Tuesday, 11 September 2012

 For class today, we had to read a decent poem and then write a two-page paper about it. I know I whine about Hamline a lot, and so this day will be no different…

Two pages about a single, thirty-line poem?

Here’s the poem.

Needless to say, I was able to turn in a paper that met the requirement, but, damn, it’s hard to write two whole pages about a single poem. And I say tha tas someone who’s usually so verbose I have to edit like mad. For example, when I write speeches for Toastmasters, they’re usually over 15 minutes long on my first read-through. I then have to take a chainsaw to them and bring them down to ten or eight or even six minutes. For today’s assignment, I had the opposite problem. Tough.

In other news, my old friend Tim has decided to take a photo every day and post it on the old WWW. My wife had this same idea back in 2006-07. So I’m sure Tim was inspired by that, especially since I just talked about my wife’s project in This Recent Post, which I wrote just before Tim’s project began. Either way, good for him. He’s taking some great photos. Comment on them, if you feel so compelled. Comments help give bloggers the incentive to continue.

Wednesday, 12 September 2012

Well, today Owen and I completed reading the book Detective Camp.

If you’re one of the two people who actively check my list of Books I’ve Ths Year, then you’ll know why this is a milestone: I have now read at least one book from each letter of the alphabet (I’m talking about the titles here).

Honestly, I didn’t try to do this…it just sort of happened. Of course, I was helped along by reading the A to Z Mysteries with Owen. This year, we read the G-Z books (but not the T book, which we read last year). So, just by reading those, I had already read a book from every letter except A, B, C, D, E, F, and T. As luck would have it, I read a book with a title beginning with A, B, C and T during the first part of the year, leaving only D, E, and F. I talked about that last month.

Coincidentally, my father-in-law let me borrow the book Fire and Rain last month. I didnt’ even ask to borrow it, so don’t think I asked just to satisfy the list. Nope. He just gave it to me. So I read it. Then Owen and I read the really awful Esio Trot, which I don’t reccommend you parents out there reading with your kids.

Anyway, this just left the letter D. Owen insisted we read Detective Camp (I didn’t even want to read it, being plenty done with Ron Roy’s writings). But even if I hadn’t read it, I’m positive I would have read a D book by year’s end. I just received Damned Good Company in the mail to read for a book review, and one of the books I had to buy last week for my latest university class has a title that starts with D. So there you go.

Sunday, 09 September 2012

Ten years ago today, I began my employment with Part Three Analytical, a contract lab for 3M that refused to call itself a contract lab for 3M.

This may seem like a somewhat arbitrary anniversary to acknowledge, especially since I don’t work there anymore, but it was a big deal to me at the time.

Earlier that year, I graduated from Century College. I spent the summer looking for a new job. I wasn’t terribly eager about it. For one thing, I liked my current job. Yes, it was in the eyecare industry and, yes, I had to work with the public, but working at Apple Valley Eye Care was an enormous leap forward in terms of job satisfaction.

See, in February 2001, I finally quit my job at Lenscrafters. I worked there for over six years, enduring all manner of incompetent and micromanaging bosses – a revolving door, it seemed, of goons who each had their own idea of how to ingratiate themselves to upper management. Then there were the long and inconsistent hours – one day I worked from 10:00 to 2:00, the next day I worked frmo 9:00 AM to 9:30 PM. The pay was marginal, my co-workers were so-so, and the customers collectively rank as one of the worst experiences of my life…right up there with junio high school, the orthodontist, and the Wheelock Parkway congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses.

So, yeah, leaving that hell and going to Apple Valley Eye Care was downright glorious.

But, like I said, I still had to work with customers. There also wasn’t much room for advance. And the benefits, as is typical for a small company, weren’t much to speak of.

Finally, in August 2002, I interviewed and was offered a job at Part Three. Following our wedding anniversary, and jury duty, I began work there on this day ten years ago.

When I arrived home that evening, and Jennifer inquired as to my day, I said, “It was awesome, I didn’t have to talk to one customer all day.”

And it’s been that way now for ten wonderful years.

Saturday, 08 September 2012

Well, in the world of obscure and nearly meaningless trivia, I’d like to take today’s post to point out that Jimmy Carter, our 39th President, has now set a new record for longest Presidential retirement. He has now been an ex-president for 11,554 days. That’s one day longer than Herbert Hoover’s retirement, which ran from March 4, 1933 (the day FDR took over the reins) to October 20, 1964 (the day he died).

Nine presidents, of course, had no retirement at all. That’s because eight of them – William Harrison, Zachary Taylor, Abraham Lincoln, James Garfield, William McKinley, Warren Harding, Franklin Roosevelt, and John Kennedy – died on the job. While the ninth, Barack Obama, is still employed at the White House. 

Of the 34 men who outlived their tenure as president, some of them didn’t have much of a retirement. President Polk, for example, died just over three months after leaving office. More famously, both George Washington and Woodrow Wilson died just under three years after leaving the job as Commander-in-Chief.

Of course, the word “retirement” isn’t the best word for it. Carter hasn’t exactly been sitting on his duff these thirty-one years since he moved out of the White House. Other ex-presidents, too, had notable careers after leaving. John Quincy Adams, for example, went on to serve in the House of Representatives for 17 years following his Presidency. William Taft followed up his four years in the White House with a stint as Supreme Court Justice (this thus gave him the unique distinction of being on both ends of the Oath of Office for the Presidency).

So, you might ask: Does this mean Jimmy Carter has lived longer than any other President? No. At 87 years young, Carter has had a long life, but he hasn’t lived longer than several other former Presidents, including the man he beat for the job back in 1976: Gerald Ford holds the record for longest-lived President. He was 93 years, 165 days old when he died. In fact, Carter isn’t even the oldest living ex-President. That distinction goes to George Bush, Sr., who is about three months older than Carter (but, having left the White House in 1993, has had a far shorter retirement).

Any way you slice it, Carter’s been collecting a Presidential pension for a long time. As The Atlantic kindly put it, his ex-Presidency has lasted longer than 26 Iranian Hostage Crises.

Friday, 07 September 2012

Okay, so I’m going to be reading a portion of my short story “Losing My Head” at the Southdale Library on Saturday, September 16th. 

The Minnesota Atheists will be holding their monthly meeting, and this particular meeting will be dedicated to a discussion, and readings from, the book Atheist Voices of Minnesota. That’s the book my essay is in (I talked about it HERE). Proceeds from the book benefit Minnesota Atheists’ radio program, so I guess they have a vested interest in promoting the book.

In case you don’t really care for me, you’ll be happy to know that fifteen other authors will also be reading portions of their essays. This includes people who have blogs that people actually read, such as Stephanie Zvan and PZ Myers. Another former Witness, Robin Raianiemi, will be reading an excerpt from her essay. Michelle Huber and Ryan Benson, who wrote two of my favorite essays in the book, will also be reading, as will Todd Torkelson, who has one of the most unusual stories of any freethinker (he used to be a ghostbuster).

There will also be a question and answer portion, so if you have any questions, like, “Why was James’ essay included in this book?” you’ll have a chance to find out the answers.

The book will be available to purchase there, too.

So, come to the Southdale Library in Edina at 1:45 on Sunday, Spetember 16th. I know, I know, it’s not on TV or Facebook, so it’s kind of a bummer. You’ll also end up missing the last half of the Vikings game that day, so I’ll just go ahead and tell you now that SPOILER ALERT! they’re gonna lose.

Thanks for your support.

Click here for more details.