An Oblivion Evening

Well, it was a so-so day today at the office.  There were a few too many meetings and I burned out about mid-way through the day.  Somethings were accomplished, some were not and tomorrow we get to go through the whole dance again! 

I've spent a quiet evening here tonight, mostly watching Oblivion (Tom Cruise, Olga Kurylenko) from the DVR, which I captured off of FX on the DVR.  It's an entertaining movie - it's basically "only Tom Cruise can save the world from Tom Cruise", which cracks me up to no end.  I am a little tired tonight since I didn't sleep long enough last night and had a slow and choppy start to the morning.

On the plus side I was able to sleep a solid six hours and sleep on my side for the first time in just a little over three weeks.  The sprain under my ribs has mostly healed and there is only a bit of residual discomfort.  It took about as long as such things to take to heal and I should be back to 100% by the end of the week.  I think I made it through the entire day today without taking an Ibuprofen, though I will probably take one tonight just to make sure I sleep comfortably.

I finally picked a window for my vacation - November 12th through the 18th.  I will make the travel arrangements tomorrow and see what it all shapes up as.  I am planning on going to South Dakota for five or six days - I wanted to hold the last weekend in reserve so I can get back to California and enjoy a bit of staycation.  So, on that note, I am going to wrap it up and curl up with a book.

A Nap and Minimalist Decor

I completely ran out of gas today at about 3:30. I am sure my body is recovering from the long distance drive. It is about 1600 miles, so it was a pair of 800 mile days, each taking 12 hours of pure driving time, plus, usually, an additional two hours of stopping for gas and meals.  That is a long time to be sitting in essentially the same position. I got home on Saturday night, rested up on Sunday, then headed off to work yesterday and today, so I reckon that I am still catching up.  I napped for about 3 hours today.

I'm going to work virtually tomorrow since I've got six different meetings and I suspect I am also going to need to take a nap tomorrow as well. That should give me the opportunity to make some progress against the headwinds I am running into on assorted tasks and projects.

I did observe/learn something while I was in South Dakota. I spent the time at the ranch with is decorated in, well, ranch style. My style is more minimalist here at the apartment in California (definitely influenced by TR). Even as minimalist in style as it is, I'm going to take steps in the coming weeks to become, yet again, more minimalist. I have a couple of pieces of furniture and some possessions that I can get rid of since I don't really use them. The time in South Dakota just emphasized my love of the minimalist style of décor.

Thirty Three Days

That was a fast passing 33 days. I'm back California. It feels very good.  Today was a balmy 50 degrees with rain. Nice.

It is all relative of course.  While I was in SD the temp ran a pretty constant range between 0 and 20 degrees. I have all the right clothes, so I was never too cold - but I was constantly cold and when ever you went anywhere you had to take the weather into consideration.  So, I compensated and I did all right.

The drive back was two full days but, other then running out of gas in Nebraska because my gas gauge was inaccurate, an uneventful trip.  I'm tired now and spent most of today resting and relaxing. I am having an inner debate concerning whether or not I should take another day off. I probably won't.

My mothers surgery went fine and she is well into her recovery. Since that was the purpose of the trip, it's a good deal.

Tonight, my plan is simple. Rest. Relax. Take a hot bath. Sleep.  Plenty of sleep.

The Night Before I Travel

Today was my last day at work for this week.  Starting tomorrow I am heading out cross-country for a drive back to SD.  The Jeep is packed except for the handful of high value items that I will carry out tomorrow morning. There wasn't enough time to do everything at work, so I am leaving with some stuff undone, but I am anticipating that I will be able to get some work done as soon as I arrive back in South Dakota.

I should get them some time Wednesday night, get a good night sleep, then I am going to do a quick turnaround and take my mom up to the orthopedic surgery center in Sioux Falls for shoulder surgery on Friday. We'll end up staying there for two days and then head back to Winner. For there I'll camp out at the ranch and work virtually.  I am looking forward to it, though I am sure I am going to miss California, especially the weather!

So, the plan tonight is to simply unwind and then start the trip tomorrow.  It is about fifteen hundred miles so it will take somewhere between twenty and twenty four hours of road time to get there.  I've made the trip a dozen times or more over the years so it should be pretty routine.  The advantage of car travel is that you're able to carry enough stuff that, in the event it is not normal you'll have enough tools and equipment to deal with anything that might arise.

So, wish me luck!  I will probably have more of an opportunity to write while I am in South Dakota with those nice quiet evenings at the ranch.

A Child of the Long Summer Twilight

Today was the first day back to the office after my vacation. I kept having to field the question “how was your vacation”? The question itself left me kind of ambivalent. A trip to South Dakota is time off from work but it isn’t what I would consider to be a vacation. To me a vacation is going someplace very nice and spending a large amount of time doing nothing or doing only those things you want to do. A trip to South Dakota is, well, a bit different.

When I go back to South Dakota the day begins, usually, with an early morning departure – around 6 AM or 7 AM. There are no direct flights into South Dakota from California so my choice is to go, generally, either through Denver Colorado or through Salt Lake City Utah. Inevitably, there is a layover at either airport of anywhere from an hour to four hours before the connecting flight into Rapid City South Dakota.

Once I am in Rapid City I either rent a car, or have someone pick me up, or borrow a car and drive about three hours to the ranch, or now, to Winner South Dakota. Depending on the length of that layover, and the weather, it can be either one very long day or two days to get home. The same rhythm applies on the return trip.

Then, I find myself in the bosom of my family. Now, make no mistake, I love them all dearly but… there is always a but… family can always be challenging. There is always some drama to navigate. There is always some ongoing crisis within which I can either intervene or avoid. For me it is an extraordinary event to go there. For them it is me arriving in the midst of their ordinary days. I have stepped out of my ordinary days, but they have not stepped out of theirs.

Adding to the mixture warring siblings, aging parents, a sick nephew, and the usual internal family politics and you have a great visit but not a vacation. This one was no exception. They’re much more working vacations. But, in spite of that, I enjoyed the trip. I love my family, all their faults included, just as they love me with all my faults included. And it is always great to set foot in the land that gave me birth both physically and psychologically.

I am a child of the Great Plains. I am a child of an endless horizon. I am a child of a long summer twilight. The journey from that place to this place marks the course of my life. That place contains within it numerous essential landmarks and milestones, memories tied to the land of my birth. It’s a great journey whenever I go home because many of those memories are flat out wonderful. So, at the end of the day, I am glad I am a child of that long summer twilight.

Somewhere Normal

Somewhere along the line my personal blog became my work venting blog. I guess that is bound to happen sometimes. With the recent decisions at work to transfer us out from underneath the evil director I’m hoping to return to some semblance of order in the work world. We seem to be moving in that direction, though we have a lot of territory to cover. For several years what I would call the project control mechanism was broken.

Each of the feudal baronies in our kingdom was once again pursuing their own goals and their own systems to attain those goals. We found that in several cases the company is at varying degrees of implementation of duplicate systems. I suspect it will take us a couple of years to get them under control.

The first step, the first challenge facing our new management is going to be to put into place a process to control the creation of technical projects. Once they have control of the faucet they can then control the flow. It’s going to be fun.

I’m getting ready for vacation at work right now. I’m trying to knock off the things that have to be done in the intervening week. I made good progress in that direction today and I expect to make a little more progress tomorrow. I should be in good condition when I come home tomorrow night. Then it’s just a question of easing into the vacation.

I am looking forward to going back to South Dakota, I’m looking forward to visiting family, I’m looking forward to seeing the old country and I’m looking forward to moving outside of the world I’ve been moving in. One of the great things about travel of any sort is that it reminds you that there’s an entire world out there that you are part of. That is a wonderful feeling.

I think I’m going to keep this entry simple tonight. I’m in a good mood, I have lots of work to do, but I’m not feeling that crushing stress that came from the unpredictability of the evil director. I’ve got a lot in front of me but like anything it can be divided and conquered with a little bit of work and a little bit of imagination.

 

I went to bed last night with the intention of reading some more of the serpent of Venice but I only managed to knock off a couple of pages. Tonight I’m hoping to do a little bit more than a couple of pages. I love a good book and I count myself a great Christopher Moore fan.

 

 

A Quick Step of a Week

Okay, it is a quiet Friday evening and, after dishes and taking the trash out, I am kicked back and watching an episode of Ancient Aliens, one of my guilty pleasures.  Let me catch you up real quick on the things that have been going on.  On the personal side of the house TR is on her journey yet, so I am missing her and enjoying each chance to talk when it occurs.  The folks are doing well in the assisted living community in Winner, SD.  Siblings are doing okay.  Most of my friends are continuing their journey there, so all is pretty much status quo.  At work we rolled out phase one of the project I am working on and we got some much needed direction in terms of future developments in the project and the O&M support model.  The launch was amusing but mostly smooth.  Now, we start work on the second phase this coming week.  In short, a brisk and busy week without a lot of opportunities to write - most of the free time I had went to work, to the process of getting the project launched.  I am looking forward to a solid night of sleep tonight without having to worry about the work project - largely because no one should be working over the weekend.  Tomorrow, I am planning on making it a long, slow and easy day.

It's Already Thursday

It;s already Wednesday.  Two more days and then I start my Thanksgiving vacation.  I am looking forward to it. I'll be going to SD for the week to spend the holiday with family.  I hope the weather is good!  Fall in SD is usually not too bad, but they've already had one brutal snow storm - I hope it is a clean trip.

Work has been mostly busy but not productive.  We're way understaffed right now due to travel and vacations, so the first part of the week, the last three days, for me, have been nothing but putting fires out. I am hoping I'll be able to get a few tasks done tomorrow and Friday, but, honestly, my hopes are not high. This is a week or fire fighting, then off for a week and then, well, I guess I get to start all over when I come back.

A Winters Day

It was a very quiet day here at the ranch. This was mostly due to the fact that we're snowed in. I am supposed to head back to California on Saturday, so tomorrow will, most likely, be the the make or break day, at least for a Saturday departure.  I did build Sunday into my schedule as a slip day and I may have to use it. Fortunately I have the vacation available if I need to spill.  With weather, especially South Dakota weather, unpredictable is the name of the game.

So, most of the day was spent in lazy pursuits, with an interval for napping, and then another spate of lazy pursuits.  Tonight, I am planning on going to bed after Archer's season finale and reading my way deeply into "The Lies of Locke Lamorra". I have enjoyed the visit, but I am anxious to get back to my own bed, in my own apartment.  There is always something about curling up in your own bed at the end of a long vacation that makes it all worth while.  I wish I'd hit better weather this trip, I would have liked to have gotten out and done some more visiting.  I brought my camera with me and other then the handful of pictures I've shared, I really haven't used it much at all.  There are limits of what you can take in a snow storm without freezing your camera.

The whole vacation has been an exercise in zen releasing. I am in an interesting position. My nephew has his illness, about which I can do nothing except offer my best advice in a very difficult circumstance.  There is a larger lesson there about the importance of building relationships and perhaps I will reflect upon that later, but it will be a difficult thing to do without putting on my judgement pants, which I always find uncomfortable.  Then, there are the additional issues associated to my aging parents, about which I can do next to nothing except offer my best advice.

I could relocate to help them, but they are not yet at that point where it is necessary. They enjoy my company of course, but largely as a visit, and as a visit it must have an end. Though they are both getting older and frailer, with all of the issue associated with aging, they still remain capable of making their own decisions.  Whether or not they make good decisions is one of those things that would, again, require me to put on my judgement pants.  Oh, how easy life would be if we could just make all the decisions for all the other people.  But, it doesn't work that way.  As John-Rogers says, we must allow other people the dignity of their own journey.  That is not always an easy thing.

The Ranch In Winter

The storm continues, but it is supposed to break today and, with my fingers crossed, I am going to make it out on Saturday for the journey back to my beloved California. Meanwhile, I just thought I would share a few pictures for the heart of the storm.

The Ranch In Winter

Settled in for a Winter Storm

I seem to be in the rhythm of posting every other day while on vacation.

Yesterday was spent cleaning the den, a daunting task. In my parents home the den is the most convenient room off the living room - as such, over time, it turned into the general "catch everything temporarily" room, except that temporarily turned out to be, as near as I could tell by the dates on envelopes, about six years. 

It actually wasn't that bad - it was a jumble of stuff and a lot of half-filled boxes that had to be gone through.  There is still another two or three hours in there, but it is shuffling and organizing hours.  Figure two hours there and another hour to sweep through the living room and that will make a big difference.  I've already made a big difference.

Today however was pretty much a day of rest.  As you can see from the pictures, snow is the landscape of the day.  We are in the middle of a major winter storm that has half the state shut down and the other half creeping through the ice.  It is not really a bad storm in this part of the state, it is cold, heavy, wet snow - but the wind is not to bad.

I took a nice long nap mid-afternoon and right now I am sitting in front of the TV watching "The Outlaw Josey Wales" with Bill, waiting for the lasagna to finish up in the oven.  Other than the aforementioned cleaning, I don't really have anything special planned tonight.  When you are in the grip of a winter storm here in South Dakota, you just kind of settle in and wait for it to pass.

Vacation - Quiet Days in South Dakota

I am enjoying the quiet days here in South Dakota.  Today was a particularly easy going one, especially it involved a late afternoon two hour nap.  That was a nice treat. So, outside of napping it has been a series of easy days here at the ranch, visiting with Mom, Bill, and Tom. 

I was teasing them the other day that, between the three of them, they have the health of a whole person.  In the case of Mom and Bill, it is the effect of their age. In the case of Tom it is a result of his illness, which has him up and down and up and down.

Each day is easy though and I have been gradually making a dent in their junk.  I didn't do much today, but it is a slow and steady challenge. Tomorrow, I am going to hit the Bedroom Number 2 hard, and then from there pivot and attack the Den.  The Den is actually far more disorganized them it is junky. 

I think, because the den is easy access off the living room it is very convenient to just open the door and temporarily drop things in - consequently, it is more of a space occupying pile of stuff, as opposed the prepackaged density of Bedroom Number 2.

Tonight, I am currently sitting here writing this entry and watching Lawrence of Arabia on TMC.  That is one of my favorite movies.  I've seen it several times on the big screen and I try to catch it each time it comes out.  It is an amazing piece of film in so many ways, each time I see it, I see something in it that I haven't seen before.  Within the movie the desert itself is an astounding character.

I am of course concerned about the various health issues, but there is a bright spot in the midst of it all - with Mom and Bill, their principle challenge remains age and the effects of age, as well as their assorted chronic conditions. Tom is far more acutely ill and how he manages his illness, if he can, is going to effect his morbidity. The prognosis for him, absent some fierce discipline, is going to be very rough.

It has been very nice to be quiet, to move easily through the day without any special schedule, free of the mad calendar of the work day, and in a state that I would call about 95% off the grid. The world definitely moves at a different pace here and that is very enjoyable.  Given the hectic nature of this particular trip, I am glad I took the full two weeks, even though I suspect I am going to pay for it when I get back to work - it is always so nice just to step out of that world and into this one.

And, in lieu of that, I hope you're having a good day, whoever you are and wherever you are.

Vacation - Day Six, Seven, and Eight - South Dakota

Let's see if I can provide a quick summary of the intervening days.  Tuesday was a very long travel day.  My alarm clock went off at 4:00 AM, I splashed through the shower, then called a cab for the ride to the airport. A smooth pass through TSA, a bit of a wait in the departure lounge, then a Delta flight to Salt Lake City.  A quick turn around in Salt Lake City - a scant thirty minutes to change from one plane to another.  Fortunately, it was only from the D terminal to the E terminal, so I made it. I was the last one on the plane and shortly after I boarded, the door closed and off we went.  All in all it was a smooth pair of flights though and I landed on schedule.

Once in Rapid City, I headed over to Walmart to pick up a pair of shoes and a pair of socks, then drove on over to Regional Hospital to pick Tom up. There was bit of a wait at the hospital while they cleared him. Then, we began the long days dance trying to get his medications approved (he is indigent) and issued.  We ultimately gave it up and were told to come back tomorrow. I did not feel like spending the money for hotel rooms, so we drove across the country to the ranch, got in, visited with mom and Bill, then created a nest to go to sleep.

We were up in the morning and returned to Rapid City.  We worked the phone and were able to make sure that one access point was temporarily closed, so we took another route.  After a few more hours of waiting and a bit of dance, he was able to get seven days worth of medication and he was directed to go to IHS on his home agency (which he has needed to do all along, but he has resisted - oh, the struggles our ego puts us through).  From there, another drive across the country and we arrived at the ranch at almost the exact same time we arrived before.  Two days gone in a very long blinking of the eye.

So, last night, I managed to get a solid night sleep.  I woke this morning and was in the bathroom washing up and I heard Bill on the phone.  However, by the time I got out, he was gone - he'd had a doctors appointment that he thought was this afternoon, but it turned out that it was during the morning, so he dashed off to see the doctor.  Then, after the appointment was over, he has stopped for gas and ran into an old friend, one of the other local ranchers, and they ended up spending two hours visiting and drinking coffee.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, I spent most of the day cleaning up what I will call Spare Bedroom Number One.  It took a while, I ended up throwing away two bags of incidental junk, then folding a lot of sheets and spreads and putting them away in the proper drawers.  Once all the straightening and folding was done, most all the stuff fit into the appointed places.

We then made a quick run into Mission to pick up some groceries, so it was a pleasant drive across the country side and we saw the tribes buffalo herd grazing off in the distance. It is a dry spring here, which is not a good portent for the summer to come. It is shaping up to look like a drought.  The grass is dry, pale green, and short.

I got back to the ranch and cooked up dinner for the folks - breaded home-style pork chops, fresh cut green beans and scalloped potatoes.  It was a tasty treat for dinner and was well received.  I am just now settling into the ranch and because of the two full days of travel at the beginning of the trip, I am actually pretty tired.  This is sort of a working vacation, as I intend to spend several hours each day (maybe more) cleaning and straightening   We will see how it goes.

As the evening settled in, I was sitting out on the porch with my mom, and we watched a flock of wild turkeys settle into the trees below the house, roosting for the night. It was a cool sight and not something that I see all the time in California, that's for sure. A little later, I was out in the front yard and I could hear coyotes howling in the distance.  It was also very cool.

So, at the end of the day I am waiting to watch an episode of Archer, then I am going to curl up and read myself to sleep.  It is nice being ninety percent off the grid, though it is not without a melancholy moment or two.  This is the first trip I have taken home in a long time where I did not close each night out with a conversation with T.R.  That has a melancholy feel to it.

Vacation - Day One - Evening

It was an easy day to start a vacation on. I lingered in bed, then met Tony for breakfast over at Goodies II.  Breakfast inside me, I swung home and spent an hour or so tinkering around, then joined back up with Tony and ran a couple of errands while getting ready for vacation.  I am basically set to go and tomorrow I just need to throw the incidentals into my bag and I am ready to hit the road - or the air, as the case may be.

We had lunch at Pasta Pomodoro at Santana Row and then took a wandering walk through Best Buy, just to see what the newest tech toys were.  From there, I swung back home and spent the afternoon printing off documents for the trip this weekend, called the ranch, did some incidental things around the house and then settled in to watch "Master and Commander" with Russell Crowe and Paul Bettany, an enjoyable movie.  I followed that up with several hours of watching my TomTom update.

Then, I finally heard from my nephew, who was transferred to the hospital in Rapid City, SD.  He is recovering from internal bleeding, as side effect of his illness.  Still, it was good to talk to him and he was going to call the ranch after he talked to me.  A close one, and we can only hope that he learns the lesson about staying on his medication and taking care of himself.

Vacation - The Beginning

Today was my last day at work as my vacation begins.  So, in an attempt to totally decompress, I am going to go completely off the grid, as far as work is concerned.  For the next two weeks I am not going to discuss work here on my blog.  For now, let me just say, it is a clean getaway.

Tony and Ty finished off the last of cleaning Tony's apartment today and then they met me for dinner at Buffalo Wild Wings.  Dinner was a variety of appetizers, which we followed by a walk through Westgate while Tony looked at a new suitcase, which I've currently got sitting here in my living room.  Since he had the last of his personal effects in his car, there wasn't room for it without effecting his sight-lines.

I am going to split my vacation between three places - a few days here at home, the weekend in Anaheim for Wondercon, then 11 days in South Dakota visiting the ranch.  I am looking forward to all aspects of the trip.  A bit of bad news, my nephew has been transferred to the hospital up in Rapid City and though he is still keeping the cone of silence down, he did give permission for his doctor to notify the folks at the ranch.  I will be keeping him close in my prayers - while at the same time I respect the dignity of his journey.

I have the new Blackberry Z10, which I've been playing with for the last two days, so that is going to be part of my learning curve for the period of time when I am on vacation.  I am contemplating taking only the smart phone on vacation as my only electronic device - I don't know if I will be able to successfully do it, because I do what to have my laptop with me on vacation, since that gives me the opportunity to do many things.  I will make that decision when the time comes.  I think I could travel light on the smart phone, but at the same time - I do have all these cool other toys that I love to play with!

The plan tonight is a couple of episodes of Whitney, then curling up with "The Lies of Locke Lamorra", which is very amusing so far.

Helicopter - Spring Creek SD

My sister send this a little earlier today - a fire fighting helicopter filling it's tank from the Spring Creek dam in South Dakota.
Sent via BlackBerry by AT&T

A Saturday with Team Banzai

An enjoyable Saturday.  I left home about 8:30 AM and spent the entire day wandering. It was extremely nice, if a bit on the warm side.  I got home tonight and decided to watch a classic movie that I'd captured on my DVR.  The movie?

"The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai across the 8th Dimension".  Ahhhh, a true classic cult Science Fiction movie.  How can you possibly go wrong with Team Banzai? If you've never seen it - find it, settle in with popcorn and your favorite beverage and enjoy.  I personally have no idea how many times I've scene it over the years. Most important to me, I remember when I saw it the first time.

It was the summer of 1984 at the Winner Drive In, east of Winner SD. A hot summer night, with good company, sitting on the white benches in front of the concession stand, in that timeless time when the world was young.  So, from that summer night to this summer night, I still love Buckaroo Banzai and the Hong Kong Cavaliers.

A Four Minute Update

I have four minutes before I am going to start walking down the street to grab a quick lunch, so I thought I would fire off a quick note.  I’ve made arrangements for my June trip back to South Dakota to visit family over Fathers Day and my mother’s birthday. I’ve made hotel arrangemetns in San Diego (at the Marriott on Coronado Island) for Comic Con weekend (five days, four nights) and I am jazzed about that trip.  I have a podiatrist appointment tomorrow and I am very much looking forward to coming off the IPO boot. I finished Christopher Moore’s Sacre Bleu and learned more about painters then I ever knew before. Next up, for fiction, I am going to read “Mocking Jay” and finish up the Hunger Games trilogy. I am nearly finished with Haruki Murakami’s “The Elephant Vanishes” and when I finish there, I plan on diving deeply into IQ84. The unexpected spiritual journey of 2012 continues. I contemplate many things.

Traveling Thanksgiving

I am in South Dakota for the Thanksgiving Holiday. At this moment, I am sitting on the couch in the living room on the ranch, listening to Hank Williams, sniffing the scent of fresh barley soup prepared by a professional chef and the scent of biscuits in the oven. That simple dinner is about twenty minutes out, so I thought I would pop online and make a quick entry.

I came back to the ranch on Friday the 18th and will, soon enough, be heading back to California. I like visiting here, it is always good to see my parents, my siblings, and any of my other relatives and old friends that I might stumble across - but, honestly, there is only so much to do in South Dakota, and all of it involves lots of driving.

On Monday, I was the parents driver, taking them into Winner (about twenty miles east) for a doctors appointment and errand running, then driving back to Rosebud (about forty miles to the west), and then back home. It was a fairly long day, but everything went pretty smoothly. Then, on Tuesday, I ran back into Winner to pick up the odds and ends for Thanksgiving Dinner.

We're going to have a small one, half a dozen people or so, and we are going to keep it simple and traditional - turkey, mashed potatoes, vegetables, corn bread dressing, and pies, lots and lost of pies. On Tuesday I picked up eight pies from the Winner bakery - two each of apple, cherry, pumpkin, and pecan. That is going to come out to about 1.8 pies per adult! It certainly could have been the all pie thanksgiving. I am sure they will try to foist one on me for the trip back to SD, but pies, in general, simply do not travel well! No matter how careful you are, at the far end, you end up with "the stuff that makes up a pie all mooshed into a container". Trust me, I've tried it.

So, I am spending the days as simply and quietly as I can, napping, reading, visiting, cooking, watching assorted things on television and listening to my folks listen to Hank Williams. And I am thankful, very, very, thankful, for every moment of it, in all it's simplicity and grace. So wherever you are, whoever you are, I hope you're able to find something simple and graceful to be thankful for.

Daily Life: Disney Haunts My Dreams

I had a fitful and dreaming night last night. I am not sure if there was any particular reason, or if it just was where I was. Of the dreams I had one that was particularly strange that I thought I would share.

I dreamt my living room was a chat room and that all my furniture was chatting. There was this particularly obnoxius lamp that irritating everyone in the chat room. I watched it for a while and I suddenly realized it was not my lamp - it was the magic lamp from Disney's Fantasia.

I like Fantasia but I haven't seen it in years, so the appeareance of the lamp was a little strange. But, on thinking about it as I drove into work this morning, I can easily see where the fertile subconscious was tilled and the lamp turned up.

I am going down to that ultimate pop-culture fest, the San Diego Comic Con, for vacation. It is, of course, the celebration of many things from popular culture, including comic books, graphic novels, and animation - of which Disney remains the American King of Animation. If I think of animated movies, the first ones that pop into my mind are the Disney classics of my youth.

One of my early movie memories is going to see "The Jungle Book" at the Elks Theatre in Rapid City, South Dakota with my brother Dusty and my dad. In was a winter night and after the movie we went to the diner next door and had apple pie and hot chocolate. It is a very good memory.