Revenge

is a dish best served around, oh, seventy-eight degrees.

Happy new year y'all.

(Atlantic Beach, FL / 31 Dec)

Non-Topical Random Update

Back in Florida. Also, unemployed. (Incidentally.)

I had an interview today with a web design company here in town, so maybe i won't have to start temping after all. Although most of the temp jobs K. had didn't seem all that bad. I don't recall ever having a job where my boss said it was all right if i played on the internet all day. Played Tetris, yes. But Tetris loses some of its appeal after the first four hundred and sixty-eight games. Besides, they made me lick envelopes. Which did actually help the days go faster, depending on how much of the glue i ingested, but then they took them away and made me answer the phones and stuff.

At least New York was nice. The people were nice, of course, even the ones i wasn't related to by marriage. And some of the other things were nice - wood smoke, snowshoeing, seeing deer again - but in general, it was kind of a weird thing. Flying from Florida to upstate New York for Christmas is like paying a brief visit to another planet. A very, very gray planet. Where it's dark seventy percent of the time. After a day or two there you begin to have a hard time remembering what the rest of the world is like. Or that the rest of the world exists, let alone that sunny places with palm trees exist and you live in one.

So yeah. I was getting a little discouraged earlier with the weather down here - it's been in the forties at night - but that was mainly because without central heating, the temperature inside one's apartment is very nearly the same as the temperature outside. K. made fun of me for wearing my winter jacket at the dinner table. Do what you gotta do, i say. The weather in New York this week was actually fairly similar, but the key difference was that they heat their houses up there, so i stayed warmer in Albany than i'd been in a Florida month. And anyway, better times are coming. It's supposed to be seventy-six here on New Year's Eve. Stick that in your snowblower and...well...ehh, never mind.

Mildly Interesting Photos Of The Week

(both: Northville, NY / 27 Dec / Casio EX-Z750)

UPS. And, The Evolution Of Human Society

Out delivering after nine o'clock again last night. It was almost ten the night before.

Get up, brush teeth, drive to mall. The mall's crazy. Push a loaded eight-hundred-pound handcart through mobs of cattle, i mean people, shuffling half agape from one full-room advertisement to another. You imagine you can see the drool. They're potty-trained, mostly, but that's the only difference i've noticed. Oh, except: cattle are more polite. So. Navigate the mall for five hours, more or less, depending on how badly the rental Penske was organized by the loaders. Then off to the second shift, past the naval air station. Drive to meet the second driver wherever he/she happens to be - what did anyone do before cell phones? - jump on, pull down the seat, strap in, and hang on. I haven't even had time for coffee this week. Just that free cup from those nice people at the mall Starbucks, bless their corporate heart.

Most UPS drivers race to get done before dark. Everything's a hassle after dark. You can't see the sprinkler heads and extension cords. Not to mention the dogs. Or the addresses. But i've been out after dark every day now for two weeks - it's the season - and there's actually a contemplative side to it, almost an existential side, after a while.

It's an exercise in being an outsider. A hundred doors open to you; a hundred doors close. Lights wink on and off in just enough time for hello and goodbye. The smells of a hundred strange cultures waft out as slivers of light widen like the portals of a different dimension. Then they shut again, and it's cold; you're still outside, and your brain grasps it if your mind does not, but then you're already running away.

Jump up on the truck, swing into your seat as the driver jams the stick into gear and nails the gas and the angry old diesel jerks the scenery by to the next stop. Again the truck's long blast of cold wind. You can close those sliding doors - the stickers admonish "risk of serious injury" if you don't - but who has the time? It's dead dark; there's only the ghostly green reflection of your diad computer to see by. Hit the ground at a run as the driver's still yanking the air brakes. Your medulla reverts to some still more ancient system of preconscious survival as your legs pound through the dark. Is that snarling dog loose? Uhh--

Another glow of warmth, another portal crack closed. It's after nine now. You're running up apartment steps, just a few packages left to go - one more stop - yes! she's home. Swing up, slam down the seat, and let your back melt against the metal as you slide the roaring truck's door closed at last. A Navy Orion circles high overhead, coming down to land. There's an open door of your own waiting for you, and it's warm.

Why I Like The Economist

If you've never read it, The Economist is a British world-news-and-opinion magazine to which, through a recent odd coincidence involving old forgotten frequent-flyer miles, i am now a subscriber.

I used to stand and read it in airport bookshops. You'd have to pay me to touch Time or Newsweek, but i savor The Economist. I would subscribe just for the classifieds. Really. Some actual want ads from last week's edition:

• The United Nations: Statistical Director

(a definite growth industry, though a bit on the creative side)
and

• The World Bank: Public Sector Economist

• Seton Hall University: Dean (School of Diplomacy & Int'l Relations)

• European Beret Sale $10 + Shipping

• Central Intelligence Agency Clandestine Service Careers

(the latter being an equal-opportunity employer, it should be noted.)
Further opportunites included

• City of London: Transport Commissioner

(in charge of the Underground system, all the buses, and every taxi in London)
as well as

• Immigrate To Canada Now. We Can Help!
  

And if that's not an opportunity, i don't know what is.
Then an especially fine pairing, on facing pages--

• British Commonwealth: Anti-Money-Laundering Advisor

• Offshore Tax-Free Corporation Formation & Account Setup

--and finally, my current favorite:

• The Great Socialist Peoples Libyan Arab Jamahiria, General Post & Telecommunications Company, Tripoli, Libya: "...Request of quotations and proposals to proceed with Maritime Radio Communications, Radar System and Sites Location of Radar System."

If you're interested, you know where to look.

Mildly Interesting Photo Of The Week

Couldn't decide. You pick.

(Jacksonville, FL/18 Dec/Canon S110)

Getting To Know Your Neigborhood

Okay, not quite there on the 68-and-sunny.

But it's Saturday nonetheless, even if it's been pouring all day. Saturday's been laundry day lately, meaning a trip to one of the local laundromats a few blocks away. This being a unique kind of neighborhood, there are some rather unique businesses around.

It's a decent place, this one. Dingy walls and peeling paint - but when you think of it, have you ever seen a prosperous-looking laundromat? This one looks like an artillery-damaged embassy from the planet Formica, but it's still only six quarters for a wash, and things do get clean. Dryers seem a bit expensive on first glance, at fifty cents for ten minutes, but anything you can possibly cram inside one of them will get dry in half an hour. Three loads usually fit. They may be nuclear powered; i'm not sure.

Besides, no matter what kind of day you're having, the laundromat atmosphere never fails to soothe the troubled soul. I like laundromats. They're always warm and snuggly-fresh, and everything hums in a soothing sort of way against that tranquil soundscape of splashing water. If they'd just replace the fluorescent ceiling bulbs with some gentle mood lighting and maybe a leather recliner or two, they could charge me money just to sit there.

But i digress. No time to sit today, in any case. Katie had already put ours in on her way to Publix, so all i had to do was walk in and take it out of the dryer. It occurred to me that i could plausibly have taken anyone's clothes out of anyone else's dryer and no one would have even noticed. For all they knew, i was just some thug off the street with Wisconsin license plates, stealing that nice girl's underwear.

No one said a word, though, so i escaped without incident. But there's a problem with leaving this laundromat, and it's that you have to cross the parking lot. On the other end of the parking lot is an old local guy with an ancient pickup and beat-up trailer, and to this trailer are welded two huge soot-black drum-style barbecue grills billowing hickory smoke from stovepipe stacks. A folding table with paper plates stands crookedly to the right. The old man reclines in his customary lawnchair, smiling his imperturbably Southern smile, nodding slowly with proprieter's pride at all customers, sheriffs and firefighters and rich white folk alike. You get about halfway across, lugging your laundry, and the smoky-sweet aroma of exquisitely roasted meat hits you like a revelation and nails your feet to the ground. It takes real effort to walk the last ten feet toward your car.

I am unable to report as yet on the taste, as our budget does not currently extend to such ecstasies every Saturday. But one of these days it's going to happen. Come the revolution, there will be parking lot barbecue for all.

Signs Of A Fine Establishment, Pt. 25

(Jacksonville, FL. 16 Nov)

Final Tuesday Morning Assessment Update

Forecast for this weekend: 68 and sunny.

Heh heh.

Tuesday Morning Assessment Update

Clothing worn to work yesterday and today: Shorts and short-sleeve shirt

A Tuesday Morning Assessment

Articles of insulation i slept in last night:

• fleece pants
• thermal underwear bottoms
  
• wool socks (cotton kills!)
• polypro long underwear top
• merino wool long underwear top
• fleece ski hat
• flannel sheets
• fleece blanket #1
• comforter
• fleece blanket #2
• fleece blanket #3
• polyfill flannel sleeping bag

Temperature upon waking: Perfect.

It's Profanity Monday Again! [Special TV Jurnalists' Edition]

It is a damn poor mind indeed which can't think of at least two ways to spell any word.

Andrew Jackson

Church Shopping (A Poorly Written, Half-Thought Rant Posted Anyway)

Went to a candlelight service at Grace Anglican the other night. It wasn't candlelight because of Advent; it was just... candlelight. The music was chosen to fit the atmosphere, and the atmosphere was beautiful. Trust them Anglicans to do it right.

Actually, i'm still one of them. That is, if Church of the Resurrection up in Chicago hasn't misplaced my membership yet. We're still trying to find a place to belong down here. One of the first places we looked was the AMiA directory - out of simple expediency more than brand loyalty; i have less patience for shooting in the dark when there are fifty varieties of Community Christian Church within ten miles and my attendance at the most typical of them, i fear, might do me more harm than good. Not to mention those around me. In an environment thick enough with spiritual cliches, biting your tongue starts to hurt after a while.

I mean, worship is about God and not us, and if you work at it, you can manage to do it anywhere, even at the precise moment when the young Gap-clad "worship leader" (as if worship consisted only of childish music with semiliterate lyrics) is beginning the latest WOW! hit for the fifth consecutive time. But if what we call worship has nothing to do with our experience, then let's all just sit around on Sunday morning and read aloud from the front pages of the hymnal. The 1947 one. Not that that's not interesting too, in its own way, but you see my point.

So we've been visiting at Grace Anglican. We've also visited a little AMiA churchplant in our own neighborhood - an interesting little collection of people characterized not least by quite a bit of anger, per capita, at the Episcopal Church. Anger (even the "righteous" sort) isn't always a bad thing, but given that righteous indignation to date has launched about nine thousand different schisms and counting, maybe it's not the best motivator around. Also, we were the youngest people there by approximately three decades. But being at Grace, in any case, has made me realize how badly i'd been missing Church of the Rez, as well as my last home-away-from-home-church, Christ Anglican in Mobile. Of all places.

I grew up in the Lutheran church, which i guess makes me something of a statistical oddity among my Lutheran gradeschool peers in that i still attend any kind of church at all. I hated school, but i think i hated church more. The only good thing about it was that it didn't last as long as school, and it more than atoned for that minor positive quality by planting itself, an island of drudgery and coercion, squarely in the center of my weekend. I really did hate church. I still cordially despise many varieties of it. But i've learned that the real thing's out there, and i have discovered enough shimmering oases of this reality that my thirst for it has been able to overcome my resistance. I quit listening to "Christian" music in general a long time ago for the same polarized reason - half of it was totally irrelevant to ninety-nine percent of Christians, let alone anyone else, and the other half tried so hard to be "relevant" that in the end it was just all about image. Which is where the vast majority of it seems to be today. Not that so-called secular music is any different, but i think the stuff calling itself Christian should be held to a higher standard - just as with people. But there were always a rare few artists - Rich Mullins, to hazard an example - who embodied that higher standard, who seemed to care more about being authentic than about their image. These few were more than just palatable to me. At times, they were life preservers.

But a reaction to style-obsession is a style all its own. Which means i'm still just church shopping. Is this all just about style? I don't think so. In a sense, it is; everything in human society is about style. It always has been. That's what human society is: people grouped together around similar ways of seeing the world. So of course we cluster by music type or liturgy use or age. Maybe the answer is not to make a great show of trying to avoid such cliques (as if we could without forming new ones) but rather just to make sure we shake them up on a very regular basis. But i still really think it's not about style as much as it's about awareness. Not awareness of current trends, but awareness of trendiness. Everyone is aware of trends, whether their awareness is up to the minute or lags several years behind. Compulsive attention to dressing right and using just the right music is not companionate with authenticity. Even if you're the first one in your neigborhood to do everything, you're still just following, sucked in and swept along, and it's merely annoying to anyone who happens to be thirty seconds more up-to-date than you. And though you won't recognize them, of course, there will always be people like that. No, i'm talking about awareness of that - which leads to freedom. Knowing, but not caring overly much...now that's style.

So maybe it's a little bit about style, but only peripherally. What it's really about is authenticity, and that's about humility, which is maturity, which is wisdom, which is...truth. That's what i like in people, and that's what i like in a collection of people called a church. Not that i have any of it myself. But i want it when i see it. Which is the first step to having anything. I hope.

Warning!

Cheap dry-spell boilerplate may follow.

Several Additional Numbers, Presented For General Public Edification

25 lbs: Weight, average, of a UPS box delivered to Yankee Candle

120 lbs: Approximate weight of empty cart

45: Average number of boxes fitting on cart

1245 lbs: Weight of one cartload

7: Number of cartloads delivered to Yankee Candle last Wednesday

1/4 mile: Approximate distance through the mall to Yankee Candle

8715 lbs: Weight of 7 cartloads pushed 1/4 mile through the mall

2100 lbs: Weight of the Toyota Tercel i drove to work

Literary Jewels From Clive Cussler, Pt. 3

(from Cyclops)

Foss Gly was waiting when LeBaron entered room six. He sat there, a brooding evil, a human murder machine immune to suffering or death. He smelled like decayed meat.

On The Novelties Of Semi-Forced Aceticism

What's it like living in an apartment with no heat? Kind of fun, initially. Like camping out in your own home. (Like being back on the ship during winter PR, now that i think of it.) On the face of it, i like the principle. It says, I live in the tropics. I don't hide from my surroundings. I drive with my car windows down. (Particularly now that the car's temperature control is broken and stuck on Full Heat.) It injects a little adventure into daily life. My theory on that is, the less you think you want adventure, the more desperately you need it. I haven't gotten too re-mired yet in the American day-to-day, but i continue to take my precautions.

Anyway: cold. I've slept inside a number of buildings before where i could see my breath upon waking up - most recently, i think, that below-freezing week on that concrete floor in Mexico - but it's really a nice thing now and then, if you haven't tried it. At least at night. Pile on the extra blankets, and all's right with the world. Early morning, however, is a different matter. I can't make my sourdough starter work because the yeast goes on strike below sixty. The bathroom's so cold that a hot shower fills the room with steam so dense you can't see through it and end up having to feel your way out. We still haven't tried the little "warm" setting on the dial of our window A/C unit, but yesterday we swallowed our pride and cranked up the living-room space heater. After a little experimentation, that and a hot cup of coffee got things just about where they Ought To Be. If only the rest of the world were so simple.

And besides, it's still sunny out. And they're not kidding here when they call their weather schizophrenic. It'll be back up to seventy this afternoon. Lots of places lay claim to the old "if you don't like the weather, wait a few hours" thing, but this one ain't kidding. They told me that in Britain, too, but all i ever saw when i waited a few hours was more drizzle, more darkness, and the thermometer dropping from four degrees Celsius to three. I'll take my chances here.