Tomorrow is perhaps my favorite day of the year, when all the work of a week’s worth of preparation comes to fruition for one magical night. Not a lot of time for a long, contemplative writing piece after a somewhat…
Month: December 2014
The Dinosaur Ornament
When I was seven, in 1987, we moved to Washington DC. We had lived in California as long as I could remember before that, though I was born in Nevada and lived in Oregon for a while as well. We…
5 Days Out: A Brief Photo Retrospective from Albuquerque
It is five days before perhaps my favorite night of the year and worth putting a little visual element to the experience of preparing for putting up one of the largest luminaria displays in the city where they are most…
Airport Morning
The DHS dog comes by amiably, tugging his black-jacketed attendant along as he moves from person to person like he’s seeking a treat. He pauses at a small red bag in the genre of the modern over-sized carry-on, sniffing it…
It’s Lumi Time!
Rumor has it that it’s the most wonderful time of the year. I couldn’t agree more. You can keep your ornate displays of high-watt outdoor bulbs, your blow-up santas and penguins, your animatronic lowing cattle and rooftop reindeer a-tromping. Save…
Facebook Tires of Dominance, Success, Decides to Start Self-Destruction
Remember MySpace? Or Friendster? No one talks much about Friendster anymore, because it was basically exactly Facebook. I remember the first time someone told me about Facebook, which I had just missed by graduating a little too early and not…
Revisionist History
From time to time during the seven years of this blog’s existence, I’ve added new categories for indexing the various kinds of posts one sees on this page. I’ve long eschewed the notion of a specialized blogging pursuit, such as…
Password Protection and Self-Defeating Security
This country has a bit of a problem with a false sense of security. So-called revelations have been abounding this week over the extent and nature of some specific acts of torture enacted by the CIA during the Bush administration…
My Life with (Ms.) Pac-Man (or 84,400 Points Can’t Be Wrong)
Ms. Pac-Man has played a major role in my existence. I think I first played the arcade classic in the early-mid 1980s, probably just after it had come out. My father was a big fan of the early Pac-Man tables…
My Public Ballot, 2014 Louisiana Run-Off Edition
This is probably the most inconsequential election I’ve ever taken part in, especially given that my primary act was to abstain from the headline race because (a) it literally forced me to vote for a Democrat or a Republican and…