It's All Fun and Games Until...

Tonight the Tattered Thread household hosted the monthly euchre party. The concept is a relatively straightforward one: 12 people get together (plus interested spectators) and play euchre, exchanging partners and tables in an intricate dance after every 10 tricks. Four rotations later, a winner is determined based on total points and a small amount of non-existent money changes hands.

What I completely don't understand is how we manage to get along. If you look at the group on paper, the only real common thread that ties it together is some connection to teaching (all the participants are 1st or 2nd degree friends of Kathy's) but that thread doesn't seem to actually come into play very much. There is some amount of low-level "shop talk" but not enough to account for even 10% of the actual interaction. No, somehow if you put 13 people in a room and give them something to do they'll find a way to entertain themselves together. From a purely logical standpoint I simply can't fathom it. Even more puzzling to explain is the fact that I manage to participate in it in some positive way but could not for the life of me tell you how. I just do not understand frivolity. I can apparently do it (not all that well mind you) but I just can't explain it.

Now, it was all fun and games until ... the "internet video" screening. I should mention that these get-togethers do have at times a somewhat adult thread running through them. This is natural of course whenever adults get together but sometimes it can run horribly amok. I won't state which of the many "worldwide internet fad videos" we watched (as a group) at one of our guests suggestion but suffice it to say that it was, by far, the most disgusting thing I've ever seen. It was personally difficult to resist the temptation to vomit on my own floor. If I'd been standing over someone else's floor I might not have tried so hard. This is exactly the reason you invite hip young people to your parties. They know all about this... wait a minute... maybe that's why you DON'T invite... Any rate, no harm done except for the large, brown stain on my eternal human soul.

The one thing I'm not overly thrilled about is the choice of activities. Despite the fact that the party is billed as a 'euchre party' the cards actually seem to have very little to do with it. In fact, in the past when we've had substitutes for missing players who were actually intent on the game, they were a detriment to the enjoyment of others. Playing cards is really more of an excuse to get together than a reason to do so and while the structure of the game forces a regularly timed mingling, in the end it gets in the way and creates moments of awkwardness. Depending on how the rotation works out, you may end up stuck at a table for 20 minutes with the 3 least compatible people in the room or you may find the people you enjoy the most stranded at a distance for the entire night. This was a much more enjoyable format BEFORE we'd done it a dozen times and got to know each other well.

There is also a bit of a quandary on the topic of alternative party activities. During one of our monthly club meetings we were short of the necessary quorum for the usual game by a significant amount so we played charades instead. This, in my opinion, was an order of magnitude more enjoyable than euchre. Where euchre divided us, charades brought us all together to play and have fun as a unit. What is odd about this is that many people simply refuse to play and I'm puzzled as to why. Technically speaking, being a reserved person I shouldn't play a game that requires me to get up in front of other people and act the apparent fool but for some reason I enjoy it. It forces me to crack open my shell and let the world see what's inside. Having brought this up to others though it seems like it's actually the more outgoing people who refuse to play and I have absolutely NO idea why. You would expect that being in front of people and having their undivided attention should be natural to someone who is extroverted. Several in our group though flatly refuse to even attend if charades is the game of choice. It makes me question the true nature of what it means to be extroverted; why am I, socially clam-like as I am, willing to expose myself to the universe in this way while more outgoing people are not? Is this a universal trade-off that I've failed to notice until now?

Even further from the original topic of this post, this makes me question the entire dynamic of friendship and interacting with people. I've always viewed extroverted people as open people who are out there to be befriended by anyone. They were, in my mind, always ready to share of themselves and that's what made them everyone's friend. Introverts were clams that you had to pry open with a screwdriver. They were hard to get to know and you had to really work at it.

It seems clear to me now though that it's actually the opposite. Outgoing people put a good face on it, they have a version of themselves that they show to the world and is available to anyone who merely wants to take the time to look. This is not to say that the face you see is fake, it's certainly them but it's only a part. To get to the heart, the true self, of an extrovert you have to first dig down past those outward layers. The hardest thing about this process I suspect is knowing when you've actually finished. How do you know when you've finally gotten to a person's true feelings? Is it when the office clown suddenly becomes serious? Perhaps when the pious man admits he has doubts? I just don't know but it's certainly an adventure trying to find out.

Anyway, it's officially 1 A.M. and I've suddenly realized that this post that took you a whole five minutes to read took me two and a half hours of typing and analysis to generate. I'm not sure I've come to any new conclusions except that there are some people I'd like to try to get to the very heart of (but won't know when I get there). Further, I'm going to nag my wife to schedule a charades party and invite every person I can think of. Then we'll see who shows up and who doesn't... Then those of us who do show up can psychoanalyze those who don't.

Black and White just make... Gray

For various reasons, over the past month my life has been composed primarily of dizzying heights of absolute bliss and depressingly abysmal lows. I haven't laughed so much or enjoyed life so much in any of my recollectable history but conversely, I don't remember having been so randomly worried, depressed or pissed off either. Overall it has been a great few weeks but I tend to think I'm handling it the wrong way; I'm mixing the black bits of life with the white bits and getting gray rather than keeping them separate and enjoying them in their purer forms.

For example, today I went out with some co-workers who are, as has been mentioned, very pleasant and at least similarly-minded people. For some reason I can't fully explain though, something in the course of the day pitched me into the very depths of fury. I had a name for the target of my rage but it wasn't exactly justified or completely comprehensible, even to me. Yet as ineffable as it was, this blackness consumed what was otherwise a perfectly pleasant situation. I'm still a little surprised that we went to lunch without the actual guest of honor (ok, not surprised, horrified) but be that as it may it was no reason to let unrelated fury consume me so. It wasn't constructive; nothing was gained whatsoever. Yet consume, it did and everyone felt it.

Then just as I was about to come down from that stratospheric fit of annoyance I arrived home to find a message on my home answering machine from my boss's boss. It seems that while I was meeting with the rest of the department one of my customers called my boss's boss's boss to complain that I hadn't resolved the issues they had reported just a mere three hours ago while I was in a meeting. Further, they complained that they hadn't heard from me all day. This was especially surprising since we had one phone conversation and exchanged six emails in the morning before the meeting but be that as it may, this was officially an emergency of the highest caliber. The appropriate response is, of course, to panic so I spent the next four hours snapping people's heads off, being a general asshole and trying to sort out problems while all the interested parties had long ago gone home for the weekend and stopped worrying about whatever was so important before. This bit of black ink in my life consumed the entirety of a Friday night.

If it were just me wrapped up in this, that would be fine. I can suffer alone. But it's not just me, there are other people involved in every step of this, some of whom I love and care deeply for. From my puzzled lunch mates to my family they all suffered in some way whether they just took the time to inquire after my mental state and offer words of encouragement or made me dinner. I feel bad that my ink splattered on their lives; people have enough ink of their own to deal with.

My Bored Bubble Popped

After a lovely chat with the Mrs, my bubbles are back in the bottle again. It's amazing how well she knows me after 14 years. She always knows just the right thing to say to put my train back on the tracks. The funny thing is that nothing has really changed. Television is just as boring... These books are just as dull... This laptop is just as scalding hot on my lap as before... yet none of it seems to matter quite as much.

The question remains, what to do about it long term. I think my original propositions stand; I need to get out more and widen my sphere but it's no longer an emergency. I need to reconnect with my work in a strategic rather than a reactionary way. I need to remember to relax and not view everything (even recreation) with such urgency. *yawn* *stretch* Luckily tomorrow is another day to practice.

Bored, Bored, Bored and Grumpy x3

It has become clear to me that weekends are my downfall. There is just NOTHING to do around here. Saturday began at 2:30am as the whole house found itself awake for no particular reason. The wife and I concluded a conversation we'd dropped the night before before bed (since we had little else to do) and finally faded off to sleep around 4:00. After a dull breakfast the kids and I hung about the house while my wife dined with a friend for lunch. After lunch we hung about the house while waiting to go to dinner. We shared an uneventful and somewhat quiet dinner which was, in fact, so quick that our movie plans changed from Sweeney Todd to Atonement. I was completely unaware just how much I did NOT need to watch a 2-hour movie about a frustrated love affair. *sigh*

When I wasn't bored today I was just plain grumpy. For whatever reason, this usually happy clam has a bit of sand in his shell. Frankly, I blame the weekend. Those things which seemed merely typical the day before became damned annoyances today. There is a black fog over the planet as of late that I'm unable to penetrate. The piles of books that seemed so entertaining before are merely doorstops today. Television is even less entertaining than usual. All the fizz has left my soda pop it seems.

Anyway, I'll stop complaining now.

Words, Edgewise and Otherwise

Last night we had one of my wife's FABs over for dinner and during the ensuing discussion I was struck by a few unrelated thoughts.

Firstly, I have to wonder if all people have conversations like the ones my wife and her friends share. They seem to have examined the people around them in vast psychological detail. I'm not sure I'd categorize this as gossip per se as it's not done in a vindictive manner but it's just astounding how much thought they've spent on this analysis. Where other people might discuss politics or world events these two do detailed psychological profiling. I have to wonder if this is some unique characteristic they share and that makes them deeply compatible in that way or if it's just what normal people do. That said, much of it, on the surface, is somewhat redundant from one conversation to the next; I've heard many of the same observations occur in multiple conversations but I think this is really because the purpose is not to exchange new information. Through this communication they're trying to draw new conclusions about the situations and people at question. It's as if they're constructing some vast mathematical proof together and at the end, both parties actually have MORE information than they started out with, some of it generated on the fly. After the conversation is over, those new conclusions are taken into the field and put to the test. Days or weeks later when they come together again results are compared and new conclusions reached. In this way they both come to a deeper understanding of the people around them. It's really quite freakish that all this is hidden in the guise of idle gossip.

Aside from the profiling I'm also astounded at the depth of their conversations about very personal topics; when I defined a FAB a couple weeks ago I don't think I took into proper account the level of emotional intimacy. I'm sure this is more common than I realize but it is somewhat surprising to see it in action. I tend to consider myself a very open person; I'll answer any question put to me almost unholy honestly but I'm not really sure that this makes me at all exceptional. I think that on some very low level people want to be honest and open with others but the variable is the level of trust required for this to occur.

On a personal level, this reminded me of my 'bystander' problem in group situations. I've noted many times before that in 1-on-1 situations people find me relatively amusing because I have a captive audience and the rules of conversation are clear and simple. If the other person's not talking, you talk. Easy enough. However, if you add a third or fourth person all the easy rules go out the window and often there isn't really enough silence to interject very much. I've never quite gotten over the lack of available silence. Luckily in situations where I'm the 'disconnected spouse' this isn't really a concern. If we're out with the wife's friends then being a bystander isn't really a problem and even at my most exuberant I'm still seen as "just sitting there" so additional and costly effort seems unlikely to have a positive impact.

What makes this even more of a concern is the fact that in a few weeks we'll be attending the wedding of one of my former co-workers and for the first time in several years, my wife and I will be with my friends with her as bystander. Frankly, these situations terrify me to no end. In 14 years this has only happened a few times; it's a standing joke in all my workplaces that my wife does not actually exist because so few people have actually met her. The spheres of work and personal life are so utterly separate for me that when they collide I worry about even more unnecessary details than usual: Is my wife uncomfortable? What is she thinking about my friends? Did I say something that offended my wife/my friends? Am I paying enough attention to my wife? If you ask yourself these kinds of questions often enough you can ruin an evening pretty quickly. The real problem, I think, is one of balance. I don't want to focus on the wife too much and exclude my friends as it's these non-work interactions that act as the basis for real and lasting friendships. Sitting here on a Saturday morning with plans to do little except work and write blog entries it's clear that I need more interaction outside the 50-hour workweek. Conversely, I can't ignore the wife because ultimately she's the one I have to connect with my friends. If I can establish a connection between her and the people I enjoy being around then everyone will have fun both at the wedding and outside it. At any rate, if I worry about this enough I'm sure I can manage offend everyone.

Plenty of Tension

I've been up all night catching up on everything I completely failed to get done during the normal work day so you'll have to accept a much abbreviated epistle from my soul tonight.

As I sit here mere minutes from the comforting warmth of my bed, it occurs to me that my entire day was REALLY tense. I spent literally the entire day either IN a nerve-wracking, uncomfortable situation or dreading one. That said, it was a good kind of tension. Today exemplified the kind of intensity that you only get out of life when you don't simply go around and around in the same well-worn groove.

For several years my life has been relatively stress free. Sure there were moments of "how are we going to get all this done?" but it was always known that what we promised to do would be done. Perhaps not in the best way and perhaps not at the best time but it would get done because it was, frankly, just busy work just like the previous 10,000 units of work that preceded it. There was no real challenge, no real possibility of failure, no sense of adventure. Today, however, was a totally different story and I fervently hope that my trip out of my groove is not merely a temporary visit. It's time to wear some new ruts in the universe.

Life Without Regrets

Today was less than giddy. In fact, I experienced some regrets. I did a lot of pacing about the house trying to figure out what I should have done differently. I lectured to the walls about this option and that. I pondered several imponderables aloud and vociferously to no one. But in the end I think I concluded that you simply can't carry around any regrets. The only true regret is that which comes from inaction. If you act at all times in accordance with your own best judgment at the time, then certainly you can go wrong but that's no reason to regret anything.

No, the only real regret I can imagine is the one you experience on your deathbed when you realize you missed your chance, that one moment of realization that you let opportunity slip from your grasp out of fear or laziness. If you tried and failed, then often that's satisfaction enough to know that you did your best. There are a few things I'd like to say I did before I die:

I'd like to see my name on the spine of a book. Not from one of those silly publishing houses that'll print your life story in book form for $1000 but a real, proper, commercial book. My adoration of the printed page has been so complete since even my earliest years that I feel it only apropos to give something back to the art form. Or, if nothing else, at least use up valuable paper resources that would have gone to pulp romance novels.

Earn the real, sincere applause of an audience. Yes, I know, this is totally out of character for me. I'm the type who hates to do anything in front of people it is in fact my greatest dread. But something inside me yearns to perform, to cast off the shackles of reality and assume the personae of someone totally different, to sing a song (badly in all likelihood) or tell a series of awful jokes in a bad rendition of someone else's voice. Doubtless this is just another form of escapism, a momentary rush to be experienced and described in minute detail later but it still earns a place on the list.

Host a really exclusive party. One to which I invite only friends I've known and talked to on a regular basis for 20 years. Preferably, of course, there would be someone to invite.

Lastly, and probably most importantly, I'd like to make a difference in someone's life. Not in a family member's life, that comes by default generally for good or bad. But just once I'd like to know that I helped a person in some significant way, that something I said or did had a real and positive impact on them. It'd just be nice to know I made a difference to someone outside the sphere of my own family. And this, I think I can safely say, is something we all want before we die.

Alright, I think I may have meandered a bit there but now that that's all out in the open let's get to work people. Make your lists and make sure that each day you do what it takes to have a peaceful deathbed. None of this pointless thrashing about at the very end screaming, "Oh!!!!! If only I'd planted daffodils instead of narcissus in the front flowerbed!" Let's figure out what we want to get done before we die and do it. No fear, no regrets!

From Giddy to Slightly Less Giddy in Six Hours

I have to admit, I was giddy to the point of inappropriateness this morning. Everyone was out of the house for the first time in two weeks and I could walk around shouting nonsense words at the top of my voice and nobody complained. I could dictate emails aloud to myself without interruption. I put on some music and turned it up so loud that I couldn't even hear myself dictating emails. It was pretty much the pinnacle of bliss. (Well, maybe not the pinnacle but at least somewhere up the slope.)

To add to that I think I've re-figured out my requirements for enjoying a job. Infinite power over the processes that impact me you might suggest? Nah. Gobs and gobs of money? Um, no. A chance to wield all my powers of intellect in a maximally entertaining and productive fashion? Hardly. The adulation of my co-workers and bosses on a job well done? Not necessary. Processes that make optimal use of my time and don't make me perform unnecessary steps to get a job done? Not even that. No, I think the only real requirement is that I have a job where I can actually succeed. A job where I can come in, sit down and do what's expected of me and have those expectations not be utterly impossible. That's it. Give me a job I can do and I'm good. Heck, give me a job I can do 80% of the way and I'll have fun stretching to get to 100%.

Now, that's not to say that the other things wouldn't be nice. Clearly it's in a company's best interest to provide interesting work that puts their employees to the best possible use but that's not necessarily a requirement from the employee's point of view. I need to constantly remind myself that the point of work is to make money. Nothing more. If it's enjoyable at the same time, all the better but it's not required and generally the exception rather than the rule. It's also not my fault if I'm not put to the best possible use after I tell the people I work for again and again and again what I think that best use is. There's only so much I can do. Despite what Henley may say to the contrary, I am not the master of my fate when it comes to work.

Unrelatedly, I'm starting the believe in the power of 'presumed familiarity.' Someone once told me simply that she assumes people are her friends until she hears otherwise. I think that's a powerful concept; there are a couple of people that I've tried this out on recently and it really seems to work. The trick seems to be to just convince yourself that you've talked to this person at least 10 times more often than you actually have and when you take that stance people can't help but reciprocate. This of course makes future contact all the more likely and chances are good that you'll actually fill in the presumed familiarity with real familiarity or at least have a lot of fun presuming. Again though, the theme is the same. Smile and the world smiles back... Scowl and the whole world scowls back... Be friends with the world and the world calls you for coffee on Saturday morning... Just remember to go dutch.

Habits, Old and New

OK, I saw a promo for this new Fox show, "Moment of Truth" and while I'll guarantee that I'll forget to watch it, one of their promo questions did remind me of something. The question was, "Have you ever touched a co-worker in an inappropriate manner?" Ugh, dammit. Yes, I have, but here's the stupid story.

Year and years ago when I'd known my current wife for a couple years I got into this habit of playfully swatting her on the rear whenever we'd pass by each other. Well one day I was working in the Terry Courts kitchen at Purdue as a waiter and a female waiter I knew somewhat (but not well) was leaning over cleaning something. By now you've probably guessed that something in my brain short-circuited and I playfully swatted her on the rear. I, of course, was three heartbeats from having my head explode with embarrassment and the only thing I could think to say was, "Sorry, wrong rear." Luckily she seemed unabashed and perhaps flattered more than anything.

In the same vein, whenever my wife and I end a phone conversation we generally give it the "bye, love you" at the end and on SEVERAL occasions I've barely stopped myself from saying this to female customers on the phone. This isn't surprising really; you have a lot of contact with a spouse and you build up habits that are hard to break with others of the opposite gender. I'm sure Freud would have something to say about all this but let me assure you my affection for our customers is purely platonic no matter what I may accidentally utter on the phone. The worst danger in this area is people who tend to hug. Aside from my wife, I get hugged about once a year so I'm happy to accept your hug but remember that the previous 499 hugs I gave out came with a little bit more than a hug.

There aren't a lot of stories from my childhood kicking around in my brain but there's one that I can remember word for word. If I have time I'll transcribe it for you: "You took forever to learn to talk but once you did you never shut up." OK, that's it. That was pretty long by the usual standards. The point here may be that at some point I did shut up again. And I think that to a large extent any success I've had at these "job" things has been due to my ability sit down, shut up and work. In fact, I've been told that people avoided me specifically because I "looked like I was doing something important." (It's an easy face to pull off: lips together and slightly puckered, narrow your eyes and eyebrows down as far as they can go. Then stare determinedly at a fixed point. No one has ever been fired while assuming this face.)

Lately though I've gone completely the opposite direction. I can literally blast away an hour and accomplish absolutely nothing except lively banter about the lifestyles of Italian nuns. And I can see why people do this; it's damn amusing. It's probably the most entertaining thing I can think of. That said, we really need a short, polite, unambiguous way of saying, "Listen, I'm really enjoying this conversation but to be honest I have to get back to work because if I don't... well, there's going to be some sort of personal hell for me to pay later. So if we can, let's just pick this up later, OK?" Perhaps a code word of some sort. Not rutabaga, that's already being used to indicate when someone really needs a breath mint. No, I'd suggest watercress. It's short and gentle sounding, "Sorry, man, watercress." Who can get mad at watercress?

Anyway, watercress.

Random Notes of the Day

I have to ask, do all women go around sniffing their significant others? I don't wear any cologne of any kind yet my wife's always telling me how 'good' I smell. What I wonder is whether she's just gotten accustomed to my specific scent and associates me with it or whether people fall into certain 'scent groups' that somehow signal a level of biological compatibility. The latter seems to be suggested by the fact that there are other men in her sphere that smell 'good' and others that she describes as 'stinking'. Similarly, there's a 'my baby' smell too apparently. When our daughters were small my wife always said they smelled 'good' while all other babies were, again, 'stinky'. This is a measurable phenomenon since studies indicate that mothers can always smell the difference between their own baby's blanket and those of other babies. Someone should commission a man-stink study but I think the thing to remember may be to smell your man (I'm told the neck is the best place to put your nose) and if he stinks you may have a problem. Similarly, give that baby a good whiff before you bring it home. If it smells sour then check the hospital's records.

On a completely unrelated matter, I realized recently that it's been literally years since I've seen a "man" movie. For 14 years, almost every time I enter a movie theater it's to see one of those "romantic comedy" movies or worse a children's movie. Now don't get me wrong; I can appreciate a woman movie with the best of them but give a guy a break. Well I'll tell ya, I'm seein' this damn Sweeney Todd movie; if blanket invitations to all the eligible people in my sphere are ineffective I'm druggin' a wino and propping him up in the seat next to me. Yes, I know it'll suck and be nothing like the stage version but that changes nothing. Some things you have to see for yourself. Oh... what's this...? my wife's putting in a DVD. What could it be... well crap, When Harry Met Sally. Dammit.

90 Minutes later.... this movie's puritanical views are bullshit.

Itches of the 7, 14, and 21-year variety

Firstly, not like that, perv. Secondly, I'm a big believer in itches. The idea that after you've been in a relationship for several years you might want a change of pace seems pretty natural. The key, I think, is how you put this energy to use and whether the results from that are positive or negative.

Fourteen years ago I scratched an itch and broke up with one girlfriend and not long after met a woman who completely took my breath away (and I haven't breathed since); regardless of how 'out of my league' she was or how completely backwards I was, she stood by me and we muddled our way through until I was at least passable as a human. To this day I have *NO* idea why she didn't go off and find someone who was a little less of a fixer-upper. But now, of course, she's stuck with me and can't run off because she's invested too damn much work in me. Ahh, the blessings of human inertia.

Seven years ago or thereabouts we had our first child and the earth shook beneath us. Before, we were two separate people revolving in opposing orbits. We were together and yet not REALLY together. To the outside eye we were one person but there was little holding us together except legality and a common mortgage payment. After our first child, suddenly there was this whole other center around which to revolve and after some complicated adjustment we tightened our orbits and in time came to love each other like never before.

Today... well, you've seen the latest itch in crazy detail. You've heard enough about it over the last month to want to vomit so I'll not repeat it. The point, I guess, is that there went another seven. I think the main point that came from all that scratching is that while marriage is a thing I'd never disparage, it's not everything. No matter how much my wife and I may enjoy gazing into each other's eyes, it gets extremely old after we're stuck with only each other and the kids for company for two weeks. She needs to get back to school and all her outside inputs as much as I need to get back to mine. It doesn't mean we love each other any less, only that we still can't do without the rest of the planet.

So now that that's apparently over, I think it's time to make plans for seven years from now. So far, my plan is to celebrate my 42nd birthday (That's DDA - Double Drinking Age) by having a shot of whiskey. It seems an appropriate first drink for a 42-year-old man.

From Heaven to Hell and back to Earth

It seems clear that grandma was always right when she said, "too much laughter now will be tears later." Today completely and utterly sucked and, just like yesterday, I'm totally responsible for having caused it. As usual I will not encumber my readers with the details but instead let it simply be said that I take full responsibility and am sad to have dragged other people along in the wake of my misery. I honestly don't remember a more maddening day in the past five years and all because I jumped to conclusions and misjudged the intentions of her with whom I am one. On the positive side, I think the air is finally clear and we can now proceed down the road to happiness again. I have to admit that getting out of the breakdown lane and back onto the highway was one of the most difficult processes I've been through in a while.

Annnnyyyyyway, on to more mundane topics. After all that we went downtown to the IRT to see Tuesdays With Morrie. In the past couple months I have come to appreciate live entertainment like never before. While sitting through this thing, I cried for the 11th, 12th and 13th times today but oddly I laughed at least 20 times; for a play about death it's surprisingly funny. What really struck me though was the echo of my own life in the play. I've been throwing around the word 'epiphanous' a lot lately but when the actors said, "you have to be who you want to be every single day of your life and act as if it's your last" (or words that effect anyway) I hardly resisted the urge to stand up and shout to the crowd, "Yeah! That's what I've been talking about!!!" It's hard to know how I've been doing with my resolutions to be positive about things and more outgoing and friendly (there's no yardstick to measure these sorts of attributes) but with the exception of today it certainly seemed that the world was smiling back at me. In any case, the rest of the world will have to wait until tomorrow because tonight... I'm completely worn out.

From Blog to Reality

I spent another day in the office today and I've got to admit that on the relative scale of amusement this one was incredible. In sharp contrast to the last time I spent an entire day in the office I had an almost overwhelming number of inputs from wonderful and friendly people. It was, frankly, incredible and if today is representative of a normal day in the office (when everyone's actually there) then I'm an idiot to have ever left. I will not, however, belabor my readers with details but will take the opportunity to draw a few general observations.

I'm increasingly amused by the number of conversations that are drawn from or include some reference to this blog. In a way that's somewhat ironic when you consider that this forum basically amounts to the innermost recesses of my mind turned inside out for public display. Given the level of detail available in these 233 posts I'm not sure what else there could possibly be to talk about? (Have I mentioned that I often feel like I'm repeating myself?) I must admit that it's particularly amusing when someone sees themselves in a post and later asks for clarification (but possibly more amusing when they fail to see themselves entirely). When they do ask for more about themselves it's like you're starting a conversation at the end and you've skipped to the really interesting bit at the end. You know that part, it's the one where you get to find out someone thinks you look like Brad Pitt. I sometimes wonder how many people just never get to that part. Quite a shame really. Life's too short to deny people the right to hear phrases like, "You are just the nicest person I know" or "You look like Brad Pitt if he were a woman" because you're too embarrassed to utter them.

Speaking of repeating myself, I'd intended to write about how incredibly friendly the world was today. I wanted to write about how I went out the front door with a completely jubilant attitude and how the whole world was one big mirror and reflected my great mood back at me. I even had all this formed in my mind and ready to put down in 1,000 words or less. I wanted to describe my friendly banter with pretty close to strangers, my smiles shared with small children playing tennis and the tinkling sound of laughter and the knowledge that I had caused it... Well, I was going enumerate all this and point it all back to the fact that I started the day with a positive attitude and from there I'd point out what a great epiphany this was and how glad I was that I'd made this discovery. Then I realized that I already said that three years ago. Have I mentioned that I often feel like I'm repeating myself?

As I was driving home (Have I mentioned how many ideas come to me when I'm driving home?) I remembered the power that music has over us. Somewhat ironically, these thoughts made it completely impossible for me to pay any attention to what was coming out of my speakers at the time. But the point is that over all the years of my life I remember the people that gave me music. Dad gave me an incredibly diverse baseline from the 60s through the 80s in the person of Zappa and the Beatles when I was a lad. My grandparents gave me a handful of songs and an appreciation for Bing Crosby. Of course these are people I'm supposed to remember but even into college I remember the guy who gave me They Might Be Giants. I'm carrying around tunes from The Beautiful South, Prozzak and Miranda! in my head from my first job. In a very real way music ties us together. Now if I find the person who gave me this Lou Bega CD I'm going to shoot them.

< ... turn over CD to continue story ... >

Another Day, Another Blog

Funny thing about today. Once I hit 'Publish Post' on this little editor, that'll be 29 posts. 29 posts in 21 days. Now that I've gotten into the rhythm of posting every day I'm not exactly sure that I can stop. In many ways, the daily routine of turning on the computer and dumping an entire day of feelings and observations into a little rectangle has become a necessary cathartic. So.... on a prime number post where to begin...

Much like many recent days, today has been a bit of an emotional roller coaster. I practiced my motto of 'honesty in all things' but my delivery sucked so while my message was delivered, it was received like a hedgehog from a cannon. Clearly the honesty rule needs a corollary or two involving the gentle extraction of emotions before delivery. It's enough for the receiver to deal with the content of your message without having to pluck the emotional quills from their forehead because you were irritated at the same time.

I accepted another invitation today from one of my ROWs and not, as he said, merely to "shut him up." My ROW invited me to read the book he gave me two years ago (I'd forgotten how much I love these old posts) on a specific schedule throughout the year published by his church. As much as some people hate proselytizing I tend to take it in the spirit in which it's done; it is a pretty kind sentiment to concern yourself with the preservation of someone's eternal soul. This is not to say that I expect my ROW to accomplish his goal but I have enough interest to sustain the study of the Bible as a literary work. I'll offer up my observations but I'll create another blog for that so as not to clutter up this one. I'd hate to be seen as a preachy agnostic.

My wife suggested I send the Charlie Wilson's War entry to the paper. To be honest, I'm not sure what they'd do with such a thing but I've been married long enough to know that sometimes you just do the thing being asked and don't offer any questions. We'll see if anything comes of that. Oddly, we don't actually subscribe to the paper so it's possible that we'll never know if it's published.

For dinner tonight we went out with one of my wife's high-level male FABs. I have to admit that I'm mystified at my wife's ability to attract high-quality friends (particularly of the opposite gender). We've officially been out with them enough times that they've crossed the line between, "Rob doesn't talk much" and "My, Rob was talkative tonight!" I have to admit that when I'm in a group (larger than 2 people) it's still a somewhat queer feeling when I start to say something and 3 faces turn to look at me. There's just enough time for the thought "hey, they're listening; better make this good!" to run through my mind before I'm expected to talk. I think the next landmark is the point when this thought doesn't enter my mind at all. Overall though, I have to admit they're great company despite the fact that we have absolutely NOTHING in common.

In summary, today's roller coaster ranged from profound (but temporary) depression to utter and complete giddy elation. In one day I feel like I've screwed up, worked like hell to fix what I broke and had the giddy realization that I'd done something right where I usually do screw up. Overall, a great day with a few minor potholes. To top it all off I get to go see real people in a real office tomorrow! What could be better than that!

Promiscuity: An Evolutionary History of Sperm Competition Chapter 2

I recently recommended Dr. Tatiana's Sex Advice to All Creation to someone and was reminded that I had Promiscuity waiting for me on the shelf upstairs. Over the next few posts I'll jot down a few notes and afterwards boil those down for your perusal along with a few of my personal observations. It should be noted that these posts will likely be extraordinarily graphic and thus not recommended for the faint of heart. That said, they should at least be interesting but don't expect it to hang together like a proper narrative since I'm just going over my notes, not retyping the whole text.

Chapter 2

Birds, it turns out, are total sluts. Studies indicate that 70% of bird species engage in sex outside their brooding partnership. A notable example is the purple martin; when given access to a multi-apartment birdhouse in the spring, the entire house will be first taken over by one male who will protect it fiercely until he attracts a mate. Once he has his mate in place and she's attending her nest he'll invite other males to join the household and when they do so he'll also have his way with their mates as well. Genetic studies show that the dominant male in fact fathers half the offspring in the entire complex. The amount of sluttiness (and the success of it) seems to be directly related to just how different the males look from the females. Apparently females need a particularly studly-looking guy to make it worth the effort.

On the flip side, monogamous females are relatively rare and when they do occur it's usually under somewhat unusual circumstances. Among some insect species which reside in dormancy underground before sexual maturity, males will actually dig up dormant females and copulate with them before they are fully developed. Some butterflies even go so far as to have a long, hard penis which can penetrate the female's pupal casing. Even more bizarrely, female angler fish support their tiny male counterparts for life. The male lodges himself inside the female and sucks her blood to stay alive ready at any moment to perform his function.

The Corydoras Catfish takes no chances with the father of her children. When mating the female places her mouth directly over the male's genitalia, sucks his sperm out and reissues it through her own genitalia seconds later to fertilize her eggs. Male seahorses and pipefish are similarly cautious since responsibility for the eggs lies with them. The female lays her eggs in the male's brood pouch and only after the eggs are secure does the male fertilize them by himself with a box of tissue and some hand lotion.

While the female is out seeking the attentions of others the male is working on a plan of his own to keep her faithful. The most common of these is 'mate guarding.' In many species the male will simply follow the female wherever she goes when he senses she is fertile. For insects, the last male to copulate with a female has an advantage over those who have come before so they tend to guard their females after the act. One extreme is the male dungfly who will hang on his mate's back for 20 minutes while she lays her eggs to ward off any latecomers. Alternatively, some species of shrimp have reproductive processes which favor the first male to copulate with a female. Males range far in wide in search of virgins and in some cases will go so far as to pick up an immature female and carry her around for several days until she's ready to be fertilized. Depending on the male to female ratio a male may cart around a woman for 9 whole days before he has his way with her and leaves her forever.

If a male can't guard his mate he may resort to just doing it with her over and over again. Giant water bugs have been known to copulate 100 times in 36 hours during periods of egg laying. Birds may do the act from 1 to 500 times over a single clutch of eggs.

Headed to the Bijoux: Charlie Wilson's War

In addition to simply entertaining, Charlie Wilson's War reminded me of several of my pet peeves. Least significantly, I can never watch a semi-historical movie without constantly asking myself exactly where the line between fiction and fact lies. As with any product of Hollywood, one has to assume that whatever appears on the screen has been exaggerated by at least a factor of three. While I realize the intent is solely to entertain, it does a disservice to truth to warp reality for this purpose. It's also worth noting that my wife and I were the youngest people in the theatre by a wide margin. Apparently the 30-something crowd isn't interested in historical drama. That's probably related to the fact that none of this ever happened...

I don't know about you but when I was in school they taught the same 450 years of history every single year. Somewhere around 1500 some guy found the New World and then there were some wars and finally there was this Hitler guy who started a HUGE mess in Europe but we never really found out how that ended because then it was time for summer vacation and when the next year rolled around we just started all over again at 1500. As far as I was concerned (at least in class) the Korean War, Vietnam War, and the Cold War didn't even exist. So while watching this movie, one's forced to ask: "Afghanistan? Where's that and why would the Russians be doing anything there? Aren't they busy enough with Hitler on the Eastern Front?" (at least if one depends solely on your public school education).

And really, if you take a look at the Indiana Academic Standards for Social Studies it's not hard to see why. Who in their right mind can look at this 149 page document and think that there's time to teach all this? Remember, there are similar documents for other subjects too that all need to be taught concurrently and consider that there are standards like:

6.1.4 Analyze the reasons for the decline and fall of the Roman Empire.

That's one standard out of about 100 in 6th grade social studies; how long shall we dedicate to it? A week? A month? It's such a simple topic after all that can be easily summed up in 1300 pages of text or so.

It's no wonder then that teachers come up short at the end of the term. My question though is, why neglect the end of history that's has the most to offer? One can easily see why kids always think of history as 'dry' and 'uninteresting' when most of the history they've been taught is so dusty and ancient that they cannot possibly relate to it in any way. If kids were exposed to the history that's taking place around us every day they'd be much more likely to appreciate it (and remember it).

Imagine that little Stevie spends the first month of history class learning about the first war in Iraq. He goes home and mentions this to his parents who may very well have taken part in the war and may even have the scars to prove it. At that moment the child experiences the most important revelation history has for us, that history isn't merely "something that happened" but "something that could happen to me." That's when history is truly alive and meaningful but in the traditional history class you never actually get to this point. Without this connection, the realization that history is real and happens to people JUST LIKE YOU, history is just a jumble of unconnected facts, a series of dry and uninteresting tidbits to be memorized until the next exam... and then discarded.

In the teaching of history we bow to the logic of cause and effect without regard to the audience we're trying to reach. From a purely logical standpoint we have to teach history in chronological order because that's the way it happened. World War I perpetuated World War II, not the other way around. Unfortunately, that leaves our audience with no sense of what any of the facts and figures really mean. To teach history or any other subject effectively we have to teach from the standpoint of the student and work your way outward. We must give our students history in a context they can understand and relate to first, and as their sphere of knowledge expands so does their ability to connect with what we're teaching. Learning is like a bridge, we cannot simply begin at some arbitrary point in the hopes that when we finally arrive at our destination the student will still be there waiting for us.

Happy New Year - 2008

Well, as I sit here watching television while the new year rings in just like the previous 20 years, I regret in a way that I've never built any tradition around this day. The wife's in bed, I sit here alone and the rest of the world celebrates. As long as we have an entire year on our hands lets celebrate in our own quiet way and review the year.

In the one-room schoolhouse of my mind 2007 was a year of epiphany. After years of describing myself as a misanthrope I realized that not only do I actually LIKE people but I also NEED them. I learned a few of the rules of dealing with them and made a real and concerted effort to cultivate friendships. The jury remains out on the results but the first step to solving any problem is recognizing it so I've taken a step in the right direction. More importantly and complimentary to that I've realized that there really is no higher purpose than pure and simple enjoyment of life (for both yourself and others). Most surprisingly I've admitted that under an obnoxiously thick crust I am a wild (and hopefully fun) person to be around. I've come a long way from curmudgeon.

This was also the year when many of my projects reached record productivity. The most significant household project was undoubtedly our slate tile floors. The blog reached a record 107 posts throughout the year including an exceptionally candid autobiography. While productivity at home was up, productivity at work was way down. I don't recall any time in my working history when I was less motivated; I'm not sure what it says that nobody seemed to notice.

On the literary front I waded through 54 books including the complete works of the Bronte sisters but most of my time was spent in much more modern works. I have to say that fiction has come along way in the past 40 years; almost everything I read from the genre of modern award winners in the past 5 years was absolutely exceptional. (Recommendations available upon request.)

Resolutions for the new year? Simple enough:

• Have fun and not feel bad about it afterwards.
• Take every available opportunity to get to know people better, enlarging my sphere of friends and improving the status of the friends I have.
• Start (and finish) some of those long-neglected household projects.

That should be plenty. It's only a year we're talkin' about.