Busy, busy, busy July 1, 2009

There are a couple of things I want to say. Number one is that all my old blogs from Yahoo 360 are on here now. Import worked great. So go ahead and check them out. There’s about a year of blogs I think…maybe even two years. I’m not really sure.

Second thing, I am taking two classes. Introduction to Political Science and Writing 101. They are taking more time than I thought they would. And they are taking more of my brain than I thought they would. I didn’t realize I had a limit to how much writing and thinking I could do in a day but apparently I do.

Third, I am working on a number of art projects that hopefully will look good in pictures (provided I ever get them posted). A dragon journal for a swap. I signed up for it three months ago but desperately don’t want to do it now. But I’m getting through it. Luckily I only have to do ten pages and I’ve got three done already and a fourth almost done. That means only six more to go. WHHAAAAAHHH!!!

The other’s are surprises. But I think I’m going to make two of the one surprise and keep one for myself. We’ll see.

Oh, and I got my hands on a truly horrible child rearing booklet that I’m going to alter into something hilarious. Not sure what but it’s just too funny to not do something with. Israel thinks something S&M themed but I’m not sure I could pull it off. We’ll see.

We got our passport stuff in today. WHEEE!

I gave blood today. Took about five minutes to actually drain a pint out of my arm but that was after waiting almost 45 minutes to actually get a needle in my arm. They were just…incompetent. I was a little nervous about letting them stick me with a needle but it all went fine and I’m glad I didn’t flee in fear.

Not much else going on. There is a chance my sister is comin to visit in September. *crosses fingers* I am incredibly excited about this. I will cry for days if she can’t come (no pressure).

Well, I’ve got a paper to write. I will try to post pictures soon.

Finally, a good day trip in Germany! June 20, 2009

Living in a foreign country has given me a love of reality I didn’t know I could have. When I am based in reality, life is good. When I am based in fantasy, life is horrible.

A couple of months ago we went to Köln for two days. We took the train so we wouldn’t have to deal with finding parking. We stayed in a hotel near city zentrum (city center) so we’d be near all the sights. We bought one umbrella when it started to rain and attempted to share it. We went to a museum, the first we f0und in order to get out of the rain. I had made a list of the different things we wanted to see but we were unable to see most of them. We did walk through the Dom, the huge (and in my opinion, incredibly ugly) cathedral in the center of town. But it was cold and damp and everything was in German. We planned on using public transport but were unable, or unwilling, to figure it out. Our hotel room had two twin beds and a pull out for Jael. It was hot and stuffy so we had to open the window in order to sleep but because we were in the center of the city, the noise from the street was excessive. We all had pounding headaches. We got on the train the next morning and went home, depressed, discouraged and hating Germany.

We had today the day we’ve been trying to have for nine months. We drove to Koblenz today and while I did take a right when I was supposed to go left (due to a surprise turning lane), I was able to turn around at the next round about (within sight of the missed turn) and get right back on track. We went to a store and spent a couple of hours wandering around. We found things we weren’t embarrassed to have in our home (we were in an IKEA). We had an icecream with Jael. We went to the Midsommer fair they had in the parking lot and Jael had fun. She jumped in a bounce house, made a flower wreath head piece, and hammered a nail into a log. We went to the marktplatz and walked around until it started to pour VERY COLD rain. Then we ran to through the marktplatz until we found a store selling umbrellas. We bought an umbrella for each of us and found a quiet restaraunt to eat lunch in. We had a good lunch, a decent cup of coffee and a donut. Then we went home, again, without getting lost, not even a wrong turn.

What we did right today, what we’ve failed to do on our trip to Köln and on other days, was our expectations. When we started out today, we didn’t plan on having a “whirlwind German adventure.” We said, “We are going to the next big town to do some shopping. We’ll probably have some lunch there and see what we can see. We will probably not be able to find everything or even anything we are looking for.” And since our expectations were based in reality, reality was what we got and our expectations were met. We did not set our expectations on being “super tourists” who see all the sights and go to all the museums. We didn’t do anything touristy because until we are comfortable with a city, touristy stuff makes us want to gouge our eyes out.

Maybe next time, when we have an idea of where things are, we will do some touristy things before lunch. There are a number of neat things in Koblenz that we would like to do. There is a castle, a military museum and supposedly a nice park. Perhaps we’ll just go to IKEA and reveal in being in a large store. I don’t know.

But what I do know is that as I drove home, I felt happy and full of life instead of drained and depressed. Reality can be your best friend if you embrace it but your worst enemy if you try to deny its existence.

Oh, and Lisa and Angie…sorry it’s been so long since I’ve posted. Thanks for you patience.

Two Sides to Every Story, Take Two April 13, 2009

Exterior

Interior

I feel like a previous post has been misunderstood so I am going to attempt to clarify (or muddy up the waters so much no one can see where they are going).

This is what I was trying to say:

War is a very powerful tool. Let me compare it to an axe. An axe is a very powerful tool. It can bring down a mighty oak, perhaps one that has stood for a hundred years. Cutting down such a tree should not be a decision made lightly. Perhaps the tree is in the way of your new condominium you want to build. Should you apply the axe to the tree? I don’t think so. Perhaps the soil has washed out from under the tree and it is leaning precariously over the home of a family. Should you apply the axe to the tree? If other methods of securing the tree and keeping the family safe have proved fruitless, than yes, you should chop down the tree with the axe.

But an axe is not a maintenance free tool. Chopping down a tree wears down the axe. Every time you resharpen the axe, a little of the metal is worn down. Chopping down the tree is necessary. The tree itself might not have done anything wrong. It’s just doing its job, which is to grow. It must obey gravity; it has no other choice. The soil is the part which has failed, causing the tree to endanger the safety of the family. But the tree still must be removed.

But do not think for a minute that there isn’t a price to pay. The axe head will be worn down. It will have to be sharpened and eventually replaced. The bigger the tree, the more of your axe you are going to wear away. If you haven’t counted the cost and do not have sufficient axe heads, you will be left with a tree which is even more unstable than before and an axe head which is all used up. You will have consumed the axe and not gained any safety for the family.

But if you do count the cost and do have enough axe heads to finish the job, you have made the family safer. You have also removed a living tree from the ecosystem and however many axe heads from your tool belt. What’s left of the axe heads can be remelted and turned into new axe heads but there is a net loss of metal. So in the end, if you were successful, you are still one tree shorter and X amount of metal shorter. There is an intangible gain (the safety of the family) and a tangible loss (the tree and the axe heads).

If the tree is the “enemy” and the axe heads are the “good guys,” in the end, there has been a net loss of life. If you believe that human life is precious and the ending of it bad, than you have to believe that war, which results in a net loss of life, is bad. It might be less bad than doing nothing, which would result in the net loss of the tree and the innocent family. But it is bad. Is the axe head bad? No. It’s simply doing its job, wielded by someone else. Is the lumberjack bad? No, he’s doing his job, too. Is the soil bad, for washing away and leaving such a precarious situation? No, it was following the rules of phyics. So who’s to blame for the net loss of life, tree and axe head?

Well, it’s complicated. Who planted the tree on a hill above a house? No one? Who didn’t maintain situational awareness to be aware there was a tree growing on the hill over the house? Who should have noticed the tree when it was small and removed it then, perhaps relocating it somewhere safer? Who made the decision to let nature take its course and not shore up the hillside to prevent errosion? Maybe there was strip mining going on which caused the hill to erode so quickly. Maybe pollution killed the ground cover, exposing the soil to the effects of erosion. There is a HUGE chain of events leading up to the current crisis of tree threatening house. Is there any one person or group to blame? Who made the family build under the tree? Why didn’t they move? Why didn’t they cut down the tree when it was smaller, using their own axe heads at their own expense?

And so on, and so forth. I believe that war is evil but as as John Stewart Mill said, “It’s not the ugliest of things.” War is bad. It might be a necessary bad. It might be better than allowing nature to continue her course. But it is bad. However, the people fighting the war aren’t bad. They are just doing their jobs, many heroically. Many are heroic in a bad situation. But they are not in a heroic situation. They are in a bad situation and they, because of their character, become heroes. But they are the hereos, the heroic ones, not the situation they are in.

The Talented Mr. Diesel? April 11, 2009

Vin Diesel

The first movie I saw Vin Diesel in was “Pitch Black” and I hated it. My definition of a “good” movie was very, very narrow. “Pitch Black” was done on the cheap with unknown actors and actresses. It was set on a desert planet and so much of the filming was overexposed to give it that sun scorched feel. It was also a horror film and since they were on such a budget, the director felt that the unseen was scarier than the seen through bad special effects. So the glimpses of the monsters are quick and undefined. And I didn’t like horror movies at the time so I hated it.

Fast forward a number of years. I see “The Fast and the Furious.” I thought it was okay but didn’t really notice Vin Diesel too much. I mean, he was buff and that was noticable but other than that, I really didn’t think much of him. My husband HATED it which cast a negative view over the whole thing and it was not one I cared to see again.

Then Israel went to tech school and came back having seen “The Chronicles of Riddick.” He wanted to see it with me but only after we watched “Pitch Black” together. This time around I LOVED it. Maybe it was falling in love with a guy who shaved his head, maybe it was growing as a person and realizing that there are other cinematic methods than those used in movies such as “You’ve Got Mail.” Whatever the reason, I loved it this time around. Diesel did such an incredible job as the consummate bad ass Riddick, in both “Pitch Black” and in “The Chronicles of Riddick.” But I thought that’s all he was. He was eye candy whose acting abilities consisted of having a great voice and being bad ass.

Then, a couple of months ago, after watching “Pitch Black” again, I googled Vin Diesel to see what else he’s been in. I borrowed some from the library, rented some from i-Tunes and began to realize I’d horribly misjudged Mr. Diesel. Yes, he is eye candy. Yes, he has a deep, signature voice. Yes, he plays bad-ass really well. He can also play broken hearted husband (“A Man Apart”). He can also play loyal friend (“Knockaround Guys”). He can also play (though I’ve not seen this yet) a mobster representing himself in the longest trial in American history in the movie “Find Me Guilty.” Than I got a hold of “Strays.” That would be the feature film he wrote, funded, directed, and starred in. And did a great job, I might add. That was when I began to realize, there might be more to this man than a shiny skull and a set of pipes.

So I spent today watching his TV appearances. Leno, Conan O’Brien (whom I love), BBC’s Ross show and others. And he’s great. He regularly turns the attention to the directors he’s worked with, the host of the show, the audience, other actors, the band, whomever. He credits others for the part they’ve played in his success. He steers the conversation away from his personal life and attempts to respect the privacy of his loved ones. He’s funny, he’s personable, and if he’s not actually a nice guy, he’s a much better actor than we’ve all realized.

All of this to say that as much as you can respect someone you’ve never met and have only seen on camera, I respect Vin Diesel. There aren’t many famous people I respect. There’s not that many I’ve taken the time to research to be honest. I respect Dolly Parton. I respect the late Johnny Cash. The list is short but it just got one person longer.

For what it’s worth, Mr. Diesel, you have the respect of Becky Walker.

Two sides to every story April 11, 2009

Omaha Beach Cemetery

I watched Saving Private Ryan yesterday. I watched it years ago when it first came out and haven’t watched it since because, quite frankly, it was incredibly disturbing. I don’t like seeing the insides of people on their outsides. I don’t like watching people die horribly. I don’t like to see men wasted and war wastes men.

We have a friend in Iraq right now. He volunteered for his current job. It’s the most dangerous job in the Air Force right now. He opted out of a mission a couple of weeks ago and the two guys who went instead were both killed. He had to identify their remains and guard them until they were evacuated. I don’t like that.

My husband is in the Air Force. He will probably deploy this year. I don’t like that. Many of my friends are spouses of military members. Their husbands also deploy as do the fathers of my daughter’s friends. I don’t like that. I don’t like my loved ones being placed in harm’s way, for any reason, no matter how noble.

But John Stuart Mill said something many years ago that I agree with, even though it means that my husband, my daughter’s father, my friends, my friends’ husbands and their kids’ father must all place themselves in mortal danger. He said:

“War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of men better than himself.”

I agree. There are things worth going to war about. There are things worth fighting for and against. There are things that are more important than my own personal safety and the personal safety of my loved ones. I agree with that. But I also agree with Jimmy Carter when he said:

War may sometimes be a necessary evil. But no matter how necessary, it is always an evil, never a good. We will not learn how to live together in peace by killing each other’s children.”

And that’s a fact.

So I am divided. On one hand, I absolutely believe that war is sometimes a necessary evil. On the other hand I believe absolutely that war is evil.

Damned if you do; damned if you don’t.

Art, art, art April 4, 2009

This blog was not started as an art blog but due to my current interest, that’s what it seems to be becoming. Of course, since art is the main thing I’m doing right now, it remains an update of my life blog.

I’ve done a lot of little things since I last blogged (sorry, Lisa). I’ve done too many to show them all, though I am working on getting all the photos over to Flickr so that I can showcase the best here and link to the rest over there. But it’s not happened yet. But here’s some of the better things I’ve done of late.

Contrast Study of Vin Diesel as Xander Cage, sans tatoos

I wanted to work on drawing tone. I have a hard time seeing the value of colors and hues. So I decided to start black and white with a high contrast photo. Oh, and I wanted to try out my new ebony black pencil. It’s neat but I’m not sure it’s that much better than plane graphite and charcoal. Oh well.

I’m also working on a couple of journals. One is just little stories about me, like the time my bra broke during gym class, during the jump rope portion of the physical fitness test. The other is for a swap. It’s a Journal with a Twist. Each entry has to have an “extra” with it. An ATC, a recipe, a photo, a painting, a candybar like the one you ate that day. Whatever. Here’s my favorite page so far. And the extra for this one is a print out of the original The New York Times article on Alia Muhammad Baker.

The Librarian of Basra, a true story from Iraq

Here are two ATC’s I did for a swap titled “Good vs. Evil.” We had to make two ATC’s, one showing Good and one showing Evil.

Evil ATC from Good vs Evil

Good ATC from Good vs Evil

Next is an ATC from the Butterfly ATC swap. I glued wrappers from Dove Dark Chocolate Eggs onto a piece of cardstock and then cut out the openings in the butterflies wings. I glued it down and then used water color crayons for the background. Then I drew around it with a Sharpie. Oh, and I used color pencils for the body of the butterfly. Pretty cool, eh?

Dove Dark Butterfly for Butterfly ATC swap

Playlist just screwed me over April 3, 2009

I logged into Playlist today and had a red message up that read, “Due to licensing restrictions, some tracks are currently unavailable for playing in your country.” I clicked on my favorite playlist, one I have spent hours getting just right. Just the right mix of angry, complicated rock and fun, peppy pop. Deep male voices and angelic female vocals. Dark, rageful and lighthearted fun. And of the 31 tracks, a whopping 8 are available to me.

WHAT THE HELL?

Is there a way to copy songs from playlist that I don’t know about? Exactly how does me listening to songs in Germany vs listening in the U.S. violate licensing? I am so incredibly pissed off. And you know what? This doesn’t make me want to go out and buy any of the music which is now unavailable to me. It makes me want to learn how to pirate music and then mail the artists some money directly since they are the talent I wish to support, not the fat, bloated, record company executive ass-clowns who make the really big money. I would like to send Dolly Parton a couple of bucks and a nice letter that say, “Hey, I illegally copied some of your songs. I want you to continue to make music and I want to support you in that so here’s some money. I’m sending it to you instead of buying your CD’s because I think the record companies are a bunch of life sucking, greedy bastards.

But alas, that’s not what I’m going to do. Instead, I’m going to rant and rave about it. I’m going to support open source projects like Ubuntu and Wikipedia and do my little part to screw people who do not believe in freedom of information. And I’m not going to buy any CD’s. Screw ‘em. Screw ‘em all.

Ohne Dich and ATC’s February 24, 2009

I’ve got lots of pictures of my projects to post but today I’m just going to post a couple. I’ve got to spread these things out, you know. First is a postcard I painted for Israel. “Ohne dich” is German for “without you” and this is pretty much how everything appears when Israel’s not here.

"Ohne dich" in watercolor on watercolor postcard

These next two are my first attempts at making ATC’s with photos. I wish I had some oil paints to play with but I made do with what I’ve got. The pictures I used were all pictures that didn’t make the cut for my “some day to be completed scrapbook” and I decided to see if I could have fun cutting them up rather than leaving them molding in a box.

Basic Relief

"Missed you, Daddy"

Frankfurt Fears…no more February 23, 2009

I love it when I leave cliff hanger blogs and then don’t post for a couple of days. “Did they make it to Frankfurt and back?” “Did Israel’s plane make it to the States?” “Were there pastries involved?”

Friday night, my friend Sheri called and offered to ride to Frankfurt with us so I wouldn’t have to drive back alone. Bless her heart. She agreed to come with us at 5am. She has endeared herself to us forever. We all piled into our little Panda and headed to Frankfurt. It was a pretty good drive though my stomach was in knots. For some reason, this TDY scares me more. After much reflection and much talking about it with Israel, the conclusion I’ve reached is this: Israel has never been so far before. He’s across a frickin’ ocean! Seven time zones away! There is much more work involved in him getting back to us if the world screaches to a halt. When he was in California and we were in Kansas City, he could have walked to us. It would have taken a while but it was a physical possibility. This isn’t Civilazation III, he can’t just go down (or up) to the poles and walk around the world to Europe. And that’s scary. Worst case senario has to involve many more things.

But we got him to the airport fine and left him standing in a long line 2 hours before his flight. I cried, which I don’t think I’ve ever done when he was leaving before. Of course, I was much more naive then and had no idea what two weeks with no husband or father for my daughter was like. But we said our good-bye’s, kissed our good-byes, while scandalizing onlookers — hey, the course is an elective — and Jael and I and Sheri walked away.

We only got onto one wrong road. It was the right road, just heading the wrong direction. After getting turned around, we drove straight home…with many potty breaks. It’s about a 3 hour drive for us in our little car. We drove Sheri home, had pancakes at her house for lunch and hung out for about three hours. Then, as my yawns increased in frequency I figured Jael and I should head home. We drove to Speicher and as we neared the center of town, we saw a police car, blocking the road. Uh oh, I thought. Yup. Big uh oh. There was some sort of carnival in the middle of the road. I’m sure it was fun. I’m sure it was worth blocking of the MAIN road through town but my sleep deprived and husband deprived brain freaked out. Which of course means so did my thinking brain. So instead of cutting back to the roundabout that goes to Trier, taking the road that goes by the fancy kitchen store and the meat market we’ve never been to (yes, that’s really how directions are in Germany. I am a classic, road names only please, no landmarks, kind of girl and yet…this is what I’ve got to work with) and coming out on the other side of the carnival, I completely forgot that part of town exsisted and instead went all the way to Bitburg to  come in the back way past the train station. But of course, I didn’t do this in a straight shot. I tried two shortcuts, both brought me back to the wrong side of town. Then I got turned the wrong way on B51 in Bitburg and had to drive for some kilometers before finally pulling a U-turn on an empty stretch of highway. But then we got home fine.

And even though I was exhausted and had been up since 4am that morning, I was unable to convince myself that I should be in bed and instead, stayed up late perusing the Internet, making ATC’s, and various other things which I can’t even remember now. I will post pictures soon. Due to not having a USB to camera cable anymore (it broke), uploading pictures is…intersting. I have to take the card out of the camera and put it into the Ubuntu computer (a desktop model) or the Linux laptop (a tiny, tiny Acer running Limpus Light for it’s OS) and then upload the pictures to that computer. Then I have to load them onto a photo sharing site, usually Shutterfly now that I’ve figured out the gliches between Ubuntu and their upload software. Then I got into the living room and using the Mac, either download the pictures from Shutterfly onto the harddrive or I simply use the Mac to post pictures onto WordPress or whatever else it is I want to do with them. And if the desktop computer wasn’t sitting on an endtable in the hallway, with the safe in front as a seat and I didn’t have to balance the keyboard and mouse on my knees, I would do the whole thing from Ubuntu.

I love Ubuntu. We have had Windows and we hated it. We switched to Ubuntu and loved it but there were some issues. Then we got a Mac, and while we don’t hate it, we don’t love it. We love the hardware. I love not having to have a tower and a monitor and speakers and a subwoofer. The lack of wires spilling everywhere is wonderful but the Mac OS is not that great. I prefer Ubuntu. MUCH prefer Ubuntu. I think everyone should switch to Ubuntu. It’s absolutely wonderful. Of course, I totally depend on Israel to figure all the details out. Maybe I wouldn’t love it so much if I had to do that. But Israel loves it too so maybe it’s just that great.

Anywho…I’ll post pictures later today or tomorrow as I have class tonight and should really spend some time studying, seeing as how I missed the last class.

Frankfurt fears February 20, 2009

Israel leaves on Saturday. He flies out of Frankfurt Airport at about 11 in the morning. I don’t want him to go. It’s only for two weeks. It’s really not that bad. It’ll be the shortest TDY he’s ever had. But I don’t want him to go. I don’t want to be a single mom, even for two weeks. It’s just not as much fun without him here.

But there is a silver lining to many clouds and the silver linings to this one are several. Number one, Israel gets a two week break from 60 hour work weeks. I get a break from living with someone who’s working a 60 hour work week. Israel will have the opportunity to eat at Applebee’s, something he’s been surprised to miss. I will have no expectations of meals placed upon me, as Jael is perfectly content to eat Macoroni and Cheese at every meal. I will have more free time and will have a chance to catch up on some of my projects.

But all of the silver linings in the world will not grant me the motivation to use these two weeks wisely. My previous behavior during Israel’s absences has been to eat myself sick and stay up WAAAAAY to late. I’m hoping that a year and half of growth and maturity will have given me a bit more self discipline. I know the sleep thing will be an issue…it always is, even when Israel is simply working nights. But I’m hoping that since I have a class, which is very important to me, to be alert for and multiple homeschool related things, I will not abuse my body too much.

Also the shortness of the TDY should help with that. I’m not going to have two weeks to get back on track before Israel returns. If I spend two weeks making myself sick he’s going to come home to a sick wife and I don’t want that.

What’s really concerning me is driving to Frankfurt and moreso, driving back from Frankfurt by myself. I’m nervous. I’ve driven in Trier and gotten lost each time. I am not looking forward to driving in Frankfurt and getting lost when I don’t have a navigator sitting in the seat next to me. *sigh*

And you know what’s really frustrating? When it’s all said and done, I will be fine. I will be better for my Frankfurt adventure and I’ll be really glad it happened. I will have grown and learned and it will be a good experience, one I wouldn’t trade for anything.

*sigh* And now, I need to go put clothes in the laundry so that I can sew patches on tomorrow. I HATE sewing patches on and, no, I won’t grow from it or learn from it or look back and be glad I had the experience. It’s purely because of the highway robbery they practice at the alterations shop and the lengthy wait that I am sewing the patches on and not paying someone else to suffer through it.