Frenzied Daddy

This story brought me to tears. I honestly don’t know what I’d do in their situation. Reading some of the descriptions of the pictures, or of the way the kids have been treated was totally demoralizing. I’m glad there’s people out in the world hunting these animals down. I wonder if a starting wage for them is comparable to what I’m looking for- I might be able to help them. But the nightmares would keep me up at night.

And here, I was going to come to you and tell you about the chicken I fixed for dinner- marinated with ginger, garlic, soy sauce and a fresh orange, it was tastier than I imagined it would be. I was going to tell you about how much better I feel when I cook food that’s not out of a box or a can. Boy, talk about shallow. :S

I’m working my way through this book- skimming it, basically, I don’t have time for a whole navel-gazing career makeover, but I am open to changing my current job description. So, to shortcut that, I’m going to ask you — I have some skills, namely, I’m good with computers and programming for the web. And I have two things I like doing - helping people tell their stories, particularily on the Internet because it seems like such a hard thing to so many people, and I like making computers talk to each other- I got a real kick out of my last job, getting the stock market information from a data source and placing it into our pages for our client. So — does anyone out there know how I can combine my enjoyment of helping people with their web projects / storytelling with my skills for computers? And how can I fling “working with kids” into this mess? It’s not required, but it’d be a nice touch. Feel free to suggest off the wall suggestions like “write a kid-friendly blog program”

Only ten months old and already we can’t keep this kid indoors. She’s unhappy because she can’t see over the windowsill. Once I pick her up and she can see out, she’s fine. Sitting in the chair and looking out isn’t good enough.

A zillion years ago, in a land far far away; ok, I’ll be honest, it was Alaska, my family went camping on the Kenai Peninsula. In all truth, this one camping trip should have prepared me for a lifetime of camping in the Pacific Northwest. As I recall, and I believe I was Miss B’s age at the time, we were out for a week trip, and it was raining. It rained every day, big bucketsized drops of rain that soaked even the wood under the trees.

Mind you, this was before the camp host tooled around the paved circle towing a little wagon with bundles of nice dry wood in it. Back when I was a kid, we had to forage our campwood, and like it.

After four days (or so) of wet, there wasn’t a dry bit of wood anywhere. Even the centers of the logs you could chop into to get bits of wood were soggy. There was going to be no camp fire- we couldn’t get anything lit. So we were faced with a night of something cold, followed by a cold tent on the cold ground. This just wouldn’t do- so my father started up the plymouth and we grilled peanut butter and jelly on the engine (it was that or hamburgers, and I don’t think he wanted the grease in his pistons or wherever it would have gone). The Peanut Butter and the Jam combined into a warm (hot!) sticky mass, the heat brought out the flavors of the peanuts and the jam. And the bread was nice and toasty- toasty and gooey. A winning combination- and the sugar kept it hot.

For the last ten years, I’ve been threatening Ms B with those sandwiches; offering to grill them for her, or suggesting she eat them for supper if we’re our of cheese and she wants something toasty and gooey– heck, she’s halfway there with peanutbutter on toast. Last week, in a black mood, I made one, and crunched enthusiastically into it. About halfway into it, Ms B asked for a taste– and now she’s hooked. Grilled PB&J for all!

Now that I’ve begun this slow descent into Peanut Butter megalomania, I’ve introduced another abomination– dipping Chips Ahoy™ into Peanut Butter. Don’t knock it until you’ve tried it.

What the hell does this mean, and why are people saying it? So much, what?

At any rate; thank you all for the offers you’ve given us over the past week. We’ve been sent cash, food (well, the offer of shopping in a freezer), people have brought us dinner, lots of people have offered job references, the list goes on and on.

So, thank you. From the bottoms of our hearts.

I’ll post later, after I’ve perused the want ads.

“So, are you a computer programmer?”

I was selling books back to Powell’s Books, and some of the books I was trying to sell were programming books. “Ahh, naw, just Internet stuff, ” I told the nice lady named “Info” , “I leave the real coding for the hard core geeks.” Well, now I’m an unemployed soft core geek …. well, ok, unemployed “Senior Developer.” My newest ex-boss was not willing to pay us in beer, so he let us go this morning. That’s a line that he can draw that I can respect; I’m not volunteering my time for his business.

We did leave it open for the future, when they get solvent again. We believe that his product will be profitable, but we are under no illusions, and we are instructed to file for unemployment and to look for work.

Check, and check. I’ve also filled out the form for “Business License Exemption” for businesses that will earn less than $25,000. The business name I’m using is Argh Webworks, a display site I set up about a year ago as a place to aim possible clients. It’s funny, I always swore I’d never own a business, but here I am, looking at the startup steps to earning my fabulous wealth.

My outlook today is completely different from a year and a half ago or even when my first dot-com dreams died. I have a much higher sense of my self-worth, underlined by my boss’s parting words. “You have the talent and the knowledge. You’re a good programmer. And judging on what I’ve heard of your history, you deserve a lot better. Don’t take that again.” Well, hell, with a blank check like that one, I’m going places.

See ya in the unemployment queue.

I found these over at A List Apart. They’re excellent advice for either webloggers or print-loggers, err, paper-writers. These are their headings, with my explanations or synopses, or just plain ole ’shoot from the hip responses.’

1. Write for a reason
   Well, duh. And make the reason more than just “I burped today. It tasted like pizza.” Although that could be interesting, in the right context. A few of my posts have been more filler than content, I’ll admit, but that falls into the ‘Write Often’ category.
2. Write often
   What if nothing exciting has happened since the last post? Write about something mildly interesting happening in the news. Write about something dorky. Do a book review. Prove to your readers that your life is more than “get up, go to work, come home, eat, sleep, get up.” Sometimes, I’ll admit, I do things just so I’ll have something to blog about. Or I’ll write about something really dull (woo, running over to the school and back).
3. Write tight
   Definately. Don’t use very too many words, ok? And also eschew obfuscation.
4. Make good friends
   Get some. Some of mine are better than I thought. Find like-minded webloggers who you can link to in times of stress.
5. Find good enemies
   Joseph Conrad wrote of enemies: “You shall judge of a man by his foes as well as by his friends.” (more enemy quotes). A good enemy is a foil for your own beliefs, someone strong who you can argue with. Be careful about treating them with respect. They may read your weblog too, and they can write … too.
6. Let the story unfold
   You’re a storyteller. Do it.
7. Stand up, speak out
   If you see an injustice, you have a voice. Use it.
8. Be sexy
   Sex is, according to my nonscientific poll, roughly 85% of the Internet Business Section is related to sex. The other 15% has to do with refinancing your home mortgage.
9. Use your archives
   Link to yourself, in your archives. Make your archives search-engine friendly. When someone is reading an archive page, make it easy to find out who you are and what you’re currently writing about.
10. Relax!
    We’re all just people. Well, maybe if Thomas Jefferson was blogging, you could feel a little shy. But he’s not.

Miss B ran ten laps. I’ll email out reminder notices tonight to those of you who will be paying from far distances (Hi Shane!). Personally, for a kid who has a hard time getting out of bed some mornings, I think two and a half miles is pretty impressive. I’ll take the ‘donate’ button down Real Soon Now.

I heard on the radio this morning that they don’t embalm Popes because if the body doesn’t decay, then obviously the Pope was a saint and the guy gets inducted into the Papal Hall of Fame. So I have a message for the next Pope.

Twinkies.

Seriously, man, eat twinkies for breakfast and dinner, and your place at the table of Saints is practically set.