I despise Howard Stern. The guy is such a vacuum of social value that for years I’ve hated the fact that he’s out there, on the air, even though I’m ignoring him. I am so glad he’s taking a blow to his career from Clear Channel. Maybe he’ll get out of “entertainment” and realize there’s a dream job out there for him: washing windshields of cars stuck in traffic, and trying to get people to cough up a buck.

I can’t tell you how glad I was to learn that Clear Channel fired that lowlife miscreant Bubba the Love Sponge. I remember the day in February 2000 when he castrated and butchered a live pig, on the air. Bubba and I exchanged a few e-mails over that one. Wish I knew where those e-mails are now. I’d show you a clear picture of the shallow end of the gene pool. The sponge is just some flotsam, stuck in the filter and collecting scum.

To be fair to DJs and Clear Channel, not all their people suck. Here in Santa Barbara, we have a good rock station, KTYD. It’s been around since 1973, so they had their act together before Clear Channel got involved. But the Early Show is cool, if you’re ever listening in SB in the morning, 6-10. The DJ, Matt McAllister, actually seems to care about the community, kids, and pets. … the deeper end of the pool.

I was watching my favorite TV show, The West Wing, tonight. The press secretary, CJ Craig, is meeting with a reporter from the NY Times and wants some information from him, but it’s against his policy to provide it in advance of publication. The reporter obviously accidentally drops the information on the floor. They both know he did it deliberately. He asks for an interview with the president, which CJ agrees to. OK, enough set up…

What caught my attention was that he dropped a floppy disk. It might have been a Zip disk, but I think it was a floppy, a plain old 3.5 MS-DOS preformatted floppy disk. Man, those were the days.

I know, floppies aren’t cool anymore. I’ve got a burner for CD-R and CD-RW, and I use that most of the time. But my desktop and laptop (“Old Sparky”) aren’t networked. There’s no wi-fi in my condo. So if I get home with the laptop and I haven’t e-mailed my writing to myself, or put it on FTP, I use a floppy. I darn sure don’t want to disconnect the cable and hook it to Sparky if I don’t have to.

So I like floppy disks. They’re small and funky and they make you prioritize – you have to think about what’s worth copying and what’s not. ‘Cause you only have 1.4mb to work with. That’s it. Choose, or sit there moving stuff over and over. Yep, back in my day we had these little plastic things with little plastic tabs to keep you from hosing something good. Floppies and moon pies, RC Cola and Grandpa’s cassette tapes of the Dead. [Sigh.]

* * *

About Sparky: One time at work, a buddy of mine came by the cube with a voltmeter. I don’t know why, but he was running it past the computers to see how much they were leaking. My laptop lit that thing up like a Christmas tree. It’s discharging enough ambient juice to cook soup. Hence, Sparky.

A court in Columbia is expected to rule today on posthumously restoring the military honor of the grandfather of Gabriel García Márquez. [news]

Follow this link to find three beautiful poems by Cesar Vallejo, a beautiful poet.

my death goes away, my cradle leaves,

and, surrounded by people, alone, cut loose,

my human resemblance turns around

and dispatches its shadows one by one.

* * *

I remember we made ourselves cry,

brother, from so much laughing.

I took my dog Tasha to the vet today for a followup. I’ve posted the outcome on her blog.

not with a bang but a gurgle.

A Diary of those working with the Amar Foundation which is bringing humanitarian aid to the people of the South Eastern Iranian town of Bam.

“It was a brilliant spring morning, the day before Easter and the sun still low beyond the house and filtered through the trees. I squinted my eyes and the light through the branches broke into star points, novas, flashes. From there you couldn’t see that the garden was gone, it’s grapestake fence torn down a few years back and hauled off by the Mexican workers. It was a lot of wood, and they piled it behind the barn. I plowed the garden under myself, and planted grass to let the lawn drift away from the house as far as the edge of the apple trees.

Tuber roses bloomed in the brick planter at the edge of the patio. Yellow streaked with faded red. It stood there to remind me of Easter. Yellow and red, so beautiful, I almost stopped to pray. No wonder the sky was clear, the jays dropping from the power lines behind the house to the lawn where Dad had thrown out seeds. In all the years I remember, it never rained in Cortina on Easter. Not even a sunshower, hardly a cloud. I went on past the roses, and into the house by the screen porch door, careful not to let the spring slam it shut.”

© by Kyle Kimberlin, 2004: novel in process

This blog is sincerely sorry for the death of the president’s dog. I truly do not wish such grief on anyone, even such an asshat as Mr. Bush. I pray that God will comfort his family in their loss.

–My right elbow is sore from getting yanked by Bart yesterday.

–I’m nice and clean: Had a late evening shower, which helps me relax.

–Its warm in my office.

–The dog has put herself to bed.

–I’m thirsty.

It’s quiet here. It’s only midnight, on a Friday night, but the neighbors are asleep. I haven’t heard the sprinklers go off yet.

As a result of the quiet and the thirst, I am very aware of my solitude. I am deep in it, steeped in it. Maybe with rain coming, the sprinklers won’t go off. Maybe there’s a guy in charge of that, turning the sprinklers off when rain is coming. How do you get a job like that. The rain god of the condo association. El Brujo of the little rain.

Overheard: Of course we’re all afraid. How could we not be? Here we are on this planet, we don’t know how we got here, and we don’t know where we’re going.

Yeah, worth pondering, huh? Even for those of us who are religious. When you think about it, the best itineraries we have are a tad vague. We’re traveling on faith.

Also overheard: FEAR = Fark Everything and Run

Bart is a big dog. You wouldn’t notice it so much from a distance, unless you’re a smaller person, but Bart’s pretty good sized. He’s a chocolate lab, deep brown, nice coat, big head with a friendly slobbery face, deep eyes. He is eighty pounds, best guesstimate, of pure canine muscle. I mean, this dog is strong and fast.

Bart’s not my dog. He’s not even my neighbor’s dog. He’s my parents’ neighbor’s dog. He’s an outside dog (I know, that’s stupid) and he doesn’t care much for being left alone. He figures that’s his time to roam, explore, sniff out the world. I’ve captured him before, and it wasn’t easy, and he wasn’t nearly as strong back then.

I was over at my parents’ place, middle of a quiet afternoon. Dad wasn’t home. Mom was talking to a visitor, and I glanced out the kitchen window. Just in time to see Bart head-butting the fence near the top of the driveway. He gave it a few good smacks and hopped right through, and down our driveway and into the world.

There was a car in the neighbor’s driveway but no one answered the bell, so down the street I went, after Bart. With no leash, no cell phone, not even the sense God promised me long ago. He was four houses down by then, peein’ on the bushes and barking at a little girl across the street. The poor kid was petrified, standing on the sidewalk with her hands clasped under her chin … he must have looked like an arctic wolf to her. I can’t guess why he was barking at her, but she didn’t like it. He crossed to her side of the street about 40 feet from her, she crossed towards me, and I went after the dog.

Got him by the collar, a thick leather job with a buckle and two tags. I had a good grip, like a rodeo cowboy on a bucking horse, and took maybe five steps toward home before he backed up, wiggled his big head, and left me holding the collar. He took off toward the park, galloping like Seabiscuit.

My Mom offered to help. I grabbed a leash and a phone and we set off in her car. Down to the park, then up a residential street, up the busy county road, down another street … and there he was, still peeing on every other bush. I tried again with the leash, but he took off, down the county road two blocks. I got out again, and this time he thought I smelled interesting. Which was a break for me.

I managed to slip the collar over his big brown head, with a leash attached that Mom bought for Happy, our Pomeranian, for Christmas. It’s the thickest, widest leash we have, about an inch of green an white nylon, decorated with little wreaths. She has a collar to match.

Great, I now had an 80 pound retriever on a leash that belongs to an 18 pound lapdog, and I can’t pull him forward because it’ll come off over his ears again. No way to coax him into the car, which doesn’t interest him anyway. (I thought it was pretty darn nice of my Mom to offer to let me put this big slobbering dog in her Lexus.) Well, I was getting pooped already, but off we went for walkies.

The first time he decided to pull, I wasn’t ready. I didn’t expect it. Picture yourself standing on the roof of a building, holding a line connected to an anvil, which somebody kicks over the side while you’re not looking. I’m a big guy; to be sort of honest, lets say a cross between an NFL lineman and this guy. Bart almost pulled me over. He proceeded to do that, though not unexpectedly, all the friggin way home. We got there. I put him back in his yard, while Mom shoved a garbage can up against the board in the fence where he broke it.

Dad came home in a while, and we were setting out to fix the fence, when Mom asked me if I’d closed the gate at Bart’s house. It was wide open. Yes, I’d closed it. The little sweetheart head-butted it until it opened, and he was gone again. Dad and I drove his usual streets, but Bart was nowhere to be seen. He had his collar on again, and God only knows how many times he’s gotten out. I’m one of several neighbors who have been dragged home by this dog, and there’s only so much you can do. By then, his family were home, making calls, sending out searchers … again.

I’m told that two men – friends of Bart’s owner – found him down near the freeway, preparing to merge onto the northbound 101. They put him back in the yard, and wired shut the gate. I hope that helps. My Mom said they were as impressed with his strength as I was. I wonder what they’re feeding that guy.

The morals of the story, and you knew it had some:

· That dog doesn’t belong out in the yard. It’s not safe for him. He belongs in the house, where he can smell his people in the environment when they’re not home.

· Bart’s a great dog. A big, rambling, Let me after them ducks, Daddy! kind of a dog. Is a small, suburban backyard the right environment for such a dog? I don’t know.

· Bart needs to be neutered, if he isn’t. That might help calm him down a bit.

· We can’t have big dogs roaming the neighborhood, scaring little kids.

· He could’ve been killed at several points during his afternoon of running amuk.

· I could’ve been bitten, though he’s never been aggressive to me before. That’s a big mouth with lots of teeth; I can picture a big lawsuit, with lots of damages.

Keeping our pets safe and secure is serious as a heart attack. And yes, I’m aware of the irony of that remark.