Looks Like Rain

Today’s walk to work looks like it will be a wet one. Snow still covers the ground but there appears to be a light rain falling on it. From the porch I can’t tell if the rain is icing over on the ground or just turning the snow to slush. Should be fun either way.

Ultimately I’m hoping that the rain is melting this mess. Much as I enjoy the snow, Seattle isn’t a snow town. The sensible part of it just shuts down. The stupid part of it keeps driving.

And, selfishly, Nizzibet and I were planning to see Return of the King tonight. We have a volunteer who has agreed to watch Aged Mother but her coming here (and us making it to the theatre) is dependent on having clear roads.

Write Damn You!

You. On the list. From the 24th. Write. Get yourself a weblog and write.

I understand if you only write intermittently. I understand if all that gets written is a description of your less than exciting visit to the DMV. Sometimes that’s what life looks like.

You think you don’t have anything to say? Worry not. There are over a million weblogs out there right now and more are getting created all the time. Most of them have less than a dozen readers. If those stats down the page are any indication there are around ten people a deal reading my ramblings. Don’t waste your time writing for the masses. Write for the entertainment of it. Write to get it out. Write for me.

Not just ’cause it’s all about me. You may not think it’s all about me. I’m cool with that. Occasionally I consider the possibility that the world doesn’t exist just for my amusement.

Cause I want to know what’s going on with you. Tell me about your kids. Or your motorcycle. Or your redecoration. The new job. The lack of job. The cat. The dog. The feeling of impending doom. The latest book you read or movie you watched or what the weather is like. If you’re more tech savvy than I, get yourself one of the alternatives to Blogger. One that allows comments. Not that you’ll hear from me much.

I’m lame that way. I write most of my posts in between getting the Aged Mother breakfast. After that my ability to hold a linear thought gets taken up at work. By evening I’m good for holding a conversation with Nizzibet and little else. That’s my excuse.

Write.

And let me know you’re doing it. My address is down there above the meaningless statistics. Just remove the spaces around the @.

Cheers!

Because My Opinion is SOOO Important

Latest Entertainments –

Bulletproof Monk –

the Movie. Haven’t read the comic. Might be brilliant. The movie is fun. Many silly stunts. The leads play off each other pretty well. But …

Enough with the Nazis as villains. Yeah, Nazis are Evil. Yeah they had fashion sense. So what? They’re easy.

Compliments to Chow Yung Fat on the improvement to his English speaking skills. He’s picked it up pretty fast. He could use some more baritone in his voice for that action hero thrust but that my cultural/personal prejudice speaking.

Identity –

Fun to watch once. Unlike The Sixth Sense or Fight Club (two other “gimmick” movies that come to mind), I can’t see myself watching this again. Seems almost like it would have been more fun if it had been lower budget with unknown actors. I’d have had different expectations. Still, as said, fun to watch once.

Finder –

Dream Sequence. The latest collection from Carla Speed McNeil. I love this series. Probably would have hated it as a kid. Too much open ended, not spelled out clearly, stuff going on. I’m sure it’s all crystal in McNeil’s head. Her footnotes at the back of the book spell out a lot of the “what was that?” Recommended for any reader of SF, especially someone who enjoys Ursula LeGuin or Sheri S. Tepper.

Sitting Around With Mom

No. Not doing a damn thing that I consider fun or useful. The cat appreciates me donating a lap but she’d appreciate it more if I’d spend the time petting her rather than typing. Aged Mother is having breakfast. Should be done shortly. Which means anytime in the next hour.

Why am I spending the time telling y’all about it? Gawd. I don’t know. So many things to do today (and tomorrow and the next and the next) and huge chunks of the day are spent directing AM in taking care of basic survival functions. Her sophisticated human brain, now that it no longer works smoothly, seems more to hinder the process than to help. She gets stuck in thought loops. She knows she’s supposed to be doing something but can’t remember what it was. And it’s a rare thought seems able to go from point A to point B without taking a detour to X and then getting distracted by M.

She’s good natured about most of it. And when there is an upset it’s usually easy to distract her. And then she seems to forget.

Happy New Year!

This journal is just a few days shy of a year old. It’s the longest sustained journal exercise I’ve ever done. I fell far short of my initial goal of posting every day but them’s the breaks.

Today is the day that Nizzibet and I traditionally go over the previous year’s events and then make plans for the year just beginning. We look at what we need (that which is necessary to mental and physical health), what we want (that which we would make an effort to achieve or aquire) and what we wish for (that which would be nice to achieve or aquire but isn’t really something that we feel a need to make an effort for) and plan for how we can support each other in taking care of the needs and the wants. (Wishes, being fanciful desires, we don’t pay too much attention to. Except perhaps to make note of them as possible presents later in the year.)

It’s going to be a little tricky taking care of this while watching out for Aged Mother but we’ll figure something out.

Best wishes, one and all.

Retrofitting

Redecorating continues apace at Sentient 39. Four “new” pieces of art have replaced the “coming soon” pages. I’ve redone the link headers but won’t have a chance to load them until this evening (or, if things go not well, tomorrow morning). Can’t decide if I like them or not. And I won’t know until I see them up on the net.

The essay on ruling the world needs a serious update but I’ll let that slide for a little bit. It’s going to have to be either a complete rewrite, or a second essay, or I’ll be deleting the whole thing altogether. Priority it’s not.

Yumm!

Many thanks to Soprano’s Pizza and Pasta for my lunch today. It was given to me free in the hopes that I would think of them the next time I felt like going out to eat. And in the hopes that I would tell my friends about them.

Which I’m cheerfully doing right now. Rosemary Chicken Ravioli. Nummy.

Having Stepped Out Of The Airplane, I Begin To Redecorate

Part of the fun of the web is the ephemeral nature of it all. It’s the perfect George Lucas (or Orwell, depending on your taste) environment. Don’t like what you’ve posted? Pull it down and put something else up.

Between now and the first posting for The Journals of Lado Perapek on Thursday I’ll be cleaning up and clearing out the Sentient 39 site. There’ll be no evidence that I ever intended to post such a creature as The Cauldron. All the “coming soon” pages will be replaced by new art work. All the link images will be brought in line with the new world order.

This is assuming that I can keep Aged Mother busy (or asleep) long enough to pull it off. And I can get the shopping done quickly.

At 1:10 p.m. today I was reader number 666 to this journal.

Red Headed Stepchild of Invention

Why yes, that is an announcement that The Cauldron will be delayed. It is also, please note, an announcement that there will be something being regularly posted at that space. Right now the plan is to post weekly.

It won’t be a comic. More like illustrated text. Sometimes. More often illustrations with accompanying text. The first two pages are already complete. I just need to load them to the Keenspace queue. It’s very much a make it up as I go along project. I’ve got the basic parameters down. It’s subject matter that’s popped up in my sketchbooks often over the years.

Gonna be interesting.