no blog post today

100_3889, originally uploaded by beths96.

weekends = omnibus post

president taft

president taft, originally uploaded by pr9000.

We watched "Dick" this evening. It was a favorite of mine when it came out back in '99; my wife says it's because it has a real "Romy and Michelle's High School Reunion" feel to it ... two very attractive, not-very-booksmart blondes and how they interact with the real world.

"Dick" had that, and it was made by someone who really knew the arcana of Watergate. I had to pause it several times to fill my wife in on some of the more arcane aspects of the scandal -- not just the 18-minute gap in the tapes, but the allusion to the Saturday Night Massacre, Butterfield's almost-accidental disclosure of the taping system, and the rivalry between Woodward and Bernstein. This just goes to prove that I should have been a virgin well into my 30s.

here's a truck stop instead of st. peter's

swasey, originally uploaded by pr9000.

blasts from the past, circa 1992:

Driving home from the mall (how suburban of me) the local "alt-rock" station played "man on the moon" from R.E.M's "Automatic for the People" and without realizing it, I found myself quietly singing along to the chorus.

In the fall of 1992, I was a junior at Denison University. Taking up my time were (1) my position as a student adviser, and (2) being a DJ at WDUB, Denison's 100-watt FM radio station, doing (if I recall) two shows -- one with "regular" music, and the other featuring all Beatles. "Sitting on a Cornflake," I called it, and just typing those words trigger goosebumps down the side of my neck ... it was corny, it was pretentious, but it was fun, and it was the only show I ever did that got regular listeners.

I borrowed "Automatic" from the station -- this was long before the days of ripping CDs, back when an 80 MB Syquest disk was hot shit -- and let it sit on my counter for a week before I was willing to listen to it. I'd just been introduced to R.E.M. my freshman year and loved "Out of Time" but this one scared me, because the first single, "Drive," was moody and dark -- which "Out of Time" most definitely was not -- and I didn't understand it terribly well.

But I finally gave it a listen, and ... well, I don't think I played anything else for two solid months. I got the goosebumps because of that -- all the events and people tied to that disc make it impossible for me to listen to nowadays. I don't think I've heard it more than twice through since 1994. My good friend Adam had a theory about the negative effects of revisiting music that stirs up too much nostalgia. I thought it was bunk when he told me, but I realize now that I was having too much fun living in the past that way, so: Adam -- you were right.

"Monster" came out in 1994, "New Adventures in Hi-Fi" in 1996, "Up" in 1998, and "Reveal" in 2001. I was sitting in a restaurant in Evanston, Illinois, with my lovely wife, and we'd just purchased "Reveal." The cast on my leg, and the crutches I used to get around downtown Evanston, made me realize that you could tie almost every momentous event of my life to that point around some R.E.M. album's release.

To wit:

-- my first big crush in college ("Out of Time")
-- my junior year ("Automatic for the People")
-- my first job and first new car (I got out of work early my second day at the paper to go get "Monster"(
-- moving to Chicago, sans job (one month before "New Adventures in Hi-Fi")
-- first job in IT (same week that "Up" was released -- "Daysleeper" is the first thing I remember hearing, in mono, through Targetcom's office phone system)
-- surgery for my broken ankle ("Reveal")
-- I have nothing for "Around the Sun," really -- maybe I could stretch something, but why break a good, useless theory with facts?

So here we are in 2006, and I don't listen to R.E.M. much anymore. I think the presidential election really keeps me from listening to them or Springsteen. I don't mind that artists have political opinions; it just so happens that, at that time and even somewhat today, I don't share them. Which is fine, I guess ... but the vehemence of their opinions, the vitriol that poured out, and the abject, brazen campainging for Kerry left me alienated a bit from whatever their art is trying to say.

I don't listen to them much, but it's kind of fun to do my Elvis impression during "Man on the Moon" ...

avocado salad

avocado salad, originally uploaded by pr9000.

There are "weeknight meals" and "weekend meals" -- some meals are simple fare, made quickly after a long day of work. others are elaborate, thought out, maybe even fancy schmancy dining events.

It's Wednesday, and we had a "weekend meal" tonight.

We'd gotten some good kabob meat at Byerly's for New Year's Eve, and it was far more than either of us could eat. So we saved the leftovers ... and decided to change it up a bit and make steak sandwiches.

I got a loaf of "artisan" french bread ("artisan" = "not sliced") and made toast on the griddle by coating the bread in butter and olive oil -- just one side, because while it's on the heat, I use my grill press to mash the bread into about a third of its original thickness. Then I coat the cool side, flip and repeat.

We sliced the steak into strips, then warmed it up on the griddle for a second, as well as some sliced portabello mushrooms we'd grilled on NYE. We took the toast and coated one side liberally with Boursin cheese, then constructed the tastiest steak sandwiches ever made.

We'd also made the fluffiest mashed potatoes for NYE, and heated them up as well. My wife's secret ingredient -- whipping cream instead of milk.

Tonight, she made "asparagus fries" by roasting asparagus tips in olive oil and fresh parmesan, until the veggies were shriveled and crispy.

So ... steak and mushroom sandwiches with homemade toast and herbed cream cheese, amazingly fluffy mashed potatoes, and asparagus fries.

Then came dessert.

Fresh strawberries, with some homemade whipped cream (she didn't use the whole pint in the potatoes, thank goodness), served on top Cointreau dessert cake slices.

This was so good we're going to roll it out for our next dinner party.

to paul from grandma, 1972

to paul from grandma, 1972, originally uploaded by pr9000.

That's an ornament my Grandma Ruth got my first Christmas.

When we were home for Christmas last week, I loved to look at Mom's tree -- It's cool that she puts up so many sentimental ornaments every year ... there were some others I found that I'd forgotten about, such as "Black Santa" -- a Santa ornament made on dark wood; whoever made it didn't paint his face, so St. Nick appears to be Shaft at Christmas. There's also "Camel Claus," which is one of those little triangular things with two wiggly toy eyes -- if you pinch his cheeks, his mouth opens up, and you can put a Hershey's Kiss inside. Except my dad put in a cigarette one year, and it made my sister, Beth, just explode with anger.

, originally uploaded by pr9000.

Mom always decorates the mantle; those two alabaster angels were made by her sister/my aunt Evelyn when I was in middle school. Mom used to go off and do her Christmas shopping, and leave me in charge of Beth. I'd grab the little Lego space men and turn off all the lights in the house except the mantle and the tree, and I'd pretend that my living room was a huge space dock for the USS Enterprise. I still get a small urge to buy some Lego space men around Thanksgiving ...

***

Right now we're a TV-less household, as we told DirecTV to shove it earlier today after the latest customer service screwup with our DVR. We demanded to be released from our contract, which (to their credit) they did with little resistance. Only then did we think "What will our alternative be?" -- which is not exactly Negotiating 101, but hey, you do things in the heat of the moment and you live with the consequences.

After some research, we decided that the local cable monopoly can suck our collective ... uh, toes ... and we went with Dish Network. They seem to be giving away HD packages right now, which is very nice -- we can get the same channels, almost the same DVR packages, free HBO for three months, and only pay about 70 percent of what we were giving those assholes at DirecTV.

I'll miss the NFL Sunday Ticket next year; I can only hope Sen. Specter (R-PA) continues to rattle the NFL's cage sufficiently to allow the league to let everyone sell the Sunday Hit O' the Crackpipe.

***

, originally uploaded by pr9000.

These Christmas shots were taken with my D70, and I've finally started to explore settings beyond the "Auto" dial. I'm having more fun with the camera now.

a new year

, originally uploaded by pr9000.

a new year means more posting. or at least that's what i'm promising myself -- one per day, rain or shine.

this will count for the first one.

this also actually happened

in keeping with the previous post ... i'm man 3.

walking the streets of a major city

man 1: you and i, man, we've got the curse of the fair skin.

man 3: yeah ... i can't get out in the sun.

man 1: what do you shave with?

man 3: mach 3.

man 1: nun-uh. you need the quattro.

awkward pause

man 1: see, the quattro, it has four blades. the mach 3 only has three.

this actually happened

scene: three of us. i'm man 3, quiet, in the back seat. man 2 is driving us to dinner.

man 1: so how's the guest house coming along?

man 2: rockin', man, rockin' ... it's coming along well ... we've got the frame built, and the steel is up already.

man 1: steel? for the frame?

man 2: no. steel roof.

man 1: ah.

man 1: did you get the driveway done?

man 2: driveway?

man 1: yeah ... when i was out there, you were working on the driveway. laying tile or concrete, i think?

man 2: no, we're not doing anything in the driveway.

man 1: are you sure? i remember the driveway being all torn up.

man 2: no, dude ... nothing in the driveway. oh oh oh -- you're thinking of the floor in the guest house.

(silence for a bit)

man 2: we're looking for a gay guy, very meticulous -- well, they all are, but very meticulous, very neat. someone who can walk the dogs -- you know the kind.

man 1: yeah.

man 2: and he'll need it, like, one week a month. so we can rent it out.

man 1: how much?

man 2: $2500.

man 1: $2500?

man 2: yeah. dude, that's rent in LA. that's not too expensive. we're looking for that gay guy, or maybe we'll give it to a struggling actor or something -- you know, he can walk the dogs, take out the garbage, and stay there. it's like you'll get privacy, we'll get privacy. it'll be awesome.

man 1: yeah.

shoes and socks

i had a bizarre dream last night ... lately i haven't been dreaming much, and i think it's because i've been snoring so hard over the past few weeks that i'm not even getting deep enough sleep to dream. but last night (even though i snored a lot, apparently) i had one of the most unusual dreams in a long time.

the weird thing about it: in at least one part, i knew it was a dream because of comments i made to myself. this always fascinates me, because it's happened to me a few times before.

in part 1 (yes, my dreams have chapters) i was heading off to a work appointment with a colleague from apple computer ... we were walking along a boardwalk of sorts, heading to a temp agency where i used to work, and we were window shopping. i remember stopping at an art gallery, and we were peering in through the window for a moment, then moved on.

except that i left my shoes at the window.

i didn't realize it until a few minutes later, and once i did, in my dream i had a long shot from the water, looking at us walking on the boardwalk, and i was wearing these ridiculous horizontally striped, brown and yellow socks -- like a clown, or maybe the socks from some NFL uniforms of the 1960s.

i apologized instantly and started running back to find the shoes -- i didn't immediately realize where i'd left them -- while my colleague just rolled her eyes.

***

according to the dream dictionary, this could mean a few things:

In general, shoes represent your approach to life. It suggests that you are well-grounded or that you are down to earth. It also represents your convictions about your beliefs. ... If your forget your shoes, then it suggests that you are leaving restraints behind you. You are refusing to conform to some idea or attitude.

i like this analysis ... but read on, and you'll see this:

To dream that you are not wearing any shoes, signifies that you have a lack of confidence in yourself and low self-assurance. You may be dealing with issues concerning your self-identity. Thus if you dream that you lose your shoes, then it suggests that you may be searching for your identity and finding/exploring who you are.

how, then, to interpret the dream? if i forgot to wear my shoes after the gallery, then i'm a rebel. if i lost my shoes at the gallery, then i'm adrift, unknown to myself, without a solid identity.

the self-referential part, though? in the dream, when i rounded the corner and found my shoes, sitting perfectly next to each other in front of the gallery window, i said "i wonder what this shoe thing means. i'll have to look that up."

i knew it was a dream ... and that's the part that i'm amazed by this morning. having the self-referential dream suggests to me that it's a story as much as it is me working out issues in my life. i wonder if everyone's dreams are like that -- little movies, complete with scenes, different camera angles, cut edits, etc.

three things probably sparked the dream: (1) i worry constantly that my more seasoned colleagues think i'm a novice at my new job -- they'd be right, of course, but i still worry; (2) i took amina to the airport last night and left the house in my slippers; and (3) i was messing around with final cut pro last night, cutting up some movie clips, just to see if i could do it well.

the other part of the dream involved steve jobs convening a panel of interesting people (of which i was one) for a seminar sponsored by target. each of us would be asked a question in our area of expertise, but none of us knew the question before he or she was asked by El Steveo. i was sitting next to jamie foxx, and he was the first one called upon -- to do a tap dance, of all things.

later in the dream, i was asked by steve to describe "the (jibberish word) experience of a website i recently paid for" ... that's not exactly what it was, because i can remember the scene being edited so that i could see the card he was holding ... but i started babbling about dot Mac, and the new webmail interface ... boring stuff, and steve kept giving me the "hurry it up" hand signals.

but the self-referential part: someone murdered jamie foxx by suffocating him with a stick of mitchum deodorant. and he was talking to me, and asked if i wanted the same thing to happen to me, and of course i said "no," and we just laid there, the murderer, jamie foxx and me, and i remember thinking "oh, i've seen this one before" -- as in another dream.

i couldn't find "mitchum deodorant" in any dream dictionary.

diggler voted

diggler voted, originally uploaded by pr9000.

well, trotter didn't vote. but i did ... unhappily, without a good feeling in my gut, but it's done.