Yesterday: Laid off by my employer.

Tomorrow: My first-ever trip to Hawaii.

In between: Completely reacquainted myself with the unstoppable combined powers of the dharma, meditation, and the deep and abiding love of many wonderful people who care for me so much it's beyond humbling.

New chapters await. An overdue reshuffling of priorities. Already, this soon, excitement is overtaking fear . . .

(Ka is a wheel!)

Last year, I took my birthday off from work. That was one of the best decisions I've ever made. If you can, you should take your birthday off. Period. And do what you want to do. Which, today, I did. And it was wonderful.

Among a great many other things, I returned, for the first time in years, to a place that fills me with great wonder and great emotion, a place that is, in many ways, my own personal Dark Tower. I stood at the gate today and I commanded it to open to me. It opened. And the end of the story is one that I keep to myself, but I tell you this: As with any really good ending, it was really more of a beginning.

"Ka is a wheel."

— Roland Deschain, of Gilead

To all who showered me with gifts and great, great love today, I say thankya.

[In late 2007, I read Stephen King's The Dark Tower, all seven volumes, in very quick succession. It continues to resonate in my consciousness. It is a stunning work of art. More on this to come. There will be posts. Aye, there will be posts again soon. Happy New Year to all!]

Spotted brunching together at the table next to me this morning at La Note in Berkeley: Jake Gyllenhaal and Reese Witherspoon. They shared a Sunday New York Times as they waited for Berkeley's best breakfast to arrive. Reese is a tiny little thing, and even mousier in person than on the screen. (I've never understood why some guys find her dreamy.) Jake is a hunk who apparently has to do battle with acne, just like a real person.

The Chronicle reports on a plan to "ruin" the Albany Bulb. This is the best (and most affectionate) portrait of the Bulb's current state that I've seen in the mainstream media. I will never forget my first visit to the Bulb (back in 2001, when the Sniff pieces were in much better shape and not, it seems, as well known), and the place has grown quite dear to me since then. I hope that its freewheeling nature — indicative of much that is special and good about the Bay Area — can be preserved.

(And a wee bit of text: Today was my thirty-second birthday, and it was so, so, so very splendid. I do not have words to describe... I could tell you I walked aerily along a beach lit with the brightness of a thousand centuries... I could tell you about watching the waves roll in with a friend who has been there watching those waves with me for eons... I could tell you about the baby who looked at me with stern, trusting eyes that imparted everything he knew about where he had come from... I could tell you about the toothless old man who walked with a cane and smiled at me, knowing something about my future... And I would not have even begun. So, at a loss to convey what this beautiful day has meant to me, I leave you with four images, and this: I am so blessed. I love you all so much. Namaste.)

I was challenged today to contribute to the Mayfly Project, where you use 24 words (no more, no less) to sum up the past year. My entry:

I strive daily to cultivate peace and compassion. I am often blissful, sometimes troubled, sometimes stressed, and usually a bit lonely. Change is possible!

A belated Happy New Year to everyone!

On mahnamahna.net, an RFP is a Request For Prayer.

I got word this morning that a friend of some dear friends — someone I have hung out with several times, have always gotten along with, and have happy memories of — was in a terrible car accident this past Sunday as he traveled from the Bay Area to a new job and a new life in San Diego. He is hospitalized in an intensive care unit in Bakersfield with two broken legs, and unspecified internal and head injuries that my friends are hoping to learn more about soon. For now, if your spiritual tradition allows, please send thoughts, prayers, and hopeful vibes of lovingkindness out into the universe for the sake of Randy, who needs them right now.

. . . (among other things) hearing the '68 Beetle that you bought with your entire life's savings when you were not quite sixteen (which you hold onto through the years even as everyone you know insists that you sell it) fire up for the first time in some eighteen months and ROAR in its humble, unique way.

(We all have a roar. It doesn't matter if others don't recognize it as such. It is a roar nevertheless. Own your roar.)

But: At last, I have found my scarf. :)

. . . but I have somehow hidden my scarf from myself during the warm months. I cannot find it anywhere. :(

Over in the City, at the Buena Vista — the tavern that introduced Irish coffee to these shores — they've changed the whiskey they pour, actually moving away from their own private blend. The owner sez money has nothing to do with it. He just likes Tullamore Dew better, and claims that was the stuff they used when Irish coffee arrived here in 1952. Hmm.

On a day like Thanksgiving, if you can't be with family, you make family. Did you have a happy Thanksgiving? I did.

The problem with NaBloPoMo is, there are some days when I am simply not inspired at all, and posting something lame feels worse than posting nothing at all. Posting becomes a chore. And I don't like chores.

On day one of NaBloPoMo, the_lucky_duck got a free bike. I thought that was pretty amazing. But I had no idea I would be the next winner! Leaving the office on Friday, I espied a laser printer sitting atop a trash can at the northwest corner of 2nd and Bryant. A sheet of paper in the output tray conveyed the handwritten message "Free (works fine)." (Lesson: Blog daily, get free stuff! Who's next?)

I have wanted a laser printer for some time. Inkjet printers — well, modern inkjet printers* — suck all kinds of ass, unless you print regularly. If you don't, the ink doesn't flow right when you fire it up after three months, and you print eighteen hideous pages before you get a clean one. I have had this problem with Epsons and Canons, and I've been told that Lexmarks and HPs are no better. You either print a minimum of a couple times each week, keeping that expensive ink a-flowin', or you curse whenever you use your printer. I've been struggling with an Epson Stylus Color 860 for several years now. I've wanted to heave it out the window with nearly every use.

Well, eff all that. I have a laser printer now. more...

It's Election Day, and here in Alameda County, the Sequoia e-voting machines are actually not the touch-screen models I'd feared. No, we're filling out huge-ass paper ballots with ink, and then feeding them directly into chirping electronic readers ourselves. So, we've got nice paper trails should we need them, no one is cursing at misaligned screens, and the biggest problem at my polling place was that one of the election workers had misplaced some of the "I Voted!" stickers.

I haven't been this hopeful on Election Day in a long time. Let's hope this day is the turning point we've been waiting for. Power to the people!

(Double-post today to make up for a busy, postless Saturday. Have I destroyed my NaBloPoMo mojo?)

My alma mater's longheld desire to renovate its football stadium has hit yet another unexpected snag: It appears that the current plans would effectively destroy the longstanding Golden Bears institution known as Tightwad Hill. I've never watched a game from up there, but I've always liked the idea that it was a possibility. My hunch is that the university will destroy the Tightwad tradition, just as surely as it has quashed decades of tradition at nearby Bowles Hall.

I've returned to what Burners call "the default world" and it's all feeling a little weird. Typical. Over at SFist is a report I filed from Black Rock City. I'll have a picture gallery up here soon.

Just a few dozen yards away, the boy was squeaking and giggling and splashing up a storm. The best my camera phone could manage to record is the pathetic pixelated piclet you see here. Surprisingly, it does somehow manage to capture (for me, anyway) a bit of the human joy that was present in that moment.

(Note to self: take a real camera to the beach next time.)

Yep, I'm a Deputy Commish. Licensed to solemnize!

The Telegraph Avenue location of Cody's Books closes today. It's big news. People are sad. I was feeling the same way until I read these latest words from owner Andy Ross:

"Students today, they use the Internet. They read their textbooks," Ross said. "In the '70s, they had wide-ranging intellect."

This is not the first time Ross has blamed his clientele (and elsewhere, the city of Berkeley) for the fact that he failed to adequately respond to changes in his own industry and in his business's immediate environment. Your bookshop is not shutting down today because 21st-century students suck and don't read books, Mr. Ross. Your bookshop is shutting down in part because your mindset shaped your business, and that mindset has become a lot more friendly to the yuppies who inhabit your store on Fourth Street than it has to the university students of today, plenty of whom have wide-ranging intellects and might have kept your store alive had you not been so dismissive and scornful of them.

[image stolen from telegraphshop.com]

I haven't yet reached the point on my own life path where I can experience what I imagine is the unparalleled joy of parenthood. But I am very, very much enjoying being an honorary uncle (I really need a better word or phrase than that) to two recent arrivals on this planet. Here I am with young Ben, and even younger Harper.



[Thanks to proud fathers Andy and Byrne for the great shots!]

I have now completed thirty-one journeys around the sun. Saturday night, I celebrated karaoke-style with a few friends:


more...

[Happily, I know the truth. John lives.]

Many of my friends, I have discovered over the past few years, are fellow members of the Church of NyQuil — true believers in the product's ability to mitigate the inherent nastiness of a winter cold that's set in. I imagine they'll be as horrified as I am to learn that one of NyQuil's key ingredients, pseudoephedrine (a.k.a. Sudafed, the lowest-common-denominator knock-you-out-but-clear-your-sinuses decongestant) has been removed from the NyQuil mix, apparently because too many FUCKING TWEAK JUNKIES* were stealing NyQuil to make crystal meth. So, this Public Service Announcement: When your winter cold sets in, look for the generic NyQuil equivalent that hasn't yet removed the precious de-snotting ingredient.

* Sorry for the caps. But tweakers suck.
[spotted at digg.com — finally, a better Slashdot than Slashdot!]