Anyone ever watch Blazing Saddles when the call girl sang I'm Tired? This is exactly how I am beginning to feel at the beginning of each New Year, and its getting worse. "Madison Avenue" hasn't come up with anything new or unique for years now; I'm pretty sure that if originality introduced itself and bit people in the ass, they'd fall over from the shock You doubt me? Then all I will say to you is Clerks II.
I honestly can't give anyone any lists this year because I honestly can't remember enough of anything i watched or read or listened to this year to actually compile an actual list. The only standout in my mind has been Battlestar Galactica. Damn, what an original, daring piece of work, of art, that genre breaking show has turned out to be. I liked Dead Man's Chest because it was quirky and odd and didn't kow tow to the masse's "block buster" expectations. Plus, K Knightly. There is nothing in fiction that I can recommend, because there wasn't anything that even remotely caught my eye, which is just sad as I like fiction. I liked Frank McCort's Teacher Man in the Memoir catagory. For the annual poetry selection, I'd have to recommend Jack Kerouac's Book of Haikus. My non-fiction selection would be Garry Wills's translation of Augustine's Confessions. The best new group that I heard this year was TV on the Radio, altho I thought the guys were pretty much dicks when i watched them in an interview on MTV. For best video I must bow my head in shame and name Nellie Furtato's Maneater, altho My Chemical Romance's new video was pretty good.
I know this is a pretty short list, but I can only work with the materials I have.
This has been a great week, a week that has been basically down time, rest and recuperation. I have a confession to make: My ambition in life is to be able to read, uninterupted without any responsibilities, forever on a summer day in western Nebraska. Thats it. There is a reason why I like reading Jack Lewis. Jacobs, in describing the end of The Last Battle, wrote:
This conclusion is, of course, a learned Christian's homage to Dante, who also ends his vision of Paradise with the image of a great Book, but far more than that, it is a dream come true of a small boy alone in a house full of books in Belfast, who wanted nothing more than to be set free from all drudgery and responsibility and pain and loss so that he could sit in a window overlooking the sea, reading the stories he loved hour after hour by the bright calm light of endless day. p. 301
My cherished ambition will never ever happen for me except for when I do experience the bright calm light of endless day, but its a nice day dream to have in the midst of my circumstances here as I walk thru the valley of darkness.
I finished reading Jacobs's Jack Lewis biography, and I really, really liked it a lot. For once there is a biographer that didn't have an agenda, either to saint Jack or to swing a sledgehammer at a human being's feet of clay. In other words, it isn't a biography by Walter Hooper or A. N. Wilson. This approach of Jacobs only makes Jack more special, as it is ordinary people that Jesus saves, not so-called "saints."
I dunno what really to read next. I only have four more days of watching the house and walking these fucking dogs, and everyone said, 'Let my people go!' I have some books that I have bought but haven't read, so I think I'll try to read some of them. Garry Wills has translated Augustine's Confessions, and has wrote four books corresponding to the four critical books of Confessions: Childhood, Memory, Sin, and Conversion. I grabbed each one of these hardcovers up at the B&N bargin table for $4. My only problem is that I'm not really in the mood for that kind of book. It is great -- Wills does an introduction, a commentary with the text as well as at the back of the book, and adds a little something extra in each edition. I guess I'm just gonna have to discipline myself and read.
I took an incomplete in my methods class, so january is gonna be a busy month. I'm also going back to hell to visit my sister-in-law at the end of the month in Indiana. Just thinking about revisiting that godforsaken piece of real estate pretty much just makes me wanna vomit. There are circumstances that just in and of themselves are simply unsurvivable on several levels. We happened to do two in secession there in Indiana. Most of the misery I have experienced in the last five or six years has roots running directly to these experiences. But oh well, I love my SIL.
My next blog will be the usual yadda yadda yadda about the end of the year and the beginning of the new, and all the lists. I think an interesting list might be all the cool things that went to shit in '06. Hmmmm.... so much happens because that is what happens to anything original in this plastic culture here in 'Merica. Gotta take advantage of the down time.
Every Christmas ends like this, ever since i was a little kid; Christmas Day turns out to be dull and boring. It happens because, a) I have family obligations more important than my own circumstances, and b) i have yet, even with my immediate familiy, to experience a relationship where i am loved as much as i love back.
Jack Lewis once wrote,
My happiest hours are spent with three or four old friends in old clothes tramping together and puting up in small pubs -- or else sitting up till the small hours in someone's college rooms talking nonsense, poetry, theology, metaphysics over beer, tea and pipes. There's no sound I like better than adult male laughter.
I had that for the years I was actually an undergrad at Bible College, and when I was the resident director for the boy's dorms at that same college. I have never had it back home, or when i was in any of the churches that i served. People have been discipled so poorly that for edification's sake i could never talk about the thoughts that were going thru my mind, i didn't want to be the one that caused another Christian to overload and stumble. This sounds arrogant, no? It isn't, it is actually my lament. If Evangelical Christianity is in a place were basic questions about why there is sin and suffering in the world or what is it to have a free will cannot be asked or answered, then the Church indeed is in trouble.
Two summers ago Nate, a friend of mine, and I went to the coffee house almost evry day just to talk and to argue and to hang out. Those were some good days. But i have had no consistent fellowship like this, although this blog has been a nice avenue.
There other thing I enjoy is to simply watch movies. For years and years all i've really ever wanted to do was go and watch movies during Christmas afternoon and evening. A Christmas Day movie is probably the only semi-consistent tradition my family actually came close to establishing. I can still remember my shock when my Mom decided to come with us to watch Dances with Wolves on Christmas night. But i have truly never been with a group of people or with another person that actually intentionally made it their goal for me to be able to hit the theater and have my very special day.
Don't get me wrong, i like familiy obligations. I know it is much better for me to interact and relate with my family while i have the chance. We may not talk about the stuff that really would bind me with them, but it is important to get to know them, to find out what is important to them. It is important to physically be there, even if it is a day out of your life you'll never get back. I am a better person in community, when i care about others and don't make my desire paramount over others i care about. Even bored to tears i understand that it is important, that the time isn't really wasted.
But in the quiet part of my soul, sometimes i wonder if what i am looking for will only be found beyond this life.
Meanwhile, my mother in law and brother in law came in last night for Christmas Eve. It was a good time, the wife made lasagna, the italian dish Garfield likes so much. I thought it was a little strange for Christmas Eve, but it was one of their family traditions. I go a CS Lewis daily reader (which was nice), a $25 gift card to CiniMax, and $50 on a Visa card my BIL gave me. Not a bad Christmas. The Wife and I didn't exchange gifts, and i still don't know what to think of that. We went thru a lot of money for her gig, she bought a couple of outfits and all the food and drink for the evening. I would have got her something, but she is very picky, and anything i might have bought her she probably would have taken back.
As i have already written, today was a big waste. I walked the dogs all three times, fed em, and watched lousy movies on TV. The wife took off this afternoon and "forgot the time" while she was at her friend's house. If she doesn't forget it again, i may actually get to watch a movie tonight. I am not crossing my fingers. Tomorrow i am back at work again, this week 7 AM to 3 PM. It should be very slow. I'm looking forward to getting some reading done...
So Saturday was a rough day all the way around, disjointed and strange. I ended up going to the late movie and watching We Are Marshall. Afterwards I went to my local watering hole for a beer before closing time, which is 1 AM in this little town.
I wan't surprised by the fact that The Spoke was far from empty the night before Christmas Eve. The guys I like and get along with were all there, and several of my favorite bar wenches as well, and everyone was full of Holiday cheer. The 50" HD TV was on, the jukebox was playing, and everyone was talking much louder than they normally would have. As I was drinking my beer and watching the going ons around me it struck me that I could very well be visiting a scene from what could have very easily have been my life.
At any time during the last five years or so i could've, and was in fact daily tempted to have had, just thrown in the towel and went with what the status quo and conventional wisdom whispered into my ear, the inevitable of destiny -- I could have signed up for the "gradual slope" lifestyle. As I was drinking my beer I tried to imagine what my Ghost of Christmas Might Have Been would have looked like -- probably what most guys look like around here, 5'10", 190 lbs, hair shaved close with a goatee and wearing long shorts and a bar t-shirt. This is not the demographic ESPN wants, but these guys are sports in New England college bars. I can imagine my Ghost with a smirk on his face showing me what had happened after i ditched my wife and church and jumped into bed with T or E or K or one of the other girls and started to hang with the guys.
I'd look the same and talk the same but everything else would be different. Probably the biggest thing about my might have been self would be that I'd be a much harder person. You should hear the conversasions I have in my head as i am now. What comes out is often not what i have actually thought, it is a kinder, gentler and edited version because i know that sin is crouching outside my heart's door, and would love me to take my own bitterness and anger and depression and have me wallow in them until i drown. But I know that i would would not only indluge in doing just these, i would swim in them and my personality would be affected to my very core.
I'd be smoking, as i have daily resisted that temptation since i was sixteen and i couldn't tell you why. I would also be smoking weed, as everyone i know here does. I'd also probably be a bit more pharmacutically adventurous than i am now, altho Christian or not, i doubt i have the compulsive nature to be an addict. I'd also probably be drinking on a pretty regular interval, especially if i was sleeping with and hanging out with seriously experienced functional alcoholics. Alcoholism would be by far a serious alternative for my personality. Which brings me to the pictures that no one sees in my imagination, except for God. If i was sleeping with T or E or K, i know that it would be for companionship, but that would only mask a blast furnace of lust and self that feeds on what would be left of the remains of my tattered soul. Love gives it's self away, lust takes and exists for itself. I have never kidded myself about my sexuality; if a pine board had the right size knot hole I'd have at it if it felt good, there would be no end to the sexual perversion. Pure hedonism is not something anyone should mess with.
I call this type of life "the gradual slope" because that is the most attractive road to hell for me. For all the hardness and selfishness, these people i like and are friends with are also sentimental and often have expectations about what is fair and just far beyond what those in other communities have. It would be a fairly straightforward life -- if your pissed off you fight, if your horny you fuck, if your hungry you eat, if your sad you cry, and if happy you laugh. It is this sentimentality, this was of interpreting the circumstances of life, that blind my pals to the damage they do to their sould. The only problem is that what is real in this kind of life lived is the spiritual reality i first described, and this is the ideal and dependent entirely on circumstances beyond individual control. It is a perscription for misery.
I don't think the Ghost of Christmas That Might Have Been would be a very nice guy, and the Ghost of that particular Christmas Future would be very, very alarming as if one sows to the wind, one reaps the whirlwind, and my death and final judgment would have been like jumping into a bottomless abyss without a parachute forever.
On Christmas Day I sing along with Mary because What Might Have Been would've really been except for the grace of God in Christ to me. It is because of that soft spot that I have written about in the past, God's weakness for the little, the least, the last, the lost and the damned, that I have personally ever known joy, or ever heard that music from a tune I've never heard, news from a country I've never been:
My soul magnifies the LORD,
and my spirit rejoices in God my
Savior,
For he has looked on the humble estate
of his servant.
For behold, from now on all
generations will call me blessed;
for he who is mighty has done great
things for me,
and holy is his name.
And his mercy is for those who fear
him
from generation to generation.
He has shown strength with his arm;
he has scattered the proud in the
thoughts of their hearts;
he has brought down the mighty from
their thrones
and exalted those of humble estate;
he has filled the hungry with good
things,
and the rich he has sent empty away.
He has helped his servant Israel,
in remembrance of his mercy,
as he spoke to our fathers,
to Abraham and to his offspring
forever.
The Magnificat
This is an easy one: Scrooged. Thought it was great the first Holiday season I saw it in the theaters, altho at the time I was a little dissappointed. Bill Murray SHINES in this one as it seems as if he improvised almost the entire movie. Truth be told, I'm not a very big fan of holiday movies, they move into the realm of mush sentimentality like instant pudding. About the only serious holiday special I ever thought worth it was, believe it or not, the very first The Waltons episode, which happened to be a Christmas special. Only other holiday movie close to worth its salt is the uncut version of Bad Santa....
I have to admit that this Christmas season kinda snuck up and surprised me. Since my Mom died at the beginning of December four years ago, I've made it back to Nebraska each year. It was not hard to get into the Christmas spirit surrounded by all my nephews and neices and the hustle and bustle of the Scottsbluff Super Walmart! But this year I am staying around, and it has been weird. It is the first time The Wife and I have celebrated the holiday together in years and years, and while the fact that we are bodes well in rebuilding our relationship, it is still kinda strange.
What will make it stranger is that her Mom and brother are coming up from CT tomorrow. The last time The Wife and I celebrated Christmas together was in CT with her Mom and brother and things were just fine. However, we were not hosting the event, and The Wife's Mother has a general tendency to freak out under the stress of cooking holiday meals. On top of all this, I have to admit that my name is Martin, and I am a Christmas Eve shopper. That's correct, i have bought no one presents or shopped for any gifts yet; i am a bad, bad man.
So it is off to the mall this afternoon. I need to get a haircut (for the little I have left on the top), get The Wife a present, and probably shop for some food while at the same time resisting temptation to watch "The Good Shepherd" at the multiplex. I love spy movies. "Confessions of a Dangerous Mind" is my favorite movie, in my number one slot of my all time top five movies, followed closely by Roxanne, Groundhog Day, The Tao of Steve, and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.
Work was awesome yesterday! The kids were gone, and it was a slow F,F, G & T day: Foreign kids, Freaks, Geeks, and Townspeople. I now have three entire days off, and I'm so happy just thinking about it that I almost wet myself just now. Gotta be careful.I wrote some stuff that I hope to post either later today or tomorrow on some scrap paper, it was so slow.
The Wife locked her keys and cell phone in the car yesterday, and didn't get home till late. I was both pissed and a little worried as it was dark, raining, and the roads were full of moron BoBos in SUVs here for the holidays. I have to admit that I pretty much just melded with the couch, ate chocolate, and watched The Nightmare Before Christmas on TBS. I hate it when I am so inert that I do not do my Offices and pray. I doubt if God is amused either. When she finally made it home she was discouraged and tired, so we snuggled up on the couch , began to watch the beginning of Heat, and then went to bed.
Which wasn't a good idea. She had gone to some chiropracter who was also some Budhist ex nun or something and during the night both big toes and the thumb on her left hand went numb and began to hurt. THAT was fun.... she woke me up for that experience. Didn't get up till noon, I walked the dogs, and posted on vox. So now its time; once more into the breach, band of brothers (and sisters).... PS, any one wanna buy two dogs with mental health issues? I will not even attempt to describe what happened on our walk this morning, except to say why don't sqirrels die and decompose up in trees? Yeesh.
I've been waiting for the new Harry Potter book to be finished so I can sign up for the book release in july. I've been doing this for four years, and it's always a fun time to hit the Borders or B&N because they stay open till 1 or 2 AM and throw a release party. Its kool to watch the kids mess around the store, all dressed up and pysched about reading a book. Anyway, I was searching the net for the latest rumors on when the last and final book would be finished when I came across a web sight that turned me ice cold.
On this sight whoever ran it wrote that they thought it would be cool if the finish of the Potter series was like the finish of The Matrix, in that good, Neo, and evil, agent Smith, were reconciled at the end of the movie. They thought it would be quite the dramatic irony to have Harry commanding the Death Eaters... I figure the answer to the question of when will people quit trying to say day is night and night is day would be they never will, it is a flaw struck deeply into human nature since the failed coup attempt against God. To say black is white and white is black is the basis of the whole Hannible Lecture series by Harris, the guy who wrote Scilence of the Lambs. The whole ying and yang dualistic thing will eventually lead to some attempt at saying good and evil are just different sides of the same, exact coin.
I HATE dualism. I hate it most of all because it is not true, with a capital T. I side with CS Lewis in saying that evil is only a parasite on the good, or a perversion of the good; evil cannot exist on its own while good can and always has stood alone. There can be no synthesis of the two while retaining any type of unique individual identity or any concept of the word "justice". Religiously, dualism has always been a way to try to find a reason to explain why the potential for evil exists in everyone. real Magicians/pagans, psuedo-scientists, and Eastern religions are actually very very pragmatic in finding a way for people to accomodate for when they do not live up to their own standards, let alone anyone else's.
I believe joy is found in the good. However, happiness is almost rarely experienced by the good. I do believe in paradox! Life is often lived in a kind of sleep walk thru a nightmare, execpt you can't wake up. So many things are actually beyong our control, regardless of what we have been taught to expect, that everyone knows the feeling of being back up against a wall in some type of last stand before what is overwhemlms what we think ought to be. Life is often very uncomfortable, bright, sharp, and hard. Try living your life in pursuit of happiness and watch it slip farther and farther out of your grasp.
Life is pointless here on this crazy, spinning orb. "Vanity of vanity, all is vanity." Yep, exactly. Most people would like to lead their lives like there is no tommorrow, they want to eat drink and be merry because sooner than they think, they are six feet under. Of course, the reality is very few people are brave enough to face life without meaning, without purpose, so most people are wired so tight in an attempt to control the circumstances and people around them that if you stuck a peice of coal up their ass they would shit diamonds. Even if the say they understand its all meaningless, they are generally a bunch of posers, because they try to control life to make it meaningful by making someone or something meaningful to them. This never works, eventually the person or object implodes under the weight of such expectations placed on them, and the person is left stranded and disillusioned in the ruined temple of their shattered false god. The life of a control freak is never a healthy or happy one. There are those, tho, who do this defiant, existential life and live as what life gives them. People like Hemingway, Jim Morrison, Hunter S Thompson, and Jack Kerouac did it -- altho it may be prudent to point out that the mortality rate with these guys are almost 100% before their time. Hemingway blew his head off with a shot gun, Hunter S. Thompson did the same, Jim Morrison ODed, and Jack Kerouac purposely drank himself to death. These guys weren't posers because they died younger than they should've and what they thought were on their own terms.
We celebrate Christmas because it is God Who rescues us from these fates. It is God who gives us joy, and makes life a dance. Jesus said that he had come to give life, and that more abundantly. Given the context of these words, that is a pretty bold claim. How can life be a dance? Christianity is pre-modern, and it has what we think are crude elements. Anyone reading this would never look upon a human blood sacrifice without flinching just a little, whether in distaste or just plain avoidance. Yet it is the brutally short life and death of Jesus, God incarnate, that enables us to dance with some joy in this life. Yeah, I said dance. It may be amidst the ruins, but it is a dance nevertheless. Christ was raised for our justification, and the Father sent the Spirit to make us His own. It is strange that in every day life any Christian, good oneswho do their best and bad bad ones who do not live up to the tite, in some way rennact this very pattern of death, ressurrection, and life and thus live in joy.
So today I take my day off and I do my sleep walk dance of joy and thank God for the birth of the baby jesus in a rundown cave/stable because God so loved me and the rest of the world. Joy to the world...
So I've been working in hell since about Saturday at Midnight. I worked till 8:00 AM on Sunday Morning and then went back to work at 6:00 PM the same day. I worked 6:00 PM to 2:00 AM yesterday, and its was around 1:00 or 2:00 this afternoon that I was even able to lift my head off the table. 4k the first 24 hrs, 4.5k yesterday, and I have two more days left, as I'm working six days straight. I done all this trying to fight off the cold that fucking won't go away, which hasn't exactly made for a sunny disposition.
I haven't had a lot of time to think deep thoughts tyo write, the thoughts I have been thinking haven't been very kind or gentle. I think it has a lot to do with working in retail. I am now convinced that 50% of people were born and raised in a barn, while the other 50% were raised by wolves. I keep having to clean up messes ONE FOOT away from the gargage cans!!!!!! Arrrrrgggggggggghhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!! lazy fucking spoiled kids. I get to handle customers who must be such complete losers that it is only in food service, where they are catered to, do they have any sence of worth or control.
And I've just about had it up to here with these arrogant, smirking foreign kids who's cultures have taught them they don't have to treat workers with respect. I swear that most of the time you can tell the difference between Muslim Indians and Hindu Indians by the way they treat people: the Muslims mostly have respect, the Hindi kids think your a lower caste. The Asian kids are a mixed bag, as any international kid gotta have the money and the pull to even be here taking classes. American popular culture seems to be especially seductive, and the kids that embrace it the most are the rudest. The Asian kid that looks like Wally and Beaver are by far the most polite, and they smile more.
Believe it or not, the best international kids are the African kids, excepting the Nigerians. They are laughing, personal, and generally a lot of fun. My father had a few rough experiences with some urban black kids when he was in the service in the late 50s, and I had to overcome a lot of negative sterotypes to come to the conclusion that it doesn't matter what color the skin is, everyone bleeds red. The only true way to evaluate anyone is by what they do, how they decide to act.
I have to go back to work soon, but I feel a little bit better and I actually got some uninterurpted sleep. Tonight may be the last busy night, as finals are winding down on Thursday. Everyone has to be gone by 5:00 PM on Friday, so tonight will probably be the busy night. Gotta sign off, TTFN.
Today I don't have to go to work till 11:30 PM, which means I am doning the graveyard shift. I actually don't mind all that much as there aren't any finals tommorrow and Its gonna be slow, slow, slow. But that is OK, it isn't like I'm getting paid by commission, and besides, this will not be an unpleasant shift. Something my Dad once said when I was a little kid has really stuck in my mind: it is only the small minded and petty that get bored. Growing up everyone would go moping around, saying how there was nothing to do except drink, drag main, and try to get laid. If i had a sketch pad, or a book, or enough room to take a long walk I was fine.
Things went really well last night; The Wife had a nice debut. It was the Pushkin, a little art gallery that was converted from a bank. It was actually a pretty cool space. Is it just me, or is most art crap these days? Don't get me wrong, self-expression is admirable and regardless of someone's talent or ability. But this stuff was hanging on walls and was, like, for sale. There was an artist there, John Clarke, who was very talented. He had a few photographs, prints, and etchings on display that werer very, very good. I had a feeling his work was lonely.
Yet I digress. About 35 or 40 people showed up, more than I personally thought was gonna be there. The Wife did a great job! Her first set was good, but I didn't think that they had the vocals turned up enough. In the second set someone turned her up and wow did that make a difference. I was so proud of her. The musicians were quite good, and they really enjoyed themselves. I have not had the opportunity to listen to a lot of jazz, and I liked it; The Wife likes the Cole porter songbook.
The night was not without some tension, an old friend of The Wife's was there that I have really taken a dislike to, and I had to co-exist in the same room with him for at least half the night. I will also have to admit that I really don't "get" her circle of friends. They are for the most part Rasta hipsters and bohemian/hippy chik, involved in the ragge and dub scene. I'm pretty muchg just a plain old farm boy from Nebraska. Can you feel the love waiting to happen?
Oh, and The Wife's Mother decided to come and witness the glorious event. Which was pretty cool, just that much more support and encouragement on hand. However, I had to ride up and back with her, I ate a late supper with her, and I sat with her thru the entire show. Have I mentioned just how much the woman doesn't care for me? Don't get me wrong, she doesn't hate me. But she really doesn't like me all that much. We live out such different versions of the one Christianity... opposites not only attrack, they also try to cancel each other out. She got the Wife a really nice, thoughtful gift to commemorate her first gig, and I didn't (mostly because I paid for everything and also because I have no gifting to doing that type of thing.
The Wife has always hung out with older people. Eric, a bi sexual guy from her hometown, is pretty much her ideal of what a man should be, Besides the fact that he was sleeping with a Catholic preist the last time I talked to him, he is one smooth opperator. He has CLASS. Everything he does he does with serious style... I have often wondered just how the Wife and I managed to hook up, we have such different tastes. But together we are, and I have had the better end of it all. If I could have $ for all the times I have heard incredulous people say, "She's married to him????" I'd be a fairly well off individual. I took some pics last night, I'll try to get 'em up here tomorrow.
Well, I gotta walk the dogs, feed 'em, watch NBC for Its A Wonderful life, and try to get a nap before my shift from hell....
F$#^K me gently with a chain saw... I am sick, and I hate, I mean hate, being sick. When I get sick I am the biggest baby in the world. When I get sick I don't know whether to laugh or to apologize for the conflicting looks of self-pity and genuine concern for me in The Wife's eyes. When I get sick I just wanna curl up in the fetal position in a dark place and suck my thumb.
As usual, this is the worst possible time ever to be ill. My wife is singing her first public set tonight that she has ever arranged, and her Mom and possibly her best friend from nyc are coming. She went out and bought clothes last night and wouldn't tell me how much she spent, which truly makes me nervous. She is providing the booze and some snackage, so she has a lot to do today. However all this stuff is just the trappings of the "night life," the vanity that people involved with the weight of nothingness called entertainment think to be important. What is amazing is my wife's talent to sing, and I can't wait to hear her tonight. It is the singing of the song that is authentic, not the style that surrounds or who hears it all.
I even changed my work hours from 1 PM to 9 PM so I could be there. It is finals now, there will be finals tommorrow, then Monday, and our little coffee kiosk, whose typical customer's purchase is about $2, will bring in anywhere from 4k to 5k a day. I am sick and I want my Mommy. I had to take an incomplete on one of my classes, so I don't have to worry about it till the first or second week in January, but still, this next week till Friday will be completely insane. There is almost no way I can call in, short of being dead, that won't screw someone over, so I am stuck doing my shift as an extra playing a zombie victim in The Night of the Living Dead.
I am about half way thru Jacobs The Narnian. Me next book project is goint to be the stack that I bought but haven't read, no more "new" used books till I am thru these. I am looking forward to reading Wills's commentary and new interpretaion of select chapters from St Augustine's Confessions. I love just what this guy does with words... He gets in the inside of heads to bring a distinctive voice to the people he translates. I think he is working on a translation of the New Testament, and I can't wait for that to eventually come out. I also have a odd little book about the birth of the Beat generation that I still need to read. 1950s America is just facinating...
Well, time to go curl up in a ball somewhere and make the wife miserable -- just where would one buy a little hand bell to ring for service?
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