Revenge of the Ten Unmediated Pleasures

1. Shocking pink roses, blooms as big as your fist, from a thorn bush that seems to thrive on neglect.

2. The clack and crackle of dice on a hardwood table—and the memories the sound evokes.

3. Pinching out an A minor 7th chord and feeling it snap beneath my fingers.

4. Shadowboxing—the way you pull your fist out of your back pocket for the throw, the way your shoulders swing on the follow-through.

5. Looking out on the back yard, astonished, at a duck's stony plummet out of the sky to paddle on a pool left behind on the lawn in the wake of a summer rain.

6. Early morning at work, aching, sleepless eyes red and sore: I should be miserable with exhaustion, but I cannot suppress a smile (and a shiver) as I remember just what we were up to last night when we should have been sleeping.

7. Cracked-pepper pappadums puffing and distorting in the hot oil, with pear-and-cardamom chutney close at hand.

8. Warm little arms flung round my neck and the toddler's voice fluting, "Hug."

9. Lotte Samkang Melon Big Ice Bars from the Korean grocery down by South Town, near RIT.

10. The way it feels when the words are coming easy.
    

The First Hint That Something’s Gone Wrong

I’m gonna hate myself for asking this, because I can only imagine the horror and devastation that these people must be feeling.

But.

There is a real question here, and that question is: Who the FUCK takes a three-year old to see Alien vs. Predator?

So Clever and Classless and Free

Because I identify as working class and am largely self-educated, I have a bad and visceral reaction to being patronized. Dealing with difficult people is all part of eating the whale's asshole, in any job—but some days I can deal with it better than others.

Today was one of the others.

Part of it is the nature of the gig. I work in the research-and-development arm of a major provider of digital imaging and reproduction equipment (which shall remain nameless—but it starts with an X), and my job is basically to be the village idiot; I beat up the product until it breaks, then beg for some kindly engineer or software developer to come get me out of the terrible mess I, in my ignorance, have made. In this way the weaknesses and failures of the product are exposed; but you can see where a degree of indignity is built into the system.

Now, the engineering and development teams are generally decent enough folks¹: but there is one fellow²—one is particular—who is bright, charming, charismatic, and often unbearably smarmy, prone to treating me with the affectionate condescension usually reserved for a retarded eight-year-old, and thereby filling me with a raging desire to FUCK HIM WITH KNIVES AND SHIT IN HIS LUNGS³.

A working-class hero is something to be.
But for once I'd like to try being something else.

¹ A blatant lie. They're bastards all.
² i.e., all of them, really.
³ © and ™ Warren Ellis.

Finest Worksong (1)

A thought for today, from the Sufi master Rabia el-Adawia:

I will not serve God like a labourer, in expectation of my wages.

Awe (Shucks)

So we've redecorated the kids' room, much to everyone's delight. I'm talking over the changes with Claire:

"So what d'you think of your room now? Pretty cool, huh?"

"Yeah! It's awesome!"

"It's like the Town Hall of Awesomeville!"

"Yeah!"

"It's the summit of Mount McAwesome!"

"Uh-huh—"

"It's like Captain Awesome's Citadel Of Awesomeness!"

"Dad. It's awesome. I know."

My daughter.
Eight years old tomorrow. God help us all.