eight years ago today

Eight years ago today, my dad died.

I have nothing more to say about that, but it’s worth writing down.

digitizing old media

Do I know anyone local who has VHS-to-(eventually)-DVD and/or cassette-to-c0mput3r transferring capabilities? And is either willing to loan equipment or doesn’t mind me coming to them?

I know there are Services out there. I’d like to avoid using Services, mostly for financial reasons.

welcome, 2009.

Earlier today (yesterday) I wondered why it felt so odd to feel kinship and rightness in both Solstice and New Year’s Eve-into-Day. I grew up with New Year’s like some of my friends grew up with Christmas. That’s when you had the tree (Yule tree, though I didn’t know Yule then), had the gifts, had the big party or went to one. We had no Christmas, nor Hannukah. Both of these have always been a bit alien to me, because I didn’t get exposed to either until I was almost 14. Then, six or seven years ago, I simultaneously tuned out of Christmas, repelled by all the consumerism and the omnipresent tchotchkes everywhere, and got into marking time by actual seasons – celebrating the solstices and the equinoxes.

Somehow, New Year’s didn’t get touched by this. It makes sense emotionally, but not logically – how is it that I deeply, viscerally relate to both? And I decided that they’re different markers. The Solstice is, for me, a turning point in the natural cycle. I move within it, and with it, and am happier following a moon calendar that changes ever so slightly to keep in tune with the planets and star and galaxy around us. Solstice/Yule is a social thing only because I happen to be surrounded by people who keep time by it, too, and for some of whom it is – as it is for me – a holy day. Not all of us have that privilege, and I’m thankful to live where I live.

New Year’s is a social thing in a larger sense. I’m part of a larger human community that keeps a 365ish-day calendar, and that by and large marks the midnight of December 31st into January 1st. I’ve taken part in that since I was little, staying up past midnight for the first time when I was six or so. (And stayed up until 6am! I should ask my mom exactly how insufferable I was the next day. If she doesn’t remember, that’s probably a good sign.)

Tonight I was with acquaintances and beloveds, eating good food and drinking goofy-making drinks and enjoying my brand-blue hair and petting the love cat, talking, listening, taking it all in. At midnight I was napping in a warm happy bed upstairs from the party. The new year is here, and it is welcome. My personal newest chapter began over a week ago; but the passing of 2008 actually closed the previous one. Couldn’t have happened soon enough.

Good night, fellow humans. Happy new year.

geekyQ: wordpress- and domain-hosting

So, I’m transferring wordsend.org off of its current server… um, somewhere else. It’d be nice if the somewhere else was particularly adept at hosting WordPress. There are several recommendations at wordpress.org, and I’ve heard good things about a couple of them, but then I’ve also read some abysmal reviews of both. So, Reader, if you have opinions on Blue Host, DreamHost, MediaTemple, HostICan, and/or Laughing Squid, I’d love to hear them. [on Words’ End, not on LJ] Bonus points if you are using WordPress as the backbone of your site.

The things I care about are uptime and responsiveness to problems. Auto-install and upgrade of WordPress are a big help (really, the install is the important thing), but that is less important than either of the first two. I don’t need a huge amount of space. Good privacy policy is paramount – i.e., if their TOS say “we can monitor you at any time for any reason, and will likely allow law enforcement to snoop around without a warrant,” we’re probably not made for each other. Yes, I know that this isn’t a guarantee against anything, but there’s got to be a good, ethical host whose ethics (law enforcement can totally snoop around, with proper authorization) are explicitly reflected in their terms of service.

Halp?

i have discovered the secret…

…to learning what to do with miso paste, when you just bought it for a single recipe that calls for a few tablespoons, and have no idea what to do with the rest of the inevitable big tub:

You put it in everything, if it even remotely seems like it’ll go. Chances are, miso paste will make whatever you’re cooking awesomely outrageous.

Today I had a small breakfast, no lunch, and a two-hour commute for dinner. (Disabled train, they said, but then why all the ambulances? That’s a rhetorical question.) So I came home, opened a bottle of a 2006 late harvest wine from Trader Joe’s (delicious), threw a whole mess of vegetables in a pan with miso paste, a little butter and fresh (!) herbs, and am eating the whole thing.

Next, I will conquer the world. That’s how I feel right now, anyway.

under water

Today, I feel like I’m under water.

Partly it’s allergies. (I have to fill a couple of prescriptions, one of them for an allergy med that ran out a few days ago.) Partly it’s the air, heavy with gray despite the relative presence of light. Also I haven’t had coffee yet, and have once again managed to get only six hours of sleep, which is not enough, in a big way.

But I was reasonably satisfied with what I got done at work yesterday, and plan to feel the same way today. As long as I stay away from reading the review book (only efficient when I’m awake) and stick to writing and writing and writing — some guidelines we’re working on, the work blog, a work email I owe people — I’ll be fine.

There’s a blue-dominated collage on my desk, featuring a sitting Buddha with butterfly wings. Inside, for once, I’m calm. Solstice is coming, I’m content to be right where I am and do exactly what I’m doing, and I don’t want anything right now.

OK, except maybe coffee.

moods, reflections, re-collection

S.A.D. is kicking my ass this year, but this doesn’t come close to last year’s suck. Of course, I’m also not in crisis mode this winter, but there’s still a lot going on, and it’s good and bad and hard to keep up with, and I’m swimming more than sinking, and that feels good.

Last winter was easily the worst time I’ve yet spent on this planet, but it taught me a lot about my own strengths, and these days I’m remembering the lessons and putting them into practice in completely different contexts. That also feels good.

Today I was… moody; let’s say, it wasn’t full-blown SAD crashing down on me like a storm cloud, there were just things that kept throwing me off-balance. I made it mostly a good day, but couldn’t stop the wild swinging until I started cooking. Only a few minutes into it I felt this weight that I hadn’t even known was there fall away. Happy conclusion, or re-learning, or what have you: cooking is not something I indulge myself in and carve out time for here and there. It’s nothing short of medicine. Remarkable, really.

i just dreamt about zombies.

Well, not exactly. But close! It was a horror flick, for sure, with some elements of classic horror both on film and in video games. Strange, as I don’t tend to like the genre, mostly because my excellent visual memory gives me nightmares afterward. The confusing part is, this dream followed a fantastic dinner with the housemates, a generally excellent evening, and a lovely IM conversation just before bed.

First I was at home, and I knew that sleeping here were also Molly and David, and AndyB, and some other people. (I know all of them in waking life, but don’t live with any of them.) They were all in a… band? Maybe in the band. I knew that the three of them and some others were going on a road trip when they woke up, and I distinctly remembered Molly saying to the some-others something to the effect of, y’all do what you want, but I am going to follow Andy up the river; he knows where all the good eating places are. I thought that maybe I should point them to a place I went to, up the river, but my diary entry for that place was more about the presentation, the good hostess who looked like a dancer, the pink tutu she was wearing, and a good but unremarkable meal. I decided against telling them; they might as well seek out remarkable meals, plus they were sleeping, plus there were bedding sheets in the fridge, which I didn’t understand and thought, maybe someone was having a fever, so I shouldn’t disturb them.

Next thing I know, we (who’s we? I don’t know, except Andy was there.) were in a big field; I feel like I knew where, and maybe it was even along the up-the-river route. At least part of it was a corn field, except the corn plants were all dead for the season and all the corn had been picked, and also the plants were in neat rows with trellises supporting them, which isn’t like any corn field I’ve ever seen. There were a few cobs left here and there, though ultimately I only found one. As soon as we plucked it, to bring to the… place where we were staying? as contribution for dinner maybe?… a monstrous vaguely-human was running right towards us. There appeared a… not exactly a worm, but something similar yet unmoving, at our feet. Andy, whose head seems in real life to be filled with obscure but vital information that comes in handy in a large variety of situations, told us to kill the monster by chopping up the worm. So we did. We chopped it up into little pieces with an ax. (?!) But then I was all alone, and more of those not-quite-zombies were running fast toward me, and there were three worms at my feet, and they were so tough that they wouldn’t break apart, and so I got surrounded.

A woman monster looked closely at me, and I said, please, just make it quick. She told her companions something like, this one’s mine, and amazingly they seemed to lose interest in me, though continued standing around. The woman monster started spinning round and round, presumably to transform into something that could more conveniently tear me limb from limb, and I realized that this was my only chance, and ran like hell. Nobody stopped me, because everyone had lost interest and the woman was busy transforming.

Then I woke up with a purring kitty on my chest and an asthma flare-up. Took some albuterol and wrote this down. Strange and seemingly disconnected from everything I’ve been thinking about lately.

drugs for the competent

A bunch of scientists have written a commentary in Nature arguing that mentally competent adults should be able to use what have been referred to “brain doping” drugs (Adderall, Ritalin, etc) at will, for cognitive enhancement. The idea is responsible use, of course, and of course I’m for it in theory. (For me this falls into the same category as my firm pro-choice stand: anyone who can soundly judge what they’re doing should be able to do what they consider needful or desired with their own body. And face all consequences arising from their decisions.)

Three things worry me. First, where’s the line of mental competency? This isn’t a new question, and I don’t pretend to have an answer, but it’s relevant here. Second, even assuming competency, what about sound judgment? (Ah, but here’s where their responsibility begins, and nobody should stand in their way.) And connectedly, what about physical addiction to stimulants of various sorts? This ties into both competency and sound judgment. But also, successful navigation of the addiction bit heavily depends on education, and that’s what I see as lacking.

So, we need, must have education on this topic that goes along with the freedom to experiment with one’s own brain and body chemistry. And allowing people to do so at will involves implicit acceptance of some incidence of drug addiction. But just as alcoholism is no reason to reinstate Prohibition, addiction to drugs — prescription and otherwise — is no reason to restrict those drugs.

Of course, there are drugs whose addictiveness is so overwhelming that I wouldn’t particularly want those available without a prescription. But, having seen people around me take Adderall and the like for some years, some of them getting addicted, some — not, I think cognitive-enhancing drugs aren’t physically addictive enough to worry. We just need to make sure to get information to people, enough of it that they can make their own informed decisions.

(Edited to add: But I do wish people would stop calling them brain doping drugs. That puts a derisive spin on what isn’t an inherently bad practice.)

explain to me something.

Am listening to Obama’s weekly address, the one in which he “lays out key parts of Economic Recovery Plan.” Don’t get me wrong, I’ve totally drunk the Obama Kool-Aid. But I don’t understand this: “We need to upgrade our federal buildings by replacing old heating systems and installing efficient light bulbs. That won’t just save you, the American taxpayer, billions of dollars each year. It will put people back to work.”

Fair enough on saving tax dollars, but how will this create or restore jobs? Does every bit of savings in taxes put people to work?

let me tell you about my bad day.

Yesterday I woke up grumpy. I had my reasons, but mostly it boils down to, I’ve been getting abysmal amounts of sleep this week – five to six hours a night. No good reason for it.

Moaned about, got out of bed like an hour late, went to work and stayed there for ten hours, in part because the first half of the day I was mostly useless. (Enh. It happens. It’s SAD season, and I do what I can, and somehow work-blogging after hours feels different, calmer, with nobody around.) And near the end of the business day I found out I’d made some people unhappy, and had to deal with that, and it wasn’t a big deal—in fact, the conversation with a third party was helpful and reassuring—but it’s never a good feeling to know you’ve screwed up. On the other hand, learning experience, and a mild one as such things go.

So by the time I left work at 8pm I was tired. And… not exactly grumpy, just feeling off. But then.

Then I came home, and there was a circus band rehearsing in my living room. Went upstairs, and housemate Coraline was hanging out in the kitchen with her friend Carolyn. I threw my stuff down and—having had no dinner—declared I needed scotch, and to make a casserole. Why? I dunno. I guess I’d had a fantastic casserole at Molly’s the day before, and I’ve had random foodstuffs hanging around the cupboards for forever, AND I’d never made casserole before.

Yeah, really.

So we broke out the bottle of 12-year-old scotch that I’d taken to Burning Man and we’d never gotten around to opening (there was other alcohol around, but it’s not tempting to drink a lot of dehydrating liquid in that climate). And I made a casserole of frozen artichoke hearts, frozen peas, frozen corn, frozen mixed mushrooms (thank you, bulk food ordering, I have a mushroom invasion in my freezer), chick peas, canned tuna, multi-colored potatoes, cream and two kinds of cheese. And I’m probably forgetting other stuff.

All the while, people around me chatted and sipped tasty alcohol and giggled a lot. And later I ate and felt more human, and around 10:45pm Coraline (ok, Johanna) and Eric and I went out against all better judgment, because spectacularly under-advertised Midnight Madness was going on in Davis Square. We gawked at antique bobbles and boutique-y clothes, but mostly we dropped by Dave’s Fresh Pasta, sampled tasty foods, and brought home mozzarella made that evening by a neighbor of theirs (or something).

Oh. my. gods. Homemade mozzarella with crushed pink peppercorns and a drizzle of truffled olive oil. Yeah, I’d say that, combined with hanging out with my awesome housemates, was a win even though it meant that once again I got too little sleep.

Boy, if that was a bad day, bring them on, you know? Speaking of days, I should probly go face mine. The sun’s rising, a warm shower awaits, and today I get to take tasty casserole to work for lunch. Oh, and tonight I get to see both of my favorite small girls (can’t call them toddlers anymore, as they’re skipping and giggling on either side of three years old), and go to the Museum of Science with one of them and her dad. WOE. Woe is me in this sad season.

Today I’m thankful for good people in my life, and for all the weird bipolar days that, in the end, let me know that things are going to be ok.

Obama goodnesses.

Two things about the incoming administration:

One, the security team. “Nominees announced today include Senator Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State, Eric Holder as Attorney General, Governor Janet Napolitano as Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, Susan Rice as Ambassador to the United Nations, and General Jim Jones, USMC (Ret) as National Security Adviser. President-elect Obama also announced that he has asked Robert Gates to stay on as Secretary of Defense.”

Out of six people, on the security team, three are women. This should be interesting. I’ve heard it said many times that if women were in power, we’d have fewer military conflicts and more diplomatic resolution. I’d like to see this theory tested.

Two: change.gov is published under a Creative Commons Attribution license. Whoa, sanity and openness in practice! Now, if only they’d publish a revision history of the site…

Wow. What’s wrong with this picture?

Picture here. It’s Obama’s team-to-be, the people being considered anyway. What’s wrong with it?

causes

You know how they say “every donation counts, no matter how small”? Well, historically I have felt silly donating small amounts of money. I’d like to change that, and am seeking suggestions.

The idea is to donate $10/month to different organizations (so, not a monthly pledge to a specific organization). I can afford to donate more, but that will be occasional, and I know the ways in which I want to target that. I’ve paid lip service for a while to socially liberal (and yet Responsible!) ideology — so, you know, time to contribute something, even if small. Donating my time is another way to participate in the world, for sure. Right now that’s a scarce resource, and is going to a smaller subset of the world.

I care about, in no particular order: health care reform, immigration issues, drug policy issues, education (mostly primary and secondary, for these purposes), reproductive choice, gay rights, racial equality issues, environmental crises, disaster relief. This isn’t an exhaustive list.

There’s always Kiva, or Heifer Int’l, but right now I’m interested in finding donation targets within this country. I realized, thinking about this, that I know more venues for helping poor people in Indonesia than here in the States. I’m particularly interested in organizations with very low administrative overhead.

So, suggestions?

why technology is awesome, flu season edition.

“We’ve found that certain search terms are good indicators of flu activity. Google Flu Trends uses aggregated Google search data to estimate flu activity in your state up to two weeks faster than traditional flu surveillance systems.”

Once again I fall a little bit more in love with the 21st century.

ask the internet: [for] SCIENCE

What’s your favorite web resource for a decent, concise discussion of basic scientific facts and phenomena – like what a pulsar wind nebula is, what role specific chemical elements play in our life, how circulation works in octopi? Anything, as long as it’s interesting, diverse and fairly fast (30m or less) to read up on.

Wikipedia doesn’t count, for the purposes of this exercise.

bawlmer?

It looks like I’ll be in Baltimore soon. I’ll be flying in on Sunday 11/16, and leaving Tuesday evening 11/18. On Sunday I can travel in the morning, or in the evening. If I get there in the morning (or around noon), I’ll have the rest of the day to kick around.

Worth it? What’s there to do in Baltimore? I don’t know that city at all.

If you’re reading on LJ, please to leave any comments on Words’ End and not on the LJ feed. Thanks in advance for any advice!

and yet…

A Los Angeles residing person whose blog I read, and whose life I admire, writes:

I did not realize it was possible to be simultaneously deliriously happy and bitterly disappointed until tonight.

Why, California? Why do you hate some of your residents so much that you would take away the civil rights they were given enough time ago for you to have seen that marriage between two people who love each other doesn’t hurt you in any way?

oh… my…

…gods.

*giant sigh of relief and amazement*

today.

Today, the U.S. presidential election has drawn a record number of voters. Ever since I got to this country and began thinking about civic engagement, I’ve been appalled by the voter turnout; and, gods help me, I am already proud of my fellow voting-eligible citizens this time around.

(Not that I voted yet; the line totally defeated me this morning, and laughed in my face too, what with being three blocks long. Going to cast my ballot after work, when it doesn’t matter how long I stand in line.)

Today, people are twittering and blogging and talking about hope, and I’m afraid to hope but so, so excited.

Today, like some others,, I’m feeling pragmatic – about the U.S., about the world in all its polluting, genocidal glory, about my own little life and where it’s leading me. It’s leading me in some scary-exciting directions.

I like today. It’s electric.