Busy as a Bzz-Bzz Bee

It’s that time of year when Kris and I spend much of our time outside, working on the yard. We’ve tried to train the cats to prune and plant for us, but mostly they just lay around glowering at birds.

Kris is (jusifiably) proud of her flower beds, and lately she’s been grabbing my camera to take photos. “Post these,” she says when she’s done. Here are some shots from her most recent batch.

The front border bed

The ‘Gold Medal’ rose

Kris loves bees. I was impressed that she was able to make some nice hand-held captures of honeybees at work. For example:

[photo of a honeybee flying among the lavendar]

Bee in flight

My favorite photo of the bunch

It’s raining today (Sunday), but yesterday we were able to do a lot of yardwork, pruning limbs, mowing lawns, and otherwise fussing over our plants. Very fun.

An Unpleasant Surprise

How lovely. I just got to work. Imagine my delight to discover that unwelcome visitors have once again set up housekeeping beneath my office. Yes, it’s true — the skunks are back.

Jeff just walked into my office to discover the smell. “Oh — that’s nice,” he said.

If I were blogging full-time from home, I wouldn’t have to sit in a skunky office!

I just hope this is temporary. I don’t want to have crawl under the trailer again to retrieve a skunk corpse…

We’re Not Interested

The phone is the bane of my existence. It rings all day long, especially at work. And since I’m the one charged with answering the phone, I have to stop whatever it is I’m doing to answer the damn thing.

Yes, I know I get paid for this, but it’s still frustrating. I’m thinking. My mind is at work. When the phone rings, it breaks my concentration. Sometimes, when we’re busy, the phone rings ten or fifteen times an hour. When this happens, I begin to curse.

Even at home, the phone bugs me. Send me e-mail! E-mail does not interrupt my work flow. I can answer it when I have the time. The phone requires my immediate attention. (Obviously, I don’t mind calls for certain things, but come on: a lot of things are better suited to e-mail.)

All of this is preface to another story.

J.D. and the Yellow Pages
Once upon a time, I had a bad experience with a company that publishes a Portland-area telephone directory. Before this time, I had basically been polite and patient with telemarketers who called about their various phone books. (And who knew there were so many? It’s crazy!) Since then, I’m an asshole, and I don’t care.

Just yesterday morning I received the third call in as many days from somebody with a thick Indian accent offering to update our free listing in the U.S. Business Yellow Pages. The first two times I politely asked to be removed from the list. Yesterday I was not so polite. I’m not proud of my behavior, but hey — I’m only human.

Anyhow: on Monday, Nick received a call late in the afternoon. It was a fellow named Raymond. He’s taking care of our account this year at the one telephone directory in which we choose to advertise. (There’s a new account rep every year, it seems.) Raymond was all chummy with Nick, telling him how much he looked forward to meeting all of us. Nick hates stuff like this. He told Raymond to call me Tuesday morning, but then he couldn’t get him off the phone. (Nick is not assertive.)

On Tuesday, Raymond called me. He told me that he had a lovely chat with Nick on Monday, and that he was pleased to be talking to me. He asked if he could come out to go over our yearly contract and to tell us about the company’s internet directory. “We’re not interested in the internet directory,” I told him.

“Oh, I think you’ll be interested in this, J.D.” he said. Whatever. I gave him directions to find the place. “Oh, I’ll bet it’s gorgeous out there,” he said. “I’ve never been out there. I look forward to seeing the country. And I look forward to meeting you.” Whatever.

Yesterday Raymond called just before our schedule meeting. “J.D., I’m running behind,” he told me. I said that was fine. I’d be here. Hoping the telephone would let me write in peace. “Great,” he said. “I really look forward to meeting you.”

“Man,” I said after he hung up. “That man is obsequious.”

“What does obsequious mean?” asked Jeff.

“Brown-noser,” I said. “Ass-kisser. He’s full of false flattery.”

Nick agreed. Then he had an idea. “Uh, I’m going to town,” he said. “I’ll, uh, run in the deposit. Bye.” He had no desire to be in on the meeting. Taking a hint, Jeff grabbed the loppers and went outside to prune trees. (Trees that have never been pruned before in nearly two decades.)

Raymond arrived. “Wow,” he said. “This is gorgeous country, J.D.. What an amazing drive. It must be special to work out here.” I gritted my teeth, first because of his painful saccharine-sweetness, and then because the grip of his handshake was hard enough to crack walnuts. We sat down.

“J.D.,” he said, “I want to show you our internet directory.”

“We’re not interested,” I said.

“I hear you,” he said, “but I think you should look at the changes we’ve made, J.D. We’ve had 60% growth in the past year.”

“That’s nice,” I said. “But we’re not interested. Nobody I know even uses an online telephone directory. They all use Google.” Even as I said that, I knew I’d make a mistake. I’d given him a concrete rejection, given him something he could reply to.

sigh

Raymond held up a finger. “Hold on. Let me show you something, J.D.” He leafed through a binder, hunting for a page he wanted to share. He couldn’t find it. He leafed some more. He leafed some more, and then turned the page a quarter of the way toward me, as if letting me look (though I could not see a thing). “Our customers have shown tremendous satisfaction with our online directory. It lets you target locally.” Blah blah blah.

Raymond talked for five minutes about his stupid internet directory. I just let him go. I sat there and nodded, but I was really thinking about my blogs, and about what I would write in the afternoon, if the phones ever stopped ringing. Blah blah blah.

“Now doesn’t that sound great, J.D.?” Raymond said, wrapping up the spiel.

“Look,” I said. “I told you before: we’re just not interested. We have no interest whatsoever.”

He was about to reply to this when there was a knock at the back door. It was the Schwan’s man. Actually, it was the substitute Schwan’s man. He’s a bozo, and I know it, but I was in a passive-aggressive mood. I played happy and cheery J.D. “Hi, how’s it going?” I said. “We don’t need anything this time. I’m sorry.”

The Schwan’s man said okay, and then he told me all about the awesome grilled cheese sandwiches they’ve begun to sell. “They’re great,” he said. “I love them. I ate a whole box by myself the other day.” (And he looked like it.) “If I could, I’d sit around and eat these cheese sandwiches and play video games.” He paused. “But my wife wouldn’t like that.” I laughed heartily, but not because I thought it was funny. I was just being mean to Raymond.

As I returned to the office, the telephone rang. It was a customer with whom I could joke and chat, so I played happy cheery J.D. again. But when I sat down to talk with Raymond, I was dour, serious J.D. He seemed to get the point.

“Well,” he said. “I guess we should sign the contract.”

“Yes, that’s a good idea,” I said.

I signed and initialed a couple pages. When we got to the last page, he said, “Now you’re sure you don’t want to consider the internet directory?” I had to look at his face to tell if he was being serious. He was.

“No,” I said. “We’re not interested.”

We finished the deal, and I led him to the door. “Thank you so much, J.D., it was a pleasure to meet you. It was great to get out here and see this beautiful land. You sure have a great business. Take care!”

I sat at my desk to process some quotes. I had been working for about five minutes, and was getting up to use the fax machine, when Raymond appeared at the door.

“Pardon me, J.D.,” he said, “But I thought I should let you know that you can change your mind at any time about the internet directory. It’s not like the print directory where there’s a deadline. We can insert your listing into the online directory any time.”

“Okay,” I said. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

He left. I finished my quotes and wheeled over to write up a weblog entry. I had been writing for twenty minutes when all of a sudden Raymond was by my side. “What the hell,” I thought to myself. What planet was this guy from?

“Pardon me, J.D. But I forgot to give you these flyers. This flyer describes your contract. It’s the same one you get every year. And this flyer describes the internet program. It’ll give you a better idea of what it can do for you and your business.”

I couldn’t believe my ears. “Look,” I said. “We’re not interested. That’s it. We’re just not interested.”

“Oh, I understand,” he said, though he clearly did not.

About five minutes later, Nick returned from town. “Is he gone yet?” I whispered to him.

“Who?” he asked.

“The phone book guy. He keeps coming back. He won’t take no for an answer.”

Nick laughed.

I told Kris this story this morning as we were getting ready for work. “Who’s going to take care of crap like that if you leave?” she asked.

I thought for a moment. “Nobody. Custom Box will just have a listing in the online yellow pages.”

Nick just came to interrupt my writing to read the following quote, which is from his favorite film of all time, As Good as it Gets. (Which apparently is not very.) Simon has just knocked on the door of Melvin, a writer who does not like to be interrupted.

Melvin Udall: Never, never, interrupt me, okay? Not if there’s a fire, not even if you hear the sound of a thud from my home and one week later there’s a smell coming from there that can only be a decaying human body and you have to hold a hanky to your face because the stench is so thick that you think you’re going to faint. Even then, don’t come knocking. Or, if it’s election night, and you’re excited and you wanna celebrate because some fudgepacker that you date has been elected the first queer president of the United States and he’s going to have you down to Camp David, and you want someone to share the moment with. Even then, don’t knock. Not on this door. Not for ANY reason. Do you get me, sweetheart?
Simon Bishop: It’s not a subtle point that you’re making.

I’m under the impression that Nick believes I’m like Melvin lately. He may have a point.

Ten Suit Jackets, Barely Worn

For a guy who never wears a suit jacket, I sure have a lot of them. As part of Project De-Clutter, Kris had me parade before here wearing each jacket in turn. I paraded ten times. Where did all of these come from?

The two I like best were both thrift store finds. They’re both wool sports coats in varying shades of brown and grey. They fit well. They move well. I might even enjoy wearing them! (I don’t think I’ve worn either of them before.)

The second best pair were, I think, donations from Jeremy Gingerich. They’re both the same size and style, just different colors. They fit okay, but are a little tight in the shoulders. As I continue my wellness regimen, they’ll probably actually fit just right eventually. The best part is that they come with matching slacks.

Then there are the four different navy blue jackets I’ve acquired over the course of my life. My father bought me one of them: it was my salesman’s uniform for several years when I was just out of college. It fits well enough, but I just don’t like it. The other two are way too big. (I suspect they’re also thrift store purchases.)

The last two jackets are no good: one is just too big, and the other is my Vernon Dursley jacket from oh-so-long ago.

Kris is Hermione (who has turned into a cat)

I make a damn fine Vernon Dursley

Inside the breast pocket of the Vernon Dursley jacket, I found a cigar of the type Jeremy brought for us to smoke at that gathering. In fact, I’ve closed the door to my office and am smoking the cigar now. (It’s only a matter of time before Kris becomes enraged with me for this.)

These cigars were better five years ago, when they were fresh…

My other jackets contained goodies, too. One contained my ticket from Don Giovanni last May. Another contained the cork from a wine bottle. And a third contained banquet tickets from the 1999 Oregon FBLA State Leadership Conference — that was the year I helped Linda Kavan chaperone various events.

In any event, I’m only keeping five jackets, but even that seems like overkill. I’ll keep the two nice sports coats, the two suits from Jeremy, and the navy jacket that Dad bought me. (Though the latter may actually be purged soon, too.)

Project De-Clutter

I’ve been working with my wellness coach, Lauren, again for the past few weeks. Though we both went into this expecting to focus more on physical fitness, our sessions have actually taken a surprising turn toward mental fitness. As a result I’ve been led practice meditation, to determine my personal priorities, to cut back on blogging, and, most recently, to de-clutter my environment.

As most of you are aware, I’m a clutter kind of guy. I accumulate stuff. I always have. When I was a boy, I had what my parent’s called a “rat’s nest” — a closet filled with whatever I could find and hoard. I still have packrat tendencies.

I collect comics. I have several hundred record albums. I have thousands of books. I’ve kept every letter or note ever written to me, from fifth grade until now. (Well, some have been lost, but only accidentally.) I keep every receipt. I gather free literature on roofing, on rototillers, on automobile tires. I collect this stuff, and I bring it all home.

I’m like a black hole for junk.

Obviously, this stuff all needs a place to live. Most of it lies buried in closets and sheds, but some of it — the most recently used stuff — has a tendency to collect in piles on every open surface. Since we moved to this house, we’ve managed to keep the downstairs mostly clutter-free, but the upstairs is a haven for the stuff.

Now, this might not be such a problem — I might be able to live a happy cluttered life — except for the fact that it really detracts from my ability to concentrate. If I sit at this desk and there are papers scattered everywhere, and there are things on the filing cabinet, and the coffee table is piled with books, and there’s stuff all over the floor, well then it becomes difficult for me to focus. I can’t write.

When I complained about my cluttered life at the Get Rich Slowly forums, several readers recommended Clutter’s Last Stand by Don Aslett. I got a copy, but I haven’t been able to read it yet because Kris took it and has had it ever since. It must be pretty motivational, because it’s prompted her to action. She spent the weekend de-cluttering whatever she could.

Though I haven’t had a chance to read the official de-cluttering techniques, I’ve made a start on my own projects. This office is now mostly clutter-free. I do still have one stack each on the filing cabinet, the bookshelf, and the desk, but that’s a vast improvement from before. (And, to be honest, as I look around at these piles right now, I feel the urge to stop and sort them.)

Andrew Cronk goes through periods in his life where he purges things. We’ll get together and he’ll say, “Here, J.D., I have some things for you.” He’ll hand me random stuff: a science fiction book, a computer game, a fishing pole. My understanding is that when he does this, he’s basically de-cluttering his life. Now, for the first time, I can really understand his motivation.

Don’t be surprised if, the next time I see you, I hand you a stack of comic books or some REO Speedwagon LPs.

A Frustrating Phone Call

This is dedicated to Tiffany, who loves these sorts of stories.

* ring *

J.D.: Custom Box Service
Bertha: What size are your medium boxes?
…long pause…

J.D.: Uh, well, we manufacture custom boxes, so we don’t have anything we’d call a medium box.
Bertha: But what size is a medium box? Is it seventeen inches?
…long pause…

J.D.: Well, I don’t know what a medium box is. It might have a side that is seventeen inches, but a box has three dimensions.
Bertha: I know, but couldn’t a medium box be seventeen by seventeen.
J.D.: And how high?
Bertha: I don’t care. I’m putting four coats in it. UPS wants me to quote them a size, but I don’t know it. All I want to know is how big your medium boxes are.
J.D.: Well, we don’t have medium boxes. That phrase doesn’t mean anything to us. We make boxes to order.
…long pause…

Bertha: But they might be seventeen inches right? That would fit four coats?
…long pause…

J.D.: I guess it might fit four coats, it’s hard to say.
Bertha: Well, it does firt four coats. I have a medium box here, and I have four coats in it and it’s ready to ship, but UPS wants to know what size the box is. That’s why I called you. All I need to know is what size a medium box is.
…long pause — J.D. is dumbfounded…

J.D.: Uh…
…long pause…

Bertha: Don’t you have a medium box?
J.D.: No, that’s what I’m trying to say. So you’re telling me that you have a box already. You don’t need a box. You just want to know how big the box you have is?
Bertha: I know what size it is. It’s a medium box. I just need to know the inches. I think it looks about seventeen by seventeen.
…long pause — we’re both getting frustrated at this point…

J.D.: Look. I have an idea. I think I can help you.
Bertha: Good.
J.D. Do you have a piece of paper near you? A piece of typing paper? A piece of notebook paper? Just a standard piece of paper that’s 8-1/2 x 11?
Bertha: Yes.
J.D.: Let’s use that to measure your box.
Bertha: How can we possibly do that. I don’t have a measuring stick.
J.D.: Well, we can use the paper to make a rough guess. The paper is 8-1/2 inches wide, right? If you measure two widths of the paper, that’s seventeen inches.
…long pause…

J.D.: Did you measure it?
Bertha: I don’t understand. All I want to know is how big a medium box is.
J.D.: Well, I’m trying…
* click *

Bertha hung up on me.

A Weekend of Stories

This was one of those rare weekends where we were able to cram in a lot of stuff, and yet I don’t feel overwhelmed, as if I didn’t have time for myself.

Saturday was book group, but on Friday afternoon, I still as only one hundred pages in. Since I chose the book, I figured I’d better get cracking. While Kris went grocery shopping, I climbed into the bathtub to read while soaking. Only I fell asleep.

I was dozing soundly when the phone rang. “Damn it,” I thought. “It’s probably Nick calling from work.” I went back to sleep. The phone rang again. Cursing, I pulled myself from the tub and sloshed naked to the phone. It was Kris. She was at Safeway, ready to pay, but she’d forgotten her wallet. She had, however, remembered her new cell phone.

I got dressed and drove to the store. “What would you have done if I hadn’t answered?” I asked.

“Just kept calling,” she said brightly.

Grrrrrr.

I’ve noted before that I’m not the best person to be using a chainsaw. By nature, I’m clumsy. One might even call me careless and not get an argument.

Still, there are many chores around Rosings Park that are aided by a chainsaw. We have a lot of wood, and while it could be chopped with an axe, that would take several orders of magnitude more time than I’m willing to spend.

The last time with had the Bacon-Flicks and Hampton-Zinnikers over, Chris looked at my chainsaw for me. It had an oil leak, and was altogether Not Right. He opened it up, fiddled with things, and then put it back together. “It should be ready to go now,” he said. “You just need to tighten these nuts.” Well, apparently I forgot to tighten the nuts.

I put the chainsaw away in its case, and forgot about it for months. On Sunday, though, we took advantage of the cool, sunny weather to tackle yardwork. One of our chores was to prune the lilac. We have a monster of a lilac out by the road, and we’re pruning it a little each year. This is our third year of trimming it, and next year should be the last.

To prune, we use our Japanese saw to hack a limb off at the base of the trunk. These are big limbs, though, three or four inches in diameter and very heavy. After Kris has harvested blossoms, I attack them with the chainsaw.

Well, on Sunday I was midway through the first limb when all of a sudden the chainsaw fell apart. No, seriously — it literally fell apart. The sideplate fell off and the thing stopped running (thank goodness). I was stunned. I also felt like I’d just escaped certain death. Eventually I realized that the nuts that hold the sideplate on had fallen out. (And remembered that I was supposed to have tightened them.) Through sheer luck, I found both nuts, and re-assembled the chainsaw.

I spent ten or fifteen minutes cutting up the remaining lilac branches. Just as I finished my final cut, the chainsaw stopped once more. I thought I saw the chain fly off into the bushes at a high rate of speed, and I thought, “Holy cats! I’m lucky to be alive!” In reality, the chain was dangling from the saw — it had kicked off the track. (This is just as dangerous as flying off, but at least it didn’t break.)

“You need to take a chainsaw class,” Kris told me after watching these mishaps. “You’re going to kill yourself with that thing if you don’t.”

She may be right…

On Sunday night, we met Will and Marla for dinner at Gustav’s. We almost didn’t make it.

When I started the car, the gas light was on. (It hadn’t been on the night before.) As we pulled away from the house and started up the hill, my car died almost immediately. “Damn Ford,” I said. I always curse my car when it gives me trouble.

“What’s wrong?” asked Kris.

“It may be out of gas,” I said. “That doesn’t really make sense, though. The gas light wasn’t on yesterday. Fortunately, we were just a few hundred feet from home, so I ran back to get the mower gas can. We got back in the car and started up the hill, but the car died immediately again.

“I’ll get my car,” said Kris. “Just leave your car here. There’s obviously something wrong with it.”

I was still convinced it was just out of gas. I made sure there was no traffic, then put the car in neutral and let it coast backward. While it rolled, I turned the wheel, turning the car to block the road. I opened the door and then gave the car a little push forward, continuing to turn the wheel so that the vehicle pointed downhill. (Basically, I did a three-point turn using gravity and muscle.) I rolled down to our house and parked. Then I tried the engine. It started. I drove around the block to make sure things were okay. They were. We drove off to meet Will and Marla.

Gustav’s isn’t one of my favorite restaurants. I find the selections limiting. Still, the fondue is good (especially with big, soft salty pretzels). Our waitress was a piece of work: brightly painted fingernails, obsequious manner, and an inability to to pass things across the table. When she set out the drink napkins, she sort of tossed them in the general direction they needed to go, but wouldn’t actually set them in front of people. She said things like “Absolutely!” and “Have we decided yet?” When she came back to take our dessert order, she smelled like she’d just smoked a pack of cigarettes.

After dinner, we followed Will and Marla to look at their new house, just past Keizer Sunnyside. It’s a lovely new home built on a hillside. Construction is nearly finished, and they hope to move in by the end of the month (though I keep telling them they won’t be in until June). We walked up the steep stairs to look in the windows. Then Will, on a whim, tried the door. It was open. “Should we go in?” he asked. They’re really not supposed to, but we took a risk. We walked through, admiring the layout and the materials. Will and Marla have selected all the tiles and carpet and paint color. They’ve done a good job.

I look forward to seeing the final product. In June.

A Three-Foot Monster

My nephew, Noah, came to work with Jeff the other day. His baby-sitter was sick, so he hung around his dad’s office playing with Hot Wheels and generally being a four-year-old. At one point he decided to tiptoe down the hallway, throw open my door, and shout, “BOO!”

Being a four-year-old, he wasn’t exactly sneaky. I heard him coming. Still, I did my best to act scared. “Ah!” I said, holding up my arms in fright. Oh, how Noah laughed. He thought this was a riot. He ran to Jeff and died laughing on the floor.

“What are you doing?” Jeff asked.

“I’m doing my job,” Noah said between giggles.

“Your job?”

“That’s my job,” explained Noah, “scaring Uncle J.D.”

When his giggles had subsided, he tiptoed down the hallway, threw open my door, and shouted, “BOO!”

Again, I acted scared. I leaped back in my chair, flung my arms in the air, and put on my best show of fear. Again, Noah thought this was great. He ran to tell Jeff: “I scared Uncle J.D. a lot. He went backward in his seat!”

Things were quiet for a few minutes. Maybe Noah was playing with his Hot Wheels. Maybe he was drawing. Whatever the case, eventually he decided enough was enough. He announced to Jeff, “I’m going to go scare Uncle J.D. again.” And so he did. In fact, he continued to scare me for five or ten minutes, by which time I’d long since given up on play-acting every time. (I had work to do!)

I did, however, take time to convince Noah that he could scare all of you…

One Small Step

Max (aka Meatball) has a bad habit. He likes to lay on the stairs, stretched long so that he takes up an entire step. This might not be such a big deal except:

He is grey and the stairway is often dark.
He doesn’t move when a human steps on him.

As you can imagine, this presents some difficulties.

It’s official: I’m cutting back to just three blogs. I’m not sure that I shared the plan Kris and I came up with last week, but here it is for the curious:

Cut back to just three blogs right now: foldedspace, Get Rich Slowly, and Animal Intelligence. GRS is most important, as it is now producing almost as much income as I make from Custom Box. I’m not cutting AI because I love it, and because it takes very little time.
I’ll continue to write about comics and vintage pop from time-to-time, but I’ll post about them here instead.
Next year, on my 39th birthday, I plan to reduce to part-time at Custom Box.
At that time, I’ll start another site since, in theory, I’ll have the time to do so.
On my 40th birthday, I’ll quit Custom Box completely.

These plans are tentative. Any number of things might change them. I might decide it’s foolish to quit. My web income might dry up. I might move to Australia. Who knows? But for now, this is the agenda.

Friday was gorgeous, just at the upper-end of my heat tolerance: sunny and 24 degrees centigrade (that’s 75 Fahrenheit for those of you who live in Oregon City). I met Matt for lunch, and then we headed to the tulip fields to take photos. Matt moved from California to Oregon a couple years ago. He’s a long-time professional blogger, and is full of great advice. Plus he likes photography, bike-riding, computers, etc. I’m pleased to have made his acquaintance.

Taking photos of tulips in the midday sun is an exercise in futility. The colors don’t photograph well under the best conditions; they’re a nightmare in the glare of the sun. The colors are so bright that they get “blown out”. Still, here are a few shots from the trip.

It's difficult to photograph tulips sometimes

Two examples of “blown out” colors.

I love old oak trees. They’re beautiful.

The tulip farm was very crowded. (I saw Karen Kropf.)

In the afternoon, Kris and I were going to visit the rhododendron garden, but we opted to do yard work instead. We made a trip to the hardware store to load up on mulch. Later, she worked in her flower beds while I popped dandelions and then mowed the lawn. Together we tied the blackberry and raspberry canes in bunches, which makes for a much neater presentation. My grapes look awesome. I love all the buds on the vines.

Because it was so beautiful, and because the weather is getting warmer, Kris opened the French doors in the bedroom and latched them down. In theory, they’ll stay open now until October. I say “in theory” because at 2am Saturday morning the rains set in. It rained for eight hours. It’s a wonderful, comforting sound (exactly like the “Hawaiian rain shower” I listen to on my iPod sometimes in order to get to sleep).

On Saturday we got a very early start, running all sorts of errands by noon. We stopped by to see Andrew and Courtney before 9am! Kris and Courtney discussed gardening while Andrew showed me his new Super Deluxe-o-Matic 12″ compound miter saw. I’m not much of a tool guy, but even I had to drool over that machine. (I’m drooling just remembering it.)

It’s been a great weekend so far. Now, early on Sunday morning, the sun is back, and I think we’re going to be able to finish our yard work while keeping dry. I’ll spend most of my day, of course, writing weblog entries for the coming week. It’s been a long time since I was ahead on my writing, but I sense that I can get there today.

Wii Man

Kris and I have been playing a lot of Nintendo Wii lately.

We played the game a lot when we got it in November, mostly because of the novelty. During the holiday season, we had fun sharing the Wii with friends. Whenever we had guests, we would create a Mii for them. (A Mii is a cartoon avatar that represents a person in the game.) We now have a large library of Miis for all our friends.

During January and February, though, we didn’t use the Wii much. It sat unused, looking more-and-more like one of those impulse purchases that I used to make. (I have boxes of seldom-used gadgets out in the workshop.)

Then Kris discovered fitness mode in Wii Sports. Wii Sports has five games: tennis, bowling, golf, baseball, and boxing. You can play these games by yourself or against other players. But you can also do three training exercises for each sport. In fitness mode, the Wii randomly selects three of these fifteen exercises for the player to perform. Based on the results, the game assigns a “fitness age”.

Kris had been doing this for about a week before I decided to try my hand at it. I was dismayed to find that my fitness age ws 58. The horror! I began to take the fitness test every day. (Each person is only allowed one chance per day.) I’ve managed to climb into the 30s and even the 20s now. I still have bad days (51 last Saturday!) on occasion, but most days I’m around 25. The best score you can get is 20, I think.

Meanwhile, I’ve also begun to practice bowling and tennis, the two games I find most enjoyable. For a long time, I was using a bowling throw that removed spin from the ball: I released the ball late, lobbing it out into the lane. I was able to get some good scores — a high of 258 — but ultimately I decided this lob throw was too sporadic, so I’ve been working on a spin throw. (I actually tried this lob throw at a real bowling alley, thinking it would reduce my natural spin. Not a good idea. It’s very conspicuous when your ball sails through the air and then clunks to the ground halfway down the lane. Management doesn’t like that.)

Tennis has been my real source of joy lately, though. As you get better at each game, you’re given a rating. “Pro” level is 1000. I think the max rating is 2000. My bowling rating has hovered around 1250 since last fall, but my tennis rating had been a measly 400. With daily practice, I have this up to about 1750 now, and can usually win against the top two computer opponents (rated 1900 and 2000). I love the tactics of Wii tennis: the positioning, the shot selection, etc. It’s fun. (I’ve never really played actual tennis, so I don’t know how it compares.)

I’ve also begun to explore other areas of Wii-ness. For example, yesterday I downloaded the Wii web browser. It’s quite a trip to look at my own websites from inside a video game console. I also recently downloaded some classic games. The Wii comes with a “virtual console”, which means it’s able to play games from all of Nintendo’s past systems. You have to pay to download them, but they’re relatively cheap. For example, I paid $5.00 to download Super Mario Land (from the Super Nintendo system) and $12.00 to download Mario Kart 64 (from the Nintendo 64). Fun stuff. The selection is limited, but it doesn’t matter because Nintendo is offering only the best classic games. (The Wii also plays Gamecube games directly — no downloads required.)

I bought several games when the Wii was released, but I haven’t played them much. (I’d like to trade them for other games.) I do like Zelda and the surgery came (which I forgot to show to Pam), but the others aren’t that exciting. I’m waiting for more stuff directly from Nintendo itself.

I’m only spending about 30 minutes a day with the Wii, but I’m having a lot of fun!