we’ve packed up two-thirds of everything we brought to new zealand, loaded it in to the car that catches fire and have headed to the south island for holiday.


be back in march.

ever since we moved to the city we mark the end of the week with a block and a half walk to george’s fish. there we pick up a gift wrapped in newsprint of fresh fried fish and chips. this experience alone merits a trip to wanganui.

there is a small park with some benches just outside our apartment. last night on the way to market someone sitting on one of the benches said hi to me. i thought they looked familiar but wasn’t certain. it wasn’t until i got to the market could i finally place them. i have mole like prowess when it comes to facial recognition.

considering my handicap on the way home it occurred to me i have been struggling to recognize faces and expressions since i was a child. first because i was late getting diagnosed as needing glasses, second because i was smart enough to know i would need to be superman to keep from getting thrashed on the playground wearing the clark kent spectacles my parents picked out for me.

so i’ve decided that my brain never got a chance to develop the connections necessary for facial recognition. anyone want to offer me a grant to pursue this investigation in a more scientific manner?

the stuff i post everyday is fairly brief so you’d imagine it doesn’t take too long to write, but you’d be surprised at how long it can take to make this little sense.

today was particularly frustrating as i tried to recount a story from a few years ago. after multiple starts and stops tossing out each attempt which only seemed to be getting worse instead of better, i gave up.

so instead of a poor rendition of a good story you get a poor excuse for a good attempt…

i like the foods in new zealand better than their counterparts in the states because none of the foods here have calories, they only have energy…

i would prefer we all still live in mud huts opposed to wielding nuclear power when i find out a candidate for president of the united states rallies his minions with comments like this:

“i didn’t major in math. i majored in miracles, and i still believe in them, too.”

mike huckabee
9 february 2008

i used to do mathematics in my head while singing along to heavy metal blasting from a boom box.

now i can barely walk down the street with my ipod listening to yann tiersen without tripping over myself…

one day i told a co-worker that i never used a public toilet if sitting was going to be required. they responded by saying, “no wonder your so angry.”

since i’m pretty much blessed on every other front i’ve had to accept their theory as the cause although i could never accept sharing a public restroom as a cure.

but today confirmed my suspicion that the actual cause of my angst is the societal norms and fragile egos that prevent me from expressing my opinions and the battle i constantly wage to avoid doing so…

deference isn’t something that should be given away for free. its only valuable after it has been earned.

if more people challenged their leadership not only would we diminish the rewards heaped upon incompetence but the overall efficacy of our leadership would increase as a result of all our contributions.

but alas the majority is giving away deference for free and even poor leadership recognizes that isn’t worth much and they continue to lead with incompetence and we only have ourselves to fault.

hmm, this looks like a cover for something else…





oh, but obviously not a linguistics school…

war then…

1. don’t waste anything
2. buy only what is necessary
3. salvage what you don’t need
4. share what you have

excerpt the war, disk 3

war now…

and one of the great goals of this nation’s war is to restore public confidence in the airline industry. it’s to tell the traveling public: get on board. do your business around the country. fly and enjoy america’s great destination spots. get down to disney world in florida. take your families and enjoy life, the way we want it to be enjoyed.

george w. bush, 2001.09.27

today i celebrate getting my life back after releasing in to the wild an application that has consumed way too much of my life for more than the past six months…