Category: general

Where I put something when I’m too lazy to categorize it.

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a place where I is

Don't abide it.Monday night.

I’m falling asleep in my head.

You know the feeling?  Somewhere in the back of my brain, I’m already asleep.  There’s a dense, heavy rock in my skull, and it’s taking up valuable neural space I could be using to produce real-time cogent thought.  Except, I can’t; because of that sleepy rock taking up all the room.  Even if I shake my head around the rock won’t go away.  I know this means I should just give up on the evening and hit the sack; but I’m stubborn and American and, I don’t know if you heard, but we do what we want.  What?

I think I’ll go out to the woods somewhere and find a place where no one is. Through the grip of my hands and the ache of my back I’ll turn that place from a place where no one is into a place where I is. I’ll maybe dig a hole in the ground, reinforce it, and live like a hobbit. With little windows in the side of my mound-home that let in the sunlight and keep out the rain. It would smell like earth and woodsmoke inside. Or I could build a house on a platform up a tree, perched above the wilderness. There’d be a beautiful evening vista, maybe mountains and a river. It would be full of breezes and fresh air and would stand strong against the winter storms. I could take my family there; maybe to a cabin built hard against a lake, with a water wheel. We could live inside and sleep bundled up in patchwork quilts Sharaun makes out of scraps of last year’s workclothes. We could eat fresh fish and maybe wild turkey. Burn candles. Sit on the porch in rocking chairs.

Is this so much to ask?

As a young teenager, I had really bad acne.  For about two years, all through 7th and 8th grades of junior highschool, I suffered.  No, not suffered like so many around the world starving or bearing the brunt of social injustice… but the teenage kind of “suffering” caused by… pimples.  It was bad enough that even my best buddy Kyle would sometimes give me crap about my face, since he was blessed, at that age, with smooth unmarred skin.  On the whole, I didn’t let the acne bother me too much… I think I was young enough that it wasn’t the end of my social universe.  But I did hate it.  I hated it.

Sometime during the apex of my affliction, one of those lifelong kind of memories was burned into my brain:  I was laying on the couch in the living room one evening; my folks were watching TV while I rested, and obviously thought I’d fallen asleep. But, as I lay there, awake with eyes closed, I listened-in on their conversation about their sleeping child.  “His acne is really bad,” lamented my Mom.”  “Yes, it is,” said Dad.  Mom continued, “I remember how bad it was when I was his age; it must really be hard for him… I just wish it would clear up.”

The conversation continued, but the sheer pity expressed in my Mom’s voice flat-out sunk my heart.  My parents were talking about me like some terminally ill patient.  Condemned to be glimpsed through my wretched veil, apparently, they mourned for me.  Talk about a terrible conversation for a kid to hear; a real self-esteem torpedo.  I don’ t think I’ll ever forget overhearing that conversation.  Hurting themselves, feeling the hurt I had myself, I heard my folks’ personal suffering for their child’s condition.  And that, people, is what parenting is all about.

I didn’t write well, that rock of sleep is dominating… I know this could be better.  I can’t find the phrases.  Goodnight.

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a five-by-five weekend

It's gonna be fine right?Sunday afternoon and I just put Keaton down for her nap.

Sharaun’s also asleep and so I’ve got the place to myself. I put George Harrison’s All Things Must Pass on the iPod and am currently enjoying the sound of the massive triple-album opus. If you know nothing about this album, I implore you to seek it out. Put simply: It may be the best solo album any ex-Beatle has ever made.

It was a good weekend; the kind I’ll find myself replaying in the highlight-reel in my head to break the monotony of the work week. Come Wednesday, our Saturday morning family bike ride to the park for a picnic lunch will have passed into legend. By Thursday, the beautiful weather we had for church on Sunday morning will have joined it. By 2019, provided I make it, they’ll both have joined the blurred apocrypha that will be these years. Yeah, a family-tight weekend; makes me appreciate what I have; and that’s good because, on occasion, I’ve been known to forget…

Saturday my brother called me from his home in southern Washington. “Hey lil’ bro,” I answered, “Whatca doin’?” “Not much,” came the reply, “I just went over to REI and went a little crazy; bought myself a backpack.” “Yeah?,” I asked, curious. “Yup. I think I want to try and take up hiking.” “Wow,” I said, “That sounds awesome. One of the better passtimes I ever got into myself.” He then mentioned that he was planning on taking a week off work in September, around the time of his birthday, and was considering a multi-day outing in the Columbia River Gorge. “What are you doing in late September,” he asked. “I’m flying to Oregon to go backpacking in the Columbia River Gorge,” I answered, “How about you?”

And so was planted the seed of the three-day, thirty mile loop that we’ve pretty much settled on. With about half of the miles on the locally famous Eagle Creek Trail and half on the globally famous Pacific Crest Trail, the loop goes through some of the most gorgeous waterfall country Northern Oregon has to offer. I’m excited; my bro is excited; we’re both looking forward to it. So that helped make Saturday enjoyable. A dinner with friends where the kids were allowed to run free-range wild worked to further the goodness.

And Sunday evening tied a bow on the whole weekend. After a nice meal up at the church building, Keaton and I had to drive home separate from Sharaun (who had to be there early for a meeting). On the ride home, the free limited-time XM that came with the new car was really on a roll and the weather was perfect. In a fit of spontaneaity, I turned the car up into the foothills close to where we live. Up to the crest of one of the more prominent ones we went. Once we reached a good vantage point, I pulled the car into the shoulder, flicked on the emergency flashers, and popped the tailgate so we could climb into the back and watch the sun set.

Fantastic. Goodnight internet.

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my applesauce

Who got da Motts?Hey there internet, what’s brewin’ with you?  Me, who knows? … who could ever know…

If you guys picked up page A1 of a newspaper this morning… you’re probably over fifty.  If you instead read an aggregate of socially-upvoted AP headlines via an RSS reader on your iPhone, you likely came across a story that broke last yesterday: the Cash for Clunkers program might be busted; flat broke.  That’s right… a week into the program and the rumor is that the Fed is going to pull the plug because they’re afraid the backlog of already-done deals might burn through the remaining funds and then some.

Personally, I agree with some of the bloggers (and others who are in the know) who think this may just be a tactic to secure continued funding for the program.  Perhaps a legitimate tactic, in that the program may really be going like gangbusters, but a well-placed PR type of tactic to show 1) how well the program is actually stimulating the industry and 2) make a plea for additional money and facilitate additional stimulus – hey, who doesn’t like more stimulus?

Seems we did our part; thanks for the stimulus, Americans.

Hey let’s switch gears…

Remember a while back when Michael Jackson died?  Oh, what’s that?  You can’t not remember because the story still dominates the news, even though there are tons of other real newsworthy stories we could be discussing?  Well, either way…. Michael Jackson did die a while back now.  And, when that happened, the radio stations went MJ crazy.  Remember now?  Yup, they played Jackson’s stuff (which, by the way, was pretty dang brilliant pre-’87) wall-to-wall.  Michael was on every station, filling every minute of every hour.  No, I’m not writing to bag on this adoration – I think it was fairly appropriate given the man’s status.  I’m writing to tell a story that all the MJ hooplah made possible.

See, during the MJ marathon, Keaton became quite familiarized with the King of Pop’s better numbers.  I mean, who wasn’t struck by a bit of nostalgia and didn’t play some of their own favorites in memorial?  Me, I rocked some of the better numbers that I think he ever did for a day or so, just to kinda fit in with the nation or something.  Sharaun, too, got her dosage via her radio habit.  So, through our couple Jackson-drenched days, Keaton learned his stuff fast.  In fact, during those days it was not uncommon to hear her singing snatches like, “… ♫ the pain is thunder! ♫ …” or “♫ pretty young thing ♫ …”  It’s amazing how fast kids can pick up on things when they’re indoctrinated for hours a day, y’know?

Anyway, Keaton’s quickly established her favorite song as Jackson’s “Wanna Be Startin’ Something,” a track written in 1978 and intended for inclusion on 1979’s Off the Wall album but instead released on 1982’s seminal Thriller.  She was drawn to the gibberish style ending, where Jackson repeats a nonsense phrase that I’ve always sung as something close to “Mama-say, mama-saw, m-ma-coo-saw.”  (Wikipedia says I’m not far off from what he’s actually saying, either.)  Anyway, what Keaton hears and sings is different in one key way.

In what I deem one of the cutest three-year-old misheard lyrics ever, she sings “Mama-say, mama-saw, my applesauce.”  I absolutely love this; what a brilliant interpretation from within the context of a three-year old mind.  I mean, surely he’s saying “applesauce” right, no other word in the three-year-old vocabulary sounds anything like that…

Well, not only did Keaton have her own interpretation, she apparently tied that interpreted phrase to the artist singing the song.  In other words, she thinks Michael Jackson’s name is Mamasaymamasawmyapplesauce.  Yup, all one word like that… that’s his name.  To the point where when she hears any track that’s a Jackson track, she says, “Hey Mom!  It’s Mamasaymamasawmyapplesauce!”

At some point, Sharaun must have told Keaton that Michael Jackson passed away.  Those were her words, I’m certain.  Probably something like, “Did you know the singer of this song passed away?”  Well, maybe something like that… but one thing’s for sure: Keaton remembered that the guy who sings mamasaymamasawmyapplesauce “passed away.”  It’s not likely she even knows what “passed away” is, but it sure is hilarious to hear her say, whenever a Jackson track comes on the radio, “Hey Mom… did Mamasaymamasawmyapplesauce really pass away, or are you just joking?!”

Yes babe, Mamasaymamasawmyapplesauce really did pass away…

Goodnight internet.

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surgery

This I'm OK losing...Halfway through another week.  At work, we refer to this as “workweek thirty-one.”  Not sure about you guys, but all I can think about when I see that number is the fact that, somehow, we’ve made it more than halfway through the year of Our Lord two-thousand and nine.  Think about that; more than halfway.  It boggles.

Today I had a small cyst removed from my left leg.  I’ve had this thing since high school (when it was much smaller, about the size of a BB),  but in the last five years it’s grown a little too large for my comfort.  So, after talking to one reluctant surgeon (why remove it if it’s not causing me pain or suffering?) I found one who was willing (you wanna get cut?, OK) and went in today for the super-fast super-easy procedure.  The only thing is, with me, anything involving my own blood or “fleshwork” is always a trial.  Why?  Because, as manly as I consider myself to be… when I’m personally involved in the gore, it’s almost a sure bet I’m going to want to faint.

No joke.  It’s happened almost as often as I’ve been exposed to personal carnage, however controlled the environment.  It happened when I had an ingrown toenail cut out as a teenager; they had to go old-school that time and break out the smelling salts to bring me back out of the ether.  It happened when I split my head open diving into a too-shallow springs.  It even happens, to a much lesser degree, anytime I have to give blood (I can feel the symptoms coming on, but they never fully manifest).  Here’s how it goes down: First, I begin feel a bit “off,” disconnected.  Next, I begin sweating; just a sheen of perspiration to start but soon enough turning into full torrents of gym-worthy sweat.  Finally, I can actually feel the blood draining from my head and face – to the point where I eventually realize: “Uh-oh, this ain’t gonna end good unless I lie down fast.”

Anyway, I’m familiar enough with my reaction in these situations that I now warn the doctors in advance that I’m a lightweight.  Universally, they seem to appreciate the heads-up.  Today, the doc smiled and said, “Yeah, a typical man.  Males have a much harder time with it than do women, for whatever reason.”  Humph.

In the end though, I bravely maintained consciousness (mostly by choosing to not even watch the procedure, lest I see any messiness and completely lose it).  And, after about fifteen minutes of sweating and metered breathing while I felt my skin being tugged and heard tissue being snipped with scissors – it was all over.  I had to recline fully on the little doctor’s table and concentrate on not passing out.  I tried singing a song in my head to take my mind (and ears) of the hacking and snipping that was going on in my filleted leg.

OK, so I’m a wimp.  I just can’t handle it.  Goodnight.

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obama bought us a car

Bank error in our favor!Well guys, Friday was the day.  What day?  Why, the day that the Fed’s “Cash for Clunkers” auto-industry stimulus went into effect, of course.

If you’ve been reading my posts for the past few months, you know that Sharaun and I have been planning to take advantage of this incentive by way of scrapping the dilapidated Ford in exchange for a new car and the government’s $4,500.  The lead-up to the plan was somewhat frustrating, but, we successfully did our CARS deal on day-one this past Friday.  That’s right, we finally got a new vehicle.

The Ford is gone; and I mean gone.  Out of my head and out of our lives.  I left it sitting in front of the dealership right where I drove it up.  Gave the guy the guys and the fob and a quick warning that only one of the three doors worked so he’d have to climb in over the back seat to move the thing.  He looked at me as if I was joking, to which I said, simply, “Hey, it’s cash for clunkers, remember?”  And our clunker is now awaiting its wrecking-yard fate… after nine years of service and hundreds of thousands of miles.  I did give the old Ford a brief moment of thought whilst driving to ditch her, thanked her for her time with us.  After that though, not a look back.

In the end, for those who may be curious, the government’s plan was dead-easy to use.  We came prepared with everything the CARS website says you should bring: a year’s worth of proof of registration, a year’s worth of proof of insurance, and a clean title for the vehicle.  I knew our vehicle qualified, and I had long ago whittled down the list of prospective new vehicles which would qualify us for the maximum rebate amount ($4,500).

We sat down, signed one piece of  official NHTSA paperwork certifying our Ford qualified, and then did an optional CARS survey which was designed to determine if the program actually incentivized us to buy a new vehicle.  After that it was car buying as usual, with the trade paperwork showing a $4,500 value for our “trade in.”  Combined with the GM “friends and family” discount a buddy was so kind to enable us with, the year-end tax claim on the sales tax we paid, and GM’s 0% APR for the term of the loan – I don’t think we could have done better.

Thanks for our new ride, taxpayers.

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portland was good to me tonight…

Waiting is death.It’s 1am and a man shuffles unsure down an empty city street.

Staring into the sterile glow of his phone, trying to reckon his direction from where he is, he resorts to asking a scruffy looking fellow for help. Eventually this man, still dressed for success in his workplace clothes, ambles aboard a westbound train (the last one of the night, the lines are all shutting down) and settles into a seat. He pulls his knees in on himself, a purposed outward show of youth through flexibility, and puts the new Mew album on his iPod for the ride home.

His head lolls as the train clucks and clicks and clacks down the track… and he thinks to himself, “Portland was good to me tonight… Portland was good to me tonight.”

Well folks, as you read this, the details of the federal government’s auto industry stimulus package, called CARS, are set to be communicated to dealerships tomorrow. As you may know, Sharaun and I have been awaiting this day – as we’re ready to take advantage of the legislation by dumping our old Ford in favor of a new ride. You can read more about how we’re personally planning to use the program in my original entry, and then about my experience earlier this month talking to our local dealers about it in this entry.

Back a couple weeks ago, most dealers were either in a fog about the plan (not entirely unexpected, as they had no hard details from the Fed) or were completely unaware of it. At each dealer I visited, I was the most knowledgeable about the plan, and had to speak carefully to avoid sounding smarmy and patronizing when explaining it to them. After a few days of fruitless negotiations, however, I realized that I was just chomping too hard at the bit – and that only patience would resolve my issues. Put simply: I would have to wait for the July 24 date on which the government promised to send the program’s logistics to dealerships. So, I hunkered down and watched the lot inventories online in hopes that the vehicles we are after stuck around.

Then, on Monday evening, a shimmer: The local Ford dealership called me while I was in Oregon to relay good news. They’d got “all the details” on the Cash For Clunkers program “ahead of other dealerships” and were “doing the deals now.” In fact, they said, they’d already done nine, count ‘em, nine, deals under the program. Impressive, I said… and after some chit-chat, I told them I’d give them a ring when I was back in town. Unfortunately for Ford, Sharaun and I have pretty much decided on a non-Ford vehicle. However, I was able to use that Ford cold-call as a nice datapoint with the other dealers. I made the calls, and here’s what I learned…

I called the GMC place and they are by-the-book. No deals until the 24th, said the sales manager. Not until they’d got the communication from the Fed explaining what they have to do in order to make a deal comply with the legislation. In fact, he went as far as to say that, even when the “magical” details are received on the 24th, that it may take time for the dealer to get the mechanics of the system implemented. In my mind, this is the most logical dealer position, and makes the most rational sense.

I called the Chevy place and they landed somewhere between Ford’s salesmanship and GMC’s transparency, saying that they were indeed doing C4C deals now, but that they were doing them “outside” the governments program. They explained this as basically giving buyers trade-in cash equal to what they would qualify for under C4C (using the governments qualifying criteria site) and then hanging onto the trade-ins to submit for the federal program when they got the details. I’m certain that’s what Ford is doing too, although I think they are misrepresenting themselves as having “insider info” and thus a leg-up on their competition.

Right now it’s down to a battle between the Chevy place and the GMC place. At this point, I’m really hoping that we can make a deal this weekend. I’m hoping that the C4C details are easy enough that the dealers can make deals on them ASAP. If that’s the case, then, for us, it’s the perfect storm of car-buying conditions: The C4C rebate, Obama’s new-car stimulus sales-tax writeoff, GM’s 0% APR, and the “friends and family” employee pricing hookup from a Godsend GM-employed friend. So, this weekend is the prime weekend… this weekend is where I’ve reset my expectations around… you think it’s gonna work?

Wish us luck.

It’s 1am and a man shuffles unsure down an empty city street. Staring into the sterile glow of his phone, trying to reckon his direction from where he is, he resorts to asking a scruffy looking fellow for help. Eventually this man, still dressed for success in his workplace clothes, ambles aboard a westbound train (the last one of the night, the lines are all shutting down) and settles into a seat. He pulls his knees in on himself, feeling young and carefree, and puts the new Mew album on his iPod for the ride home. His head lolls as the train clucks and clicks and clacks down the track… and thinks to himself, “Portland was good to me tonight… Portland was good to me tonight.”
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free pants

Money!What a crappy Monday.

I picked up the bug or whatever it was that Sharaun was kicking around on Friday.  While not debilitating by a long-shot, it’s certainly annoying.  Seemingly centered in my sinuses and making my head throb and ache and dizzy.  Anyway, it’s not got me down and out… just more like down.  Boo.

I’ma tell a story now.  It’s kinda good.  You should read it.

Sharaun had to teach a class at our church’s Sunday morning “second service” this weekend, which left Keaton and I alone while she stayed at the building. Since she’d secured a ride home, we took off with designs on a lunch together at home after a brief stopover at the local big-box store to get some $15 jeans and shorts for me. With the recent weight loss, nothing I own fits to my satisfaction anymore, and the el-cheapo duds that the warehouse stores sell for pennies are just right to fill out the empty closet and drawers.

While rooting through the tableful of denim I spotted a pair that looked good and advertised my current dimensions. I picked them up and unfurled the length of them so I could see how long they were (my #1 gripe about mens jeans is that they are too long and look all bell-bottomy at the end; call my unfashionable but I actually prefer a somewhat tapered leg that doesn’t bunch up in balloons of fabric around my ankles). As I let them hang, I heard another customer say to me, “Woah, you dropped something there.” And, looking down, sure enough, at my feet was a sprinkling of bills… cash… money… dosh.

Befuddled, I looked at the man who’d alerted me to the greens. I looked back to the jeans. I looked to my own pocket, where I knew my cash was safe and secure inside my wallet. I looked around. Finally I replied, somewhat confused, “I… I think that came out of these jeans…” “No way,” the other guy responded. His daughter then piped up, “Oh yeah,” she said, pointing at the jeans still dangling from my hands, “Look!” And there, peeking from the right front pocket, was more cash.

Flabbergasted, I simply grabbed the money out of the pocket as the other guy bent down and collected the spilt cash on the ground. We laid it all out atop the pile of jeans on the table and did a quick count: a little more than sixty dollars. I must have made some comment about not knowing what to do with it, because the guy replied, “There’s not much you can do; it’s fair if you take it, they’ll never find who it belonged to.” Not needing a ton of convincing to begin with, I agreed. In return for him spotting the stuff, I offered to split the findings – he declined, but, when pressed to take at least a third or something, acquiesced and allowed me to give his daughter five bucks.

So, I left the store sixty dollars up from when I walked in. Pretty crazy.

Goodnight.