Tax Day: The Aftermath

Charles Gibson is annoying. This debate is totally not tubular. I suck at calculus. How do astronauts become astronauts? Do they get certified in spaceship aeronautics and then just wait around for someone to come up with a mission? I love Hillary's response to being called on the blatant Bosnia lie ... "First of all, let me just clarify that there is one thing I am not -- and that is dumb. I am not dumb. Sometimes I say things that don't entirely jibe with other things that I may have said in the [distant] past. So ... let's give it up for my bud General Wesley Clark!" Loose transcript, but not inaccurate.

I have been thinking quite a bit lately about Mrs. Piggle Wiggle.

In fact, I'm beginning to suspect the "random" thoughts are becoming encoded into my daily mental-musing circuit. Is that a bad thing?

Not sure.

Maybe.

I think Panda Bear sounds a lot like Brian Wilson. Does anyone else feel this way?

With Amye providing fine assistance in design sense and manual labor, we moved furniture around Sunday. Now I love it! Both rooms! Wait, lemme see if I can take a picture with the computer:

That's just a corner of the front room, but it's next to a table we set up so I would have a lot of space to do schoolwork. There are three windows in this room, and they are really big!

I like almonds, although more in concept than in texture. I like the taste. Too many almonds may sort of numb my mouth and throat, like avocado. But I'm not sure. Maybe at Christmas we'll get a big wooden bowl to put nuts in, including almonds, and eat them with a nutcracker. I'll have like 20 in a row to observe the effect.

Also, I really like vanilla and lavender, in concept and in smell and in looks. And it's fun to add cinnamon to whatever I'm cooking. Although I haven't cooked in a while. Neil cooks lovely dishes, like on, I think, Thursday he made chicken molé with greens, just because. Tonight I am slated to make grilled bacon & cheese – I will try to do him proud. And also, I love having time to do my homework. Love it.

good tv

http://view.break.com/467869 - Watch more free videos

lost?

there are 53 faux-scriptural tractates prominently featured as the "exegesis" in philip k. dick's now semi-prominently featured-on-lost book valis. following are those corresponding with "the numbers," uh, just for fun --

4. Matter is plastic in the face of mind.

8. The upper realm has plenary [Var. plenipotentiary] powers.

15. The Sibyl of Cumae protected the Roman Republic and gave timely warnings. In the first century C.E. she foresaw the murders of the Kennedy brothers, Dr King and Bishop Pike. She saw the two common denominators in the four murdered men: first, they stood in defence of the liberties of the Republic; and second, each man was a religious leader. For this they were killed. The Republic had once again become an empire with a ceasar. "The Empire never ended."

16. The Sibyl said in March 1974, "The conspirators have been seen and they will be brought to justice." She saw them with the third or ajna eye, the Eye of Shiva which gives inward discernment, but which when turned outward blasts with desiccating heat. In August 1974 the justice promised by the Sibyl came to pass.

23. The plasmate can crossbond with a human, creating what I call a homoplasmate. This annexes the mortal human permanently to the plasmate. We know this as the "birth from above" or "birth from the Spirit." It was initiated by Christ, but the Empire destroyed all the homoplasmates before they could replicate.

42. To fight the Empire is to be infected by its derangement. This is a paradox: whoever defeats a segment of the Empire becomes the Empire; it proliferates like a virus, imposing its form on its enemies. Thereby it becomes its enemies.

42 is good. 42 in tandem with, say, 30 could be the solution.

the Hillary Hussein Clinton campaign had nothing to do with crafting this charming plagiarism ..as far as I know

I just washed my face

Note to any business (e.g., restaurant, vacation spot) that is putting together a Web site: Refrain from music, elaborate introductions and complicated presentations that require specialized software. These features are distracting, annoying, and potentially toxic to the system.

I love Famous Dave's BBQ. Neil says he doesn't love it but it's "fine."

I was aghast at (note the non-link) Charlotte Allen's article in the Wash. Post Monday. Neil describes it as "boring."

Why were marshmallows invented?

FINNISH STUDENTS ROCK!!!

This article indicates brains are not born of homework.

quote of the day

"Y'know, Tim ... you ask a lot of hypotheticals."

P.S. Saturday I rode the elliptical machine and watched Lawrence Welk and was soooooo happy.

bad day

today was somewhat sucky, although I only had to go to one job, for which I was grateful. I probably was also supposed to go to another job but made an executive decision not to, plus, I don't know where it is, except somewhere far away, and I had already worked many hours and my life force was saying no. Tomorrow, after class, we are going to Prescott :) :) It will be very nice and peaceful and romantic, with fresh air and sunshine and flowers and horses. And I will bring The Custom of the Country, which has been whimpering with neglect since school started, and I will not bring the computer.

I got 95% on the last computer science programming homework! It took like a hundred hours. Neil is doing well in his class and said today the teacher talked about if-loops and for-loops, in which he already is versed. I think we should go on a family vacation to Europe next year ... anyone?

it was fun to watch the debate tonight and watch Obama and Clinton subtly piss each other off. I mean, there was nothing subtle about the way they felt -- the subtlety was in the lil' digs. Last night I went to Anne and Wayne's and watched the lunar eclipse. The cloud masses were kind of flirting with it, but they parted now and then so we could see the moon being occluded by other things that were more interesting than clouds. I think there is a Thievery Corporation song called "Shadows of Ourselves."

Hold the phone -- the highs in Prescott Friday through Sunday are 43, 50 and 58, respectively. Hmmm. ... I'm glad I checked weather.com prior to packing (which will be at the last second tomorrow). A recent bubble bath washed away some of the bad feeling from today. Now I will watch Lipstick Jungle and read Java and maybe start the next assignment. I appreciate friends and family, especially when they're just nice and supportive and you don't have to fit a certain type or mood.

stream of monday night

She's out of my-y le-eague, just a fool to believe I have anything she needs("she breaks the wind" is what Neil would say, were he here) tonight I changed 7 dead to 6 dead in the niu shooting and 5 dead to 32 dead in the va. tech shooting and youth core to youth corps for some e. valley group. no stellar headlines. after work at 12 I have to figure out how to put all my pdf docs (5) containing my writ calc homework into 1 doc without compromising the legibility -- acrobat reader just reads. I found a free, cute lil' dashboard application on apple.com, but 3/5 of the pdfs I cleverly emailed myself before leaving for work are broken. So I have to do it at home. after work. no problem, hopefully. i will not be docked for turning them in "after" 12, hopefully. Nor will I receive 8.8/30 on the assignment, hopefully, which is what i received on the last one, for a number of diverse and interesting reasons. tomorrow, after a few hours at health south and home health, i look forward (no, I really do) to cleaning the bathroom and dusting the furniture and -maybe- cleaning the floors. the most obvious way to clean them is with the vacuum, but that rates a 30% in total quality. The tiles have marks from god-knows what that I think don't respond even to windex (I will try that tomorrow), so moving a vacuum over them at times feels like an ex. in fut. Plus, there are no carpets anyway, so mopping probably would be a more effective cleaning method, but with mopping it's like I put so much (ok, 5 minutes worth of) effort into preparing and lugging around a sudsy bucket, and moving the furniture, and then the sudsy turns to grimy when I'm done with like half a room. I guess there are worse things than refilling the sudsy bucket, and methinks tomorrow is my day to test that hypothesis. And then we will light candles and I will maybe go to the gym and maybe go to yoga and maybe go to a computer security systems club meeting at school and definitely work on my computer science project, due weds. I finished most of it at the godfreys' this wknd, just needs some fine-tuning. so fun! I look forward to having the time tomorrow to do these things. Maybe neil will read me some pages of Mildred pierce! ok the papers are here bye p.s. bones from a 16-inch frog that had a lot of teeth and lived with dinosaurs were discovered in madagascar, and also, state legislator Karen Johnson really wants teachers and students to have guns at school so people don't shoot each other. :)

this is not a pipe

What logic is this?

hi

Hi. I don't have to get up for work tomorrow. The weather is not quite as cold as last week. It's pretty much in the mid-60s during the day. Does anyone know what it means when your Toyota Camry has to be revved to go after every single red light? I'm sure I'll find out tomorrow and it would be really sweet if the answer involved spark plugs. I have major aspirations to go the gym all the time, starting soon, and also yoga. All the time. Starting soon. I have middlin' aspirations to play the guitar. And get more massages.

computer humor

Support: "Type dir, space, a, colon."

Customer: "With a space after 'space'?"

P.S. I got a "A" in computer science (no joke)!

quotes I liked recently, unrelated

psa

i thought this unicef psa was pretty horrifying and then i saw this .. and *then* i watched this.

Happy Thanksgiving!

1. If the presidential candidates are so concerned with how to campaign in Iowa through the holiday season without being too negative, getting on people's nerves and killing the holiday spirit, why don't they do some CHARITY WORK -- and shamelessly make sure it gets press?

2. Do men's bathrooms also have changing tables? If not, I understand that it would be kind of a waste of money, but what are dads supposed to do when they are at In-N-Out with their infants?

3. I heard a funny song on KXCI (local Tucson station) yesterday whose subject matter included hullabaloo and tuberculosis.

4. Neil dreamed about Guantanamo last night.

5. vestiges of Halloween

How to keep the brain kickin'

I found this NYT article to be an interesting report on activities that have been shown to be beneficial to brain function. Now I'd like to see a study on joggers who do sudoku.

12:28 a.m.

I soooooo can't sleep. I think I have to get up at 6. When I was pikku my mother would sing me the Teddy Bear Picnic song. It was entrancing. The undersides of my elbows are scuffy. I am divided as to whether this would self-repair if I stopped resting my elbows on tables, or whether the damage is done. I was in the mood for Neil Young this weekend but I forgot to listen to him. I bet if I pull out a cd tomorrow it will make studying calculus funner.

npd's new favorite

I have to vacuum today, for sure

I just woke up after dreaming of people falling down the stairs, so this NYT article was of especial interest. An excerpt: It is likely during REM, some scientists argue, that the brain proceeds to mix, match and juggle the memory traces it has preserved, looking for hidden connections that help make sense of the world. Life experience is cut up and reordered, sifted and shuffled again. This process could account for the cockeyed, disjointed scenes that occur during dreams: the kaleidoscope of distilled experience is being turned.

Of note in these here parts: Yesterday was really windy. This week the Computer Science Dept. is looking at applications for its office assistant job, of which there are 30+. I had a French midterm yesterday (lundi) and have a csc midterm Friday and a calculus test next week. School is in week 10! But I don't feel exactly employable as a computer scientist. I know I have had only .67 csc classes, but I hope at some point in this program I feel remotely competent.

Neil pointed out that our VHS copy of The Graduate was released in 1985 and bears a recommended retail price of 59.95!!! Does anyone else remember this '80s exorbitance?

I don't like green beans. ... Well I don't.

I haven't yet read this story, but that doesn't mean you can't.

Some of us need to hustle so we can squeal into swallow group at the designated time of 7:30. If I was ever on time for swallow group I feel like I should get a bonus. Or at least a homemade cookie. But probably my self-pride in being punctual would carry the exact same annoyance value to my coworkers as my being 5 minutes late. Alors, no cookie! I have to work Sat. and Sun. but I have a date with Neil tomorrow! Yipee! And he has 2 new UA applications pending. One potentially involves handling blood ... in the name of scientific research ... it sounds tres interestiing.

And also: I got an A on my calculus test! Which I still am in shock over! OK, now I really have to go, even though I would like to sit here for at least 30 more minutes. I don't even know what's happening in the news. I think employment is designed to keep people ignorant of what goes on! Except maybe Dennis and Neil.

The Sky Harbor Back Story

Carol Gotbaum's history

Husband had bad feeling

So ... what kind of legal recourse, if any, would you pursue? Of course, A. by consuming alcohol, which she already knew negatively influenced her mood and behaviors, Gotbaum herself was an agent. ALTHOUGH she apparently was addicted (and therefore the level of personal responsibility involved in picking up a shot glass may be somewhat tempered) and was flying to Tucson specifically to find help. And B. by knowing of these tendencies, her family perhaps could be considered mildly negligent in not appointing a responsible party to fly and make the change with her (although someone was supposed to meet her at Sky Harbor and do just that). That said, what would you do? P.S. I would like to take the credit, on behalf of all women, for NOT printing "hysterical" in a hed on the story in last Sunday's paper. Someone else wrote it and I spoke up. Perhaps they were unclear on the etymology.

calculus on the brain

It is 11:55 p.m. I have given up on trying to figure out why the Java String length() method won't count spaces, and why the indexOf() method won't look at spaces, and why the charAt() method won't recognize spaces. It's really not that hard, which is why I've spent hours trying to find the solution. It's so simple. I just don't know it. Maybe if I looked in my book ... Plan B, which I'll tackle tomorrow.

And speaking of calculus, when I find the derivative of the derivative of a polynomial function, how am I supposed to know the values of x for which the function is positive and concave up? Or is the function supposed to be positive and concave up, since the 2nd derivative isn't even mentioned in the problem ... but why would we even talk about concavity were we not referring to f''x?

And on French ... Good vocab scores. Good effort. Every class I pray that she will not tell me to present a French article in 2-5 days. And that's all I have to say.

Greer is so cool and nice. We walked by the Little Colorado and looked for fishes. We rested and read a lot.

Neil is good. He makes me dinner and cleans the house and asks me how my day was. OK I have to go to bed.

oprah contingency?

Does anyone think Oprah Winfrey would have a fighting chance if she ran for president? Because she is soooooooo popular. ... I just wonder. P.S. No relation to the picture.

fun

It would be neat to backpack through Europe. Has anyone done it?

hibachi, starbury, etc.

exhibit A for why arizona deserves to be the 25th best school in the country (2 ahead of harvard). also, gilbert comments on crazy steph doing an interview. i have linked. you need to watch the whole thing.

such as and

posters for pleasure

.. great movie art featuring paul tebo dead ringer klaus kinski

physical science

1. This article is interesting, and it makes me think of potential research in sensory integration techniques in the autism population. I hope researchers perhaps can get beyond the stick and hammer -- how about a feather and birthday cake!

2. I will post pictures of painted furniture soon.

3. I study calculus every night! College is so fun! The third time around is always the best!

4. The Star published this article Sunday about the possibility of troops in Iraq being exposed to toxic substances and consequently developing cancer. The information is gripping and I want to see tons of research and perhaps lawsuits. Tons.

from a to b

lone star spoiler starting at 6:30