breathing
Well, after a record week of printing that coincided with midterms last week I just finished a marathon of sorts. I am doing my best to take it easy this week (my printing slate is caught up and midterms are graded. whew!). The only reason I pulled off the whole guest post thingy last week at Sar's was because there was a mix up and I thought it was going to be featured a week earlier. So I had accidently done my homework early and got to just send it over and check in and make comments in what turned out to be an exchange of upwards of 60 comments that is still going on! I tried to sign off and say thanks and goodbye and then Sar started in again on Major Dad and then O Ceallaigh chimed back in and as of today I entered the fray again.
It's all been a grand experiment but one that has given me some insight and also, sadly, reinforced my feeling that all of the powers of civil discourse cannot make a dent in some levels of dogma. At the end I got scrappy and wasn't proud of some of the comments I made. Though I made some apologies I think I still need to learn the meaning of the phrase "shake the dust from your feet" and walk away or just maintain patience and calm. I still have much to learn.
I am going to have some time to write for a change and I've got people waiting-- nothing great, no more War and Peace, no novel, just computer graphics stuff and if I get the time, my long shot book, The History of Design, From Animal Fat to Inkjet (The War and Peace of Design). I've been waiting to shove open a window to focus on writing these textbooks and it will be a different pace than last week. Something to look forward to.
C Jo and baby Bonnie are going to take off for the coast for three nights. I'll be home alone with the other kids and that will give me more writing time (one hopes). We were set to go as a family but Rob's football team won their first playoff game! It's a single elimination playoffs that is open to all teams, regardless of their record. Well, Rob's team had only won a single game all year. We had heard mid season that only teams that had 4 wins would go to the playoffs. So we scheduled a trip for after football, once his team got to where there were less than 3 games left. Come to find out that all teams go to the playoffs. Okay, no worries, chances are, the way things had been going, that they wouldn't get past round one. Well, they destroyed the first team and looked like Ohio State out there! What happened! They executed plays, they threw passes, they had sacks. Now what do we do? We have a house rented at the beach. So, C said I'll go have some fun with the wee one, you stay and write and support the football thing and it will be fine.
All's well that ends well. I'll miss the beach and my wifey and the little snapper. I love the coast. but a light work week and a weekend without a toddler will be a nice change, especially with all of this writing to do. We'll see-- I do feel like somewhat of a taxi service for my teenage daughter's social life a lot of the time and I don't want to ignore Rob, but at least the spinning head of parental radar can be turned off and I might be able to focus. Famous last words, I know.
Wish me luck. And I hope to steal some time in blogworld, especially since I won't be nursemaiding a somewhat fruitless discussion on war and peace at Sar's that I created. Will I ever learn?
Tom
posted by Just Tom @ 2:54 PM
17 Comments
17 Comments:
Good luck on the book; I like the ''Animal Fat'' line -- a good hook.
Congrats on the football winning; good luck on the writing time. :)
-GG
What? Parental radar? Surely you jest. I think you just take the batteries out when I am away!
Good luck with the week-end. I am sure you will find the perfect balance with play and work...and play. Rob will be in testosterone heaven to hang with you so much. And Carrie, well, she knows where all Daddy's buttons are.
I love you. And I know you'll give me a vacation, after my vacation with the toddler...right?
Mwah!
Wifey
Tom, I checked out the debates at Sar's. Everybody has good points. Yours were jabbed in some very tender places. Even your apology sounded more like, "I'm sorry you're stupid." I think those last few posts kind of pointed out why there's such a wide gap between the political poles.
Tom, hope you have a great weekend and get to do what makes you happy. I'm off now to see if you really are stirring up things over at Sar's! My bet is you are (as usual) too hard on yourself. Life is short - don't take it too seriously. Love you.
Nice to hear the fire is still going over at sar's. I'll stop by again if I ever get really cold. :)
I have a nitpicky suggestion. Can you (or your lovely wife) maybe increase the contrast between the text and the background? I don't know if it's just this laptop, but I feel like I'm looking for my shoes in the dark. :)
Personally, you'd have an easier time with the baby than the older kids I think. Congratulations to Rob's football team! Sounds like they finally jelled, and could possibly go farther than you've ever dreamed.
QD, I agree with you, which was why I wrote that rather somber review of myself. I started out with a very civil, level headed approach but allowed myself to get sucked in and lose my couth. I will get back on the horse and try again.
But really, the guy said that he had blood on his hands for helping to guide missiles at a target he couldn't see but that was in, and I quote, "bad guy land."
Bad guy land? he said sodomizing prisoners was okay if it got you what you needed and that the bible had no place in military engagement. I agreed with the latter statement.
I don't believe that you can be a Christian and support a war (at least most wars) unless there is something in the old testament that I am not aware of-- which would be a Christian equibalent of Jihad. But there is a fine line between some cults of fundamentalist Christianity and the Taliban. And I'm exploring whether or not there is a line at all.
Still doesn't rationlize my behavior. pooh!
Sorry about the equibalent thing but I have a cold.
Tom,
I am not saying I disagreed with you! I didn't. I'm just saying you sharpened a couple of those barbs before you slung them -- and a few may have hit more than your target.
I think most soldiers go to war firmly uholding the belief that they are defending our freedoms. I personally know several military men who joined immediately after 9/11 with just that thought.
The American people did cry out for war -- but they did not cry out for this war. We were all swindled by our own government. Some of us realize it and admit it. Others have invested too much, their lives or the lives of their children, and cannot admit, or refuse to acknowledge, that they were tricked.
And then there is that other percentage -- a very small one I hope -- who believe the president is a personal friend of God and therefore all his decisions must be right. I often hear, "the Christians support Bush." I am a Christian. I am an evangelist and I do not support Bush. I also do not believe he is following God's agenda.
Well it's good to get your perspective, Quilly. Your sister was the one who gave me the impetus to write that post and you are giving me perspective to understand it and my own very human self.
It's also good to hear from an evangelist that is a free thinker. A lot of my post and commentary was about stereotypes. I certainly don't want to get into that mode, myself. but it's easy to do, even if we don't mean to.
Peace,
T
Ahhhh, much better. :)
God gave me a brain. I think I would do him a great disservice if I didn't use it.
Oh good. You never know how things look on other computers. Like most graphic designers, I'm Mac. However, I did not design my blog, it was a gift. I've always like the rich colors, though-- but want it to be legible, like loking for shoes in the dark with a flashlight.
That last message was for Diesel.
QD, did you catch Sar's post about meeting Sister Prejean? She made some good comments about having faith and her own political views, etc. It was a very inspired post.
It is very hard to put our egos aside when we have a passion for our beliefs.
People will often say outrageous things they don't really mean because they are frustrated and scared and baffled. Those people you can work with.
Other people are so sure of themselves. They are the scary ones. Anyone, regardlees of who they are, that is not willing to look at their beliefs in a critical way is scary.
Tom: I did. It was.
Nessa: you're right!
Tom, your blog looked wonderful on the machine I designed it on, but I do have trouble reading it from my work machine. I thought it was the different browsers. Home = Firefox. Work = IE6 (bleh). I am glad you fixed it. The point was to help you communicate. If you can't make it do that then I gave you a trial, not a gift.
No worries, QD. I'm on a mac on firefox and it always looked good to me, but this way it will accommodate more mcahines and browsers.
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