Friday, November 20th, 2009
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2:03 am - From Twitter 11-19-2009
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Thursday, November 19th, 2009
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2:03 am - From Twitter 11-18-2009
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Wednesday, November 18th, 2009
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11:29 pm - Signs of the Apocalypse
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2:29 pm - Quote of the Day
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"It is essential that sacred activists...learn to work together and to form empowering and encouraging "networks of grace" -- beings of like heart brought together by passion, skill and serendipity to pool energies, triumphs, griefs, hopes and resources of all kinds. When people of like mind and heart gather together, sometimes miraculously powerful synergy can result." Andrew Harvey
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(tell me tell me tell me)
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2:02 am - From Twitter 11-17-2009
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Tuesday, November 17th, 2009
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9:57 am - New Jersey?
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Any friends in the New Brunswick, NJ, area? A friend of mine in the area needs some help. Company while she does some packing, maybe a lift in a car. She is kind, decent, and loving, and has been going through hell.
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(7 stories | tell me tell me tell me)
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2:03 am - From Twitter 11-16-2009
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Monday, November 16th, 2009
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11:50 pm - What a Good Day!
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It started with email praising my work on a freelance job I did last week -- yeah, while I was sick. (My voice is still croaking.) When the plumber came by half an hour early, I was already awake and dressed, instead of having to scramble into clothes; better yet, he didn't need to install a new low-flow toilet, since my unit already has one. Excellent. I hate having strangers in my space.
Lunch with ![[info - personal]](http://s.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png) gramina; because of my germs, I've missed a couple of dates with her, and I *missed* her. She handed over the newest Terry Pratchett, Unseen Academicals, as well as a couple of other library books to return. (The Pratchett will be read by her whole household plus me before it goes back.)
This was my first time out since before I got sick -- other than to drag the trash outside -- and it was wonderful just to be in the sunlight. I checked out the new library, which has some delightful sculpture and a very nifty book-drop system that actually checks books as you drop them off. Plus a cafe, many shelves of sale books, and plenty of space. Nice going, Castro Valley.
I sat in the sun awhile and read the book. Then home, email, and news of a possibility of additional freelance work. (Crossing fingers.) Then I actually encountered my oldest friend on Facebook's chat. Nice talk. That made me happy.
Did four loads of laundry and finished the Pratchett. I'll never get 90% of the allusions, since it's about soccer (I did pick up some, at which I'm absurdly pleased), but I loved it anyway. Not just for the many delightful touches in the book, but for its strength and heart. And this one deals with a tearing primal guilt and fear that I am all too familiar with. Very, very good. And as usual Terry has strong, interesting female characters -- and he even gets explicit about approving of homosexuality, which was not always clear. (Despite Leonardo da Quirm and his detailed drawings of muscular young men.)
Now I'm going to strip and remake the bed and get some sleep. Tomorrow I'll wake and have a date with pokershaman, who was away last weekend.
A good day, and I am grateful.
How are you doing?
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(3 stories | tell me tell me tell me)
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2:02 am - From Twitter 11-15-2009
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Sunday, November 15th, 2009
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4:54 pm - Random Poll, LJ Edition
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4:03 pm - A Random Poll
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2:37 pm - Better Living Through Chemistry
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The baseball season is over, but baseball stories are all year round. Especially when it's Dock Ellis talking about his no-hitter on acid.
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(1 story | tell me tell me tell me)
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2:02 am - From Twitter 11-14-2009
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Saturday, November 14th, 2009
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2:02 am - From Twitter 11-13-2009
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Friday, November 13th, 2009
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2:02 am - From Twitter 11-12-2009
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Thursday, November 12th, 2009
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5:12 am - The Scent of Old Books
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2:03 am - From Twitter 11-11-2009
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Wednesday, November 11th, 2009
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2:03 am - From Twitter 11-10-2009
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Tuesday, November 10th, 2009
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2:03 am - From Twitter 11-09-2009
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Monday, November 9th, 2009
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2:02 am - From Twitter 11-08-2009
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Sunday, November 8th, 2009
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2:03 am - From Twitter 11-07-2009
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Saturday, November 7th, 2009
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2:02 am - From Twitter 11-06-2009
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Friday, November 6th, 2009
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5:38 am - Higher Education
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"The exploitation of syntactical certainty fails to penetrate the myths obscuring the hermeneutic of the real."
That's not Lacan or Bataille. It's the Academic Sentence Generator. Click "Tell me how it works" in the lower-left-hand corner for the delightfully lucid explanation of why these sentences are so bad.
Deciphering Academese, by PhD Comics. A paper from the prestigious Intl. Journal of Temporal Deflective Behavior. This page is reached by hitting a panic button on any of the PhD comic strips.
Grad School Is Hell, by the immortal Matt Groening.
The truth about grad students, post-docs, and professors (and other grad student humor)
A grad student, a post-doc, and a professor are walking through a city park and they find an antique oil lamp. They rub it and a Genie comes out in a puff of smoke.
The Genie says, "I usually only grant three wishes, so I'll give each of you just one."
"Me first! Me first!" says the grad student. "I want to be in the Bahamas, driving a speedboat with a gorgeous woman who sunbathes topless." Poof! He's gone.
"Me next! Me next!" says the post-doc. "I want to be in Hawaii, relaxing on the beach with a professional hula dancer on one side and a Mai Tai on the other." Poof! He's gone.
"You're next," the Genie says to the professor.
The professor says, "I want those guys back in the lab after lunch."
And, because I love learning if not always academia, Fun with physics: Bill Bryson visits the Large Hadron Collider.
[ Error: Irreparable invalid markup ('<a [...] </a>') in entry. Owner must fix manually. Raw contents below.] "The exploitation of syntactical certainty fails to penetrate the myths obscuring the hermeneutic of the real." That's not Lacan or Bataille. It's <a href="http://ow.ly/zQtj">the Academic Sentence Generator</a>. Click "Tell me how it works" in the lower-left-hand corner for the delightfully lucid explanation of why these sentences are so bad. <a href="http://www.phdcomics.com/archive_journal.php?n=405">Deciphering Academese, by PhD Comics.</a> A paper from the prestigious Intl. Journal of Temporal Deflective Behavior. This page is reached by hitting a panic button on any of the PhD comic strips. <a href="http://www.history.ucsb.edu/faculty/marcuse/images/ComicGradSchoolHell72dpi550pxw.jpg">Grad School Is Hell</a>, by the immortal Matt Groening. <a href="http://www.chat.carleton.ca/~jnoakes/grad.html">The truth about grad students, post-docs, and professors (and other grad student humor)</a> <blockquote>A grad student, a post-doc, and a professor are walking through a city park and they find an antique oil lamp. They rub it and a Genie comes out in a puff of smoke. The Genie says, "I usually only grant three wishes, so I'll give each of you just one." "Me first! Me first!" says the grad student. "I want to be in the Bahamas, driving a speedboat with a gorgeous woman who sunbathes topless." Poof! He's gone. "Me next! Me next!" says the post-doc. "I want to be in Hawaii, relaxing on the beach with a professional hula dancer on one side and a Mai Tai on the other." Poof! He's gone. "You're next," the Genie says to the professor. The professor says, "I want those guys back in the lab after lunch." </blockquote> And, because I love learning if not always academia, <a href="http://ow.ly/zR2U">Fun with physics: Bill Bryson visits the Large Hadron Collider.</a> <a href="http://www.slashfood.com/2009/11/05/julia-childs-primordial-soup/?icid=main|aim|dl3|link6|http%3A%2F%2Fwww.slashfood.com%2F2009%2F11%2F05%2Fjulia-childs-primordial-soup%2F>Julia Child's Primordial Soup."</a> |
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(6 stories | tell me tell me tell me)
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2:03 am - From Twitter 11-05-2009
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Thursday, November 5th, 2009
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2:02 am - From Twitter 11-04-2009
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Wednesday, November 4th, 2009
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7:00 am - Today's Treat
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2:43 am - National Children's Memorial Day Is December 13
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More than one of my friends and family members have lost someone dear to them this year. It's hard even when someone dies who has lived a long, full life. But there's a special tearing grief for those who died too young. And the grief is powerful even when you believe in an afterlife.
Every year, the second Sunday in December is Children's Memorial Day. That's the day many people grieve for those who have died too young. At 7PM local time, light a candle and let it burn for an hour. It helps to get some of the grief faced before the holiday. I've been doing this since 1997 -- the first year it was held, the year Diane died.
I've been told that this is a fake holiday or that I should stick to traditional mourning days. But as a Protestant Christian, I don't actually have traditional mourning days. The liturgical denominations commemorate All Saints and All Souls, but my background is fundamentalist, and those days would be just as artificial to me. Unlike Jews, we don't observe a formal yahrzeit, the anniversary of someone's death. I don't even know what commemorative customs other religions follow.
Because I've observed this day for a dozen years, prayed and wept and watched the candle burn down, Children's Memorial Day is a genuine holy day for me. Maybe you have other ways to mark your grief, or you don't want to try this. That's fine. But maybe you'll find comfort in the candle-lighting ceremony.
Whatever your grief, may you find comfort and peace.
From the web site of the Compassionate Friends:
The Compassionate Friends Worldwide Candle Lighting unites family and friends around the globe in lighting candles for one hour to honor and remember children who have died at any age from any cause. As candles are lit at 7 p.m. local time, creating a virtual wave of light, hundreds of thousands of persons commemorate and honor children in a way that transcends all ethnic, cultural, religious, and political boundaries.
Believed to be the largest mass candle lighting on the globe, the Worldwide Candle Lighting, a gift to the bereavement community from The Compassionate Friends, creates a virtual 24-hour wave of light as it moves from time zone to time zone. Hundreds of formal candle lighting events are held and thousands of informal candle lightings are conducted in homes as families gather in quiet remembrance of children who have died, but will never be forgotten.
The Worldwide Candle Lighting started in the United States in 1997 as a small Internet observance but has since swelled in numbers as word has spread throughout the world of the remembrance.
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(1 story | tell me tell me tell me)
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2:03 am - From Twitter 11-03-2009
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Tuesday, November 3rd, 2009
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8:31 am - Redwood
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You will find something more in woods than in books. Trees and stones will teach you that which you can never learn from schoolteachers.
St. Bernard
How do you convey the essence of a redwood tree? No words, no pictures, can capture the experience of walking through a grove of them.
Redwoods lack the graceful stance of elms, the glorious color of sugar maples in autumn, the picturesquely twisted branches of oak trees. They don't even have the shapeliness of a blue spruce or a Douglas fir. In fact, they resemble extremely tall bottle-brushes.
Moreover, a hiker can see the whole only from a distance. Up close, you don't see much of the branches; they start above eye level. What you see is the reddish bark, the vast trunk, perhaps a few needles dipping low enough for your notice. They stand, calm and strong, alone or in great goosepens or in ranks on steep ridges. They carpet the woods with their shredding bark and their rusty, fragrant needles. But the simplicity of the great trunks has grace, and the fibrous bark -- the color of tea in sunlight -- has a subtle auburn glow.
And they are huge. The vast specimens in Muir Woods are among the greatest of the Coast Redwoods, Sequoia sempervirens, which aren't even the most massive of the redwood family. The Giant Sequoia, Sequoiadendron gigantea, are thicker-trunked. But even a comparatively adolescent Coast Redwood tree can be magnificent long before it reaches its full growth of 350+ feet in height and as much as 26 feet in diameter. (Not circumference. Diameter.) They're big enough to camp out in when hollowed by fire or age. They grow taller than the Statue of Liberty on her pedestal. And they have a natural lifespan of as much as 2,000 years. Trees of 600 or 700 years old are common -- well, common in places where they haven't been clear-cut.
Walking among them is like walking in a great cathedral, or Stonehenge. They carry a sense of holiness, of calm contemplation. It's more than the effect of great size; I've been in buildings where humans were puny without feeling the upwelling of joy these forests give me.
Words can't do it. Pictures fail. But maybe this video will help. It shows the making of this large-scale photograph.
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(7 stories | tell me tell me tell me)
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2:04 am - From Twitter 11-02-2009
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