Fallen Into Knowledge

Call them plans, really. I’m not huge on suddenly deciding to make a big change on New Year’s day: History suggests that those types of plans rarely work out. But, here’s mine anyway. Hold me to it.
To be completely honest, I have been thinking about this for a a few months. In a sense I have dreamed of doing this for years and years.
Within one year I want to be ready to buy, or to have just purchased land. I am looking for 20-40 acres to the northwest of Portland between the city and the coast. I am aiming at no more than an hour (or so) drive to downtown.

Then, sometime Spring ‘09, I want to break ground on a house. I want to do most if not all of the work myself, both to save money, and also because I have pretty specific ideas on what I want in a house. It will be a small house, not more than 1000 sq. ft. That way I will be able to afford to lavish attention on the details: I will be able to build my own cabinets, the doors, and built-ins. I want to build a small house like its a piece of furniture. I also want the house to be small so I can make it efficient: I want it to make a small ecological footprint, rather than a large one.
So that’s the plan.

Article Here.

Currently they are making $165,200 per year. So, certainly a raise is long over-due, right?
Meanwhile, national minimum wage has stayed at $5.15 per hour for 10 years. That works out to $9,888 a year for a full time near-slave.

Another Advent Reading, this time from Mary’s Song (Luke 1:46-55):

His mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation.
He has shown strength with his arm;
he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.
He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly;
He has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty.

For Sunday’s reading:
I notice this from Luke 2:3
“And everyone went to HIS own town to register.”  NIV
“And everyone was on HIS way to register for the census, each to HIS own city.” NASB

WHAT HAPPENED TO THE WOMEN?!  At least one is recorded as making the journey, does Mary not quite count?

This is, partly an issue with English, I understand.  We don’t have a way of doing first person singular (he/she/it) that is gender neutral.  Nonetheless the days of claiming that “he” “him” and/or “man” counts as a gender neutral category too are long over.

This sort of thing really irks me.

Luke 2:1-7 (NRSV, Anglicized Version):

“In those days a decree went out from Emperor Augustus that all the world should be registered.  This was the first registration and was taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria.  All went to their own towns to be registered.  Joseph also went from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to the city of David called Bethlehem, because he was descended from the house and family of David.

He went to be registered with Mary, to whom he was engaged and who was expecting a child.  While they were there, the time came for her deliver her child.  And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn.”

Hallelujah.

Its true, in addition to all the other things I lack, I also lack “Christmas Spirit.”  There are at least three reasons for this lacking:

1.  My Family.  For as long as I remember my parents never really got into Christmas.  Even when I was the age to want to be out of bed long before dawn on Christmas morning, even then I knew that my mother, especially, didn’t particularly enjoy the season.  Don’t get me wrong, I don’t hold it against her:  I didn’t really care then - as long as I got the presents I wanted, and I don’t hold it against them now because I understand why they aren’t that thrilled.  I’m not either. Still, if I grew up in a family that put up decorations and made a big deal of it, my attitude might have started out differently.

2.  Starbucks.  I worked at Starbucks for many years - and worked through many Christmas seasons.  More specifically, I worked through many Christmas seasons at the Starbucks (pl.) in Pioneer Place Mall.  The masses of people.  The lines.  The Shopper’s Tempers.  The imperative to buy, buy, buy (and, for us: sell, sell, sell).  The imperative for the employees to “be happy!!!” despite all of this.  And the noise.  Oh, and listening to the same 30 Christmas songs for a solid month.  Because of this, while I worked there, I dreaded the season ’s approaching.  That dread seemed to linger on long after I had left Starbucks

3.  BUY, BUY, BUY.  Between the commercials on the radio, the newspaper ads, and the ever-present billboards, it is hard for me to miss that I am supposed to express any Christmas Spirit with my credit card.  Consumerism isn’t really all that attractive the rest of the year, but in December I can’t shake the suspicion that it is covering something that might be worth celebrating, after all.

so Bah, Humbug.  Several years ago my family started a tradition of leaving for Christmas.  We’d get a place out, away from town, and check out of all of the above.  I really enjoyed that.  We’re not leaving this year, but that’s okay.  This year I don’t feel the need to leave.

This is the first year I have spent away from the city.  Out here there are no billboards, few people have Christmas lights, and NPR doesn’t play Christmas music non stop from Thanksgiving on.  As a consequence my experience of this season as a holiday has been experienced at church.  Advent.  Here we are, just a few days out, and I have this to look forward to:  a weekend hanging out at church and with my family.  This is worth celebrating.  This is Worth some Christmas Spirit

Let the Hype begin. As has been widely reported, the title of the seventh, and final, Harry Potter book has been released, “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.” I didn’t start reading the series until it well under way, and I was well past the target demographic. I read the first four books, and ever since have bought each new release and read it on its release day.

One of the wonderful things about novels is their ability to present not just a story but a world. Quite often, when the story is over, I still want to keep reading about that world. I think this is the draw that the Harry Potter series has for me, I can come back periodically. This is also why I don’t mind when the book’s page count threatens to outrun the attention span of those kids who are the target demographic.

I have been less a fan of the movies that have corresponded with the books, though I have seen them all. The next movie adaptation, “Harry Potter and the Order of Phoenix” will be out in the summer (alas, likely before the seventh book), and the trailer is online.

It may not be taking forever, but I sure am taking my sweet time. I haven’t touched the dresser in months, and tonight I discovered that in the interim it had warped. Which is bad. I fit the back, partly to try to straighten the dresser out. I also began the process of making parts for the drawers: I made the drawer fronts and sized them.

Most drawers made these days are “overlay:” the front of the drawer, when closed, sticks out from the front of the case. For my dresser, I am flush-mounting the drawers, so that they are flush with the case when closed. Flush-mounted drawers are much harder to make, because the tolerances are much tighter, but they also look better than the alternatives.

Tight tolerances + warped case = real problem. I”m still working on a solution.

That’s woodworking: its about solving problems. Perfection doesn’t really happen, so a woodworker has to approach a project in a way that reduces the likelihood that problems will be ruinous or un-fixable. Every once in a while a project will “just come together,” but most of the time - at some point - you’ll make a mistake. Only expect perfection on the last step, allow for a fudge factor everywhere else.

Well, the power is back on, for now.  We are in the middle of another storm in Portland, this one is focusing on wind.  Like, 70mph gusts.
After being in Portland for the evening, and seeing many parts of the city with the power out, I headed home only to be stopped halfway up my road by the fire marshal who told me, “A tree fell across the road and took down the power lines, it will be an hour or so until the road is clear.”
Well, Scappoose isn’t the most exciting town to kill an hour in - even at 9:30 on a Thursday night.
But I’m home now, and have power.  Here’s hoping theres power in the morning, and no trees down over the road, or my house, or my car.

School is out, and as a consequence I have more time to continue working on the website: Here is an update.

The Upgrades fall into two categories: Blogging and Photo Galleries. I like having both, but I haven’t really been happy with the solutions I’ve tried in the past - that’s the main reason this site gets worked on so often.

Blogging: I am using a program called Wordpress to run the blogging portion of the new site: its free, popular, and powerful. Using this system I can update my blog (this page) from any computer, or from my phone, quickly and easily. This is something that the previous web site didn’t do well; in fact, any update to the last website took at least a half hour. Most of that time was waiting, but still quite time intensive. This works better, and as a consequence i have been posting more often.

Photo Galleries: Go ahead, click on the “gallery” tab up at the top of the page. Most of the blogging programs don’t do photo galleries well, if at all. The last website’s photo galleries looked great, but like the blogging, any change took forever. Now I am using a program called Gallery2 to run the galleries. Like Wordpress, its free and powerful. Best of all, I can upload pictures directly from the program I use to manage my photos, Aperture - or, if I’m not at my computer, I can upload from any browser. Pretty cool.
The trick has been to integrate these two separate programs into a seamless site. Getting these two programs to work together has taken the most work, but this phase is now done. Now I can turn my attention to the look of the site. These changes will be more obvious, so stay tuned…

This afternoon, we delivered the first of several batches of cabinets to Bob. Bob is “remodeling” a large tugboat - he plans to live on the boat. I first visited his boat a few months ago, and he has made a ton of progress since then. While we were motoring the cabinets (for the “head” - the bathroom) across the water on one of his work barges - he owns a marina - I couldn’t help smiling and thinking, I’m getting paid to do this!

It is!