Precocious

If it's one thing that our brains do well, it is pattern match. We constantly seek to make order out of the chaos in our lives. From arm-chair psychology to abstract artistry to stereoscopic vision, our brains have become well versed in finding ordered reality out of almost anything. Some would even argue that the one thing our brains do better than anything is lie to us.

A concrete, and literary, example of such deception would be in the way we infer the definition of a word based on its connotation, inflection, and the context of the sentence in which it is used. From time immemorial I have heard the phrase:

"Eddie, you are so precocious" or "Eddie, stop being so precocious.

Do you know what precocious means? For the longest time I did not know what precocious meant. I inferred (i.e. my brain lied to me) that precocious was a negative word. Somehow, it must mean "bratty" or "insubordinate", "flippant" or "sassy". Well, actually, it doesn't mean any of those things. Apparently, precocious means:

Manifesting or characterized by unusually early development or maturity, especially in mental aptitude. (from www.dictionary.com).

So, for all of those years, I was being complemented -- the negative inflection mere sarcasm, not damnation.

Now, I came to that recognition a while back, but I have also been reading an excellent book called "Words that make a difference" and was surprised at how little I understood the meanings and etymologies of the words I use.

Because so many people learn words through informal usage and imprecise definition their "meanings" tend to be tied to how they were first used (which, of course, perpetuates their continued usage in that vein). As I come across some wordy wisdom, I'll try and put some examples up on the blog. I think some people might be surprised at the meanings behind the words they use. Of course, it could just be me who uses words without knowing their full meaning...

As an aside, the word precocious and the word apricot both come from the same Latin word. That why and how of that linkage is left as an exercise to the reader.

-Ed

ps:

Of course, this means it is equally possible, growing up, that I was being told:

"Eddie, you are an apricot" or "Eddie, stop being such an apricot."

Da Plane! Da plane!

I have thought, on and off, (for some years) about what it would be like to get a tattoo. Not some shoulder-encompassing or back-covering mural -- rather I want something small and reasonably tasteful. Sorry, mother, but I'm just not interested in the giant, maternally-labeled heart across the ol' bicep.

Were I to permanently ink myself the act would require some meaning. I am not a big fan of the standard (and in my opinion creativeless) patterns, corporate logos, or cartoon characters. Sure, some patterns look good, but to make such a permanent statement for mere decoration seems odd to me.

In fact, alot of tattoos look odd to me. Here are a few favorites:



This is a nice tattoo, for sure. What does it say about the person, though, other than that they want to look like a wrought-iron fence.




This one is more meaningful, as it says something specific about the tattooee. Apparently, she is trying to tell the world that her nether-regions whistle.




I am wary of putting anything permanent on my body that seems like it would be, well... part of a temporary phase. I would love to meet this guy when he is far older and watching out for the real Mr. Reaper. We must all realize, one day, that we will cease to be a threat to others -- but that is a different blog entry entirely.


Every once in a while I think about my ethereal tattoo. If I can ever find something meaningful to me that will fit in a 2"x2" square, I would get one. To date, my search, infrequent as it is, remains frustrated.

I wonder if anyone I know has a hidden tattoo. Several people in my dojo have them. Some of them quite large.

-Ed

To Have or to Hold?

I've always said that I enjoy having a personal backlog -- a list of projects. Without something (or, more often, somethings) waiting on the back burner I feel empty. Truth be told, I am scared to death of boredom and the waste of unrecoverable time it implies. And by boredom I mean boredom, not reflection, meditation, or self-examination all of which are worthy pursuits, in moderation.

The danger of viewing ones activities as a backlog is that one tends to make line-item tasks out of constant activities. What do I mean? Let's look at my most recent backlog. Some of the things are, truly, line-item tasks (of various duration)...

- Finish caulking and painting the baseboards in the upstairs hallway and stairwell.
- Sand down, stain, and put up the banister in the hallway
- Sand, stain, poly, wax the new doors I "made" for the linen closet.
- Put up Linda's "Winnie the Pooh" door (pictures coming)
- Install slate in our foyer
- Make kitchen cabinets
- Build the garden hutch before spring
- Texture and paint the ceilings
- Take down the Christmas decorations (yeah, I know....)

etc... etc... trust me, there is aplenty on the list. But, they are all things on a list. You do them, and they are finished in some reasonable amount of time. Then there are other things on the list...

- Work out for 1.5 hours
- Handle the next 2 classes from graduate school
- Blog
- Get ready for your next martial art belt test
- Follow up on the new years resolution to reconnect with the family/friends you have not been paying attention to in a while.

etc... etc... and trust me, there are others here too.

All of which makes for a prioritizing nightmare. Does one pursue the individual tasks (the things to have) or does one pursue the lifestyles (the things that hold). So, that has been a question on my mind today: which is more important -- to have or to hold?

Probably not the deepest "question of the ages", but it is, to me, an important question. I've always struggled with the right way to prioritize my time. Having a large and active base of friends, and family, and hobbies has always been a double-edged sword -- there is simply never enough time to make everyone happy so you just resolve to get by on the understanding of those around you.

-Ed

Momma, Don't Take That Kodachrome

I'd like to believe that my life is a series of continual evolutions -- that we increase and better ourselves with each passing day. I'd certainly like to believe that, except I keep finding evidence to the contrary.

You see, I'm in my early 30's now and look something like the picture up at the top of this blog, which is maybe 2 years old. For most of my 20's I was pretty overweight. Actually, at my heaviest I probably was almost 300 pounds and, trust me, very little of it was muscle. Morale to the story? I'm in much better shape at 31 than I was throughout the first half of my 20s.

Which brings me to the worst picture taken of me in my life. The picture was taken on my first day of work at COMSAT. I was 21 and fresh out of college. I had groomed especially for the occasion; the picture was for my work "badge". The youngling that I was saw this badge as my ticket to the real world! It was my membership card to the self-sufficient land of the middle-class. My proverbial man card!

Who doesn't want to rewind history and slap a little sense into that kid?

But, please, without further ado, here is me at the tender age of 21:

I have no shame

I think we all need to understand that our lives are never linear evolutions -- we sometimes need to stop, rethink, and re-trace. Often, giving up the illusion of continuous improvement gives us the permission to redo. It took the guy in the picture above a good 5 years to figure that out.

-Ed

ps. Upon showing the picture to my wife and remarking "You know, that really isn't that bad of a picture" she responded, quite readily, "Oh.. yes it is." I'm sure there are worse out there. I just don't have the emotional strength to go looking for them right now.

The 24 Hour Flu

Is aptly named.

Hoo-boy, am I glad to be alive right now. Thursday evening around 3am I was kneeling in front of our commode. By 4am I was shaking so violently my muscles still hurt. By 6am I was greedily eyeing the immodium. Too much information? Bah.

Friday was spent curled under 3 blankets watching the "Amazing Stories" marathon on the sci-fi channel. This morning I woke up at 10am and was completely fine. No temperature, and just some minor muscle aches and pains.

It is just amazing to me how quickly such an illness can descend upon you and, likewise, how quickly it can pass. I would be in greater amazement, but I am just going to sit back and bask in my tempoerarily lost ability to sit in front of the computer without wanting to pass out.

-Ed

NASCAR on Ice

I was in the kitchen this evening going through some mail, looking at what catalogs held bathroom-window-shopping potential -- and if you are reading this and are a guy you know exactly what I am talking about. Suddenly, I heard a series of noises from the television room. It sounded a little bit like laughter. Not a laughing giggle. Not a polite dinner-party chuckle. No, something was undergoing a series of diaphram-spasming guffaws a few rooms away.

My survival skills were engaged almost immediately. Had a wild beast broken into the house? Were my cats being beset upon by hyenas? Had someone tuned in Animal Planet and left the volume on high?

No.

My wife was watching "Skating with Celebrities" or, as she puts it, "NASCAR on Ice".

As an aside, I'm typing this entry on a laptop next to my wife in bed and she is laughing just remembering it... still laughing...there's a snort... gotta breathe, honey, gotta breathe...

What was I saying? Oh yes, NASCAR. We don't actually watch NASCAR, but I hear people watch mostly because of the possibility of a car wreck. Linda watches the skating show on the tantalizing possibility of a proverbial train wreck. Well, that and, apparently, Bruce Jenner looks like Herman Munster on ice.



Now, neither of us have much room to talk -- the last time we went ice skating I had to rent three skates, two for my feet and one for my behind. However, I am also not trying to skate on national television.

So we now have skating with the stars, dancing with the stars. I wonder, next season, what "Verb with the stars" show will have my wife in fits.

Juggling with the stars?
Ultimate Fighting with the stars?
Volleyball with the stars?

I propose "Starring with the stars". Remember, you read it here first. 8)

-Ed

Handy

I'm half Italian, a quarter Irish and a quarter German. I used to joke that I was genetically engineered to eat too much, drink too much, and fight about it. Were I to be serious, I would say that I'm Irish in appearance, German at work, and Italian everywhere else.

The Italian side of my family were essentially immigrants. My grandmother came over from Italy on "the boat", went through Ellis Island, the whole "nine yards". Through the familial lore I remember a strong sense of community -- a feeling that you survive through pooled resources and infinite forgiveness. How many people lived in my grandmother's house at one point? I always lose count. It was a surprisingly fluctuating number.

My mother bridged the culture gap and I was born thoroughly Americanized -- completely melted into the proverbial pot. Who were these heavy ethnic people I see in faded color photographs? Ginevera? Settimo? Nine kids? Yeah, whatever. Pass the Nintendo, please. Such "simple folk" could not compete with a young me focused as I was on maximizing myself and my life. It amazes me how much of my life (and all of our lives) we spend pushing buttons and see light flashes and hear sounds just for the sake of seeing light flashes and hearing sounds. That is, however, a much different entry.

This past Sunday I went to my uncle Vic's 85th birthday party. It was full of the "eye-talian" side of the family. I think I mentioned previously that my ears were still ringing from the event. It was a mob scene (no pun intended). In one room, eight desserts. In another room screams at the football game on the tv. Next door politics. In the main room a record was on and my 85 year old uncle was dancing in front of some video cameras. When was so-and-so getting married? What 8 year old had a crush on who? Amid the cacophony I found myself staring at my aunts and uncles -- so few still with us -- and being overcome by an overwhelming sense of belonging.

This sense of belonging did not arise from the house. In truth, it was not completely driven by the people either. My home was in the attitudes, the arguments, the community. There was a warmth in that house that day as comforting as any I'd ever experienced. It was the kind of nourishing warmth that makes you remember who you really are or, perhaps, who you want to become.

Too often I wanted to become important, or rich, or both. Now, don't get me wrong -- I think prosperity is a good thing. I would never deny anyone their prosperity. Yet, lately, I have been thinking of the trade-offs of the modern-day middle class. I know too many people who spend too much time working and, when the money for that work comes in, it goes right back out again in trinkets and distraction. Ginevera and Settimo? They could have raised 37 kids with the kind of money we pull in and, yet, many of us get concerned over 1.

My mother laughs it off and reminds me of how her mother talked about it: "When I was your age, we didn't have a pot to piss in and we made it. You'll be fine -- you'll find a way."

And so I remember that picture of my great grandparents and I think how lucky they must have been. Now, don't get me wrong, they don't look lucky in that picture -- if it were a painting it would be labeled "Italian Gothic." But I think they were lucky nonetheless.

Why?

I've known all kinds of happiness in my short life. Believe me, I haven't grown up with a lot of "wants". I've known professional happiness, relationship happiness, and financial happiness. I have a large network of friends. I'm a reasonably happy guy and, gosh darn it, people like me.

All of that is different, though, than the Happiness of being amidst your family -- of knowing, as they say, "where you come from". I know what Tom Wolfe meant when he wrote "you can never go home again". I'm older now, my home has changed a bit. Last Sunday, though, quite suddenly, I found I had somehow stumbled back home.

Having so stumbled, it makes me wonder -- why do we spend our time and energies seeking out anything else?

Now, please pardon me -- I need to go and sire 10 children.

-Ed

Poison dog food

Hey, I know some dog owners read this blog. I think Diamond dog food has a food recall in 24 states based on tainted food. It may be worth a google search.

_Ed

I wonder

If people understand that my sophistry is sarcastic. That's the problem with having a (sometimes) dry sense of humor -- I say things outlandish but with such sophistic vigor that others might believe what is coming out of my mouth.

Making the weaker argument the stronger is a fun mental exercise -- and critical, in my opinion, to developing good debating skills. However, it has always been the case (and always will be the case) that truth is far removed from one's particular ability to present it.

A friend was talking about getting a shorter commute to work, to which I replied: "I would never want that. I meet so many interesting people on 95 each morning." He said "well, there's that" and changed course. Yes, I meet many interesting people on 95 each morning -- most of whom are actively trying to kill me. Sarcasm. Sophistry.

In speaking of answering essay questions, I espoused the ideal of "quantity over quality". Why answer the question? Just brain dump everything you know into the answer and the teacher must give you credit for something.

I have made people (cat lovers) pseudo-livid through my insistence that cats, as a species, fling feces. (That rhymed!)

Sometimes I think the overly serious way in which I approach my work and some of my more important hobbies makes me need to let off steam in silly, but thought-provoking ways. I enjoy the sarcasm. I enjoy the dead-pan. I enjoy the sophistry. But I enjoy them as personal entertainment.

And I think that, to varying degrees, we all engage in some such activity. It is far easier to sarcastically take sides with the ridiculous. It is far easier to define what we are not instead of defining what we are. If there are laughs along the way, that's all the better.

However, it troubles me that there may be some poor soul out there going "Ed tries to meet people in the mornings on 95, eschews quality, and loathes cats." Well, actually, if that is the worst people say about me I could live with that.

And I have personally seen our cat chest-duh mark his territory from 20 feet away. Little bugger has an arm better than most major league pitchers.

_Ed

Enjoying The Calm

I went to my uncle's 85th birthday party on Sunday. Have you ever been to a house filled with 30-40 Italians? My ears are still ringing. 8)

I also went to a funeral this evening -- a friend's godmother passed away.

New Horizons launches tomorrow.

Graduate school starts back in two weeks.

I've learned it is hard, during these busy times, to have the time to reflect and have the time to intelligently relay that reflecting. And by time I certainly don't mean physical time, who can't find a spare 10 minutes in the day for their favorite bad habit? I mean emotional time. Putting pen to paper (or, more specifically finger to keyboard) takes a certain emotional toll.

For the time being, that's emotional energy I need to be hoarding for the weeks to come.

-Ed

Dinner Deadlines

Linda and I make no secret about it: we invite people to our house so that we keep the house clean. If you are reading this, and have been invited to our house for something, it probably meant we wanted to accomplish some project and needed to give ourselves a deadline. 8) Cleary, that is tongue-in-cheek -- we invited you over because we liked you and your company. Clearly. Honest. I swear.

Ahem...

It all started so innocently: pull up some ratty rug going up the steps and through the upstairs hallway. Stain the steps. Oops, paint the step risers. Oh, that molding in the upstairs hallway has to go. Oh, and the stairwell and hallway need a few coats of primer and paint. But wait, there are so many knicks in the wall, time to spackle it and sand it. Are those nail pops in the ceiling and in the wall? Better fix all 30 of them too. The bannisters don't match the stained steps, they must be sanded down and re-stained. The bi-fold doors of the closet need to be replaced with new regular doors, oops, that means re-framing the door. While we have the closet cleared, it could use a new coat of paint. The lights in the upstairs hallway now look shoddy and must be replaced with better fixtures. Oh, and the landing at the bottom of the steps needs to be updated. The steps look nice, but we need to add a nice oriental rug runner. Hmm, the runner looks a little plain, perhaps we could add stair rods to complete the look.

We needed something that would end this madness. We needed to invite people over for dinner. And, thus, a normal "friend dinner" was elevated to the launching of the "new and improved stairwell and upstairs hallway". 8)

We got almost everything done in time, just a little trim work that can be handled this weekend. We worked until midnight every night this past week. A few mornings I got up extra early to put in an hour or two of work before going to work. Saturday we spent almost 8 hours painting, nailing, sanding and cleaning before company arrived at 7pm.

How we managed to be clean and not zombies through the dinner is anyone's guess. I'm just happy I can sit and write about it in an office no longer filled wait-high with spackle and sanding dust.

Candid Camera

A few days ago my wife and I were on candid camera. I mean, no one popped out and told us that we were on candid camera. We saw no actual cameras. We signed no release forms. Nonetheless, we were able to infer our participation in the show through sheer observatory skill. Let me relate the experience, I am sure you will agree.

Linda and I went to an unnamed new grocery store that recently opened in our neck of the woods. We don't want to name the grocery store lest we give this particular one a bad review. Let's just say the name rhymes with "zygmans".

So we did our grocery shopping and came to the checkout counter. Now, we had never been to "zygmans" before, and it carried alot of wonderful food that is just not available at our regular grocery store. We wound up purchasing quite a bit of stuff, which meant we were checking out for a reasonable amount of time, which led to our inevitable spot on candid camera.

Our checkout clerk was either high as a kite or had just jumped off the plane from the California surfer mellow-yet-verbose competition. Great and deep apologies to those Californians who I know read this blog. Blame Hollywood, not me, for the stereotype.

We purchased some red peppers. This was, apparently, the greatest event in this young cashier's life...

Cashier: Wow. Red peppers are, like, great. You can eat them raw, cooked. Just do your thing. Like salads, oh yeah, do you eat salads? Put some in your salad, or like, stir fry. Chinese food is terrific. I bought my sister a wok for Christmas, well, a wok and chopsticks. She was like "ok..." but, you know, I like this kind of food, so it's all good, right?

We had alot of groceries. We had alot of monologues. I'll skip the retelling of the pampered chef parties, making your own sushi, and vodka mixers. Suffice it to say that we not only purchased food, we purchased a front-seat view into our cashier's psyche.

The punch line? While rolling the cart to the car Linda commented on how it seemed like we had alot of bags. As we were putting the bags in the trunk we noticed that the bags seemed very light. So, we looked inside.

In one bag was a single red bell papper. In another bag was a single block of cheese. In another bag was every thing we bought that was made of glass.

Who puts one red pepper in a bag?

We waited for a few minutes in the parking lot for the camera crew to jump out at us but that never happened. So we came to the most obvious conclusion: we were just too good looking to be put on television.

-Ed

The Nerd Cometh

Not only am I old, my car is old, too. My little bimmer now has over 100,000 miles on it. Fortunately, these are "highway miles" and the little monster drives as good at 100,000 as it did the day I got it.





Yesterday morning on the way to work I noticed the new mileage: 101,011 miles. How does that make me a nerd? Instinctually, I noted that this was a binary number. Specifically, I noted that this was 0x2B. Then, hurtling down 95, I thought how nice it would be to only have 0x2B miles on my car -- that would be a mere 43 miles for all of you non-math types.

But, alas, I have more than 43 miles on the car. And yet there was this binary number staring me in the face on my instrument panel.

I was faced with quite a dilemma. What was my mileage?

0x2B or not 0x2B, that was the question.


Fortunately, soon after, the mileage switched to 101,012 resolving all doubt.

-Ed

ps. No, that story was not contrived. Honest to goodness that's what went through my mind in that 45 seconds. No wonder there are so many accidents on 95 in the morning.

Common Cents

Waiting in line at the cash register today the woman in front of me was short 7 cents for her food. Our cafeteria provider has a policy *against* "give-a-penny-take-a-penny" jars for some reason, so she was in a bit of a pickle.

Fortunately, I had some extra change and offered the needed 7 cents. You would have thought I had given this person a kidney.

What is it about context that makes us place inordinate value on some things that would otherwise be valueless? I wouldn't delve between couch cushions for 7 cents (and if you ever go hunting in my couch, you'll find that is true), but in a cafeteria cashier line 7 cents might as well have been a chest of gold.

Which really makes one wonder, do our tangibles have value in a vacuum, or is there worth always and simply relative to the situation? The answering of that question, I bet, will have alot to do with whether we talk about emotional worth or financial worth.

-Ed

Paradoxes

Sorry I've been away from blogger... there are some house projects that must be done before the resumption of grad classes in a few weeks. But, that's a different blog entry.

--

Any casual reader to my blog will understand that I spend an inordinant amount of time speaking in paradoxes. I talk about my rapidly advancing age while being only 31. I speak of needing to get in better shape when I am now in better shape at 31 than I was at 21 or 11.

While being lambasted for these paradoxes recently (by someone far older than 31 who bristled at the thought of 31 being "decrepit") I explained it thusly:

"What I mean to say is, I'm an old young person, not a young old person."

And such is the tragedy of life-sweeping transitions -- the mind often lags the body's evolution, for better or worse.

Through some of my hobbies I interact with people far younger than I and that makes me feel incredibly old. Through other hobbies, I interact with those far older than I and it makes me feel incredibly young. While my age has not (appreciably) changed, my perception of it fluctuates wildly based on my current environment.

Some other good Ed paradoxes? I used to weigh alot more than I do now, and none of it was muscle. In 1999 I think I maxed out at 5 push-ups. During my black belt test I did something like 92. At one point I was talking to someone about "the transition" and said:

"I used to be a thin fat person, but now I'm more of a fat thin person."

When my mom was recovering from her cancer surgery I made the observation:

"At some point, you'll stop being a sick person who has a few good days and you will start being a well person who has a bunch of sick days".

So, where exactly is this line that is drawn in the sand? Where is the point that we flip those adjectives? Most would argue that the point is in my head. And I would absolutely agree. It is in all of our heads -- it is our attitude. It is how we approach the world.

And why is attitude so important?

When I walked around with the excess weight, I said to myself "I'm a thin fat person" -- i.e. were you to drop me in a room with the clinically obese, I wouldn't look so bad. When I started thinking I was a "fat thin person" I noticed something was wrong. Stick me in a room with the clinically normal and I'm sticking out like a sore thumb. Did my weight fluctuate between those observations? Nope. But my internal drive sure kicked in once the new self-image took hold.

There's a common phrase, and one that I believe in very much: People rise and fall to your expectations of them. The one corallary to this that many forget is that the term "people" also refers to ourselves.

So... um.. there. I lead a healthy life by walking around complaining about how old, fat, and sick I am...

Grumpy too.

-Ed

Wow

Now, I know that one really shouldn't complain about free journalism (oft worth every penny) but I was profoundly struck by this headline:

"Study: Free booze benefits homeless alcoholics"

Now, regardless of your stance on the matter, was it really an open question as to whether handing out free booze to the homeless would be a boon to homeless alcoholics? Yes, it is interesting research. Is this how we write about it?

How does one get the grant money to perform these studies? If you are such a person, I have several studies that I would like funded:

1. Is eating less and exercising correlated with weight loss?
2. Soap. Is it necessary for proper hygene?
3. Excessive volume, does it lead to hearing loss?

Who will answer these questions? Who will continue the march of scientific progress?

Where can we get that free booze? And, more importantly, does that mean we will now have to sneak into Canada for our liquor as well as for our medicine? 8)

-Ed

In memorium

And this time, it is no play on words.

Last Sunday a 46 year old coworker of mine died suddenly of a heart attack.

Such loss, so suddenly and so young, caused a great deal of shock and sorrow this week. We were not close -- we worked on different projects in different areas -- so I cannot pretend to have known him as anything other than a familiar face in the hallway. I do know that he is fondly remembered by those with whom he did work.

What I can speak to is the ensuing, horrible recognition of the fragility of life. It is easy (too easy) to see ourselves aging gracefully in a rocking chair as we count down the years until our 100th birthday. For many that is simply not the case. For my co-worker, it was not the case by half.

At 31 you will not hear me complain about my life. I know some who never made it to 31. I've known others who never made it past 31. Yet the sentiment is incomplete -- it is tremendously difficult to be satisfied with what you have accomplished in your life while there is yet so much more to be done.

Perhaps the best we can all hope for is the cultivation of those family and friends who will continue our work in the fateful, off chance that we fall too soon.

A fund has been set up for his four children. I am sure a donation would be appreciated -- I know I will contribute.

http://www.offenbacherkids.com/index.html

-Ed

New Years Resolutions

I used to joke that my New Year's Resolution would be 1024x768. As a joke it always backfired: If you didn't get the joke, you didn't want to hang around me. If you did get the joke, chances are I didn't want to hang around you! 8) No offense, it's an alpha-nerd thing.

So, I've been brainstorming on what my New Year's Resolution should be, and I think I have narrowed it down to a top ten. Please feel free to comment.

Top 10 Things I Should Start Doing in 2006

#10) Flossing
#9) Aging Gracefully
#8) Eating Breakfast (and eating it before 11:00am)
#7) Learning to say "No"
#6) Getting to Bed By Midnight (and not defining "bed" as "the chair in front of the computer")
#5) Getting back to the shape I was in when I got my black belt.
#4) Realize I most probably am destructible and, murphily, at the worst possible moment.
#3) Stop quoting B movies as if people know what I am talking about
#2) Start taking my writing seriously.

#1) Prohibiting senseless, self-serving entries like this on my blog.


-Ed

Raised Right

Last week a chair broke in someone's office at work. What do you do with a broken chair? You take it outside and leave it in the hallway. Clearly at some point elves will come in the night and take the chair off to the great chair burial grounds.

Alas, this being near the holidays, the elves must have been off, as the chair remained in the hallway for some time. So long, in fact, that our office secretary took it upon herself to move the chair the 40-or-so yards to her office where she could arrange it to be picked up.

Now, our office secretary is about 67, and was recently back to work following knee replacement surgery. She is also one of the sweetest people you will ever meet.

As luck would have it I rounded the corner to the hallway just as she reached over to pick up the broken chair. Now, there was no way I was going to let her drag that chair down the hallway by herself. The ensuing conversation went something like this:

Ed: Let me grab that for you (taking a chair leg in hand)
Secretary: No! I can get this myself. You have more important things to do.
Ed: What could possibly be more important than helping you carry this chair?
Secretary: That's sweet, but I can get this on my own.
Ed: Well, you'll have to drag me with it because I'm not letting go. You're stuck with me. Why don't we do this together?
Secretary: Allrighty then.

About halfway down the hall I think she realized that this was going much better than dragging the chair behind her. Why? At about the half-way point, she looked at me and said:

Next time you see your mother, you let her know that she raised you right.

So, if you are reading this blog, mom, you raised me right. I know you were in doubt as to that based on my previous blog entry chronically staying up until 4am drinking. Nevertheless, you raised me right.

-Ed

My Head

New Years Eve was alot of fun this year. Busy! But alot of fun.

Dre, as promised, no pictures on the blog, but I do have some and they are terrific.

We got home around 4am after I'd drunk, approximately, my weight in beer. Now, there are two things you should know about me:

1. I'm old.
2. I don't drink all that often (see #1)

So when I rolled out of bed around 3pm the next day it was with no small amount of cursing. Quiet cursing. Head pounding cursing. The hangover is just now, three days later, leaving.

That is something that I cannot do more than once a year, if that.

Many thanks to Linda who sobered up around 1am, a few hours before we left the party at 3:30am. I will never understand how people think they can drive themselves around when drunk. Half an hour into the new year I would have given my keys to a stranger to drive me home!

I will say that I was sober enough at midnight to call my family and wish them a happy new year -- a tradition happily uninterrupted in my 31 years.

-Ed

Doomed To Repeat

I've always considered myself something of a reactor -- someone who takes his social cues from those around him. Now, I'll wait a moment and let some of my friends and family pick themselves up off the floor...

Back with me again? Good! Let's continue...

Yes, when some moral or ethical path illuminates in front of me I'll follow my belief in it through thick and thin. But in times of peace, when such adherence is not called for, I tend to take my cues from those around me. Really. I promise.

Some people I work with think I am devoid of a sense of humor. Others outside of work think I am devoid of a sense of seriousness. Some think I never finish anything, others marvel at what I've accomplished. To some I despise technology while others think I'm an incurable geek.

Linda sometimes thinks it funny to watch me skate through different social circles -- noting that I really do act differently (sometimes contradictory). She knows when my laugh is fake, when I've modified a story to be more applicable to the current audience, or when I am encouraging things I don't really believe just to positively advance the current conversation.

Now, it's really not as bad as all that -- I'm usually pretty honest when it counts. But I've recently reconnected with someone I hadn't talked to in quite some time. A previous co-worker who has a very dark, very sarcastic sense of humor. You all know him too -- his picture is two entries beneath this one.

Shooting some e-mail sback and forth this past week I was struck by just how quickly I try and align my humor to his. And in the event that he is reading this blog -- no, I just can't bring myself to do that to a ferret.

While a part of me appreciates, understands, and kind of brags about such adaptability I've come to understand that it represents a serious integration problem. And this blog is an excellent example of that.

Lots of family read this blog, as do several friends -- across many different social circles. What face do I put on these entries? Do I bounce from personality to personality or try and find a consistent on-line voice? I suppose that were I to try to remain faithful to the purpose of this blog I would remember that I'm supposed to write here for myself. Such independence precludes worrying about the response these writings have on others.

We have DVDs!

One thing that my home-built PVR (MythTV) never did very well was archive television shows. How do I know that? The 80 episodes of "Good Eats" clogging my hard drive were a good indication. Unlike Desperate Housewives or Monk which lose their appeal once you know the story, Good Eats is more of an instructional cooking show. Something you want to watch again when faced with a menacing kitchen and a new recipe.

So, Good Eats was not about to be deleted from our PVR. We would not put our future souffles, home-made cheeses, egg-nogs, dough, doughnuts, barbecue, and crepes in such danger. At the same time, however, we were rubbing up against the confines of our storage capacity. Something had to give, and it turns out that something was me.

Since Friday I'd invested perhaps 30 hours in getting my Linux PVR to correctly record DVDs. What does correctly mean? It means correctly identifying commercials and removing them from the program. It means correctly grabbing short animations from each program to use as animated DVD menus. It means getting audio and video synchronized on the DVD. It means auto-generating the DVD menus correctly, with submenus. It means wrapping the whole 15-step process into a nice script that is easily usable and hard to mess up. In the Linux "Do It Yourself" world, this stuff is encompassed by the term: "Wife Friendly" -- the holy grail of Linux DVDing.

Well...

My MythTv Show archival is rapidly approaching wife friendly. It just passed functional yesterday evening. We've burnt 18 episodes of one show -- i.e. thank goodness we did not have to suffer the shame of backing them up to VHS tape for our personal use instead of DVD.

Hearing my computer hard drive churn in the background as 6 more episodes are plumped onto disc (that's right, sans commercials most episodes are 20 minutes -- that's 6 of the puppies on a 2 hours DVD at full quality) I suddenly realized -- intermized with the adrenaline of success -- that I am horrificly tired.

-Ed