PooShoe

A coworker stepped in shit this morning. On this foggy, Christmas Eve morning he stepped in a big pile of shit. (Hopefully, dog.) He handled it well. Grace under pressure and stuff, we're kind of trained to be cool in this job. We're investigators at a psychiatric hospital. Anyway, the shoe. It's too bad we're at work, because this is a job for a water hose. He's outside now looking for a stick.

Like I said, it's Christmas Eve. I'm at work. When I was a kid today was The Day. Our family always opened presents on Christmas Eve after a fancy dinner. Now that I have my own family presents get opened on Christmas morning. Rightfully so. Santa's coming. My son is going to wake up to a wonderland of toys and wrapping paper and joy. Looking back, I feel a bit gypped that my Christmas was over before it even began. I don't know why my parents chose to celebrate that way. They also forced me to go to church at midnight. And even though I didn't believe any of what the church was selling, the gravity of spending midnight on Christmas in a church singing Silent Night holding a candle in a darkened sanctuary was always humbling and sobering. Myths and legends aside, there's a power in those churches that's hard to deny. Perhaps it's the collective strength of numerous people praying their faithful prayers to an entity far more powerful than anything they can imagine. There's magic in a belief that strong.

So, tomorrow morning my son will wake up and see what Santa Claus has left behind. It's going to be exciting and magical.

Music Appreciation: Best of 2014

I have a cynical outlook on time. How humans have manipulated the concept of time from an actual unit of measurement to a constraint or barrier that we use either as a way to label or identify arbitrary things in our lives. Or, how we have turned time into fences that surround our trivial moments. For example, yes, I get very caught up in holidays and certain dates of commemoration. But these are just numbers on a calendar. Days of the week and months and years are cute and pretty, but they're meaningless on a celestial plane. There's really only two time-related events humans should concern themselves with: Summer and Winter. Everything else is minutia. With that said, I would like to present my favorite album of the year Two-Thousand Fourteen...



I purchased this album with no knowledge of their previous offerings. I don't know if or how the band has evolved over the years blah blah blah. What I can tell you is that I have it on vinyl and it has consistently gotten heavy rotation on our living room record player. Atlas has a transformative, ethereal beauty to it. It conjures up in me feeling of nostalgia and care-free moods of years long gone. Listening to Altas gives me a sense that some day, if I try hard enough, I can get those years back. I can move myself mentally and emotionally back into the mindset of my college years when music meant everything and love was the only thing I lived for.

I fix things

There is a certain satisfaction in fixing something above my educational standing in this world. Granted, the fix was merely the acquisition of a new cord, but still! I fixed it. I tried fixing a door, too, but that didn't turn out so well.

If only life's quirky problems could be fixed with new cords. Because if its a new cord you need, look no further. I'll get you that cord.