doubting thom

Yesterday, Jeff posted about his recurrent bouts of the “drama bug,” whereby he periodically gets nostalgic about his theater experiences in high school and college, and begins to think about auditioning for some local community theater.

For my part, I have two activities–singing and gaming–for which I have a similar chronic affliction, with intense cravings periodically flaring up like sunspots (though that creates a mixed metaphor, it seemed a nicer image than my first idea of “periodically flaring up like herpes,” which I thought also might give the mistaken impression that I have direct experience with the latter).

I sometimes feel like Sophie in Mamma Mia! who in the words of ABBA’s “Thank You for the Music” notes “Mother says… I began to sing long before I could talk.” My own mother was the organist and choir director for the family church, and some of my earliest memories are of standing around an old pump organ singing old-timey gospel songs with my parents and grandparents. In high school I sang with the choir, and was drawn to musical theater, where I played Albert Peterson in Bye, Bye Birdie and, true to type, Og the Leprechaun in Finian’s Rainbow. In college I sang with the all-male Harvard Glee Club for two years, the mixed Harvard-Radcliffe Collegium Musicum for one, and with a variety of small close-harmony groups and even a barbershop quartet throughout. One memory I particularly cherish is soloing with the Glee Club while on tour at the National Cathedral in Washington, a concert my parents also were able to attend.

In the nearly twenty years since graduation, though, I’ve done very little on this front, beyond a few aborted attempts to start up some close-harmony groups. This holiday season, at least, I’m singing in the choir at work–it’s far from a polished group, but it’s better than not singing at all.

Gaming, specifically role-playing, is another hobby I once was nearly completely immersed in but for which my participation now is changed in kind–primarily one-person or multi-player online computer rpgs instead of in-person tabletop gaming–as well as greatly reduced in quantity. In 1990 I met my lifelong friends Sheldon and Lisa through gaming, and our gaming together played a large role in our deciding eventually to become housemates. While we lived together in the early 90s, we gamed every weekend and one or two weeknights, and attended several annual gaming conventions. Sheldon is a world-class game master–perhaps the best I’ve ever encountered–and we had an incredible group of players. After Sheldon and Lisa were transferred to Belgium, our gaming group disbanded, and I left the activity in favor of some new hobbies, primarily squaredancing.

Recently, though, I’ve caught the bug again, and my experience with hundreds of computer-based rpgs–and even the half-dozen massively multiplayer online rpgs–just haven’t scratched the itch. So I’m starting to actively look for a new gaming group, specifically one that is expressly queer-friendly.

Last week there was a mild (magnitude 4.5 on the Richter scale) earthquake centered about 30 miles west of Richmond, Virginia. Many people here in the DC area also report having felt it, including one of the Admin. Assistants right outside my office; jealously, I admit, I didn’t notice anything.

Saturday night we had a little snow–2 inches at most–and yesterday was rainy with temperatures in the high 30s to low 40s, so by this morning there was merely a dusting left on grassy areas, and none at all on the roads. Yet nearly all area schools opened two hours late today. What is up with that? I lived in Boston for seven years and I don’t recall the schools ever closing. Yet when someone spits in the street in DC or Northern Virginia the roads come to a standstill. And if someone spots a flurry of snow, the schools rush to close down. I blame the lawyers.

Yes, we have heat again in the condo. So far the new heat pump seems to be working fine. The new digital thermostat, which allows us to program four set points for each day of the week separately, is an awesome change over the previous model, though its thermometer appears to be miscalibrated; Jeff and I both felt that the temperature seemed cooler than the thermostat was suggesting and two different mercury thermometers we brought into the room agree in showing an ambient temperature about four degrees lower than what the digital thermostat reads. When the contractors come back out to work on the humidifier and install a replacement drain hose I’ll ask them about it. In the meantime, we’re just setting the desired temperature a few degrees higher to compensate for the seeming inaccuracy.

The new unit is a little smaller and certainly is much quieter than the old one, which would rumble, rattle and shake. It’s so nice to have heat again, though it was also nice to see that my electric bill had been only $35 in October (with no heating at all) and $45 in November (while running a high-wattage space heater in the bedroom at night).

So, the refinance is complete, the heat pump is installed, I have my iPod and the accessories I ordered with it, and the various items I’ve shopped for online all have arrived; things actually have been starting to go well (almost too well, the voices caution me). Wouldn’t it be the icing on the cake if the Prius were to arrive before next Tuesday?

For nearly a week, I’ve found nothing to say here. Sadly, last night while Jeff and I were at dinner, I came back from the rest room announcing that I had (along the lines of) the following opening for a blog entry: “Just because they’re called urinal cakes doesn’t mean they should smell like buttercream frosting.”

Pathetic that I’m reduced to posting about this.

But truly it was disconcerting to walk into the men’s room and encounter a strong aroma of strawberry Creme Savers® and then to discover that the smell was emanating from the bright pink deodorizer in the solitary urinal.

Which also made me muse to myself about the fact that somewhere there are factories that make urinal cakes, and people whose livelihood depends upon the sale of urinal cakes. And to wonder why they’re almost invariably pink (though usually a soft pink, the one in the restroom at CPK was a brighter shade).

For some odd reason, as I sound this out in my head, I now find myself mentally pronouncing, in the British fashion, “uRInal cakes.”

By the way, my limited research on what’s in these things turns up the following statement on a janitorial supply web site: “WARNING: This product contains a chemical known to the State of California to cause cancer.” So why do they make them smell like candy?

Well, almost. My heat pump–on September 9 I reported that the previous unit had failed and on October 23 I wrote about placing an order for a replacement–finally has arrived. The technicians are coming on Thursday morning to begin the installation, so by Thursday evening Jeff and I should have more than our love to keep us warm.

For those poor souls among you who haven’t yet accepted TiVo as your personal time savior, you probably at least know that TiVo is a personal video recorder, a device that allows you to digitally record television programs for later viewing (and pause and replay live TV, as well). TiVo’s software also has a feature called “Suggestions,” by which TiVo builds a database of programs it thinks you will like, based on the other programs you’ve watched, recorded and rated. I have my TiVo programmed to automatically record suggestions as long as there is space available on the hard drive.

My TiVo, however, is starting to feel less like a helpful friend making suggestions, but more like a shrill, nagging spouse who thinks it knows what’s best for me. It doesn’t seem to care that every time I see the items it has automatically recorded for me, I immediately delete Jackie Chan Adventures, Third Rock from the Sun, King of the Hill, Just Shoot Me, and That 70s Show, among other titles. Instead, it methodically and invariably fills up the hard drive with every single episode ever recorded of these shows, insisting in its insidious, passive-aggressive way “Watch this!”, “Watch this now!”, “Do you really need another helping of Great Performances? Maybe you should have some low-cal Saved by the Bell instead.”

So if TiVo is smart enough to make new suggestions based on what I’m recording, why isn’t it also smart enough to learn from the things I always delete without even previewing?

Of course, I could use the rating option to give a thumbs down for those series, which would stop TiVo from continuing to suggest them, but that feels like an act of deception on my part. After all, tt’s not that I so actively dislike these series to the point of permanently inscribing a red thumbs down icon on their TiVo program guide entries, I just don’t really care about them. There’s a wide gulf between disinterest and hatred. I mean, I wouldn’t want to go into a strip club on Boubon Street hawking “Live Nude Girls,” but I wouldn’t throw pig’s blood on their door. And just because TiVo has turned out to be a bit of a harpy and control queen doesn’t mean that I have to turn into a sneaky liar in response.

It might not bother me so much if my TiVo hadn’t turned out to be so disturbingly lowbrow; I’m terrified I’ll come home one afternoon to find it wrapped in a housecoat, recording Jerry Springer and having discarded its digital optical input for a set of rabbit ears.

According to the ACLU, and reported yesterday in The New York Times, among other sources, a seven-year-old boy in Louisiana was disciplined by his elementary school last month and was referred to the school’s behavior clinic a week later for “using foul language and behaving inappropriately.” The assistant principal who described the young boy’s actions as such to the child’s mother went on to state that he didn’t feel comfortable repeating the specific word used over the phone.

So what was this horrific thing perpetrated by the apparent reprobate, Marcus McLaurin? The Times notes, “The incident occurred when the class was lined up for recess and a classmate asked Marcus about his mother and father. Marcus responded that he had two mothers, not a mother and father. When the other child asked why, Marcus told him that it was because his mother was gay. The other child then asked what that meant, and Marcus explained, ‘Gay is when a girl likes another girl.'”

The ACLU reports that Marcus then was publicly scolded by his teacher, told that “gay” is a bad word that should not be used in school, and sent to the principal’s office. He was barred from recess that day and a week later was sent to a “behavior clinic” (that phrase just gives me the willies) where he was required repeatedly to write the sentence “I will never say the word ‘gay’ in school again.”

That policy sure is gonna make it difficult for the kids to sing “Deck the Hall” at this year’s holiday party.

As to the other side of the story, school officials deny that Marcus was disciplined for using the word “gay,” but rather for “behavior problems.” However, the ACLU has published a copy of a behavior report signed by Marcus’s teacher, which reads “‘Marcus decided to explain to another child in his group that his mom is gay. He told the other child that gay is when a girl likes a girl. This kind of discussion is not appropriate in my room. I feel that parents should explain things of this nature to their own children in their own way.'” Copies of the two forms from the school may be found on the ACLU web site (see the “behavior contract” filled out by Marcus and signed by his teacher and the behavior report completed by the teacher, noting that the child was reprimanded and showing the requirement for attending behavior clinic the following week).

The other Jeff (that is to say, not my Jeff, though I will confess to having had a blogcrush on the former as well) has added a countdown to his 30th birthday to his blog, reminding me of something I’d meant to write about several weeks ago when I first heard the following news:

On November 20, People magazine named the 40-year-old Johnny Depp this year’s “Sexiest Man Alive.”

On Book of Ages, a blog that accompanies Book of Ages 30, a book for and about those in the 30s, a poster noted in “For Sexy, 40 Beats 30” that along with Depp who already is 40, three of the other men on the Top Ten Sexy Men list–Brad Pitt, Russell Crowe and Lenny Kravitz–all turn 40 within the coming year. Of the other six in the top ten, George Clooney is 42, Hugh Grant is 43, and Denzel Washington is 48. Hugh Jackman, at 35, is on his way to 40, while the only 20-somethings to make the list were Ashton Kutcher and Justin Timberlake.

Apparently, then, forty-something men are the sexiest. This comes as no surprise.

Last night I installed the new PCI card with USB 2 and FireWire ports. Once I had the computer open, I discovered that it appeared that I already had three IEEE-1394 (aka i.Link, aka FireWire) ports, which hadn’t been reflected in the information available online at Dell for my service tag number. The reference material on my PC, though, suggested that Dell had certified those ports only for use with digital videocameras, and not with other FireWire devices; besides, I wanted the upgraded USB ports anyway.

A very little while later (a time measured in minutes as opposed to hours, thanks to the fast FireWire transfer speed, though I did spend several hours updating and correcting ID3 tags) my iPod was configured, was showing up as an additional hard drive on my PC, and I had transferred about 5,600 songs to it, enough music to play for more than 15 straight days. That’s about two-thirds of my CD collection, and I still have almost 11Gb left for the remaining tracks. Since I had ripped 99% of my CDs to very high-quality mpegs on my PC before the iTunes was available for Windows, currently I would only be able to transfer about 7,000 songs compared to the 10,000 Apple says you can store on a 40Gb iPod; I might now go back and re-rip them to AAC over time instead, which will reduce the file sizes.

By the time Jeff came home, I was able to do my own imitation of the iPod commercials, dancing around the living room and belting out Barenaked Ladies tunes while holding about two-thirds of my entire music collection in one hand. It’s so cool to realize that I can now have access to all of my music at any time–at home, at work, on the road, or just walking down the street. I don’t really remember the last time I even used my CD jukebox anyway, since I’d been ripping all my tunes to the PC, so theoretically I could sell the jukebox and all my original CDs, and reclaim some space both in my audio cabinet and in my closet (once the CDs number in the hundreds, the jewel cases alone occupy a surprisingly large amount of cubic feet).

Heck, this iPod might even pay for itself in that case. I am so in love with Apple right now.

My new iPod arrived last night. I love the packaging, the hinged square box with the matte finish that opens up into two compartments, the way in which some of the components nestle within others, even the little strips of plastic tape that are used to lift some of the pieces out of the styrofoam inserts.

When I pulled the iPod itself out of the box and unwrapped it, I accidentally brushed against the very sensitive buttons, and it turned on. Oddly, the menus were all in Japanese, so I couldn’t even figure out how to turn it off until I found instructions in the manual dealing specifically with the situation in which the iPod were (inadvertently) set to a different language.

At this point, all I’ve been able to do is to charge the unit. My PC doesn’t have USB 2 or FireWire ports, so I wasn’t able to connect the iPod in order to transfer any music or files. Today at lunch, however, I drove to the local CircuitCity and bought a PCI card with both FireWire and USB 2, which I’ll install tonight. Of course, this has had the effect of making me want a brand-new computer; my current one is a 2-year-old refurbished Dell with only a 1GHz PIII. For the nonce, though, given all the other expenses I’m incurring, it’s just fine.

Like Gene, I’ve always thought of myself a high-end technology early adopter, one of the Pew Internet and American Life Project’s “technology elite.” My mother still reminds me of the year I asked only for a calculator for Christmas; I was probably 7 or 8 and at that time calculators were big, very expensive, and couldn’t do much more than basic arithmetic and square roots. Just as two other examples, I started using Macs in 1984 and bought my first two years later, and I bought a stereo Beta VCR my freshman year of college; both of these cost me a fortune, given their priciness and my very limited income at the time.

But I was musing yesterday that my pace as an early adopter has been slowing down. My first inkling of this was when my father, who despite his interest in technology had resisted even buying a computer until five years ago, bought a DVD burner last year, a piece of technology I still don’t own. And last week my aunt bought Dell’s Digital Jukebox, their competitor to the iPod, while my 17-year-old nephew has owned an MP3 player for over a year. Yesterday’s iPod is my first.

I still own a Pentium 3 computer without USB 2 or FireWire; mercifully, I did at least upgrade it from Windows ME to XP earlier this year. I’ve never owned a videocamera at all, and my 2.1 megapixel digital camera now also feels woefully underpowered given today’s cheaper yet higher-resolution models. Yes, I have DirecTV (three years ago) and TiVo (earlier this year), but I don’t yet own an HDTV monitor. The Prius is now four years old and I’ve only just committed to purchasing one. My Palm OS Handspring Visor–which I bought the first month they were available–now seems like a toy compared to today’s PocketPCs and Treos.

I do still salivate over many of these new gadgets and technologies, but I’m a little more considered these days. My first Macintosh purchase depleted my savings and still put me into significant debt for the time–yet I did it fairly blithely. Now, although I lust after wall-mounted thin LCD and plasma screens, I absolutely balk at the idea of spending a few thousand dollars for a television, even though I could readily afford it. And, you know, I don’t even really want a Segway at all.

I started wondering if I were suffering from “technology fatigue,” but my excitement over my new iPod and my occasional giddiness over a Prius I don’t yet even have seem to suggest that I’m still capable of being swept away; the love affair with gadgetry is by no means over, it’s just perhaps more akin to the smoldering embers of a lifelong relationship than to the blinding, dizzying passions or infatuations of my youth.