Blogger suffers burnout.

Don't worry, it's not me. Stories need to be told, and so I'll tell them one by one.

My blogmind is just waking up again.

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Playing poker and talking about TV on Tuesday night, I came to the conclusion that Stargate is the opposite of Gilligan's Island.

Though they frequently find themselves on an 'uncharted desert isle' the one thing you can be sure of is that at the end of every story the group makes it back home every single time.

I think this is a broader pattern in TV. I think that most TV shows either fall into the category of 'Every week they need to achieve this same goal and they come perilously close to achieving it' (aka 'Damn!' shows like Gilligan's Island) or 'every week they need to achieve this same goal and come perilously close to not achieving it.' (aka 'Phew!' shows like Stargate)

Then there are a few outliers like Quantum Leap and Sliders, where it's all about the local 'Phew!' and the greater 'Damn!'

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An MSNBC story today gives the author's thoughts on how Episode III should bridge the gap between I and II and the original trilogy. At the end of the article, the reporter asks how you would write the story, and save the series.

Here's my take:

Padme, realizing that the legislative battle against the Imperial senate is futile, turns toward more desperate measures to save her planet. Working with Darth Maul to position her world as a founding member of the new Empire, she turns Anakin toward his more powerful dark side, showing him that his true nature lies in fury, evidenced by the retributitive bloodbath he enacted after the killing of his mother.

Secretly gathering influences of her own throughout the Imperium, she masterminds the overthrow of the Imperial order.

Halfway through the movie it comes out that she has an extremely high, though inactive, latent midichlorean count herself, and deliberately sought out Annie more than a decade ago, in order to produce a child more powerful in the Force than any ever seen before him.

Kenobi, who discovers this duplicity as Amadala is birthing the twins are born, kills Amadala (in self defense, of course) and steals away the twins.

Anakin never knew Amadala was carrying twins, and so attempts to hunt down Kenobi on Corusant. To hide Leia's existence, Kenobi looks up his friends, the royal family of Alderaan, who are on the capitol planet for a State function, and convinces them to hide Leia and raise her as their own child.

Kenobi then flees and takes Luke with him to Tattoine, where he knows Vader's deep-rooted turmoil around the death of his mother will prevent him from sensing Luke's presence across the light years.

Despite the best efforts of the Jedi council, including a space battle where the Jedi Masters attempt to defeat a swarm of Clone-piloted Tie Fighters from their own hand-crafted ships (each reflecting that Master's character and physiology) they are eventually forced to sacrifice themselves to destroy a Jedi superweapon weilded by Duku, Vader, and Sidious. The resulting devastation leaves all dead except for Vader, Yoda, and Sidious.

Vader is so seriously wounded that Sidious has Vader's suit and helmet crafted to sustain him.

As Vader and Sidious continue their takeover of the Empire, Yoda retreats to Degobah, awaiting the eventual weakening of the new Empire, or the emergence of a new Jedi force.

Montage: Anakin/Vader at Padme/Amadala's grave, where he loses the last vestage of his humanity and his tears turn to a stone demeanor we are all familiar with.

Yoda, cleaning his old home and peering in (with Jedi sight) on Leia, now on her new home of Alderaan, presented to her people as an adoptive princess, and then on a newborn Luke, cared for by his aunt and uncle, who were presented with Luke by an intermediary, as Obi Wan looks on from afar.

R2 tweets at Obi Wan, who gazes into the Tatooine sunset and says "No, my little friend. It is just the beginning..."

Roll credits.

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(first in a series)

It was more than ten years ago that I spent a summer studying drama in London. A program(me) in acting, directing, and playwriting, it brought about 25 college freshmen and sophomores together, half from the UK and half from America, though only one other from so far away as I was.

In the early days of the course we spent a good amount of time learning about the differences between the Brits and us Yanks. Easy differences like power voltages, the difference between cookies, crackers, and biscuits. Surprising differences like what it takes to get a bank account in London versus New York, and what that relationship means to you.

Each morning us Yanks would emerge from our dorms at the London School of Economics, vacant for all the budding economists were on holiday, and walk, rain or shine, to Euston Station, get our morning biscuits and march down into the tube for our two-part runs to the theatre in Sloane Square.

Emerging from the station it was a quick right, a few doors down, then another right, down the alley to the back door of the theatre, in the door, up the steps, past the offices, around to another black-clad stairwell, then up one more set of winding, narrowing stairs with a rise-over-run fit to remind us again that we weren't on western shores anymore.

There, on the same attic studio where the Rocky Horror Show was first performed, we would learn about theatre and about humanity: what makes us different, what makes us the same, and how the delta between people is drama.

More than ten years ago, and still the memories flood back, like vignettes of mirror-world humanity.

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So it's only two days until I turn 30, but nature's present came early. I walked outside tonight at about 9:30 to go see a free showing of Goldmember in the park. Stepping off my porch, I stopped in my tracks. Between one warm evening and the next, the fireflies had come out in force.

From my first visit to Pittsburgh over a year ago, I was clear on the concept that I wasn't in California anymore: Bright sunny 80-degree days are no guarantee against a quick thundershower before sunset. When I came here to live last August, I learned about the cacophonous cicada and their 22 year cycle. Fall introduced me to the colors of which Pennsylvanian nature is capable, followed unusually quickly by Winter's blankets of snow, applied again and again. With the Spring came the rain, lush green grass right outside my window, and an ocean of dandelions. Approaching the end of the full circle, I thought that I knew all of Gaia's gifts to Pittsburg, but stumbling upon thousands of glowstick-green fireflies softly lighting and fading while weaving in front of, behind, and around tombstones in the twilight struck me dumb in a way I suddenly realized I had feared I was becoming incapable of as I enter my fourth decade.

I've often used the cemetery as my emotional soundstage over the last year, whether surreptitiously placing easter eggs on the statues with Rachel, picnicking on the grass, following foot-deep foot-holes in the snow on the way to the bus or striding hom, weaving through the headstones beneath the midnight moon with 'Rest in Peace' blaring in my iPod's earbuds. This felt totally different though. Tonight the graveyard was alive.

...

It was exactly 20 years ago today that I had last seen the faerie. A half a world away, in a vineyard an hour north of Florence, I was just two days away from my 10th birthday, travelling through Europe with my mom and sister. The fireflies were everywhere around the trees and the vines, flicking on and off, talking to each other, and speaking to me as well. It was a magical night outdoors, eating a fine dinner, feeling the Summer warmth, and walking a path under a waterfall reputed to take a decade off the ambler's age (a completely different prospect to someone not quite ten yet).

As we waited for the tour busses to take us back to reality, I urgently found a jar and caught a few of the fireflies. I was so proud. Mom told me that I could keep them if I wanted to, but I should know that they'd die within a day, and they would never glow again. I let them go just before I climbed the steps onto the motor coach. Mom smiled.

...

The faerie have changed in the intervening decades, but then so have I. In 1983 I was spastic with youth, and the fireflies reflected this with their fast binary blinks. Somewhere on their abdomen they were flittering their shutters open and closed, sending precise signals through the dusk.

Nature, digitized.

Today's gift was so different that at first I didn't even recognize it. A sine-wave of brightness in the corner of my eye, another floating above my car. I literally rubbed my eyes to clear these errant embers floating senselessly. After one travelled right in front of me, I realized what they were, so different from what I expected. Focusing out beyond the grass and to the headstones beyond I could see hundreds of them, brightening, peaking, and dimming to invisibility, seemingly constant lights drifting between this dimension and another. Seeing headstones literally lit by their passing glow, I thought to myself, 'Buffy can't touch this.'

Reality, smoothed.

I had to share, so I called Rachel to tell her that she was right and the fireflies had indeed come. "Of course, silly!" 'Will they stay? or is it a one-night deal?' "They'll be around all month! It's what they do."

Feeling the magic lift me, I got in my car and drove to the movie, seeing only one or two fireflies the whole way. Apparently the dead get first dibs. Well, them and their neighbors.

Tomorrow I'll see how well the video camera can handle this unique low-light setting. For tonight, I'm cherishing my first birthday present.

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An autobiographical story like the kinds I look forward to writing again when I can harvest the hours off trees, and days pass like clouds instead of kidney stones.

Read it out loud to a loved one...

Thanks Noire, for the link.

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and this is a really good story.

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Watching "Heathers" on the plane ride back to Pittsburgh, I was reminded of my own history of explosions at school...

It was Sophomore year of high school, and I was in Honors Physics. We were learning all about gasses and pressure, by way of two-liter soda bottles, water, and pieces of dry ice. The demonstration involved filling the bottle one fourth of the way with water, and slipping in a few pieces of dry ice and replacing the cap, so we could see and feel the pressure in the bottle rise as the dry ice went from solid to gaseous carbon dioxide. After it dissolved, we would unscrew the caps and hear the fizz of the escaping gas.

In true experimentary fashion, my lab partner Jason and I wanted to take it further: If a little bit of dry ice caused a little bit of pressure, what would a lot of dry ice do? This was high school, a time of experimentation, so there wasn't anything to do but give it a whirl!

Add a little more water so there's less air volume to compress, put in a few more chunks of dry ice, then a few more. Screw the cap on. Tight. Wait a bit... Shake the bottle slightly, accelerating the evaporation.

Watching the little white bubbles rising from the chunks of ice, we tapped the side of the bottle with a fingernail. The way the pitch of the taps kept rising reminded me of the elevator scene in "Ghostbusters" when they turned on the proton packs.

We quickly realized we put in too much dry ice. It was still bubbling away and we were rapidly approaching the maximum tolerance of the bottle. Sitting there on the desk it looked so innocent, but the slight bowing of the sides of the bottle belied quiet yet formidable pressure. Jason and I looked at each other, and at the other kids in the class who were oblivious to our little extracurricular experiment.

"Should we loosen the cap?"

"There's a lot of pressure. It might be dangerous."

"What should we do?"

"We've got to take it outside."

"The bathroom."

"Good idea."

"I'll go," Jason said.

He picked up the bottle. Gingerly. Recognizing it for the bomb that it had quickly become. Relying on skills learned from countless films, he kept the bottle steady as he smoothly and quickly made his way to the door, down the deserted hallway, past the banks of lockers, toward the bathroom about sixty feet away.

As he ducked out the door I breathed a sigh of relief, not knowing until moments later that my exhaultive exhilation was premature.

...

BOOM

...

So in high school I had this problem (hah, who am I kidding? Like I'm any better now...) where drama and comedy always took precedence over restraint and pragmatism. The smart Kevin would have acted surprised. The pragmatic Kevin would have run out, concerned for Jason. Unfortunately those Kevins weren't around back then, and as the huge subsonic rumble shaking the building was still echoing amidst the clink of beakers jostling on their bases, the dramatic Kevin bolted for the door, yelling "It worked!!!"

...to be continued...

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So today is my last day of classes for the semester. I still have a final on Monday, and a final presentation the day after, but as far as class goes, I have my last session of Communication Design Fundamentals in a little over an hour, and that's it.

I'm sure it's partly the snow, partly the fact that I'm coming off an all-nighter, after coming off 4 hours of sleep (6am-10am) on Tuesday night (Wednesday morning), and partly having far more exciting stuff to do than time to do it, but it's literally incredible to me that the semester's essentially over. Incredible, as in not credible, as in I understand the concept, yet cannot give credit to the prospect of its validity. Sure, I still have work to turn in in three of my classes, one of which I haven't started yet, and sure I have a final that could snap me like a tiny twig of logic, but I'm not the only one. A lot of people are in a daze, looking vaguely like they should be passing their yearbooks around for people to sign, but they forgot to make yearbooks in the first place.

Okay, enough with that. Time to enumerate stuff:

There's snow on the ground and lots of it. I checked Weather.com at 4am and saw Pennsylvania covered in dark white (heh, 'dark white' makes sense if you look at a precipitation map). I looked out the window and saw the world covered in softness. Don't worry Ali, I got your snowscaped graveyard picture. I just need to get home to download it. I forgot to bring the cable. The snow's about 5 inches deep; just enough to change a road from a right to a privilege. The forecast is pretty clear for the next week, but the temperature will sway from 36 to 8, so I don't see much of this stuff clearing away before I take off. I hope my car likes its snowbank.

My powerbook came last Tuesday (wow, two days seems so much longer when you were conscious for 49 of the intervening 53 hours), and I've barely had time to give it its due, much less revel in it here. Fittingly enough, I'm typing on it now in the UC center, its frosted silver mirrors the suddenly winterized world just outside the double-paned glass. I haven't had time to install enough apps or docs on it to feel comfortable giving it dominion over my digital well-being, but somewhere between Tuesday and Thursday I'll be loading it up with my 20gig mp3 dowry, 4gig photo tome, and assorted other data vaults. The thing is truly freaking beautiful. I don't know what more I could want in a machine. I can't reasonably ask for faster than a 1Ghz G4, and the screen constantly seems bigger and brighter than this svelte machine should be able to house. Internal wireless is also a dream come true. Joy.

When I brought the box up from the FedEx guy Tuesday morning, I gently patted my newly-old powerbook, telling it that it would always have a place with me. I have an affinity for my portable machines. In contrast, I'm planning on selling my Quicksilver G4 tower, its noise and continuing depreciation outweighing the little unique utility not duplicated by my sibling powerbooks.

I should have treated my sidekick so well. Nestled in my pocket yesterday, it decided to make a plea for attention, no doubt feeling neglected and threatened by the new baby. It decided to deactivate every other vertical line of pixels, and dim several of the others. Cajoling, rebooting, and eventually slapping it briskly (think baby's first breath, not crying toddler over the knee) to kick'start the display, but to no avail. The true irony (if one can extend anthropomorphosis this far) is that the temper tantrum is backfiring: T-Mobile is sending ad advance-replacement my way this morning, and it'll be here early next week, so the sidekick that wouldn't shape up will now ship out, replaced by a new doe-eyed machine that's never known a world without the G4PB. Now I just have to make sure the powerbook doesn't get jealous. Oh, and a name for the new powerbook? I'm leaning towards 'Sendai.'

What else can I tell you? For the first time in memory I have both of my Congresses of Vienna blocked out for a Gaskell's Ball that's still over two weeks away. Not bad for a country boy. Now I just have to make sure I can still dance.

The Great Blogger Diet hasn't been forgotten or abandoned. On the contrary, there's quite a tale to tell on that front; one that might just rival this post in length, and may even rise to the level of the mythic laundry story, so you'll understand that I want to take my time with it. Some time this weekend. (I just want to add how cool it is that searching for that url was so easy

It's amazing how everything's quieter in the snow. It's like hanging tapestries on the walls, all over the world. Busses driving by no longer chug, but shoosh, and traffic moves slow enough that you don't have to look both ways, just walk with the traffic, going at a downstream angle, just like how they told you to escape a running river.

The air is so quiet, and everyone looks like a student. It feels like a weekend on campus, which is just like a weekday on campus, with authority figures removed.

But I still have a few miles to go before I sleep, and more upon my next waking, so I'll cut this short (even though it's anything but). I could write all day, but I need to turn it to more scholastic ends at the moment.

And yea though I had to trudge through powder to get to a packed damp bus early this morn, I do still so love the snow.

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It was 1991, and I was a freshman living at Clark Kerr, dorms for UC Berkeley. I'd been at college for about 4 months and, as usual, I was eating dinner at Clark Kerr's DC (dining commons). Walking down the stairs from the third floor of Building 3 with friends (Denise, Sean, Carina, Ethan, and Samir, if I recall correctly), I once again noticed the beautiful sunset from the stairwell window, and wondered idly how cool it would be to take a picture of the sun setting over San Francisco every day, as a journal of sorts.

Of course, digital cameras weren't around in 1991, so that didn't happen.

We went to the DC and got our food (always heavy on the starch, as pasta was the only dietary constant (well, and soda, but that shouldn't count)). The five of us walked to the tables, found an empty one. Long tables with chairs on either side, think hogwarts, but with the tables turned 90 degrees, and an aisle down the center. The room used to be a chapel.

We had only been eating for a minute when a well-dressed Asian gentleman of modest stature walked up to our table, stood at the head, and asked if he might join us. After we happily agreed, he pulled up a chair, set down his own dinner tray, and sat at the head of the table.

He asked us in his strong accent how we enjoyed our classes, what we liked and didn't like about the university, and listened to our own conversations. You could tell that he really cared about what we were saying, and I for one was as honest as I could be when telling him what I thought was good about Cal, and what could be better. Having been in college only a few months, it was probably the first time I really sat down and thought about that question.

Having spent far more time listening than talking, he finished his dinner before us. He thanked us kindly, shook our hands, and excused himself. Once he'd left the hall the others looked at each other and shrugged. "What do you think that was about?" Denise and I looked at each other. We realized we were the only ones who knew. I assumed everyone did. "That was Chancellor Tien" I said. Tien had only just the year before become Berkeley's seventh chancellor. Incidentally Clark Kerr, for whom my dorm was named, was the first.

Tien was immensely approachable. While chancellor, he still taught classes and mentored graduate students in mechanical engineering. The students loved him. They loved that he went to every football game, often standing in front of the student section, leading cheers by shaping "C" "A" "L" grandly with his arms. It seemed no coincidence that we made it to #9 in the AP poll that year. Tien's trademark "GOBEYAH!" ("go bears!") was such an inspiration that to this day Karen and I use it as a Cal rally cry.

And so it was with a heavy heart that I heard tonight that Chang-Lin Tien passed away on Tuesday, from complications related to the stroke and brain tumor that had debilitated him for the last year. Chancellor Tien was what every administrator should hope to be; not a lackey to the higher administration (ahem, Regents), but an advocate of the educational process, and the students.

Chancellor Tien's memorial service will be in Zellerbach Hall on Thursday, November 14th, from 3pm to 4pm. I wish I could be there. If you were a Cal student while Tien was chancellor, and valued his presence, I hope that you'll bid him farewell, as I know I will from the opposite coast.

Thank you, Chang-Lin, for your dedication, caring, and overall excellence. Thank you for listening, and wherever you are, I bid you a hearty GOBEYAH!

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There's a pigeon in my kitchen.

I've left my kitchen window open for the last couple days. It helps the ventilation in my apartment, and it's my low-tech air conditioner. A few minutes ago I was working at the computer, and I heard rustling. At first I thought it was the neighbors in the hall, but it didn't have that through-the-door deadness.

And it was getting restless.

Being naked (tmi-tmi-tmi), I decided that pigeon-herding was, if not a formal affair, at least one that warranted jeans and a shirt, so I went to the bedroom and got dressed. This is not the first time I've been called to this task, though the first time in seven years, the first time in this apartment.

The broom is in the kitchen. Damn.

I peek around the corner. No pigeon. I look up, in case it was an ambush from the top of the cabinets. Nada. I hear a rustling coming from a bit deeper in the kitchen.

I creep through the doorway far enough to get the broom. My kitchen is very close quarters, so there's no place to retreat (for either of us) once the confrontation began. I also grab the 5 D-cell maglight. I peek behind the fridge.

No pigeon.

I creep around toward the back of the kitchen, and the rustling stops. I'm pretty sure he's wedged between the fridge and the stove.

I back off, just outside the kitchen door, and wait silently to get a read on him when he moves again. It takes about two minutes before the rustling continues, slowly...

I creep back into the kitchen, setting down the broom, flashlight at the ready. I pull away the window curtains so he'll have no trouble finding the way out. I peek between the stove and fridge.

Nothing.

I look on the far side of the stove. Nothing... and silence...

I stand there, waiting, and in a few moments the rustling, softer, continues.

God only knows how, but I think the pigeon is inside my oven.

So I did the only thing you can do when you find out that an errant pigeon has workd its way into your oven.

No! Not that! How could I do that? I mean seriously; my oven doesn't even work.

No: I crept out of the kitchen, sat in front of the computer, maglight in my lap, and blogged it.

Okay, I'm going back in.

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Speaking of focus groups (and for the reader with a shorter-than-three-week attention span, we were), I think they're a lot of fun to participate in. As should be obvious by my mere existence as a weblogger, I like telling people what I think, and it's even better when they want to listen. When they're willing to pay me to do it, well, I'm sold.

Being in a market researcher's focus group pool is a lot like being a movie extra with an agent in the '80s: You fill out a long questionnaire to define your demographic to a tee, then when you least expect it, you get a call from the company, calling to you action. Okay, so it's more like being a sleeper fo the KGB but, you know, same difference.

I'd participated in a few focus groups over the years for this company called Larry Weiss & Co. From the first time when I filled out all the paperwork, they've got my name wrong, and no matter how many times I corrected them, that my name was Kevin Fox, and my company name was Fury Solutions (or later, Fury Media Services, or now, simply Fury.com), at the end of the day I'd still get an honorarium check made out to Kevin Fury. My bank has yet to bat an eye. Maybe they're aware of my rockstar status.

Larry Weiss clearly must have been aware of my rockstar status in July of '98 when they offered me $200 to participate in a two-hour focus group on a new hardware product.

I loved working in downtown San Francisco, feeling like I was part of something when I walk outside and saw all the other businesspeople walking around. Staying a little late in the office, then walking over to the market researchers five blocks away, I was a little smug. I'm effectively getting paid double for the day, and I get to tell people what I think! (This was pre-blogging, when I wasn't used to having people wanting to hear what I think. ;-) )

Even working late, I still arrived a bit early for my group. I sat in the waiting area, pecking at the veggies and dip that an earlier me would not have recognized as the remaindered leavings from the 'inner sanctum' of groups earlier in the day.

Sitting in the lounge, trying to pull meaning from three month old copies of Men's Fitness, People, and Psychology Today, I'd eye the other participants as they trickled in. Geek... Geek... Exec... Geek... ...Mara??

...

I couldn't be sure. To be fair, it had been nearly four months since the Levi's group. Was this the same person? Or was she just another instantiation of this prototype in my head, linked to the Mara I saw four months ago by a shared similarity to the prototype, and a similarity in circumstance? Was it that this was the first time I'd been to a focus group since then? Was one part of my mind already thinking about her while the other part was leafing through the body bulker ads in the fitness mag?

...

She walked in, ate a carrot stick, and took a seat on the other side of the room. I looked back at my magazine. It only took a second to remember that, my own experiences notwithstanding, to her I was 'Just Another Stranger' (JAS). That is, if this person was Mara at all...

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Those who can't write, link.

Today on inpassing there's a great thread about readers' most embarassing injuries, started off in dedicated fashion when the site's author, Eve, broken her ankle on a trampoline this weekend.

This is a great site (for those of you who haven't visited before) and a particularly good thread. Be sure to add your own injuries to the pile. Not only did I write about my two accidents (breaking a rib in a theater and voluntarily forcing myself unconscious on a dare) but so did two friends who I, in the incidents mentioned, took to the emergency room!

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Back in early '98 I was working for a now defunct company called CKS Partners. I was leading development of Levi Strauss's first online store. We'd gone through a few rounds of creative, identified business goals, measures of success, and it was time for the focus group testing.

It's a strange thing being on the dark side of the one-way glass. On one hand, you feel like you're about to watch a hollywood premiere. It's dark, the seats are comfortable, and there's hors d'vours. The screen extends across the whole wall and there's plenty of suspense.

On another level it feels like you're about to watch a police lineup. You have a sheet in front of you with the names, occupations, salaries, ages and more about each of the participants. I scanned through, comparing their salaries, ages, and preferences to mine, and a name caught my eye. Mara K. (yes, I had the whole name, but I won't share it here). I thought that name sounded familiar, really familiar, in a peripheral way. Was she in one of my classes? Was she an ex-girlfriend's roommate? I brushed it off.

The focus-group leader walked the eight women, aged 18 to 25 into the room. One immediately caught my eye. Mara. I knew it was her before she even put her 2nd-grade name-tent down on the table. I took a closer look at my cheat-sheet. Occupation: Webmistress. OOOOooooh...

As anyone except those who get paid to run focus groups will tell you, the problem with focus groups is that the eight participants are really just parroting back the strongly-expressed opinions of the one or two most outspoken. Mara was the Alpha Participant tonight, as I knew she would be. She said anything more than 4 days shipping was a total waste. She threatened to boycott Levi's if they used frames in their store. I could have kissed her right there, but for the glass, my coworkers, my not having any idea who she was and her not knowing I exist.

As the focus group wrapped up, I excused myself to call up Karen, and ask her if Mara was her old roommate. Karen had never heard the name before. Walking back towards the 'dark room,' I pass by the participants filing out of the conference room. Mara's right there in front of me, walking by.

"Hi, I've been watching you from behind the half-silvered mirror for the last two hours, watching how you fold your hands and time your sentences. I know your name, where you work, what you make, and what browser you use. Love me?" I didn't say, seeing a couple of my CKS compatriots in the doorway. Half doctor, half stalker, I didn't really think there were many opening lines in a situation like that, or at least I didn't think of any in the 0.3 seconds before she was past me, walking toward the exit. I was just another guy, probably on my way to participate in a focus group myself.

Sitting through the next two-hour focus group I felt bad then better. Ships had passed in the night, and though I'd never see or talk to Mara again, it would be by my own choice. I could call her, or find any of a dozen ways to 'accidentally' meet her, and I'd choosen not to.

Driving home from South San Francisco to Berkeley late that night, I felt great, exhilirated. Mara showed me that someone could come in out of nowhere and flutter the heart. It didn't matter that it was the wrong time and place. It's the experience, and the awareness that this kind of thing can happen at any moment, that counts.

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Before Saturday morning arrived I had done a lot of research on the web. I wanted to know how things go wrong up there, how often, and what I could expect. Ironically, I wanted to make myself more comfortable by being fully informed of the realities, instead of relying on blind trust and assurances.

For example, one of the commonly used skydiving platitudes is that you have a greater chance of getting killed driving to or from the drop zone than skydiving once you're there. This actually isn't quite right. There are nearly 2 million jumps a year in the US, resulting in about 23 deaths a year, or one fatality for every 86,000 jumps. By comparison, there are 0.47 driving fatalities for every million driving hours, equating to one chance in a million of a driving fatality for a typical two-hour journey. Since the Byron drop zone was an hour away, that means the chances of a fatal accident on the trip there or back were roughly one-twelfth that of during the 7 minutes I'd be in freefall or under canopy.

Another way of looking at it is that a single jump is about as dangerous as 24 hours of driving time (not continuous, of course). That way doesn't sound so bad.

Driving to pick up Karen, who had graciously volunteered to come along to keep me company, provide support, and be my cameraman, I reminded myself that tandem instructors are among the most experienced, professional, and risk-avoiding bunch of the lot, and that though there are roughly 140,000 tandem jumps a year, a tandem crash only happens every 2 or 3 years, pushing the stats for my particular jump farther to the safer side.

But enough with the statistics.

I went out there Saturday to watch people skydive. I was willing to pay the $160 jump-fee to learn about the process, gather all the information I could, and back out in favor of a rain-check coupon before I got on the plane. I wanted to see people get in a plane. From the ground, I wanted to see them pull their chutes, navigate, and land. 'Normal, everyday skydiving' doesn't get much press. The average joe only experiences the media of skydiving when there's an accident, or when people are performing extreme maneuvers for the camera. Stories like "last Saturday, 18,230 jumps were made with no serious injuries, one broken leg, and 14 sprained ankles" never make it into the paper. It's just not news.

So Karen and I followed the directions, through the Altamont Pass, past the windmills, by the abandoned train tracks and the cows, and arrived at Bay Area Skydiving just before 9 am.

Jumping right into things, I was given a clipboard with two waivers, one absolving the skydiving company, and the other for the equipment manufacturer. These waivers were the most complete I'd ever read, not only saying I promise not to sue, but that they were not to blame even in the case of gross negligence, that I had provided financially for my dependents in the event of my death, that if I or my dependents should attempt to sue, they are simultaneously agreeing to a $25,000 fine for doing so, and that, in the event that I or they did sue and won, I or my beneficiaries would be entirely responsible for paying the settlement to ourselves, as well as the legal fees for all parties. They weren't kidding around.

Also, I and my friends from work were set down to watch an instructional video, explaining the risks of skydiving, and reiterating the finer points of the waiver. The man behind the desk in the video looked like a ZZ-top understudy, and his words were so wooden and eerie that I half expected his translator to cut out and he would start saying "Ack! AckACKack. AckACK!" in true 'Mars Attacks!' fashion.

Reading each clause and initialing them, I told myself it didn't really matter because I wasn't jumping out of a plane today anyhow. They checked that I initialled and signed everywhere I was supposed to, took my money, and put my name on the tandem list. It would be another couple hours before I was called up.

The first load of the day was just getting underway, so Karen and I went outside to watch the landings. I figured this would make me more comfortable. I wasn't actually scared at this point, because I wasn't actually going to jump. This acceptance of backing out freed me from anxiety the whole morning. I wasn't scared because if I got scared I could back out, so there was no point being scared yet. I don't know if that makes sense on paper, but it's clear in my head.

Watching landings is great. You get a real respect for the control these people have, and how far parachuting has come from the days of circular canopies and landings equivalent to jumps from ten-foot walls.

Two things that Byron had in abundance on Saturday were sunshine and pollen. I'd been fighting an allergy attack for the past several days, and this new assault was easily too much for my own defenses. From the time I arrived my nose was runny, but walking out of the hangar and into the sunlight, staring up at the sky, sneeze followed sneeze, sometimes as many as 12 sneezes in a minute. There was no kleenex to be had, so I made frequent trips to the port-a-potty to get toilet paper for my nose (port-a-potty toilet paper is closer to sandpaper than a kleenex, an unfortunate reality that led to my nose still being sore and dry two days later).

Soon enough they gathered up all the tandem jumpers to go over exit procedures, including how to waddle to the door of the plane with an instructor strapped to your back, how to tilt your head back once at the door, to prevent knocking heads with the instructor upon exiting the plane, how to cross your hands on your chest, specifically to not hold on to the door. That's the instructor's job.

We were told how to position our hands and arms out once we were in free fall, how to 'kick the instructors butt' upon exiting the plane, to get our legs in the proper position for a controlled dive position. We were shown the signals that the instructor might give, tapping our shoulder to remind us to keep our arms out, tapping our thigh to get us to kick back farther. Between the exit door and the canopy deployment there would be no words, because 125mph doesn't lend itself to conversation.

All these instructions would be given to us again by our individual tandem instructors, we were told, but it was good to go through it once first, so we'd remember.

Then there was more waiting. My allergies were really killing me now. an endlessly running nose has been joined by itchy, watery eyes that just wouldn't quit. I'd stand inside the hangar to watch landings now, because a little less sunlight helped to stop the sneezefest my sinuses had become.

Liz, one of my co-workers, and the person whose bravery I was hoping to latch on to (we're both in it together. We'll make each other do this), was called up. Her instructor, Richard, ran her through the procedure again, as she was suiting up. Richard clearly knew what he was doing, and Liz didn't seem too worried about the adventure to come (or so I thought, until Richard told me later how worried she was once they got in the plane ;-) ).

We watched Liz's plane take off, and about ten minutes later, watched her and Richard's descent and landing. Coming back from the landing field, Liz was relaxed and happy. Now I'd not only seen people jumping and landing, I'd seen a friend go through what I was still on the edge of doing, with similar fears, and coming out of it happy (and, of course, alive).

More sneezing, trips for tissues, and watching landings, and my name was called up, along with a few others. I went into the hangar, met up with my assigned instructor, who turned out to be Richard! Sniffling and blowing my nose, I suited up and Richard and I went through the procedure again. I'd paid for video and stills as well, so from this point I also had a camera guy (I never did catch his name!) who added a second reel of clips to the one Karen and I were compiling with my camera.

The jumpsuit (hah, a real 'jump'-suit! Hence the name) had a small pocket on the left bicep with an elastic opening. It was just perfect for me to stuff in a small spool of toilet paper, and I could pull it through the opening, tearing off as much as needed, for blowing my nose. I thought to myself 'if god is the one who makes the next tissue come up, then I guess god is with me in this jumpsuit.' wiping an already raw nose, I wondered if the pollen-free air far above the ground would give me a respite from the allergies.

Strapped into the four-point harness that would hold me to Richard (and, by extension, the parachute) I was shown how to adjust the leg straps once we were under canopy, lifting my legs and pulling the straps down to make a seat instead of a groin swing.

Then it was time to walk to the plane. The plane's door is in the back, and so the first out the door climb in last. Tandems are the last to jump, presumably because they need more time (or because if they chicken out, singles don't have to get past them), and as the biggest tandem, we went into the plane first. Richard and I, facing backwards, were right next to the pilot.

The rest, two tandem pairs and a handful of singles, pile into the plane, making a tight squeeze in two rows straddling long padded benches. They slide closed the plexiglass door, fire up the engines, taxi down the runway and take off.

I've been in a lot of small planes before, so I wasn't too worried about this one, though I was idly amused that, after hearing so many quips about 'jumping out of a perfectly good airplane' I couldn't help but notice that the plane's pilot, along with everyone else, was wearing a parachute of her own. Perfectly good plane, my ass.

I could see the large-faced wrist-altimeter of the jumper in front of me, and I watched as its needle rose above 3,000 feet, 4,000 feet, and higher. Richard attached the four harness points to his harness, and we spent a few minutes tightening the leg straps securely, working together to pull them to their tightest. Richard told me I ought to put my goggles on now. Then it was back to looking out the window or altimeter-watching. I was a little impatient to leave the crowded plane and get this show on the road. I was ready.

Soon we were at 14,000 feet and were in position. The first jumper slid up the plexiglass screen and quickly, without fanfare or pause, was out the door. Richard joked that 'oh my god he fell out!' but I was already calm, and a little detached. I had a thing to do and it was just about time to do it. Looking back on it, I suppose the right word for my state of mind was 'detached' (not that I'd want to use that word anywhere near a drop zone..).

It was only a few more seconds before we were scootching down the bar, stooping up and waddling to the back of the plane and the door. I looked down and I could see the airstrip. I noticed how close the windmill farm, which looked so far away from the ground, seemed to the strip from this height. I couldn't see my car. The parking lot was a speck. Then I was outside the plane, with Richard still inside. I crossed my arms, tilted my head back, and waited. For the briefest of moments, a part of me mentioned that this is the point when I should be jibbering in fear. "Um, lets' not do that" I said to myself, and wondered why we weren't falling yet, and then we were.

Falling, I kicked back and put my arms out. My mouth and nose inflated under 125mph of force. We were falling, it was a blast. It didn't feel like falling, or flying, and certainly not floating. When you're that far off the ground, you don't see it getting bigger unless you watch carefully. Instead, it seems like you're in this stationary place, with wind just blowing really, really hard.

Breathing is weird up there. Taking a breath is like taking a drink from a firehose. Instead of sucking air in to take a breath, it's like not pushing air out quite as hard, letting it push its way in. I macked for the camera a bit, giving thumbs up, and when the camera-guy mocked picking his nose at me I was suddenly worried that I had a stream of snot or something just as glamorous going on, so I mock-picked back at him, not realizing 'till later just how silly this would look, seeing only my side of it, on the eventual tape.

Too soon it was canopy time, and I was almost worried that there wasn't a sudden jerk. There was a pull which brought us into a vertical orientation, from the horizontal, and a pul that kept on pulling, more than a single gravity, but not the force that seemed necessary to bring us from 125mph down to 10mph vertical descent.

Ow, that harness is pretty tight around the areas I'd really rather not have so tight. I waited for Richard to tell me it was okay to adjust my straps. After a few seconds he gave the okay and I brought my leg up to my chest to reach under and try to bring the strap forward. My hands and fingers were numb. I hadn't realized just how cold it was up there, but when I couldn't feel my fingertips I clued in. Still, I needed to move the straps and I could tell when my hands were in the right place so I gave my fingers and hands their marching orders, and though I couldn't feel my hands they did their work. First one leg, then the other. Ahh.

Richard let me take the toggles (handles) while he held them higher up, so we could try a few gentle turns, and a couple tighter ones. It wasn't the roller-coaster ride I'd have expected, because while a roller coaster gives most of its thrill from pushing your body where Newton's laws wouldn't have it go, when you're under canopy making a tight turn, down always feels like the opposite of the canopy, even when it's 45 degrees off of vertical. Lots of fun. We practiced landing, with me lifting the toggles as high as I could, then bringing them all the way down to my legs, creating a momentary stall that, at ground level, would bring our vertical velocity to nearly nothing.

"Don't try to stay standing" was one of the thing they pushed in the ground school. Especially guys. We feel the need to be macho, and forget that, in addition to falling out of the sky, our harness means that we'll be carrying both our weight and our instructor's weight, as the instructor is about 8 inches higher up in the harness. "Lift your legs forward" is the instruction we were given, and that's what I did. As we got closer to the ground, we leveled off, pulled the toggles down as far as possible, and slid easily into home. Seconds later I was unhooked and on my own two feet.

Karen and I stuck around for a couple hours as they dubbed the tape and, at my request, made me a DV copy of the digital master for my own iMovie fun. That digital source, along with footage Karen and I shot with my camera, is where all this video came from.

...

So you might be wondering: "What happened? You were going to bail out, you were worried, and then, what? You're in the air and out the door?" Well, It might seem like a cop-out answer, but simply, yes. I think it was the allergies. I was so distracted with the nose that wouldn't quit. I had so much to occupy my mind that the paranoia and fear of the door, falling, all of it, never came into play.

I'll get shakes sometimes, before and after bungie jumping being a good example. I could put my hand out and see the shaking. Public speaking can do that to me too. Heck, even when I call in on a radio show and I'm on the air, I'm a little shaky. But here, in the plane, in the air, back on the ground, nothing. I didn't have that searing squinch of a squeezed adrenal gland, pumping fear and energy into my body. I enjoyed every second of the experience, and I'll probably do it again if the opportunity arises and the time is right, though I'm considering an AFF program (solo, and a full day of ground training).

Karen said she'd consider jumping next time, as long as she doesn't have a trip planned shortly afterwards (she's going to Thailand, and doesn't want to hobble on a sprained ankle).

Me, I'm just amazed at the power of a little pollen...

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Today's the first day in about three weeks that I caught the train with no drama.

I kinda liked it.

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Chapter Two: The Big Wheel - 1980

I was too old for a Big Wheel, but after losing my bike I had to devolve to an earlier mode of transportation (there was a reason I couldn't take my skateboard, but I can't recall what it was now...). Susie, Linda and I were on our way back from the Galleria. We'd just gone through the pedestrian tunnel under the freeway (truly scary, a cave 4 feet wide and 200 feet long, with two little lights spaced wide inside, like a coal mine, a coal mine that people pee in), and we were heading home.

Susie and I were supposed to trade off between the Big Wheel and her bike (Linda had her own bike), but Susie, two years older than me, had an even greater antipathy to being seen riding a glorified tricycle than I did, and so she refused the deal. As Susie and Linda rode off I ran after them, all the eight blocks home, telling mom of the grave injustice. She asked where the Big Wheel was and certainly wasn't pleased to hear I'd left it at the mouth of the tunnel. I suppose I figured it was safe as, being a vehicle that my sister and I were fighting over who got to be the one not to ride it, who would want to steal it? And it was a suburban neighborhood, and we'd only be gone a few minutes.

Gone.

Not as interesting a story as the others, but as part of the anthology of compromised vehicles, it had to be included.

Next stop: The Scooter, part one of two.

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Came home from work about 7 on Monday. Picked up my mail and hopped in the elevator. On the way up I went through the envelopes, divining the contents: Bank statement, election propaganda, 'have you seen me?', and a thin envelope from the Department of Motor Vehicles. Hands full, i had to wait 'till I could dump everything in my apartment before opening the envelope.

To give a little background, my dealings with the DMV usually consist of me getting a registration renewal notice, putting it in a pile somewhere, and letting the due date go by, getting a second notice with late fees, trying to pay online, finding out I need a smog check, to pay an old ticket (or tickets), or both, then going in to the DMV in person to pay. My car's registration expires in April. Last year I didn't end up getting my little blue sticker until September.

I got this year's renewal notice about three weeks ago, and promptly went online and paid the fees. My sticker came in last week's mail, and it's now sitting happily affixed to my car, two months early.

This only added to my puzzlement over the envelope I clutched in the hand that wasn't unlocking the door. Did they make a mistake? Did they want more money? Did they want to give some back? It's been known to happen.

After dropping my backpack, coat, keys and energy inside the door, I open the envelope, extracting a single-sheet, block-type missive with "NOTICE" emblazoned coldly at the top of the page.

I read through the page, finding that it was a notification that the DMV had, based on my car's license plate, given my name and address to an attorney who was pursuing litigation against me. They went on to say that they only release addresses to licensed attorneys and only if the attorney requires the address in the course of a civil or criminal action.

They also included the attorney's name, address, and telephone number, helpfully suggesting that I get in touch with the individual to find out more.

Fuck.

Fuck, fuck, fuckitty-fuck-fuck-fuck.

I try to remember (as if I'd have forgotten) if I'd possibly damaged someone's car, or been a witness to an accident somewhere. If it were something like a red light or bridge toll (neither of which had I remembered running or evading, mind you) the state would have access to my address already, without having to go to an attorney to get the info from the DMV.

Could I have cut someone off without realizing it? Was their quick notice of my distinctive license plate the tie that brought this letter to my rapidly moistening hands? Could I have seriously hurt someone, or worse? Could I go to jail, my liberty forsook in an unknown moment?

I say again, for those who missed it: Fuck.

Then I think: I have only one plate. My front plate was stolen almost six months ago. I assumed it now adorns someone's cluttered dorm room or frat den, but maybe it's affixed instead to another person's car, and who knows what kind of red-light-running, demolition-derby-loving, hit-and-runner now wields my identity? Am I about to get a sense of exactly what kind of malfeasance he's been dishing out?

Still, there's work to be done. I have a name, and I have a phone number. I hop to the net.

A google search for the attorney's name turns up a handful of links, mostly to the odd East Bay court docket here and there. There are a couple links to conference guides, citing my personal Inspector Javert as a guest speaker, an expert in the field of post-traumatic stress disorder litigation. Did I cut someone off, and now I'm going to be taken to the cleaners for their resulting stress?

I've found pretty much all I'm going to, so I make the call, doubtful that 7:30 in the evening would find anyone in the Walnut Creek law office. Dialing... Busy.

I try again: Busy. Wait 5 minutes, dial, busy.

Okay, whatever. I don't think there's anyone there, and I know I won't be able to sleep with this uncertain fate looming over my head, so it's to Yahoo's People Search, to find a home number. Ahh, a single match, in Danville. Dialing...

"Hello?" The voice at the other end of the telephone couldn't have passed the bar, unless she had a few years head start on Doogie Hauser.

"Is Robert home?" I ask, polite. None of my trepidation showing through. Whether talking to him or his daughter, I know that lawyers can smell fear, and often mistake it for guilt.

"Yeah, just a second. Who is this?"

"Kevin Fox" Like the name will mean anything. He didn't even know my name until the DMV handed it to him. I'd have a better chance of recognition if I told her "Grr, Arg" was calling, but somehow I'd probably have a smaller chance of actually getting Robert on the phone.

"Just a minute..."

And then I had a talk with Robert...

...

I'm tempted to end the story there for a few reasons:

• So the reader would share some small idea of the suspense I felt throughout this eternal ten-minute ordeal.
• Because if I don't finish the story I don't have to look stupid at the end of it.

...

Yes, there was a 'civil action' being taken against me. Would I be going to jail? Would I have to spend my dotcom-hundreds on attorney and court costs, fighting a bitter battle for liberty? Um, no.

One morning about five weeks earlier, I neglected to leave a parking permit on my dash at the emeryville Amtrak station. This inaction set the wheels of litigation rolling so that Ampco, the private parking lot management company contracted by Amtrak, could mail me a ticket. "You'll be getting it within the next few days. You may have received it already." Yes. Yes I did a couple days before. I never thought about how they got my address.

I apologized for bothering him at home. Apologizing all at once for his good nature about being bothered at home by a stranger, apologizing by karmic proxy for the dozens of people who probably call him each month or year, terrified, irate, or both.

With a good-natured goodbye, Robert wished the DMV gave a little more detail about why the person wanted the address. I agree that would be nice, so that I wouldn't interrupt his dinner, and so I wouldn't lose an appetite for my own. G'night Robert. Have a good evening.

Then I went to the Starry Plough to dance it all off.

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I've never had very good luck with vehicles. Most vehicles I've owned have been wrecked, stolen, or both. The unifying thread through these mishaps is that, with rare exception, I've never been there when it happened.

Chapter One: The Huffy - 1980

I was seven years old. I learned how to ride. I spent days with my mom and dad, getting over using training wheels. I remember the first time Dad let go of the back and I started going down the cul de sac on my own, losing my balance, and banging into the neighbor's trash can. I remember it specifically because it was the same trash can (or at least a descendent of the same line, from the same neighbor's breeding stock of corrugated aluminum trashcans) that I hit with Dad's car ten years later when he was teaching me to drive stick.

Well, I did learn how to ride the Huffy sans training wheels at long last. I remember the day I got the hang of it and Susie and I went with the Selbys to UCLA to ride around the campus, and to let their dog splash joyously around in the inverted fountain. I wouldn't claim I was a pro at using the bike; for weeks afterward I would jump off the bike when I wanted to stop, afraid of the brake. For some reason I thought the brake (which worked by trying to backpedal) would lock the wheel and I'd go flying over the handlebars. That fear was stronger than any possible injury I might sustain by jumping off the bike to a run and letting it crash where it may. Eventually I got the hang of it (first of bailing, then of breaking)

Ready bike mobility was a big boon to my social life, and now I could ride to The Galleria. (The Sherman Oaks Galleria, the primordial pool of what would come to be known as the 'Valley Girl.' In fact, the movie of the same name was filmed there.)

Of course, for security's sake, my mom got us chain locks for our bikes. This was before there were Kryptonite locks, and the four-tumbler cylindrical lock afforded more security than this seven-year-old had ever had. I could lock things. I could keep things even when they weren't in my room.

That was the theory, anyhow.

A few months later Susie and I took our bikes to The Galleria and we locked up both bikes with my lock. After a hard day of wandering (the pet store, the arcade, the bookstore, the movie theater, the pet store again) we descended to the underground parking structure to grab our bikes and ride home.

Sifting through the crowded bicycle rack, like trying to find a book on the bookshelf, I skipped over my bike. Looking again, it wasn't there. Locked with the same lock, they were right next together, but now my sister's pink bike stood alone, jilted, with nothing but a broken chain draped on the neck of the handlebars like a broken promise of security.

Speaking of broken security, that was our next stop, to have a report written up by the mallcops. (When you're seven, you don't realize there's a difference between a mallcop and an actual police officer.) The guy said he'd call if anything turned up, and Susie and I made our slow way home, me walking, her on her bike, mildly miffed that the thief didn't think her bike was even worth stealing, when the chain was already cut.

...

Three weeks later I took my skateboard to The Galleria and was skating through the empty parking lot ramps on a Sunday morning and I get stopped by a mall cop who's going to write me up for riding on the parking lot's ramps (first time warning, second time the board gets confiscated). He starts writing up the warning and pauses, frowning further:

"Haven't I stopped you before?"
 "No, sir."
"I think I have. This isn't your first time. I'm going to have to take your board."
 "This is the first time I ever took my skateboard here. I used to take my bike until it got stolen a couple weeks ago."
"Here?"
 "Yeah, right over there. Did you find it yet?"
"No. Um, go on along."

It was a while before I got another bike, but I put that skateboard to good use. In junior high I would ride it 6 miles each way to my Saturday bowling league. (There are so many things wrong with that statement...)

But that's another story.

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Self-imposed writing exercise: Write a self-contained short story between 2000 and 5000 words.

Time limit: 3 days.

(okay, so maybe time 'limits' aren't the way to go, but it's a goal. Heck. I might just write it tomorrow.)

I'm not promising it's good. I'm not even promising I'll post it, but I probably will...

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So that I don't completely forget, stories that are in need of telling:

• The Ohio Scooter Story
• How I Met Mara
• CKS & Long Life
• ... I know there's more...

Okay, just reminding myself, because I just know listing them on the blog will get people bugging me to write one or two soon.

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Back in '97, at CKS Partners, I worked with some interesting people. It was the dotcom heyday, and uniqueness was embraced. Not to say that individuality is a back-seat commodity now but, well, there were just some strange people at CKS.

One of the strangest was J. J was a copywriter at CKS, a new mother, a nice person, and a real freak. I'm not talking about quirky-weird, like some of my coworkers. Sondra was '88 lines about 44 women' weird. J was Fairuza Balk in The Craft, fake-dead-sparrow-hanging-upside-down-from-her-office-ceiling kind of weird. J was Chicago Elements of Style and Strunk & White bookended by an alien-fetus-in-a-jar kind of weird. Though there was always a second desk in her office, it saw more temps than Murphey Brown had secrataries.

J was seeing an engineer in the Cupertino office (did I mention that she was married? Oops. Yeah she was) on the sly, while at the same time leading on a co-worker friend of mine, C, who was dissatisfied with her own live-in girlfriend because said partner was starting to date other people. Got it? No? Okay: J, married, with 6 month-old baby, is also seeing engineer-guy behind her husband's back (she later leaves her husband for engineer-guy, who leaves the company and changes his name). J is also having a tenuous relationship with my friend C, who is looking for something real to replace the uncertain attentions of her own girlfriend. J gives C just enough attention to give C hope that J might be the one for her, or at least the one to assuage the pain of her girlfriend's infidelities.

Meanwhile C and I became good friends on some levels, while remaining strangers on others. We have lunch often, talk about our problems, and share stories. She needed an ear and, like van Gogh, I had a spare. We all like to feel needed. Of course on other levels our lives were entirely separate. It's what I would call a 'fourth-wall friendship.' That is to say, We each got a full view of the others life, from one perspective, but there was no interaction with that life. We'd each know what was going in the others 'real' life, but that life was behind the scrim, for viewing purposes only.

The only part of each other's life we would actually touch was in the office. For many people that would mean a Dilbert-Venn intersection, almost a parody of real life with 'how are your projects going' and 'did you see last night's West Wing?' replacing 'what's your major' on the smalltalk punch list. But then there was J, a rust-crimson dot on the overlapping intersection that was CKS.

Like C and myself, J was looking for attention. While at first I rarely spoke with J, eventually C told J that she and I had been talking about their relationship, and J instantly started paying more attention to me. The three of us would go out for lunch together, and occasionally J would try to shock me by telling me about how she hears women masturbate in the ladies room, and she wonders if other people hear her.

J needed constant validation of self-worth, seeking it by trying to fill every nook of her life with physical intimacy. C was afraid of abandonment, and needed a safety-net, or possibly an escape ladder, in case her current relationship fell apart. Me? I fell into my usual role of Jiminey Cricket, acting as confidant to both, while not betraying either. It's not as bad as it sounds: both of them were fully aware. Looking back, they may have gotten off on it, feeling the excitement and fear of telling me what they were too timid or afraid to tell each other. It's a role I've played several times, and one I try hard not to fall into anymore.

Adding to the mix, C was a cutter, and that habit rubbed off onto J. I'm a fixer, and hadn't yet clued into the reality that a lot of people are self-destructive for attention's sake, acting out just so someone will come and try to fix them.

This weird menage-a-twisted relationship came to a head one day when I dropped by J's office for something and she kept wanting to see my hand. "Let me read your palm" as she splayed my fingers, tracing my life-line. For a moment I thought to correct her, giving her my left hand, as I'm left-handed. In palmistry, the right hand of a leftie depicts their 'forecast' at birth, while the dominant hand shows what the person's will has made of their life. I pulled back a fraction, and her grasp on my hand tightened a fraction. I realized I didn't really care so much what she would read in my future.

My hand in her hand, she opened her desk drawer with the other, plucking a pin from amongst its shiny sisters in the front of the drawer. Her fingers grasping my palm, she turned her head up and said, "let me" as she brought the pin toward my hand. I don't remember exactly what I said, but I took my hand back and watched as she slowly, deliberately, pricked her middle finger as I watched in surprise. She dropped her pin onto her desk and took my hand by the wrist once more, while squeezing her pricked fingertip between her thumb and ring-finger, summoning up a growing red drop of blood from the pinprick.

...

When I was seven years old, my sister and I had the same best friend, Linda. Three years earlier Linda and I met when we were in the same kindergarten. One day after school I found a scrap of paper on the playground near the classroom and, ever curious (even more so at that age), I picked it up. The scrap held a phone number. Ever the precocious four-year-old, I took the number home and called it that evening after school. Linda, a hitherto (no, I didn't use words like 'hitherto' back then) unnoticed classmate who had written the number down for another friend, became fast and close friends with me and my older sister, Susie. Linda had a younger brother and golden retriever. Her parents were both teachers and they had a VW van and two bugs, one of which they'd periodically repaint new colors. Our friendship was the stereotypical childhood friendship. We'd spend summers riding our bikes to the mall, camping out in the backyard, and making up games. When one of us would run away from home, it was a fair bet that we ran to the other's. Our parents became good friends.

One day, alone for the afternoon, the three of us decided to become blood brothers, Indian style. I'm sure that we had seen it on TV somewhere; to cement a friendship into a kinship, you each cut your hands and shake, letting the blood mingle and re-enter your system, each of you letting a little of the other's life-blood into yourself. This is a one-way function; irreversible. Forever.

We got the needle, sterilized it with a match, and each pricked our fingers in turn, drawing forth a drop of blood and mixing them in one palm.

It didn't really matter that our mixed blood would never get closer than the palm of my hand. The blood was there, intertwined, and that was enough.

...

My wrist in her clasp, J said she wanted to 'mark' me, to make us closer. I was certain that this was exactly the kind of situation that gave mankind the term 'ulterior.' I took my wrist from her grasp; not violently, but with determination. "No. I don't think that's a good idea." "Please? It's important." (reaching for my wrist again) "I don't think it's a good idea." (pulling out of reach) "Fine," she said, and looked around her desk. I was wondering what had her attention until she said "well I need to wipe it somewhere" and she smeared her finger on my jeans, front-mid thigh. "Wha" "Don't worry, it'll wash out." This awkward blood-power struggle over, I turned and left her office, the red spot on my pale blue jeans already weaving its way into the fabric, turning rusty as it went.

Days later, folding my laundry, I noted that the stain didn't come out; it only faded a bit.

A few weeks later, after a second washing, the stain was gone. To be specific, the spot where J's blood infused the fabric was gone, completely, inexplicably.

I'm glad it wasn't my hand or anything else.

Comments? (37)

Okay, so in the same vein as the Bathroom Cellphone story, but much more concise, here is today's Yahoo! bathroom episode:

I go to the restroom, take the far, handicapped-sized stall because stall #2 was taken, and this stall (#4) gives the appropriate 'one-stall buffer zone.'

All goes fine, I unlatch the door, go to the sink, and a Yahoo! janitorial guy goes into the stall I just vacated. I thought he was just observing the buffer zone rule too strictly, as he could have used stall #1 or #3, and buffer zone rules don't apply when it means that you'd have to actually wait to use a stall.

Before I'm done washing my hands, he walks back out of the stall, tosses something substantial into the trash, and leaves. I dry off my hands, and before tossing my paper towels in the selfsame trash, I take a peek, and it's the half-used (half unused? Which one would be the optimist in this case?) toilet paper roll from my stall.

Is there something I should know?

Comments? (9)

Good morning! Hope everyone had a good weekend. This morning I've got a story written by Sean, Karen's brother. I really liked the story and asked to put it on the site. I hope you enjoy it as much I did!

My firm has a charitable giving campaign every year where we raise money by participating in silly activities, like trivia contests, guess how many jellybeans are in the jar, and mini golf played through the cubicles in the office. The whole thing is brought to a close with a costume party on Halloween. You know the drill, stupid costumes, beer, wine, food, beer, and, of course, beer. At the stroke of 5:00pm, the party becomes a ghost town. With no obligation to stay, everyone disappears faster than good manners on public transportation. I was waiting to meet up with my friend, Jones, so I stuck around. There was no sense letting all that free beer go to waste, so I sacrificed my sobriety for the greater good of proper resource management.

Jones showed up right on time, a half hour late, at 6:00pm. I was already pretty buzzed and Jones had been drinking since 1:00pm. As it turns out, he was on day 2 of what would be a 5 day bender. Way to go Jones! We headed out to a shitty Irish bar/Indian restaurant called "Kennedy's." Yeah, it's an odd combination, but they have $2.00 Guinness on tap and free pool on Wednesdays, so that's where we were headed. Did I mention it was Wednesday? Just as we turned down Columbus St., I let Jones in on the secret that I had liberated several beers from my firm's party and smuggled them out in my bag. I barely finished my sentence when Jones said, "Well, let's drink' em now."

I hesitated for a moment... "Okay." Ignoring my better judgment, I pulled a couple cans of Guinness out of my bag and handed one to Jones. He popped the top and it started to foam over. I said, "You gotta drink right away or it gets everywhere."

"Now you tell me," he said with beer dripping off his hands.

"Well, I thought you knew what you were doing," I replied as I demonstrated how to do it without making a mess.

Jones wiped his hands on the back of his pant legs and we started walking again. At about this time, I launched into my usual schpeal about how I don't like my apartment and that he and his roommate Dan need to move out of my old apartment, which they've been living in under my name for over a year, and we should all go in on a three bedroom place. Jones's answer is always the same and this time is no different. He agrees and tells me that he's ready. But when I ask when he will be able to afford it, he says it will be a couple of months. Doh!!!

We were about two-thirds through the conversation when I heard something that didn't register right away. Then I heard it again and by this time I realized what I had heard the first time. The guy playing saxophone on the corner was saying, "You're gonna get a ticket."

I remembered our beer and looked up to see two cops about a block away walking in our direction. Immediately, I turned up the cross street and said, "Let's go this way," hoping Jones was following and that the cops didn't see our beer.

Trying not to give myself away, I didn't look back right away. When I finally did, I saw Jones about 25 feet behind me. The dumb ass was pretending to pick up one of San Francisco's free publications and instead was putting his beer inside the newspaper machine. Now, if I wasn't trying to avoid the cops, I would've been rolling. That has got to be one of the funniest things I've ever seen.

I turned back to my own get away when I heard, "Hey you. STOP!" Fuck!!! I quickly put my beer down on one of the outside tables of the restaurant I was in front of and then turned around looking completely surprised. "Come over here," one of the cops said to both of us.

I started walking towards them when the other cop pointed to the newspaper machine and snapped at Jones, "Get that out of there! What the hell are you thinking?" I almost died. Both of these cops were totally disgusted and I was only able to keep a straight face because of the impending ticket. Jones took the beer out and put it on top of the machine. "Where's yours?," the pig asked me.

"Over there," I answered pointing at the table.

"Go get it," he said. So, I retrieved my beer. When I got back, cop number one was looking at Jones's military ID. I also noticed some girl a few feet away watching us get hassled by the Man. We realized later that our public consumption had interrupted some scamming between this chick and one of the pigs. Anyway, the cop asked me for my ID and then asked Jones if he was still in the reserves.

Jones said, "No."

Then the cop asked, "You have any other ID?"

"I have my New Jersey ID," Jones said as he looked in his wallet.

The cop took my ID and asked, "You in the reserves, too?"

With ramrod straight posture and my high and tight haircut, I said, "No sir!" I wonder if he realized that I was mocking him. If he did, he didn't show any sign because he went right back to Jones.

"You don't have a California ID?," he asked, as if Jones was saving it for a special occasion.

"I haven't been here that long," Jones told him.

The cop countered with, "You're required by law to get one within 30 days of moving here." Then he looked at me, "And you; You should know better. You live here."

"Yeah...," I nodded.

"This is a $97.00 ticket" he exclaimed, as if he was the one who was going to have to pay for it. "I'm gonna cut you guys a break. I want you to pour out your beers and throw away the cans."

I turned and stepped toward the gutter with my beer, but Jones was a little more eager to comply and started dumping his beer directly onto the sidewalk right in front of the cops. What a champ! ...Or is that chump?

"I'd prefer it if you poured it in the gutter, nimrod," the cop growled while rolling his eyes.

"Oh...," Jones muttered and then joined me at the curb where I was giving the eulogy for an old friend. Damn... It was more than half full.

"Alright, get out of here," swino numero dos said as we finished dumping our treats.

"Thank you, officer," we both expressed as sincerely as possible while already walking away.

It was a good thing Kennedy's was only a few blocks away, but that's another story.

Comments? (15)

Last Tuesday I was at work and, is bound to happen when you're working in the real world instead of a TV show, I had to use the restroom. If I'd known that going to the bathroom might have placed my life in danger, I'd have held it. I didn't have to go that bad.

No, this isn't going to be one of those stories. As you can see, Yahoo's facilities are quite clean. Nothing to be afraid of.

Or so I thought.

Okay, back to the matter at, er, hand. I walk to the men's restroom, pick a stall (which, like the nature of my business, was Number 2), and I latch the door behind me. Bip-bip! Hmm? What was that? I thought the restroom was empty (not that it matters). Bip-bip! I look over (I haven't sat down yet (TMI?) ) and see a cellphone in a leather case, double-bipping every Bip-bip! 6 seconds or so. It's just sitting there on top of the stainless steel toilet paper dispenser like a child who, when lost at the mall, has the good sense to stay put but lacks the maturity to keep the small plaintive whimpers inside.

I lean over the phone and take a look at the display. It's not ringing but it sounds like it has a really important message, and the sender isn't willing to settle for just a 'once every 5 minutes' beep and tickle. Taking a look at the display, I see it's all in Spanish and, of course, there's no signal in the middle of a stall in the middle of a bathroom in the middle of a building in the middle of the reclaimed South-bay dotcom wetlands.

That's fine. I get to be helpful! I'll take the phone out with me when I'm done and I'll send out an email to the floor and see whose phone it is. But wait. What if they come back while I'm going? The strange taint that adheres to the emergency toilet paper roll, passed under a stall from a savior to a stallgoer in need of saving, could be nothing compared to the cooties that would infect a cellphone passed from an unseen stranger's unknown hands under the stall door to the owner. This is not the kind of dirt the leather case is designed to repel. Worse, unlike a 'holy roll,' the phone would stay with the owner, if anything, holding on all the tighter for its recent traumatic experience. No. Clearly I couldn't leave it in the stall while I went (and not because I felt it would be staring at me, tittering all the while. Like I said, it's not that kind of story. While we're on the subject, why to they call it 'going'? You don't start going until you're already in the restroom, and you certainly don't leave the restroom until after you've gone. Ahh, linguistics. But, as ever, I digress...).

So clearly the thing to do Bip-bip! is put the phone on the counter by the sinks, then go, then take it with me back to my cube when I leave.

Unlatch the door, pick up the phone, put it on the counter, come back, latch, clean the seat with a sheet (YTMI!), and do my business.

Someone walks in. Is it them? No. To the urinal they go. They finish up, Bip-bip! use the sink furthest from the phone and leave, ignoring the phone (which, in retrospect, they probably assumed was mine).

I realize now (I'm referring to the 'now' of me writing this story, as opposed to the more distant 'now' that I'm relating in the story or your own personal 'now' assuming you're still reading this story, bravely trusting that this really isn't a scatological tale (or, alternatively, becoming rapidly frustrated that your own odd fetish isn't being serviced by my tale (OCTMI!) ) ), I say I realize now that the reader might be getting the wrong impression, that I'm one of those people who has to stop what they're doing whenever someone else walks in, as though the sound of bowels being voided in a restroom stall is as shocking or shameful as a muffled orgasm coming from an office stairwell (NTMI). No, I'm not one of those people, though there seem to be a lot of them here at Yahoo! (the 'don't go (void) till they go (leave)' type, as opposed to the sex in stairwells type, which I haven't encountered, though a coworker told me about a pair (I hesitate to presume they were a 'couple') who was(*) dismissed after being caught having sex in a conference room after everyone else had evacuated for a fire drill). It leads me to wonder what, given how often I see (err, sense) these introverted excrementers, happens when, inevitably, two of these people are in the bathroom at the same time? Defecation Detente? Anyhow, now that I've embarrassed myself further by trying to prove that I'm not a freak (and succeeded in demonstrating that I'm very much a freak of a different sort) (Err, meaning the kind that analyzes people in bathrooms too much, not the kind that has sex in stairwells (oh forget it. I'm getting back to the story now.) )

Right. Where was I? Yeah; so number 1 leaves, a few seconds pass, and another guy walks in to the bathroom. He walks straight to the phone on the counter, picks it up, turns to leave, and on his way out, pulls out a walkie-talkie, pushes the button and says,

"I found another one."

Comments? (11)

So, since so many people have said I should share the story, inciting others to be oh-so-curious about the eighth wonder of the world that is my laundry, I will now proceed to relate the ending of this story. As Jessajune said, at this point it can't help but be anti-climactic, but there it is.

For those of you who haven't read, or have forgotten, the first part of this story, I invite you to (re)read it.

So Monday I had brought my huge oversized bag full of dirty laundry to work for cleaning, and it was dubiously picked up that afternoon. Their policy is that simple 'wash and fold' laundry has a next-day turnaround, so it should be back on Tuesday. Of course, that doesn't take into account that I only authorized them to do one bagful, and that's a 'normal-sized' bag, not my uberbag.

Tuesday: No word. They're probably still trying to lift the thing.

Wednesday I get to work to find a voicemail from the laundry service. The woman asks why I didn't use the regular bags. you see, they have these specially sized laundry bags for this sort of thing, and you pay a $5 deposit per bag. (This is not nearly as god a deal as the $3 deposit I put on my nifty green stackable WebVan crate which, now that WebVan has gone belly up, is the permanent kitty-food and toys crate. But I digress...) The relevant point is that I had committed not only a faux pas by using my own bag, but one that apparently befuddled the laundry officer charged with my load. The good news (made all the more quaint because she thought it was the bad news) was that the normal bag (the 'red bag', to be differentiated from the ne'er again referenced '3 sinkful blue bag' I was shown when my 'gargantua' bag was picked up) was intended for 14-24 pounds of laundry, and my bag weighed in at 48 pounds, and so I would have to be charged $49.90 instead of the single-bag $24.95 price. What's more, they would give me a free red bag for next time (not quite sure why they didn't give me two, after witnessing my extreme laundry needs).

I call her back, assure her that the $49.90 is completely acceptable, and I am happy to receive their services and their red bag. She informs me that the laundry will be taken care of today (Wednesday) and returned to me tomorrow (Thursday). Three-day turnaround instead of one, but I don't mind.

Thursday morning I come in to work, making sure to drive, as 50 48 pounds of laundry (does laundry weigh less after being washed? Does the removal of dirt result in a smaller mass? And what about the lint?) is not what I want to bring on to Amtrak, along with my regular backpack.

Email, work, and morning meetings. I return to my cube with anything but laundry on my mind and I find... Three stuffed, white, tall kitchen garbage bags, double bagged, with the red pull-handles neatly tied into bows. The feeling-before-thinking part of my brain recalled that I have exactly the same bags at home (well, yellow pulls instead of red, but close enough) and the only time I would double-bag is if there was something particularly noxious inside that I wished to doubly insure against accidental escape, in much the same way that young lovers use a condom and the Pill, because sometimes 97% just isn't enough. But I digress...

After a poke, and a flashback to the Simpsons, when Marge and Homer are caught naked in the minigolf windmill ("feels like a hefty bag full of meat") and people are groping inside to figure out what's making the balls stuck ("maybe it's presents for all of us!") it dawns on me that, despite being in neither the gargantua bag, nor two 'red bags,' the contents of the three (six, really) garbage bags is, indeed, my laundry.

Like an old friend coming home from an unexpectedly long trip, I ripped open one of the bags to see it. Okay, that's a really inappropriate metaphor simile. Let's try that again: Like one would embrace an old friend returning from an unexpectedly long adventure, I strove to see, touch, and smell my laundry, to affirm its existence, and verify that the double-bagging was to protect this newly-revirginized clothing from the comparatively dirty outside world, rather than vice-versa, as was the case when last I saw my good friend.

Struggling with tie-handles drawn thin and tight by the weight they recently carried, finally I have the two bags of the first bundle open. I spy the tightly folded stack of shirts within, and bring my nose close for a good inhalation--

Let me once again break from the story for a second for a little necessary background: I love the smell of laundry, and others love (well, like. Well, actually, let's be fair, like, like, in the Jr. High gossip sense) the smell of my laundry in particular. I don't use dryer sheets. I don't use fabric softener. I don't separate my delicates (I don't think I have any delicates) from the rest. There's just two piles, white/light, and dark/bright, and each gets its own load. The Tide is my shepherd and I shall not want for another. (Or, to put it another way, for religious sensitivity: There is only one god Tide, and Procter & Gamble is its prophet.) Suffice it to say that the smell of my clean laundry is a comforting force in my life. Suffice it to say that I am a freak. But we knew that. Now, to continue:

I touch my laundry. I peek into the bag to see the nice, neat stacks. I bring my nose in to get a nice whiff of laundry smell, and I swivel my chair back to the monitor and go back to checking email.

...

About thirty seconds pass before I stop typing mid-sentence, and turn back to the bags. I go back to the opened