Potato Chip Mobile!

Mark Frauenfelder over at BoingBoing has posted some pictures he took with his cell. One of them is of a horrible 70's book called "Don't Throw it Away!", and includes something that looks frighteningly like a potato chip mobile.

For some reason, the phrase "Potato Chip Mobile" causes me to giggle uncontrollably. It's right up there with "Origami Boulder".

Super Sounds

This is going to be a music post, because I like music and I think other people should like what I like. That's the kind of non-conformist I am. Here's what I've been listening to today:

Carolina [Ben Gibbard]: This is from the Home V EP

Playhouses [TV on the Radio]: From the upcoming Return to Cookie Mountain album

Six Pacs [The Getaway People]: I don't really know anything about this one, but I like it!

Frozen Feet [Tacks, The Boy Disaster]: Best band name EVAR. Also, a pretty cool song.

Observation

The unobserved life is no life at all. I consider myself to be a writer and a photographer, so it's sort of hard for me to NOT observe. I find myself noticing detail, angle, light, ideas.

Sometimes I wish it could be turned off, though. I don't have the same filters that most people do. I can't stop myself from considering other points of view, can't stop plotting trajectories into the future. This can be helpful, but there are times when I would just like to be righteous and angry and yell and work myself into a big goddamn hissy fit, complete with crazy googly eyes, wild hair and spraying saliva. But that ain't me, so I gotta deal with things like I always do; step back and look at the landscape of what has passed, see if there are lessons to be learned, and do my best to learn them.

Enough navel gazing. Despite being down, there are a few things I'm excited about. First of all, I'm getting more into photography. I've been prowling my backyard with my camera, one googly eye peeled for interesting detail. I've also invested in a fancy remote for my camera, so I can take long exposure shots, including the fascinating "light painting" technique. Essentially, you leave the shutter open on a static scene for anywhere between 5 seconds to 2 hours, and you use a flashlight or external flashes to illuminate or "paint" portions of the scene.

So here are a few of the shots I've taken recently. Hope you enjoy!

Wenn Das Kind Ein Kind War

When the child was a child, a day in the sun was the best thing that could be imagined, and tomorrow was a speck on the horizon. If noticed at all, it might be a bird, or a bug, or something more fantastic.

When the child was a child, the present moment was enough, and when it was done, another one was waiting.

I'm sitting here at my dining room table, the ruins of a pancake breakfast surrounding me, birdsong drifting in through the open back door. It's sunny, and there's a breeze. I feel it on my cheek as I write this.

I am sad. Many of the little things that brought me joy in the course of my day are gone. There's no silly email note, there's no irreverent or naughty chat. There's no cheery hello or soft goodbye. The daily confirmation that I love, and am loved in return. These things are gone, and it's difficult because I noticed and appreciated them when I had them. I was not always that way.

I am no longer angry. I know why she left. She felt that she owed it to herself and to her ex to give it one more shot. She felt that she didn't try hard enough, that she gave up too easily, that he didn't know what he had until he'd lost it. I can only hope that he appreciates it as much as I did, and that she's happy if she chooses that road. She has the strength to do what's right. She only needs to figure out what right is.

I do not know what the future holds. I only know that I have to continue, I have to keep being the best me that I know how to be. I'll not be a pale shadow of myself. I'll not sweep this under the rug and pretend it didn't happen, or hurt myself with thoughts of what could have been. I will not do that to myself again.

I need to think about what this experience has taught me, how I've changed as a result of it. It's only been four days since last I saw her. It's not that long. But it feels like a lifetime, because I'm afraid that I'll never see her again, and I'm not sure I can deal with that. So I have to be gentle with myself. I need to slow down, choose my words with care, order my thoughts. I need to think.

I'm a better person for having met her, having known her. She made me want to be a better person, just by being herself. That is no small feat, especially for someone as reserved as I used to be. She taught me that meeting new people and letting them in to your life is not a scary thing. People have stories to tell, and I love stories.

I don't know what the future will bring. I just need to be ready to meet it when it arrives.

When the child was a child, it lived each day as if there was no tomorrow.

Bats and Raccoons in the News Today

First of all, the Fark.com headline for the raccoon story:

Mary had a small raccoon,
it scrambled up a pylon,
10,000 volts went up its arse,
and turned its fur to nylon.

I don't think I can really top that, so I'm not going to try.

In Bat News, a 6 year old boy was bitten by a bat at a Payless Shoe Source in Bakersfield, California. I blame the parents in this case - everyone knows that no sane bat would hang out at a Payless Shoe Source.

And if you combine the two stories, you could say that if the raccoon had been wearing rubber soles, it wouldn't have been blasted out of the belfry.

(sorry)

Night Falls

It appears that I'm going to have a lot of extra time on my hands these days, due to the fact that The Girl and I are no longer an item. I feel hurt and angry, and I'm grieving for something that I thought had real potential. I'm comforted by the fact that I know I treated her right, and that I did the absolute best I could. In the end, though, it just wasn't enough. Other things took priority, and I have to accept that.

This obviously makes me very sad, but has also caused me to realize that I've been neglecting other aspects of my life, like say, WRITING A LOT, and I mean to fix that. I'm really going to concentrate on updating this thing on a daily basis, and I will, as always, attempt to steer clear of descriptions of my lunch, and other random minutae about things no one gives a crap about.

I'll also be posting more stories and bits of writing, and if you're lucky, I may even regale you with tales of how I defeated the Copper Coated Crabs of Crabulon Crux. Hint: It involves sandwiches and a marinara cannon.