What the Hell Have I?

I read a line in a novel today that said words mean things, and that got me to thinking. Words don't really mean anything, except by mutual agreement. I'm sure I'm not the first person to mention this, not by a longshot, but it's the first time I can remember really thinking about it. Words don't mean anything unless people agree that they do. Otherwise, they're just sounds or squiggly marks. I mean, if you meet someone who doesn't speak the same language that you do and you convey to them that the sound "carrot" means a vehicle with an internal combustion engine that you drive around, how are they to know different? To take it a step further, let's look at two words that don't seem to have anything in common--A chair is something you sit in, right? And a head is something that sits on top of a neck and contains a brain. These two words don't seem to have anything to do with one another. And yet, isn't the chair of a committee the head of that committee? Yeah, it's weird. Maybe I just have too much time on my hands. Anyway, maybe it's all the seed of a story that I'll never write.

Joyride

Farewell little jester, I bid you adieu
In your comical cap and your bell-bearing shoes
With your stick and your ribbon and your flashing tight smile
With your words wiped with whimsy and your backbiting guile
Maybe one day I'll look back and see you behind
But if that ever happens you won't catch me blind
Because I know your tactics and motives and pain
The things from your dreams that creep out of your brain
To snap at the heels of all good men and true
And make them into villains, rather than you.

Don't ask, I have no idea. Definitely subject to further editing or deletion.

First We Take Manhattan

First off, I should preface this post by saying that I'm a fan of the music and lyrics of Leonard Cohen. Especially his lyrics. Particularly and emphatically his lyrics. The vast majority of song lyrics aspire to doggerel. Occasionally they rise to honest, or thoughtful, or even inspiring. Only rarely, and by rarely I mean almost never, can a songwriter be truly called a poet. Leonard Cohen manages that in spades, but again that is a most subjective ideal to which I happen to subscribe.
Anyway, on to the point. Yes, it's strange but true that I actually have a point in this post. I just watched a movie called "I'm Your Man," a kind of combination documentary and tribute concert movie of Leonard Cohen's music, and my point is that it's very much worth watching. I'm not sure if you need to be familiar with the music to enjoy it--many of the performances are very different from Cohen's own versions of his songs. I myself was familiar with much, though not all, of the songs in the movie. Also, other than Nick Cave and U2, I was not familiar with the artists performing in the movie. Nevertheless, most of the performances were very good or better, and the final song in the film--Cohen himself performing "Tower of Song" backed by U2--was worth the time all by itself.
I strongly recommend that anyone unfamiliar with Leonard Cohen's music check it out, both his albums and this film. His "I'm Your Man" album is a good place to start. He's a fascinating person--a Jew, a Zen monk, a father, a "Lady's Man." It's great stuff.

Did You Miss Me

Woohoo, Shauna is back in Reno to stay. She'll be going to community college in the Fall. She'll be looking for a part time job over the next couple of weeks and we'll be working on getting used to living together again. It's been a year and a half since she went to Utah, and we're both very excited that she's back.
It's going to be an adjustment for Emily as well, now that Peaches will be here permanently. They get along really well so far, playing together and sharing the attention. They've both been used to getting all the attention so I imagine that will be the biggest change for each of them, no longer being the single dog in the house.
I"m really looking forward to the rest of the summer now. It's nice to have someone to share my days with again.

Chant of the Ever Circling Skeletal Family

I've often heard it said that life is a Journey. Personally, I'm not a Journey fan. Oh sure, they have a couple of good songs but overall I think I like their album covers more than their music. I think life is more of a Bowie--you know, ch-ch-ch-changes, turn and face the strain.
I've certainly had a number of different personae over the course of my life. I spent a few years as a space cadet, though maybe not quite as flamboyant as Ziggy Stardust. I can't say I ever really did the androgynous thing, but some things are a little too weird even for me. I would say that the term "misspent youth" would not be far wrong in my case, but I did have some fun. I'd say I also did the Thin White Duke thing, being all angsty and existential. I spent some serious time always crashing in the same car.
All that stuff, though, just contributed to me becoming the person I am today. Regrets, I've had a few; but then again, too few to mention. All in all, the changes I've been through have made me into a skin I'm pretty happy to walk around on the inside of, looking out.

Ramblin' Man

Shauna and I just enjoyed a terrific weekend together, her last visit from Utah. It was her last visit because weekend after next she'll be back in Reno permanently. She took the train this time, instead of driving, and it seemed like she enjoyed this alternate means of getting here. We had no idea that the train was so inexpensive--her round trip ticket between Reno and Salt Lake City was just over $100. It costs that in gas to drive. Unfortunately, it meant that she couldn't bring Peaches so Emily was quite disappointed.
So next week I'll be taking the train to SLC for a visit and to attend my father-in-law's retirement party. He's officially retired from the military this week, so he's having a big barbecue weekend after next to celebrate. He's retired from the Army as a Command Sergeant Major I believe, the highest noncom rank aside from Sergeant Major of the Army (of which there is only one.) He's a great guy and I'm looking forward to seeing him.
So at the end of my visit to Utah, I'll be driving back to Reno with Shauna and this time she'll be staying. She's stressing out about finding a job here when she gets back--we can't afford for her to be out of work for very long. She has a real problem with job interviews because of her size. I've been trying to encourage her, to help her feel positive about the job hunt. Any employer would be fortunate to get her. Also, we'll be getting her registered for classes for her Fall semester at the local community college. We're both excited about her going back to school.
After my days off with Shauna, I was of course very busy at work today. My days off came right after our annual inventory, so there's lots to do to get ready for our busiest time of the year. These are the times that I'm thankful for the awesome student employees we have working for us--they do a terrific job of allowing me to delegate a lot of what I need done, and do the work so well that I don't have to worry about it.
Speaking of student employees, a couple of my former student workers have invited me to the inaugural meeting of the Book Club of Awesomeness. They're planning it as a discussion and social book club centered around graphic novels. I've only read a couple of graphic novels, so I'm thinking it could be a lot of fun. Given my general lack of recognizable social skills and tendency to become passionately eloquent to the exclusion of other's opinions when it comes to certain types of discussions, we'll see how that all goes.

Song About Nuthin

Friday night all alone. Beer and some David Bowie music help with the bored and the lonely, but not all that much. I really need to move the rest of my music to my new computer. It's really not that new anymore, I've had it almost a year. Sometimes I think it would be better to live in an isolated cabin in the woods somewhere, then at least there's the chance of being kidnapped by aliens or something. On second thought, maybe that wouldn't be so great, who'd feed Emily and the birds? I need to go buy a weedeater this weekend. Hmm, why does the spellchecker suggest that instead of "weedeater" I might have meant to type "beefeater?" That kind of scares me. Perhaps it's just suggesting that I'm doing a yeoman's job with my blog type thingie here. I could live with that, as unlikely as it is. Freeform blogging, I think I might be on to something here. This is much more entertaining than trying to organize my thoughts into a (marginally) linear format. Format--that's another word I think is kinda strange. I suppose it makes sense, eytmologically (oooh, now that's a good word), coming from a root verb that means "fashion." Maybe the reason it seems weird is due to its evolution in usage. "Format" has gone from something of a jargonistic (I'm on a roll here) word that existed mostly in the vocabularies of secretaries, writers, and printers to an everyday word common in popular culture. It's a theory, anyway. I'd call it a hypothesis but then I'd feel obliged to investigate it further in a pointless attempt to prove or disprove it and that would just be silly. If there's one thing I don't want to be, it's silly. Absurd, sure, but not silly. That just isn't dignified.
Okay, out of a lack of anything better to do I've looked up the origins of "silly" and "absurd" and found something interesting (to me.) "Absurd" comes from the latin "absurdus," which means discordant or unreasonable. Very straightforward. Very dull. On the other hand, "silly" originally meant blessed. I didn't know that. According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, the meaning of "silly" has progressed from "blessed" to "pious" to "innocent" to "harmless" to "weak" to "feebleminded or foolish." That's either really fascinating or just silly.

A Day In The Life

Haven't posted in a while, so here's a mishmash of what's been going on lately. Emily is doing great--she seems to have gotten over her pancreatitis and she's back to the happy dog we know and love. The semester is over, with summer on the way. The busiest stretch of the year for me at work is now only a few weeks away and I can't say I'm looking forward to it. At least I'll have a good student staff this year. I had expected to lose my best student employee because he graduates on Saturday. He's enrolled in grad school and wanted to keep his job, but due to some silly changes in student employment requirements he wouldn't be eligible to do so unless he took summer classes (that's not a requirement for undergrad student employees, and until a month or two ago wasn't required for grad students either.) Today he decided that keeping his student job was worth what amounts to a waste of his time and money to take some summer classes (that he neither wants nor needs) so we get to keep him. Unless of course they change the requirements yet again.
Shauna will be here next week and we'll get to spend my birthday together. We're both looking forward to that. We're going to be trying to find her a job here in Reno during this visit, so wish us luck. We're very tired of having to live apart. Whether we find her a job at this time or not, it will be good to be with her again. I really miss her.
Speaking of Shauna, she's enrolled in the local community college and another thing she'll be doing this visit is having an advisement appointment and taking the placement test. I'm really excited that she's decided to go back to school, and I think she'll be very successful with it. I also think that she will enjoy it--I know I enjoyed returning to school when I went back after 17 years. I imagine that she's probably nervous about it, but she'll do great. She's a smart woman.
I went and saw the new Star Trek movie last weekend with some friends. It's great. I also saw a very funny video report from The Onion about how Trekkies hate the new movie because it disdains the traditions of past Star Trek movies by being exciting and fun to watch. LOL.
My favorite sports teams are doing great, too. The Penguins just put away the Capitols in game 7 of that series and have moved on to the conference championship in the Stanley Cup Playoffs. Go Pens! The Dodgers are having a great season as well, best record in baseball as of this writing in spite of losing Manny for 50 games. They have a great team all around, in spite of some weakness in pitching, and their offense continues to rack up the runs even without Manny. Juan Pierre is showing the fans what he can do! I do love me some baseball.
Speaking of baseball, a professor that I know a little here at the University, Jennifer Ring, has written a book called "Stolen Bases: Why American Girls Don't Play Baseball." I've sold her a few computers over the years and helped her out with some computer problems, and I'm really looking forward to reading the book. I'll be back later with my review and you know it will be good--I do love me some baseball.
That's it for now and for the two people that I know actually read this blog on occasion: Shauna, I love you, and Inez, I miss you.

See Emily Play

My retriever, Emily, got sick last week. I woke up to find multiple regurgitations by the back door--she's a sweet girl, and she wanted to be sick outside but it was the middle of the night so I didn't know she wanted out. She was lethargic and didn't really want her morning treat, and after thinking about that all morning I took the afternoon off and came home to see how she was doing. She was not doing well. She hadn't eaten and was even more lethargic than she had been that morning, so Shauna made an appointment for her with the vet and I took her in the next day. They ran some tests and decided she had pancreatitis, and that she needed to stay the night at the vet's. They gave her pain meds (aparently it's a very painful condition) and gave her intravenous or subcutaneous fluids through the night--she needed to go at least 24 hours without taking any food or water by mouth. I picked her up the next afternoon, along with some no-fat dog food to give her for the next few days. She seemed to be feeling a little better, although she wasn't happy with the dog food. I've been feeding her small amounts at a time since then, and I'm thrilled to say she's just about back to normal. She was able to play with Peaches while Shauna was here for her (Shauna's) birthday, although with somewhat less than her usual vim and vigor. We couldn't take them to the dog park this time, since Emily wasn't supposed to get overheated, but they had a good time together. I didn't even mind the large vet bill too much--she's part of our family, after all.

Classic Hollywood Ending

I haven't written anything here in quite a while, and Shauna's been giving me a hard time about it. "Just write anything," she says. Well, I kinda got stuck cuz there are some things I want to write about but I've been having a hard time getting started. So, I've decided that since I rented some movies this last week and they all surprised me in one way or another I would write a little bit about them.
First up is "Punisher War Zone." I am an unabashed fan of action movies, and I'm not particularly discriminating when it comes to them. I'm not really a big fan of comics, but I do tend to like movies made from comics. My favorite comic (or graphic novel) is "Watchmen," which I also saw this week, and it was phenomenally good. "Punisher War Zone" doesn't fit into that category by any stretch of the imagination. It was wonderfully violent although perhaps a little more graphic than necessary at times. The problem I had with it was the guy who played the Punisher--bland, bland, bland. He did fine with the action sequences, but that was it. Nothing in the script or perfomance gave me any stake in him or the things he did. Every other character in the movie was far more interesting than the hero. For example, this was the first time I can remember seeing Wayne Knight in a non-comedic role and he was actually pretty good. That I cared more about his sidekick character than the hero surprised me, as did the fact that this quite bloody and emotionally void mess was directed by a woman.
"My Name is Bruce" stars possibly the greatest actor of his generation, Bruce Campbell. This movie is terrible, embraces its terribleness, and rises below it. Total camp. Anyone who isn't a big fan of Bruce Campbell and bad movies will hate it, and they should. This is a movie that sets the bar low and still limbos under it. I loved it.
"Role Models" is the kind of movie that I almost never watch on purpose. I don't even know why I rented it. I'm not a fan of most comedies made nowadays, I just don't find them very funny. Generally speaking, if you've seen the preview you've seen all the funny bits. This week I rented two comedies and they were both hilarious. Paul Rudd is very good as a cynical guy whose life isn't turning out the way he wanted, and Christopher Mintz-Plasse, who's turn as McLovin in "Superbad" was by far the funniest thing about that movie, is once again very funny as the nerdy kid whose hobby is live action roleplaying. The whole live action roleplaying thing will certainly be a riot for a lot of the people I know (I'm thinking of my D&D friends). This movie had me cracking up all the way through, and I highly recommend it.
Okay, I saved the best for last--"Hamlet 2." Don't worry, you can enjoy it even if you haven't seen the first one. There really isn't that much to say about this one other than SEE IT. It turns every "inspirational teacher" movie ever made in its ear, and the tunes are quite catchy. Steve Coogan is one funny guy.

Alone Again, Naturally

Well, the holidays are over and Shauna and Peaches are back in Utah. I'm not actually alone--Emily, Nemo, and Daisy are here with me and we're all missing Shauna. The last couple of days Peaches and Emily reached an understanding and started playing together a lot, and Peaches quit chasing Emily away from her food dish. I go back to work tomorrow (Monday, 1/5). It's been a nice week off. Shauna and I had a lot of fun, even though we didn't do too much. We went to Rum's a couple of nights, went out to eat a few times, and saw "The Strange Case of Benjamin Button." We've kind of rediscovered each other, so it was really nice just being together. Even when we just hung around the house and watched DVD's, being together was plenty. I'm gonna have to work hard to see if I can find something for Shauna here in Reno, so she can come home again for good. I'm sad now, but I have memories of a very good week to tide me over until next time.