I'm For Sale

The yellow couch is for sale.





Not the idea, nor the blog, nor the domain name (I've checked), but the actual couch is, unfortunately, on the chopping block. First 500 CHF takes it. It is a wonderful couch, but when I started to look at the cost of actually moving it... well, it's going to be a bit pricey.

So if you're interested, let me know.


It's been a long time since I've written... I've been pretty busy trying to get all of my moving stuff figured out. Turns out that it takes a lot of energy, and I am SO looking forward to getting it done. In any case, the little chick and I are well; I hope you are, too.

Sheila

I was thinking that a sheila was a female kangaroo, and that made me wonder if anyone was actually named that in Australia.

But I looked it up, and it's actually slang for a woman.

So, my question remains. But besides that, the fact is that the Aussies have the best slang in the world. Take these examples:

Bluey : pack, equipment, traffic ticket, redhead
Bluey : blue cattle dog (named after its subtle markings) which is an excellent working dog. Everyone's favourite all-Aussie dog.
Bluey : heavy wool or felt jacket worn by mining and construction workers.
Bluey : bluebottle jellyfish
Bingle : motor vehicle accident
Bonzer : great, ripper
Budgie smugglers : men's bathing costume


And those are just the highlights of the B's!

Once again, I fear that I may have been born on the wrong continent...

Happy Valentine's Day

And that's about all I have to say about that.

Amsterdam

Just got back from a weekend in Amsterdam with some great friends.

It was really cold.

I ate a lot of fries with mayonnaise.

I met a poet.

I took 600 pictures.

I didn't smell much more pot than in Geneva.

I lost at cards.

I didn't sleep much.

So, I'll write more later.

I WIsh

That I could legitimately make "y'all" a regular part of my vocabulary. I love it.

Whistling

...is kind of like playing solitaire on the computer; they're both probably more fun to do than to be a spectator for.

Happy New Year

Original, huh? Nonetheless, I hope it's a good one... for all of us. And I'll be updating more, soon. I promise. Until then, have an egg-nog for me. Or, better yet: I'll have the egg-nog and you can do a half-hour run for me. If only it were that simple...

Too Bad

It's only Wednesday. Still, they're all over the soundtrack to Starter For Ten and I almost got Nathan to play it for the offertory on Sunday. So, sing along wherever you are...

I don't care if Monday's blue
Tuesday's gray and Wednesday too
Thursday i don't care about you
It's Friday I'm in love

Monday you can fall apart
Tuesday Wednesday break my heart
Thursday doesn't even start
It's Friday I'm in love

Saturday, wait
And Sunday always comes too late
But Friday never hesitate...

I don't care if Monday's black
Tuesday Wednesday heart attack
Thursday never looking back
It's Friday I'm in love

Monday you can hold your head
Tuesday Wednesday stay in bed
Or Thursday watch the walls instead
It's Friday I'm in love

Saturday, wait
And Sunday always comes too late
But Friday never hesitate...

Humo(u)r

I've realized that I've become afraid to use the "humor" label on my posts. Part of it may be that, in retrospect, I'm ashamed of using the American spelling (no offense, Americans). But I think that most of is that I'm a little concerned someone will get onto my blog and do a search on it.

Then they'll sit back, cross their arms, and read.

Unimpressed.

"I don't see what's so funny about that," they'll say, reaching for some more lemon rind. "Hurrumph."

On the other hand, if they're not expecting anything to be really very clever, even just a little bit of wit can be rather impressive.

So, if you've searched and just found this, I'm sorry. But if you keep digging, you never know what you may find.

Canyon

I'm standing at the edge and looking down. It's deeper than I thought; steeper than I had anticipated. I'm ready, though, I'm pretty sure.

At least I think I am.

I hope.

I've been wanting this for a long time, now. I've been working out, getting in shape. I've been doing some heavy training, actually. I've checked my gear, over and over: the harnesses, the ropes, the chalk and the carabeeners. It looks to me like everything is here. I've had the maps spread out on my table more times than I can count, been planning my route, making sure I know where the crevices are deep and the overhangs more than I can handle. When I close my eyes, I can see it in my mind.

I'm prepared.

But everything is different on game day, you know? The moves that seemed so secure and well-practiced on the wall aren't quite the same on real rock. The muscles that have been getting stronger in the gym turn out not to be the ones that are needed to make it over to the next hold and down that face.

I know there will be some things I haven't foreseen; I have a feeling that they're still going to take me by surprise.

I wonder if I've made a mistake in some of my judgements, if maybe the ropes I have prepared aren't going to be enough for this climb, if the route that I've planned won't work once I'm on the face. I wonder if I'm in as good a shape as I want to believe I am.

I wonder if I'm more hesitant than I should be, or if maybe I'm not nearly cautious enough.

I wonder if I'm going to get half-way and become paralyzed with fear. I can see it already: too scared to take another step in the descent, too tired to get back up on my own. Stranded. That happens, sometimes, to people. I've heard about it, and it scares me.

But I know, at least, that I can't know. Not now; not really. I won't know if my hands have the strength I need until I have to swing across for my next foothold. I won't know if my heart has the courage I long to have until I choose to test it and let myself go.

But I hope.

My Favorite Compliment

The best one I've had in the last while was from a woman who was with me when I was listening briefly ("grooving" is probably a better word) to some recordings of a jam session I had played at. After a while, she told me, "I like watching you listen to music."

I thought that was pretty cool, especially since I can imagine that my particular version of "active listening" could be annoying. It was nice to hear.

[EDIT] Oh, and for the record, she's closer to my mom's age than mine, and wasn't hitting on me, which maybe doesn't make it count double, but it is different.

Going Home

I leave tomorrow. It will be nice to be home. It will be wonderful to - soon - see my little chick again. But it's going to be hard to leave Stockholm. So, I pause to reflect.

Things I like here:

• Fewer people using their cell phones as stereos on public transport. And, as a result, a much lower desire to feed people their own phones.
• When I'm out walking and I'm not taking pictures, I am usually still looking at people. And, when I look at people, I make eye contact. And people here look back. And here's the cool part - they smile. I couldn't be happier.
• There are a lot of red shoes. Not a lot, I guess, but relatively more. Red shoes are good.
• There are beautiful children playing, which makes me almost unbearably happy and sad at the same time.
• It feels safe and orderly, but not as though a 70 year-old Swiss woman is about to pop out and hit you on the head with a broom, if you know what I mean.
• I saw a woman with her 3 kids carrying hockey sticks. Hockey sticks are good.
• I think Swedish is a cool language. My Swedish friends had told me that it was like Swiss German. Sure, there's a little more up and down than English, but it doesn't sound like anyone is about to cough up their spleen.
• There is a certain agelessness to a lot of the women here. I'm crap at guessing ages, which is why, if you ask me to guess yours, I will just say, "I don't know". And then I'll wait for you to talk about something else. But here, it seems even harder than usual. There are a lot of women who, I get the feeling, are somewhere between 25 and 40, but they could tell me anything in that range and I would believe them.
• The city is small enough that there are some people I've seen several times, and I think that's pretty cool, for only having been here a week.

Things I don't like:

• Smoking isn't allowed inside, except in my friend Johan's apartment, where it's mandatory.
• Some women are not just wearing leggings under shorts, but shiny leggings. Like super-hero costume kind of shiny.
• It's about 9 CHF just to take one ride on the metro. That's just way too much.

Something I've been thinking about:

I've seen a lot of parents of fairly young children who are tired of walking, who seem to be dealing with it poorly. They either just have the kid, crying, trailing along at the end of their arm, or, I've seen the family actually leave, go into a building a 100m away and wait. Eventually, they came back for the little boy (who was sitting, rather resolutely, where they had left him - seems this had happened before). Here's what I think.

Maybe those 3 year-old legs are just tired. Maybe you skipped naptime. Maybe he's hungry. So maybe you should carry him for a while.

And, even more to the point, maybe she just wants to know she is loved and valued. I don't know, but perhaps if those parents would just stop and crouch down and say, "You're tired, aren't you? Me too. I love you, and we have a little more walking to do before we can stop. Shall we sit here together for a minute before we go on?" there would be a lot less crying now and a lot fewer feelings of abandonment to work through later on. Maybe.

Anyways, time to pack!

You're Mac'ing Me Nervous

Yes, the title does make me feel like I've spent too much time in the Loony Spoons cookbook. But that's not the point right now. Not even close.

Did you know that the total market share of Mac's OS X operating system is about 6%? But 30% of people who visit TYC are running it. And since I am gifted with numbers, I'm going to break that right down for you.

It means a lot of people here are using Macs.

Now I have some good friends who use Macs. I have even more who have iPods. They say they're pretty.

I can't really blame them - they are nice to look at. But they remind me of an old saying: "Like a gold ring in a pig's snout is a beautiful woman who shows no discretion."

I think maybe it started when I used my first Mac (they called it a "Macintosh" then) to play games with my friend Andre. About five years before my dad had picked up a little Timex computer that had a whopping 2K of memory. It used a black and white TV to display, but it worked pretty well for Frogger. A year or two after that I had a friend with a Commodore 64. It was even better - color, little songs. Then I went to Andre's place and it was like going back in time. The screen was just slightly larger than a watch. That was kind of fitting, actually, since we spent years of our life waiting for it to load.

Then I used a Mac in a fine arts class in University. It wasn't an easy transition:

Me: "Why does this mouse only have one button?"
Mac person: "Apple invented the mouse, you know - Microsoft stole the idea."
Me: "That's great. But why is there only one button?"
Mac person: "You only need one. You can make it do whatever you want... you just hold down the apple key when you click."
Me: "Uh, yeah, but that's kind of why I use a mouse - so I don't have to worry about the keyboard at the same time."
Mac person: "We invented it, you know."
Me: "Yeah, you and Steve. We've just been there. There's no scroll wheel, either?!?"
Mac Person: "You don't need that. You just hold down the button and then drag the mouse."
Me [holding and dragging]: "Like this? Why isn't this working? You know, my mouse has five buttons and a wheel. I don't mean to turn this into a pissing contest - I'm just saying."
Mac Person: "You just have to hold it a little longer."
Me: "Now?"
Mac person: "Not quite."
Me: "Now?"
Mac person: "Almost there..."
Me: "Where's that stupid apple key..."

It went downhill pretty quickly from there.

So, Mac People: I have a feeling that we're never going to see eye to eye on this. You can tell me about how Macs never break down; I can ask you about which of the three Mac-compatible programs you enjoy the most. But I'm glad you're reading, and I appreciate you coming back.

Oh, and I'll try to remember to keep adding pictures.

;-)

It Was Bound To Happen

I don't have much to say today. Except, maybe, this. I've been terrible at following up with friends lately. There are people I've been meaning to call/mail for ages and I've just not been doing it. So, if you're reading this and thinking that I owe you, yeah... I do. Sorry, and don't give up hope...

In The News - ANS and Market Trends

So, Anna Nicole Smith's death is confirmed as a drug overdose and the markets in North America take a dive. Coincidence? I think not. I just need to wait for Jon Stewart to be sure.

Chairs, In Groups Of Three

Because everything is 3x better if you can do it while sitting.