Sleeping Angel

One of my favorite things to do is to go back to bed in the morning and watch my wife when she sleeps. Not only does she look so sweet and endearing like a sleeping angel, she doesn't see all the funny faces I make.

(Just kidding)

Give Me Convenience or Give Me Death!

Pop culture. Who drives it? Who decides what we will decide on?

The more I look at culture the more I see how it is driven by the ad people of large corporations that will stop at nothing to redefine our culture and control the minds of children (and adults) if only to sell more.

What could be more exemplary of this than the current hip-hop music? Once a very authentic form of folk music untainted by the moguls is now the golden goose for many rich white men that view the art as nothing more than a product. Now this music has become it's own cliche' and a mere husk of it's origins.

In fact, it is the antithesis of what is once was. What is viewed as a form of rebellion and form of "self expression" by young people is no more than a well marketed fad. Would many young people have any concept of who they were as a human being if it were not for the sense of pseudo-individualism that the minds at MTV have spoon fed them? I watch and buy therefore I am.

Have we shortchanged the schools to the point where they were forced to solicit the fast food companies? The proliferation of fatty foods in our schools and otherwise marketed to children is unlike any other crisis we have seen in the world. Obesity in children is such a problem that some studies predict that their future health issues will result in a shortening of the average live span of Americans! Not only will this be the first predicted drop in the average life span in over 100 years it also is a harbinger of the rising costs of health care that the tax payers will have to pick-up. I can only imagine the effect that the rising numbers of heart and diabetes patients will have on our health care system. In that event the higher insurance premiums are sure to come.

More about all this later....

Rain Gutters

After running up a tab at Home Depot over $168.43, I rolled my heavy duty cart onto the parking lot. I was weighted down with parts and equipment for my latest project: installing rain gutters.

I had never installed gutters before. I would be doing this alone, on a roof, without a net. Oh, sure I had already combed the do-it-yer-self books at home, combed the internet for tips and visualized the whole process from start to finish. I felt so good walking into the Home Depot.

But now all of that had vanished. I pulled the cart away from the cashier's post. The sweat of nervous commitment accumulated on my brow. The sounds of the cart and it's steel uneven wheels on the parking lot surface was loud and thoroughly disconcerting as it drew all eyes towards me. I felt like I should be wearing a sign: "Please stop me. I don't know what I am doing."

I worked hard and for hours doing preparation in the kitchen with a ratcheted ladder for a saw horse/work table. Sawdust, drill bits and steel moved around and through the air as the cats looked on alternating bewilderment or apathy...but that was normal for them I guess.

I went through quite a bit of trial and error, too much time just trying to figure out the process and gathering the proper tools in the proper place and the proper time. Long story a little shorter, the gutters are up. They look good except for where the downspouts flare out at the very ends due to their design, not my error. I like it. It was another reminder that a sense of self-satisfaction that I will call "pride" and skill must be earned by sheer application of mind and body through some amount of faith in ourselves.

Of course, it hasn't rained yet.