Minding the sandbox

It's April, dammit!

Sat, 26 Apr 2008 14:32:13 GMT

I'm so tired of cold and snow.

I'm reminded of a joke that a guy my dad worked with in North Bay used to tell. "I'm going to take the wife and kids camping this summer, if it falls on a weekend."

Insomnia sucks

Fri, 04 Apr 2008 08:36:27 GMT

How can my body be so tired and my brain so awake? Humans are so stupid. You don't see cats with insomnia.

Maybe they're sucking up all the sleep around me...

Kathye's report from the DFL Senate District 50 convention

Sun, 09 Mar 2008 16:44:38 GMT

OK, so in a fit of giddiness after Minnesota's caucus in February, Seth and I signed up to be delegates from our ward/precinct to the DFL (Democrat Farmer Labour) Senate District 50 convention.

I wore my Order of the Stick "I'm participating" tshirt and Seth wore a Vote Saxon shirt. We had fun, but it was very much like watching a trainwreck. Really, they spent so much time trying to include everyone, that no one was in charge, and nothing got done on time.

The call to order was supposed to be at 9am. Around 9:10 someone got on the mic and told us too many people were still trying to register, so we would start late. We were supposed to have a credential's report before doing any voting. But, they were running late, so we just went on and did stuff. Every so often we would have a special guest come in, and they would interrupt what we were doing to let them talk. The chaos actually was fun, since we had no place else to be.

I got to shake hands with Al Franken (he's running for US senate from Minnesota, and he showed up to give us a speech and meet-n-greet).

To decide who we would send to the state convention, we did a "walking caucus". It's an amazingly complicated process (just tried several times to type it up, and I'm giving up). Basically, some of the people there wanted to support a specific candidate or issue, and they had to get a minimum of 17 other people to group up with them in order to get a delegate to represent their candidate/issue at the state convention. There was a lot of negotiating between groups to get people to join up to get the minimum. Some groups at the end had very long names, representing all the sub-groups that had merged together (we were Franken/Fiscal responsibility, Supporting business in Minnesota, social justice, and veteran's benefits).

After all that, we had to go back upstairs to vote on resolutions. At the first caucus, anyone could get up and read a proposal, and if the room voted that it was ok, it went on to the district resolution committee to get merged with all the other groups in our district. So, you could stand up and say "Be it resolved that the Minnesota DFL party supports legislation banning the SciFi channel from cancelling any more shows", and if enough people in the room agreed, it would go on.

At the convention, we voted for which issues were most important to us, then we were supposed to get a chance to discuss any of those we wished to, and vote as to whether we wanted them to go forward to the state and then national platform. Unfortunately, the disorder that we'd had all day meant that we were way, way behind at this point, and only had about 30 minutes to discuss everything before we had to clear out of the high school we were in.

Here's a real resolution (didn't get beyond our group):

Be it resolved that the DFL party will not support any legislation that bans ownership of any breed of domesticated species and subspecies in the family Psittacidae, specifically parrots and parakeets.

Didn't know the anti-parrot lobby was so powerful.

So, we participated. Don't really feel the need to do it again, now that I see how it works (kept wanting to take control and get them organized, but I think they like not being organized).

Mortality

Tue, 26 Feb 2008 23:09:37 GMT

My friend Bob died today. He found out in October that he had a brain tumor, and now he's gone. It seems like it's been a long time, and no time at all. He was always bigger than life, and I suppose he always will be now.

"Death is just another path, one that we all must take.
The grey rain curtain of this world rolls back and then you see it...
white shores...and beyond, a far green country, beneath a swift sunrise."

Waves

Sun, 20 Jan 2008 23:37:00 GMT

Nothing really to say, just wanted to make sure that I got a post in in January!

Hi everyone!

Kathye

Merry Christmas!

Tue, 25 Dec 2007 00:15:30 GMT

Instead of a song, a letter today:

Fra Giovanni Giocondo (c.1435–1515) was a Renaissance pioneer,
accomplished as an architect, engineer, antiquary, archaeologist,
classical scholar, and Franciscan friar. Today we remember him
most for his reassuring letter to Countess Allagia Aldobrandeschi
on Christmas Eve, 1513.

I salute you. I am your friend, and my love for you goes deep.
There is nothing I can give you which you have not. But there
is much, very much, that, while I cannot give it, you can take.
No heaven can come to us unless our hearts find rest in it
today. Take heaven! No peace lies in the future which is not
hidden in this present little instant.

Take peace! The gloom of the world is but a shadow. Behind it,
yet within our reach, is joy. There is radiance and glory in
darkness, could we but see. And to see, we have only to look.
I beseech you to look!

Life is so generous a giver. But we, judging its gifts by their
covering, cast them away as ugly or heavy or hard. Remove the
covering, and you will find beneath it a living splendor,
woven of love by wisdom, with power. Welcome it, grasp it,
and you touch the angel's hand that brings it to you.

Everything we call a trial, a sorrow or a duty, believe me,
that angel's hand is there. The gift is there and the wonder
of an overshadowing presence. Your joys, too, be not
content with them as joys. They, too, conceal diviner gifts.

Life is so full of meaning and purpose, so full of beauty
beneath its covering, that you will find earth but cloaks
your heaven. Courage then to claim it; that is all! But
courage you have, and the knowledge that we are pilgrims
together, wending through unknown country home.

Happy Solstice, Merry Christmas

Fri, 21 Dec 2007 21:45:41 GMT

Happy Solstice, Blessed Yule, and Merry Christmas, y'all!

And to celebrate, here's a song by (natch) Peter Mayer

Where is the Light?
When it’s late December, dark and cold
Where is the light?
When old man year is bending low
Where is the light?
When the sun runs off to bed too soon
Where is the light?
And there’s nothing but a skinny moon
Where is the light?

CHORUS:
Where is the light?
Where is the light?
Where is the light? Oh…
The light’s inside of me

When it’s dark each morning when I rise
Where is the light?
And it’s dark when my eggs are fryin’
Where is the light?
And it’s dark when off to work I go
Where is the light?
And it’s dark again when I get home
Where is the light?

CHORUS:

It’s in my skin and in my bones
In my heart and in my soul
That light of life, so bright and golden
Like a summer day
When the sun goes missing in the sky
It is rising in my eyes
Chasing all that winter gloom away

I’m burning bright like kerosene
Where is the light?
I’m twinkling like the Pleiades
Where is the light?
I’m dancing like a candle flame
Where is the light?
I’m flaming like a fruit flambé
Where is the light?

CHORUS: (2X)

This little light of mine, I’m gonna let it shine
This little light of mine, I’m gonna let it shine
This little light of mine, I’m gonna let it shine
Let it shine, let it shine, let it shine!

The Golden Compass

Mon, 10 Dec 2007 00:24:56 GMT

Not going to say much, but... where would genre films be without Christopher Lee and Ian McKellen?

Omega con!

Thu, 29 Nov 2007 21:32:44 GMT

Gotta quick get an entry posted, so I can have one in November.

On November 9, we went to Omega con, which is a relax-a-con (where there aren't that many activities planned, so you just relax amongst like minded geeks).

See the pictures!

While we were there, we had drinks

We played video games

Moose decided he wanted to play miniature golf

Obi and Quigs decided to renew their vows

It's not a sleepover until we've done each other's hair

We played more games

We played with fire!

Moose found a prosthetic that he liked

And everyone told stories around the campfire

All in all, a good time was had by all. Especially me, because I ended up sleeping 12 hours in a row on Saturday night. Hey, it's all about what relaxes you...

Happy Halloween!

Thu, 01 Nov 2007 01:10:11 GMT

Wow, time flies!

Happy Halloween, Happy Samhain (depending on your persuasions)

For anyone celebrating New Year tonight, here's a song from Peter Mayer

We have been weighed down by sadness like a stone
And we have yearned, we have yearned
And we have sometimes felt so utterly alone
While we turn, while we turn

And we’ve been stricken by the wonder of it all
Stricken dumb, stricken dumb
And we have sometimes felt so faint we want to fall
Overcome, but all in all

CHORUS: I’d say this year in flight together has been fun
What say we make one more circle around the sun

We have raised our fists in anger and we’ve tried
To work it out, work it out
That we need each other, we cannot deny
There is no doubt, there is no doubt

So let us weave another dream in outer space
While we’re turning, while we’re turning
On this planet home that holds our human race
We still are learning, but all in all

CHORUS:

I’d say this year in flight together has been a good, good one
What say we make one more circle One more circle
One more circle around the sun

http://www.petermayer.net/

And while I'm ranting

Sun, 07 Oct 2007 20:28:52 GMT

Ian McKellen is in town, performing "King Lear".

And I couldn't get tickets to see him. I'd marked on my calendar when they would go on sale, but it didn't matter because they sold out 2 weeks before they were available to buy. The theatre here advertised to people to get season tickets, and pick Lear as one of their choices, if they wanted to see that play. I didn't figure that so many people would pony up for season tickets just to see the play, so I won't be going.

Oh, I discover that this isn't entirely true. I just thought about checking ebay -- if I want a pair of tickets for this, I could pay $500-$700 for them.

Oh well. At least this means I don't have to choose between spending time with my visiting parents, and going to see the play.

*pounds head*

(Just kidding, mom and dad, in case you're checking out Livejournal from my computer)

One good thing...

Sun, 07 Oct 2007 20:06:35 GMT

One good thing about "The Seeker" being such an amazingly bad adaptation of "The Dark is Rising", is that at least I wasn't exactly sure how the movie would go.

I tried to like the movie. I tried to disregard how it wasn't matching up the to book. I was doing pretty OK, too, until the incredibly bad ending, where they completely stopped trying to follow the book at all.

Coming home, I was trying to explain to Seth what happened in the book. One of the issues I had with the movie was that they showed the power of the Dark as actual darkness sweeping over the earth, and tarnishing major landmarks. In the book, the real power of the Dark was in turning human hearts and causing despair.

He said, "Well, if the power of the Dark is causing despair, then I guess they won one with that movie."

I was also ranting on about how, given the changes in this movie, how they couldn't really adapt "Greenwitch" or "Grey King". He said, "I don't think that's going to be a problem."

True, that.

Anniversary trip

Sun, 23 Sep 2007 04:04:02 GMT

Photobucket Album

Not dead yet!

Sun, 23 Sep 2007 03:34:42 GMT

Still working on my anniversary trip report.

So, here's something to distract you.

363 Days

Fri, 07 Sep 2007 13:10:38 GMT

Well, it's been 363 days since Seth and I got married. And, I'd do it again (with a few changes, like, checking the rules on how long your passport has to be good for before entering New Zealand).

We're leaving today for a weekend...somewhere. So far all I know is that I needed something nice to wear tonight, stuff to go walking in, and a swim suit (and stuff to wear in between).

As long as the mystery trip isn't just to the Mall of America, I'll be happy.

Why not just use the story that was written?

Sun, 02 Sep 2007 22:23:25 GMT

When I was a child, I loved Arthurian legend. I'm not even sure where I first read or saw it. But, I loved everything "Arthur". When I was in middle school, I discovered the "Dark is Rising" books, and I'm sure that the Arthur connection is part of what made me fall in love with the books.

So, I was happy to hear that a movie adaptation was being made of The Dark is Rising.

And what I saw in the trailer for "The Seeker" (good lord, they've changed the name, and not even using a title that's in the book), besides Christopher Eccleston, did not give me a good feeling about the movie. I'll still go see it. Maybe it'll be a good movie in its own right, even if it isn't a good adaptation. But some of what I've read is making me shake my head.

Why make Will's family non-supportive (one of the things I loved in the book was how close the family seemed)? Why make Max a bad guy? Why change the names of his parents? It's like whoever wrote this had an original story idea, and decided to cut and paste that story and TDIS together for the name recognition of the books?

And, to take this back to the beginning of this post, reports are that they're taking the Arthurian parts out. I can't imagine what The Grey King or Silver on the Tree would be without that.

*Sigh*

But I'm sure it'll look pretty.

Tagged!

Thu, 16 Aug 2007 01:28:12 GMT

OK, so I've been tagged with a meme. And it goes like this:

a. List seven habits/quirks/facts about yourself.
b. Tag seven people to do the same.
c. Do not tag the person who tagged you or say that you tag whoever wants to do it.

First off, I don't know seven people who haven't been tagged, so I'm skipping the tag part.

Second, I haven't thought of all seven, so I'll start with what I have and add from there.

1. Apparently I feel more sorrow for other people's tragedies/troubles than I feel for my own (also known as: "I was fine until someone else started to cry."

Testing my patience

Mon, 06 Aug 2007 02:21:21 GMT

OK, so I live in Minneapolis, where a major bridge recently fell into the Mississippi River.

This is most certainly a tragedy for the people and families involved, and a humongoid inconvenience to just about everyone, but...

After the first hour or so of the coverage of this, I was sick to death of how the media was handling this. We had the news coppers constantly circling. We had the news crews trying to get close ups of the rescue workers. At one point, they were filming firefighters who were climbing up to look into cars to make sure they didn't have anyone in them. The newsbot said, "We may be seeing exciting rescue footage, LIVE!". Well, the car was empty, so no exciting footage was to be found.

And then the exaggeration set in. The newsreaders started to say that this happened during the "height of rush hour".

Well, no.

It happened at the end of rush hour. Yes, having this happen at all during rush hour was not a good thing, but an entire freaking bridge just fell down! No need for additional dramatics.

And then we had the newsreaders who had done "research" -- by googling. They pulled up reports on the bridge, and tried to read the big words in a dramatic way -- that made it pretty obvious that they had no clue what these sentences meant. They interviewed professors who taught bridge design. With one of them, they asked him what kind of a bridge it was. He answered that it was a deck truss bridge. The reporter then asked what a truss was. There was a gap of several seconds where the professor was trying to figure out how to dumb down structural engineering enough for the reporter. He eventually settled for "It's the triangle part."

Not that there's anything wrong in not knowing that a truss is, but this reporter was trying to get a the physics of why a bridge stays up, and why this one might have fallen down boiled down into a 30 second clip in simple, easy to understand words. You know, people go to school for several months, if not years, to learn this sort of thing.

And then, they interviewed the fire chief, and asked him how quickly the bridge could be rebuilt. His guess was a couple of years, but with a look that said that they could have asked the person next to them for just as good an answer. Let's ask the police chief for the crop report next! Maybe the mayor can suggest some hot home decor tips.

Bah.

Testing my icon

Thu, 02 Aug 2007 01:01:40 GMT

OK, so I'm way too pleased with myself for having created one new icon...

Testing

Fri, 20 Jul 2007 22:10:46 GMT

Mostly, this is just so that the journal has something in it.