The Next Dark Age
We're in it Now
What I Saw Today
Out the back of our parking lot is an abandoned Smokey Bones restaurant. We cross this parking lot often on our way to other places at lunchtime.
Today, on my way out, I saw a minivan. Doing donuts* in the snow.
I went to Taco Bell, had lunch, read my book. On my way back, the minivan was still there. He was joined by a little black Honda. They were both doing donuts in the snow in the abandoned parking lot.
The Honda got so close it kicked the snow up at me. Displeased.
* Anne has determined that “donuts” are the circles in the snow, while “doughnuts” are the pastry.
Ainslie Elizabeth
I am not much for newborns. They pretty much all look the same to me. If not for the outfit (which you can rest assured that I did not purchase for her), I would never be able to tell her apart from the newborn pictures of her brother, Alex.
But here she is, my niece Ainslie:
P.S. I’ve been buying her clothes. On Thursday night, when I went over to my brother’s house to stay with Alex, I brought an outfit with a black top and white patterned pants. My sister-in-law, Becky, had already purchased the exact same outfit..for Boxing Day at my house.
Plug for a Guy I Used to Know
So. We have all heard of Digg, right? Community of people that surface and vote on cool stuff on the Internet. I am not a member, but I appreciate the idea and if I thought my life could stand five more minutes of hanging out of the Internet, I would hang out there.
Digg has a weekly podcast called Diggnation where the founder, Kevin Rose, talks about the pieces that were popular that week. His co-host, to my shock, is a guy named Alex Albrecht who was my friend and next door neighbor for two years in college.
Alex and I have not been in touch for years. The last time I saw him was at Louie’s wedding and that was..what, eight years ago? At the time he was in L.A. starting up an Improv Company. He was a techie whose heart was in entertainment and he seems to have found his niche. I am proud of him so I thought I should give him a plug. This is a recent clip:
http://bitcast-a.bitgravity.com/revision3/swf/rev3_player.swf?AutoPlay=
I cannot seem to make the screen get centered here, but this is exactly the way I remember him. I would come home from class and go to Louie and Dean’s room to hang out before dinner and he would be there playing Mortal Combat III and mouthing off about stuff.
Alex also does The Totally Rad Show and I spent over an hour watching the Halloween Episode last night.
Thanksgiving Dinner Review
Fresh Market set up the pre-cooked carry out menu. You pre-order and then pick up on Wednesday. Reheat on Thursday – then send you home with an instruction sheet. I chose this one:
Traditional Holiday Dinner (Serves 6-8) – $79.99
10-12 lb Fully Cooked Turkey (regular or smoked)
3 pounds of Traditional Herb Stuffing
3 pounds of Yukon Gold Whipped Potatoes
30 ounces of Home-Style Turkey Gravy
1½ pounds of Cranberry Relish
1 dozen Soft Yeast Rolls
The store had trouble with my order in that they couldn’t find it and had to pack it up while I was waiting and trying not to get killed by last minute grocery shoppers. That was a bit disappointing in that I hadn’t just pre-ordered onsite – I had pre-paid onsite.
The food was really good. The turkey had to cook for a couple of hours, so a complete amateur might have had a bit of trouble. My mother followed the “time” of cooking, rather than using a thermometer, so she had trouble carving it..(“The meat is just falling off the bone!”) but it wasn’t dried out or anything.
I heated up the potatoes in the conventional oven, but because I was required to make green bean casserole I ended up putting the stuffing in the microwave. It turned out just fine.
My grandfather was all..”Your cooking is better”, but we were perfectly happy and the work was minimal.
There were other vegetables that we could have added on, and of course there were desserts. The basic meal was plenty for us. Good showing by Fresh Market.
I Thought I Had Seen Everything
I have purchased doggie ice cream. Doggie birthday cake. Fresh made doggie cookies of many varieties. I have generally determined that unless it it is a matter of health or other special needs, there is no reason to spend serious money on dog treats. I have never seen a dog that wasn’t perfectly happy with that which can be purchased at PetsMart.
I have drawn the line. I thought I saw a 100 calorie treat pack while standing in line at the store. I was not about to get out of line to satisfy my shocked curiousity. Because that is what the Internet is for..and here it is.
I am as lazy as they come, but this is ridiculous.
Observation
The Lord of the Rings is running on TNT over the holiday weekend. Again. Star Wars is on Spike. I am sure Harry Potter is somewhere.
I was thinking that I like Fellowship the best of the Hobbit films. I am not sure if it is because it is less dark, or because I appreciate the character development.
Then I thought of the first Harry Potter film. Again, I like it the best, so far. It is less dark. But it wasn’t just introducing characters. It was introducing a whole new universe on screen. To a John Williams soundtrack.
Rather Ashamed of Myself
The state of Illinois has a rather tragic budget situation right now, which is probably not unique. The budget is being cut right and left. One of the more alarming things was in Health and Human Services – which makes me wonder how many abused children will be lost in the system over the next few years.
Sadly, a whole bunch of our state landmarks are closing – including Carl Sandberg’s birthplace and one of the Frank Lloyd Wright houses downstate. I am ashamed of myself for two reasons:
First, the article in the Travel section of USA Today was the first I have heard of these closings. And second, I do not recall having ever visited a single one of those historic sites. Although the Lincoln Log cabin might have been part of our 7th grade capitol trip.
This is the List, and the towns that will lose the tourist traffic:
PARKS CLOSING:
_Castle Rock State Park, Oregon
_Lowden State Park, Oregon
_Illini State Park, Marseilles
_Hidden Springs State Forrest, Strasburg
_Moraine View State Park, Leroy
_Weldon Springs State Park, Clinton
_Wolf Creek State Park, Windsor
HISTORIC SITES CLOSING:
_Dana-Thomas House, Springfield
_Lincoln log cabin near Charleston
_Fort de Chartres, Randolph County
_Vandalia statehouse
_State center at Bishop Hill, Henry County
_Carl Sandburg birthplace, Galesburg
_Cahokia courthouse
_Hauberg Indian Museum, Rock Island County, but the adjacent natural area will stay open.
_Jubilee College, near Peoria
_Apple River Fort, Elizabeth
_Fort Kaskaskia, Randolph County
_Pierre Menard home, Randolph County
You can read the full text of the article here.
More about Security
I am in line at security at O’Hare. Security gives me a “Is this your bag?”
Me: “Yes.”
Him: “Do you have any sharp objects in this bag?”
Me: (Holy crap!) I don’t think so.
Him: (Pulls something out of the bag) “What is this?”
Me: (Melting into a puddle on the floor) …staple remover…please go ahead and throw them out…
Him: Are there any more?
Me: I think there are a total of four.
He pulls out all four and hands them to another guy who takes them somewhere. They are brought back and put into my bag. I am dismissed.
I told Dwight that would happen when he gave me those things in Raleigh. He said it wouldn’t be a problem. Well, not at his airport, I guess.
When I arrived in Fargo, I told the story to Kim, who picked me up at the airport. She said:
“If you took those through security in Fargo, they would have been confiscated and you would have been strip searched. We will mail them back to you.”
Called into the Principal’s Office
I hadn’t unpacked my bag yet, so my camera was with me at work. Our building had put up the Holiday decorations while I was gone, so I went to go take a picture of the tree for our employee newsletter. And maybe one of the stuffed white tigers staring at the stuffed baby penguins to complain about on the Internet, but nevermind.
Security guard walks up to me:
“I’m sorry about this, but we are on camera, so I have to tell you. All photography must be cleared by the Building in advance.”
I asked who I should speak with in the office and he gave me a name. I walked over to the office. Assistant manager lady came out and I introduced myself. I explained that I had taken three pictures for our employee newsletter and understood from Security that was a problem.
She said, “We need to know in advance. You could be anybody taking pictures for any reason.”
I understood “any reason” to mean “so that you can blow up the place”.
“OK,” I said. “So it is a security issue, as opposed to a copyright issue.”
“It could also be a copyright issue,” she replied. “What are you going to use them for?”
Apparently, using them for an employee newsletter is fine as long as the newsletter is only for “use in our space”. So sending it to our employees outside of Chicago, “would have to go through corporate first”.
“It isn’t worth it. I will delete them right now.”
I was going to say something nice about our Landlord to all of our employees and all of our retirees. Now they are all going to hear it on the Grapevine. Because I stood and shouted about it in our lobby.
The other thing I learned today is how our receptionist knows everything.
Nephew Story
I am back in town, but exhausted and cranky. So you get a story from my brother, Scott:
So I decided yesterday to put the tree up since I wasn’t going to want to do it in a week and Alex is with me.
He says, “Daddy, your job is to put the tree up.” (He’s all excited about having jobs and stuff since going to preschool.)
I said, “Okay, what’s your job?”
“I’m going to eat this cookie….. and watch.”
The Next Dark Age 