Month: February 2011

Just got back from Chicago

I love my maw. I took the Megabus down to Chicago to visit her on Saturday morning. The ride was uneventful. The bus did not run out of gas on the interstate as it did one time previously. I did not sit next to anyone who reeked of pot. And I didn’t have anyone shouting into her cell phone at her baby daddy the whole way there. You do have to sit through about half an hour of people devouring their fast food after the mid-way rest stop. But still, not bad for thirty bucks round-trip.

In Chicago my mom and I caught a movie, went to a nice little Italian place (I had calamari, mussels and clams), and visited the Adler Planetarium. The highlight was a screening at the museum of a half-hour film on modern telescopes. It had an overview of telescopes, both earth-bound and extraterrestrial, taking in data in visible, x-ray, UV, infrared, radio, and gamma light.

I also exposed myself to the horrors of online anonymity on 4chan. Why didn’t someone tell me about this sooner!? You can google “shovel dog,” “I can count to potato” or “4chan: Should I kill myself?” to see what I mean.

Isaac

Cedar Rapids

I went to the movie “Cedar Rapids” with my mom today. I loved the movie – I recommend it. I do NOT recommend taking your 64 year-old mother to it, though.

Among the novel vulgarities I learned:

“greasy old twat”

“that fucking cunt-stain”

“What do you call an anorexic woman with a yeast infection? A quarter-pounder with cheese.”

But despite the crude language, my mom and I both laughed the whole way through.

Isaac

Wood Lake Nature Center

Spotted there: a crow. A kid with Down syndrome who yelled “Hiii!” at me about fifty times. Deer poop. And a lot of soon-to be-melted snow.

 

And yesterday for Valentine’s Day I hung out with two of my Fabulous Boyz, drank homemade beer, and had a delicious hoagie prepared by a quite drunk waiter.

 

Isaac

Went to Westwood Hills Nature Center today

I looked for the pair of great horned owls I had seen two winters prior, but they were well-hidden and were not calling. All in all I saw one bird, plus or minus one bird.

The visit made going into St Louis Park – even when I didn’t have to – worth because of the sun and moon. The sun has been setting later and later (I have heard we are gaining five minutes a day) and the crescent moon was prominent. It will be full on the 18th. I also some some tracks from a heavy animal, maybe a coyote.

Isaac

S.P.E.C.I.A.L

How to improve this trait?

Strength –

weightlifting, strength circuit with dumbbells

Perception –

birding, sketching, photography

Endurance –

running, cross-country skiing

Charisma –

inviting people over to apartment, visiting family. even watching movies might help

Intelligence –

actively studying

Agility –

lunges with dumbbells, tree climbing

Luck –

there is no such thing as luck – Han Solo. just be prepared – “Chance favors the prepared mind,” per Louis Pasteur

Isaac

Toss the sticky notes

Are all one’s thoughts like passing clouds? Touching nothing, present
only distantly, wispy and indistinct, forgotten and replaced as soon
as they have left one’s view?

I pondered this question or doubt recently as I counted up all the
notes I had put down on three-by-five note cards, sticky notes, and
legal pads over the past month or so. Each note cued me towards a
task, idea, concept or phrase I meant to pursue at the time I wrote it
down. But as I sift through the notes in the present the voice
conveyed by them seems distant. The urge to pursue it seems weaker.
The purpose seems vague. The reason for having written it down is hard
to remember. Obviously I had once considered it worth pursuing. Yet
what is it now but part of a pile of paper?

I suppose a sense of anxiety is responsible for some of my doubts. I
want to be a person of action. But so often my resolve is fleeting. I
fail to seize the resolve of the moment while it is there, instead
filing the thought away for later. I am not in school, some of my
proudest attributes have stagnated, I spend a lot of time reading
while sipping coffee like a retired person.

I say anxiety makes me think this way. Anxiety is like fear. Fear an
effective inciter of action. Very well then. May my anxiety provoke
action and urge it on. May I put down my goddamn three-by-five note
cards and comics and go do something, advance my life, learn in a
systematic way, make money, form memories, be with my friends, visit
my family. And perhaps most important to me personally: go outside!

My thoughts needn’t be like a passing cloud. Instead I will make each
one a call to duty and a license to action!

Isaac

Kurt has died

On Tuesday 30 November 2010, Kurt died. I have only gotten to writing a proper encomium now, three months later. In the morning of that day I saw him eagerly scratching to get out of his cage as he does every morning when he hears that I am awake. But I was running a little late in my routine, so I didn’t let him out for the oatmeal breakfast he usually takes alongside me. I left for work at 12:30 pm without letting him out. When I got home at 9:30 pm, I went into the kitchen and had a glass of water without hearing him stir. When I went over to his cage I found him in the typical dead rodent position and I knew immediately he was dead. I bagged him up and put him in the freezer. A necropsy will rule out or confirm my suspicion: an upper gastrointestinal bleed from swallowing a piece of his cage. He had a little blood around his anus and a few dark, compact turds in his cage consistent with passing blood. Not finding any wire in his gut would make me feel a little less guilty over his death.

I will stuff Kurt to have him around. I already have the borax and cotton balls. I will miss him. I am glad I took dozens of pictures of him recently. I keep thinking about him. I feel bad about leaving the chicken-wire with him and about not taking him out in the morning like I usually do. I knew he had been picking at the top of his cage but I didn’t consider that he would swallow any wire. Still, he had a good life, and two and a half years is a long time for a rat. Also I don’t think he suffered when he died. Indeed it may have had nothing to do with the wire. An information pamphlet from the Humane Society tells me that 2.5 to 3 years is a normal lifespan for a rat. I had thought it was longer. But recalling my previous three rat companions (Razar, Sasha, and Rat), I realize that each of them had lived about that long. It only seemed like longer because I was a kid.

I mentioned an informational pamphlet from the Humane Society. I have it because I have already adopted another rat. I have named him Carl (an improvement over “Dozer,” his previous name) and he is from a group of three brother rats. He is named after Carl Sagan, just as Kurt was named after Kurt Vonnegut. He cost five bucks. He is already 2.2 years old, so he doesn’t have much time left, as if a rat ever does. I have already introduced Carl to my friends and family and taken a bunch of pictures of him. He has adopted many of the same habits and idiosyncrasies of Kurt. We have bonded well. I hope his two brothers are in a good home.