I guess this will wind up on extreme outer cable at some point. I’d love to check it out. I’m a Garrison Keillor fan.

I like yogurt. It makes a great snack. Indeed, in my mind it’s better than ice cream … sometimes. Now, I’m a pre-stirred kind of guy. Having to drag that stuff up off the bottom and mix it together is … well, for one thing, it’s not my job; for another, it just never quite mixes right.

How about you?

A fine column called You Can’t Bomb Beliefs by Naomi Klein

in The Nation:

“Far from reducing the draw of extremism, the US attack on Sadr has greatly strengthened it. Sadr has deftly positioned himself not as the narrow voice of strict Shiites but as an Iraqi nationalist defending the entire country against foreign invaders. Thus, when he was attacked with the full force of the US military and dared to resist, he earned the respect of millions of Iraqis living under the humiliation and brutality of occupation. “

The milk’s gone bad!

Chewing on a piece of grass

Walking down the road

Tell me, how long you gonna stay here, Joe?

Some people say this town don’t look good in snow

You don’t care, I know

So as I was saying, my brother Joe has been staying with me much of the time for the past five months. His local business concluded, he’s decamped and on his way home to his wife and child. They want him back you see, and make a more compelling case than I for his company. No, it’s just time to go home. As it should be. And once again, it’s just me and Tasha here in the condo, as it’s been for many years. The closet, drawers and shelves he used ring with clear, untangled emptiness.

I’ve not had a roomie since I finished college in ’86; didn’t want one. I wouldn’t have done it with anyone else. Don’t get me wrong, we had us some laughs. And I thought I was doing Joe a favor, letting him stay here rent free and all. I was wrong. There were – and still are – a lot of things in my life and heart needful of organization, prioritization, and polish. And some defects of my character needful of extraction from deep storage. These things my brother did for me. In gratitude for which, just this:

Vapor Trails

1.

Harvest moon tonight.

It will be cooler, and grow

cooler still as each night

falls away.

I live upstairs you know,

so standing by the silent

piano I can see the vapor

trails curved and stretched

among the clouds, bound

for San Francisco.

Even at night, the moon

will catch them, bring

them down for me.

The dog doesn’t mind

a contrail in the house;

the ghost of a journey

not our own.

She sleeps.

2.

I could make supper

and watch TV. Or stand

in the center of the room

and kill the lights, bend

the darkness around me

like a coat, an iron

maiden of my loneliness,

my unmusical, unhappy

self. The dog shifts

to a new plot of carpet;

fresh ground for her dreaming.

3.

It is all well. The crows

are down in orchards

to the east, their vespers

done. I made spaghetti

and watched the evening news.

We learn so little of each

other, even if God gives us

months. So you’ve returned

our coarse, untangled

distance, and my bathroom

drawers. The dog

wakes up, and looks around

for you.

Kyle Kimberlin

“Back in 2000 a Republican friend warned me that if I voted for Al Gore and he won, the stock market would fall, we’d lose millions of jobs, and our military would be totally over-stretched. You know what? I did vote for Gore, he did win, and I’ll be darned if all those things didn’t come true!”

– James Carville

It was a good day to be scared, to get a little jump on Halloween. I got myself scared real good, twice.

In the late afternoon, I was sitting on the deck, reading a book. Tasha was with me, but I thought she’d gone in the house. She’s gotten where she doesn’t care to be outside long: no comfy carpet out there. She goes inside after a few minutes if the door is open, which it was was. So, when I went in, and looked everywhere for her, and couldn’t find her, I paniced. Everybody helped me search every room, but she was nowhere to be found. Finally, I went back out and looked on the lawn. There she was, laying in the grass by the edge of the deck. Looked up at me and said, “What?”

When Joe and I got home to my condo around 10:00pm, we noticed that there were lights on inside, which we didn’t remember leaving on. And the porch light was on, which was really strange. We talked about how something was different, and came in by the kitchen door, carefully. But I wasn’t prepared for a tall man in a hat, standing by my piano holding two pistols.

I kinda jumped, kinda ducked, probably grabbed my chest, and I don’t remember exactly what I said, but it probably wasn’t nice. Joe got a good vicarious scare behind me. Then we both got a pretty good laugh.

Seems our folks dropped old Roy off while we were out. Yeah, that’s a life-size stand-up picture of the old cowboy, a little taller than me. Whew … thanks, Mom & Dad. It’s nice to know my ticker can still stand a shock.

Give people keys to your house, then see what happens. It’s cheaper than an EKG.

The following books are presently on the table next to my very comfy chair:

Reservation Road by John Burnham Schwartz

Beautiful writing, emotional rich, but a little thin on plot. The writer seems to have some trouble crafting separate and distinct lives for his characters. But this is a page-turner; very enjoyable.

Eats, Shoots & Leaves by Lynne Truss

Lots of fun for punctilious punctuators like me.

Four Past Midnight by Stephen King

I’ve had this one on my shelf for a long time, but left it unfinished. I read a lot of King’s stuff. It’s four novellas: The Langoliers (made for TV movie), Secret Window, Secret Garden (recently a movie with Johnny Depp), The Sun Dog (earlier material for Needful Things), and The Library Policeman. I’m reading the latter piece now, but haven’t come to an opinion about it yet.

I hope you’re enjoying your reading too.

My brother Joe has been staying with me much of the time for the past 5 months, while he had temporary business in the area. Now sometime in the next few days, he’ll be packing up the aero bed and going back to his wife and son, ostensibly to stay. I’ll write more on this later; for now, let me just inform you all that I don’t like it. I’m going to miss him. A lot.

A soldier’s blog: http://cbftw.blogspot.com/

CBS stations are getting e-mails , calling for CBS to fire Dan Rather.

Oh, sure. Don’t oust the president, who broke faith and trust with America by lying us into an ill-conceived war, based on personal vendetta and monumental false pride. Not the president, who deceived Congress and mislead the public, betrayed America’s good faith with the world community, then soaked the Iraqi sands with gouts of blood, including over a thousand American youth. No, no, the king’s no fool; kill the messenger.

Idiots.

I want one of these.

Christmas is only 3 months away!