Brian the Bold Adventurer

Brian knows how to get into the rafters, but not how to get down. Typical. I have some perforations around my hands and wrists.

Portraits

Here are some photos taken by my friend Wayne over the weekend.

Me:

Eva:

Pressed For All Time

I spend a lot of time reading, both at home and at work. Goodreads helps me keep track of what I've read, and comes in handy when I wonder exactly how many books I've read in a given year. This year I read 73 books, or 28,058 pages. It doesn't have a breakdown of how many words that is. Here's the page with the list of books. I read a lot more fiction than nonfiction. The line is often blurred anyway. There is a lot of truth in fiction, and a lot of... interpretation (to put it kindly) in nonfiction.

Speaking of reading, I recently got a 1919 edition of Algernon Blackwood's "Pan's Garden", and as I was flipping through it, I discovered that the previous owner had used it to press flowers. Considering that it's a book of nature stories, I guess it's appropriate. I thought it was interesting enough that I'm not even irritated that some of the pages are stained. It adds to the character of the book, I think.

I've got a cold right now, although it's not a horrible one. I'm not working again until New Year's Day, and then only for a few hours. Today, I'm going for a walk to mail a bill payment and get some supplies at the pet store.

Before and After

After a couple of days acting as site supervisor up at camp, I stepped aside and spent time with friends, took a trip to San Francisco with Jeanine, Eva, and Eva's friend Michelle (to eat a meal in Chinatown and do some record shopping at Amoeba), and then once again gathered with friends to eat some deep dish pizza (jalapeno and pineapple actually goes quite well together).

While walking back to the car, I was wondering aloud why we kept hearing Motorhead (first at Amoeba, and then blasting forth from some other store we passed), and Eva replied, "it's because Lemmy just died". If it's possible to be shocked and not shocked at the same time, that's how I felt. It's like having an ailing relative who keeps hanging in there well past all expectations to the contrary, until one day the struggle suddenly ceases. Today, I'm going to spend some time with my pile of Motorhead records.

Lemmy joins musicians Vic Chesnutt and Lhasa de Sela, who also died around this time of year, Chesnutt on Christmas Day, 2009, and Lhasa on New Year's Day, 2010.

It was cold this morning, in this new Lemmy-less world. There was frost on the roof and the yard has that wintery moistness so common this time of year. The chickens don't seem to care. Chickens are quite imperturbable, unless there are hawks around.

Quoth the...

Jeanine got me this nice raven nightlight for Christmas. She tends to buy gifts whenever she comes across them, whereas I generally do most of my shopping at the last minute. Jeanine's way is better, although sometimes so much time passes that she forgets what she has bought. This little guy languished in some forgotten corner for half a decade before being exhumed and wrapped.

Eyes On Us

Whenever I get the feeling I'm being stared at, I turn around and see this:

This clown lives in the struggling indoor foliage, malevolently glaring at us, waiting for the right moment to do something that I'm sure will manage to be simultaneously comical and terrifying.

Nearby are hundreds of little plastic eyes, staring blankly from the faces of Jeanine's other Pez people.

Aftermath

The house is a mess. For the next week or so, I'm acting as a site supervisor for a meditation group who is renting our site for the week. It doesn't look like I'll have to do it every day though. Not that it's hard, but it I'd rather be doing things at home or elsewhere because this is traditionally a vacation week for me.

I could start with cleaning up the living room. Or not.

After the unwrapping festivities on Christmas, we had a meal, followed by a short trek over to eat dessert with cousin Peter and family. Yum. It's still a novelty having relatives nearby. I like it. They're moving slightly farther away in around a month though. Right now, they're walking distance away, if one doesn't mind a long walk. When they move into their new house, they'll be driving distance away.

Merry

Older kids let the parents sleep in, but they're still pretty happy when they unwrap gifts. A happy Yule to all, and to all a good night.

Guilty

Brian sure looks guilty about something. Maybe he is guilty of wanting to snack on the lizard.

Willow is spending Christmas Eva at her mom's house this year. Greg is spending it here. In true "war on Christmas" spirit, I wish you all happy holidays.

Metal

This is the little metal guy who lives on our hearth. I guess he's kind of a steampunk house hob or something...

We've never actually had a fire in our fireplace. Jeanine's not a big fan of fires, mostly due to the smoke. As for me, whenever I've lived in a place without a fireplace, I've wanted to have one, but whenever I've lived in a place with a fireplace, I've more or less ignored it. I'm not sure why.

Keys to the Underdogworld

Yesteryear's utilitarian objects become today's decorations. I've always had an affection for old, rusty objects. I've also always had an affection for the underdog. I can trace this all the way back to early childhood. When I was in preschool, while on the playground, I could always be found riding the oldest, most decrepit tricycle. Missing wheel? Check. Loose handlebars? Check. More rust than paint? Check.

Nobody needs to speak up for the new and the shiny. Give your love to those who need it most.

Website

A smart spider plans ahead, making a web near an outdoor light where insects are sure to congregate.

Are you a smart spider?

So it begins...

Windows to Other Worlds

Today is a lazy Sunday, with gray skies occasionally sprinkling us with rain. I actually went to a Christmas party last night, where good food and good conversation was had. It was up in the hills of Oakland, and I had to brave rush hour traffic (on a Saturday? What the hell?) to get there, and later got stuck in traffic behind a couple of accidents on the way to drop Greg off at another party.

Willow is back from her girl scout camping/sleepover. Not sure what else we'll do today.

Here is a picture of a collection of ideas. Books are windows to other worlds.

While We Sleep

Despite not having to work, I more or less stayed awake all night last night, first reading and then tossing and turning until a rainy sunrise glowed through the gaps in the curtains. Then, I slept until noon.

Sometime while I was sleeping, Jeanine took these pictures. By the time I had gotten up, she had left for work, but the photos awaited me in my inbox.

On an unrelated note, here's a close-up of the freezer door. Magnetic surfaces sure end up cluttered.

A leaden blanket of clouds was visible to the north before sunset, and rain is promised. I didn't get out of bed until 5:00 PM today, and I feel like I'm coming down with a cold. I'm done with work until after Christmas.

I've been working on the caramel flavored coffee that Jeanine got me for my birthday, using a mug that she got me sometime earlier, all while bathed in the harsh light of my desk lamp.

It's already time to go lock the chicken coop for the night. I should have gotten up earlier, especially since I'm going to be on a daytime schedule for at least a couple of weeks.

Yule Be Sorry, Or Maybe Not

When I was young, it was always important to me to find the biggest Christmas tree possible (my reasoning went something like: bigger tree = more room for presents), and that notion stuck with me for much of my adult life. I was somewhat cured of it when I lived in a studio apartment, since a big tree meant that not only was there less room for presents, but less room to get in and out of the front door and move around the living space.

For the last couple of years, we've just been using Jeanine's little plastic tree, and strangely, it doesn't bother me. It's cheaper and easier, and when it's lit up, it looks just fine. Expediency trumps tradition. The holiday season seems shorter every year, although if one bases the beginning of the season upon when the advertising starts, it is actually getting longer and longer.

Tonight is my last night of work for the year (barring a little bit of work as site supervisor for a meditation group renting our site between Christmas and New Year's Eve).

Cornered

My photos tend to be more for documentary purposes than artistic ones. The light is usually dead by the time I get out of bed, making even the indoor photos less interesting, artistically speaking. Occasionally, one or two photos might approach being art. The photo below isn't one of them.

This is Jeanine's corner. It's beautifully crammed with all sorts of stuff, especially right now because of the upcoming holidays.

Knick-Knacks

This is the last week of camp for the year, and so far it has been a chilly one, with ice on windshields and clouds of breath surrounding our faces as we walk. I have to wake up three kids each night this week in the interest of keeping their beds dry, which is more than the average for the school year so far. It has actually been a pretty easy year, as far as wake-up calls are concerned.

One night down, three more to go. Jeanine and I both have mild colds.

Casting about for something inside to photograph, my eyes alighted upon our strange knick-knack shelves up near the ceiling in the kitchen. It's a true marriage of items from our separate pasts, and they fit well together. Whimsy dictated that I do some extreme monkeying with the contrast, making the resulting photo resemble a panel from an unsettling graphic novel.

Inspired by my friend Otter's great photos, I've got my eyes on some photo software. Otter showed me a program called Lightroom, which looks interesting. For some reason, I always dilly-dally when it comes to making these types of purchases though. I want to get some music software too. Will I? I'm not altogether sure. I probably need a new laptop first. Mine is getting cranky. Jeanine suggests that I just use Willow's laptop, since last Christmas Willow got two; one from her mom and one from me. I don't think she has touched the one I got her in months, preferring to immerse herself in her iPod and iPad.

Heartening/Disheartening

In thinking up new writing challenges to keep me interested in regularly posting here, I came up with the idea of sharing either the most disheartening and/or the most heartening thing I come across on a daily basis. Perhaps I'll post in opposite pairs, or perhaps I'll do a whole month of the former, followed by a whole month of the latter.

I mention this because today I saw this article. It takes the grand prize for the most disheartening thing I'm likely to see today, and I've only been up for an hour now. This means that the people of the town of Woodland, North Carolina, have a collective IQ lower than that of the handsome lizard pictured below.