Dilemma

So here's the thing...
I'm starting to fall in love with my wordpress account (which I run through my Linux account on my domain). At the same time I'm falling out of love with Blogger. I don't run my blogger through blogspot because frankly blogspot is torturous, and I just like having stuff on my own domain...remember that controlling thing?
So I'm starting to think about closing down my 'blogger' and just using my 'wordpress'.
I'd slowly have to aggregate (wonder if I using that right) all of the archives into the wordpress files.
Basically this means that I'm going to stop the dual-posting on both sites and just post new things on the wordpress.
I'm imported all my links of my bloggy friends, so really the only thing that's changing is the link to my blog...
So if you are reading this...I hate to put you through the hassle of changing your template and re-linking so if you want, feel free to just drop me- I promise not to be offended. We all need a fresh start. You might not like reading me (or now 'hearing' me) blog and hey, I can't blame you. So consider this a de-friend, get out of jail free card.

IF however you'd like to keep going and reading (and listening), well clearly you've got a problem with masochism, but I thank thee...
So just change your link to http://photoblog.stamant.org/blog/ and then heck it'll be like nothing ever changed at all (except yet another new look and name change). You also might get an annoying email announcing the change because I do that from time to time. Oh and when I comment on your blogger it might still have my blogger profile (cuz that's just easier).

so'okay...I'm turning off the lights now here...there'll still be furniture and stuff for awhile, once I actually move everything out it will vanish, but that'll take a while (heck this blogger thing is over 4 years old...I have almost 400 posts to move...I should have hired some movers.

Remember: http://photoblog.stamant.org/blog/

Goodnight sweet blogger, and flights of angels sing thee to thy rest!

JibJab

If you've never ridden the JibJab train, you should...
This is the latest piece of brilliance...
It's just so damn true it hurts

What We Call the News | Send To Friends | Funny Animations at JibJab

Flying Solo

Lazy Girl

Originally uploaded by AmericaninCanada.

Shell is doing some painting at her parents' house this week and because of some appointments I had today she got a late start, so she decided to stay overnight.
This meant that I had Gracie all by myself tonight. There's been a couple of nights I've done the night by myself, but probably not in a long while.
With Shell's normal work schedule when she's on a project she usually doesn't get home until after supper time, so in the evening I generally leave the two girls alone so they can have some quality uninterrupted mommy-daughter time. If I'm in the room, Ginny Grace tends to maintain her normal daytime daddy-clinging, so basically I want them to have as much unfettered bonding as possible.
This also means that Shelley handles the nighttime rituals- books, jammies, bottle, teeth, and saying 'night-nights' to the puppies and me. So I'm just not used to those, and GG is not used to having me do them. It makes me a wee nervous.
After dinner I was sitting in the living room getting ready to watch the Leafs game and GG wandered to the back of the house...and got really quiet. Quiet in the 'too-quiet' way. I went to investigate.
GG is a serial-door closer. She closes any door she can. So I was none too surprised to find the hallway door closed. One layer of soundproofing. Then I noticed our bedroom door closed as well. A second layer. Brilliant child!

As I approached the door I could hear the television in the bedroom and her jabbering. She had turned the TV on and had the hockey game on (it was the last channel I was watching) and she was sitting on the floor talking to Dixie.

Just the two of them. An eighteen-month old and her patient big sister doggy, plopped on the doggy bed, having a grand old time without a care in the world.

I wandered in and sat on the bed content to let them enjoy their own human-canine bonding. I never thought THEY needed the same kind of treatment that any other pair in the house needed. She was petting Dixie on the head, giving her kisses on her nose, leaning in and giving her hugs (which to Gracie consist of just laying her head sideways and saying 'aww'). The she pointed at Dixie's eyes and said "Eyes, Dada"

A new word...cool! New words come about one a day or so now. We've got a list. Shell keeps a list of everything which is good because blogging and pictures are the only backup I have for my lax memory. Her vocabulary is up to close to 40 words so we're on a good pace I think.

She looked at me through the bars of the foot of the bed and spent the next few minutes in her 'Hi Dada, Hi Dixie, Hi Wo-wo (her name for Willow)' routine. I told her that when she's a big girl and sleeps in a big girl bed, Dixie could sleep in the bed with her. "But", I warned, "Dixie snores".

"Snore", she said.

ooo...another word! Where's the list?

Well she clearly knows what 'eyes' are, but she's just mimicing on 'snore'...but that means the instant mimicing is upon us.

This is key.

This means someone in the family with a reputation for somewhat of a 'potty mouth' *coughshelleycough* has to be on the best of behavior, lest more colorful words get added to the 'list'.

Tranquility Base

Well I've gone and done it...the Eagle has landed...at Tranquility Base

Podcast #1 should be available soon, but you can if you so choose listen to the first podcast directly on my site.

Once I get the information from iTunes I'll pass it along and then you can just subscribe to it (for free of course) and then it will just download whenver there's a new one.

Now available at iTunes

I'm begging for feedback and mostly questions, questions, questions to fill up the time on the next installment...so send all that to:

TQBasePodcast@yahoo.com

I'm thinking that I might eventually shift all my blogger archives over and just have the one sight...wordpress is just so lovely and helpful.

Anyways...I hope you like listening to my voice better than I do!!

Cheers

Wowzers

Um...wow...Shelley's Grandma apparently just gave us a check...a sort of advance on her inheritance to save some tax money...let's just say...we've been thrown a huge life-preserver out of the blue...

If you ever wanted a visual representation of the word 'gobsmacked' being in our living room a few moments ago would have done the trick...

Still absorbing...

More later...

Questions of Podcasting

Have you ever listened to a podcast?
I listen to a bunch of podcasts.
If I had a podcast would you listen to it?

What sort of things would you want to hear in my podcast?

I ask these questions because I'm thinking that I blogged before most people I know, and before everybody else gets their own podcast eventually, I thought maybe I'd start a podcast.
I'd love to eventually have guests on it. I enjoy a conversation about an interesting topic. Basically I'm a curious person. If I meet someone at a party I tend to pepper them with questions, because I'm interested in things I don't know, or partially know.

I was trying to think of a good name for my podcast...any suggestions?
I was leaning to Tranquility Base, because it's my favorite word, but I'm wondering if that's really a good name for a podcast.
I have to find my microphone today...

Dueling Numbers: 416 versus the 905

Ever increasingly, a divide has erupted in the Greater Toronto Area.
For those outisde of Toronto, it is the city against the suburbs.
For those in the GTA it's known simply as the 416 versus the 905.
416 is the phone interchange for Downtown Toronto and some of its surrounding communities, 905 is phone interchange for the rest of the Greater Toronto Area.

The 905 prefix is used quite liberally (if you'll pardon the ironic pun) to incpororate some areas in the Hamilton areas, but mainly, what is considered the focus of 905 is the largest of the cities the immediate west/northwest: namely Oakville, Mississauga, Brampton, much of Halton Hills, Peel, and other regions.
While this definition is by no means perfect it is central to the lingering political disputes between the two regions- Toronto proper and the Greater Toronto Area.

The tension has reached critical mass in the latest Ontario budget. In recent decades the 905 area growth explosion has outpaced most infrastructure. The current highway system is poor by everyone's agreement, while the needs of social services to the large segments of immigrant populations in these subburbs has put a strain on the 905. Meanwhile, the 905 has in a sence been subsidizing social services costs to the 416.

This latest budget has apparently broken this chain- with the 905 receiving a huge boost in provincial monies, while the city is now facing a short fall in their social servce budgets.

To those in the 905, it is long overdue. To those in the 416 it is the provincial government turning their back on their most loyal voters.

The 416 is largely, almost solidly Liberal voting, whereas the 905 is less tied to one party, has grown increasingly small 'c' conservative leaning in recent elections and thus Ontario Liberals face a great dilemma: Help secure the 905, in the hopes it can increase its presence in those ever growing ridings (only to get larger as businesses move out into the 905 to take advanatage of available land and lower poperty taxes; or risk alienating their strongest base in the 416 by forcing them to raise property taxes to make up the social services shortfall.

It is to be sure a complicated calculation, only to become more complicated if, as Toronto Mayor David Miller suggests doubling the property tax increase twice the rate of inflation (1.5% to 3%). Studies done such as those by firms like REALpac have analyzed just what sort of effect this all will have on the two regions.

Michael Brooks, Executive Director of REALpac: This can have significant negative effects on the City of Toronto's economic growth, because when it comes to work, increasingly, employers are choosing to locate offices in the 905 region, due to its dramatically lower tax rate."

With businessness moving out, and more monies needed to make up the gap, will more middle income workers follow the suburban flight, leaving Toronto a city of a shrinking middle class unwilling to pay higher proerty taxes, on already higher assessed homes??

In a game of winners and losers, or new versus old, Ontario's politicians seem to be banking on the expanding growth of the 905 and the dwindling fortunes of the 416.

The Daily Show Takes On The Gonzales Scandal

The Daily Show has been really strong of late which is probably due to the fact the Bush Administration is giving them so much good material...

*sigh*

Kim knows why...just...just...*sigh*

I'm glad my wife and child were not around tonight to see a grown man cry...I'm a Cubs AND a Leafs fan...why must I willingly submit to so much heartbreak? Is this my karmic exchange for the good parking I always get at the mall?

4 goals in like 8 1/2 minutes...

*sigh*

I promise to post something of import later...for now I've got to clean the tears off the floor

Bon Voyage

My dear friend Lauren, the Aussie (by also Canadian) princess, has started her 7-month long trek through Europe with her beau, Henry.
I am: jealous, happy, scared, hopeful, misty-eyed, and proud.

If you think 'the internets' are a scary place, filled with spooky people, I contend, it is also a portal that allows you to meet beautiful souls you might not otherwise meet on your journey.

One of the most beautiful I've ever come across is Lauren.

We met her in an on-line group about 7-8 years ago. We finally met her a year later in person when she came to the States on vacation and we hung out together in Colorado and then later in Salt Lake. She did the 8 plus hour car trip from Denver to SLC..TWICE!! with me. She visited again last summer and Ginny Grace instantly fell in love with her too. So she's got the whole family under her spell.

A Case Of The Empty Empties

Note: I had a very long and funny post that was eaten by Blogger and ultimately unable to be recovered...that really sucks. It was hysterical. No really. You'd have laughed yourself silly. Some of you would have hurt yourself from laughter and might have pursued legal action against me...maybe it's a good thing it was eaten. But really...you should have been there...

I thought we needed to shake of the dingy dark winter days with a little shout out to spring. Here's a shot of a day lily from Shelley's garden last summer...maybe it will bring a glow to your world.



The warmer weather brings out the hippies.
Last night as I was walking back to my car from the library, I passed a house and the marijuana smell wafting from the windows nearly threw me back a block.
It was so intense that I was fairly certain that the house was either hosting a spontaneous concert by The Wailers, or someone living there had the world's worst case of glaucoma.
I'm not a prude, and I was certainly no choir boy...I just think it's a little excessive to turn your fireplace into a walk-in bong.

My apologies to the hippies in the audience. I'm just not very hippy, though I did sort of marry one. Sure, she seems straight-laced but she's got latent hippy tendencies. She did live in Portland and San Francisco after all...those ARE the West Coast affiliates of Sodom and Gomorrah right?

It's gotta make you wonder, btw, why did Sodom get something named after it but Gomorrah...zippo. Come on Gomorrah, represent yo!

I lived in San Francisco too, but it didn't really have any lingering affects.
I did try to wear flowers in my hair once, but I don't have any hair so they sort of fell on the ground...I guess I could have taped them on...but then the song said nothing about visiting San Francisco and scotch-taping flowers on your head, so I think I made the right call.

When I got home last night, Shell and Gracie were in the bedroom playing.
She was probably teaching her some hippy stuff like ultimate frisbee.
Shut up!
Sorry

Anyway, she said, "Gracie, come see who's here".
GG walked around the corner, saw me and her eyes lit up. She got a huge smile and ran up to me, threw her arms up at me and said "Hi Dada".
It's enough to make a grown man cry.
Maybe I am a hippy after all...hippies cry a lot. Alan Ginsberg would sob for hours. Ken Kesey was a puddle of tears 24-7, well when he wasn't seeing monkeys talking to Jesus.

Hmmm...'Bong Hits 4 Jesus'...now I know why he needed all those loaves and fishes!

The girls are gone now. They went away for the weekend to Tim's house.
Probably getting their freak flags on!
Shut up, I said!
Oh yeah, I forgot...I was totally baked

So I'm all alone in the house, me and the dogs. I'm just wandering room to room. I don't get it. I was alone, basically, for 30 plus years...why am I suddenly lost without a giggling toddler and a busy-bee wife hovering about me? I've double checked to see if Shell pinned a note to my shirt in case I got lost. No such luck, but to be on the safe side I probably shouldn't got outside.
Plus what would I do? Hug a tree?
What if the tree hugged back??


My apologies to all the hippies out there...I love you all...just stay away from my Oreos.

Blushing

Today I became an official artist.

The fact that someone liked a photograph of mine so much they wanted to pay me for it is beyond my comprehension.
I had to pinch myself a couple of times...I think I'm bruised now.
I had to make some decisions that I never had to make before- like how much to soak a friend- luckily that friend is amazing and kind.
I also had to make a decision about how to set an appropriate number for the prints...I chose 17 because it's my number.
I...I...am fairly speechless.

The Color Of Love

100_8338
Originally uploaded by AmericaninCanada.

At the moment it's 5:30pm and I'm at the library. I'm tired and class really knocked me out. It seemed for the first hour it was left up to be to be the soul voice within the class.

Sometimes that happens. Everyone else is afraid to speak up, to perhaps make a mistake, to say something stupid.

I figure, 'heck I say stupid stuff all the time...it's nothing new for me' so up I pipe and away we go. Occasionally I'll get lost, that's when I delve into philosophy. Even most of my professors really don't know a lot about philosophy. And when even *I* don't know what I'm talking about...I can sound like I do. It's a gift. The gift of a pompous ass.

Anyway, it tends to wear me down.

I've been working on some stuff for my big paper, but I was a little put off by getting my first small paper back today. I didn't get the mark I was looking for and frankly I can't understand why. He didn't give me a lot of criticism, nor did he really point out any obvious flaws- just merely commented on 'not seeing it'. But that was the problem- the paper was a totally subjective analysis of our favorite science-fiction movie. How can that be objectively critiqued?

So I'm sort of down.

I went through my blogroll, which is even more depressing because there are so many great writers out there. (I hate you all) Okay not really, but yes. Parts of me hate you. The jealous, envious, ego parts. The rest of me loves you.

I'd pack up and go home now but a) I have to walk 4 city blocks in the rain to get to my car and then b) sit in traffic because it's rush hour in Toronto...

So now I'm blowing off steam, afraid to leave this computer because they get gobbled up like mid-20th century central European states by the Germans and I don't have the energy right now to do anything but appease.

But despite my whining I'm actually quite happy today. I'm just saving all my happiness for later when I'm comfortable in my jammies and warm bed.

That last sentence should have sounded less sensationalistic but I'm not about to erase it.

Looking at photos now. I like this one today. There's just so much whimsical evil in my daughter's eyes...I know she gets that from me. Well the whimsy she gets from me, the evil is soooooooo her mother.

Just kidding honey...

Maybe I should have saved that joke until I was inside the house...she could probably change the locks on me before I made it home.

Damn!!

Um...honey? You're so pretty....

(that's an inside joke)

Anyone got a doghouse I could sleep in?

Every Picture Tells A Story, Don't It?

[This photo has been sold as a limited edition signed print. The first of 17 prints has been sold.]

I ventured out today to look for a job and also to take some pictures of this awesome Croatian Centre they built in the country. It was a beautiful blue sky sunshine day perfect for some photos (except for the bitter cold wind).

With my luck of course I pick a day where they've parked a giant yellow dumpster in front of the place- I guess to remove some stuff in the construction process. I took some pics but had to keep the lower half of the building out of the shot.

This was only the start of my bad luck. On the way back, about a mile from the Centre, I saw a distant snow covered pond. I pulled off the side of the road and found a spot from which to shoot. Got a couple of good pics and headed back to the van. That's when I found out that the door somehow locked behind me with the van running...whoops.

I walked across the street and knocked on the houses with no answer from either place- even though they had cars in the driveway. So I wandered back out to the roadside and eventually flagged down someone and asked to borrow a cell phone. I called Shell who had a nice laugh at my expense. She and GG came to rescue me.

When they arrived I was pretty frozen. Shell took pity on me and decided to take me to lunch before she and GG went to Maria's for the evening...

I'm still kind of thawing out.

On Wisconsin....D'oh!

The Wisonsin upset destroyed my brackets, which to be honest were suffering before anyway...

[Click to see the large size...if you dare]

Princess Grace

Princess Grace
Originally uploaded by AmericaninCanada.

Last night while my father-in-law and I watched the Leafs game, Shelley and Ginny Grace went with Shell's mom over to see Great-Grandma Amos.

Grandma Amos is almost 92 and still sharp as a tack.

She did however have a little spill a few weeks ago and so Shell wanted to go see her and allow her to spend a little time with her great-granddaughter.

I think it's pretty wonderful that GG has two Great-Grandmothers.

Since growing up I only had one grandparent at all, my grandmother Wenonah, having any 'grands', not to mention 'great-grands' is to me a real blessing.

Apparently Ginny Grace, who is normally shy around everyone, was unusually spunky at Great-Gramma's place, doing all her tricks, babbling, and even showing Great-Gramma Amos that she can blow her own nose in a kleenex.

They came home from their visit all full of laughs and smiles.

They also came home with a gift from Great-Gramma Amos for GG's college fund...a really, really, nice gift...with lots of zeros. Apparently all the great-grandkids are getting a similar contribution and with 4 of them..that's a fairly hefty sum.

Ginny Grace is too young to understand the generosity...but we aren't.

I've said numerous times I married into an amazing family- last night was proof in spades.

Today we had a few adventures as well. We went to the town library and got some books. We were sitting in the kids section reading a story about Mog the Cat when the power went out. Grace was unfazed by the sudden outage and just gathered up her things and walked over to see Beezus and the other guinea pig whose name escapes me at the moment- they live at the library in their little guinea pig cage.

The power came back on before we left, but then went off again later when we got home. We only live around the block from the library so it was a neighborhood temporary blackout I guess.

We also made our first foray into the world of EBay. Yes, it's 2007 and we've never done anything on EBay...we are behind the times a bit I guess. Shell has some stuff she wants to see if she can sell. Some crafty bits that might not be appropriate for The Galloping Goat Gallery like scarves and some odds and ends. She also wants to sell some expensive dress she bought a few years ago. When she told me how much she paid for it I think I suffered a mild coronary. I don't think I've paid THAT much for my entire "wardrobe". (I put the word 'wardrobe' in quotations because it's pretty laughable to call my collection of clothes a wardrobe- or even a collection...but I digress.)

She's got a couple of tiaras too. I don't know...women need them I guess. Gracie decided to model one for us.

I had a flashforward to her getting married.

And I think I had *another* coronary.

How will I ever break it to her that she's not allowed to get married until she's at least 45?

The Roundabout

Self Portrait with Shades
Originally uploaded by AmericaninCanada.

Let's be frank...I don't like my having my picture taken.
In part that is why I enjoy taking pictures...I don't have to be in them.
I think that is my defense mechanism: control.

I'm not controlling because I enjoy control, it's not in other words an aggressive controlling (though it might take that look and feel).

Somethings I try to control for practical reasons. For instance I get extremely carsick so I prefer to drive since it lessens the queasiness. Shelley has reluctantly given in to this- yet another reason why I love her. Power struggles can be pretty devastating.

Then there are the times the control is less practical. For instance my dictatorial power over the radio. I hate listening to music I don't like, so I either listen to sports talk radio or a CD (that's a twinning control, over my spouse AND the stupid program directors on music radio stations).

Sometimes this control can get out of hand. For instance (I'm for instance-ing a lot), if I go to a bar or restaurant that has a jukebox, I'm pumping change in there like its a slot machine.

Yes I understand that by exhibiting my control in such a setting I'm merely forcing the very thing on others to which I'm rebelling...but I'm not here for you to make such sense to me...I'm enjoying my insane troll logic, thank you very much.

What does any of this have to do with, well, anything?

I'm not sure.

I took this picture of myself today as we got set to go to Shell's parents house for dinner.

There are a few things to note about this picture. The first being that I took it at all. For someone who doesn't like their own appearance all that much, taking one's own picture would seem on the surface to be twisted. And this is true.

Another thing to note is that I'm not smiling. Why? Well I don't smile.
I mean I smile in theory. Occasionally in practice. But it's spontaneous. Smiling for a camera is not spontaneous. In fact it is wholly fake. Now it isn't that I'm not above being fake, it's just that smiling for a camera makes the fakery that much more obvious.

Yes, I'm this neurotic.

But in a cute way.

Not really.

The last thing to note is that despite my own visage-self-loathing, the one aspect that I think is the tiniest bit attractive about myself (this sentence is making me throw up in my mouth a little) is my eyes. At least that's what people who have been in the position to comment, albeit sometimes uncomfortably, upon my appearance have mentioned most. So isn't it a bit strange that the one thing that might be remotely interesting about myself is thusly covered up completely??

These are the things I think about at 1am when I'm supposed to be playing softball but am not.

So where was I? Oh yeah. Me!

This whole post disgusts me. And yet I'm oddly compelled to continue.

When I consider myself, and my picture I feel deeply sorry for my wife who must answer variations on the question, "Why did you marry a hitman?"

Which I guess is marginally better than the question, "How did that grizzly bear learn to drive?"

I'm suddenly aware of the fact I've just disparaged the mass of grizzly bear population who did nothing to me in the first place.

If you happen to be a grizzly bear reading this, I'm deeply sorry for offending you and your 'kind'.

This long-winded post is a roundabout way of telling you about my Saturday...and I haven't really done that much in that direction have I??

Perfect Catch

I just don't rememeber what I did for fun before I had a kid.

Bracketology

bracket1stround
Originally uploaded by AmericaninCanada.

Well the first round was pretty standard for me. I went 23-9 (by the way I don't know why they didn't highlight ALL the winners and losers?...maybe after round two). One reason I did so poorly is that for the first time in years there were no 12 v 5 upsets. The 12v5 game is always good for a couple.

I *WAS* sweating the Wisconsin game. They were down for a long time and I have them winning it all. That would have been a HUGE blow to my bracket.

Pause To Think

I have a weakness for intelligent women.

There's nothing better (dare I say: sexier) that a woman who can knock your intellectual socks off.
As some of the veteran blog readers know, I'm a political junkie and one of my recent obsessions is Bloggingheads. Two (generally reasonable) people debating issues of the day. If watching two fixed heads talking about Plame-gate, the Iraq War, realism versus neo-conservatism, is your bag then you should check it out. I recommend searching for the entries involving the founders Bob Wright and Mickey Kaus- they're the best.

Anyway, because of Bloggingheads I've found a couple of really interesting new voices- 2 somewhat conservative and 1 moderate- and they're all women. I've now added them to my blogroll and if smart women make you weak-kneed like me I recommend you give them a read.
Ann Althouse is a University of Wisconsin professor, Garance Franke-Ruta is an editor at The American Prospect, and Dr. Helen, is a forensic psychologist, and wife of blogger Instapundit (Glenn Reynolds).

Too Much Information

Jebus but this is a long (well I guess it's two long) memes...but what the heck

1. Can you cook?
Yes...I suppose
2. What was your dream growing up?
To play baseball
3. What talent do you wish you had?
I want to play the piano...piano dudes are suave.
4. Favorite place?
The 5th tee box at the University of Utah golf course
5. Favorite vegetable?
The carrot
6. What was the last book you read?
The Conservative Soul, by Andrew Sullivan
7. What zodiac sign are you?
Scorpio
8. Any Tattoos and/or Piercings?
My ear is pierced but I think it has grown over
9. Worst Habit?
forgetting to shave for a week at a time
10. Do you personally know anybody on Blog?
On my blog list I know: my wife (duh), Tim, Artsy Mom, Nicole, Elise, Laura, and Barb
11. What is your favorite sport?
golf- first among many
12. Negative or Optimistic attitude?
I'd like to think I'm optimistic...but I have doubts
13. What would you do if you were stuck in an elevator lift with someone of the opposite sex?
Why, what did you have in mind???
14. Worst thing to ever happen to you?
It's probably too painful to talk about
15. Tell me one weird fact about you:
I'm made of space-age polymers
16. Do you have any pets?
2 dogs- Dixie and Willow
17. Do you know how to do the macarena?
Um....you bowl the water first, then put it in, cook until tender, add the cheese??
18. Is the sun shining where you are now?
No, the sun is shining a few million miles away
19. Do you think clowns are cute or scary?
Clowns make people sick
20. If you could change one thing about how you look, what would it be?
One thing??
21. Would you be my good angel or bad angel?
Probably a bad angel pretending to be a good one
22. What color eyes do you have?
Blue
23. Ever been arrested?
No
24. Bottle or Draft?
I like my Corona IN the bottle
25. If you won £10,000 today, what would you do with it?
probably try to figure out how many pounds in the Canadian dollar?
26. What kind of bubble gum do you prefer to chew?
I only chew gum when I'm playing ball and I have no preference
27. What's your favorite bar to hang at?
The monkey bars
28. Do you believe in ghosts?
I think I saw the ghost of a old Ute woman once...it's a bit of a story
29. Favorite thing to do in your spare time?
Movies
30. Do you swear a lot?
Not 'a lot'
31. Biggest pet peeve?
We don't keep pet 'peeves'...they make a real mess and you have to keep 'em chained up all the time
32. In one word, how would you describe yourself?
Sacrilicous


and another:

WERE YOU NAMED AFTER ANYONE?
My first name comes from a Vietnam buddy of my Dad's who died, and my middle name is my Grandfather's middle name
ARE YOU AN ONLY CHILD?
No
DO YOU LIKE YOUR HANDWRITING?
Hate it
WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE LUNCH MEAT?
Roast Beef
DO YOU HAVE KIDS?
One little monkey, currently playing a little Fisher-Price horn and making quite the racket
IF YOU WERE ANOTHER PERSON WOULD YOU BE FRIENDS WITH YOU?
That question frightens me on several levels
DO YOU USE SARCASM A LOT?
Nooooooooo....
DO YOU STILL HAVE YOUR TONSILS?
Yes
WOULD YOU BUNGEE JUMP?
No chance in hell
WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE CEREAL?
Capn Crunch
DO YOU UNTIE YOUR SHOES WHEN YOU TAKE THEM OFF?
Not if I can help it
DO YOU THINK YOU ARE STRONG?
My wife says I have 'super-strength'
WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE ICE CREAM?
Butter Pecan
WHAT IS THE FIRST THING YOU NOTICE ABOUT PEOPLE?
Their smile...hopefully
RED OR PINK?
Red
WHAT IS THE LEAST FAVORITE THING ABOUT YOURSELF?
My general jackassery
WHO DO YOU MISS THE MOST?
My friends in the US
DO YOU WANT EVERYONE TO SEND THIS BACK TO YOU?
Sure
WHAT COLOR PANTS AND SHOES ARE YOU WEARING?
Not wearing pants (I'm wearing shorts people, calm down) and no shoes
WHAT WAS THE LAST THING YOU ATE?
Steak and rice
WHAT ARE YOU LISTENING TO RIGHT NOW?
BloggingheadsTV
IF YOU WERE A CRAYON, WHAT COLOR WOULD YOU BE?
Hopefully not one of the ones the dogs eat
FAVORITE SMELLS?
napalm in the morning
WHO WAS THE LAST PERSON YOU TALKED TO ON THE PHONE?
My mom
DO YOU LIKE THE PERSON WHO SENT THIS TO YOU?
I took this off of Ange's blog...she's a peach
FAVORITE SPORTS TO WATCH?
football, hockey, golf, baseball, basketball...do you see where this is going?
HAIR COLOR?
*sniff*...hair??
DO YOU WEAR CONTACTS?
No
FAVORITE FOOD? ,br> spaghetti
SCARY MOVIES OR HAPPY ENDINGS?
happy endings
LAST MOVIE YOU WATCHED?
The Sentinel
COLOR OF SHIRT YOU ARE WEARING?
grey t-shirt
SPRING OR WINTER?
fall!! HUGS OR KISSES?
kisses
FAVORITE DESSERT?
cheesecake
WHAT BOOK ARE YOU READING?
Guns, Germs, and Steel (which was a gift from Ange & Tom)
WHAT IS ON YOUR MOUSE PAD?
My mouse
WHAT DID YOU WATCH ON TV LAST NIGHT?
Smallville
WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE SOUND?
my daughter laughing
WHAT IS THE FURTHEST YOU HAVE BEEN FROM HOME?
West Germany (when it was West Germany)
DO YOU HAVE A SPECIAL TALENT?
I play the harmonica
WHERE WERE YOU BORN?
San Diego

The Puppet Mistress

The Puppet Mistress
Originally uploaded by AmericaninCanada.

A day of mixed emotions.

On the one hand is the terrifying reality that there's no money coming in after today. No job yet for me, and no word on a new project for Shell. The weight of the unknown is heavy.

On the other is relief that my wife will actually have a break from the grinding production schedules, long commutes, and deadlines. She's worked so hard and has not really had any kind of vacation in 4 years.

That's the real paradox at the moment. Time but no money with which to enjoy it. Rather than some money but no time to enjoy it.

Last night she grabbed me in the kitchen, sort of fell into me, wrapped her arms around my neck and said, "wouldn't it be great to go somewhere nice and warm and just do nothing".

She wants one of those all-inclusive vacations where you don't have to worry about anything, it's all set up ahead of time.

We're doing our taxes this weekend. Maybe we'll get a nice surprise and get a fat return and if so, we can survive the break AND we'll take that vacation yessiree!

But that will need some finger crossing and number crunching (hey those things I'm REALLY good at).

But for today, I just want to celebrate my gal. Here she is hard at work at the old studio.

When I was writing my post(s) yesterday, I was thinking about what I'd say today on her last day. I didn't want to repeat the mushy of yesterday. So I started looking through some photos and thinking and it dawned on me....

When I brought Shell back to Canada in the spring of '02, she went to the studio to let them know she was back in the country and without a project.

She soon got the clown show and she's been steadily doing a variety of shows since. Almost 5 years. That's actually kind of remarkable in her line of work considering all it takes to get from point a to point b in television production.

In fact when she came back from working on Phantom Investigators and The PJs in the States, to Canada, the studio was in a completely other building. Now they've moved to a third. But the bulk of that five years was spent there on that 5th floor, day after day.

I'm so proud of her. I hope I get to take her someone warm and sunny and soon.

The First Kiss- A Follow-up Story

Zilla begged for details in the comments section, and even offered the story of her and Mr. Z's first kiss. So, if everyone promises to play along and comment about your first kiss with your current significant other I will share this story.

I asked her tonight whether she remembered our first kiss, and she said "Oh yes, of course I do"...which has to make a guy feel good. But then she qualified it, "I remembered it because it was so different and better than the last boy I'd been dating."

Alright, at least I'm 'better' that's a plus right?

"Please to explain?"

She remarked that her last boyfriend before me had 'sharp lips' where I apparently had, 'soft lips'. Having never kissed myself I'm taking her word for it.

At the time she was renting the room at a house in Daly City from a guy who did armatures in stop-mo. So we spent most of the time in her room, sort of holed up like college kids in a one room apartment. Dixie took to me instantly, but she was a little jealous of my hanging around the bed area (it really was the only place to sit honestly).

It was evening and she'd made me a wonderful dinner and we were having wine and talking. We talked a LOT back then. There's some legendary stories of our talking for hours on end. Anyway, we were sitting on her bed and she was sitting up, and I was sort of laying down in her lap. I was exhausted after all...long flight, long walk at the beach, long drive back to the house etc.

She claims now that she had to make all the moves because I was just too much of a chicken. But hey, I AM a boy raised in the south, and my Southern gentleman just don't 'make moves' like that unless they are positive. The fact that I'd flown there, was laying in her bed in her apartment in her lap apparently wasn't enough of a clue. I'm also slow. I don't have 'moves'

Shell says I'm 'easy to fall for' which is why she always raises an eyebrow when I have so many young female friends at school. "yes dear all the 22-year olds are soooo hot for me!" I sneer.

At some point she grew tired of my inability to make a 'move' so she leaned over and kissed me. I kissed back. Having spent so much time talking to her in the past 3 months or so, I knew kissing was 'big' for her. I was pretty sure Shell was taking me in stages: good to talk to, dixie likes him, won't be easily tossed to the rocks, knows how to eat with utensils...(kissing was next in the order, but near the top of the list).

Now truth be told, I can (and would) kiss my wife until my lips fell off. She's a great kisser, she can kiss at all the speeds. She's a kiss stylist if you will. To this day we debate which one of us really pursued the other. Maybe it was a little of both. Of course she had me at hello. I think it took a little longer, even passed that kissing. In fact if one must pinpoint it, I think the day she really decided she loved me happened months later.

I think the light in her room had burned out or something and I lifted her on my shoulders so she could reach it. Apparently being able to put a woman on your shoulders is a big deal to women. I think it represents something deeper, protection, power...I don't know. But when I set her back down on the floor she threw her arms around me and started crying. She asked me never to leave her.

Though it would take another 2 weeks for her to say the 'L' word, I think the moment on my shoulders secured my spot in her heart. I'm glad that thus far I've managed to stay there, and I'm not about to leave.

After all she asked me not to.

Six Years

Hat
Originally uploaded by AmericaninCanada.

The 'ides of March' were a warning to Julius Cesaer that his life was about to end.


For me, the 'ides of March' were a warning that my life was just about to start.


Six years ago, on the 15th of March 2001, I met the woman who would become my wife.<.br>
I saw her first as she walked down the McCarron Airport terminal in Las Vegas with my friends Susan and Emma. Shell was an old friend of my friend James, and since we were all meeting in Vegas for the weekend, and Shell was living in Portland at the time (and hadn't seen James in over a year) she was joining us.


This picture was taken in the hotel about 15 minutes after I met her. How could I not instantly fall in love with that smile. Smiles are my weakness.


We shared a hotel room that weekend because neither of us, nor Emma, had someone to split a room with. We were, I suppose, forced to be together at first.

I'm pretty sure after the first day I was something like a lost puppy following her around. But she didn't seem to mind. The second night we all got dressed to the nines to head out to the casinos. She split off alone with me at one point in the Luxor. We were sitting side by side at the slots. She had a Tom Collins in her hand. Her eyes were sparkling, her smile brighter than all the neon in Vegas combined. She turned to me and smiled.


To this day she swears she knew from that moment I was in love with her- it took her longer- about six months, but for me it was truly love at first sight.


When I got home from Vegas I told my friend (and boss) Jesse that I'd met a woman I could spend the rest of my life with. It was a totally fleeting idea because she was going back to Portland and I was in Salt Lake- plus the fact that she didn't seem the least bit interested in me.

But about 6 weeks later she emailed me. We talked on the phone the next night, for about 7 hours. She hit me with a "you have a crush on me". I gulped and stammered.


About 3 weeks later I flew to San Francisco where she was living now working on a new project. She'd invited me to spend the weekend, I guess to see what might happen. We went from the airport to Cliff House and walked along the rocks- I think she was just making doubly sure of me again before she took me home and if for some reason I wasn't what she remembered she could throw me to the rocks below.


We held hands.

I should have kissed her.

To this day she pokes at me for not kissing her like I wanted to...she calls me a chicken. She's right.

I didn't last the day though without kissing her.

I might be a chicken but I'm not a stupid chicken.


This morning I said to her it doesn't feel like 6 years. It feels more like 6 seconds sometimes.


I'm not the world's best husband or partner. I fail a lot. She's been doing the lion's share of carrying the family while I wander through school and a new country. I'm scared a lot. She's my hero. I don't deserve her. But I'm glad I have her.

Experimental Post

I took my sleep meds an hour ago...they have about an hour time frame.
They make me really drowsy and i'm trying to type with as much coherence as I can muster. Most of the members of my blog crew enjoy beverages as alteration experience, I don't use my meds for that. I use them so I can actually sleep at night-
How am I doing? (I think I was just answered by the fact that it took me 6 tries to add the question mark to the how am i doing question.
This experimental post has failed.
I think I'd need some sort of control group of startingly sober peeps sharing a blog with me while my sleep medicine creeped into my brain and made my finger touch typing fall from about a 55-60 words per minute to about 15 words a minute, most of them mispelled and one or two I'm strangely convinced aren't code for a pre-planned super-alien invasion force.

Yes yes I should sleep now. or atleast if i make it to the next room where the bed is...

tschüß

Ha! I couldn't have been THAT out of it since I remembered teh German word for so long AND looked up how to spell it with the correct characters from my keyboard.

So there

ahem, that last 'so there' outburst probably lost me a couple of cool points huh?

Chat Room Open Letter

Dear Blog Friends,
We set up a nice little chat room a while back so that we could all gather and have a nice chat.
Sadly, there was a possibility of stalkerish types who have struck at some in the group in the past raising their ugly heads again out from under their smelly, muddy rock.
So, in order to maintain our privacy I have shifted the chat room from its old place to a new place where it could be password protected.
[Ha, take that loser creepo]
Sorry I had to vent there for a sec.
So anyway here's the thing. All that you need to do to join us is to email or comment to me so I can email you, your username and password, then you just go to the new site at:

http://photoblog.stamant.org/capnscabin.php and log in, then just do what you normally did.

Only people with a correct user name and password will get in. Wheee... I'm working on the decor so if things look dishevled I apologize. Cheers

It Comes In Threes

If it's true that Death comes in threes, then perhaps the same applies to the death of car batteries. If you recall my post yesterday, my car battery was dead, from lack of starting in the cold snowy Ontario winter.

So last night when Shell got home from work, she pulled up the van tight to the car so that we could give the car a jump this morning.

She got up this morning and about 20 minutes later she's crawling back into bed and she's pissed.

"What's wrong?"
"Don't worry about...go back to sleep and I'll explain in a bit."

I don't have to be told twice to go back to sleep! So 'zzzzzzzzzzzz'

She awakens me a bit later and tells me to get dressed because CAA is on the way to give the van a jump...she meant the car right? I at this point wasn't clear-eyed enough to realize it was long since passed the time she was supposed to catch the train. Apparently she had left the interior light on in the van by accident last night and so awakened this morning to not one but TWO! dead car batteries.

Classic!!!!!!!

A few minutes later the CAA man drove up, plugged a little hand held charger to the vehicles and they were both vrooming in seconds. She drove off, and I let my car idle for a bit in the driveway so it would recharge itself.

Hopefully it holds that charge. If it does, then I'd be checking my own car batteries if I were you...these things come in threes, remember!

March Madness

Just in case anyone is interested, and you probably aren't, but nevertheless...
Here's my brackets for the NCAA Tournament. (If you follow baseketball and want to play along just send me your picks as well).

[click to see large view]



I think the biggest suprise is that I don't have Georgetown advancing past the second round and G'Town is a very popular pick to win it all. So if they get on that run I'm screwed.

Walkaways

Walkaway
Originally uploaded by AmericaninCanada.

Took Ginny Grace out today. This image reminded me of the beautiful and sad "Walkaway"

I gotta rush away...she said
I've been to Boston before
and anyway, this sudden feeling
doesn't make the rain...fall
There's no big difference these days
Just the same old walkaway
Someday, I'm gonna stay...
But not today

She did of course come back, after she fell in the mud and then on the ice. But for a sec she looked so bold and in control. And I was so happy.










I love seeing her explore, I love seeing her innocence, I love when something is discovered (like a pine cone) as if it is the most valuable treasure. Most of all I love that she calls me 'Dada'

Dark Energy

This is truly one of the most tantalizing, and mind-expanding articles I've read in a long while. I don't claim to understand it all, but I do have some opinions about it. I'll post the first part, then link to the whole article, and then add some selected pieces of note:

March 11, 2007
Out There
By RICHARD PANEK
Three days after learning that he won the 2006 Nobel Prize in Physics, George Smoot was talking about the universe. Sitting across from him in his office at the University of California, Berkeley, was Saul Perlmutter, a fellow cosmologist and a probable future Nobelist in Physics himself. Bearded, booming, eyes pinwheeling from adrenaline and lack of sleep, Smoot leaned back in his chair. Perlmutter, onetime acolyte, longtime colleague, now heir apparent, leaned forward in his.
“Time and time again,” Smoot shouted, “the universe has turned out to be really simple.”
Perlmutter nodded eagerly. “It’s like, why are we able to understand the universe at our level?”
“Right. Exactly. It’s a universe for beginners! ‘The Universe for Dummies’!”
But as Smoot and Perlmutter know, it is also inarguably a universe for Nobelists, and one that in the past decade has become exponentially more complicated. Since the invention of the telescope four centuries ago, astronomers have been able to figure out the workings of the universe simply by observing the heavens and applying some math, and vice versa. Take the discovery of moons, planets, stars and galaxies, apply Newton’s laws and you have a universe that runs like clockwork. Take Einstein’s modifications of Newton, apply the discovery of an expanding universe and you get the big bang. “It’s a ridiculously simple, intentionally cartoonish picture,” Perlmutter said. “We’re just incredibly lucky that that first try has matched so well.”
But is our luck about to run out? Smoot’s and Perlmutter’s work is part of a revolution that has forced their colleagues to confront a universe wholly unlike any they have ever known, one that is made of only 4 percent of the kind of matter we have always assumed it to be — the material that makes up you and me and this magazine and all the planets and stars in our galaxy and in all 125 billion galaxies beyond. The rest — 96 percent of the universe — is ... who knows?

The full text can be read at the New York Times Magazine website.

The 4 percent figure is startling. Not just because it whittles down all we know into a miniscule portion of existence, but that the other 96% is apparently unknowable. Panek explains:

“Dark,” cosmologists call it, in what could go down in history as the ultimate semantic surrender. This is not “dark” as in distant or invisible. This is “dark” as in unknown for now, and possibly forever.
If so, such a development would presumably not be without philosophical consequences of the civilization-altering variety. Cosmologists often refer to this possibility as “the ultimate Copernican revolution”: not only are we not at the center of anything; we’re not even made of the same stuff as most of the rest of everything. “We’re just a bit of pollution,” Lawrence M. Krauss, a theorist at Case Western Reserve, said not long ago at a public panel on cosmology in Chicago. “If you got rid of us, and all the stars and all the galaxies and all the planets and all the aliens and everybody, then the universe would be largely the same. We’re completely irrelevant.”

So the posit that there is not just dark matter but dark energy somehow protecting, or perhaps confining the matter and energy of what we know to be the universe. If this dark energy exists, does it have a function? Is it a 'cocoon' as the cosmologists suggest, or a cage? Or both? Is it perhaps the balancing of the push and pull of forces beyond our conception? Panek addresses this idea of something beyond our conception later in the piece.

In 1963, two scientists at Bell Labs in New Jersey discovered a microwave signal that came from every direction of the heavens. Theorists at nearby Princeton University soon realized that this signal might be the echo from the beginning of the universe, as predicted by the big-bang hypothesis.
... But then, in the 1970s, astronomers began noticing something that didn’t seem to fit with the laws of physics. They found that spiral galaxies like our own Milky Way were spinning at such a rate that they should have long ago wobbled out of control, shredding apart, shedding stars in every direction. Yet clearly they had done no such thing. They were living fast but not dying young. This seeming paradox led theorists to wonder if a halo of a hypothetical something else might be cocooning each galaxy, dwarfing each flat spiral disk of stars and gas at just the right mass ratio to keep it gravitationally intact. Borrowing a term from the astronomer Fritz Zwicky, who detected the same problem with the motions of a whole cluster of galaxies back in the 1930s, decades before anyone else took the situation seriously, astronomers called this mystery mass “dark matter.”
Dark energy is whatever it is that’s making the expansion of the universe accelerate, but, for instance, does it change over time and space? If so, then cosmologists have a name for it: quintessence. Does it not change? In that case, they’ll call it the cosmological constant, a version of the mathematical fudge factor that Einstein originally inserted into the equations for relativity to explain why the universe had neither expanded nor contracted itself out of existence.

Again the idea returns that this 'other', call it dark energy if we must, is somehow protecting a spiraled galaxy, smushing it flat, and one would assume keep it from fraying at the ends. It's the compression (though that may not be an accurate term) that to me confounds our normal thinking, because we are basically three-dimensional thinkers. To think that existence has many more dimensions, even dimensions beyond ones already posited by people like Hawking and others, is perhaps impossible.

Smoot and John C. Mather of NASA (who shared the Nobel in Physics with Smoot) designed the Cosmic Background Explorer satellite telescope to do just that. COBE looked for extremely subtle differences in temperature throughout all of space that carry the imprint of the universe when it was less than a second old. And in 1992, COBE found them: in effect, the quantum fluctuations that 13.7 billion years later would coalesce into a universe that is 22 percent dark matter, 74 percent dark energy and 4 percent the stuff of us.
In the observation-and-theory, call-and-response system of investigating nature that scientists have refined over the past 400 years, the dark side of the universe represents a disruption. General relativity helped explain the observations of the expanding universe, which led to the idea of the big bang, which anticipated the observations of the cosmic-microwave background, which led to the revival of Einstein’s cosmological constant, which anticipated the observations of supernovae, which led to dark energy. And dark energy is ... ?

Much of the article is spent dealing with the difficulty of the cosmological community to find some fraction of evidence to definitively prove 'dark energy'. What little I know of string theory, which is addressed in parts of the larger article, makes sense on some level. Basically what I take from string theory is that the universe is a series of vibrations. I tend to think of it those terms because I wonder whether the 'dark energy' is somewhat relative to the flux of a wavelength. If you think of a wavelength we concern ourselves mostly with the linear part the wave motion, the wave moves up and down, we think vertically from the low point to the apex of the wave. We think of the horizontal in terms of one apex to another. But if we took the wavelength and altered our perecption that we saw it on two completely different axses perhaps we would see there was another wavelength within the wavelength- a vibration between the vibrations as it were.

The new thinking involved is this idea that an expanding universe must ultimately contract OR somehow continue to expand until it is so expanded it exhausts itself. So instead of thinking of the big bang and the expansion of the universe as a ripple, think of it instead as a multi-dimensional vibration, perhaps- like the snap of a whip that as energy explodes (the big bang) it continues out and rather than rebounding or fading away, it at some point snaps, creating a different energy (a vibration) that induces a new engergy of its own.

I See You Spring

Against the Sky
Originally uploaded by AmericaninCanada.

Happiest of Happy Birthdays to the beautiful and brilliant Elise who turns a quarter century today. I miss her, but I'm glad she's spending her big day in the warm California sun rather than the cold of the T-DOT. I love you E...I'd say it in French but I'd make a shambles of it. ::muwah::

What an absolutely gorgeous day we had today. Despite losing the hour of sleep in the new daylight savings time shift, I feel very rested and refreshed.

So, okay, a lot of that has to do with the fact that Shelley let me sleep in...I mean seriously in. The only way she could have let me sleep longer would have been to kill me. Basically I got up so late, I refuse to tell you just how late it was because I'd feel guilty, and you'd probably send me something stinky in the mail out of a jealous spite.

Then I had a lunch meeting with my G'town softball team at the local Boston Pizza (which isn't in Boston and I didn't have Pizza). I did have a beer. I had a Corona. It cost me $6. I think perhaps it was bottled by magical faeries...that's the only reason I can see them charging me that much for a bottle of beer.

After the meeting I ran some errands for Shell. It was the least I could after the sleeping in. (Did I mention I slept in for a really long time?) Heh.

When I got back from the errands, I decided that it was such a lovely, sunny day that I'd go out to take pictures. Shell wanted to get out of the house too, so we piled Ginny Grace and the dogs in the van and off we went.

Basically I ventured along the Credit River which winds its way through our little hamlet.

We wound up at the Willow Park Ecological Walk and enjoyed some fresh air and snowy stumbling all to the sheer delight of Gracie and the puppies.

Home now and really worn out but in a good way. Trying to be bright and positive and hopeful that spring is around the corner.

Some other pictures:









Lots more at my Flickr

By The Way

For those who were unable to view the wedding video, I uploaded it to YouTube and replaced it in the post below...so now you should be able to see it.

You Can't Save The World

There's a fascinating post and discussion at CoyoteBebop's blog about, among other things, dealing with disaster and helping the helpless. The metaspiritual fight between saving someone or saving yourself.
It's a complex question, and many people have differing views, none of which in their own rights is the wrong answer- the nature of such difficult and overwhelming discourses.
As for me, I'm of the belief that you can't save the whole world. It doesn't mean you should try to save someone, or help someone- so if you read it that way you are off the mark.
There is no way really to discuss it rationally without sounding cold (as I've tried for the last 15 minutes to write and rewrite a few paragraphs). The point is that rather than trying to end every suffering, harness the energy you have (the emotional, physical, spiritual well) and use it to make better those things which you have control over.
The immediacy of the cases that Coyote spells out are compelling. Confronted with the given situation of disaster or human tragedy right before one's eyes is difficult to understand not actually being that specific person in that specific place- thus judging someone for acting (or non-acting) is difficult for me as an individual. To see a child starving before your eyes with vultures looming is a spritually crushing vision- and it is no wonder the photographer eventually took his life, unable to deal with, we must assume in part, of what his non-action.
But his suicide merely points out the futility of the engagement, in the most devastating of ways.
Yes there are things that as whole socities we 'could' conceivably harness enough resources to make a grand change- but every action has its cost. If I sold all my possessions and gave the money to the poor, how does that help? It merely shifts the equation- it doesn't make it better.
So how *could* I make it better?
For starters I could be a good citizen. I can follow the laws so as to not put a strain on others- my family, my community, my government. I can be a good husband and father so that I can pass on proper values, and hopefully propagate a lineage of the like thus exponentially reducing the strain on society. I can be a good steward of my small arc of the world.
These may sound simplistic, or even obvious- but ask yourself how many people AREN'T observing these simple and obvious tasks.

Too often we can become locked inside the infinite paradox of the butterfly effect. But that really isn't a healthy course I recommend you travel. It sure wasn't healthy I believe for the photographer Coyote tells us of, and I don't think it is healthy for the rest of us either. We do not have the infinite grasp of the universe. No matter how enlightened we believe ourselves to be. We are human.
It doesn't mean we shouldn't care, or feel, or empathize- for doing so would make us LESS human. What it does mean is that we must realistically and honestly evaluate our simple role in the complex chaos, and make, as much as is possible, rational choices. We think and we feel. Two completely differing processes designed to give us balance. If we lean too much to one, we risk losing the other, and ultimately both.

The Start Of Something Bigger

As you know, I've been making little videos for my friends here and there for the last little while. There's has been a great deal of positive feedback, and many people have mentioned I should look at actually doing something with it on a professional basis.
I've been mapping out in my head a strategy by which in the near future, I'm going to launch a multi-media (but small of course) little enterprise. Eventually I want to be able to combine photography and video creation whereby someone hires me to shoot digital stills or video for events and I package it for them. I'm still a way off from getting my skills where they need to be, but I feel like in the last year I've made great strides.
I've been creating a photo-portfolio and now I'm also working on a video portfolio, culminating hopefully by years end with a web launch of the different digital portfolios. To that end I've been working of late on a wedding video (our's naturally). I think it turned out splendid. It's still rough around the edges, (or at least my skills are) but here's the results:

Remain(der)s of the Day

cradle in the sun
Originally uploaded by AmericaninCanada.

[another set of loose threads and odd bits]

* Since Shell put the new floors in I feel so much more comfortable in the house. It is a shame we'll be selling it soon.

* Ernest Gallo died yesterday at 97. He (and his brother) parlayed an original investment of $6000 into an estimated fortune of over $1 Billion. Though they made 'finer' wines, they are probably more famous for also making Thunderbird and Boones Farm which anyone who has ever drank before they were legally allowed to, probably has had a taste of two. I wonder if Gallo's coffin will be wrapped in a brown paper bag?

* I don't feel bad about making a joke about Gallo's death...he was 97 and worth a billion dollars...something tells me he could take it

* I have my paper topic for this semester. My prof loves the idea. I'm going to write about Philip K. Dick and two of his stories that have been adapted to the screen- looking at the implications of societal and political events on the adaptations (among other aspects).

* In case you've seen or heard him in the last few days since the Scooter Libby verdict...Robert Novak is NOT a journalist...he's a hack shill for the Republican party. I don't care much for Bill Press, a Democratic party shill but he made a great point about how 12 years ago lying before a grand jury was an impeachable offense but now everyone is singing a different tune.

* For some reason I love the picture posted above. Ginny Grace is just so happy.

* The British House of Commons is moving legislation to end the legacy of the House of Lords- frankly I think Britain's Parliament jumped the shark when Christopher Guest (yes Nigel Tufnel himself) became a Lord when he inherited his title from his father...when parliamentary debates are being heard by Corky St.Clair, it's time to change the system.

* How long into the season will my heart survive before the Cubs eventually break it again...it's a yearly thing

* Shell is thinking about getting her hair cut, she says she wants to get a 'Chloe' cut- so clearly she's bought into my obsession with Allison Mack (which reminds me it's Thursday and Smallville is one tonight- yay!!!) I *heart* Allison Mack

* I finally got an appointment to talk to a doctor about my propensity for nightmares...I'm hoping to get some ideas to reduce their frequency and lingering effects

* There's a small iceberg in our driveway behind my car and in front of the garage...it probably will not be gone until May...it's so incredibly thick and frozen...I know now why the Titanic sank.

* Here's a couple more pictures from the other day that I loved:

American Exceptionalism

Hat Tip to Andrew Sullivan...

Macworld: News: France bans citizen journalists from reporting violence

The French Constitutional Council has approved a law that criminalizes the filming or broadcasting of acts of violence by people other than professional journalists. The law could lead to the imprisonment of eyewitnesses who film acts of police violence, or operators of Web sites publishing the images, one French civil liberties group warned on Tuesday.

The rest of the story can be read at the link above.

A classic reactionary move that winds up curbing the civil liberty of the majority to punish the few, this new proposed French law is exactly that sort of ridiculousness.
Beyond that however, there is within this debate a very real distinction between Europe and America in how (or what) they view as ultimately dangerous in society.

The U.S. is generally accused of having a negative reaction to depiction of sex (or sexuality) and less of a reaction to violence, while in Europe the opposite is true. Neither culture is without sin, and each thinks it is superior.

This dynamic also plays into the myth of American Exceptionalism. Many postmodern critics of the US, and US history, attempt to cast America as ego-maniacal in its self-promotion. Foreign policy bullying, public display of patriotic fervor, American 'moralizing' are the general sterotypes. Yet every culture in fact deems itself somewhat superior, even Canadian culture. Watch any amount of Canadian television, or listen to (usually) left wing politicians in Canada and you will hear just how superior (or exceptional) Canadians believe themselves to be over Americans. It may not take the form of Canadian patriotism, but it does manifest itself in the perpetuation, real or imagined, of a certain negative "American" culture.

My point is not to deny that there is a self-professed exceptionalism in the American DNA, any honest historian can clearly see the signs of that in the scope of US history. Instead it is to point out that exceptionalism is not purely an American phenomena. Exceptionalism can be found woven into the fabric of just about any society or culture in the modern world.

So returning to the story, is the divide between societies of Europe and America as I formulate it, a real one?
If so, is exceptionalism merely a by product, a much healthier expression than xenophobia?

It's Tomorrow But...

It's always good to get a jump start on the celebration...plus this way it's easier for everyone to spread the love. So feel free to embed the video on your own blog and show Sarah just how much we love her!!

Happy Birthday Sarah!!!!!!!!!!!
From All Your Blog Friends

Well...

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Originally uploaded by AmericaninCanada.

So it would seem that I'm not even good enough for large box store soulless company. I'm in some sort of employment limbo hell. I don't know what we're going to do after Friday.

There's just each other to hold on to and hope for the best.

I didn't even earn the benefit of a phone call...I got a letter...a FORM letter telling me that I wasn't selected. With my resume I could run the place...I think that's part of the problem.

I'm going ahead with starting my book though, at least this has pushed me to that end. The encouragement of people has really helped me think it is something I should/could/can do.

I just hope we're not living under the highway when it happens.

At least we have this silly face running around to keep our spirits up.

Things That Make You Go Blech

Something for the ladies...

What I know about women's fashion, or fashion in general, could fill a thimble.
Yet it has been stated by my wife on several occasions that I seem to have an eye what looks good on women. Maybe that's where the part of Oscar Wilde resides?
To be sure I have no personal fashion taste for myself. This is something else that has been stated by my wife on even more occasions, usually in the form of "is THAT what you're wearing?" or more pointedly "could you please dress less like a hobo?"
So I grant you my fashion bona fides are a bit suspect...however...
When I saw the front page of the Washington Post this morning I nearly lost my breakfast (more on that in a bit). Apparently there was a 'fashion' show over the weekend- notice the use of quotation marks- because the only thing I could gather from the photos was the theme of the show must have been "I See Dead People...In Fabric"

Well here...judge for yourself:


Now the first one I can see as 'fashionable' if you desire to look like a character from a Japanese horror film. The second one I can only assume is what a supermodel looks like after a 4 day coke binge and being dredged from the Hudson River. The third at least looks like something your mother 'might' wear...if she went shopping while on mescaline. But none of these diasters matches this fiasco:



Is this what the 'well-dressed' zombies are wearing this year??

Okay, yes I know that the makeup and skeletal frame of the model probably is influencing my distaste for this frockery...but seriously...is this what every woman aspires to wear? Something that looks like it was pulled from Mrs. Haversham's dusty clutches?

I'm sure some of you might even like this dress...in fact maybe on one of you it might even look attractive. But when the photographer has to photograph you in front of the combo of lilacs and straw (?!?), perhaps it's time to just throw on a pair of jeans and a hoodie.

Why don't people hire ME for the red carpet shows...isn't this what the fashion world is crying out for? The opinions of a straight male???
Yeah, probably not.


Now about the whole breakfast thing...
In my wife's effort to retain my heartbeat and brain function (for what reason I have no idea...she would certainly be better off with me out of the picture I'm sure)...still there's not accounting for taste...anyway...
She made me forgo my usual breakfast cereal choices (the standards, Frosted Flakes, Fruit Loops, Cap'n Crunch, the latter of which I think is a shame because I'm 'the cap'n after all...I should be allowed my crunch).
Instead I am eating something sort of banana and granola mixture. It's called Muslix but there are umlauts over the 'u'. I don't think as a red-blooded American I should ever eat anything that has umlauts in the title, unless it involves jagermeister or beer...
Plus Muslix just sounds gross. It sounds like something you put in your carburetor to unplug your throttle...which is probably metaphorically what she is trying to accomplish.

Lyrics For Zilla

Chatting with Zilla today while I plunged myself knee deep into The Tragically Hip (the greatest of great Canadian bands...and I loved them long before I moved here...), I sent her a couple of songs, including "Wheat Kings" which is one of my favorites from Fully Completely. The song tells of a kid wrongly convicted of murder who spent over 20 years in prison before finally being released and eventually cleared of the charges.

This will definitely turn up on the next Mix CD that I'm putting together so if you've never heard it before you soon will.

Btw, just for the record they are playing in Indianapolis tomorrow night (with a return date just announced May 10th), and also they are playing the Gothic Theatre in Denver March 19th (just so a certain former Hamiltonian who lives in Colorado can feel at home again)

Sundown in the Paris of the prairies Wheat Kings have all their treasures barried All you hear are the rusty breezes Pushing around the weather vane Jesus
In a zippo lighter you see the killer's face Maybe it's someone standing in the killers place Twenty Years for nothing well that nothing new Besides no one is interested in something you didn't do Wheat Kings and pretty things, Lets just see what the morning brings
There's a dream he dreams where the high school is dead and stark It's a museum and we're al locked up and after dark up in it and after dark Where the walls are lined all yellow gray and sinister Hung with pictures of our parents prime ministers Wheat Kings and pretty things, Lets just see what the tomorrow brings
Late breaking story on the CBC, A nation whispers "we always know he'd go free" They add "you can't be fond of living in the past, Cause if you are then there is no way you are going to last" Wheat Kings and pretty things, Lets just see what the morning brings Wheat Kings and pretty things, Thats what tomorrow brings

Come Dancing

One of the true joys of my fatherhood has been seeing Ginny Grace fall in love with music. She loves JoJo of course but she also loves other stuff. She loves listening to Sinatra, she jumps for House of Pain's Jump Around (at least for now when she can't understand the lyric).
Today we were going through her toy box while sitting in the office listening to iTunes when she found a CD amongst her toys. It was an unopened 12 Super Songs and she knew enough to hand it to me like I was supposed to pop it in the computer. So I did. It's got the 'standards' like Pop Goes the Weasel (what are people thinking...it's a song about an exploding ferret!), Humpty Dumpty (a song about a suicidal egg), and A Frog Went A-Courtin' (about a sexed-up toad).
To make matters worse it has as its lead-in "Puff the Magic Dragon"!!! Geez which one of you hippies sent us this as a gift?!? After just one hearing I'm totally baked. Right after that is Old MacDonald which at first seems harmless, but when you listen to it in its monotonous litany of animal names and sounds it is somewhat painfully hypnotic. I'm this " " close to driving to Arizona and taking some peyote.

I think we'll be skipping this CD when it hits on my iTunes. I just gonna play her some Kinks instead...it still makes you want to turn your head into a bong but at least it rocks while it's doing it.
Besides "there's a red under my bed and there's a little yellow man in my head"

Back in the USSR

For those of you without the benefit of The New York Times: Police and Protesters Clash in St. Petersburg - New York Times

The rally was held in advance of local elections scheduled for March 11. Opposition events typically draw no more than several hundred people, but several thousand gathered for the rally in Vosstaniya Square. Two leaders of what is left of Russia’s liberal opposition, Garry Kasparov, the former chess champion, and Mikhail A. Kasyanov, a former prime minister, spoke to the crowd. Then the protesters, accompanied by Mr. Kasparov, marched most of the length of the street, pushing through three police cordons as sirens wailed and Interior Ministry riot police scrambled to block their path. The rally marked one of the higher-profile actions by Mr. Kasparov since he retired from professional chess to dedicate himself to opposition politics. “This is our first real victory,” Mr. Kasparov, speaking over a bullhorn, told the crowd on the muddy street, surrounded by rows of police. “I congratulate you for overcoming your fear. We will have victory when we get our Russia back. We have 364 days before the election in 2008.”

The rally was, from all objective reports I've read, completely peaceful before the police arrived. Putin has steadily deconstructed any type of liberal advances made since the Soviet collapse in 1991.
One might allow that the reaction by the police was just a mistake in the heat of the moment, but one must remember that Putin is the former head of the KGB and thus such allowances are skewed to be sure.
The end result of this latest fiasco is that the remnants of the far left Bolshevik parties are now given encouragement to radicalize those in the center. Such is the yo-yo effect of Russian politics.
Every time I read of the latest reactionary episode in Russia, I'm taken back to the early days of the current Bush adminstration to the moment President Bush said he'd looked into Putin's soul and knew the sort of man he was. I wish I was possessed of the 'soul glass' that President Bush has...but I'm just your average human.
But while we've been pursuing failure after failure in the streets of Baghdad with no real plan for a political solution, we've seen the Taliban re-invigorated in Afghanistan, Lebanon slipping further into the abyss, North Korea with the bomb, and Iran with a bun in the oven.
Foreign policy is complex, and I do take the longview...but I worry that the current administation is merely trying to run out the clock and leave its dirty laundry for the next administration, like they've already left their defecit for the next 7 generations.

In Reply Part #2

Defending the sisterhood, Undercover Angel writes:

but after all we only have your best interests at heart. We do mean well...really...

Yes, I know. Which only makes the anguish deeper. That and the fact that you are all absolutely right. God how I hate it when you're all right!!! Stop with the sound logic and common sense.

See to me Shelley and the rest of you overprotective wives are a lot like Casey Stengel...let me explain.

Mickey Mantle tells this great story about how he and Whitey Ford. Ford and Mantle were notorious drinkers when they played for the Yankees in the 50s. Stengel was the manager (I'm pretty sure it was Stengel, it might have been Houk but my books are packed at the moment and I can't reference it...but let's say it was Stengel).
Anyway, Ford and Mantle went out one night and didn't just tie the normal one on, they tied about 3 or 4 on. It was 4 or 5 in the morning and Mantle was begging Ford to go back to the hotel because he had to play the next day, whereas Ford being a starting pitcher had the day off. So Ford didn't care how messed up they were getting because he'd be in the dugout.
So game time arrives and Mantle is shot. Not only is he still hungover (maybe even a little drunk) but it's like August and 100 degrees.
Stengel is of course disgusted that Mantle is in the condition he's in, and so rather than giving him the day off he makes him play. (Ford had been regaling everyone in the clubhouse of their long night out before the game of course)
Mantle hits a home run in the middle innings and as he crosses home plate and returns to the dugout he almost tosses his cookies. Ford is in the dugout laughing hysterically. Stengel doesn't say a word.
The next guy up gets a single and Stengel yells over in the direction of the bench where Ford is chuckling and Mantle is hurling, "Ford! Go pinch run!"

That's pretty much how I feel...part Mickey Mantle (knowing I screwed up and haven't take care of myself) and part Whitey Ford (pissed off because not only do *I* know I've screwed up, but now you- the wife- knows too and is gonna make me pay).

At least you all look a HELL of a lot better than Casey Stengel.

In Reply

In response to my last post about the bitterness of concerned and overprotective wives, Writer Mom writes:

We bark because we love you

Yes of course...but bark leads to bite, bite leads to hate, hate leads to anger, and anger leads to the dark side...

One would think the two of you Star Wars geeks would realize that...

For the record...I tried to have some popcorn tonight...I was rebuffed...

Ange further opines:

national health nazis are hinting around that we're supposed to do 10k/10,000 steps worth of exercise a DAY

Firstly, 10,000 steps a day is impossible...unless one is being chased by pumas!
Secondly, I get plenty of steps chasing the mischievous monkey around the house!!
Thirdly...okay there is no thirdly...but I'm clearly fighting a losing battle and I hereby surrender...I feel so..so...like France.

High Rider

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Originally uploaded by AmericaninCanada.

As Shell enters her last week of work, we've tried this weekend to work through the stress- 'failing' would be a good word to describe our success at it.

She's making a lot of unilateral decisions, all of which are good ones in the abstract and great ones in practice except the few which I will now detail.

Firstly she's decided that since she's likely to be off work for a while that she will be cooking for us. This is NOT because I'm a lousy cook, but because I'm a lousy food planner and my 'habitus' is a clear example that she is, as per usual, completely correct. So she's cooking for us in an effort to make me eat better, and take better care of myself. While I love her for it (in the abstract)...I chafe at the actual constraints.

Me: "But, why can't I have those honey roasted peanuts??"

Shell: "You may have peanuts but not the honey roasted ones they are just crap and full of needless sugar"

Me: "But I want the honey roasted ones, they are tastier"

Shell: "You are acting like a 4-year old!"

Me: "Oh yeah, well I'm holding my breath until you take that back"

Shell: "You don't need the honey roasted peanuts, honey, I'm trying to help you feel better"

Me: "I'm rubber, your glue, whatever you say bounces off me and sticks to you!"

Shell: "That doesn't even make sense"

Me: [sits down in store aisle and pouts]


Thus, I'm now forced to NOT eat the stuff I really like..which I know is a good thing (again in the abstract)

I got home from my softball game last night at 3am. I thought I had an early game (at 11:45) but I was mistaken and had to sit and watch as half my team drank a pitcher of Moosehead and I just waited and waited. When I got home I took a shower and by the time I was in bed it was 4am. Thankfully Shell let me sleep in this morning and then go back for an elevensies nap!! (see THIS is where I love her in the practical AND abstract senses)

She also unilaterally decided that we would take a walk today and get some fresh air. Seriously this being taken care of by my wife so I won't die is gonna kill me.

But we did have a nice walk, except that I forgot my gloves and my camera batteries died halfway down the street so I had to go back and replenish so as not to miss cool shots.

Also I got to give Gracie a lift when we were walking along Hwy 7 so that she wouldn't dart out in traffic.

Oh and the next time I make a grapefruit yarmulke I must take a picture for Zilla!

Like many a Monty Python sketch this blog post has no ending and so just imagine someone walking in the room and hitting you over the head with a rubber chicken. That'll do the trick.

New Look

I felt like changing the look (yet again)...there were some annoying things about the last layout. We'll see how this one grows on me.

Shell made us a lovely lunch this afternoon while I was trying to get the car out of the driveway. The van is free but the car is buried and unmovable thus far.

A snapshot of my life is found in the following conversation during lunch...

Shell: Do you want half a grapefruit?
Me: Sure. Why do they call it grapefruit? I mean it's not grape.
Shell: I don't know.
Me: Maybe it was supposed to be called 'great fruit' cuz it's so large and someone just misheard it.
Shell: What is wrong with you?
Me: Nothing, I just like to mock fruit.
Shell: Well it isn't much mockery to call something 'great'.
Me: That's a fair point.
Shell: Do you want it peeled or do you want to eat it with a spoon?
Me: Um...I'm not really that experienced with grapefruit...hey it's not even purple or white like grapes...it's 'pink' grapefruit.
Shell: Just eat it.
[few minutes later]
Shell: You're making a mess!!!
Me: Well why did you give the rookie a regular spoon and you took the grapefruit spoon??
Shell: This is my antique silver grapefruit spoon.
Me: I thought stuff was 'ours'
Shell: Not the stuff you wouldn't buy on your own. Besides I've told you what's mine is mine and what's yours is ours.
Me: I missed that memo.
Shell: Look, you've wasted a ton of that grapefruit.
Me: Nah-uh [takes grapefruit and turns it inside out] See!!!
Shell: You're like a child.
Me: But at least I ate it all!! Plus look...I made a grapefruit yarmulke!!!
Shell just shook her head at me after that.

I did two choruses of "O Mine, Papa".

This is how our life is.

Tinkering

I'm tinkering again...bear with me...

Afternoon Moon

I feel pretty great today. We've still got some pressures hanging about us, but this morning I felt like things were going to be okay. (aside: thanks to Ange and Jennifer for the encouragement the last few days)

Shell and I had a lovely evening, and I think we both actually got a decent amount of sleep. It's still difficult getting used to the clickity clackity of the puppies paws on the floors- especially Willow who likes to roam around the house at night and make sure no one is trying to break in.

There was one little hiccup however and it happened just a little while ago.
We have a convenience store on the other side of our neighbor's house which makes it nice when you suddenly realize that you've run out of milk for the baby at her nap time.

I dashed about and grabbed some change to go and get some more. I have a pair of thick sweatpants that I use to wear over my clothes when I have to muck about in the snow. They are big enough to fit over anything, and they are really warm. I was wearing shorts today so I threw the sweats overtop of them since I was in a hurry. I trudged through the snow and slush, got the milk, and made it back into the house just fine. I took off my snow covered shoes and coat and started to take off the snow covered sweatpants. We have an enclosed porch and all our snowy gear comes off in there so we don't bring snow through the house. I pulled at my sweats and...

well...

they came off and so did my shorts.

Yep...I inadvertantly mooned the world in my doorway. D'oh

Exponential

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Originally uploaded by AmericaninCanada.

Gracie's vocabulary seems to be growing expontentially.

In the last two weeks she added "door" "dixie" "mimi" "papa" and as of last night "leah" (we use the pictures on the fridge every day to practice names...note we're not at this point confusing her by showing her "leigha's" picture at the same time as "leah's" picture...sorry Sarah...as soon as she gets it down we'll try!!)

This morning she said "willow" but it came out "whoawhoa" but it was directed toward the dog so...

I'm looking forward to this weekend. We're not planning anything...just spending the weekend with each other and being a family.

Lion In Winter

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Originally uploaded by AmericaninCanada.

There it sits, the shovel on the porch.

The snow has been falling steadily since this morning.

It's so deep and the driveway needs to be shoveled.

This is the time I hate snow.