All done!

Full Frontal

One completed (but not caulked) wall, and some trim shots

The corner by the AC unit and trash can

"Shakes" providing a visual accent over the
 bedroom window

The corner by the herb garden

Just before finishing.

Trim boards with aluminum flashing over top

More trim boards

In the grim dorkness of the far future there are only cats- and the government controls them!

http://governmentcontrolledcats.dreamwidth.org/

May I recommend you visit this wonderful flash-fiction project hosted by a dear friend of mine. (Caution: Language)

A random sequence generator creates premises so horrible you would only see them on the back cover's in your local bookstore's YA section. Given this so-bad-they-are-good prompts various writers are posting 1-500 word snippets one might expect to see if they flipped to a random page in a Young Adult dystopian future novel with the listed premise. Great fun.

Also my spell checker though that instead of dystopian maybe I meant Fallopian.

Who's siding are you on?

On the left pleae enjoy viewing some tar paper

Enjoy it MORE

Country Lane Red, for your consideration

Work from the bottom up!

Can we go outside and fight the siding?

Before/during

My house is stripping off its clothes and standing around in its underwear for all to see. Would you like to see?
You are about to!

View from inside. Honestly I think this is how all windows should be- covered to prevent awful sunlight rom infiltrating your home.

Before! Horrible wood lap siding, with a terrible grayish color ruining the awesome red

Sort of a mid way point, the house wrap is stapled off tot he old siding because they are not ready to do that side yet.

During! The clay colored area is some bizzare poorly applied moisture barrier. We're not sure if it's older or newer than the tar-paper which the house wrap is concealing. The gray areas have tar paper underneath which is staying since it's another barrier and not hurting anything. The red areas have that clay colored junk paper underneath. Not sure if that's staying or not.

More house wrap over the tar-paper which is over the wood planking.

More during and a great shot is this ridiculously over sized breather pipe fort he sewer. That thing has to stay...

Remember when I got married?

Chicken Salad Sammich - not wedding related

This picture starts our great and gets funnier the longer you look at it

Too much rock for one hand!!!

My beautiful bride

I am not a crook!

I am a handsome devil

JUST KIDDING! GOT YOU!

Our rings, making out

I have photographic evidence!

New High Impact Terms for Customer Service

Today I had the experience of hearing a very humorous verbiage/tone disparity. A rep was very forcefully and assertively saying things like "Let me be the one to serve you" and "I am here to help you and address your problems."

The customer was basically full of nonsense and trying to get help from departments that could not even begin to help her. But the tone/word dichotomy made me laugh and it made me think of something even, I think, funnier.

I propose implementing extremely forceful and aggressive terminology delivered in an ultra-saccharine easy-lsitening tone of voice.  How would you feel hearing the following phrases poured like sweet syrup into your ears?

"Let me be the one to obliterate your problems."

"I will help you get into contact with the best person to annihilate this complaint."

"My role in the organization is to terminate issues that cause customer dissatisfaction and lead witch hunts against customer roadblocks."

"I will beat the living Hell out of this fulfillment shortage for you."

I am considering writing a book.

Now that I'm a grown up I am mature.

"I love you with all my heart."

"That's not that big of an organ, I love you with all of my liver."

"Well I love you with all of my hair."

"I love you with all the acid in my stomach."

"That's kind of gross, I love you with all of my skin."

"I love you with all the blood in my veins."

"Okay, ew."

"I love you with all the poop in my butt."

"EW."

"And it's a lot.'

"EW. STOP!"

"I haven't gone in 2 days."

"You are SO GROSS."

She leaves the room. Now I have the couch to myself to watch Dexter!.

A thought

Have I come up with the best band name of all time?

I think so!

"Side Project"

Now if only I had a band.

Forbidden

I have been explicitly forbidden to blog the following picture:

FORBIDDEN

Pictures forthcoming

I'd like to tell you about how I got angry at my walls.

You see, they would not tell me the things I wanted to know, about the secrets they were concealing.

Water infiltration was being concealed, certainly, but most importantly, what I needed to know was how much window my wall was begging for.

We are replacing an existing bay window with a combination picture unit. This is about as complicated  as it gets for average homeowners.to top it off the existing bay is a really old Pella unit attached with an outmoded angle style frame- and the drywall return had metal sheathing that was well beyond the ability of my little handsaw to cut. I have had to do some guesswork (hopework?) to figure out how wide, exactly the studs in my home are.

"Shouldn't they just be 18" on center? Isn't your house to code?" I hear you say.

My response to you is soundless weeping.

For the vertical I was able to find the sill support (which I pray has jack-studs) and (phew) the header. there was a real concern this house would not have headers over the windows- they weren't code back in 1910 when this house was built. I had to punish the drywal for a while to find it- but low and behold sweet sweet 2x4 where I needed it to be and no visible degradation. We'll know more when the siding itself comes off.

Note the sweet custom bookshelves!

The front room was much easier to measure and as an added bonus moving the furniture here exposed 6 cat toys. This is where the fake mice go to escape our tiny predators.

Speaking of the siding coming off- our project begins in 3 weeks! June 6 or 7th is the day, and the 6th happens to be D-Day as you all know! Also, it's my anniversary. Time to completion is estimated at two weeks from start!

Lastly here is a few pictures of our cats making out. Totem! She is old enough to be your mother!

And this potato chip is HUGE. Blizzard authenticator for size reference. THREE BITES! I was blown away.

Corporations Making Things Happen

This is the kind of thing that annoys me about corporate culture:


From: Tania Scutte
To: James Hogan

Mr. Hogan,

Our internal communications team would like to leverage you. Can you please contact me about your availability.

Sincerely,
Tania Schutte

-------------------------

From:  James Hogan

To:: Tania Schutte

Tania,

I would prefer not the be leveraged, and if being leveraged becomes a work requirement I will seek resolution with Human Resources and outside legal aid if required. I categorically reject the use of any force-multiplying simple machines on my person. I would point out that I can move about the office premises full well under my own power and any tom-foolery with a lever could result in my injury or death.

Thank you,

-JB

P.S. Pella City ordinance 101.3B states that any person becoming dead are required by law to remain so. This is just an FYI.


----------------------------------

From: Tania Scutte

To: James Hogan

Mr Hogan,

What we are requesting is to resource you to generate some lyrical content for a internally based training opportunity. Your name was submitted through the customer service team inter-departmental coordination channel as being a possible internal sourcing for creative content to use in customer service training videos.

Thank you,

Tania

-------------------------------

From:  James Hogan

To:: Tania Schutte

Tania,

Are you asking me to write a song about customer service? Will it be a rap song?

I need you to submit your request in that verbiage if this is the case.

Thank you,

-JB

-------------------------------

From: Tania Schutte

To: James Hogan

Mr Hogan,

Yes that is correct. Will you write a 3-4 verse rap about customer service for our training program?

Thank you,

Tania

----------------------------------

From:  James Hogan

To:: Tania Schutte

Absolutely not.

You people

Due to outside pressure I will force myself to begin new posts occasionally. I may even finish and subsequently post them Thank you all for making something that initially seemed fun and turned out to be work, into work that I am also obligated to do. Work that I can safely ignore is one of my few life pleasures, but I can see that You People are hellbent on denying this small creature comfort to me.

Villians.

My next post will be the promised expose' on my retarded dog, Athena Boofdog Psychosnout. Pics will be included as our new camera has arrived. I hope you enjoy it, because I will not be doing so.

The Lovecraft tribute will be shelved until it is completed and then set up to post in "real time" under a different blog, as an "art piece". I pla on hyping it on some of the more credulous paranormal enthusiast forums and message boards and see if maybe a few people will be along for the ride. Orson Welles pulled it off- and he was fat.

No no no no no no no

It snowed again. After hitting the 70s and seeing the very last of the monster piles from the blizzard melt away Iowa has reminded us that we are unwelcome. The sooner we can flee back east the better!

Perhaps this is just another sign that I am an old grouch in a young-ish man's body but I hate snow. I see snowmans and I want to punch their heads. I see snow angels and I think "I hope whoever made that got snow in their undershorts."


Snow does nothing for me. I think the last time I enjoyed snow was when I was twelve or so. Then I realized snow was dirty, cold, and useless. It's dangerous on the roads. If you want to throw things at your friends- there are rocks. If you want to build a fort, get some wood, or go to a beach and make a castle. If you want to sculpt- get a real job, or failing that, some clay.

There is nothing snow does for you that other, more pleasant things don't already do better.

Also, these new bands today don't handle a candle to blah blah blah, get off my lawn you dirty kids, and my aching back is killing me.

Names for my Wife

It's rare that one uses another person's actual name when they are in a close relationship. It's strange, but generally true. At work I'm likely to call someone Laura or Jon or whatever. But my best friends I call, buddy or man, or dude. It seems excessively formal to call someone by their real name when you've stayed up all night with them playing Mario Kart or hunted for crawdads in a river together. It's even more so with your spouse, I think.

I almost never say the word Christy unless I'm upset. Usually it's the old standbys, baby, honey, etc. I do however have some unique ones to share with you.

a) Socks
I frequently refer to my wife as this particular piece of apparel. Socks are great and there are few clothing related pleasures greater than putting on clean socks, or warm socks when you're very cold, or thick padded socks before going on a long walk etc. Socks are great. My wife is great. It seemed an easy leap to begin calling her socks.

b) Dumple
I didn't coin this term, it's actually something Strongbad came up with as a sports mascot. It just rolls off the tongue so wonderfully and is affectionate, diminutive and just a little aggressively playful. All of these things describe my wife.Also it vaguely elicits the word "dummy" so I can say it when I'm upset without regretting it later but still allow those immediate impulses to lash out a method of escaping.

c) Princess Takesforeverella
This is what I call my wife when, well, it's pretty self explanatory. It is my firm belief that our desire to get ready for something quickly is always in inverse proportion. This is what I call her when she is holding us up. Lazy bum is hers for when the roles are reversed.

d) Squishmitten
I have no idea. It just came out. She responded to it. It stuck

e) Whatever the last noun of the previous sentence was.
This is why our conversations are always very juvenile sounding to outsider. "Do you want green beans?" "YOU are a green bean." It's nice to have your work done for you.

So what are your pet names?

Clarification

The current line of posts are a short story writing project that I am using the distribution method of blogging as a personal motivator to finish the story. The intended final format of this story is to be split into more digestible and realistically paced blog posts on  new blog. The blog will be programmed to release a post at the appropriate time and day for the story. The blog will then be advertised on the internet among forums where people might be credulous of these events and also on forums for amateur writers. The finished form will then remain, never further updated as sort of an "art piece" blog/short story. Comments/critiques are welcome on the content, but not needed on the format as I understand already that the timing and pace of the posts HERE are not ideal for the story.

Thank you.

Confusion and Despair

I have made some further investigations into the contents of the box. The journal entry is very amazing and somewhat exciting, but I haven't finished reading it or begun to understand it so I will hold off on sharing it with you for now. I'm getting ahead of myself. Let me be organized. I will list the contents of the box and described roughly the order and condition they were in. Then I will tell my extremely odd experience at work on Friday. (I feel however that I ma just stalling from telling you what I came here to tell you, the events of early Saturday morning. Yes I am sure that I am stalling but I don't care. I must work up to that.)

1) The Shoebox. It is dusty and battered and bears no logo or manufacturer information. It is gray with a red lid. It measures roughly 18"x8"x6" I don't think it is really a shoebox but that was my first thought upon seeing it and it has stuck with me

2) Upon removing the lid the first thing in the box are a few loose-leaf papers. Their contents have been painstakingly reproduced for you already. The details even of the error message have been copied exactly for I feel even they may have some arcane significance

3) Under these a stapled set of papers. They are hold by two staples on the left hand side. These are the scanned documents which appear to be someone's journal, well part of it anyway. Hereon I will call them the journal and we will visit them later.

4)Next under this are some as far as I can tell unordered and random envelopes. I have opened none of them. There are three standard white letter size, one of the smaller international letter sized with the red and blue hashing on its perimeter, and two manila large envelopes, one the kind with a brad serving as a clasp- it is stuffed full of something- and one that appears to be a bubble mailer, it is larger than a standard letter opener but not as large that the overstuffed one. the overstuffed one seems to be the right size for mailing 8 1/2 x 11 papers without folding them.

5) A green disc, unexpectedly heavy with scrimshaw detailing all over

6) A yellowed page, bound and rolled like a scroll. I have untied it and looked at its markings. It is covered with sigils and glyphs. I have no real education in pictographic writing but I don't think they are Egyptian hieroglyphs. More on this.

7) A dark brown viscous stain on the very bottom of the shoe box. I don't know what this is, but I felt it bore mention since it has an odor I cannot describe. It is not bad, like the stain on the letter, but heady, redolent with spice and smoke.

I have returned all but 2) and 6) to the box and placed it back in the crawlspace upstairs. 2) rests next to my keyboard for now, from when I was transcribing. 6) I intended to take to work to scan.

I drove to work at 7:30 that morning, intending to get there a little earlier and scan the scroll before I began my daily tasks. I scanned my ID badge at the side entrance and the reassuring beep let me know the doors were unlocked but I could not open them. I found this odd- but suspected nothing strange yet. It has happened before. I jogged around to the front entrance, which I usually avoid so Id don't have to exchange trite pleasantries with the security guards but I found all 4 massive doors locked also. This was very strange. They don't require a scan to open and are only locked on Christmas Day. I banged on the glass hoping the guard would hear from their little side room that looks out into the narthex. I peered into the glass and could see that no one was in the guard room

This made no sense. If this hassle continued I was going to be late. I banged some more on the glass. I looked out behind me and saw there were cars in the parking lot- both in the visitor's and the employee's. Inside through the two great rows of double glass (I work for a window and door manufacturer- they like to show off their glass at the corporate office) and could see no one inside.

Then I noticed faintly a woman. I waved but got no response. She just stared. With a start I realized I wasn't seeing someone inside it was a reflection. I jumped and looked around but no one was by me at all. I turned to look at the glass again, and there she was faint, but plain as day. As I moved my head around to view from different angles I began to feel like I was seeing a sort of reflection of a reflection. It was as if she was in the glass and was reflecting off of the air on either side of the glass.

I know this is a weak description but it's the only thing that made sense at the time. It was very unnerving and I left immediately. From the car I phoned in to work, but got only voicemail from my boss and my boss's boss.

At around noon my boss called to ask if I was okay. I said I left her a message and since I couldn't get in assumed the building was closed. She said we weren't closed and that this would have to count as an incident because there was no message and I didn't call her cell phone. I should have tried her cell phone. I said that was fine I was feeling sick anyway and wanted to stay home. She told me she was very surprised I was no call/ no show since that has never happened before and asked me again if I was okay.

I said other than feeling sick I was fine and I'd try to make it in on Saturday to make up for the missed day. She agreed that I could work off the incident and still get my 40 hours by pulling a weekend day. Someone from the weekend rotation had just told her she wouldn't be coming in because of a family emergency so it worked out.

Upon returning home I attempted to photograph the scroll since I wasn't able to scan it. The yellowish tint seemed to be the exact shade to prevent photographic reproduction- like those scripts that get sent in on special paper, unsolicited, by authors so paranoid their ideas will be stolen- rather than simple thrown away.

I got frustrated after the 3rd attempt, and decided that I would just copy a few onto white paper and photograph those. My wife came and asked me what was going on and I snapped a quick picture of her to catch her making a surprised face. The picture came out grainy and blurry- way below the normal quality of the camera. I explained that work was canceled (a lie, I know, but a better choice it seemed) and I deleted the unusable image files.

I copied the first rune onto a notebook. After I finished I noticed one of my hairs had fell onto the page. this happens all the time. I tell my wife it's a sign I'm going bald and getting horribly old, but she just laughs at my ridiculousness. I wiped it off and I CUT MYSELF on the rune!

I know what you're thinking- "you mean you got a paper cut?". No, it was not a paper cut. As my finger moved past the fresh ink I felt a hard, razor thin edge and it sliced my index finger. It bled profusely and I had to put a band aid on it. I slammed the notebook closed and did not attempt to copy any other glyphs. So disturbed by the supernatural events of the day I decided to leave the contents of the shoebox alone and distract myself with frivolity. I rolled the scroll back up and put it on the living room bookshelf.

I played video games for the rest of the day and went to bed early so I could get up in time for work on Saturday. I suppose I cannot stall any longer.

My friends I fear I have opened Pandora's Box, only to find the demons inside have consumed Hope and there is no salvation ushered in alongside the suffering. I will attempt to recap the events of that night.

It was early Saturday morning I awoke suddenly to silence and darkness. I paused for a moment trying to get my bearings. I felt as if something had startled me awake but I held in my sleep-addled mind no faint memory of a noise or a jostle to my body. I waited for three heartbeats then sat upright.

It was then that the fear gripped me. It came on suddenly and so intensely that a cry of startle died unheard in my lungs. I began to sweat. The night seemed to gain substance as if I was in a cloud of densely humid gloom.

I called out for my wife but she did not awake. I heard only her heavy labored sleep breathing. My room is lightless- heavy blackout curtains over the one window prevent any stray streetlight or starlight from infiltrating my bed-chamber and I allow no digital clocks or charging cell phones. Normally I find utter darkness relaxing and comforting- a perfect sleep habit- but tonight I was desperate, thirsty even, for light.

I summoned the will to reach for the floor lamb beside my bed. Even in utter darkness I have no trouble finding it's cord. My wife and I read in bed every night, and I turn out the light without looking. Muscle memory tells me to move just so- and there it is! That comforting cord with the plastic switch in. Never has a simple length of wire and plastic felt so comforting. I try to apply pressure to the switch and my body betrays me.

An agonizing cramp leaves my right hand a useless claw, tense and unrelenting. I cannot decide to massage it with my left hand or try to turn on the light instead. The pain and the pressing fear have left me dumb, childlike, sitting useless and terrified in the bed, no danger present but certain of my doom nonetheless.

After a moment of this pathetic waffling the pain overrode my fear and I tried to work the renegade hand muscles back into submission.

I cannot say for how long I sat like that, hunched in pain, scared of the dark. Minutes? It felt like hours. Slowly the pain in my hand subsided, and the strange alien fear kept pace with the pain and eventually I was in full control of my mental and physical facilities.

I no longer had an urge to throw on the light. Reason had set in. It's only dark, not dangerous. The stupid human fixation on needing to see to feel safe seemed a joke now. The room doesn't know if it's bright as day or pitch black. That doesn't change that it's filled with harmless things like clothes and books and dogs and cats and people. Sudden light would serve only to annoy my wife and burn my eyes.

I was still sweating, but my breathing was under control again. I had just made up my mind to sleep again when

Oh

My

God

Under

The

Door

A

Strange

Green

Light

Suddenly

Shone

I could feel the immediate effects of a second dose of adrenaline coursing through the twists and folds of my brain. This was something real, measuring, an infinitely more terrifying than being awake against my will and unable to see. such mundane fears seemed adorable in comparison.

then, as suddenly as it appeared the light vanished.  Why is someone in my kitchen? My mind was racing. I fumbled around in the darkness for the expandable baton I keep on my bookshelf. I was angry, furious even to be terrorized in my own home. I would show this burglar the real dangers that lurk in the night: me.

I took a moment to mentally channel my fear in hatred and moved slowly form my bed to the door and slowly into the kitchen.

Nothing.

Living room. More nothing. I turned on the kitchen light, ready to jump at any would-be intruder. I was relieved but worried that no one was there. Then, from the laundry room again appeared a glow. I headed that way. I could tell it wasn't coming from anything in the laundry room, but rather from the stairs leading up to the second floor. I had him trapped now.  He must not have heard me yet or noticed when I turned on the kitchen light.

He must have mistakenly assumed the valuables would be upstairs. I'm sure he'd be disappointed to find only an old unused computer and some half finished sewing and modeling projects. In the closest there were also some marginally valuable musical instruments, but he would have been better off staying downstairs and taking my TV. More the better.

I crept up the stairs. The light went out. When I reached the top of the stairs I threw on the light, baton at the ready. The upstairs was as empty as t ever was, just me alone with my confusion. I searched thoroughly but quickly. There were only two rooms and a closet. Well the closet does connect with the crawlspace where the strange shoebox was found.

I couldn't bring myself to search that portion however. Confident that my house was safe from intruders I pushed down my fears of that foreboding crawlspace and went for the stairs. Just as I took my first step down a flash of light appeared. Brief, almost so brief that I could believe it was all in my head. But it wasn't.

And it came from the crawlspace.

This is the kind of thing that just encourages me not to clean upstairs. (Part 1, maybe?)

<The following post contains the transcribed contents of papers I found in a shoebox while cleaning the crawlspace upstairs. I have tried to make it as clear as possible which commentary is mine (by italicizing and bracketing my words) so you can differentiate me describing the material, and the various makers and handwritten notes that appear on the material. None of the handwritten notes indicate their authors and the handwriting is different in several places indicating multiple writers.

 I have no idea who they belong to- I must assume that the previous owner was also unaware of them, as he was a Pella local and a music pastor at the smallest church here in town. It seems extremely unlikely that he would have contact with anyone in England, or Egypt. I am currently attempting to contact him to get some information on the previous owner, who sold the house in 2003.>

Dec 12, 2002 0014GMT

From: theodorus.justin.k@oxford.edu

To: theodorus.edward.m@oxford.edu

Subject: This is getting old

Dad,

Got another packet from XXXX in Cairo. Unlike the previous two this one simply contained some assorted loose-leaf papers. I have scanned and included them for you. I am no longer convinced that this is an elaborate hoax. Instead I believe this is the work of a madman who has somehow found out about your research and believes he is providing some great insight to your studies on the ancient glyphs of various cultures.

I have forwarded the first two packets containing the (alleged) Aboriginal Death mask and the (alleged, again) dust from the ancient Mesoamerican tomb structure. These sorts of things are, of course not my area of expertise. The £7.37 was either wasted insuring a paper-mâché mask and some dirt or spend woefully underinsuring some rather valuable artifacts. I don't not care either way, and I grow tired of this distraction from my botanical research.

I am tired of receiving these packages. Please inform your friend that if he wishes to continue "helping" you in your research he should direct packages to you. Any future packages from XXXX in Cairo will be marked return to sender and refused by me.

I will see you and mum at Christmas as usual. Perhaps then you will be able to say "Gotcha" and reveal that you are XXXX in Cairo- in which case I demand to know how you pulled off such a clever mail fraud- as I have verified twice with the parcel service that the package did in fact originate in Cairo. Ellen sends her love, etc. etc.

-Justin

Dec. 12th 2002 0015 GMT

Delivery to the following recipient failed permanently:

theodorus.edward.m@oxford.edu

Technical details of permanent failure:
The email account that you tried to reach does not exist. Please try double-checking the recipient's email address for typos or unnecessary spaces.
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Date: 12 Feb 2002
Message-ID: <AANLkTi=S7H3S3d2Pb-M09C5q=zVNFG5TVbQQwfw=1HZG@mail.oxford.edu>
Subject: This is getting old
From: Justin Korgath Theodorus < theodorus.justin.k@oxford.edu >
To: Edward Malefector Theodorus < theodorus.edward.m@oxford.edu >
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-

<There is a large discoloration at the end of this piece of paper, similar to the effect of spilling water on paper then using a hair dryer to dry the page back out. The mark however smells terrible, an odor I cannot fully describe but it haunts me, literally haunts me when I lie awake at night. I cannot imagine the chemical or biological substance this paper touched to create such a stench.>

Dec 13, 2002 1257GMT

From: theodorus.justin.k@oxford.edu

To: Ed.Theo@gmail.com

Subject: Re: This is getting old

Dad,

Is there something wrong with your university account? I know you've been in the bush in the past few months but your email should still get forwarded to your remote laptop, right? Let me know when you get this I got another damn package from XXXX in Cairo that I want to discuss with you.

-Justin

<There are eight tiny holes through the paper here arranged thusly: ҉>

Dec 13, 2010 1258GMT

From: Ed.Theo@gmail.com

To:  theodorus.justin.k@oxford.edu

Subject: Out Of Office

Greetings,

This is an automated notification that I am currently in the field and may not have access to my email. I will attempt to respond to your email as soon as I am able.

-Ed

Ne timeas ignotis, pavor ignorantia <There is a quick handwritten scrawl after the e-mail signature:>

"Pretentious bastard"

<Handwritten note at end of page, red ink, messy block printing, different hand than the two word epithet above:>

 "Here there appear 6 lines of uninteligible [sic] characters and glyphs, the likes of which I have never seen appear in any font or typeface. When I attempted to cut and paste them into a Word document it displayed only three pound signs and one single character similar to an ampersand but... angrier, is the only way I can describe it. I will attempt to draw it here:

###(a symbol I am unable to reproduce, but the above description is... accurate. there are three underlines beneath the final symbol, and they grow progressively darker and have deeper indentation as if the pen was pressed harder and harder against the paper.)

<End of handwritten note>

<This next portion appears to be, although I cannot be certain, the "scanned loose-leaf papers" referenced in the first email. Once I scan them myself, or transcribe them- I'm a little frightened to bring them to work to use the scanner there!- I will post their contents. If you have any knowledge of the events mentioned here please contact me, I will gladly turn over all the contents of this mysterious shoebox. Frankly it makes me uneasy just looking at its ragged dusty frame. >

A Level of Momentum that is Unlikely to Continue

Here I sit, blogging from work. It is time for my morning break, which is a moment to grab the second cup of coffee and bemoan the fact that by and large, almost none of the work day is completed and almost all of it lays before me. This is not the best time of the day to interact with me.

Sudden segue:

Yesterday my wife and I came to what would be to some, an unorthodox arrangement. In exchange for my assuming 100% of the cat litter duties (a dreaded task which has caused more marital conflict for us than money, family, and use of our single car COMBINED) my wife has offered to put forth no less than 1 hour a day leveling my Paladin alt in World of Warcraft.We are both confident that we have come out ahead in this agreement, which is the definition of a great deal.

Hopefully upon arriving at home I won't find poor Understand level 64 Tauren Paladin face down in a ditch, on fire, with swarms of demons laughing at his plight, (which is what happened last night when I played him while being distracted by a rather hilarious YouTube video.)

This won't be a blog about how interesting my cats are, I promise...

I am cautiously committing to blogging. I have some major hurdles to overcome, to make this a worthwhile project.

1) I don't actually want to do this.

2) Nothing interesting happens to me.

Hopefully I can overcome these hurdles. This blog is intended to address both of those obstacles. First, by forcing myself to write consistently on a small scale I hope that it will improve my large scale writing and motivate me to write more frequently. I am already aware that I thrive on routine so hopefully, over time, I will come to desire blogging and feel remorse when shirking it.

In regards to my second concern, I hope that by documenting my days I will uncover threads of interest and identify activities that lead to worthwhile and interesting posts and pursue them with renewed vigor. I "get" that interesting things don't happen to you, you must go and do interesting things. Perhaps making daily events more concrete and using this blog as an auxiliary external memory, since my hardwired one is so atrocious I will discover, to my glee, that interesting things do, on occasion, happen to me.

Also we have a new camera and I want to post funny pictures of my pets. So here they come. Our pets all get full names, influenced by aspects of their personality or appearance. We have a dog too- but she deserves a post all her own. 

Here is one of our first cat, in the act of writhing around on the floor. I tried to catch her mid-writhe but it was always blurry.

Guinivere Failcat Pooftail

Next up is the newest cat, a stray that adopted my wife. She was pretty disgusting at first which influenced her last name.

Octavia Watermelon Grosscat

Our perpetual kitten (he's a runt and refuses to get any bigger! <3) is next. He is bigger than these next two pictures indicate because he was totally uncooperative about having his picture taken today. He's still way smaller than a normal adult cat though- he's only about 8 pounds! Here are my two favorites of him as a "teenager".

Totem Tinyman Tailerson

Not Shown: A tiny bug around the corner about to be obliterated

Tinyman is of course pronounced as if it is a Jewish last name.