Laws of the Land

Yesterday I got taken around by someone who works in the Singapore offices here. We went to what he called the dirtiest/most dangerous part of Singapore. It is considered dirty because the roads are not in as good as shape as the rest of the roads, but they are comparable to most roads in Portland. I'm amazed at how clean and safe this place is.

The most dangerous part of Singapore for me is crossing the road. As a child I was taught to look both ways when crossing. Left then right, then left again. In Singapore if you look left first you're gonna get hit by the car coming at you from the right. (The drive on the left side of the road here)

The reason Singapore is so safe is because of how strict their rules are. When you get off the plane you are handed a customs form to fill out to enter the country. On the back of the customs form is a notice about drugs. The penalty for dealing drugs in any capacity in Singapore is death. DEATH! If you threaten harm with anything that can be used as a weapon during a robby...DEATH! So if you hit a guy over the head with a loaf of bread and take his gum, then get caught, you will be put to death.

That would never happen though because they don't sell gum in Singapore beacuse it is illegal to chew it. If you get caught chewing gum here you get a fine, if you get caught spitting the gum out, that is considered at least littering and you face a possible caning. It can be classified as vandalism wich carries a prison sentence and caning.

Caning is the fun one to talk about. Me and a couple of co-workers took the time yesterday to talk to the locals about caning. We really wanted to see one happen, but learned that they are done in private. The use a long bamboo rod that is sharpened to a point and then dipped in warm water. You drop your drawers to expose your bare bottom. They cover your kidneys and calfs with rubber pads, if they strike you in the kidney during the caning there is a likelihood of death.

After each strike of the cane a doctor has to inspect the area to be sure that you are fit to take another strike. If you are unable, you are returned to your cell to wait until you are able to take more strikes until your sentence is fulfilled. Those who get caned usually can't do anyhting but lay on their stomach for a month. It is safe to say that repeat crime in this country is almost zero.

Needless to say these people don't play around. To be honest I'm pretty fond of it. At home you got all these people freaking out over whether or not you should spank your kid with your bare hand.

Pictures below (not pertaining to caning)...

This is what visibility turns into when it rains here. You can comapre to the picture of downtown from my previous post. Being from the Northwest I thought I new rain. This is a completely different monster.

This is the Merlion. Half lion half Mer. On the trip over my co-workers kept telling me about the Merlion but I thought they were playing with me. Turns out Singapore means Lion City. When settlers first got to the area they encountered lions, since Singapore is an island they figured they must have first had the bottom half of a fish and the Merlion was born.

This is the canopy that goes over a mall about the size of Washington Square in Beaverton. Thing is while Washington Square is a mall of retail shops, this is a mall made up entirely of bars. And since there are so many bars next to each other the competition is super fierce and each bar tries to differentiate itself, the result is that every bar is a theme bar. One bar we passed you sat in a wheel chair and drank your drink from an IV bag. Believe it or not there was also a Hooters, counterintuative to have a Hooters in Asia if you ask me.

Sinapore

In case you didn't know, I'm in Singapore right now, and it is absolutely amazing! The flight over was slightly unpleasant. A little inside information about me and fears. Two things in particular that scare me are tight enclosed spaces, developed as a child when siblings would hide me in the dryer during hide and go seek, or brothers who would like to wrap me up in blankets so tight that I couldn't move me arms at all and then sit on me. The other is flying. I don't like it all that much. When I really think about it my problems with flying are exlcusive to three things. Take-off, landing, and turbulence. This can be a very small percentage of the flight, but I've been on flights where it was the majority.

My first leg of the trip to get over here in Singapore was Portland to Narita which is the airport just outside of Tokyo Japan. It was over ten hours long, and thankfully there was no turbulence what so ever. It was honestly probably the most peaceful plane ride I've ever been on. When I first boarded I noticed that there was a family of four across the aisle from me. The two children were young and I was highly concerned about their ability to keep it together for 10 hours. I was really impressed they did awesome, and the youngest only broke down once and it was only for a few minutes.

I was seated next to Ivan Drago the russian boxer from the Rocky movies who killed Apollo Creed and then Rocky handed him his lunch in Rocky IV. It wasn't really Ivan Drago from the movies but I took a picture of him so you can see for yourself how much he looked like him.------------------------------------------------->

Ok you got me, not really a picture of the actual guy I sat next to but serieously the guy looked exactly like this except he was wearing a turtle neck sweater. He said 5 words the entire 10 hours, and they were either yes or no. He didn't have a decernable accent, but he could have been German, or Russian, and not have been a strong english speaker.

About 5 hours in I offered him a chocolate chip cookie so as to loosen him up a bit. I wanted to know how it felt to kill a man with your bare hands. He looked at me shook his head and gave a grunt and looked staright ahead and did nothing. He wouldn't make eye contact with me for the rest of the trip. I decided I didn't like him all that much after he kept pushing my arm off the arm rest when I was asleep.

Posted below are a few other pictures I took when I first arrived at the hotel. First; the hotel is the Ritz-Carlton and it is incredible. Second; I wish you could feel the humidity in these photos. I landed at 12:30am on Wednesday (Asia time) That is Tuesday morning for you American readers. It was 86 degrees with about 85 percent humidity. I took a bunch more last night when I got to get out and see the city some more but I haven't been able to load them onto the puter yet. I will share them later on during the trip. For now please enjoy this humble offering.

This is the view from my room. It is the downtown proper of Singapore, but really the whole city, which is also a nation, is urbanized. If you go to the Zoo in Singapore they have horses, cows, and chickens there because seeing such an animal in this place is impossible.

This is directly across the street from the hotel. It is the temporarly national stadium while they renovate the old one. The soccer field floats on the harbor. I thought that was really really cool. Also this was a very overcast day, but it was 90 degrees out that day. Its so wierd seeing that color of sky and sweating profusly.

Christmas Tree

Growing up in our family was a pleasant experience.

The exception being the cruelties that my brother put me through. Like dressing me in full football gear-pads and helmet-and him and his friends taking turns blowing me up! I thought it was so cool that I got to play with my big brother, looking back I think I got suckered! He got his though; his son looks exactly like me! Who's the sucker now!

During the holiday season I've been reflecting on Christmases past. My younger older sister reminded me of one the other day about the Christmas tree. Throughout my childhood my mother always went through the trouble of decorating the house. Looking back it has become clear to me that she did it for the kids more than herself. Now that we have all grown up the decorations are much more low key...and they match, very little matches when you have kids I think.

Whenever it came time to decorate the tree she would get out the hundreds of ornaments; so many ornaments. When we got done with the tree it looked like over worked mule. A few that still stand out in my memory; disco ball, candy canes made out of beads that I think we might have made in Sunday school (?), teddy bears sitting on blocks with the first letter of our names on them, a spider made from pipe cleaner, and all of the kids "Baby's First Christmas" ornaments.

Tradition had always been that we would take turns putting an ornament on the tree. This had been more difficult during my middle school years due to my two oldest siblings being in college. So the Christmas of my freshman year of High School the tradition changed drastically. We did not take turns putting ornaments on the tree. My mother had always wanted a "pretty" tree like what you see in the magazines. Her wanting that didn't bother me all that much, would have been nice to maybe put one ornament on the tree, but whatever I got over it.

She decided to flock the tree and only put silver and gold ornaments on the tree, meaning no bears on blocks, or spiders made out of pipe cleaner allowed; all of which had become synonymous with Christmas. It all looked very nice, very professional, like it belonged on the glossy pages of a magazine, but it also felt odd. What was tragic was that I had a better chance of touching that Christmas tree in the magazine than the one in the living room of where I lived.

It was only a year before that my sister and I assisted in placing hundreds of ornaments on the tree. Now the tree had become what my mother called a "no no" (or is it "no-no"? Freaking hyphens! When do I use you?) To a small extent it felt like Christmas had almost passed me by that first year of the new tree. In my life it had been a stable occurrence, and there was no warning of a change on the horizon. It just happened one day. Compounding the issue was the rule that under no circumstances was anybody allowed to touch the tree.

10 years later(<--holy crap!) and at 24 years old I still couldn't touch that tree and get away with it. The tree has become an extension of my mother. She can be on the other side of town and if you touched it she would know. You may be thinking that the "no touch" rule is soft, and mainly used as a scare tactic. To those I would challenge you to go to my mother's house and touch her tree. I would bet money that she would be very polite and not mention anything about it but you could sense that something was bothering her. You would never think it was because you touched the tree. I guess it all turned out to be a good lesson because I learned that the only time the Christmas tree belongs to the guy is when it is still connected to the roots.

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One little random slightly weird thing to think about. How much more difficult and complicated would Christmas become if trees pooped? Watering the tree is enough of a hassle, throw in having to clean up its poop and that is a deal breaker for me!

Bad Dentist Experience

I have very bad memories of the dentists. I don't believe many people have positive memories, but mine go beyond dentists being careless. I once became so anxious and stressed about getting my teeth cleaned that I threw up...while getting my teeth cleaned...all over myself....and the lady cleaning my teeth. Served her right!

Today I went to get my teeth cleaned. Due to my anxiety over dentist appointments I had done little to arrange one for quite some time, but at the constant request of my wife I submitted. I had done well to forget about my appointment until the reminder call came on Monday.

I didn't have to wait long, shortly after sitting in the waiting area a large portly woman swung the door open and called my name. She was a dead ringer for Cathy Bates, "Misery" Cathy Bates not "Failure to Launch" Cathy Bates, only she was from Eastern Europe. her name was Eliana.

I saw "Misery" when I was a kid. My brother had rented it, and I watched it for some reason and I have since realized no child should have to see and try to make sense of a man getting his ankles broken with a sledge hammer. (Thanks Bro for looking out for me) Cathy Bates is freaking nuts! So you can understand my concern when I discovered she was my dentist.

She chatted me up as she was getting all of her instrumentation in order. She took the time to explain a few new instruments that I had never seen before, which began to put me at ease with her. As she cleaned my teeth she gradually turned into a gentle person who I trusted and felt completely comfortable with. She was telling me everything that she was doing, even though I couldn't talk back, or even understand her through her accent and mask at times.

She even apologized for getting a little rough and stabbing my gums causing them to bleed. I can't beign to tell you how many times a dentist has stabbed my gums and then exclaimed,

"Oh looks like you're bleeding there champ. You really should take better care of your gums."

If I stabbed them in the leg and they began to bleed would the logical thing to say be,

"Looks like you've got a pretty poorly maintained leg there pal. You should work on toughening that guy up a bit."

NO! It wouldn't, because that would be an unbelievably stupid thing to say; but I digress.

Eliana was just getting ready to do the final setp of my cleaning. When I heard her stomach grumble a bit. I didn't think much of it, if anything I was impressed by her focus, it didn't even phase her.

Shortly thereafter I heard what I initially thought to sound of someone passing wind. Though when it happened she showed zero signs of aknowledgement and after worrying about it for a few seconds I decided that it must have been the chair. Shortly after I heard it again, and felt that my final conclusion had been correct, that it was the chair.

Then it hit. It was faint at first, not too strong, but noticeable. I knew it was only going to get worse so I began to breath through my mouth. I watched her eyes for any kind of admission of guilt; nothing.

She was so nice and I had become so comfortable with her, and aparently her with me, that I tried not to make a big deal about it and continued to breath through my mouth for the next 5 minutes. Then it all went wrong; horribly, horribly, wrong!

"Could you please breath through your nose? You are fogging up my mirror." She asked politely.

I hesitated. I was terrified! All in a second I contemplated the consequences of non-compliance. Maybe she gets a little careless with the instrument cause she can't see? That is something I could live with. I even thought of telling her that my nose was stuffed up, but to really sell that I would have to change my voice; something that would have required a plan that went into action before I first spoke to her.

I slightly nodded my head and exhaled through my nose. Upon retreiving more air it became very clear that over the past 5 minutes she had not ceased in her flatulence and the overwhelming power of which this stentch had taken over the room was unbearable. If you lit a match in that room we would both be gonners.

One of the more impressive/distrurbing parts of this entire experience was that she didn't even flinch. She had no idea what she was doing to me, as far as she was concerned her gaseous expels smelled like a bed of roses. I'm sure all she smelled was that strong "medical" fumes from the mask that she wore.

Secondly, and even more impressive/distrurbing was that it wasn't even close to being the worst trip to the dentist. Not even top 5!

This is how bad going to the dentist has been for me!

Losing Streak

My wife and I have been attending a young marrieds group for whats has almost been a year now. The leader of our group is a very competitive man (we'll call him J. I don't like to use names in the blog unless they are family). There is nothing wrong with this, I feel too often competitive becomes synonymous with jerk, but it is not the case with J. J is about 6'4" built on a solid frame. I play basketball with him every Tuesday and he is what physics refers to as an "immovable object".

A few weeks back we went bowling with him and his wife, T, as well as some other couples from our group. T is a thin unimposing relaxed woman, who appears extremely fragile. She is Wilma to J's Fred.

At first glance T doesn't appear to be competitive, she doesn't both to take such trivial things such as bowling so seriously. However she does in this case because J has never beaten her in a game of bowling and the frustration that this causes J has heightened its importance to her.

On this particular night J was winning going into the 8th frame on two games and ended up losing both games, and to my knowledge remains winless against his wife.

Another married couple who we have been friends with for some time was telling us about their competitions. He wins most, but there is one or two competitions where the husband has a significantly lower wining percentage this his counterpart. Their example was her ability to determine whodunit when watching NCIS. Apparently it drives him crazy.

I am beginning to feel that most marriages have something like this. A partner who dominates most of the competitions, but has that one thing they can not break through on. My wife is in no way a competitive person, but I for the life of me, am completely incapable of defeating my wife in Rock Paper Scissors! Of the hundreds of rounds of Rock Paper Scissors we have played I can count the number of victories I have on one hand. I can't even manage to win a best of three series.

The defeat wouldn't be so embarrassing, there are tons of husbands who have something that their wives can beat them at. But with J, it is because T is more graceful, and more adapt for a game like bowling, she is just flat out better. With our other friends, she is more attentive while watching TV and is in tune with storylines and clues.

What makes my inability to win at Rock Paper Scissor so shameful is the completel lack of skill required to win. Mathematical laws state that I should have one at least 10 best of three series by now, let alone a better record than 5 for 247. That is a .018 winning percentage. I can get better odds in Vegas!

I have concluded one fo two things. Either my wife is the greatest Rock Paper Scissors player to ever play the game, or I am the worst.

Cliche Election Post

I know it is terribly terribly cliche to write a blog post about the elections. So cliche in fact I just threw up in my mouth a bit. However I can't help but share with some of you my feelings about what democratic elections have become in my eyes.

It feels to me that everyone becomes so judgmental, and on edge; like they are waiting for someone to disagree with them so they can hate them.

For two years at a time we can get along, but as soon as elections roll along we become completely incapable of looking past our differences. It is so ridiculously pathetic how incredibly petty human beings can be. This is why I hate elctions, they are so depressing because for two or more weeks I bare witness to the true depths of the human race's (American's in particular) shallowness.

I'm Back!

I wish I could say things have gotten so super busy for me that I couldn't even bother posting a few sentences, but that would be a lie. I have indeed been really busy but not so busy that I couldn't post a few comments. Truth be told what writing I have been doing has been more along the lines of a short story that is more pg-13 rated and I try to keep my stuff PG for the blog.

Also because sometimes my Mom gets lucky and actually figures out how to get to my blog.

I do have a few comments to make today. Last weekend Mrs Wonder Boy and I went shopping at Winco, an adventure in itself every time. One thing on the list at my request was peanut butter, I have become quite the fan of peanut butter and banana sandwiches, try one it will rock your face off.

Usually I go with the JIF Creamy, but this time I decided I wanted to step up my PB & B experience a notch; not too much, just one notch...I wanted to go crunchy. To my utter disbelief the people at JIF had the audacity to skip the natural progression of adverbs and go from Creamy to Extra Crunchy with no Crunchy representaiton what so ever! Even Skippy went from Creamy to Super Chunky! It just fires me up when people use adverbs so irresponsibly.

I feelings for JIF went from Complacent to Extra Upset. Doesn't feel so good when you're on the other side does it JIF?!

What the Drop in Gas Prices Feels Like

I was driving back home with my wife from the story yesterday and I saw a gas station selling gas for $3.83 a gallon. My feelings about the lower price bothered me.

It is kinda like if one day my nemesis, the one I'm going to hire from craigslist, came up to me and punched me in the groin. Then the next day he came up to me again and punched me in the groin. He would do this everyday and everyday I would know I was going to get punched in he groin no matter what I did. He wouldn't even sneak up behind me, there would be no need for such stealth because there would be nothing I could do to stop it.

Until one day my nemesis comes up to me and punches me in the stomach. I would double over, (as I usually did when being struck) unfold and smile. My face would light up and my excitement over not being punched in the groin would boil over. I would be inspired to yell out, to no one in particular, words of pure elation. I would hug complete strangers.

What bothers me about this is that I'm still getting the crap kicked out of me. The only thing that has changed is that I'm excited about it now.

The post about my Wife and the Fair is coming soon. I'm working out publishing rights on some photos as well now. She's one tough cookie.

My Imagination

This one is a little off the wall. I've been having some really weird things just popping into my head and to give people a feeling for how odd it can be to be me sometimes, and also because I've dished it out to everybody else enough on this blog that its time I make fun of myself a little bit, I've decided to share.

Last week my wife and I are driving to some friends house. It is garage sale season so there are tons of signs out of people trying to drive traffic to their yard sales. It was earlier in the morning and I wasn't really firing on all cylinders. What cylinders were firing were being used to operate the car I was driving. We passed one that my wife read aloud, "G-Sale." Obviously short hand for "Garage Sale"

The image that immediately pops into my head is a lime green ranch house with a concrete driveway with chalk drawings being interrupted by cracks in the surface. A middle aged lady sitting behind a folding table that she and her friends had played bridge on the night before with a glass of iced tea and a visor she had laying around the house that she had never worn, but could never throw away because she was sure it would come in handy some day.

From her perch in the garage doorway she keeps a close eye on all of her items for purchase. All seemed normal at this point. Then things got a little twisted. Instead of monopoly games where the thymbol, the car, and the dog pieces are missing, sweaters that have lights in them, and a collection of micro-machines that have been fished from the noses of children the items are of a more organic nature.

Scattered across the driveway are a collection of men of varying sizes, shapes and colors. Each one though is wearing a long chain made of either gold or platinum ornamented with some kind of medallion. Some had bottles of malt liquor in there hands, some had cigars, and others kept grabbing at their crotch and repeatedly pulling up their pants because, even though they were wearing a belt, it was for decorative purposes only.

All of them were yelling, and blurting out phrases that would have been difficult to understand even if they weren't all talking at the same time. None of them were wearing shirts with sleeves and one even took his shirt off and began pointing out all of his scars from being shot and/or stabbed.

My age group is obviously not the demographic for such a sale but it just goes to show how things can get confused between generations. To my mother that "G" means garage. To me, in the early hours of my day, that "G" meant a person who spent their time on the streets, being "G"angsta. More commonly spelled gangster. I then couldn't help but wonder how it would look if anybody actually showed up to that "G-sale" looking to buy G's and not useless personal belongings that people no longer want.

My sister in Law uses these on her Blog. I figured I would give them a try, don't worry Jen I will return them when I'm finished.
v

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Also on another note of my mind running wild, I was doing laundry this afternoon and the fabric softener smelled so good that I began to wonder what it would taste like. Obviously we are told that drinking fabric softener would be a terrible idea, but what if somehow fabric softener tasted delicious and nobody bothered to taste it and find out.

I'm curious but not stupid. I will let someone else figure that one out for me. Also if anybody has ever come across something where it is general knowledge that it would be a bad idea to taste, but you were still curious; let me know. It would be comforting to know I'm not alone.

A little tease about my next couple posts...One will be about my Wife and how if you're going to the fair why she is the best person to go with. This may get delayed because she will probably get final editing rights. Also, on the subject of tasting things we shouldn't taste I want to tell a story about my friend Wendy who sampled some goods a Wilco. (For those of you who don't know Wilco is a farm supply store) Stay tuned.

My Friend Blake

I don't think Blake knows I'm writing this so I should say that this post in not an officially sanctioned post of Blake Arnold Incorporated.

I've known Blake for 4 years now. He has been a house mate, a groomsman, and a dear friend. The most incredible thing about Blake is that he is the most self sacrificing human being you will ever meet in your life. For the longest time I felt he may be too self sacrificing. That has since changed.Throughout the story below I will share some pictures of Blake, I think it iwll add to the emotional connection you will feel towards him. (Starting now)

Blake is most famous for driving girls with boyfriends hundreds of miles to go see their boyfriends. Because of Blake most, if not all, or these girls are now married to the boyfriends Blake drove them to see.

Blake goes out of his way to make your life easier, and more pleasant. The two instances where Blake's self sacrifice has been displayed to me are when he took upon himself as my groomsman to babysit another groomsman who got drunk at my wedding. Nobody wanted to do it, and I don't blame them, but Blake took it upon himself even driving said drunk groomsman home and stopping twice on a 15 mile trip for him to throw up. AWESOME!

Perhaps the greatest though is when I was a Junior in College, Blake was a freshman, and I refused to sleep on the sleeping porch.

To those who don't know a sleeping porch is where everybody that lives in the house sleeps. It always smells TERRIBLE and in the winter is freezing cause the door stays open so it doesn't smell worse. Probably the worst invention ever.
Instead I chose to sleep on the couch in my room. Towards the end of the year I was becoming stressed and having a difficult time sleeping. One night I was laying on the couch and Blake came in and we were talking about nothing in particular, but I remember his voice being so calming that in the middle of the conversation I fell asleep. I have never slept so good in my life!

The next night I asked Blake if he wouldn't mind talking me to sleep again. He happily obliged, and I got another great nights sleep. Word began to spread about the deal me and Blake had going. The next night my roommate Marcus slept on the other couch in our room and Blake talked both of us to sleep. By the middle of next week Marcus and I were kicking people were turning people away from sleeping on the floor of our room to listen to Blake talk them to sleep. (We never had more than 4 bodies in the room, otherwise it would have totally defeated the purpose of not sleeping on the sleeping porch)

The last night of the year Blake began telling us a story about how he built an outhouse in Alaska and later he had to take refuge in it from a bear, or something like that. The story isn't important what is important is that it took Blake 3 hours to tell it. We all fell asleep 15 minutes into it. I wake up 3 hours later cause I had to use the bathroom and there is Blake sitting in the recliner in front of my desk looking at the ceiling saying, "I hated building that outhouse and digging that hole, but I must've done a real good job cause the Bear couldn't get me in there."

Blake's the dude flying through the air

"Blake?"

He lowered his chin and looked at me and smiled "Oh hey Chad."

"What are you doing?" I asked

"Telling the Outhouse story."

"Blake we all fell asleep almost 3 hours ago!"

"I know, but I started the story and I couldn't just stop in the middle, so I figured I would just keep going in case anybody woke up and needed me to be here talking."

SPECTACULAR!

If you're interested let me know and I will see if I can't get Blake to come to your house and sit in your room and talk you to sleep. He doesn't stare while you sleep...psychos stare, he's totally professional.

My Bad

I'm aware it has been over a month since my last post. I am a disgrace to bloggers world wide. But I have a few excuses to share with you. First I've started a new job and it has been an adjustment period, i spend a good chunk of my day behind a computer--which isn't a bad thing--its just that when I get home sitting at a computer regardless of the activity is the last thing I want to do.

B) I've been trying to make it a point to have some catch up time with old friends from college. I almost blogged last week but hung out with my friend Blake instead. I also decided that night that I will blog about Blake sometime in the near future. he is a fascinating human being.

III. I've been sick...real sick! I have a fever...not just any fever...THE fever....The Olympic Fever! I come on home at lunch and spend an hour watching whatever event is on. I watched synchronized diving for an hour two days ago, and for the last 15 minutes I was getting upset with the judges for poor scoring. Earlier tonight after a terrible dive by the Americans I proclaimed to my wife--in all my expertise in synchronized diving--that those guys had no business being in that competition. I immediately hated myself for knowing everything that was wrong with that dive. Other events I've watched that no human being should be passionate about unless you or a family member is participating. Trap Shooting, Doubles Trap Shooting, Kayaking, Crew, Water Polo, and Women's Basketball.

I have enjoyed watching Team handball the most. i took that class three time in college. The teacher loved me. I'm gonna get a little cocky here...I was dominate! Team handball is pretty much basketball and soccer combined, the two sports I play, so naturally my skill set was more advanced then the other people in the class. After watching the Olympics I would have undoubtedly gotten my lunch handed to me. Very humbling.

Since It has been so long between posts I will treat you with this video--completely random--of Demitri Martin who is a comedian who is an all time favorite of mine. Enjoy.

Sun Burns Are Nothing to Laugh at...

But the lines it leaves behind are. My Wife got sunburned pretty bad on Saturday. What makes this even more spectacular is that I (who can get a sunburn in the dead of night!), did not get sunburned. Mostly due to the three layers of SPF 50 I applied. I wanted to take a picture of her sunburn but her reception of my request was surprisingly very negative. I upped the ante and offered to do the dishes in turn for the picture. This offer was so poorly received that I ended up doing the dishes anyways. So instead I give you the picture below. Disturbing? Yes. Do I chuckle a little bit when I look at it? You betcha! Three reasons...

1. Was there anybody in this Woman's life who saw what was going on and tried to help her. I can't help but wonder if they have interventions for this sort of thing. This isn't something that happens over night. There are warning signs like applying SPF 4, or taking a vacation to Alaska in the winter and returning with a tan.

2. This picture shows that the best sunscreen protection available is clothes. If you want to take this image a step further I'm willing to bet that woman doesn't have a tan line on her which means it is more than likely some people have seen that walking around a beach naked. YUCK!

3. It would be interesting to see if you could make a wallet or maybe even some boots out of that skin. That was very "Buffalo Bill" of me but seriously It puts the lotion on its skin...please

Best of Craigslist

The following was a post published on Craigslist. No joke there is an entire website dedicated to the best of Craigslist (Google it), some are vulgar and sad while others like this one are humorous, while all in some way represent how pathetic some person's in our culture have become.

I've been trying to think of ways to spice up my life. I'm 35 years old, happily married with two kids and I have a good job in insurance. But somethings missing. I feel like I'm old before my time. I need to inject some excitement into my daily routine through my arm before its too late. I need a challenge, something to get the adrenaline pumping again. An addiction would be nice, but, in short, I need a nemesis. I'm willing to pay $350 up front for you services as an arch enemy over the next six months. Nothing crazy. Steal my parking space, knock my coffee over, trip me when Im running to catch the BART and occasionaly whisper in my ear, "Ahha, we meet again". That kind of thing. Just keep me on my toes. Complacency will be the death of me. You need to have an evil streak and be blessed with innate guile and cunning. You should also be adept at inconsicuous pursuit. Evil laugh preferred. Send me a photo and a brief explanation why you would be a good nemesis.

British accent preferred.

Had this been posted in Portland, and had I seen it I would have done it for free. If anybody is looking for a nemesis contact me and we will discuss the particulars. I am a professional at doing the small nagging things. My best references are my Uncle Dan, and my Uncle Mike. Just the other day I had Mike wishing he stayed in Tennessee! MuHaHaHa!

Bacon is King!

For the 4th of July my wonderful wife and I went to her parents house and grilled some beef/veggie burgers. Jess, my wife, is always trying out new recipes, usually they do not involve meat, in fact they usually involve humus, prunes, and soy. Before I go further I should mention my wife is in no way a vegetarian/vegan because she is opposed to eating animals. She has dietary restrictions that do not allow her to eat dairy or most meats besides chicken and fish if prepared properly. She has given up so many foods that I would never be able to do it is absolutely incredible.

Anyways She made this bean dip, and included a few strips of bacon in the recipe. Not turkey bacon, or fakin bacon, real 100% artery clogging, enlightenment inducing bacon. This is an occasion in our household that is worthy of a parade. Alisa, Jess' sister, invited a couple of friends with her. One of her friends name was Allison, she was really enjoying the bean dip. After taking a few sizable portions of the dip she made a comment to Jess.

"This dip is so good! I love it!"

"Thank you. Its a new recipe I was worried it wouldn't come out right." my wife politely retorted.

Allison took another bite of a chip with a dollop of dip on it "What is in it?"

As soon as the questions was asked another one of Alisa's friends perked up and began to motion to Jess to not say anything.

Jess reluctantly began listing the ingredients while Alisa's friend continued to vigorously wave her off. After listing a couple ingredients Jess asked the question she feared to be true.

"Are you a vegetarian?"

"Yes." Allison covered her mouth and became concerned. "Is there meat in this?"

Jess hesitantly replied, "There is a little bit of bacon."

Allison was a good sport about it. She admitted that must have been why it tasted so good. This just represents the power that bacon has. She had been a vegetarian for 20 years and even now bacon makes her weak in the knees. Respect the bacon, cause even when you think you are safe from its temptations if will rock your world. Vegetarians: 0 Bacon:1

Mazel Tov

This weekend Jess, my wife, and I were invited to a wedding of a former co-worker of hers. It was being held down town at the Hilton; already a higher class of wedding than our own. Gas prices being what they are we opted to take the light rail in. I would only recommend taking the light rail when dressed in formal attire for a wedding to professional light rail riders only, and always use the buddy system.
We were on the train all of 5 seconds before Jess gets her first compliment form a woman whose face showed many more years than her eyes had seen. "You look beautiful!" she blurted causing all on the train to turn and stare. She was missing a front tooth and so a slight whistle escaped making the situation even more difficult to ignore. Jess, a modest woman, was thoroughly embarrassed. Toothless or not the lady was correct in her observation, Jess did look amazing.
Shortly after boarding the train it was revealed that the people getting married were Jewish. I should note that I wasn't excited about going to this wedding. To me weddings are great if you know, or are related and close to one of the persons getting married. If that is the case you are usually a part of the wedding and as such are not attending a wedding, you are participating. Okay back to the story. I began to dread it even more. I have heard stories of how long and dragged out a Jewish wedding ceremony can be.
While the ceremony was a bit long (my wife did not think so, but a man's idea of too long, and a woman's can differ greatly.) it was an incredible experience I'm glad to say I enjoyed. I suppose it would be best to say that the ceremony wasn't long as much as it could have been twice as short. The reason for this being the Rabi had to say everything twice; first in Hebrew and then in English. The Rabi was very good about explaining everything that was going on and why. To the point that I began feeling like I was watching a special on the discovery channel.
The ceremony ended with a broken glass and everybody yelling "Mazel Tov!" which is way cooler than the movies make it look. The bread and butter of the Jewish wedding I learned though is the reception. I've never seen so many old people dancing; some of those men were going Patrick Swayze on their ladies too...unbelievable! I almost felt like they knew the ceremony was long and so to make it worth while they go nuts at the reception. Needless to say it was the best wedding I have attended. So if you are Jewish and getting married soon, hit me up, I'm looking to learn more. Also it doesn't hurt if you have an open bar.

I wish I could give you a good excuse as to why I haven't updated the good old blogaroo. Truth is, there is none. I've been busy these past two weeks doing very little aside from the occasional honey-dos.

My contract at Nike ended the last Friday of May and I've been waiting/hoping for a new contract or full time work there to come up while continuing to grow my network, all that boring stuff. Last Friday I got a call from an old boss of mine during my time working at Oregon State with an opportunity to pick up another contract at Nike. Went into an interview on Monday, nailed the interview...BOMBED the Excel test that was given to me after the interview. All is well though, I got a call early Friday with the good news that I got the job. So not long until I'm back on campus.

What has been most interesting about this time off is that I learned bored is a very dangerous state. Being alone with your own mind for too long can become terrifying. I had so much time with my thoughts, and what felt like nothingness (You can only play so many video games and read so many books) that I began to write a story about nothing. Not like Seinfeld was about "nothing", rather "nothing" as in what nothingness is and does. One of two things happens; You either go a little bit crazy for a little while, or you go completely sane, or so it may seem. It is entirely possible that what feels like sanity is in actuality long term insanity playing a trick on you. I fear that I may have suffered the latter. I expect to know more when i finish the story; I will keep you posted.

Trapt in the Elevator

It's been a while since my last post. Things are getting busy at work for me, while at the same time my contract with Nike will be over at the end of the month. So while staying caught up with work I'm trying to fit as many informational interviews in my day as possible. This becomes even more difficult when you spend an hour-and-a-half of that time stuck in an elevator. This is exactly what happened to me on Tuesday.

Because of the large amount of shoes that I have to deliver on a daily basis I can't get them upstairs with the passenger elevators. Instead I get the privilege of unrestricted access to the freight elevator. This sounds super lame, but is coveted in some circles throughout the development team.

I found myself on the third floor, after delivering samples to the categories up there, on my way down to the second floor. The elevator suddenly dropped; not exactly a controlled drop either, more like a free fall for about four to six feet. The thing about elevators is that they are designed with the purpose of not making you feel like you're on an elevator. It is the goal of the designers for you to be unaware that you are moving vertically, so when you feel it as I felt it you it would be entirely appropriate for one to promptly defecate in their drawers.

After the second or so it took the elevator to do what the bowl of raisin bran had been unable to do up until that point, the emergency brakes kicked in. At that point all I could think about was that the only thing saving me from a three-and-a-half story fall to the basement was some metal locks I initially imagined to be quite hefty. After contemplating the emergency locks further I began to realize they were much more modest than I imagined, and that not everything can be made perfectly.

The terrifying realization of how it would only take one thing to go wrong in the process of putting the elevator together, or even in the production of the parts that made up the elevator, could end my life I began to plan in the event the elevator did go into a free fall. My brain, drunk on fear and adrenaline, told me that jumping on the stack of boxes filled with shoes would be my greatest chance for survival. In retrospect I should be embarrassed of ever letting fear take me this far away from reality, but I'm not. To be honest I am undeniably impressed with the fact that given my state I came up with an idea that, I still believe now, would have saved my life, or at the least a lot of pain from broken legs.

The best part of this story is the phone call to security. It went like this. (Joking aside this conversation needs no embellishments or exaggerations. This is as accurate as it can get!)

"Security, this is Robert."

"Robert, I could use your help. I'm stuck in the Mia Hamm Freight elevator."

"Stuck? How so."

I was curious as to how many other combinations of events there were that would cause me to be stuck in the elevator and still have the capacity to dial security.

"As in it stopped working while I was in it. I'm in between the second and third floor."

"Oh, well did you scan your access card, it won't work unless you scan your access card."

I was quickly becoming clear to me Robert wasn't too sharp.

"Yes Robert, I scanned my card. I scanned it and then the elevator fell 6 feet and stopped."

"Oh! Yah that isn't good."

The little blind faith I had in Robert, was gone by now. It was at this point I knew there would be an end ot this conversation where I found myself in disbelief.

"Much less so when you're in the elevator when it happens."

"Well I will dispatch a security guard and some maintenance guys to fix that and get you out."

"Thank you Robert."

At this point, I was on edge, and extremely aware of the intermittent creaks and ticks coming from the elevator. Anticipating the next one to be the straw that broke the camels back. I felt uneasy with the reliance I had on Robert to come through for me.

15-20 minutes pass without any movement or word from security or maintenance. This is concerning because the security office is 3-and-a-half floors below me; it should have taken 2 minutes tops! Reluctantly I called Robert again.

"Robert, can I get an ETA on that dispatch?"

"Oh yah, they fixed it you can get out now."

Was he being serious?

"Uh, no they didn't."

"Yah, they went over there called the freight elevator and it came down and opened up just fine."

Robert's incredible ineptitude was becoming less and less surprising.

"Then why am I still stuck in here, calling you on the elevator's emergency phone?"

"I don't know, that is kind of confusing"

Unbelievable!

"Lets start over Robert. I'm trapped in the Mia Hamm freight elevator between the third and second floors."

"Oh Mia Hamm?....."

I cringed. I could hear his next words before he could say them.

".....I sent them over to Tiger Woods;....."

This time I heard his words before he even knew he would speak them. Somehow when I first met Robert over that scratchy phone I knew our conversation would culminate to this...

".....that is probably why you're still stuck."

I threw my forehead into the palm of my hand.

"Probably."

New Look

I never really liked how my blog looked so I made a few changes since I finally got the time to do so.

I also should take the time to explain the name of the blog. It is a short hand for "To be or not to be" (Yes I realize that the letters don't go in the correct order.) It is the name of a short story written by Kilgore Trout. Kilgore Trout is a fictional character created by Kurt Vonnegut, and made many appearances in Vonnegut's stories. Vonnegut's writings were saturated with satire, often making fun of what humanity has become and/or the direction it is heading due to what little value we see in anyone besides ourselves.

Feel free to read the story and perhaps grasp a better understanding of where I'm coming from. If you are super technologically challenged and are wondering where you click to read the story try here or here.

Mother's Day Tribute Part 2

As explained in my previous post in the spirit of Mother's Day I wanted to share a few stories about my Mother that don't involve her humiliation for the sake of humiliation. They are stories more focused on the impact that they had on my development into the person I am now and hope to be in the future.

The score had stayed the same since I had entered the game, leaving me with the satisfaction of a job well done. I had been sent into the game late due to my absence at a practice the previous week. In the first half the opposing team had scored 4 goals due to the lack of speed possessed by a particular defender on our team. All 4 had been scored by the same player.

After the final whistle blew our team gathered on the field to listen to our coach struggle for positive comments to make on our play. When he spoke of "Good power on our thrown-ins" or "Give a lot of credit to your keeper. He did the best he could with what he was given today." we knew we were in for trouble the next week. One solace I could always take was my parents meeting me with my bag as I walked to the sideline.

They were both fantastic about coming to every game they could, no matter how much I was going to play. Regardless of how I played my Mother would flash her enthusiastic grin at me give me a powerful hug and a "GREAT GAME BUD!" slapping me on the back authoritatively. I always thought this to be her way to make this seem like less of a mushy exchange in front of my teammates and peers.

On those occasions when I felt as if I had played well, as was this one, I would absorb satisfaction from my Mom's blind enthusiasm for her child. As I turned towards the sideline and tried to feign disappointment with my teams play while ignoring my own excitement for my success, I took notice of the void next to my father. I searched for my Mother amongst the other parents, perhaps she had gotten caught up in a conversation with one of the other player's moms. She was nowhere in sight.

"Where'd Mom go?" I asked my father as he handed me my bag. A huge smile poured across his face as he showed his teeth. An event my Father usually reserved for those moments he found lavishly hilarious. His belly began to bounce up and down as I continued to wait for an answer while he composed himself.

"She'll meet us over by the track."

This was away from the players and coaches as well as a detour from the direct line to the team bus. The 100 yard walk to our destination we were supposed to meet was filled with pleading gestures by myself for my Dad to tell me what would possess my Mother to go to such lengths to not encounter any other people after the game. He continued to laugh, chuckling out bits and pieces along the way.

I finally spotted my Mother, walking a brisk lap around the field adjacent to the one we had just played on. She had her hands on her hips and she appeared to be looking at the ground directly in front of her.

As she approached us the tension would have been more concentrated if not for the intermittent chuckles from my Father to my side.

"What is going on Mom?" I asked mildly concerned

"I'm sorry, I wanted to be there at the end of the game I just couldn't I needed to cool down. You played great." She gave me a hug, with no pats on the back and held me tightly for longer than she usually would in such a public setting. She did her best to understand embarrassing situations for a teenage boy.

"Cool down from what? What happened?"

The laughter from over my shoulder became obvious and my Father turned and walked a few steps away to be less of a distraction-or less of a target I was never sure of which. My Mother hesitated in explaining her odd behavior. To her the moment was still too fresh, and the anger too real. She looked around intently being sure the coach or any players were within ear shot.

"I just want to punch that Tyson kid!" Tyson was the player who had started in my place and allowed the one player to score 4 goals.

I began to see why my Father was having such a hard time containing his amusement.

"There is no reason he should have been starting and not you. What was the coach thinking?!"

My Mother had refused to take any path to her car that would force her any human interaction. She had allowed herself to become so worked up about her son not starting when she felt he should have that she became fearful of what she might say and do to whoever she did encounter. My Mother, being the kind self-aware woman she is, determined the best action would be a quarter mile detour to prevent herself from committing physical assault.

The reality of the situation was that I was not allowed to play that first half because I had missed a practice, standard team rule. This meant little to my Mother, as it would to most mother's I feel. When they see their child being treated in a manner they feel to be harsh they become completely different beings.

Looking at my Mother in that moment I could not imagine her as the woman who would rub my back when I was sick, or come to my bedside after I had a nightmare. There was no room for such compassion in this woman. The person I saw was so overcome by anger she was ready to throw down with whoever wanted to test her. This coincidentally was why my Father had decided it in his best interest to try to conceal his laughter from her.

No matter how much we deserve the consequences of our actions a good Mother will always be there, and sometimes she'll be ready for a fight.

Mother's Day Tribute Part 1

I have many stories about members in my family. Some I have shared in the short life of this blog. In the spirit of Mother's Day I wanted to share some stories that I feel were significant in how I will remember my Mother in the different stages of my life. After thinking of all the possible stories I determined that most were similar, a tribute to my mother's consistency of being awesome, and others would probably be much more embarrassing than she deserves.

One in particular is much too embarrassing for her and I, it is at least a PG-13 story-maybe even R- and My Brother and father, who were present at the time, get way too much joy from my extreme discomfort for me to give them satisfaction of reliving it. So that being said my first story I feel is an excellent example of how my Mother never allowed me to feel alone in any aspect of my life, whether it was joy, sorry or guilt my Mother shared those feelings with me, never letting me go it alone.

I was less than 7 but more than 4 years old. The church, and by extension various members of my family, had returned from a missions trip in Mexico a few weeks prior. On this particular Sunday night there was what I thought was called "super supper" when in all likelihood my mind had noticed a similarity between the real name-"soup and supper"- and something that sounded way cooler.

This Super Supper was no ordinary Super Supper. It was the day when those who returned from the missions trip had the opportunity to share there experiences with the members of the church who attended. I remember three of the four walls were lined with tables and the tables were covered with displays. Some hosted pictures of the children they encountered, and projects they worked on, others had goofy pictures of the team members experiencing the adventure of over a thousand miles with 50 teenagers and poor hygiene.

The tables that attracted me, and every other child there, were the tables that hosted the souvenirs. Do remember that when you were between 4 and 7 things purchased in Mexico were exotic and fantastic. In fact when many years later I attended the same missions trip as a Junior in high school the only purchases I intended to make were tacos from a taco stand called Tacos Perez. It coincidentally was one of the dozen or so places you could eat in Tijuana and not be stricken with debilitating diarrhea, or so my experiences have taught me. The point being items from Mexico lose there luster as you get older but when you were a child they were as incredible as a Disneyland pen.

One exhibit caught my eye. There was a pair of maracas. I had never heard of anything by that name, and therefore knew nothing of what to do with or how to play such an instrument with such a name. I, in fact, had spent some valuable time playing a maraca as an infant and toddler, only i knew it as a rattle. I was quite good, or so my experiences have taught me.

My mind, still unsure if girls were yucky or not, determined that they best way to play such an instrument was to hit it against the table.

Now would be a good time to address how and when Mexican souvenirs lose their appeal. They're cheap. You usually learn this after your first trip down there when you buy the fake Oakley glasses for 5 bucks when they're over $100 at home. You think you got a steal and that nobody will be able to tell the difference and you don't even get the chance to try and put it past people because they break before you can even get home. My first pair fell apart on my face when I laughed in a manner the glasses deemed too extreme for its existence.

Needless to say the maracas were made with the same spirit as the Oakley's. They crumbled like sand. I remember my face began to burn and I tried to swallow the lump in my throat. My mind, being what it was, told me to run away and never speak of this to anyone. My mind also assured me that none of the 100 or so people present, the 15 within a few yards of me, nor the 5 directly behind me in line saw what I had done, and that nobody would ever be able to figure out that it was me.

It was the next week during the day, so I must have been in Kindergarten. My mind must have betrayed me because I confessed to the whole thing with little pressure from my mother. I remember feeling so terrible about breaking the Maraca. Worse off the Maracas had belonged to a pastor at the church, David Case.

Perhaps I thought I could trust my Mother with such incriminating information and that I could now go along with my life without having to burden myself with such guilt. I was wrong. That afternoon my Mother took me down to the church and walked me into David's office. I did not want to go. I remember thinking how cool I thought that Maraca was and that I would be so upset if that was mine and somebody had broken it. I looked my mother through the tears cascading down my cheeks and said, "I don't want to do it Mommy, I don't want to do it."

This is where things get serious. This is what stands out to me most about my Mother and is the best example of Love that a Mother can show her child.

My Mom replied, "Neither do I." She was crying even more than I as she guided me into David's office. I can not recall what I said to David, what I do remember was not being afraid anymore. My mother stood next to me and continued to cry. Her tears comforted me. Each one told me how much she loved me. No matter how dark of a place I found myself in I knew from that day forward without a doubt that my Mother would be there with me if I asked her to. While it might not seem like much to others it meant the world to me. I love you Mom.



Keep an eye out for Part Two later this week.

Mariposa de Muerte

I've probably taken enough jabs at members of my family. At the very least it is time for me to tell a story about someone else. Again names have been changed to protect their identity. Also some of it has been fictionalized so that it sounds way cooler than it actually was. This is the life creative fiction lives.

Tom Chadkins laid in bed with his covers kicked aside, sweating. His roomate had gone home for the weekend, it felt as though the room had doubled in size with his absense. The cracked window allowed a chill to crawl silently throughout the room. The hum from his computer echoed off the white cinder block walls.

As Tom laid there gripped with fear, he thought about those blocks and the life that they had lived. They had surrounded hundreds of residents before him and had undoubtly seen much. Too much. He imagined them getting painted over every few years and then being told that they were new. That must be how they tolerated such a life, with the hope of a new begining not being far around the corner.

The chill had climbed the bed and found its way to his brow, yet Tom still felt as though he was choking on flames. He thought about the science of such imagery. He assured himself one could never choke on a flame. For the flame to exists it must have oxygen, if there is no oxygen to sustain oneself, then there would be none for the flame. Unless of course the flame was using all of the oxygen before your body could use it, but surely even a child knows that is not choking, that is asphyxiation.

He felt the fire circulate throughout his chest. His heart fluttered in pain like a butterfly with razor blades for wings flew freely through his blood. Sensing his life may be nearing its conclusion he looked to the bricks with envy wishing for a new begining rather than an end. Tom held his breath and closed his eyes. Waiting for the butterfly of death to deliver its final blow.

The mariposa de muerte - named such by Tom for many reasons, none more important than alliteration - teased him for hours. Keeping him from a resting peace while simultaneously teasing him with hopes of fresh comencement of life. His panic would calm enough for him to dream of what he would do with such an opportunity. Such as spending more words on compasion and less on criticism.

After hours of torture Tom gave in. He released himself from the mortar that made him a part of this world. He drifted away never expecting to feel the chill dance across his brow again. He smiled as his eyes relaxed and his flame was smuthered.

For a man who had experienced many illnesses in his life, from migranes to bouts of diarreah, Tom was completely oblivious to the symptons of heart burn.

His new and terrifying experience combined with his solitude and insightfulness of a brick's life had led him down a path of hopelessness. The path was dark, but will be brightened by the laughter as we all follow him back to life.

One more technology story

Last post was a story about a woman who we referred to as both L Tompkins and Linda T. This seemed to be an effective practice in protecting her identity so we will use the same method to protect the next persons identity.

Phil T is an old fashioned man living in a cutting edge world. He is the type of Man that would still use a rock to shave had his wife not purchased an electric razor for him for Christmas. He may not understand most technologies but to survive he has been forced to adapt and engage in their practices.

The first time I saw a cell phone was a phone he was given by his employer and was a size of a brick and a half. Being compact was clearly not a design concern in those days, like they are now. They would later upgrade him to a phone that was just under the size of a full brick whose outgoing audio piece would flip open and closed to shrink the size of the phone. Both of these phones were never to be used for anything other than emergencies and if he was called for work related reasons. I never saw him make an outgoing call from either of these phones, for all I knew they were incapable of doing so.

My sophomore year of high school was the first time that our household had internet access. I use that term loosely because at 28 kb/second it was 50 times slower than what the standard is for today. Phil T would occasionally use the internet to check his email, and once a year to file his taxes, but that was about the extent of his use. He was very cautious of the internet after hearing all of the horror stories of viruses that can be contracted via the internet.

My Freshman year of college I was set free. I was on a network that had internet access up to 100 times faster than what I had previously known at home. This opened up an entire new world to me. Most notably the ability to be signed on to instant messenger without tying up the phone line.

Less than two weeks into my first year of college Phil T happened to be signed on to the internet. The way his internet service provider worked is that when you signed on to the internet it automatically signed you in to the messenger as well. I decided I would try to have a quick chat with him. I typed "Hey D__, how r u doing?"(I have left out the final two letters of the first word to protect his identity)

After about 5 minutes there was no reply.

"D__, it's me, your son...In Seattle. Just type something in the box below and hit send...It is called instant messaging."

immediately after I sent the message he signed off. I imagined how panicked he must have been. I'm certain he thought he had encountered a super sophisticated virus who knew private information about him. As a precaution I would not be suprised if he bypassed logging off, and just unplugged the computer form the wall.

Later that day I called Phil T and asked him if he was online earlier in the day. His reply was that he had been but shut the computer off when he felt like there may have been a hacker on his computer. he claimed that they knew his name and that I was in Seattle. When I informed him that it was in fact me he fell silent. I could faintly hear his whiskers rubbing against the receiver. After 15 seconds of confused silence he asked "Where did you learn to hack computers?"

Phil T grew up in a world where phones were used for emergencies and special occasions only and now found himself in a world that had begun to use phone for casual correspondence and now to be replaced by the internet. Only a few months later to be replaced again by phones, only cellular this time. Things moved too quickly for him to keep up, and to this day is apprehensive about buying into any new technologies for fear that once he figures it out he will be asked to adapt to a new one. This is a legitimate fear, and in most cases would be true. I just find it interesting the ability of my generation to adapt to the rapid technology changes in our world. And Phil T's concern with those rapid changes and ultimately his lack of trust in them. The poor guy barely answers his cell phone.

Physical and Perceptual Changes

(The name of the main character in the story has been changed to protect her identity.)

L Tompkins came to me for help in preparing a DVD for viewing. I rolled my eyes and called her a "n00b" in my head. If you've ever: asked your child how to email, typed "http://" before the web address, thought the CD ROM was a cup holder, or claimed to have "baked" or "cooked" a CD you've undoubtedly seen this look before from your child, or anybody that knows anything about electronics.

Back to the story. I followed L Tompkins to the DVD player...

(Lawyers have brought it to my attention that the identity of L Tompkins has not been properly protected. To correct this we will now refer to her as Linda T. We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused for said person.)

I placed the DVD in the tray and pressed a few buttons on the television remote to get it to the proper feed as she desperately tried to follow so she could later mimic these steps in hopes of a similar result.

What Linda T did next would forever change my perception of technology. Linda T reached her arm out and began tapping the television screen; the part of the television that read "Play". I sat still on the couch watching intently as confusion began to cross her face. She tapped the screen again this time gently dragging her finger from "P" to "A".

She did not waste much time going from gently and soft to a stern poke, quickly followed by forceful stabs. I continued to sit quietly on the couch as to not spook her. I was in fact watching an event I had never seen before. I had heard stories of older people's encounters with new technology but you never think you will get to see one happen right in front of you.

I watched her confusion turn to audible frustration comprised of grunts and disgruntled breathing patterns. She looked at me with the eyes of a truly innocent child. I found myself in bewilderment at what Linda T thought was possible. To her the DVD did more than change the format in which she watched her movies. It had made possible a physical change to occur to the television, like adding yeast to bread.

In her mind the television, close to 15 years old at the time, had been transformed by the DVD player into a interactive screen. She-like all before her-had been tricked by what the world had told her to expect from technology. That it could physically change things in this world.

What she taught me was that technology will never directly cause change in this world. It can only change how we choose to change the world.

Birthday Post

I recently have gone through the incredibly repetitive tradition of becoming a year older. This process is so frustrating to me not because I don't want to get older, or even that I magically feel a year older as soon as that day comes. What is so frustrating about it is everybody else seems infinitely more interested in my birthday than I myself am.

I am human, so to say I don't enjoy the attention would be ridiculous, however I can't help but feel guilty at the same time. These people are spending so much attention and good intentions on me - what a waste. Perhaps I should care more, but I simply can't.

I am the youngest of four children, with about 7 or 8 years between me and my oldest sibling. I grew up around conversations and interactions that were always more mature than myself. I wouldn't say this was harmful to my development, just unique.

Due to my inability to participate in these conversations and interactions I would do my best to "juvenile" things up a bit. This usually meant making jokes. As a result I never feel as old as the calendar says I am, and am forced to not take myself seriously. If I started taking myself seriously I'm not sure I could survive, I've never been able to operate that way.

This is the only explanation I could come up with to explain my odd, and to some, embarrassing behaviors. As well as my lax disposition to the celebration of my being. I hope this cleared things up for some people who have experienced (read: been victimized) by my happenstance placement in the family tree.

POP!

I'm not really sure who would care enough to read my blog with any regularity. I will not be posting any pictures of a child so I have automatically lost the interest of who likely would be my most frequent visitor (sorry Mom). I'm not a producer on a popular television show that would allow me to give you all of this sweet inside information, nor am I an expert in anything besides myself.

That being said I guess a little background would be helpful. I've been studying me for almost 24 years now and some years have had greater discoveries than others. The recognition of a distinct difference between boys and girls was the first significant discovery I remember, only to be trumped by how much more different I was than previously assumed.

About a year ago I accepted an understudy to me. She follows me everywhere, sleeps in the same bed, sometimes even wears my t-shirts, and I have a sneaking suspicion she will use my deodorant on occasion. I suspect this is to gain a better understanding of me, but i can not be sure. Every time I bring it up she adamantly denies it.

During her probationary period, before being accepted into the program, she would frequently place her mouth on mine. Like an infant interacting with objects in front of them, like a ball, or their own foot. She was quite good at this and ultimately was a strong influencer in her acceptance.

She is incredibly mysterious, and seems to have no consistency to her motivations. Perhaps there are but I have yet to find them. I hope one day to understand her but recently have discovered this may be more of a challenge than I knew.