead and break my dry spell by posting a backlog of Keaton pictures. These stretch back over the weeks I’ve neglected posting because of work stress and/or vacation non-stress. Check ’em out here, but make sure to remember to come back to read the rest of the blog when you’re done.

In other Keaton news, over our holiday she really seemed to sprout like a weed – learning new things like “cruising” and opening drawers and cabinets and possibly even saying her first word (it’s hard to tell, but she sure does seem to say “hi” in the right context and with good repeatability). Maybe, if her first word does turn out to be “hi,” it’s a good sign socially… or something. Sometimes I see her in a certain light and am taken aback by how “big” she is. In those moments, I instantly feel like I’ve not been paying enough attention, like things shouldn’t be allowed to change this fast, like I’ve she’s somehow changed while I wasn’t looking, while I blinked. To see her tiny legs holding her up when I can remember well the days where we cheered her as she struggled to roll over… that’s something, I tell ya. I have this fear I’m gonna take a nap and wake up to her in miniskirts and eyeliner…

Three days ago I decided to go off my allergy pills, cold turkey. I’ve been on them ever since my run-in with anaphylaxis, and had, at a couple times since then, ran out for a day or two before refilling the prescription – which, without fail, resulted in an intense all-over itching. I never had this whole-body itching thing before I started taking allergy pills, and for some reason I got the idea in my head that, maybe, I’d become reliant on their histamine-stomping powers so much that my own system had become weak. Also, I had begun to loathe the $15 a month which we were shelling out on the pills. I got to thinking, is itching really that unbearable? I mean, is it $15 unbearable? Plus, I have this notion that if I’m able to just stop taking the pills, my body will step up to the challenge and once again begin its regulation of histamine, unassisted by modern medicine. In the meantime though, I’m a red, blotchy, itchy mess – and am having to rely on my tremendous mind-over-matter fortitude to mentally block out the prickly fires on my skin. I can do it though, I’m convinced I’m stronger than the Zyrtec.

Two songs, people… two songs. That’s what’s leaked so far from the Arcade Fire’s upcoming 2007 release (which, consequently, is totally mastered and ready for release – and therefore literally begging to be leaked… can you imagine being the scenster who ups that badboy?… talk about instant kung-fu). See, it was only supposed to be one song, “Intervention,” released exclusively on iTunes. But, something went wrong… I’ll let Win explain it himself (I know this is old news to those who are up on the wold of the ‘Fire):

The song that people have downloaded from the US side of iTunes is called “Black Wave/Bad Vibrations,” and it is the next track on the record after “Intervention.” I guess it is sort of charming that we can send the wrong song to the whole world with a click of a mouse…oh well. The real “Intervention” will be up soon…

Turns out they accidentally pushed a mislabeled and completely different song from the album onto the US iTunes. The mistake was corrected with a quickness, but not quick enough to prevent the bits from filtering into the ether and eventually making their way into the P2P universe. So now, there’s the supposed-to-be-released track and the accidentally-released track floating around (and in heavy rotation in my iPod). Both are good, and have my Pavlovian instincts wetting my chin in anticipation. I also think it’s cool that the band “gets” that illegal downloading is inescapable, and is creative about it, saying: “… there will be a paypal link up on arcadefire.com for those who have downloaded the songs without paying but still want to give some money to www.PIH.org.” Way to be progressive guys, way to be.

Before I go, here’s some linky goodness that spoke to the new father in my, check out this article on the extreme hoochiefication of today’s girl-type youth.

Goodnight.

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lazing around


The cold weather was a fluke – we’re back to the 80s here in Central Florida and it’s nice. I’ve, of course, reverted to my standard t-shirt, shorts, and flip-flop wardrobe and am loving it. It’s hard for me to believe that we’re basically at the end of our vacation – two weeks can really fly by and I’m in no way ready to go back to work. In fact, the bad memories I left with are still fresh enough to put a sour taste in my mouth just with the thought. Ugh, but, back to work I’ll go…

Keaton showed her signs of first post-fever roseola rash today, starting off as just a bunch of spotty red prickles mainly on her chest and back. Apparently, they’ll get a little more pronounced before fading. She also woke up in a nasty mood, fussy and crying and overly sleepy as well as not wanting to eat – she was also tugging on and rubbing at her ear. Now, ear-tugging/rubbing can either mean teething or an ear infection, and I’m voting for teething and I think I attribute the general crankiness to either the same or the roseola residuals – but we’re both hoping she hasn’t somehow managed to develop an ear infection on top of her outgoing roseola. When I was a kid I was plagued by ear infections, and she’s already had one now… just hoping she doesn’t take after her dad in that respect.

Last night our little family spent the night, as we always do when we’re in town, with Sharaun’s grandmother. I actually love that pre-assigned sleepover every time we have the chance to do it. We usually sit up late talking and playing games: dominoes or Yahtzee or Uno or something, and then wake up early and have breakfast together before lazing around the house until noon or so. This visit was all the more enjoyable as it came on the heels of a day spent motoring around Florida, in the heavy Orlando traffic and back, and as such the “downtime” felt all the more down. Those times, enjoying family and friends, are among the few things which make me wish we did live closer to what I still consider “home.” Not that I would now abandon California and pull up stakes – but I do admit I wish Sharaun could be closer to her family. Then again, I wish we were closer to my family as well – so it unfortunately cuts both ways.

As a Christmas gift to a long-time buddy, and fellow music-nut, here in Florida – I spent a lot of time over the past few months ripping every last remaining CD I own, and then doing a massive re-organization and cleanup of my entire digital music library. My goal was to give my buddy a well organized hard drive filled to the brim with every single piece of music I own. And, even though it literally came down to the last few hours on the last day before we headed to Florida a nearly two weeks ago, I was able to get the files sufficiently organized, centralized, and copied over to drives. I stuck them in the pockets of my jeans, folded them, and placed them in my suitcase. Then, when Sharaun and Keaton and I went over to Bob’s (that’s my buddy) house for dinner (a fine southern meal), I gifted him with them. The next day I had a message on my voicemail from Bob, sounding more giddy than I think I’ve ever heard him, saying things like, “Dave, this shit is amazing… where on Earth did you get The Crazy World of Arthur Brown?! I used to have this in vinyl…” Make a body feel good.

Although, I will admit that there were a couple not-entirely-selfless motivations in play here: 1) to have an off-site, remote backup of my music, and 2) to receive those “why isn’t so-and-so’s album ‘whatever’ on here?” for new music leads. Either way, it was a good exercise for me in that it helped me get my collection uber-organized, and since it got Bob smiling it was all the more worth it.

I likely won’t post Monday as we’ll be in the air and technically it’s a holiday, so look for me again on Tuesday – back in the C-to-the-A and back at work chained to my cubicle. Until then, I love your shapes.

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otters, herons, and fishies


Cold winds bloweth, spake the weatherman, and thus it was so.

Last night we had a fire here at casa-de-inlaw, and I even donned my longpants and Christmas-new shoes to fight back the chill. Now, I’m not talking igloos and icicles, but it’s definitely a change from the impossibly neutral warm temperatures we had for the first part of our visit. I believe that the same humidity which makes the heat so much more oppressive here also makes the cold feel a lot colder. It’s nice though, actually, as I didn’t end up packing the khakis and jeans and thin sweaters for naught, and Keaton can get into a whole other alternate wardrobe of cute for showing off. Not only Keaton, as Christmas giving found me the new owner of a new haute couture sportcoat/blazer thing (pinstripes and all). I haven’t got to wear it quite yet, but am looking forward to it once we get back to the lower temps of Northern California.

Been a whirlwind couple of days here on the vacation tour. Orlando and back, several hours in the car, and crammed-in visits here, there, and everywhere. As is standard fare for the last few days of our jaunts here, we’ve once again booked up a busy schedule before our early morning Monday departure. We did, although, have some time today to sit outside and enjoy the weather at a natural springs north of Orlando. I took Keaton down her first playground slide, and she got to see otters and herons and fishies. Speaking of Keaton, she’s recovered nicely from whatever she had, but we still haven’t seen the telltale rash/breakout that’s associated with roseola – so who knows if that’s what it was or not. I’m just happy her fevers have passed and she’s feeling better again.

Thanks for all the comments lately friends – makes it easier to keep writing. Until tomorrow, take care.