My owner’s wife and son were gone for a week, so he and I got to spend a lot of quality time together. We are closer than ever! I even got to sleep on the bed at night, which is usually not allowed. Don’t tell anyone! — Lightning Read more →
July 2008
Horses, Barn Doors, Etc.
Fed to crack down on shady lending practices — msnbc.com Quant le cheval est emblé dounke ferme fols l’estable. — Les Proverbes del Vilain Read more →
This Doesn’t Look Good, Indy
IndyMac, my former employer, laid off another 3,800 people this week, more than half the remaining work force. I got the axe myself almost exactly a year ago. Prediction — at job interviews, these people will hear something I heard a lot during my own interviews: “We’re seeing a lot of applicants from the mortgage industry.” Yeah . . . tell me something I didn’t know. The Elite Mortgage Daily Blog has helpfully provided a brief history of IndyMac stock: Read more →
Family Reunion
My family is back from Thailand . . . At 6:30 this morning, I’m awakened by the dog pawing on my bedroom door. I get up to see what’s going on and find my son — who is never up at 6:30 in the morning but is still operating on Thailand time — playing a video game in the family room. “Rise and shine, parental!” he says. “Shouldn’t you be getting ready for work?” “I was up till 1 a.m. getting you home from the airport so I was planning to sleep until 7.” Meanwhile, the dog is trying to get someone’s attention by jumping around next to his food bowl. “Why is he jumping around like that?” I ask. “I don’t know,” the boy says. “Has he eaten?” “No.” “Mystery solved, Encyclopedia Brown. I’m going back to bed.” A few minutes later, the boy inexplicably shows up in… Read more →
Sex in Space
Outer-space sex carries complications — msnbc.com Hey NASA, I’m no aeronautical engineer but what I’d do is to tether the woman to a stationary object so she can’t move, just like I do here on Earth. Uh . . . with her consent, of course . . . Read more →
3 Easy Steps to Simplify Your Life
Simplify, simplify, simplify! — Henry David Thoreau, Walden Thoreau’s Walden had a profound impact on my thinking. It’s hard to achieve the kind of transcendent simplicity he describes when you live with other people, as I do, but if your family is out of town for a week, as mine is, here are some things you might want to try. Don’t Recycle When my wife is here, we have to sort and bag bottles, cans and plastic separately. Later on that noise! Everything goes straight into the garbage! Simplify, simplify, simplify! Don’t Wash Dishes Drink liquids from the container and eat food straight out of whatever you cooked it in. If you have to clean an eating utensil, put it in your mouth, press your lips together, and pull it back out. Bloom Where You’re Planted Why walk all the way to the bathroom if there’s a bottle, can or… Read more →