off to Minneapolis

Heading out to Minneapolis for a conference the next few days. This year it's already been DC, Orlando, Eugene, Tahoe and Seattle. Tomorrow it's Minneapolis, then in the next few months it's Denver, Reno, Seattle, and Minneapolis again. And if I'm really really really lucky, another side trip to Seattle again.

If you look in my job description, it does not mention travel anywhere. Still, as long as someone else is paying, who am I to complain? Airplanes and lonely hotel rooms are great places to get some writing done.

Speaking of writing, a quick update: No recent rejections. I submitted another short story, so I have four out for consideration right now and will be submitting another one at the end of the week, plus I'll send out a poem in a couple weeks. But I'm back at my novel, and I've met a successful author (over 40 books published) who also does writing classes, and her initial feedback is so positive that I'm thinking that I might be on to something.

must be an election year!

I just read that Bush has relaxed regulations so refineries can produce more gasoline without those pesky environmental concerns. All of you with 8 MPG SUVs can once again return to the pump this summer. In the same announcement, he said that no oil would be set aside for the national petroleum reserves for the next several months. Immediately after Bush's announcement, oil prices dropped.

Normally, gas prices rise dramatically after the July 4th weekend and then fall again in winter. Also, incumbents fare less well when gas prices are extra high. The Republicans know these things, of course, and they are desperate to ease the pressure for this November's elections.

Bush managed to do several things in one fell swoop:

1. screw the environment
2. help the oil companies, who just happen to be making record quarterly profits
3. feed America's "oil addiction," which just days ago he touted as a primary national concern
4. keep our oil reserves low, which will be terrible in the case of another major disaster
5. perpetuate our dependence on foreign oil, hurting our national security in the long run
   

The ONLY reason for making these decisions is to keep gasoline prices close to their current levels for a short time, perhaps, say, oh, maybe... through October?

My 1994 Toyota 4Runner, an SUV, gets about 16 MPG. While I would love to get a hybrid instead, my conscience is clear because I drive it only about 35 miles a week, or a full tank roughly every other month. I just got rid of my gas-powered lawn mower and got a leg-powered "reel" mower. I am doing my part to reduce America's "oil addiction," and I plan to figure out even more ways to be more efficient with our driving.

Bush, however, is rewarding rich, suburban republicans driving their Suburbans and Tahoes and Hummers with their fading yellow magnets that say, "Support Our Troops" and in the process screwing the environment, our children, our troops, the working poor, and our nation's long term economic health. When you are in debt, economic health is not created by raising your credit limit. Economic health is created by fiscal responsibility. Bush prefers raising the credit limit and toxifying the environment.

It really makes me physically ill to think of the arrogance, the sense of entitlement, the utter denial that most people have about their gasoline usage. How often do I hear someone say, "But I NEED the Tahoe/Suburban/Hummer... nothing else is big enough for three kids." Funny. When I was growing up, my dad and his three kids got around just fine in a small sedan.

Anyway, back to the point: I hate paying high gas prices, but the blatant disregard Bush shows for the environment, disaster preparedness, and national security is galling. All for a few pennies per gallon at the pump, which may or may not buy Republicans a few percentage points in November's election.

Pathetic.

still a little left in the tank...

(Nope, not a political post about gas prices, how they've risen because of the war, the obscene profits being made by the oil companies, or how gas prices should have risen further but Bush decided to open the national oil reserves to keep prices lower before the election... no, this is a post about soccer.)


Yesterday morning my over-30 soccer team trotted onto the field with our third-string goalkeeper between the sticks and just seven field players, one of which was at about 50% due to a mysterious injury in his hamstring. Our opponent had a full squad and three subs. We figured we were in for a very long and tiring 90 minutes. (Or, this being a Cup game, possibly 120 minutes plus penalty shots.)

We looked over our numbers and decided to play a 3-3-1, which turned into a 3-4-0 after a bit, which sort of devolved into a 2-5-0, with all seven of us trying to cover large sections of the field. 25 minutes into the first half, the injured guy got hurt more and essentially wandered around trying to get in the other team's way until halftime. Then he dropped out. So we switched to a 3-3-0. Our opponent managed only about four decent chances in the first half, and we managed three of our own and even a couple corner kicks. Our goalkeeper, being a tall guy, actually went all the way forward for the corners, but we failed to score. Just before halftime, the opponent managed a good corner kick and scored off a header. After all, it's not easy to mark all 10 men with just 7.

The second half saw more of the same despite being four men down. It took about 35 of the 45 minutes for the opponent to salt away their second goal (which was a weak bouncer that just eluded the keeper's hands), and we had some very good defending in the box. Again, we had a couple decent chances ourselves, and it was hard not to be proud of the final 2:0 score.

I'm a little sore today, but with my 39th birthday coming up I think I can feel pretty good about my fitness. It really was a good game on our part, though it helped that the opponent is simply not a very good team.

saving the world one pint at a time

Give blood today. I did.

(And you thought this post was about beer, didn't you?)

fourth time the charm, or I'm Just Not Good Enough

A Love Sonnet to Rejection

A rising eastern brightness wakens me--
Oh shit I might be late to work today--
In twilit corners I attempt to see
The cleanest clothes to don without delay.

The traffic's light; the train is right on time!
My fears, ill-founded, fade by clicks and clacks.
I close my eyes and drift to thoughts sublime
While rain outside purrs gently on the tracks.

An email in my inbox lurks in bold;
I see it's from that web site as I sit.
My tingling skin feels blood beneath it cold
I'm sure it's not rejection... is it? Shit!

The email says, "It's good, but we will pass."
Well, they can pucker up and kiss my ass!

"spending restraint"

In an article about the federal budget proposal unraveling in the House today, CNN.com quotes Bush as saying, "If necessary, I will enforce spending restraint through the exercise of the veto."

This is the same president that has made a habit of leaving the Iraq war out of the annual budget and then asking for "emergency" funding for the war in the hundreds of billions.

Is anyone fooled by Bush trying to spin himself as the "spending restraint" president?

But wait... since Republicans control both houses of Congress, doesn't Bush's statement imply that Republicans are unable to exercise fiscial restraint without his personal involvement via presidential veto? Republicans can't restrain government spending? Republicans are the party of "big government"?

Welcome to Wonderland, Alice. Have a piece of cake.

rats and a leaking ship

If the President authorizes a "leak" of classified information, and the President has the authority to declassify information, wouldn't that in and of itself stop the "leak" from being a "leak"? It would make the Plame leak no longer illegal, right? Essentially, if Libby got permission from the prez to drop the info on a reporter, that would essentially amount to declassifying the information.

Then why all the coverup in the White House?

The problem in the White House is that they have a serious problem with ethics. Courage is doing the right thing when no one is looking. Cowardice is doing the wrong thing and covering it up. THIS is the problem with the tendency towards secrecy in the Bush administration.

It may turn out that the biggest illegal activity was Libby's alleged lying to the grand jury. If Bush authorized the "leak," then it would no longer be a leak per se, it would just be an unethical (though legal) abuse of Bush's power as president. But as Bush has shown again and again, ethics and courage don't matter much in his administration; the public will again let him off the hook on the technicality that he didn't specifically break any law.

Maybe by now I should expect politicians to be corrupt, unethical, and untrustworthy. And maybe I'd say "so what" about Bush, as I mostly did with Clinton's misdeeds. But Bush's decisions have led directly to the death of over 2,300 American soldiers (talk about courage) and countless innocent Iraqis, and there is strong argument that indicates he has increased the world's terrorism, not decreased it. He's a policy disaster, and the entire kit and caboodle of them comprise an ethical quagmire.

But hey, as long as the Nascar Nation feels they can have a beer with him at a backyard barbecue, he makes a great leader of the free world, eh?

A few minutes ago in Chicago...

The time was 01:02:03 04/05/06. In just under two hours it will be that time here. Cool.

Rejected Again (again)!

Sestina got canned
I worked really hard on it
Ok, not that hard

I'll show them, I will
They've not heard the last of me
I've got another

a depressing time of year

I hate baseball season. The fact that the Earthquakes moved to Houston and left the Bay Area with no MLS team makes it worse. I'm happy the World Cup is this year, but still... once tonight's basketball game is over there is little else to look forward to until late August when college football starts up again.

I can think of no sporting reason that baseball became our "national pastime." It's so lame they can't even play it in a light rain. 95% of the game consists of three players--the pitcher, the catcher, and the batter.

I had the opportunity to hear Ken Burns speak last year, and he gave me the only credible reason I can think of that baseball is so popular. You hear football fans say, "Remember that [catch|goal-line tackle|etc.] that won that game?" You hear basketball fans say, "Jordan was really something that day he scored 60." You hear baseball fans say, "Remember that time we piled in the back of the station wagon and dad took us to Fenway?" That is, the experience is not about the sport but about family, friends, atmosphere.

I think that's one reason soccer is so popular elsewhere in the world but not in the USA. I play on a team, and the only spectators we get are the occasional wife and kids that are dragged along. We sometimes play on fields next to a Latino game--in our area it's mostly Mexicans--and there are literally hundreds of people out with barbecues, kids, coolers... it's a whole community event.

I guess that's why baseball is so popular. The game's pace (glacial) lends itself to frequent trips to the barbecue, bathroom, beer cooler, Asia, etc. It becomes a community event, not a game.

But I really wish the blight on sports that is Major League Baseball would wither and fade away. Sure, it would put some sportswriters out of work, but overall the impact on America would be positive.

a good reason to stay away from Lake Merritt

So I flew across the country today. That gave me the opportunity to browse Southwest Airlines' Spirit magazine. Its featured destination on page 34 was Oakland. The first item in the summary was this "Best Factoid":

Not only is the formerly undamned tidal marsh now known as Lake Merritt the largest urban saltwater lake in the United States, it is also the country's first wildlife sanctuary.

OK, perhaps I missed a news item. Lake Merrit was recently undamned? If it is "formerly undamned," that would mean that it is no longer "undamned," which would make it damned, right?

Maybe it was just a misspelling of dammed, but just to be safe, I'm going to start wearing garlic around my neck whenever I go to downtown Oakland.

Rejected No Longer

Boy, was I surprised to check my email this morning and find that one of my stories had been accepted for publication. It's a small, literary journal, a new one. My story (a personal essay, actually), will appear in their first print issue. One publication does not a career make, but it has come more quickly than I anticipated. And, even though I don't think I will actually get paid for the story, I find I am euphoric today--difficult to concentrate, but generally in a very good mood.

liquid sunshine rains
all butterflies and sugar
accepted at last

Another Downed Tree!

Remember The Tree That Fell?

Now, we've got the sequel: The Tree That Really Fell! This is the story. These are the photos.

Shortly after noon today, after a hard morning of yardwork and paperwork, I sat down for a few minutes on the couch. Then, a loud noise like one of the boys riding his bike full speed into the garage door had me up and running for the door. Partly to make sure no one was hurt, and partly to deliver some heck to the kid that did whatever it was.

As I sped out the front door, I saw something quite unexpected (see the photos below). The irony in this is that on Thursday, we called the city and had the sidewalk guy come out. For years, the sidewalk next to this tree has been buckling, pushed up by the roots of this tree. It finally got out of hand, and the city guy put some tar on the trip hazard and said he'd schedule someone to come out later this summer to take down the tree and fix the sidewalk.

Fortunately, it was a city-planted tree, and the policeman who responded to our call got the tree guys out within an hour. They cut it all up and got rid of it except the thick stem, which requires "heavy equipment and a dump truck." Also fortunately, no car was parked there at the time and no children were playing in that area.

Cal to win NCAA basketball national championship

You heard it here first. Cal is going to win not one, but BOTH NCAA basketball championships this year. Men's and Women's. After they do, I will be hailed as the only genius in the country to have predicted it.

There is a fine line between genius and a lot of other things. I've been called a lot of other things.

Writing update: Still waiting for rejection on four submissions made at the end of February. I don't expect to hear for a while, so I'm just sitting tight. I have written another story which is currently in revision for submission to a contest at the end of March. So that's that.

W

Warning: Liberal Content Ahead

I find it hard to believe that many people in my town still appear proud of their "W in '04" bumper stickers. Don't they realize by now that they've been had?

Does anyone know what the W in George W. Bush stands for? I've never learned that. I know his father's W stood for Walker. Here are some possibilities:

• Waffle. As in, waffle on the reasons for sending over 2,300 GIs to their deaths. Was it WMDs? Spreading democracy? Affiliation with Al Quaida?
• Waver. As in, wavering on his "mandate" from his landslide 2004 election victory. What were his top priorities? Oh, yeah: Social Security reform, right?
• Wimp. As in, the tag his dad picked up and W clearly has been desperate to shed from the family name with his "Bring 'em on" bravado and "Mission Accomplished" idiocy.
• Weak. As in, the administration's response to Katrina devastation.
• Whoops. As in signing a deal to turn over control of our nation's ports to a company housed in a prime Al Quaida country. Or as in, "Whoops, guess we goofed on the Iraq thing." Or as in, "Whoops, maybe we should make sure we have the right target before we start spraying the buckshot." (Guess it's really the same mistake, isn't it?)
• Warrant. The GOP is pretty familiar with the concept of warrants and indictments.
• Where? Back to that WMD thing again.
  
• Whopper. OK, back to that WMD thing again.
• Wrong. I would say "back to that WMD thing again," but this one applies to so many, many aspects of Bush, his staff, and his presidency that it doesn't even come close.
• Waste. Over 2,300 American lives have been wasted bringing civil war, terrorism, and instability to a country that, while run by a ruthless dictator, had been pretty stable and non-threatening to the USA. What a waste of people, power, prestige, equipment, and money.
  
• War. Clearly, Bush's middle name is War. It's defined everything about his presidency. A guy who could have been known forever as a truly heroic leader after 9/11 by going after and demolishing Al Quaida instead chose what he no doubt thought would be an easy war for the greatest military power on Earth. I believe that Bush will, after a hundred years of hindsight has been applied, be known as one of the worst presidents in our nation's history.

I read recently that the Democrats are so wrapped up in W-hating that they have lost the ability to put forth a proactive agenda or plan of any kind. Perhaps. But right now the most proactive, right, forward-thinking plan is any plan that counteracts even a small amount of damage Bush and his administration have done to our country.

It's my belief that the simple truth is that the country has become too big for human beings to run effectively. The problems have become too large, change too rapid. In such an environment, even the best people get caught up in a cycle of confusion, special interests, and power brokering on small levels. The big issues (health care costs, the economy, security, ethical behavior of corporations, the environment, the deficit) get lip service because no one in Washington really has any idea how to change the existing systems so they actually work.

It is a cynical view, but I don't believe Democrats in charge would be any more effective at creating positive change than Republicans. The difference is that while Republicans are in charge, the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. While Democrats are in charge, the gap tends to narrow and the environment gets more attention and deficits are smaller. As part of the disenfranchised "middle" class, I tend to fall on the side of the poor people, the workers, the environmentalists, the people in favor of religious freedom, those in favor of restrictions on corporate behavior, etc.

I guess I'd make a great writer...

Here is the quiz.

Here is the result I got: 93 points. That grades out to the following:

You'll probably make a great writer. You should think very carefully before getting married, having children, or buying a pet, however. Walking into your livingroom and discovering the dust-covered skeleton that was your cat -- or your spouse -- can be really bad for morale.

I never thought I'd say this...

I wrote a sestina today. It wasn't in my mind to do that when I woke up, or even when I started writing it. I won't post it here because I plan on submitting it for rejection by an online publication. After the rejection I might post it. Or not. I might save it for a later compilation of my rejected stories, poems, haiku, and essays. So there.

A sestina, by the way, is defined thus:
A fixed form consisting of six 6-line (usually unrhymed) stanzas in which the end words of the first stanza recur as end words of the following five stanzas in a successively rotating order and as the middle and end words of each of the lines of a concluding envoi in the form of a tercet. The usual ending word order for a sestina is as follows:

First stanza, 1- 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6
Second stanza, 6 - 1 - 5 - 2 - 4 - 3
Third stanza, 3 - 6 - 4 - 1 - 2 - 5
Fourth stanza, 5 - 3 - 2 - 6 - 1 - 4
Fifth stanza, 4 - 5 - 1 - 3 - 6 - 2
Sixth stanza, 2 - 4 - 6 - 5 - 3 - 1
Concluding tercet:
middle of first line - 2, end of first line - 5
middle of second line - 4, end of second line - 3
middle if third line - 6, end of third line - 1

But you already knew that, I'm sure.

blue funk day

The time is out of joint, and things seem no longer to be what they used to be. Some days it's hard to see all the good. Blue funk days. But I know there's plenty of good, in fact more than my share, and now guilt piles on the wagon, straining the axles and creaking the joints and making the horses sweat and snort with the strain of dragging the wagon past nine a.m. Sunny warmth outside, though the forecast is torrential rain. Same as yesterday. But other things are different, and I get tired thinking how many more years I have to hitch those horses to the same wagon. And I wonder how many more times the forecast will be wrong, and I'll wake up on a blue funk day while the rest of the world smiles sunny and warm.

three more out for deliberation

I recently sent three more stories out for rejection. Now I am in a very focused period where I will spend an entire month writing one short story for one contest and ignore all other writing opportunities. We shall see how it goes.

they always write back
I know they really like me
one more rejection

so, THAT didn't work.

I now have no stories out there awaiting rejection letters. They have all already been rejected. One novel submission and three short stories (one of them rejected twice!). I will, however, be sending out two more stories tomorrow, and then a personal essay later this week, and finally another short-short submitted to a web site. Oh, and I sent my novel to the Pacific Northwest Writers Association Literary Contest. But they can't reject it... they can only fail to give it a prize. So that's nice.

At some point I will have to rebuild my personal web site (not this blog) to showcase all my rejection letters and my works-in-progress. And, hopefully, one day my actual publications! (I mean fiction. I already have a few published articles posted there.)

knew it was coming
at least they got my name right
those rejection blues

Bombs Away

If at first you don't succeed, revise it and send it somewhere else. That's what I've done with a story that got rejected last week. I have revised the hell out of it, and I hope I didn't make it worse. If you calculate it all out, I believe I spent about six hours on it. At 417 words, that works out to 69.5 words per hour, or 1.16 words per minute.

During NaNoWriMo, I averaged about 1,250 words per hour, but that did not include revision time.

The new place I've submitted accepts only eight stories for each quarterly issue, and I am imagining they get several hundred submissions. So I'm not holding out much hope. But until I get that return email saying "no way jose, your story stinks," I still cling to a fool's hope.

PS: Seattle is beautiful this week. Despite the rain, the Olympics are glorious across the Sound from the 14th floor of the Wells Fargo building. I do miss living in this city.

Go Bears

Bears beat Stanford. Though why the Cronicle claims it was the first-ever sellout of Haas Pavilion, I'm not sure. Particularly when Cal's release, right there on their web site, says Haas was sold out when Stanford visited two years ago.

REJECTED AGAIN!

Egads. Both my "flash fiction" pieces were rejected by QuickFiction. I may submit one of them to another magazine, so I won't post them here now, but to commemorate the occasion, here is a flash haiku:

dreams dashed, no glory
battle lost, a war to win
rejected story

Baseball may be gone, but...

My faith in the international sporting community has been restored. I have been vaguely disturbed over the years by the trend in the Olympics of not only allowing but encouraging the participation of professional athletes. It's happened in basketball and hockey and baseball, and it's made me wonder about the meaning of the Olympics. Is it to become just another money-making venue for highly paid prima donnas to strut in front of cameras and adoring throngs? It's already sold out to corporate sponsorship and TV contracts, but at least they could rely on the emotion and integrity of using "amateur" athletes in most sports.

Then, in one fell swoop, the IOC got rid of baseball, and some of the balance was restored. (They also got rid of softball, which I think is a tragedy, and not just because the USA won every game.) At least we wouldn't have to hear about how A-Rod and Barry Bonds were waffling about whether their hangnail was bad enough to keep them from joining the US National team.

Now, more news comes from the Olympics to restore my faith further. Curling, one of the weirdest sports I've seen, will no doubt have center stage during these Olympics in Turin, Italy, thanks to a special calendar that helps promote the sport's exquisite athletes. (No, I have not purchased this calendar.) I mean, who could fail to love an ice sport that does not use skates, instead utilizing brooms and stones? Alas, there is no swimsuit division, but I still will be sure to catch the high definition broadcast (if there is one).

Writing Update
I have written two new short stories but have not yet heard back from either QuickFiction or The First Line. I don't expect to until some time probably near the end of March.

pins & needles (or, update from the author)

Although I've already received my first novel rejection letter, I am currently on pins and needles awaiting the result of three short story submissions, all due today. Two are "flash fiction" submitted to Quick Fiction, and the other is a 2,000 word story submitted to The First Line. I've already got another story in first draft to submit to Thema, though they have been affected by the hurricanes. (If any of my regular readers would like to read any of these stories, let me know. I would be happy to share them privately and accept any comments.)

kicked, raw, from the nest
will it fly or will it fail?
story submitted

Kudos to the Organizers

Last night, the annual "pinewood derby" was run for our local Cub Scout pack. It's one of the two events my scout loves each year, though his dad (me) has woeful woodworking skill. Actually, it's not the lack of skill but rather the lack of patience. When I think of all the things I could be doing on a Saturday afternoon, spending hours and hours perfecting a little, wooden car is not really near the top of the list. In fact, I would say it falls slightly below "laundry" and "mowing the lawn."

Last year's race was a tremendous success for us. We created an inspired design of the USS Hornet that won a "most original design" trophy. The quality of the woodworking was questionable at best, and it was slow as a snail compared to the fast cars, but there he was, up on stage receiving a trophy.

This year, I felt it important to have a discussion about expectations.

By the end of the race night, we had achieved our goal of getting a 2nd place run in one of the heats, and we never finished lower than 4th, but still the car (a tugboat design) was, shall we say, less than speedy. Tugs are not designed for speed, after all. And, looking at the other designs, and knowing that he'd won a trophy for design the previous year, we were not expecting much.

My hat, however, is off to the organizing committee. In addition to the trophies, they awarded certificates to all the other boys who entered cars. Ours was, by luck, the very last one to be awarded, for "Best Maritime Design." Other awards included "Most Heavily Armed" (for a tank car), "Most Likely to Pull Someone Over" (for a police car), and "Best Use of Hardware" (for another police car with real lights that blinked).

The transformation simply amazed me. The last half hour of the night, E was desperate to go home, knowing he wasn't going to win anything. He was frustrated, tired, disappointed, bored. Then, he walked up on stage, shook hands with the race official, and got his certificate. As we walked out of the venue, he was all smiles and showed me his certificate. He asked, "Can we frame this?"

Right before bed, he got out last year's car and last year's trophy and lined them up next to this year's car and this year's certificate right near his bedroom door, so he would see them right when he woke up. What magic a simple thing like a certificate can bring to a little boy's life.

REJECTED

I failed to interest the small, independent, mid-list publisher in my first novel, "Across the Stream." Their rejection letter says they publish two books per year, and mine didn't make the cut. No indication of how many submissions they get.

Back to the Writer's Market to submit again.

travel poetry

coffee-stained papers
crumpled on an airplane seat
haiku from the road


channels mislabled
Law & Order on AGAIN?!
I wish I could sleep


sudden gusts of wind
sweep across bare, white plateau
farts in hotel bed


big mac for dinner
taxi stinks like an ashtray
how was your flight, sir?


smiling stewardess
no, I don't wear red makeup
pen leaking again

2222 and counting

Do you ever watch your odometer when it gets close to some milestone number? Do you ever watch it to try to see the exact moment when it rolls onto that number, to the point of endangering everyone on the road while you glue your eyes to your dashboard?

Oh. Um... well, me neither.

Anyway, I just noticed that 2,222 is a pretty palindromic number. That happens to be the number of dead American soldiers due to the Iraq war at this moment (as reported by icasualties.org).

Unfortunately, like a car odometer, it can't go any lower once it's hit that number. Or rather, maybe it can. You know, an unscrupulous person could set the odometer back in order to sell a used car. It's not unprecedented for the current administration to work a little creativity into figures they report, particularly about the war.

that's interesting makeup...

Today I flew through Chicago to Washington, DC. The flights were really quite nice except this little episode.

I like to use the pens we have at work. They are microball-roller style, very fine point, very smooth feel. The only problem: Put them on an airplane, and one out of three times they'll spring a leak, right at the tip where your fingers are.

It was the red pen today. I realized before it got too out of hand, though very quickly my hands looked like I'd lost a fight with a kindergarten art project. The pen was tossed, and I switched to traditional ball-point.

About ten minutes later, the snack cart came by. The flight attendant gave me a nice smile and for some reason made sure to let me know that the drink cart was right behind her. Sure enough, a few minutes later the drink cart came by. They gave me what I asked for, then as an afterthought I figured I'd ask for some napkins to try to clean up my hands.

That's when she nodded and said, "I was going to ask." Odd; she couldn't possibly see the ink on my hands from the aisle. I was in the window seat. As she handed me a stack of napkins, she said, "I thought it was some sort of new thing, like an Indian red ink mark, only to the side." The Japanese guy in the aisle seat then nodded gravely and said something along the lines of, "It's pretty bad."

They coached me through wiping as much of the red smudges off my nose and chin as possible, but it wasn't until two hours later when I visited the restroom that I was able to wipe most of it off, at least to the point where it didn't look worse than a minor skin irritation.

Other than that, the flight was great.

a "writing" group

I love my new writing group. I've attended three meetings for a total of five hours now, and we've spent approximately thirty minutes writing. But we talk a lot. Which is kind of a different experience for me. The only downside to this writing group is that it occurs once a week during prime soccer-playing time.

The group consists of sevenish people (five to seven usually), and I happen to be the only man. Which is OK with me. The ages of the women range from the indescribably young (she really is turning 29 next month) to the world-weary (fifties, I think), but all are kind and interesting and fun. This is not a diverse group--all educated, white, suburban people. We meet at a coffee shop (not Starbucks) in what might be the wealthiest, whitest town in the east bay. I come in from Walnut Creek and can feel the whiteness of this mall, that's how nondiverse it is.

Anyway, I'm glad I've found this group. While I may not have written much in my 5 hours of meeting with them, I have gained inspiration and momentum and comeraderie and have managed to write about 10,000 words more than I probably would have if I weren't hooked in with them.

why I am scared of our president

I have no doubt that George Bush thinks he is doing everything in the best interests of America. I just think he's dreadfully, dangerously wrong. Everything he's done has been calculated to consolidate power into the hands of the president and to marginalize the judicial and legislative branches of government. Everything he's done has been done in the name of "national security." However, everything he's done has pushed the country in the direction of becoming a police state, or an authoritarian structure.

Why is this not good for the average citizen? What harm could there possibly be in making the country safer in this manner? Let's ignore for the moment the thousands of experts who refute the claim that the country is safer today than on September 11, 2001. Let's look at why this could be bad for Joe Sixpack.

• Bush enacted a "first strike" doctrine when he invaded Iraq. While other presidents have struck first on occasion, the policy has always been one of prudence and restraint. Bush turned that around and said he will go kick ass if he thinks someone's ass needs kicking, even if they didn't do anything to us. (See: the well documented LACK of connection between Iraq and 9/11. Also, the well documented LACK of evidence of WMD in Iraq.)
  
• Bush initiated a "war on terror," claiming expanded presidential power because we are in "war" time. A war with no definable enemy and no discernable end point is a dangerous thing. Given that there will always be people who disagree with the president, this is potentially a war that never ends, with an enemy that can never be clearly identified.
• Bush has encouraged the use of wire taps without seeking the warrants that are traditionally required. He claims this is legal due to the expanded executive power in "war time" and the necessity of such wire taps for "national security." A creepier invokation of fear in order to spy on citizens has never been told. If you do not have the necessary evidence to secure a warrant for a wire tap, then perhaps you should not be presuming the target guilty. Bush's justification: We are only tapping those international calls to or from people who are suspected of having connections to terrorist organizations. Let's play the "Six Degrees of Osama" game and determine whether your phone call to that hotel in Vancouver qualifies. What is next: justified searches of people's homes without proper warrants in the name of national security?
  
• Under Bush, American citizens have been labeled "enemy combatants," making them enemies in the war on terror. Now we have a president who can tap your phone without just cause and who can call you an enemy combatant in the "war on terror." It becomes very convenient that the enemy is not clearly definable in this new "war on terror."
• Bush's administration has held "enemy combatants" and "suspected terrorists" indefinitely, without formal charges, without access to lawyers or even family members, on foreign soil. The Guantanamo Bay facility is a good place to keep legitimate prisoners, and I've no problem with that. The problem lies in the idea that Bush thinks that anyone he has detained is, by virtue of their detention, a legitimate prisoner. Circular logic: We would only detain you if you were dangerous, so if you've been detained then you must have been dangerous.
• Bush and his administration have defended the use of torture and extreme interrogation techniques for enemy combatants held on foreign soil. If you're detained, you must be dangerous. If you're dangerous, you must know something. If you know something, by god, we'll get it out of you, even if it kills you.

Now let's see how this slippery slope works.

You want to plan a nice little vacation to Puerto Vallarta, so you call up this nice resort there. You didn't realize that a suspected terrorist had once stayed there, back in 1994. Since the hotel has ties to a suspected terrorist organization, the NSA listens in on your phone call. During your call, you have the TV on in the background, and the CNN anchor reads a story about Osama bin Laden. The NSA hears that in the background and do not realize it's actually the TV. A month later, you are picked up at the airport while trying to board your plane to Mexico. The government instead treats you to an all-expenses paid vacation to Guantanamo Bay. When you arrive, the interrogators are told that you might have ties to Osama and that you were going to a hotel where a suspected terrorist had been known to stay. They are told to get whatever information you have. And, they know they are allowed to torture you because you have been labeled an enemy combatant, and you are on foreign soil.

Far-fetched, sure. But if it's possible, then it's not a long stretch to imagine a different scenario:

You didn't mean it to happen, but you had an affair with a married woman who subsequently left her husband and moved in with you. What you did not realize was that the jilted husband was an NSA wire tapping agent. He watches your phone until a mysterious call comes in from overseas to your phone, a call you did not expect from someone you don't know. It could have been a wrong number. It could have been arranged. He then sets up a wire tap on your phone to listen in on all your conversations.

Or maybe this: You are a Democrat about to run for president in the next election. A "wrong number" call from a phone in Iran rings at your home phone. Boom, the NSA suddenly has the authority to tap your phone.

That last one is not so far-fetched. In this president's administration, we are only one ethically-challenged moment away from such a misuse of power. That is why this president scares me. He thinks the existence and use of such power is just fine, and justified, and that no one will misuse it. Restrictions are put on power, however, to protect us from false accusations, from belligerent evildoers, from bullies with badges. It is important to remember that not all bad guys wear black hats, and not all people who wear white hats are beyond reproach.

it defies categorization

I just saw a commercial saying that Cadillac won some award for the #1 luxury SUV this year.

God bless America. We have an entire category for luxury sport utility. Is it for work? Yes! Is it for sport? Yes! Is it luxurious? Yes! The only thing that makes this sweeter is that it's a Cadillac, a brand traditionally known for its reliable and sturdy trucks.

God bless America. Yesterday I saw a commercial for the Chevy Tahoe. One of its new features is a rear-view video camera. Yes! It's so large that you can't reliably use mirrors or the rear windows to see behind you, so you have to drive by video game!

God bless America. Two separate studies released recently by independent organizations estimate that the true cost of the Iraq war will be between $900 billion and $2 trillion dollars. The authors of both have been detained at the Guantanamo Bay detention facility for jeopardizing American national security by publishing the studies.

Uh... My mom said Kevin Costner

A woman--apparently a mom of a kindergartener because she was coming from that part of the school--smiled at me this morning. She was heading to her car, I was heading to my home. I have to admit, she was cute and enjoyed quite a comely figure.

Anyway, she stopped to say "hi" before getting into her minivan. Then she dropped it on me: Apparently, she thinks I look like Kenny Chesney. My mom used to say I looked like Kevin Costner. Since they're both rich and famous, I'll take these comparisons as compliments. But I'm not sure I believe them.

Must-See TV

For anyone who has ever seen "The Play," you gotta check out the low-definition TV version by Sony. It is truly awesome. Hell, even if you haven't seen "The Play," check it out.

Soccer really IS exciting!

This just in: Soccer is more exciting than baseball!

Although this scientific study definitely fits into Mark Twain's "lies, damn lies, and statistics" category, in my personal experience there is virtually nothing exciting about baseball except that home run that bounced off Jose Canseco's head. The only reason baseball is our national pasttime is that it offers more opportunities per minute of action to retrieve more beer from the fridge or to visit the restroom. You're virtually guaranteed not to miss any action.

Happy New Year!

I thought I'd start the new year with a sign of things to come, so to speak. To the left is an actual sign posted at a museum in Vermont that we visited. I think maybe they should get a new landscaper.

Vacation Update: Terrific Times!

Weather is here; wish you were beautiful.

I guess I'm royalty...

I've been elevated to the status of royalty recently. Someone eminently qualified to identify true value has linked to my blog and referred to me as Haiku/Novel King. A great honor, and I am humbled.

when will this day end?
clock, in slow motion, ticks once
vacation pending

Persistence

"Press on. Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not. Nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not. Unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not. The world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent."
- Former US President Calvin Coolidge (1872-1933)

Words for me to remember when my novel boomerangs back at me at a hundred miles an hour, having caught a rejection letter on its spinning arc. For the twentieth time.

coming to grips with my role

I have always thought of myself as a midfielder, wanted to be a midfielder. I played midfield for the past five years. I have the fitness and speed to be a very good winger, but this season I was forced into central defense because we had so much quality in midfield.

That was hard for me at first. As a sweeper, I don't run as much. I don't get involved in the attack. I have much less room for error--one mistake, and I'd better recover or it's one-on-one with the goalie.

Over the past several weeks, though, I've come to realize that I am a sweeper by nature. What seems to me to be natural and relatively effortless, other players have been praising as "great" play. I see the field and the play developing. I have good closing speed and recovery speed, and I couple that with good anticipation of where the play will go. I have even learned how to direct my other defenders on the field.

I still wish I were in midfield, attacking and building the game, but I have finally come to grips with the fact that I should be in central defense. That's just who I am, in my skills and in my personality. I have always loved watching great defensive play, whether it's football or soccer or even baseball (maybe that's why I never really got into tennis or golf or track, for example). And I do get a sublime satisfaction in thwarting an offensive threat and deflating the attackers' hopes.

Aw, hell, I never scored many goals anyway and wasn't about to turn into a serious offensive threat. Better to do what I'm good at and accept who I am than try to be something I'm not.

Polemicist

CLICK THIS LINK: [link]

My 16-year-old nephew, Max, is the bassist for this band in the DC area. They have two tracks on this web site at the time of this writing. "Numb" is great. The other is good, too.

Anchors Aweigh

Remember that feeling when you first had to ask a girl out? (OK, since more than half of my readers (2 of the 3) are women, perhaps you don't remember that.) Anyway... the hours of working up some semblance of nerve, the sweaty palms as you try to dial the phone, the absolute terror as you hear her voice on the other end of the line... and the anticipation of a rejection with a laugh track louder than the Cosby Show's followed by snickering and pointing at you all the next week as you walk down the halls of your junior high?

That's a little like the feeling I have as I print out my cover letter and first 40 pages of my manuscript to submit to a midlist publisher I think would be perfect for Across The Stream.

Wish me luck. Or don't. I guess it's up to you.

Proofreading Failure Leads to Distrubing Result

I'm happy the Cal Bears basketball team won their game over Akron tonight, but I was stumped by this portion of Yahoo! Sports' game summary:

Theo Robertson gave Cal a 62-49 lead with 12:50 to play on the front end of a fast break. Dambrot was forced to put Travis back on the floor, and he responded with two quick baskets that helped cut the advantage to 64-48 with 10:20 remaining.

I am not certain I would call going from a 13 point differential to a 16 point differential "cutting the lead." More distrubing is the fact that Akron appears to have lost a point despite getting two quick baskets. Curiouser and curiouser...

That Darned Survey

So here it is because someone asked for it. Blame that person.

1. WHAT COLOR ARE YOUR KITCHEN PLATES?
   We have plates? Seriously, mostly they are white, but I prefer the plastic ones with drawings on them done by my children.
2. WHAT BOOK ARE YOU READING NOW?
   I don't read books; I only write them. Last book I read was... um... hold on... nope, can't remember. It might have been the four books of the Hitchhiker's Guide trilogy.
3. WHAT IS ON YOUR MOUSE PAD?
   A renaissance-style map of the world.
4. FAVORITE BOARD GAME?H
   aven't played it in 33 years, but I used to love Uncle Wiggly. Watch out for the Skeezix!
5. FAVORITE SMELLS?
   evergreen; desert dust during a thunder shower
   
6. WHAT IS THE FIRST THING YOU THINK OF WHEN YOU WAKE UP IN THE MORNING?
   what time I have to be somewhere
   
7. FAVORITE COLOR:
   generally forest green, though rich, dark blues are good, too
   
8. LEAST FAVORITE COLOR:
   Red
   
9. HOW MANY RINGS UNTIL YOU ANSWER THE PHONE?
   I am getting used to ignoring the phone, and it is quite liberating.
   
10. FAVORITE CHILD'S NAME?
    I love both of my children equally and don't have a "favorite." The name for a child I liked best but didn't get to use is "Tess" for a girl. NOT "Tessie," though.
    
11. CHOCOLATE OR VANILLA?
    Usually vanilla.
12. DO YOU LIKE TO DRIVE FAST?
    I tend to drive fast, yes, but I don't look at it as a thrill or a recreational activity.
    
13. DO YOU SLEEP WITH A STUFFED ANIMAL?
    Nope.
    
14. DO YOU LIKE THUNDERSTORMS?
    Brilliant.
15. WHAT WAS YOUR FIRST CAR?
    1979 Subaru wagon. I was a junior in high school. There was a girl on the track team who had a white 1965 Mustang with red leather interior. It was sweet. My Subaru was not so sweet, but it got me around OK.
    
16. WHAT IS YOUR SIGN?
    Cancer. But in the sense that BSP took the question, my sign is "DO NOT DISTRUB."
    
17. DO YOU EAT THE STEMS OF BROCCOLI?
    Ayep.
    
18. IF YOU COULD HAVE ANY JOB WHAT WOULD IT BE?
    If that isn't the best straight line I've seen today, I don't know what is. Anyway, one of the best jobs in the world is former president of the United States. You get like $200,000 a year, you get your own bodyguards... sweet.
    
19. IF YOU COULD HAVE ANY COLOR HAIR, WHAT WOULD IT BE?
    I kind of like the color I used to have, when I had hair.
    
20. IS THE GLASS HALF FULL OR HALF EMPTY?
    Half full. And if I leave it out in the rain, it will soon be entirely full.
    
21. FAVORITE MOVIE?
    The Sting, Pirates of the Caribbean, Lord of the Rings, Mary Poppins, Singin' in the Rain
    
22. DO YOU TYPE WITH YOUR FINGERS ON THE RIGHT KEYS?
    Urd/
    
23. WHAT'S UNDER YOUR BED?
    a big basket full of wrapping paper. some books. slippers. lots of dust.
    
24. FAVORITE SPORTS TO WATCH?
    Football and soccer. I can like hockey, too, and sometimes like to watch a good boxing match. Can't stand tennis, golf, baseball, etc. on TV.
    
25. YOUR SINGLE BIGGEST INTENSE PAIN?
    A good friend totally crunched my ankle playing soccer several years ago. Needed crutches for a couple days, but it was OK. I've been fortunate otherwise.
    
26. PERSON YOU SENT THIS TO WHO IS MOST LIKELY TO RESPOND:
    No one, because I won’t send it.
27. PERSON YOU SENT THIS TO WHO IS LEAST LIKELY TO RESPOND?
    Everyone that I don’t send this to
28. KETCHUP OR MUSTARD?
    This question needs a context.
    
29. HAMBURGER OR HOT DOG?
    This question also needs a context, but I think I'll go with hamburger.
    
30. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE SEASON?
    I think it would be fall. Living in northern California, there really aren't any seasons.
    
31. THE BEST PLACES YOU HAVE EVER BEEN?
    The Vermont mountains, Yosemite Valley, Lake Tahoe. Kauai is nice for the weather. Otherwise, I mostly like New England.
    
32. WHAT SCREEN SAVER IS ON YOUR COMPUTER RIGHT NOW?
    It goes blank, like my mind when it's not used for ten minutes.
    
33. FAVORITE FAST FOOD?
    Whopper and fries, probably.
    
34. WHAT IS YOUR BIRTH NAME?
    Same as my given name, I think.
    

Now I've REALLY done it.

I can't believe I've actually written two novels. (Plus a novella a few years ago, but frankly that one works better as kindling than reading material.) Tonight (or this morning, for those scoring at home), I finished the final chapter of "Crossings", my second novel in two years. No idea if it's any good yet as I've not read it. I think I'll wait for the movie.

Perhaps most surprising to me is that when I was younger, I always envisioned myself as writing fantasy or science fiction. Instead, my first two novels really are more in the literary fiction/mainstream fiction category. Who'd have thunk it?

What a great job

Although I would much rather have no job at all, since I must be employed I am quite glad I have the job I do. I work for Wells Fargo, a little bank on the west coast. Maybe you've heard of it. Actually, it's one of only 17 publicly held American companies to have been in existence for over 150 years. It's got a cool history museum at the downtown San Francisco headquarters where you can see one of the old stage coaches that carried pioneers and gold across the old west. But that's just part of why I like my job. The real reason is that I help people give money away for a living.

Wells Fargo was just named by Business Week as the nation's #9 most generous company in terms of philanthropy. It's nice to know that my company, which has been making money by the supertanker-load for the last several years, does give some amount of that back. And it's nice to know that I helped directly in allowing the company to win all four top achievement awards from United Way of America in 2004. And that my work has helped our employees go from giving $12 million in charitable donations three years ago to somewhere near $22 million this year.

When you have to get up early and get on the train with people coughing and sneezing around you, and you have to sit in a cube all day in front of a computer, these are nice things to remember about your job. Best of all, since I work with other people who give money away for a living, I generally work with nice people. Not a lot of sales pressure in my line of work.

Why am I blogging this? I've found that when I'm writing, especially during NaNoWriMo, I think how wonderful it would be to quit everything and write novels full time. So I need to remind myself from time to time that what I do matters, and it's pretty good being able to do what I do.

By the way, I just passed 60,000 words and am closing in on the end of the book. Another 3,000 or so and it will be all over.

Quietly past 2,100

No, that's not my word count for the day. It's the number of American soldiers killed in Iraq. So far.

50,000

Last night I reached 50,000 words. That means I've reached my NaNoWriMo goal, but I still have a ways to go before the story is finished. I'm shooting for the end of the first week of December to finish the entire novel, earlier if I can swing it.

The writer's world, part 2

Tell me I'm smart.
Tell me I'm witty. Or charming. Or that I have nice teeth.
Tell me that my shirt goes with my eyes, or that my voice sounds unusually confident today.
Tell me that that girl, you know the one, has a crush on me.
Tell me my kids are so well-behaved that you have renewed hope for humanity's future.
Tell me you like my aftershave even though you know I didn't use any.
Tell me I am a credit to my parents.
Tell me you like my haircut, or that my shoes seem to fit exceedingly well.
Tell me my socks match my eyes, or that my frown makes me look intellectual.
Tell me you just finished reading a wildly successful book, and that not a word of it was worth a cent of your money.

Yes, I've been writing today. How can you tell?

WE HAVE THE AXE!

Go Bears! [link]

a writer's world

inspiration comes
riding its huge, black charger, lance pointed,
an armored beast snorting steam and snot

inspiration comes
passing through the glass door and ordering a mocha,
floating into a plain, wooden chair the color of her hair

inspiration comes
with hiss of runners slicing snow,
the frigid breath of winter icing my lips and teeth

inspiration comes
gliding scarlet and gold on a black current, dancing on an eddy,
beconing its brethren to descend

inspiration comes
arm wrapped tight around fuzzy bear's neck,
eyes closed and soft, warm cheeks rose-pink in the night

The Big Game

It's that time of the week again. Read my Big Game Preview over at The Cal Insider to see why I'm predicting the Bears will retain the axe with a 28-10 final score.

Go Bears!

Textbook Disclaimer Stickers

Some of these textbook disclaimer stickers [PDF] are difficult to believe. I recommend you read them all before judging them.

And thanks to the wonders of TV advertising, I just learned that my life could be drastically improved if I had a car that could sense raindrops and automatically turn on my windshield wipers. I suppose that's designed for the people who are putting on mascara, drinking hot coffee, talking on the phone, and handing things to their small children in the back seat. Who has time to turn on windshield wipers? Come to think of it, who has time to look out the windshield anyway?

Winning isn't everything...

... but it sure feels better than losing, and even bad beer tastes good after a dominating win. For five years I managed my men's over-30 soccer team to mediocre records and eventual relegation. I sacked myself after last season but somehow was retained as assistant manager, and this year in the bottom division we are 2/3 of the way through the season with six wins, one draw, and one loss. Today's win virtually assured us a top-two spot in the division and put us in the driver's seat to win it outright. It's always been fun, but it's more fun to win.

Although I wrote only about 2,000 words this weekend, I'm still on a good pace to make well over 55,000 in November.

Big, Bad Cal Mauls Poor USC

I will never forget that huge headline the year that Cal demolished USC, scoring 50+ points in the process. That is not likely to happen this year, though I am predicting a Cal upset. The Bear will not quit; the Bear will not die.

Go Bears!

Nano Nano

Last Thursday I went to my first NaNoWriMo "write-in" at a local cafe. I was only slightly disappointed to have it be just me and the local coordinator--I was hoping for more people, but I was happy that the coordinator was an attractive, charming, interesting young woman. We both got a tremendous amount of writing done.

Tonight's write-in at the same location was also good: Ten writers showed up. I got less written because there was more chatting, but they were all nice people. I am hoping some subset of us form an ongoing writing group. I am very near 20,000 words now (somewhere near 19,700), and that is right on track for meeting my personal goal of 60,000 for the month.

If any of my regular readers (I think there are three of you) or any lurkers (yeah, right) want to read either my work in progress or the first draft of last year's novel, I would be happy to share.

You'll laugh; you'll cry. They're better than "Cats."

I have nearly perfect teeth

The dentist told me so today. She's a new dentist and was amazed at the quality of my choppers. I think if she wasn't married she would have taken me right there on the spot, so enamored of my pearly whites was she.

But maybe she says that to all the boys.

Tattoo

My tattoo is relatively inconspicuous. It is on my left calf, only about two inches tall and an inch and a half wide. That's it, over there, on the right.

What is it? Norse runes. Three separate runes, superimposed onto each other. I won't say I'm any expert on the subject, but google is a wondrous thing, and you can learn the basics pretty quickly. The three runes have the following meanings:

• The first represents bravery, energy, passion, and victory;
• The second represents health, wealth, and happiness;
  
• The third represents harvest, eventual success, and the cycle of life.

As a gestalt symbol, to me it represents the idea of eventual success in all endeavors through a trusting in the cycles of life and the natural order, a trusting in one's own bravery and internal fortitude, and a focus on spiritual health (not in terms of religious study but in terms of personal spirit).

I have never regretted for one second getting it, and I find myself wearing shorts more often to show it off. I often forget I have it, but it does help me focus sometimes when I think about the meaning.

Update, several years later: I should have added an actual photo at the time.

Lonely Haiku

No comments in days.
What does a guy have to do?
Get a nose piercing?

An Even Better Feeling

I did not have one single bomb blow up on my street today. And it's an election day here! I thought that democracies were supposed to have bombs blowing up at polling places, marines and army positioned all over. I thought there were supposed to be lines and lines of people with purple thumbs. I guess it'll be a while before the kind of democracy that everyone is so proud of creating in Iraq makes its way to my town. Until then, I guess I'll just have to suffer through what we have.

And this year, for the first time since I turned 18, I was a Bad Citizen. I did not vote. Although I did help many voters cross the street safely to get to the polling place. Does that count?

A very good feeling

I love the feeling I get when I return to my desk at work and there is no voice mail for me.

10,582

On Sunday I managed to surpass 10,500 words. That puts me right on track, though my personal goal is actually 60,000, and I'm behind on that. This is the time of the month when I begin thinking that my story is crap, the characters are boring, the writing is mediocre at best, and what's the point of carrying such a loser pile of garbage all the way to 50,000 words? I know, however, that's a totally normal feeling at this point, so I'll power through it and aim for 28,000 by the end of this coming Sunday. That's an average of 2,500 a day, certainly achievable but not easy. Between 4 and 5 pages a day.

Years ago I used to read Dear Abby because it sat next to the comics in my local paper. I remember only one bit of good advice in all the years I read it. A young woman had written in to say she wanted to pursue a graduate degree through night school, but it would take her five years to complete, and by then she'd be 35 years old. Dear Abby wrote, "In five years you'll be 35 anyway, and wouldn't it be better to be 35 with your degree than 35 without it?"

I am figuring that next year I'll be 39 anyway, and wouldn't it be better to be 39 with two completed novels than 39 with only one? (Maybe some day I'll even submit them for publication.)

Bears to Stomp on Ducks

Cal visits Oregon tomorrow, ABC at 12:30. The Ducks are on fire at 7-1. But Smokey the Bear will stamp out the burning Ducks because a flock of Ducks without an experienced starting quarterback is like a grilled cheese sandwich without a jackhammer. Or something like that.

Read about it here.

WriMo Inspiration, Part Deux

Are you writing a romance novel? I'm not. But I still found this site to be extremely helpful in many ways. Mostly in helping me laugh. Be sure you have a half hour or more to give it the time it so richly deserves.

Some WriMo Inspiration

Writing a novel is a terrible experience, during which the hair often falls out and the teeth decay.
--Flannery O'Connor

Writing is not a profession, but a vocation of unhappiness.
--Georges Simenon

Writing books is the closest men ever come to childbearing.
--Norman Mailer

Writing stopped being fun when I discovered the difference between good writing and bad and, even more terrifying, the difference between it and true art. And after that, the whip came down.
--Truman Capote

I always start writing with a clean piece of paper and a dirty mind.
--Patrick Dennis

How is that possible?

I was reading a 401(k) newsletter from my employer this morning, and in one sidebar graphic they showed the US savings rate declining over the past several years. This is the amount that US families are saving from their income. The savings rate declined to zero percent (0%) in June of this year.

What confuses me, though, is the caption. It said that 0% was the "second-lowest rate since the great depression."

How, exactly, is zero percent the second-lowest rate in 60 years?

Two Books in Two Years

I realized today that for the first time I actually feel like a writer. For years, ever since I was in junior high, I wanted to be a writer. I've written as part of my jobs since college--articles in high-tech magazines like EE Times, vast reference tomes for operating systems programming, press releases and brochures, and hundreds of thousands of words of web content. But I really have had that yearning to be a fiction writer. Stories, novels, whatever. But that's where I wanted to be.

And all along, the thought that I was really just a poseur, a wannabe, hovered just behind me saying "no" constantly, just like the "bit" that followed Jeff Bridges around in Tron. I read articles about writing, and every one of them says things like, "A real writer has stories that just have to be written. A real writer simply can't not write." And the dread that I was getting older and no stories had knocked me in the head to say, "WRITE ME" kept growing.

Earlier this year I finished my first novel, which began as an experimental foray into NaNoWriMo. Nope, haven't even tried to publish it yet, but the three people who've read it seem to like it. This year I will write another, then return to the first to revise with the intent to publish in the future.

And now, today, for the first time, I feel like a real writer. NaNoWriMo doesn't start until tomorrow. I can't officially start my novel until then. But my characters have been with me for a year, like friends who moved away and are coming back to town, and they are tugging me forward into November, eager to fill me in on what they've been up to and the people they've met and the changes in their lives. There is a story there that wants to be written. It may not make a publishable book in the end, but it's a story I want to hear, and the characters are ready to tell it.

I think I'll wait until December first to see how well I do. Needing to write is only part of being a writer. Actually writing is the other part. My "bit" hovering behind me won't start saying "yes" until December 1st, and maybe not even then because revising is the third part of being a writer, and I've not conquered that yet. But I can feel the tide turning, and now I know that indeed, a writer is what I am in the same way that a father is what I am.

2000

2,000 casualties in Iraq. That's deaths. Of American military personnel. Not counting deaths of other country's soldiers. Or Iraqi police deaths. Or civilian deaths. Or injured or maimed soldiers. Or soldiers who come home and end up sick or emotionally scarred. Or orphaned children. Or injured or maimed civilians.

2,000 is a lot. My high school had about 1,600 kids in it. Maybe 1,800 people when you add up all the administrators, teachers, custodians, etc. You'd have to throw in 200 more and kill them all to reach 2,000.

If every life is sacred, why does it seem that the life of a fertilized egg is so much more sacred to some people than the life of an American soldier?

Hungry Cougars

So, the Bears lost again last week in another stinker against Oregon State. Somehow Cal manages to stink against the Beavers most years. Not sure why. Now WSU comes to town the best 0-3 Pac-10 team on the planet. They are, I think, better than the Beavers but manage to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory where OSU does the opposite. In my preview, I say why I think this game could be a defensive battle right to the end, and I do end up predicting that the Bears will make it back into the W column.

25... 24... 23... 22...

Just in case anyone has forgotten, US soldiers continue to die in Iraq. At this moment, the stats say that we're just 24 martyrs away from two thousand.

I've been pretty silent on this topic for a long while now. I didn't chime in with the obvious, "Where were the national guard when Katrina hit? Oh, yeah, Iraq!" I have not mentioned the indictment of Tom Delay or the growing black cloud over Carl Rove and Scotter Libby. It's good to know, though, that if any are convicted of a crime, Bush will probably ask them to leave their jobs before he pardons them at the end of his term. I've stayed away from the supreme court nominations--mostly because I have no opinion on them--and only stood by silently, mildly amused at the run-up to Hurricane Rita, as I pondered the no-win situation for Bush: If Texas were over-served by military and national guard, he'd look like he played favorites. If Texas were under-served, he'd look like a two-time failure.

There, I've had my say on those. But let's not forget Iraq and the soldiers there, the Americans being killed and injured for the sake of... what, exactly? I forget. First it was WMD. Then it was to get rid of a brutal dictator. Then it was to secure and rebuild the country we'd bombed to smithereens. Then it was to "stay the course" in order not to disrespect the deaths already suffered.

A week ago I was chatting with the custodian at my kids' school. He mentioned he was treated like pond scum when he returned from Viet Nam--people actually came to the airport to insult and accost him and his fellow soldiers as they finally arrived back on US soil. Tragic. I have another good friend, in the Army, who has a support role for troops in Iraq; he lives on a base overseas and frequently visits Iraq as part of his job. Many wives and children live on the base, often not hearing any news of their husbands and fathers for days at a time, knowing they are in danger every minute.

We just held a memorial service for my father-in-law on Saturday, and it was really wonderful how many friends showed up, the stories they told, the love for him. Most of us would consider him young at his death--just 63. All of us will miss him, think about him often, feel the absence of him at holidays, on sunny weekends, when the wind is high, whenever I see a sail on bay or lake or river or ocean.

1,976 American soldiers dead in Iraq. Every one of them has a story, people who loved them, people who will mourn them for years to come. I am no expert on grief, and I hope I never become more than its casual acquaintance. Grief knows no economic, ethnic, or educational boundaries.

Where are all those voices who cried out in support of Terry Schiavo's parents? All those who tried so desperately to keep that one unfortunate woman on life support indefinitely? Why are they not crying out to save #1,977? Will not the parents, spouse, children, friends, cousins all mourn #1,977 as sincerely and powerfully as Terry's parents mourn her?

why do I even bother...

If there's anyone left out there reading this blog, you can see my preview of how Cal will lick the Beavers this Saturday here. Go Bears.

ashes to ashes

This Saturday we will be laying to rest my father-in-law, spreading his ashes in the bay from the deck of a sailboat owned by one of his best friends. Afterwards, we will retreat to his yacht club for a memorial of sorts, with a looped slide show of photos from his life.

I have been so busy the past month that I have not had time to reflect deeply on Gary's passing, but many thoughts and feelings have been lurking behind me, making themselves felt like when you walk into a dark room from a dimly lit hallway and feel that someone has passed in right behind you.

Gary was a wonderful man, a truly kind person. We got along very well even though we held diametrically opposed political views. We rarely argued; it's an unwise son-in-law that does not nod, smile knowingly, and keep his mouth shut when his father-in-law discusses politics. Yet I always respected his viewpoints no matter how misguided I thought them for he always had logical and consistent thought process behind them.

Through this past five weeks, however, I have come to learn a bit about myself. I am surprised at how easy I have found it to let go, to say goodbye, to continue on. At first I felt a guilt about that--shouldn't I be feeling devastated and stricken with grief, shouldn't I be crying a lot and feeling a deep void in my life? The truth was that although I was sad and am sad, and I do miss Gary somewhat, those things did not happen to me.

It's not that I don't feel emotions, and feel them deeply. One look at either of my sleeping children reminds me the depths of the feeling that can strike me. Rather, I have a strong sense inside, an unconscious and innate sense, that all things are temporary. Everything has an end, and tomorrow I will wake up and adjust my life based on tomorrow's reality, not based on how I used to think tomorrow would be. When things change around me, I flow with that change rather than rail against it like many of my coworkers. I do not think of life in linear terms but rather as a wholistic totality, ebbing and flooding and swirling in patterns simple and complex. We all are part of this beautiful pattern, both shaping it and responding to it just as the planets pull and push each other as they glide around the sun.

It is a nice philosophy, I think. Yet it leaves a cold, empty spot that is filled by most religions: mortality. I like to think of an afterlife; it is comforting to hope that we all move on to some other place and retain our essence, our self, our soul. Yet I can not bring myself to believe in it as most religions have proposed it to be. Our bodies are made, as Carl Sagan would have said, of starstuff. All living things die, and their physical components are reduced to their base forms and recycled by the universe, to be made into other living things. Dust to dust. This is true of the wealthiest robber baron and the basest crackhead, the most beautiful starlet and the most inane talk show host.

I do not pretend to know whether our "souls" are distinct things that transcend the physical world, or whether our essence is just another aspect of this swirling soup of a universe. The living may never know. What I do know is that we all return to the earth, and for whatever reason, that thought allows me to let go.

When I was little, we had many cats, and it seemed that at least two a year would get run over by cars. It also seemed that several more were born each year in my sister's closet. So perhaps I grew up with a vague, mixed sense of the circle of life: all things die eventually, and there are more where those came from.

I have also had many goodbyes in my life. My parents divorced when I was two, and my dad moved out. When I was not much older, my mom moved across the country. My brother and sister moved off to college when I was in middle school. Through the years, I have never been much troubled when friends fade from my life or when coworkers move on. It seems natural, and there are more where those came from. The wheel turns.

I know there are not more Garys where Gary came from. I know my boys can no longer say things like, "Maybe Grandpa can fix it." I know I will surf past McLaughlin Group some night and feel a sharp emptiness where Gary's voice would have been. And I know that some day I will follow him and the billions of other people who have returned their bodies back to the earth. What happens afterwards, I have no idea. Perhaps nothing. Perhaps something. Perhaps both.

On Saturday we will commend Gary's ashes to the waters of the earth, and we will each contemplate not just the man and his vast roles in our lives but also our own mortality and the part we each play in this ever-changing cosmos, and the parts we each play in the lives of so many others. Life is a wondrous and mysterious thing.

Cal Visits UCLA (eat my shorts)

The Bears travel to the Rose Bowl this week, hopefully for the first of two appearances there this season. My preview is now posted at The Bear Insider.

Cal at NMSU

My preview of the Cal game at New Mexico State is now posted online.

Go Bears!

Cal v Illinois

My preview of Illinois at Cal has been posted to The Bear Insider. Go Bears!

Cal at UW

Cal plays at Husky stadium for the second year in a row. The Bears are #17 in the country, 8-point favorites. The gamblers like the Huskies to cover; the line started at 11 and has fallen rapidly. Sagarin says the Bears are #45 because their 1-0 record is against a terribly weak, 1-AA opponent. Washington is #75, with sagarin predicting a 4-point Cal victory.

The Huskies stunk up the joint last year, going 1-10. Fortunately, they played San Jose State, though they only managed 21 points in their win against the Spartans. That was under Gilby, though, and the Huskies have Willingham in charge now. That alone should make Old Blues nervous. As we've all read by now, Willingham was 7-0 as a head coach against Cal, and 3-0 as an assistant. There is little doubt he will turn around the UW program and make them powerful once more, but it is hard to say how quickly.

Personally, I think the Willingham substory in this game is overblown and overwritten. He will make the Huskies better, but this game has more to do with the players than the coaches. Certainly this year's game will be much closer than last year's 42-12 whomping, in which the Bears gained over 300 yards rushing, but it shouldn't be a real nail-biter.

The story of this game is that of two offenses with big, experienced offensive lines but youth at their skill positions. The story of this game is turnovers. The story of this game is fourth quarter fitness.

Last week, UW held a 17-6 lead going into the fourth quarter but lost, 20-17, to a decent but not dominant Air Force team in Seattle. The game was just 3-3 at halftime, and even though the Husky offense seemed to improve after intermission, they didn't have enough to overcome the defense's weakness against the run. Air Force gained more than 200 yards rushing on the day, and they had two turnovers in Husky territory. The Huskies did show improvement on last year's 14 points-per-game average, and they did not turn the ball over once (in 2004 they were worst in the Pac-10 in turnovers). They start a new QB and have youth in other skill spots, but RB Rankin gained 112 yards on 23 carries for the Huskies. Essentially, they looked steady and reliable, but they went neither fast nor far. They had only two drives of five minutes or longer, both in the second half. They were 0 for 5 in 3rd down conversions in the first half, though they improved to 6 of 7 in the second half. They had just two drives of 3-and-out, but only two drives had 10 or more plays. They punted four times on the day.

All that is to say that the Huskies are not what you would call a dominant offense. Considering they scored 20 or more points last year only three times and were held to 16 or fewer seven times, they look improved but not terribly so. So far. I see no reason to think that they will improve significantly on their 17 points when they face the Bears on Saturday; Cal has a more athletic defense with more speed than Air Force, and experience in the DBs that will hold the passing game of the young QB in check.

The real question will be how Cal's offense performs.

UW's defense sports four seniors and four juniors, so there is experience there. The D line is not big, though, averaging 272 pounds. DT Hopoi is the giant of the group at 290. Compare to Cal, which has two D linemen at 305 and averages 283 pounds. Now, compare to Cal's O line which averages 334 pounds. I don't know about you, but I would rather not play an entire game giving up an average of one fifth of my body weight every play. This will be the single biggest factor in the game if the Bears win--Cal's O line will dominate the much smaller Husky line and linebackers (who as a group average 222--exactly the same as Cal's LB crew) as the game goes on.

We all know the question marks in the Bears offense, however. QB is the main one, where the Bears will start Ayoob, who was 0 for 10 in his debut. The good news? He is the only Cal QB who did not throw an
interception in the opener. There is little doubt Ayoob will improve on his first game; now, however, he'll be in a hostile environment on the road for the first time. Personally, I have confidence that he will have a solid game and will play well, though I have no basis in fact for this. Tedford will, no doubt, design a ball protection offense to allow Ayoob easy passes so he can take the pressure off the running game and really turn it on in the second half. The Bears MUST protect the ball after five fumbles (two lost) and two interceptions against the Hornets. Last year's Bears started the season with too many turnovers, but they controlled that problem by mid-season before going to the positive side of the differential.

My Prediction:
The Bears will again start slowly, and the game will be close at halftime. Like most of their games last year, however, they will begin to dominate with superior fitness and size in the second half. It is impossible to predict from statistics how the two offenses will execute, but Cal's offense was weak against Sacramento State and still put up 41 points. They will focus this week on execution and ball protection, so I expect to see very few fumbles and improved passing statistics as Tedford goes to simple passes and short gains to control the clock, keep the DBs and LBs honest, and open up the running game in the second half. Cal's astounding fitness will simply overwhelm the Huskies in the fourth quarter, allowing the Bears to expand their lead and keep the ball away from the dawgs. I look for Cal to score 13 in the first half and another 21 in the second for a total of 34.

The Husky offense is also unpredictable at this stage, but it is safe to say they will not put up big numbers against a fast, physically gifted Cal defense. They will have a reasonably balanced attack and gain some yards and score some points, but I will be surprised if they get into the end zone more than three times. I think their ceiling is 24 points, and I think they'll actually be held to 20.

Halftime: Cal 13, Huskies 10. Final gun: Cal 34, Huskies 20.


Go Bears!

in memory

Gary will never again need that fifth computer hummingly quietly by my side right now. He passed on shortly after 5 p.m. on Sunday, September 4th, seven days after going to the emergency room, two days after being discharged from the hospital, and 16 days before his daughter's 37th birthday.

that fifth computer

It's officially reached "ridiculous." I'm talking about my office. I have one desk and three computers, one lap and two laptops. Yes, I have five computers in my office, now that we've become the foster home for my father-in-law's Mac. That makes one Mac, two Windows PCs, and two linux machines. I'd say that makes a full house, unix over Windows. We don't even have five people living here.

I am loving this Mac, though. My father-in-law is a graphic artist, so when he got a new computer a few years back, he got some cool-looking Mac with this awesome, crisp, beautiful flat screen. Plus, it's not Windows, so it's got that going for it.

We are not sure whether my father-in-law will need it back. He spent this week in the hospital, and he was discharged just today to head home under the care of hospice. On Sunday he was in a very bad state with a terrible infection, but the infection is under control and he's become more lucid and at least can walk again in small bits, slowly, with a walker. The cancer has gotten very aggressive, and complications have caused the doctors to stop chemotherapy treatments.

We hope that he gets well enough, for a short time at least, to need his computer back. We would love it if he could answer his own emails. If he could converse with his friends and clients. If he could be strong enough to want to do those things. I hope that this beautiful Mac does not stay in my office long.

I hope, but a part of me sadly thinks there is little hope to be had here, really. We cling to that little bit of hope, but at the same time I can feel the clock ticking down. There is no doubt of the result, only the timing. It's that little bit of hope that we cling to, like a piece of driftwood on the ocean, that keeps us from slipping into a cold, dark despair. Just a little more time. Just a little better, even just for a short while.

one man's trash...

... can get to be quite voluminous over 35 years in one house. We helped my father-in-law run a garage sale on Saturday, and I was astounded by what people bought. There were some useful things, and some not-so-useful things, but by the end of the day quite a few of both had sold. There was plenty left over so the people at the dump would not feel left out, however. And we hadn't even gotten to go through about 40% of the garage before the sale.

I hate garage sales. Hate them, hate them, hate them. Garage sales have only three benefits in my mind: First, they give you an excuse to sit around and not do yard work or other home projects for most of the day. Second, you generally do end up with less stuff and more cash at the end of the day. Third, the people you see come through can be strange and wonderful things.

We had two ladies hobble by (I think one was the sister of Moses), and one of them asked about a few balls of blue yarn. She makes small American flags out of yarn; apparently she has some sort of machine that helps. It was late in the day, so we just gave her the yarn for free (don't tell my father-in-law). The next day she came back and gave us one of those little flags made from that yarn.

Early on a woman stopped by and found a smallish picture frame in our 25-cent box. She had no cash, so we told her to take it anyway (don't tell my father-in-law). She came back around noon to drop off the quarter.

One guy drove up in what looked like a 30-year-old, hand-camoflaughed Suburban with a low-walled trailer bumping behind it. He had long, greasy-looking hair and a long, gaunt face that suggested the cigar sticking out of his mouth was just the latest in a very, very long line of predecessors. He quietly stalked about the tables for a while, investigating every nook until he'd found a half dozen things he wanted and had piled them in the middle of the driveway. I don't know how much he ended up paying, but this was definitely a case of one man's trash turning to another man's treasure.

A lot of the locals had opinions they felt like sharing on the real estate market, since the house had a "sold" sign in front. The concensus is that we've passed the peak and prices will continue to soften for a bit, perhaps even decline significantly. Everyone spoke about it with knitted brows and grave concern, then merrily went along and bought the $3 badminton set or a few old music boxes or a dozen shelf brackets found in a box full of random garage leftovers.

Science in the "Age of Reasons"

The Onion discusses the Theory of Intelligent Falling.

It has become well documented that the current administration in charge of the USA simply ignores scientific findings that it does not agree with. It has also become well known that they alter intelligence information to justify policy rather than use intelligence information to inform policy.

I suggest that eight years of the Bush administration is a long enough time to give it some sort of name (just like during Reagan's time, we had the "Me Generation"). I propose we call the current time the "Age of Reasons."