27 May 2005

About to start a delightfully long Memorial Day weekend.

Nothing much to speak of...I really need to buckle down in June and pass two Microsoft tests. But until then, I am in post-semester coasting mode. Not that my life without school for me is anything like coasting, but I'm thankful for the temporary comfort the semester's end has brought.

IT workers are like artists...they have alternating moments of frenzied productivity and dull stagnance. Welcome to an instance of the latter.

Somewhere I read a suggestion for the ultimate "Black and Tan", being made from Dogfish Head 120 Minute IPA and Dogfish Head World Wide Stout. Probably best shared with a friend as that would put you out for the night, methinks. But worthy of trying no doubt, as both are astonishingly good on their own.

Damn those currant plants. They tear at my soul. Briefly springing to life and bringing resounding joy to my heart, then fleeting away to a quick and brownish death. Can I ever love...errr....plant again?

Thanks be to Signor Talberto for his great gift for me from Europe...a Union Jack from the honest-to-goodness British soil of Gibraltar. Old, eternal rock of the Empire, standing guard over the Mediterranean. I haven't decided where to hang it (no, not on my flagpole...I may be an Anglophile, but I'm no traitor! Patriot blood runs steadfast in these veins!).

Gun purchase has been put on hold. Too much money that could be put elsewhere...besides, I'm reasonably well armed with two automatics, a revolver, and a Brit battle rifle at the ready. Perhaps someday a FAL or CETME will enter the arsenal, but its by no means essential.

Perhaps someday I can finagle my work into sending me and my wife to the British Isles. Check up on our dealers and such. Well, who knows?

23 May 2005

Back after a brief hiatus...

With as much typing as work requires me to do, and the subsequent shooting pains through my right hand, I'm losing motivation for this blog. There is something noble I suppose about enduring pain for "art" (ha) but to me it strikes me more as the dying embers of arrogance brought low, still trying to prove that I am prosaic and/or witty in the written word while my skills fade, like Mozart...or, consarnit, Beethoven, or whoever that guy who went deaf was. I should know of course, but, well, I know a lot more about other sorts of music, and only a basic cursory knowledge of the classics.

Screw this pretentious rhetoric, right up the nose, to put it eloquently.

So my blackcurrants are dying...something I've had to come to terms with. Perhaps gardening is not a gift of mine, or perhaps I just need to try again next year. We'll see if I have the heart to do so.

This morning I had a surge of federalist sentiment, particularly on the abortion issue. But really, on any issue. As far as I'm concerned, let Massachussetts (sic? heck if I know) marry gays, let Utah marry groups, and let Kansas or Wyoming or whoever outlaw abortion. This is the thing I just don't get about liberals...what subtlety am I missing with the Bill of Rights? Basically, it outlines the rights and powers given to the government on the federal level, and then says, all else, given to the states. Do we disagree on that? I'm a simple, entirely un-nuanced guy in this, and I took one class on Constitutional History but I've forgotten most of it. So bear with me in my simplicity. So where does abortion fall? And gay marriage? I say, nowhere in the Bill of Rights. At least, I haven't found any of that yet in there. Email me if you've uncovered it by all means. Ahh, pardon the sarcasm, grouchiness is a side-effect of sore wrists/fingers. But honestly, why shouldn't that logically be the realm of the states? Is that so unthinkable? What is unthinkable, to me, is a federal government constantly expanding in direct, open contradiction to the Constitution, and the only ones who take issue are known as fringe nutjobs by "mainstream" America. What's so nuts about abiding by the Constitution?

Roe v. Wade was a travesty in my opinion, just as the Federal Marriage Amendment would be in a sense, although at least that has a solid foundation, being a Constitutional amendment. Amendments are part of the Constitution, so therefore are not ruled by it.

I could rant more, but there is work to be done. Adios for now.

06 May 2005

"An Entire Menagerie Called Abdul."

Can't get enough Python. I'm a comedy junkie, admittedly. I've scoffed at most film dramas I've laboured through, with some most notable exceptions (various Shakespeare histories, "Breaker Morant", and others), and in general, if a movie isn't trying to make me laugh, I'll find some way to laugh at it anyway. Much to the chagrin of my wife if she happens to like the film a lot.

"Half a bee...philisophically...must ipso facto half not be..."

But yes, Fish License still makes me laugh inside, without fail, even just thinking about it. Why? I don't know. Something about silliness or insanity (and I mean that in a literal sense, like mental disease insanity) portrayed with abject sobriety is so maniacally funny.

I've planted a quartet of blackcurrant seedlings (Ribes Negrum) in my backyard. Strange you say? Yes. Yes it is.

My hand is already shooting with pain. I've got to stop typing, and get back to work, eh?

Altogether now!

"I like Chinese....I like Chinese...I like their tiny little treeeees"

Don't ask.