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30 April 2004

 
Hung out with Bruce and Gimpi until I had to get offline. Here Bruce is waving from atop the throne-ish thing at Tyr.


 
Anji
well you know these online shops have to be cautious of those strange olympian people...maybe they have been caught before.
we don't move until end of june, however steve goes on may 10...it'll be a tough ride without him...he'll be able to come down every second weekend or so, then we have the FIGI (that unknown place) trip on 12-19june, so that will be a nice family holiday. before the big sea change.
and no there will not be anymore nieces or nephews for you, not from me anyway, can't speak for Jason tho,,,brad probably in distant future.
so the big house can be full of international/interstate visitors.
Caitlin is having her party on sunday, we have 20 kids coming...bloody heck,
but since it's her last in melbourne for a long long time, thought let her have a wild one. made the fairy pinata and have a fairy entertainer coming, who i have seen several times and is fantastic...entertain the kids for 1&1/2 hours...then i only have to put on my party face for another hour or so. i'll send pics later.



28 April 2004

 
Me: Great photo! I've never been back to any of my old (12? 13?) schools -- brrrr I hated school!

hey viv,
funny how you hated school and now teach in one.... we have bought a house in brisbane, queensland, went up on the weekend and by tuesday (today) had a house. It's spectacular...i'll forward the realators web page on it. and i mean spectacular.
hope you are well.
anji

Me: Yes -- spectacular. This means you can have another 3 or 4 children! The particular school in which I work is such a strange, offbeat place that it's unique. I'm not saying that gratuitously -- it's the only school for Native American students that isn't a tribal school. As part of that -- our students coming from many communities and reservations -- we have tried to be like a family. I am heartened to be a part of a school where children aren't scared of adults -- unthinkable to me as a child. In my room we spend time laughing, and that is by no means something of little value. In other words -- a rose by any other name would smell as sweet, however this school may be called a "school," but it doesn't horrify me like lots of other schools. Extremely windy yesterday, with a tornado (but not at my house!). Today is sunny and calm. I have been (Visa card) rejected by my
present-for-Caitlin online bookseller -- I can't imagine why -- so no on-time present. Have to wait until you move, now. Their online-form-thing adds an "NA" after the city -- so I wonder if seeing "Olympia, NA" made my bank reject the attempted purchase? Unable to remove the "NA" which they add automatically when one writes in a state or privince rather than choosing from their drop-down menu of Aussie states. Silly. love, yer auntie


 
Tiff Writes:
Today we went to the wonderful Art Museum of Belles
Arts. My favorite painter there was still Goya.
Later we went to an unbelievable old mansion that has
become a museum of objects from France at the time of
Napolian. Its totally great. My favorite painter
there was EL Greco.

We visited a church that is 300 years old. It has a
piece of Mary,s veil as a relic in a little gold and
glass box. The piece is less than an inch square.
Went to the city of mausoleums again *Recolletta(
where Evita is buried. It is a huge collection of
ornate mausoleums. It does resemble a city of
minature buildings. It has lanes that twist and turn
like a really huge maze thru crypts. Some of the
coffins are behind glass doors so you can see them.
The Recolleta is full of hundreds of cats. The walls
keep the dogs out so the dogs get the streets and
parks and the cats get the mausoleuns. It is really
amazing how tolerant everyone is of strays. The
pampered dogs have their own walkers. You see people
walking 10 or so at a time. I have not yet seen a
skinny stray.
There is a funny drink here/funnier than the Seattle
coffee thing. People carry Mate/tea/cups full of tree
bark that makes a tea but you have to fill the whole
cup so you carry a thermos of hot water with you all
day to keep filling your cup and drink it thru a
slotted spoon straw combo thing. Lots more trouble
than a paper cup of latte to me.
The subways here are from 1913 and cost less than 30
cents to ride. The stations all have murals done in
tile.
There are huge beautiful parks here in the rich
neighborhoods//the bad neighborhoods have dirt//So
sad.


 
Secret Service Confiscates Anti-Bush Drawings by 15 Year Old



27 April 2004

 
WASL testing at school today so my schedule was totally screwed up. I did have Josie and Scott on time. Third graders -- doing this difficult graphics project -- they are doing very well. Josie is doing the fifth grade page, which involves coming up with a concept, dragging over the student photos and re-sizing them all, scanning and coloring all the drawings that are for the photo shapes, heading, etc. Chosing the font and doing the names, too. Scott took an excellent photo of a substitute teacher, did some work to organise the second grade photos, and finished coloring, the formatted and printed a sheet or stckers of a strange original drawing. At one point I suggested he put his name on the stickers, so he wrote it. I said, now find a font you like, and pick a style. He became fretful when I turned to help Josie, and said, "Hey, I'm WAITING, over here." I turned back and told him that he'd spoken out of line and needed to get the things finished that I'd told him to do. He did. It was fine. Waiting, indeed. At least he wasn't whining, which he's learned gets him exactly the opposite of whatever he wants. I traded Rosanne Sam for Andrew, as I adore both boys and she was having trouble with Andrew. He was skating on thin ice from the beginning, which I told him. He asked me why he wasn't having art on Thursdays, and I said that apparently he hadn't been interested in what Rosanne was offering, so now he had to have evil me. I was very tough on him, not because I thought it would help this week, but because I think it'll help next week. He poked the boundaries until I kicked him out and said I would call Montrose to say he was on his way back to class.

I taught Halisa to find fonts and install them -- she has the makings of a font-nutcase like most graphics people. Tenaya saw one on H's monitor that she wanted for her first grade cartoon-look page.

Tammy and Dakota worked on their photo projects wherein they took photos and made Tammy playing basketball with Dakota's head, and Dakota yo-yo-ing with Tammy's head. They also took a very nice photo of the bus folk for the yearbook.

Slicin' Dyson is re-building my lefthand computer this week -- I'll be happier with a faster processor and more memory, but I have limited faith in the proposed rehabilitation of what to me is an outdated system, albeit one that functions about as well as it possibly could. I don't get why paying someone to rehabilitate a computer is beter than just spending the money on a new system. When I replaced my computer I reckon 3.5 years ago, the only thing I could use was my cd burner, which was new. Even the CASE wasn't much use. So better it should stay whole, as it did.

Osprey out the window.

Very windy, sunny, cloudy, wild weather today.


 

Anji and Steve and Caitlin and Ryan's new house in Queensland.
Holy moley.



26 April 2004

 
No National ID Cards

I HATE that idea -- it smacks of this.


 
After the Fall
Tiff and Brad at Iguazu Falls
OK--I'm totally blown away. This morning we woke up
to a dusty;ordinary South American town. I wondered
if all that 20 hours on the bus was a misteak. Now my
brain is exploding with what we saw. Never-ever have
I seen anything like these out of the way;isolated
falls. You can't even call them falls. The whole
world split and the bottom fell away and all the seas
of the world have spilled out. There are falls of
every shape and size crashing over the edge clear to
the horizon. Some are over 240 feet high. Don't try
ro visualize it--You can't. I have seen Niagra and
many others--You just can't imagine it. I never could
have and I saw pictures. The only thing I've ever
seen as powerful is The Grand Canyon--but then the
Canyon doesn't have all the sound of oceans escaping
and plunging to depths you can't even see because of
the spray. Its all so unimaginably huge. The world
has no boundaries here--Everything is so big and goes
on so endlessly.
Our tour included a jungle 4 wheel drive. There are
440 species of birds here and thick jungle that
harbors all the big cats and poison snakes. There are
85 species of orchids-not blumming now-but many other
flowers were.
Then the best ever. A crazy raft;speed-boat
combination that roared up the raging rapids and right
under one of the falls. The boat driver got into a
contest with the photographer (All our cameras were in
plastic-so the company takes photos under the falls).
We were only supposed to go under once but we went in
and out four times as they messed with each other.
Everyone was screaming. You couldn't see at all under
the falls-in fact I was choking on all the water I
breathed in. It was a blast. We were all laughing
and so excited by our own terror. It was tons of fun.
The boat driver loved getting us scared. None of the
other boats had such a scoundral for a driver. There
were no other English speakers in our group but after
the waterfall dunking we were family. It was like a
bunch of goofy kids.
After walking around a bit on catwalks over the very
edges of a bunch of the falls-we went to lunch. The
waiter had to pull all kinds of colorful beatles out
of my hair before giving us a menu.
The falls happened because one of the gods around here
fell in love with a beautiful mortal woman.
She,however was in love with a mortal man, so she and
her lover decided to flee downriver in a canoe. The
god was so angry-he made the world split and half of
it plunged down in their path. She went over the
widest fall (called the throat of the devil) and is
now a rock at the bottom. He became a tree looking
over the falls at the lover-now rock-that he can never
rejoin but who is constantly in sight but out of
reach. Quite the punishment. The Indian people who
still live here sell their artifacts at various places
here on the walks. They still have their language and
seem very seperate from the rest of the culture. I
haven't learned much about them.
There are birds at the falls that circle and actually
fly into the falls. They are as amazing as salmon in
their ability to challenge rushing water. The other
really wild flying creatures are the hundreds of
beautifully colored butterflies.


 
Tiff Before the Falls
The day we left our bus didn"t leave till night so we
kicked around Buenos Aires. We saw the memorial to
the tragedy of the 2,000 men lost in the Falklands
war. It is so hard to understand war--and even harder
to understand how it happens over and over.
Dinner was what they call a Tenedor Libre (free fork).
There were 150 dishes to choose from for $3 apiece
and it was excellent barbequed meat and chef made
dishes.
We saw Tango Dancers in the sreet. Everyone stops and
watches and donates a peso or two. The sad thing is
their are obviously lots of street children in the
city. They stand like acrobats on each others
shoulders in between cars in terrible traffic and
juggle for coins. Its kind of horrifying but I don't
see the terrible poverty like Peru but there are a lot
of poor in the fringes of what looks like but isn't a
European style society.



24 April 2004

 
How Funny is This?
I got an email telling me that "vampireblood" had posted a comment on my photolog ("statues"). Vampireblood's comment? Ooooooooh. Bwahhaha. "Lovely," said vampireblood.

I finally got around to plugging in another keyboard as mine must've reached critical corrosion level and the arrow keys were definitely wonky. It was the spillage and seepage factor. I've had this kb sitting on the floor for months. Might go back into for-emergency-kb-break-glass mode as I don't like how it... feels and sounds. Yea, I am THAT SENSITIVE.


 
I met a FAMOUS STAR in There today -- lol -- and he told me to call him "Bruce." Wow! We went around taking screenshots for fun.

What a dancer!

I left out the shot with the naked man in the background.

Bruce knows all the words to the classic Broadway musicals -- I was surprised at how good his singing voice is.


 
Today is the first day of fishing season. Usually there's been no activity on the lake before the season begins, however this year due to the unusual weather there have been weeks of boating, planes, wakeboards, jetskis, etc. I don't know how it affects the fishing, but there was a jetski towing something (probably an inner tube) last night in the dark. I could tell by the lights and noise. It's hard cheese for the poor nesting birds.

I was talking to an English programmer the other day -- a member of a computer nut group that he says is mainly German and Dutch. The group is called "Shadow Force," which he said was not his responsibility -- stupid name. They all have the same hair/hat. I noticed that right away after seeing two of them and asked if he was part of a gang or cult. The other hat... uh... fellow came over and started talking about Second Life, which I'd try if I had broadband, as I believe I could be a giant duck. (Daz: "Quack.") I asked him which he liked best -- he said as a programmer SL is more interesting, but There has some good things. I said well, you can be on There even if you are poor and have cheesy dial-up like me. They told me I should get bb. Well, chance would be a fine thing, my lads.

I just saw Rocket, the ever-barking dog next door, go zooming past in the prow of a little boat rowed extremely quickly by the son of next door. Oh, here they come again... I like Rocket, who I usually call Rockette (she's a girl) except having a Rottweiler barking next door for hours at a time is perhaps not ideal. She doesn't bark all the time -- just when she's placed in her pen after the next-doors go to work, or when she's excited.

I was on a quest last night and ran into my friend society, who offered to come along and provide another pair of eyes. I'd reached a perfectly stupid clue that could've caused me to drive around for the rest of my life looking for the damn thing. We wound up going around together, and I was surprised (I knew this theoretically but never really in practise) to find out that because she has no "explorer pack" her "There" is significantly truncated. And no compass, etc. So she'd been laboring under the rather extreme delusion that in aerial view the top was always north. Good way to get completely lost. She was very helpful in finding clues (my usual way of operating is that alone I can do anything in about two minutes, but with another person I get distracted and can't function at all) but I cared very little for the quest and instead it was just an excuse to talk.

The son has now put Rocket on the shore and is whipping around wildly using an outboard. Maybe the idea is to keep fishermen away? Maybe there is no idea.

Yesterday at jin shin Frank told me he expected me to be in a rather bad place today, then said, "Are you going anywhere tomorrow?" I said, "Apparently not." I called E this morning, and she told me about her strong muscles she's developing at power lifting. She has everyone confused because she'll tell you, in answer to "How much can you lift," the size of the weight on the right, and the size of the weight on the left. So it sounds less than it is. She was telling me something about 85 lbs and 85 lbs. Not bad. She overslept and was phoned by her work yesterday. She rang them right back and went straight in. I said, "Good girl," then, "AAAwwwk! What am I saying???" She laughed. Good girl, indeed. She's 37! Occasionally she'll say, "Get with it, girl," to me. Alas, my days of being with it are not numerous at this particular time, and I'm sure I quite deserve to be told to "Get with it," by someone with Down's Syndrome. I wonder, in fact, if during the entire course of human existence, anyone else has ever been told to "get with it" by a Down's Syndrome adult. Once when I was married I told my husband that since a woman is born with her eggs, and since his mother and my mother were born in the same year, it followed that we were born from eggs created in the same year and were the same age. He gasped and told me no one had ever had that thought before. I don't know, I'm sure -- although I think if I'd, say, sprinkled salt on an egg he might've gasped and said no one had ever done that before. Perhaps.

I suppose I should ask people to sign my guest map, which has been on this blog for years and has 6 signers -- one being the map company, and one me trying it out. Then I made Tiff sign it, and so the only "real" signers are Karan, Rayne, and Joel -- good on you, mates. And thanks. I think I discouraged you, Looper, so now I am reversing my position. And Mrs. Monster. Jim -- you are perhaps a lost cause. But you could put a flag somewhere where you are not. Rayne can sign again after she moves!! Yay!! I could ask Anj to sign but in Oz (at least last time I looked) a surfer is charged by the amount of download -- which is everything -- so she doesn't read my blog. I'll have to ask her about that...

After ignoring the link for a while, I've wound up signing up for Google mail, as maybe I can eventually ditch Hotmail as it is semi-non-friendly although reliable at least mostly. I already have about 5000 email addresses -- so that can have been my only reason, I'd reckon. Unnaccountably "osprey" was taken, so I fell back on "firemistred." I seem to be always either osprey or firemist red. Sometimes I make up email addresses (for the domain) and so now I receive viruses exclusively through "monkeypoxvirus @ atomic-raygun.com" and I get spam occasionally addressed to weaponsofmassdestruction @ a-r.com.



22 April 2004

 
Went to see "MY Architect" with SWMNBMIMB. It was excellent and made me cry because it sums up a great truth about art.

Shoot I just mentioned SWMNBMIMB and then had to ERASE THE WHOLE STORY about Islamabad and the missing books. Oh well.


 
The Ne-
w Yor-
ker Hyp-
henates




21 April 2004

 
Tiff's Notes
Well, we took the plane to Bariloche and were able to
see the Andes the whole way. I think we flew really
low as the mountains were right there. It was a
gorgeous flight. When we reached Bariloche the wind
was kicking up a storm and I promised that if we got
in I would take the bus from now on --but the bus to
Buenos aires is 24 hours across the desolate (really
desolate) Pampas so that is the end of that promise.
Actually a Cessna did crash-- nose first-- that day.
My eyes were closed tight as we landed as I was
praying and I missed seeing it beside the runway-- but
we ran into our nude skydiving friend from Australia
whoose plane landed ahead of ours and he saw it.
The meals in Argentina are ridiculous. They are huge.
I had a simple side of potatoes that was 6 potatoes
just for me. I'm sick of delicious thick, tender
steaks for a dollar. Today I just got a bowl of soup.
Our room is $5 apiece and restaurant meals are less
than $3 and it is enough for all day. Brad could live
here in the summer for lots less than airconditioning
for a few hours a day in the summer.
We took a wonderful two boat-two lake tour for about
$12. It was all day. The weather was gorgeous. One
lake was pure blue and the other was deep green. The
white snow capped mountains were all around.
Today its raining-so we went to the really wonderful
regional museum. It had all the birds and snall
animals from here displayed. In my next life I,m
going to be an Andean Condor. They live only in the
highest peaks and fly higher than any other bird in
the world--over 30,000 feet.
I learned a little about the Mapuche Indians from
around here. They were forced onto the desolate
Pampas by the Spaniards. They are still in the area
but I haven't learned much about them.
The spiritual beliefs of some of the Indians of this
area are so similar to many Judeo-Christian bible
stories--the creation stories, the flood, the saviour
returning with the gift of fire and revolation after 3
days and 3 nights in the wilderness. It is amazing
that the spiritual beliefs of mankind are so
universal--for me it gives veracity to it the shared
spirit of us all.
We are on our way on a flight to Buenos Aires
tomorrow.


 
hi viv
i went for a visit for old time sake to my old primary school. it was during the school holidays but the principal was there and let me have a wonder thru the buildings...so i left my mark in my old grade 6 class room, which i hadn't been in since 1980 i was 12yo. wow.


 
Another Virtual Day, Another Virtual Dollar
I stopped by Karuna Plaza for some reason, and saw people up on the stage -- a rare enough thing so that I wanted to check it out. I saw about ten people involved in a game of Truth or Dare. I stopped to watch, but I was offended at the way it seemed to be going so I teleported to the nearest place on my favorites (my map wasn't working). I'd just arrived when a member of my dueling club IMd and asked for help, then wanted to duel. I helped him, said "yes" to the duel, then immediately a noob started asking me something. I got rather engrossed, so I feel guilty about not responding to the IM boy. I went driving with the noob, and then back to the lounge to talk. He's a 33 year-old Italian journalist who lives in Milan and would like to become a teacher. We talked about opera -- he has "been to the theatre of la Scala to see Carmen of Bizet." I asked him if he'd just been at the Truth or Dare game, which he had ( I remembered seeing him there). That's a newbie spawn zone. I wondered about the strange coincidence of teleporting and having someone show up immediately from the place I teleported from. It happened before. A girl teleported about 5 seconds after me, and I said, "Are you following me?" She blushed and disappeared. I suppose it could either be coincidence or something to do with being a beta tester. 'hmm At one point a man came over and stood on top of Lu, my Italian friend, and he said, "Who is this person who is standing on my legs?" I IMd Toxic but he moved spontaneously so I just said "thanks for moving." Lu is an anime nut and sleeps with a noisy pc downloading all night for him. I told him about wanting to be Max Headroom and that I was getting close. He talked about wanting to look less like Ken and that he was wearing the plain, white "T shirt of the poor demo people." I told him about the Uru refugees. He told me about an article he'd written making up a story for Barbie and Ken's divorce. All I remember is Barbie had a "story" with "Jim," and Ken didn't mind as he became a pacifist. W/e. I suggested Barbie might like G.I. Joe, but he said G.I. Joe is much younger than Barbie. I'll bet Barbie's had plastic surgery.

It would be nice if there were a "notes" section to "My Buddies" so one could be reminded of who the heck these people are, since about a quarter of the people I don't remember offhand, and another group are gone. Like "blackstorm," a kid in Atlanta I talked to on several occasions. I remember he said his mother didn't like him skateboarding, but because he'd broken his leg (he told me) grinding or something, I said, "No wonder." A nice kid. I miss my friend Relic, who is a member but just disappeared around the time I disappeared for a couple of weeks as my wrist went wonky. I met a girl a few weeks ago, then last week I was climbing around on something and she came over especially to talk, which was nice. I think it's the oddest thing to've been in There long enough that I recognise people, or at least know them from their designs or so on.

I did a quest, and afterwards went back to the start with the intention of IMing Psi -- got to talking with a "man" who was a male avatar being borrowed by the owner's wife. She lives in Ontario, so I asked her about the younger Canadian knowledge of Avro -- her husband immediately started talking about it. Meanwhile Psi logged out -- too bad.



20 April 2004

 
A Boring PostGetting a little closer with the yearbook. Christy worked on the kindergarten page (with crayons as the theme). I made H work on her store, randomuniverse. Tenaya got work done on the seventh grade activities page and the first grade "comic" page. Sam and Gabe took photos. Dakota made a very nice little drawing. Skyla made a comic strip about a student missing the bus. It's quite basic, but nice. I accosted the teachers about material for the yearbook (again, as usual, etc.) Had a training thing after work so I didn't get home until 5:00. Montrose walked me out to my car to tell me about an Aussie band night he went to -- the Vines, et al. He said the Vines were good live, which rather surprised me. I'm still chafing over having to miss Mudhoney, the Melvins, and Ariadne auf Naxos in one week due to my feeble-ocity. Not just in one week -- in half of one week. Oh, well.

D. BullPlume asked me to bring in large-sized Ts, today, for her to sell at her Evergreen class, but apparently she forgot. Put not your trust in bullplumes, I'd reckon.

Not a particulary interesting day. Spoke with v.p. this morning about a) the poster, and b) the freakin' pow wow tent, which is a topic I'm growing tired of. The Muckleshoots are supposed to come up with a (huge) tent otherwise we're back trying to get (rather later in the day) Omar the Tent Man's enormo-jumbo-rrific tent that's something like 7 grand. I asked a few weeks ago (something that's always gnawed at me) whether Omar the TentMaker is his real name -- since Omar Khayam means "Omar the TentMaker," it seems as though it's a pseudonym but who knows? Certainly no one at school. I shall have to ask O the TM next time I see him (which doesn't happen often enough so that I recognise him).

Got summoned by Psi online last night when I logged on for a minute. He said, "I'm just going to be on line 10-15 minutes* because I have to go to school tomorrow." I said, "Boo," or something. He said, "No, they are being easy on us." I said "Too bad, they should stress you to the max." "Whose side are you on?" "I'm a trouble-maker." "I noticed." There's a large percentage of There people looking for "romance," I suppose one might say. It seems like a lonely sort of place for a well-behaved 13 year old.

*nearly 10 my time but nearly 1 his time.



18 April 2004

 
Tiff is a Tiffany, but she comes by that moniker legitimately as it's a surname in her family -- like Haley Mills is named for her mother's side of the family, her mother being Mary Haley Bell. She's also outside the gang of girls named after jewelry stores and alcoholic beverages, since she's older than me. I wonder what would lead one to name a baby "Brandy" -- surely it would be setting an unfortunate fate in motion. There's a section on Not Without My Handbag that deals with Bad Baby Names. I never fail to get a kick out of it. Still waiting to see someone has named twin girls "Tiffany" and "Harry Winston" though.


 
Inside the Secret Room in Egypt


 
Inside the Secret Room at Grandis Tuma


 
Rostropovich and Mr. Looper
Mr. Looper works at a theatre in Seattle. While eating in a sushi restaurant he made the acquaintance of Rostropovich, who is in town fronting the Seattle Symphony. They became best buds and R invited Mr. L to visit him in his dressing room, and got tickets for him. Mr. L visited with R after the performance. Ah!


 
I'm Shocked
Anji, Steve, Caitlin, and Ryan are moving to Brisbane.

I've been to Cairns and Townville (and Mt Isa etc.) -- but it was a long time ago. I remember being ringed by bushfires. That trip I went to Alice Springs twice, and traveled both up and down the unpaved (then) Stuart Highway. It was 1979 -- the year Skylab fell in the outback. Although I was in the outback at the time, it missed me (nyah nyah!). I remember standing atop Uluru looking at the endless miles of spinifex grass -- it looked like the ocean (Rayne, I can identify with your experience). That was also when Lord Mountbatten was murdered.

I was in Delaware for Three Mile island, the outback for Skylab, and then moved to Washington just in time for Mt St Helens, which made day into night and deposited a thick layer of volcanic ash over everything. It was very peculiar waking up in the morning to a pitch black day -- didn't realise what'd happened at first. That was the second eruption -- the first was merely something I watched and photographed. Before that I'd watched the slope of the mountain bulge out further and further in the weeks preceding the eruption. I think the rest of the disasters I've been part of have been family and personal disasters.



17 April 2004

 
Dinner With Ann, Chris, Geraldine...
...Elizabeth, Robert, Phil, Grace, Keith, Melody, Jackie, Tanya, and several other people whose names I can't remember at this secong because I'm so exhausted. Had a superb time, however, and spent a lot of time just laughing uproariously. Robert has no short term memory due to a horrendous car accident, so every time we meet I have the chance to be someone different and new. Spent time trading funny remarks with Keith, my All Freakin' Night buddy. A nice woman related a story of her husband tracking down the Mold, Washington cemetary owner to inquire about plots. "Well, you can't buy just one -- you have to buy 8. And I just raised the price." To $15. Neglected to talk to Phil about composting toilets as he was at the other end of the table. As Phil and Grace were leaving I pointed out to Keith that every time I think of his father toilets spring into my mind. Keith helpfully offered to go get Phil so I wouldn't feel my evening was lacking. Before dinner some candles in the bathroom set the wall on fire, for a brief, but stimulating interlude.

Chris's joke: Q.:How did the Pentagon know there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq? A.: They kept the receipts.

More From Tiff
Yesterday we went to the National Parque de Tierra Del
Fuego. It was so beautiful with all the trees turned
red and the white snow on the mountains all around.
It is such an empty land-with lakes and snow-covered
peaks forever.
There are few native plants or animals here because
its an island (a big one). Some years back some
traders decided to import fur bearing beavers to make
money from the fur trade. They imported about 20
pairs from Canada. It got out of control because
there are no predators and the winter is much milder
here than Canada. Anyway, the sad end of the story is
there are now 50,000 beavers and their fur is no good
because the weather is too mild. The beavers though
are cutting down all the precious trees that take
forever to re-grow. It even takes hundreds of years
for a fallen branch to decay because all life
processes are slow here. The few types of vegetation
here are small. There are only five kinds of trees
and when they established the prison colony here (more
in a minute on that) they chopped down trees that have
never regrown--they didn{t know at the time that they
grew so slow. Now the beavers are finishing the
process. The trees that are left though turn a
beautiful red.
The start of the Pan-American highway is in the
Parque. There is a sign pointing to Alaska (18,000
km.). One lady from Argentina thought Brad was so
handsome in his cowboy hat that she wanted her picture
taken with him. She thought he was an American movie
star. She made sure I was out of the picture- but
offered me a piece of cake and kissed my cheek as she
motioned me away while her friend took her picture
with Brad.
There is a great little old guy from Japan we keep
running across from Puerto Montt on. He is all alone
and very elderly and seems to speak neither English
nor Spanish--yet he is on every tour bus-boat,etc. He
takes millions of pictures. He is my heroe as he must
be very brave to be all alone and unable to
communicate very much. No one speaks Japanese here.
The old prison (1902) is one of the best museums I
have ever been to. It has a perfectly wonderful
display. The seperate buildings have a maritime
museum, a jail museum, an Antarctic museum, and an
indigenous peoples museum.
The Antarctic museum has reproductions of all the
Antarctic expeditions and ships (it seems they all
sank in one or two trips). All the stuff from
Shakelton,s and Ammundson,s excursions are there with
all kinds of original photos. I think if I were in
their shoes--I could have cared less about documenting
the whole thing. Some excusion group of 3 ate 72 or
was it 700 dead penguins-thats all they had for the
winter. They looked bad in their photo.
The Maritime museum had models of all the early
explorers ships including the Megellan expedition
where only 17 out of over 200 men returned. Sir
Francis Drake also brought ships thru here. There
were early charts and maps of this area dating from
1515. Some where made by Mercador. They really
progressed in acuracy from the guesses of the 1500s to
pretty accurate maps in the 1700s.
The Prison museum had statues of some of the most
notorious prisoners. One poisoned 8 in his family.
He was caught because he said he was shot in the foot
trying to save them from the poisoners. However, he
was found guilty when they discovered the bullet hole
went thru a part of his shoe where his foot would have
had a hole in it and his foot was untouched. Another
child killer had great big ears and they decided his
evil spirit was in his big ears so they clipped his
ears but he was killed by the other inmates soon
after-so who knows???
For me-The most interesting was the museum of the
early indigeneous people. Darwin went thru here and
documented these people. He said horrible things
about them-deciding originally that they could be the
"missing link". He said they were more like animals
than people. The thing was--they spent their lives in
canoes so their legs were very thin and crooked. They
didn,t walk really upright. Anyway at the end of his
life Darwin changed his mind and wrote articles trying
to undue what he said. The people all died quickly
after contact because they were always naked
(BBBRRR!!!) and went in the water and got clean on
occasion-also their temporary shore structures would
wash away and thus get clean. After houses and
clothes-they were surrounded by too many germs and new
dieaseases and there is only one woman left who is 83.
Tomorrow-LADE air to Calafate and the hostal Pioneros
Los Glaciares Its a tour to Moreno
Glacier on Sat.


 
Breakfast
I left here at 10:20 am to pick up Con at her house in Oly. She came streaming out of the house saying she'd just got up a minute before, and said, "You can do two of two things...oops, I mean one of two things." I said I'd do three of one thing, and waited ten minutes while she got ready -- wing in a sling and wig-hat on as her hair is falling out from stress. We were driving along when she told me Nancy was meeting us at the restaurant -- perfect! We expected Marilee to be along momentarily -- Nancy arrived, and finally we rang Mailee, who'd forgotten and was in bed. All in all a whacky outing -- finally the four of us sat at the same table, but it took a long time. We knew Marilee and Nancy would meet and like each other -- although different generations they're very much alike. By the time I ordered I wanted lunch, so I had the beet Napoleon salad again without the candied walnuts. Better. I just got home, and I'm going out to dinner tonight -- too much in one day, really, for me.

I met Marilee in about 1998, when one of my students told me he wanted to learn how to carve. Marilee's husband, Pete, is a wonderful artist who is currently working mostly in yellow cedar and red cedar, and I approached him at a longhouse gathering I took K. and his cousin S. to. K. was apprenticed to Pete, and so I had the job of driving him there and back -- leave here, drive to Nisqually rez, pick up K. and feed him something at BK, then drive to Skokomish rez. I got S. involved as he was near to getting his license -- didn't work out however as he wasn't reliable, so I went back to driving. I'm a big believer in older people mentoring younger people. I got tired of seeing my students reach a certain age then crash and burn -- so I'd spent a lot of time, money, and energy giving them a boost through the hard times. I only really helped a few kids -- but I'd be willing to bet that some of the ones who wouldn't take advantage of help were helped merely by knowing someone cared a lot about them. I miss J. a lot -- the first time I saw him he was about 4 or 5 and came running up to me. "Miss Kendall, can I go in the art trailer?" At that time I was running my program out of a condemned single-wide -- not the whole thing, just a small part of it. I used to tell J. I thought he should be a tribal policeman -- impediments were certainly there, though. I asked him once when we were driving somewhere if he'd thought about what he wanted to do as an adult. He said yes, that he'd like to be a game warden. I tried to hook him up with Howard, who was a research biologist who liked children very much. That didn't work out -- fear factor looms large especially in children with effed-up lives.

As an aside -- my children now are much more verbal than formerly. The children before were equally communicative -- just not talkative. I always knew what they were thinking.

When I was in high school -- a tech school I chose to go to as I wanted to escape from the rah-rah district into which I had moved -- I had a friend named Kenny, who was about 6 feet tall and rather crazy off and on. When he was not crazy he was very thoughtful, though, and I remember being impressed by something he said to me. I was at his house for some reason, which was interesting to me not the least because he lived in a little black enclave where everyone was close. Some small children asked him to drive them to the store or something, which he said he would do later. In explanation to me he said, "I remember when I was a kid. When someone grown-up did something for me it was great -- and I want to help those kids have a good time, and help them grow up just like other people helped me." I absorbed his idea -- his words have always seemed about
ten feet tall to me.


 
Two of the Clock -- Go To Bed, Damn It
Looper, who is a MacArthur Genius, told me she used something I wrote in an email, in a poem. I said that then she should dedicate it to me (I was just trying to make trouble), but the poem is dedicated to the dead friend who inspired it. However, I'm happy to be so honored.
Because It Looked Like The Picture I Took in There
I spent time trying to find a picture my brother took of me being attacked by a mob of kangaroos once when we went out on his boat for three days to whatchamacallem lakes in Victoria. The water was so shallow in areas Steven had to heel the boat to reduce the draught so we wouldn't become stuck. We went through passages from one large water body to the next at a highly fraught 45 degrees angle. Anyway, it was winter, and coldish, and we stopped at a little deserted island with large signs reading: DO NOT FEED THE KANGAROOS. Who wanted to -- not I. However, my brother, claiming it would make for a better photograph, stuffed a load of bread in my hand, then backed off. I was immediately surrounded by a bazillion animals all slathering at the sight of white bread. I couldn't fling the bread at them fast enough -- no, I was actually bitten -- the damnable things drew blood. I was looking for THAT picture and couldn't find it, although I found one of my brother imitating the kangaroos. Once at an injured-animal place on... what? Green Island? anyway, Queensland, I was talking with the keeper when a wallaby started humping my leg. I nonchalantly shook my leg harder and harder trying to dislodge it, until I shook so hard it flew off across the compound. The keeper paid no attention so perhaps it was something the wallaby did to everyone.


 

I made the guys take their pants off.



16 April 2004

 
Strange But Virtually True
I like to hang out in a virtual world, and lately I've been interested in doing "quests," which are a chain of clues that can be hard or easy, and vary in number and form. A quest can use balloon clues, journals, chests, or invisible clues. I've seen quests with ten clues, and quests with twenty clues. Some are riddles, some are trivia, others are photos of locations where the next clue can be found. It used to be that if you found a clue in the landscape you couldn't easily find the starting point -- the only place from which you can join the quest. Now, however, you can teleport to the start from clues that belong to quests you haven't started -- much easier.

The other day I stumbled across a journal clue, and teleported to the start of the quest. It was on a tiny island, and the second clue was in a cave nearby. I also found an out-of-sequence clue that I couldn't open (you can only open clues sequentially). The second clue pointed towards the 'hood -- I had no idea what that meant. I didn't give up -- I went to a cave in a different location just in case the clue was there. To my surprise another out-of-sequence clue was there. A couple was reading the clue, and I asked them about clue 2. They said, "Oh, the TMP Community Centre," but didn't elaborate. Just then my friend Bob IMd me, and asked what I was doing. I told him and he said he'd help. I summoned him, then said maybe he'd like to go to the starting point so he could do the whole quest. We went back to the island. After B read the clues, we were joined by LegallyPink, who made me laugh a lot -- I told her her skin color didn't match the exposed skin on the shirt she was wearing. She said she knew, but wanted it that way -- "I have to be who I am." I asked her wryly, "Who ARE you, Pink?" Bob showed Pink the clues, then we just stood there doing online research. Bob's computer crashed and he disappeared. Pink wandered off.

At this point I didn't know if the community centre clue was in There, or perhaps was a written clue on a webpage outside.

I discovered through reading people's profiles and putting 2+2 together that the inhabitants of another virtual world -- a world that had somehow been destroyed -- had migrated to There. They kept together as a group, and although not in the least unfriendly to outsiders, didn't advertise their presence at all. If you weren't of the group, though, perhaps you'd never learn of their existence.

By reading an out-of-There forum, I found out that the community centre might be "on the hills near a volcano." I teleported to a spot and investigated for about a minute -- it just felt wrong. I teleported to another place, ran to where I could drive, then took off in my buggy headed in one direction (not zig-zagging or otherwise searching). I had driven for only a short time when I literally drove up to the door of the place I was looking for.

I followed clues until I reached one I couldn't understand. There were two people there, and after we spoke for a few minutes they took me under their wings for a while. I am indebted to them, as I would've had a difficult time with a couple of the clues. One clue required us to go up to a sky paz called the "13th Floor" and jump off facing the east. I helped them find one clue -- the one I'd found in the cave. I'm sure they'd've found it without me -- but at least I felt I had a contribution to make.

I figured out the last clue on my own, which was nice. The end of the quest was down in the moat of the Tyr temple -- actually a favorite place of mine as I like the water depiction.

I joined the group and was invited to the quest winners' awards ceremony, where I met many people and had a good time keyboarding. I was happy that they are all grown-ups (one can become tired of immaturity), and one man listened to my story then told me that I was "the real winner."

The community centre was moved even before the awards ceremony, and the clues were all removed.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
More There BlatherI met someone named Psi in There, when a quest went on the blink and we goofed around in a boat until it was fixed. He asked me if I'd ever played game X, and when I said "No," told me it was a game in which one kills demons. I said, "Personally, some of my good friends are demons." He said some of his good friends like to kill demons, and that the top three demons are xxx, yyy, and Baal. I said, ""But of course. Why don't you kill some of the demons in the government? Three top demons are Ashcroft, Cheney, and Bush." I asked him if he is a rep. or a dem. He said his parents are republicans who actually wanted Gore in the last election, but that he, himself, is 13 and can't vote." I said, "Jeez, Psi, you're 13? You're quite mature." He seems like a very intelligent and polite person -- some of the people in There are rude and in other ways uninteresting. At the library yesterday I happened to overhear a fellow making lewd comments to a woman -- who was handling him quite well. I went over to show solidarity, and when he left we laughed about him -- she said he couldn't even spell the words he was attempting to use, and I said, yeah, well, he was probably 14. She thought he was older but merely stupid, and she's probably right.

Yesterday I went driving with a super-nice man -- we had a lot of fun and hit it off. He's part of the large gay contingent in There -- and a very experienced builder. He told me he is having a house-warming party soon, and would I like to come? I said, "Yes." There's a lot of scope for building and decorating -- both in portazones and houses. I never do much since I don't really see why I would want to -- the most I do is go to the fire atop Katana Lighthouse and put a skull up there. I'm accumulating some oddball items now from quests -- a gold and jeweled egg, a chest of diamonds. These are a surprise to me -- I never thought I'd get anything for questing.




13 April 2004

 
I'm a sucker for puffy clouds.



12 April 2004

 
Easter Sunday*
82 degrees??? Heat just about kills me, but anyway, E and I were very kindly invited to Easter dinner with Connie and Dave and Dave's mother, Louise. Dave cooked as Connie just had her arm operated on and had her wing in a sling. At one point L was telling us how her doctor had told her to drink three Ensures a day, but her heart doctor stopped her because her congestive heart condition doesn't allow for much liquid. I said, "What about bars?" and Louise exclaimed that, "Oh, no! They would just kill me!" Con hastened to say that I wasn't talking about going out to bars. At 9 I rather abruptly staggered to my feet -- well, it took a while -- and said I had to take my sister home. I don't think they understood quite -- I just meant she had to go to work and needed to go home. She gets up at some ridiculous hour like 5. I know she never goes to bed early enough to get eight hours sleep, but we don't have to make it seem like the plan.
*82 degrees on 11-April-04 but there is no global warming...



11 April 2004

 
Tiff's News From Way Down South
Well now we have really seen beauty to stun the
senses. We took a bus to Torres del Paine National
Park. We saw all our friends from the Navimag trip.
Most are doing three or four day hikes thru the
park--Its quite expensive to get set up though so we
just did a glorious day hike. From one viewpoint we
could see waterfalls, lakes, glaciers, the horns and
the towers. It was magnificent. Here it is like
there are no boundaries. Nothing seems like there is
any end. The vistas are to infinity. In the park we
saw some animals only found here. One is a bird that
looks like an ostrich, called Nandu and one is a "New
World" camel called a Guanaco.
We took the bus to Punto Arenas and arrived to
beautiful weather. I was crazy to catch a boat to
Ushuaia and Tierra del Fuego so we were running all
around trying to find one that was going but it is
Easter weekend so no luck. We did however run into a
great little guy sitting in a hole in the wall tourist
office who couldn´t find us a boat but did take us to
some friends of his for the greatest lamb barbeque you
can imagine. They treated us like royalty. They had
a beautiful little horse farm set on the bluffs
overlooking the Staits of Magellan.
After dinner they offered horseback riding. I didn´t
want to go because I was afraid, but Brad made friends
with some guy from France who came out to the farm to
ride horses but didn´t speak Spanish- so we kind of
bonded as I could translate for him. He and Brad
wanted to ride and the family kept coaxing me to go.
They promised they had the sweetest old horse on Earth
for me to ride. I finally agreed and they brought out
this huge, strong, beautiful horse. I balked -so the
young girl of the family led the horse by the rains
out to the bluff while I nervously hung on. They were
right--it was the sweetest horse ever. Anyway I
didn,t want to run or even hold the reins and Brad and
the French guy wanted to run so I had the little girl
take me back to the house- where they entertained me
with sweets and conversation and coffee till the guys
came back. All the children in the family want to go
to Disneyland. Everyone down here knows Disneyland
and Bill Gates. Bill Gates is very popular here
because he gave computers to all the schools around
here. The Chileans are really focused on education.
They have a very high literacy rate and must spend
huge sums on education as the population is so
scattered and everyone gets sent to a city for high
school with all expenses paid. Some of their schools
only have a few children in them but the schools look
really nice and well equiped.
Our new Chilean friends sure had a laugh about the
barnacle I ate and then later was horrified by in the
open fish market.
Our little travel guy took us to some other points of
interest. We drove over bluffs overlooking the sea
that truely did let you know you were at the end of
the world. We passed the marker for the mid-point of
Chile. They are very proud of their claim that Chile
goes clear to the South Pole. All their maps show
Punta Arenas as halfway down the country. I don´t
know if anyone else in the world recognizes their
claim-but boy they are sticking to it.
We went to an old Chilean Fort on a bluff overlooking
all sea access (3 directions).Fuerte Bulnes 1843.
We also went to the site of Puerto Hambre, founded in
1584 (Port Famine) where 300 Spanish Colonists starved
to death trying to occupy this land for Spain. None
survived. I don´t know why they starved--there is so
much marine life-but the wind is ruthless at times so
maybe they just froze in the winter.
When we finally got back to town we talked politics
with a couple from Australia. Their election has the
same divisions as ours but their present leader is
expected to be thrown over for his alliance with Bush.
The Australian Guy gave a nude skydiving exhabition in
a nudest camp. Think I´ll pass-but he was fun. His
wife was a teacher.
The bus trip between Puerto Natales and Punto Arenas
was all the huge sheep estancias. Looks just like you
would expect. Everything here is super-jumbo size-
including the ranches. It all started with one
illiterate Portuguese guy who hired a Lithuanian
accountant to keep his books in a shipping country he
started. There was an Argentinian who went bankrupt
and some Argentinian foreclosure guy bought his land
and brought in sheep. The Portuguese guy married the
sister of his accuntant and then died. Then the
accountant inherited from his sister. Then the
accountant married the daughter of the Argentinian
foreclosure guy and they had 10 children. The
cross-match resulted in the shipping company Navimag
and the largest wool-processing operation in the
world.
There are also some oil fields here but not much
because no one wants to develop it because Argentina,
Chile, and some indigenous groups all claim the
offshore islands. Hope they never get it resolved as
this is such a wild and free and wonderful wilderness.



10 April 2004

 
I just saw a bald eagle attack an osprey again -- but this time the osprey let go of something which the eagle dived for, and got. I've seen and heard loons, lately, too.


 
Imagine a Breakfast Cereal Based on John Cage

And this article about cereal is very funny, too.


 
This totally rocks.



09 April 2004

 
Now I Have a Horse...
...and I've had an annoying dog named "Bosco" for a while. I was playing with him at Katana Point when some man came over and said his (dead) dog in real life was named Bosco. A cocker spaniel. He asked me to call the dog so his daughter could see it. I'm recreating my life, I suppose -- since it was all horses and dogs before I became ill.


Rank Was Pulled
And I made the poster without the children's drawings, unhappily. But that's it.

They Don't Make Ph.D.s Like They Used To
I am being forced by the BIA to use standardised tests -- well, a lot of what they said made sense and is not at all unwelcome, however using a standardised test to determine creativity???? I can't even express how cold that idea leaves me. Hil gave me a paper about a test she'd reckoned would not fit her writing program but might fit my art program. She gave me a paper along with it that I just read today. What in the world??? What could someone possibly think they mean by writing these words:
"When interjected in a cultural context the complexity of creativity magnifies and the perspectives change."
As opposed to WHAT?? Creative children RAISED BY WOLVES??????

Another part that made me froth at the mouth:
"...tests used to identify the gifted are often standardised on populations that do not include a representative sample from all racial and cultural groups..."
Standardised tests only work when there is a common culture. In this country there's no common culture so why do they use standardised tests??? Makes no sense to me. Even within the BIA-funded schools -- there are HUGE differences between the different Indian nations, and a test made for one school might not work at all in another. Kill standardised tests!! They must die! Die! Die! Oh... humphf... um... well, I don't much like standardised tests.


 
Moths Must Not Be Able To See Well
I was just lying on my bed staring up at the closed blind of the skylight. I closed it during the ill-fated re-roofing extravaganza, and I don't wish to open it until the job is finished (they began in August or September). A large, rather attractive moth -- grey with a diamond outlined in black on its back -- was wandering the edge of the skylight, and almost ran straight into the stinging part of a wasp. The wasp swung around and the moth fluttered off, then did the same thing all over again. We should pool our money and buy contact lenses for these poor moths -- otherwise moths with poor eyesight might accidentally be killed! I thought the wasp was quite nice, however -- maybe the scenario had been enacted dozens of times before I watched. I suppose it might be that Nature, not a wasteful force, considered things like intelligence, memory, and eyesight unnecessary in short-lived creatures.

More Moths
I don't watch television so I have no idea what's going on, but apparently there was a performance at the Grammys that has Indian Country up at arms since it featured faux Indians. I'm amazed that anyone would think such a thing is a good idea to instigate in this day and age. Something I read quoted someone to the effect that other ethnic groups would not be treated that way. It made me thing -- what ethnic groups are off-limits when it comes to evoking offensive stereotypes or treating them disrespectfully, and which ones aren't? I always think of my friend from years ago, whose background was Scottish. She talked about the stereotypical Scotsman, who takes out his purse from which moths are released when he opens it. She thought it was funny -- the stereotype is that the Scottish are thrifty to the point of miserliness -- because she felt it was ridiculous and quite obviously not something that could harm her. I don't think one can equate that, however (which she did), with evocations of offensive stereotypes that have been used to crush and control, or evidence of disrespect that reveals a lazy and ingrained way of thinking that needs to be changed. It boils down to empathy, again -- I see all the time that people only apply what they know about themselves to themselves -- they don't apply it to others. Say, I like to be treated with respect, therefore MAYBE other people like to be treated with respect.


 
Since I've been just ridiculously in pain the last few weeks I haven't done my laundry -- oops! So today I decided I had to do a couple of loads no matter what -- having run out of T-shirts. Anyway, I reckoned I'd put the second load in and wait downstairs for it to wash, then remove load one from the dryer, replace it with load two, and take load one upstairs. I sat on the stairs and waited, and that left me with time to contemplate the fellow-who-lives-below-me's framed prints. Straight in front of me was a tastefully framed (although to me anything above a single mat is tacky) print of a rather radical Monet landscape, Ile St Martin.

If you turn it upside down you can see it's a huge "R." That amused me for a while -- before that I was just interested in how the composition worked, and just how wild it was. Yes, yes, I've seen it a billion times before as has everyone, I'm sure. However, spending time wholly focused on it was different than just casually looking. It's a beautiful painting, but I am against the idea of litho prints -- people should have original artwork on their walls, listen to live music, and go to the theatre -- well, ideally. And, of course, go to the movies and listen to records, etc. I just think those things should be in some part live and not regurgitated. We are like baby birds being fed regurgitated cultural worms.

For one thing, paintings reproduced for mass consumption have altered color and scale, and then too they have no texture, which is a huge thing. I was amused to see that in "There," the color/pattern used to cover objects is referred to as "texture," which to me it isn't. It's akin to people making things for the tube or monitor, and saying the things are 3d -- we know what they mean by that but although there's an illusion of depth the things are 2d and that's that. I have children who draw something -- say letters of a name -- and then "make them 3d." I used to always train the children to draw, and to depict three dimensions on a two dimentional surface, but now that I haven't been working with the whole school on that I'm saddened to see the drawings I get now are terrible. Not only that, but children in quite high grade levels have shown me coloring they've done as part of class projects. Coloring! I'm appalled.

I did a rough of the pow-wow poster and emailed it to the v.p. for the committee meeting yesterday. When I got home from jin shin and stepped out of my car into the garage I could hear the v.p. on the phone, so I staggered in and spoke with her -- she was relaying a few changes they wanted, and a few design suggestions -- one of which was to replace the childrens drawings that run up and down the sides with the school logo repeated ad nauseum. I laughed -- said I wouldn't as it was a horrible idea, and said "Everyone thinks they're a graphic designer." I asked her who'd suggested it, and she mentioned two men, one of whom IS a graphic designer. The v.p. had shown me, on Tuesday, the logo they have decided on for the pow-wow, which is horrible, and which I refused to use. So there you are. It all boils down to -- chacun a son gout. I will suggest that next year instead of trying to graft his work onto mine, with a resulting Frankenstein's monster effect, they just give him the whole thing. Then they can remove every reference to children and generally have their own way.
Poster 2003
Poster 2002




08 April 2004

 
Looper Fought the Law
"...and won. IT will be contacting E to schedule her powerlifting dial-a-dip ride for the duration of the class--will check to make sure she gives them the right cut-off date. I'll ask Jane the travel trainer (who hasn't called me back, though she's supposed to be back from vacation) to train E in how to call d-a-d in case she does ever need to use it."

After vowing to change Dial-A-Lift's 6-months-or-more-or-you-have to-call-for-each-ride rule Looper made good. Now the rule is 3 months -- half the time. In other words, if you are needing a ride every Tuesday for 3 months at 3pm to Planet X, now you can schedule the rides at one time, instead of needing to call for each ride. The entire process is so difficult L was despairing of DD individuals managing at all. Now it is somewhat easier! All Hail Looper!

And Looper said earlier:
"my friend's daughter wrote yesterday (a friend I write once or twice a year) to say that my friend is dead. I'd been waiting for a long time for something like this to happen, as I find it disturbing that some people I believe are alive are in fact dead. There's a Berryman poem about this that I'll have to put on my blog. I wrote back to my friend's daughter to relay a story that her mom told me (she has probably heard it a thousand times but nevertheless) about how when she was shopping for fabric in Macy's, holding a swath across her body, Greta Garbo walked by and nodded, like: yes, buy that. So she did but never sewed it into anything."

Kinkmeister Wayne
A million years ago I remember John Wayne, I think it was, saying that there was a famous star who was masquerading as a woman -- either Maye West, Greta Garbo, or someone I can't remember -- and that when that person died his sex would be revealed. So I stood with bated breath following the death of number one, then two, then three. No strange news. And really, I would just as soon not know if it is true. However -- semi interesting, hmmm?


 
More From Tiff
Everything has far exceeded my expectations. The four
day boat trip was unbelieveable. This time there
really are no words. The whole rest of the world
seems the size of a toy. Everything is so
immense--The distances, the mountains, the glaciers,
the waterways,everything is giant sized. For three
nights and four days there was not a sign of humanity.
We even only saw one other boat. After 3 days we hit
the only outpost--a village of 115 souls. We went
ashore there.
The outpost was called Puerto Eden. The last
remaining 7 pure-blood Kawesgar Indians live there. I
think we saw all 7. There are also some Chilean
fishermen. Kawesgar means "Man made of skin and
bones". They lived in that area for 7,000 years and
then a weather station came and made life too easy and
they all died out from being given flour and other
foodstuffs from the station. Clothes were the biggest
killer. The women used to dive naked with animal fat
rubbed on their bodies to keep warm. They dived for
the shellfish that was a main staple of their diet.
Once they wore clothes the clothes kept the moisture
on their bodies and they died of colds, etc. The
women were the economic base and the only ones allowed
to learn to swim and thus the culture died out. The
Indians lived all their lives on the water in hollowed
out canoes. Children were born and lived and died in
the canoes. The fathers carried the babies umbilical
chord around their necks for one year to bring the
baby luck. Their only spirits were evil. The spirit
of the glaciers and noise was the worst so being quiet
was very important. They believed in two
forces--Chaos and Harmony. The evil spirits caused
chaos if they were awakened. They had ways of making
different color smoke from the perpetually burning
fires in their canoes. They sent out different
colored smoke if they came across a beached whale or
some other food so that others, if they were in the
area, could share in the bounty. They only went to
shore to pair up the young people at about 12--each
new couple would then make a boat and go off as a new
family. There were no permanent settlements at all.
They carried fire at all times in the canoe on a bed
of sand and stone. They never let the fire go out.
Sea Lions provided all their material needs-like
clothes, tools, etc. They carried dogs on their
canoes and fed the shellfish first to the dogs to test
if it was poisoned by red tide (very prominent here
because of the strong rays of the sun due to the lack
of an ozone layer). Just think-they lasted 7,000
years in one of the harshest climates on Earth and
flouished till life got too easy (about
1940)--amazing. The village today where they live is
all built on stilts and there is a wooden sidewalk
also built on stilts as the land is all marsh and
wetlands.
The trip on the ship was fabulous. We had great
weather and saw it all. Mountains, waterfalls by the
hundreds, glaciers,and on and on. There was one very
rough part where the ship actually goes to open ocean.
It is called the Gulf of Sorrows. It lasts about 18
hours. There were about 100 backpackers, etc. on the
boat and that night there were only 18 left
functioning. Everyone took Dramamine but it was just
too much. I guess I´ll never get motion sickness.
Brad and I were 2 of the 18 left standing.
One of the most amazing things here is the hole in the
Ozone. Its awfully weird. The temperature drops at
least 20 degrees when a cloud goes over. The sun is
intolerably hot even here in the far South. The rays
are unbearably bright. I was out in it for about 10
minutes and my nose is burned. Its merciless--but for
the most part there are high clouds although they say
the rays come thru just the same.
This region is called Patagonia because the Indians
wrapped their feet in layers of skins and so they made
big footprints so the Spanish called this the land of
the people with big feet.
We passed an old shipwreck perched on a mt. peak.
sticking out of the water. The captain of the ship
was supposed to deliver a sugar cargo and instead sold
the sugar in Montevideo and planned to keep all the
money himself and scuttle the ship so no one would
know--Well he misjudged and when he told his story of
the lost ship--they came to investigate and there it
was stuck on the submerged peak and he was busted red
handed and went to prison for three years. This
happened around 40 years ago and the ship is still
stuck out there and is completely visible.
Our ship had its own very spoiled cute little puppy.
Tomorrow "Torres del Paine". Truely this is as
wonderful as anything could possibly be. I can´t
imagine there could ever be so much
endless-spectacular scenery and wilderness.



06 April 2004

 
Saturday
Hilarity-fest chez Looper w/ Mel and JanO.
Sunday
Just a continuation of my all-week-long agony extravaganza. Woo hoo!
Monday
Dropped Sha at my garage for an oil change, telling Adam to check him over, and that I'd do anything he told me to do. Then went to breakfast at the American Grill with SWMNBMIMB. I told her what I'd said to A and she said, "Oh my God! You should NEVER say that." Had the fruit-in-season plate, but I asked the waitress, "What fruits could POSSIBLY be in season?" Picked up Sha. A: "Your car is fine." Me: "It must need somerthing." A: "Do you WANT to spend money?" Ka-ching -- $20 or something.
Tuesday
Classes were fine. Saw ChristineS who has moved on to another job, and Roseanne, who was nice and brought me juice. Sent Sam around taking photos of adults, and the results were quite fantastic. Gabe used my camera (he likes mine much better -- it IS much better). Got Tenaya rolling on my idea to make the Gr.1 page look like a comic strip. Made Halisa work on a graphic for her store. Her mother, who was there last Tuesday (she works in my room) had her baby on Wednesday -- a 10 lb. boy. D. BullPlume said, "I bet that hurt." She wants to take T-shirts to sell at her Evergreen class. K. Had a meeting post-school about the pow-wow poster, which I always do over spring break. Called the meeting myself (with Skunky and Brenda) because -- hey, well, I have to know what they want ON the poster and today was my last day before the break. I knew Skunk wanted a sideways poster with his ideas dominating, but I wasn't terribly looking forward to doing it as I like doing my own everything. I said nothing, however, and it has turned out to be a larger format poster with some new additions but lots of the magical elements that set it apart. I have to do most of the work tomorrow (as it turns out) but that's fine. Got home at 5:30 to a phone message from JanO.

Tomorrow: pow-wow poster and Girl with a Pearl Earring.
Thursday: please jin-shin, help.



02 April 2004

 
Better Phlebotomy than Lobotomy
I had my jin shin yesterday -- I go every week and have that energy work. Usually it's on Mondays, but I changed to Thursdays as I am at a spot now when the day after the jin shin is horrible. Today was ok up to about 3 -- not bad. I went for a blood test, then got groceries and went home. By the time I got home and had to get the groceries from the car and put them away I was f*cked up. Oh well! I was happy to have the blood test as I was the one who insisted I had to have bloodwork prior to my liver-doc appt. The last time I saw her (Dec 02 how time flies) I had my appt then had the blood drawn. That made NO SENSE to me, so this time I agitated and got my way (I'm a spoiled brat). I'm watching "Ghost World," on tape from the library -- they had to change it from the graphic novel, yes, but I think the story is less interesting. Tomorrow I go to see Looper, then Monday I take my car in for a check-up. Tuesday is work, Wednesday a movie: The Girl with the Pearl Earring at 6:30 at the Capital Theatre. Thursday is jin shin again. I've got Lucia intrigued by my reports of the virtual world I spend time in. I find it fun. I know why I'm there -- and some other people have good reasons (I was talking to an Australian stay-at-home dad with a sleeping 2 year old yesterday). Some people, though, I can't figure out. Why are they there? Why aren't they out in real life? Like "A Hard Day's Night," where "Paul's grandfather," a "clean old man," tells Ringo he should be out "paradin'." Not with his nose stuck in a book -- or a monitor.



01 April 2004

 
Discover magazine has a snippet about a scientist who has discovered a way to slice cheese to the thickness of a human hair with a laser, something I mistakenly thought hoagie shops could do all along.

I've been sticking my nose in a new hair cutting place next to my jin-shin place every week, but there was never an open slot. Today I finally got my hair cut. I had been going to a nice place before this, however, the stylists kept getting pregnant and leaving -- and I'd be shuffled to a stragner. After 3 bad haircuts I was revolting, and didn't go back. This new place is adjacent to my accustomed parking spot, so I can do two things at one time. I asked the stylist if he was likely to get pregnant, and he said, "No, I don't even like children."

I spent 5 minutes getting b5th's tiny wee camera operational on my system. It is, I fear, not worth it even five minutes of effort, however, as the quality of the pictures is low.

Someone who sounded like a man but having a woman's name left a message asking me to make replacement spice labels. I thought the usual crank caller asked for "Prince Albert in a can." You watch, though -- I'll probably wind up making replacement spice labels -- I'm a soft touch. Plus I never seem to think I can do without one iota of goodwill. Wuss.

 

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I want to ask for thoughts about improving the world -- what do people need? How can things be organised?