Real Life

Maia (the older cat) had an appointment with the vet yesterday. She’s not a fan of the kitty carrier – so we usually sneak up on her. The usual routine is to put the carrier in the next room with the top lid open. Then…

I want to write something, but I’m just blank. Too much business travel does this to me. I have hours free on the train today – which I always claim I’ll use to some productive purpose. I could have caught up on emails, run some…

H’okay. So the purposes of the internet are (a) self-involved drama and (b) pictures of cats. If you’re allergic to either of those, stop reading now. First things first, here’s a picture of the new (as yet unnamed) cat – pushing her luck with Maia.…

Question: What if we feel an unbearable compassion for the suffering of other beings–especially animals, because it is often more obvious–yet we have not developed the wisdom to deal with it properly? HHDL: This is all the more reason why, now that you have developed…

Had a recent experience that demands documentation. My brother graduated from Peabody conservatory this year, racking up the family record for most degrees per year: Two bachelor’s and a Masters in five years of study – guitar performance (Peabody), recording engineering (Hopkins), and acoustics (masters…

Vignette 1 I spend the morning stomping the stupid out of several prospective plans. Stomp stomp stomp. At one point I was heard to say, “look, don’t imagine that you can hurt my feelings here. We’re talking about technology and I’m pretty sure I’m right.…

Indulged, this past weekend, in the now four year old tradition of renting a cabin in the woods with a dozen or so friends. The stated purpose of the weekend is to work on the arts and crafts projects that we push to the side…

I’m ever-so-slowly making my way through a truly massive tome: Christianity, the first three thousand years. It’s a brilliant and thorough (oh god, 1,200 pages of tiny type) history by a smart and snarky Oxford professor. I highly recommend this book both to my agressive…

multiplexer has adequately captured my feelings on the matter of what Obama should do about the oil gusher. It amounts to “so long as BP has the best experts and equipment, and appear to be working as hard as they can, let them run the…

What a night. Around 2am, the battery in the floor level plug-in CO2 monitor in the hallway by the bedroom failed. The device (plug-in, mind you) started to beep – approximately once every 90 seconds. This woke me. I got up and stared at the…