The weather is attempting to shift, but I think the clutch is out. My car remains full of leaves from the weekend with the top down and the warm air brushing and churning through its creases and folds. There is an unidentifiable layer on the sun visors, I would wonder where else it might be lurking but it would probably disgust me out if I allocated any real cerebral power to it.

The windows in my apartment are being replaced today, when I arrive home the promises that I’ll “feel a difference” will remain untested, as I stretch their width to allow the outside in. This morning the city is coated with low clouds, while just last night the moon hung so bright and low in the sky I thought I might touch it and adopt its glow.

Another season changing, the promise of renewal. The hope of a fresh and bountiful harvest is on the horizon, and my soul slows to soak it all in. Mankind seems to measure its pace and reflect, to have peace within grasp.

This, and halfway around the world in a place we hear about on the news but might rather sweep from our minds, there is unfathomable violence. Linked to this, on our own soil, there is a decision being presented to the American public that we appear to have already grown weary of. Still the concept of one man making a difference isn’t digested.

There are too many opportunities for each of us to impact humanity, yet find our schedules too busy. I came to a realization a few years ago when I, too; thought I was too busy.

I’m not Madeline Albright.

I have the time.

Lou Reed found the words years ago, and they found me. “They’ll shit in a river, dump battery acid in a stream, watch dead rats wash up on the beach and then complain when they can’t swim”.

Don’t just vote. Give your time to a cause. 2 hours a week. You can find that, can’t you? To make sandwiches for the homeless instead of watching an episode or two of Law & Order you’ve already taken in half a dozen times? To stuff envelopes for a non-profit after work one day instead of yapping on the phone about nothing or playing Duke Nuke ‘Em…again…or futzing around with your MP3 collection.

Complaints about the economy or the welfare system or any of a thousand other pressing cultural issues will find themselves ignored by my ears unless you’re personally invested in paving the way to change. You know what I believe, but I’ll say it again in the event you haven’t committed all my life philosophies to memory.

If you have or perceive a problem and you do nothing to remedy it, you forfeit your right to complain.

It’s a choice, one you’re blessed enough to have granted by citizenship and one you may neglect. There is a part of who you are that swells and falls with the breath you give it – the breath of hope and change.

Life is what you make it. Make a difference. Do something.

20 Questions to a Better Personality

Wackiness: 50/100
Rationality: 40/100
Constructiveness: 24/100
Leadership: 24/100

You are a SEDF–Sober Emotional Destructive Follower. This makes you a Evil Genius.

You are extremely focused and difficult to distract from your tasks. With luck, you have learned to channel your energies into improving your intellect, rather than destroying the weak and unsuspecting.

Your friends may find you remote and a hard nut to crack. Few of your peers know you very well–even those you have known a long time–because you have expert control of the face you put forth to the world. You prefer to observe, calculate, discern and decide. Your decisions are final, and your desire to be right is impenetrable.

You are not to be messed with. You may explode.

Of the 32863 people who have taken this quiz since tracking began (8/17/2004), 14.2 % are this type.

The Blarney Stone, that is.

“It’s said that the secret of the holy stone was given Cormac MacCarthy, King of Munster, by the local whome he had saved from drowning in the lake behind the castle. It’s also said that the stone was brought back from the Crusades and that it was made into two halves. One is the Stone of Scone, also known as the Stone of Destiny, the other half was given to Cormack MacCarthy by Robert Bruce of Scotland in gratitude for the Irish Army of fourth thousand men which was sent to help him at the Battle of Bannockourn in 1314.

Whatever it’s origins, through the centuries the stone has succeeded in stranthening the mystical romance and legend that reaches out to the four corners of the world as is evident by the thousands of people who visit Blarney Castle every year just to kiss this mysterious stone in the hope of recieving the gift of eloquence or perhaps to capture a little of the mystique that is the Blarney Stone.”

Either way, all I got out of it was this lousy photo…I still can’t tell a joke or a story to save my life.

Some days, there isn’t a solid point behind my entry. It winds up just a lot of mush…rambling. Today is one of those days.

With the hangover of the next hurricane looming, I’d have been a fool not to have spent the weekend playing in the sunshine, riding with the top down, allowing my hair to become a hopelessly tangled mess.

And I wonder why it comes out by the handfuls in the shower?

Friday night my headache and I shared a pizza (naughty!) and got to bed by 8 in hopes that one of us might wake up alone. Though I tossed and turned (each time fully aware of my throbbing cranium), when I finally rolled out at 8:30 Saturday morning I was alone. I threw the bike on the back of the Jeep and hauled myself out to East Bumble, where I only managed about 10 miles on the Silver Comet before I decided I’d had enough and would rather be laying in the park reading a book. One parking space adventure later, I was situated on a grassy hill on the 10th street side of Piedmont Park. Bliss.

When I’d had enough I took myself on a little lunch-date – for one of my favorite foods: Houston’s chicken salad with honey mustard (instead of honey lime). As near as I can recall, I went home after that, tidied the place a bit and went to bed.

Sunday arrived and found me with morning hair and my book at the laundromat – which – for the first time I can remember on a Sunday – was not a zoo. A nice older man who seemed down on his luck offered me the rest of his Tide. Awww. Another was having trouble with the change machine and I, apparently; have the touch.

A quick shower and a few hours of running errands in the sun later, it was time to head home and get some quiet time before The Hair Ball.

VOD has the potential to be a beautiful thing. It’s a shame Comcast (The Tree vs. The Dish = Good-Bye TiVo) hasn’t worked out all the glitches. Signal hiccups in the middle of a show, non-standard on screen graphics, unfriendly navigation, etc. make it almost not worth your time to deal with. Just the same, I managed to watch the first half of the last Six Feet Under – I had previously seen the second half – and then got dressed.

I guess it’s bad form to show up to a melanoma fundraiser with a tan and a heat rash, huh?

My reason for going to the ball was two fold: my friend MaryJac was one of the designers for the show, and my friend Amy has been kicking melanomas ass off and on for several years. The plan was to show up, and then attempt to find MJ’s man Eamon in the crowd. Brave, right? Not like me. As I was making the turn off 14th St. I decided to call Amy. I didn’t get the usual “Melanoma Monday” type e-mails from her this year, and after having dinner last week I knew she was going to Europe soon, so I assumed she was going to miss the event. My message was rambling but said what I need to say and the next think I knew ~ring~ring~. It’s Amy. She, her husband Chris (who is a DOLL), and her friend Chad are at the event. Also there are her friend Bunny and Bunny’s friend Jo. Safety in numbers.

The weather and the venue were agreeable. When discussing the water feature with Chad, I wondered out loud how many drunk people wound up in it every weekend – Chad replied that drunks don’t wind up in there, the crack kids do. Oh.

The show itself was – entertaining. There was an Ode to The Pink Panther that I could have done without, and a few “do’s” that Cher did in the 80′s. I couldn’t help but think that Intern Nick would have really loved the show, the eye-candy, the pseudo high-fashion, and the attitudes to match what hadn’t been earned. Despite how it may sound, I didn’t lose sight of why I was there — why we were all there. There was a touching tribute to Don and Sylvia Shaw’s daughter, the reason the Hair Ball takes place every year.

After half a glass of white wine, an hour of standing behind a lot of tall people (where did these freakish Amazons come from?) and annoying the hell out of a guy in a Burberry shirt with our heckling, it was time for my tired little feet to head for the hills.

I never did find Eamon.

Another Friday has arrived, following a long week of restless nights and inexplicable chronic headaches.

Bonus tracks on the humor source LP are these two gems. The first is an IM exchange from when Jonathan was in Germany a few months ago and was having some intestinal tract issues, Kyle was good enough to record it permanently. I read it again this morning and it had me laughing so hard that tears were literally spilling out of my eyes. It’s crude and juvenile but I’ll be damned if those qualities aren’t some of the best things life has to offer.

The second is a video from Fatboy Slim that my friend Stacey sent me a link to yesterday – knowing my love of all things Walken. Go here, click on audio/video, right above that “astralwerks” will appear, click that then scroll down to Fatboy Slim. You’ll thank me.

In short, nothing original today. A few regurgitated bits to inject spikes into my laugh track.

My ultimate goal in life is to laugh. More deeply, with increasing frequency, from a genuine place.

This morning that was hard to keep sight of, while shaving my legs I got goose-bumps and let me just tell you how painful the aftermath can be if you don’t stop and wait for them to go away before continuing with the task. It’s even more difficult to keep sight of when Americans are being beheaded in foreign countries and we’re in danger of a whining, spineless republican residing in the White House for four more years.

When I have a bad day or something strikes me wrong, I do my best to find ways to laugh at it. It’s something my mother taught me, I guess. She was a double amputee and from time to time I’d have a new friend over and she’d sit in the living room, in her favorite corner chair in the sunshine spot with her legs crossed, one artificial limb on top of the other. She’d bounce her leg and let it get “out of control” until it eventually slid off, much to the horror of the newbie in the house. Ah yeah, good times. And you wonder why I’m sick in the head?

The point is: between the headache and the decapitated hair follicles, my day isn’t starting off right. When this happens, I have 4 sources of lightheartedness that never fail to amuse me and turn my disposition right around.

~This picture, hanging on my office wall
~The mpg file of the Cowbell / Blue Oyster Cult skit from SNL downloadable here
~ The Manah Manah song, preferably via the one of the Muppet Show DVD’s I have at home, but I will frequently settle for the MP3.
~ My most tangible smile source: finger puppets.

Just a little more humor. Cat Stevens (one of my all time favorites, thank you) was put on a watch list by the government (he changed his name to Yusuf Islam) and prevented from entering the United States. This morning on The Today Show, Katie Couric and John Stewart are yukking it up.

John: Well they put him on the watch list after they figured out he was being followed — by a Moon Shadow
Katie: Our producer was using that one all day yesterday
John: Well, I just woke up
Katie: Morning Has Broken, as it were

They went on and on, and I hopped in the shower…you know the rest. Bad puns, I will NEVER get enough! Sadly, my laughter alone doesn’t change the way the world is run, but it’s a start. Pay it forward.

I’ve had a headache since Sunday, and it feels as though it’s actually infiltrated my eyeballs. I’m not clear on the cause, but it’s impacting my desire to look at this screen long enough to write anything of interest or value.

That said, I leave you with this: men should not have moustaches unless they’re in the Wild West. In as much as my footwear gave away my nationality while in Ireland, your choice of belt/no belt with jeans tells me with a high level of accuracy what part of the states you were raised in. (Lord, is that sentence even anywhere near grammatically possible?)