Walking the Middle Way

Every so often, I need to sit down and sort out my physical and mental projects. Maybe they're actually a mixture of both, but some of these things require 'head-time', and others need 'body-time'.

Here's what is currently in my hopper:

I've decided to go with WordPress as my site rebuilding software. This means learning it from scratch as a website, rather than a blogging frame. Then I have to redesign two websites: my own old "Sunfell" site, and my sister's meat market site.

I need to do up a cookbook for my sister. That won't take too long.

Another learning project involves learning about electronic music and digital audio workstations. This has tons of potential, but I've been stalled out on it for nearly a year. I may have to walk away from it, but I know it's just good old fear that is keeping me from taking a real crack at it. I hate this- doing stuff like this used to be relatively effortless. Now it isn't.

Connected to that is my desire to learn more about audio engineering, and take some courses. Both DubSpot and Tuts+ have tutorials about these- and Tuts+ has WordPress tuts, too. I think it might be worth $20 a month to get on their premium program. It's a lot cheaper than DubSpot, which is a real pro-level program, with both onsite and web-based courses. The whole shamoodle of their courses is ober $10K. I'd need to win the lottery to make that work.

My re-eating project: turning my thoughts about going gluten-free and re-writing my mind to deal with it and keeping the weight off into a book.

Body-time projects include:

Reclaiming the front bedroom
Having a yard-sale
cleaning up the yard
starting small projects around the house, refurbishing one room at a time
Sorting through the wardrobe during the spring/summer closet-swap

I'll admit that I am not a fan of Valentines Day. This might have stemmed from my school days when we'd make cute little mailboxes, and our classmates would put cards in them. Everyone was supposed to get one, but somehow I would not get as many as my classmates. Being the oddball child counted against me, and I was very glad that that particular tradition ended with elementary school.

I managed to dodge the whole couples thing- even my brief engagement skipped the day. I did have one would-be beau send me flowers at work, which had the opposite effect he wanted- we went our separate ways shortly after that.

I have to admit that I find it rather fun to play Valentines Day prognosticator. It's a private game, though- no sense upsetting anyone at work with my observations about bouquet sizes versus potential problems with a relationship, and how long it might drag on. Let's just say that the bigger and showier the bouquet, the more trouble there likely is in the relationship- either overt or covert. Sadly, I am seldom wrong.

While I dislike the artificiality of the whole event, I have to say that I do have a soft spot for heart-shaped items. Like my other shape-preferences, I have a very specific parameter that makes a heart look 'right' to me. This year seems to be the year of wonky, pointy looking hearts, sad to say. There was a pretty heart-shaped rag rug that would have been great for my back bathroom, but it was one of those weird wonky ones. But Whole Foods had some adorable little heart-shaped cheeses, and I happily purchased a few. I figured that if I don't have a beau to indulge me (within limits!), I can indulge myself. And I tend to happily stock up on chocolate on the day after. A heart-shaped chocolate is a good thing. Chocolate! Shaped like a heart!

So, while I don't care too much for some of the totally over the top romantic things this day brings out, I am not totally against the day. Or the hearts. I'm eating a chocolate one right now.

For the first time ever, I am going to do something unusual. I am going to go to a lecture by a psychic, but not as a fellow psychic, but as a skeptical realist with telempathic abilities.

Say, what?

I am an ex-psychic. That's right: ex-psychic. I was really into the sparklefart woo-woo as a youngster. I had things happen around me as an adolescent that would have made "Carrie" envious. But then something happened. Something wonderful: I fell into the Abyss, and came out on the other side totally stripped of any trace of woo-woo, rinsed clean of any fart-sparkles, rewired, and grounded as a realist. Even better, although I pitched the foofy language and cloud-pilot sensibilities, unpeeled the whole angel-cloud-rainbow-fairie-UFO-bliss-ninny scales from my eyes and soul- I discovered that it did not peel off my capacity to actually sense underlying currents and context. If anything, removing the layers of presumptuous gods-bothering crud actually upped the bandwidth and made the sensorium more sensitive, rather than less. It was the psionic equivalent of stripping the computer to the metal and kernel, and rebuilding it.

After realizing this, and going through stages of outrage, grief, and moping for a while in a position of face-palm dismay, I decided to make the best of it. OK, I'm not hearing things, I am not propogating a meme, I am not magnifying fluff, I am not being silly, maybe the 'voices' aren't real, but damn, they sure have some interesting, and often very useful things to say. But I had to pitch that troublesome word: 'psychic'. It is a red-flag word now- an indicator of possible malarky and shenanigans and puffery of the sort that gullible and needy people flock to, and willingly permit themselves to be spiritually and financially fleeced.

Just call me Sister Hat-Pin of Reality. It will be interesting to sit in on this lecture (and I am shocked that the Clinton School would invite someone as thoroughly discredited, contested, and even a bit contentious as this person to speak), and keep silent. But I will. I will experience this whole thing from the other side of the Abyss, with my fresh-pressed, shiny new set of perceptual gear, and know if she's a bullshitter or not. That by itself should be fascinating.

Zachary Quinto Sunday Times interview

Zach did an interview with the Sunday Times, where he talks about life, "Margin Call", and his coming out:

( Zachary Quinto's Times interview )

This is an excerpt from an interview Zachary Quinto recently gave for the Sunday Times, which, sadly, is behind a paywall...Here, he talks about coming out, and why he did it.

“The torment those people feel - and I know it because I´ve seen it, I know it in people - is so heavy, so painful,” Quinto says. “Things need to change. This is just bullshit at a certain point. I´m not going to live my life based on fear of other peoples judgements. If somebody doesn´t want to work with me because I´m gay, then I don´t want to work with them anyway.”

“Gay or straight, my trajectory has never been conventional. My journey has never been conventional. I´m not interested in that. That´s not what I´m about. But if I was playing Kirk, if I was more of a traditional leading man, I still don´t think it would make a difference. I certainly don´t think it should.”

Margin Call director JC Chandor added:

“Zach is a fairly humble guy,” Chandor says. “He had not thought through the scope of it, for sure. To find out it was such a big issue for people was, I think, exciting and invigorating. I gave him a hug right there on the street. It felt like a weight had been lifted off him.”

Sunday Times, January 2012

Zach's coming out was huge- and he did it his way, which made it so classy, and so much his own event. I know that his friends didn't know he was going to do this- the one I spoke to was totally stunned when he found out- he'd been on a cross country flight when the news broke.

Every time he gives an interview, he says something that increases my admiration for him that much more. I always knew he was an unconventional man, intelligent, articulate, and deeply insightful. I really hope that he will write a book someday. I started out liking him because he played Spock- now I like- no, deeply admire him- for who he is. I really hope to meet him someday.

It's hard to believe, but on February 5th, it will have been 10 years since I had a life-changing procedure done to me- a breast reduction.

Most of the time, women want bigger breasts. And when I hear that, it boggles my mind, because I had big breasts, and hated them. And when I say 'big', I mean massive. I never got an accurate size, but they were around the area of 44H or so. They were big enough that when I folded my arms on top of them, they were at the same length below them, making me look like one of those quadruple-breasted Star Wars characters.

I could not wear normal blouses. And by normal, I mean anything that buttoned. I had to accommodate my breasts, rather than my arms, so I wore 2x and sometimes 3x pullover shirts. I stuffed them into the biggest bras I could find. At restaurants, when placed in a booth, I had to figure out where they went. Up or down? My shirts always got dirty at the chest area because things would land on them.

Men never looked me in the eye. I could not see my toes because of their bulk.

Their weight began to affect my health. I started suffering awful back pain, and the bra straps dug grooves into my shoulders. I suffered from sleep apnea. I could not sleep on my stomach, and it was hard to sleep on my side.

The first time I tried to get corrective surgery, I was turned down by my insurance, because it was considered a cosmetic procedure. I started going to my doctor complaining of back pain. I also told my tale of woe to one of my female legislators, who -unbeknownst to me- kicked the insurers in the shins about it. When I tried again in late 2001, they approved it.

I had the procedure where the doctor keeps the blood and nerve supply to the nipple in order to preserve it. I was at the extreme end of the parameters of this particular method. Most reductions of my size have the nipple removed and grafted back on. The pedicle procedure permitted me to have feeling in my nipples, which I appreciated.

I had 6 pounds of tissue removed, and was reduced to a 38C. It has since filled out to a 38DD, but it is still manageable.

When I woke up from the surgery, I could feel the difference immediately. And in fact, my first words to the nurse were, "that's a load off my chest". I no longer felt like there was a large cat sitting on my chest.

I healed well and without complications- until I had a traffic accident 5 weeks post-op which crushed the inner part of my left breast. That was a bit of a setback, and resulted in a minor assemmetry. I chose not to get it corrected, since my clothes fit OK. My doctor told me that it was fortunate that the car I was in did not have an air-bag, or he would have had to redo the whole thing.

When the swelling went down enough for me to start wearing normal bras again, I got into my wardrobe and found vests that I refused to part with. They fit. I could wear normal button-up blouses again. I could see my toes. "2x" was no longer the default. And since losing an additional 30 pounds, I've started reaching for "M" along with "L"- ladies large, not womens.

Reducing my breasts was one of the best things I've done for myself. I can breathe easier, sit in booths at restaurants, and see my toes. I look proportional- with a 10" difference between my waist, bust and hips- the classic hourglass. I've never been one to show them off- or the rest of my body, to be honest, but I am truly comfortable in my skin now.

I had an interesting encounter today: While returning to my car, a lady pulled up behind me, and asked me for money to get food for her kids. I don't carry cash anymore, so I did not have anything. I told her so, and she drove off.

I felt a bit bad- in retrospect, I could have offered her the bag of quick-cooking grits I'd purchased, but I wondered if she had a kitchen. Or cooking tools. She would probably have gone through a drive-through and purchased the usual corporate coffin-filling crap-food that poor people are forced to eat.

We live in a strange, upside down world. Beggars drive cars. Poor people here are the richest poor people in the world. Instead of starving into sticks, they starve into obese balloons on dollar meals.

All around me, the signs of hard times are impossible to miss. Empty homes, empty storefronts. People crowding the back racks of shops, digging for bargains. The SUVS purchased during the boom times still ply the road, but more and more of them are parked in those 'buy here, pay here' lots, replaced by 90s and 00s bangers. Boats have disappeared- I used to find myself behind them all the time. Same with ATVs. Gone. I went cruising through one newish neighborhood- one that had those cookie-cutter McMansions that were way beyond my price range. I counted nearly a dozen for sale signs.

It's a really strange thing- during the 'boom' times- including the dotcom and the housing flare, I was impoverished. 20 years ago, I spent 6 weeks technically homeless- couch surfing with friends until I could scrape together the means to get me and my cats back to the US. Then, it took 2.5 years after that to claw my way out of crushing depression to the point that I could get a job that was actually complementary to my skills, and another decade to climb out of the fiscal hole my father's 'tough love' stunt placed me into.

I knew what it was like skipping meals so I could make the rent. Or gas the car. I knew the humility of asking to borrow money from family and friends- always paying it back- to tide myself over until the next meager paycheck came through. I knew what it was like to have to hustle for every dollar, every sale, doing what I could to 'accessorize' it to put a dollar or three more into that pay packet.

When I found myself overwhelmed and defeated after trying to purchase a home in 2002, I went to the Community Credit Counseling Service to straighten myself out. It was either that- or go through bankruptcy. I had to go through their program before I could declare bankruptcy. I did, and two years later, I emerged with tools and tactics I used to put myself back on my feet.

All the while, the housing boom continued. Prices soared, and people were given extravagant amounts of mortgage money, as well as equity money. I was surrounded by shiny huge new cars and trucks, watched swarms of contractors build even more neighborhoods, and wondered if I would ever afford a home of my own. And I resigned myself to renting- forever. I was saving money, though. Being a good tenant meant that the landlord did not jack the rent on me like he did the neighbors. And while I appreciated that, it would have been nice to have known about the damn meth lab in the neighbor's house. Yes, moving would have been a pain in the ass, but my health would have not suffered. Even now, when I pull things out of boxes, I have to wipe off a nasty sheen of contaminated dust or run them through the wash. Some things I've simply thrown out.

The crash of '08 happened, and I lost 40% of my savings. All that money- gone. I was devastated- that was going to be a down payment on a house. But it slowly came back- and housing prices started to drop. I kept up my fiscal discipline- and decided to purchase a home.

But for a long time, I was technically poor. In fact, for the first 20 years of my adult life, I lived below the poverty line- but I never drew any sort of dole- somehow I always made about $1 more than what it took to qualify for foodstamps. I made errors- and learned from them. The decade of poverty I got through taught me how to shop, how to spend, how to make things stretch, and how to save money. I gradually got promoted. I found myself in the middle class.

I worked hard to get to this place in my life. It's a great place, too- with money left over after paying bills, some savings, and a car and home of my own. I took no handouts- government or family. I had no spouse to share expenses with. I did this all on my own- with the support and encouragement of my friends. I learned how to do the math- to calculate the real cost of something. I learned that preparing food from scratch- while time consuming and perhaps a bit inconvenient- was the best bang for the buck. I learned to separate want from need. Even now, I ask myself if I actually need something. And every so often, I get stuff I don't need.

I learned not to let people rush me- especially with the 'buy it now, before it disappears' ruse. I avoid being caught up in frenzies. I have learned that she who hesitates pays less. I research every major purchase almost to death. I get value for money. I've learned the two sides of 'perfectly good'- perfectly good things that I can use, and perfectly good things that are for other people. Flea markets, yard sales, and thrift shops are my favorite places. My mantra has become, "There will always be another sale" along with "If you really need it, you'll find it".

It's strange to be on the flip side of hard times. The same people who gleefully filled my rear-view mirror with their giant SUVs have downsized. Apartments have waiting lists, rental homes get snapped up within a week of posting the sign, while for sale homes on the same street languish - often for years. One around the corner I saw last year still has a sign in their yard. (It was quite cramped- and its back yard had been flooded out.)

I do have compassion for those who have fallen on hard times. But I also know that many of them got herded into the situations they find themselves in. I find myself split between feeling a bit guilty about my modest success, and perhaps a sense of relief for keeping my head.

And that's the key. Keeping one's head. This appears to be the crucial element that divides success from failure, power from panic. When I find myself in a situation, my logical Vulcan side takes over, assesses the problem, and comes up with a stack of solutions. I roll up my sleeves and get it taken care of. I shift my priorities in seconds. It's like I become another person.

If it is any comfort, I have a feeling that the tide is finally turning. Good things will return, but not in the measures we were used to. Prices are not going to drop, packages of food will not get back to their old sizes. The new paradigm of over-qualification for an under-served workforce is the new paradigm, and the resulting poverty will sadly hang around for decades until we get our education back level with our actual jobs. Parents are still flogging college to their kids like it's the 90s. It isn't. If I were to give a young person advice for continuing education after high school, I'd tell him or her: LEARN A TRADE. Learn something that is essential and hands-on. Something that requires a physically present person that cannot be fobbed off on a robot or computer. Or- learn to design, build, install, repair, and maintain those robots and computers. And I would also tell them that they need to learn to do the math. Doing the math is the other key to making it through hard times. Dispassionate weighing of elements isn't fun, but it keeps the lights and heat on.

I hope that lady found someone who still carried cash and could get her some food. And I hope that she learns to do her own math and climb out of that situation. It's a situation far too many of us are in- or near.

This classic image of Spock with his tricorder is one that I've seen tons of times. But I never really gave much thought about what he had in his hands and what he was doing with it until now. Looking at his tricorder, it's clear that the creators of Star Trek had some incredible imagination and creativity. The prop reflects the technology of the time- from the leather-and-metal case to the miniature CRT screen and tiny discrete controls. Even the strap is an artifact of that time- today, he'd wear it on a belt.

Being a geeky person, I wonder about what sort of engine is inside that device. Is it anything like our computers, or portable devices- with several radios, gigabytes of memory, multicore processors and firmware operating system? Does it have chips that can be swapped out for various operations? Are there wearable remotes? Would it have a touch screen?

Today's tricorder would probably look a lot like a small smart phone. Perhaps in a way, our smartphones are tricorders of a sort- although they serve more people as entertainment, enhanced communications and production devices than they would scientific things. Still, with the advent of things like labs on a chip and huge database crawlers, we aren't far from having such things today.

Spock would be proud. Or, at least- fascinated.

Here's to good riddance of 2011!

I can safely say that I managed to meet the goals I created for myself in 2011. Perhaps even exceeded them a bit. I learned that I could indeed keep a roof over my head, and maintain it, as well. It's been a good first year, and hopefully the start of many more.

I had created a list of strong parameters to use when I was looking for my home back in 2010. I stuck to it, too- meaning that the search went on for longer than normal- six months, in fact. I refused to compromise on the important things, and was very glad I did. And I almost fell into the traps that many erstwhile home-buyers do- mistaking decor for soundness, being charmed by appearance while ignoring actual structural faults that would have been incredibly expensive- if not impossible- to repair. I got lots of good ideas for decorating, though- ideas that cost me nothing but the time it took to actually realize that the place I was looking at was a pig wearing lipstick.

But practical points aside, the one take-away I feel is an absolute MUST DO from here on out- a must-follow for every year is this:

Live within your means.

That was the ultimate goal of my homebuying and ownership expedition. My home costs had to fit into a budget that included savings and a car payment. If it could not, and the sellers would not come down, I passed it up. And then, I found a place that was well within my means- with the mortgage payment being lower than my rent!

Living within your means is not easy- but the costs of not doing so can wreck your health, wealth, and relationships. When you have money left over at the end of the month, and some extra tucked into savings, it's a great feeling. When you can look at something and say, 'I can buy that' but not need to do so- that's also a great feeling. When you do splurge, you can do so without guilt, because you've saved up for the item. It's almost like permitting ice cream on a diet- without bingeing.

I will continue to maintain my means- discipline for the rest of my life. It isn't a goal- it's now part of my life- along with my fitness regimen and cooking. I am determined that the 'back' half of my life will be better than the early days.

This year, I hope to bust out of my musical silence and actually do something with the software I have. I've never been so profoundly blocked in my life. This bothers me, too. I don't want to walk away from it- I want to add my voice to the chorus. But I have to hack back the thorns of real fear. I am not sure how to do so in such an isolated place. But I'll have to figure it out.

Today is effectively the end of the commercial Christmas season, which seems to become longer every year. It seems that I've been hearing carols in shops since before Halloween this year. Long before. Season-creep is simply a pain in the butt.

But at long last, the season with its excesses is finally exiting, leaving me to consider purchasing a new vacuum cleaner to suck up its glitter-infested wake. My sister and I are at odds about the whole thing - she's into the whole family Christmas thing, with gifts and all the usual trappings. Me? I'd be happier setting up a new Klipsch or Polk subwoofer and thumping to some good electronic music rather than enduring all the awkwardness that happens when people who have taken vastly different paths in life get together. She's country. I am not. She's religious. I am not. She's traditional. I'm indifferent. We're not kids any more, nor are there any kids in the family to transmit any traditions to.

And if there aren't any kids to dazzle (and perhaps poison with the whole greedy spectacle), what's the point? I'd much rather have a nice dinner and not worry about buying stuff for people. I've proposed a gift free Christmas, and have been shot down. The phrase I truly detest is 'What do you want for Christmas?' Anyone asking that- especially a relative- is openly demonstrating that they really do not know me, nor understand my philosophy. If someone has to ask me what I want (NOTHING!!!), it's clear that they are not close enough to me to observe me. And when I get asked that question, I generally tell them that I want something that is way out of their price range- like the above mentioned Klipsch subwoofer, and accompanying amplifier, center and surround speakers.

I do not need more material things- I am divesting and replacing things, not accumulating them. And I know what I want. Or need. Consumables are fine- like calendars and desk books. Christmas is the perfect time to exchange such things.

But right now, I am simply glad the whole thing is rolling its end credits. It's almost fork-time. It's done. And Monday, the roads and shops will again be clogged with people exchanging things for what they really want.

I look forward to getting in early this year on the garden stuff. I'll prune the roses, hollies and bushes. And I'll start shopping for the building I want in my back yard- when I get my tax refund.