I've had two conversations two nights in a row with two different people (both of whom know me fairly well, not just random coworkers or anything) that have both ended with me in a kind of shocked bewilderment when the other person said something along the lines of "I'm incredibly upset that you would say that about me." As the only common denominator between the two, I'm obviously the problem, but for the life of me I can't figure out what's going on. It has me rather frustrated and more than a little paranoid (very Mr. Darcy-ish, I assure you).

Labels: introspection, stress

The tangled webs of historical wordplay entwined within the last day of the week are complex, and possibly trivial to the unconcerned masses, but suffice it to say that it is a day named, uniquely among the largely Norse-inspired week, for a Roman deity adopted from an earlier Greek deity who, among his other charming attributes, swallowed all of his children. To honor this great paragon of parenthood, we named a planet after him.

There was some sort of sporting event of note in the state today. Its existence was presaged by mumblings at work on Friday and a cacophony of red "N" sweatshirts and flags today (along with one odd woman wearing an orange shirt with similar "Husker" markings; even a heretic such as I knows the proper color for the state's quasi-religious following). I was vaguely aware of it (more so than my usual indifference) due to friends attending and the "flexible" television scheduling that "slides" shows I might otherwise watch to later time slots. Of the actual event itself I have no knowledge.

Some gas stations, in furthering efforts to attract customers to the insides of their establishments (for, despite outrage to the contrary, gas stations make very little money off gasoline itself and instead make most of their profit from marked-up consumables), have expanded their beverage fountains. One particular place on my drive home includes not only six flavors of slushies, eight flavors of coffee and a do-it-yourself-from-pre-frozen-fruit-cups smoothie bar but also a panoply of soda flavors bordering on silly. My personal favorite addition, however, has been the "old fashioned" soda fountain flavors, dispensed at the push of a button, which allow anyone to become a connoisseur of fine carbonated masterpieces; in my case, this means a cherry vanilla Dr Pepper roughly twice as "cherry vanilla"-y as the cans in my refrigerator, a concoction with clearly visible stratified layers of red and yellow filling a full third of the cup before the final mixing. This is a luxury I find wholly unnecessary and overly indulgent in the context of global poverty and conflict, and yet I continue to plunk my dollar down on the counter.

I stood in line at Wal-Mart today for most of half an hour waiting for a photo kiosk to become available. Until this point, it had not dawned on me that anyone would actually use the primitive cropping and adjusting tools built in to such machines; compared to even the simplest photo manipulation programs (let alone Photoshop) they seem clumsy. Nevertheless, two different women patiently resized, cropped and removed red eye from, between them, over 200 photos. The Zen aspect of my mind understood for the first time that the digital revolution has not distributed itself equally, and there is likely a substantial minority, perhaps even a majority, of the population forced into digital photography without a corresponding interest in (or access to) computers, and to them the kiosk fills a void that those of us on the bleeding (or even near-bleeding) edge of digital technology take for granted. It occurs to me that my mother would likely still be using a film camera, or at best using a digital camera and taking the card directly to Wal-Mart, but for my patient prodding and explaining, and I'm probably in the small minority of people who spend time adjusting the histogram channels and other quasi-arcane-sounding hoopla. On the other hand, the petulant aspect of my mind was annoyed that their imperturbable manipulations tied up the only gateways to the actual developing process, which seems something of an efficiency issue on Wal-Mart's part. I think it's possible to send photos directly to a Wal-Mart store over the Internet. I may have to explore.

In a further degradation to one of the strong influences on my formative high school years, the SciFi Channel premiered the direct-to-tv presentation of "Highlander: The Source" tonight. In keeping with a franchise of such strong potential and fan passion, the show was of course promoted so well that I wouldn't have even known it had premiered if I hadn't looked at the television schedule tonight to see if there were any CSI reruns. For those of you unaware of the schizophrenic thrashings of the Highlander mythos, suffice it to say it has produced one classic movie, one six-season television series with some very good (and some rough) moments, two movies that were officially written out of canon, a fourth passable if not great movie and now this monstrosity, which went through multiple scripts, staff and edits over two years before being released to DVD in Europe to dismal reviews, then more edits before what was at first promised to be a theater release, then a DVD release and finally a direct-to-tv movie. It sounds like a train wreck from what I've read (Mad Max-esque future anarchy and superhuman blue-skinned villains; for crying out loud), so I'm tempted just not to watch it. Ever. The show was one of the defining influences on me in high school and college (I was wearing trench coats before they became "scary" and one of my high school yearbooks had a quote from me about being immortal, not to mention the swords and the fencing . . .), so there's a degree of sadness at the franchise's failure to live up to the fan expectations.

To those of you concerned about my online scarcity and my last few "away" messages: thanks for the concern and inquiries. No worries. I'm trudging, sometimes mechanically rather than energetically, through rugged landscapes of eddying and chaotic emotions, beautiful, in their own way, as the black clouds of a particularly impressive thunderstorm evoke primal wonder and awe despite their dark hues. The signposts have long ago rusted away to useless mockeries in the shifting sand, and it may be that the path I once believed to be linear is in fact spiraling across previous forays, a frustrating experience for which I have no immediate solution. Such are the foibles of human existence. For those who have no idea what I'm talking about, take comfort in the cryptic and nod along.

And finally, as a direct address to my MarioKart partner: Hey, Lane, I have this fantastic idea. Why don't we, and I'm just going out on a limb here, *not* punch other karts while we're crossing rickety bridges. You know, to keep us from falling in the water. Just a suggestion. (It's an inside joke; Lane is already laughing.)

Labels: introspection, lane, miscellany, social commentary, stress

Oft-checked stratagems and intentions best are but beggars,
scratching for crumbs in the dirt,
when dining in the hall of Paucity, King of Castigation.

Labels: introspection, stress