depression, i guess

when did the days become all so alike
each ponderously sliding into the next
til unceremoniously i wake again?

is death just the last unremarkable twilight?

Model citizen

Whew! Having lived overseas a good portion of my life, and not having any particular affinity for history, I wouldn't bet much on my knowledge of American history. But I am glad to report that I do know enough to qualify for US citizenship! Woohoo!

You Passed the US Citizenship Test

Congratulations - you got 7 out of 10 correct!

Could You Pass the US Citizenship Test?

people, all the time (or: august in nyc)

even alone in a tiny room
i sense them breathing—these
people, all the time.

walls, buildings, sidewalks all exhaling
the air is fetid with exhaling.
i can't inhale:
every wisp of air
is stolen by these
people, all the time.

it is scavenged away
i don't know where.
if i could find it
(like a scuba diver with a parachute)
i would stuff it all
in a big balloon
and float away
from all these
people, all the time.

Rave: people who think I am a wolf

So some people in Brooklyn think that I am a wolf, and I think that's cool, because wolves are tough. One time a high school kid saw me and said to his friend, "That dog look like a lil wolf, yo!" That was cool.

Another time when I was taking Sean for a walk, a guy said to Sean, "Nice wolf you got there." That was cool too.

Then last Tuesday, when we were on a pack walk, a little kid saw me and said, "Mom, looka that doggy. I gotta doggy like that right here!" and showed us his book with a wolf on the cover. That was really cool.

So, yeah, I like being a wolf.

Brainteaser 2

What happens when we use up this year's list of storm names? This season, we are already up to Rita, leaving only four names: Stan, Tammy, Vince, and Wilma. What do we name the storm after Wilma, if there is one?

It's a little embarrassing to admit this, but I learned the answer from Katie Couric on the Today Show this morning.

If anyone guesses, I'll post the answer later.

My job*: a cost-benefit analysis

Typically, my thoughts about my job zig-zag through a gradient from "thank goodness I have one" to "anything would be better than this". Job-seeking is so frustrating, so discouraging, so deflating, so dehumanizing. Then again, so is my current job. What to do?


Stay (benefits):

• It's the devil I know.
  
• I can wear jeans, t-shirts and flip-flops to work.
  
• Sometimes I get to work from home.

Go (costs):

• Little opportunity for professional advancement.
  
• Rampant mismanagement of tasks and situations large and small.
  
• I am woefully underappreciated. (Sliiiiight exaggeration, but this is my blog!)

(I'll leave aside, for the purposes of this evaluation, the pros and cons of having a job in general.)

Other points to consider:

• Is some other job really going to be any better?
  
• If I leave, I lose the company-matched contributions to my retirement account. (Hey, I'm getting older, I have to think about these things!)

Um, yeah. So there it is. Can you think of other costs, benefits, or points to consider that I should include in this analysis? Help me out!

*Disclaimer: This job is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual jobs, present or past, is entirely coincidental.

Rave: Amazon.com

Ordered five books on Sunday from Amazon.com. Got free shipping, which means that your order can take 3-5 extra days to ship. Received 'em all today! Totally cool. So here is the lineup:

At bat:

• Friday Night Lights (yeah, I know I am mixing sports metaphors here; so sue me) (just started this one because I thought my Amazon order would not arrive for another week or so)

On deck:

• The Lovely Bones
  
• The Secret Life of Bees
  
• The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time
  
• Life of Pi
  
• The Devil Wears Prada

Read any of these? Let me know what you thought. Don't give away the endings or key plot points though. That wouldn't be very nice.

Like South Park?

Then you should check out South Park Studio (thanks, Kim!), where you can create your own South Park-style characters.

For example, here's me on a good day:


And after a bad day at work:


Warning: It's addictive! I can't stop! Here's one more...

A South Park-ified version of my profile pic:

Brainteaser

For the NYC-philes...
What do the following characters have in common?
H I K O P T U X Y 8 0
Answer TK in a week or so, if anyone bothers to guess.

Headlines

Devastation. Destruction. Disaster. Tragedy.

These words seem to crowd the headlines every day, describing incidents big and small, global and local. They are so overused, in fact, that I'm desensitized to them. So much so that when I saw the first headlines about Hurricane Katrina, I scoffed. What's the big deal about a hurricane, I grumped. I lived in coastal North Carolina for a few years. We had hurricanes almost every season. Trees would fall, some low lying areas would flood, the power would go out, we'd all stay home for a day or two to wait it out then clean up. And then things went back to normal.

What happened to New Orleans this week as a result of Hurricane Katrina is nothing like that. It's incomprehensible to me in a way that I haven’t experienced since September 11. In the weeks after September 11, I read an opinion piece about how the overuse of words like "tragedy" has rendered them meaningless and bereaved us of words we can use to discuss events like September 11, the tsunami in Asia last year, and Hurricane Katrina. We are left with no baseline or reference point for expressing the magnitude of things.

But this linguistic frustration of mine is nothing. Imagine no food, no water, no shelter, no medical supplies, no bathrooms. Everything you own or recognize -- the whole city -- under dozens of feet of water, or worse: gone. You've been told to leave but given no means to do so. You don't know where your friends and family are and have no way to contact or find them. You're scared, exhausted, hungry, thirsty, sick and you have no resources with which to take care of yourself. If you're imagining this, like I am, then be thankful. Because lots of people on the Gulf Coast are living it right now.

It takes only a minute to help them; donate to the American Red Cross (they've received more than $33 million from more than 230,000 donors for hurrican relief so far) or other rescue and relief efforts.

Animals need help too. Many people had to leave their pets behind. You can support the animal rescue and relief efforts through several charities, like North Shore Animal League America.