HAUNTED BY THE HOLY GHOST

misbehaving over at facebook....be back later... 'K?

I dreamed I saw St. Augustine,
Alive as you or me,
Tearing through these quarters
In the utmost misery,
With a blanket underneath his arm
And a coat of solid gold,
Searching for the very souls
Whom already have been sold.

Arise, arise, he cried so loud,
In a voice without restraint,
Come out, ye gifted kings and queens
And hear my sad complaint.
No martyr is among ye now
Whom you can call your own,
So go on your way accordingly
But know you're not alone.

I dreamed I saw St. Augustine,
Alive with fiery breath,
And I dreamed I was amongst the ones
That put him out to death.
Oh, I awoke in anger,
So alone and terrified,
I put my fingers against the glass
And bowed my head and cried.

Lyrics by Bob Dylan

...the only thing you can’t get is red ink.’

Recalling a recent quote I heard after while reading yet another lament for our "lost freedom", as if we really knew the first thing about freedom:

And this one was written in 1996

   " In an old joke from the defunct German Democratic Republic, a German worker gets a job in Siberia; aware of how all mail will be read by the censors, he tells his friends: ‘Let’s establish a code: if a letter you get from me is written in ordinary blue ink, it’s true; if it’s written in red ink, it’s false.’ After a month, his friends get the first letter, written in blue ink: ‘Everything is wonderful here: the shops are full, food is abundant, apartments are large and properly heated, cinemas show films from the West, there are many beautiful girls ready for an affair — the only thing you can’t get is red ink.’

    Of the joke, Zizek writes:

    One starts by agreeing that one has all the freedoms one wants — then one merely adds that the only thing missing is the ‘red ink’: we ‘feel free’ because we lack the very language to articulate our unfreedom. What this lack of red ink means is that, today, all the main terms we use to designate the present conflict — ‘war on terror’, ‘democracy and freedom’, ‘human rights’, and so on — are false terms, mystifying our perception of the situation instead of allowing us to think it. In this precise sense, our ‘freedoms’ themselves serve to mask and sustain our deeper unfreedom."

From the film, Zizek!

 

no more political posts.  I used up my quota for the next 5 years.

Facebook status:

busy trying to see if I can rent the Roman Coliseum and some lions, or maybe a few Alaskan brown bears.

FACEBOOK UPDATE CROSSPOST: Chicago, the "Windy City" doesn't know jack about WIND

Windy City: Tornadoes Rip Through Chicago


90-MPH Gusts Breeze Through Chicago,
Indiana; O'Hare Airport, Wrigley Field
Evacuated  

Is there anything more useless than satellite TV when severe weather hits?

The signal was gone 15 minutes before the Tornado sirens went off in downtown Chicago...
Not to worry...that's what the Front Desk is for....to let you know if there there is a "situation" and to guide you in case of emergency.

We were staying right next to the Downtown Fire Station.  After the sirens has been sounding a good 10 minutes without stopping, I decided to look out the window (we were on the fourth floor and the "window" was the entire wall in our room.

Oh, it's raining...no it's more than rain...as a small tree tumbles down the road...then I lost sight of the road and just about everything as the rain pours down sideways and lightning hits so close the thunder causes the plate glass in the window to shake.

Does anyone in Chicago know the difference between regular sirens, (which are always going off, but always stop after a couple minutes), and Tornado Warning sirens, which go on and on and on and on?

I am not sure who came off looking more stupid;
Me for standing in front of the plate glass wall size window watching the storm,
OR the Hotel personnel who didn't seem to know what the sirens meant or  the definition of a "tornado warning"

Here in Michigan, they pretty much make sure we know that by 1st grade, and if you watch the weather even twice in a decade, you are sure to get a refresher course.

Chicago, at least those who live and work downtown, either missed that day in school, or assume that with all the high rise buildings, glass, and SATELLITE TV...no one stands a chance, or they just choose to play the odds.

When I finally got the scoop that a couple tornadoes had been sighted by checking ON-LINE, Weather.gov, and called the desk to find out what to do (see below to see the "Answer" that the desk clerk gave).  The Tornado Warning was almost over.  We wouldn't know until the next morning  that they evacuated Wrigley Field, and that trees and rooftops had ripped up by the winds not too far away...and that tornadoes has torn up a good part of Northern Indiana.

But the desk clerk remained calm and told us

"don't worry about it"
"no one has told us anything about it."...(as the siren screams in the background)

I guess those sirens were meant for someone else.

They were expecting engraved initiations, I suppose,  addressed specifically to them
or a phone call from headquarters, at the least, if they were expected to do anything.  God forbid they think for themselves, or make a decision, or assume that their job included anything as important as knowing the definition of a tornado warning, or why the heck those sirens didn't quit.

FACEBOOK CROSSPOST: I can't decide if I feel more like John Nash or Chauncey "Chance" Gardener

OR   "WT#  am I doing at a Writer's Conference?!?" 

            

 

Ron Steigler: Mr. Gardner, uh, my editors and I have been wondering if you would consider writing a book for us,
something about your um, political philosophy, what do you say?

Chance the Gardener: I can't write.

Ron Steigler: Heh, heh, of course not, who can nowadays?
Listen, I have trouble writing a postcard to my children. Look uhh, we can give you a six figure advance,
I'll provide you with the very best ghost-writer, proof-readers...

Chance the Gardener: I can't read.

Ron Steigler: Of course you can't! No one has the time!
We, we glance at things, we watch television...

Chance the Gardener: I like to watch TV.

Ron Steigler: Oh, oh, oh sure you do. No one reads!

Movie quote from: Being There

Hero has a New Hobby (Facebook crosspost)

No, not beer drinking....Ant Farming (besides, as she says "Beer is a drink for the commoners, and her palate would never stoop that low). If you want to know what is behind this "private joke", ask her.  This rates right up there with the "beanbag chair" story, the "oatmeal story", and the "Hero can do anything if she has a pair of rubber gloves" story.

Creative writing, creative excuses, and the email than garnered me a 5 day extension on my already late manuscript plus an invitation to Open Mike Night at the Glen

On Jul 6, 2007, at 2:34 PM, Caitlin wrote:
Dear ISABELLA:

  We have not yet received your manuscript for the Glen Spiritual Writing Workshop.  Please send one hard-copy to our address below, and send your ‘soft-copy’ via email to [email protected] as soon as possible.  You will be sent all your classmates’ manuscripts by email, to print and bring with you to the workshop.

Thank you,

Caitlin
.
Luci Shaw Fellow
IMAGE/GLEN WORKSHOP
www.imagejournal.org

...............................................................................

From: Izzy
Sent: Thursday, July 12, 2007 3:20 PM
To: Caitlin

Subject: Re: Glen Manuscript

Dear Caitlin, and Miss Julie,(your blackmail won’t work, withholding my classmates manuscripts until I submit mine, won’t make me write any faster.   Nice try)

Here’s my excuse, I mean explanation as why my manuscript has not been  written, finished, edited, mailed.
We  had and unexpected trip, less than 12 notice  to travel to Tennessee, and just got back on Sunday.  Also, my mom went into a nursing home today (after 2 months in and out of hospitals and rehab).  My Mormon brother from Wyoming, who I haven’t seen for over a year has been in town, while my husband and I were having the worst fight in our 29 years of marriage (we both recently converted to different churches-I’t a replay of the 1054.  We could probably sell tickets to what life was like during the Great Schism (minus the blood and carnage, so far),  lots of theological shrapnel flying back and forth; my children are learning  new words like filioque, apostate, unitism, caeseropapism.
They are also learning who said what and who did or didn’t do  what at the 4th 5th and 6th ecumenical councils.
My Mormon brother thinks this is a great missionary opportunity to bring  peace, and restore us to the True Church, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.  .I’ve been watching Big Love...no thanks.  I’ll keep kissing icons and he can keep his temple underwear.   He just left for home and I found another Book of Mormon strategically placed where I would be sure to find it.  Those books multiply like rabbits when he visits. The only reason I would open it would be to steal some ideas for my manuscript. At this point I would take dictation from angels with gold tablets to meet my page quota.
But I am working on it.  Like the writer in “Stranger than Fiction”, my Editor is living with me and keeping count on  how many words I write. (She just graduated from college, moved back home, has no job yet, except what I pay her  for Editing.  Her nickname is the Editor Predator, and she more than lives to the name.  There is more red than black on my drafts; and it didn’t help that she taught me how to make frozen margaritas this week.
My youngest daughter has just decided she likes a boy and started dating for the first time (she’s 20).  She’s not living at home, but calls on her cell phone (which got wet and didn’t work for awhile because she jumped into a lake to save a missing swimmer, who didn’t exist (she works at a summer camp and it was a surprise drill). All the while Mom is thinking the worst because the last she heard from “innocent”, and up until last week, man-hating daughter, she reportedly returned to her cabin late with her shirt inside out(with a reasonable plausable excuse).... it’s a Lutheran Camp...did I mention we recently left the Lutheran Church? and converted).

At camp there are no secrets and one big grapevine that reaches all the way back home to big sis, whose boyfriend also works at  the same camp as a lifeguard, and neither of them can keep a secret. And how could she keep this one when her  little sis, who is vegan-uber-nature-girl, and brags she could survive in the wilderness eating nothing but bark, berries, and cat-tails, and, if needed, can kill a squirrel by throwing sticks at it(seriously-she took a class), finally did something her  grandchildren are going to hear about (other than the tattoo, which they will be able to see on her aging sagging skin:  She stole away from camp for a whopping 10 minutes(nothing, not even hand holding allowed around the campers) and  tristed(trysted?) with new boyfriend(whose name is chalky-what kind of name is that???) in some poison ivy.

I don't know if will last.  His favorite movie is "The Promise", hers is "Fight Club". 
But they did go see agree to see "Transformers" together. Funny, though;she couldn't tell me what is was about.

He also eats meat, but she is trying to convert him (to veganism, not lutheranism).  He is a runner and there's some kind of deal if she runs 20 miles, he won't eat a hamburger that day.  I think she needs to get a better deal-he can only eat meat that he kills himself by throwing sticks at it while she runs along in case he only wounds it  She can chase it down and finish it off. 

 

Big Sis tells me everything and anything after the second margarita, and she knows I won’t tell. Actually she knows I will tell, even perfect strangers, but it doesn’t stop her.   I also found out that the little sis has managed to find and date the only asian-american who will probably never have a job because he  hates math and science and wants to be........are you ready for this.....a writer. (that is not racist, but irony-see below). He’s reported to be a Episcopalian Buddhist--yeah, I can see that happening. Camp Music director dates new catechist.  Did I mention we converted.

Friendship bracelets, campfires, flies as big as bats...romance is in the air. And she must be so irresistibly cute and artsy to a starry eyed writer,  playing kumbaya in four octaves on her ? thousand dollar violin at chapel.    I spent 5 years listening to her whine about how she practiced (she is a trained classical violinist, and Interlochen Grad, and was studying at the Chicago School for performing arts, but decided to drop out and now she plays in “a band”). She officially changed her performance major to music therapy(that fodder is just too easy, I’ll let it pass).  Anyway, a big reason, supposedly, was she could practice a zillion hours and still not play it as well as her good friend, a young girl from China who plays Paganini on a  12 dollar violin while watching reruns of Grey’s Anatomy.

Dear daughter blamed us, her parents, because her scandinavian viking DNA lacked the perfect pitch, and killer vibrato gene that apparently everyone born East of Helsinki gets gratis.
So she now plays acoustic violin backup for a couple of alternative/christian (take that any way you want) rock bands (which is exactly what she wanted to do anyway....she’s been playing gigs almost every weekend and has recorded on two CD’s    I haven’t heard Bach  since I converted, I did mention that I converted?.....so there is going to be some Bach in my writing..... I am writing my piece in fugue style.
But who knows, I may just  be having a fugue episode (consult DMS-III, abnormal psych diagnosis guide, if confused). My Editor is also a Psych Major....handy.

That’s my story......can this be half of my manuscript?

Kidding. I had to come up with something, and since the only pets I own are a hamster and a parakeet, saying the pet ate it is not an option, and it’s not true, (almost everything else is, though) ....I can’t plead sympathy because my Arthritis and Lupus are sleeping like babies od’ed  on qualudes (it’s really prednisone, and not nearly as much fun).
I will not sleep ( I don’t sleep anyway) until it’s done......I hope to email it to you no later than Monday.
I am writing about my conversion and I  the more days I that go by, the more interesting it may get.
Sorry about the spelling and grammar, I can’t show this to my Editor. She would Killllll me.
She made a note on my last draft....she claimed  I had written the longest sentence that she had ever read  in her life, and she has read Proust, so I was pretty proud of that.....I like creative punctuation, just stingy with periods

Very Sincerely and Sincerely working,

whatevernameiamusingthisweek

--------
There’s many a bestseller that could have been prevented by a good teacher.
Flannery O’Connor

Begin forwarded message:
From: “, Caitlin”
Date: July 12, 2007 6:28:09 PM EDT
To: Isabella
Cc: “ Julie” <
Subject: RE: Glen Manuscript

Dear Mrs. Isabella

            If I may be frank? this email made my day much cheerier. And I would be happy to accept it as a manuscript, but think that your Editor might be happier if I told you I won’t be sending out another batch of manuscripts until late Monday or Tuesday. So please, take your time, enjoy the process, and please send me what you create when you can, because I cannot wait to read it—stingy periods and all.

            All the Best,

                        Caitlin

----------------------

I have Bea's her permission, she read this.  She brought the boy home, rather he brought her home and only stayed ten minutes.  He was heading to Borders to get in line for the last Harry Potter book,  I don't think she's even read the first book.

What do they talk about??????

Photography, Art, Beauty, Faith: Beating back the encroaching insanity of the world.

It is too, a monstrosity, for a tattoo; but it could have been worse:

but all is forgiven because she is my best  model; mostly because she doesn’t care a whit if there is a camera 3 inches from her nose; And she lets the camera fathom depths  she would not reveal to the human eye. That is not carte blanche for another tattoo.  

 

Emo? Is that anything like Elmo?

Should a person take offense of if they have been described as going "emo"?

As a wise old fogey, the first place I checked was Urban Dictionary, a parent's best friend,
but it seems "emo" holds the record for number of defininitions,
none of which more a handful of the readers can agree on:

This one from the top ten:

-The word that holds the record for the most definitions at urbandictionary.com at 1,181.

I like this one better:

-A word people who are old like me come to urbandictionary.com to define so they can point out how they were emo fans before most people looking at this site were in elementary school. Old Person #1: Have you heard what people nowadays call 'emo'? Old Person #2: Yeah its so weird. I woulda called them Green Day clones back in '92. Old Person #1: Them was the days. Old Person #2: Yeah. I'm gonna go make fun of emo on urbandictionary. People will think I'm an old creep in a young person's world.

... only I would have to go back to "72, and dig up something like "deadhead".

I’ve got a bad feeling, emotion, sentiment, inkling, notion, speculation, hunch

S’io credesse che mia risposta fosse
A persona che mai tornasse al mondo,
Questa fiamma staria senza piu scosse.
Ma perciocche giammai di questo fondo
Non torno vivo alcun, s’i’odo il vero,
Senza tema d’infamia ti rispondo.

Warning: I am not in control of this post. It is being heavily influenced by a new Super Editing Program I just downloaded. I dare not say more. It is listening.

I hear ticking. I think my head is going to explode.

Why did my new spelling program just give me 12 synonyms for the word explode?

Hero, I am writing this just for you.
You complained I wasn’t writing anything, but just cutting and pasting quote that were causing you to do bodily harm to yourself (something about your head and a wall).
And  you better not be toying with me about coming home soon. I am going stir crazy. Actually, I have been there and back several times.

You would not believe the excuses I have used to get out of this house.

Did you know last week was National Engineer Appreciation Week? I convinced your father it wouldn’t be proper for me to let it pass without at least taking him out to dinner.  Pretty desperate.

And I think I may need a hamster intervention. I won’t go into too many details, but I think Thumblina may have an aptitude for chess.

If my head doesn’t detonate, burst, discharge, mushroom, blow up, counter-exemplify, or go boom in the near future, and my cell phone stops buzzing and beeping, and the other phone stops ringing, and the hamster stops spinning that silly wheel(which should be when the Ritalin wears off-she was chewing on an empty pill bottle that hadn’t been rinsed out). Yes, I let her play on the desk while I am on the computer. But I have stopped feeding her junk food. It is Lent.

Why the ticking, and impending brain explosion?  It started when I thought a live video iChat between Grandma and the Way Out West Gang was a good idea. It is a good idea, but I should have done it under more...optimal circumstances.

Just trying to log on should have been enough warning. After the adults spent 20 minutes getting nowhere, my sweet bro threw tossed handed the phone to his teenage son who started throwing words like Jabber, AOL, AIM, MSN, buddies and buddy lists at my little Mac mind.
I iChat. Period.
I don’t IM, I don’t Jabber, jibber, or breed unholy alliances by mixing Gchat, AOL, AIM or MSN with my .Mac  iChat.

I hit my iChat icon, and if there is anyone there, I talk to them.

I finally convinced the little whipper-snapper that we had to go .Mac to .Mac, or the deal was off. And one of us  hit the right button, because my bro’s mug popped up on my computer.

I also didn’t take into account that Grandma would react l like she was having an out of body experience.
I think Grandma thought I was doing some kind of witchcraft.

How different is it from talking on the phone?
It’s a phone call with pictures. Right?
And I have seen her talk back to her TV many times, so she has some experience with the concept.

I’m sure it didn’t help that the Internet connection we were “borrowing” was so slow, that there was an “X-file” quality about transmission. It wasn’t High Definition quality, but it wasn’t Mission Control to Apollo 8 static either.

She did say that she would like to see it again (?!).

Like a M*A*S*H* rerun.

I’ll take that as positive feedback

Are you finding this interesting, Hero; NO QUOTES.

about the editing program. shhhhhh.

I just got the Nuke of all spell check programs, Spell Catcher.  It’s in the free shareware stage and I have no idea what I am doing and it knows, so it thinks it’s the boss of me and intends to have a good time at my expense until I can reign it in.  
It does some really cool things, but it kind of like having a Great Dane on a leash; it may look like you are walking the dog, but everyone knows who would win if you wanted to go left and he wanted to go right.

A strange thing, sometimes, I swear I hear it snicker.  I also think that it may be bi-polar, or at the very least, has an attitude problem.(sixteen synonyms for the word “problem“. I can see where this is going).

I hope it is not a portent(augury, bodment, omen, presage, prognostic, harbinger, forerunner, shadow) that I am going to need that many terms to describe it’s behavior.
And why did it insist on spelling chat....chaT?  I just wanted to send a quick email and it turned into a tug of war. It wouldn’t allow me to correct the error, no matter what I did. So I had no choice but to choose another word, and, of course, it was more than happy to give me 50 suggestions.

I think it has authority issues.
I have already put the mute/muzzle on.  My lovely William from Cepstral Voices, I love your English accent, but I couldn’t stand to hear you say “curious” every time I spelled a word in an imaginative way.

I may be able to silence it, but I am not sure that I know how to disable the program.

I wonder why there are no synonyms offered for the word “disable”.

I’m beginning to wonder...maybe it’s like cyber slave trade.

Anybody catch an Amber Alert for a missing English TeachEr?

______________________________________________________

Hope this was more to your liking, Hero.

Why do I think you are going to make me delete this when you get home today?

Do you still have Laryngitis?  That means you can’t yell at me.

Tell Claudio, I think that “marble thing“ may be mixed up in all this.

GENERAL ANNOUNCEMENT

If you see the following person wandering around Chicago, wearing no socks, no gloves, no hat, and no coat, and the temperature is -2 F, and the wind chill is -50 F, do not approach. DO NOT offer your socks, gloves, hat or money to this person. 
She is not homeless.
REPEAT:SHE IS NOT HOMELESS!

And is you value your life, do not offer to take her for a burger.

:-)

told 'ja

FOR HERO AND BEATRICE

A Man Who Wasn't There

Last night I saw upon the stair
A little man who wasn't there
He wasn't there again today
Oh, how I wish he'd go away...

ps: i am not crazy;
and I did this whole thing in html language,
including the pictures.

Poem:from William Hughes Means "the little man who wasn't there"

read the rest by clicking below