Futile State

Great raging torrents of sadness cascade-crash over me. My children have fled. Hearth and home offer no comfort. There is no warm light beckoning. My sanctuary is cold and barren.

In disbelief I sit staring blankly at Cardinals and Sparrows foraging beneath frozen feeders. Spreading seed on the hard snow pack was the only thing I could think to do. Feeding the birds is the only good I could do. Then sit and blindly stare.

Seething raw anger erupts railing against the futile state. Then deflated realizing I cannot will the electricity to return any more than I can will my children to give up the boisterous company of their friends to return to this cold house.

Empty now save the racking sigh-sobs of despair. Tears welling in glassy unfocused eyes overflow, trace cheek to chin then fall away into darkness.

Kentucky: State'O'Mergency

17:45ish last Tuesday the lights went out in Kentucky...or at least my little corner of the world. By the time an account was taken 70% of our county was without electricity. Today is Saturday. I will be surprised if service is restored before next Saturday.

Judiciously running the gas stove keeps the main room between 55 and sometimes 63ish. Water pressure is holding so the bathtubs full of water are only a convenience not an absolute need. Temperatures hovering right around 32F means that food stuffs stored in the shed are at least 'refrigerated' - curiously frozen things aren't staying frozen but that is another matter.

Today it was a hot shower at the Y and a couple of hours at the office ... to recharge the cell phone. The Saint wants instant coffee. Not as tasty as mountain grown, cold ground, french pressed but a helluva lot easier ... and instant Cocoa mixes in better too!

The kids got cabin fever after the first 36 hours and a couple of them abandoned the family homestead for friends with amenities. This exercise in limited resources has been very enlightening. SPOILER ALERT: there is life without an internet connection ... but you can't blog without one. Another interesting fact is that it get REALLY REALLY dark when the sun goes down. So bed time is somewhere around 18:30-19:00 cause there just isn't anything else to do in the COLD and the DARK. Now iffen it were warm and dark that might be another story.

Cell is charged. Better git back out to the Flyin' Pig Ranch 'fore it gits dark. Gotta eat supper early 'cause cain't see to eat oncest the sun goes down.

Stay warm ya'll 'n' keep yer powder dry.

Pew News IQ Quiz time again....

Click the graphic above and give it a try.

(Spoiler: I only got 93%)

Lego my POTUS

I found a source here.

Onus of responsibility...

After a long conversation with a good friend I thought I would try to solidify my thoughts regarding what is truly important between people...

I do not want You to like me.

My wanting You to do something is imposing, pressing my views, values, needs and desires on You. Instead, I want to be likable. If everything works out correctly then You get to decide if You like Me or not.

I do not want you to please me.

My being pleased is not Your responsibility. My being pleased is my responsibility. If I am displeased with my circumstance(s) then it is my responsibility to do something for or about myself, not You.

I do want to like you.

And I will like you unless or until you do something that I find unlikable. If that time arrives then it is my responsibility to be honest in my actions. Either I can distance myself from you, denying friendship by the lack of proximity, or I can tell you the truth of my feelings. If the occasion warranted it I might say, "I do not like you when you speak badly of your peers."

In the rare circumstance when I cannot remove myself from a difficult situation I will do the hardest thing I have ever had to do, tell another human being that, "I do not like you."

I can say from personal experience that this statement, "I do not like you." offered directly to another human being has devastating consequences. This is why it is so seldom said 'mano a mano'. More often than not it is alluded to in a gossipy fashion, "Oh, I don't like so-and-so."

The actual expression "I do not like you." is incontrovertible. Once spoken it cannot be rescinded. Once expressed there is a distance between the two people involved that cannot be bridged. When those words are delivered then the most primal foundation of trust is shattered.

[Note: Distancing oneself from an objectionable person or circumstance only relieves the discomfort. It does not resolve the situation.]

I want validation (respect and approval).

As such it is my responsibility to be respectable and be worthy of approval. As well it is my responsibility to know that validation cannot be given before the fact.

A demand for validation is the same as wanting some one to like me.

[I believe the practice of unconditionally protecting Janey/Johnny's self-esteem has had a very detrimental affect on our social values. If every action is met with approval and validation then Jane/John can no longer tell what is truly valid or worth of approval.]

For the record, I ain't...

I ain't erudite.

I ain't got all that book learning at my fingertips so's I can add in all them fancy quotations and citations. I don't know all them intricate linguistical turns of phrase that give substance to the foundation of my writing. I do not have the ability to adequately convey higher order concepts. At least not as well as I might. It is very unlikely that I will ever write a seminal thesis on any given subject.

I do endeavor to speak to issues of the human condition. I attempt to write in a voice that can be heard and easily understood. To that end I take certain liberties. I depend on the commonality of the human experience. I even go so far as to make assumptions about the environment we live in and the experiences we share. I write to reflect my observations of my human condition.

...S'there! I tol' you I weren't erudite. Now do you believe me?

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Read A Commonplace Blog

Time is running ... In

(Featured in this space was a count-down timer to the moment that Barack Obama became President. ...and none too soon.)

FAT Tuesday and Wed. & Thurs. & et al

Watch CBS Videos Online

bears repeating...

Yaron reacts by posting the following image, displaying an IDF soldier protecting a baby carriage, while a Hamas fighter uses the baby as a shield:

duly noted

Borrowed from Boyd @

/Ambivalence

Urban Sketchers: Lunch Time @ McSorley's

Urban Sketchers: Lunch Time @ McSorley's

I was there 30 years ago and the place looks just the same.

Thank you Stephen Gardner <- go look at his stuff, there are more great sketches.

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Read Urban Sketchers

Windows 7: Less Annoying

I read Seth Godin. Even if you are not in his 'business' you should read Seth Godin. Today in his posting Love (and annoying) he started out by saying this...

The goal is to create a product that people love. If people love it, they'll forgive a lot. They'll talk about it. They'll promote it. They'll come back. They'll be less price sensitive. They'll bring their friends. They'll work with you to make it better.

If you can't do that, though, perhaps you can make your service or product less annoying.

Microsoft's Vista immediately comes to mind. Vista, the Windows ME of the 21st century, failed (on so many levels) because Microsoft insisted on making it more annoying.

If the goal is to create a product that people love then Microsoft should very seriously consider allowing the user community to acquire Windows 7 the way it did with early versions of Windows 3.x.

Remember, if you are old like me, how liberating a graphical user interface (GUI) was compared to the cold and impersonal command line interface (CLI) DOS prompt, C:\>.

Remember how empowered we felt being able to simply point and click our way into personal computing? Be honest now, remember how much in love we were with Windows (and Microsoft) at the time. Microsoft would do well to remember how we almost literally fell over ourselves running out to purchase new PCs with the latest version of Windows.

Microsoft would do well to remember that If people love it, they'll forgive a lot. Our love affair with Windows allowed us to grudgingly overlook things like the dreaded BSOD.

Microsoft Windows XP BSOD

Perhaps if we could love Windows 7 we would be willing to overlook how completely Microsoft tried to force the likes of Vista on us. We might overlook how successive generations of Microsoft Windows have forced us to pay for very expensive hardware upgrades. They were very expensive because they offered little return on actual computing but were only necessary to support Microsoft's porcine programs.

Microsoft will gain the love of every computer user if they make Windows 7 available as a free very low cost upgrade. Imagine the GIANT public relations coup Microsoft would enjoy if licensed XP users were simply allowed to upgrade to Windows 7 the way we 'upgraded' from the DOS prompt to a new shiny GUI.

And speaking of falling all over ourselves ... Microsoft must realize that as we consumers lean toward small-form, even sub-compact, notebook [Netbook] computing platforms we won't accept forced hardware upgrades because of Operating System (OS) revisions. In order to maintain the love Microsoft will simply have to strive at being less annoying.

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Read Boiling Linux and Windows

The game's afoot...

...and I was taken by a photograph... of you.

Blogging needs to be much more than just my ranting and raving... so I have not posted lately. Seems privately I have been doing too much internal ranting and raving - every time I try to form an opinion or develop a perspective it becomes quickly laden with r&r venom. You don't need to read such negative vibes. I don't need to write such negative vibes.

More to follow, healthy stuff, I promise.

Who, me? Moi!?!

- TruthDig - and not just for the cartoons.

I need these...

Twenty-one things I've learned from jazz and Zen

1. In structure there is freedom and spontaneity.
2. Restraints and limitations can be great liberators.
3. Don't ever force it; be ever natural.
4. Good intentions are key. Sincerity is king, and yet...
5. It's not about you.
6. Listen more than speak.
7. Speak only when you have something to say, and then in the most economic way possible.
8. Your approach can be direct and subtle at the same time.
9. Fear is natural (and human), but work through it and past it. Don't let fear hold you back.
10. Mistakes are part of it (do not worry about them).
11. Embrace the power of now, this moment.
12. Technique matters, but it's not the most important element.
13. Make no pretenses; put up no facades.
14. Laugh, smile if you feel like it — why not?
15. Share yourself with others; make a contribution.
16. Simplicity is supremely beautiful, yet difficult to obtain.
17. Emptiness and silence are powerful elements of expression.
18. Remove the clutter, strive for absolute clarity.
19. If you think you have mastered it, you've have already begun your descent.
20. Always be learning. Always be learning. Always be learning.
21. Curiosity is your greatest gift, nurture it (in yourself and in others)

(Thanks to Garr Reynolds, Presentation Zen)

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Read Tales From the Mash Tun

Juxtaposition

• Porkbarrel Projects

...a tip of the foolscap to Pen-Elayne for such baconic delights.

A respectful balance

lao tzu

. . .
Thus Something and Nothing produce each other;
The difficult and the easy complement each other;
The long and the short off-set each other;
The high and the low incline towards each other;
Note and sound harmonize with each other;
Before and after follow each other.
. . .

In each duality neither is dominant. Each could be reversed and the meaning would be exactly the same. One does not change while the other remains steadfast. Neither makes a value judgment of the other.

• In each case the two elements balance each other.
• In each case the two elements compliment each other.
• In each case the two elements respect each other.

The respectful balance of note and sound ... harmony.

"Beautiful Jam" in the 2/18/71 Dark Star

Here is the connection..

Don't need no stinkin' badges...

Free from the hinderance of Constitutional protection
(Click on the map)

This is why we can have faith and hope...

Here is a man who really needs a job!