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November 2009

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Website: kence.org

http://the-panopticon.blogspot.com/2009/11/about-rose.html

Way back when I was living in Boston and working for starvation wages at a rather grim college for musicians, I had a secret dream. Well, I had two; but the first involved feeding the president, provost and faculty of the grim college for musicians into a wood chipper, so I kept it quiet.

The second was to be a host on The Victory Garden. Didn't happen. It's tough to land a job demonstrating the proper way to espalier an apple tree when you've never actually tended any plant that wouldn't fit in a window box.*

All of my adult life, you see, I've been a city apartment dweller with–at best–a south-facing windowsill deep enough for a couple of African violets. So, although I yearned for a bit of earth, I was stuck with Gertrude Jekyll, The Victory Garden, and digging compulsively in my window box with a very tiny spade. Did you know that too much loving care can actually kill an African violet?

Since African violets are supposed to be the one thing still blooming after a nuclear holocaust, when I got my hands on a rose bush I figured the sucker was toast.

Mind you, I'm talking about one tough mofo of a rose. It grows on this property in Chicago's Wrigleyville neighborhood–so-called because of its proximity to the famous Friendly Confines of Wrigley Field, home of the Chicago Cubs baseball team.

This rose sprouted voluntarily in a bed adjacent to the sidewalk, and there survived at least 25 brutal Chicago winters without a lick of attention. It is also an easy target for drunken Cubs fans who stop to pee on it as they stumble away from yet another ignominious defeat. A rose that can handle being pissed on every time the Cubs lose is a rose that wants to live.

When I took control of the flower bed, the rose was alive, but only just. It had one large dead and two small living stems, the tallest being six inches high. Nobody knew what color it was, since nobody in the building could remember it blooming. One year it achieved a bud, which promptly turned black and fell off. If it were a person, this rose would have spent every day in a dark bedroom listening to emo and writing Twilight slash fiction.

After doing a little soil preparation, I moved the whole plant from the shady corner to a sunnier spot on the other side of the bed. I fed it. I watered it. I encouraged it to do its own thing, but told it I was there if it needed me.

And three months later, look what happened.

Just a small bloom, yes; but it burst forth with panache and lasted an entire day until a passing hurricane lopped it off at the neck. So I christened it Marie Stuart.

Not long after, Marie managed another bloom. By then it was nearly September, and in Chicago's climate after September 1st all bets are off as to what the weather might do. As I watered the bed, I found myself humming a favorite song, John Stevenson's "The Last Rose of Summer."

If you were assembling an album to be titled Queen Victoria's Greatest Hits, "The Last Rose of Summer" would jockey for top billing with "Home, Sweet Home" and "The Lost Chord." The lyric–actually a poem by the Irishman Thomas Moore–is a real heart-tugger.

In the first stanza, we note the eponymous blossom, looking lovely but lonely:

'Tis the last rose of summer
Left blooming alone;
All her lovely companions
Are faded and gone;
No flower of her kindred,
No rosebud is nigh,
To reflect back her blushes,
To give sigh for sigh.

Sniff. But wait, it gets better. This is a Victorian poem, remember? And what's a Victorian poem without a little premature death?

I'll not leave thee, thou lone one!
To pine on the stem;
Since the lovely are sleeping,
Go, sleep thou with them.
Thus kindly I scatter,
Thy leaves o'er the bed,
Where thy mates of the garden
Lie scentless and dead.

In case you're made of stone, Moore throws in one more stanza that ponders the futility of life and the cold, cold solace of the grave.

So soon may I follow,
When friendships decay,
From Love's shining circle
The gems drop away.
When true hearts lie withered
And fond ones are flown,
Oh! who would inhabit,
This bleak world alone?

OMG. ROFCMMBS.**

Seriously, it's really a sweet, simple little piece. These days it's more or less the property of schlockmeisters like Charlotte Church and André Rieu. But I'll never forget a performance I heard once in the mid-1990s on World AIDS Day: nothing but a tenor and a piano. The singer, the pianist and about half the men in the audience had watched all or most of their beautiful friends die. In that room, in that context, it was devastating.

Of course, Mother Nature doesn't give two hoots about poetic justice. Well into fall, the dang rose sent up two new shoots and each produced a bud, which meant Exhibit A was at best The Penultimate Rose of Summer. Who's going to set that to music? Nobody, that's who.

When the late arrivals hadn't opened by the time I left for England, I figured frost would get them. Nope. They just got bigger and fatter and then, on Thanksgiving Day: pop.

As dear Edmund Waller wrote, "Go, lovely rose! Dude! Right on!"

*Also, I was the wrong color. Everybody on The Victory Garden was white, in that purebred luminescent way that only old-style Bostonians can be white. The show's sole nod to ethnic diversity, as I recall, was a presenter whose last name was Shimizu, and even she was blonde.

**Rolling On the Floor Clutching My Mourning Brooch and Sobbing.

~Tuesday~ I think my buscapade characters are conspiring against me for riding the Wolfline buses a lot lately. This morning's city bus offered up only Sci-Fi Fantasy Man, reading as usual, but without the usual ear buds in.

None of my other peeps made an appearance today.

We had our weekly department meeting from 9:00-10:00 to which I brought Tiramisu. Rhonda brought Crackerfuls, which I'd never heard of before and whose name seems a little bit derogatory to white people—"You crackers get your crackersful." I'm just saying...

I worked on the organization and navigation of our organization's accessibility website with one of my favorite people, Jen. I also did a usability test for her, which as usual, at times, had us in hysterics. The great thing about me is that I have just enough ego to blame things that I do wrong during product usability tests on the interface, application, or product design rather than on myself.

I submitted an application to enroll back in NC State as a NDS (Non-Degree Studies) student, which included having to pay a $25 application fee. I was surprised to find that the system couldn't find my previous student ID, as it's only been two years since I graduated with my Master's degree.

I'm going to register to audit ENG 583a Social Networking and Technical Communication in the Spring 2010 semester. As university employees, we can take up to two classes free (with the Tuition Waiver program) per academic year. Classes will start January 11 and run every Monday and Wednesday, from 6:00-7:15, through the end of April. I've never audited a class, so it should be interesting.

Temporary Alice and her assumed sister Word Search Lady were on the bus home today. Temporary Alice had a stocking hat pulled over her head and did not speak to me today, and Word Search Lady sat across from her saying her letters out loud and working on her Word Search. All quite on the western front.

I ran to Durham and dropped off those laminated "Manbites Dog Parking" signs at the theater, where there was someone in (full dress, evidently) rehearsal passing through the lobby who answered my knock and took the signs to give to Ed.

Back in Raleigh, I stopped in Helios where I spent at least 15 minutes trying to connect to their free wireless access. Finally, I looked at the list of other available free networks and connected to Solas'—the "upscale" restaurant next door.

At 9:25 I headed over to Legends for their 9:30 trivia game, and once I took a seat Mary K Mart told me that I would have to excuse myself from the 5th round as she was going to use the category and questions I sent in.

Things I learned and/or overheard tonight:

Tea was discovered in 2737 BC.

Everyone knows that the traditional "man on top" sexual position is called the "missionary position," but did you know that the "woman on top" position is called the "acrobat?"

I knew right away that "the part of the flower that produces the pollen" was not the first two of these answers offered in the multiple choices:
1. Pedal
2. Pistol
3. Stamen
Everyone knows that the pedal is the part of the bicycle that helps it go and that the only discharge that comes from a pistol is gunpowder. Bless their mess. Can you say petal and pistil?

During the break, I overheard (echoes of Gladys Kravitz) two very young girls sitting behind me have this exchange:
- Girl 1: "I drink mixed drinks at home before I go out. Once I'm out, I drink beer, because it's so much cheaper."
- Girl 2: "I do the exact same thing! Being 21 is expensive!"

Tags: affirmations (implicit), anecdotes, bar talk, bus, coffee shops, grad school, manbites, sci-fi fantasy man, temporary alice, word search lady, work
Mood: Content

http://calebandchloe.blogspot.com/2009/11/ringa-ringa.html

Our evening routine is as follows:

Dinner at 6:30
Bath at 7:00
Family playtime in Caleb's room from 7:30-8:00
Bedtime is 8:00

We started doing the 30 min of family playtime a couple of months ago. Before then we let Caleb play in the play room with his toys until bedtime. We were having trouble with Caleb getting too riled up and putting up a fuss when it came time to brush teeth and go to sleep. So, thanks to Juan, family playtime was born.

The rules of family playtime are that we stay in Caleb's room and either read books or play and sing. We try to keep the wrestling to a minimum and the vibe calm. Well, as calm as an almost two year old boy can be at least.

Caleb's new favorite thing to do during play time is Ringa Ringa - also known as Ring Around the Rosies for those of you know not well versed in Toddlerish. He loves it and does a fabulous dramatic fall at the end. He also insists that we ALL play (no sitting out by Dada) and we ALL have to fall down. He then heroically pulls Juan and I back to a sitting position and it all begins again.

Family bonding at it's best. All three on the floor giggling, holding hands and spending time as a family.

I am so very thankful.

http://it.toolbox.com/blogs/db2luw/ibm-aquires-guardium-35631?rss=1

On November 30, 2009 IBM announced that it has acquired Guardium, a market leader in real-time enterprise database monitoring and protection.

Here are some points from the press release:

"Guardium gives clients unprecedented visibility and control over their data access activities while taking advantage of automation to deliver rapid return on investment," said Ram Metser, chief

~Monday~ I had the most ridiculous dreams all night long about editing a document in Microsoft Word that was going to be published on the web. Inane.

I got behind enough this morning to miss the 8:15 city bus, so I carried myself over to Gorman Street to catch the #9 Greek Village Wolfline bus. The bus was fairly crowded with students, but not jam-packed to the point that it usually is. No doubt at least some kids extended their long weekend home for the holiday by one more day—or perhaps, were taking a day to recover from being home again for an extended stay.

The guy sitting across from me sat with his legs spread open far enough that they overlapped the front of the seats on either side of his, but not to the point that they precluded someone from taking the seats. As—fortunately thin—people did take each seat, it never once seemed to dawn on him that maybe he ought to pull his knees in to make it more comfortable for those around him.

A young lady, a sorority girl with a dramatic blond "up 'do" and rather large breasts, ended up standing in the aisle right in front of me and she held the strap from the bar above her to keep her balance in such a way that the short sleeve of her blouse pulled back enough to reveal stubble in her armpits. If she doesn't attend to that soon, she'll be moving from Alpha Gamma Delta to Gotta Braidya Pithair.

I had a breakfast sandwich using my penultimate massa roll this morning: turkey sausage, a fried egg, and some melted pepper jack cheese on it.

I hate 9:00 meetings on Monday morning, but that's exactly how my day started. My boss' boss was out of town at his 102-year-old grandmother's funeral in Kansas, so a peer boss of my boss ran the meeting. She was a little distracted facilitating, and later told me it was because she had checked her e-mail real quickly during the meeting and found out a friend of hers had died.

Just to complete the "death comes in threes" superstition, I'm going to go ahead and use up the third one by saying that several years ago in my book club, I read "Death Comes for the Archbishop" by Willa Cather.

In the afternoon, I had a meeting of the organizing committee of our holiday party which is coming up this Friday, December 4th. Out of a potential of just under 150 people, 62 have signed up.

Tonight was Salon VI from 6:30 until 10:00 at Mitch's Tavern. Our ever-diverse agenda included the following (various and sundry notes have been added in and around items):

If you were the saint of something, what would it be?

Kim: Patron Saint of Undercats
Anna: Patron Saint of Human Magpies and People Who Love Office Supplies
John: Patron Saint of Protecting Straight People from Drag Queens
Sarah: Patron Saint of Being on Time
Etta: Patron Saint of Possibilities
Brad: Patron Saint of Immediate Connections

Are northerners easier?

No: Extra layer of clothing
Yes: At least they tell you when they're not interested

The value of authorial intent, redux

Brad maintains his posit that listening to an author read his or her work is not a valid method by which to determine its authorial intent. He would appear to espouse "New Criticism, which argues that authorial intent is irrelevant to understanding a work of literature. The text is the only source of meaning, and any details of the author's desires or life are purely extraneous."
Most of the group seemed to disagree—Anna the most vehemently. Perhaps she is simpatico with the Reader Response critics, who have argued the author's intent will shape the text and limit the possible interpretations of a work. Then again, she might just have a psychological complex as a result of hearing her father read his own work.
Anna's father, in response to such a possibility printed on a piece of paper, might get out his rubber stamp and stamp the page:
Beneath Contempt!
Then again perhaps we're all just preoccupied with intent, which Wimsatt coined intentional fallacy.

Catalogs for salonist(a)s: Despairwear and one other. Visual aids to be provided by Anna (who promises to remember this time), so hold your Google fingers steady if you can.

Anna shared a catalog from Dispairwear
She also shared a Bas Bleu catalog, complete with an insert to join their society, one of whose membership benefits is "a membership card to flaunt your bluestocking status."
A copy of Curious Lists, a creative journal for list-lovers, and we attempted to create a list for the list title of, "Substitutes for Marshmallows."
A copy of Wicked French, which was just hysterical.

Anna's wedding photos, if anyone still cares

Poles, cleavage, and a stripper with a mullet, OH MY!

Etta's wedding photos, if she brings them

This topic got rather incendiary; we'll just leave it at that.

Why Brad HATES people who use sentences like "We'll need to be planful" or "Would someone language that up for me" [don't even get me started about "Thought Leaders"]

We talked about a few other words that set us off, such as administrate and followership
Kim said she likes words like gihugic and I asked what differentiates that word from ginormous, and she said gihugic is "bigger and grander"
Anna noted that she loves business-speak

Sustainable sustainability: On buses, gardens, avoiding elevators, and sleeping all day

a.k.a. "The Lazy Man's Guide to Sustainability"
This item did, however, spark an interesting discussion about public transportation (the impetus for, and the rationalization for not—a lot of which was quite valid)

The etymology of "worry"

This discussion was gihuged by our server saying, "No worries" when we asked for something
What we don't like (and it's plenty) about the phrase, "Don't worry!"

It's negative
It's an imperative statement
It's an incomplete sentence
It invokes worry with the mere mention of the word
It invalidates one's feelings

STC End-of-Semester Party

We agreed to keep a low profile as Salonists
We left that fact that Anna changed her RSVP alone
John was reminded about his potential Twitter balls

STC-SIGDoc transition update

In short FAB (however, not an abbreviation for "fabulous," but an acronym for "frustrated," "angry," and "bitter")

Magic underwear

This item was a place holder just to make sure everyone had seen A Flowchart to Determine What Religion You Should Follow

Holiday letters (Love 'em or Hate 'em?)

Kim: Doesn't like them
Anna: Most of them make her sick, but she sends one herself
Etta: Likes them if they're well-written
John: Sends one himself; likes most, but like Etta, they must be well-written
Sarah: Likes them, noted a series of satiric episodes in which each next update of a holiday letter gets more tragic
Brad: Likes them

The Cost of Celebrity (Fame vs. privacy)

Tiger who?

Check Mitch’s for an arcade machine with Word Dojo on it

There wasn't one.

Other notable moments/ponderings/quotes:

With the ubiquity of Facebook, are holiday letters heading for extinction?

Brad recommended checking out goodexperience.com/games.

"If you ask a boy to get naked, he will."

The "secret hover" of xkcd comics

A potential preferred appositive for Brad after sharing his story involving a bathroom, matches, and tissues: "Brad, builder of fires."

A few suggested agenda items / action items for next time:

Sarah will bring body glitter

Our impetus for going to grad school

Each read a paragraph from Brad's book (sent to us before the meeting); have him read the paragraph at our next meeting, and tridux on the value of authorial intent

John to create a doodle.com poll for our 2010 meeting schedule

I stopped by karaoke at Flex tonight to meet Joe for a couple of drinks. It was pretty tragic in there, and I left at a little after 11:00, unfortunately before Joe got called up to sing his song. David (the emcee) took a break that I didn't want to wait through, so I left before Joe's turn.

Some of us have to work tomorrow.

Tags: affirmations (implicit), bar talk, bus, salons
Mood: content

I intended to rest over this long weekend, honest. But somehow, it never quite happened. Or maybe I did rest and now I'm tired from the resting. This weekend's rest included:

Eating Thanksgiving dinner with Jeff at Trellis on Thurday and then dropping Jeff off at the airport.
Finishing knitting Jess' dreads, felting them, and making them into a hair piece.
Completely cleaning and organizing my previously out-of-control craft room.
Cleaning the kitchen and living room. (Ok, not that thrilling, but had to be done.)
Putting up the Advent Calendar, adding new activities to it, and filling it with candy goodies.
Making experimental spinach and artichoke dip (yum) and having people over for another installment of DVD day featuring Doctor Who.
Crafting a small tree's worth of nerd ornaments and decorating said tree. See photos of the results.
Going to I Heart Indie (a craft fair) with Jess and discovering Jess' completely awesome and hidden rock shop in Kirkland.
Hauling out all of the Christmas decor out of storage and assembling the tree. It's got half of its lights on it, but my other strands are burnt out, so I must get more. That's probably a job for later, though.

I had planned on getting the tree completely up along with the rest of the Christmas decor as well as making some eggnog, but I think those will need to wait for another day. I need a break!

Tags: arts and crafts, home
Mood: accomplished

~Sunday~ I am enjoying the massa I received at Thanksgiving from my parents (as a belated birthday present) and I only have a couple left so you can expect only two more reports about it as a breakfast roll. Today, I skipped the egg (since I had three of them in that breakfast combo I had at IHOP at 2:00 in the morning), and had sausage with a slice of American cheese melted on it. Delicious.

As predicted yesterday, my abs are sore today from the absence of doing ab work and getting back to it yesterday.

I'm going to get on a little bit of a soapbox here about famous people and privacy. It is amazing to me that people who become mega famous continue to not only expect privacy, but espouse how they "deserve" it. Folks, this is the reality of it. Losing your privacy is one of the trade-offs that comes with becoming famous. It's that simple.

Tiger Woods has yet to talk to the authorities about what happened, but today issued a statement that ended with this: "But, I would also ask for some understanding that my family and I deserve some privacy no matter how intrusive some people can be."

Uh, no, you don't deserve it. You are being paid well for your loss of privacy. It isn't fair you say? I noted in an entry in the recent past that Chief Justice Roberts makes around $225,000 a year making complex, daunting judicial decisions that affect our freedom and our future, while Judge Judy makes $24 million dollars a year. Fair? No. Reality? Yes. Quit whining and deal with it!

Here it is pictorially for all future famous people who learn better visually—this is the trade-off you are signing up for. If you're going to get all self-righteous about it later, then just don't sign the contract that's going to earn you a gazillion dollars. Get self-righteous about it while you're poor.

Graph showing the more fame you have the less privacy you retain

Graph showing the more fame you have the less privacy you retain

Let me step down off this thing now...

I made a pit stop at K-Mart on the way to the gym, where I picked up some Nyquil and some cough drops.

I did thirty minutes of cardio on the treadmill in the "Endurance Training" range (in terms of incline and speed), and I listened to a podcast of Fresh Air—Terry Gross interviewing Judd Apatow—On the Alchemy of 'Funny People.'

Some time in the last day or two I mentioned Terry Gross to someone and they said, "She's a Lesbian, right?" I hadn't thought so, but she does interview a lot of gay people and she's very open-minded without a doubt. Funny, the biography part of her Wikipedia entry talks about her often being mistaken for a Lesbian. But I digress...

Back to the gym—30 minutes on the treadmill for a 325-calorie burn.

On the way home, I both laughed out loud and was sad inside within minutes of each other.

Happiness: Just before turning into my townhouse area, I saw a bumper sticker on the back of a car that said, "I miss Pluto," which just tickled me.

Sadness: When I parked in front of my townhouse, in a window of my ex-neighbor's townhouse to the right of mine, I saw a "For Sale" sign. While I knew it was coming eventually (she got married and moved in with her husband in May), the sign makes it real and marks the "end of an era." She was a fun neighbor, and really, the only one I'm friends with.

I cooked a most delicious spaghetti and meatball dinner tonight, with some garlic bread on the side. Yum!

Robert and I finished another online game of Scrabble this evening, after which I made some chicken salad for sandwiches this coming week. The ingredients, several of which required slicing, dicing, and food processing included: ground boiled chicken breast meat; diced celery, green pepper, and onions; sliced Gherkin pickles; raisins; crushed pineapple; mustard, mayonnaise, and Teriyaki marinade.

I started way too late, and spent about three hours finishing up the judging of the four STC Competition entries that I had a commitment to get to Anna, our team leader, by tomorrow. It feels good to be done with that, and I feel like I made a decent contribution.

Tags: accomplishments, affirmations (implicit), exercise, gym, health, podcasts, stc
Mood: content