Random Access

Tuesday
Worked. Left early. Amen.
One funny note: I was working in Anchorage letters for a while and a letter came across for: ##### Captain Cock Road. It took me a few seconds to compose myself. There’s a Captain Cook Road there, but it looks like he may have some competition now.

Dee and I went to a Stingers game. Angie had won two tickets, but isn’t a big baseball fan, so… she gave ’em to me. The seats were just off home plate on the first base side; we were about… 20 to 30 feet from the plate. The Stingers played the Nashville Sounds. Yes, The Sounds. I don’t name the teams, I just watch them play. I wasn’t rooting for either team in particular; I was just there to enjoy the game. We had a blast! I had forgotten how much of the ‘watching sports in a live venue’ experience was attributable to the crowd. The Stingers lost 3-0, but I think that the umpires made a bad call in the bottom of the 9th against them that might have given them a chance. *shrug*

NPR/PRI Stories
Talk of the Nation – Women’s Health (Part Two): Heart Disease
Talk of the Nation – Women and Osteoporosis
Talk of the Nation – Puzzles
All Things Considered – Cystic Fibrosis
All Things Considered – Housing First: ‘Liberty’ for the Disabled
All Things Considered – X-Press 2
The World – West Nile Virus
The World – Edinburgh Fringe Festival
The World – Abandoned and Stray Cats in Rome

Quotes of the Day:

• Dee: “I’d clap, but I’d spill beer.”
• Me (After watching the pitcher ‘adjust himself’ repeatedly): “You’ve got three batters to go and handle your business. Don’t bring it onto the field.”

Peace.

Monday
It’s 3:30. I just finished eating a bowl of Java Chocolate Chunk ice cream. Why am I not in bed?! Java Chocolate Chunk. Hmm. Java = coffee… Chocolate = cocoa and sugar… Nah. That couldn’t have anything to do with it.

Not much to say about work today. The day passed quickly. I listened to more of Children of Dune, but I don’t feel as… compelled… to listen to this as I did Dune or Wizard’s First Rule or the Harry Potter books. It’s good, but there’s something… that doesn’t draw me in. *shrug*

I went to the gym tonight. *UGH* Starting over is not fun. Well, it is… but the “Realizing where you are NOW compared to where you were THEN” factor is not.

NPR/PRI Stories
Talk of the Nation – ‘Betrayal: The Crisis in the Catholic Church’

Betrayal a new book by a team of Boston Globe reporters reveals how the Boston Archdiocese of the Catholic Church re-assigned a pedophile priest to different parishes for over a decade, despite knowing he had abused children. On Talk of the Nation, Neal Conan talks with two investigative reporters from the Boston Globe about what it was like to take on the Catholic Church.

All Things Considered – Interactivity
All Things Considered – Radio Diaries: ‘My So-Called Lungs’

Laura Rothenberg is 21 years old and she’s already had her mid-life crisis. Laura has cystic fibrosis, a lung and digestive disease, and she’s not expected to live far past age 30. Still, she fights for every year she can get. Monday on All Things Considered, hear “My So-Called Lungs” — Laura Rothenberg’s audio diary. (22:00)

The World – Brazil Homeless Report
The World – Volcanoes Report

“My So-Called Lungs” was, to me, an incredible look inside a young woman’s fight to live. I highly recommend listening to this segment. It help makes you think about the adversities we each face and helps put them into perspective. To learn more about Laura and cystic fibrosis, click here.

Also, during the first hour of Tuesday’s Talk of the Nation, they will be continuing their “Women’s Health” series. The topic will be heart disease – the number 1 killer of women. This airs at 14:00 EDT (11:00 PDT) on your local NPR station; if you aren’t sure of your local station, go to http://www.npr.org , enter your ZIP Code and click “Find” (in the upper left corner).

Quote of the Day: Dee and I were finishing out the day in Buffalo, NY letters. And, we were talking. (Big surprise there.) I don’t recall what we were talking about, but it had gone on… and on… and on… until Dee said: “I passed the road sign that said ‘Stop this conversation now’ about 6 or 7 miles ago. I’m going to go back and hug it.”

Peace.

It was another “get to bed way later than I planned” morning. Not too bad, since I could sleep in a bit this morning. But, not great because the satellite guy was scheduled to be here “…between 12 and 5.” He got here at 11:35. Fortunately, I had awakened at 11:20 and happened to look out the office window and saw him as he was parking. He comes up and informs me that he could move the dish… but I would lose almost all of the channels that I get.

::: braincramp :::
There are only about 20 channels on the other satellite; they just use a slightly larger dish and reposition the unit slightly and that covers both of the satellite signals. He did, however, note that Dish Network and DirectTV have merged and that they would be doing installations for “both” starting in two weeks. This is good because we would have line of sight to the DTV and be able to reposition the dish to conform with the complex’ directives. (“Conform or be cast out…” Subdivisions) So… I get to go to the office tomorning, explain the situation, and see what they say. Whoop-de-damn-doo.

I forgot to mention: I saw our downstairs neighbors last night at the bowling alley. We have lived above/below each other for almost 18 months and this was the first time that we actually met and introduced ourselves.

“And another thing…”
I was doing my morning news-crawl and came across this article on the website for The Guardian, a British newspaper. Did I really need to know this? Did I?!? No, not really. No, I think that it even goes a little deeper than that: I didn’t care about it in the first place. Am I going to sleep any better or worse for knowing? Nope. Is it going to change any of my paradigms? Let’s just say that I have serious doubts about that. Am I going to be a ‘better person’ for knowing it? Umm….. I don’t think so.

What has become of the news – the real news – today? Whatever it is that we are getting now has become innundated with fluff and pablum. Yet, we soak it up like sponges and come back for more. And, it’s never enough. We want more-more-more and we want it NOW! Instantly! As it happens. Thank you, MTV, for teaching us that “Too much is never enough.” And, I think that we also owe them a debt of gratitude for helping us to become a “buzz-clip culture.” What do I mean? We have attention spans that rival those of goldfish. (Note: This isn’t entirely accurate – Goldfish have memories that only retain the past seven (7) seconds… but this example works for demonstrative purposes.)

We seem to have lost the capacity to slow down; we want/need everything to work in fast-forward. We live for sensory overload. Look at CNN. It wasn’t enough for us to just have a newsperson telling us what was happening. What did they do about it? They give us a window with a talking head and then fill the rest of the screen with scrolling, flashing, constantly changing data.

::: PROCESSING :::
::: PROCESSING :::
::: PROCESSING :::

If this is the “latest and greatest,” I can’t wait to see what’s next. Wait… I think I have it! “Subliminal news!” News that flashes past so quickly, it implants itself in our subconscious and then we ‘remember’ the news on an almost instinctive level. Yeah… that’s the way to go. Where are Ted Turner and Steve Case?!? This sounds like the perfect thing for the AOHell Time Warner syndicate to put into R&D.

Now, I need to figure out what to do with the rest of my day.

Peace.

Saturday
A small group of us went to breakfast this morning…. at 05:00. We had a good time. We left as the sun was preparing to climb above the slopes of the Wastach Mountains. Had to be back home and tucked snugly in our coffins before it crested, you know! I think that I made it to bed sometime around 06:30. I was asleep fairly quickly. Xena and Sissy, being cats, decided to frolic about the bedroom sometime this morning… I don’t remember when, but it was enough to awaken me a couple of times. They’re cute, but they still seem to think that I am supposed to operate around their schedule. Maybe I need to check the Cat Owner’s Manual on this one…

I slept in somewhat and then went about not doing much. It’s my day off; I’m allowed to slack. After a refreshing shower, I continued doing little. ::: bliss ::: Jess woke up a little later and I went into the bedroom to talk with her. Then it happened. I looked over at the dirty clothes basket… and there was Xena. That, in itself, wasn’t so bad. It’s what she was doing that mentally scarred me: She was nuzzling the pair of skivvies that I had discarded prior getting into the shower and then rolling around the floor. Then she’d do it again. And again. And again. And… well, you get the idea. I’d seen her (and/or Sissy) lie on the bed/pillows or jump on a pile of to-be-folded clothes, but this… *shiver* Where is that damned Cat Owner’s Manual?!?! Jess said that the look on my face was something along the lines of “That’s something that I didn’t expect to see and never want to see again.” Then she laughed. A LOT. And for a long time.

After I’d had a few hours to recover, I went by Adrian’s for a bit and then went to Borders… and spent about three hours getting some drawing practice. And then there was Saturday Night Bowling. Hoo-AH! My hook is still more inconsistent than I would like, but it’s developing nicely. Larry, Matt, and Monty bowled while Angie, Thom (Monty’s roommate) and Melissa (Thom’s gf) provided moral support. After the games, Larry, Matt and I headed to the V.I. for breakfast-type eats. Mya and Kate (two of the servers¹) were giving us some of the latest gossip. They also warned us about some of the “Do’s and Don’ts” of women’s fashion. It was funny.

Amusing Sites of the Day:

• Things My Girlfriend and I Have Argued About I’m not going to even attempt to describe this one. The title pretty much says it all.
• This one is a little… unusual. Some friends of mine have been talking about this site for a few weeks. The site is: True Porn Clerk Stories; it is the “diary” of, as the title suggests, a clerk in a porn store. This young woman, Ali, writes about the travails retail customer service in her store. You’d think that this would be a fairly dodgy subject, but the way that she writes is wonderful.

That’s it.

Peace.

¹ Instead of “waiter” or “waitress,” they use the generic term “server” here. I’m not sure if this is a Utah-ism, but I don’t recall hearing it anywhere else. One of the first times that my friend Joe came out here and we went to dinner, Restaurant Employee X came to the table and said that she would be our server. Joe, not missing a step asked “And, who is going to be our workstation?” She just stared at him blankly, mouth agape. (Joe works in networking/network security.)

I saw Signs with friend (and co-worker) Paul, his folks, sister and sister’s friend. I liked it. It’s not a typical suspense film… but neither of M. Night Shyamalan’s other films seem to be, either. I remember reading somewhere that this movie, The Sixth Sense and Unbreakable were supposed to comprise a trilogy of some sort. I can’t remember what aspects/concepts that each was to represent.

After the movie we ran into (former co-worker) Brooke and Keith (a supervisor at our facility, but currently out of the office on assignment). I haven’t seen Brooke in…. umm… way too long. Paul and I sat around and talked with them for a while. We sat outside a yogurt shop that was closing. The front doors were locked, but we kept pointing people to the still-open side doors. I’m not sure whether the employees were too happy about that. We didn’t let it stop us, though. Besides, if they really didn’t want any more customers, they would have locked the side doors, too!

Amusing Site of the Day: I got this (indirectly) from a post by :

Andy’s Homepage

Peace.

Friday

• I woke up around 11:30 this morning. That’s not too bad, considering that I was up until nearly 06:00 playing EverCrack. Sure, you only plan to play for an hour or two, but when you look at the clock HOURS have gone by. Oh well, I had fun. Except for getting myself killed twice. Joy.
  1. A bear attacked me… when I was minding my own business (for a change) and just running through a zone. Just running. Not attacking anything. And, I didn’t even see it, it attacked me from behind! Bastard ass!
  2. The second was because of a boneheaded move of mine. I was trying to talk to an NPC… and wound up attacking him, by mistake. At least this death was quick: He punched me once (ONCE) for over 350 points of damage… and I died.
• Putzed around for an hour or so and then…
• Took a nap. What can I say? I was tapped.
• Got up near 2 and felt demi-human, again.

I think that I am going to see Signs this evening. Other than that…. no clue.

And I think that I will henceforth refer to Fridays that I take off as “Pre-Saturdays.” Why? Because I can. What other reason do I need?

Peace.

Thursday
Day Four of a…. four-day work week. I’m taking tomorrow off. Wasn’t a bad day: Mail in. Mail out. And if you haven’t read yesterday’s tirade about addressing your mail, do so now. No, stop reading this, go to yesterday’s entry, read it and THEN continue reading this.

::: humming “The Girl from Ipanema” while waiting :::

Done? Did you read the whole thing? Okay, moving on… I don’t have anything to rant about tonight… but I reserve the right to do so, just in case.

Watched my obligatory two hours’ worth of Star Trek. It’s still a little… odd to see Captain Commander Sisko with hair. Also odd (or maybe just amusing) is watching the (first season DS9) actors try to get comfortable in and with their roles.

I chatted with and for a bit.

NPR/PRI Stories
Talk of the Nation – New FBI Rules on Informants
All Things Considered – Pumpkin-Shaped Planet
All Things Considered – Chicago Beating Deaths
All Things Considered – Mammograms
All Things Considered – Children & Health Insurance
The World – Malaysia’s Policy on Illegal Immigrants
The World – The Russian Mob and Sports
The World – EasyJet In-Flight Entertainment

Quote of the Day: From my conversation with : We were discussing the fact that our families have not embraced some of the newer technologies that are available (and that they call us to help them figure it out when they finally do break down and join the electronic masses).

• Me: “I’m a digital kid. I have analog parents.”

For : “Cracker Pants.”

Peace.

Wednesday
Another typical midweek workday. I remembered an item that I forgot to mention last night:

Please (see, I’m starting out politely…), when you are preparing letters and bills and other mailings, please write legibly. You would not believe some of the penmanship handwriting chicken scratch scrawling that we have to try and decipher and interpret into something that resembles a viable address.

And, when you are writing said address: Make sure that you use the full (and correct) address. I know that sounds like a no-brainer, but you’d be amazed at how many things that we get with just a person’s name, the city, and the state. ONLY. *ARGHHHH* Yes, there are a fair number of small towns where a letter addressed like this might actually get delivered, but for the most part…. no go. And street suffixes (“street,” “avenue,” lane,” “drive,” etc.) are not just there for decoration. There are some cities where there is more than one thoroughfare with the same name; the only difference is the suffix. Sometimes, they aren’t even in the same part of the town; if the suffix is missing, that delays delivery… even if it comes to a facility like ours. Suite and apartment numbers? Same rules apply. If, for some reason, you aren’t sure of someone’s address (or street suffix or apartment number), ask them. I’m Ivory Soap® sure that they will tell you. If not, I’m pretty sure that they have family or friends who will confirm whether you have the correct information

This is a good place to mention return addresses. IF the address that you have for Person X or Firm Y is… ‘not as correct as it could be’ and we have to send your letter back to you, it helps if there is an address on the envelope to which it can be returned. Don’t feel like writing it out? Address labels. Simple, yet effective.

And, finally: Stamps – they aren’t just nice to look at, without them, we don’t deliver your letters. Again, this is pretty much a no-brainer. Yet again, you’d be surprised at how many people think that we won’t notice the lack of postage. (Hint: We do.) Lack of postage is another way to guarantee that the letter that you sent today will be the letter back in your mailbox tomorrow… waiting for proper postage.

All right, I feel better now. With email and e-billing and e-this-that-and-the-other, you may not use “Snail Mail” very often, if at all, but these items will make sure that your mail gets to its destination on time. And keep everyone happy.

Came home and watched the Sisko and the Janeway/Barbie Borg Shows. I also got to call our satellite provider to upgrade our service. Why? Because, after a year-and-a-half, apartment management has decided that the dish can’t be cantilevered out over the balcony. Hello….?!? They are the ones who said that it would be all right to do so in the first place.

::: braincramp :::
So, the dish must be moved. The inherent problem: The satellite from which the signal comes is sighted along the edge of the building. Hence, the reason that the dish protrudes from the balcony. There is another satellite that is available, but it’s not viable for the package that we have. *sigh* So… upgrade time. This will add new channels and bring newer equipment AND be able to access the other satellite.

NPR/PRI Stories
Talk of the Nation – Group Dynamics Under Pressure
All Things Considered – Reading Up on Islam
All Things Considered – Braving the Badwater Ultramarathon
All Things Considered – Hogs as Tuition (I did NOT make this up!)
The World – Saints (Did Juan Diego, the latest person to be canonized by the Pope, really exist…?)
The World – Airplane Seat Sensors

Quote of the Day: Dee and I were talking about a mutual acquaintance of ours. He surprised me with information about her personality…

Dee: “She’s not all sweet, she’s got a feisty side!”
Me: “Oh… she’s like Frosted Mini-Wheats.”

For Dee: “Blind Man’s Bluff”

Peace.