You are browsing the archive for 2007 November.

I Really Did My Best

November 30, 2007 in Blogs

Someone significant is in jail tonight. To some degree it is my fault–I was unable to keep him out, despite putting a significant amount of time and effort into the task. It also fell to me to deliver him at the scheduled time. Although the appeal is pending, the courts rejected the motion for a stay of the sentence pending appeal.

I might also be driving one of my sons to his brother’s later tonight, and am trying to work out the scheduling for delivering a guest back to her school in a timely manner, but those have been lower on the priorities list.

I’m not feeling too good about all this, but trying to keep going with my other obligations.

–M. J. Young

Tuesday Plus Tuesday Equals Foursday

November 29, 2007 in Blogs

I got shorted on sleep last night. It is entirely my own fault–I knew that I had to get to bed, but I put on a tape of an Inspector Lindley Mystery that I had failed to watch several times, and then instead of falling asleep during it I stayed awake through it. This was despite my full knowledge that I would need to get an early start this morning in order to handle the details related to the appeal of last night’s court decision. We wanted to talk with a lawyer before proceeding. The bad news is that he did not agree to represent us through the appeals process; the good news is that he looked over the filings I’d drafted and said they looked good, and didn’t charge us anything for that. I then put several hours into making that happen, and will have to do a bit more legwork tomorrow to finalize it.

The truck is back. I’ve a number of other errands, not yet finalized, to accomplish tomorrow, but I’ll describe those that need description at that time. Meanwhile, I’m having trouble keeping track in my own mind both day and date, and have wondered several times why I was doing whatever on either a different day or a different date than actual. That suggests I’m really too tired for much of anything–but hopefully I do not have to do much of anything more, and it’s early enough that perhaps I will get my rest before it’s too late.

–M. J. Young

When In Romans

November 28, 2007 in Blogs

I did a fair bit of printing last night, covering the last maybe three hundred of the nearly nine hundred pages that comprise my Romans notes. When I do two-sided printing, the printer program ties up the screen for long periods, and I can’t really do anything else on the computer (a definite design flaw–it’s telling me to turn over pages that the computer thinks have finished printing but the printer hasn’t yet done). Thus while I babysat the printing process I also continued the editing process.

I also had to take someone to court tonight; it did not go well, and I’ve started working on paperwork for an appeal, but my wife has decided to bring in an attorney on this. That means my schedule tomorrow has gotten more complicated. However, I did more editing in the courtroom while waiting for the case to be called.

I posted the new character generation thread for our Multiverser forum game; I also called the mechanic, who told me that the truck would be ready late this afternoon, but that was too late for me to pick it up and be at court on schedule, so I’ll have to get it in the morning.

In other news, there is something of an unofficial announcement that there will be at least one more and possibly three more Terminator movies; here’s hoping they just go for the neat high-tech war stuff and stay out of time travel as much as possible, since (as I say in my Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines analysis) they’ve managed to resolve everything temporally, and anything more is likely to bring the entire story crashing down. Otherwise, I might have to add a rather scathing commentary to the Temporal Anomalies site.

I’ve more paperwork to do tonight; really, I’m trying to get my brain to relax a bit, so I’m doing this as filler. But I have to do this, too, so I’ll be bouncing back and forth for a while, I expect.

–M. J. Young

And All That Jazz

November 27, 2007 in Blogs

I got in late from my anniversary dinner to find a message from one of the ushers at our wedding. I’d like to say he remembered our anniversary, but the truth is he recently found my web pages (through the songs, I think–he was drummer in The Last Psalm back in the early seventies) and has called a couple times, and when he got someone else here he was told that we were out celebrating the wedding he attended thirty-one years ago. I returned his call, because he has emphasized that he is always up late, and indeed he was up and chatted with me for quite a while. Eventually he was asking about the books and the Multiverser game, and I have promised him that today I will set up the character generation thread for him, and he has promised that he will call me around ten tonight to walk him through it–he knows so little about role playing games that he thought Dungeons & Dragons™ was originally a card game. So I’ve a bit of extra work on my plate, but a new gamer on the way. I’m toying with running him in a world I’ve never even thought of running before, but it’s going to take me a bit of scrambling to put it together. Anyone know anything about the history of Bourbon Street Jazz?

Meanwhile, the car is back, brakes repaired; the truck will be another day, hopefully not more than that.

–M. J. Young

I Hesitate to Report

November 26, 2007 in Blogs

There is really not much to say today. I am told that the truck might be ready tomorrow morning, and that the car will also be done by the afternoon, so here’s hoping at least one of them is right; we had to return the borrowed van this morning and borrow a houseguest’s car for an hour, but now I’m piloting a rental boat–seriously, I’ve been driving minivans for the past several years, and this thing feels huge. Actually, it’s as if it’s bigger on the outside than it is on the inside, to reverse the famed comment about a more flexible vehicle. When I’m standing next to it, I feel as if it’s really huge, but when I’m inside it I don’t really have the sense of roominess inside.

I was thinking that I really had nothing to report here. I fell asleep early last night, awoke in the middle of the night and saw to a few things, then went back to bed, got up to roust the schoolboy, then went back to bed. I think I’m well rested, although my body seems to be fighting something. I didn’t watch anything I needed to watch, but then I’ve not yet moved the DVD player back to the bedroom. I did take my mother-in-law shopping, which took up a fair chunk of the evening. I’ve got a dinner date after work tonight, to celebrate our thirty-first anniversary (I hope I’ve done the math aright), and she expects to be out on time so I really don’t have much time to finish what’s on my plate as it is. So it’s a day with little to report.

However, when I arrived to write this blog, the site software informed me that there was an incoming link to the site from a source with a rather disturbingly vulgar name–at least, to me. It turns out to be a blog by one of our gamers, linking to his game thread here at Gaming Outpost–one of Scott’s people, not mine, although that doesn’t really make a difference. I’m not sure I understand the logic of the vulgarity, although perhaps it is his first blog entry and he’s hoping it will show up in search engines and get him some readers. Probably if it works, they won’t be back.

Anyway, as mentioned, I don’t have a lot of time. I’d better use it well.

–M. J. Young

Primer on Disasters

November 25, 2007 in Blogs

I have continued to fight my way through the analysis of Primer, writing as I reason, and challenging my understanding of the film with each step. I need to view it again before I can finish it, because there is an extended segment about a guy with a shotgun at a party that I’ve not quite fit into the story yet.

I have also started on Lake House. It seems that on Friday night, my college son and his girlfriend decided they wanted to watch it, so I opened it and set it up. Then her phone rang, and he decided to get something else done while she was on the phone, and I decided to get something else done while awaiting them, and in the end she fell asleep on the couch and he decided not to watch it. I watched more than half an hour of it, but had to run a scheduled errand and never got back to it. However, it is already interesting, even if part of my interest stems from the fact that I was told something about it in advance which informs my understanding of one of the earliest scenes in the film. I’m already labeling it “Frequency by mail”, because it has that aspect of sending information through time.

Meanwhile, our intended Collision rehearsal collapsed, because the brakes on the new car quit, apparently blowing a major leak in the line to the rear brakes. My houseguests have concluded that this is not something they can fix here without a lift, so we are temporarily without a vehicle. On the other hand, they don’t think it will take long for a mechanic to fix it tomorrow, so that’s the plan.

In the midst of this, our washing machine decided to start spewing water onto the floor. This created a serious complication, as my wife has to have clean uniforms for work every day, and that includes doing laundry before tomorrow afternoon–not to mention that everyone else in the house needs clothes as well. Fortunately, our houseguests were able to find and repair that problem, so this is up and running. I must also extend my thanks to Grey Vanaman of Audio-clear, who has extended to us the use of one of his equipment transport vans to handle our necessary transportation.

I need to get a few things done before I lose the light, and figure out what I’m making for dinner, but hopefully I should be back to the forums before long.

–M. J. Young

Undertow

November 23, 2007 in Blogs

There is a moment in the surf when one wave is still receding and the next is starting to advance. It’s an odd moment, because it seems quiet, and yet there is a lot of power and chaos around it.

That is today. I am reflecting in the back of my mind on what is happening, and it is as if coming out of Thanksgiving nothing is happening; yet everything is happening.

I put Primer in again last night. It seems to be taking too long to analyze, but I shut it off before it ended–or rather, I walked out of the room and turned my attention to things that did not require my attention so that I could think about it. In essence, I realized a critical point I had not yet resolved. I have now started writing the web page, although I’m going to have to do a lot more thinking and at least some more viewing before I have a complete page.

I also gave Baxter a call, and Collision is tentatively practicing tomorrow afternoon. He’s going to see whether he can get hold of Brittany and/or Kevin, but we’re planning to work together whether or not that happens.

I’ve got church tonight, but things are moving along.

–M. J. Young

The Giving of Thanks

November 22, 2007 in Blogs

It is part of our family tradition at Thanksgiving that as we gather to eat, each person (beginning with the youngest) states something for which he is thankful. Although I am not the oldest every time, I am last, which puts me at the disadvantage that all the easy things have been taken. However, I have much for which to be thankful this year. The new furnace is working, the new car passed inspection, and the family is all healthy enough to gather with our houseguests for another celebration.

Let me apologize to our Canadian friends and any from abroad for missing their appropriate holidays this year, and then say to all those in these United States:

Happy Thanksgiving.

–M. J. Young

Not Entirely Thankful Yet

November 21, 2007 in Blogs

The heat is on, in more ways than one. John is here, ready to start working on tomorrow’s feast; the furnace was installed this morning sometime, and seems to be fully functional just as we are headed into our first brushes with zero celsius weather out here. the new car went through inspection with flying colors, and I’ve already gotten word that kids are collecting for the purpose of descending upon us. I even got to the store to buy the extra dinner plates I knew I would need.

However, I am already tired, and there are still multiple tasks ahead. I might have gotten an hour of fitful sleep before rousting the youngest for school this morning, and then maybe two more hours before the banging of workmen in the basement (admitted by John, who rarely sleeps and drinks coffee abundantly) moved me to the living room, where I think I slept again for another hour before beginning a very disrupted routine. The boy missed the bus going in and coming back, and I couldn’t find him when I went to get him. The home hostess has planned to make pies when she gets home from work tonight, and needs me to pick up a few things not previously mentioned. My neck is sore and my eyes heavy, but I’ve got work to do if things are going to work tonight.

In the midst of this, I’m still working on the regular work. It’s not really too late, all things considered.

In case I do not get back here tomorrow, and also for all those Americans who do not, Happy Thanksgiving.

–M. J. Young

Thankfully Closer

November 20, 2007 in Blogs

Some of yesterday’s errands required follow-up today, including cancelling that order. There is some irony in the fact that although I took both my mother-in-law and my wife to the store last night, both of them managed to forget to bring the free turkey coupon they had earned by shopping. My mother-in-law will thus not get hers, but she was going to give it away to us anyway, and we already have turkeys in our freezer we can’t use so we were probably going to give it to the church to give to a family in greater need than ourselves. Today I took our coupon and picked up our turkey.

I could make a crack about picking up turkeys, but it would be unkind and untrue; I need to make a long trip to get John. Were I to say he will be helping us prepare Thanksgiving dinner, I would be underestimating his contribution–it will be I helping him, I am certain. The five hour round trip is going to take a chunk from my busiest night, but there’s nothing for it. I’d considered picking him up tomorrow, but the heating contractor called today and said he would be installing the new furnace tomorrow, so that’s several major projects added to the middle of the week, and I’m going to need John all the more for it. Even now, kids are moving things in the basement to create access, and dinner is about to come out of the oven, and I am almost ready for my mission.

My wife is ill tonight, so I will be making the trek solo on the outward journey; this will give me opportunity to review music in my mind, I expect, perhaps even to sing some of it. Baxter and I have been having trouble arranging a meet between ourselves, and the more so because we want to include Brittany and Adam so we can get a solid start on Collision, but at least I’ll have a good handle on the repertoire myself by the time we start.

–M. J. Young