Friendly Fish Phronistery

sore thumbs

2009-11-08T13:44:00.000-08:00

My thumbs have matching blisters. All popped and yucky and painful and, at this moment, covered in matching Band-Aids. If only the kiddie Band-Aids were big enough, I could mix and match Sponge Bob and Cars. Instead, I have boring brown-colored fabric bandages. They do the trick, I guess. All this comes from raking leaves at Laura's yesterday. I should have brought work gloves, even though my work gloves are cheap and make my wrists itch. They would have been better than nothing. Laura did not get blisters, and I don't remember getting such heinous blisters when I raked leaves as a kid, so I must have been holding the rake wrong. It felt right, though, so maybe my hands changed. Anyway, there they are. After raking, we went inside and had hot chocolate and a fire and dinner and lemon tart (mmmm) and Natalie and I did puzzles and colored, and the dog sat on me several times. It was fun. I am easy to please. My boss thinks my standards are low, but I think that I am happier for it.

Another thing, unrelated: Last week as I walked off the ferry in the huge cattle-like throng of people (ferry cattle throng? ferry throng? as long as it's not ferry thong), I noticed that the woman walking next to me had a sticker on her pants leg. It was one of those long stickers with the size on it that they put on pants at department stores. I waffled between telling her about it and not. Is it too personal to point out the size sticker on her leg? Would it just be embarrassing all around? I have had similar issues when I have sat behind someone on the bus and noticed the big mole or spot on their ear. They obviously couldn't see it themselves - did they know about it? Is it just creepy to point it out? But they might die if I don't point it out. Anyway, I debated telling the sticker woman about the sticker and then thought about writing here that I had wimped out, and I was ashamed. So I told her. And she was grateful. She said that she had been walking around like that all week, and the pants weren't even new. Hmm. And then we had to walk next to each other the rest of the way around the ferry terminal, and it was indeed embarrassing. But I felt noble. The ironic thing is that if it had been a mole or scary-looking skin spot, I probably would not have said anything. That is more personal than a sticker. But potentially worse, too, so it is actually more important to speak up in that situation. It's a funny old world.

Ooh, I just realized that I began and ended this post with stories about skin blemishes. Sorry about that.

stereotype threat

2009-09-28T20:08:00.000-07:00

I just read an interesting article (written by my favorite math prof from college) about increasing diversity in mathematics departments, faculty and graduate students. In it, she described a theory called "stereotype threat," which holds that the perception that others expect you to do poorly because of a societal stereotype actually makes you perform poorly. Not too hard to imagine, since we are told that people live up or down to our expectations all the time. There have been studies performed in which one group of people taking a math test are asked their race or gender before the test, and another group is asked the same thing after the test. African Americans who are asked their race before the test do worse and those who are asked their race after the test do better. In two instances (one of which was the math AP exam), one group of students were told before the test that the test was gender neutral (no gender biases, or not easier for one gender than the other), and another group was not told this. Women did better in the first group, after they had been reassured that their gender was not against them before the test. The interesting thing is that men did worse on the first test than the second, suggesting that their (and our) underlying assumption is that they, as men, will naturally do better than women on a difficult mathematics test. When they are warned that this is not so, they then exhibit stereotype threat, even though the stereotype has been removed. Because it was a positive stereotype from their point of view, removing the stereotype had a negative effect on their performance. Or so it seems, anyway. This happened on at least two different occasions - it is reproducible.

Verrrrrrry interesting.

A small happiness

2009-09-04T20:41:00.000-07:00

Favorite authors who have short stories posted on their websites. Thank you, Julia Spencer-Fleming and S. J. Rozan!

Now, where to post this - here, on Goodreads, or on Facebook? Good thing I don't twitter or tweet. No worries about posting twice, though, since no one reads this anymore.

mmm, food

2009-08-29T09:21:00.000-07:00

It is a rainy Saturday morning, misty and cool and very Northwest. The mist makes me think of rain forests, and I could go visit one on the island if I chose, but I have lots of other things to do. Instead of doing those things, I have been reading S. J. Rozan's Lydia Chin and Bill Smith mysteries and making chocolate oatmeal cookies. The books are mysteries, but Lydia's books are also about food. (Bill's are about music.) Chinese food mostly, but also other wonderful food, all in New York. Glistening greens, white scallops that taste like the sea, sproing-y garlic, tofu, shrimp, pork, sesame cakes, and lots and lots of tea. Real tea, not the herbal stuff I drink because real tea doesn't like me. Also pot roast and pumpernickel and liver sandwiches (which I do not yearn for) and many wonderful things. It makes me want to go to New York. Preferably with a native who knows where such things can be found, and will show me all I want to see and do and eat.

Instead of those things, I am making cookies. Chocolate oatmeal cookies, my mother's favorite. They are basically baked fudge with oatmeal. Incredibly sweet. I made the dough last night and am baking the cookies now, so of course I ate a lot of dough last night. I always do, and have accepted that I am dough-eater. I will surely pay. Anyway, I am pretty happy that I didn't go into a diabetic coma, and I can see that if and when I get diabetes, this particular recipe will be off limits to me. So much sugar. Really tasty. The first batch just came out, and my kitchen smells like a fairground, like doughnuts. Honestly, there isn't that much fat in them. I mean, no more than the usual. They smell heavenly. Along with the obscene amount of sugar, they also have an obscene amount of vanilla. I used Safeway brand vanilla, which claims to be "PURE vanilla extract", and also claims to have corn syrup in it. Ack! Does all commerical vanilla have corn syrup? I don't believe it. I'm shocked. I will try making my own vanilla, like Mother used to do. Well, she's doing it now for the first time, but she started before me.

All this sugar makes me yearn for vegetables and protein and tofu and meat.

The High and the Low

2009-04-12T12:36:00.000-07:00

It is Easter and it is raining in an all-day sort of way. The sort of way that makes me want to stay inside and do nice things. But instead, I will probably stay inside and mope around doing a smidgeon of work and a smidgeon of laundry and some cooking. I did my nails, and I fear that there are nail bits all around my living room. I'm usually very careful with my nail bits, but I trimmed with abandon this morning, and things flew. Disturbing. There are good arguments for trimming your nails outside, where your nail bits can be left to rot (if that ever happens). But there are even better arguments for trimming your nails in private (probably inside), because no one really wants to be around other people's nail bits, especially when they are flying. During my epic journey to Maryland on Christmas, I was sitting fairly peacefully at the Philadelphia airport waiting for my flight (cancelled, no surprise), when the middle-aged couple sitting near me decided that it was a good time and place to floss their teeth and trim their nails. Finger nails, thankfully, but still. I felt like asking them if they also wanted to clean the grit out of their bellybuttons, and if they would like some privacy for that particular ablution. But I didn't. I glared instead, in a passive aggressive sort of way. It was a long day.

I'm glad to see that the captain of the Maersk Alabama has been rescued. I was worried. I hope that he and his family will be okay. I'm sorry the pirates were killed. It feels a little naive to worry about them and their families, but it feels closed-minded, arrogant, and cruel not to. Where do we draw the line between loving our fellow man and condoning really bad things? What is the difference between the person and the act? What if you want to forgive someone, but they don't acknowledge a fault? It's probably a good thing to learn to forgive anyway, but it's not always easy. I have forgiven the couple in the airport, but if they sat near me on the ferry and did the same thing, I would have a hard time. It's true, I don't know their story or the pirates' stories, and public nail-trimming is a far cry from piracy, but there are standards of behavior to be observed. Also, the sounds of the nail clippers really annoyed me.

In theory, I am full of tolerance. In practice, not so much.

Bread Pudding

2009-04-03T20:37:00.000-07:00

I am making bread pudding. It is in the oven, and it smells heavenly - all cinnamon and nutmeg and vanilla. These are good, good smells! The timer just beeped, but the pudding is not set. I have never made bread pudding before, and used a mix of skim milk and soy milk in place of whole milk, so maybe it will never set. I'm okay with that, as long as the eggs are mostly cooked. Mmm. Yum.

Everybody is at Camp right now, but I am at home, making bread pudding. I'm okay with that, because I am cold and I know that I would be colder at Camp. Maybe. Also, I am going to an improv show tomorrow with Deb and Chris, and that will be fun. And I have to get my taxes done and this dumb paper. I keep on rewriting it, and it keeps on needing more rewriting. My aim is to have it done in two weeks, when Vaishali and Elliot and Ari and I go to Orcas Island for the weekend. That would be soooooo nice to have the paper done by then. At least submitted to John, if not to the journal. That's my goal. So that's what I'll be doing tomorrow when I'm not cleaning and going to the show. Fun, fun!

The bread pudding will help.

sunshine and work

2009-01-31T12:46:00.000-08:00

It is Saturday and I am sitting at my computer because I'm supposed to be working. I have my flash drive plugged in and the files ready to open. My yellow legal pad is turned to the right page. I have a pen. I am all ready to go. But I don't wanna. I never do wanna at home. My home computer is for surfing the web and playing pop-top games. Generally, it is for wasting the largest amount of time possible, although I actually bought it to do work on at home. Today, I have made a pact with myself - no games until I do at least 2 hours of work. I'm not sure if that's a pact or not. It has to be two hours of actual work, not just two hours of sitting here. Now, it is lunch time, and it is sunny out (and cold), and so maybe I will eat lunch and then go outside, and return and do work later. It sounds great, but chances are that if I don't start work now, I never will.

I know, there is nothing startling in this post. Another goal for today is to get some photos off of my camera and onto my computer. If I do that, I will put one here. But that involves not going completely brain-dead when I sit at the computer. Tricky, tricky, tricky.

Still the best

2009-01-24T09:12:00.001-08:00

see Sarah Palin pictures

Farewell, Mr. President

2009-01-17T09:36:00.000-08:00

I have been dreaming about George W. Bush. Much to my surprise, my dreams are sympathetic to him. I am worried that he feels like a failure, that he is sad because so many people are so happy to see him go. In my dreams, people give him tender good-bye kisses. He's not so bad. On the other hand, in my last GWB dream, I am pretty sure that he murdered Dick Cheney with a wire whisk on a carousel. Some big leader murdered his second-in-command, in despair because he had finally realized just how badly his Number One had screwed him over. Thankfully, my subconscious did not dwell on how someone would murder another person with a wire whisk, or what the victim would then look like. A crowd of concerned citizens gathered to solve the murder mystery. An FBI agent listed all the suspicious clues at the scene. But the leader had fled.

All this tells me that I am an optimist at heart. I look for the best in people, even if the best is simply that the person is a good-hearted and complete idiot who is easily led. But in fact, I still have my doubts about ol' George. He may in fact be a complete idiot, but I wonder about his heart. Still, if he really was aiming for the best possible outcome throughout his presidency, which one must assume he was, then the result is very sad. It is sad to try so hard and to fail so miserably. That's me with teaching middle school - I tried hard, but boy, was I bad at it. I don't think it makes me a complete idiot. But it does mean that I was trying to do something that I was not at all meant to do, and no one was the better for it. I think George W. Bush has been trying to teach middle school for 8 years, when he should never have been put in charge of a classroom.

It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year

2008-12-22T18:33:00.000-08:00

What a load of crap that is. I heard that song on the radio the other day as I made my way through the snow storm to the airport and hotel, just so I could get to my early flight the next morning, after the big storm came through. I made it to the hotel, made it the airport, waited for hours with many stressed and frustrated people, and then the flight was finally canceled.

First it was delayed two hours - the airline called me at 4:00 am to tell me that, and then just as I was finally falling back asleep, Orbitz called me to tell me the same thing, but that my original check-in time still held, so I had to get up and over the airport at the same time. It turns out that I could check in from my hotel lobby, but I didn't know that at 5 AM, when Orbitz called. Then, when we were supposed to board, they said that it "would be a bit longer" because the covered walkway to the plane was frozen, and couldn't be extended to reach the side of the plane. They had to thaw it out. A little voice inside me knew right then that it was all downhill from there. Sure enough, it took 2 1/2 hours to de-ice the walkway. They finally let us on, and then we had to sit while they waited for the go ahead to leave, after which they would begin to de-ice the plane. They said that if they de-iced and then went up to the runway, we would just have to de-ice again. I think they were waiting for the weather to change or something. That never happened, so they canceled the flight, 5 1/2 hours after it was scheduled to depart. I started to get a hotel room for the night near the airport, but decided to just come home, which was an adventure in itself (not as much as it could have been, thank God). The power went out in my town just as the ferry docked, and I was seriously considering crying, since swearing out loud in public hadn't helped any. The taxi could barely get out of the ferry parking lot, and the driver was also being the dispatcher and so was on the phone constantly, it was still snowing, with 3-4 inches already on the ground, no power, and my feet were already frozen. But as we got closer to my apartment, there started to be signs of electricity. And I had power. Rarely have I been that thankful. It was off today for most of the day, but it came back on about 30 minutes ago, and again, I am super thankful.

The thing is, when I got to the airport on Sunday, and even when we were supposed to board, it was not snowing. It was cold and there was snow on the ground, but it was not snowing. By the time they let us board, it was snowing hard. If they hadn't taken so darn long thawing out the walkway to the plane, we could have left and I would be in Maryland now. Grr. As it is, the next flight I could get is on Christmas Day. Same itinerary, so I am going to stay at a hotel again Christmas Eve - isn't that the most depressing thing you've ever heard? I got one with a restaurant, but I'm too cheap to really splurge, so it's going to suck. I was able to push back my return flight also, so I will have the same length of time in Maryland, which is good. It would have been even better if the power had not gone out today, because I was planning on getting absolutely tons of work done today (and tomorrow and Wednesday). But the power went out, I lost the clever code I had just figured out, and then I spent the rest of the day with Laura, Carol, and Natalie. They have been without power since yesterday sometime. They have a nice wood-burning stove and a gas range, so they can cook and be warm (though not throughout the house), but they have no water without electricity. I had water, but no heat and no cooking. So they came over and bathed, and then we went out to lunch at the one restaurant open, and stopped off at Safeway because I had no food - I had eaten it all in honor of leaving for more than a week.

Yesterday sucked, but when I got home, I was so thankful to be in my own home, with my own bed and with power and food and heat. Lots of people were stranded at the airport. If I hadn't gotten out when I had, I might have been stranded there, too. The shuttles and taxis were swamped and were having trouble, since the roads were terrible. I have never seen the taxi line that long. Finally, the taxi drivers started shouting out the neighborhoods they were going to, so they could take multiple parties. I took the shuttle, and they were on a reduced schedule/plan/whatever - they would take people to the downtown hotels (and the ferry, yay), but not make any residential drop-offs. Got lucky there. And throughout the day, Cindy was so helpful. She had already gotten me the hotel room for the night before, and she went online and tracked the weather and news, and even offered to have her brother come out in his 4-wheel drive to pick me up. She is so sweet. And she is taking off tomorrow (with her brother, in his 4-wheel drive) to drive to Las Vegas to see their parents for Christmas. I'm worried about the roads. Las Vegas got snow last week, and it hasn't melted yet - amazing. Anyway, I am super grateful for Cindy, and for Mom, and Aunt Sally, and Marnie (my neighbor), and the shuttle driver, and Skip the Taxi Driver, and the power company (yay, Puget Sound Energy) and all their workers who are out there risking their lives to get our power back on. Yesterday could have been so much worse. I just hope that the trip on Thursday is better. But I am afraid it will not be, since we are expecting another storm tomorrow afternoon and evening and Wednesday morning, and Thursday is supposed to be cold. So I'm still not counting on getting of here.

I hope you are having a better Christmas week than I am. Be thankful for all that you have. There is a reason the Christmas story is at the darkest time of the year. Then again, as Laura said, "F**k Solstice!"

Election Sunday

2008-11-02T09:46:00.000-08:00

It is the Sunday before the election, and I am nervous. I am afraid that people will be complacent and not vote. I am afraid that the Republicans have "fixed" the vote in key states, by successfully challenging legitimate voters or otherwise keeping people from voting. I know that they have been prevented from doing just that in at least one state, but they are crafty and have no morals. Not that all Republicans have no morals, but the party leaders are certainly moral-deficient. Like iron-deficient, but this deficiency affects the entire world. I don't think that anyone reads this blog (understandable, given how rarely I update it), but if you do read it before Tuesday, get out and vote! And do it right - if you have to fill in little circles with your pencil or pen, fill them in completely and stay within the lines. If you have to connect two parts of an arrow, follow the example and do it properly. If you have to punch out a hole in your ballot, make sure that chad is not hanging. And if you have to press a touch-screen button, you had better pray. Let's get out the vote, people!

short

2008-10-20T13:40:00.000-07:00

The constellation Orion is on my chest. His belt, anyway. Kind of freaky.

looking ahead

2008-10-17T19:56:00.001-07:00

This morning, I had to reschedule my dentist appointment from next Monday to sometime later. Shingles and lying in a dentist's chair and being all contagious just don't go well together, and probably it hurts, too. And I bet the hygienist wouldn't be so thrilled. So I rescheduled for Monday, Nov. 3. And now I am worried - what if something happens to me in the dentist's chair or while I am en route to or from the dentist, and I can't vote the following day? Scary thought. Calming thought: Kitsap County does vote-by-mail for everyone. Given the number of political signs out for some local person today, I figured the ballots were coming today. Nope, but it should come before the 3rd, so I have a chance. In the meantime, I'm dealing with my second bout of shingles in 25 years, and I am really too young to be able to say that. The upside is that I am no longer worrying about possible scopolamine toxicity. And I am allowing myself to eat ice cream and Wheat Thins. I'm the only person I know who gains weight when sick.

Added Saturday morning: It turns out that my ballot really did arrive yesterday, as I suspected. I just hadn't looked at my mail carefully. The ridiculously easy geo-quiz questions on the National Geographic that arrived yesterday put all thoughts of the rest of the mail out of my head. So did the itchiness and tickliness of my torso. gaaaaaaaaaah! I ate all the ice cream ... yesterday. oops.

15 seconds

2008-09-18T20:19:00.000-07:00

My choir is on YouTube! You can finally hear what we sound like. Someone posted a video of parts of our performance of Gabriel Faure's Requiem from last Sunday. The sound quality is better than the visuals, I promise. I am up there on the stage, somewhere in the middle of the first row. Go listen!

update

2008-09-15T09:51:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the long silence. I have been silent because I have felt especially boring lately - nothing to report. I have been obsessing over a mystery series (by Julia Spencer-Fleming). That type of obsessing is always a little embarrassing, so I try not to obsess directly to other people or, say, here. So I won't. Instead, I just admit to the obsessing without going into details.

Mom and Dad were here for a couple of days, dropping off lots of boxes of My Stuff From Their House. In the unlikely event that they brought it all, I am now officially out of their house, all grown up. It only took 35 years. I haven't yet opened any of the boxes, since I have no place to put any of the stuff, but I now have all the books and mementos of my childhood that I am ever likely to have, along with some dishes and glassware from my ancestors. Not sure which ancestors. Great-aunts, mostly. So not really ancestors. Anyway, I have no place to put them.

Mom and Dad drove out from Maryland with all these boxes, and were here for less than 2 days. As Mom said, it's the journey that's important, not the destination. I'm the destination. Now they are on their way to Oregon to see Mom's sister, and then will start back east. They have had a nice trip, and we had a good time yesterday. My choir performed at the big fancy concert hall (Benaroya) in Seattle, as part of the Day of Music and Art, in honor of the10th anniversary of the hall. Everything was free (mostly), and we sang in the middle of it. Faure's Requiem, which we performed in May as well. It was very nice. Mom (or maybe Dad) said that when the singers (that was us) opened our folders, the lights on the stage reflected off our music and up onto our faces. We all glowed. How nice. After the concert, we had a big lunch at Elliot's, the seafood restaurant by the water, and then braved Pike Place Market in search of croissants (mmm, the French bakery). Then we braved the even scarier ferry terminal, which was filled with hundreds, perhaps thousands, of sad Seahawks fans. The Seattle Seahawks had just lost their second game of the season (football). The ferry terminal was full of depressed blue-clad people, with a couple of sedate (but secretly ecstatic) 49-er fans. Once we got on the ferry, it was very nice. We sat up top in the wind and the sun, and breathed in the exhaust from the engine house. How lovely.

Now Mom and Dad are gone, and I have called in sick to work. I was planning on calling in sick anyway, but I actually have a sore throat and was achey last night, and am generally pooped, so I feel somewhat justified. And I'm a little blue, as expected. It is loud here - my apartment building is getting new siding and new windows on the back, both good things and loud. It is a beautiful day - a nice day to work outside and put on new siding, I would think. Perhaps I should go move plants away from the wall on my deck. Yes, I should.

another book review

2008-08-07T21:08:00.001-07:00

Better: A Surgeon's Notes on Performance by Atul Gawande

My review

rating: 5 of 5 stars
This is a great book. From it's title, I thought it was about how doctors figure out how to make their patients better. But instead, it is about how the medical profession makes itself and its performance better. Gawande classifies the methods he sees in several ways. First, there is diligence, doing right, and ingenuity. He explores these ideals while discussing the campaign to get doctors and nurses to wash their hands in hospitals, improving the field of obstetrics, saving the lives of more and more wounded soldiers, and improving life expectancy for people with cystic fibrosis. He emphasizes that improvement is possible, even with the tools and techniques we already have. We have to use them diligently, every day. It's not easy. At the end of the book, he has 5 suggestions for improving performance and generally making a difference in one's career. His audience is typically medical students, but these suggestions work for everyone:

1. Ask an unscripted question. In other words, get to know the people you are working with. They will mean more to you, and you will work with them better. It's just good for society, too.

2. Don't complain. Complaining drags us all down. I love to complain, so this is a hard one for me. But I also know that negative energy is infectious, and kill energy and creativity. But positive energy is also infectious. Neither he nor I am encouraging people to be chipper and annoying - just don't drag everybody down. Change the subject if necessary.

3. Count something. That I can do! Gawande's point is, find a question that interests you in your profession, and observe it. In order to improve performance, you need information on current performance, and also information on why current performance is what it is. So count something. Then give me the data and I will analyze it for you.

4. Write something. Gawande says you should show your writing to other people, write for an audience. I think that you can learn a lot about yourself and your profession through writing, even if no one else sees it. It helps to clarify thoughts.

5. Change. Don't be afraid to make changes when they are necessary.

Here is a quote that I like from the book, the essence of the book in one paragraph:

"Arriving at meaningful solutions is an inevitably slow and difficult process. Nonetheless, what I saw was: better is possible. It does not take genius. It takes diligence. It takes moral clarity. It takes ingenuity. And above all, it takes a willingness to try."

Gawande is a good writer, and his essays are interesting individually. Despite what I might have indicated here, he does not preach. He provides examples and offers up the lessons he learned from them. And he writes about really interesting topics. In addition to the ones mentioned above, he writes about doctors who participate in executions, trying to innoculate 4.2 million children in 3 days in India with a polio vaccine, the difficult question of patients' dress (or lack thereof) during medical examinations, doctors' income, and the extreme and pedestrian steps that some surgeons must take every day to treat patients in public medical clinics in India. Interesting stuff, well-written, reads quickly.

View all my reviews.

Happy Birthday, Em!

2008-07-01T21:32:00.001-07:00

Here is a big happy belated birthday to Emily! Hippo birdie 2 ewes, Em! I hope you had a good one! :-) I miss you.

The Matt Video

2008-06-29T21:53:00.001-07:00

Others have blogged about this video, and now that I have watched it, I must blog about it, too. You should watch it. It made me laugh, and then smile, and then cry (in a good way). It's hokey and sweet, and it makes the point that the most serious place on earth really is the Demilitarized Zone in Korea. And that you don't have to dance well - you just have to dance.

Ooh, was that lightening??! Be still, my beating heart! Something to write home about. Hmm. Guess not.

Another Book Review

2008-06-27T20:21:00.001-07:00

Sanditon: Jane Austen's Last Novel Completed by Jane Austen

My review

rating: 3 of 5 stars
This book was by Jane Austen and "Another Lady," mostly by the other lady. The first 11 chapters were by Austen, mostly, and it was obvious. By the end of the 11th chapter, though, there was no real indication of where the plot would go, except for using other Austen novels as a guide (seems reasonable), so most of the plot is by the other lady, as well. It is pretty much a published piece of fan fiction. Not bad fan fiction, but not great fan fiction, either, and not even close to the author it is meant to honor. That said, I enjoyed reading it, once I decided not to hold the bulk of the book up to Austen's level.

One thing the book did for me is to cast into fairly sharp relief those qualities of Jane Austen's novels that I like: the language, the social criticism and commentary, the character development, and the multi-dimensionality of the book's structure, among other features. This book had the language and the groundwork for the social commentary in the first eleven chapters, but those were short chapters and there was no room for character development or multiple dimensions. By the end of the 11th chapter, we knew very little about the apparent heroine, and the supposed hero had been mentioned once (and so maybe they were not the hero and heroine, after all!). The rest of the book is high on personal criticism, but is one-dimensional and is missing the social commentary, language, and character development. Another Lady tells us repeatedly about the selfishness of certain characters, practically rubs our faces with it, in a way that Jane Austen would never have done. Another Lady tried to capture Austen's language and the contemplative tone that most of her books have, but she didn't succeed. Still, it was fun and not actively painful. Plus, with two elopements on the same day, it's hard to complain.

View all my reviews.

Book Review

2008-06-14T13:57:00.001-07:00

The Math Gene: How Mathematical Thinking Evolved & Why Numbers Are Like Gossip by Keith Devlin

My review

rating: 2 of 5 stars
Devlin gives a hypothesis about how mathematical thinking evolved. He claims that the capacity for mathematical thinking is the same as the capacity for language (i.e., syntax), since syntactical thinking allows us to think "off-line" about objects, concepts, plans that are not in our immediate environment. Off-line thinking may be stimulated by non-environmental cues (e.g., thoughts), whereas on-line thinking is always stimulated by the immediate environment. Off-line thinking allows us to think about abstract ideas or objects, necessary for mathematical thinking.

Devlin also claims that doing math is like watching (or creating) a soap opera - it is all about relationships, but between mathematical objects instead of people. He likens mathematics to gossip.

Devlin's theories sound plausible to me, and it certainly seems that language and abstract thinking are related. It is interesting to read someone's ideas of exactly how they might be related. He gets into linguistics and archeology, too. It is also good to see someone describe, or attempt to describe, mathematical thinking for people who dislike or simply don't do math. I think this would be a worthwhile book for teachers of school math (arithmetic especially), since Devlin describes why arithmetic is difficult (his theory) and how it differs from true math. Anyone interested in math education should read it since it relates math to language and gossip, etc. Lots of good information, or at least some interesting ideas.

I don't like the way the book is written, however, neither the organization nor the writing style. For a mathematician, Devlin does not produce a neat, clean argument, although all the pieces may be there. He spends too much time saying what he will say and what he has said, and drags out what he says with extra words. Not concise. Maybe his publisher or editor wanted a long book. If one can get past the writing, organization, and repeated plugs for his other books, though, one will find an interesting, worthwhile theory.

View all my reviews.

Finally

2008-05-31T19:32:00.000-07:00

It is still May for a few more hours yet. Tomorrow is June, the month when the stress is supposed to all dissipate because all the reports will be in and done. It is not as clean as that, though, and everything is dragging on, so the stress continues, but it's not too bad. It helps that I finally have a non-horrible diagnosis for why I have been feeling tired, nauseated, dizzy, and tingly since before Christmas. It's not multiple sclerosis. It's not chronic fatigue syndrome. It's not a tumor. It's an inner ear disorder of unspecified everything. It might be problems actually in the vestibule. It might be damage to the vestibular-auditory nerve. It could have been caused by shoddy materials. Or my concussion 4 years ago (some gifts keep on giving). Or a virus. Or maybe it's something else. Anyway, I have been doing vestibular therapy, which consists of eye and neck exercises, and sitting up and lying down quickly. The problem is that I don't do them nearly as much as I am supposed to. The first eye exercise has really helped (or maybe it's a coincidence), so although I am still dizzy and kind of tingly, I haven't been as diligent as I should be with the exercises. And I haven't done any of them today. oops.

Here is poem, written to my friend Carol:

"Poor Toe"

A battle between wall and toe.
Wall won.
I thought of you.

That's all. Carol might understand it because she broke her toe months ago. Or she might not.

Did you hear about how cute and lovable walruses are? They are the sweethearts of the pinniped world.

Between cut-off and applause

2008-04-20T08:53:00.000-07:00

Our concert was yesterday, and it went very well. We were all very emotional during the "Requiem" (Faure). So many singers had particular people they were singing for, people they have lost recently. One soprano lost both her sister and her brother in the past year, and she was having a hard time yesterday. Fred was performing (conducting) it in honor of both his partner's ex-wife, who passed away last year after a long, horrible battle with cancer, and his father, who died long ago. This requiem was the first big piece that Fred conducted, and that was at his father's memorial service. He cried after the last cut-off. I don't think the audience knew, but all the performers did, and so it was all more meaningful than most concerts, which are usually pretty emotional and meaningful anyway. It was a gift to be part of it, and to help people with their grieving. A gift both to us, and to them from us. It was a blessing to be part of that gift. Jennifer, our Soprano 2 vocal coach and resident soloist, performed the "Pie Jesu" (solo movement in the Requiem). She has the perfect voice for it, and put everything into it. It was beautiful. That doesn't really begin to describe it. Transcendental. I know she was working hard, but it was almost as if she just allowed it to happen, or that she was accessing some channel of perfect music that is all around us all the time, but happened to be accessible through her (and Fred and the orchestra) at that time and place. And amazingly, she did it at both dress rehearsals, too... Boy, she's good!

I feel very fortunate to be part of this group. It demands a lot of time and energy, and there were many times this winter and spring when I wanted to quit because I was just so tired, but I am glad that I didn't. Something magical happens at the concerts. We are singing the same music we have been singing all along, but until the audience is there (and we can't stop to correct mistakes), we are singing for ourselves alone. With the audience, we are singing for them. We are giving them a gift. But we are also singing for ourselves and for Fred and for the orchestra, much more than in rehearsal. Lately, Fred has been showing his emotions more at concerts, or maybe I have just started noticing. He goes to a different spiritual plane during concerts. He is with us absolutely, and is connected to each singer and each instrumentalist, but he is also in some higher realm. Some of us are there with him, or near him, I think. It's not that we don't make mistakes, or that Fred makes no mistakes, or that we are not worried or tense about making those mistakes. We make brand new mistakes during the concerts, mistakes that we would never have imagined making. But it doesn't matter (usually), because the audience (usually) doesn't know, and the energy in the room takes us past it. That energy is part of what has always drawn me to choir. My high school chorus teacher always talked about positive energy, and it sounds a little hokey, but it's true. There is something about working in concert (literally and figuratively) with many other people, all toward one end and all together, that produces a magical energy. "Magical" isn't quite the right word. Maybe "transcendental" again. It takes us out of ourselves, and maybe onto that plane of Fred's, except that I don't think we are quite where he is. And it's odd, because I don't always recognize that transcendental energy at the time, and sometimes I wonder how it is that other singers noticed it or that the audience noticed it when I didn't. But I notice it afterwards. I notice that it was there at the time. And that it is now gone, and so I am now a little bummed. But the memory of it is still here. It doesn't hit you over the head. If you don't want to notice it, you won't. But if you are open to it, it will be there during the concert, and especially between the last cut-off and the start of the applause. Maybe I notice it then because Fred reflects it most in those moments. I think it is strongest in those moments of transition between our giving to the audience, and the audience giving to us. Typically, those moments are filled with coughing from the audience. A cough will take you right out of that transcendental space - grr! That was the case during most of the concert yesterday, until the end of the Faure, when even the coughers were spell-bound. Or maybe they had just gotten their cough drops down by that time. I'm glad they did; we needed that moment. Fred needed that moment. And later, when I am annoyed with Fred, I will remember his moments during the silences of the concert, and I will be kind. I hope.

All our soloists right now are wonderful, and I hope they stay with us. We were all a little worried when Lisa, our previous Soprano 1 soloist and vocal coach, left us to move to Chicago with her husband, the new bishop. Lisa is a wonderful singer and teacher, and so warm and helpful and kind, and some of us couldn't imagine that anybody could take her place or that we could continue in the same way without her. Well, no one has taken her place and we are not quite the same without her, but Jennifer is also a wonderful singer and teacher, and she is what we need right now. She is positive but honest and reasonable and not snotty or cliquish, as some soloists can be (especially the altos, for some reason). Linda is our Soprano 1 soloist. I don't think she has the teaching experience that Jennifer and Lisa have, but that's okay because Jennifer has it. Linda's voice is achingly beautiful. She claims that it is just hitting high notes (a common claim among the high-voiced soloists), but it is much more than that. She also accesses the channels of perfect music. And our male soloists did that, also. I hope they all stay with us!

My friend Lisa (Alto 1 section leader and all around great person) won the Inspiration Award this year, and I'm so happy for her. Congratulations, Lisa! I'm thrilled that people other than the Alto 1's recognize her greatness! And also that someone I voted for finally won. :-)

Avian Junior High

2008-04-08T23:23:00.000-07:00

see more crazy cat pics

You didn't know this was a cat pic, did you? And of course, you can't see it all because blogger's default settings are silly and I don't know how to change them, and don't plan on wasting my programming energy on it. Nyeh. So there. Here's what the caption says:
"well u can tell her i'm not speaking to her either."

Nyeh.

Where Should You Live?

2008-04-02T14:44:00.000-07:00

I just took a test that matches personality and geographic location. If you want to know where you would be happiest, go here. Maybe Eric Weiner should take this test.

Here are my results:

Your personality type is RLOAI

You are moderately reserved, moderately moody, moderately organized, moderately accommodating, and intellectual, and may prefer a city which matches those traits.

The largest representation of your personality type can be found in the these U.S. cities: Oklahoma City, Albuquerque/Santa Fe, Indianapolis, Reno, Greenville/Spartanburg, Cincinnati, Memphis, Chicago Area, Pittsburgh, Orlando, Louisville, Providence and these international countries/regions Czech Republic, Guam, Austria, Luxembourg, Philippines, Iceland, Indonesia, Portugal, Taiwan, Hungary, Israel, France, New Zealand, Slovenia, Canada

What Places In The World Match Your Personality?
City Reviews at CityCulture.org

The Purfuit of Happineff

2008-03-31T15:42:00.001-07:00

I just finished reading a book on happiness/unhappiness around the world, The Geography of Bliss by Eric Weiner. Weiner is a grump who wants to know who the happy people are and where they live, and why they are happy. What is happiness? So he studied up on Happiness Studies, and went to a bunch of different countries that are well-known to be either very happy or very unhappy. The happy countries were the Netherlands, Switzerland, Iceland, Thailand, and Bhutan. The unhappy one was Moldova, a very unhappy place. India and Qatar were mixed, but India seemed happier than Qatar. Great Britain was fairly unhappy, although they are beginning to think about trying to be happy, to the dismay of many people. America is not the unhappiest country, but not near the top of the happy spectrum. I hope I haven't forgotten any.

Weiner's conclusion is that happiness is multifaceted. A certain amount of money is involved, but it isn't much. Human connections are necessary, and trust. Envy is the enemy to happiness. That all makes sense. After that, you're on your own. That's what he found, anyway. That makes sense, too. Different people find different things that bring them happiness. Most people in the happy countries do not spend time wondering about happiness, perhaps because they are too busy being happy. If you've got it, you don't miss it or wonder where it is.

One thing that Weiner doesn't address is the temporal aspect of happiness, or the essence of happiness. He wrote about what makes people happy, but not about what it is to be happy. Is it joy? If so, is it constant joy? Or do scattered joyous moments equate to overall happiness? Is a person's happiness level their average state of being, and if so, is that necessarily where they are on the happiness meter during the majority of their life (or day, or week, or hour), or can it be the average of extreme joy and extreme misery? Is not hating your life the same as being happy? I think I am fairly happy, although there are many things I would like to change about my life. It could be better. But it is what it is, for now. (I think that was a message from one of the happy countries, actually.) But it's not constant or even frequent joy.

Another question: Why should we expect to be happy? In America, we are told that we must be happy, and that if we are not happy, then it must be our own fault. But I don't think that it is the human norm to be happy, not actively, consciously happy. I also don't think it's the human norm to be actively miserable. I think that in general, people just go along and do what they have to do to get by, and if they are happy, that's great, and if they are not, well, then, that's the way it is because they don't have any choice in the matter. Granted, I am thinking of serfs and subsistence farmers and all, but most people in the world have been at that level of society and have had little choice in their lives. (The Bhutanese, pretty happy people but they don't admit to it, have had little choice in their lives until now, when they are getting democracy by decree of the king; they don't want it, but they all voted because the king told them to. I don't think they really get this democracy thing.) It is all Thomas Jefferson's fault, this fixation on happiness that Americans have. Not that he promised us out and out happiness. He just promised the right to pursue happiness. With that right, then if we are not happy, then it must be our own damn fault. Jerk. Also, the American public is too stupid to distinguish between the right to pursue happiness and happiness itself. We feel so entitled to everything. If we are not happy, then it must be the government's fault that we are not happy. The government owes us!

So, it's either our own fault that we are unhappy, or it's the government's fault that we are unhappy. The book implies that it is both, in the sense that some countries are generally happy because of the system of government, and others are happy because of the cultural and societal attitude, which of course defines the government, as well. It could be our ancestor's fault, if it is all genetic. Or perhaps happiness is just a modern marketing ploy, and it really means nothing. I think that part of it is that, and that the choices that we make will not necessarily lead to either happiness or unhappiness. They may lead to comfort or discomfort, but not necessarily change our happiness level. (Happiness researchers agree.) On the other hand, some choices are definitely better than others. If only they were easy to identify.

This book did not address anything like depression or PTSD or the effects of war or trauma or other bad things. Weiner has spent time in Iraq and other places that have been going through horrible times, and he purposely avoided these places and issues for this book. He himself is not a happy person, which is why he was curious about it. He seems to be a little happier after writing the book (certainly after getting it done). One thing he says at the end: many people find it more important to have full and meaningful lives rather than empty and happy lives. The implication is that having full, meaningful, and happy lives may not be an option - so you may not get to pick. In which case, perhaps we should just stop worrying about it, and get on with our lives.

So there are lots of contradictions here, and in the interest of my happiness and yours, dear reader, I am not going to try to smooth them all out. I liked this book, and I recommend it.

It's About Time

2008-03-09T10:55:00.000-07:00

As usual, it is Sunday. Always Sunday here at the FFP. It is a short Sunday, with one hour missing. This is just cruel. Sunday is a day crammed with things to do, so why must it be the day that gets shorter? What should I not do because of that missing hour? Sleep? Laundry? Clean? Cook? Surf the Web and Post on my Neglected Blog? Talk to my Neighbor? Walk? Obsess about MS/Gluten Intolerance/Celiac Disease/Body-on-own-Body Attacks That May Continue Until I can Eat Nothing AT ALL? Read? Work? I vote for cleaning, as I usually do on Sundays, even those of normal length. But this place really needs cleaning. And work really needs to be done, along with the laundry and the cooking and the neighboring and the walking. The obsessing just comes along for the ride. I plan to obsess about gluten as I eat the remaining Girl Scout cookies. After all, I have to get them out of the house, right? They haven't been here long.

I have made progress on my book problem: I have finished two books, and now have only 6 to read before I can get any more. It has taken me a long time to finish these books, partly because of work and partly because I keep trying to read too many at once. For one thing, it's hard to hold them all. Weight Watchers has an article about how to save time, and talks about learning to speed-read. My reading of their article slowed down considerably on those 3 sentences about speed-reading. I don't think I am made for that. Also, even though I would like to not be buried under a pile of unread books, and I like buying new books, I don't want to just get through the books I have as fast as possible. Why bother reading them if you don't plan to enjoy them? I like reading slowly. But it does make it hard to stay up-to-date with the current crop of books, let along catch up to the rest of the reading population. I will never catch up, and will never be up-to-date. But I don't really want to be. For one thing, it's more expensive. If you keep buying books when they first come out, then you spend extra money on hardbacks and extra money on the extra bookshelves needed to house the hardbacks. If you wait a few years or decades, then the books come out in paperback, and they are smaller and easier to store. And if they don't ever come out in paperback, then maybe they weren't worth reading in the first place. But you will be out of touch. Not necessarily a bad thing.

Book Problem

2008-02-24T09:08:00.000-08:00

It is Sunday morning again, and there are many things that I want to get done today. Too many things! I have been wanting to go sit and read in a coffee shop on the weekend for weeks, but I never get to it, because there are too many other things that actually have to get done. Other people manage to do it. How do they do it? I don't know. I did actually sit in a coffee shop and read yesterday, but it doesn't really count, because it was in Seattle and I was kind of in a hurry and instead of having a nice cup of tea, I had a bagel and cream cheese to ward off starvation. It was yummy, but there was no lingering. I want to linger.

I have a book problem. Last fall, I told myself that I could buy more books only after I read 3 of the 15 or so unread books I already had. So I read 3 books. But then it was Christmas-time, and you can't buy yourself things right before Christmas, so I didn't buy myself any new books. Instead, I received 5 books for Christmas. So then I had to read 5 books before I could buy any new books. I read one. Four to go. I am working on 3 concurrently, plus some other long-term books. Then my birthday came, and I received 2 books, both of which are the next books in two series, thus opening up access to 3 other books which follow those 2 books, so if I wanted, I could get 5 read in one or two fell swoops. Except that I don't want to rush through them. Still, that is good, but now the number of books to read before buying new ones was up to 6. Yesterday, I worked in my office for awhile, and then decided to ignore my plan for reducing the unread book burden at home, and spent an hour or so browsing at Elliott Bay Books, finally buying two books. So now I am up to 8 books to read before getting any new ones. The book burden increases. So does the stack of books on the floor by my bed. On the other hand, the need to buy new books has been temporarily assuaged.

Here is what I bought yesterday:
Better, by Atul Gawande. Gawande is a staff writer for the New Yorker, and a surgeon, so he must be very, very busy. I have read some of the essays in Better already, I think, because they appeared in the New Yorker. He is a good writer. Hopefully I have not read all the essays already.

The Collected Poems of Sylvia Plath. I have never read any Sylvia Plath, and the only way I will read poetry is if I own the book it appears in. Does anybody check out books of poetry from the library? Only die-hard poetry-loving freaks, and they would also buy it, unless they are poor. So only impoverished die-hard poetry-loving freaks.

At any rate, now I have filled up the card from Elliott Bay Books, so I can now get $20 off my next purchase. That store is one big enabler, that's what.

birfday

2008-02-21T08:25:00.000-08:00

Enter the ICHC online Poker Cats Contest!

Shoot, I don't know how to make it not get cut off on the right. Silly blogger.

TGI Sunny

2008-02-18T09:38:00.000-08:00

I love morning. Clean with sunshine and new possibilities. "Salt shining behind its glass cylinder. Milk in a blue bowl," and all that. Coffee, and this morning, pancakes and E.B. White, whose writing is of summer and Camp, and lazy days by the lake in Charleston, bull frogs and duck weed, grasshoppers humming, sun and shade, nothing to do. In actuality, people (me) were hot, sticky, headachy, and irritable, and E.B. White actually writes of Maine, not Pennsylvania and Illinois, but the memory of it and what it could be is nice. I want to go to Camp, and am glad that it is in August this year.

It's a holiday and it's sunny and chilly, with a beautifully blue sky. Tomorrow it will rain again, but I think that this part of the country does not actually need rain.

Okay, that quote is from Mary Oliver; see the link. I can't not state that, as footnote-ish as it is.

Sense of scents

2008-02-16T09:27:00.000-08:00

Lately I have been noticing scents. Some are good and some are really bad, and some just are. I won't go into detail about the bad ones, except to say that yesterday, my usually clean coworker really needed to take a bath. Let's bathe every day, people!

Happily, most of the scents I have been noticing are good ones, and I am very glad to notice them. For the past month or so, I have been having flashbacks to the office my mother worked in when I was a kid, taken there by the combined smell of strong coffee and a dentist's office. Mom's office was a doctor's office with lots of coffee, so that makes sense. I get these scents in the lobby of my office building every morning (where there is a both Starbucks and the entrance to a dentist's office), and they make me curiously happy. I liked going to see Mom at work, and there was something friendly and reassuring about the building she worked in (despite the scary medical-ness of it) and the room she and her boss (our doctor) shared as an office. The people were friendly, and the music (oldtime jazz/swing music) was entrancing and promised all sorts of untold wonders. I loved that music.

Happy scent number 2: On the occasional morning this winter, when I leave the passenger cabin on the upper deck of the ferry upon arrival in Seattle and walk out onto the deck itself, I have noticed a lovely, rich bakery smell. It's faint, and it smells like the scent that pours out of the open doors of Specialty's Cafe and Bakery, which I sometimes walk by on my way to work. Specialty's is not that close to the ferry, so I may be imagining it, and the bakery scent I noticed on the ferry yesterday was not the same bakery scent that came out of Specialty's when I walked by 10 minutes later, but it was a scent that they often produce. They keep their doors open, and I think they actively pump their rich, buttery scent out to the sidewalk from multiple outlets up to a block or so away. You can almost see the currents of good-smelling air pouring out of the doors, and you can definitely see the currents of people pouring in, like water swirling down a drain. Keeping those doors open is a really smart marketing idea, although they are heating the outside. I can't eat any of their lovely warm cookies (nut issues), but I can enjoy their smell. I think I enjoy their smell much more than I would if I could eat the actual cookies.

Happy scent #3: On Valentine's Day, I stopped by a sidewalk flower vendor and bought myself two bunches of tulips - one bunch has beautiful light orange petals, and the other has delicate white petals. Both have lovely green stems and leaves, and the whole thing is just really pretty in a light blue vase in my office window. The flowers opened once they got in water (and next to the heater vent), and they have a scent. I have never noticed a tulip scent before, and would have scoffed at anyone who said that tulips smell. But they do. The orange ones have a stronger scent than the white ones, but they are also open more. I never noticed that daffodils have a scent before, either, but a friend proved me wrong the other day. Either that or the flower vendors are adding scent... Horrible thought. We are still months away from flowers blooming in yards here, but it is supposed to be 60 degrees and sunny on Monday (oh, happy day! and a holiday), so there is hope!

Vitamin D Blues

2008-01-17T21:02:00.000-08:00

Apparently, I am deficient in Vitamin D. I don't know that this explains my fatigue and nausea, and the doctor did not say that it does, but I am definitely deficient, so hopefully taking mega-doses of Vitamin D will make me feel better, or at least help prevent all sorts of nasty things like osteoporosis, MS, cancer, depression, etc. So now that I know that I am super super low in Vitamin D (but still on the scale), I am now nervous that I am on the verge of having all of those things, or perhaps past the verge. Cindy printed out something for me that says that 6 days of sun exposure supplies enough Vitamin D for 49 sunless days. So apparently it's easy to get, but I can't get it. Nevermind that the sun has come out here maybe 3 times in the last 49 days, so we should all be deficient in it, and that we probably all are. So I am all raring to go with my Vitamin D supplements, if only the prescription would come in the mail. For some reason, the doctor's office is mailing it to me. I don't know if they are mailing the piece of paper that I take to the pharmacy, or if they are mailing the pills. If it's the piece of paper, I would have preferred that they just handed it to me, since my pharmacy is in downtown Seattle, near the doctor's office, and I could get it filled right away. Whatever it is, they sent it Monday and it has not arrived yet, and I am feeling abandoned and depressed. I am going to go buy some Vitamin D tablets over the counter tomorrow, just in case it doesn't come tomorrow. Even if it does come, I will still need them after the megadose pills run out, since you aren't supposed to take it at that high a dosage for very long. And let's face it, I don't ever get much sun, even when it's out, because I work inside.

This may explain why it takes about 3 years or more for people to really get good and depressed during the winter here - they have to really deplete their Vitamin D stores. And we have higher rates of MS here than elsewhere in the country, as do other northern areas, apparently. That's freaky. And even though I now know a possible cause for my feeling yucky, I still feel yucky. My muscles feel like they have worked really hard, but they haven't. They are kind of twitchy. I felt better on Wednesday, even though I didn't get much sleep on Tuesday night because of choir. However, I ate both salmon and tuna on Wednesday, and they both have Vitamin D. That's the second time I have felt noticeably better the day following a tuna-salmon day. Hmm. So I came home tonight and ate a lot of tuna and milk. Anyway, the upshot is, get sun (but not sun cancer - you figure it out), and drink milk and eat your fatty fish (but not too much because we are depleting the stocks of fatty fish).

I'm alive, really

2008-01-14T21:01:00.000-08:00

It has been so long since I posted anything that I had to re-enter my username and password into Blogger. It had forgotten me! wah! But then, I had nearly forgotten it, so I guess it was mutual. Sorry for the long periods of silence. When I have been at my computer at home, I have had nothing to say (still don't), and when I have something to say, I am not at the computer. Such are the trials and tribulations of modern life.

A perk of modern life - I just purchased my first ringtone, a nice recording of birds in the forest in Costa Rica. This website has links for ringtones of birds that are much closer (i.e., within 10 miles of here), but they are not available for Verizon phones. Phooey. So I found something similar on the Verizon website. yay! And also, I have reached my Weight Watchers goal, which is just dandy. The news effectively put the cabash (kabash? kabosh? cabosh? Blogger likes none of them) on my plans for a nice peanut butter and sugar snack. I knew that wasn't really what I wanted for my snack, but I haven't yet found what I really want. Anyway, Weight Watchers helped me celebrate by lowering my daily point value, the bastards.

Now I'm hungry.

comfort foods

2007-12-17T19:46:00.000-08:00

I wish I had something interesting to say, but I don't. That's the main reason I haven't updated my blog in a month. The other reason is that it is generally too cold in the computer room to want to be in here for long. True, I am here now, and I remembered my password to the blog tonight, so here I am. But with nothing much to say. I am nauseated and have been for almost two weeks, and am tired and just am going to whine for awhile. But I'll stop now.

I finished reading another Jan Karon novel, a Christmas one this time (and the next one in the series - how's that for planning, eh?). They are nice books, about nice people who have real doubts and fears and struggles, and they always make me feel good. I would not say that they are meat and potato books, but they are not brain candy books either. They are more like comfort food for the soul. Dare I say chicken soup? No, I don't, mostly because that is not my comfort food. But they aren't all sweet and overly carbohydratey, either, which is generally what my comfort food is, so maybe they are like chicken soup.

So what is your comfort food these days? And (big question) are you allowed to eat it?

Happy Thanksgiving!

2007-11-21T09:24:00.001-08:00

Happy Thanksgiving, all! I am on my way down to Portland, OR, today to spend the holiday with Aunt Sally and Uncle Bruce et les chiens. It is a beautiful day outside, chilly with blue skies and a few colorful leaves left. I think I have a cold, which makes it less beautiful, but I am not at work, which makes it more beautiful. One can't have everything, but one can be thankful for what one has. Right, One? I feel like the mayor's wife from "The Music Man." Have a great Thanksgiving!

Birds Gotta Dance

2007-11-10T20:22:00.000-08:00

Go here, you animal lovers. It's great. I love it.

fever dreams (2)?

2007-11-09T10:14:00.001-08:00

I woke up this morning (with headache) from a complicated, visually detailed dream that included hang-gliding (someone else was doing that), a huge ox, my grandmother sitting in the back of a car and me trying to do laundry in the front of the car, airports, my bridesmaid's dress from last year, and some other things, I think. Oh yeah - Christmas with empty stockings. The hang-gliding and ox were impressive. My dream started out as a documentary on someone hang-gliding near the coast, full of mountains and streams and estuaries - very neat. I'm impressed with the visuals that my subconscious can create, since I can't create them when I'm awake. Then, it switched to a scene where a man was driving a cart, pulled by the biggest ox you could imagine. He kept poking the ox with a pitchfork, which looked like a toothpick compared to the size of the ox. The ox turned a sharp corner in the road, and got caught up in telephone or electric lines, which was ironic since the rest of the scene was very pastoral and appeared to be pre-industrial. The ox gave up and went into a barn or building or under some eaves or something, and rain water poured off the eaves. Then we were at the bank of a river, and an American Indian came up, but as he approached it turned out that it was a film, and the actor was an Indian Indian in the role of an American Indian, and it didn't look quite right. Then I woke up or the dream morphed into the grandmother/car/laundry/airport/Christmas stocking dream, which was a pretty frustrating dream. I was glad to wake up. I passed a large blue jeep yesterday with a license plate that said "Bloo Ox," which made me think of Paul Bunyan and Babe, and I think that must have been where the gigantic ox in my dream came from. It wasn't blue, though.

dreams come true?

2007-11-07T17:05:00.000-08:00

Speaking of dreaming of whales, this morning we saw a pod of killer whales from the ferry. So neat! I think I saw 5. I saw the first one before the captain announced them, I think. It was far away and just the dorsal fin was above water, and I wasn't sure if it was a whale, shark, or diving duck (since it kept disappearing). After the captain made his announcement, I moved over to the windows (amazing how many people did not do that!), and saw three whales traveling in tandem (although now I am not sure I know what "tandem" means), and then a single whale that was breaching quite a lot. They were moving. I took the 12:20 boat home this afternoon because I have some sort of bug, and I saw fish jumping, probably salmon. Maybe that's why the whales were there in the first place. It was an interesting day on the Sound, yesiree.

FYI, we do have sharks in Puget Sound. We have at least one species of small shark (dogfish) and probably more, and a few years ago, a UW professor discovered that there are sixgill sharks that live near the Sound floor. They are big, and I ride over them daily. Hmmm. And apparently, they have good, strong family values.

not much to say

2007-11-05T20:19:00.000-08:00

It's Monday, and I had forgotten that I had a blog. So sad. Poor little neglected blog. I have nothing very interesting to say. I am trying to stick to the Weight Watchers thing, and my motivation goes up and down. I couldn't exercise this weekend because I have a sore leg muscle (the same muscle that marked the beginning of the end of my productive time at the gym, though there have been many since then), and I had bad cramps and all the things they entail.

I dream of cake and cookies and things like that. I dream that I am making them, or that they are just here and I will get to eat them. I never actually do eat them in my dreams, but I look forward to it. It's odd, because in real life I would not have had cake since I started at WW, and I may or may not have made cookies. Probably not, but maybe. And it's not as if I have sworn off them forever. I intend to have some at the right time, and other yummy things, too. And I have apple cranberry crisp in my fridge right now (and am not eating it right now, amazingly - we'll see how long that lasts!). When I first got my nut allergy, I dreamt about nuts. Mostly I dreamt about eating them and then freaking out, whereas the cake dreams are about the anticipation. And they are beautiful cakes, too. And I am looking forward to Mom's birthday cake, which was featured in last night's dream. I would never dream (ha!) of foregoing that cake. But I wonder if I am mourning cake and cookies. Actually, it's mostly cake. Cake that I get maybe two or three times a year - it hasn't been a big part of my diet. I should be mourning cookie dough, but I guess I haven't really given that up. Weird.

I also dreamed about upside-down six-gilled sharks and humpback whales and orcas and things like that, right outside the little dinghy I was riding in. Very exciting!

Mom and Dad are leaving for Italy tomorrow, so now I will be nervous until I hear that they are safely at home again. Someone said that worrying was the one kind of prayer he approved of. Who was that?

WW trepidations

2007-10-29T21:55:00.001-07:00

So, I have now lost 7 pounds on Weight Watchers, and I am impressed, because despite trying for years on my own, I have never managed to do that. All sorts of exciting dreams of pretty clothes that actually look good on me are floating in my head. But I'm not there yet (and losing weight will not make my head, hands, or feet any smaller [the opposite, probably], nor even out other parts of my anatomy). And it seems like most people who lose weight with Weight Watchers proceed to gain it all back, plus much more. What's with that? I gather that is par for the dieting course. But then, we aren't supposed to diet, we are supposed to make lifestyle changes. So Weight Watchers must not be guiding their clients on that transition very well. They definitely seem to be on the diet path, rather than the lifestyle change path. (Of course, their solution would be that everyone should stick with them for life, and pay the not inconsequential monthly fee, too.) So I'm trying to make these changes lifestyle changes. I don't think I could eat like this for the rest of my life, because one must eat out and one must eat super rich and gooshy food occasionally. But I am hoping that I can keep that to special occasions, and limit the serving sizes when I do. So far, I have eaten out and done okay (I guess). I haven't had the gooshy food temptation yet, mostly because I do not have any in the house and haven't had time to think about making any. Also, since the WW thing is new (and costly), I am trying to make it work, so no gooshy food. But what happens with the cookie dough munchies strike? Okay, so I do have a plan for that. But what about Christmas and Thanksgiving, for pete's sake? Part of the joy of Christmas is Mom's birthday, with cake and steak - it's a perfect meal, really. And you can say that I should just have a small piece of cake, but now really, is that what I will want? No, I will want to indulge in it, which means having a large gooshy piece of cake and eat it all and want more (at inappropriate times, even if not immediately). Sigh. We'll be driving on Mom's birthday, anyway, but that just raises the question of when and where the cake will be. There must be cake.

And Halloween is Wednesday. Scary!

Ads that depend on poor math skills

2007-10-19T20:30:00.001-07:00

The Weather Channel shows me a little weather report whenever I turn on my computer at home. It's nice and useful and funded by ads, such as the following one from Lowe's: "Get $70 off instantly. $5 off purchases of 1 gallon of Valspar paint or $20 off 5 gallons."

Can't I just make 5 individual purchases of 1 gallon each and save $25 off 5 gallons? To save $70, should I make 14 individual purchases of 1 gallon each to get that $70 off, or should I buy 15 gallons and save $60, and then buy two more to save $70? If I bought those 17 gallons individually, would I really save $85? Did anybody read this ad before it was published? Or does a gallon cost $5, or 5 for $20? That would be a nice savings.

short

2007-10-13T15:47:00.000-07:00

Did you know: Teri Polo, an actress who has been on Northern Exposure and Sports Night, among other shows, dropped out of high school to become a model. She dropped modeling after a few years because she couldn't get a long-term contract because of her "height restriction." She was signed to Elite petite division. She is 5 feet, 8 inches tall.

The Day It Should Have Been Done

2007-10-12T20:29:00.000-07:00

Today is the day when the Report From Hell was supposed to be done. But it's not. It's in much better shape than it was in a few weeks ago, but it's not done. I wrote a horrible discussion section in a hurry yesterday, working from a nice, long outline, and got most of it done so I could give it (mostly) to my boss before he left on a business trip, so he could look at it before I sent it to the other coauthor, who will rip it to shreds. And my boss will also rip it to shreds, because I didn't get to even read it, let alone proofread it, before giving it to him. I know it sucks. I know it is way too long. Oh well. After doing that, my motivation today was in the dumps. I worked on references for the discussion section, which took all morning, even though I knew what they were already. Weird. And in the afternoon, it was all I could do to make myself work on fixing up the glossary, which is still not done. So I didn't get my big stressful thing done, but my boss doesn't seem to care. I hope that means he really is okay with it. I've been working on it, and it's better, but I wanted it out of my hair, at least temporarily, by today. Rats. It's hard to imagine what I did all week, but I recall working on it and being frustrated with it and all.

And then I joined Weight Watchers with my sister (because she asked, and I love her, and I need to lose weight more than she does), so now I am hungry. I cannot believe that my beef stew, homemade and chock full of veggies, is really 10 points. It was a nice big bowl, but I don't think 10 points is right. I haven't entered the recipe, and I don't know that I want to, because their point assignments are stupid. Sweet potatoes and regular potatoes get the same number of points, when everyone knows that sweet potatoes are much better for you than regular potatoes. Baby potatoes get few points, when they are worse for you. Sweet potatoes (baked, with salt) get fewer points than Sweet potatoes (cooked), or cooked without salt. Huh? So I didn't enter 10 points for my beef stew. I entered 5 points, and now I get some extra points because I also got some exercise. But do I really? I'm going to go use them, so I hope I really get them. The question is, what should I eat? And before you suggest anything silly like vegetables at 8:30 at night, let me just say this: no. I need some carbs and fat and protein and stuff. Just not too much...

Finished a Faulkner

2007-10-03T21:23:00.000-07:00

I finally finished reading "Light in August" this morning. I took me more than a month, during which time I read another book that was a lot more fun. Yep, that is a classic, all right. You can tell by all the horrible things that happen to people and the way Faulkner gets to make up grammar and punctuation and all. It felt like most of his characters really hate women. And he doesn't really seem to like them much, either, although he does show a smidgeon of understanding near the end of the book. I certainly don't want to jump right into "The Sound and the Fury," but there is something about Faulkner. His writing is compelling and slow and beautiful in its way, with its made-up words and not quite omniscient point of view. I don't really understand what makes half his characters tick, if any, but there is still something there. I don't know if I like it or not. I'm not sure it is a book that asks me or anyone to like it. I think I'll wait a year or two before reading the other one.

rant on Christopher Hitchens

2007-09-25T20:06:00.000-07:00

Slate.com has an editorial by Christopher Hitchens on why Gore should run, and basically why America and the Democrats suck. You can read it here, and really should if you want to get the most out of my rant.

Here's my rant, which was originally a reply to the email Cindy sent me with the Slate piece:

Who is this guy? I think I read a review of his book in the New Yorker. It was not favorable, I think, and if this article is indicative of his writing and reasoning, then I can understand why. Does he really wonder what the connection between global warming and peace is? Does he actually think that societies who are starving because of drought will just quietly die and let those of us with favorable rain survive? Has he forgotten that Nixon wasn't actually all bad and in fact looked pretty good at the time he was elected, and that people do have at least a smidgeon of respect for Carter now, when they have none for Bush? And if Gore decides not to run, that does not necessarily mean that he doesn't have what it takes and never did, nor that we all wasted our time and effort trying to get him elected 8 years ago. He may think that this society will never elect anyone worth electing, and that he can do more in the private sector. Plus, people were calling Hillary "Hillary" years ago - mostly Republicans, who used it as an epithet, but it's not new. And while I can understand feeling bitter against the most powerful country in the world, I hope that I would also recognize that to be an illogical reaction to its power. He resented the fact that American voters could influence European lives, but ignores the fact that if Europe were stronger, that wouldn't be true. He didn't mention America screwing up European lives (though he missed a good argument by ignoring Middle Eastern, Central and South American, and African lives), and if his omission means that he thinks that America didn't screw up their lives, then what is he so resentful about? It sounds like he and the Europe that he claims to represent have a big chip on their shoulder, like the puny kid who is bitter because he is not the star quarterback. While it may be understandable, it's not reasonable. What an idiot. It makes me proud to be in any country that he is attacking, which was probably not his point.

That was my rant. I think he's an idiot. Not a complete idiot, because his book is right in that religion has caused a lot of problems. And my pride in being an American will probably fade by tomorrow morning, but then again, I have Season 2 of the West Wing here (and a cold), and that show helps. I thought the line about how the president "likes surrounding himself with smart people who disagree with him" was very sharp - what a nice contrast to the current president.

not quite Sunday

2007-09-15T21:03:00.000-07:00

It is Saturday night, and (1) I am at home, (2) I am happy with that, and (3) I am listening to an auction going on at the Children's Museum (aka Kiddie Mu) 100 yards from my apartment. I think it is a weird place to have an auction, but possibly it benefits Kiddie Mu. I also think that it is annoying that I have to listen to it in my apartment. I guess I could close my window, but it's summer and I live on an upper floor and I don't close my window.

I tried watching "Apacolypto" earlier (Mel Gibson, so I was kind of turned off from the start). A friend loaned it to me. She thought it looked authentically Mayan, for a movie. I think the actors don't look particularly Mayan, although they appear to be speaking in a real non-English language. The hero and heroine were quickly identifiable by their big eyes. I stopped watching in the middle of the Attack on the Happy Villagers scene. I don't think I can finish it. I know I don't want to. PBS has a Willie Nelson concert (or maybe more than just Willie Nelson) instead of something good (no offense, Willie, but I wanted British sitcoms), but of course they (PBS) are fundraising as they always are. If it's not a stupid concert it's Antique's Road Show. Boring-boring-boring-I'm-not-giving-them-any-money-this-is-why-people-mock-them. The only other thing on is sports. So I must update my blog.

My choir recorded music for an album of movie trailer music today. It was fun, and we are all exhausted. It's like doing two concerts in one day without preparing for it physically or vocally. My vocal cords are all stretched and ready for the season now, though. And the SCC has a nice sum of money in its coffers, which will probably be gone very soon. Last Saturday the treasurer informed us that there was no way that we can break even on a concert, even if we sell out. It's just impossible. The least amount of money we lost on a concert last year was $3300. The worst was something like $50,000. Par for the course of performing arts organizations, apparently. Scary. So I increased my monthly donation by a buck. Now they will have a whole extra $12 per year, which should make a big dent in the debt. I might have considered giving more, but a buck increase was what they suggested, and suited me fine. You can hear some of the music we will be performing at our next concert here (Jenny will like it). And here. And here. We won't have the candles or the funky cloaks and there will be many more of us, but it's basically the same thing. Except that we have really very little idea of how to pronounce Irish Gaelic, and we generally don't look so good.

Hey, the auction is over. That's nice. Now they are frantically cleaning up and trying to get everybody the things they bought so they leave with happy thoughts toward Kiddie Mu, or whoever it is for. Yay.

Sunday again

2007-08-26T17:01:00.000-07:00

It is Sunday again, afternoon this time. It's not as sunny as I thought it was. I'm making lasagna, and I think I have a wee cold. Have been watching The West Wing, which is great of course. First season. Next is Gilmore Girls, but honestly, I need a break from the non-stop DVDs. It's not healthy to watch so many in a week! At the same time, I could have stood one more West Wing episode, and was really expecting at least one or two more, since the exciting cliff-hanger ending came on the 3rd disc, not the 4th. But I ignored the fact that it really was an exciting cliff-hanger ending, and that 22 episodes fit well on 3 discs but not so well on 4, and that I had actually watched 22 episodes. The 4th disc is extra stuff - very disappointing. So i put the 2nd season on hold at the library, and promptly suspended it so that it doesn't come in the next week, because although I would like to find out what happened right away, many more things will occur in that first episode of the 2nd season, and I will not stop with only the first episode, and I have other things to do. Like go visit my sister! :-) Saturday, whether she wants me or not. Yay, it will be fun! Must dig out my bathing suit. I hope it still works - it's been a long time since I've worn it. Too darn cold here.

Sunday rain

2007-08-19T12:30:00.000-07:00

It is Sunday, and it is raining. It feels like morning still, but it is actually afternoon. Why can't weekend mornings go on forever? They are the best times of the week. Now that it is afternoon, I have to move around and do errands and clean my apartment and get all the weekend chores done.

Here are several things:

If you like flamenco music with a twist, listen to Rodrigo y Gabriela. They are fabulous; try out the video links on the "media" page. They are Irish, surprisingly. Well, Mexican actually, but they live in Dublin. Did I say they are fabulous?

I just finished watching Season 2.0 of Battlestar Galactica. I watched it yesterday while I finished up my decade-long butterfly cross-stitch project (yay! if I had a digital camera, I would show you what it looks like, but I don't). Great show, raises all sorts of questions, and I have only Season 2.5 left. Very sad. Kind of weird, the show is.

Did you know that so-called "extra virgin olive oil" is often not olive oil at all, and even if is olive oil, it may only be virgin or even lampante (lamp oil). Or a mix. There's a huge amount of fraud, and it goes back for millenia. I don't really care if my olive oil is extra virgin or just virgin, although I would prefer not to eat lamp oil, but I really do care if, instead of getting pure olive oil, I am getting hazelnut oil. Yes, that's right - some producers put in hazelnut oil instead of olive oil. Or maybe soybean oil or sunflower seed oil or whatever, but the point is: undocumented hazelnut oil. For those of us with food allergies, this fraud is not just annoying, it could be deadly. Hazelnut oil may or may not contain the allergens, depending on how it was processed. Higher temperatures mean fewer allergens, but then again, roasting hazelnuts may either lower or increase the level of allergens, and the first nut I reacted to was a roasted hazelnut. And all that preparation-specific allergen level business has been studied only in relation to people with pollen-related hazelnut allergies (oral allergy syndrome; this link claims that this does not involve an actual allergy to the foods, but that these foods might cause anaphylaxis, which could cause death - sounds like an allergy to me), and not in people with systemic hazelnut allergies, possibly because those allergies are more severe. After reading info on this stuff this morning, I don't know what to think. Since I have OAS, I will probably have less severe reactions to hidden hazelnut oil, but it's not a given, and looking up "hazelnut oil" in Google takes you to lots of sites extolling its glories but none of its dangers. If people want to eat nuts, that's fine, but why do they have to be so pervasive in restaurant rood and pre-prepared food? "It's great in salads" says one website - swell, will my server know that there is hazelnut oil on the salad before he or she gives it to me? On Friday, I told the waiter at an upscale Italian restaurant that I was allergic to tree nuts, and he looked at me blankly. He must have understood the words, though, because soon a woman in white (not a chef, but someone higher up than a waiter) came and asked, "Tree nuts?" There was a blank look in her eyes, and absolutely no understanding in her voice. How in the world can you work in an upscale restaurant without knowing what a fucking tree nut is??? Half their dishes had tree nuts, so they really need to know what they are. And these people have worked there a long time. Apparently, people with food allergies not only have to eat at home all the time, but they have to cook everything from scratch, and they have to raise absolutely all their own food - vegetables (easy), fruit (assuming they can eat any), flour, oils, meats (vegetarianism is not an option for these people), milk and eggs (if they can those), and anything else they might want to make the food actually taste good.

Frack it.

parrot therapy

2007-08-11T07:55:00.000-07:00

Did you know that U.S. Army veterans are working with parrots as part of their therapy? Yep, they work with abused parrots that have been rescued, and they help them recovery from their abuse. Helping the parrots helps the veterans. You can hear about it here. It brought tears to my eyes; I almost started crying on the ferry. Then again, I'm a softie. It would be nice to help out a parrot in need. We could have a big aviary where they could fly around. It would have lots of plants that would somehow thrive in ways that my houseplants do not. One of my plants is dying, I fear. The soil was bone-dry, so I watered it. The leaves immediately turned yellow and then brown and fell off. So I decided not to water it. Then the soil became all dry again, and the plant, what was left of it, looked very sad. So I watered it. And the remaining leaves are turning yellow. It is the kind of plant that looks great when you first get it, lasts a few years, and then collapses. I don't remember its name, but apparently it is known for this. This is the second time it has collapsed. The first time, I went east for the summer, and when I returned, the people left in charge of it had resurrected it. I'm not sure how. Maybe I should give some nice plant food.

It is Saturday and I have to work. Too many things are due next week, things that are nowhere near done. Actually, one thing is near done, but another thing is in bad, bad shape. So I'm going in to work this morning. Pretty exciting, I know.

white pelicans

2007-08-06T21:10:00.000-07:00

Do you like pelicans? How about white pelicans? Here is a picture of them at Blackwater Wildlife Refuge in Maryland, taken by Bob Quinn, who takes a lot of great bird pix there. I wonder if I can put it in the post? I think it's cool. And I have nothing else to write about, except that I am off to Portland tomorrow night for a meeting on Wednesday, and then back up Wednesday night. Super thrilling.

checking in

2007-07-30T20:16:00.000-07:00

I had things to say, interesting articles to point you to, clever quips, long and thought-provoking essays ... but that was last week and now I forget what they are. And I was just kidding about the clever quips and thought-provoking essays. But I know I read something that I thought would be neat to blog about. Was it the cat who ... did ... um ... whatever the cat did that was cool? Saved somebody? Maybe it was a dog. The chihuahua that saved his owners' grandson from being bitten by a rattlesnake by rushing in and taking the bites himself? That might be it. That was some dog. He survived, too. You can read about it here. Or here, where you can also find a link to a story about a dog breaking Paula Abdul's nose. You can also read about a rent-a-pet service. Cool.

Harry Potter people!

2007-07-19T18:44:00.000-07:00

Go here and listen to Becky P's Harry Potter songs!

Of course, one of my two readers is Becky P, but the other one (Jenny!) should go to that there link and listen to her songs. They're good! And Becky's band (Knockturn Alley) has a gig tomorrow night at a Harry Potter party! Yay! Good luck, Becky!!! oops, I mean, break a guitar string and all sorts of other horrible things. yeah.

And while you all wait for your book, do NOT read the paper or even talk to your friends, because (1) there are REVIEWS of the book in the papers (they got advance copies, the bastards), and (2) your friends will tell you the upshot of the review, thereby telling you something about the book, even as you yell at them to SHUT THE FUCK UP because you don't want to know ANYTHING about the book until you, yourself, have had a chance to read it. Yes, my friend (more like a coworker, the git) told me the upshot of the Seattle Times' review, and I want to hurt him. He wouldn't stop, even thought I told him to stop telling me about it. He kept saying, "I'm not telling you anything," and then he told me things. It makes me wonder about him. Usually a good guy, but gee. He thinks that he told me nothing about the book, but now I have somebody's value judgment about it, so now I know something about it, and I HATE THAT! I don't want anybody else's judgment about books or movies or songs or anything before I experience them myself, especially the eagerly anticipated ones like this one. If it is something that I have never heard of before, that's okay. Like someone saying, "Have you heard of "FTBWBWUUUBSBZZZZZZZ"? No? Go read it! It's the best thing EVER!!!") That would be okay. Other friends lend me books and tell me at the same time, "It was pretty good. Kind of soupy. The end was bad. But here you go, you can have it!!!" Gee, thanks. So, no comments on HP of any sort, not even the sort that say, "Hey, did you know it's a book?" Yes, I did. "Did you know that someone scanned some pages online?" Yes, I did. They are bastards. The media are bastards. My friend had a moment of bastardity this morning, and I am the one to pay.

funny YouTube video

2007-07-14T16:44:00.001-07:00

Here is a funny video: here, go here

ghost gas - is it there or not?

2007-07-14T15:43:00.000-07:00

Did you hear about ghost gas? Apparently, if you pump gas when it is really got out, you get less gas for your money because the hot temperature makes the gas expand. You can pump the same volume but get less overall, because it contracts again when the weather cools down. So you should buy gas when it is cool out, like at night or early in the morning, to save yourself some money. I did not know this. Here is a story on NPR about it.

Here are some questions for you, in case you want to ponder something and are at a loss: Which is more important, liberty or equality? And which makes a person good or bad, their intentions or their actions? Or does that question completely miss the point?

Marsha

2007-07-09T20:20:00.000-07:00

Marsha was the flight attendant on my flight from Pasco to Seattle this afternoon. She made the security announcements fun, as in, "Your seat cushion can be used as a flotation device. Hold it to your chest, wrap your arms about it, lean over it, and kick, folks, because you're in a bad situation." I'd say so. Fortunately, we did not have to do any of those things.

I wonder if I have a spider on me.

Shakespeare came today!! All 38 volumes. I promptly ripped a page of "Twelfth Night," because I was so excited that I wrenched it open, and the nice little blue ribbon that was stuck in two pages tore one of the pages. So now it's mine. Unpaid for, but mine.

Two Things

2007-07-05T19:49:00.000-07:00

Thing One: My classical education has been lacking, so only now am I reading King Lear, and only now am I discovering the source of "Bury my body" and "Sit you down, Father," in "I am the Walrus." I guess there's a lot more of that scene in that song, but those are the lines that I notice. Everyone else already knows. I knew as soon as I got to "bury my body" in Act IV; the line spoke itself in the voice in the song, which was not the voice I had been using for Oswald until that time. Weird. Also, while looking that up on the Web (because I forgot what song the lines appear in), I read about the Paul-Is-Dead thing, which, yes, I did already know about. I know about it, and don't believe it, but man. It's spooky! And all I really know (or think I know) is that the man who has "been" Paul McCartney my entire life appears to be one of the two remaining Beatles. Maybe he really isn't. Maybe he's just really good at pretending to be Paul McCartney. For decades. With a wife (2! but no longer) and children (several!). And he's the right age. Even if he weren't Paul McCartney originally, isn't he Paul McCartney now? It's weird.

Thing Two: Also kind of weird, in a spooky and pathetic sort of way, because of what it says about what really matters to me right now. I was eating my lunch today, slowing getting through a sandwich which I didn't much like. It had chicken lunch meat on it, and the lunch meat had been in my fridge for awhile now, but it seemed okay. No green spots, and didn't smell bad. It tasted okay. I think my fridge is too cold, though I keep turning it up (or down, depending on how you look at it, and if you understand anything about temperature). Anyway, I was about 2/3 of the way through my not-so-yummy sandwich when I suddenly felt really sick to my stomach. So much that I thought I might have nasty, embarrassing sick-type problems involving the waste basket. I was glad that I did not have those problems, but I still felt nauseated. I wondered if it were the sandwich, and so threw it in the waste basket. But it didn't seem like a food-borne (bourn? bourne? born?) illness. I wondered if something horrible had happened to my family, and if I should call them and find out if they were all okay. But I didn't, because I know that's silly. After a few minutes, I felt better.

Then, Peter came in. He came in with bad news about the program we use to convert raw tagging data to the data format we need for the other program, which we use to do the analyses that we have been doing and redoing since last fall. Over and over and over again as we discover more and more and more errors in the data and in the converting program. We finally paused in our analysis and re-analysis fun some time in January, and did a bang-up beta test of the converting program, and spent a lot of time making it just right, and checking and rechecking it. And then we re-ran the data in it, and then spent about 3 weeks reanalyzing the re-run data, and fixing up everything, and getting the results on the web, and I'm supposed to be doing the report if I ever get time. And I really just want it all to END. I'm tired of it. And so is my boss, who would be really, really upset if we had to do it all over again. Really, seriously upset. So Peter's news was BAD. Potentially, anyway. It turned out that the error applies only to data that we haven't run, so our version of the data should be okay, at least as far as this is concerned. WHEW. Yay. That is a good thing. After we realized that it was a false alarm, I asked Peter when he had discovered this error. And when was that? At the same time that I had suddenly felt ill, right out of the blue! Yes. It's true. He was so freaked out about this potentially horrible development, and I am so attuned to any problem with these freakin' data, that he must have sent out shock waves, shock waves that I received. It's almost enough to make me doubt Paul.

They may be insane

2007-06-30T09:33:00.000-07:00

Have you heard about the new FAA dress code for air traffic controllers? They may be insane.
I mean, honestly, who cares what these people wear, as long as they wear something? These are highly stressed out people, and I want them to be comfortable while they direct planes and keep lots and lots of people from dying horrible, firey deaths. If a man wants to wear bright turquoise pants, I say, let him. If he wants to pair his bright turquoise pants with a bright tropical shirt, possibly with a pink flamingo pattern, then I say, go for it! As long as it does not distract co-workers from doing their job. And another thing, what's with the prohibition on listening to the radio for severe weather forecasts?! I really want these people to know about oncoming tornadoes and things. I really, really do.

Happiness

2007-06-23T15:42:00.001-07:00

Saint Augustine says that we all seek happiness, and so must all have an idea of what happiness is somewhere in our mind or in our soul. How do we know to yearn for happiness, if we have never been happy? We must be remembering happiness from somewhere or some time in the past. Is happiness one of the Ideas of Plato, that we are born knowing and spend our lives remembering? According to Augustine, happiness is the love of truth, which he equates with the love of God. It is not clear what he includes in this “truth,” or what he excludes. Does he include the horrible facts of life – disease, death, hunger, pain? Or does he refer to a higher Truth only?

Orhan Pamuk doubts that the point of life is to seek happiness. He wonders if only those who are unhappy have led worthwhile, full, or important lives. Being unhappy presumably makes you search for happiness, and so makes you act, either externally or internally. Or perhaps being unhappy is the result of a worthwhile life – it means that you did something, either externally or internally.

I believe that people are genetically predisposed to levels of happiness. Some people seem happy, regardless of what happens. They have disappointments, they go through periods of stress and upheaval and sadness, but they are generally happy. My grandmother was such a person. In her case, I thought it was because of her firm faith in God – this agrees with Saint Augustine. But I know of another woman, my own age, who seems incredibly happy most of the time, and she has never referred to God or faith. It is possible that these people are simply putting forth a happy front, or are repressing negative feelings and being falsely happy. But I think that they really are happy in their lives. Other people seem congenitally unhappy. No matter their experiences and their situations, they are unhappy, despite striving for happiness. They think a lot, while the happy people don’t seem to think that much. At any rate, the happy people don’t dwell on unhappy things. Is that because they are happy, or is that the cause of their happiness?

Scientists say that our genes dictate a lot about our lives – our health, our weight, our ability to gain or lose weight. We can change our behavior and our health, but only to a certain extent. It seems possible to me that we have a similar relationship with our level of happiness. We can create circumstances and situations that should lead to happiness, if we all have the same capability for happiness. But that does not mean that we will all be happy in those circumstances.

We all search for happiness. That much is obvious from the tabloids, magazines, and advertisements. “Buy this product and you will be happy.” “Lose weight and you will be happy.” “Sustain this way of living and you will be happy.” Society has one standard of living that will produce happiness, according to it – married, 2.5 children, dog, SUV, big house in the suburbs, thin, busy, etc. Most people try to achieve that standard of living. But do people find happiness? Some do, and some do not. If we were truly happy with what we have, we would not spend more and more money and more and more time trying to become happier. The question that most people ask is “what is happiness?” Perhaps the question should be “is happiness the goal of life?”

If we just live and then die with no further existence, then we might as well be happy while we are alive. But if we cannot attain happiness, then the struggle to find it and the knowledge that we have failed will make us even more unhappy. We would be happier if we stopped trying to be so unhappy. If we were to truly accept ourselves as we are, then we could be happy, or at least not unhappy.

So the secret to happiness is to stop searching for it, to stop focusing on it, and to accept ourselves and our lives as they are. How very Zen. Is the concept of an Ideal then counter to happiness? Doesn’t this mean that belief in God results in unhappiness because it produces discontent arising from the failure of attaining some level of the Ideal in our own lives? Many people who believe in God are happy, presumably because they also believe in his love and acceptance of us as we are, and so they do not feel the pressure to attain the Ideal. That is based on a certain conception of God. Where does religion’s focus on sin come into all this? Saint Augustine thought a lot about sin, very particular sins, but he also thought that he could attain happiness via a love of God and a love of truth. Part of that truth must be that he was a sinner – did he also love that? He wanted to not be a sinner. He wanted God to take away his sins, not just from the great balance sheet, but from him entirely. He wanted to be free from sin. So although he knew what happiness was and had attained it through love of truth and God, he still yearned to improve himself, and so must have had moments of discontent, frustration, and general unhappiness. If happiness is love of God and truth, then is unhappiness discontent with God and truth?

I believe that to be happy, I must accept myself as I am. But I would like to be different in certain ways. I would like to eat and live more healthfully. I would like to work more efficiently. I would like to be more connected to society. I would like a dog. I would like a partner. But these all entail change. Some entail very hard change. In order to exact that change, don’t I have to accept my unhappiness? So to attain my ideal me, which I believe would make me happier, I have to be unhappy. To be happy, I have to put up with who I am. Is happiness accepting of one’s inherent soul, rather than of one’s current physical circumstances? That would allow people to be happy but also to work for betterment. But if one cannot change one’s physical circumstances, one would never be happy. Physical circumstances are important. So I don’t think that is it.

It seems like the secret to being happy is to be happy. But don’t push it.

Who Am I

2007-06-23T15:16:00.000-07:00

My sister sent me her list of likes and dislikes, and asked me to send her my own list. So I started composing a list, and then couldn't think of what I liked and didn't like, so I looked at a document I made titled "Things to put on my blog." I wrote it when I was trying to come up with a name for my blog, and could think of things to say but no name. It's kind of fun, so here are the fun and still pertinent parts. A don't know what they are pertinent to, but here they are, in the "who am I, and what do I do, and what do I like" category. Don't ask for structure.

1. I like a lot of things, but I like them in my mind. Just because I like something doesn’t mean that I learn everything there is to know about it. I like jazz, but I don’t even try to get all the great jazz albums (though it would be nice), partly because I have a great jazz station so don’t need to get all the albums myself. I am not a nerd, it turns out. What a revelation. Maybe that should be my title. “Yes, I like all sorts of non-cool things, but I am not a nerd about them. Too bad, really.” I dream a lot, and what I like is in my dreams, so I don’t necessarily need to have it all in real life. Well, that’s really depressing.

2. Choir music. Mostly to sing. I prefer to sing it than to listen to it. If everyone felt this way, we would have no audience. Wait, we do have trouble getting audience members... hmm.

3. Music in general. But I don’t often have it just playing in the background, unless it is on my iPod on the ferry. Is that because I haven’t found the right music yet, or because I am so into it that I can’t think about anything else when it is on? I prefer to think that it is the latter. Probably it is more that I get distracted, and that I haven’t found the right music yet. There is nothing wrong with silence. And if I need ambient music, I am more likely to make it myself than to put on music. So I don't listen to most of my CD's.

4. Singing. I love to sing, but I don’t have good breath support and I can’t memorize to save my life. Those two difficulties ended my stage career early on.

5. Hummer – that’s me. I hum. If I make that the title of my blog, then people will think I like big huge gas-guzzling vehicles and am an idiot, when only part of that is true.

What if someone I work with or want to work with finds this blog and figures out that it is me, and realizes that I am just a humming, dreaming fool who hasn’t even listed statistics and fish yet? Yeah, I like statistics, and fish are okay, too.

6. Math – I like math. I love pure math – it’s pure, it’s beautiful, it’s godly. Really. But I do statistics. Applied statistics. And I like it. Especially the theory parts. If you want to use mathematics in a practical way, you have to do statistics. I say that, but I am practical only when I want to be.

7. Perfectionist. I never finish anything. Not quite true, but almost. Sigh – can’t even be perfect in my record of never finishing anything.

8. I kind of like philosophy. I kind of like cooking. I kind of like gardening. I really like baking. I am learning to like poetry, of sorts. W.H. Auden and my cousin and I share a birthday – cool!

9. A blog is supposed to be spontaneous, right? Won’t writing things out like this to put on my blog later lack the necessary spontaneity that a blog should have? The first post will just be me catching up with all my thoughts, and who will want to read that?

10. I hate Microsoft.

11. I like newts. And birds. And dogs.

12. I like my sister. I sent her an email asking for help. :-)

just checking in

2007-06-14T21:49:00.000-07:00

I'm supposed to be going to bed now, and I really need sleep, but then I noticed the link to my blog in my bookmarks, and I remembered that I haven't written anything here in a while. I've been getting through the cold, and it was indeed nasty. It's not over, but the unpleasant fever bit is, and now it's just collateral types of stuff, like congestion and weird inner- or middle-ear fluid/balance/hearing issues. Yeah. Too much information. Sorry about that!

I just figured out my estimated taxes. I was going to write about it, and in fact did write about it, but then I realized that I don't want that much information about me out there on the web where anyone can read it. So I'll leave it at that.

But that doesn't mean I'm done. I watched "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" the movie the other night. I figured that if I was going to be all into the tv series, then I had better watch the movie that it is based on. Boy, was it dumb. Not unpleasant, but dumb. I'm glad it's over. Last night, I watched "Notes on a Scandal." Boy, was it good! Really good. Judi Dench and Cate Blanchett and others. They're great! Judi Dench is amazing. Good story. Disturbing. But good. As for Buffy, stick with the TV series - it's good and the movie is not. I think most other people in the world already realized that, but I'm slow.

fever dreams?

2007-06-09T11:08:00.000-07:00

I have a cold, and had many dreams last night, all brightly colored and edged and none of them very pleasant. The last one was along the lines of your typical unprepared-for-examination dream. The first question was, "How large is the leak in the [map or chart or exam paper something]?" Rich (coworker) got down on his hands and knees with his test paper on the ground, and started measuring its dimensions with a tape measure. I, in my one instance of smarts in this dream, noticed that the question was multiple choice, with choices "heavy" and "not heavy." So I filled in the circle next to "not heavy." After that, the exam all went downhill. Rich soon left, having given up after measuring the dimensions of the test paper. He went outside and talked with the professor, who eventually turned into Mrs. Jones, my 9th grade English teacher. I continued with the test, but I might as well have given up, too. I thought the next question asked what was the 7th dam on the river (Little Goose Dam or Rock Island Dam, depending on the river), but instead it asked what was the operating procedure for spill [water over the dam] on the 7th day of the study. I had no idea that when I was reviewing the report/paper/study, I was supposed to be memorizing it. Then I had to compute derivatives of things, but not normal derivatives. No, these were wacky derivatives that somehow used the chain rule but not in any obvious way. I had not studied. I was going to fail. Everyone had already finished except for one guy in the corner with his iPod going and his feet on the desk; he may have been asleep. I explained to Mrs. Jones that I had just simply failed. She reminded me of the Chain Rule, but it didn't help.

Before that dream, I dreamt that Little Cousin Helena was holding Littler Cousin Chloe. Very cute, but strange, since they are from different branches of the family and live on different coasts. Eric K. was graduating from some university in Alaska and wanted us to attend his graduation. There was something about a river and rafting or kayaking or riding it on a log. I was supposed to be continuing my post-doc along the Pacific Rim, which meant that I next had to get a job in Hawaii. There was something about dolls and people outside the windows in my old room in Illinois. Oh yeah, and a taxi ride to Vaishali's. I caught a taxi in Charleston somewhere near Paggliai's (huh? the pizza place), and wanted to go to V's house, which was in Heritage Woods, but was really across 130 from the high school, kind of behind Mom's old office and in Eastgate. Two other people got in the taxi, too, and they wanted to go much farther than I did, so the taxi driver took me first. I gave him the address (62nd and N Street), and he took off in some strange direction, looking for the address amidst lots of condos and townhouses that had no backs. I gave him directions and he finally got me to Vaishali's, whose neighborhood resembled the lower part of Ashby and also what Aunt MaryAnn and Uncle Vernon's neighborhood usually looks like in my dreams. The road was twisty and windy, and the taxi driver announced that the house in front was owned by some people whose name was obviously Jewish, so I knew that Vaishali and Elliot's house was next door. Huh? They had a long straight driveway up a hill, and because they never shoveled it, it was full of snow. So the taxi driver left me off at the bottom of the driveway, and wouldn't tell me how much I owed him and also wouldn't give me change for the $10 I gave him. I woke up as a wrestled the ten away from him, and Vaishali came down to greet me. I still don't know how much I owed him, but I was certain that he didn't deserve a tip.

These are thrilling, I know. Very strong colors. Weird. It's raining out and my headache turned out to a caffeine headache. I guess that's good. My coffee table came yesterday, just in time for me to spend all day on the couch while I reviewed the long report. Useful.

very long ramblings

2007-06-03T08:22:00.000-07:00

It is a nice sunny Sunday morning out there right now, and the Weather Channel is predicting isolated thunderstorms for this afternoon, which seems fantastical, somehow, in this part of the world. We have perhaps two thunderstorms a year. But they do occur. A few years ago, a young woman was struck by lightening while she was sitting inside, near a window, sewing during a storm. The needle acted like a lightening rod. She came through it fine, I think, but a bit shaken. Electrified.

Today is the final concert of the season for my choir. We are performing this show just once, instead of the usual twice, because we are performing at Benaroya Hall (where the Seattle Symphony resides) and it is incredibly expensive. We have not sold enough tickets. It used to be that the leaders of the choir talked about ticket sales in helpful ways at many of the rehearsals, giving creative selling ideas and making it seem romantic to sell tickets. Nowadays, the membership president just says, "sell tickets." She does talk about its importance, but she is not inspiring. And the people who used to stand up and inspire sales no longer do so. And Fred is slow at producing the email annoucement of the concert that many of us depend on for sending to our friends and coworkers. And so we sell fewer tickets. Perhaps choir leadership thinks that we should have it all under control by now, but the evidence points to the contrary. For one thing, there are new members that have not experienced the ticket-selling focus of the past. For another, and perhaps more important, people tend to think that everything is dandy unless someone tells them that it is not. If the leadership does not talk with us constructively about ticket sales, then we will assume that ticket sales are no longer important and so will relax our efforts. Thanks to Jen for pointing that out.

This is the last year for this particular membership president (as membership president - she will still be singing with us), and I am glad (sounds nastier than I mean, I think). She has worked hard at a thankless and unpaid job, and has made some good changes. But she is not an inspiring or warm person. The previous president (call her AP) is a very intelligent, warm, kind-hearted, poetical, inspiring person. She helpfully talked about working on music at home and selling tickets and proper concert behavior, and she always had a poem to read to us before concerts, which helped us focus on the beauty that we were about to create for our audiences. AP was president for a long time, and got tired of it. Now she is happily just a regular singer, retired from her paying job, and doing quilting for people for money. Not a bad life. The current president (call her K) is also an intelligent woman, and she shows moments of warm-heartedness. Her mind is lively and she has done some good and necessary things for the choir, and she is also tired of serving as president. But she is not, by nature, a friendly person, I think. She is a clique-ish person. And she is not poetical, though she does try to give us inspiration at focus circle before concerts. But she reminds us of proper concert behavior by saying, in an annoyed manner, the same words over and over again. "All page turns are too loud," she says as one quoting an aphorism. Yes, they are, but when you say it like that, people automatically stop caring. AP would talk about ways of turning pages quietly and the importance of doing so. K just blurts out in a stentorious voice, "All page turns are too loud." Not helpful. I guess I shouldn't complain too much about K's unfortunate comparison with AP unless I am willing to step up as the next membership president, which I am not. K has done some things much better than AP, things that make the choir run more smoothly behind the scenes. But I miss AP's warmness, and her understanding that she was working with people, not computers. AP was a teacher and mother (still is a mother). K is a computer programmer. Maybe the differences are not so surprising.

I woke up this morning from a very uncomfortable dream about today's concert. I was still at home on the island when I was supposed to be at the concert hall. I couldn't find my makeup, music, car keys, or other important items, and my body was rebelling in annoying ways as usual in dreams. I had about 5 minutes to get to the ferry if I wanted to get to the concert hall before the concert began. Mom, Dad, and Jenny were all here, being kind of helpful in ineffectual ways. I was crying and all upset because I was completely blowing it. And I had cramps, which didn't help. I finally woke up, and still had cramps, and I got up and found my makeup, and I am going to get every ready to go after I finish this. Talk about a stress dream. It was hot in my room. Too darn hot.

Camp was fun; lots of connections; run-on sentences

2007-05-31T20:04:00.001-07:00

Camp was lots of fun. It would have been darn near perfect if my wonderful sister Jenny had been there, too. I missed her. Cousin-in-law (hereafter referred to simply as "Cousin") Tyras asked after her. So did others. I could see in Little Cousin Helena's eyes that she, too, wanted to know when she would meet her other cousin. I said to her, sometime!

We saw: a big black bear (Monday night, from the porch, great view), 1 newt, lots of turkeys (young and old), 11 deer (some more, some less), 1 Moccasin Flower (found gleefully by Cousin Carrie), a very busy bluebird couple, towhees, pheobes, lots of tent caterpillars (sadly), lots of Russian Olive (very pretty and sweet-smelling, so probably an invasive, right?), some turtles, little white flowers, little purple flowers, little yellow flowers, bats, lots of whip-poor-wills (heard them, actually), carpenter bees, hummingbirds, piliated woodpecker (but it didn't look like the one in the book), poison ivy, ferns, an enormous number of jack-in-the-pulpits, some wasps, some smallish bees, and many more things that I forget. It smelled good, and it felt good, and we ate good. Boy, did we ever eat good. Paula brought fancy cheese from Rick's cheese shop in Chicago (herbed gouda - YUM, piave, madrigal, stravecchio, stilton, and maybe more), we had lots of wine (spread out over the week, spread out over the week!), bruschetta with the new olive oil, bacon, eggs, pancakes in the mornings (sometimes) (and these people know how to eat pancakes right -with peanut butter and syrup. Whitney puts peanut butter and sugar on hers, which I think is a good idea.), ham, bean soup, corn, watermelon, grilled pork tenderloin, pot roast, chicken turkey goulash with gnocchi, and other things that I forget. It was cool in the mornings and got pretty hot in the afternoons later in the week, and then on Saturday, we had (oh glory be!) a thunderstorm. Maybe it was Friday. It was short and sweet and cooled things down nicely, and most of us sat on the porch and watched it. We got ice cream (almost everybody got Keany Beany Chocolate; only Carrie branched out [as usual] - she got Teaberry, which she said tasted like the pink candies that Grandma used to have, and which most people apparently didn't like, but she did), and took a lot of walks, and played Uno and Pass the Pigs and Gin Rummy and I did cross-stitch and Mom pieced a quilt border and Paula knitted. It was good. The final night, I woke up thinking I heard a bat in the bedroom, which kept me up the rest of the night (as an alternative to the snoring keeping me up), so I wasn't terribly sorry to leave. Still pretty sorry, though.

Now I am home and trying to get back into the swing of things. My choir has a concert on Sunday. If you're in Seattle, you should come! None of you is (are? is), but whatever.

Here is what I wrote to Becky earlier today. She said I could put it here:

"Here's a cool thing, something I intend to blog about, but in case I don't: I am reading three things in my off-time. One is the New Yorker about the Great Wall of China. Very interesting. It's many walls, and nobody really studies it or knows how long it is. all about Mongol hoards. The second is "Another Mexico" by Graham Greene. He didn't like Mexico, and while he is a darn good writer, he is also depressed, depressing, and comes across as really self-righteous. But still, the point is, it's about Mexico. And to tie these two pieces together, I am reading National Geographic about the wall being built between the US and Mexico. It's a lot like the Wall in China. How's that for a nice little triangle that just happened without my planning it at all? Kind of neat. I might even remember something about all these things because of it."

Auction Over, Camp is Next, Work is Pervasive

2007-05-17T22:03:00.000-07:00

The auction went pretty well, all things considered. We made more money than ever before, and hopefully did not also spend more money than ever before. We didn't actually lose any items at the auction, which was great. We just didn't know that some things went together when we gave people their stuff at the end of the night. But that happened only twice, which is still better than usual. It was frantic, it was chaotic, I got home at 1:30, but it was okay. It's over and that's great.

Next is Camp. I'm leaving Saturday afternoon, taking a taxi to a hotel near the airport, and then catching a flight out bright and early Sunday morning ... to Cincinnati. And then to State College. And then I expect to have to wait for my parents to show up, because they are picking up a friend who is flying in to BWI. If I had known that they were willing to pick people up at BWI, I would have flown in to BWI and saved myself $300. That would have been nice. I'll be lucky if I get home without shelling out another $300 because my plane is late, I miss my connection, and the airline is stupid. We'll see how that goes.

All my lyrical and impressive thoughts are gone. Here there are only boring, straightforward statements of fact: There is a lot to do before I leave. I have so much work that I can't believe it. And here I am, not doing work. And I didn't do work yesterday evening either. Or the previous evening, though that was rehearsal and that is a kind of work. The kind you pay to participate in. Yeah. On the other hand, much of my work is in the proposal stage right now, and it is conceivable that none of it will be funded. That would not be good, although I would still have enough work to keep me busy all year. The really big new project, the one that John calculated would take 6 man-months (or person-months, thank you very much, I am working on this, too) at the very very very least, has a very high chance of being funded. But they didn't know how big a project the statistical side of it would be when they said that. Now we know - it's kind of dissertation-level big. John pointed out the other day that I will be doing the equivalent of 2 or 3 master's theses this year. Then I pointed out that this project is more on the scale of a dissertation. He said, "Yes!" enthusiastically. I said, "At the same time." He said, "Well, yes, that is a problem." Nice of him to notice. Better than being bored, I guess.

But friends of mine have even more to do, which is scary.

Auction Day

2007-05-12T09:14:00.000-07:00

Today is the day (Day) of my choir's big huge fundraisingbenefitauction (seems like a one-word type of thing). We have a big catalog and lots of guests registered, so we hope to make lots of money. I am in charge of item pick-up, which is the process of collecting all the purchased items and putting them all in neatly organized piles so that when people want to leave, we can easily get them their purchases and they can leave happily. It is the last part of the auction experienced by the guests, and so if it goes well, they may think well of us, and if it goes poorly, they will hate us forever. It is usually very chaotic. No stress. Last year it went pretty well because we had so many people working on it. This year we have lots of people working on it, too. But last year I was not in charge, and this year I am because the woman who is usually in charge (the lovely Judy) is in Peru. So I'm a little nervous. I got up early so I could get there bright and early, and then got an email this morning saying I don't have to get there before noon - hallelujah! So I am wiling away my extra hour on the internet.

I just joined Classmates.com. I joined under the name I use now (i.e., Rebecca) rather than the name I used then (Becky), and now I can't figure out how to change it. I assume that is why so many people have double entries. Either they forgot that they had already joined, or they couldn't figure out how to edit their profile. The people I am really interested in from high school either have not joined or have not done a profile. Most people are married with 1-3 children and are conservative in their political views. Thank God some are single, childless, and liberal. And no longer living in Illinois, those left-leaning anti-family people.

I gotta see what ferry I have to take. I hope this auction thing goes well. Tomorrow I sleep.

Congratulations, Becky!

2007-05-07T20:45:00.000-07:00

Congratulations to Becky P. for passing the big huge nasty oral exam with flying colors, at the top rank, and no doubt in record time, too! Yay!!!

too much

2007-05-03T20:41:00.000-07:00

Have you ever had those times when you ignore things like daily mail and cooking and cleaning and all those little entropy-fighting things that don't take that much time but are kind of a pain? And then when you do finally get to them, they take for-bleedin'-EVER? Because you haven't been keeping up? Of course you have. I know my readers. I know we all do this. Anyone who doesn't do this is some evil demon in almost-human form. This time, on top of all the mail and cooking and cleaning and all, I have birthday cards that I bought after the pertinent birthday and that I have yet to send. So I must send them, because then I will feel better. And maybe the recipient will, too, because they will know that I have not dumped them as friends and first cousins once removed. That reminds me that I have not responded to my own birthday card from a college friend who I really, really owe a letter. At least an email. It's so hard to email when you haven't emailed for so long. Either you write a tome that takes an hour and a half to write and 20 minutes to read, possibly boring the friend to a sock-free state, or else you write two sentences that basically say I'm still alive and how are you? Then the sock is on the other foot, or the email guilt is in the other inbox. And the friend writes back immediately with a nicely detailed (but not too detailed) description of her life and plans and all, and it is the right length and she even includes a photo, and then it's all back on you. aargh.

A good friend of mine has a big horrible nasty ORAL exam tomorrow - GOOD LUCK, FRIEND!!!! You'll do GREAT!!! And I will send and am already sending good thoughts and prayers your way, so that you will think clearly and calmly and creatively (and I know you will), and that when it is all over, you will wait until you get home before you break into hysterics. But if you don't wait, that's okay, too. Always remember that DONE IS GOOD! :-)

And "Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood" was actually pretty good. The writing wasn't top notch, but it got better, and who am I to criticize? A loud and annoying yet somehow admirable (as in, one should admire her but she drives most of us crazy) woman at choir was complaining about the butt of someone on "Dance with the Stars" (or whatever) the other day, and I thought that she really was not one to criticize anyone's butt. Hers is quite large. Not larger than mine, mind you, but not the seat of a butt critic. So perhaps I shouldn't criticize the writing in DSOFYYS ... but I do anyway. The story was pretty good. Had everything in it but the kitchen sink, actually. The message was good. Then I read Terry Pratchett, and while it ("Eric") was not one of his best, it was still better than most stuff out there, and it made me laugh. I don't know what I'll do when I have read all the Terry Pratchetts. I might go insane.

mysteries

2007-04-26T19:20:00.000-07:00

On Sunday, I walked down to the Seattle Mystery Bookshop in Pioneer Square. I was looking for an out-of-print book by a particular author, and was willing to buy a book by another author, as well. I went in, turning off my cell phone as requested, and was awed by the sheer number of mystery novels they have. It's not a huge store, but it's not tiny either, and its shelves are packed. They have brand new editions and used ones, too. And if I ever kind of, sort of thought about trying to be up on all the big mystery authors and know them all, I have now officially given up on that idea. There are so many mystery authors out there, and they aren't all good, and even if they were, it's just too many. There are classic authors I have never heard of before. It's daunting. They didn't have the out-of-print book I was looking for, but I didn't ask about it, and so maybe they would help me find it. I bet they would. They (i.e., the man behind the counter) looked very helpful. Instead, I bought a new paperback copy of the next book in another series that I am reading.

And I felt guilty about it, because I already had about 23 books sitting at home, waiting to be read, plus the 82 books on my list at the library. And then there's my queue at Netflix, which will take me 4 years to get through at my current 2-DVDs-per-month speed, which has been too fast lately. And there's the DVDs I have on hold at the library, too. And the New Yorkers and National Geographics that I am behind on. And yeah, there's work, too! Keep forgetting that...

Right now I am reading "The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood" by Rebecca Wells, whom I actually saw with my own very two actual eyes in February, on this actual island. I thought, ooh, Rebecca Wells, I should read her book. So I am, years after the rest of the country read it. And I am ambivalent toward it so far (I'm about halfway through). The story is okay, but the writing is not that great, which just goes to show how hard it is to write well, and in particular how hard it is to tell a story well. There are moments of something like greatness, though. Just when I want to give up on the book, there is some passage that makes me feel vulnerable and uncomfortable, which I'm sure Wells would be thrilled to hear about. I don't particularly enjoy it, but I guess I'll keep reading. I will still have 23 books to read when I am finished with it, though, with the Laurie R. King novel I bought on Sunday. Her books and her writing I like. She has a nice blog, too, where I can go and read her writing any time I like. Cool.

I'm getting a cold. Bleh.

Motorcycle Diaries

2007-04-19T20:15:00.000-07:00

I finally watched "The Motorcycle Diaries" this week, just finished it minutes ago. It's great. I liked it very much, and now I want to learn all about South America. The photography, the soundtrack, the acting, it was all excellent. And the scenery was fabulous. It makes me want to learn Spanish. I watched "Long Way Round" last year, which is also about two friends who take off on motorcycles on a long, long, long trip. LWR is a documentary, though, so you see Ewan MacGregor and Charley Boorman struggling through the Steppes of Asia for real, while TMD is a bona fide movie, and you get to see Gael Garcia Bernal and Rodrigo De la Serna pretend to be Che Guevara and Alberto Granado struggling across South America. But Ewan MacGregor and Charley Boorman had a photographer and a support team that they met up with occasionally, while Che Guevara and Alberto Granado had nothing of the sort, only one bike, and it kicked the bucket part-way through. Both films are about male friendships and adventure, and they are both really nice. Go watch them. Plus, if you like dark-headed men, then you've got Ewan MacGregor and Gael Garcia Bernal. If you like light-headed men, you've got Charley Boorman and Rodrigo de la Serna. You can't go wrong either way. If you like women, you might have a problem.

Virginia Tech

2007-04-17T22:03:00.000-07:00

Is everyone in shock? It seems like the official, formal entities have responded to the shootings in Virginia - the president spoke, the Queen spoke, the flag is at half-staff, the same gruesome picture is on the front page of all the newspapers. But on a more personal level, people are avoiding this. They seem curious. They want to know about it - they read the newspaper over people's shoulder, spend lots of time on it online. But they don't talk about it. Two people mentioned it to me today (not counting my mother and sister, who emailed) - a friend who confessed to being obsessed with it (pretty healthy, I think), and my boss, who made a bad joke and then apologized, kinda. Everyone else avoided it, including me. The blogs avoid it, too, at least the ones I've looked at. I've been thinking about it a lot, so I figure that everyone else is, too, and that no one knows how to deal with it. Or maybe most people are like the folks on the ferry tonight - happy, cheerful, oblivious. Except for the lacrosse team, who talked and joked about it. They're teenage boys, that's how they deal with it. But the other ferry people kind of annoyed me. How can they be so cheerful? How can the people next to me happily talk about which colleges their daughter is looking at, and not even mention it, or at least be a little less cheerful for a second? Did they forget? Lucky them.

Most of us have been in the position of the people who were killed. We have lived in a dorm, we have gone to class, many have taught. This could have happened to any of us. When I was teaching, I had a quiet, loner-type student who had a military background and a short temper. I didn't have any trouble with him (much), but I know that the university authorities were worried about him. Would he just flip out someday? If so, what would he do? I never worried about him shooting down scores of people, but maybe I should have. I would worry about that now. We had a murder-suicide on the University of Washington campus a few weeks ago. Campuses are not secure at all. They can't be, unless we build walls around them and check absolutely everything that goes in. That sounds very medieval, and would not be a helpful solution, I think. A more realistic solution is making sure that no one is left to brood on their own to the point where they hate everybody, including themselves, and want to destroy everything. We have to stay connected to each other and to the human race. That's what prevents people from flipping the switch and becoming a murderer. It's one thing to tell yourself to be connected, but I don't know how to tell someone else to be connected. It's hard to force someone to participate in society if they don't want to. Do we have to worry about everyone who just wants to be left alone? If so, then the introverts of the world (and I think that described most of the people who read this blog) are in trouble. But there's a difference between being an introvert and being a murderous loner. So, psychology friends and family, please comment!

I almost forgot to say: my prayers go out to the family and friends of those who were killed, and to all the Virginia Tech community. Also to the family of the gunman.

blogs

2007-04-14T12:18:00.000-07:00

At the top of the screen, just below the toolbar, there might be a link called "Next blog." If you click it, you will get to another blogger or blogspot blog. I guess they are chosen randomly. I've been looking through some of them, and some are interesting, most are boring, some are not pleasant, and many are in languages other than English, which is nice. Spanish, Swedish (I think), and Russian, so far. I don't recommend clicking on the link with your young or otherwise impressionable children sitting with you, because sometimes (not often) something hostile or offensive comes up. Maybe I should flag those for blogspot, and tell them about it. Hmm. I didn't do that, I just clicked on to the next blog. And cleared my history.

What is with all the peeps videos?

The Guilt

2007-04-13T20:14:00.000-07:00

Tonight (right now) I am supposed to be singing in Carmina Burana with my choir and the Pacific Northwest Ballet, wonders that they all are. But instead I am home typing on my computer, because my back muscles have chosen this week to go all haywire, and so I can't stand for the 65 or 90 or whatever it is minutes the show lasts. And sitting down during the show is not an option. So I am here, and they are there. I sent Fred an email about it this morning, and tried calling his office, but got no answer and no response to the email. I hope he got it. I also sent it to Lisa, and she wrote back with sympathy and understanding, so that's nice. Tomorrow I hope to go. Tonight I'm going to make cookies. Assuming I can get down to the oven. Maybe it's not such a good idea.

Bob came, saw, and conquered

2007-04-11T20:51:00.000-07:00

Bob was here today. He drove up and down the street, looking for my apartment, unable to find it because no one can find it. I feel that I am safe from potential stalkers, unless they follow me home. Unlikely. Anyway, I looked out the window and saw a large man in a red minivan driving slowly past my window, with a look of exasperation on his face. He drove by again (and about 20 middle-aged to elderly adults walked by - what was that about? 10:15 on a Wednesday morning?! The idea!). So I went outside and saw him parked where everyone parks after trying twice to locate my apartment, and we shared a chuckle about being lost, and he came and put my Nerka (that's my computer's name) back together, with a new power supply. He made sure everything worked, and then he left, taking the old power supply with him. Now that's service. He says that next time, I can call him before calling Dell, and maybe he will be able to help so I can avoid dealing with Dell. Isn't that nice? I like Bob.

But I still dislike Dell.

Then I went to work, where I got next to nothing done because my back muscles have chosen this week to spasm like it's there last chance ever to do so (I wish) (maybe - maybe not - there are unpleasant alternatives to both a long life with spasming back muscles and a long life with non-spasming back muscles), so I mostly sat in my chair in weird positions and thought longingly of the floor. Sometimes I just gave up and laid on the floor, which helped, but didn't quite do the job. If I knew what I did to start this all off, I promise I would never do it again. I hope it wasn't singing Carmina Burana 5 times last weekend, because I'm signed up to do it twice more this weekend. Wafna! (I'm behind the wheel, first row, just to the left of center in that picture. I think - that picture is from 2004, but it looks the same as last weekend.)

I took a personality test just now, the Jung & Enneagram Test, courtesy of my sister who has a knack for finding these things. I am INTP, 9, and sp/so/sx. I'll try posting my results here, see if it works:

INTP - "Architect". Greatest precision in thought and language. Can readily discern contradictions and inconsistencies. The world exists primarily to be understood. 3.3% of total population.

Take Free Jung Personality Test
personality tests by similarminds.com

Cool. Here's more:

Main type	Variant

Take Free Enneagram Personality Test
personality tests by similarminds.com

Enneagram Test Results

Type 1	Perfectionism	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	40%
Type 2	Helpfulness	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	43%
Type 3	Image Awareness	\|\|\|\|\|\|	26%
Type 4	Sensitivity	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	40%
Type 5	Detachment	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	50%
Type 6	Anxiety	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	46%
Type 7	Adventurousness	\|\|\|\|	20%
Type 8	Aggressiveness	\|\|\|\|	20%
Type 9	Calmness	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	53%

Your main type is 9
Your variant is self pres

Take Free Enneagram Personality Test
personality tests by similarminds.com

I think I have been INTP before. But I read more about type 9, and that really does not sound like me. Not at all. So forget that.

Yay, my computer works!

Bob comes tomorrow

2007-04-10T17:36:00.000-07:00

With any luck at all, or perhaps with a great deal of luck, Bob will come tomorrow and fix my computer. He is coming from Olympia, only about 2 hours away, and says that he comes up to Bainbridge quite a lot, because the Seattle tech guy (whose name I don't know, but whom I will call Stan) doesn't like to come to Bainbridge. He doesn't like to get on the ferry and be forced to take a half-hour or so off and stare at the water, maybe eat a burger or have some treats. He likes to stay in Seattle and play games. Or something. I don't know. If he's the Dell tech who went to my coworker's house, looked at the computer that he was there to fix (with the same part as mine, mind you), and just sighed heavily, then I am glad that Bob is coming and not Stan. But I am ticked off that it is taking a week and a half to fix my computer, when I bought the 24-hour service package! grr.

Okay, must end, because I'm not on my home computer and this is just wrong.

alternative power source

2007-04-01T15:36:00.000-07:00

Whatever is true about Dell financial people and Dell management, the technical support people I have spoken to have been very kind and helpful. Well, kind, anyway. Keith and I spent about an hour yesterday afternoon playing with the innards of my computer, yanking things from the motherboard and trying to figure out what was wrong. It's the power source, thinks Keith. I think he may be right. So some tech person from Dell is coming to my apartment sometime in the hopefully new future, new power source in hand (the sun, perhaps?), and he or she will hook it up and put the innards of my computer back together. They are going to call me tomorrow to set it all up. We'll see. Of course, they don't come out on weekends, so I will have to take sick leave for this, which ain't grand. Still, there is hope, and now I know what the inside of a computer looks like. It's mostly air.

In other news, the low bass sound that I have been hearing at night, that sounds like a car stereo, or maybe an idling car, has been growing more prevalent. Now, I hear it outside my apartment as well as inside, and in the daytime as well as at night. It is more constant, too. I still cannot figure out what it is. I'm beginning to think (a) personal ghosts that ride around with me but are generally centered in my apartment, or (b) hufflelumps (sp??). I may be going insane, and this is just the first symptom.

Might get snow tonight! happy spring!

dead computer

2007-03-30T15:54:00.000-07:00

The computer must have noticed me saying nasty things about its maker, because now it won't even turn on. I push the power button, and nothing happens. So I will be talking to Dell, after all. And I will probably be sending my nice new computer back to them and trying again. I'm not happy. But I did see two eagles today, hovering over my apartment and talking to each other. Maybe they are thinking about moving in. And then I managed to get back up to my office on the 18th floor this afternoon (with lunch!) in the short window of time when we were allowed on the stairs during the Burst Water Pipe Incident on the 14th floor . If I had had my ferry pass and phone and ipod and keys, I would have just gone home, but they were on the 18th floor. And I got a work-out at the same time. Which then lead to chocolate, of course.

more oddities

2007-03-28T21:30:00.000-07:00

Have you ever thought of buying a Dell? If so, I suggest you look at this website and the links there before you purchase your computer. Hello, Better Business Bureau! That site lists complaints from all sorts of people who have been screwed by Dell. It includes people who ordered their computer, paid by credit card (or waited for a bill), didn't receive an invoice with their computer (Dell sends something separately that looks like an invoice but says "This is not an invoice"), and then instead of receiving a bill or getting the charge on their credit card statement, months later they find out that Dell processed their purchase through their financing department, so now they have a loan they didn't know they had and they have been accruing months of finance charges during the period when they didn't know they had a loan that they NEVER ASKED FOR. Does any of this sound familiar? It sure does to me. The thing is, the charge for my computer did show up on my credit card statement, and I paid it, and my "credit application" was "denied." Should I feel lucky? Perhaps it is standard operating procedure for them to run everyone, regardless of customer wishes, through their financing program? One woman turned down an extended warranty, and they charged her for it anyway and refused to remove the charges even after she complained. That website is full of posts from really angry, frustrated people. It seems like there is no recourse once you get a Dell. If someone tells you, "Dude, you're getting a Dell," you should run screaming from them and change your name.

I'll be sending them that affidavit. And will be thinking about the BBB, too.

Now it's just frustrating

2007-03-27T23:22:00.000-07:00

To follow up from yesterday, apparently when this happens you are supposed to put a fraud alert on yourself at all the big credit reporting agencies, which is amazingly easy. Do it at one, and they will alert the others. That's nice. And the FTC has a website on identity theft (which I hope this is not) and on fraud (which this appears to be). If you want that website, here it is: http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/edu/microsites/idtheft/ (even underlined in blue - I hope the link works). They have forms and information. I haven't filled out the forms yet, but I printed them out, so I guess I know what I'll be doing tomorrow evening. Fun fun.

I tried calling the computer company several times, but unless you have a service code or an account number or something like that, you can't talk to ANYBODY. There is no way to get to a human on their phone service if you have a generic complaint like I do. Or if there is a way, they do not make it obvious. I am at the point where I could spit nails at them, if only they would feel it. aargh! All the insults that I am willing to put here would actually insult entire species who have never hurt me, and so I can't even call them (computer co.) names. Oh yeah, they're evil. I'll just call them Mr. VP.

scary credit things

2007-03-26T20:29:00.000-07:00

I was going to write about how I find it hard to think and do work while wearing shoes, but the letter I got in the mail today has scared that thought right out of me. I got a letter from a bank saying that they are denying me credit, but I haven't applied for any! Certainly not from that bank. And the credit report people say that I haven't been denied any credit recently. So someone is scamming me, and I'm not happy about it. In fact, I am pissed. And neither the bank nor their financial services group (or maybe it was the financial services group of this other company that went through the bank) (that company is a well-known computer company from which I recently bought a computer - evil evil evil) make it at all easy to contact them unless you are asking for a loan or buying a computer and the point is that I am doing neither. The computer company called me a couple of weeks ago asking if I wanted to buy the computer that I had ordered (twice) (they called me twice), and I told them that I already had my computer (and am typing on it now). Maybe this is part of that. So now I have to call them, but that is not easy. We all know about calling customer service at computer companies and how horrible it is. Crap. Evil evil evil!

what happened to the title?

2007-03-24T22:28:00.000-07:00

Looking at my first post, I realize that the apparent title probably is not the title of everyone's first post. "Saturday, March 24, 2007" is probably fairly rare among first post titles. But the title I typed into the Title window was "I have a blog!" That is a much more likely first blog title. But I don't know what happened to it.

2007-03-24T21:46:00.000-07:00

Is that the title of everyone's first post? I bet it is. How exciting to have a blog, like almost everyone else I know. The hardest part (which most of you already know, since you already have a blog) is picking the title. Phronistery, phrontistery, whatever, there are red squiggly lines under both of them. One of them, or maybe both, means "a thinking place" or "a place to study." It really has nothing to do with fish, but fish that are friendly could study and think here, if they could somehow enter the internet.

Why friendly fish? Because fish have friends, just like you and me. When fish school (some fish, anyway), individual fish tend to get together with the same other individual fish each time! So they have friends. And a fish that moves from one school to another can teach the new school techniques to deal with predators that are new to the new school but old to the old school. How 'bout that? And, fish release gases from bodily orifices other than their mouth... just like humans. And dogs. So, fish are just like you and me, but without opposable thumbs. Had to be said.

Let's post this and see what it looks like! Cool.