Why is technology so alluring? The idea of a laptop computer that is able to be hauled everywhere, wireless networks (especially ones that you have craftily hacked), MP3 players, external hard drives, digital cameras...the list goes on and on. There must be something wrong with it methinks, but 'damned if I'm not hooked!

The house is quiet and dark this morning. The sun has not yet risen, and cold and silence seem to creep from room to room, looking for sleepy victims wrap up in their somber arms. Christmas was lovely, better in many ways than the last few; truly full of joy and peaceful. T.M.O.I.A. drove up from Boise in his Suburu for Midnight Mass with us, and stayed until Sunday evening. We gave him a pop-gun. Life is full and thoughtful and slowly taking in all the bustle of the last week. It is comforting to be alone on this chilly morning at sunrise. I can't explain this relief at being by myself; but I am content.

What is there to say when words will not do?
Melody pounds through my brain like a ship floundering in the storm
Emotion rages with unbridled fury
And the lights flicker with the hit of the bass
California, I am returning to your golden shores and hills
And the Polyphonic Spree undoes the last
Yes, the last of all that I fear
For she is so far away...
She makes my head

Spin around

These guys are on CRACK, but they sound damn good

It is a frosty world here...I am reminded of a harsh English winter from a Dickens or Bronte novel. So bitterly, unnecessarily cold! O sun, where have you gone and left me here so cold...

Time no longer has any meaning. Day and night blend together into a soupy fog of half-existence. The day is not yours, nor is the night. Eating regularly has become difficult, and sleeping is pretty much out the window. I know now why they say working graveyard is hell. It is interesting as well though...the night shift is quiet, and it is fun to sit in front of the store on our break, in office chairs stolen from the work table, listening to the silence of the night, subtle under a continuous drone of crack-smoking philosophy from my coffee-drinking, chain-smoking, crazy, crazy old man of a co-worker.

Whey hey up she rises
Whey hey up she rises
Whey hey up she rises ear-li in the mornin'!

Well, the Rambler rose and fell today. It runs great, everything is back together, and life should be peachy...but this is the infamous $100 Rambler we're talking about. I got about two miles of an initially successful test drive out of it when the oil light came on. I fiddled with it, but in the end Nathan and I had to walk home (in the BUTT-COLD!) and get the beastly '61 International truck to tow the car back. In the garage there is once again, good news and bad: The gear on the end of the oil pump has stripped out, which is good news because it easy to fix; the bad news is, as usual, finding parts for a car with a rare ALUMINUM BLOCK ENGINE whose loving mother company went out of existence in 1968 tends to be travailous. But hey, it could be a lot worse.

Be Good Tanyas at 1 in the morning
Lends a surreal haze
To a soul filled with mourning
As I drink these bitter drops
Rain falls without warning
Silent on my book

"...in the midnight moonlight...midnight; moonlight..."

-B.G.T.

The day is done. I am tired and thoughtful, but the night is beautiful. I think I'll go read about the Baudelaire Orphans; maybe their troubles will be worse than mine. And for now, in the eloquent words of Jimmy Dean:

"Well, now, there, then."

I've been encouraged, (or rather, it's been demanded of me) to write about something beautiful or at least interesting around here. I guess I haven't really made much effort to enjoy this place, though I know I ought to; It's my own home after all, my original stomping ground as it were. So yesterday morning I was sitting in my uncle's kitchen looking out at his yard and the fields spreading beyond; he had gone to work, and his wife to the store, leaving the house empty and silent. I realized all at once how much I enjoy a quiet, empty house. For good or ill, it seems to be one of the most relaxing things in world (does this mean I can't get married? All those screaming kids! My dad has 9 of us!). I also noticed that beyond a quiet house, living in the countryside is perhaps one of the most important aspects to living a peaceful, thoughtful life. The biggest reason for my recent dissatisfaction with the places I have been living is simply this: no peace. But who am I to make claims on life? Charity comes about through being among others, not hiding in a corner protecting yourself from...what? A house full of good people doing worthy things (like seminar at Dr. Ferrier's) is a great thing too. So, as for my appreciation of beauty here in the Northwest, I love the wide spaces, the little pockets of forest, and the old, settled houses. There a lot of silence to be had up here. I grew up caressed by it. It truly is beautiful here.

What means this?
Hast thou a flame?
Your meaning, sir!
Truth? For shame!
Of the rolled kind?
Even so.
Are we, then, all lost?
Only you are to blame.
And what of myself?
Still?
As you see.
Damn! So; the same.
Come, come sir! The flame...

It is the time of night be in bed
But this glowing screen laughs instead
And wordless thoughts are overhead
Singing to memory what was always said
Late, under stars and clouds of lead