I wonder if we can ever forgive our Senate for selling America to the terrorists.

My kids, extra water supply in hand, on our outing to Sky Bridge.

Undoubtedly for many of us, the best thing about myspace.com is the abundance of ads for True that pop up every couple of pages. According to this editorial, it’s a serious case of hypocrisy, and indicative of the multiple-personality problems from which many online dating services suffer. Since I’m not actually looking to use a dating service, and since I never believed the young ladies pictured are real members anyway, I say, “Keep 'em coming!”

I hate to point fingers at anyone, but a series of events occurred which made it plain to me that an argument I had sometime last year was the direct result of someone's attitude, and not a misunderstanding. Last year, a student who got to school one minute late or who left one minute early was considered tardy. For the purposes of truancy calculation, being tardy was consider one-half of an absence. In other words, if a child came into school at 8:06 every morning, and left at 3:14 every day of the school year, he'd be considered absent for the entire year, even though he would miss less than one day of instructional time. Due to me not being exactly punctual and also a few bouts of strep infection last year, my children racked up quite a few absences, both real ones, and the virtual ones caused by the one or two minutes late they would sometime be. I went to a program at the school one afternoon, and it was over at about 2:50. The kids were all going to go back to class, sit around for ten minutes, and then get ready to get on the buses. Since I was already there, and becase they asked me to, I decided to just sign the kids out and take them on home. I was informed by the attendance clerk that I might not want to do that, because they'd already accumulated quite a few absences. I replied that it didn't matter, it wasn't as if they went back and started some math instruction. This seemed to infuriate her, that I didn't take the policy seriously. She told me that's what I would think when I got a summons to court to answer why my kids were truant. Of course I never got a summons to court for truancy, but still it bothered me, that it appeared in the records that are kept that my children supposedly missed almost as many days as if I were completely neglectful of their education. That conversation ended with some curt words and mean looks. Imagine my happiness on parents' night this year when I learned that there had been a change in the way attendance was figured, and that now it would be based on actual instructional time missed. I had nothing to do with this decsion, but I knew that probably some parent somewhere had been through the same ordeal I had and apparently had some pull with someone in the department of education; or maybe they just sued. I'll probably never know. Anyway, fast forward to a week or two ago, when I signed my son out to take him to the doctor's office. I overheard a comment this same attendance clerk made to someone standing in the office. She said something to the effect of, "This new way of figuring attendance is killing me." This wasn't said in a mean way, or with the intent that I overhear, or anything else like that. She was just making the point that it meant a lot of extra work for her. I thought nothing of it until this morning. The kids cleaned their room yesterday and somehow managed to lose one of Delaney's shoes. That didn't become apparent until about ten minutes before time to leave for school this morning, and to make a long story short, they were both a good full five minutes late. I resigned myself to the fact that I wasn't going to be able to pretend my clock was slow; I was actually going to have to sign them in. I made my way into the office, where I was as cheerful as always. Anytime I'm in the wrong, I'm sure to turn on the charm. I was not greeted with the same. She wouldn't even look me in the eye. Just waved her hands as if indicating a a runner was safe, and told me to just let them get to class, no one had sent any slips yet anyway. Suddenly it became clear. When someone is tardy or leaves early it creates more work for the attendance clerk. The clerk doesn't mind so much if she feels the transgressor is being punished, even if only in a statistical sense, and especially if there's the hope that eventually the offending parent will be called before the man. This year however, there's no real penalty for a child missing the first five minutes of the day. Now I've been a lot more vigilant about getting them there on time, but still, once in a long while there will be a slip up and we'll be late. But now she gets no satsfaction from marking my children late, because there's no way they could ever miss enough class to constitute truancy. So she lets them go on... and I don't think she likes it.

I was browsing flickr the other day and came across a group called Through the Viewfinder. They get some very nice shots by taking pictures of the large glass viewfinders on old Duraflex and other similar cameras. They don't allow fakes, but here's one anyway.

Here's an excellent example of what I was talking about below, and also a good example of slightly soft focus and over-saturation rather than under-saturation. I had to turn the red down and the yellow up to keep my dear son from looking like a hypertensive drunk of course.

I just found this interesting. I tried to recapture some of the warmth of those old pictures you see from back in the sixties. The color is a little faded. It's all narrow, soft-focus. Everyone is smiling. This is my aunt Rita and my uncle Eulice by the way, at our family reunion in June of this year. This and all my other reunion shots are now available on flickr. I decided I needed a place to just archive everything, and since I'm already paying for flickr... I just recently decided to link it form here. I hope you like the link. I know it may slow the page load down a little. Recently I've begun creating snapshots, of which this is one. They're not what I consider (with some exceptions) to have a lot of artistic merit; they just chronicle things that I want to share (or that have been requested that I share). By the way, among them are a great number of close-ups of people. Generally when I take a close-up shot, especially when it's not a posed shot (and it has to conform to some insane framing standard like 4X6), I like to focus on the facial expression, and often crop the picture below the top of the head. Someone recently told me they find this disturbing. Anyone care to weigh in on this issue? By the way, the link over there to flickr seems to be showing my most recent uploads, which were all framed as snapshots at 4X6, either vertical or horizontal, so showing them in little squares is a little non-fortuitous.

Here's a little something from the parade last Friday. I think the blue ribbon was deserved, not that the hippie van coming out of the Nada tunnel didn't deserve one too. I'm sure Cory has made it clear on his own site, but there will not be trivia this evening, as it appears Peppers is having some kind of difficulty in keeping the doors open. I hope that we find a suitable, stable place very soon where we can count on our weekly dose of regular trivia action. I'm of half a mind to go on to Malabu Pub this evening. We'll see.

I took the kids to Sky Bridge Sunday. We were going to make the entire loop, but a sign advised us that a large tree had crushed the stair in the back art. We backtracked back across the bridge. I realized I'm not the kind of father who can lead his family into a detailed exploration of the Grand Canyon, or perhaps take off on a small sailing vessel for a world tour. I just get way too nervous when my kids get close to the edge.

Live - From 8th Avenue

Here I am, it's 1:41 in the morning. I've finished most of a bottle of Old Fitzgerald. The BAC I blew into Nathan's PBT about two shots and thirty minutes ago was a .13 something. Knowing that, I am not prepared to wake Tina from her slumber just yet for fear that she may demand that I drive on home. All fellow party-goers have gone on home, the ones who live far from here with designated drivers, the ones who live near with the hope of grace of God, and Cory with a puke, and then a last peak at who remained, before retiring. It casts a reflective mood. I gaze at David's painting of the hero of Marathon running from County Powell, an almost accidental blue mark or two cast where may lie Waltersville and the the bottoms, and a torn reflection of the county itself, centering on what is undoubtedlty his own ancestral home on Furnace Mountain, knowing that art of my own graces the wall behind me. I wonder at how I've come to this yet again, the last to leave the party, the sheer volume of my lifesblood preventing me from reaching total collapse. I hear in the other room a text message reach Cory's phone, knowing that means I am not alone in this part of the morning, and it makes me wonder against my own will where this party may yet continue. I think that I will end here and cast myself in repose, either to slumber, or to rise yet again, and seek fulfillment.

How many times can you accidentally wave at someone you don't know or accidentally not wave at someone you do before people start talking about you?

Sarah is back!

My apologies to the model for tattooing her.

Here's a small scene from the rock star party of a couple weeks ago.

Somewhere along the way, through somewhat irresponsible journalism and conservative spin, blogging has gotten a bad name. In the minds of the uneducated or uninitiated, blogging seems to conjure up images of sexual predators, covert drug deals, underaged promiscuity, and general debauchery. I actually heard the words, “Blogger, what in the world is blogger?” come out of someone’s mouth, said with twisted lips and a tone of voice usually reserved for questions like, “You killed your own child?” These people need to be educated. Blogging is not a sin. Now maybe sinners have more fun at it, but that’s hardly a new or trend-specific concept. There is worthwhile material out there in the blogging universe no matter who you are, and I have no doubt that it helps to keep us all a little bit sane. Next time you hear someone disparage blogging in general or a blog site, speak up. Let that person know that you enjoy blogs, bloggers, blogging, and general sociability, and they should try it before they judge it.

The only reason I haven’t set a date up to this point for a camping trip is that it seems so busy in August that I’m still shell-shocked to the point that it seems like their should be something I have to do every single weekend. This temporary insanity has finally given way to rational though. I’m just going to set a date, October 6th and 7th. That’s soon enough I can go ahead and get excited about it and far enough off I still have time to plan. Also it isn’t opening season of bow hunting or any part of gun season. I checked. I talked to David Rogers and he has a pretty good plae to camp. Supposedly it's haunted. I've been on a bit of ghost-hunting kick for a while now, not really seeking out opportunities to find ghosts, but relishing them when they come. I don't believe in ghosts, like I don't believe in a lot of other things. Confirmation of the supernatural might be a real life-changing event. Bradley mentioned that he might want to go with us and recommneded some place with water nearby, for late-night fishing. I don't know if David's place offers that or not. Just imagine, haunted fishing. There aren't nearly enough horror movies involving fishing.

In order to get around the Bayesian algorithms that spam blockers are using these days, spammers have begun sending me emails consisting of an image containing their message and then several lines of text, usually taken from English literature. Some time ago I published a poem here taken from text of my own emails, and it was somewhat well-received, so I thought I’d try my hand at crafting a new passage from the text at the bottom of these spam messages. Here it is.

Have I not told you to wait and be content? I glanced at the sky and saw that there was yet an hour before the sun vanished. To others she might be rude and petulant, but never to me. That something could only be a love affair. I do not think that I should be able to hide it for long. Besides, if I wanted more, I had only to ask for it. Haku switched on the lights, both up-stairs and down. She took her dinner in bed, as she often did. Her mind struggled with the problem, while perceiving that there was no solution. At any rate one sober man was beginning to admit her compelling power. The girl was a witch, and they had determined that she must die. Well, let the gods fight their own battles. We haven’t any time to waste.

Thankfully the worst week in recent memory is now over and a new week has begun. I got the opportunity to visit with friends and family over the weekend, to play a little golf, sing a little karaoke, and of course to honor the fallen. As a special present from fate I was reminded that every week has its trials and tribulations when my wife discovered yesterday morning that the hot water was no longer available; we are out of propane. I’m sure that can be dealt with, with only a modicum of pain and suffering. I’ve been depending mostly on the microwave and toaster to do my family’s cooking here lately anyway, so I doubt I’ll starve to death before I can arrange for a fresh load of propane.

My brother’s son Seth’s birthday party was Saturday afternoon. I made a rushed run to Lexington that morning to acquire a new belt and to pick up his birthday present. I was disappointed to find that Wal-Mart does not carry the riding toy that I wanted for him, the Cozy Coupe. I was right next to Toys’R’Us so I popped in to see if I could find it there. I missed it when I first walked into the riding toys sections and began to doubt I had the means to purchase it if I did find it when I saw similarly sized toys selling for $130 and up. On my way back around however, there it was right in the corner, and for the price I expected to pay at Wal-Mart. I won’t say what that was, but it was a lot less than one hundred thirty bucks.

I realized after they’d only been dating for two years that my old friend Mark Nolan is the current boyfriend of Tina’s cousin Miranda. I thought I’d lost touch with him for good, but apparently I even talked to him two years ago without realizing who he was. Then again, maybe I did realize it, but it didn’t seem as important as it does now. I’m planning, along with a few others, on having a grand Class if ’93 fifteen year reunion in 2008. I can now add Mark’s name to the list of people I’m pretty sure I can contact. Pretty soon I’m going to start making a database or something so we can all track who can be contacted and who is missing in action. I’m sure I can reach at least thirty or forty if not more of the people I graduated with. We’re a pretty close-knit bunch, especially considering we just let our opportunity for a ten years reunion just drift on by.

Aaron and I are going camping in early October. Anyone who wants to come along is welcome, with the understanding that it’s probably going to be a relatively primitive, relatively drunken experience. There may be an additional day attached to the beginning or the end to take the kids along.

My condolences to the Rogers family. It seems lately just regular tragedy isn't enough.

Visitation for Jason Rogers is this evening at Wells.
Visitation for CW Fortney is tomorrow evening at Hearne.

If no one noticed, it feels like fall outside. October is just around the corner.