Point of Accumulation

This weekend we said goodbye to one of the greats of jazz, James Moody.


jibcraip | May 13, 2007


The twelve days of Christmas are nigh and no doubt people are thinking about the things they're going to buy for their loved ones, the things they want, or the effect of the things they've already got. No gift exchanging for me this year since my family is all far away and lost in the chaos of our own meandering lives. Sad, I know.

I've been thinking about my childhood and growing up poor. I can remember being one of those kids who wished for everything he could possibly think of. I wonder if I figured I had the freedom to wish for any and every thing since there was little possibility of getting anything. I also remember many years of straight up yearning: yearning for material things and also for abstract things: a new life, a more sentimental family, a change of scenery. The more I think about it, the more my life seems like the backstory for a supervillian.

It's too bad I'm just an average Joe, though. No tragic villiany, no superheroic struggle. No warm, loving family life. I'm one of billions of people who are mostly alone on the holidays with an average array of "stuff" around him, an ordinary job, an unspectacular nightlife. Here and there I've made piecemeal improvements to my life. Over time I begin to wonder if this accumulation of things and subtle changes amounts to something uncanny. I want to eschew the trite and traditional question of the meaning of life, and focus on what individual pieces accrue into over time. Think Ship of Theseus. I'm also asking the question for the sake of this blog, and for my life's work.

I caught an episode of Brew Masters this weekend wherein the head brewers wondered if the recipe for a 4 year old IPA called 120 had changed. They did, in fact, discover a change in taste through a sampling of 3 years of brewing. They subsequently decided to dial the recipe back to what it tasted like in 2006. Neat stuff.

Quick Change (1990) directed by and starring Bill Murray. I watched it. This weekend I also watched RED, and got into Elfen Lied. I have 7 more episodes of Lied. Somewhere I also started watching Dexter. These are good, bloody shows.

First Portrait-dex and now Drawthisdress web comic artists make the best tumblr blogs.

And now for no reason at all: A good ol' soul playlist feat. Alexander O'Neal and friends.

MissNaturalMystery