Normally I put my political posts over on Geeks Against Bush, but I have to say something here.

I'm watching the presidential debates. I realize that to a great degree, what the candidates say is being fed to them from their handlers and backstage puppet masters, but, roly-poly fuck, How can anyone vote for a man as defensive and inarticulate as President Bush?

Do people overlook his mispronounciations, his incomplete thoughts, his stuttering, his whiny voice? The man was born in freakin' New Hampshire: where did this phony Texan accent come from?

So damned frustrating. • 7:08 PM 0 comments

Almost half of Britains surveyed had cheated on a partner.

And, you know, if that many English would cheat, the numbers have got to be waaaaaaaaaay higher for the more confident countries.

I'm just sayin'. • 3:14 PM 0 comments

So, there's this radio station in Seattle, KEXP, 90.3 FM. I may have posted about them before; I listen to them on the IntarWeb (using iTunes) because they offer high-quality streams of their stuff, plus they archive the past two weeks of broadcast, plus they save all their in-studio guests' shows, blah, blah, yadda, yadda... They're great.

They're all listener-supported. This week they're having a pledge drive. Go. Listen. Give them money. They're totally worth it if you like independent radio and are tired of listening to whatever the Big Five record companies are paying Clear Channel to play.

Anywho, reason I bring them up again is because yesterday morning, they played a new track from William Shatner. Yes, Captain Kirk-slash-T. J. Hooker-slash-"legend in his own mind" William Fucking Shatner. He's been recording a new album, which is being produced by Ben Folds, and they've released a single from the album. It's a remake of "Common People" by Pulp.

And it totally fucking rocks. The actual singing is handled on one chorus by Joe Jackson, but hearing ol' Bill talking his way through the song, with his emphatic repetitions and weird pauses... dunno. It just works. This song, and my cat, is the only thing that's made me smile today.

So, see, here's where the coolness of KEXP shines through. Even though they played it yesterday, you can still hear it. Go to KEXP's streaming archive, select Tuesday, 28 September 2004, around 7:23 AM, and pick one of the streams (Windows Media Crapper or RealCrap, hardly matters which) and, after hearing John and Amanda beg for donations for a minute or two, you'll hear the song.

And, believe me, you'll want to hear it over and over again. I know I do. • 6:57 AM 0 comments

I dreamt about Sasquatches last night. Fake Sasquatches, but the costume was really very good.

I was in Michigan (in my dream), on a road trip with my sister and her kids, my niece and nephew. Grosse Point, Michigan. You know, like the movie. Except John Cusak wasn't there.

Yeah. Dreams are weird. Like when I was flying around, and thinking, "They may be fake Sasquatches, but at least I'm safe while I'm flying."

Heh. Dreams. • 6:45 AM 0 comments

Oh, remembered another point about trusting people:

• Lack of Reciprocity - Again, this is tied into the others, especially empathy but deserves to be mentioned on its own. There needs to be a balance in the give-and-take department. For instance, who calls whom the most? Who initiates things the most?

• 10:48 AM 0 comments

There are many reasons I should not trust someone:

• Lying - This is the biggie. Why do we put up with people who lie? Is it because they're so charming we tend to overlook their lies? Is it because they're chameleons who tell us what we want to hear? No matter, it's always a bad thing. If I catch someone in a lie, whether it's to me, or to someone else, it's a huge sign that this person isn't going to be a good friend. Other things to watch out for; different definitions of lying. For example, if they think that withholding information when asked a direct question isn't lying... well, it is, and it's just as bad. I can't be close to someone who has shifting ideas about what honesty is.
  
• Never meeting their friends - Another huge one. When establishing a new friendship, or a dating a new person, it's normal for the two people to wait a bit before introducing the other person to their friends (and family, if they're close to their family). But eventually, I'm going to want to meet the people they call friends. I'm going to want to see how they interact with their friends, what kind of people they are friends with. It's important to see people in their normal context, the surroundings they choose for themselves. If the other person withholds that, that's a clue that something's not right. Believe it or not, I've known someone for over a year and a half and never met their friends! Um... that's not friendship.
  
• Lack empathy - This one is more subtle, but it can be picked up on. Here's the first example that comes to mind: If someone never tries to figure out if their behavior is causing me to react. If they just do whatever it is they want to do, in spite of your reaction, and they continue to do it even after you've become angry (yes, it's typically something that causes a negative reaction, rather than a positive reaction), and then they continue to do it some more... until you finally call them out on it, and they put it back on you, claiming that you never sat down and spelled out in black and white what, exactly, they weren't supposed to be doing, and you point out that you did try to explain it to them, and they sit in stunned silence and try to change the subject or then try to say that now, now that they see what it is, they'll do as you ask... Until you point out that the two of you have been through this, already, with a very similar situation, and you don't trust what they have to say this time. Just a, um, random example. I'm just sayin'.
  
• Won't respect boundaries - Boundaries are important in any relationship. I think most people will agree with this. And setting boundaries are important. Being able to set boundaries is a function of communication. This is connected with the empathy point above, but it's also a separate issue. How much communication is required in order to tell someone "this is not OK behavior with me"? If I find myself pointing out things that bug me over and over again, that's a clue that this person and I do not communicate well, or that this person does not respect me enough to not test my boundaries. Or both.
  
• My behavior changes around them - If I find myself doing things I normally never do around my other friends, I should watch out. Sometimes other people, right or wrong, bring out the worst in me. They exaggerate my negative qualities, or do things that anger me and make it more difficult for me to restrain my anger. I want to be clear here; I am responsible for my own emotions. However, perhaps because of another person's lack of empathy or lack of respect for my boundaries, they can encourage behavior in me that is less than my best. I'm not blaming them for my behavior; I'm just saying that if I notice myself acting differently around someone else, I should be cautious and limit my exposure to that person until I figure out why I'm changing around them.
  

• 6:31 AM 0 comments

There's a difference, I'm learning, between selfish flirting and (for lack of a better term, I'll call) giving flirting. This is something I've been thinking about and trying to notice for at least a couple of weeks now. I first started to think about it when I noticed that some women I flirt with, even though it's exciting, leaves me feeling nervous. Powerless, basically. But other women, when I flirt with them, it's fun and sets a mood but is generally a positive experience. What is the difference between the two types of flirting?

After paying close attention, I decided that you can flirt to draw attention to yourself, or you can flirt to give attention to the other person. And, actually, you can mix the two in one encounter (which is probably more common). But, overall, the tendency to flirt to draw attention to yourself leads to the feeling I was describing above, where the other person leaves the encounter feeling bad, or put-down, or... powerless, weak. That's not a good feeling. Obviously.

And, actually, in the times I've noticed the more positive feeling, it was only a word or a phrase, out of the entire encounter, that caught my attention and made me realize that the other person was being a giving person.

I've been trying to find, or make up, specific examples and it's difficult, because a lot of it is body language and tone. I wanted to make a note of it in my blog, though, to bookmark the idea for myself. Expect more posts on this subject as I work through this idea and incorporate it into my life. It's something I want to do more of, and something I will be looking for in women. • 5:12 PM 0 comments

I'm in the process of adding some new pages to my site, pages dedicated to running. The first page is my Running Log, which will (eventually) be where I record, day-by-day, all my running, my times and pace (when I record them) and any notes. There's no content there right now, as I post this; I'll start filling it in on Monday.

The second page is where I'll record my "standard" courses, along with notes on hills, mile points along the course, and total distance. There's some basic content there, but I want to play with the format to see if there's a better way to organize the information. I'd like to add some pictures, too; some of my runs are pretty scenic.

The links are over on my linkbar (to the left) but, as I said, not much content there.

In the future, I won't be writing about my running in my blog much, unless something odd, funny, or notable happens. I will probably still note any actual races I enter in the main blog, however. I'm trying to separate out my running from the journalling that is the main purpose of my blog.

I've also started to redesign my site, to help with load times and to make it a little prettier. But I'm not promising anything since it's something I work on in my spare time. • 8:50 PM 0 comments

Sorry I haven't been posting here much lately. Three things have been preventing me:

• I had to send my beloved iBook back to Apple to repair a display issue. Luckily, even though my laptop is out of warranty, Apple covered the cost of the repair, which would have been over $300 (motherboard replacement). I took it to the Apple Store in Washington Square on Sunday, and had it back in my possession on Wednesday evening; they had to send it back to "Depot", wherever that is, to do the repair. Much quicker than my friends thought it would be...
  
• Secondly, my new kitten, Smacky, is taking up a lot of my time. He's a bundle of energy! I have metric tonnes of "cute kitten stories" to post...
  
• Lastly, a lot of my writing energy is going to a new site, Geeks Against Bush, a site my friends and I have founded to collect information and well-reasoned arguments for sending George W. Bush back to Crawford, TX. We call ourselves "Tech Support for broken America". Check out the site and contribute to the discussion in our forums -- even if you disagree with us. Maybe even especially if you disagree with us. We want to hear what you have to say.

OK, actually, there's been a fourth situation that's been taking my time and attention lately, that is hopefully dealt with... you may or may not be reading more about that here. But even if you do, it will be in non-specific terms... • 3:17 PM 0 comments

I ran to work today. 5.07 miles, did it in 48:25.61, for a 9:33 pace!!!

Whoo-HOOO! I'm a rock star! • 9:14 AM 0 comments

Remember those old stories about Faeries? I'm not talking about gay folk (not that there's anything wrong with that). I'm talking the mysterious magical folk, the ones that modern lore has reduced to tiny elves baking cookies or working at the North Pole. Yeah, I'm talking about the inspriation for faerie tales.

However, the original faeries were powerful beings, only vaguely human, and as beautiful as they were cruel.

In a lot of the old stories, some dumb lucky human would stumble, at night, into a circle of mushrooms or something, or be lured into a forest by a glimpse of some alien exotic beauty, and come face to face with an enigma: faeries. There would be riddles, or dancing, or seduction... and somehow he'd come away with gold. Lots of gold, enough to make him and his descendents richer than a clever pirate, certainly richer than a king or other lord or lady of the time.

He'd escape, and plan revenge on his enemies, or benevolent dreams of rescuing a maiden, or whatever turned his crank. None of it mattered, however. He'd haul his bag of faerie gold back towards his village or the castle or whatnot, thinking that this morning was the turning point in his dreary life.

But as soon as sunlight, rather than the fickle and changing moonlight, touched all this glittery wealth, the illusion was revealed. All those coins and jewellry would crumble into sticks and leaves. He'd be left with worse than dirt. All gone. He'd been fooled into thinking that faeries were dumb enough to let a stupid mortal vanish off some of their treasure. Silly mortal.

Sigh.

Some relationships are like that. Under certain, controlled conditions, everything seems fine. There's laughter, fellowship, familiarity. Good times, had by all involved.

But when the cold light of reality is allowed to touch the friendship... poofta! Nothing but twigs and dead plants and scraps of spider silk. Maybe even a spider or two, to add a poisonous bite to the lesson.

Why is that? What makes a son of Adam think that he can battle a denizen of an eternal race that thrives on uncaused effects... and win? When he knows, from stories told by friends and family, and even from direct experience, that such a creature is not to be trusted, not to be believed? When he knows that to allow faerie gold into his life is to invite chaos, and giving someone so untrustworthy any power over him at all is to wish pain and confusion on himself?

Life. It's a funny ol' thing... ain't it? • 9:03 PM 0 comments

My new kitten, Smacky, is intensely cute. We were playing "Hide And Go Smack" this weekend. He'd hide around a corner, waiting for me to walk by, then jump out and smack my feet or ankles, then tear off like a maniac. Then it's my turn to hide somewhere, and jump out when he comes around the corner. • 8:55 AM 0 comments

My friend Caleb called me up last night and asked me if I wanted to run in the Race for the Cure this morning. I thought, hey, great; dress all in black, sing depressing songs.

Oh, no, wait... wrong Cure.

But, hey, boobies! I like boobies. I think we should save as many boobies as possible. It's a good cause. So I got up early this morning, and ran in the co-ed 5K. I did pretty good, too. My "unofficial" time, as reported by my trusty Timex Expedition, was 32:24.18, but I want to subtract 2:04 because it took me that long to just reach the starting line. There was quite a crowd; Becky and Caleb thought there was around 33,000 folks running today. My "official" time will include the 2:04, and might be a bit longer, too, because of the crowd at the finish gate. I stopped my watch when I went under the finish banner. At any rate, I was pretty happy with how I did.

The course went south on Front Ave., turned west then north down Broadway, then all the way to Burnside. Just before Burnside we passed by another monument to boobies, Mary's Club. Hooray! We crossed the Burnside Bridge, which was a bit of a hill. It was impressive to see the crowd of people filling the east-bound lanes of the bridge! When we were on the bridge, the faster folks were on the other side, returning across the bridge. Man they were fast. We cheered them on. Then the route turned south again and went down MLK Jr. Blvd, looped back, and crossed the Burnside Bridge going west. Looped underneath, and finished back on Front Ave.

I ran for beer last weekend, and I ran for boobies this weekend. Say... they should combine those two events. (I totally stole that joke from a friend. Thanks, Deb!) • 10:46 AM 0 comments

Downtown today, I saw a tall black woman, wearing a t-shirt that read (and I am not making this up):

"Blondes Do It Better"

Um... I don't get it. • 2:11 PM 0 comments

I'm walking downtown (heading back to my office, if you must know) and standing on a street corner waiting for the light to change, or for traffic to clear, whichever comes first. As I'm looking down the street, I see this small SUV, a Honda CRV or something similar, heading towards me, and it's got it's turn signal on. It looks like it's going to turn onto a wrong-way street. That catches my attention.

It doesn't, in fact, turn. But it pulls up in front of me, blocking the pedestrian walkway. It pulls up behind a row of cars parallel-parked on that side of the street.

And the car is full of bald Asian guys, all wearing orange-colored robes. They look like monks or something. There's five or six of them.

The driver's side window is down, and I'm feeling annoyance that they're blocking my way, and on top of it they're illegally parked.

So I say, "That's not a parking space" into the window.

The driver turns and looks at me, and starts to say, "Oh, I know, we're just here for a second--" but I cut him off and repeat, "That's not a parking space. That's illegal."

He starts to repeat his statement, and the other guys in the car are looking at themselves and talking amongst themselves, and I start to think that I'm going to get my ass kicked by a bunch of pacifist Buddhist monks for pointing out their illegal parking. But, somehow, I just can't stop myself.

"I'm just saying," I continue, "that what you're doing is ILLEGAL." And I make air-quotes around the word ILLEGAL.

Luckily the bald robe-wearing guys aren't getting out of the car. They're still just sitting there, and the driver is leaning out the window and trying to explain himself. I repeat, once more, for emphasis, the single word "ILLEGAL" and again make with the air-quotes.

And then, because the light has changed, I cut around the tail end of their car and cross the street. • 3:26 PM 0 comments

They've already posted results for the Pints to Pasta 10K. I did slightly better than I thought I had done...

I've added those results to my Trophy Page. • 8:27 AM 0 comments

Thought I'd share this picture of me bonding with my new kitten:


Click image to go to Smacky's picture gallery

...so it looks like "Smacky" very much fits his personality. I think it's going to stick... but I'm not entirely sure. Stay tuned for the poll which should be up tomorrow. • 5:59 PM 0 comments

Pints to Pasta 10K Unofficial Results

Team Saponified was represented by one member today. I ran the Pints to Pasta 10K this morning. I ran it strong; only stopped twice for the water stations. My unofficial time, thanks to my trusty Timex Expedition, was 59:59.49, or a 9:39.481 pace (give or take a few). Which is almost exactly what my pace was in the Run Hit Wonder 10K a month and a half ago, at least my "chip time" -- it's 2:40 faster than my gun time in that race. Damn. For some reason I thought I did better.

Still, it felt good. Lots of downhills, which probably helped quite a bit. Started in north Portland, along the bluff on Willamette Avenue, ran down the hill to N. Interstate, then across the Steel Bridge, along Waterfront Park, and then finished at the Old Spaghetti Factory off of Macadam. There were a lot of people. I noticed a bunch of people with black Adidas dri-fit overshirts, emblazoned with the Pints-to-Pasta logo and asked about them; those were the race shirts from last year. This year they just gave out regular cotton t-shirts. Oh, well, at least I got soup, two beers, and a coupon for dinner at the Old Spaghetti Factory. Oh, and a coupon for a free Cinnabon which will be my reward later today. Mmmmm...

Not bad for my second-ever 10K.

It was kinda fun to look around at all these people and think, "I've got something in common with all of them." Struck up a few conversations, although for some reason it's difficult for me to come out of my shell lately.

Labels: exercise

• 10:36 AM 0 comments

Pints to Pasta 10K

I'm running in the Pints to Pasta 10K tomorrow morning. I have to be down at the Old Spaghetti Factory off of Macadam Blvd. around 7:00 AM, pick up my packet, then catch a shuttle bus to the start of the race in North Portland. It's going to be fun. It's my second-ever 10K (the Run Hit Wonder on August 1st being my first), and I've been taking it easy on the running since that last race. I was going to run in Tillamook a couple of weeks ago but ended up in a car accident instead. Oh, no one was hurt, but it still put the kibosh on the drive to the coast.

I'm not sure what to expect for this race but I'm going to do my best. I should be going to bed soon, but I have to go pick up a FlexCar to use tomorrow. Bummer, huh?

I'll get a t-shirt, two free beers, some soup, and a dinner coupon for the Old Spaghetti Factory, plus live music and the accomplishment of running a freakin' six-plus miles. Yay, me. I'm going to be using my new Nike Air Structure Triax 8's in the race. Oh... maybe not. Maybe I should stick with my trusty Brooks Addiction GTS 5s... yeah, running a race in brand-new shoes is probably a Bad Idea.

I'll post any pictures and my impressions of the run tomorrow afternoon.

Labels: exercise

• 8:02 PM 0 comments

Smacky

Over on the right-hand column you can see a picture of my new kitten. Black with the coolest gray-green eyes, short-haired, a tiny little fluffball. He likes to climb things, like, oh, say, me by my pant legs (and skin when I'm wearing shorts). He turned seven weeks old last Thursday, the same day I brought him home.

I'm still trying to find a name that suits him. My original name for him, "Smacky", doesn't quite fit now that I've spent some time with him, although it might stick for a while until I can find a better name.

You can find more pictures of him in my Flickr Set named "Smacky".

Labels: Smacky

• 6:15 PM 0 comments

Posting returns

Yay! I can post at will once again! I was experimenting with other blogging software (including one written by my friend Caleb called "blogtastic") but in the end I was able to figure out the settings that will allow me to use Blogger on my new webhost.

Prepare for lots of blogging to come! I'm also going to move my running journal to another section, and make some other changes to the site. But for now, it's working just as it did before!

Labels: meta

• 5:45 PM 0 comments