Did Beethoven Do the Dishes?

Here's how my mind works... I want to spend today writing, right? I'm sitting here in my bed, enjoying my morning coffee and harping at Nigel to quit whining (he's having one of those days—already), and I think, "Wow, I'm feeling the urge to write!" Then it all starts to pile up...

The Wolf is Chasing the Sheep

"Wolf! Wolf!"

I'm boycotting the Weather Channel. I've had enough of their tabloid-like, fear mongering headlines and alerts. Enough of their shouting, flailing "meteorologists", enough of their all-caps headlines and bylines. If it isn't a supposed snowpocalypse, it's something that has nothing at all to do with the weather. Take today's little collection, for instance...

The Door

It doesn't matter what I do, what I think, what I feel, how much I try, how much I believe, how much I want. It doesn't matter whether I meditate, whether I visualize, whether I claim. It doesn't matter if I sprinkle fairy dust on myself and jump from the window, or if I follow the rules and take a more sensible approach...

Relief At Last

Good-bye you literal hell of a summer. Don't let autumn's door hit your butt on the way out!

My beef isn't only about being uncomfortable. Lawns, trees and flowerbeds died, kids couldn't go outside (NObody could), so everyone has cabin fever, the state was riddled with wildfires and drought, and families had to decide whether to buy food or pay criminally high utility bills. And, of course, this is the summer that the AC in the car went out. Have you ever driven around in a black automobile in 115-degree heat with no AC? This is the worst summer I've lived through and I'm glad it's nearly over.

How Rude! Indies Need to Hone Their Social Skills

Lately, I've been receiving a lot of friend requests in Facebook. Because most of them are indie musicians and authors who find me through mutual friends who are indie promoters, I accept them. Hey, a little mutual backscratching never hurt anyone. So far, everyone has been polite and very careful about not being guilty of obnoxious self-promotion. They're all quite friendly, in fact. Some of us are even building nice online friendships....

The Dogs of Summer

Look, I have no problem with dogs. I'm a "dog person" and I miss having a dog so much sometimes, it's actually painful. And I'm pretty patient where pets are concerned. I'll deal with your dog crapping in my yard, pissing on my tree, and even drinking my cat's water. No big deal, just everyday things in the life of a dog.

What I can't deal with is your barking dog keeping our family awake all night and then waking me up after I've finally managed to join them. When your dog wakes me up, although I'm wearing 33db earplugs, there's a problem. DO something...

Too Damned Hot

A solid month of triple digits. Of the lowest temp being around 90 at three in the morning. And I don't see it cooling off because we haven't even come into the hottest time of the year.

This is going to require beer.

Homesick

The fact of the matter is, I'm just plain, old-fashioned homesick. I'm homesick for my state of California, my county of Ventura, my clan, my music, my life. I'm homesick for ocean and mountains, fewer bugs, lower humidity, broader-minded people, and fun. I'm homesick for my own kind. Say what you will about us Californians. I don't care...

Ooh, Baby!

Alright... I can't keep still on this crap anymore.

Why, in the name of all that's somewhat sane, do people feel the need to make baby dolls out of grown men of power or talent, and why do grown women feel the desire to buy them? Several years ago I was introduced to Cabbage Patch Mozart. Now we have Baby Doll Obama...

They Used to Tell Me I Was Building a Dream

You know how sometimes when times are hard you get a break and you can breathe for a while, but you really can't breathe too deeply because you know the break is only temporary?

So you tell yourself to enjoy the bounty while you have it, to live in the present, but be frugal. And you do a great job making that eagle bleed, stretching every dollar as far as you can by buying things at the dollar store that you'd spend three dollars on anywhere else...

Peanut Rolling

I've made a new discovery. Or maybe it's a new determination, or both, and of course I'm going to tell you all about it.

I don't handle negativity very well. I can be happy as can be, smiling, enjoying my day-at-a-time existence, but the minute someone starts talking about how pissed off they or, or what's wrong with the world, or how bad they feel, I get sucked right into it.

The first clue is that I get angry. Not raving mad, but just unsettled in the little place that was happy before they opened their mouth. Something in me just sort of wilts and I start looking for ways to get away from them. If I can't do that, I simply tune them out, one of the Waller gene pool's many talents.

That's why, on Facebook, I've hidden people who post nothing but stuff about politics, religion, environmental concerns, veganism, etc. They're still on my friends list, but I don't have to see their constant ranting. I just can't handle it, even if it's flavored with enough positivity to make people think they're not actually being negative. This is also why several months ago I announced that I'd no longer make political or religious posts in Facebook, or comment on those of other people. And come on, it's just so much pontificating and preaching to the choir anyway, isn't it?

I understand social consciousness. I'm from the Sixties for crying out loud. But to tell the truth, I've had my fist up in the air for so long, my arm's about to fall off. I know the planet's in trouble. I know about the rising tide of corporate feudalism. I know that everyone has been thought of and treated unfairly in some part of the world, at some time in history. I know that Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, and others of their ilk are morons who are poisoning America. I know that Hitler was bad and I know that Marie Antoinette never said, "Let them eat cake". I know that Lynette and I are considered little more that second-class citizens to some people and that other people believe we deserve to die cruel, miserable deaths, and I know that the economy is the worst it's been since the Great Depression. I know all of this stuff, but I don't have to, nor will I, allow it to steal what little happiness I've been able to scrape up for myself, so leave me alone, alright? Quit pissing on my parade and understand that unless you have something nice to say, I really wish you'd just shut the hell up.

All this is not to say that an occasional conversation about what's wrong isn't okay. I just don't like it to be the only conversation. I've always hated talking politics and religion. That's why I didn't fit in very well into that part of the Sixties. While everyone else was chanting protest songs, there I was, singing Donovan ballads.

I've battled depression my entire life, but although I've gotten a pretty good handle on it, my daily life is a constant struggle with my own negative thoughts, fears, and worries. I work hard at it. I meditate and I always look for the good around me. When people start talking about what's wrong with the world it just triples my workload, which means that once they're gone, I have to start rolling that peanut uphill with my nose all over again. It's exhausting.

Look, the bottom line is that this stuff simply lessens my happiness. It makes me angry and opinionated and discontented, and I don't have so much life left to me that I want to spend it feeling like that. That's all. If you enjoy marching around with your fist in the air that's fine. Go for it. Just don't bring your parade up my street.

The New Google Image Search Sucks

The new Google Image Search format is crap. It looks disorganized, the searches aren't as fine-tuned, I can't see the resolution, file type, or size of an image, and I've always hated those hover panes that some people have enabled on their sites, which is how the new GIS works. The infinite scrolling is an equally bad idea, just for orientation's sake. From what I can tell, they're just competing with Bing, which I've never liked. Guess I'll be heading back to Alta Vista, or see if there's something else. Time for me to start doing some surfing.

If you haven't been given it yet, here's a page that tells you about it.

This is a poor excuse for a blog entry, I know, but I haven't been to bed yet and I'm falling over. Good night.
____________________
UPDATE 7/23/10:
UPDATE: My friend Siren has informed me that after you type in a search request and you access the page with all of the thumbnails on it, scroll to the bottom of the page and click "Switch to basic version". Voila!

Thanks Siren!

I'll Never be a Saint

One of the character traits I'll continue to keep battling, regardless of how many lives I live, is indignance, which actually boils down to ego, which in turn boils down to fear. It doesn't matter how I try to combat it, or for how many years, it pops up its nasty little head every time I feel slighted, not taken seriously, scolded, or mocked. Meditation helps for a while, but I'm just not one of those serene types who can spend hours in it in an attempt to keep the real world at bay. I used to think that I could be like those who appear to live in a New Age trance enjoying the vegan lifestyle and somehow being above mere mortals, but I quickly discovered that I didn't want to live like that...

F*** it Monday

I'm not the kind of person who goes in for all the "I hate Mondays" stuff that I read everywhere on line. I kind of follow the idea that we make our day what it is and Monday is no worse than any other day of the week. But then, I work from home. Which doesn't mean I don't have my frustrations and BS to deal with like anyone else, it just means that I'm no longer part of the commute group...

Going Up in a Festering Heap

In just a few days I'll be able to order Windows 7 from Ebay, and I can push the button on Vista.

I don't know about you, but I think that when a company as successful and far-reaching as Microsoft puts out a product as bad as Vista, they should be required by law to stand behind their product and make good on it. It's not right that they got away with this one.

I'm so tired of the blue screens, the crashes, and the auto-restarts that I really want to throw my laptop out the window. Except that I know the laptop itself is a great machine. It's just Vista.

I thought of writing a letter to Microsoft--a real letter, not an email--and complaining so vociferously that they might, just might, consider sending me Windows 7 free of charge, but I know better.

What's in a Name?

Life could have been so much easier for me if my parents had either

1) given me a name they intended to call me, or
2) called me by the name they actually gave me. My name has been a big frickin' deal my entire life.

I was christened Sheila Kathryn, but did they call me Sheila? No. When I was a baby, it was Sheila Kay, but all I remember is Kathy. At the age of 9 this was changed to Kaye, and until their deaths, my mom still called me Kathy while my dad called me Kaye. I preferred Kaye, and used it until 1999, when my pen name, Steph, took over by the use of online friends who never knew Kaye. But even that began as a masculine pen name, Stephan Karl, which is what my parents had planned to name me, until I emerged from the nom de plume closet and my gender was plain for all to see. Still, all through my school years, the kids called me Kaye while the teachers called me Sheila, which, for some reason, gave the kids reason to make fun of me. WTF...

The State of Things - My Perspective

Hello everyone. I just thought that I'd tell you what's going on around here. I'd tell you my name, but I'm not sure what it is. At first, they called me Sweetie, but that's been changed to Kitty, sometimes Cat (when my people are angry at me for God knows why) or, worse, F**ker-Cat. Sheesh. I don't understand people. I like things to be a certain way, you see. I like my meals on time, doors to stay open, and my litter box to be clean. Is that so much to ask? In fact, what prompted me to write is the subject of food.

Why is it so hard to get a fripping meal around here? I know that my meals are always at 7:00 am and 5:00 pm. That's why I start two hours earlier to remind my people that meal time is coming. If I didn't, they'd probably forget. You don't know what a hassle it is working a four-hour split shift just so these bozos don't forget to feed me. Besides, it works. Sure, they get mad and call me names, especially when I sharpen my claws on the furniture, but I do that stuff on purpose, you see. All this hard work, and do you know how they reward me? They go and give MY FOOD to that old yellow Tom who lives in the dog house in MY BACK YARD! Out of MY Bistro feeder! Just great. He gets an unlimited supply of food that he can have anytime he freaking wants it, and I have to wait for MY food. He doesn't even have to do anything to get it, either! I've never been more insulted! I hate ferals. Get a job, ya lazy-ass!

As if that isn't enough, there's that calico Tom who sits on MY porch and stares at me through the door like I'm a piece of meat or something, the birds that sit in the bush just outside MY window, teasing me, all these damned neighborhood dogs, and worst of all, that ugly-assed cat that walks around on MY roof at night. At our other house I was top cat in our neighborhood! I was a force to be reckoned with! But here? A mere shadow of my former self. And now they're feeding that old fart in the back yard.

Well, that's all I really wanted to say. I feel much better now; I think I'll take a nap. Thanks.

And That's All I Want to Say About That

The American public, and in many ways the world at large, has been the victim of a fear-mongering, abusive right wing for so long, now that they are no longer in power they want to continue the old way of keeping the rest of us in line. Now that the main fists have been removed from Capitol Hill, those that remain are scrambling around in an attempt to continue business as usual, or at least as they have come to know it...

Basta, Cielo!

Pamina: "I'm so tired, Tamino. Will these trials ever end?"
Tamino: "Sod it! I'll keep playing this damned flute until I turn blue!"

Okay, a day of R&R (sort of) and I'm back in the fight. Just try keeping me down, Life!

Characters and photo from Die Zauberflöte (The Magic Flute) by W. A. Mozart.

Reason #1 Redux

Okay, so here we are sweating our asses through the hottest week this area has known in a decade--under an extreme heat advisory--and our AC breaks down. Again. Yeah, I know you've heard a lot about this over the past five years, but now it's really serious. The unit is making all kinds of banging-clicking noises and it's standing in about an inch of water.

SOMEBODY PLEASE TELL ME WHY WE'VE BEEN PAYING SO MUCH G.D. RENT TO LIVE HERE, AND HOW THEY HAD THE NUTS TO RAISE THE RENT TO AN AMOUNT THAT CAUSED US TO HAVE TO MOVE!


Seriously, this is a nice house. In California, it would be a $500k-$800k home. It's big, stylish, modern -- the kind of house you see in gated communities. THINGS ARE SUPPOSED TO WORK. I can't believe that the suckers people who are moving in after us are going to be paying $150 more a month than what we're paying. Good luck!

I called the maintenance guy yet again (we're on a first name basis now) and someone will be out to look at the problem LATER THIS AFTERNOON. Meanwhile, it's 93° and climbing, and this beast of an AC is raising our utility bill and giving us nothing in return.

I've had it.