End Of Summer Blahs And Reflections

Between the election, the weather (insanely hot with periodic afternoon/evening thunderstorms that don't cool everything down but do add plenty of humitidy to the heat), and the general time of year (getting ready for school to start, trying to finish up a bunch of projects that seem for various reasons to be stalled at work), well... Blah. I just haven't had much to say, or much energy to say it with. Writing projects? Phbphbphbphbphbpbt. Housework? Enough to keep us clothed and fed. Various other things that need to be taken care of? Yeah.

It just seems to be one of those seasons where everything falls behind, until it starts looking like it's going to take a superhuman effort just to get anything moving again -- and forget about ever catching up. There aren't enough hours in the day for that, and you wouldn't get anything done if there were.

I was posting about Black Lives Matter, but... Meh. What it comes down to is that I (still) think they're legitimately protesting a real injustice, while the person who prompted me to "dig deeper" thinks they're bad people out to cause trouble. Even if I had the emotional energy to pursue that, I think the effort would be wasted; I'm not going to change anybody's mind about this.

I had some fiction things I was going to write, but apparently I'm not up to that, either.

On top of everything else, we're due to head back to where my father grew up to put my mother's ashes in the ground in a couple of weeks. It'll be good to get out of town, and I like that area, but it's also a two-day drive -- plus there will be a lot of family, plus the burial. On some levels, I'm looking forward to it. On others, it just sounds busy and stressful.

At this point, what I really want to do is crawl into a hole for a little while. Unfortunately, I don't think that's going to happen. I don't see any way it can.

So, um... have some Dessa? Sure. Have some Dessa:

Eye Tyrant

We're unloading the storage unit, which means sorting through a lot of boxes of things that we were just sure we'd want to get back as soon as we moved into a bigger house. Only, we didn't move into a bigger house. We reconfigured the existing house instead. So we're doing a lot of giving things away and selling things off and throwing things out.

In one of the boxes, I found a picture that Firstborn did... I'm guessing about four years ago, so he would have been probably six years old:

It's a Beholder, an Eye Tyrant. Nasty floating eyeball critter.

It's... it's one of his stuffed animals.

Grass-Type

Me: "That's not a cockroach. That's a cricket. He doesn't even want to be in our house. And unlike a spider, there's absolutely no chance that he's venomous. So what we do is, we pick him up very carefully, like this. See how I'm holding my hand, so he's trapped but he isn't squished? Then we take him to the door, and toss him into the grass."

Firstborn: "So he's a grass-type Pokemon who only knows the move Bounce."

Me: "Pretty much."

An evening reflection on life

One boy is in the bath. Another is eating a cheese stick. The world spins along on its meaningless path through the dark and uncaring cosmos. The cold winds howl between the stars. Somewhere, a dog is barking. Somewhere, a child is crying.

Also, I should probably go to sleep.

Me-o-centrism

So, a friend pointed out this article, about a fellow who has made a film defending the geocentric view of cosmology. (In English: he proposed to show, in his film, that the Earth is the center of the Universe, and apparently this is vitally important for the future of Christendom.) Which, at a glance, sounds like the sort of batshit-crazy premise that could only be produced by a certifiable kook.

However, upon reading the article, I find that it's... well, it's far more persuasive than I would ever have imagined. In fact, the only real problem with Mr. DeLano's premise is that he didn't take it far enough.

You see, based on a lifetime of personal observation, I can only conclude that in fact the entire Universe moves around me. I am the center; everything else either moves or is still relative to me. (In fact, you could say that any observation of what any object is doing is subject to that... what should we call that... ah, yes: relativity.)

Admittedly, making that realization forces you to do some pretty weird calculations about the way things move...

For example:

I get into my car and start the engine. First, I put the car into Reverse and press gently on the gas pedal. This causes my entire house to move away from me, and in the process carries the garage away from around my car. As the end of the driveway moves past me, I turn the wheel; this cause the world to rotate as well as continue moving, so that the alley gets pulled under my car. At that point I press on the brake and the world quits moving. I then put the car in Drive, and press the accelerator; the world begins to move past me again. Throughout the whole process, I remain sitting still, surrounded by my car.

So you see, officer, you can't say that I drove into that wall. I was merely sitting in my car. Unfortunately, I happened use the controls in such a way that the wall moved over in front of my car and then crashed into me.

Lichen This Guy's Style

I'm still trying to dig out from under the avalanche, so instead go read about how How a Guy From a Montana Trailer Park Overturned 150 Years of Biology. Science is cool, y'all.

Parenting: Boss Battle

Secondborn: "I'm going to have to restart this entire boss battle."

Me: "Good luck. Get out there and show that boss who's boss. Wait, that didn't come out right."