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Wednesday, July 30, 2003 ( 7/30/2003 10:42:00 AM ) DN Just read this essay. I thought it a thoughtful response by Wendell Berry to criticism of his refusal to use a computer, including a lament for the simple life. Feminism, the Body and the Machine # Tuesday, July 29, 2003 ( 7/29/2003 02:16:00 PM ) DN Amazing. I just passed by the blogger home page & found a Blog This button for Mozilla!!! Here's what I looked at to test it (works great!!) Coherence Engine # ( 7/29/2003 01:55:00 PM ) DN Why can't I have a Blog This toolbar??? Because I won't switch over to the other side. Mozilla does it for me, & when it doesn't I keep an IE icon handy. # ( 7/29/2003 01:53:00 PM ) DN Finally I got some relief, in the form of a lovely check from the IRS. August normally is hell on the finances due to child care in summer and excessive vacation spending. All but one of my virtual savings accounts within my checking account are depleted & we're spending from the last one (virtual Christmas club). The conference last week wasn't bad. Both a.m. and p.m. sessions were a little unfocused, so when the afternoon trainer looked at her watch at 3:05 and said, "We're going to have to shorten the program," we all just nodded accommodatingly, even though the class was scheduled till 4:30. I also missed nearly 20 minutes of it at the beginning because of a fabulous one-day sale at Kaufmann's. When I left the Town Center mall with about 4 minutes to spare, I left by a different exit. Thinking I was only 90 degrees from the Convention Center, I walked to the corner, turned, walked to the next corner, and then was only a block & a half away. Now that I think about it, I was only 90 degrees off, but in the other direction. Update on my Dad: he does/did have Lyme disease, but is doing well now. I heard thru the family 'vine that my niece may have it, too. Yikes. I might have to stay inside when we visit next month. I googled Tom's weekend band, the Neverly Brothers, and look at 'em! Also found the Neverly Hillbillies. Guys, you need to get a website. # Wednesday, July 23, 2003 ( 7/23/2003 12:46:00 PM ) DN Lynch made a nice, short speech yesterday. It was printed in full in the Huntington paper (not that I actually read it--made do with the sound bite on last night's news). She had a kind comment on Piestewa, and all in all, sounded like a fine young woman. Tomorrow I get to go to the state education conference in Charleston. I'll get some course credits for my adult ed certification. Last year I fell asleep in class, despite excessive amounts of coffee; this year I looked at the conference brochure and absolutely couldn't remember what I had signed up for. Maybe they'll tell me when I get there. Jackie (my boss) will take care of me, if I can find her in time. I think it might be reading strategies, almost the same as last year's snoozer. I'm ready for vacation!! # Sunday, July 20, 2003 ( 7/20/2003 10:48:00 AM ) DN Jessica Lynch is coming home to Wirt Co. today. She's expected to speak to the press. What might she say that would change her hero status? She'll probably say what's been reported as her explanation of her capture already: "I don't remember what happened." I can't believe there's not another word for how America feels about her; she's like a kitten saved from a flood, and we smile with relief to see it bedraggled but still perky. She's a symbol of innocence, rescued by American know-how and luck. So we're celebrating our soldiers as saviors. The fact that Lynch is a soldier but paradoxically also the little kitten rescued is where we get in the muddy water. # Friday, July 18, 2003 ( 7/18/2003 08:12:00 PM ) DN Though I'd like to be, I'm not much of an activist. I think I give up too easily. I read about what the Massey CEO said to the legislature earlier this week, calling the flouting of the coal truck weight limits "common law," and feel outraged. That's some CEO job, I tell you. He faces lawsuits, public tirades, and hatred every day on his job. Not just occasionally, but ALL the time. I heard Massey's stock was doing quite poorly, too, due to low earnings. So he probably gets it from the shareholders, too. But what do you do with the anger & contempt? I usually let the issues fade, knowing they'll eventually sink to the bottom of the Things I'm Worried About list. I really need to stop doing that. # Thursday, July 17, 2003 ( 7/17/2003 09:30:00 PM ) DN Here's what I've been looking at: Some guy's personal website - humor - if you get spam, you'll like the Nigerian Direct Mail Conference. Otherwise, for goofy parodies, look at Web Design by Myrtle. Or take a peek at Bill Gates's inbox. The Name Machine - this is cool. Hard puzzles & logic tests - I think the Giga genius test is a gag. There are six people in the Giga society!! If it's not a gag, it just devalues Mensa all to hell. Falling into the extremely weird category: Psychoflubber # ( 7/17/2003 07:01:00 AM ) DN Summertime My dad has been sick for several weeks. After two ER visits in the night my mom insisted that the doctors put him in the hospital and try to figure it out. This was a couple of days ago. Since they checked him in, fluids and better painkillers have improved his situation, but the doctors don’t know what he’s got. I think it’s a bad case of Lyme disease; when reading the CDC article, I discovered that Delaware, where my dad lives, has the fifth highest rate of Lyme disease in the country. He’ll probably be better before they figure out what it is. I tried to call him yesterday, but I found that he didn’t have telephone service to his room. The marble-mouthed telephone operator, in her Eastern Shore accent, said, “You can call the nurse, hon, and see if he wants to have the telephone turned on for you.” And I said no thanks. I’ll write him a note. If dad doesn’t want anybody calling him, would he make an exception for me? Meanwhile. I get mosquito-bitten about twice every time I go outdoors, even though I nearly always use bug spray. I’m hoping to develop immunity to West Nile. The kids are just going to have to tough it out. They don’t use repellent very often, and we’ve got lots of mosquitos. What are we going to do, stay inside? Meteors and lightning are out there, too, and we don’t hide from them. That’s me, the scoffer. # Tuesday, July 08, 2003 ( 7/08/2003 04:44:00 PM ) DN No word from the house buyer. I have been cleaning!! After a week of looking at house ads but not actually looking at houses, we exhausted our energies and have abandoned any house searching until we get our home appraised. However, it has made me look critically at our place, knowing the appraiser will be coming. I've cleaned & repainted major amounts of woodwork, hid some termite damage (don't tell), and seriously started to clean out the basement. I had to pay a guy $100 two years ago to haul junk out of my basement, and I believe I will have to do it again. Where does it come from? And it's not all little plastic toy parts, either, although I'd have guessed that too, if I were you. Just junk. Started watching Sex & the City a few weeks ago, and I'm enjoying it. Yes, I've been HBO-deprived all these years. I've caught a couple of episodes of Six Feet Under, also pretty good. (What I like about it really is that guy from Sports Night.) Let's see, what else can I post to avoid doing any more work today? I'm feeling sorry for my boss (at my part-time teaching job), this week. Last week was the final week for me, filling in for her for a few weeks. We had about 25 students a day, which is hard. Everyone is studying different materials, unlike a regular classroom--and I mean everyone. Plus they're a needy bunch. Maybe all students are. I also had a half-dozen teenagers, whose high school memories are still very fresh, meaning they still act like their high school selves. But the kicker for me & now for her is a young man who had previously enrolled to study for his GED (twice or more) at our center and been expelled back in the late 90s. Didn't know they did that at the classroom of last resort, didya? Well, my boss let him back in, not knowing he'd been removed. . . . Then she started her vacation, leaving me to handle him. Turns out he'd been studying for his GED for the past three years, in Huttonsville (state prison). Hadn't learned a thing, either. It was a fun week, last week. I had to practice my disciplinarian skills, which are weak. I like to frown and guilt people (thanks Mom!) to get them to do what I want. Which is why I'm feeling my boss's pain. Okay, I made it. It's quitting time. # Monday, July 07, 2003 ( 7/07/2003 11:27:00 AM ) DN Whew. I'm at work today only to feed the laser printers paper, so I've had free time on the web. I spent an hour today reading about drugs (for very important research), until my heart started pounding & I began to feel queasy. After a few moments of this, I realized it was from the fourth cup of coffee, but for a bit, it reminded me of my last experience on an amusement park ride, all of three days ago. We spent the Fourth of July at the Cabell County Fair in Milton (on the Mud), WV. It was stinking hot. Evan dragged me off to a ride called the Gravitron. Inside the saucer-styled spaceship thingy, it was dark, stifling, and loud with full size Peavey amps blasting something or other. He wanted to get out immediately but I calmed him down, laughing like the idiot I am, not having the foresight to know how extremely unpleasant the ride would be. The Gravitron doesn't let you feel Gs, just centrifugal force. I'm truly surprised the operator didn't stop the ride; he was inside, directly facing me, and so could see me fanning myself frantically and patting my own chest to keep my heart where it belonged. Evan rode the ride three times and Katie twice. When he got out the second time, he told Tom proudly, "I was scared this time, too!" Two links of interest: A WV blogger! The Hillbilly Sophisticate - finally off the Pfc. Jessica Lynch story. and a funny article about Irony, that maligned coping device (or sign from God that you aren't so hot). # Thursday, July 03, 2003 ( 7/03/2003 02:07:00 PM ) DN Idle Thoughts As I understand conservative political views, there's a general belief that today's society is more decadent than it used to be and in general, not getting better. Our newspaper constantly prints letters bemoaning the many people today who are lazy & live off the state, who don't know what respect is, who think abortion and gay lifestyles are okay, etc. If America is so bad, how come Eighty percent of conservatives are extremely proud of the country, compared with 68% of moderates and 56% of liberals. (Gallup)? You'd think they'd be ashamed. # ( 7/03/2003 11:24:00 AM ) DN Anglo I just read an article about the treatment of Los Angeles in fiction. Since I’m in the middle of Palm Latitudes, a Kate Braverman book about Los Angeles, it got me thinking. My own perceptions of the city have little of the hopeful, Hollywood glamour. Unfortunately, my memories are like summer mornings in L.A., cool with anonymity, under an wide fog of depression and self-absorption. One of the people I think of when I think of Los Angelenos is an older man I knew, an accountant. He was a Nisei. When he was a young child, at the time of WWII, his family lost their strawberry farm in Orange County. At the time I knew him he worked in the same 14,000 employee aerospace facility as I did, in an extremely Kafkaesque internal auditing division. The old parts of the city, the central and eastern neighborhoods of Hispanics, I never knew well. But I remember Pico Boulevard and its Jewish section, Watseka by the Krishna temple, taco stands, Mexican groceries, street corners where the men sell bags of oranges or gather for day labor jobs, the many inflections of Que pasa?, and Esmeralda from ARA, the Cuban matriarch of the 747 cleaning crews. In literature, though I love Day of the Locust, Los Angeles is better captured by Raymond Chandler (those dingy apartments on the edge of the hills!), James Ellroy, or John Fante. Palm Latitudes is just as good, and fresher (since the noir effect thrives after 70 years). Braverman’s sensibilities pervade her book, her descriptions incredibly tactile: yellow houses, shabby palms everywhere, the ominous sun and the giant weather-events, the feel of life beneath a constructed city. It’s Malcolm Lowry with a less despairing touch. Makes me nostalgic for a place I never liked much. # |
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