Re-energized

I'm not entirely sure what it was, but I feel better about work after today. Maybe it was riding the cable car to work after getting an extra hour of sleep. Maybe it was nearing the end of my monstrosity of a project. Maybe it was talking about the new code base with a clear separation between the data, the business logic, and the presentation. Maybe it was the warm welcome of FxCop. Maybe it was the fact that it is payday, that never hurts.

And They Clapped

When the credits rolled on Batman: Dark Night I clapped too.

Just a Guy

As much as people may jib an joke about me having a big ego after an off statement here and there, I have a self-perception disparity. The things I do, I do them because in my mind "That's what any other good person in my shoes would do." I pick up an extra empty bag of popcorn on my way out of the movie theater, I taught people to fence, I befriended someone in need, I bought sandwich makings for a hungry couple, I drove across the Midwest to help a friend in need.

I did these things, and many others, not because I wanted to shine, but because I wanted to be average. But from the reactions of people, I can only judge that these are not the actions of the average man. By trying to be just another guy, I've stood out, created something exceptional. It wasn't my intent. What I think it speaks about me, it speaks volumes more about people in general - that they do not very often go above and beyond the call of duty. Sometimes they don't even listen to the call of duty.

The people I keep closest to me, they are the exceptions, the ones who do go the extra mile, who listen at 3AM when you call. They show me how to live best. They are exceptional. Me? I'm just a guy.

California Will

Will

I decided that if I was an action figure, that after the market was saturated with the standard issue Will Read with type-action, they'd have to make special Will's. This picture represents "California Will". A lot more hair, foo man chu facial hair, and comes with kite-boarding accessories. Still the same steel blue eyes and grey tuft up front.

The same, but different.

First Glass Flame working Class

There you have it, my first task in class, melt a cylinder of glass into a sphere. It took an hour and there's a crack inside where I made the glass fold over itself and it is a little lop-sided because it was still warm when I set it down in the mold.

It's tough because you can't shouldn't put your hand or tools in the flame. So you either hot seal or cold seal a stick of glass to one side. Hot seals are where both parts are hot, so the glass mixes and it holds really well, then you use the flame to cut it off when you don't need it. The cold seal is where you heat the stick and stick it on the (cold) piece. It's a weaker bond, but if you do it right it comes off clean and just a little flame polishing gives you a nice finish.

The second project was still hot when I left (class is 4 hours once a week). Another marble, this time with a mushroom inside and some decoration on the outside.  I didn't get to the decoration part, and my mushroom was tiny because of insufficient heating. If it is still there next week I'll try to finish it, otherwise I may start over.

Either way it was fun. I got burned when I grabbed hot glass. I want to do more!

Week Of Destiny!

It's my 27th birthday on July 24th! That's Thursday! Yahtzee!

AND

I start a Glass Flameworking class on Wednesday! Bingo!

AND

This weekend I get to see the newly weds, Matt & Lauren! Jackpot!

AND

Who knows what else could happen!!! (Or what other game slogans I might shout out)

Double Feature

I went to see Batman, it was sold out. So I got a ticket for Hancock. When I came out I snuck into Hell Boy 2. I think it is the first time I've stolen anything worth more than two cents.

Weighing in on "Wall-E"

It's an ok movie. It isn't great, and the social commentary that everyone seems to think it provides is undone in the credits. At best this is a love story done in CG.

You have a lonely guy, a very lonely guy named Wall-E. He's a robot, the last of his kind. He lives by scavenging parts from his deceased kin. He is tireless in his duty, but he longs for companionship. That companionship arrives in the form of a slick, but evil looking robot named Eva. Yeah, it's cool that she was designed by the same guy that designed the iPhone, BUT, she's evil. Sleek, dark faced, and very little to offer in the way of emotional feedback. Despite this, she turns out to be the true love of Wall-E after the predictable choosing of her duty over love that she has never felt.

Meanwhile, people got fat. That's good because aside from the group that did the Final Fantasy movie, no one has figured out that we can't CG normal humans and have people buy into it. Anyway, our tubby ancestors forget all of their American ideals - freedom, creativity, and love. But this isn't commentary on how technology makes us lazy. In the movie they explain that "space" is the cause for the change in physicality.

So the bad guys get zapped, the misfits help out, and the guy gets the girl, and the credits role as the humans are setting foot on earth, less educated than when they left and read to "grow some pizza". The credits then show stills of the humans returning to their old shapes, and their old ways. Reliving our own history, rebuilding the same things that led to our trash-filled downfall. The stills do not depict the use of solar or wind power, they don't show people recycling right from the get-go, they don't show people who live in harmony with nature as the animals did.

They show exactly what we want to see, that our way of life can be maintained, they pander to us, they roll over. They have no backbone to make the statement people so desperately want them to be saying. It's just another movie.

I Hate Baseball... Less

Football is terrible for the bench seating, but baseball has a special place in the dark part of my heart. Bunch of guys, standing around in the grass, hoping that the man up front can't hit anything, yeah, that's excitement. But it makes me un-American to hate baseball, so when it is on, I don't protest too much. I've recently come to realize that there is some entertainment value though:

Batters look hilarious when they swing and miss - especially when they're convinced they're gonna get all of the ball. It is hard to look at a splayed out batter and think "professional", but really easy to think "HAHAHAHA".

Saw What I Needed To See

This weekend was Matt & Lauren's  wedding. It came off without a hitch... wait, there was one hitching, so I guess hitches are good inthe case of weddings. It went smoothly. I was the MC, which I do and I don't exactly understand why I was selected for the role. I think there are a number of their friends with enough personality and comfort with crowds that could have done just as good of a job as I did. That being said, I am happy that I was picked for the job, and that I got to stand in their wedding.

A few months back I had visited Matt & Lauren when they were living in Illinois. It was one of the first times I got to see them otogether on their home turf. We played some Settlers of Catan and I ended up being on the periphery of some very competitive conversations. And I have to admit it made me worry about them and their ability to resolve conflicts.

I saw what I needed to see this weekend though. During the days that proceeded the wedding there were a handful of surprise challenges along the way. I saw Lauren weigh the value of he bridesmaid's happiness against the logistics of adding a very late guest. She identified that the happy bridesmaid was very imporant to her own happiness and took action accordingly. I also saw Matt & Lauren faced with another challenge where they both were able to communicate the level of importance to th other and again, take action.

They were not paralyzed by choices. They worked together. They were not stubborn. I am not certain that I could have done the same myself in this stuation, so I am happy to see them together, to see them growing, and to know that they will make it, that this marriage will last. They are important people in my life, and I am glad to see they have the tools they need to e successful.

From My Flights

First class: Just because you sit in it, doesn't mean you are.

I've Been Lucky

I can tell I've been single for a couple of months, my posts are starting to focus more on my thoughts on relationships.

But I'm sitting here procrastinating, listening to my iPhone, and some music comes of that an ex gave me back a handful of years ago. I think about some of the other gifts she, and others gave me, and it reminds me of a story I heard on the fourth. My coworker Geoff mentioned that he wanted a marlin because it was the cool thing to have where he grew up (Florida) but he never had one. So when his birthday rolled around, one of his friends organized a purchase of a marlin. It was exactly what he wanted, but didn't know he wanted. It would have never made a wish list.

A lot of the gifts I've been thinking about have been in that category - things I never knew I wanted, but was delighted when I got them like gummy bears out of the blue, curling fish, monkeys, Mighty Putty, and a bunch of stuff I won't list here. Gifts from people who knew me better than I might give them credit for. These women all listened to me and what I was saying, even when I wasn't listening to myself.

Those are the gifts, and though they are usually small, speak volumes of how a person feels. Sometimes, I admit, I didn't listen to what those gifts said. I was excited, but I didn't understand always. Maybe I just need to listen, not just to words, but to actions, and in that I will find the successful relationship I've been searching for.

Josh Touches on Something Bigger

In the first three paragraphs, Josh talks about how the less you know about someone's past, the more uncomfortable, the more random that person seems (specifically in a movie context). Me, I find I go out of my way to do the complete opposite. I give people so much background about myself that maybe I lose that element of surprise. If you know exactly what path I've walked for the last twenty six years, it is easy to see where I'm going in the next five minutes, next week, next year, and you could probably make a good guess at the next decade.

I was talking to Matt and Lauren a while back and it came up that I'm not "wild and reckless", I don't have that "Who knows where he'll pop up next" ideology attached to me. I'm dependable. I think it sucks some of the excitement out of who I am now that I'm thinking about it. What if you didn't know what I do? What if I only told you things about right now, this moment? When I did something it would be a new adventure every time. It would be impossible for you to set any expectations, you'd never be let down, at least not for a while, but by then you'd be hooked on Will Read.

I'm going to ponder this some more.

No William!!!

There's a commercial from Farmers Insurance where a guy has his name tag stolen as a symbol of his identity. He chases the perp through the city and eventually loses him. His name is William. Every time I see the commercial I want him to just put a hand over his name tag and sock the thief in the jaw. Pow!

Applause

When I was growing up, younger than ten, people would always clap at the end of a movie. Sure, the movie makers weren't there, so they didn't know, but the theater knew, and they paid the bills for the good movies. But people don't clap anymore. The only time I've heard people clap is when I went to an overflowing theater for Star Wars: Episode 1. It was jam packed with fans, and they were going to clap regardless.

So what happened? Did we have too many "during the credits" segments where people wanted to start clapping, but then the end wasn't clear, like a Kubrick film (I hate that guy).  Animated films are particular offenders. But I don't think this is the whole picture.

What I think is that we've become afraid, afraid of voicing our opinions. Woah. America? Afraid? But think about it, why do you stay your hands? What if you clap and your buddies think it was terrible? What if someone in the theater thought it was terrible, said something, then you had to stand up for your opinion. That's a scary statement, "back up your convictions." How many people are willing to stand up and say that he has a different opinion? Some. All the time? Not many.

So we sit on our hands, keep our mouths shut, and while the voicing of our opinions may drive a wedge between us from time to time, but it also unites us. Not like our silence, we only become islands unto ourselves. Alone.

Categories and Tags

In Wordpress, I can put my posts in categories (which is what I do) or I can type some tags for each post. What's the difference? At first glance, the tags seem like more fine grained identification of the content. But when you start typing a tag, it suggests your old tags. So they want you to reuse them. But then they're more like categories, no?

And with all of this, does it really matter? Search engines are pretty good. Why tag or categorize when I can just search for what I want, ya know? Blah!!!!

Roommate FTW!

My stuff came today. They lost a box that had some of my sheets and some bathroom stuff (shower curtain and maybe toilet brush) so I'm not complaining. They destroyed my bookshelf in transport, but it was just a $40 book shelf anyway and I was half tempted to just throw it away back in Lafayette anyway.

I'm most excited to have my necklace back. I really liked wearing it around and it fits my "San Francisco look". But of course the most anticipated delivery was the TV. Forty two inches of LCD goodness. What I didn't expect was the nice pairing with the roommate's equipment. Exhibit A) XBox 360 - 'nuf said. Exhibit B) an iPod dock/speaker system he won. I'm usually not one to go for a good sound system, but the TV's sound blows dog balls. I previously had it hooked up through my computer speakers, which works ok, but you had to get off your butt to change the volume. No good. These speakers have a remote, and really good sound. Not to mention, that if I want to rock out to my iPhone, I can still just throw it in the dock and aural pleasure is all mine.

So thanks Brian!