Losing the world when reading.

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Today was the final tournament of SFUC. Yesterday, the tournament was a beach tournament, 5 on 5, because the fields were too wet to play on. As I wasn't particularly interested in playing beach ultimate, and neither was Kris, we stayed home and worked on the backyard, which is a jungle.

Getting up to go to the tournament was rough this morning, as we were getting up at 8:00 am! 8! Ugh. Still, we rolled out of the house at 8:30 and arrived at the fields at 9:30, just as the first games were getting started (1/2 an hour late).

My team won our first game (in pre-quarters), so we had a two round bye until the quarter-finals. Great. For someone who would rather be home sleeping, or at least just working in the back yard, this was a little torturous.

But only a little.

True to form, I had a book with me (The Reality Dysfunction, Part 2: Expansion), and read during the byes. I sat at the sideline of Kris' games (we managed to play only one of six rounds at the same time), so that I could watch him play. When he was on the field, I would watch. When he was on the sidelines, I would read. Worked out well.

At the end of the day, Kris asked me if I noticed when he was playing in the sunshine.

Huh?

He went on to explain that, at one point when he was on the sideline next to me, he positioned himself so that he was casting a shadow over the book as I was reading. He then shifted back and forth to cause the shadow to flicker on the book as I read. Had I noticed?

I had not.

Not only had I not noticed his doing this at the time, I also disbelieved him when he told me he had done so.

So I told him about the first time I knew of when I didn't notice the world while I was reading. I was 11.

No surprise to anyone, I've been a bookworm my whole life. As near I as I can tell, I've always loved reading. So, when the family was all gathered in the family room (oh, to have a house big enough to have a separate living room and family room!), I would sometimes read when everyone else was watching TV (I still do this: "TV is a waste of time, but reading is productive!").

It was one of these evenings that, while I was reading (a Nancy Drew book, actually, probably borrowed from my friend Jenny), everyone in my family jumped up and ran out of the room.

I noticed the movement, and puzzled, stood up to follow them out of the house. Everyone was in the kitchen, which looked out over the front yard (which, as this image shows, is about 3/4 of an acre deep).

There used to be a huge tree at the very front of the yard, about 10 feet from the road. The tree trunk was about 3 feet in diameter, so it was a good sized tree. About once a year, someone would come around the curve too fast, stare at the tree as they came around the bend in the road, fixate on that tree, see nothing but that tree, and plow right into it.

This particular night, it was several young men (I don't recall the age, but I don't believe they were underage) who met the tree. They had been drinking (an open six-pack in the backseat), and driving. The driver came around the bend too fast and wrapped his car around the tree.

Turns out, the whole family heard the screech of tires and the loud crash of the car.

Except me.

I never heard the sounds. Our neighbors many many houses over came out to see what was going on. Some were over a quarter mile away and still heard the crash.

Not me.

My dad commented to his dad sometime after that how he wished he had the ability to block out the world when he read. He didn't understand how I did it. He was glad I had the ability to become absorbed in books, as it meant I could concentrate well. But he didn't understand the gift.

I related the story to Kris after he told me he had shifted his shadow while I was reading.

I never noticed.

I'm a night owl. Wanna see?

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I think I'm a night owl. Actually, yeah, I am. Given that I hit my stride at 10pm, go to bed at 2am, and can't stand getting up before 10 am, I'd have to say yeah. And now I have the graphical proof to prove it!

At the bottom of the pages of Photo Matt, there's an image showing the post times on Matt's site.

Cool!

So, I searched for a bit to find the source to generate the image and the originator's site (Sanjay's Coding Tips - thanks, Sanjay!). Of course, the code is written for WordPress (i.e. not Drupal), so a little rewrite was needed. Well, that and installing GD. A couple hours and a bit of fudging later, and I now have a blog post time image. Whoo!

I haven't made the code robust enough for general consumption yet. If you want a copy, drop me a line and I'll send you the Drupal module.

The license plate Holy Grail!

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Oh, so close! So very close!

When playing the license plate torture game, I thought the best license plate to see would be a non-vanity, 2 character license plate: one where all the numbers were the same, and all the letters were the same. Some would be better than others (5SSS555 and 2ZZZ222, for example), but even so, a 2 character plate would be awesome.

Well, I came close today.

While at lunch, Mike and I pulled up behind a mini-bus with a government license plate. The number was 1112212.

Now, technically, it satisfies the two characters requirement. But it's not a passenger car. So, I'll keep looking.

The closest passenger car I've seen was a 4MMK444.

Little doggie, how do I torment you so?

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Little doggie, how do I torment you so?

Let me count the ways!

I take you for walks. I scratch your back when you nudge me. I feed you doggie crack. I feed you more food than Kris says I should feed you. I take you on mini-walks through out the day. I play tug of war with you.

Oh, these are all such torment!

I let you sleep in the bed with us (which is, by the way, an incredible sacrifice you don't know the half of!). I tolerate your barking. I let you sniff each and every smell on your walk. I let you into to the bedroom during the day so that you can sleep in the sun. I run after squirrels with you. I take you to the vets on a regular basis. I take you to the park to run around.

How can I be such a cruel, cruel owner?

I sneak you extra shizzle sticks to chew on (okay, so I bribe you with food to shut up, it's the same thing, right?). I stop Annie from dominating you, thereby keeping her as the Omega dog. I scratch your belly when you present it. I take you on hikes through trails and forests. I even buy the books with the trails listed in them, just so that I can find dog-friendly trails. I take you to Waterdog Lake so that you can go romping through the reeds (and where I get ticks).

I even let you sit in my office chair.

When I'm in it.

Oh, the torment!

It's only fair that sometimes, just every once in a long while, I get a chance to really torment you.

Say, with two Elizabethan collars!

1-1 tie for 2005

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And we start the year off right. We're tied 1-1 going into March. That's one migraine and now one menstruation. 0-0 is, of course, ideal, but even isn't as bad as the 2-1 ratio of last year.

Let's keep it up!

Crime? Be-Fow-LING the castle!

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Here's an excerpt from Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets:

Page 126, third paragraph:

"Name ... Harry Potter. Crime ..."
"It was only a bit of mud!" said Harry.
"It's only a bit of mud to you, boy, but to me it's an extra hour of scrubbing!" shouted Filch, a drip shivering unpleasantly at the end of his bulbous nose. "Crime ... befouling the castle ... suggested sentence ..."

A couple days ago, Kris was sitting next to me on the couch. At the top of his lungs, he yells, "Crime?!" Startled, I looked over at him.

"Befouling the castle!"

What?

And then he let one rip.

Now, if you've never been in the presence of one of Kris' farts, let me warn you that they are quite, um, odorous. When I hear one, I flee.

Fast.

Of course, I can't say mine smell any better. I'm just used to my smells.

So, our new word for "Flee for your life if you wish to avoid the smells emanating from my butt!" is "Crime?" yelled at the top of one's lungs. The proper way to finish the warning is, of course, "Befouling the castle!"

It's quite entertaining.

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