Logic

I am a person, more specifically a man, that tends, at most times, to look at the universe as a giant system that obeys some fundamental principals, laws if you will. Application of these laws allow engineers to build bridges and skyscrapers, doctors to cure diseases or redesign faces, scientists to piece together where we've come from, what is happening, and where we could be going. The practical application of logic has allowed us, as a species, to progress in so many ways that I will not continue to extrapolate on them here, as that is not my point.

In a high school geometry class, one expects to learn how to calculate the area and perimeter of basic shapes, to memorize a bunch of formulas, and to apply those skills to the 'real world' through the solving of word problems. Our teacher used the same standardized text as the rest of the mathematics faculty, but he had more to impress onto us than solely geometry. Many of my classmates said that he was not a math teacher and did not appreciate him. At least, they didn't appreciate him at the time.

One day he asked the class how fast we were moving. Puzzled, looking around, the class assessed itself. Everyone was in their chairs, not moving at all. After an uncomfortable silence Dr. LaFruit explained to us that our speed is relative to other objects. For instance, even though we felt as if we were sitting still, we were traveling at hundreds of miles per hour relative to earth's axis, tens of thousands of miles an hour relative to the sun and hundreds of thousands of miles an hour relative to the center of the milky way galaxy. All while sitting on your ass, perhaps even sleeping through a freshman geometry class. Quite possible this fact might expand your mind, if you weren't sleeping of course.

Logic is learned but it comes from that Ah-Ha moment that jumps up to surprise us. I remember when I was a young boy, playing outside on a rainy day. I watched with amazement as rain fell across the street and my side of the street stayed dry. Before that experience, I had never really thought about the fact that the rain had an edge. My world had grown slightly bigger and more complicated.

Some teachers, the good ones, teach by leading a student to that moment. On multiple occasions, Mr. LaFruit had started class by holding up a map of our galaxy, the Milky Way, that had a small point away from the center labeled with an arrow an the text, "You Are Here." He would explain to us that the sun would, in 4 billion years, swell into a red giant and engulf the first four planets of our solar system. "This will destroy the planet earth," he would say, "your grade in geometry does not matter."

This was an odd thing for a math teacher to be telling a class full of math students. Perhaps that is why I remember it over a dozen years later, while many other memories of high school fade into the background noise of life. I think now, I'm beginning to realize what he was trying to lead us to.

'car'puter resurected

A couple years back, I went all out and installed a PC in my '95 Chevy S-10. I purchased a MP3Car custom car computer and an in-dash motorized LCD touchscreen all from mp3car.com. Other than a 12V power supply that was shipped DOA, everything else worked.

A couple years later, I was parked overnight in the city and someone broke into my truck and stolen the radio and the in-dash LCD. On the bright side, they hadn't taken the actual computer that was behind the seat.

Recently I dusted off the computer and purchased a new 12V LCD touchscreen. I haven't yet spent the time to permanently mount the unit in the car, but I have attached the LCD mounting bracket to a spacer piece in the dash, above the radio.

Unfortunately the spacer isn't really designed to hold any weight, so I nailed a piece of scrap wood to it re-enforce it's ability to hold weight. Not the most elegant solution, but it works ;-).

With the LCD mount in place, and the computer wired up sitting on the passenger seat, the next step is going to be finding a more permanent and out-of-the way placement for the machine and all the wires.

No matter how it's mounted, it was definitely ready to take out for a test drive and do something fun with.

Spring Has Sprung

Spring storms have passed through, the earth soaked up the life giving liquor that fell from the sky. The tulips have bloomed and since dropped their petals to the earth. The trees in the backyard, silent for a season, have started a fresh conversation with the wind.

I saw a bumblebee bouncing in the breeze the other day, legs loaded and hanging orange, visiting the numerous blossoms of the flowering redbud tree. I thought about how the bees were all disappearing and sighed. A harbinger of drastic change in our environment lies in the stinging menace. Children jump up, yelling and waving their arms, to escape them. Adults, with intense faces, avoid them with haste. I watch in wonder, this insect bobble through the air. Never would I have thought, the bee could go extinct.

Spring is a time of new beginnings, not only in the dirt, but in people's hearts as well. Flowers are not the only things blossoming.

Middle Night Over Tired

Middle of the night over tired insomnia
 Pulling sleep is like waking teeth
  Maybe every thing is for the best
   or at least fatally unchangeable

predetermination is inherited incapacity
     change is scary and hard to do
   I walk and hear the televisions
in the middle the mixture is brown


the blue and white light flashes hypnotic
   my parents sleep in different rooms
     to different subliminal dream seed
perhaps you're better half off without me

I wonder what the TV dreams when it's not awake
       selling sex fear desire and greed
  soaking up hours and years making
escaping scapegoat faking love near

What is the sound of a family of one
   where are none of your friends
keep them close mistaking the reason
grab the cat hear the fat purring clear

There are a few fish in the freezer
but they're disappearing from the sea
      and the streams of thoughts
  pour out of my head like blood


The jeans are tight and i'm singing
           high pitched with fright
the night seems to last all mourning
and i don't know what's worth the fight

i can't spell and don't believe in heaven
 gory to god in the high fear of hell
  let swell the choking choirs cries
   at least to make me feel something


I well up constantly 
    but cannot cry

I'm keeping it all pinched inside

I want something to hurt me outright

                            Clear my Clouded Sight


     Alas, We are all absolutely alone in the end
        Collect you, one or one hundred friends
     Have a Husband or a Wife and Five Children nigh
     Not one person can come with you when you die

              When my time draws near
           I hope I've let go of my fear
       so that if I do go somewhere to dwell
          Inside my mind it would be heaven

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