I spent the day tweaking retirement projections.
The spreadsheet continuously implied new ways to spreadsheet.
Embodied numbers demanded exponential reanalysis.
You are the unit of measurement.
䷣䷲
Shock comes — oh, oh!
Laughing words — ha, ha!
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Filling pastel cells in Excel overwhelmed the artist with sublime joy.
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They flapped stubby wings, marched around the room, and sang the song of the high-low bird.
<crunch>
My wife asked, “Did you steal the hexagon crackers?”
<crunch>
“No…Maybe…Yes?”
<crunch, crunch>
The boy sauntered into the kitchen.
I’d already cleaned the table.䷆䷓
There is game in the field. It furthers one to catch it.
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The boy told to his sister “I want to be the first dog.”
The tablet rang on the on a stool beside his table.
The boy paused the playdough to answer.
“姐姐和妈妈一起读中文”
Sister is studying Chinese with mom.
Grandma asked him to tell the girl call back.
“好”
OK
He hung up...
Nero’s Aqueduct in Rome (ca. 1809–1812) by Joseph August Knip. ..
You’re never there to give a speech. You’re there to communicate with your audience.
from “One or a Thousand” in How to Get Your Point Across in 30 Seconds – or Less, by Milo O. Frank..
䷈䷸
Return to the way, How could there be blame in this?
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At dinner, he recalled an appointment before realizing it had been scheduled for last Tuesday.
I wasn’t in a playful mood after dinner.
The boy drew at his desk.
He drew a yellow circle with a giant smile.
Then we read a book.
That one with the big spider.
We read it again.
And a book about the solar system (when Pluto was still a planet).
He returned to the desk.
He drew a blob with two arms.
He called it a birthday card.
He added “d a d – e d” in giant letters.
Six weeks early. Just in time...
Pianist and Singer (1928) by Ernst Ludwig Kirchner. ..
A river is, in its essence, a thing that branches.
James Gleick in Nature’s Chaos..
䷕䷝
A white horse comes as if on wings.
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The pointlessness of his planning was only matched by the peril of never planning ahead.
I built a spreadsheet to squint at the future.
Lovely projections,
Until the next recession,
Hyper inflation,
Or a bust among the premises I blindly assumed.
I’ll realize the error after it’s too late.
But, today, I had fun...
Assembled from three black and white negatives by the Image Processing Lab at Jet Propulsion Laboratory. ..
but wouldn’t it be better to sit still
from “62” in the Tao Te Ching, by Lao Tzu (transl. Ursula K. Le Guin)
and let the Way be your offering?..
䷜
Water flows on interruptedly and reaches its goal
-
Beginnings intertwined with ends; a messy century of Aprils.
I wrapped the presents with blue tape and old drawing sheets.
He tore them with gusto.
Minutes undid two nights of work.
My wife marveled at the flight of four years.
I reminisced about my first renovation at the State.
The kids played.
She enjoyed the gifts more than her brother.
Except the book with a giant spider on the cover...
Wild ducklings illustration from Seitei Kacho Gafu (1890–1891) by Wantanabe Seitei, a prominent Kacho-ga artist. ..
I hope we can all agree that the long run is made up of a bunch of short runs.
“The long run (and the short runs)” by Seth Godin.
That seems obvious.
The surprising thing is that we live our short runs as if that isn’t true...
䷴䷫
On the mountain, a tree: the image of development.
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Disneyland in the Kitchen Living Room
It started innocently, pushing the boy around the house on the tricycle. To mix it up, I counted down from ten and took off like a rocket.
The girl heard him laughing and wanted to join the fun.
The boy didn’t want to share but learned that half is better nothing when we stopped playing with him.
We started zooming across the floor, again and again.
While waiting for her turns, my daughter started riding their plasma car. She wove between the scattered trampoline, tent, and slide. With this spark, we pushed and pulled the furniture to create a second ride that weaved through the living room and kitchen.
Disneyland at Home.
The Plasma Boat Cruise was a figure-8 circuit. It started with a leisurely River of Animals, passed the Drawing Station and slid underneath the (dining) Table Mountain, next to the Aladdin’s Cave (tent). It rolled through the Cooking Zone and Frozen Land, looped through the Furniture Alley (with the trampoline, slide, reading chair, and ottoman), baked through the Sun Canyon next to the patio door, flowed through the Gorge of Chairs, dug under the Snow Tunnel and we were back at the beginning.
In the meantime, the Rocket would take off. When the Cruise had ended, the tricycle would be ready to go again. The riders would switch and do it all over again.
This wasn’t the real thing. But the kids had fun, and I ate a tastier (and much cheaper) home-cooked breakfast before heading upstairs for work.
See you in Anaheim.
Someday. -
Plasma Car, PlaSmart Toys, 2003
The car moves when the steering bar is wiggled back and forth. This bar is connected to the front wheels and the ocillating rotation propels the car forward.
The boy didn’t grok the gimmick, but he enjoyed using his feet to scoot around the expansive tile open floor plan of my in-law’s house.
That was fun eough, but the car proved its value last summer.
Our daughter leapt off a dining chair and landed awkwardly.
Her foot swelled.
It didn’t warrant a doctor visit, but she had to stay off her feet.
We carried her around for a day before the epiphany hit us – we have is an arm powered locomotion device!
The kids loved this impromptu wheelchair. They would squeeze together to ride around the house. Sometimes she’d steer as he faced towards the back. Other times, he’d squeeze up in front to be the a taxi driver for his fare.
And that’s when he finally learned how to properly drive the plasma car.
This was the last Offerup purchase we made before the world shut down in 2020. It was nice to get this toy on discount at offerup, but this would have been worth it at full price.
I wonder when we’ll start thrifting again.
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Pansicles and Popcakes gamboled in their dreams.
My wife was making cupcakes with the kids.
While pouring batter, I saw a familiar consistency.
“Could we make popsicles with this batter?”
“Popsicles?!”
“Uh, I meant pancakes.”
The kids started chanting.
“Popsicles and Pancakes!”
“Popsicles and Pancakes!”
Standing on a chair, he bounced with each “P”.
“Popsicles and Pancakes!”
“Popsicles and Pancakes!”
That’s enough.
It’s bedtime.
“Popsicles and Pancakes!”
“Popsicles and Pancakes!”
“We have to dance first!”
“Popsicles and Pancakes!”
“Popsicles and Pancakes!”
..
La vache enragée (1896) print by Henri de Toulouse–Lautrec. ..
The road-runner is one of the mildest-looking and most graceful birds of the desert, but the spring of the wild-cat to crush down a rabbit is not more fierce than the snap of the bird’s beak as he tosses a luckless lizard.
from “Winged Life” in The Desert, by John C. Van Dyke䷄䷦
“it furthers one to cross great water”
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The lobby was an atomized horde of bodies slouched over their screens.
Fifteen years ago, I resisted the smart phone.
Why would I want to be tethered to the internet?
Now, I abstain in public so my enlightened ass can feel “present”.
Snobbery has come full circle...
Caliban figurine for “The Tempest” by William Shakespeare (1914) painting by Franz Marc. ..
literature as an existential fuction, the search for lightness as a reaction to the weight of being.
from “Lightness” in Six Memos for the Next Millenium, by Calvino.䷰