Name: Gregory, aka "uglyelf"
Posts by uglyelf:
- Akismet (A must have plugin to prevent spam from comments and contact forms)
- All in One SEO Pack (A must have way to add Search Engine Optimization to your site and every page)
- Contact Form 7 (A simple contact form. There are others, you’ll probably need one and this has been fine for me.)
Executable PHP widgetPHP Code Widget [edit: this was renamed at some point] (A nice plugin that lets you use WordPress PHP inside a widget the same way you do with pages / templates / posts. I use it to list recent blog posts, excluding my private members posts)- Google Analytics for WordPress (A must have plugin to track the traffic on your site)
- Google XML Sitemaps (A must have plugin that makes it easy for google to map your site accurately)
- Really Simple CAPTCHA (A simple way to cut out bots from using your contact forms)
- WordPress.com Stats (Gives a nice graphical way to see how your site is being used)
- WordPress Database Backup (It regularly emails you a copy of the text from your database. If you have to move your site suddenly, you could use this to recreate the content — except the pictures)
- WP Super Cache (Speeds up the delivery of your site by caching pages that haven’t changed. I believe I remember configuring this to work with nginx.)
- Reliable Twitter (It nice to keep your front page always a little different. Mirror your twitter posts to your site to do just that!)
- WP-Polls (People like polls. — actually I’ve never used them. But I like knowing that I could…)
- WordPress Access Control
- Frontpage Manager
- Profile Pic
- WP-Members (Not to be confused with WP-Member — not kidding, that’s different)
- WP Hide Dashboard
Be good to your wrists (and shoulders)!
August 9th, 2011This is a brief post about wrists. Your wrists are good to you, be good to your wrists. If your wrists are hurting, it’s your fault. Not theirs. Stop being a dick to them. As per normal, I’m just going to link to people who are smarter than me. Actually it’s wrist and shoulders… moving on.
This post isn’t really for regular folks, it’s for people who ask more of their bodies. If you’re a regular folk whom happens to have pain from too much time on the computer or other repetitive, sit-on-your-butt work, try this post from the good folks at BoingBoing. And remember to “hold your wrists in a neutral position” while using a keyboard or mouse. That means elevated (flat). Not wresting on the desk or a gel pad. Actively holding up your wrists like a pianist will take care of most simple pain. It will also make you stand like a dinosaur for a while, but you’ll get through it.
For athletes — hand balancers, equilibre, acrobats, aerialists or anyone who asks a more from their wrists:
Start with this forum post. Did you click on it? Those bold-blue words are a link. What? Are you new to the internets? It’s like a series of tubes, invented by Al Gore or some bullshit.
If you’re lazy or in a hurry, the short version is:
Get into a pushup support position on your fists with your hands turned sideways. As you lower into the pushup, allow the wrists to bend outward and your bodyweight to descend upon the back of your wrists and hands. As you ascend out of the pushup, straighten the wrists simultaneously along with the elbows returning back up onto your fist.
– Coach Sommers
And watch this:
But really, that forum is great. Go spend some time there.
That was from Coach Sommers, who has raised a lot of Olympians and has long preached gymnastic training for strength.
As you can imagine, pushing his kids through such rigors he’s also very concerned with keeping them healthy. Thus, the wrist exercises.
I came to his website through this post by Ido Portal (who I was lucky enough to train with last fall). And this excellent post on daily preparation for training.
If you’re lazy, then there is no help for you. Go read that post.
I do all the wrist stuff he lists there, as well as all the shoulder stuff there and on his other post here.
I don’t do the capoeira stuff. Just the shoulder stuff.
The two important shoulder series are here:
And here:
And another great one from Coach Sommers is an exercise called Wall Extensions.
Just as a frame of reference. Ido had us warm up any handbalancing with:
1) 10 dorsal pushups
2) 10 finger-tip pushups, elbows in. The fingers should “gather” the ground actively, not passively resting on your fingertips.
3) 10 wrist pushups
4) 10 “first knuckle” pushups. That’s just a pushup where your elbows are locked (they never bend during the exercise) the thumb stays off the ground and you push the palm off the ground until vertical while leaving the fingers flat. Push into the knuckle behind the index finger. Don’t let your thumb touch the ground. Lower back down to your palm. Never let your thumb touch the ground. It’s only a movement in your hand, not your arms. The elbows stay locked, the inside of the elbow angled toward the wall in front of you (like you’re doing a handstand).
Why should you listen to Ido? Because Ido is an unbelievable badass!
OK. That’s the short version. Now go do wrist pushups!
-UglyElf
quick note
July 22nd, 2011OK.
So I haven’t been writing much lately. It’s one part busy, one part feeling like nothing I have to say is worth saying. It looks like Both TeaElf and TangoElf are now blogging on their own blogs, which for some weird reason makes me feel like I failed them a little. And in truth, all writing has been hard for me lately, fiction, reviews, and journaling. I don’t know what’s up with that.
Anyway, I’m going to try and get some updates made for the site. I have two books I want to review. Renovation is coming up. Circus training is crazy and fun, if equally frustrating and discouraging. And I should probably write something about the frustrations of recovering from minor surgery while training like an eighteen-year old at age thirty-five.
I’ll be back to you soon. Promise.
Ow my nose.
May 28th, 2011
still alive
Hey, all! Thanks for the well wishing! I’m doing fine. I knew I shouldn’t have worried, but I did. Here’s the short version. I had three procedures: “Right endoscopic maxillary antrostomy”, “submucous resection of turbinates”, and “septoplasty”.
Stop reading now if you are squeamish. I’m not kidding. This is all pretty gross.
The first one was removing an area of bone to increase the opening between the right cheek sinus and the nasal passages. Then he removed a bunch of “gunk” — apparently a technical term — from that sinus and put a piece of degradable padding in there. This will take a year to fully heal. Yuck.
The second was carving out some tissue from my over sized turbinates, basically just making the breathing passages a little bigger.
The third one was more intense then he thought it was going to be. He wanted to carve down the deviated septum a little, again to help me breath, but it turned out to be the bone that was deviated, not just the cartilage. It’s what I get for having a rough childhood. So he detached the cartilage, cut off some of the bone, scraped off some of the cartilage, and then sowed it all back together. I now have something I think he called a ‘mattress stitch’, as well as several individual stitches, holding the inside of my nose together.
-Ugly Elf-
Nutritional Primer
May 13th, 2011Spring has sproinged and I’ve notice a lot of my friends are making newly-woken-from-hibernation grumbling noises about wanting to eat better.
Awesome!
Of course I encourage this. I’m posting a primer on how to eat well, linking to some good articles on MDA. Mark’s Daily Apple can be a little overwhelming, so I’m suggesting you start with four specific articles, acquaint yourself with the site in general, and read more when you have time.
Congratulations on eating better! You’re doing a great job!
Caveat: this site (and my own diet) are on the extreme side. I think if you push yourself too far in too fast, you’ll abandon it. Maybe I’m wrong. But my gut says that for you, you should learn all you can and implement what you’re comfortable with. Think of it like a dietary grammar, you should know the rules before you break them.
This (go briefly glance but then come right back) — http://www.marksdailyapple.com/ — is the site I get much of my information from. But please do click through the links within the articles to their sources. I sometimes disagree with MDA, but I also often agree. It’s a little dizzying, so to get started, go to the getting started page (again, just a quick peak please, then come back):
Getting Started.
Maybe read all the titles before you click on any of the links? Did you notice there’s an entire section with eleven articles on Eating Well on the Cheap? So don’t think you can’t afford it. You can!
OK, that’s still overwhelming. For you, start with the discussion about protein, then learn about sugars, make friends with fats, and last (for now) get to know grains.
1. Protein — Dietary Protein; and also Protein Amounts in Foods
2. Sugar — Definitive Guide to Sugars Note: This is really important. Remember when I said you should click through to the links in these articles? You SHOULD. One of the best sources of information on how the body actually WORKS with food is in this article. It’s the link to Dr. Lustig’s Video, The Bitter Truth About Sugar. It’s long, but you really really should watch it. I watched it a little bit at a time. That was the only way I could fit it into my schedule. So even if you can only watch the first five minutes now, go ahead and start. I’m not linking to it, you should have no trouble finding it in that sugar article if you’re actually reading it!
3. Fats — Fats and Getting over you fear of fats (and getting rid of your mood swings). Do click the link to read the rest of the story.
4. Grains — Why Grains are Unhealthy and Definitive Guide to Grains
Optional (I promised you’d only have to read four). I thought the article on cholesterol was really interesting.
True story (and I can show you the letters from my doctor), a year ago my doctor threatened to put me on statins. This year, with nearly the same scores, he says I’m super healthy and doing great. He now believes the same things that article says, but a year ago he didn’t at all. Doctors are funny people.
Notice you’re missing something SUPER important in that list I gave you. Vegetables. For now, eat as many vegetables as you can of as many colors as possible. What you’re building towards is five colors of vegetable per meal, every meal (even breakfast). But for now, just eat a lot of vegetables and have a lot of variety. Then look up better information when you have time. (hint: make the time.)
When considering fruit, it makes a great dessert and a great snack. Enjoy. But keep it to snacks and desserts. Don’t let it kill your appetite for protein or veggies.
Wait! You say. What about my
We need to define moderation. Moderation is an exception to the rules that keep you within your goals. Are you within your goals? If so, there is some room for “moderation”. If you’re not, there is no such thing as moderation. Don’t cheat yourself.
That said:
I think the most important thing you can do with food choices right now is to celebrate your successes and not dwell on any lapses. Positive reinforcement will guide you down the right path. The mind is a powerful thingum. If you try this way of eating, you’ll see positive changes and like them. Don’t think about your weight, just watch your shape. Give it two months and be amazed! Last note: this is not a diet to be followed for a short while before reverting to your previous crap way of eating (yup, I said it — crap), better eating is a way of life.
-Ugly Elf-
WordPress Plugins
May 3rd, 2011I’m helping a friend set up a WordPress site for the first time. In the process, I needed to send her the plugins I use, and a brief explanation as to why.
I figure that’s useful stuff to know, so I’m going to put it up here and you can use it too.
What are your favorite plugins? Add them in the comments. Extra points if you can tell me a good plugin for a flickr widget, and one for a flickr gallery.
Day 2 – Interlude
March 28th, 2011I’m sitting at the end of a five & 1/2 minute hallway.
Unknown Highland Ruins
Actually it’s only about a minute long, but the musically obsessed / literati out there will appreciate the reference to a song and a book written respectively by a sister / brother duo. I got a good four hours of sleep last night, then my good friend Insomnia dusted the sand from my eyes, I eventually got bored, showered, and grabbed my laptop and headed outside so I wouldn’t borrow my travel mates. I’m now sitting in the hallway outside our room (room #5 at the Bazpacker’s hostel) taking advantage of the free time to catch up with you, dear reader.
I’m not going to spend to much time on Day 2. I want to get to the next, Day 3, because it was awesome. That should hint to you that I’m at the beginning of Day 4.
When I left you last time, Insomnia and I were hanging out in the common room and the whereabouts of my travel companions were unknown. I wish I could tell you they were on a great adventure: fighting soccer hooligans, trapped in The City Below, walking with ghosts, carousing, fucking, haunting a graveyard, or even pulling the comely inhabitants of Scotland. They were none of these things. At six in the morning when I left the library of Castle Rock Hostel, I passed through the common room and they were there, sober as dowagers, chatting away. They swore they hadn’t moved all night and Axel had only recently left them. I don’t know how I could have slipped past without running into them, but I had. Good thing too, Day 1 wouldn’t have written itself.
So my insomnia worked out for me then, we were all sleepless. It’s not as welcome now, they’re sleeping like babes, and I shall be tired today.
Anyway, we met up. I tried to get another half hour of sleep and failed; Cameron cleaned up and Adam read. We regrouped and headed into the Edinburgh morning. It was beautiful. We’ve been damn lucky with the weather.
Cameron & Adam, CityLink bus station, Edinburgh
With wifi we had our ticket numbers and went back to the bus terminal. The bus ran late but we met and chatted with another American expatriate. His name was Jay, he played American Football for the University of Edinburgh while pursuing his graduate degree in creative writing. Nice guy. He’d personally met a (grammar) hero of mine, Geoffrey Pullum. Jay said Pullum was a brilliant but intimidating and snarky professor. I wasn’t surprised.
Taken from the window
On the bus we slept. I slept a little they slept a lot. I got some beautiful photos of the Highlands out the window. We alighted in Inverness stumbled groggily to our hostel and then did stuff. OK! OK! I’m tired! I’ll try to be more descriptive than that. We at at the Castle Tavern, which is right next to the Hostel. Adam and I each had the cod and loved it. Cameron had a vegetable panino and hated it. We all drank scotch (
Cameron & Scotch
After that we went and checked out Inverness Castle. Although the site has been home to castles since 1057 — nearly a thousand-effing-years! — the current castle was built in 1837. It’s home to the Sheriff Court of Inverness and as such is not open to the public. But we walked about outside it. It was good. I have to be honest, this day is a blur. Sleeplessness is not good for one’s memory. We did have a beautiful walk along the banks and over the bridges of the river Ness.
Shut up and eat your muffin
And the quote of the day was: “Why are you sitting on my chest?” “Shut up! It’s time for your muffin.”
Day 3 will be a much more epic post, I promise. For now, I’m waking up the troops so we can be on our way. I’m doing it with this song (is that cruel?)
Enough. I must pack up.
-UE
Euroland Day 1 – The will to drive myself sleepless
March 26th, 2011
Early morning Edinburgh
Apparently I can get insomnia even in Scotland.
This is not a fact I was hoping to discover. Anyhoo, it’s four am, I have to get up in two hours to catch a Mega-Bus, and I figured I’d use the time to blog day 1. Fortunately, not all that much has happened, so this should be short.
My flight was technically KLM, but really Ghetto Delta. It was direct from Portland to Amsterdam, with a four hour layover before a transfer to Edinburgh. Normally I have no trouble sleeping on planes, but my insomnia had come back all last week and didn’t loose its grip just because I was shimmying across time zones.
I should confess to you, that for about a week now I’ve had a drowning, haunting feeling that something will go imminently wrong in my life. I rarely pay attention to such fanciful fears, so I assumed that when I hit the ground in the U.K. I would have a pint and the dreadful feeling would shed like a snake’s skin. I was wrong.
Anyway, I can’t complain about the flight. It was under-booked, so, luxury of luxuries, I had two seats alone together: window and isle. I’d requested “gluten free” meals, which turned out to consist almost entirely of rice (which I didn’t eat, but I came prepared: more on that later). The night was long and I flew through it. I tossed and turned. I tried every imaginable position. I didn’t sleep a wink. I watched Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows; pt 1 and later The Kings Speech. I remember them both well, but it’s a flavorless, oatmeal kind of memory.
I have a special kind of insomnia. At least I think it’s special, I haven’t met anyone else who confesses to the same symptom. When I can’t sleep, it’s an itch that keeps me awake. Literally. A small, persistent itching will afflict some random splotch of skin. If I scratch it, it will move to some other random, splotch of skin. Right now it’s the back of my left hand and my left temple. I’m not bothering to scratch either. They’ll move on their own anyway.
When I say the flight was itchy and uncomfortable, I don’t want you to blame the airline. It was a fine flight. I was not a fine passenger.
We landed in daylight, 11:23 am local, Euro time. I stumbled through the airport with my backpack and a small, Powell’s-Books paper bag I kept the few extra things I couldn’t pack. I was bringing some shoes for Tea Elf, so as soon as I unloaded them I’d have no need for the paper bag. Anyway, I found my gate (D52) and did like the only other waiting traveler: I lay down on my bags and closed my eyes. An hour and ten minutes later I awoke in the middle of a throng. There were perhaps a hundred other people who had materialized in the hour I’d slept. The first hour of sleep I’d had since Thursday night’s four hours. It was Saturday afternoon by now.
There was some triviality of a second security moving from Amsterdam to U.K., I was on the plane and, thankfully, I awoke in Scotland with another forty minutes of sleep behind my eyes. I’m breezing by something here and it’s a diservice. This second set of security was an adventure because of my provisions. I brought pemmican.
Although I break my diet on these trips, I don’t go stupid about it. When the only breakfast available is a sugary pastry, I don’t eat. Last time I hunted for food; sometimes to the annoyance of my travel-mates — may they rest in peace. No! I kid! I kid! I didn’t murder them. They’re fine. Mostly…. So this time I brought Grass Fed Pemmican from U.S. Wellness meats. Each (cherry-and-honey-free) bar has nothing but beef, tallow, and salt. 20 grams of lean protein and all the free-range fat a body could want. And before the ignorati out there start to cry about my cholesterol or some bullshit about hardened arteries, My HDL is through the roof, my triglicerides are on the floor (52) and you need to read this article: The Definitive Guide to Cholesterol. And yes, my doctor agrees with me.
But the salient point here: each stick looks like a poorly formed bar of plastic explosives. Also, it’s technically raw beef (dried below 114°F). There are some good articles (here’s one!) that explain why this is “safe” (yeah, irony quotes…). The portland security girl stared at my bag longer than I’ve ever seen a scanner operator stare at anything. Never mind that’s my food you’re irradiating, I was a little nervous. The dutch operators were quick with the scanner, but slow with the hand inspection. They were reading the tiny, cover-your-ass words printed on the package from U.S. Wellness that read “keep frozen” when I spoke up: “Protein bars.” It was only a little lie. That was when they noticed my Vibram Five fingers and my blue hair. They laughed, gave me my bag, and let me through.
Sometimes it helps to be a freak. (Gooble Gobble.)
Where was I? Right! So I have 17 of these things, at least at trip’s start, minus the two I ate on the plane. Hopefully I can just use them for breakfast. We’ll see.
Ugly Elf note: it’s 5:09 am here. I’ve been writing an hour. See how much I love you?
I landed in Scotland at the appointed hour, bought a tea from Costa, tried to board the bus I needed, bus 100, was rejected for not having a ticket, bought a ticket and was forced to surrender my tea — no beverages allowed on the bus. I considered mutiny but then decided there would be other teas. Je ne regrette rien.
Last time, Sommer, Michael, and I took the Waverly Station exit to get to the Castle Rock Hostel. This time I got off at the West End station and walked up from the other side. I think the walk was about the same, but it was an earlier stop so it might have saved me a little time.
Castle Rock Hostel, now with added Scaffolds.
I was only a little shocked to see the hostel completely covered in scaffolding. [I'll have to remember to insert the picture] Upstairs I found my new room just across the hall from the room we had last time I was here.
I thought I’d reserved a double twin room (two twin beds). Apparently I only had a double bed. That would work out in the end (more on this in a minute), but I blinked awkwardly at Cameron when I saw only one bed and the two of us. I hoped she didn’t think I was being skeezy. I met Adam, Cameron’s friend and the completing member of our party for the Edinburgh to Inverness portion of this trip. He’s awesome. I approve. He out-geeks me, but only by a little. We talked Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Portal, and American McGee’s Alice. I was out of the conversation when he brought up another game, Braid, I need to play.
We went to the Black Bull for dinner. They were out of fish and chips. I cried a little. But I had the chicken Kiev, which I peeled out of its breading and enjoyed its butter-and-garlic middle. I had a beer, but it was unremarkable. I should say I’ve been so grain free as to forgo beer lately. Having a beer, breaded chicken, and chips is a big departure from my usual diet. I’m planning to get fat and ache. So be it. It’s worth saying that the waitress was beautiful. I have a thing for dark hair and blue eyes. I recently met an aerialist in Portland who fits the profile. I have a crush. I’ll get over it.
We came back to the hostel after monkeying around on the scaffolding, and I showered while Cam and Adam went to the common room and did some planning. I joined them. Cam was sitting down next to a man I didn’t look at and assumed was Adam. I jammed them together in order to fit onto the tet-a-tet and only later realized this was not Adam. Bear in mind how little sleep I had. Somehow we ended up with another crew member for the night. A lovely young fellow named Axel (spelling?) who is getting his English degree in Creative writing at Tufts university in Boston. He’s originally from Argentina, but the only word I heard him speak with an accent was “tattoo”. Everything else sounded perfectly american.
The four of us went out and got a little lost, but eventually ended up at the Last Drop mostly accidentally. It, too, is a place I went last time I was here. This time, none of the natives engaged us in conversation. I missed Steven (the Last Drop) and Steve (Black Bull). I hope they’re well.
Cam and Adam huddled, drank orange juice, and discussed something important. Axel and I talked circus and creative writing. I was deliriously tired. I hope I made some sense, but I doubt it.
We came back to the hostel, tried and failed to find the bus station we needed the next morning, tried again and succeeded, and came back to the hostel.
I went to bed. The others were going to hang out for a bit down in the commons. We have to get up at 7:00am to catch our bus. Cameron was supposed to stay in the room with me, and Adam, a late member to our party, had a bed in the dorm. I slept for maybe an hour, tossed for a while, read a hundred pages of Rothfuss’s Name of the Wind, tossed some more and grabbed my laptop at four am to head downstairs. There was never any sign of Cam. She’s likely off on an adventure, I hope she’s safe.
Anyway, it’s 5:46am now. There’s an hour and change until I have to get up, so I’m going to post this thing and head up to the room and pack, maybe have a pemmican bar. 
I got the will to drive myself sleepless,
-Ugly Elf
Euroland 2011 – Zero Day
March 25th, 2011
PDX
I tell you all this so you will understand that when I say I’m eating at an airport bar, you will understand the reckless, devil-may-cry mood I’m in. The restaurant in question is a Rogue Brewery — a dubious establishment in the best of circumstances.
Sure, there was a time when Rogue was a flagship beer. One of the best Oregon beers… one of the best beers in the world. But as anyone who’s visited the brewery knows, their award winning brewing stopped in 2002, what remained was simply brewing. After a strong decade of accolades, they’ve had nothing to be proud of sense then. They cut the quality of their ingredients to stitch a few extra dollars onto their bottom line. Their head brewer “went another way”. Now they’re the Ass-King of beers, right along with their idiot cousin, McMenamins. At least McBeer has fun places to go, even if their beer and food are embarrassments to the northwest.
Enough of that. I’m travelling again. Like every great adventure it begins with a wait. I’ve been waiting for days, for weeks, for months! — in my own little way. But then, I didn’t really know I was waiting until now.
Now I’m through security, well into my second drink, and I know exactly that I am waiting.
If only the waiting were a guarantee of a great adventure. While the wait is a sure thing, what comes next could be anything. I’ll do my best to keep track of it all here; a little more real time than last July. Last July… the trip began so well and ended so terribly.
Oh, July.
Right! About the trip! Well this just gets stranger and stranger. I’ve kept to the policy I made after the Evil X dumped me. When I realized how much extra money I would have (she cost A LOT to support), I decided then that if anyone abroad invited me to come visit them, I would go. So when Tea Elf invited me to come while she was studying in St. Andrew’s, Scotland, I said yes. I wanted to go back to the U.K. and see more rural areas anyway. The trip quickly turned into Scotland, Ireland, and Northern Wales, but then I realized how much time off of training this was. I axed the Welsh part of the trip, changed my tickets, and now I’m going to see Scotland and Ireland.
The last time, Sommer did a brilliant job of making an itinerary. This time Tea Elf and I are mostly winging it. I took care of finding us places to stay; she took care of major transportation, but we’re going to use Google Maps for public transportation locally, and we don’t really know what we’re doing on any given day.
It’s a fucking adventure.
Man I keep getting off track. I blame drinking almost not at all and now having these two drinks do their impression of a Sea Monster in my belly — ahoy thar.
Anyway. The plan.
I arrive in Edinburgh tomorrow after nearly a day of travelling. It will be a little before four. I’ll take bus 100 to the same stop I took last year, and hike the same hill I did last year, and stay the night in the same hostel I did last year. I knew it was good, so I picked it. I hope Sommer and Michael won’t mind — it’s just for the night. The next day we take a bus to Inverness, the Capital of the Highlands, and far to the north. We’ll stay in inverness for two nights, then take a couple of train rides, including the Harry Potter train route (not the steam train, that’s only available in the summer) and a ferry to get to the Isle of Skye. Two nights there and then we head back to Edinburgh. The plan that night is to dance tango with the locals, then, the next morning, catch a flight to Dublin. In Dublin we’re renting a car and driving down to Cork for two nights. That will be our base as we do a little international road tripping. I hope to get to the western coast and see some more castles. Then stay the night of the 3rd (of April) in Dublin and fly out on the 4th. I have Straps class on the 5th and a normal life awaiting me.
Anyway, me and my blue hair need to make our way to the terminal. Not long until the point of no return.
Take care, Elves.
-UE-
En Passant
February 16th, 2011There’s nothing like a family reunion to take an exquisite index of every flaw you may / or may not have. The downside is: I’m a stress ball with stress-ball shoulders so tight that hunched is the new relaxed. The upside is: I can’t feel like any of the misfortunes that ever landed in my lap weren’t justifiably earned. That is, I don’t feel sorry for myself at all. How could I? I’m right where I’m supposed to be.
JT FTW
This isn’t such a bad thing. It doesn’t matter what I do, everyone who loves me will have the same response; whether I’m strangling baby seals or curing cancer they’ll think the same of me. I can do anything I want; anything that will make me proud of myself or even just entertain me.
Let me put it this way: My family is a finite state machine with only one state. No matter what input I put in, there will always be the same output.
When considering my life goals, where I’m heading, the ten year plan or what have you, I don’t need to consider “what will they think of my choices?”. It simplifies the equation.
So that’s covered. Moving on.
I’m back from four days of family time in “Palm Springs”. I put that in quotes, because I never actually went to Palm Springs, I went to Rancho Mirage, a neighboring town that, to the casual observer, is part of Palm Springs. I honestly can’t tell you where one ends and the other begins and I tried to figure it out on Google Maps. But I say “Palm Springs” because it’s easier than explaining where the eff Rancho Mirage is.
But we did take a hike that took us up and around Bob Hope’s mansion. I’m not sure who owns it now; there’s a lot of construction. It looks like they’re making a big addition to it.
Anyway, like the song says, lets begin the beguine.
I flew into Palm Springs International Airport on a small plane from Portland that touched down in Sacramento long enough to offload some peeps, grab some new ones, and fuel up. The approach to Palm Springs is famously turbulent, but this was the first time I’ve ever flown in with absolutely still skies. It was so still, in fact, that the forest of pristine, white windmills were still as porcelain statues, a bizarre, post-modern homage to Don Quixote.
I spent the flight reading Kurt Vonnegut’s mother night, a solipsistic look at the futility of human action (I’ll write a book review later), while trying to ignore the bulk of a fat man next to me. Yes, that’s politically incorrect and harsh, but I was literally pressed against the wall of the plane. The armrest could not sit all the way down. His leg flowed around mine. There was some discomfort.
I love flying into Palm Springs for the view. The tiny airplane portal reveals a desert frame around a Welters Board (see the Magicians) of green, blue, and brown squares as California continues it’s war on nature. If you want to see the Colorado River, come to Palm Springs where it’s watered on every lawn, filled in every pool, falls from each fountain, and laid to rest in every man-made lake. Generally, it’s sloshed around in a manifest destiny of disregard for the nature.
We landed. I grabbed my pack off the cart and began at once to decompress in the 22°C sunshine. Palm Springs International is a tiny, big-band-era airport filled with travelers cast from beautiful people. They range from Hollywood-ugly to Hollywood-gorgeous. It’s a nice place to hang out. I had to hang out just long enough that I made a plan to get to Grandma’s house on my own when my Aunt Jane showed up, which was a lovely surprise. Aunt Jane is a peach, and I didn’t know she’d be there.
It turned out she was just staying through dinner time, but that gave me the better part of the day with her and my grandmother back at the ranch (so to speak); they were lovely company. I was a hollow shell after three hours of sleep and a day of travel.
I lay out in the sun and drank tea and later wine.
The Arkansas Family arrived, then later (great) Aunt Ky, short for Caroline, then even later my sister Diedra and her chihuahua Jolene, named after the eponymous Dolly Parton song.
The Arkansas Family is comprised of two of my brothers, a wife, a toddler and a baby. Almost at once my older brother gave me a new, abusive epithet but I’ll leave that for the restricted part of the post. I set about to win-over my two-year-old nephew by chasing and being chased while doing my monkey-gallop, and accidentally got myself a workout in the process.
The grapefruit tree was in full glory. Like a universe bush heavily laden with golden, ripe suns. I climbed it, no great feat, and brought in many fruits. I prefer to peel them and eat them like oranges, which I did with great gusto. As in previous years, they were the best grapefruit I’ve ever experienced. In surplus of past years, the tree was filled with fruit to a nearly-ridiculous proportion.
The day ended with a brief soak in the hot-tub with the brothers and the sister-in-law. I turned in early.
Jumbo Rocks Campground
I was further frustrated by the banality of the climbs themselves. It was simple, if you could get enough friction on the rock to stand up, then you could grab the top, or secure such easy holds that it didn’t matter. The crux was always the first move. No joy.
I hung out at the campsite with my friend and two of her friends, had a beer, ate dried mangoes in such quantity it would have killed a lesser man, and eventually returned back to the ranch (so to speak).
The evening was pleasant and uneventful. I began a new appreciation for white wine. I failed only in not making it to the hot tub, which had been my goal. Getting to sleep early was a worthy substitute.
Sunday was a hell of a day.
By Sunday everyone preferred my epithet over my name. Including my grandmother and her sister, my great aunt Ky. It was a little disturbing hearing the two call me a vulgarity. They insisted it was fitting, and in the context of me, cute.
I was proud to have kept outside my normal family patterns. My brother had tried to pick a few fights and I’d avoided them. I’d not fought back against the epithet, though I tried to steer away from it, and tried to take the high-road. Still, my ego was wearing down. My grandmother had already pointed out to me that I couldn’t afford a house, but perhaps that was for the best. And later my older brother pointed out the same fact without the silver lining.
Asleep on dad's shoulders.
The main activity of the morning was a cute-little, dog-friendly hike up to Bob Hope’s maison. It couldn’t have been four kilometers. My older brother carried his son on his shoulders. Later, on the phone, my sister would refer to it as a “death march”, but nerves were frayed by then.
The afternoon was spent dividing up what was left of my late father’s things. This was mostly artwork he had made throughout his life. He was a talented artist. The process upset my sister greatly. It may come as a consolation that she got the pieces she was interested in; we were happy to let her have them. I think we all got what we were interested in.
There were family pictures in the hoard. My grandmother, sadly, pointed out to us that I wasn’t in any of them. I’d been born, but my parents never wanted me in the pictures. My mother explained to me why, often enough. I’ll leave that for the protected part of the post as well.
Diedra left for San Diego after dinner. She went to address some friend and family drama. That is, drama surrounding a friend of hers and that friend’s family.
Everyone else, except for me and my nephew, Billy, had something of an icecream social after dinner.
The rest after the jump,
—Ugly Elf
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The Magicians
February 3rd, 2011
Click the image to go to Powell's
“Quentin did a magic trick.”
And thus begins Lev Grossman’s novel The Magicians.
First of all, this is my first book review. Be gentle with me.
The Magicians, plural, is by Lev Grossman. This is not to be confused with The Magician, singular, which is a classic (by W.S. Maugham) what I know nothing about.
Now that we’ve cleared that up. Lev Grossman works for Time Magazine writing their book reviews and other things like their recent “person of the year” article. I guess his title is “senior writer”. He also writes for Time’s Techland website. Obligatory twitter and blog links.
The Magicians is sort of an answer to everything that ever bothered or nagged you about Narnia and Harry Potter. In his book, Grossman uses a thinly veiled reference to Narnia with mystical land named “Filory”. And his Harry-Potter Hogwarts analog is an upscale, Anglophilic wizarding college in Upstate New York called “Brakebills”.
From his website:
“Quentin Coldwater is brilliant but miserable. He’s a senior in high school, and a certifiable genius, but he’s still secretly obsessed with a series of fantasy novels he read as a kid, about the adventures of five children in a magical land called Fillory. Compared to that, anything in his real life just seems gray and colorless.”
Before we get into any spoilers — and I promise I’ll warn you before we do — let’s hit the basics.
The Magicians is a tightly-worded, beautifully-written novel. You may come for the story, and it’s a story worth reading, but you will stay for the prose. This is the first place it separates from the Narnia books, which have tight-but-plain, shallow language, and the Potter books, which have so much unnecessary and ill-formed language Rowling must have assumed she was to be paid by the word. By contrast, The Magicians doesn’t waste a word. Entire seasons sweep by in a sentence without ever leaving the reader confused or disoriented. Each scene is exquisitely limned with words that are painted rather than written on the page. Grossman may have traded his soul for the artifact of prose — it was a worthwhile trade.
We’re still not into spoilers here, at least not in any significant sense of the word, but I have to talk about the tone and character of the story now. The book begins with seventeen-year-old Quentin in his final year of high school and moves quickly on to Brakebills College for Magical Pedagogy. And here, again, we separate from other magical, school-yard, fairytale-land stories. Quentin and the other members of the cast are adults in the sense that young men sent off to war are adults. And the themes and events in the story reflect this. Grossman pulls no punches when dealing with the issues and mistakes young college students and later independent, privileged twenty-somethings make. The kind of issues that may haunt the reader’s own past, as much as they haunt the protagonists present.
This book is beyond the bright-eyed optimism of talented youths ala Pevensies or Potters. Instead it’s told from the bitter, none-of-this-is-what-I-signed-up-for “reality” of adulthood. Remember when you first learned that college was less about independence and more about hard work? So does Quentin. Remember figuring out that the life you’ve worked so hard to achieve has nothing to do with the happiness you were really looking for? So does Quentin. Remember losing something really precious, because you didn’t know how good you had it until you squandered it away? Yup, again, so does Quentin. Which is the third point of divergence from the children’s books; despite empathizing, even sympathizing, with poor Quentin Coldwater, you cannot forgive him. Not any more than you can let yourself off the hook for every fuck-up and faux pas you’ve ever committed. At times you will hate Quentin as much as you’ve ever hated yourself. And you’ll love every minute of it.
There’s not too much more, but it get’s spoilery. Read the rest after The Jump.
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