my new pen

A very sweet guy in my class this week, who is a wood worker, made me a pen and then wished me luck with my writing.

Nice!

gas on valentine's day

I decided the best way to  celebrate valentine's day was to watch my favorite astrophysicist Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson talking about the worst solar storms in the universe (did you know the spots on planets like Jupiter are storms?).

While I was watching the show they talked about how Titan has oceans like earth but instead of water it's methane. So I got an idea and sent this email to my brothers (I admit I obsess about how to get a space ship to a black hole because I want to know what's in those things):

I'm watching a show about planetary storms and started thinking that maybe you could refuel a space ship with shit from planets. Like methane.

Then you could get a ship to a black hole.

Steve responded:

You will enjoy this book: http://www.amazon.com/How-Hippies-Saved-Physics-Counterculture/dp/0393076369/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1329270400&sr=8-1http://www.amazon.com/How-Hippies-Saved-Physics-Counterculture/dp/0393076369/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1329270400&sr=8-1

I have the audio book if you want it.  You would enjoy this book it's about the ridiculous things that physicist did to create jobs in the 70s. 

Methane is theoretically abundant because it's a stable combination of two compounds abundant in this solar system (hydrogen and carbon).  However, it has a fairly low energy on chemical combustion.  When we do use it we compress it, I doubt in space it will have very effective propulsion.  But maybe used for energy to fuel some other method.  But if you are doing that, why not just make a nuclear power source?

Also, don't forget that no matter what your mass is, as you accelerate you require exponentially more energy.  A photon has no mass, which is why it's capable of going the speed of light.  For all items with mass you would require infinite energy to achieve light speed.  If you look in your physics text books you will see all relativity problems say something like "item traveling near the speed of light (0.98 C)" in all the problems.

Another idea shot down.

physics jokes

I was doing a search on google today and found this great page of physics jokes.

Favorite so far:

The following is a little known, true story about Albert Einstein (attributed to Paul Harvey).

Albert Einstein was just about finished his work on the theory of special relativity, when he decided to take a break and go on vacation to Mexico. So he hopped on a plane and headed to Acapulco. Each day, late in the afternoon, sporting dark sunglasses, he walked in the white Mexican sand and breathed in the fresh Pacific sea air. On the last day, he paused during his stroll to sit down on a bench and watch the Sun set. When the large orange ball was just disappearing, a last beam of light seemed to radiate toward him. The event brought him back to thinking about his physics work. "What symbol should I use for the speed of light?" he asked himself. The problem was that nearly every Greek letter had been taken for some other purpose. Just then, a beautiful Mexican woman passed by. Albert Einstein just had to say something to her. Almost out of desperation, he asked as he lowered his dark sunglasses, "Do you not zink zat zee speed of light is zery fast?" The woman smiled at Einstein (which, by the way, made his heart sink) and replied, "Si."
And know you know the rest of the story. 

crackers to cockroaches

This weekend at my parents' house, on top of celebrating my dad's birthday, my brothers fixed my mom's paddle boat rudder and started designing a navigation system (which is funny because the pond behind their house isn't big enough to get lost). They are also going to add a system to disable an uncooperative paddler's pedals (that's because my nephew Michael paddles in an inefficient manner, either too fast or too slow).

And then for some reason graham crackers came up. I did some research on wikipedia and found out they were invented by a minister and doctor named Sylvester Graham. He invented them for the graham diet, one of the tenets of the diet being bland food suppresses sexual urges and keeps people from masturbating. Which I found interesting since they are made with something called endosperm which, combined with seeds causes plants to flower. Hm.

Then my dad and brother tested me to see if I could remember the address, zip code, and phone number of every house we had lived in from the time I was five (I remembered and now my dad thinks I really do have asperger's). Weirdly not a single house that my dad has ever owned shows up on google maps (the picture, not the map itself).

Then at dinner the next day I brought up Lorenz maps because we were talking about the storm in Colorado and my siblings made fun of me for having a "favorite meteorologist" and then because I couldn't remember the U sequence.

From there I had a conversation, while drunk, with a friend of my brother's who is a mathematician. We discussed (and be we I mean, hee, me) the U sequence (I looked it up finally because I could only remember 5 numbers, it's 1 2 4 6 5 3) and my favorite mathematical theorems (Goedel's incompleteness theorem 1 & 2 - perfect theorem for those who hated higher maths). And my mom said "I can't believe you let your sister talk to a girl you are romantically interested in while she is drunk".

Then I looked at animals that I could adopt for my niece and nephew (will adopt Winter the tail-less dolphin for Nat and a great white for Michael - my dad said "you know if you adopt a great white you have to go live with it for 6 months" and Michael got excited so we had to say "haha grandpa was just joking").

Which leads to cockroaches...from my brother Bob:

For $10 or $15 dollars, you can adopt a cockroach.
http://magblog.audubon.org/nothing-says-%E2%80%98i-love-you%E2%80%99-roach-chocolates

it's not that robots are stupid

Ever wonder what a robot would look like folding laundry or putting on socks? Check out this article and hilarious videos.

In the upcoming robot war, just give them socks! Then you can escape.

my idiot super bowl moment

My brother Steve went home right after our late lunch/dinner (what ever that's called)  and told my parents he would call when he got home.

I would like to pause here and say I don't own a tv. I've never had a tv. I also have not had a land line phone for 10 years.

Anyway, half time started and all of a sudden my brother Steve's name showed up on the bottom of tv screen. I was like "Oh my god, why is Steve's name in the super bowl???????????????" I was like"Steve hacked the super bowl!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Why did he do that?????????????????"

Turns out my parents have some how set up their tv so it shows the name of who ever is calling their phone. Don't ask me. I don't know how they did it.

My brother Bob was like "please don't write this as a blog post because then people will know what a dumb shit you are."

But it's too funny to not write about.

snow day

After being home for 22 hours, I had to fly back to the east coast (flew home from New Hampshire yesterday, got in at 1030, left my house this morning at 430 am). Not had to, flew back here for my dad's birthday.

My flight was supposed to leave at 720. It took an hour to de-ice the plane so we didn't leave until almost 830. We were one of the few flights that took off. I was just hoping that I would make it out for my dad's birthday. Airport was strange because it was so empty, especially for a friday. I was looking at the departure screens and after every flight it said "CANCELED". My flight was supposed to be full but only half the people made it. They closed I-70 minutes after I got to the airport.

Don't take off in these conditions. It's scary. The plane was sliding all over the runway...

Have gun will travel. Especially for my dad's birthday.

My parents were happy to see me. By the time I get home to Denver on Friday I'm sure all of the snow will be gone. Best part, I got a great parking space at the airport. At least, I think I parked in a parking space.

With all that snow, who knows.

I guess she was hungry

Last night I had the most bizarre dream.

I dreamed I was awakened in my house because a large black woman was banging on my window. I could see her through a window in my bedroom but it was through the blinds so I could only see the bottom of her arm and her body as she was banging on my window. I couldn't see her face at all.

I was afraid for some reason, and then the woman started yelling "Just let me in! I'm hungry!" I started thinking about how I could give her some food without letting her in my house and then realized I have no food in my house (that's true, in real life, except for some soup and a big bag of gummi bears).

I woke up in a sweat and realized:

1. I'm not home, I'm in a hotel in Massachusetts.
2. Even if I was home, my bedroom is on the second floor of my house.

I don't know why but the feeling of fear from the dream lasted all day. And it was so real. It's been a while since I've had such vivid dreams. First the aliens, then this.

Full disclosure and confession:

Yesterday I ran 2 1/2 miles on the treadmill. I couldn't stop myself. And I did an hour of exercises (like crunches) when I got back to my room.

My knee feels fine today. Shoulders kind of sore...

crows

I've been researching animals for my kid's book. One animal I'm really starting to like are crows. I always kind of liked them when I lived in Baltimore. Other birds just seem like mangy little poop bags. But you could tell crows are smart. New Caldonian crows are the smartest. And they have a great name.

Of course, a scientist finally built a test to stump the crows and to prove they can't problem solve in their heads, but rely on visuals. I love this quote which says the same thing but in science speak: “Our results raise the possibility that spontaneous string pulling in New Caledonian crows may not be based on insight but on operant conditioning mediated by a perceptual-motor feedback cycle.”

What kind of person spends time trying to stump a crow on a logic test? What, did his kid not get into Montessori school and now he wants to make everyone feel dumb, including the crows?

Which brings me to the story of my day today. I'm thinking my company can fire all of the administrative "support" and hire crows.

Got to the airport at 6 am this morning, got into Manchester NH at 5 pm because of the crazy multi-leg flight they put me on, hauled ass to my company's building in Littleton, MA where I was planning to set up my class for tomorrow (set up was confirmed on Friday with the front desk at the building)...only to discover the room empty. Of course, it may be the wrong room because all the room numbers in that facility have 4 numbers and the fuckwit at the front desk who sent me the room number sent  only a 3 number room number. But they were all the same number (A111). This was also the woman who said the facility was "close" to the airport. It's an hour away. I have a 6 am flight Thursday morning. That's going to be fun. Getting up at 3 am. Why do I do this job again? Oh yeah. Bills to pay.

And the class I'm teaching next week...apparently the customer has been unable to download the images for their laptops. I know this will shock you, but they've had a trouble ticket in for 2 weeks already with no solution.

Ech. Or, should I say "caw".

the internet abducted my post

Rats. I wrote a long post about my customer experience here in St. Louis and the internet ate it.

Oh well. Summary of this week:

• my customer drew a chemical model for me showing the make up of butter (he pretended he was drawing a network concept diagram - chemist jokes)
• a chemist showed me aspirin in powder form, but it's so strong if you get it on your skin you'll die (it's mixed with other chemicals - they manufacture it in the same building I'm working in)
• no one at the company where I'm working takes aspirin because it causes genetic transmutation (which is why you aren't supposed to take it while pregnant, especially the early stages of pregnancy when the genetic material is developing)
• if I pay the company $2,000 they'll sequence my genes and show me what diseases I have and what treatments will and won't work

All in all, it's been a pleasant engagement except for this broke ass hotel in the middle of no where with no working gym equipment.

Oh, and the IT guys finally got back to me today about my computer. I fixed it last night. Idiots.

medical explanation for abduction dreams

I love wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleep_paralysis

And an interesting story about a woman who swears she and her husband were abducted by aliens:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betty_and_Barney_Hill_abduction

Chapter 3: They Rescue a Kangawrong in the Market

Though he pretended to be sleeping the croco-diamond was quite excited about going to a market. He had never been. There was, of course, the issue with people, in a mob, and him with so many jewels. But the real reason he had never been to market is that croco-diamonds are snobs. They only shop in places like V’Ates on in Weremonshire and Hemington’s Fine Wools and Edith’s Terribly Refined Comestibles (mostly sold in intricately designed little china pots that people save to reuse, though, to be honest, they are entirely impractical for any use except comestibles, which come in their own china pot).

The giant man pulled up into a dusty lot next to all the other ticky tap taps which were painted Japanese Green, Orange-glo, Spangled Yellow, Purple Fright, and other colors. The croco-diamond was a bit miffed that his ticky tap tap was frankly, and in not just his opinion, a bland blue. But soon he turned to other matters of importance.

For example, the giant man was pulling the four cringle crisp baskets (one had, by all witness accounts, blown away, and had not been eaten by the croco-diamond as some might suspect) to the edge of the ticky tap tap.

“Is this your marketing plan? No, no, this is all wrong!” The croco-diamond clicked his nails and the giant man made a step with his hand. With a flump (his feet) and a palump (his tail) the croco-diamond was out of the hammock and standing in the bed of the ticky tap tap.

The noise attracted the attention of the market goers, who started to gather in a group around the giant man. They were awestruck by croco-diamond, regally standing on his hind feet with his tail casually but strategically draped over the side of the ticky tap tap. The red streamers fluttered in the gentle summer breeze.

“What we need are boxes. Boxes fit for cringle crisps, an unparalleled snack in all of the worlds.” The croco-diamond paused as if waiting for the crowd to produce boxes.

When that didn’t happen the croco-diamond, remembering his chipped nails, placed his front webbed feet behind his back, as if he was a general surveying his kingdom. But really, he didn’t want the crowd to see his nails. “Good people! Good people of the market! As you see, before me are four baskets. Baskets which contain…”

But the market goers were already lining up with their brown paper bags. The giant man was filling the bags with cringle crisps and collecting coins. The croco-diamond barked out a “wuf” in a way that he hoped would be thought of as accidental. The market goers in line stopped clamoring forward and took a step back from the ticky tap tap, wavering between cringle crisps and the foreboding animal before them that had just barked. Loudly.

Having regained the crowd’s attention the croco-diamond continued. “A new day is dawning…a new day for the cringle crisp. As you see today, we have a simple yet elegant operation. But in keeping with the times, new trends, laws, regulations, and market forces, in the future we will be revolutionizing distribution…boxes, we will have boxes of cringle crisps, my picture of course, on the boxes…a new day for cringle crisps! I personally will sign every box, with this, my own hand…”

Hip squish squish.

The crowd turned to the noise. Which was not coming from the croco-diamond.

Who decided to unclasp his front feet from behind his back. “This, my own hand!” He waved his large (though at this point besides nail-chipped, slightly dirty) front foot towards the audience. “Yes, you, you the common people, will have a picture to cherish, a picture of a croco-diamond…” The crowd once again looked at the croco-diamond, who clenched his hand into a fist to hide his nails and to project a sense of power.

Hop squish hip. Hip hop squish. Squish hip.

“Hey ya! My termarters! Looka whatta ya did ter my termarters!”

An angry voice caused the crowd to turn away again. This time, the croco-diamond looked too. First he saw…giant red footprints.

Was it? Not! Blood? Croco-diamonds can not STAND the sight of blood. It makes them faint, then whimper, and then they cry.

But blood does not have seeds. These red footprints had seeds.

Squish hop hip squish thump.

Squish.

Hip.

Squeeeee. Eeeeeee.

Noting the direction the crowd was looking, and the closeness of the noise, the croco-diamond turned to the right side of the ticky tap tap.

Sproing!

One large, to be honest, rather too large, furry brown ear popped up near the fourth basket of cringle crisps.

Sproing!

A second furry brown ear joined the first.

Was it…a rabid bearstein? A mad doglin? A wolf-o-snappish?

Was it…the worst monster in all of the worlds?

The croco-diamond fought to maintain his composure. Croco-diamonds, because of their long and esteemed lineage, do not show fear.

“Show yourself good sir, or I shall chop you! With my choppers!” The croco-diamond displayed his white gold teeth, which glistened in a menacing fashion, even with a few cringle crisps caught in the crevices because the croco-diamond had forgotten to floss after eating cringle crisps on the ride to the market.

Poing!

A nose shot up, leaning into the bed of the ticky tap tap.

Ploink, ploink!

Two soft brown eyes with very, VERY long eyelashes blinked at the croco-diamond. Who stood with an over-extended tummy full of one too many baskets of cringle crisps, unsure of what to do. He felt, to be honest, a little afraid.

The giant man made a noise as if clearing his throat. “I believe, I think, what we have here, is, erm, hm, I’m quite sure actually, that is to say…that is a kangawrong.”

“And it murshed my termarters!” cried a voice in the crowd.

“Oh your termarters! We, we are quite tired of hearing of your termarters!” said the croco-diamond. He was very glad that the creature was not the worst monster in all of the worlds or a sneaky-thief trying to steal his jewels.

“But he murshed my termarters! Punish, I say!”

The croco-diamond made itself even taller than he already was by standing on his tail and puffing out his light green belly. “There will be no punishment of the fellow!” He watched as the long lashes went “wink wink”. The whiskers of the kangawrong’s petite nose wriggled left to right. “We shall free this prisoner! We shall pay for his wrongs! We,” at this he nodded at the giant man, “shall allow this prisoner to be free!”

The crowd clapped and the giant man looked a little worried at how much this payment would cost. The voice from the crowd said “He ain’t no prisoner. But he murshed my termarters! Just hopped through and didn’t even look!”

The croco-diamond laid a chipped, but still royal, nail on the kangawrong’s forehead, between the two soft brown eyes, and said “I forgive you. By my order as a croco-diamond I forgive you for your wrongs.”

The kangawrong looked at the croco-diamond and tilted his head to the side. He raised one of his abnormally small arms and waved at the croco-diamond with his furry paw.

“I think he likes me,” the croco-diamond stage whispered to the giant man. “Let’s take him home.”

He was already imagining how the kangawrong could wait on him, bringing him baskets of cringle crisps while he lazed in the hammock. Even with its stunted arms, perhaps it could help pick cringle roots. Baskets and baskets of cringle roots. One basket of cringle roots equals one basket of cringle crisps and they, the two of them, could pick baskets and baskets. The front of the croc-diamond’s snout became moist and his nostrils expanded, breathing in the heady scent of cringle crisp crumbs, all that was left from the day’s market trip.

“Ummmmm…okay,” said the giant man.

“He will of course have to sit in the front seat with you. There’s no room back here.” The croco-diamond slumped to his belly, pushing cringle crisp crumbs that had fallen to the bed of the ticky tap tap into a pile and then rolling over on his side to look at the kangawrong.

“Chop chop then little lad! To the front seat of the ticky tap tap! Forthwith! Post haste!”

Ploink ploink went the kangawrong’s eyelashes. It didn’t move

“I believe it’s a bit daft,” the croco-diamond stage whispered to the giant man. “Help the dear thing to its seat!”

So the giant man opened the passenger door of the ticky tap tap and helped the kangawrong inside. Its tail made a sproing brrroing proiiing noise as the giant man attempted to arrange it comfortably in the cab.

Which covered up the sounds of the croco-diamond eating the crumbs of the cringle crisps. Munch munch crunch. He was being very quiet.

Chapter 2: The Giant Man Makes a Plan of Action Which They Carry Out

The croco-diamond popped the last bit of ka-nana-kin in his mouth. “Delicious!” he said to the giant man. “Did you grow that on this farm?”

“I grow everything on the farm and then sell it at the market. I like to work outdoors.”

“And you live here alone?” asked the croco-diamond, noticing, now that the sun was fully up, that the giant man’s house, while well made, was, to be honest, a little dirty.

“I’ve lived here alone for a long time.”

The croco-diamond said, with pride, “I have never lived alone.” Then, thinking his response may have been a bit impolite, he whispered conspiratorially, “However, I did live in a swamp. It was quite mucky. You can’t even imagine what it did to…my jewels.”

Every croco-diamond has a unique set of jewels, some won from dueling with pirates, others bestowed for valor, a few given as payment for scholarly works, and the rest handed down through the generations. All of the croco-diamond’s star garnets were inherited from his father, who had received them as payment for a series of books he had written about roebertian engine design. Croco-diamonds can be very mechanically inclined when they aren’t being lazy.

The giant man had no jewels. That made the croco-diamond feel bored. He thought about returning to the purple hammock for some sleep. But the giant man had other ideas.

“What we are going to do now is go out in the field and pick some more cringle roots. Then we will go into the kitchen and make the cringle crisps. I think we can make at least two bushels before market.”

At first the croco-diamond was not sure at all that he wanted to go into a field to do manual labor. The giant man watched as the croco-diamond lowered his snout and made a “kkkech, bleccch” noise. He wrapped his tail around his body and looked as if he would turn into a giant ball and bounce away.

So the giant man said “I would like to tell you about the cringle root. The cringle root is a beautiful thing, like your jewels. You plant it in the fall, the seed looks like a flower. You must tend to the root gently through the winter. In the spring tiny green leaves sprout from the dirt. The leaves are shiny, like…”

“Like my emeralds?” the croco-diamond asked, suddenly interested, since the subject had changed to him.

“Yes, like your emeralds. Under the leaves a small root grows hidden, a translucent globe at first, darkening to a shade of purple, the purple of royalty. The purple…of kings.”

“I see,” said the croco-diamond, contemplating the rich purple of the cringle crisps, and how they had shimmered in the basket, tempting him to eat them. He wondered how croco-diamonds had been unaware for all of the years that cringle crisps existed since they were obviously the food of kings. So light and airy with an exceptional crunch leaving a nutty earthy taste in the mouth as one savored the broken crisp on the tongue…

A trickle of saliva rolled down the croco-diamond’s lower jaw. He wished for a cringle crisp at that moment and wanted it more than anything in all of the worlds. He thought to ask the giant man if there might be some over looked baskets, perhaps in the house, which, while not a perfectly clean environment, would not preclude the croco-diamond, recently from the swamp, from eating a cringle crisp.

“Say, would there be any more cringle crisps about somewhere? You have piqued my interest. I am very excited to get to know more about them through a thorough study.” The giant man sadly shook his head.

At that moment it became clear to the croco-diamond what needed to be done. He raised his snout up. “To the field!” he commanded, raising a finger on his front foot in the air. “We go! Post haste!”

And so they went into the field. The croco-diamond watched impatiently as the giant man picked a cringle root. He had to bend down 20 feet to the dirt where the cringle roots were. He would stick his big fingers in the dirt, fumbling because the cringle roots were much smaller than his fingers. Because of his height it was hard to see the ground, so he would have to bend even lower, saying “oof, my back!” to make sure he only picked ripe cringle roots.

“This will not do! This will not do at all!” The croco-diamond’s mind was racing thinking cringle yummy crunchy. Crunchy cringle crummies. Cringle cringly crispy yummy.

“Please, step aside dear sir!” commanded the croco-diamond. “We will NEVER get to market this way!” He began to delicately scratch at the ground, determined, though it was manual labor, to pick some cringle roots so he could have some cringle crisps.

In fact, the croco-diamond was much faster at picking than the giant man. Being lower to the ground, with his long nails, he could easily pull the cringle roots out of the earth.

The croco-diamond was able to pick 10 cringle roots in the time the giant man picked just one. Though he was later heard to brag that he picked 20 in the time the giant man picked one that only happened after he had been picking them for a week.

Because the croco-diamond was faster at picking the giant man busied himself back at the house making the cringle crisps. He covered the ground from the house to the field in just five steps, returning to pick up baskets when he heard the croco-diamond’s joyous “Ruf!” that yet another had been filled.

Left alone in the field, the croco-diamond was filled with anticipation as he pulled each cringle root out of the ground. “Oh, oh my beauties. I will do anything for you! You, of exceptional beauty and taste…” He paused, holding a shimmering purple cringle root up to the light of the sun. A solitary tear slid from the croco-diamond’s right eye.

But then, embarrassed and fearing he was being dramatic, he addressed the basket of cringle roots before him. “Well, I do like you. But, mostly when you are a cringle crisp.”

In less than two hours they were ready to go to market with five baskets of cringle crisps. The giant man put the baskets into his ticky tap tap. And although there was room for the croco-diamond to sit in the front seat he decided instead that he wanted to sit in the ticky tap tap bed with the cringle crisps. The giant man strung the hammock up across the bed.

“You see, this is how my people travel,” the croco-diamond told the giant man as he climbed into the hammock, not on his own accord though, the giant man had to make a step with his hand. “I am used to being carried in a royal litter by eight sloth toed land fish. A flamencio bird walks in front sprinkling a basket of flower petals to mark my arrival.” The croco-diamond looked around hopefully, but there were no flamencio birds or sloth toed land fish to be seen anywhere. “You do at least have flower petals? Red is my color but what ever you have on hand will do.”

The giant man worriedly scanned his yard. No red flower petals. The closest thing he had was an oops-a-daisy bush and that wouldn’t flower for another month. He scratched his head, thinking quietly “um, erm, hrm”. And then…

“I have it! An idea! I saw it in a book! I can tie red streamers to the front of the car. That way everyone will know there is a very important person in the car.”

The croco-diamond genteelly nodded his head in agreement. Quickly the giant man tore the red bandana he wore around his neck into strips. The streamers were attached to the bumper and they were off to the market.

As the giant man drove he could hear, from the back of the ticky tap tap, a muffled “crunch crunch”. But when he looked in the rear view mirror the croco-diamond always pretended to be asleep.

revision to Chapter 1 of the cringle crisp caper

I've rewritten the first three chapters of my new kids' book.

Chapter 1:  The Giant Man Discovers a Croco-diamond in His Hammock

One morning, as the sun was just rising, the giant man woke up to the sound of crunching. It was not normal crunching. It was very loud crunching.

He sat up in bed and peered out the window of his attic bedroom down to the courtyard below. There he saw in the growing light a croco-diamond lying on his back in the purple hammock. He had a round light green belly covered in cringle crisp crumbs, shiny long nails at the end of his webbed feet, and thick teeth covered in patterned white gold. Down his spine was a sparkling array of aspen diamonds, cardentine emeralds, star garnets, marlonian opals and a De Le Ve Dornian ruby once owned by a real King. In each foot were 5 cringle crisps which the croco-diamond daintily placed in his mouth before snapping his snout shut with a loud munch and chomp.

Beside the croco-diamond was the basket of cringle crisps the giant man had made just the previous day. The basket was almost empty.

The giant man was puzzled for two reasons. The first – no one had seen a croco-diamond in years. They had moved deep into the swamp because fortune hunters would remove the jewels that made up the spines of the croco-diamonds while the croco-diamonds were sleeping (they sleep very deeply).

The second – though croco-diamonds are known to eat mash pies, squiggle salads, kormy buns, broccolini casseroles, eggy torts, okre poker soup, and jellied can cakes they had never been seen eating cringle crisps. Cringle crisps, as you know, are made from cringle root, which is in the cringle tuber family, also known by its Latin name Crosimius Cringlecrumbium.

“Delightful morning!” called the croco-diamond, spying the giant man at his window. “I shall rest here for a bit and then I must to do something with these nails. A warm bath would be wonderful. Do you have any bubbles?”

“Erm. Hm. Um. Just a minute. I’m coming down,” said the giant man, proceeding to put on his robe and walk down the narrow staircase from the attic, careful to duck his head to avoid the ceiling. Arriving in the courtyard he found the croco-diamond brushing the crumbs from his belly with an elegant but worn cotton square. He put the last cringle crisp in his mouth and then looked at the front of his feet.

“I had such a nice pair of gloves for my trip, seem to have misplaced them and walking on tile is so hard on the nails…” The croco-diamond stopped speaking because he noticed the giant man was staring at the path behind him that led from the courtyard out to a barn. The path was strewn with baskets. Empty baskets.

“Five, six, seven… Hm. Eight. Erm, um, nine.” said the giant man to himself, counting the baskets. The croco-diamond covered the front of his snout and burped into the cotton square.

“My cringle crisps. All…all of my cringle crisps?”

“I was hungry. Sometimes I do eat too much.” The croco-diamond wiggled his tail in an attempt to sit up. The attempt failed. “And now it’s hopeless. I’m afraid I’m stuck in this hammock.” His snout sagged open and a small trail of drool dropped to his tummy. “Perhaps I’ll have a bath later instead of now.” His eyes started to close and he yawned a big croco-diamond yawn.

“But…it seems you’ve eaten all of my cringle crisps? All of them? ALL?”

At this the croco-diamond’s sleepy eyes suddenly opened, and with a great effort he managed to roll over onto his right side so he could more easily see the giant man.

“I don’t understand. Is there…a problem?”

“There is a problem. I sell cringle crisps every Thursday at the market. Now…there’s nothing to sell… Erm, um, nothing…”

The croco-diamond blinked and then stared at the tall figure in front of him whose bath robe flapped in the gentle breeze, as if lazily pointing to all the empty baskets.

Due to his large size, strong teeth, well polished nails, and general aura of royalty, no one had ever reprimanded the croco-diamond before. But he was pretty sure he was being reprimanded. And was unsure what to do. A feeling of sadness replaced the happy feeling of just moments before from having eaten nine baskets of cringle crisps. He put his front foot to his face and pressed it against the side of his snout.

“I just…I just don’t know what to say,” he sniffed. His large tail thumped down dully onto the hammock and his rear feet curled into tight balls of webbing.

The giant man realized the croco-diamond was going to start crying. And the worst thing is when a croco-diamond cries. First it goes “sniff sniff” and the eyes get a sad gleam. Then the croco-diamond makes a noise like “kak, kak”, clearing the lungs. One, then two egg shaped tears will roll down its cheeks, followed by a lowly murmured “neuuuuuuuu!” Sobs follow.

Croco-diamonds have a large supply of tears and can cry for a month without stopping except to eat and polish their nails (very difficult to do through a curtain of tears but somehow they manage). The giant man had once heard the story of a croco-diamond that cried so much, for so long, that the croco-diamond’s snout had to buy an umbrella and galoshes.

“Oh no. Don’t. No don’t do that. Um, it’s okay. Erm, don’t cry. Please. Now, there’s no reason to cry…” said the giant man as the croco-diamond’s chest puffed forward and his front feet covered his face. “It’s…it’s okay. We…we’ll make some more cringle crisps. With two of us…it’s…it won’t take long. Erm, hm, please don’t cry.” The giant man moved his hand as if to pat the croco-diamond, but his hand was far away and so it just patted the air. “Oh please please please! Please don’t cry!”

The croco-diamond thought for a moment, noticed his chipped nails again, and decided it would be best to delay his tears, at least for the moment. He stared at his front feet, and then his back feet, uncurling them and then wiggling each webbed digit nervously. Was he supposed to apologize now? Croco-diamonds don’t like to apologize.

“They had such a nice zing and a delicious crunch and I hadn’t eaten except for a tiny pot of cactar jam, it dries out the throat you know…” The croco-diamond coughed a tiny cough and put his snout almost to his belly. No, he wasn’t going to apologize.

The giant man sighed. He knew there was no point in getting angry. So he said “I’m going to get dressed and make some breakfast. You should join me at least for some fruit because jam and cringle crisps are not a balanced diet. After breakfast we will discuss what to do next. We need a plan of action!”

an abduction dream solves my writer's block

Yesterday, after my screen writing class and my writer's group meeting, I started working on the first 5 pages of my screen play, which are due Wednesday but in reality I have to get them done today because I work on my book during the weekdays. I couldn't think of how to get the movie started in a way that would be immediately funny. So I started watching an iraqi movie called fratricide and fell asleep at 9 pm...

During which time I had an abduction dream. I haven't had one since I left DC. In the dream I was laying on my stomach and I heard footsteps coming up the stairs. At first I thought it was just the normal house noises (I think I have ghosts because I hear light footsteps going up and down the stairs almost every night. But, never see anyone and it's not as loud as people footsteps - probably just the wood settling or something). Anyway, the footsteps got really loud and sounded like people footsteps. I was scared but thought I shouldn't move. 

Then I felt two small feet land on my bed. I wanted to move but I was paralyzed. The next thing I knew I was being pulled up towards my ceiling at a fast rate. Then I was outside, flipped over on my back, and could see myself heading towards the bottom of a metallic green...box. You know, like those ammo boxes? But this one was huge and I could only see the bottom of it.

Everything was completely black and I was laying on a table. Then I heard a "pop!" like a lid being pulled off a plastic medicine bottle (child safety-less cap). Then I felt myself being lifted up and thrown into the sky. I was falling at a fast rate but wasn't scared at all. I wanted to fall.

Woke up in a sweat. And then realized - that's it!!! The first few minutes of dialogue will be about aliens!

I forget what the medical explanation is for abduction dreams.

my brother and I talk about asperger's

by email, of course...

Bob: What test did you take, and is it available online?  Is there a treatment or just a 'haha, you have aspergers...' Listening to the NPR piece now...

Me: I'll send you the test link tomorrow (downloading a vm ware image which has brought my fuckwit laptop to a screaming halt). 

My ex used to move things on my shelves while I was at work, and we'd get into a huge fight about it when I got home. I realized listening to the npr story that my need for perfectly arranged objects might not be normal but it's not because I'm a bitch. BTW. I am obsessed with license plates and need to come up with some numeric resolution of the plates when I'm driving. It's horrible. Plate ACE 246 is easy. The rest are hard. I do the same with my hotel room numbers.

Also, as I'm getting older my facial recognition skills are getting A LOT worse. Stresses me out at work. I'll spend 10 hours with a customer, show up in the lobby the next day, and NOT recognize the person AT ALL. 

Bob: I like to think that I can't wear my glasses on the beach, and that's why I can't tell anyone from anyone else on the beach.  The reality is that I was in a training session (week long) including an earthquake that disrupted the event, then met a person that was at the training a month later.  He immediately recognized me, I had no recollection of ever meeting him.

I'm starting to think everyone I work with has asperger's...

incompetence, part II

I got an email at 630 this morning from IT saying they set up a training environment for my class. The sales woman on the thread said "you are my hero!" to the IT guy. Like, why, because he did his fucking job?

So I logged on to the training environment and discovered the image the IT guy uploaded had
1. exercise files for EVERY class but the one I was teaching
2. an expired license (meaning, no one could use the software)

I was like are you GODDAMN KIDDING ME???????

So I sent the files that needed to be added to the IT guy. How FUCKING long does it take to drop them in the training environment? About 6 seconds. Instead, he didn't do it until 11 am (he received the files at 7 am). And he only did it because I called so many times and screamed at his manager (who told me "he's in a meeting right now" when I asked, at 10 am, why the files hadn't been uploaded). How long did it take him to upload them? If you guessed "around 6 seconds" you're right.

So, for a two day class, the students weren't able to get into the software tool until 4 hours before the class ended. I put them through the paces and we made a lot of progress.

That is, until the session ended because the fuckwit IT guy had the class end at 6 PM EST, not 6 PM MST. I started a web conference and finished the class.

Someone should be fired. But the idiot way my company works, it would probably be me.

rain man?

I've often suspected certain members of my family, who shall not be named here, are autistic. Like, is it normal for a 28 year old to have 6 software patents? Didn't think so.

But this past summer while I was on my lighthouse retreat I met a woman who has a son with asperger's who is also a therapist. She said I had it.

And they just did this cool story on NPR about people with autism that try to have romantic relationships. I was listening to some of the comments thinking "hm, sounds familiar".

So I took an asperger's test a few minutes ago (long day, training problem still not solved, no idea what I'm going to do tomorrow). The score for a normal person is 16. Asperger's score is 32. I scored....

45.

Ech. Seriously? Maybe that's what's wrong with me. The weird thing is a component of asperger's is to have a child like imagination. So, maybe my kid's book will suck less than my other book. Got another rejection today...

incompetence

Wait until I tell my uncle about this one...

Today I was supposed to be teaching an online training class for students spread out across the US and in India. It's the first time I've taught a class like this.

Half the students never read the email with instructions on how to log onto the course so we were delayed 10 minutes because of that. Then half the students have audio problems because they never tested their equipment so they can't participate. None of the students have taken the pre-req. The software being used to serve the class is erratic and half the time the students can't see my screen. When I'm doing a demo I can't see the portal and have no idea if the students are trying to contact me because they can't see my screen (and since some can't talk...well, you get the picture).

Through all these problems I kept contacting the training coordinator, who is supposed to help. She told me to call tech support, which is difficult since I'm the instructor. Normally I would give the students an exercise to do while I did the training coordinator's job but...

...the best part...80% of the class is doing exercises in a software tool that is supposed to be available through a citrix lab. But, the class status in the system was shown as "unbooked" so the IDs and passwords to get into the citrix lab were never generated. And apparently there's no room on the servers to put my class up and I was told to reschedule it.

None of the training people are responding to my emails.

keyword searches that found my blog

These are the keyword searches people have done in the past week that brought them to my blog.

My favorite is "getting fucked by a subject". No, it's "banjo boobs". No, it's "penis eating fish". That entry still gets hits each week.

Virginia Woolf I am not.