Dancing Bologna: Shoes! video

Howdy all. It's a test day so I thought I'd mesmerize you with dancing lights until I can do a real post. This video is one of the anthems of the study group. There may be inside jokes in the future that depend on it.

Enjoy,

Bp

Typical study night with The Crew, some naming as well

Doctor Octagon, Captain America, Lil' Mike, Big Chocolate, Tweaky,the Sundance Kid and I convened last night at The Den to prepare for our upcoming tests. I wasn't present for the naming of Lil' Mike's girlfriend, but she has been dubbed Tweaky. Apparently she made some sound in Doc's presence recently that reminded him of the robot from Buck Rogers. Another name change occurred recently, in that Smartypants finally was re-dubbed as Kw; which not only are her initials, but is a constant we use all the time in chemistry. The Geek Rating (tm) of this nickname is basically off the chart.

Last night was a typical scene at The Den: small dining room table covered with notebooks and calculators; Full throttle, Red Bull and Rock Star power drinks were all represented, bags of various snacks were open and spread about including the infamous Cheezy Poofs. The Crew was huddled over their notebooks, plugging away at calculators, huffing and puffing over the problems. Occasionally loud expletives erupted from the table.

[A side note about Cheezy Poofs -- I am fully responsible for introducing this addictive substance to the study group, and I'll take my karmic lumps for that. A bag lasts approximately 7 minutes once opened -- if they weren't so rich they wouldn't even last that long.]

Tweaky and I were off in the living room, studying on the Comfy Couch. Despite the posh accommodations we had, I felt a little strange and a little anxious, as I was off to the side studying evolution instead of chemistry. It was like having to pull over on the side of the freeway, hood steaming with some engine problem, while all your friends in a caravan blasted on past you. I knew dam well I needed to put in study time for the upcoming evolution test, but I also knew I was falling behind in Chemistry. I guess it was one of those "character building moments" your grandparents always told you about. Or, one of those self-help opportunities that are dubbed in my house "another fucking opportunity for growth." Regardless, I pressed on and put in the minuscule amount of time that evolution gets allotted. I easily spend 85 - 95% of my study time on Chemistry.

I've now taken the mid-term in evolution, and it felt pretty OK. I'm going to walk around in the sun for a few minutes before Injury Avoidance class (Aikido) and possibly think up another post. I have 3-4 brewing at the moment, we'll see what arrives.

Enjoy yourself,

Bp

Altruism in animals continued, BEES!

Comedian Eddie Izzard is the inspiration for the capitalization and exclamation point on BEES! I may have to do that this whole blog. The line is, "I like my coffee like I like my women... with BEES!" I love him, so weird.

So, bees and eusociality -- let the conversation begin.

Eusociality is the ultimate evolved form of altruism, in a biological sense. For those who haven't hit the link, it's the kind of behavior we see in animals that live in colonies, that normally have sterile worker castes, and one or very few breeding "royalty." From a fitness standpoint, what the hell do the sterile workers gain from this scenario? It's obvious the Queen gets to spread her genes all over hell and gone, but the grunts got nothing going. Or at least that's how it appears. The workers are living a completely altruistic lifestyle.

The truth of the matter, now that the genetics of the situation have been sussed out, is that in all Eusocial animals the degree of relatedness is very very high. Meaning, most everyone you are surrounded by as a worker is related even closer to you than a human child would be toward it's parent (assuming no inbreeding).

Sometimes this high level of relatedness happens due to a genetic strategy called Haplodiploidy. In the case of BEES!, the males have 1/2 the genetic material than the females do. Without going into a huge explanation of it (Wiki does a pretty darned good job, so click that link if you are ravenous for more knowledge), it means that the sterile worker females are more related to each other than even to their queen. 3/4 of their genetics are shared -- humans have no analogy for this, except possibly that it's 1/2 way closer to being identical twins than being normal siblings.

As I mentioned before, relatedness in many situations determines the amount of altruism. If an animal helps their closely related kin, then their genes pass on and that type of behavior becomes prominent in that animals lineage. This is called Kin Selection. Like everything in nature, it's not *quite* that simple, but close enough. These bees are all having their genes passed on to the next generation quite efficiently by specializing at being good workers and not going through all the work and effort of breeding.

There are very few Eusocial animals in the world, most bees and wasps, some termites, ants, a couple beetles and one mammal. Only one mammal is currently known -- the Naked Mole Rat. These bizarre little buggers are not fashion plates, thus the picture of BEES! at the top of the page and not this.

They are also highly related, in fact even more than Haplodiploid colonial animals -- they are .81 or 81% related. How would mammals be this closely genetically similar? Inbreeding, intense inbreeding. Honestly, these are disgusting little animals. But, they are a God's-honest example of eusociality in Mammals, and the only one known of so far -- they deserve a mention.

Some time if I'm feeling scatological and sadistic, I may go into an explanation of these animals. But this morning, I have breakfast to eat and that wouldn't be conducive.

Biological musings, insomnia

Sitting in evolution class today, learning about relatedness and altruism in a biological context, it's almost impossible not to relate it to humans. I may launch into a more comprehensive explanation later on, but the basic concept that got me rolling was "altruism" in animals, in almost every single case, can be related to personal benefit. Either direct benefit through relatedness -- you help your sister raise their kids and some of your genes (also in your sister's kids) still get passed on to the next generation. Or through delayed reciprocity -- you help another couple of birds build their nest and raise their young because there is a lack of females around, so when her current mate dies you will very likely be his successor.

An important understanding is that the passing of genes isn't a conscious decision. Behaviors that successfully pass genes to the next generation themselves get passsed to the next generation. This fixes those behaviors in populations. It's not a personal thing, it just happens.

So how does this relate to humans? If you do the cold math, it would mean that if a passel of people were floating by in a river and would drown without help, you'd save the ones most closely related to you. You'd save brothers over cousins, and second cousins over strangers. Behavioralists have looked at whether these equations (that work pretty dam quite well in the animal kingdom) work out for humans, and in general they turn out to be quite true.

Humans are weird of course, especially now that culture puts such a huge emphasis on thought and intellectual property. New concepts need to arise to accomodate the value of passing on thoughts and ideas, placing them nearer the value of a purely biological heritage. Nowadays people want to pass their ideas along as much or more than they want to pass on their genes. This is where the term Meme came from.

And that is where this musing starts to wander far enough afield that I'll let it go for now.

At the beginning of this post I was going to make some reference to how the post might be odd or badly written because of lack of sleep. And then I realized, I have either referenced or wanted to reference lack of sleep in every post for the last week and a half. Or nearly so.

I'm starting to think this blog should have been called an insomniac's journal. I will be heading to the acupuncturist after Injury Avoidance class today to set things straight, so soon I trust the issue will be moot.

I know it's ravenously engaging for my readers -- no, really!

Enjoy your day,

Bp

Approaching 2,000 page views.

I'm not going to post at every single numerical landmark, but I just noticed this one and figured I'd mark it. Also got the idea for a new label, "Blog Landmarks." The first comment by someone I'm confident I don't know personally also spurred me to action (thanks for the kind words Janet).

I know there is a lot of argument about page view counters and how they decide who is a 'unique' page view etc. but I'm just pleased to see that folks are enjoying the blog. I am enjoying the hell out of writing it. It has limbered up the writing parts of my brain, and now I can at least trot, or maybe even canter without straining a neuron.

I still have to stretch a lot or I'll pull something I'm sure. But the exercise is going well.

Thanks for stopping by and making it that much more appealing to practice my writing.

Video: Taylor Mali "what teachers make"

I freaking love this video. Inspires me to keep working hard to pursue my teaching career.

Plus, Taylor is a dam good spoken word artist.

Caffiene, vampire movies, "Do Not Pipette by Mouth"

So I hatched a diabolical plan at study group last night. Instead of buying bottled ice tea, I'd save my money and buy a humungo barrel of cheapo Lipton instant ice tea -- pre-sweetened and lemon flavored etc. It's unclear how much of this evil, addictive brew I drank last night -- but it was way too much. The presence of tonnage of the product lead to excess.

The study group powered through some chemistry, but eventually Captain America and Big Chocolate hit the road due to early morning duties, leaving Lil Mike, Doc Oc and I to try and be productive at the house. We quickly succumbed to entropy and stopped studying. It was only like 12:30 at this point -- 2 or so hours earlier than our normal study stoppage, so Doc proposed watching a movie.

I was easily convinced to stay to watch this bitching Russian vampire movie called Night Watch. I was so hopped up on Lipton that I knew I wouldn't sleep anyway. Lil Mike resisted at first but once the movie started he got sucked in by how bitching it, indeed, was. He soldiered on through some of the movie before he was getting too tired to drive and had to bail.

The movie is an A -- lets just start there. So far all the movie reviews I've written haven't busted the B category, but this one really did. It's gritty, interesting, and most of all original. The depictions of magic are... the only phrase I can use is "down to earth." Gritty works too, but I used that term already. The storyline is typically European, in that you'd better pay attention. You aren't spoon fed most anything, which I dig, even if I have to see the movie twice. The special affects aren't overblown, but are definitely adequate to depict the story. If you have any interest in action movies, or vampire movies -- definitely see it. Apparently when it came out it was a sensation; but of course passed right under my radar.

Which leads to the pipette comment. [Now that I've retrieved an image off the web, I see that pipet is spelled differently -- I don't like their spelling so I'm holding firm, screw convention].

I was drearily thumping around the house this morning in my robe, having achieved about 3 1/2 - 4 hours of sleep after the disastrous Lipton Experiment (tm). T. and The Wife were, of course, cheerily having tea in the living room, spread out on the floor as is custom. I began talking about the vampire movie from the night before, and was looking for an example of "grittily portrayed" magic -- finally deciding on an opening scene where a witch (depicted as a gregarious old lady in a cluttered apartment) pricks the protagonist's finger with a pen to get some blood, and out of nowhere grabs a pipette and sucks some up. She dumps it into a shot-glass, where it is mixed with liquor and I think lemonade mix to make a potion. This was of course a huge geek moment for us Chemistry students -- as it's well known you do not pipette by mouth in a lab. It was convention back in the day, but you use devices (pictured above) to create suction now for obvious reasons.

Well T. and The Wife dropped the movie description line of conversation immediately and just couldn't get over the whole "do not pipette by mouth" phrase. The Wife immediately started pressuring me to steal a warning sign from the chemistry lab at school, so we could hang it over the toilet in the bath room. "You could do it slyly, just work the sign off the wall a little bit at a time, so that by finals you can just grab and be off with it." T. just kept saying the phrase over and over and laughing, while rolling on his side -- his trademark belly-laugh move. So if you visit our house and there is a big Do Not Pipette By Mouth warning sign over the toilet, you know nothing -- NOTHING I tell you.

And now I head out into the world.

Enjoy your day.

Bp

Poem: "Deal"

[I considered starting another blog for poetry posts, but I figured they'd be few and far between, so I'd just inflict them on ya'll instead. This I found while cleaning up school papers from PCC Sylvania, where I took a great poetry class with Tim Barnes. Now, lets see if I can get this formatting right.]

                        Deal



Give me back the breathless, fertile body of my virginity. 

Give me back days of ant watching, 
      toe wiggling, 
               and grass chewing. 

Give me back little frogs in the back ditch, 
      the smell of bicycle chain grease, 
               and scabby, tanned little knees. 

Better yet, 

Give me back a mind wrought from storytelling, 
       and weather; 
              rock, and bone. 

Give me back bear grease, 
       stone tools, 
              and river baths. 

Give me back the simplicity of the rut, 
       the sturdiness of hooves, 
              the warmth of thick fur. 

Give me back my place in the net of the world, 

and I swear I'll hand over my plastics, 
       my petrol
              and concrete. 

I'll willingly surrender my cynicism, 
       my reticence, 
              and my precious restraint.

12/05

Randomness: beatbox video

This video is making the rounds of the study group. It's from a beatbox competition in France. It's worth watching all the way through, he does House music at the end -- it's inhuman. Also, there is a 2/2 of this video as well -- it seems to get better and better the longer he performs.

This performance strikes me as the ultimate geek redemption. You know this kid spent wayyy too much time alone, pursuing his geek art in lieu of girls, an apartment of his own, or a social life.

I blatantly stole this post from Stingite's blog. It was too good to pass up.

One never knows how cool their house is til they show it to a 7-year-old

After a middling showing at a chemistry quiz last night, Doctor Octagon gave me the ceremonial ride home. On the way he picks up Squirt, so I get a little bit of kid-time in, which is nice. As he pulled up at my house, I realized that Squirt hadn't seen our chickens. I took him to the house to give a quick show-around before they took off.

Walking with him through the house, I realized that this place is pretty dam cool. Squirt's eyes darted here to there; the purple walls, the Peruvian angel icon paintings, forged iron Minora, and orchids in bloom. He wasn't super into the orchids until I told him that they were deep forest plants, growing on tree branches in steaming jungles in the amazon and such. His eyes got wide and he took new interest.

We walked out back to say hi to The Girls. They were just roosting up. I warned him the inside of the coop may be stinky -- he pinched his nose shut and went right in. The Muppet impressed him the most, which is only right. As we went back into the house, I pointed out the straw bales I use for archery target backstops. His eyes just about bugged out of his head.

"You have bows and awwows?" (he's not so hot on the hard "r" sound just yet)

"Yeah, wanna see?"

His look said -- "do I wanna see... HELL YES I WANNA SEE!"

I showed him the hickory flatbow I made. Showed him some arrows... he fondled them and was lost in his imagination. It was just too cool for words. He was absolutely mesmerized. The reality of it struck him I think. In his world -- full of Pokeman and Superheroes -- all weapons are made of ice or metal and shoot flames or acid or butterflies. The simple woodiness of this bow, its heft and size kind of stunned the little guy. I strung it for him, and he twanged the string -- still lost in some newly-created fantasy world in his head.

Before he left, Squirt decided to run around our house and count all the "gardens." He came up with 16 -- get that, we have 16 gardens at our house, does that rock or what? I kinda tried to explain that a separate part of a big garden is called a "bed" but I could tell it was starting to harsh his buzz -- so I relented. "Yep, 16 gardens, pretty cool eh?"

So there you have it -- our house is full of superhero weaponry, little feathered prehistoric monster beings, and 16 gardens! Who woulda thunk it.

ps: I did a Google search for "Dr. Octagon and Squirt" to get a possible image for the supervillan sidekick, and the first place selection was my own dam blog, the infamous Utopian Bathroom and chemistry study group post. That's kinda... wow.

Poll -- Multiple posts in a day Work for you?

I noticed a lot of reading going on yesterday, and I wondered if it had to do with the fact that I posted twice. Thought I'd try this poll service and see if it works. Thanks for your time.

Blog synchronicity, sore arms, sexy back

First off, I sat down this afternoon to type up a post from my fire lookout journal onto my other Blog, and it is covering some of the same material I wrote in this morning's post. I talk about the Hanbleceya ceremony specifically. Interesting little synchronicity there, I thought.

School report: Today was mostly about my Injury Avoidance class. We were doing wrist lock maneuvers which, if I were a better blogger, I would have the Japanese name for. What it left us neophytes with after class was arms red with "raspberries." As kids we also called these "Indian burns." Where the hell did that name come from?

A quick lookup in Wikipedia gives this:

Indian burn

A prank done by grasping the victim's forearm firmly in both hands, and then twisting the hands in opposite directions about the victim's arm, causing the tender skin to stretch making it red and sore. Also called a Chinese burn, Indian sunburn, Indian rugburn, or Snakebite.

The Wife has amused herself by putting Sexy Back on her headset and putting it on my head while I was writing this post. She knows I can't resist the Head Bob while that song is on, as poppy and pathetic as it can seem. It bumps well, what can I say. She left just long enough for the Head Bob to start up, came back in and leaned on the office doorframe rolling a cigarette and laughing at me. She's easily amused.

Insomnia solved a problem for once -- scriptwriting may ensue

Last night I accidentally turned lemons into lemonade (there has GOT to be a better phrase for that). After a brief bout of insomnia, I may have solved a writing problem I've had on the back burner for years.

After having hit the sack at a reasonable hour (a first this week)I woke up, bright eyed and bushy-tailed, at 3:00 am. Before I knew it I was downstairs watching movie previews on Netflix. Dammitall, such a waste of a good discipline moment. Due to my movie-watching, I was in a cinematic headspace when I went back to bed. I lay in bed, starting to sleep, when a problem I'd been chewing on for (embarrassingly enough) 12 or so years started to solve itself. The problem of how to turn my experience of being on the road, hoboing, and jumping trains into a storyline. Better yet -- into a screenplay. There WAS something positive about sitting in front of my computer, drooling and half asleep, for an hour and a half in the middle of the night!

I'll lay out the story first, then describe the idea.

A series of events led me, when I was 20 years old or so, to a huge burst of freedom and adventurousness. I had broken an ill-conceived engagement to be married (sweet woman tho she was, I was too young and finally realized it), and was overwhelmed with an urge to get the hell out of here. I decided to Vision Quest (Hanblecheya) in the desert that spring. I also began working off the debt I had accrued from both school and the relationship. I had already met a poet/mountain man type guy named Ross (I have been giving him the pseudonym Russ in my Fire Lookout Blog and this morning decided to just use his real name) who shared my passion to be out of doors and was going to be joining me in the Vision Quest that spring. He would also, it turns out, be joining me on the road 6 months later.

To cut the story short for this post, we did the quest and it was amazing. Beyond amazing actually, completely life-altering. After that, I was planning to throw a futon in the back of my little ' 79 Datsun pickup and go to the South West to see what I could see. When Ross found out about my plans, he said "Well, I'm going to the SW this next winter too -- only I'm going to Mexico first, and I'll be jumping freight trains instead of driving once I'm back in the states." That sealed it -- he and I left town that winter with $400 bucks each and were gone for 6 1/2 months. There were many adventures, of course.

I was mulling over the screenplay idea as I lay in bed. I've never written one, only small (real small) stage pieces. The idea to turn this period of time into a screenplay has been around since right when Ross and I returned to Portland in '92. The first mention was from a Cherokee man we were studying with at the time. He said, after hearing some stories about the trip over lunch, "you guys need to write this journey up as a screenplay. You don't even know what you experienced yet -- writing it down would teach you a lot about your experience." That was the last thing I expected to hear coming out of his mouth -- screenplay? Also, lately The Wife has been mentioning that I aught to get my writing into screenplay format so I can "keep her in a matter to which she is accustomed." Writing this blog has only increased her insistence. So -- between all the movie watching and these thoughts, screenplay writing was on my mind as I tried to get back to sleep.

The realization I had last night was how to start and stop the story for a serviceable writeup/memoir. How to frame the story. It was always a huge conundrum for me, writing from my own life, how the hell do you start? Everything in your life leads to that moment, so how much back-story do you give, and what back-story? This event leads to all the events in my life after it, so where do I stop? What is the cutoff? I've known for a long time I wanted to write this portion of my life up, either as a series of short stories, or a novel or even a screenplay; and this problem was one of my major hurtles.

The solution to my problem of how to frame the story is Ross himself. He was the catalyst for a lot of the action that ensued in this period of time. He deeply affected me through not only introducing me to many authors (Gary Snyder, Barry Lopez, Thomas Merton, and Wendell Berry to name a few), but by being a disciplined and serious writer. He was my original inspiration to take writing seriously. As a character, he is complex and mysterious. Through the course of our traveling together, despite all that happened, I learned very little about him. He lived very close to the chest.

I outlived Ross. He died young in a single-car accident outside Big Bend National Monument in Texas a few years ago, and so remains a mystery. Investigating his personality and our friendship is a perfect entrance and exit to this story. Maybe starting with the funeral and working through flashbacks, maybe something different. However I approach it, using his character to start and stop the time-line works better than anything I've considered before.

I fell asleep very excited by this idea.

Enjoy your day,

BP

Best T-Shirt Ever, and other materialistic madness

How materialistic shopping madness happened this day. First -- take the car in, turns out the thing we need fixed we don't need fixed -- boom, saved $250 right off the bat. How must I respond to this revelation so early in the morning? Get off my ass and replace the stolen camera. T. was pleased about this, as he wants to get on archiving this year's garden decisions. With spring spronging, I've seen so many photo ops it's not funny, so this will be a good move. There are some cat dynamics that will just be easier to address with photos as well. Hard to plunk down another 300-some-odd dollars, even though I know some of it was covered by insurance. C'est la Vie.

While I was online, I decided to replace my favorite t-shirt of all time. My original t-shirt is a victim of the Wife's theory of not separating colors in the laundry as long as you wash in cold. (She's pretty and all, but sometimes, GEEZ -- I kid, I kid). I buy the shirt from a Native American source, because the image isn't trademarked and sells so well that everyone and their uncle now prints them.

Update on the ants, almost all gone already -- go genocide.

More later, enjoy your day.

BP

Quickie report from The Pyramid, Paris Hilton of all things

So I received an email from Flank this morning. If you don't remember his mention, here is the post where I introduced him.

Anyway, Flank has started working as a cook in the Big Pyramid On the Strip in Las Vegas. He says he keeps wondering what kind of effect working in a pyramid might have on him. Will it bring back his hair, cure his insomnia, reduce his aging? So far, a few weeks into it, none of these things. But, he reports that the turnover rate at this hotel is absolutely the lowest of any place he's worked in Lost Wages. People are super mellow, friendly and enjoy working there. He's pretty amazed.

But the big report is that service employees on The Strip are all breathing a huge sigh of relief that Paris Hilton is (or soon will be) in Jail. She hasn't been on the strip for weeks now, and everyone's loving it. He says there is rumor of a collection being made to see if somehow they can bribe someone to keep her in jail longer.

Random I know, but it struck me as funny.

Ants and the extreme hangover

So, as per every rainy springtime, multiple colonies of ants have decided that inside our house holds a lot more prospects than outside our house. Especially around the cat food bowls, but extending to the bathtub (for some unknown reason).

So, as we do every year -- or I should say as *I* do every year, being the "death and compost" part of the marital team -- ant baits have been procured and set out. The ants have been fully warned, with a full explanation of their choices in life and the consequences of said choices -- given 48 hours to vacate the premises. They didn't of course, probably couldn't hear the warnings over the thunderous crunching of cat kibble. So, we've resorted to genocide.

We use Ant Bait, which for years has worked fabulously. It's simple, very low toxicity, and kinda neat if you think about it. I mean, killing things isn't great but if you have to -- elegant solutions are nice.

The bait is just glycerin and Boric acid. I could fully well mix it up myself, there are recipes all over the internet, but I have yet to come up with as elegant a delivery system as the little bait hotel tray things provided by Terro. Anyway, the glycerin is nice and sweet so the ants lap it up, and the boric acid after a time dehydrates the little buggers. But it takes enough time that they normally get all the way back to the queen to feed it to her before their individual demise, and she gets knocked off as well. Boom... no more ant problem.

T. was making various analogies to Imperialist policies of the past centuries, and maritime law as we stood and watched the ants lap up their last meal. In the end tho, it was his observation that this bait induces a really extreme hangover that stuck. Hangovers are caused by dehydration from having to metabolize alcohol and sugar all night long while you sleep (which takes tons of water), leaving you with a dehydrated brain pan and a horrible headache, among other things. This bait, T. observed, got them high on sugar then dehydrated them as well, it just dehydrated them to death. Nice one.

Had I taken better notes, I would have traced the Imperialist Colonial analogies that were being made but I was too tired and laughing too hard to get it all down. I do know that the Spanish/Portuguese sea powers were mentioned, as well as the American insurrection.

Off to study.

Enjoy your spring, it won't be around long.

BP

Movie Review: The Matador

Ok this is more of a DVD head's up than a movie review. I realized thinking about my timing with seeing movies, that pretty much all my "movie reviews" will be "DVD release reviews." I just don't tend to go to opening night or sneak peaks of pretty much anything.

So, on the phone with my Dad the other day, my stepmother yelled from the other room to make sure to tell me to see this movie. She said it was the best part she'd ever seen Pierce Brosnan in. After seeing the movie, I have to agree.

This is a movie about a hitman in the end of his years, quickly losing his edge. He befriends Greg Kinnear in Mexico and their lives intermingle. There are some real gem comedic scenes in this movie, and it has a nice overall look and style to it as well. I highly suggest this movie for a light comedy/light action evening in. A little booze helps get you over the bumps, and most folks with any interest in Brosnan whatsoever will be quite pleased.

The bumps: Greg Kinnear plays his stereotypical role -- nervous, loser dad/supporter type. He's a good actor and I'd like to see him do something different. There also is a little too much characterization about how much he and his wife are such a perfect couple -- love each other despite their difficulties in life etc. Seemed like unnecessary film time to me. And there are splashes of hollywoodness, of producer-style cliche in the plot line, especially at the end.

Despite giving as much ink (or pixels) to the down side of the movie as I gave to the up, I highly suggest this movie. We laughed a lot and only had to cringe a little bit towards the end (any more, expecting no cringing whatsoever in a movie seems to be shooting for the stars). This is definitely my favorite Pierce Brosnan role ever. I'd love to hear some feedback from folks who see or have seen this movie, to find out if we just had "one too many" last night or it's as entertaining as we thought it was. B, to B+.

Took a night off, parade of the old ladies

Morning everyone! I'm actually well rested today, its amazing. I feel like Popeye after a can or two of spinach. I've been up til 2, or 3, or 4 every night this week and threw in the towel last night to hang with T. (hadn't seen him in 3 days, and we live in the same dam house) and The Wife. And to sleeeeep, oh beauteous sleeeeep.

Got up early enough to get our garbage to the curb. In my white terrycloth robe and some rubber garden shoes, I was a fashion plate. On my way out, there is Ruth from around the corner waving madly at me. She's in her fuchsia puffy jacket with some nice teal highlights, she has a plastic scarf thingy on to keep the rain off and she's talking away even though I can't hear her yet.

"What was that?"

"It's COLD. I hate the cold! It's May, it's not supposed to be COLD."

She gives a dismissive wave with her hand and marches on down the street. I was half hoping for one of her blue-tongued tirades -- Ruth, at approximately 4' 10" and 70-something years, cusses like a sailor. It's absolutely fantastic. She keeps a beautiful and precise garden just around the corner, on our way to the Max station. When The Wife and I were commuting by light rail we ran into her out in the garden quite a bit. She loved The Wife and corralled her daily, talking plants. I hadn't met her yet at this point, but one day passing her garden she waved me over. She squinted up at me with a face like a dried-apple doll.

"Your wife, is she going to be around soon?"

"Well, she should be by here around 5:30 -- what's up?"

"Oh I just wanted to show her some new plants I got. Where's she work?"

"She runs a law office downtown."

"LAWYERS! God I fucking HATE lawyers. Fucking scum of the earth, lawyers. Ok, well I'll wait til she's off work then. You have a wonderful wife, but the lawyers can go to hell if you ask me!"

It's hard to illustrate how hilarious and shocking the tirade was. I flashed back to the movie The Princess Bride, and the old couple played by Billy Crystal and Carol Kane.

So, back to taking the garbage out. I'm not yet to the curb with my garbage can when yet another old lady comes by and waves and smiles good morning. If you keep a good garden -- or in this case if your roommate keeps a good garden and folks think you do -- the old ladies instantly see you as a compatriot and friend. I didn't know this lady from Adam, I was half awake and not lookin so snazzy, but there she was waving madly and smiling like I was a visiting grandchild. It's awful sweet, and a nice way to wake up.

Chickens as peacekeepers

Dirk sent this to me, it's genius. I can just hear them now "oh yeah? You think fighting's good ha... do ya?" I love how the chickens stand their for a minute, then walk away like "my work here is finished."

Aikido, nausea, and weather

I discovered pretty quickly that if I ate anything solid before Aikido class, I was going to get so nauseous that I'd have to sit out. The art involves a whole lot of rolling, especially in the beginning stages of training -- so you can take falls and not get hurt. My inner ear and I have been in constant negotiation during this class. I can only get so many rolls performed in a row before I'm standing against the wall with my head back breathing heavily.

This presents me with a problem, however. I still need nutrients. I tried getting a fresh-squeezed juice drink thingy last class and it worked great. This seems to solve the problem perfectly. I get an apple, lemon, ginger and wheatgrass juice. It tastes fantastico and I don't get all shakey and headachey from low blood sugar before Aikido class. Plus, it makes me kinda high and perky, which is nice.

The weather today has been really dramatic. Spring in the NW is great that way. Headed to school in a cool clear morning, got out of class into a torrential downpour, got my juice and came out of the cafe to prodigious pea-sized hail, walked to the library as the hail abated and turned to strong wind ripping through the park block trees. If the weathermen are to be believed, there might be thunder and lightning some time this afternoon as well -- rocking.

I wanted to mention that I have received some good information from a friend regarding the whole Bee Situation. I will be digesting it down into something (hopefully) pithy and deliver the info in a RBT in the next few days. There are dozens of articles to go through though, so it's taking time. He did a nice summary himself which I just may post if I feel like it's taking too long. He's a writer, he won't mind.

I need to come up with a pseudonym for this guy. He's a real character and I aught to be able to come up with something easily, but for some reason a good nickname is eluding me. I wanted to use Dirk Diggler, but it's not quite right. I mean, it's close, but not close enough. Being in better contact with him is one of the many benefits I've gained from writing this blog.

Finally, I'll leave you with some eye-candy. Here is a website for a local nature photographer named Michael Durham. He does gorgeous work, and I'll be following his blog from now on to see what he's up to.


Enjoy.

ps/edit: We got the lightning and thunder! Very cool against the black clouds over campus. And when I arrived home, it looks like the hail was a lot larger on this side of town, almost grape sized. I'd say... oh Gooseberry sized. At least the ones that are smaller than commercial grapes.