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to pork or not to pork


It’s Tuesday night and I hope you’ve got your readin’ specs handy.

I didn’t even want to finish writing today’s entry, wanted to just scrap it. But I put so much time into it tonight, I couldn’t bring myself to trash it. I think I just ended up getting run over by the snowball it became, and ended up uninterested. It started off as serious, turned into comedy, ended up introspective – and overall comes off as a jumbled mishmash. I read it a hundred times, rewrote it half that many, and reread it half that again. All that and it’s not even that good.

To make it all worse, something about this particular entry pissed off WordPress and made it glitchy. It started doing incomplete “save and continues,” which would set me back everything I’d just written and attempted to save. At first I thought it was a cache fluke, but it happened over and over. I finally resorted to writing this whole damn thing in EditPad and pasting it into the WordPress window at the end. While it’ll never be as “good” as I want it to, here ’tis.

Oh, and for the folks who could care less about my political views, I’ve tried to highlight what I consider to be the “funny” portions of the text. Now you can skip right to them and gloss over the other crap. Also, if you really don’t care about it at all, you can hop directly to the non-politics denouement by clicking here. Sigh… so much fanfare for so little substance… it’s sad. Let’s do this.

In one of US Senator Barack Obama’s latest podcast, he expresses his displeasure about the “padding” riding on the new Homeland Security Appropriations Bill. The bill provides, among other things (some of them noble), additional funding to certain locations in the US which may be at an extra risk of terrorist attack. As part of the decision process for who gets what monies, the text gives some guidance on how to tell which sites are “risk sites:”

In prioritizing among the applications … for such funds, the Secretary shall consider the relative threat, vulnerability, and consequences faced by an eligible metropolitan region … from a terrorist attack, including consideration of:

  • Whether there has been a prior terrorist attack in the region
  • Whether any part of the region has ever had a higher threat level under the Homeland Security Advisory System than the threat level for the United States as a whole
  • The degree of threat, vulnerability, and consequence to the region related to critical infrastructure or key assets
  • Whether the eligible region is located is at or near an international border
  • Whether the eligible region has a coastline bordering ocean or international waters

Sounds reasonable. If you’ve got some critical site in your area that, because of one of the reasons above, qualifies as “at risk” for a terrorists attack, you can get some federal dough to put to use stepping up protection of said site.

Obama’s problem with the bill, however, is that some of the “risk sites” seem sorta fishy. Sites that don’t quite seem to fit the bill of “national assets;” things like Wal Marts and “bourbon festivals.” If these “fluff” sites are indeed marked for the appropriation of funds, as Mr. Obama contends, I will join him in calling foul. How did Obama get this data, though? You won’t find any reference to specific sites which were allotted funding in the text of the bill – nor in the committee reports. Just what is Obama on about? I set out to try and research his porky misgivings.

Now, because I wanted to do this entry the most justice I could imagine, I consulted an “in” friend of mine with regard to the whole bill/appropriations/legislation part of it. Being a simple layperson, I often find it hard to find all the source information I want when trying to reason about politics. That makes it more difficult for me to state a solid opinion, as I often doubt even the sturdiest seeming “facts” when they come from potentially agenda-motivated sources. (Actually, this paragraph morphed into an entirely separate thought which I felt was strong enough to carry its own weight – so I tacked it onto the bottom of this entry as an “aside.” You can read it here.)

Anyway, that’s why I wanted to do some research on the whole “Obama’s critical of the HSD Appropriations bill” thing. So I shared my thoughts with my politico friend and both of us did some fact-tracking on the HSD-pork thing. She managed to locate this very interesting report on the Department of Homeland Security’s creation of a “national asset database.” The National Asset Database is a running list of places/gatherings/events in US states which are supposedly at a greater risk for terrorist attack than normal places. After browsing the report, it’s obvious that it’s most certainly the source of Obama’s criticism of the HSD Appropriations bill. In it, the HSD Inspector General himself found and listed some “questionable” risk-sites.

This report is surely what Obama’s on about.

Below I’ve pasted in tables taken directly from the HSD Inspector General’s report which list the “questionable” national assets (remember, “national assets” are eligible for federal funding to reduce terrorist threat as part of the appropriations bill):

pork1.jpg
pork2.jpg

Ladies and gentlemen, I submit that not a single Al Qaeda terrorist with any hopes of earning the respect of his terrorist buds or his forty virgins is going to give it all for Jihad by taking out Nix’s Check Cashing. Wanna really stick it to the Americans? Hit them in their dearest national interests? If you’re serious about terrorism, you’ll not pass up the opportunity to ricin the Mule Day Parade in the bustling metropolis that is the 3,575 person community of Bishop, CA. Nor will you let the beach at end of [a] street go un-dirty-bombed any longer. Yes, terrorists, these are truly our most treasured institutions and are, in fact, representative of America’s greatness. Just ask Old McDonald of Old McDonald’s Petting Zoo, he’ll tell you.

But c’mon folks… do we really want our anti-terrorism tax dollars going to make sure that the drunk shirtless crowd at the Crossburn County Fair doesn’t have to fear pipe bombs during the free admission four-surviving-members-of-Alabama show?

In reality, it turns out that not every “asset” in the database is really considered an “asset” at all – and the Department of Homeland Security is acknowledging as much with the report. Seems the HSD moved from a population-based funding model to one where it asked the states to come up with their own “asset” lists. These lists were then combined to create the national asset database – without editing. That is, the onus was on each state to provide a list of sites it deemed at-risk, and each state did so presumably using its own criteria. According to my sources, the feds (in this case HSD) know very well that there are some “fluff” assets in the database. In fact, there’s apparently a weighted system assigning “national” import to all the assets at the HSD level (unfortunately, I have no hard source here). It’s this weighting of state-submitted assets that is supposed to ensure that funding doesn’t go to inappropriate places. Meaning, in the weighted system, one Statue of Liberty may be worth 1,000 petting zoos, and it would therefore be prioritized first for funding.

In the end, however, the federal money doled out to the states is still distributed within the state at only the state’s discretion. The state gets money, the state divvies that money how it sees fit – the idea being that the state knows better the value of its assets to potential terrorists and will do right by its allotment. I have to wonder, however, if a state is unscrupulous enough to submit its check cashing and oil change shops to the fed as risk-assets, how ethically they’ll distribute the funds at the state level. I’m sure the federal government would say that state misuse of federal funds is a state problem, not a federal one. Maybe that’s true, but certainly unethical state requests for federal monies is a federal problem, or at least a shared state/fed issue, right?

Bottom line is, while the HSD Progress in Developing the National Asset Database report does show that some states are indeed submitting “fluff” at-risk locations in a bid for federal funding, that doesn’t necessarily mean those sites will actually end up with funding. Furthermore, if they do receive federal monies, the amounts will most certainly not be flatly proportional to more “realistic” national assets like Boston harbor or the White House. This is somewhat comforting, but does not entirely invalidate senator Obama’s issues with the appropriations as a whole. After all the research, I’d call Obama’s criticism somewhat misguided. Yes, some states are submitting requests for money that would amount to “pork,” but just because they request it doesn’t mean they’ll get it – and that certainly does not undo the entire Appropriations bill, no justify calling it “pork” on the whole. I can see where Sen. Obama is coming from, though.

I suppose the best a taxpayer can hope for is that the government keeps pork spending to a minimum, as it is likely a pipe dream to hope for a Utopian spending situation where no one pads their bottom lines. While thinking this over out loud today, my dear politico friend pointed me to a resource I never knew existed: The Citizens Against Government Waste’s Pig Book. A catalog of pork spending, it lists some of the more glaring pork-barrel projects receiving federal funding. For the fiscal year 2005, for instance, the CAGW Pig Book identified 27.3 billion dollars as “pork.” Comparing this to the national budget, one can arrive at the rough conclusion that pork payouts account for about ~3% of the government’s discretionary spending (based on 2005). Going back to my original statement that one can at best hope for minimized governmental pork-barreling, I’d say this is probably a live-able amount. I don’t have to like it, and it saddens me to know we have unethical folks in positions of power who are “robbing” their own citizens/constituents, I guess it’s relatively small comparatively.

Whew, I think that wraps up the whole Obama/HSD/evil-government thing. Enough dreck for you? Yeah… I thought so. I promise not to get fevered like that for a while, but sometimes the writing takes off and I have to let it go. Turns out I’m about a week late to this story anyway… but better late than never, right?

An aside:

This is why I’m often loth to take black and white sides on political issues. This fear of not being educated enough, or being fooled by fake facts. This general mistrust of politicians and things they speak as gospel makes it hard for me to draw a line for myself on issues. I’m always wondering, “What if that’s not true,” and, “Maybe if I just do more research, my mind would change.” Thing is, I have something of a self-doubt problem when it comes to politics. In some strange way I think of myself as too far removed from the reality of it to properly understand it, and that drives me to be almost too accepting of opposing viewpoints. I do, however, have a level of education or comfort that I use to form an opinion. Once I’ve reached that level, I’m comfortable allying myself with a cause or anti-cause, as the case may be. I think this is not that uncommon of an issue with today’s youth and politics. I’ve written about it before, but it’s my opinion that that built-in doubt is a real hindrance to getting the new generation involved in government.

I’m not alone either, and there’s even data to backup my governmental mistrust. In a 1996 study by The Washington Post, Harvard University and the Kaiser Family Foundation (which was supplemented by two focus groups, interviews and conversations with Americans around the country, as well as with political scientists and other experts), it was reported that:

In 1964, three in four Americans trusted the federal government all or most of the time, a view shared by one in four persons today…

This collapse of trust in human nature has fueled the erosion of trust in government and virtually every other institution, the survey found. Mistrustful Americans repeatedly expressed far less confidence in the federal government, the military, the Supreme Court, Congress and the Clinton administration than the dwindling numbers of Americans who were more upbeat about human nature.

Government also suffers from a lack of public confidence because of other national discontents brought about by the perceived failure of government to deal with the country’s biggest problems, the survey found. Fear of crime, economic insecurity and pessimism about the lives of future generations all have separately added to the belief that government either is making things worse or is incapable of making them better.

Interesting, eh? Seems we’ve become a nation of the dubious; a wary, untrusting bunch who think everyone’s a potential enemy. While I don’t personally feel a greater sense of mistrust for humanity as a whole (on the contrary, I have a firm belief that people are, by nature, “good”), my feelings do align to this model for the most part when it comes to politicians. I don’t flat-out mistrust everyone in government, but I do feel the need to fact-check them moreso than, say, a stranger relating something to me on a train. I just do. You can read the whole six article series I grabbed the above survey info from here.

And now we’re done with this.


If you guys know Sharaun at all, you know she’s about the luckiest person in the world when she puts her mind to it. Seems she heard on the radio she could win tickets to a concert by being a certain caller. What’s more, by winning the concert tickets she’d be eligible to win a new Ford Mustang in an on-stage drawing at the show itself. It was yesterday at lunch she told me she was going to win tickets. Today at 3pm she called me to tell me she’d won them. I’m half believing she’ll actually win the dang Mustang at this point… I need to get that girl pickin’ lottery numbers, stat.

In closing: For a while now, I’ve been noticing that I’ve begun to mark the passage of days by my writing here on sounds familiar. Sounds obsessive, I know, but it’s true. The whole blogging process has become so ingrained as habit into my brain that I think of days as entries. Monday was the Keaton video, last week was stem cells, sports, and Halloween. When I think back on the week, I think first of what I wrote about. On the way home from work I think about what I’m going to write that night; on the way into work I think about what someone may read that morning. This thing has become nothing short of an obsession.

Thanks for seeing this one through with me, folks. Goodnight.

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wasps in the grass


Slow night, spent most of my time and energy making a new short film. Starring Keaton, this one showcases her relatively newfound vocal talents. Go ahead and give it a good watchin’, you know you want to. (Sharaun liked this one so much she urged me to submit it to YouTube, so I could maybe… win money or something…)

Keeping in somewhat of a theme I’ve got going lately, I stumbled on this middle east related link today: an illustrated/annotated “who hates who” matrix of middle east countries/affiliations and other world powers. Good for quick reference when dealing with stories about the incredibly complex and history-rooted relationships over there.

I mentioned yesterday that I mowed the lawn this past weekend, and that was true. What I left out were the gory details of the event. I mowed the lawn at 1pm in the afternoon, at that time wunderground.com said the temperature in Whereilive, CA was 102°. That’s hot. About halfway through the job I took off my shirt in an attempt to cool down (only in the backyard, I’ve not become comfortable enough with my hairy back to go shirtless out front yet). Any outside laborer or nomadic desert dweller will tell you that, in the obscene heat and burning sun, clothes are your friend – and taking them off only makes things worse. But, I didn’t care. Pushing that mower around, baking and sweating, my core temperature must’ve been up there. By the time I was done, I was red-cheeked and covered in sweat. Coming inside I felt like a hot coal, my insides radiating heat, only time and a cool shower able to help my finally get comfortable. Yeah, the sacrifices I make for that lawn…

By the way, did you know that wasps like to hide in long, cool grass? And, furthermore, mowing over them sends them up in angry clouds by the hundreds? As if the heat wasn’t enough, I was fleeing wasps the whole time.

That’s it for today, until tomorrow my friends. Love ya.

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good for the goose


8:30pm Sunday and I just put Keaton down while Sharaun headed to Wal Mart. On a lark, I looked up “homemade brownie recipes” online, and discovered we had all the makings for a “from scratch” fudge-brownie recipe. So, not only did I change the baby and put her down, I’ve got some baking in the oven as well. After that’s done, I think I’ll scrapbook, darn some socks, and work on my needlepoint. (The joke is me doing many womanly things, if it missed you). Was a good weekend, continuing my spurt of personal productivity. I jigsaw’d the traced wolf-shaped cutouts for this years Halloween prop, mowed the lawn despite baking in the 100°+ heat, and finished putting up the last of the garage organizing leftovers from last weekend. Also managed to mix in a good bit of leisure, playing (and losing) in a pool tournament at a friend’s party, eating some awesome home-cooked Indian food at a Friday dinner with friends, and topping it all off with a swim and BBQ Sunday afternoon. Damn, we truly live a rough life…

Sorry for the long “show and tell” intro, I hate when I do that.

Although this article is over a half a year stale, I read it for the first time last week. It’s the transcript of a phone interview with Noam Chomsky about the United States and its current political situation, but the interviewer touches on other international & domestic issues as well. I found Mr. Chomsky’s comments on the war in Iraq really interesting:

…the first thing that should be done in Iraq is for us to be serious about what’s going on. There is almost no serious discussion, I’m sorry to say, across the spectrum, of the question of withdrawal. The reason for that is that we are under a rigid doctrine in the West, a religious fanaticism, that says we must believe that the United States would have invaded Iraq even if its main product was lettuce and pickles, and the oil resources of the world were in Central Africa. Anyone who doesn’t believe that is condemned as a conspiracy theorist, a Marxist, a madman, or something. Well, you know, if you have three gray cells functioning, you know that that’s perfect nonsense. The U.S. invaded Iraq because it has enormous oil resources, mostly untapped, and it’s right in the heart of the world’s energy system. Which means that if the U.S. manages to control Iraq, it extends enormously its strategic power…

Now, any discussion of withdrawal from Iraq has to at least enter the real world, meaning, at least consider these issues. …We’re not allowed to concede that our leaders have rational imperial interests. We have to assume that they’re good-hearted and bumbling. But they’re not. They’re perfectly sensible. They can understand what anybody else can understand. So the first step in talk about withdrawal is: consider the actual situation, not some dream situation, where Bush is pursuing a vision of democracy or something. If we can enter the real world we can begin to talk about it. And yes, I think there should be withdrawal, but we have to talk about it in the real world and know what the White House is thinking. They’re not willing to live in a dream world.

I wonder if any politician/leader could succeed by speaking as simply and honestly as Chomsky describes above. Instead of talking about “freedom and democracy,” just be straight-up honest with the people and let them know we’re making a strategic and calculated imperialistic gesture for the sake of extending the nation’s power and influence. It would never work, right? But… the funny thing is, when it comes to why we went to Iraq, I don’t think most people “buy” it anyway. Not the “smart” Americans; not the “dumb” Americans. The “dumb” folks are happy we’re over there “kicking some ‘cameljockey’ ass and flexing American muscle,” and think good ol’ boy Bush is secretly in league with them and their ignorant close-minded worldview. The “smart” folks have long since seen proof after proof that the country was mislead into war, and can read through the “threat level Orange” FUD rhetoric anyway.

So, who’s being fooled? Maybe it’s just easier, or more more “civil,” to talk about it in a roundabout language of positivity than to call it by its true colors. Seems somehow less glaringly bad if you can just “dress it up” a bit and not acknowledge the uglier reality.

OK, I’m done there.

In closing, it looks like my brother and I missed robot clones by about twenty years. We should have patented the idea.

Lastly, I uploaded four measly (but good) pictures to Keaton’s gallery, go check ’em out. Goodnight.

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grease up your keyboards


Friday at last! Hallelujah!!

I honestly don’t have much today: an entire paragraph built around one funny thought, some other junk here and here, and two paragraphs built around links. Not much original, I fear. We’ll try to make the best of it though, eh?

Man, stem cells are good for blog comments, huh? I should write about divisive poll-splitting issues all the time. Next week I’m going to write about my opinions on using affirmative action to select condemned pregnant lesbian white women prisoners (with committed illegal immigrant christian life partners) for first an abortion and then subsequent death penalty. Yeah, that should get the comments flowing. Grease up your keyboards, you opinionated mofos… I love to hear from ya.

I know it was BoingBoingized yesterday, but it’s worth posting in my ongoing coverage of the I/L/H (my new shorthand for Israel/Lebanon/Hezbollah) conflict. Some people out there are actually rooting for escalating violence in the Middle East. I imagine these folks sitting in front of CNN cheering on the Israeli rockets with big foam-finger #1 things on their left hand and a bible opened to Revelation in their right. The more natural disasters, stem cell research, rock and roll music, and Middle East violence – the better. C’mon Lord, you’re really planning on taking these idiots?

Way to go Thom Yorke! Thom’s ‘headless solo debut crowned at #2 on its initial Billboard splash, being just barely edged out by some new Now! compilation of greatest hits. When I used to manage a record store in the mall, we sold tons of those Now! albums – people eat it up. Yeah, people love hits. Hits and crappy reality TV talent shows. Anyway, Coolfer had this to say about Thom’s good works:

Yorke’s first solo album, Eraser, is less commercial than would be a Radiohead release, and it was released by XL Recordings (distributed by Warner Music Group’s ADA). So we have a less-than-totally commercial album released by an indie, and it still sold 90,000 in its first week. Digital sales accounted for a sizeable 16% of total sales.

Somebody out there likes them quirky beats and loopy basslines! Go Thom.

Goodnight

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you’ve failed as a firefighter


Wednesday night and I’m having a productive week. I should qualify that: I’m having a productive week personally, but professionally it’s been a complete loss. My head hasn’t been in the game at work, but it’s OK because the environment is currently an unhinged one and I’m not alone.

Let’s do one liners, eh? I know, I know, they’re never really “one line.”

Last night I had a dream that I was trapped in a funhouse hall of mirrors. It was just like all the Scooby Doo and USA Up All Night Horror movies: dim lighting and an endless maze of my own reflection with an evil voice calling out to me from somewhere unseen. Sharaun woke me up because I was making one of those breathy dream-screams in real life (I do that sometimes, I’m a chatty sleeper). What the heck does a dream like that mean?

Noticed that Bush used his presidential veto for the first time this week to shoot down additional funding for stem cell research. I’ll state right up front that I think this is stupid, but rather than try and construct paragraph supporting my opinion I’ll just defer to this outstanding reader comment on the Newsvine coverage of the happening:

Here’s how I view whether an embryo should be considered such a valid life or not:

You are a firefighter, called to the scene of a horrific fire. The fire is in a local in vitro clinic – you put on your mask and rush inside. In the smoke and warmth, you hear a girl crying. You find her, standing next to a refrigerator holding hundreds of frozen embryos. You can only carry one. Which do you take?

The girl of course.

So does this mean that you’ve failed as a firefighter? You have forsaken the lives of potentially hundreds of children for the life of one child.

But when it comes to research, which already has proven more than helpful, suddenly the tables turn, and the embryos at stake are more important than the thousands threatened each year by cancer, Alzheimer’s, spine injuries, and the multitude of other things that stem cell research is working for.

I call BS.

Yeah, and I’ll be right there with you calling BS too.

Found this editorial take on the current Israel/Lebanon/Hezbollah thing I’ve been trying to follow pretty interesting. Although it clearly casts Israel as the bigger aggressor, it actually helped me (make sure and read the comments to for some good counter arguments that help round out the thought for those not passionate enough to have picked sides).

Wanna make your brain hurt? Head over to this site and watch the cool Flash animation that explains how to conceptualize a 4th, 5th, 6th, and on up through 10th dimension. Just click on on the zero at the bottom of the twirly numbers on the right of the page. I’m this close to ordering the book, as the Flash teaser is interesting as crap.

Goodnight.

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y’all couldn’t break me


Tuesday night. Tonight I cleaned the cat’s litterbox, as it had taken to smelling foul. Now, I always clean out the litterbox, but I rarely clean the actual box. I took the whole thing outside, hosed it down and cleaned it with 409 then rinsed it. I hate to say it, but now that we have Keaton I feel the need to have a pet less and less. Not that I don’t like this cat, but I keep thinking about no cat hair, no cat food, and most importantly no animal using the bathroom in our laundry room. I know Sharaun would kill me for suggesting it…

This weekend, while Sharaun and I were cleaning out and organizing the garage, I came across a plaque I’d received in 1983 when I played for an AYSO soccer team as a rough-‘n’-tough six year old goalkeeper. I was terrible at soccer, as I am at any organized sport. Even at my tender age, I could tell that sports were nothing more than flashpoints of self-consciousness and humiliation for me. Born with no natural skills, and skin not tough enough to endure the training to acquire said skills, I gave up sports forever. It was a decision I still rue, as today it makes me feel like I’m lacking in one critical area of dudemanship. Maybe, if I had just stuck with it back then, while my muscles and mind were still malleable, I could’ve learned skills. As it stands now, the thought of organized sports strikes fear into my heart. I can’t swing a bat, I throw like a girl, and I feel like I’m alone on a stage of shame when I stand in a field of any kind. I’ve said before that I positively fear the day my son (who currently doesn’t exist) asks me to teach him to throw and hit, I’ll have to refer him to his athletic mother and retreat back to my computer. Oh… the embarrassment is almost palpable just thinking about it.

Anyway, I took the plaque and brought it to work. Hung it on the fabric wall of my tiny cubicle as a source of mock-pride. At least my season of soccer twenty-three years ago was good for a joke now. With its wooden backing, golden soccerball, and the misspelled team name in brass, my 1983 “Scorpians” soccer plaque is sure to bring a smile. So, to all those parents on the sideline who used to scream at me to “get up!” and “get in the game!” while I was happily sitting in the goal drawing in the dirt with sticks – y’all couldn’t break me.

Finally, in closing: I was kicking around Wikipedia last night and decided to enter in my old hometown in Florida, just to see what they had to say about it. The Wikipedia article contained a link my old burg’s official homepage, and on that homepage I found a link to a Frequently Asked Questions section. Hmmm… I wonder what the town’s most frequently asked questions are? Turns out they’re mostly routine: where can I plant trees, when can I water my lawn, and how do I apply for a building permit. Then I saw this one: “Why do we charge for water that comes out of the sky?” I just had to chuckle at the elementary school phrasing, let’s read it again : “Why do we charge for water that comes out of the sky?” Hahaha, it “comes out of the sky.”

Guys, before I go, I thought I’d tell you a story. Tonight I made one of my first legitimate online music purchases. Ever since I found out today that the band that made my 3rd/2nd favorite album of last year has a new “tour only” EP out there, I just had to hear it. After I consulted the “usual” places and came back empty-handed, I broke down and bought the entire album from galleryac.com. Go me for supporting the artists, or whatever.

Goodnight.

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choke on this silver spoon


Monday night, just got off the phone with Pat, telling him I was about to go outside and pull weeds. Sharaun then walked out the door headed to the gym and, rather than haul the baby monitor outside with me into the 100°+ degree twilight, I decided to save it for another day. Another day on pins and needles at work, where the current climate is all headmen and falling axes. Without going into the whole story about my ongoing flirtation with the breadlines, suffice it to say that things have been a bit stressful and the atmosphere isn’t the most work-conducive. In fact, I don’t think I’ve done a “real” bit of work in three days now – ever since my employer raised the threat level to orange. It seems however, that I have, for now, weathered the storm – once again proving my indispensability. Chance has once again enabled me to grow more undeservedly self-assured and pompous. One day I’ll choke on this silver spoon, it’s a sure thing.

You may notice the “double posting” for today. You’ll see the entry below this one is dedicated to one of this year’s Halloween projects. I intend to document my projects a little better from now on, and will have a static, living post for each where updates will go. Not that you care about this, but it’s just easier for me to document the projects in a living post rather than setup an entirely new dedicated page. Besides, how can I one day hope to get some projects listed on the Monsterlist if I don’t document them properly and publish on the internet?

Today, while cleaning out my My Documents folder at work, I came across a curious Word document called “South Side of the Island.doc.” Not recognizing the file by name, I opened it to investigate. Inside was written only the following:

South Side of the Island

Counting myself (a librarian by former trade), the population of our little island stood at a proud six bodies:

  • Ms. O, who, it was said, was once a fearless sea-captain, and whose house had a mast sprouting from its center, complete with crow’s nest atop.
  • Mr. & Mrs. U, both schoolteachers by former trade. Their grey hair always a little wild, and both of them given to being easily surprised or even skittish.
  • Mr. T, a brilliant scientist and inventor.
  • Mr. H, who was once a police officer. Made a body feel right secure to have a former man of the law nearby.

I read this over and over again, trying to place it. Did I write this? Had I downloaded it or copied/pasted it from somewhere? I quick Google search turned up nothing. I read and reread it, and ever so slowly started remembering… I think I did write this. The date on the file says August of last year; you wouldn’t think my memory would fade that fast – but it seems it has. Maybe I was going to write a story about my #1 topic: an island. I think I was most surprised to realize I’d written it because it actually sounded interesting, and when I thought it was something I’d stumbled on rather than my own craft I actually wished I could read more.

I don’t know what it is about my “work smarter, not harder” post that attracts the whackjob comments, but it sure seems to be accruing them slowly. Check out this doozy and the one below it for an example of what I’m talking about. The other day I thought I might be imagining that the number of “random” comments I get here on sounds familiar was increasing, but with some great out-of-nowhere ones cropping up this week, I think it’s out of the realm of imagination and into the realm of fact. Maybe I’ve penetrated Google deep enough that I’m now getting a “second wave” of search-driven visitors. I say bring ’em on, I gotta believe I’m writing for someone…

I much prefer sitting here listening to music than sitting here watching TV. Let’s face it, I’m rarely sitting here without this laptop in front of me anyway, and listening to something multitasks a lot better with writing than watching something does. Even if Sharaun is home (she’s not now) and the TV is mandatory, I’m usually only listening anyway. The only watching I’m doing right now is the watching of Keaton’s video baby monitor, showing me some flickering, washed out, ghostly-grey bird’s-eye shot of her resting peacefully in her crib. Looking more like a wobbly kinescopic view into some past era than a representation of real-time events, I can barely make out her tiny form in contrast to the other shapeless grainy wiggles. This thing cost $200? It almost works like something I’d consider paying $40 for when you wrap tin foil around the antenna. Wow, that little nothing-sentence turned into a whole paragraph… now if that ain’t God’s bounty then I challenge you to show me what is.

I got more in me, but I’ll call this one done and put it in tomorrow’s so I have to write less then. Brilliant, nay? Goodnight my lovers and haters.