The dawning of twentieth century art.30 April 2008
29 April 2008
The Guy in the Pool
Tuesday morning at the pool: had to choose between sharing a lane with a muscle-bound walking guy or a slow-swimming senior.
So I choose the lane with The Guy. Sure, he’s a little more muscle-bound than I’m comfortable with, but he’s just walking and I figure I’ll bother him less. I hop in and ask if he minds sharing a lane and he replies, “The world is about sharing”. Uh, okay, thanks.
Half-way through my warm-up I realize The Guy has not been informed of pool etiquette and he wants to talk. He starts by informing me that he’s had the flu for a month and just got back to working out yesterday. Uh, okay, again, thanks.
I try to stay completely underwater as long as I possibly can, but part of my warm-up consists of using a kickboard and I am trapped, trapped in the pool with The Guy. He jog-trots alongside of me as I kick and asks if I’m ‘native’. Just like that, “Are you native?”. At this point I still think he’s just socially stunted and I answer no and kick like hell to get away from him.
The next time we’re at the same spot in the lane he begins to tell me that he recently went to Mexico and while he was there he spent some time at Venice Beach body building. Aaaaaah! Aaaaah! Now I have to decide if he’s socially stunted, a racist nut, or terminally lacking in any geographic knowledge. Aaaaaah!
Quickly abandoning the rest of my warm-up I begin to swim as fast as I can without stopping.
Muscle-bound guys look like potato bugs.
So I choose the lane with The Guy. Sure, he’s a little more muscle-bound than I’m comfortable with, but he’s just walking and I figure I’ll bother him less. I hop in and ask if he minds sharing a lane and he replies, “The world is about sharing”. Uh, okay, thanks.
Half-way through my warm-up I realize The Guy has not been informed of pool etiquette and he wants to talk. He starts by informing me that he’s had the flu for a month and just got back to working out yesterday. Uh, okay, again, thanks.
I try to stay completely underwater as long as I possibly can, but part of my warm-up consists of using a kickboard and I am trapped, trapped in the pool with The Guy. He jog-trots alongside of me as I kick and asks if I’m ‘native’. Just like that, “Are you native?”. At this point I still think he’s just socially stunted and I answer no and kick like hell to get away from him.
The next time we’re at the same spot in the lane he begins to tell me that he recently went to Mexico and while he was there he spent some time at Venice Beach body building. Aaaaaah! Aaaaah! Now I have to decide if he’s socially stunted, a racist nut, or terminally lacking in any geographic knowledge. Aaaaaah!
Quickly abandoning the rest of my warm-up I begin to swim as fast as I can without stopping.
Muscle-bound guys look like potato bugs.
28 April 2008
Home Life
I'm currently sharing my home with one-half of my total lifetime output of offspring. That makes for two, count them, two kids at home. I have with me the youngest girl and the youngest boy. Technically the youngest boy is actually the second born, but you get the idea. The youngest girl is known as The Funny One and the youngest boy is known as The Grumpy One (except when he's grumpy, then he's known as Dark Cloud).
Really only The Funny One has any right to be here, as technically I can't ask her to move on 'til she's legally an adult. I hate all these rules. The Grumpy one has been away and moved home a few months past. He is set to move on again in another six weeks, so we (The Funny One and I) are making Xs on calendars and planning a multi-day celebration.
The only other resident is The Puppy. She is the sun and we revolve around her. The one thing in the world The Grumpy One, The Funny One and I agree on is that The Puppy is the best thing ever.
Other offspring: the oldest boy is The Skinny One and the oldest girl is The Good One. They don't live at home, so I tend to like them better.
Really only The Funny One has any right to be here, as technically I can't ask her to move on 'til she's legally an adult. I hate all these rules. The Grumpy one has been away and moved home a few months past. He is set to move on again in another six weeks, so we (The Funny One and I) are making Xs on calendars and planning a multi-day celebration.
The only other resident is The Puppy. She is the sun and we revolve around her. The one thing in the world The Grumpy One, The Funny One and I agree on is that The Puppy is the best thing ever.
Other offspring: the oldest boy is The Skinny One and the oldest girl is The Good One. They don't live at home, so I tend to like them better.
27 April 2008
25 April 2008
Randomness happens...
As a species we spend too much energy theologizing, warring, organizing, enslaving, codifying, trying desperately to tame the void that waits in front of us.
The void is still there, the void will win.
* RIP RR *
24 April 2008
Why I Have No Memory
I've been going to community college since 1985. Let me tell you, that's a long, long time to be a sophomore. Sometimes I'll go two or three semesters without taking a class, mostly I'll take one or two classes a semester. There was one semester (we call it The Bad Time) when I took chemistry, anatomy, and Spanish. I woke up one morning covered with flashcards and realized that I was trying to learn three new languages at the same time. My stomach hurts just remembering.
Anyway, all this schooling is the reason I have no memory. I don't have the cute type of no memory, you know the kind where you're standing in a room and can't remember why you entered it? No, I have the being in the middle of a sentence and stopping because I can't remember what I was talking about, type of no memory. I have actually asked one of the kids, "what do you call the machine we put dishes in to to make them clean?". Yeah, that type of no memory.
My theory is that all these years of learning new information, under the pressure to be able to coherently reproduce it in a testing situation, has trained my brain to store memories in a very faulty way. Most people have sensory, short-term, and long-term memory. We can ignore the sensory memory, cause it's just stupid. So, for this post, most people have short-term and long-term memory. But not I, I have short-term, super-stressed-regurgitate-for-a-test-term, and factoids-needed-to-play-jeopardy-term memory.
This means that I know that all your mitochondria is inherited from your Mom, but for the life of me I can't remember her name.
Anyway, all this schooling is the reason I have no memory. I don't have the cute type of no memory, you know the kind where you're standing in a room and can't remember why you entered it? No, I have the being in the middle of a sentence and stopping because I can't remember what I was talking about, type of no memory. I have actually asked one of the kids, "what do you call the machine we put dishes in to to make them clean?". Yeah, that type of no memory.
My theory is that all these years of learning new information, under the pressure to be able to coherently reproduce it in a testing situation, has trained my brain to store memories in a very faulty way. Most people have sensory, short-term, and long-term memory. We can ignore the sensory memory, cause it's just stupid. So, for this post, most people have short-term and long-term memory. But not I, I have short-term, super-stressed-regurgitate-for-a-test-term, and factoids-needed-to-play-jeopardy-term memory.
This means that I know that all your mitochondria is inherited from your Mom, but for the life of me I can't remember her name.
23 April 2008
Verily, I say unto thee...
Creating a public blog that may never be read by anyone seems a wee bit masochistic. I'm already overcome with html, wysiwyg, and other internet maladies. The chief symptoms appear to be writer's block and an overwhelming urge to urinate. Did I just say urinate in my first post?
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