it's late

how late? damn late. too damn late.

congratulations are due Loren for knuckling down and putting forth a bit more effort toward his schoolwork. at the moment, as near as i can figure his GPA for the third quarter has only fallen to somewhere in the neighborhood of 2.607 (from the 4.0 everyone begins a quarter with), a marked improvement over the dismal 2.171 GPA of his last report card. he's got a long way to go to finish the school year- but i think he may be finally headed in the right direction. and i only had to beat him about the head and neck severely with a 2x4 for a few hours, threaten him with immolation and disembowelment twice, hang him from the yardarm overnight and send him subliminal telepathic messages nocturnally for a week.

in other words, by the time report cards come out, Loren will likely be sitting on a B- avg and i'll be ready for 6 months in a peaceful wooded location, seeking tranquility among others assimilating their own unique flavors of extreme personal trauma. don't worry- i'm not ready to put my head in the oven just yet....it'll take more than this to make me go Sylvia Plath on y'all.

watched The Governess tonight- i actually rented it specifically because it was the type of movie i never rent, just to "see how the other half lives" if you will....and now i remember why i give those others such a wide berth. don't get me wrong, i like Minnie Driver as much as the next guy, and her more histrionic moments, bordering on full-blown hysteria, were one of the fleeting, don't-blink-or-you'll-miss-them impressive qualities about the movie, which dragged itself laboriously through monotony after monotony.....but that's by no means an endorsement and be warned, this movie boils down to a total loss of your time. easily the worst movie i've seen in a long time. i've heard nothing but bad things about Van Helsing (except from Loren who absolutely loved it....of course everyone hated The Chronicles of Riddick (which i also haven't seen) and he loved that too) but it's still the next movie on my list, and i'm sure that after watching this totally garbage Governess flick, Hugh Jackman would have to jump off the screen and piss in my mouth to leave this bad a taste in it.

time to crash.

Happy Birthday Ethan!

well- one more notch in the little guy's belt. i think he actually carved four of 'em in it over the last week, but Sunday the Pacific NW Pelkey Clan and a large part of the Sargents got together for Ethan's 4th (and final) Happy #5 bash. Nichole and Chris have certainly done their best in accommodating all the well-wishers, and it's much appreciated. thanks guys, for setting a fine table (as always) and thanks to everyone for the excellent company- and especially to Ethan, who i think i spent more time with yesterday than i have since he was only a wee 4 year old. i decided Ethan's presents should be something both the Sargent boys would enjoy and gave him a Kerplunk! game and a Tom & Jerry video, from Loren and me. both those things were high on Loren's list of khoul stuff when he was about Ethan's age. hell- i'm 37 and i still like both those things [grin].

it occurs to me that i should hereby formally quote what i shall heretofore cite as Pelkey's Law: the chance of having money at the time of a person's birthday is inversely proportional to both 1) the degree to which one feels inclined to give a gift, and 2) the amount of time one has to shop. therefore, if one either doesn't wish to purchase a gift, or wishes to but has no time to shop, one will have plenty of money; but should one wish to give a present AND have plenty of time to shop, one will invariably be broke. this rule does not apply to belated birthday parties, nor should the user in any case reasonably expect this law to constitute a claim of accuracy. all other warrantees, express or implied, are void. actual results may vary. at participating universes only. odds of probability may be affected by local deities.

feeling too lazy right now to pick through and post selections from the 60+ pictures i took- with my current computer setup it's something of a logistical bear- but any interested parties can find them filed chronologically (as always) in my online photo album, under April 24, 2005. there are the usual so-so shots mixed in with what i consider some outstanding ones; the really good ones are labelled so, in one way or another. there's even a little bit of video of Ethan dancing around- love it :)

Loren didn't make it to the party. he had a friend spend the night (at his mother's house) and, still having company when it came time for him to leave, and being reluctant to go, i left the choice to him. i'm a little irritated that his mother didn't prepare him better to leave, and for Loren changing his mind about it between the time i left and when i got over there (all of about 45 minutes), and that i drove over to his mother's house for nothing (about 26 miles round trip) two days running (which cost me about 2 hrs of my weekend) but i suppose in the end the decision was his, and he made it. i told him today that Ethan was a little disappointed he didn't come (no surprise), which Loren anticipated. i think he truly regrets that decision- though he realizes what's done is done. Ethan asked if i might bring Loren over on Saturday this week and Loren's counted himself in for that. i should get those boys in a pool together....that might be fun this weekend.

i'm once again cellulated. someday someone will look back and try to find the origin of that term (which will have come to mean "having recently acquired or reacquired access to a cell phone") and here it will lie- though i doubt it will cause as much hype as, say, the recent uncovering of an original issue of the electronics trade mag that printed Moore's Law.

changing gears: decent day at work today....beautiful weather seems to be a trend lately- it's been in the mid-to-high 60s for most of the last week. always feel my batteries recharged when the sun comes out. i think i'm one of those "winter doldrums" people- though i always seem to like the cold weather when it comes, i think the shorter daylight hours gets to me after awhile.

talked to Loren briefly on the phone- it's getting to where he's dreading our phone conversations during the week since i invariably grill him about his school work; but i don't think now's the time to go all touchy-feely and soften up on him. i'm convinced his problem is one of self discipline, and motivating him to make the behavioral changes he needs to make is worth the effort. nevertheless i've got to be careful not to jump on him so hard he just tunes me out when he's not here. ahh, the fine balancing act....this weekend when we have more time to talk, things will get more relaxed.

time to wrap my mind around some food and laundry and maybe put a little larger dent in my book.

PEACE

sunday morning

and all's well. Chowder sleepin' in the living room. house is quiet. still dark outside and here i sit typing. cigarette burning in the ash tray. put a few more chapters of Magician: Apprentice behind me- entertaining book. fell asleep sometime yesterday afternoon after bringing Loren back to his mother's. his mom's husband, and his father, and another man were "communing with god" in their way- which involves sitting in a sweatlodge, hand-built and containing what Loren described as "a bunch of very hot rocks". watched him jump on the trampoline for awhile (while Chowder went crazy- to him the trampoline is all too exciting and he leaps bodily off the ground, to a point somewhere past exhaustion, trying to get at whomever is doing the jumping). Loren's mother was, ironically, out shopping at the Albertson's by my house- which prompted me to ask him why he didn't just have her come and pick him up when she was through, rather than me driving him all the way out there when she wasn't even there. seems it didn't occur to him. c'est la vie.

i'll be picking him up today around 2pm, to trek out to the Sargents' for Ethan's last birthday celebration of the year- i say 'the last' because he's had a few now- his folks have done their best to accomodate everyone wishing Ethan a happy #5. should be good times.

today i'll get this place back into shape (not too difficult since it's only suffered a day or two of neglect) and do a little shopping of my own, before heading out for Loren. might even get a little more time with my book before making ready for another work week.

good Sunday morning to all.

REM report

i was driving around with someone, a woman i think, on an overcast morning, on a street that may have been Seattle's Michigan Avenue. we were trying to get some donuts from a place called "Seattle's Best Donuts", which was very much like a McDonald's. i was pulling out of a parking lot, waiting for traffic to pass by so i could pull out. there was a woman in a dark blue compact sedan moving along slowly- i was thinking to myself, "cmon lady...." when she passed by i pulled out quickly, in front of a another compact sedan, this time a spendy little silver car that reminded me of a Mercedes.

i was driving along a winding, freshly paved street, avoiding the crumbling edges and potholes (?!) of the new asphalt. there was some guy on the radio talking about tax breaks and not giving up his "lifestyle", which i gathered to be something along the lines of a well-off Republican sort....whatever that means.

the scene changed to being in the home of the man, while he was on the phone with the radio station. the guy had lots of kids, all milling around the kitchen, busy with various activites, and he proceeded to name them all, the last one being Beatrice "he pronounced it "bay uh trizz". there was a string of boys of varying ages. i noticed the refrigerator was covered with 'Polly the Paint Parrot' magnets, and other homey type stuff. before long i noticed there were a lot of female children too, of varying ages, and that all the children were dressed similarly. there was a very busy mother preparing food, standing at a sink in front of a window. the family dog was pulling on her apron strings from behind, quite forcefully, and the mother seemed to take little notice of it and wasn't bothered by it. one of the girls, a heavy-set one, came home at that point, a little later than she should have (i gathered), and realizing she missed the food, looked a little crestfallen. she said something about the benefits of having friends....

nothing spectacular

to report. talked to Loren on the phone for a couple brief moments before his mother rushed him off the phone- i gathered that she needed to use it. in any case i got hung up on mid-sentence and not called back, which wasn't altogether surprising considering he'd just told me they were all leaving to go eat pizza with Loren's friend Ruby's father, who i gather is having a little birthday thing. annoying getting hung up on. hope he has fun though. wanted to talk to him about his school stuff but i wasn't given the opportunity then, and i'm certainly not going to get it tonight since it's already 10pm.

let's see....what else is worth typing up briefly.....i'm sorta just hangin' out, doing laundry, debating eating something. it was beautiful again today, 2 in a row now. i think this is the first day since last year that i peeled down to a t-shirt after work. nice to drive my truck again, i'm enjoying that. it's going to be a little more expensive overall, i'll have to keep an eye on how much i'm driving around. i've driven 100.9 miles since monday morning, three trips to work and back, and a detour to Costco. it'll probably work out to something like an extra $40/month in gas cost. growlz.

learned how to do something new with the programming of the machine i generally run at work- worthy. i'm certainly not going to get rich working for the wages i'm at, but there are things to learn there. it's nice to work at a place where everyone's friendly too- some things you can't put a dollar value on. and the commute is definitely much easier, and i'm starting to see the time benefits of spending 2 hrs/day less on the road. if my windshield had gone out in the Geo while i still worked downtown the impact in gas cost would have been enormous- somewhere around $100/month or so. i suppose one must be resigned to frugality when one considers a monthly expense in the neighborhood of $100 as "enormous". much is revealed by language.

got some new tunes floating around in my head. i've been experimenting with some drum machine beats for them- with some mild successes so far. i want to try to record the drum lines in a different manner this time around- sequence the individual drum parts in order to individually EQ and effect them on discreet channels. with the processing gear i've got locally i should be able to get some meatier sounds out of those samples in mixdown if i do- not to mention much more control in stereo placement and dynamic range. it'll be a more complicated recording process and in the end it's a quaint exercise at getting antiquated technology to do more than it was intended for, but i'm optimistic i can get some successful results. before laying anything down though i have to decide what to record next...i've got some old chestnuts rolling around in my "record queue" as well as some (for me, obviously more exciting) new ideas. the drum machine work going on lately seems geared toward the new stuff, but i s'pose we'll see what actually happens when it happens.

some more coffee sounds good. Carolan's Irish Cream Liqueur (off-brand Bailey's) is the best non-Bailey's Irish Creme Liqueur i've found in any of the liquor stores, and easily the best tasting reasonably cheap stuff. this is a considered opinion; i should know, i've tried them all. at $27 a bottle though (the big bottles- slightly more cost effective than the small ones) and the rate i pollute coffee with it, it's a reasonably large expense in itself. i wonder how difficult it is to make? that would be fun and prob'ly cheaper too....

it's becoming apparent to me that i must need to make more money so that the first issue i associate with things is no longer what it costs.

been enjoying reading Magician: Apprentice (the Author's Preferred Edition) lent me by a co-worker. i'm only about 50 pages in, but it's been slowly drawing me in and getting steadily better the longer i read. always a pleasure to find a new author to absorb. i think i enjoy picking apart how they approach and execute their craft nearly as much as i enjoy reading the stories and identifying with the characters. i lent my co-worker Orson Scott Card's Ender's Game in return, and he's enjoying it. it was an easy choice- definitely one of the best sci-fi books ever written. Ender's one of my all time favorite characters. actually- now that i think about it you could look it up on my recommended reading page and see my review of it there, so i'll get off the subject already.

Nichole wrote that Ethan started soccer on tuesday this week (yesterday)- must be summer league. should be fun getting to watch the little guy play- looking forward to yelling my brains out on the side of a field somewhere while Nichole pulls down assistant coach duties- i think that's her role, since being replaced as head coach. i believe she was relieved to be replaced, having been designated de facto coach in the absence of anyone else to run the team. my camera's itchin' for some shots of the E-man on the field- too bad it's not very good for that sort of thing. i do however have a pair of digital camera binoculars which i'm eager to try out, and a perfectly great video camera. my next generation computer (sniff sniff....i can smell it coming) is going to include a DVD burner and a video card that can do digital conversion from analog media- then the old videos start getting ripped concurrently with the old photos being scanned...which reminds me, my printer drivers still aren't installed.

wow it's amazing how much you can type when you just think out loud. or is it really thinking out loud when you're directing thoughts through your fingers rather than your mouth? thinking in public? perhaps that's a better phrase.

Loren's enjoying a little break from sports for the summer. time to get that boy in the water. gotta find out in the next few days if he wants to go white water river rafting, and how much it costs and when everyone's planning on going. i really don't know if he'd think it sounded like fun or not- i hope so, i think it would be great!

ok that's PLENTY more than enough for one post.