Jeez. I’m embarrassed for turning into a link blog. But here we are, my friends. And I will try to write something personal and substantial this weekend.

• the nyt article on why Lost is like a game more than a traditional show. after last night’s amazing finale, Lost is on my brain.
• the most amazing document on torture from the cia ever looks like this:
  
• the hamdog is “a hot dog wrapped in ground beef then deep-fried, topped with chili, cheese, grilled onions, and served in a hoagie roll.”
• nice to see my old professor, michael naimark, get linked by waxy and kottke for his displacements piece(s). 3 years late.
• want your dreams and childhood destroyed? the cure played the sasquatch festival over last weekend. the cure played. and i swear the picture below is him, thanks to pitchfork (where they have a second one as well):
  
• several people emailed me the link about miracle fruit that was in the nyt a few days ago. i finally posted pictures and will write up how our party from a month ago went. in the meantime, here’s the article.
• bill cosby is selling sweaters on ebay. ’nuff said

Popularity: 2% [?]

tomorrow night is my valentine’s date with todd – the sox game up in baltimore. funny how i don’t think of it as the orioles game. i’m way psyched and there has been so much stressy shit going on in the past weeks that i am going to throw myself into forgetting everything else except baseball. at least for 3 hours.

i have the cutest outfit to wear, too, courtesy of michelle – a pink ribbon sox shirt and pink ribbon sox cap – how perfect is that.

yoooooooooooooooooooooooooook!

Popularity: 2% [?]

Why even give you an introduction, talking about how busy I am, how little time I have for finding time anymore? Why not just give you a bunch of links and hope that the 12 hours they sat in my browser didn’t make them too stale?

• a teenager isolates a micro-organism that can break down plastic bags
• that sexy, lollipop licking girl from gta 4? yeah, turns out she’s a freak mutant with 6 fingers. little less hot now, eh?
• a brief history of the kama sutra
• ‘the black freighter’ to be released on dvd the week after watchmen opens.
• gas might hit 6 or 7 a gallon soon.
• and finally, 25 ways to help a human being.

Popularity: 2% [?]

Petunia, meet iris.

Popularity: 2% [?]

On the train, rocking KMFDM. It was a busy, off-line holiday weekend — John, Kurt, Keren, Rachael and I all loaded in Kurt’s car for a drive up to Bend, Oregon. 9 hours. 2 full days there, then we loaded up and headed back.

It was a great, wonderful time even if it lacked some of the traditional ‘relaxation’ that holiday weekends are supposed to inspire.

(Secret, I just fell in love again on the train. Don’t tell. She also has on a wedding ring. Bastard.)

Work is also busy; my role has shifted within the group, leading me to spend the majority of my hours away from my desk. And away from code. It’s a good and welcome change, though it has led to my schedule becoming more erratic — I enjoy the change, but it doesn’t lend itself to leaving at a regular time or anything like that. Lunch is snuck in, sometimes I get to enjoy it; sometimes it means nibbling for an hour during a meeting.

But I’m happy.

Here’s a rub:
I’m a motivated guy. I know this; I always have projects; I’m producing so much stuff that I can’t keep up with myself. (Which is a problem.) I have a notion of success. The rub? I don’t think I have a good notion of what success is. What it means.

In many ways, I have programmed myself for meeting a set of expectations. I set them up for myself; I use them to push myself. My biggest problem here is my inflexibility. It seems I can’t help but absorb expectations from others, by others, to define my own. Education is a prime example.

Sure, sure, I was the guy with all sorts of haircuts; I’m the wacky guy who had platform wingtip shoes and I hung out with all the freaks in high school. Great. But I’m the kid who pushed himself academically, the one who has a bunch of papers from a bunch of schools. The one who actually has a difficult time letting himself actually relax and try new things. You know — the one who didn’t drink for years, who doesn’t touch illegal substances, all that jazz. I have a tough time defining my own rules, though I’m getting there.

There are a few blogs I read for alternate perspectives on the world. I don’t read enough of them, honestly. But they have helped me realize that there is a very wide and very forgiving definition of success. And happiness can (and does) come from many places.

I don’t yet know what that means for me. I no longer know what it means to feel like my life is complete. But I know there isn’t one path, one set of directions that solves it. It isn’t a fixed and set path.

Hi, I’m 32 and still learning way too much about the world.

There are days, times, where I feel like the solution is right on the edge of my tongue. That there must be a puzzle piece or two that finishes it. And, as if I am swimming under ice, I can’t quite find that hole to climb through.

p.s. I do know that right now, the answer, the puzzle piece, is not a baby. Just beating the peanut gallery to the punch.

Popularity: 1% [?]

Popularity: 1% [?]

i’ve having supreme indecision with how to spend my day.  todd’s at work and zane’s at his mom’s, so here i sit debating whether i should:

1)  climb up a ladder and clean gutters although i have never done that before, in an attempt to surprise todd and show him that i do not leave ALL the nasty outdoor gruntwork for him

2)  go to the pool, swim a lot of laps and then fall asleep in the grass

3)  work on pulling up the ivy in the backyard (see reasons from #1)

4)  watch heath ledger movies while folding an immense pile of laundry

5)  go to the grocery store and shop for items i do not really have to have but help me to stock my pantry and feel that at any given moment, i have the ingredients on hand for any particular dish i care to create.

6)  go to the Y and work out, enjoying the fact that like there will only be 2 people in the whole place due to the holiday weekend.

the problem is that i really do not have an overwhelming desire to do any of these things, yet there is not anything specific i would rather be doing.  or at least, nothing reality-based.

maybe i should make a poll.

this is silly.

Popularity: 1% [?]