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Thursday, June 30, 2005

I Don't Necessarily Agree with All of This...
...But I do admire a good rant.

ETA: Oh, bleah.
Introductions
Over at Chez Miscarriage, Getupgrrl is preparing for the arrival of her son and finding out that some people are a little... er... different when they're about to have a kid.

No, you probably can't imagine my amazement as women who had already named their children introduced themselves as "Sierra's mommy," and women who hadn't named their children (but who knew the gender of their children) introduced themselves as "mommy to this precious baby boy," and the rest of the women introduced themselves as "mommy-to-be on [due date]" - all without ever revealing their own first names.

Sitting in the corner, I felt like Admiral James Stockdale at a mother's plagroup: "Who am I? What am I doing here?"

My mom and I bear a rather striking resemblance to one another. It is strong enough that on rare occasions I have been asked by a complete stranger to me if I was my mother's daughter and vice versa. When I was in junior high, my mom realized that the girl previously known as "Carole's daughter" had become "Jill" and she had inversely become "Jill's Mom."

When she realized this, she started responding to, "Oh, you must be Jill's mom," with a cheerful smile and a polite, "Yes, and a person in my own right."

So, as someone who is alternatively, "John's Wife," "Carole/Jeff's daughter," "Nina's Granddaughter," "Jim and Ernestine's Daughter-in-Law," "Brian's Stepsister," etc., I would like to add, "Yes. And a person in my own right."
Wednesday, June 29, 2005

Not Available for Mac Yet...
Growl.
Why is it that even after a good Yoga class I can get completely hacked off at lousy drivers? I was cut off on my way back from my private Yoga client (by someone who actually gave me a friendly wave as she whizzed past me and I slammed on my brakes. Idiot).

I muttered nasty things about stupid people for about three seconds, whereupon someone darted out in front of me, blowing a stop sign and turning left in front of me.

Is this a test from the universe? Am I supposed to be calm in the face of people blithely putting their lives and my life at risk? If so, I'm failing miserably.
Whoopeee!
John is still a straight-A student! Congratulations, my darling!
Tuesday, June 28, 2005

Age of Aquarius?
I am apparently born in the Year of the Fifth Dimension.
Six Degrees, or Something Like it
One of these days I will be tooling around the Internet and run across the blog of someone I know. It hasn't happened yet, but it is probably inevitable. I am not talking about actively looking for someone, but the cyber-equivalent of passing someone in a crowded airport. You haven't seen them in years and it's rather surprising to run into them here, but serendipity just works that way sometimes.

I have been thinking about this rather a lot lately, since a few new people have somehow found me. I am not sure what the process was, who linked to whom and who googled what, but it would be interesting to find out. It is nice to have strange names pop up in the comment field, if a little disconcerting. The group that regularly leaves comments has heretofore been a small one, and sometimes you forget that you're not just talking to yourself or a tiny group of friends. It is interesting to me to note my desire for reference points in a forum as wide and deep as the Internet is.

So welcome, new readers, and if you're so inclined, introduce yourself!
Monday, June 27, 2005

Small Towns on the Internet
Insanely detailed site on small towns - link is to their "claims to fame" section.
Curses, Foiled Again
Note to self: when taking over the world with you super-evil death ray from the strategically crucial access point at Dulles Airport, you would think that a little old lady in a wheelchair would enable you to sail through security. Apparently, this ploy is just too obvious.

John's Grannie had a wonderful visit. She arrived with a suitcase as big as she is (not large for a human, very large for luggage). She told us stories, she treated us to dinner, she met some of our friends. We laughed and talked and brought her innumerable cups of black coffee. When it was time for her to go on Sunday, we both took her out to the airport (when I picked her up on my own on Thursday, the combination of wheelchair and giant luggage caused me to dragoon a skycap just to get her out to the car). Thus teamed up, we rolled into Dulles*and got Grannie checked in. Regulations allow a disabled person to be accompanied by one non-flying companion, so John gave his ID and we waited.

And waited.

Our old nemesis, the "Terrorist Watch List" was at it again: the TSA had to be called because my husband's incredibly suspicious moniker was flashing all sorts of warnings over the check-in-bot's screens. In the meantime, he handed his pocket knife and ball-point pen to me, as I was staying on this side of the iron curtain. The truly skilled John Smiths can build backup death rays with ball-point pens and pocket knives, you see, and he wanted to avoid suspicion.

The upshot of all of this drama, of course, is that John was cleared of any suspicion of trying to take over the world with his super-evil death ray, he got Grannie settled at the gate, and I took the rented wheelchair back to the car and waited, wishing I had thought to bring a book with me. As are most of my stories, this one is anticlimactic.


* Insert mini-rant here: was there ever an airport more poorly laid out, with worse signage? If there is, I do not want to know about it. I especially do not want to know about it while pushing a wheelchair and trying to avoid herds of idiots roaming around without looking where they are going.
Thursday, June 23, 2005

Extra Busy-Ness
John's Grannie is coming to visit, so I will probably be mostly offline until Monday.

Have a lovely weekend, all.
Wednesday, June 22, 2005

Annoying, Yet Kind of Cute
Altered Consciousness? Nah. Just a Happy Tree.
There are two trees in flower on the far side of our little cul-de-sac island. They smell sweet and fresh, and since the air has gotten a bit cooler lately it is a positive joy to walk around outside.

Yesterday, as I followed the dog around for his post-prandial sniff 'n' squat, I stood underneath one of them and enjoyed its subtle fragrance. Slowly I also noticed that the tree was gently humming. As my vision took in individual flowers, I could see that there were hundreds of bees, happily harvesting nectar from each little yellow flower. Individually, each little bee's activity was a vision of industrious nature at work.

Overall, though, it seemed as if the tree itself was purring. That's one happy tree.
Tuesday, June 21, 2005

Isn't Google Doing Something Similar?
Hm. The Internet Public Library has been around for 10 years.
Two.
Two years ago today, during one of the wettest springs on record, I stood in the home of friends, nervously fidgeting with a cascading bouquet of flowers. The hubbub of thirty-six people had passed through the house and out to the tent in the garden. My mother had been ordered out to join them by Lee, who calmly informed her that he would follow us out with a golf umbrella, should the skies open up again before Maria and I reached the tent.

I had been asked to make a few decisions over the last half-hour - the intermittent rain argued for chairs to be moved into the tent, rather than holding the ceremony out in the open air, but nobody was going to make that decision for me. In a dramatic, last-minute gesture John had sent a necklace of pearls to me via Maria, causing the usually un-superstitious me to panic over the heirloom necklace I was already wearing (my "something old"). Fighting the unaccustomed paralysis in my generally swift and flexible decision-making muscles, the chairs went under the tent and I wore both necklaces, the art-nouveau pendant looking as if it was hanging from the string of pearls.

But now, there were no more decisions. Handel's unintentionally appropriate "Water Music" had started up and it was my cue to move. I looked at Maria. She gave a last, expert twitch of my veil and we went out together. There was the tent. There were our guests. And there was John, grinning like a madman. I had refused to let him see the dress - not out of superstition, but because I wanted to see that expression, that grin, that moment of seeing his jeans-and-ponytail girl as a bride-icon.

Two years ago today, we told each other we would be together for better or for worse. And we have found that our wedding, with its rain, its last-minute furniture shuffling, our steadfast insistence on the things that mattered to us, and our disregard of things that didn't, has been a pretty good metaphor for our marriage. The things we worried about turned out not to be problems. Other things we didn't expect have loomed large, but we have nonetheless moved forward. We have talked and comforted. We have celebrated and commiserated. We have each other.

June 21, 2003
Monday, June 20, 2005

Choose Your Own Bradventure!
Weekend in Review
The owner of the studio where I teach came to my Saturday Yoga class. That last sentence feels like it should be done up in flashing orange and red. She had been talking about coming to sit in on one of my classes for the last six months, and finally did it on Saturday. Lest I leave the obvious unsaid, it is pretty darn nerve-wracking to teach someone who has been your teacher. One of the small saving graces of the particular lesson plan I had prepared is that it is very slow and works deeply on breath as it relates to movement. This is the kind of thing that's right up Dee's alley.

One of the most valuable lessons I have learned is not to try to pretend that I am invincible when I teach a class. Prepared, yes. Well-trained, yes. Knowledgeable, I hope so. But invincible, no. So I said right up front, "If I seem like I have a bit more nervous energy than usual, it's because my boss is here." The students smiled reassuringly, and we got on with things. Dee had lovely things to say after the fact, and I feel just that little bit more at home in my "teacher's seat."

On Sunday, the Macht Nichts had their last game of the season, and I was actually able to attend. Most of their games have been morning games this season, which conflicts with my Sunday morning Yoga class (I subbed for my usual teacher this Sunday as well). I was privileged to witness the fact that the team has well and truly gelled. They play as a team, rather than as a group of disparate individuals. Alicia and I sat on the grass with Mac, chatting about nothing much and watched the game, which was much more concentrated on the offense than usual. With less than five minutes left on the clock, just as we had resigned ourselves to a scoreless last game, Guillermo fired off the soccer equivalent of a Hail Mary pass -- and scored. A win for the team in the maroon shirts, and a nice way to round out the season.
Friday, June 17, 2005

A Religious Experience for the New Yorker
I'm a Little Behind... Again.
A couple of weeks ago, it seemed that just about every blogger I read on a regular basis was exploding into controversy. This debate is one that inevitably rears its head, dividing otherwise good friends, creating enmity where none existed before, and generally making life uncomfortable for everyone, especially those who could care less. It is a subject people are passionate about, and the passion they feel for the subject will cause them to lay waste to anyone with a dissenting opinion. In today's polarized environment, it acts as yet another flash point for conflict. The difference is so fundamental that no compromise is possible.

The controversy is, of course, pizza: New York vs. Chicago.

I don't have a dog in this hunt. I know there must be some good New York pizza out there, but I have yet to eat it, at least in New York itself. The local pizza place that enjoys our custom is "New York Style," but since it contains flavor and lacks a veritable Niagara of yellow-orange grease cascading off of every slice, it isn't like the New York pizza I have had. On the other hand, Chicago "deep-dish" pizza is just too much of a gut-bomb for me these days. Too heavy, too much stuff going on there.

"Since I don't have a favorable opinion of either of these types of pizza, why are you going on about it?" I hear you cry. (Come on, it has been a long time since I have put words in my Dear Readers' mouths, and it seems about time to do it again). I am so glad you asked. John and I have had an enduring conundrum in our lives. We once lived in Somerville, MA, a town with a fairly large Italian population, a huge number of Italian restaurants and markets, and (at least as far as we could discover) no good pizza whatsoever. How does that happen?
Thursday, June 16, 2005

As If
I have almost zero graphic ability. But this is cool.
WWKD?
Our neighbor Kathie is a sparkling, bubbly sort. A tiny dynamo, she has the ability to zip into our house with a question, request, or bit of information, have a serious conversation, and whirl out again leaving smiles on our faces. She and her husband Philip are both wonderful neighbors - welcoming and yet respectful of boundaries.

As far as I am concerned, her most remarkable trait is her positivity. She gives the benefit of the doubt more easily and effortlessly than anyone I have ever met. Where John and I are irritated by another neighbor, she sees someone she pities. When circumstances hand her and Philip hard knocks, she acknowledges them and feels the frustration and fear that anyone would, but her naturally buoyant personality always inevitably rises with good humor and restless, fizzing energy.

So when John and I were standing in the self-checkout line at the grocery store on Sunday behind a woman and her son who took approximately ten minutes to check out five items (not including the five or so minutes that it took a store employee to replace the burst bag of Tater Tots that was the last item in her cart) and I was about to burst into a stream of frustrated, sotto voce snark, he raised a finger and headed me off with a single phrase. "What Would Kathie Do?"
::Chuckle::
Wednesday, June 15, 2005

Images Only
Google Searches v. 9
Feeling uninspired and listless in the ridiculous heat our region is bathing in (that's bathing as in "steam bath"), here's the semi-regular roundup of Google searches that brought readers to WoT. Volume 8 is here.

"you have to be brave " - Indeed, you do.

dinosaur love poem - Okay, I'll give that a try:
Oh, my lovely archaeopteryx!
Your fossilized feathers array'd
Confound the artist and scientist alike.
What color were they, anyway?

"black eye" "before my wedding" - The results of this search, aside from my own story of soccer balls, shiners, and ponies, are almost uniformly frightening.

How to say "Bread" in norwegian - I have to agree, the translation sites are generally poor on the Scandinavian languages. But... capitalizing "How" and "Bread" and not "Norwegian"? What's going on there?

what's your excuse to be rude - What are the acceptable justifications (if any) for rudeness? Discuss. Show your work.

Why is writing complicated - Because it requires thought. Next question?

random daft facts - Oh, you came to the right place for those!

estragon: nothing to be done. Vladimir - Oh, Bwah hah! I got a few of those all in a rush - is someone doing a term paper?

sprained toe and yoga - Ouch. Be gentle.

lucite shelving - NOOOOOOOOO!!!!

maple geranium - Not one I have in my semi-vast collection. Hmmmm...

Monday, June 13, 2005

Lacking the Flair for a Really Creative Insult?
Disorientation, Two Flavors
Sunday was Yoga central for me. I took my usual class in the morning, had lunch with my teacher, and promptly took off for another Yoga seminar. Aieee. The woman who taught the afternoon seminar is at least 70 years old, with bright eyes, a brilliant smile, and a deep southern twang in her voice. It is a bit disorienting to have a southern granny look you in your sweaty, red face and say, "Look at all that prana color you have!" Disorienting, but lovely.

On the way down to the seminar I remembered that the Booz Allen Classic was going on, and took the highways. On the way back, I forgot and went right up past Congressional Golf Course. Luckily it was still going on and the road was not jammed with expensive SUVs and sedans. Instead, I was treated to the odd sight of Potomac residents renting out their spacious lawns as overflow parking. Let me back up a little. Potomac is a DC suburb where the houses start at over $1 million. The sight of a giant McMansion with a hand-lettered sign advertising "Parking $20" (the price descended as you moved away from the course), and bunches of giant, shiny vehicles sitting on the usually pristine grass created a different sort of disorientation.

This morning I am integrating the two sorts of disorientation - the southern granny's serene discussion of the Sutras and the Vedas and the wealthiest denizens of the region leasing out their lawns as parking lots.
Thought for Tuesday
No essay for Tuesday, just this thought:

I watched Pierce Brosnan on "Inside the Actors Studio." James Lipton asked him to say, "Bond... James Bond." Brosnan did, with a bit of discussion as to the various ways you can play it, the pauses and intonations.

How on Earth did Lipton not ask the question I have always wanted to know the answer to? I have always wanted to know about the first time an actor says that line with the cameras rolling. Doesn't he succumb to a complete fit of laughter saying those words? Wouldn't you?
Friday, June 10, 2005

How to be an Ugly American
Expectations, Bodies, and Me
Behold, the photos have arrived. Of course, the photographer has not sent me the digital files he promised me, so you will have to make do (for now) with the crappy phonecam shots I took last night before I taught a class. So, here I am in all of my bendy glory:

Picture009.jpg

And here is the studio - it's such a lovely place:

Picture010.jpg

You may now have a sense of why I sometimes get freaked out about subbing - it's not just that I don't know the students. It is this thought that creeps in, Boy, are they going to walk in and see you and be disappointed. Who wants a stocky Yoga teacher?

Yes, positive body image. Yes, we are all beautiful. Yes, I read this book and found it affirming and wonderful. Yes, yes, yes. Whatever. Nobody is immune to the evils of expectation and image.

So there it is. A short, concise explanation of my neurosis about teaching and how utterly stupid it is. I should be far more worried about - oh, say - the teaching itself? But no. It is easier to focus on the stupid stuff, the external stuff, the stuff I have less control over.

Is it scary or healthy that I would never judge anyone else the way I do myself? Perhaps it is both.
From the "Better than Nothing" File
Since the photographer is not sending me digital files, I went to Kinko's and scanned the physical copies I have. Despite body-image issues, I am actually pretty happy about the poses themselves, so up they go on the Internet.

Thumbnail of toes:


Thumbnail of fingers:
Thursday, June 09, 2005

It's a Book... House...
Plausible Deniability
How much danger do we ignore every day? How much denial is just a sane response to the realities of everyday life?

Occasionally I will see an article about the statistics of danger - you are probably familiar with this sort of thing: the odds of getting struck by lightning as compared to something else, the odds of being injured or killed in a car crash vs. airline travel. One thing I know from having lived in the DC area during the "sniper" attacks: living in constant fear is both exhausting and debilitating. I can't even begin to imagine what it must be like to live in a war zone. I know this, and I am grateful that I may (at least so far) live in such ignorance. October 2002 was bad enough. Running in zig-zag lines to the grocery store was a reasonable thing to do in those days. Walking the dog made me feel like an ambulatory target.

In the middle of that month, when Malvo and Muhammad were in the midst of their sick, steady prowl around our region, John and I took a trip up to Northern Maine. Flying into Manchester, NH we rented a car and made the long drive up to Mt. Desert Island. We talked and relaxed and shook off our everyday life as we drove, knowing we had a few days without the worries of the workaday world. Just before we reached the causeway to the island, NPR aired a report on the sniper attacks. Suddenly, the fear and dread that had built up over the prior days and weeks surged back into my body and I realized what I had been living with. The steady, mounting water-torture drip of paranoia was bad enough, but to have it all return in a rush was horrible.

I know bad things will happen again. I know that I will see and feel pain and fear. I also know that ignorance can be sweet, sweet bliss.
Wednesday, June 08, 2005

So. Wrong.
Tiny Things
During our trip to the Arboretum on Memorial Day weekend, we visited the bonsai. John thinks they're pretty cool. I look on them as my mother does - as a form of horticultural foot-binding. While I appreciate the effort and the craft, after the 47th tiny tree or landscape, I start to get both a little freaked out and a little bored. The high-maintenance aspect is also daunting (my much-documented tendency towards geraniums is not purely aesthetic - they're easy and I can be lazy).

Our differing opinions on bonsai also reflect our different aesthetics. John is definitely more in the minimalist vein than I am, and the image of quiet and precise clipping of tiny limbs in a spare, airy room is probably appealing to him. Conversely, we both share the desire to one day live somewhere with a fair amount of land where we can have lawns and gardens and inevitably drive ourselves nuts with the amount of work we will have taken on.

So I was highly amused yesterday, when John came in from mowing our postage-stamp of a yard and announced, "I don't need a bonsai tree: I have a bonsai yard!"
Tuesday, June 07, 2005

Now What they Really Need to Have is a SheltieBall Match
Mac would so totally win - especially with mashed carrots on the ball.
Drama, then Calm, then More Drama
I am not what you would call a "shy" person (stop laughing, people who know me offline); however, subbing for a Yoga class full of strangers really gives me a severe case of the willies. "Oh, why did I ever say I would do this?" I moan to myself (silently - because after all, I may be crazy, but I'm not nuts). Yesterday I was scheduled to teach two classes in a row, subbing for a woman at a different studio from my usual. I landed on this studio's sub list because my usual teacher also teaches there, and having subbed for her I ended up on their sub list and get the occasional call from all and sundry. I usually say yes despite my moans, because after all if they're calling a complete stranger off the sub list, they're probably desperate.

So here I was yesterday, freaking out because of the little car that went klunk and hoping I can get the silly vehicle back in time to drive me up to Germantown. It was like a little call-and-response chorus of anxiety in my head, "Ooooohhhh - please let the car get fixed in time/Ooooohhhh, why did I say I would teach a Level II class?/WOOOOOAAAAhhhh, when should I start panicking about the car?/Grooooaaannnnnn what if they hate me?" It was a good thing that I spent most of the day on my own, as I am sure I would have been a whole load of fun to be around in that state.

But as you know, the car was fixed and I went off to teach (three... straight... hours...). And again, anticlimactically but reassuringly the classes responded well to what I gave them. And as the first group lay in the darkened room in final relaxation, atmospheric pyrotechnics and wind began to whip up beyond the plate glass window behind me. As they sat up, lighting flashed, rain drummed, and trees danced in frenzied ecstasy. Cocking a thumb behind me, I said, "I ordered up all this drama just for you. Namaste."

Monday, June 06, 2005

Art/Therapy?
The Betrayal of the Automobile
Summer has suddenly arrived, leaving me feeling like a fish - hooked, reeled in, and tossed on the bank, gasping for breath. Having had temperatures mostly in the 60's lately, we hit the low 90's yesterday. During a late-day trip to the grocery store, my passenger-side window went "klunk" and now no amount of button-pushing will serve to roll the window back up.

My lovely little Jetta wagon is now sitting in front of the house with a giant plastic garbage bag covering the window and I am waiting for the service department at the local VW place to open up at seven. I foresee a lot of waiting around (if I am LUCKY). I have two Yoga classes to teach this evening and I am not a happy camper. If I have no wheels I am really not a happy camper.

Please tell me something good or amusing that is happening in your life.

ETA: Katie the Wagon is back from the VW place, all fixed. Big sighs of relief all 'round (but please continue to tell me good or amusing things!)
Friday, June 03, 2005

Why this is Hell, nor am I Out of it
If Only
It's another rainy, sleepy day here at WoT HQ. I am yawning my head off in a way that would most certainly get one of my little-kid aphorisms delivered at me. I don't know if your family has catalogued the darling things you said when you were wee, but mine sure has. Thirty-three years later, "Free toys, Emmanuel" still has the power to start my mom giggling sometimes. She reminded me of another one the other day. In fact, it was one I had completely forgotten about, and missed my cue to repeat it, deeply disappointing Mom, who I believe has a secret plan to take our mother/daughter act on the road one day. Carole Sawdon: mother, vaudevillian.

The story is this: I was about five and on a car journey with my mother and grandmother. I was yawning excessively, and finally my grandmother asked me why I was yawning so much. My response was, "Because my body wants me to." My mom considers this to be a fine and reasonable response, as well as a humorous one. Wouldn't it be great, though, if it was a fine and reasonable response to questions like, "Why did you eat the entire bag of Oreos?" or "Why did you sleep all day?"

Responsibility and consequences keep us from living our adult lives by little-kid aphorisms, but I think we should have a day where we can live by the rules and boundaries (or lack thereof) we set out when doorknobs were at eye level. What a holiday that would be!
Thursday, June 02, 2005

Fun with Pop Charts
The #1 hit single in the US the day I was born was: "Dizzy" by Tommy Roe. (Huh? Have I ever heard this song?)

In the UK it was: "I Heard it Through the Grapevine" by Marvin Gaye.

Yet another example of why Anglophilia can sometimes be rational.
This is what You Get when I Surf my own Website for Inspiration
For some reason, I have been very inspiration-less this week. I am not sure what it is, but I know I go through phases like this and I know it will pass. Blogging is like life that way.

On this post, I mentioned that I had met Stuart Klipper because I quoted him. I also mentioned that it was a long story and I would tell it later. I guess now is later, because here is the story:

Many years ago, in a magical land far, far away (okay, it was circa 1992 in Minneapolis) I went to an exhibit of polar photographs with my dear friend Alicia at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. The artist had taken wonderful, panoramic shots of polar snowfields stretching in vast, undulating whiteness, empty as the skies above. Occasionally, the otherwise empty landscapes were augmented by whimsical things like a giant velvet Elvis in the middle of the landscape. I was captivated.

In addition to these photos, there was an annex with a few non-polar photographs by the same artist. One of the photographs was of a manhole cover that had the longitude and latitude of the manhole's location, inscribed with the quote, "Know where you are, be where you're at." I love quotes, and scribbled this one in my ever-present notebook.

Fast forward a few years to 1995. I signed on with America Online and sketchily filled out my profile. One of the fields was for a quote, so I typed in "Know where you are, be where you're at - Stuart Klipper." Several months later, when I was living in California for a few months with friends, I got an e-mail from Stuart Klipper. A friend of his had done a search for Stuart on AOL and had come up with my quote and cite. Stuart politely wondered how I had come across the quote. I replied, and thus started my first e-mail friendship.

A few years later, I even got to meet Stuart - he had a gallery show in SoHo and I was able to make some New York meetings coincide with its opening. I still have the snapshot he took of me in a rack on my desk. We have drifted in recent years, and I have not written or spoken to him in quite a while. Perhaps it is time to reconnect.

Wednesday, June 01, 2005

Information Everyone Can Use
June 1: My Life Has Shrunk
I have that feeling this morning that I am looking for something that is not there. Ideas flicker at the corners of my consciousness the way images can slide around the edge of vision, disappearing when full attention is paid. Like a woman searching for the back of an earring on a thick carpet, I wonder if the idea is really even there at all to be found. If it is there, perhaps it has bounced beyond the area where it seems logical to look for it. If there is an idea, and I do find it, it will seem like a minor miracle.

In other words, I am feeling allergic, sniffly, and excessively stupid this morning. Neither Kleenex nor web-surfing have brought inspiration and my bleary eyes are tired of staring at phosphors on a screen, hoping for the brain to wake up and start producing something (anything). Today is one of those days when my life seems to have shrunk to the dimensions of this search for something to say, something to write about.

Therefore, in best WoT? style, I have produced nothing, in three paragraphs. If the idea shows up later today, it will serve for tomorrow's inspiration. Have a lovely Wednesday.

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