Welcome to the "Every 30th" blog, where I scramble at the end of each month to toss a handful of words into the ether. This month, I bring you much random.

Recently, I've started using Last.fm to track what I've been listening to and to discover new music. I've been quite happy with the recommendations, although I find Pandora better at delivering a greater variety of random music that I like. Nevertheless, Pandora doesn't offer any sort of browsing capability, and their Flash-based player is less than great; Last.fm allows for iTunes integration and has a good site and community.

Primarily through these services, I've been exploring progressive metal music, roughly in the style of Dream Theater. Some of the bands I've found that I really enjoy are Pagan's Mind, Kamelot, Andromeda, Sonata Arctica, Lacuna Coil, Nightwish, Fates Warning, Trivium, and Winterfell.

I spent Memorial Day weekend in Tahoe with Karen, Tadhg, and a host of fun people. For such a large group of mostly strangers, I was impressed at how little friction, how much cooperation, and how much fun there was. It felt like the better days of high school and college, staying up late playing cards, poking fun, talking, laughing, and enjoying the company of happy people.

I experienced a strange period of time earlier this month in which people appeared to me as nothing more than shapes and color. I found it extraordinarily difficult to identify with anyone. My ability to empathize and sympathize nearly disappeared. Upon seeing a random person, in place of wondering what motivated him, what she enjoyed, what he did, what she was thinking, where he was going—in place of these things, an assortment of vaguely familiar shapes registered briefly in my attention and then dissipated.

For the first time that I can remember, I've developed allergies. And pretty badly. I spent most of this month sneezing, sniffling, coughing, and expectorating unpleasant viscous blobs.

Some of my other hobbies lately include not replying to email, not playing guitar, not reading, and not keeping my apartment in order.

I am hereby committing to posting at least one entry to this blog every month. But I can't promise that any future entries will be as exciting as this one.

On Valentine's Day, San Francisco had a pillow fight. When I first read about it on boingboing, I couldn't stop smiling for hours. I can't describe how much fun this was. I've posted photos (trying iWeb for the first time, this link may change). More photos available on Laughing Squid.

I sat down with hundreds of eager thoughts, but the empty page nearly brought me to tears. Alas, it took a full sentence to pull that trick. Writing and crying. This is home, is it not?

Am I a writer?

What a terribly frightening question. I think I think like a writer. But I have not exhibited the patience of a writer. Nor the discipline. Nor the words. That doesn't make for much of a writer now, does it? I haven't cracked a dictionary in months, digital or otherwise. And, no, it's not because every word I desire comes to mind effortlessly. Funny how a neat, orderly collection of words has come to represent to me what writing is all about, and yet what writing is really all about winds up making a complete mess of that tidiness. Let you in on a secret: I just used a dictionary to find a synonym for "order" as a better last word in that sentence. Another secret: I didn't really just use a dictionary; I wrote that sentence knowing that I would eventually do what I said therein. Still another secret: none of these sentences have survived with their original phrasing intact.

I'm just full of secrets this morning, aren't I? But isn't anything I haven't written a secret? A secret hidden in silence or forgotten memory? On the other hand, are my long-neglected scrawls in notebooks any less forgotten? Potentiality does not invest a thing with substance. Ouch. That stings. How often have I put off taking action because I knew that I could? What a fool! Of course I can! But canning a thing is not doing it. Doing it is doing it. And little else matters.

How does a writer stay focused? How does a good writer say the simple truths in no more words than it takes to understand them, and yet no fewer than it takes to convey them effectively. Was "effectively" one word too many there? Can I succeed in making you, dear reader, as self-conscious of my poor writing as I am? What a fool! Of course I can! But canning a thing is not doing it. See above.

The temptation to gush is now too strong. I felt like I was starting to write again right there. It felt good. It felt indulgent, even. My cockiness and arrogance started to ooze out of my fingertips in goops of molten self-indulgence. I looked over my newly minted sentences with guilty pride and thought, "Sure they need some polishing, but my don't they look fine, these words I've arranged here so cleverly." I was quite pleased with myself. Look how nicely it all flows! Look how it rewards the careful reader with its lightly-veiled wittiness and sage, worldly wisdom! Look at all of the rules and guidelines for good writers that I am following so diligently! And the humble, self-deprecating tone! Brilliant!

Then, as I start to count the exclaimation marks in what I begin to recognize as dross, I feel the crushing grip of doubt around my chest. I am an amateur. A dilettante. Not even a hack. At least a hack finishes. Insufferable. This is why I stopped pretending to write. This is why I quit. This is why I am unhappy now. Because I want to be a writer, but I don't want to work to get there. Because I am lazy. Because I am no longer able to suspend the disbelief that anyone would really want to read my drivel.

Just to read? No, not just that. To learn from. To be persuaded by. To be entertained by. To be moved by. To be motivated by. Why else does a person write? To be heard? Do I want to be heard? What do I have to say that's worth hearing? I don't even know what I've got to say that I want to hear myself. Not quite inspiring, I must admit. Am I teaching myself, persuading myself, entertaining myself, moving myself, motivating myself? Am I hearing myself?

Yes. Yes, I am hearing myself. And it's a tedious titter that I hear.

Sandy's comment a while ago that I whine when I write hurt. Because it's true. And I know that it's true. I know it quite well. Like an invalid knows his affliction. To know, the invalid doesn't need someone to scrape their dirty, unmanicured fingernails across his wounds and—after having examined the fresh blood undernail—pronounce the name of the affliction. If you know what I mean. If you don't, then I'm a bad writer. If you tell me I'm a bad writer: get your bloody fingernails out of my wound; if you don't: I appreciate your humoring me.

Last night I dreamt I was on a moderate, featureless slope that appeared to stretch into the horizon on both sides and upward indefinitely; I couldn't see behind me. Where I lay face-down on the slope, it was covered with thick, layered white bedding material. I held onto the material with both hands, using it to keep my place even though the slope was not really that steep. I was gradually sliding down the slope on the material. The sensation was akin to falling, but I wasn't moving quickly. I suddenly started to scramble up the bedding material trying move up the slope, but the more energy I put into climbing the more swiftly the sheets moved downhill underneath me, carrying me with them. Then in my peripheral vision I could begin to see the bottom of the slope; it ended in a vast, dark chasm. Alarmed, I immediately stopped scrambling. Once again I lay motionless, gripping the sheets, slipping slowly but inexorably toward oblivion.

I've certainly read a lot of interesting things in the course of my days, and some have had gradually come to influence my thinking and way of life over time. But the last time I read something that dramatically and abruptly changed my worldview, it was Kant's Grounding of the Metaphysics of Morals. Before reading it, I had been unable to conceive of an ultimate end to human endeavor other than Happiness; every last activity consciously initiated by any sentient being was in one way or another a means to this end. How could it be otherwise?

Kant's presentation of Duty as an ultimate end shook me deeply, if only in its delivery of a first cogent alternative to Happiness. The profound novelty of the idea resembled the effect of non-Euclidean geometry or Abbott's Flatland, except that the subject addressed here was something that I grappled with intensely almost every day. I had to carefully reconsider the fundamentals of every meager scrap of tentative certainty I had managed to forage up to that point. This experience proved alternately gutting and exhilarating, all depending on the amount of psychic energy I had available at the moment to wrestle with the dichotomy.

Last week, I finished a book that has had a similarly overwhelming psychic impact, James Howard Kunstler's The Long Emergency. Now Kunstler is neither as rigorous nor as thorough as Kant, and it's hardly fair to compare the content of their works, but the profound impact of each on my thinking is undoubtedly comparable. Each has significantly altered my perception of innumerable phenomena I had previously taken for granted or had missed altogether.

In short, The Long Emergency presents a compelling exploration of the events likely to accompany the imminent end of the fossil fuel era. Kunstler convincingly argues that almost every aspect the way of life that we have come to take for granted has been a brief historical anomaly that is about to end. And that end is not likely to involve a calm and orderly acquiescence of amenities. It could be violent, brutal, shocking, chaotic, etc., but regardless of its exact characteristics the key is that it will be dramatic and it will happen within our lifetime. It could be argued that it is happening right now. There is very little in the world currently familiar to us that will not be affected greatly by these inevitable changes.

Rolling Stone published an article adapted from this book. You should read this article.

I've been drinking coffee during the week again. Even staying up all night, I feel as though I do not have time to get done what I want to get done. But what do I really want to get done? I have trouble keeping the same goals from day to day. I often say I want something, but my actions do not substantially reflect those statements. Reminding myself isn't helpful. I'm not losing sight of anything; it's the very desires themselves that vacillate. I tell myself, "Hey, this is what you really wanted." I reply to myself, "Meh. So what?"

Technically, I suppose that I've now missed the 29th, too. But my day doesn't end at midnight. That's all.

This looks like it's going to be one of the mere placeholder entries. I have little to say. I'm writing primarily to procrastinate. I got my copy of the Cowboy Bebop soundtrack CD-BOX today, which I'm listening to right now. It's excellent. One of the best soundtracks ever to one of the best anime series ever. Having the TV Edit of "Tank!" alone makes the purchase worth it, but there are so many other great tracks, too. I really wish I understood Japanese—subtitles for the dialogue tracks would be hard to pull off on an audio CD. Maybe someday. Yes, maybe someday I'll comprehend Japanimese.

I don't know whether the greatest factor fundamentally is complacency, laziness, indifference, or absent-mindedness, but I've managed to miss a day already. I suppose I had to have acknowledged the possibility of failure considering that I had only committed to seven days, and yet still did not have complete confidence that I would succeed. I guess it's the manner in which I failed that is most troublesome. I had imagined a scenario along the lines of having a long, hectic day full of distractions that triggered my increasingly powerful tendency to take the path of least resistance. Instead, I simply forgot; I forgot that I had made a commitment. It didn't occur to me all day that I was not doing something I had chosen to do.

I feel like I was significantly more responsible and disciplined when I was younger. Of course, I did have motivations then that are entirely absent now, and a sort of self-involved idealism that allowed me to dismiss (or reinterpret) whatever aspects of the greater world that were incompatible with my elaborate conceptual fictions. Now I seem to take for granted that no choice I make or action I take can be meaningful outside of the myopic tableau of my personal perception (which I tend to hold quite low in esteem—if I can even be bothered to consider it). I suppose this itself may be a new manifestation of self-involved idealism. Though clearly this sort of cynical fatalism is not idealism, but rather something closer to base-ism.

I realized this morning that my entire diet yesterday consisted of a latte, a chocolate chip cookie, two sodas, and two bags of microwave popcorn. Bad. I slept from 18:00 until 09:00. Good.

I will post to this blog every day for the rest of March, regardless of how short or inane the entry. I'm not sure what reward I'll give myself if I do, or what punishment I'll inflict on myself if I don't; past experience suggests that contemplating which of these strategies would be more effective at helping me to keep my commitment would delay inception indefinitely. Similarly, any attempts to work out in advance what time of day I do this, from where, how long I spend on it, the minimum or maximum length of the entries, what topics I'll address, whether or not I'll reply to comments, etc. are likely to be highly counterproductive. Whether I actually learn anything from this exercise or endeavor to record what I've learned is irrelevant. What is important is that I do what I have chosen to do, even in the face of the nearly pathological—and inadequately explored—fear or despair I've developed with respect to writing.

I made a resolution last month to read at least one essay each day. Although I have faltered in the execution of this resolution according to the original terms I had set out for myself, I have been reading a lot more lately. And that was the essential aim of the resolution.

Tonight I've been playing catch-up for the nights I've missed in the last couple of weeks. To prevent the indecision induced inaction that often results for me in the face of an abundance of choices, I've just been methodically working my way straight through The Norton Reader: An Anthology of Expository Prose, Tenth Edition.

Scott Russell Sanders' Looking at Women brought me back to lazy summer days in Annapolis at City Dock with Dave discussing and appreciating women. Sanders is likely a little more thoughtful and thorough in his treatment than we were (simply by having used a greater number of words than we did then, perhaps), but I like to think that our conversations were not far removed from the sentiments he expresses. Yet his conclusion, beautiful as it is, rings too sentimental for me now. "I must prepare a gaze that is worthy of their splendor."

To sustain this conceit requires one to concede a fundamental, insoluble division between the sexes (or at least between the stereotypical gender roles that inform all of our behavior to some degree or another by virtue of our participation in or interaction with a society that continually *cough* engenders such roles). Anna Quindlen addresses this "otherness" in her essay Between the Sexes, A Great Divide. Perhaps my dogged insistence on egalitarianism and my failure to acknowledge any inherent characteristics guaranteed simply by inclusion in a given class (whether that class is gender, sexual preference, race, ethnicity, nationality, etc.) is in some way a manifestation of my insipid maleness. But in any case, I can't get out of myself to make an objective judgment. And contrary to Thoreau's Observation it is exactly this that makes the subject less interesting to me.

Next, Andrew Sullivan takes a stab at What Is a Homosexual? The themes he deals with are ever so human; it just boggles my mind that there are so many intolerant and narrow-minded people out there. And perhaps my lack of patience with such people is a manifestation of my own brand of intolerance and narrow-mindedness. Sullivan calls the stereotypes I was talking about in the last paragraph "collective characteristics". I like that. What collective characteristics, what generalizations that "ring of truth", are acceptable? What makes them so? It seems we could all benefit from being more rigorous statisticians.

Charles Lamb's A Bachelor's Complaint of the Behavior of Married People both rings of truth and is pretty funny, although somewhat at the expense of accuracy. Yet all is forgiven Lamb for having used the word "usufruct" in his essay.

And with that, I am nearly ready to go on a rant about the ongoing decline of St. John's College since 1997. But I don't suppose that 1) The Gadfly not being available online 2) not liking the new wordmark and 3) rumors that swing dancing has all but vanished from the Great Hall are reasons sufficient to condemn my alma mater.

Time to close before I wax too nostalgic.

popcorn fills a bowl

mongolian fire ablaze

i eat a full meal

The microwave at work tells me "ENJOY YOUR MEAL" when it's done popping my popcorn.

I like to think I'm a reasonable, fair-minded adult capable of appreciating a good argument even if I do not agree with the opinion that that argument is used to support. I acknowledge that I have my biases and limitations, but I like to think I am capable of understanding another point of view even when I do not share that point of view. But I am having a great deal of difficulty understanding how a well-informed person with reasonable intelligence in an average station in life could support the Bush administration. I would sincerely like to have someone provide me with (or provide reference to) a clear, well-reasoned explanation for why they feel that the Bush administration adequately represents the majority of citizens in this country.

If an essential part of your argument relies on the validity of your particular interpretation of the Bible, I suspect we're going to run into difficulties that I currently lack the capacity to reconcile.

I went to the dentist this week for the first time in almost a decade. It wasn't as bad as I had expected, but I still have a mouthful of trouble. What finally got me in was a compacted molar, which came out on Thursday. Ouch.

If you need a dentist in downtown San Francisco, I can recommend Dr. Larson without reservation.

So it's been almost six months since I've updated this thing. I've written only about five entries in my journal in that time, and hardly any personal email. Until a few days ago, the most extensive writing I had done for months had been for work.

I have been doing well. Fairly uninspired at the moment, but well. Undoubtedly, for me to try to recount all of the drama and excitement of this year so far would be counterproductive. I'd probably never finish this entry, much less post it.

Random highlights include such things as: starring as Lord Mormon on Fantasy Bedtime Hour (Episodes 16 and 17; kung-fu voiceover in Episode 14), playing lots of MTG, spending lots of time at Cup-a-Joe, and not playing enough guitar.

I've been spending most of my time with a small number of close friends. I don't feel like I've been at home a whole lot lately. By the time I do get home each day, I rarely have the combination of energy, time, and timing to keep in touch with anyone.

Sandy has shamed me into starting to update this blog again. I set him up with his own blog not too long ago, and he's been posting to it regularly. He surely has much less free time than I do, but still manages to post at least once a week. Surely I can do as much.

David also gave me a man-mule sized kick in the...er...ass.

If you, dear reader, would like a blog of your very own to neglect grievously, drop me a line.

My last Pilot Pentopia T2300-P has finally run out of ink. Time to get some BRFT4 refills. This is by far the best pen I have ever used. The weight, the balance, the flow and consistency of the ink all seem to be made for the eccentricities of my style of writing. That this fine instrument happens to include a mechanical pencil and stylus is icing on the cake.

Walking home from work tonight, I thought about samsara, the Buddhist notion of suffering brought about by craving. Wishing that things are not as they are is a rejection as much of what is good about now as it is what is not. But all is as it is; no need for dichotomy. Still struggling with that. Rejection of now is self-perpetuating and habit-forming. Accepting now does not preclude growth or change. Why do I reject now?

Words I repeated to myself frequently as I walked up the hill were "lust", "doubt", "guilt", "uncertainty", and "fear", each of these words bringing to mind images and impressions of people and events from my recent past. I have often felt reassured by the simplicity and apparent truth of the notion that one ought not desire to affect what is not within one's power. But this time, as I thought about it, I could not escape the gray area I'd done so well at avoiding: how does one know what is within one's power? Is it merely a matter of faith that I could, despite a lifetime of experiences making me less and less likely to do a certain thing, spontaneously choose to do that thing? Or are my proclivities so strong that I would never do that thing though I might without effort convince myself that I could, thereby conveniently avoiding the test?

I stand alone in an elevator, descending. All at once the elevator lurches and starts dropping precipitously. A terrible roar erupts as concrete rips violently against steel; the metal and wood-panelled sides of the elevator ripple, rend, and then scrape off leaving me in a concrete box, still descending, now amidst rushing whispers of silence. Then the walls begin to move in. Fear. Fear. Fear. Fear. Surrounded in concrete, still falling, walls steadily closing in—abruptly I recognize my imminent death. Fear evaporates. Instead, an exasperated frustration recedes into irritation and then gives way to indescribable disappointment. Moments before the encroaching concrete crushes me, I open my eyes. I lay in bed, heart pounding, sweating profusely. In that instant I know I had been dreaming. In the next instant, I close my eyes again—a blink in reverse—reenter the dream. And die.

I sleep soundly for the rest of the night.

I'm glad to hear that you've gotten out of London. I hope all is well in Stockholm. Förlåt, raring.

How much change do you need to have before it makes sense to buy a change counting machine? How do you know if you have enough change to buy one?

My monkey melted today as I slept. I pulled an all-nighter and fell asleep in the early afternoon. When I woke up, I found patches of what felt like cakes of sea salt on my sheets. Then in the shower, I discovered and brushed off many small bumps on my upper back and neck. It wasn't until I had put my contacts in, stepped back out into the bedroom, and saw my bookshelf that I realized what had happened. My wax monkey had melted. And as its waxy corpus dripped from the top shelf, the drops hit the lower shelves and the arm rest of my futon and splattered all over my bed, my books, the carpet, and my sleeping self.

Continuing to abide by my promise to Evil Incorporated, I am placing the Monkey in another prominent place here on my site, where I hope it will be less susceptible to another meltdown.

Today I did laundry, made a list of bugs I found in an application I downloaded today, wrote an email to someone I've never met, read part of a book, played guitar, changed two light bulbs (one with the other), netsurfed, played a video game for far too long, finally disposed of a dozen or so pairs of rather ratty underwear (i.e. overworn underwear), listened to a lot of music, moved my car to avoid yet another parking ticket, and paid some bills. But not necessarily in that order.

Today I didn't find the matching sock for four socks, didn't write email to any of the n people I've been meaning to write to for ages (where n is greater than fifty), my faith in the the average human being to do the right thing didn't increase, I didn't write a single line of code, I didn't work on any of my projects, I didn't post another page of dailymes, I didn't memorize anything, I didn't talk to anyone, ad nauseated. And didn't sleep. But not necessarily in that order.

I think the [Joseph] Heller influence is still strong with me.

In the context of all that has happened in my life since I started this blog, these lists highlight the utterly random nature of what I actually do blog. Of course, if you're not me, or don't know what's been going on with me, you may not fully appreciate the significance of this. Or, for that matter, care.

Proust is moving up my reading list.

I want a search engine that can catalog and search the text of every book and magazine article that I've ever read, complete with my comments in the margins. And while we're at it, it should return the results in my handwriting. In pencil.

I've finally put up the few photos I took at my class reunion earlier this month.

With Wasabi (2001) Jean Reno has paid off his debt to society for having participated in Godzilla (1998). (For the record, Matthew Broderick is still on probation.)