You're Doing It Wrong

A new Wuthering Heights is on Masterpiece Theater. I saw an ad for it somewhere and thought, I haven’t seen WH in a long time. I’m going to watch that.

Apparently I’ve never watched WH nor have I read the book because this story is intensely weird and completely unfamiliar to me.

I watched the first half hour on Monday night and then ran to the bookshelf and found the paperback and have embarked on a full fledged Brontë obsession complete with wikipedia-ing the Yorkshire Moors and then flickring the same thing. Now I’m thinking a library trip is in order so I can grab a Brontë sister bio.

Shouldn’t I have gone through this about thirty years ago?

I thought maybe I had WH confused with Jane Eyre. Are there other old gothy romantic classics that I’m forgetting? I tried to formulate that into a query for search engine but didn’t get too far. Netflix didn’t help either but it gave me ideas for a ton of other movies to watch. I just put the most recent version of Masterpiece Theater’s Jane Eyre into the queue.

I don’t have much to say and forgot to upload more workshop pictures.

Instead you should follow Peter and Elise on their honeymoon. Best Travel Writing Ever. Sample 1 Sample 2.

I think those are chronologically reversed but you can figure it out.

Choice quote:

We turned the wrong way up our street at first and discovered that it terminates in an absolutely breathtaking overview of the entire city, with the Eiffel directly in the center. We were at a loss for words.

(That is, until I remarked that the roving light from the top of the tower is not unlike the eye of Sauron. Because we are huge, married nerds.)

Howdy: I have posted the 08 holiday newsletter at

https://www.pamrentz.com/pampage/xmas/v18/p1.html.

Enjoy! Please drop me a note or leave a comment. After you’ve read it.

Also, I’ll probably do a spam-mail on it this weekend so you may hear about it more than once.

Yep, it’s all about me, me, me.

Also, I’m shutting down the computer and keeping it off until Saturday morning and taking a much needed computer vacation. I know, one day. Hardly worth the trouble. Yet, I think it’s good for me.

Here’s Bob’s write-up on Michael Pollan.

As it turns out we’re going to another lecture tonight. Dr. Terence Love. Bob got these tickets at school so the content will be a big surprise for me. Here’s a quick quote:

Holistic Design: A Philosophical Framework

Holistic design of products, services, systems, and organizations depends on the objective material opportunities but even more on our inner subjective, emotional life. We are both the creative designers and aesthetic participants in those designs.

I don’t even understand what that means. Usually when I have low expectations I end up enjoying the lecture. We shall see.

It’s nice to get out and do stuff but all this getting home late coupled with an intensive work project all week has me feeling a bit fried.

The newsletter is 10 minutes away from being finished. I just need to proofread and check some links and I can cross that off my list. I want to make tomorrow a computer free day because I really need it. So unless I’m feeling spunky when I get home tonight: Saturday the dang newsletter will be finished.

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Equal Opportunity for Humiliation

In the past several years I’ve talked to a number of women my age who participate in adult women soccer leagues. It’s come up twice in the past month. They all insist it’s super fun and since I’m such a soccer fan I should try it.

When I protest that I’m not athletic they say no one is, it doesn’t matter. When I suggest my overachiever will kick in and I will want to train. They say, no you won’t, no one does. It’s a good workout. It’s fun.

I have never enjoyed playing team sports. I’m not good at kicking, hitting, aiming or catching. I prefer to beat people by being smart, mean and better organized, not by knocking them out of the way.

I never liked P.E. I remember starting sixth grade middle school a few years after that Title IX Equal Education whatever passed and we had to do P.E. with boys. Thanks a lot Patsy Mink. I dreaded that hour. Let’s take someone timid and uncoordinated and make them play with boys. It seems like we did sports with just girls, too, which I also didn’t like. I’ve lost a lot of brain cells since then. It’s hard to remember.

I did like gymnastics. And I have this memory of spending week after week in the gym during the Saturday Night Fever era and doing The Hustle (my new favorite wikipedia entry. I hurt my chin when I fell on the floor laughing). Could that be possible?

Back to team sports. It’s hard for me to get past those memories and think that all this time later I could try playing soccer and I’d have fun doing it. I have to admit I’m curious in a “doing something outside my comfort zone” way and I could use the exercise but I don’t need to add any more activities to my roster at the moment.

Here’s Bob’s review of bluegrass. He got some wonderful photos, too.

I swear I blogged about this a long time ago but where did all the old doctors go?

I had the same primary care doctor for at least 12-14 years. She moved on this summer but since my health insurance was changing with the new job I waited until now to deal with it. I’m looking at the clinic physicians and they’re all fresh-faced children. Aren’t there any doctors over 40?

This is a photo of my Dad’s workshop. I took a bunch of great ones over Thanksgiving but realize I neglected to post. More to come.

Bluegrass was super fun today and I will link to Bob’s review when he does it because he took photos and knows more about bluegrass than I do.

I loved all the music but my favorite band of the day was Steep Canyon Rangers. I’d love to make a joke about names of bluegrass bands but I’m tired and need to get to bed. I leave it to someone else.

But here’s a quick story. The Steep Canyon guys introduced a number like this: “We got any NASCAR fans out there?” Dead silence. Then maybe two people politely clapping. “Oh, great. Well, you’re going to love this one. I can tell.”

For the record, it was a great song and we all loved it.

Two super long days ahead.

But remember the holiday newsletter? You know, the one from Christmas 08? Yeah, it’s at about 98 percent. Don’t fret. This week. I promise.

The bunny showed up in the backyard again this morning. I haven’t seen him since the first of the year and assumed he’d moved on. I’ve decided to call him Bunny Carlos (in case you don’t get the reference). Our weed-choked lawn must be delicious. If he eats slugs, I will encourage him to breed.

For my one loyal reader who isn’t near the PAC NW, it might interest you to know that our state is completely ruined with flooding and mudslides. Washington Department of Transportation has a blog , Twitter and Flickr. Go WSDOT with the technology.

This photo set shows where Interstate 5 was shut down. I guess it’s open now for truck traffic and will open for passenger traffic later. Yikes. At Trader Joe’s this morning they said their truck couldn’t get through and I noticed the produce and meat sections were pretty scanty. Have I ever mentioned my fear of food riots? Just as a conceivable scenario. I’m not worried about it at the moment. No need to go into it now.

It’s my goal to get the holiday newsletter (you know, the Presidents’ Day holiday) done today. We’ll see how I do. I’m feeling pretty squirrely.

Tomorrow is writers group at my house and Sunday is bluegrass.

For a very long time I was adamant that I had a blog and I had Flickr. I wasn’t going to join any more online things. Then after CW I thought I should do that Live Journal thing – but 99.9% of the time I just cross-post what I post here.

Then succumbed to more peer pressure and joined Facebook. It’s a fine idea but at the end of the day, it’s just one more thing to log into and fritter away my time.

So now I’m looking at Twitter. I can see the appeal. Bob and I want to switch to iPhones next year so maybe I’ll do it then.

Meanwhile, I’m thinking I should open a Twitter page for Roger the guy in the office next door.

Sample posts:

“Wow, what a cough. Someone give Roger a cough drop.”

“Smells like Dinty Moore for Roger again today.”

“Just signed for Roger’s office supplies. Looks like a giant box of tape.”