June 21

Well vacation's done and I'm back at work.  The wife is now in DC, at a conference.  I'm pushing the boulder back up the hill again, after a long time ignoring both boulder and hill.

Yesterday a long work day.  After a week or so away it went slowly.  So much I realize is kept in my head usually--about what's going on, what's supposed to happen at set parts--that coming back after a time away involves not just going back to the problem(s) to solve but refamiliarizing myself with the whole contraption, as it were, of the play.

Bink has been exhausted since we got him from the vet.  Yesterday I started to be worried that he was TOO tired--even he usually doesn't sleep all day.  Without the wife here to consult with my paranoia tends to grow.  Another of the many benefits of not being alone--keeping you grounded in reality.  In fact, the Bink was just tired but I couldn't help checking up on him as he slept in various points and positions throughout the day, making sure he was still breathing.  Which is somewhat odd.  Strange that I would worry about him sleeping, something I usually wish he did more of (especially when I work).  Any variation from routine seems ominous, I guess.

Have joined audible.com and am enjoying the new frontier of books on tape.  Walking about 45 minutes a day, it's astonishing how much 'reading' you can get through.  My first book was Jeeves in the Morning; now that I'm done with it I've moved on to something more ambitious (and much longer)--Tom Jones.  So far, it's been excellent.  It's also something like 60 or 70 hours long (in three parts) so it should last me the better part of the summer.  And it's a book I've never read.  Nor really ever wanted to (strongly).  I picked it to listen to because it came highly rated on the audible web site.  So far, I'm not disappointed, although I do miss Cecil Beaton imitating Jeeves' voice.  One benefit of listening to a book (not reading it) is that it's impossible to skim.  I realize, as I walk, that I have a tendancy to not attend too carefully to passages I either find difficult or tedious.  Listening that's not possible.  You 'read' every word.  With Wodehouse that was an undoubted benefit; he puts so much care into his language that missing even a word or two really matters.  I think it will hold true with Fielding as well (though I've already noticed a tendency to repeat himself and overlabor certain ironies--something more common in the 18th century, it seems to me.  It's as if irony needed to be more explained because people weren't so used to it.)

No tutoring for the next month at least so it's time to really work.  And diet.  Those are two big agendas for the next few months.

June 8

This will be my last post for the next week.  We're going tomorrow to Houston, for a wedding, after which time we're going to Puerto Rico for a vacation.  The vacation will involve lying in the sun, drinking things with Rum in them, playing low stakes roulette and, undoubtedly, bacon.  (The breakfast near where we stay is one of the main attractions of the trip).  My nascent diet will have to be put on hold for the next week.  But that's okay.  I've already lost a few pounds and I'm confident I can return to LA and get back to it without any hiccups.

Sadly, the Binks is going to have to be boarded during all this--at the NEW KENNEL.  We've been acclimating him by taking him to the new place once a week for the last month.  Hopefully he'll be able to bear it without being too upset.  We are already the both of us fairly upset.  He's so small and helpless!  How will he hold up with all the other dogs?  What if one of them picks on him?  What if he forgets to drink water?  What if he gets lonely in the night?  What if he thinks we've abandoned him forever?  What if the kennel where he's staying is invaded by an alien race and it's up to him to push the one button that will send them back to their home world but he hasn't gotten enough sleep and he pushes the wrong button, the one that lets them take over our planet?

It's all very worrying.

June 6

Watched The Long Good Friday last night, starring a young Bob Hoskins and Helen Mirren.  A british gangster tries to go legit by interesting American investors in a project to turn parts of London into a site for the '88 Olympics.  The story and style were hit and miss for me (great late 70s keyboard parts, however) but the acting--especially that of Hoskins--was spot on.  Something about watching a British gangster movie makes me want to start calling my phone "the blower."  "Get on the blower to Tommy and tell him we need shooters," is the kind of thing one wants to say, having seen a movie like that.

Listening to Jeeves in the Morning on my walk right now.  A long-ago gift given by Johannes.  The older I get the more I admire PG Wodehouse's prose style.   The high tone and convoluted diction is meant as a joke, of course, but that doesn't make accomplishing it any less difficult.  Wodehouse gets it right every time; he's a great crafter of sentences, among his many other virtues.

Our tecate tile back patio is currently being cleaned and treated by a workman.  How does the Monster feel about this, you might ask?  Not good.  He is yowling and whimpering vociferously from the other room.  It's a hard life, being a small bear.  Only you can detect the danger that lurks in the hearts of the people your foolish owners let into your backyard.  The price of freedom, as The Binks reminds me often, is eternal vigilance.  Also, huge amounts of sleep.  And treats.  But mostly, eternal vigilance.

Sunday June 5

Twice in the last two weeks the wife and I have spent close to 300$ on dinner for two.  Last night it was at Providence, a highly rated and regarded LA seafood restaurant.  (Seems like it maybe aspires to be the Le Bernadin of LA?)  And like last week, the meal did not come close to living up to its billing.  Was it good? Absolutely.  Were there moments of brilliance?  Yes: there were moments.  But for that amount of money, I don't want moments of brilliance: I want only brilliance.  I don't want dry duck or octopus that's rubbery.  I want perfection.  And this was not perfection.  Not even close.

So, that makes me kind of grouchy.  I feel like I've been suckered, slightly.  But oh well.  What can I do?  And the service, I must say, was impeccable.  As you would expect.

I want to write about the moving and fascinating This American Life I listened to yesterday while walking (4.5 miles) but I don't have energy now.  If you go to their website, where you can download all their episodes to listen to, it's called something to the effect of "If Kids Ruled The World."  It was put out in the last year and was absolutely first-rate.  Highly highly recommended.  Moving and funny and thought-provoking.  Great great stuff.

Day 88

Listened to a fascinating "This American Life" yesterday (part of my walking regimen: walk a few miles, and listen to TAL).  The subject was tenacity; people who don't give up, who refuse to give up, even when all available evidence suggests that they really really should.  The most interesting story was about a guy in Orange County who thought, when Conan O Brien left NBC, that he might try and be his replacement.  To get the job, he decided to start his own talk show.  In his house.  (His bedroom, actually).  Which he did.  It ran for more than two years, and involved a house band, writers to do monologues, guests, a sidekick, and, eventually, an audience numbering as high as 70 or 80 people.  (They eventually moved from his bedroom to a Veteran's Hall).  He quit his job, depsite not having much savings, and dedicated all his time and energy to the talk show.  In the process, he almost wrecked his marriage, went heavily into debt, and, as you might guess, did not end up replacing Conan.  Insane insane stuff.  (The show by the way was called The Duke Finemaster show, and apparently exists on YouTube).

Watched Fassbinder's "The Marriage Of Maria Braun" yesterday as well.  A bit too random in structure for me--biographical obviously, but still--but still worth the time.  Fassbinder is a director I know very little about.

How the Mavericks managed to win that game yesterday I don't know.  All I know is that it made me excited enough that I was actually shouting inside our house, at ten in the evening.  I'm not even that big a basketball fan.  It was just a great game.  And it at least gave us all in the good part of America hope that the Heat might have a chance to lose.  And suffer for their sins.

Day 87

Woken by prolonged and unsettled howling.  Thought for sure the house was being broken into.  Of course it wasn't.  Apparently another dog a few blocks off had started barking and Binks, in a show of solidarity, had thought it best to bark along with him.  For twenty minutes.  Loudly.  I was in the middle of a vivid dream involving training to teach middle school at my old Houston area school.  For months I had been trailing around a middle school geometry teacher, helping her in the classroom, and trying to learn how to be a good teacher.  Then, when filling out my evaluation, my mentor teacher informed she had debated between giving me "twos or ones" but decided to give me all ones.  She THEN told me that ones were the worst rating there was.  I had no future as a teacher, that was the basic gist.  It was very unsettling.  A large amount of my dreams seem to involve failure.  Is this common?

The Stephen J Gould book (The Flamingo's Smile) continues to be excellent.  Fascinating essay last night about the way flamingos eat by turning their heads upside down to dip them in water.  Upside down eating posture explains their strange smile, in which the lower and upper jaw seem to be reversed.  I also learned that flamingos eat in much the same way as great whales, by using filters in their mouth to remove tiny particulate foodstuff from the water.  Their tongues are thick and fleshy (unusual for most birds, who tend to have thin, stringy tongues) in order to aid in the filtering process.

Long day of errands yesterday will give way to long day of work today.  Doctor went fine (although I learned I now weight close to 200 pounds!), tux place went fine, it all went fine.  Now it's time for TCOB.

Day 86

I've gone to an every other day type posting deal as some may have noticed.  Try and contain your sorrow and despair at not reading me every day.  It's hard but it'll get better.

Doctor's appointment today to get me some more of that good thyroid medicine I love so much.  That means today will be another day of errands, since I do have other things to do (get contacts, pick up tux alteration, buy new mustache wax) and since the doctor's thing already comes in my sweet spot for writing.  It's my 2:30-5:30 work, after I've run, when I've got some endorphins when the morning's thinking starts to yield results.  Sometimes.  So today is another day off, of which I've had too many.  But it must be done.

Heat's win seemed inevitable last night.  They played the same as in Chicago.  They hang around for three quarters, doing nothing spectacular but keeping close enough to prevent a blowout.  Then, come fourth quarter, they unleash their superstars.  Dallas had all kinds of chances to put the game away before then--for all the talk about the Heat's stifling defense the Mavs had a TON of open looks--but it didn't happen.  Too many turnovers and too many missed shots.  I'm starting to worry it's going to be Heat in four or five.  At least give us a series, Mavs!

I wonder if LeBron genuinely regrets "The Decision."  If he could do it all again, would he do the big public announcement?  And if the answer is 'no' is it because he actually gets why people found it so galling, or just because, having seen the negative reaction, he doesn't want to repeat it.  Like a small child who touches something hot--he may not understand why he got burned but he knows he doesn't want to do it again.

Also let me say I really like the Breen/Jackson/Van Gundy announcing team.  Their personalities mesh very well.  Van Gundy can be ridiculous--the lengths he'll go to apologize for or otherwise excuse star players never cease to amaze--but he knows the game and he's funny.  Mark Jackson always seems to be auditioning for a coaching job with his commentary but oddly I find that endearing.  And Breen does a nice job of mediating between the two, occasionally provoking and sometimes conciliating.  I wish they called baseball too.  Maybe I'd watch more games.

Day 84

Worked most of yesterday, into the night.  New ideas getting harder and harder to come by.  Earlier, when I said I'd solved all big problems: that was incorrect.  Turns out a small crack can hide a big chasm.  But that chasm is being filled.  Thought by thought, agonizing intuition after agonizing wiping out of prior agonizing intuition.

A break is needed.

New books arrived, including The Flamingo's Smile, a collection of essays by Stephen Jay Gould.  Don't know why, but I've never read any of his material before (maybe an odd piece in the New Yorker).  So far I'm thrilled with the book.  I'm more interested in natural history/popular science these days, and Gould is about the best writer in that genre I've found.  Also, the fact that it's a book of essays makes it easy to dip in and out of.  (I also started The Myth of Sisyphus, but that's clearly going to require more concentration.)

Tutoring all afternoon.  Then, leftover pozole.  Got a great new recipe.  Stewed pork!  It's what's for dinner....

Day 82

Woken this morning by loud and prolonged howling.  Wife got up and for some reason left the Monster out to run around (his usual routine is to go back in kitchen lair rest area after wife wakes up and feeds).  He sat by the window, I guess, and got angry at the cats.  Too much yowling.

Finished two books yesterday--The Comedians and The Ghost Soldiers. The latter got better the more I read it; the former did not.  I'm trying to finish the Eco book but the writing is so poor it's difficult.  It actually makes me angry this book was reviewed as well as it was.  It reads as if it were written by a computer program trying to mimic English--a computer program written by someone who doesn't speak English, even.  It's filled with all sorts of glaring grammatic errors, and the prose style is muddy and awkward beyond belief.  Half the time I read it I honestly can't figure out what the meaning is supposed to be, so poorly phrased is so much of it.   How could anyone recommend this book?

I ordered nine more books online yesterday.  Tried to start reading Passage To India yesterday but it didn't do much for me.  Maybe another time.  I've ordered a lot of books on genes and natural history; I think it's time to read some non fiction.

Diet continues.  No alcohol and long walks in morning (plus cardio, etc).  I feel like I'm fighting a war against my stomach.  Every day I look down at him like he's an arch enemy.  Eventually he will be defeated.  But he is a wily and relentless opponent--he won't go quietly.

Day 80

Going to get my tux altered for an upcoming wedding I had the unpleasant experience of learning that I have gained so much weight that the pants are beyond alteration.  Sweet lord how depressing.  I started a diet last week but I guess it'll take a long long time to get down to where I was when I married.  I've been trying to find a tennis clinic group out here but the coach keeps offering me times that conflict with my tutoring.  I think he's given up on me as a result.  The real key for me is eating dinner no later than 6:30.  That, however, is often not possible if I want to eat with the wife.  Stephen Fry seems to have a lost a lot of weight by walking every day.  Maybe that's a way to go.  Not that I don't exercise.  I do.  But clearly I need to do more.  How else will I be able to appear in Milan for the 2012 collections?

Day 79

The End of the Affair

When we last left our hero (and Johannes) they were sitting in their rental house reading and waiting to go back to the concert venue.  We were both of us, I think, steeling ourselves for a fairly unpleasant concert.

And then we got there.

And it was fine.  Better than fine...it was outstanding.  The wind, while not completely gone, had subsided enough to be pleasant.  The music was underway, and it was excellent.  El Ten Eleven, the first band we saw, consists of only a drummer and a guitar/bassist.  The guy (let's call him the bassist, since that's his primary wombat) plays a riff to the drums and loops them into a pedal.  The riff repeats and he plays a new riff over it.  Pretty soon a fairly complicated set of interlocking patterns has built up from all that looping.  (He alternates between guitar and bass while effecting his loops, using a double-neck instrument for most of the set).  The songs build slowly, gathering in intensity as the loops accumulate.  Then, inevitably, he does something that strips away all but one or two of the built-up loops.  The tension subsides, and then there's another round of loop-building.

Some of the songs do tend to sound alike.  But the thrill of watching Kristian (that's the loop-builder's name) build up each new song from nothing was significant.  He was also plainly very happy to be up there performing and his joy rubbed off on the crowd.  Neither J or I was necessarily expecting that El Ten Eleven would put on a great live show.  But in fact, they did.

After El Ten Eleven came Rubblebucket, a Brooklyn-based band which featured a horn section, eight or nine members, and a lot of uptempo craziness.  

The El Ten Eleven experience was about standing and listening.  The Rubblebucket experience was about dancing.  Sadly for everyone there are no pictures of me dancing.  But dance I did.  Because that is what I am all about.  

Rubblebucket was a more satisfying live music experience, for me, than El Ten Eleven.  They got the crowd riled up, they laid down some grooves, they had a trumpet player who did some body-surfing in the crowd while he played.  They had a percussionist.  It was high-energy stuff.  Great ending to the show.

I'm going to pass over the EmCee who asked us to observe a moment of silence so we could 'feel the desert' and then told us to try and practice "Wishcraft."  (By praying for world peace or some such).  Certain kinds of hippies can actually make me want to vocally support war.  He was one of them.

On the way out, we stopped at the shrine that had somehow been assembled in the middle of the music area.  It's hard to do justice to its good-natured insanity in only a few photos.  But I'll try:

The large figure in the center is the Virgin Mary.  The other figures around her are..uhm...NOT the Virgin Mary.

On the way out Johannes insisted we stop and take a photo of an airplane that someone had mounted near the entrance of their property.  Apparently, in doing so, he fell over and ended up rolling around in the dust.  Sadly I missed that spectacle. 

That night we ate leftovers, watched True Grit, and generally chilled out.   I learned J thinks Matt Damon is a bad actor.  He learned that I disagreed.  We agreed, as I recall, that I was right.  About that, and just about everything else.

The next morning we got up, cleaned, and headed out.  (Finishing off a few of the blueberry muffins I'd made before we left).  I dropped J off at the Palm Springs airport and headed back.