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Over at Dohiyi Mir. For no particular reason, other than he's so cute when he begs.

Recommended reading

The best sentence I have read today -- and I have read a lot of them -- might be this one: "Attempts to convey the ineffable often come across as kind of effed up."

The sentence was written by Fred Clark over at slacktivist, and he's an editor, so he should know. He's posted a new installment to his ongoing exegesis of the "Left Behind" series and it's, as always, fascinating. This particular post talks about stories of religious conversion ("testimonies"), which have always struck me as bizarre and disturbing -- much like the stories of what brought someone into recovery whatever 12-step group they participate in.

I mean, I'm all in favor of redemption & everything, but it seems kind of a private matter to me, and I don't really understand this need to share. But then again, I'm a heathen, and I'm not in recovery.

I read all but the last of the "Left Behind" books; my co-workers were passing them around a while back and I was curious, and then horrified. I don't recommend reading the books, but I highly recommend taking a look at Fred's commentary for those who are interested. He offers both literary observations and critical analysis from an evangelical christian perspective. [The series is archived here.]

So much for that pedometer

The pedometer met a bad end yesterday. Yes, it was a cheap-ass little giveaway type unit and I kept resetting it by mistake, but its real problem was that the clip mechanism was just too deeply flawed and it wouldn't stay put on my waistband. Let's just say it was a watery end that it met.

But, as I said, I do love data collection -- and I promised charts & graphs -- so I bought a new one on eBay, and it's got a much sturdier alligator-type clip and you don't have to put it right over your hip, so it doesn't matter if I'm wearing a dress with no waistband. Plus it can tell whether you are running or walking and it is supposed to also tell you how many calories you are burning or some damn thing. I'm not sure this is very useful information, but data is data, and it's all good. I'll get it sometime next week, and if I'm still in this data collecting mood I'll be sure to let you know how it works. And one of my pals at work issued a challenge: whoever logs the most steps in June wins. We haven't decided yet whether the prize will involve chocolate or copious amounts of gin. Personally, I am more motivated by gin. Shoes would be even better.

There's something about the pedometer that I find bizarrely compelling, is all I can say.

In the absence of the pedometer, though, today when I went for my walk I decided to try out the exercise heart monitor my dad sent me for my birthday. I've been kind of grumpy about it. I mean, 'happy birthday -- you're not only old, you're also fat! love Dad,' was kind of how it felt, but there was a check & some other stuff in the envelope so I didn't get too bent out of shape. On the other hand, I didn't actually open it for a whole month. It's kind of fun. It took me a while to set it and calibrate it & everything, but I'm a geek, so I was entertained. After all that effort and hassle, I didn't feel much like working out, so I don't yet know whether it'll be any kind of useful. All I learned was that I didn't really do much to raise my heart rate while walking the dog; it's only a little faster while walking than it is while I'm sitting in a chair. Except on that one hill.

Bad influences, part three: The DIY haircut

Maybe I need to stop reading other people's blog archives. Especially late at night. Because where else would I get the idea that I could cut my own hair? Thanks Mrs. Kennedy. Thanks Liz. At least the two of them have the kind of faces that look good with very short hair. Me, I'm no Audrey Hepburn, nor have I ever wanted to be one.

I got hold of myself before it got too bad, but again this morning I looked in the mirror and there was this one sticky-outy piece and I reached for the scissors and, well, I think you can see what a slippery slope I'm on. I know what Liz means when she calls it compulsive behavior.

I've gotta stop myself before I end up with a mullet. But I just had to cut off the longer parts around my ears where the hair was touching my face and it was hot out and I was covered with sunburn cream and it was making me feel trapped and claustrophobic but it was too short to pin back in a barette. Anybody who says that short hair is easier and cooler than long hair is just deluded. Or lying.

I don't have a "before" picture, but you can see what it looks like now. I guess it could be a lot worse. And yes, that pink color is for real.* I forgot the sunscreen yesterday.

P.S. I strongly encourage you to visit Mrs. Kennedy at Fussy.org, and Liz at Granny Gets A Vibrator if you haven't already.

*update -- it looks way pinker here on the big monitors at my desk. The color actually looked about right on the laptop and on the camera screen. I tweaked the colors a bit so that it looks right on this monitor; the background should be blue-ish. My face looks better today, but my shoulders are still a bright pink. Wear sunscreen!!!

[Update: Seriously, do not try this at home. It's possible to go too far.]

• Bad influences, part two: The pedometer
• Bad influences, part one: The Holga

Bad influences, part two: The pedometer

My pal in the library downstairs went to some event the other day and they were giving out pedometers. She already had several, so she gave me the new one. I don't think she had any idea she was creating a monster. I walk a lot, and I have this mania for data collection that hits me sometimes so now I absolutely MUST wear the damn pedometer at all times. And record the results on a spreadsheet.

Stay tuned for charts and graphs.

OK, so you clip these pedometer things to your waist, over one hip, but today I am wearing a dress with no waistband or belt to clip it to, so it is clipped to my, ahem, undies [photo not provided - youall can thank me later - ed.]. I stopped in the gal's room before I got to my office and checked it: at 7:30 am it said 6,422 steps, which is 2.391 miles or 3.85 kilometers, according to this device. By the end of lunchtime it said 8646 (3.219 miles or 5.187 km) I'm going to have to check the calibration, but that seems about right, given that I walked partway to work, and that my office is located very very far away from anything else in the building.

I almost lost my composure just now when I accidentally reset the damn thing, which I also did yesterday at lunchtime when it was at around 5,700 or so steps. I spent the rest of the day taking naps & doing laundry and I ran a few errands, but I think it was around 8,650 steps when I took it off. That's about 14,350 for yesterday, and tonight when I got into the house it was a little past 15,000 -- which is pretty good, I suppose, given that the little instruction book thingy that came with it said you should try to walk about 10,000 steps a day. I mean, how hard is that?

I'm not going to start the spreadsheet until I get an actual reading at the end of the day. No making shit up.

• Bad Influences, part three: The DIY Haircut
• Bad influences, part one: The Holga
• Pedometer update

Bad influences, part one: The Holga

I believe I've mentioned that I am a big fan of Twisty Faster over at I Blame the Patriarchy.

It wouldn't be an exaggeration to say I maybe had some kind of wild crush on her.

A while back Ms. Twisty mentioned that she'd acquired a Holga, and I started reading about them and decided I absolutely had to have one. Judging from the comments at Twisty's place, I was not the only one.

As you can see on this photo of my neighbor's lawn, the camera does all kinds of amazing things, what with the light leaks, and odd shadows around the edges, and the unpredictable focusing. I think this one, like the one below of poor dear Pirate Jenny, was shot on expired slide film and cross-processed. [Update: but the gal at the place where I had it processed says that they wouldn't have done that, that it must have been negative film, not slide film. But the negative says "fujichrome" on the edge, and all the other rolls of fujichrome film I have are slide film. Whatever. It looks cool.]

In addition to the camera, I also found & purchased a whole pile of expired 120 film on eBay.

I read somewhere or another that you could introduce even more randomness into the process by using expired film, plus it was extremely cheap.

This is Luna, one of Stella's buddies at the neighborhood pub.

I purchased the fancy version of the Holga; it has three [ahem, four] focus settings: you can select an icon representing one person, two people, a small crowd, and a mountain. There is nothing on there about dogs. Or yards.

But it's not entirely clear that changing the setting does all that much anyway, especially in daylight.

It's certainly the case that what you see in the viewfinder bears only the slightest resemblance to the finished photo.

In this photo of my dear departed minivan, Pirate Jenny, the viewfinder was entirely filled by the van.

No background at all, and I was even afraid I wouldn't get it all in the frame.

I'm not sure what causes that weird little notch, or why it's sometimes on the top & sometimes on the bottom. But it's on all the pictures.

Anyway, I'm having a good time with it, but I can see this turning into an expensive hobby despite the initial $20 camera purchase. I'm going to use a lot of film and it will all have to be processed.

And I'm going to annoy everyone by photographing things incessantly.

Oh well. Thanks, Twisty!

• Bad Influences, part three: The DIY Haircut
• Bad influences, part two: The pedometer
• More Holga pics added July 19, 2006

Baby owls & a mockingbird

These two juvenile barred owls fell out of a tree during a recent storm, and my friend (the same one who rescued the turtle last fall) found out about them so we went and got Stella's old crate and pick them up and he ended up keeping them for a couple of days waiting for the wild bird rescue people to pick them up.

It took quite a few phone calls, and he got a lot of conflicting advice, but all ended well for the birds as far as we can tell. One of the places my friend called told him to try to feed them dry cat food, but they were not particularly interested in it. They did, however, respond pretty enthusiastically to the takeout mice offered by another friend who keeps them on hand for his snakes. They may look like adorable little puffballs, but those beaks and talons are the tools of highly efficient predators.

I feel lucky to have crossed paths with them briefly. They are beautiful birds. Unlike the mockingbird in the tree outside my window. I don't feel lucky at all at 4 a.m. every day to wake up to hear him do his car alarm imitation. You can tell it's a bird making the noise, but the resemblance to one of those awful car alarms that cycle through about seven different annoying sounds is uncanny.