Oh Yeah,

And I had lunch with one of the coolest girls ever.

Thanks, Rachel

Plan to Witness

I started feeling really good today.  Things started out a little rocky, sleepily, hangovery.  I was getting the stink-eye from the dog for taking my sweet time coming home last night.  But halfway into my first cup of tea, the sun cracked through.  I was listening to some radio coverage of Obama's train tour down to DC for the inauguration.  

I thought about the day Nelson Mandela was let out of prison.  It is the only time I remember being told to watch television.  My dad sat me down and said something like, "someday you'll be glad you saw this."  And I am.  It is such a simple thing to watch a man walking.  But at that moment, what it meant...  I'm proud to have been a young witness to that instant that things got a little better with the world. 

I look forward to watching the inauguration on Tuesday.  I look forward to one day sitting my kid on my knee and telling about it.

I admit, I can get pretty damn cynical about human nature.  I think it is too easy for people to be bad to each other.  But this widespread hope is just plain contagious.

See Dick Learn.

I'm just out of class this evening.  It is a late one.  Listening to a little Iggy Pop.  Tea.  About to dive in to some not-so-lite reading.  

A discussion that happened today was a little befuddling.  Somehow the class topic ended up on the conservation--or not--of the spotted owl and its habitat, or the timber industry's harvesting of its habitat.

One enlightened voice, I'll call him Dick, said, "Why not just put the owl in a zoo and then cut all the trees down?  That way everyone could at least see it."

I wonder what it will take to get people to understand that 'natural resource' is not a another way of saying 'rape-able.'  Sustainability is just another polysyllabic word Dick doesn't bother to look up.  

Dick is a moron but he isn't alone.

I run across this sort of thing daily.  It is terrifying to think that this is the future.  That these kids are going to run the world one day.  They aren't learning anything more than what daddy taught them from his Lay-z-boy.  They are only learning how to be better at it.  And they have the immediate gratification that if they do have the chance to chop down a tree, it'll buy them a new H3.  Anyone for progress?

Not only does Dick's mentality exist here, it persists and breeds.  The governor and state legislature just went through another round of budget cuts.  Higher education is absolutely fucked.  Our university is now looking like it could be $50+ mil in the hole.  Profs are getting notice, quality of education is bound to suffer.

Trickle down values.  Thanks folks.  We'll just keep cranking out Dicks.

Traveling With Controlled Substances

Where do I start?  2009 is an infant at this stage, and I'm already understanding just how much of a bitch she's gonna grow up to be.  Don't get me wrong.  As hard as it seems now, most of it is probably going to be worthwhile.  

On my to-do list this year:  Graduate from University, find a good masters program, figure out how to pay for it, get a divorce, travel to far off places, make bicycles go fast while I'm there, enjoy my friends, write until the keys on my computer beg for mercy, ride on two wheels, get the hell out of the south, make lemonade from lemons...  You get it.

Funny enough, I'm most preoccupied with traveling with controlled substances.  See, as a race mechanic I'm expected to have all the glue and lubricant my team needs.  The MSDSs say air travel in certain quantities is ok, but it still makes flying a bit of a pucker.  And all the class acts in blue shirts at the airport don't offer much help on the matter.  So, that's a project for this spring.  Figuring it all out.  And maybe there is a lesson in there somewhere:  Figuring out how to not let your team down while you watch your own ass.

Over and out

Dirty South

In the south, everyone calls you honey or sweetie.  What an ego boost.  My mail carrier called me sweetie today.  How flattering.  Maybe I should buy her chocolates.