what else can go kaput?

On Friday I determined that I was going to kick back as much as possible over the weekend. I see no purpose in vacation time if I am not more relaxed at the end of the vacation than I was at the beginning. That plan was going well at the beginning of Saturday. I slept in until 11AM. Had some lunch. Mrs Dust and I started doing some leisurely cleaning. I put on some music on the PC.

That's when it happened. The first indication of trouble was that the music started repeating quickly like a broken record. The second indication of trouble was that there was a blue screen error on the monitor when I went to check out the noise. The third indication of trouble was that on reboot, the master hard drive wasn't discovered.

This was definitely frustrating, but I knew what to do. I went to Best Buy and picked up a new drive. Once I plugged it in, though, the PC wouldn't even start the boot process. After tearing the machine apart (and in the process sticking my finger through the CPU fan) I determined that there was problem with the video either on the AGP slot on the motherboard or on the video card. Since I don't have a spare video card or motherboard to swap out, I couldn't narrow down the problem any further. I swallowed my pride and took the PC to the shop to determine what specifically failed. I will get a call back either today or tomorrow about it. While they are trying to determine whether my video card or my motherboard is hosed I will see if I can figure a way to get data off the failed drive.

In the meantime, if I don't respond to comments to my posts it isn't because I am ignoring you--for now.

what are you trying to say

I hate it when I guess wrong at what is being implied when someone says something to me. It can be as innocuous as not knowing the antecedent to the pronoun when someone asks, "What do you think about them?" It can also go like the discussion below that may or may not sound familiar.

Person 1: "I like ice cream cones, but I occasionally feel pressured to get nuts on mine because the person behind the counter always recommends it. I don't usually put nuts on it, but I feel bad about it when I tell him no thanks."
Person 2: "I feel bad for you. In my ice cream shop no one is ever pressured to add anything to their cones."
Me: "So, what are you trying to say? Are you saying your ice cream shop is better?"
Person 2: "No, I just feel for person 1."
Me: (sheepishly) "Oh."

Another situation occurred yesterday and even though it is related to the topic, it was non-verbal confusion.

Last night our church had an award ceremony for the mid-week kids' programs. It was announced during the service that Mrs Dust will be stepping down from teaching one of the classes. Around that time another woman in the church whom we know rather well because she was our buyer's agent for our house looked back in my direction with an expression that appeared to request a response. I am still not sure if she was looking at me or someone behind me. I have already made the mistake of assuming that a person is looking at me when they were waving or making faces, so I decided it would be better in this situation to appear a snob and not respond than appear the idiot and find out she was looking at the kids behind me.

There has to be an easier way.

don't feed the trolls

I feel a little obligation to explain what a troll is after making the claim that someone at Golden's site was one yesterday. A troll is someone who tries to make a fool of another person online. The term originated from a method of fishing where the bait is dangled in the wake of a moving boat to lure unsuspecting fish. The best way to manage trolls is to ignore them.

For a more complete definition of an Internet troll, check out the Wikipedia description.

not another girl movie

This weekend Mrs Dust and I watched Raising Helen. Given that we have watched many "chick flicks" together I have noticed some patterns in these movies. I'd like to share a few.

• The main character always does something embarrassing. Usually it is falling in public or in front of a guy she likes. This happens a lot more in teen "chick flicks."
• The main (or second primary) plot always involves a romantic relationship. In Raising Helen it was the secondary plot, but the main plot was family issues, so that can be forgiven by the audience I am sure.
• The audience is typically expected to believe that two specific people in the movie are meant for each other, even if they are already involved with other people. This is what I detested about You've Got Mail. It was too convenient that Meg Ryan's and Tom Hanks' characters got out of their previous relationships so easily. I had similar issues with Serendipity, but who's counting.
• The main character always has a chic job. How many magazine writers and advertising people are there in New York City?
• The main characters are almost always based in New York City. Even in Sleepless in Seattle true romance does not occur until both characters are at the top of the Empire State Building.
• The movies tend to preach what the target audience already believes. There is nothing better than satisfying relationships, so all else is expendable to meet that end. This is only bad when taken to extremes, but sometimes it is.
• The movie has to have a happy ending. This is even in the movies where the romantic relationship doesn't work out.

I am not going to be one of those guys that completely bashes "chick flicks" without pointing out the good, though.

• Almost every generalization above is false in at least one "chick flick" that I have seen. The only exception is the happy ending. I was excited when it appeared that Little Black Book was going to break this rule, but then a perfectly satisfying melancholy movie was nearly ruined by a sub-par happy and cheesy addendum at the end. (I actually tend to like happy endings, but not for every movie so that the happy ending loses its sense of reality).
• The movies that decide to add something beyond the sap are often spectacular. I loved Hitch and What Women Want because they both had good humor and provided some insight into the mental workings of the opposite sex.
• Even the movies that aren't very good by my standards have some redeemable qualities and so are usually bearable. Notting Hill had some humor and Runaway Bride provided some psychological insight to Julia Roberts' character.

Please note that when I describe "chick flicks" I am not describing LMN style movies. Those actually tend to be targeted to a different audience than the movies I describe. To me the typical "chick flick" is a romantic comedy with a "cute," pettite actress who goes through challenges putting together a relationship with a confusing but overall sweet and attractive man.

An LMN movie is typically about a scorned or battered wife whose cheating, abusive, greedy, and ugly husband is out to get her. Either that or her controlling mother is trying to steal her kids. Different audience indeed.

The difference is that I can enjoy the "chick flick" and I remain confused by the LMN movie. It wasn't made for me anyway.

seeing less of me is a good thing

Why do I post so much? I think it is because if I am not consistent I tend to just drop things. I almost did that with Bible Quiz when I was in high school. I just kind of skated by until a team of sixth-graders defeated the team I was on and I was forced into making a decision between going all out or dropping out (because I would not give a half-hearted effort and be embarrassed like that again). I went all out and was more obsessive about quizzing than I ever have been about blogging.

I am currently faced with a similar situation. I don't want to burn out anyone who wants to keep up with the site, but I know if I am not somewhat regimented I will eventually stop posting to this site altogether.

To address this I am deciding right now that I will post no more than four times in a week to the journal and no fewer than three times so that the posts stay fresh, but don't get overwhelming. This is not yet due to lack of content. I actually had three other ideas for the weekend post and I might try one of them tomorrow. This is simply to allow anyone who doesn't check the site daily to keep up with what I have to say.

That was a lot of words to just say that I'll be posting less. I might need to work on shortening my posts too.

may the snores be with you

On Wednesday night I got a call from Dash asking if I wanted to go to Episode III on the spur of the moment. The movie was going to show at 12:01 AM. I had to consider this for a bit. Would I be able to function the next day? Was it worth the expense? I had actually intended for this movie to be a rental later on rather than a theater movie. I caved and went.

Now, I understand that there are a lot of Star Wars geeks out there. Being a geek and having many geek friends, I have met many of them. I still did not expect the vast numbers of people I saw at the theater, though, to see a showing that would last until 2:30 AM on a weekday. How many people there were going to play hooky from work the next day? How many would try to suffer through the next day on a couple of hours of sleep? How many would inadvertently wake their parents when they got back from the movie?

Dash noted that the ratio of guys to girls was outlandish. I'd agree. Maybe 10% of the people there were girls. Maybe.

So there we were, Dash and I, in a sea of moderately to extremely geeky male Star Wars fans waiting to see the movie and trying not to fall asleep. I wish I could say we didn't fit in (no slam intended, Dash).

I can't complain, though. The movie was actually worth it.

better late than never

Last night was the last night for the marriage class I have been attending at my church. When I got there one or two people were in the room but left for a while and I was left in the classroom with B (whose wife teaches the class). Being that this was not the first time that almost no one was in the room at the time class started, we got into a discussion about how time oriented cultures can be and the differences between operating on a schedule and operating as events occur (CHRONOS and KAIROS in the Greek).

I couldn't help but think about the fact that younger generations seem to have a different view of schedules than the older generations. When I walk into my young adult Sunday School class two or three minutes late, I notice that the older adult classes are filled, but most of the people who go to my class are not there yet.

I am wondering why it is that a generation of people who live and die by the clock is being replaced by people who forget to look at their clock (myself included on occassion). Is this good? Is this bad? I guess it allows the early introverts a moment's peace before the lesson.

the post about nothing

I have been long-winded recently, so I thought I would give everyone a little break. It could be that, or it could be that I am just too lazy to type something up this morning.

from satan with love

Our family devotions have been taking us through Hebrews for the last two or three weeks. Overall, I have enjoyed this because Hebrews dwells on one of my soapboxes, which is the purpose of the Old Covenant and it's fulfillment in the New Covenant. It sounds really dry, but when you truly understand what the author of Hebrews is saying and you accept it as gospel truth, it impacts just about every aspect of your faith.

The other night we got to the chapter in the book that is both my most and least favorite. We read chapter 12 which starts with subheading "God Disciplines His Sons" in the NIV. This passage ranks up there with James saying that I should consider it pure joy whenever I face trials of many kinds (James 1:2-4). In one respect I am glad to read the passage because I can make sense of hard times. I know that if God is to make me what He wants me to be, the transition is going to be a painful process. There is a comforting honesty about the passage that I don't find in a lot of places. I am not glad that the process can be painful, though.

This brings me to the title for this post. I cannot count the number of times I have heard someone comment about tough times that some other person is going through and how Satan is really attacking that person. I will certainly not eliminate the possibility that Satan finds it meaningful to get someone laid off or to cause someone to have a disease or something like that. Job was attacked financially, physically, and through his friends and family and Satan was the attacker. Causing temporary pain on earth, though, doesn't always seem to fit what I would assume to be Satan's end goal. It actually fits God's end goal better.

If the authors of both Hebrews and James thought that difficult times should be rejoiced as a time of growth in God, why should I assume that Satan caused the tough times? Does Satan really want me to grow closer to God? Certainly not! God may want me to be happy now, but not at the expense of my long-term growth. In one sense (only because we don't understand God's purposes) it would make more sense to say God is attacking me in those times. Satan can keep me from growing by just keeping me happy for now and I see no reason for him not to use that strategy.

I am not saying that this explains all or even the majority of pain in the world. I am saying that it could explain some specific pains in the world.

I believe that many of Satan's true attacks on me are to make everything go fine in my life so that I might eventually get to a point where I wonder why it is that I need a God anyway. I'm doing pretty good without Him and all He has to offer me is some difficult moral system that I never really liked in the first place. I have noticed that I slowly but surely start thinking that way when I think everything is going right in my life. Then, as I am starting to get full of myself, something that I think is horrible happens and I realize I am not doing so good without Him. I honestly think that at that moment Satan is hoping for the same thing I pray for. "Please return my security to me!"

dust, interrupted

I got in a heated debate the other day at work. Of course I would only get dragged into debate over a deeply important issue with significant spiritual or political implications. It was about roulette. My stance is that there is no winning system in roulette and his stance is that he has a winning system. It is not worth going into further details about this debate.

The main problem with the argument, and part of the reason it was so heated, was that neither of us was willing to wait for the other to fully finish speaking until we started talking. The conversation was a jumble of interruptions and not much else.

I determined after that experience that I need to work on my conversation skills. Golden has pointed out on a few occasions that I have interrupted people during a conversation. Sometimes I remember doing so and sometimes I don't. An example of a conversation that I might have with someone else at a social function that illustrates this follows.

Victim: "... so there I was on a deserted--"

Me: "Speaking of which, have you tried the lemon desserts over there. They are fabulous. Oh, I'm sorry. You were saying?"

Victim: "Uh, yeah. I was on this deserted island, and what did I see as I was walking down the shore but a--"

Me: "Plane? No? How about a cave? Maybe you saw Jeff Probst?

Victim: "No! I saw a bottle. I saw a corked bottle with message inside. Are you going to let me finish?"

Me: "Sure. What's stopping you?"

Victim: (Bites tongue.) "The message said--"

Me: "Hey, that guy over there looks like Jeff Probst. Isn't it ironic that you were just talking about him?"

After analyzing the conversation above, I am having a hard time figuring out where things break down. The "victim" didn't seem to be at all interested in what I had to say.

On a more serious note, I need to figure out how to balance my conversations better so that I don't unnecessarily interrupt people but I still contribute to the discussion. I know that when I do interrupt, it is due to the fact that I think that if I don't get what I have to say in now that the discussion will turn away from the current topic before I get a chance to bring it up again. As a result, I believe that I interrupt long-winded people more. I also interrupt people in discussions with long-winded individuals because I need to interrupt before he or she jumps in.

If anyone has tips for how to get your message heard without interruptions I am all ears. If you are concerned that I will cut you off before you are done telling me you can just add a comment to this post. I don't know of a way to interrupt that. Yet.

i wanna know what love is

I went camping with Dash, Dar, Achtung, and Forrest on Friday night at a state park. Most everyone reading this already knows that. Here are the highlights that are legal in most states in roughly chronological order.

Among the items I forgot to take was a pillow and two inflatable air mattresses. Comfort is overrated anyway. I learned to rest my head on a duffel bag and a coat. I didn't say I learned to sleep on them, but certainly rest on them.

Four people worked to set up camp and get the food prepared. I hid out in the tent.

We ate brats, Polish sausage, hot dogs, and smores throughout the night. On an unrelated topic I made many trips to the bathroom that same night.

It rained for a few hours that night. It did not rain enough to send us to the tent, but enough that most of us sought shelter under the roof that covered a picnic table at the camp site. No one retrieved the chairs from the rain. This was a move we would live to regret.

After sitting in wet chairs that would not fully dry no matter how long they were dangled over the fire our jeans got uncomfortably wet. We were eventually reduced to dangling our butts over the fire. I believe Achtung has a picture. Mmm... toasty.

Upon sharing my arachnaphobic tendencies, I was kindly made aware of every spider that was noticed for the rest of the time we were at the park. I was even kindly made aware of spiders that didn't exist.

Forrest decided that we should try to sing 80s songs like girls at a slumber party. I realized how few 80s songs I know. I do know that Forrest knows the phrase, "I wanna know what love is," because I heard it sung approximately twenty times throughout the night.

Dash went to sleep almost before his head hit the pillow. His snores provided a cadence for Forrest's singing.

Dar's snoring, though light, was in synch with Dash's. The rest of us witnessed it. Were they really sleeping?

Dash cooked the "Worth Waiting For Breakfast Casserole" for breakfast. It was worth waiting for.

We hiked 3/4 miles on Quarry Path. There was no discernible quarry anywhere near the path.

I was told that I prance like a gazelle when avoiding muddy patches. I still don't know whether that is a compliment or a slam (I was told it is a compliment).

We took a wrong turn or two on the trails, but were never lost and never needed to stop to ask for directions.

Thanks to Dash for setting this up and giving us the use of his tent. It was a blast.

the yard looks good again

I don't generally like mowing on the weekend, but I can deal with it. What annoys me is when circumstances arise so that I have to mow during the week. Given that there is only a short window between when I get home from work and when it is too dark to mow, any complication that arises can be a showstopper.

I determined this week that I was going to need to figure a time to mow during the week. I had plans last weekend and this weekend as well that would preclude mowing, and the yard was looking worse than it had all last year. On Monday I thought about mowing, but by the time it occurred to me to try to mow it was too late. On Tuesday a friend from college stopped by for the entire evening. I usually go to church on Wednesday and I thought about skipping, but I have been enjoying the class that I have been attending on Wednesdays and didn't want to miss a week.

Thursday seemed like the best option, so my plan was to leave work at precisely 5PM and get the lawn mowed before Survivor started at 7PM. Not too tall an order, because it typically takes me between one and one and a half hours to do the yard.

To my chagrin, I could not get out of work until 5:25. I got home at 5:45, started mowing at 5:55, and then noticed how much grass there really was. I was filling a bag every five or ten minutes of mowing, so I had to stop a lot. I kept plugging because I knew that this needed done, but I was wondering how much of Survivor I would need to skip. I was much more focused on getting the job done before the show to focus much on the impending weather, so I didn't notice the darkening skies. Around 7:15 I completed the job, a little frustrated, but happy that the job was done.

As I was cleaning up afterward I noticed a loud noise outside. I checked it out and saw that the trees in my back yard were thrashing around in the wind pretty hard. I realized then that I needed to be thankful that God let me finish before the storm and not worry about catching all of my TV shows. All that matters is that there were no wind related accidents in the back yard. Either that or all that mattered was that I got to see who was voted off. I can't always tell which is more important.

the good guys

I hadn't had a chance to watch The Amazing Race conclusion on Tuesday, so we had taped it and I watched it last night. For anyone who has not been keeping track, the three teams that were remaining were Rob and Amber from Survivor, Ron and Kelly (he's a former POW and she's a Miss America contestant), and Uchenna and Joyce. I had been rooting for Uchenna and Joyce.

Toward the end of the race (and I mean the very end), Uchenna took the chance of losing the million dollar reward to make sure that he fully paid back his cab driver. When I realized how close he was to the finish line while he was going through that mess I realized how much integrity he really does have. That's part of the reason I have been pulling for the team, because his integrity was obvious earlier in the race. Uchenna and Joyce are the good guys.

I find it interesting in reality shows and in life that nearly everyone thinks that he or she is the good guy or girl, but an objective audience almost always can tell pretty quickly who is in the right. I know that part of why Uchenna and Joyce did not come off as bad as the other teams is probably partially due to editing, but even so I am amazed at the number of people who go on these shows and think they will be justified before millions just to have their bad attitudes blow up in their faces.

This a big reason why I married Mrs Dust. I have many times witnessed a situation where a woman expects support from her guy when it seems clear to me that she doesn't deserve it. She gets in an argument with someone and expects him to back her up, when she is just being selfish. My wife simply isn't like that. If Mrs Dust gets in a dispute (and she doesn't get in many), I can typically be confident that she is in the right. I hope she can have the same confidence with me. Maybe we should go on a reality show together to find out. On the other hand, I'd rather just the two of us know the truth instead of half of the United States.

got no mail at hotmail

I have five personal email accounts that I check regularly. Why I need five is irrelevant (meaning I have no good reason). Needless to say some do not get checked as regularly as others. I did think I checked the lesser used ones at least once every one or two weeks, though.

One of the accounts that I check infrequently is a Hotmail account I got when I was a freshman in college (1997). I have only kept it because there are a few select people (I am not sure who all is on the list) who can only contact me in this way because I haven't talked to them since setting up the four other accounts. I've been meaning to clear this up, but it hasn't been a priority.

A few days ago I decided to log into the account to see if I had gotten anything important in the past couple of weeks. To my shock when I went to log in it prompted me that I was creating a new email account and dumped me to an inbox with a single "Welcome to Hotmail" message within. Aaugh! My account had been removed and I had just inadvertently recreated it. I didn't have much in the account, but what was there cannot be retrieved elsewhere. I had emails from as far back as 1998 that had vanished in a poof of logic.

I had been delaying moving completely over to my GMail account, and I think this provided the motivation to do that. Now to figure out who those four or five people are who only know about my Hotmail account.

the family that washes their ears together...

... stays together.

Mrs Dust has been commenting that her ears just didn't feel right so could we try to wash them out soon? We came to the conclusion that last night was soon.

The procedure was to put some liquid in the ear, let it set for 10-15 minutes, then flush constantly for the next 15 minutes with an "ear syringe bulb," hereafter known as the blue squirty thing. I figured it would be a breeze, but it is hard pointing the blue squirty thing perfectly in the ear canal while squeezing it at a constant rate with backwash water running down your arm. More than once I was told that I was not pointing the blue squirty thing in the right place.

By the time Mrs Dust's ears were fully cleaned we were both covered in water as was the bathroom. She noted that the instructions recommend doing this four days in a row. Like that's happening. At least if Mrs Dust's ears are still clogged she may not send me to investigate bumps in the night as much. Or maybe not.

Your ears cannot be washed by me
Nor can my bathroom bear this splashing
Need is a burden which cannot be revealed
Therefore I will remain silent with my blue squirty
Whenever you are before me with yours
My ears fill with tears that are unable to flow like a squirty blue ocean
That stands still at the sight of my lost ear wax passing by

anonymous comments added

I had been holding off on allowing anonymous comments because I didn't want spamming on my blog (or journal). I just turned on the setting since a number of the people who claim they read this don't have a login. Just be nice.

venti with family

This weekend we went to see Mrs Dust's family for Mother's Day. I also had the opportunity to spend Saturday afternoon with my sister who is currently completing the second semester of her MBA program. I always enjoy time with my sister because we see things from a similar perspective as we grew up in the same situations.

I got to pick what we did so I recommended that we go to Barnes & Noble, get a coffee in the store Starbucks, and chat. It doesn't really matter that I think Starbucks coffee tastes like they decided that the filter was an optional step in brewing, I still like sipping coffee and looking at books.

When we got to the counter I asked the person at the register for a regular coffee. "Venti?" she asked. What is venti? I have to assume that it is Italian for "idiot trying to order a small coffee." I stared at her stupidly until she just barely raised a large cup from behind the counter. I figured this was a little large, but since I didn't know what the other size names were so I said sure. When I got the coffee I realized how big it really was (20 ounces), and wondered to myself whether a sane person would ever drink 20 ounces of Starbucks coffee in one sitting.

We talked about hard decisions that need to be made and what is going on in our lives, and I fear I guided the conversation more than her. Even so, it was nice to have the opportunity to discuss life with her.

One thing I do need to figure out before I go back, though, is what a small is in Starbucks talk. A venti goes right through me.

early arrivals

Mrs Dust and I have a tendency to go early to movies. Especially on Friday or Saturday nights, we like to be among the first in the theater so that we get good seats. This is also a good opportunity to observe people as they enter the theater.

When I was making plans to go see The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy last night with the guys, it didn't cross my mind that maybe I should wait until about twenty minutes before the movie to show up. The movie started at 9:20 PM. I showed at 8:35. What follows is my life during that time.

The times have been changed to protect the innocent, and because I can't remember exactly to the minute when everything happened.

8:35 - Arrive at the theater. Consider purchasing ticket for movie, but I figure I'll look like a nerd purchasing an H2G2 ticket alone.
8:37 - Attempt to call Mrs Dust to discuss Survivor. No answer.
8:39 - Attempt to call Dash to find out how far away he is. No answer.
8:41 - Consider calling Achtung, but come to the conclusion that he doen't like showing early for movies anyway.
8:42 - Attempt to call my sister to see how things are going. Her roommate says she isn't there.
8:44 - Start to clean numbers out of my phone that are either no longer used or of people that there is no chance that I will ever need to call.
8:48 - Watch the guy changing the movie listings in front of the theater.
8:52 - Attempt to call Mrs Dust again. No answer.
8:55 - Attempt to call Dash again. No answer.
9:00 - See Dash getting out of car across the parking lot. Try calling his phone. No answer.
9:01 - I intercept Dash and we buy our tickets.
9:03 - Dash and I go inside to get out of the cold.
9:09 - I realize that Achtung has tried calling me, go outside and find him.
9:12 - Dar shows, and he is not wearing cadmium yellow.
9:14 - Doc shows at a great surprise to the rest of us because we all thought he was in Wisconsin.
9:16 - Dash convinces us to go to the theater to get seats.
9:18 - Dash goes to get seats. Dar and myself both realize we need to use the bathroom. Doc buys his ticket. Forrest arrives.

See what you miss when you don't show up early.

dos años en cinco de mayo

Today is the second anniversary of my first day at the company I work for. It's not a real big deal since the three year mark is the first milestone that the company recognizes, however, given that I have gone through two layoffs from real jobs and one layoff from a temp job in the past five years, this is pretty significant. The longest I have worked at any other job was two days short of two years. It was also two days short of qualifying for profit sharing. Aaaaugh!

I have often wondered if someone looking at my resumè would think I have commitment issues. The other job that worked at for two years was with a big five technical consulting firm, so the longest I stayed on any one project was a little over a year. Since graduating college about five years ago (ironically, five years ago to the day) I have worked in eight different offices. I wish this was due to commitment issues because those could be dealt with easily.

I probably need to start having my very own Cinco de Mayo celebration every year given that this seems to be a significant date for me. I'll celebrate next year if I still have my job.

true reflections

You could always tell who the new guy at the one of the offices I used to work at was based upon his bathroom habits. If he went to the single urinal by the sink I knew that he was new. This was based on the fact that he hadn't figured out yet that anyone walking by the bathroom when the door was opened could plainly see the urinal (or the person in front of the urinal) through the reflection of a mirror on the bathroom wall. I could never figure out how a mistake like that could be made since a recent stat I heard said that over 90% of architects are male. Isn't this something that is covered in some architecture basics class? Isn't this something that most male architects will have considered. It seems like such a simple, yet vitally important, detail to miss.

It's amazing how frequently this problem is repeated. Even one of the main bathrooms in my church has this problem. There are two urinals side by side, and if you look in the door at the mirror in front of the sink, one of the two is visible. I always have to take a second or two to think through which one is visible before using it.

Now when I walk into an unfamiliar bathroom the first thing I check is what a person walking by the bathroom can see. Sometimes the only usable facilities available are not completely hidden. Some people think that the hardest decisions to make are regarding career, mate, and other things that can impact you for the rest of your life. For me, those decisions were easy compared to, "Can I hold it?"

in the gutter

I think I know why people who make stupid choices are called bird brains.

This weekend it came time to clean out the gutters on my house. This has to be the most tedious and mind-numbing chore that a person can be relegated to. The job itself is incredibly monotonous and so it feels very slow-going. As if to add insult to injury the crud that sits and decomposes in the gutter is rather gross. Fortunately it didn't stain when I sat in the drippage a couple of times. I neglected the job as long as possible until about 4PM on Saturday, then determined it could not wait any longer.

As was expected, the process was uneventful for the first 20 minutes or so, which was until I got to the far end of the front of the house. As I approached the downspout a robin fluttered out the downspout in a fury and flew away, though probably not far away. I didn't think much of it at first, but as I continued to work on the area of gutter approaching this downspout I couldn't help but notice a light chirping coming from inside my downspout. The stupid robin had created a nest in one of the joints of the downspout and had at least one live chick in the nest.

I considered my options carefully. Dare I try to move the nest and deal with inevitably killing the chick and perhaps having an angry parent on my hands? Since the downspout only handles water for a three to four foot stretch of gutter, I figured that I could probably deal with a blocked downspout for a couple of months. I decided to leave the nest for now and remember to clean it out later this summer.

Hopefully by July the robin will have figured out that the downspout only makes a good home if she wants an indoor pool. If not, I fear I'll be responsible for a cleanup reminiscent of the cottontail massacre.

aaaaah!

I have just time-traveled to the New York City area on September 11, 2001. I can see smoking buildings across a body of water. I walk down to the water to see some relatives that live in a house boat across from Manhattan.

"AAAAAH!"

I wake from my deep sleep. It must have been a dream because I am not aware that I have any relatives in New York City or in New Jersey. Wait, what was that shout? I hear Mrs Dust in the other room say something about killing a spider in the shower. I drift back to sleep.

This time I meet a music producer who is creating what appear to be Chucky dolls with elongated heads. Later I will realize that this part of my dream is heavily influenced by a Snopes story I read a few days ago (disturbing image warning). I flip a switch on the back of one of the dolls' necks, and it immediately comes to life, opens its mouth, and lunges to chomp into my jugular.

"AAAAAH!"

I have waken up. Mrs Dust is sitting next to me asking why I have such a hard time getting up in the morning (I think "AAAAAH!").

As I am getting ready for work, I ask Mrs Dust whether she really killed a spider or if I dreamed that. She did. Her hero.