Thanks to Wordpress and its myriad nifty features and plugins, I’ve not only re-enabled comments but I’ve also figured out how to keep certain topics out of the public realm entirely. I really had a lot of hesitation migrating to Wordpress at first in large part because I had written my own CMS called Chatterbox using a combination of Perl and PHP. I’d put a lot of hours into developing it. The plan was to eventually integrate the CMS with my image management system called Imagesource, which Lisa Whiteman was kind enough to beta test for me (and which she is still using to power her fantastic portfolio, Lisa Whiteman Lens). But earlier this year I started futzing around with Wordpress, getting it set up at another site. That migration proved to be painless enough on the Wordpress end that I decided to set it up at my own site and put Chatterbox to rest. For the first few months I didn’t take advantage of fully half the features, and I’d never once looked through the plugins database to see what added functionality the Wordpress community had to offer. But now I have, and Wordpress is working flawlessly … and suddenly this is starting to sound like viral marketing so I guess I should stop. Anyway, as you were.

Every morning I receive an e-mail from the assistant to the State Archivist with the subject Today’s Calendar. This is a procedure that was implemented a few years ago in an attempt to keep those of us in the Archives, Reference and Information Services department well-informed. I usually don’t read it very thoroughly because I don’t interact much with people outside my immediate vicinity. But this morning I read it quite well. I was looking for this:

Nov. 2008
24:  Michael out
25:  Michael out
26:  Michael out
27:  Thanksgiving Day holiday - agency closed
28:  Thanksgiving holiday - agency closed

Dec. 2008:
01:  Michael out

Yes. I will be out. More later.

I took Emma to Bouldin Creek Coffeehouse tonight. My plan was to take some pictures and read a little. I’ve been working on Middlesex for well over a month now and I was kind of hoping to get at least halfway through. I’d made it about five pages and had almost finished my Italian soda when a woman sat down two tables away from me. She had with her what I think were two German Shepherd puppies, probably about eight or nine months old. Emma started tugging against her leash and when she realized she couldn’t get away from me to greet the other dogs she started whimpering and finally barking. Not annoyingly really, although I started to get nervous that it would become annoying if I couldn’t get her to stop. Before I could calm her down, the woman got up and brought her dogs over.

“Can they meet him?” she asked.

“She’s a her, and I think so!” I said. Emma hadn’t been nose to nose with another dog since I brought her home, and I wasn’t sure how she’d handle it. “I’ve only had her a week and she hasn’t met any other dogs yet, so I’ll have to keep a close watch.”

Nervously holding her leash I let Emma meet the two puppies who were actually a little bigger than Emma despite their youth. They sniffed, pawed, and rubbed up against one another. I thought how funny it would be if two humans did that to each other when they met for the first time. Of course, I didn’t say this out loud. The woman was quite cute, I’m guessing in her mid-thirties, and that would have been a pretty weird thing to say to a cute stranger, right? Right.

“So you’ve only had her a week? Is she a rescue dog?”

“I got her from Town Lake,” I said.

The woman sat down at my table, and while her dogs and my dog got to know each other, she and I continued to talk. I kept looking down at Emma, who had managed to tangle herself up in her leash no less than three times in the span of about a minute. My conversation with the woman lasted about ten minutes. We talked about how hyper puppies and Jack Russells are, about kennels (I’m thinking I’m going to have to get a kennel for Emma on account of the considerable damage she’s doing to my house while I’m at work), and we talked about how much fun her dogs had at the lake today.

By that time, Emma had climbed into my lap and the woman stood up to leave. “It was nice to meet you,” she said, even though we never officially met. “You, too!” I said. And then she and her puppies were gone. I put my stuff back into my bag, and as I headed to my car I wondered if that woman ever would have come up to talk to me had it not been for Emma. I’ve heard people say that dogs can be great social ice breakers but I never thought to put it to the test. I’d have to say those people are right.

The conversation drifted from rumors of a new Conan the Barbarian movie (ugh) to John Milius (who directed the original Conan in 1982) to Walter Sobchak (who is based on John Milius). Then came random quotes from Conan interspersed with random quotes from The Big Lebowski. It was all very disconcerting.

“A guy goes nuts if he ain’t got nobody. Don’t make no difference who the guy is, long’s he’s with you. I tell ya, I tell ya,” he cried, “I tell ya a guy gets lonely, an’ he gets sick.” Ben quotes Of Mice and Men to Sawyer in the last minutes of Every Man For Himself.

Today, I got a dog. Her name is Emma. She’s a three-year-old Jack Russell mix I adopted from the Town Lake Animal Center (her name at the Center was Lilah. I have nothing against the name Lilah, but I prefer Emma). She’s super affectionate yet fiercely independent. So far, I haven’t heard her bark, but I’m sure I will. So far, I haven’t let her roam my enclosed backyard off-leash, but I’m sure, in time, I will. I’m her third owner. The counselor at the Center speculated that she may have a secret life as an escape artist, so until I’m certain that she cannot get out I’m not going to leave her in the backyard unsupervised.

Some thoughts about Emma: she is almost the same coloring as my former dog, Miles; her tail is curly; she’s skinny, like me, but I’m sure that will change soon because I’ll probably give her treats just for wagging her tail (not really, settle down); she’s got long legs and two people think she’s got some Greyhound in her; I like her a lot; the kids like her a lot; and, perhaps most importantly, she seems to find the three of us to be fairly tolerable company.

I’ll get right to the point: zip up your pants before you step away from the urinal. The entryway to the bathroom at my doctor’s office is narrow. When you first walk in, there is a privacy wall right in front of you. You have to veer to the left into order to reach the sinks or the urinals. This little jog is about as wide as the door itself, which means it’s not very wide. If you think about it, rarely do two people try to pass through a doorway at the same time, right? I mean, if you open a door and someone’s on the other side coming toward you, one of you will usually step aside to let the other person through, right? Now, imagine you’ve just walked into the bathroom and are heading into this narrow jog. Imagine also that there is a large man there, on his way out of the bathroom. Finally, imagine, if you can, that his hands are fumbling over his crotch. See, he neglected to zip up his zipper while he was standing at the urinal, and so now the two of you are face to face in this tight little jog in the entryway. You try to think fast but you’re having trouble because there’s this huge guy there playing with his goddam zipper. You think about turning around and exiting the bathroom, just to give the guy some space. But then you think that maybe you can just squeeze up against the wall and let him pass. So you do that, and all seems to go okay for a second, but then, still having trouble with his zipper, the huge guy decides to engage you in conversation. So there the two of you are, skinny ol’ you plastered up against the wall hoping to god this guy doesn’t whip it back out for some insane reason, and he’s there talking to you about the weather. The weather! Finally, barely audible over the sounds of his huffing and puffing, you hear a labored zzzzzzzzzzzip!

And let’s just nevermind the fact that he didn’t wash his hands, okay? I’d really rather not think about it.

If you haven’t seen Lost yet but want to, stop reading now. I’m about to spoil some surprises.

First off, I finally figured out where I’ve seen Ana-Lucia. She’s played by Michelle Rodriguez from Girlfight! During that whole flirting scene with Jack at the airport bar I kept trying to place her and I finally did. Of course, it sucks that she appears to be siding with “the others.” But one thing I’m slowly figuring out about Lost is that you can’t trust initial feelings about a character. For example, in Tabula Rasa, Locke finds Vincent and then tells Michael so he can be the one to return the dog to Walt. We get the sense that Locke is this highly compassionate guy, but then that episode ends on a close up of Locke watching Michael and Walt. The eerie music and the dark expression on Locke’s face suggest something sinister is about to happen and that Locke really isn’t the nice guy we were led to believe. And part-way through season two, I’m still conflicted over Locke. While I still think he’s mostly benign, we keep getting hints that there’s something not-quite-right about him. Jack is really starting to distrust him now and frankly, I think I am, too.

Another example of why I don’t trust my initial impressions: Sawyer. I really loathed him in the beginning, but I’m starting to get to know him now and I think he’s an okay guy. He may have a rough exterior and some unconventional methods, but from our discovery of his letter to the disagnosis of far-sightedness and then to his battle with Michael on the raft after Walt’s abduction, we find out that there’s a human in there after all. And so while I’m a little disturbed that Ana-Lucia seems to be in cahoots with “the others,” I’m going to reserve judgment about her until I know more. The main “other” guy, I guess his name is Mr. Eko, seems to speak fluent English which leads me to believe he’s not part of some indigenous tribe from the island but that he, like everyone else, wound up here by some freak accident. I really want to know what his story is.

Speaking of others ending up on the island, I don’t know if I like the Desmond connection. I like the character just fine but I guess maybe it would have been more dramatic for me had he been introduced earlier, like in season one. Know what I mean? Maybe if the tour de stade scene had been a few episodes before we see him again, which would have given me the chance to have forgotten about him, it would be been more surprising. But we were introduced to him via flashback in Man of Science, Man of Faith and he says, “See you in another life,” and then half an hour later, there he is inside the hatch. It just seemed a little obvious to me, which stripped the reunion of some potentially good drama.

Other thoughts: Walt’s abduction was pretty unsettling; seeing the numbers on the outside of the hatch actually gave me goosebumps; the Virgin Mary statuette in Charlie’s bag really, really worries me; Jin’s development is awesome, I love how he’s opening up; Sawyer’s slowly-unravelling vulnerability is also pretty awesome; Arzt’s “accident” was hilarious. I’m sure I’m going to hell for saying that, but c’mon, you know it was; Katey Sagal as Helen! that’s super fantastic; the “security system” is really confounding–is it a living creature or some sort of mechanical contraption? (WAIT DON’T TELL ME!); I really like Sayid. He’s the kind of guy who could talk me off the ledge; Boone’s psychotropic experience after being hit on the head by Locke was pretty interesting, and again it’s one of the ways the show makes you think one thing about a character (we’re led to believe Locke is pretty awful) but then we discover there was a logical reason for what happened (while his methods may be questionable, Locke really seemed to help Boone get over his attachment to Shannon); I think the only thing that could make this show better would be a few more half-naked scenes with Kate.

Over the past few weeks, my consumption of film and t.v. has increased substantially. One of the by-products of this depression is a complete disinterest in the things that normally interest me like music, woodworking, or reading. Actually, I have been reading a lot which is good. But the other two, which are usually far more prominent in my life, have fallen by the wayside of late. So I’ve kept myself entertained by watching movies and catching up on old t.v. shows. Here are some thoughts on what I’ve seen lately:

1. Batman Begins. I really wish I’d seen this in the theater. I thought it was by far the best of any of the Batman movies and Christian Bale is the best Batman so far. Cillian Murphy as the psychiatrist was fantastic. The whole training sequence at the beginning with Liam Neeson was somewhat reminiscent of wushu films like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Hero. I considered letting the boys watch it, but whenever the crazy gas gets released the monsters are pretty scary, especially Batman with that black ooze coming out of his mouth. So I think I’ll hold off for a while before letting them watch it.

2. The Dark Knight. Not as good as Batman Begins but Heath Ledger totally makes up for the rest of the film’s shortcomings. He was fantastic. Overall though, the movie seemed to try too hard. And the Two Face angle didn’t really work for me. I suspected something was not quite right about him from the beginning but how it played out was a little disappointing. Plus, there seemed to be a lot more emphasis on modernism and technology in this one. What I liked so much about Batman Begins was its backdrop of urban decay. Sure, there were all the advanced toys Batman uses in fighting crime, but the settings were far more Dickensian than they were in Dark Knight with all its semis and police cars and glass skyscrapers.

3. Hellboy II. I had really high hopes for this film, which wasn’t terrible, but because my hopes were so high the fact that it was just okay made it seem worse that it really was. I thought the plot was okay but it was otherwise just a parade of monsters, which were admittedly fantastic. Guillermo del Toro really has a knack for grotesques, but monsters do not a movie make. I also thought Hellboy’s arrogance was a little more over-the-top than it was in the first film. But it’s been a while since I’ve seen the first one so maybe it’s about the same. Anyway, I kept wanting to smack him in the hopes that he’d make some better decisions. Perhaps I was seeing a bit too much of myself in him at times which made his faults a little more abrasive to me. Or maybe it was just the absence of David Hyde Pierce as Abe that threw me off.

4. In Bruges. I wasn’t a huge Colin Farrell fan, but the synopsis of this film intrigued me. I was pleasantly surprised by this dark comedy. Colin Farrell played a highly vulnerable character, which made me like him quite a lot. I was a little put off by some of the humor, particularly the occasional racist or otherwise bigoted joke, but I kept reminding myself that it was all part of character development and that made it a little easier to stomach. However, if you’re looking for a nice, clean Hollywood ending, pick something else to watch.

5. Paris, Je t’aime. I only made it through the Coen brother’s segment, which was fantastic. But there was something about the next segment, the musical one where the guy is selling something to the really nasty salon owner, that really depressed me so I stopped before it was over. (Oh wait, I was already depressed.) Anyway, I’m not going to make any real assessment of this film until I’ve watched the rest of it, but I will say that the first few segments were really good.

6. Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I started watching this a couple months ago, slowly making it through the beginning of season five. Over the last couple of weeks, I’ve blown through to the middle of season six. Once More With Feeling is probably my favorite episode so far. Overall, the series has been okay, but I’m finding some things a little harder to deal with as the show progresses, such as Willow’s dependence on magic, Anya’s incessant boorishness, and Buffy’s general state of despair which I know has a lot to do with death and loss, but still. My favorite character, by far, is Spike. I loved Rest in Peace, the song he sang to Buffy in Once More With Feeling.

7. Spaced. Simon Pegg is a genius. I’d forgotten how different British sitcoms are from American ones. Kinda makes shows like Friends seem hideously corporate and manufactured. I’ve only made it through episode five, but so far I love it. Brian is hilarious.

8. Weeds. The story of an upper-middle-class suburban mom as dope dealer is terrific. And it helps that Mary Louise Parker (rowr) is the mom in question. The last episode I saw was Lude Awakening. So far I really like this show. Makes me wonder how many of the people I know have a dark secret.

9. Lost. (Saved the best for last.) What the hell was I doing when this show first aired? I just bought season one and have made it through Confidence Man. I love this show and plan to watch it religiously until the end. I really like all the characters except for Sawyer, but I guess we’re not supposed to like him right now. So far, my two favorite characters are Charlie and Mr. Locke, although I do like Jack and Kate as well. The Moth was an amazing episode. I’ll probably watch that one over and over again. Also, I really want to know what Kate’s crime was. And WHAT THE HELL is that thing in the jungle?! It’s not a polar bear and it’s definitely not a boar, unless it’s a giant mutant boar, which would be kinda disappointing, actually. Whatever it is, it’s huge. When it came upon Mr. Locke that first time and we saw Locke from the creature’s POV, it looked to be at least twenty or thirty feet tall! And I hope Sayid doesn’t take long on his trek around the island because I really like him, too. Anyway, four years late, I’m totally hooked.

And thus ends my completely unsolicited review of movies and t.v. Carry on.

So I woke up at 4:45 a.m. for some insane reason and couldn’t get back to sleep. Since no one is awake at that time of the morning–not my kids, not my neighbors, not anyone I know in Austin–I tried watching some T.V. to pass the time. You’d think that with eleventy billion channels there’d be something worth watching on T.V. at a quarter to five in the morning, but there isn’t (I’d actually go so far as to say there’s nothing worth watching at any other time either, but that’s just bellicose). I tried to watch Secretary again but couldn’t do that either. So I decided to tackle yet another project (don’t worry, I’m still working on the credenza; it’s about half finished), which was to finish up the fence/gate for my backyard . It’s a project I’ve let languish for almost six months. I poured the footings and set the posts back in January. But I stopped there and have had nothing but gateless posts sticking up out of the ground ever since. So now it’s mostly done. I’ve still got a few minor adjustments to make to it, but at least it serves its purpose now.