The tin shed is up in the backyard; the doors worked a LOT better once I stuffed a rock under one corner of the foundation to torque it all into proper alignment. Bah! The big rain (previous to THIS big rain) made all my cinderblocks settle unevenly. Humbug!
I spread the lumps of dirt (most of 'em; Marla swears she'll move the rest this week or something; she wanted me to stop, 'cause I guess I looked liked was going to die out there in the humidity), and I laid most of the paving stones around it, and it's all kind of nice. It will be even prettier once the grapes grow back, or something, to fill in the stark nakedness of that corner. I'll post pics later.
Oh, the rain, I need to see how much water leaks in... may need to assault the whole thing with a caulk gun. Wheee! Or maybe glow-in-the-dark gluestick. That would be amusing
I just ordered from ABC fill-in-the-blank services a "full exclusion" rat service, for a tad over $500. Ouch. But then again, I just got a reimbursement on my property tax due to my finally getting off my ass and putting in for a homestead exemption, totalling a tad under $400. So that helps a lot.
July is ... tomorrow! Egads! And I have a lovely four-day weekend as part of it, during which I want to settle down a connect-the-dots design (and start the prototype implementation), and I want to get starting schematics and SPICE simulations on the new Tesla coil. And maybe some parts ordered.
I'm going to go wayyyy off into high-risk territory and put some International Rectifier IGBTs into parallel conduction -- a task fraught with negative feedback and runaway current loading, which can lead to some lovely pyrotechnics. However, with the soft-switching I have planned, and running them actually SLOWER than rated (for a complete turnabout from normal Tesla practice), I think it will be just fine.
Plus, these parts are (a) cheap and (b) accessible. The part I _wanted_ was (a) expensive, and (b) really hard to actually GET. In fact, I got a call from the corporate rep and I had to tell him my plan... to us IR's part. Because it's cheap. And I can buy it. He was all, "but it shows here that it's in stock in distribution!". I countered with the hard-to-refute knowledge that of the 2 (two!) distributors that claim stock, one doesn't have stock, and the other has a horrible and useless website without any ordering forms.
Sucks to be him.
What a week... trying to get a fix from my H/W guy so I can freakin' TEST the changes that have come down the pike, so I can get a decent update to the rest of the team so THEY can test, so we can be done with this damn project.
Of course, we have three revisions of the device and the newer images don't work right on the older hardware (e.g. Rev C firmware on Rev B device; not my fault, it's hard-wired that way; if my H/W guy had used reverse logic on the sleep line it would have worked, but noooo, probably not enough room for an inverter. Or the '!' sign in the VHDL. Who knows.)
So yesterday I send out an e-mail that includes the note that the modified image I was sending FIXES the Rev-B sleep issue, but MAY BREAK four specific modules due to creeping incompatibilities. This gives us a lot more devices we can use for testing, with the effect of just losing 4 of 36 modules... no big deal, big improvement overall.
I get a ping from one of the guys downstairs saying that the RevB sleep hack doesn't work, they can't use modules! Okay, so my H/W guy messed up (don't we all?) and the hack doesn't work. Bring one up and I'll verify the problem.
Umm. Guys. This works. I see the module, I see data...
Oh! It turns out it only fails on THIS module. And this second one as well.
Both of which were listed as possibly broken in my e-mail.
These are smart guys. Did they not read my e-mail at all? It wasn't even a long e-mail! I kept it short!
::headdesk::
Thank god it's Friday; I _may_ get through this day without killing someone.
Finished the Shed structural elements last night; took over two hours, less than three. Marla was an excellent helper and spare hand, spare brain.
In retrospect, we should have left all of the screws slightly loose until all panels were in place -- getting the roof on was six flavors of annoying, trying to torque the shed walls into shape.
The instructions say "Measure diagonally to be sure the shed is square." We didn't bother with this because the instructions made no mention of what to do if the shed were NOT square, which fits in just about right with my experience with the Chinese approach to debugging -- which is to say, they don't. No error reporting, because that might indicate weakness. Bugs? We don't have any bugs! Our tests prove it, see that green light? If you measure your shed and it's not square, clearly you lived a poor life and should just go die now. Hah.
So the shed was not square, but leaving the screws loose until the end would have made it easier to finesse into position. That would have required more forethought than _I_ had going, and would have been something useful for the instructions.
Oh, and don't get me started about the highly accurate placement of holes in this metal shed thingy. Yup. Putting the hinges on, if you tighten two of the three screws, the third screw hole is over half a diameter out of place. That's some quality machining there Lou.
Needless to say, the doors don't hang right yet. Another task for the coming weekend.
I spent the rest of the evening trying to find an IGBT or other transistor shaped device that can (a) handle 600 amps, an arbitrary number I pulled out of my ear that is about ten times the IGBT I use now; and (b) can switch at 100kHz, another arbitrary number, but my current Tesla goes at 168kHz, so 100kHz frequencies seem reasonable.
I found one very nice 600A IGBT on eBay for $47, normally a $470 part, but it switches at 25kHz. In fact, most if not all high power IGBTs switch at the 20-25kHz range.
I do so want to build this massive Tesla in DRSSTC style, though, which means BIG SWITCH. Or, maybe, lots of little switches in parallel, except that IGBTs don't parallel gracefully, not like MOSFETs. But MOSFETs have issues with current dissipation at high voltages.
So the quest goes on.
Curse you evil Day Star.
This weekend was spent melting under the relentless sun, shifting chunks of clay and sandstone matrix to create a (mostly, somewhat) level foundation for my 8' x 3' "garden" shed. Hehehehhe. "Garden". I have a "Fire Garden". Heheheh.
Yeah.
Well, six 12" square concrete deck footings, dug 5" to 8" deep or so depending where on the SLOPING DAMN HILL of my back yard they were at, means removing only 2 or 3 cubic feet of earth. Not so bad, eh? Shouldn't take too long, eh?
That's what I thought too. However, a million percent humidity (INFINITE HUMIDITY; rain + sun = miasma) and near-100-degree temps made it grueling and tiring work, even with the wonderful help I had (Thanks Matt, Michelle).
So, two days worth of mornings, several hours each (until we fell over, basically), and the foundation is set, the 2x4 framework (pressure treated with alkaline copper, I believe), the 3/4" plywood topper (which should be on the metal frame and not the 2x4 frame, ah well, I'll live), the shed base, the doors, and some bracings -- built.
But no shed yet. I'm a bit frustrated about that, really.
Might finish that Tuesday.
I also read a bunch of my materials for the Flame Effects Operator License, but without knowing what kind of material they will test for, I have severe doubts about what I need to try and memorize. And I both hate and am quite poor at memorizing random crap.
Work will probably be pure suck this week, but is bound to get better once/if/when we pound the last nail into its coffin.
For now, I just need to wake up.
Work is going pretty good -- the team that owns the modules realized they messed up on this family, fixed their registers, and when I incorporate their changes my stuff works too! Yay! That's the last four that need looking at... going green even as I write here.
Of course, one of eight channels fails on this OTHER family over HERE, but hey, I don't want to get bored.
Dunno yet about the other issues yet. Maybe they have crumpled before my might logic. Heh. HEHEHehhehehehhe. ::snerk:: Right.
On a different note, I've been have some existential moments again, and I really hate that.
I went in once for dental surgery (root canals) and got a full knockout for the trip. Edwin gone. Edwin back -- and the work was done. Nothing in between, nada, blank, black.
Certain head trauma, too, will cause complete loss of memory. It just doesn't make the trip from short term to long term.
Certain drugs, too, won't knock you out so much as wipe the experience from the slate.
Certain other drugs can be used to wipe memories during recall.
So, these existential moments always harken back to that loss of existence I experienced (in retrospect) during that surgery. Edwin gone. And not waking up. Gone gone gone.
Terrifying.
There is nothing, literally nothing, more terrifying. This is why we invented religion, after all, and why it sticks around so persistently in spite of evidence.
::sigh::
And Chinese programmers? Yeah. Error handling? Yeah.
Been bugging them for 12 to 18 months about their need to, you know, catch and report errors. They started poking at that, I think, last week.
My head's gonna assplode.
And now they are giving me annoying attitude about MY error reporting, which has been in place, I dunno, for a year and a half now? Two years? They want "all clear" messages for events like pulling modules... all clear? WTF? All clear from what? When they tell me to reload the configuration, I do that, and I'm clear. What else would they like? Blood? Two weeks before drop-dead date? Give me a freakin' break!
So, work is stressing on me pretty hard, but the drop-dead date is June 30, so it _will_ be done by then, one way or another.
Of course, my efforts are totally absorbed into supporting, debugging, and doing timing and even data-motion tests on these 35 or 36 devices that plug into mine... testing that SHOULD HAVE BEEN DONE by the OTHER team, you know, the team that these devices belong to. Yeah. Them. They were all ready to release 'em without checking, you know, that they actually follow timing spec. "We got data, it's good!" Is it really? Do you know WHEN that data was captured? I do!
I've found bugs, and my cohort on that team has fixed bugs, and we are down to the last three or for, all of one family.
I had one marked green (as in good) and then I found a subtle problem in the timing. Goody. Now it's better.
Thursday had dance class again, that was fun! I'm a tad out of shape; East coast swing was hard work. But fun!
Skipped Bolero, my tendinitis was really giving me gyp; I gotta wear my muscle strap I guess.
Friday night, I had to clean up the garage a bit so the Make Magazine photographer could, you know, photograph. Hi Pam! Nice lady. During the arrangement, I dropped a dancing-flame tube pillar on my toe -- this is an 8" PVC pipe, an adapter, a subwoofer, and a 4-foot long board as a foot. My right big toe is funny colors and I limp now.
I skipped West coast swing Friday, due to funny-colored toe, and instead we had a lovely anniversary (Friday the 13 is our first-date anniversary) with my sweetie wifie.
Today, I moved about two tons of paving stone (wearing my muscle strap thing), with help from Marla, Tall Matt, and Paul (pretty much in sequence like that). The common factor was me limping around arranging stones, and the sun beating down on my (hatted) head. Reminded me of Flipside.
Now, soon, movie time! Or maybe more ibuprofen. That stuff really works.
Tomorrow am? The remaining 3/4 ton or so of paving stone. Whee!
Oooo a baby kitten is attacking my shorts. Want a kitten?
Well, we managed to tame the back yard -- which was filled, hundreds of square feet of it, with four foot weeds and plants such as sunflowers, and I don't know what all.
But we tamed it. Hard work, done in the morning and evening to avoid the worst of the heat. In the progress, we created about a cubic yard of new compost pile!
The old compost pile is now in use as dirt, spread here and there to support the nutrient needs of other beds.
I'm a tad sore, but otherwise fine. My tendonitis is giving me a bit of an attitude, but the cider is helping counteract the ache ::grin::
If our idiot HOA approves, I'll be putting a shed over the old compost area on the weekend of the 21st.
NEXT weekend, I need to lay nearly three tons of rock in the back yard, which should be interesting.
Oh, and I got replacement parts for the crispy Tesla, so I'll probably revive it next week.
I've been doing housework too, but slowly... I'll see if I achieve my June goals of planning, housework, and yardwork soon enough.
Mythos and Logos. AND. Not "OR". Important distinction, that.
In the not so distant past, and in the very real present for perhaps most people, folks guided and ruled their lives according to mythical explanations of the world. The sky gods, eventually logrolled up into a single all-powerful and jealous deity for most existing religions, were/are a real and powerful force in people's lives.
In the 18th and 19th centuries the power of logos, of rationality, started gaining momentum -- not just in the Christian world, but the Muslims had some activity here too (though European meddling in their culture and government seems to have put a bit of a pox on their explorations, so now they are very much in reaction to us, rather than exploring their own territory; but hey, Arabs and Persians are mostly still a mystery to me so I don't know).
In the 19th century, in fact, some philosophers were decrying the death of God entirely, and predicting that humanity will be ruled solely along rational lines in the near future.
Hah! See how well THAT worked out!
Well, World War I happened, and the joys of science turned out to have a very ugly side as well (not even going to MENTION WWII, it only got worse), plus there were a huge array of people not so enthralled by having their entire life map declared null and void.
That brought us, apparently, the current sets of conservative religious movements -- ugly ugly things that they are.
What we see today is a reaction by the bearers of the old mythos against the encroachments of logos -- if the world sees logic and reason as primary, and those immersed in mythos KNOW in their HEARTS that their religion is true and valuable, then therefore their myth must also be valid when viewed under logic and reason. Truth is truth, right?
This leads directly to literal readings of the bible, the creationists, and so forth. For those of us heavily steeped in logos, we see these attempts as ludicrous -- so bad as to not even be wrong. What can they be thinking? But for the people endorsing their mythos as a true answer to how the world works, misapplying science to it, they are fighting for their very existence, to preserve the meaning behind their life.
There's a key problem here: mythos and logos do not address the same aspects of our world, and applying the rules of one to the context of the other is a recipe for embarrassment at least, and social and political disaster at worst.
You just CAN NOT read mythical works, that are written to address the heart and soul, as logical treatises. And you CAN NOT expect the world of science and reason to be able to address matters of the spirit. When you try, you are missing the point quite badly.
Your baby dies and science tells you exactly WHY. Does this help your grieving? No.
Your spiritual text talks about floods and mankind being reborn. Does this make your study of geology or meteorology better? No.
Humans are amazing in our ability to rationalize (in fact, another treatise is about how we only act on reflex and rationalize every action after the fact, truth!); this is probably the thing that really does set us apart from the other animals. Our ability to predict the future, to explain our actions in terms of the past, to apply abstract systems of thought onto the world and to invent symbols to represent things that don't actually exist, to communicate ALL of this across both space and time... OH. MY. GOD. It's a huge thing. Our rational abilities, our power of logos, are unbelievable when compared to ... everything else.
But that's just part of who we are as humans.
We have a very real need for myth as well; how many of the enduring stories in the world are simple explanations? None? A few? Think about perhaps the oldest stories you know... I bet they have roots in the Grimm Fairy tales! Myths.
Neal Gaimen's stories? That guy does good mythos.
The stories that really resonate (no, not those pink romance novels, "tingle" is different than "resonate") with us, I would be willing to guess, are all mythically endowed; they reflect an unspoken, unspeakable aspect of our human nature, our condition, our place in the world.
With a good mythos, we can really feel in our heart how we fit into the world, how our life and actions can mesh with the lives of others around us, how we work as part of an overarching _story_ to achieve a greater goal.
Mythos gives us purpose; it helps us identify ourselves, to know who we are and how we fit in.
The hat-wearing shit-kicking cowboy went from reality to myth; how many cowboys do you see on 6th street in Austin? How many of them actually walk through cowshit during the day? They are identifying themselves with the cowboy storyline; the attitude; the myth.
The Goth. The Punk. The Geek. The Jock. These are each a reality and they are also each a mythical archetype, a template that can be held up to a life and used as a measure of it.
How well am I doing in life? Well, me, personally -- it depends on which archetype you compare it to!
I don't have a big savings account. I don't wield an political power. I have a million tools. I have a million skills. I work well with people, for the most part. I like to read. I like to WRITE.
So, for the template of BUSINESSMAN or POLITICIAN or even SPORTSMAN, I suck, my life is a failure, and I should just go kill myself. But for the role that I've selected for myself, the ROGUE_TECHNOLOGIST (which is a variation on the MAD_SCIENTIST), with a touch of ARTIST and INTELLECTUAL, but with a dash of MYSTIC as well -- well, my problem is that I don't have a good archetype. I had to mostly invent myself. And my my measure, I'm doing damned well, thank you.
I need to write the story that tells my myth.
EVERY SINGLE ONE OF YOU is living a story, and in that story you are the hero. Absolutely. Even if you are a villain, and you know that you are abusing those around you and that you cheat the medical system and fuck over your friends... you are still doing the best you can, and you are still the hero of your story. There is no other way to justify a life otherwise; the mental contortions to GET there may make a Chinese acrobat cringe in pain, but it's there.
The problem, the BIG PROBLEM at the CORE of so many problems both in our personal lives and in the world at large, is one of balance.
We try to live as all Mythos, denying our rational side, denying our need to invent and reinvent the world around us. We try to live as all Logos, denying the fact that our lives are stories and not equations, denying our spiritual need and our need to incorporate myth into our lives.
We need both. To be able to think and be logical, as well as to be able to have ritual and myth.
People like to be true, to be ABSOLUTELY TRUE; which feels like it should mean that MY TRUTH should be the same as YOUR TRUTH. Truth is truth, right?
For some truths, the logos truths, yes; Gravity will probably turn out to have some absolute mechanism and structure that is universally true. For now, we know down to a very fine measure, exactly how physical and energetic objects react with regards to gravity, and this is the same _everywhere_. Truth is truth.
For other truths, though, this is not even a little bit true. Your personal truth as a human being living on this vast and complex planet, interacting with your local and even global societies... our personal truth is just that. Yours. Personal. You may share it with your community, your church, your city even; sometimes even to some extent with your country. But that does not mean this is a universal truth! A billion Christians can be wrong, just as two billion Buddhists can be wrong. And at the same time, they can be right, in a local sense.
Spiritual truth is tied to the land, to the society, to the individual temperament.
For me, mythos is best represented in ritual (in action), but also in art and literature; it provides a coloring and resonance (that word again) to an otherwise black-and-white scientific world.
For some, the study and exploration of science IS their mythos; they find their spiritual fulfillment by living their life down to their very core as a scientist, teasing apart the mysteries of the universe. This is no weirder than those who find their spirit in the arcane disassembly of their sacred text, until there is no hiccup or flyspeck left unanalyzed.
God does not need to enter into the mythos as all; there are plenty of excellent myths that don't need a prime deity, or even a pantheon.
Fighting and killing because other people don't believe in your precise flavor of mythos is the stupidest, most damaging, RIDICULOUS things humanity has EVER come up with. Catholics and Protestants? Come on people, you are killing each other over... what? Yeah, for a long time the Protestant US felt the Catholics were the anti-Christ, and for all I know some still do. But that's applying your mythos inappropriately.
We need, as a race, as a SPECIES, to learn to live our lives according to myth, while at the same time exercising rational control over ourselves and our environment; and even more importantly, we need to stop acting like babies, expecting our religion or government to take care of our every need, and to GROW UP and TAKE RESPONSIBILITY for our lives. Dammit.
Yes. Bad things happen. Random death and destruction occurs. But we still have choices, as long as you breath and can move and think, you have choices. Make them wisely.
The first choice, taken carefully and with much thought, should be -- what mythos makes sense for my life and my future? Once you find that, things should become easier.
But remember, just because your mythos is the perfect thing for you, your neighbor may dance to a completely different drummer. Don't fuck up his music, okay?
Try not to confuse mythos and logos. Bad things happen when that happens; really tragically and epically bad things happen. History can be our guide on that front.
Try to pick a mythos that doesn't include too much ancillary damage; we still do need to live together as a species. Somehow.
Remember, my mythical avatar may just have a big damned hammer to smite yours with. But he won't because, frankly, that would be antisocial.
Yeah, you, I'm talking to you buddy. What good are you? What GOOD are you? How do you justify your water and carbon footprint on this planet?
Is the work you do of any value, or are you just a parasite sucking all the goodness and strength out of others? Yeah Mr. Lawyer, Mr. Politician, Mr. CEO, I'm looking at you, and you over there in the corner, you too. Yes, these jobs are all necessary and valuable when done right, and for the right reasons; but these and others are also drains on humanity when pursued for selfish reasons. You are dragging the rest of us down!
Humans are wickedly competitive, like rats on a sinking ship, and there is a horrible sense sometimes that most people would sell their grandmother into prostitution if it would help them accumulate more wealth or power.
Wealth! Now there is a stupid thing to live for. Money, and money analogs for those of you still trading in seashells or whatever, has a purpose; it stands in for the work and value we have created during our time on this planet, and we can use these markers in the various ways we have learned to love and/or hate.
But to live just to make money? What stupidity is that? You are going to spend your days doing random annoying bullshit just to collect these markers? Is what you are doing fulfilling in any way, are you creating anything, or taking entropy out of the system to make it work smoother and better? Or are you just out there... shuffling markers, trying to get the biggest pile before you die?
You are born naked and penniless, you will die the same. Your ancestors? Fuck 'em. They need to be able to be useful to society on their own merits, unless you really want to found a dynasty that will be reviled and hated for generations to come -- what is it about third or fourth generation wealth that just oozes uselessness?
Power? Sure, it's a trip to be able to control the fates of thousands, if not millions, but to what end? WHY do you want this power, WHAT do you plan to do with it?
Do you have to lie to people to achieve your goals? Distort the truth, bend reality to some alien shape and shove it screaming and writhing up the ass of your adoring public (or employees), to be able push your agenda? If so, you are doing it wrong: there is just one true evil, one unforgivable sin, and that is hypocrisy.
We, each of us, make decisions on the information we have; when that information is a lie, a distortion, then the system begins to collapse. When a company, a politician, a lawyer, an individual is living a hypocrisy, pushing bad data, it hurts all of society. I'm looking at you Mr Lawyer, Mr Politician, Mr Mega Corporate Leader, and even you Mr Player in the clubs, oozing up to the honeys and denying the damage and bitterness and alienation you leave in your wake.
There is one concept of God and Judgment that appeals to me (and just this one, I'm pretty picky): when you die, your entire life lays exposed to universal inspection (to God, to your wife, your children, your mother and father, your priest, everyone), every action, every thought, every lie and deception, every good deed done for true purposes or for false; all of it. Is this life something you would be proud of? Or will you be cast into hell, which really, is just the horror you will feel at this level of exposure.
Or maybe you won't, maybe you are a psychopath or see yourself as a predator and that it's up to everyone else to get the hell out of your way or become just another source of food (or money). There's a sucker born every minute, after all! Make good use of them!
But does that strategy scale very well? Not really; we as a society and as a culture get a LOT more done when we work pulling together, than when we are predating on each other. Most religions make note of this, the whole love your brother, forgiveness, thing.
I bet most people will cast themselves as a good Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, or whatever; hell, I've got friends who see themselves as very fine and upstanding Wiccans, Atheists, Agnostics. The entire spectrum. Good! Good for you, good for me. But, really, who the hell cares?
I see you over there, the person preaching and railing on this religious topic or other, going to church every week, saying the right things, wearing the right clothes, laughing at the right jokes, showing indignation at the right topics. So what? So you spend a few hours a week dancing a dance.
Is this really _you_? If you are casting yourself as a member of this religion, do you really LIVE that life, or are you just pretending when it is convenient? Is every moment of your day, every plan you make, every aspect of your future and every interaction with your fellow man informed by this religion, guided by it? Is your every act an act of worship, a reflection of the premise and promise given to you by your deity? For some Muslims, for some Jews, yes, I believe it is... for most of you? Hell no. You talk the talk, but I'll be damned if you walk the walk.
Oh, you wail, you hold me to too high a standard! Jesus (or Mohammad, or Buddha, or the Flying Spaghetti Monster) was so damned special, so close to the One True God, that no mere mortal can hope to compare! So you just give up? Hypocrite. If you don't make the effort, then you have no place taking the label. Call yourself atheist or agnostic instead, but do not take on the mantel of that which is holy, for you merely defile it with your carelessness.
Sure you can have doubts, and conflict, and struggles. Perfection is not for us, neither is rationality, nor full compassion, or any of those ideals. But unless you carry that vision with you, and live your life at a mirror for that which you call holy, you fail at religion. Sorry. Try something else.
This applies to more things than religion, too. I take Tai Chi and Ballroom dancing, and I move my body, in everything I do, with an awareness of the lessons I have learned in these disciplines. These skills become part of who I am, and not just things I do.
There are precious few things in life that are actually important, that are worthy of getting worked up about.
We all need shelter and clothes; humans are feeble and weak creatures, and comfort is nothing to be disdained. But does your house need to be huge, your clothes always the latest fashion? I don't think so. Sure, you can want the fine things (I know that I do) but is it important? Not really. It's NICE. It's PLEASANT. But to throw a fit because your shoes aren't the latest rip-off fad? Please! And I'm looking at you Mr. Fashionable Teen.
We all need sustenance, food, drink. And variety in that. But come on people, don't be pigs! And don't think that the crap they shovel out the windows at most fast food restaurants is good food, no matter how many times they put the Lite and Healthy and Low Fat (compared to pure lard) label on it. Remember, those companies are most likely being run by hypocrites whose only real goal is to fulfill the next quarterly corporate goal for the shareholders.
We all need society and friends and love. Really. Look to the studies with monkeys who don't get these things, it's not pretty.
Tools. I believe in tools, because I spend my life developing skills and making things. Tools are what make this possible for me.
Books.
These things give us power. Tools give us the power to create and repair. Books give us the power of society, of civilization, of education. You don't read books you say? Shame on you! I see you there, Mrs. Half of America, hiding behind that romance novel. That's not a book, that's porn. Pick up something that's not pink, mmm'kay?
Can't wield a tool? Nonsense. Knitting needles are tools, as are crochet hooks, as are your hands. Paintbrushes. Pens. Typewriters and computers. Learn to create something, whether a craft, a science, anything... for in creating we can find true satisfaction, the pleasure of seeing a real object and saying, "I made that".
Do you know what is not important? Most everything else.
A nice car or truck -- shiny, polished, lovingly cleaned every weekend . What a waste of life! Don't talk to me about resale value, you could probably repaint it before selling it with the value of the labor you put into it keeping it pretty. Sure, it can be a hobby, but important? Don't be stupid. Okay, some of you folks in the East and other places do have a valid anti-corrosion argument, I'll give you that.
Likewise, that SUV you use, that giant Pickem-up truck, has it ever seen a dirt road? Or carried a load of lumber or steel or manure? Will it? If not, then you, in your greed and childish desire for a nifty toy, are spending your life and resources unnecessarily depleting our world.
Yes, it's your right. Of course it is. If you want to be a selfish asshole, go for it, crowd the parking spaces, be a hazard on the road, suck down the gas, and waste your own resources filling it with gas. Knock yourself out. But remember that discussion above on religion, hypocrisy, and so forth? Yeah, I'm looking at you, dude.
That clean house of yours. Does it really matter? For some people, housecleaning is a pleasant activity and a clean house a joy and pleasure. For others it is a neurotic requirement, a necessity imposed on them by neurotic parents.
I grew up in clutter and, yes, filth (if you count my great-grandparents, especially), but I had in those cluttered, chaotic, dirty spaces love, attention, and support.
Which is more important? Getting the clothes off the floor, or paying attention to your children or partner?
Of course, I'm not one to harp on paying attention to family; I suck at it, and I of course point my fingers back up the chain of neglect passing through my father, his father, and on deeper into history. But still, think about it for a minute, and at least find an honest truth about why you do what you do in life. Is it really important? Does it really matter? When you have died (and yes, you will be dead soon, before you even realize it), will anyone have cared? What will the mourners at your wake remember you for? Will you even HAVE mourners?
So I don't much care for housework and the like. It doesn't matter, except when the clutter interferes with what I'm actually trying to do -- and then I clean for pragmatic reasons, to keep the bugs down, to make it easier to find stuff, to make my other more interesting tasks easier.
Every second, minute, hour, day, week, month, and year of your life, from the first moment you take a self-direction action until the very last moment before you lose conscious volition, you are spending your life.
Money is a token of work, of effort, or in some cases, of dishonesty and of theft. But still, it represents physical value.
Time is the token of life; attention and time spent are the currency of your life. Right now, you are spending some of your life reading these words, and I hope that I'm not wasting this precious resource.
You have a limited amount of time, and you don't even know HOW MUCH YOU HAVE. It's like a bank account; you can withdraw from it, but can never see the balance.
What do you spend your life on? Is it worth it, not only to you, but to everyone you come into contact with?
There are so many ways to put value on a life. What good are you with respect to your family?
Family. Breeders are everywhere, people with five and more children, spawning like the earth was still empty and in need of filling up. Dear god people, show some restraint!
Family is important, and through our children we create and re-create the world around us. It's not just the biology of procreation that is important, but the lessons, explicit and implicit, that you teach your spawn. Go for quality, not quantity. Growing without restraint, growth without boundaries? What other organism does that? Cancer. Let's not be a cancer, people.
What good are you to your community? Whether your community is your neighbors, your workmates, your friends; a physically bounded community or one tied together through common interest, how do you fit in?
I know that I feel very vividly the approbation and applause of my various communities, and that I feel so much better when I am filling an identifiable niche in the order of things.
We all have a need to be individuals, to have uniqueness and importance, but there is no way that each and every one of us can be a great shining star in the firmament. It's just not going to happen. But each of us can play a role, and play it well, in the structure of our family and a community of our choice (or not of our choice, it doesn't matter; what you do _counts_ and if affects those around you).
How do you play your roles? Do you bring joy, or improvement, or insight, or some kind of value as you fulfill your role in life?
You see, we also all have a strong need to belong, to be a part of something bigger than ourselves, to struggle with a common cause or against a common enemy. That's why when teenagers rebel, they rebel by _joining a group_ that stands at odds to the thing they are rebelling against. Why most religions set themselves up in opposition to something, in an eternal struggle. Almost nobody goes off to be a hermit, to found a new movement, to define themselves in isolation. People go off to define themselves as part of something, a something of their own choosing, but still, a group or community, with goals and standards and struggles.
Even I do that, and I grew up the consummate outsider, part of no group, bending to damn few pressures from my peers. But I chose to belong to certain groups, and to fulfill specific roles therein, because I feel better about myself when I do.
THINK about your life. Realize that the minutes you spend, you are irrevocably spending; there are no refunds. When you run out of minutes, you are DONE. You don't get a do-over.
So man up, harden the fuck up, and take responsibility for those minutes. Use them in a way that makes your world a better place, even if it's just putting a smile on a friend's face, or providing a surreal moment for a stranger to make them think about something differently. If things don't go right, don't piss and moan and sue people and whine about how the negroes or jews or Bulgarians or whomever are destroying the country; those are stupid excuses. You and only you have control over your life, so face up to it and buckle down to the work.
And who the hell cares what the neighbors think?
Die, thing of EVIL!
I'm sure that is what Papageno is saying. He's been really cranky, even hissing at Pico de Gato; it's like he is having flashbacks to 'Nam.
All because I let Marla bring a teeny tiny little female calico kitten into the house. A moment of weakness. Just a moment, but it was enough.
The Thing of Evil (Bats McMurphy, since she was found in a tree outside the mental hospital) is locked in a room upstairs, for the most part, and is temporary (hahahahahahhahahahahahahahaha! Fostering! Good one!). But Papageno is not amused regardless.
And Pico, poor Pico, being hissed at for no good reason.
Picked up wee Pico today, he's gotten heavy. Thick.
Outside of tiny fuzzy intruders, the weekend was nice. Did stuff, went places, bought some books, napped, shopped. I had a real weekend for the first time in, ohh, maybe forever! At least six months.
Work continues to be madness; my editor continues to evade me; and I'm organizing my one-time and ongoing projects for the coming year. My lists numbers 43 right now, and I think I forgot a few.
::sigh::
Anyway, Marla is cruising through the hundred or so pics I took of the tiny beast, so I'll link to them when they are up. Or something.
Oh, I think I'll focus more on Ballroom dancing than Taiji this year. Maybe.
