In September, on our way to Germany, Sibylle and I stopped off in Massachusetts to see my friends Ted and Bethanne. And to see the Genesis Turn It On Again tour. Genesis toured for the first time in 15 years this summer, doing twenty dates in Europe and twenty dates in the US. Hartford Connecticut was one of the shows, and as it is only an hour or so from where Ted lives, we decided last March to get tickets to the show.
The show was fantastic, nearly three-hours of non-stop Genesis, including some songs they haven’t played live in decades. Before and after the show there were announcements that it would be possible to buy a commercially pressed CD set of the show, taken directly from the soundboard. Ted was generous enough to buy two copies of the Hartford concert and my copy arrived in the mail just over a week ago.
I’ve listened to little else in the time since. Years ago, when Peter Gabriel had the Security album tour, it was recorded and turned into a 2-CD live album. During the show we saw he announced that the show was being recorded for a live album to deafening cheers of approval. Ever since then I’ve wondered if we were on that CD. With the Hartford CD I don’t have to wonder, I know. Ted, Sibylle, and I are all on that CD, along with 16,000 other happy fans.
The only problem is a slight fear of wearing out those sectors on my hard drive that contain the MP3 version of the show. I can always get a new hard drive, I suppose.
Roland S. Martin’s commentary on CNN got me to thinking. In a nutshell the primary system in America is broken. There are key states, namely the first to host their primary or caucus, that make or break a candidacy. Why shouldn’t all of America be in on the fun.
My idea, and I’m sure it isn’t original, is to have a National Primary day. All states will hold their primary or caucus on the same day, during the same hours. In effect a dress rehearsal for the election to follow. Now the candidates, and their election machines, will have to focus on the entire country. And, as an added bonus, the citizens won’t be bombarded for month after month about what who is or isn’t winning in other states.
I propose, then, that the first Tuesday in May be National Primary Day. That leaves six months for the parties to hold their conventions and select the final candidate. In November we all go vote again, en masse, for the next President of the United States.
I’m sure that allusions to the iconic This is Spinal Tap will abound on the Internets today, as a result of the latest point release to Mac OS X.
Here’s mine.
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While a lot of memories of my mother bring some tears with them, some are good. Occasionally they bring a smile or laughter. Yesterday was one of those good memory days.
Some background When the Beatles Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band album was released it caused quite a stir in the press. Enough so that my mom talked about it to my father. As a joke he bought her the album. She liked the music enough to go out and purchase the other Beatles’ albums; meaning I grew up with a combination of opera and the Beatles.
She also, like the rest of us, refused to listen to some songs as they would get stuck in her head.
Finally, she appreciated the Zits comic strip.
With all that in mind… I give you the November 13, 2007 Zits comic strip.
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A few things that I’ve been up to lately.
planning
A move from my current hosting provider to Blue Host, and a conversion from MT 2.661 to Wordpress. I’ve been at Pair forever and I have no complaints other than the price. Recently Sibylle was researching hosting providers for the new MAMTA site and through her I discovered that I am paying quite a bit more for my site on a monthly basis than I need. I also discovered that the latest release of Wordpress has a vastly improved MT import facility, so now I just need to take the plunge and convert already.
wanting
A new hard drive for my ThinkPad laptop. The current drive, the original equipment 80 GB drive is nearly full, so there’s no easy way to add a new partition for Ubuntu on it. A new drive (perhaps bigger) not only creates the space for a Linux install, it keeps the XP setup untouched just in case.
seriously considering
Making chili this weekend. The weather has been cold for a couple of weeks now, and I haven’t had a pot of spicy hot chili in too long.
researching
Eye exams. While my laser adjusted eyes are okay for 90 percent of the things I do, there are times and situations where I strain to be able to see. My frustration level is almost to the point of obsession, so it’s time to get some professional advice. I’ll be scheduling a complete exam as soon as possible so I’ll know for certain what my vision is or isn’t.
NB: I got the idea for this catch-all category, “up to,” from a posting over at notmyself.com.
Is there anything is the world as wonderful as a new pad of graph paper? Fresh smooth pages of quarter inch squares? Think of the possibilities. Floor plans, or furniture drawings, geometric doodles, and precision drawings.
Yesterday, while at Wal-Mart, Sibylle remembered that I wanted some graph paper and grabbed a three-pack for us. With mechanical pencils at the ready we each spent time capturing ideas for spaces in house. Piano studio, office, kitchen, and dining areas soon graced the opening pages of my tablet.
When I started high school I wanted to be an architect. It wasn’t until my junior year that I discovered computers and switched goals. A part of me, however, still likes the process of drawing things to scale, capturing ideas with pencil and paper.
Thank you, Sibylle, for the dreams and possibilities contained in the paper, and beyond.
We ventured into a couple of furniture stores yesterday afternoon, just looking for ideas. One of our favorite past times is designing a house for ourselves, and we like looking at open houses, model homes, and furniture stores to collect ideas.
The stores in this case were Ethan Allen and a Lazy Boy showroom. At Lazy Boy we found a couch we both liked. Ethan Allen had a bookcase that we both liked; enough so that we took a picture or two with Sibylle’s camera phone so we’d have something to remember later. Most of the other furnishings in the store just weren’t quite our style. The working-on-commission sales lady wasn’t my style either.
I find the mildly aggressive approach that sales people working on commission develop to be off-putting. Car salesmen are a particular breed, often hounding you across the parking lot when all you want to do is look. The same seems to hold true for furniture store employees. No sooner do you break the plane of their doorway than the next sales person in the rotation is charging across the floor with a loud greeting. They want to know you name, and to tell you theirs. They want to “help.” All I want is to be left alone until such time as I feel I need help.
Yesterday’s sales people weren’t awful, but my naturally introverted nature finds it difficult to fend these people off. Some portion of my energy is spent worrying about the next encounter with someone who is only trying to do their job, but (probably through no fault of their own) has developed an approach guaranteed to make me want to turn on my heel and leave. I guess I need to develop some spiel like, “Hey, thanks for offering to help. Tell you what, you let us browse with out interrupting and we’ll work with you when we are ready to buy. Pester us and we’ll buy elsewhere.” But that feels passive-aggressive or perhaps just sulky. so I don’t say it.
It can’t be an easy way to make a living, pestering people who probably want to be left alone; it certainly isn’t a way I could work.
We all have debt of one kind or another. Some good, some not so good. The funny thing about debt is that one seems to acquire it faster or more frequently that one gets rid of it. When was the last time you ended a loan?
For me that was this week. Three years ago, after losing my job in Illinois, we were forced to sell our house there. Unfortunately the market valuation for our house was somewhat smaller than the second mortgage lenders valuation. In other words, after selling the house and no longer having possession of it, I still owed a considerable sum of money.
This week saw the last payment made against that loan. The monkey of paying for a house I no longer owned was finally off my back. I’m not sure the full meaning of this even has sunk in yet. Perhaps it won’t until next month when I don’t have to send a check to Illinois.
Some lessons are learned the hard way. This lesson was not only hard, it was expensive too. It’s done and paid for now; one less piece of my past anchoring me there.
The Japanese Space Agency currently has a satellite orbiting the Moon. Included is a HDTV camera, which recently took these videos. Well worth a look.
Many years ago my father pointed out to me that increasingly people don’t say, “you’re welcome” anymore. Since then I have become aware that by and large he’s right. At the end of most transactions, be they in the grocery store, at the bank counter, or in a restaurant, both parties say, “thank you” to each other, but neither says, “you’re welcome.”
Watch for yourself the next time you are at the fast food counter, the employee will had you your food, and when you say, “thank you” they’ll respond with “thank you” as well. Or at the grocery store check out, or the bank, or restaurant. I find that I am conditioned to say “thank you” myself, even when I know that proper response is to say, “you’re welcome.” Just last night as Sibylle and I were leaving the new Longhorn Steakhouse we were thanked by several people and I said “thank you” to each of them in return.
It’s time to become welcoming again. When someone thanks you, say, “you’re welcome.” Or, if you want to thank them too, “you’re welcome, and thank you!”
Thanks for reading, and, you’re welcome, I enjoy the writing.