Let's play: what's wrong with this picture

Morning after my night's stay in South Park, I wandered the streets (it is literally a three street deep town) and captured the oddities around me. I decided to post a few of the pictures that seemed peculiar to me.


























The pictures above are provided for Comments about what is wrong with this picture, clarified in a witty one sentence description.

Thank you for playing :)

Interlude

Jackie and James' kiddies:



I made a long trip mid-May to visit my sister and her new family: James, Koala and Roo. We spent most of our days playing frisbee, hooping, running through puddles and drinking wine. I wish I had more pictures, but my memory card flopped* half-way through New York. Words cannot describe the time I had with them.

Thank you's go out again and again for always showing me a fantastic time.



* This is Steph and Jackie with said memory card, with faces and wishes that it can be revived.

Listen to the wind blow... watch the sun rise

I am sitting in a dive bar called McCall's in South Park Colorado, listening to Fleetwood Mac "The Chain" over their intense Jukebox. How did I get here? Well, same way I got every other place I've ever been in my life, both physically and mentally: by a series of fortuitous events.

Driving down 285 South on my way to Telluride, I wasn't quite sure where I'd stop to camp for the night. I left Boulder two and a half hours late due to personal procrastination that couldn't trump the convenience of making it to Telluride before sunset to camp in comfort. There hadn't been a car behind me for over 45 miles and out of nowhere I see a black jeep flashing her lights and waving her arms at me as she sways into the opposite lane to get my attention. My Subaru is so full, I can't even see out the back window.

She opened her door, leaned out and hollered, "You gotta do something about that rear right tire of yours - it's real low." I tried to express my gratitude: "Oh, okay th-" with the
"-anks" sliding down the side of her slammed car door.

Fortunately, there was a Conoco not 20 yards from my car. The air tank cost 75 cents and included a free vacuuming. Unfortunately for the cleanliness of my car, I haven't an ounce of carpet showing - I wouldn't have been able to even hoover the ceiling had I the desire. I filled the tire, to no avail; it held it's elliptical shape. I went into the General Store for a minute to give the car a few moments to decide how bad the slow leak was. In the shop, my mission was to find my 'lawn gnome' to accompany me on the trip. He is no where to be found, but a funky looking jackrabbit catches my eye, so I take note.

Back out at the car, 1/4 of my legs appear to be exhausted, so I drove through town in search of an Automotive Repair shop. Just as I suspected: Main Street Garage is not even a mile down the road. The following is an act from the screenplay of my day from 4:45 p.m. to 6:15 p.m.

4:45 - girl enters Auto Shop.

"Hi, I think I have a flat, but I'm not sure. This is my first car."

"Well, lemme go see if Chuck is still in. We'll see if he can help you."

Man and girl enter office and talk to Chuck. Chuck tells girl to pull her Subaru up to the middle garage. Girl leaves to get her car and just after she turns her precarious key, it snaps at the neck. The car is idle, in the limbo of on and not on. The tape deck clicks and the mellifluous voices of Paper Bird blare into her ears. Her eyes burn red and she doesn't waste any time.

"Umm... my key broke off in the hole." She offers up the feeble remnants of her key as proof to Chuck.

"Well... that's Chip's specialty. I'm sure she can figure somethin'."

Chip enters scene. He is finishing up some of his own work and grabs his pliers as he follows the girl to her car. "So where's your spare?"

"That's the thing..."

"Uh oh... I don't know if I can help you here then, miss. Let me call Wayne and see if he closed up yet."

Wayne answers and agrees to take a look at the situation. The girl and Chip get into his large truck and drive across the street to a nearly closed Hardware Store. Wayne and Chip shuffle through keys and numbers - Wayne grumbles every few minutes, especially when the tip of the key slips through the machine into an abyss. After 20 minutes of fiddling and ideas about what to do if he cannot replicate the broken metal, Wayne produces what he thinks is the best facsimile of an already over-copied and worn out key.

The key works.

The girl waits in the office, as Chip has offered to try and patch up her tire past closing time.

Chip comes into the office again, rolling the tire that is now making a slight wheezing noise.

He explains that with a Subaru all-wheel drive, it is essential that all the tires are the same, and his shop does not currently have this tire in stock. It is 5:55 p.m. "Let me see if I can't get an order in to our tire guys to have it here by morning."

He gets the order in, just in time and offers to drive the girl to the closest hotel. After seeing that The Fairplay Hotel is closed for no reason, Chip brings the girl to The Hand Hotel and points out his wife's coffee shop, his mother-in-law's coffee shop and his laundromat. He gives a brief history of South Park to the girl and introduces her to Richard, the hotel owner.

From there, the girl is placed in room number 11 Indian.
The bathroom is a converted closet. There are two tall beds with at least 8 pillows each. Extra toilet paper and tiny towels. Next door is a bar that has wireless.

The locals are grumbling about their days: on the phone with HDTV customer service for over two hours; flooding bathroom; damn tourists asking what's fun to do in town- one man is already drunk at 7:00 p.m.


So... as the news continually became worse and subsequently rescued by perfect timing and helpful people, I've concluded that I am the luckiest unlucky person. But isn't luck one of those neutral words anyway? It is the qualifier (good or bad) that tips the scale of luck. Sure, things aren't going as planned on the first day of my new job, but they aren't going bad.

A broken down car and a weird looking Jackrabbit.

I like it already.

Stagnancy as 'spider in a napkin'

...to reside is to decide to die - that is to say that to defy subsiding to the confines of your stream is to deny dying.

Somniloquence

A friend called me last night as I was falling asleep and we spoke for approximately 20 minutes. Most of the conversation consisted of mumbling remnants of thoughts and experiences I had that day.

Somniloquent conversations are my favorites.

Schedule

I am so excited about things, I could almost pee my pants... almost...

Many great trips planned for May alone: Pagosa Springs, day trip with Rachel somewhere mysterious, Brooklyn with Jackie Steph Andy James Trace...and all the others that come along with NY, Pittsburg to go camping with David and then back to Boulder for the start of Autumn Teneyl shows. I am excited to have a Subaru to roll around in and I am excited to graduate with my Masters. I am reading at a poetry reading next Friday, which goes against all my fears of reading my work in public. I haven't decided what to read yet...

Then, I spoke to my buddy Sparky a few weeks ago about crazy future plans, and I think they might not be so crazy after all. I want to apply for my PhD in Anthropology and Linguistics within the next few years, but I was hesitant and confused about what I would do in between. I had some ideas about building a website and promoting all the good things the good people are doing around me... I had ideas to buckle down and try and make lots of money selling myself to the "man"; or work for some swanky wine restaurant; I thought about becoming a ski bum in Durango and sliding my way into Fort Lewis English Dept.; and of course, the ideas are constantly rolling in and out like tides on Wildwood beach...

but recently, I think I must devote myself to becoming a liaison philanthropist: write grant proposals and seek out funding for organizations I really believe in. I mean, I am a writer and can be pretty convincing when I put a little extra effort into it. What sparked this was Sparky (how appropriate). He is an integral part of a project involving Rancho Mastatal - an environmental learning center in the rural village of Mastatal, Costa Rica. The project is still in super top secret mode, but I am really excited to get started on it!

So, life goes like this, I suppose. When there are countless options swirling above one's head like flickering light bulbs and it seems like choosing one might limit one's life, someone great is there to aid in decision making by being inspiring and motivated. That someone for me right now is Sparky and I can't thank him enough. As my friend Andy told me a few nights ago: Life is a never-ending Gobstopper of wonder.

Happy Birthday Steph!!!

Unfortunately since my last mac-y died due to water submersion, I have no pictures of the coolest birthday girl EVER.

So I googled her and this was one of the first photos that came up.

I think it's pretty fitting - don't you?

Miss you bud, see you so soon to celebrate with painting and laughters!

doukipudonktan

why do they stink so much?

*image from Digital Photography: Tips from the Top Floor
**link, compliments of Spiro
***all this asterisk citation makes me tired. . . blogging is much easier when i can just lift and pretend it's my own. but we all know plagiarists live in eternal limbo. I've always wanted to live in Purgatory - Durango, that is...

buoy and a bell tower

if we have our anchor
and we've achieved floatation

what's the worry?
let the sea sway

no need to speculate
on bell tower construction

why so many birds?

Who designed the waiting seats without cup holders? Why so many birds? The airport cafés bake ginormous pastries because they cost less to make and sell for more. Seriously, aren’t we all a little sick of the 6 dollar bitter coffee, tiny egg McMuffin, sickeningly greasy hashbrown combo? The pastry is the way to go when the stomach calls before an early flight.

After mass-texting some of my observations on the airport during an hour and a half wait for boarding, a response came in: people who stand on escalators – lazy or patient? To which I responded: people who walk on escalators – late or find any excuse to get a good workout? I’m a walker, because I feel uneasy standing still on shifting ground… She then responded that she enjoys walking on escalators as well, but not because of uneasiness – she likes feeling “super fast with minimal effort.” This I refer to as the super-hero effect. Sometimes I walk opposite the conveyance, in order to appear to be in stagnant motion: a visual paradox.

Moving walkways: near the end of a moving walkway in the Phoenix airport, there is a sign that says “Caution: Walkway ends in 30 feet” which does not help those who are walking, because those who are walking have an inherent sense of what 30 feet may feel like while walking at a normal pace, but because speed of transit has quickened, the walker cannot discern what 30 feet away feels like. (Unless said walker is an observational physicist and can determine these factors on site) My other problem with this sign is that those observant enough to be reading the signs are probably aware enough to see the end of the walkway 30 feet in front of them.

Another sign I liked was the “Caution: Terrain will change” with a picture of a stick figure dude flailing into a nearly horizontal trip at the edge of a ramp. Not only this, but something is being hurled out of this man’s hands, which makes the sign look as if he is diving to catch it; object being a yellow ball, because a yellow ball is the stick figure of any object you can imagine a man would be holding coming off of a flight. Signs are very amusing to me.

I actually like waiting for flights because the cutest kid in the airport always seems to find me and play peek-a-boo with me until I am giddier than his/her boundless chuckling. I love when they talk to me, but always feel a little creepy when I respond. It’s hard to talk to kids 3 and under when their parents are around; the instinct is talk to the kid like he’s a kid, because he is one – but competence in proper public etiquette suggests that you should act like an adult, because you are one. It’s like the whole devil/angel on opposite shoulders, except there’s the child-inside on your left shoulder and the ready-to-be-disappointed-mother on the right. My solution is to fall somewhere in between the two: I respond with terse responses and show my Pan side through facial expressions – most useful countenance is the smile. Kids love smiling adults because most adults don’t really smile unless they are laughing at John Stewart (or Rush Limbaugh, whatever you’re into…)
Kids are weird and cool because they haven’t yet learned how to be unhappy. Sure, they cry, scream, whine every once in a half-the-time, but at least they let themselves dive into the emotion, not mask it.

As for the plane, how many screws do you think they use on just one wing? I counted one square foot panel and came up with 28.

If you haven’t flown over the Colorado Rockies, Denver to anywhere-south-of-Denver is your best route. Unbelievable.

While waiting for the bathroom on the plane, I spotted something a bit awkward to me: Deja Blue. It is purified water in a can – an aluminum can! Call me crazy, but I feel aluminum cans are conducive to soda because of the metallic aftertaste, which parallels the bitter flavor that accompanies carbonated beverage consummation. However, water does not need this tinny addition to its flavoring, however subtle it may be. The can was blue and the name was somewhat clever, but I think it was better left to be bottled in a cerulean plastic container.

I read an article on the plane in Southwest Airlines ‘zine called Spirit. The writing was exceptionally funny and subtly poetic, and the subject was, what most people consider, somewhat purposeless: clapping. I thought it was an insightful depiction on the direction of humanity. The article was called “Clap in Public” by Steve Almond. I’m going to check out his book “Not That You Asked” when I get to Bookman’s in Tucson. Other books I plan on purchasing: Sleeping with the Dictionary by Harriette Mullen, and Eunoia by Christian Bök.

That’s it for this trip – oh if only I could get paid to write about nothing for airplane magazines. I would title my first article: “Why so many birds?” and do an anthropological study on why birds nest in airports and what the affects are on travelers’ level of happiness.

street seers

A cast
a dexter sex

Awed @ great beards
we stare
wear fads
we see free beds
refer ever as crest treaders

we test begs
gas %ages

red faces are
dead gears
we see a seers grave as
craved weeds

we see rest as dead
get wasted free
taste sex

we greet deeds as tests
we see war
as great text

we wear red sweaterdresses
we are street seers

time

tie me
to it, manacled everywhichway

met it with some contempt today

one derisive wink of red from the alarm clock
a synchronic call from a friend
to make use of it - time!

what's a waste?
this productive?
in what way?

time chasing,
fleeting
pull from every direction

a tug of war, me as the knot
more tension

rope taut

my shoulders tense, so i lay
down and sleep some times

star hues

he says scars are souvenirs we never lose
i say stars are tears, frozen
flickering with hues

we've always wondered if there's a color
we have not yet seen

i know it's there,
our moon shines it in
the silhouette of our trees

death acceptance:
we'll never know until our time

do we have time to understand it?
that would take hours
of musing over moons
untouchable
colors and
star hues...

skansky

everyone knows someone inspiring. i am lucky enough to know a couplefew.

this post is in awe of stephanie kansky, a buddy i consider best from the liu college days. she's my creative motivation, muse and mentor. lately, she has been posting incredible paintings she's been up to. my own little boulder bedroom is littered with skanksy art and font. this is a photograph steph took from the Union Square Pillow Fight



brilliant.

*miss you kid

emotion game

Finally, Rachel and Tim have jumped on the bike-wagon and decided riding bikes in Boulder is just about the funnnnnest thing one can do.

Tim and I rode up to Rachel's work Espresso Roma, grabbed some PBR bullets from the shop across the street and began our "imbibe and play" night. I offered that we play the "emotion game" which was introduced to me by my dear Syracuse buddies Will Chidsey and Luke O'Brien.

Basically, you take a camera, point it at a friend and give them an emotion. They must give you an impression, idea, response to that emotion. Tim and I exchanged with this game for a few moments then moved on to a much more artistic (and PBR induced) endeavor.

Here is what came of this game . . .

First! The participants: Tim, the despondent deliverer; Rachel, the Alaskan; Meghann, the "ant in my cup?"; Mary, the squiggle lion; and Melanie, the flattered baker.







Now here are some photos of words, emotions and phrases. Care to take a poke at what they might be???
















Needless to say, it was a good time.

and I must say, everyone should have a Mary in their life. She makes all her friends quilts. She just turned 60 on March 18th.

Jeanie Fay

This is Jeanie Marie Fay. She blessed my presence last year from April to December on 4th street in Boulder. A companion during troubling times, partner for hikes and bike rides and fellow lover of life and vitality. She left Boulder in December in search of a space more fitting for her mind; in February, Jeanie found out she has a brain tumor and went into immediate surgery. She has undergone two serious surgeries to remove the tumor from behind her cerebellum. Please send this beautiful person thoughts and prayers as she fights this terrible mutation struggling inside of her.

http://friendsofjeaniefay.com/default.aspx

HOOP

we come spinning out of nothingness
scattering stars...
the stars form a circle,
and in the circle, we dance.

- rumi


My life has recently taken a spin, literally. I have decided to go back to working with Autumn Teneyl at festivals and art shows throughout the summer.

My second show will be Telluride Bluegrass where I will be biking there with Bluegrass by Bike, a team of hammocking madmen.

After that will be Taos Solar Music Festival, then back up to Boulder for a week of Summer Writing Program with Bob Holman.

Got a few weeks off then Rocky Grass up in Lyons, CO, which is a little town with a trickling creek that I want to pile rocks at.

A few other festivals in Denver, Lyons, Aspen, Boulder, etc... then hopefully off to Burning Man with que, chels, ali and alecia.

To top it all off, chels might be moving to Boulder in order to pursue her ecology career. Kudos - good choice ;)

In between it all will be flower shop and friends, writing, biking, hiking and making friends with vikings.

Oh! and P.S. Check out the new company I'll be freelancing for being a hoopdance instructor: Hoopnotica.

maybe sparrow?

i've done time before -
been on the stage with
my heart flapping in the
wind
and forgot all the words

it's this vulnerability
of skin to the wind
that exhilarates
and deflates us
simultaneously

jagged chin

something about the
tilted silhouette of
him writing
that spills his
head out onto the space
that fills his booth-
If only I could decode
the air particles
and rays around
the shadows of his
face

invisibility mechanism

don't know how to heal
a wound
that never feels the blues
don't know how to hide
my eyes -
never feels too soon

everybody stares my skin
into fringes on the stage
so i wear this hat, eyes
shut up tight,
invisibility secures -

don't know about these roads
i go
with inconspicuous signs...

i think they're just a lure.

a time i wish i had my camera

So, I've been cuddled up in my public library desk since 2:15 this sunny, 55 degree, slight breeze afternoon and cuddled is certainly not an accurate term. Huddled wouldn't work either because the desk is quite spacious - fitting all 15 of my books, my two notebooks, my water, apple, cell phone, laptop and portrait of David Bowie for inspiration (juuust kiiiddin')

But, I am comfortable - with where I am at on my thesis draft and with the quiet nature the library provides.

Around 6:50 p.m., I decided to leave my nest and adventure three blocks down the creek to Boulder High School Auditorium. My favorite 9 year old in Boulder was performing at her elementary school's annual talent show and I hadn't yet seen her routine.

She went on at 7:20. I am not just saying this because she is the coooooolest 9 year old I've ever met, but she was the best. Emmitt, the 1st grade handstand walking kid was pretty skilled, especially awesome because he had the music of Austin Powers lining his performance, and even the kid who wrote his own song on the piano (which was better than all 6 other piano performances) was pretty impressive. But Haley wins, hands down. Tricks on a Hula Hoop I had never even thought possible AND choreographed hula dancing to the music.

Applause. She made my night and rejuvenated my energy.

Andes in the Rockies

This will be a picture guided post.














I suppose taking out my camera more than once might be beneficial to presenting an unspeakable weekend...

Every moment's a little bit later

After doing what has become to be my morning routine of political news, blog checks, email sweep and thesis musings, I began to notice how rapidly I was being hurtled through the Internet. Link hopping, tab-opening, bookmarking and intermittently shooting off emails to people I thought would be interested in the Internet gems I'd collected along the way.

The web-world has changed our lives so comprehensively, yet because it has all happened so fast, most of us haven't noticed how comprehensively it has changed human interaction. Those who do notice go in many different directions with their observation; some revolt and refuse to join facebook, myspace, twitter, etc. and insist on keeping their outdated nokia; some sprinkle their lives with text messages, facebook pokes and youtube videos; and then there are those who thrive on it and use the growing phenomenon to their advantage.

There are certainly more gradations of web-obsession/apathy, but these are the typical ones I've found in Boulder. I like to see myself somewhere in between the first two: the girl who joined the social communities but never really uses them, who texts messages but will not allow a string longer than two responses to transpire, who blogs but doesn't rely on it as her sense of community, etc.

The reason I am in the grey section of tech-obsession is for many reasons, but chief among them is that I believe the most sensible ideas are swimming amidst the middle-ground of the extremes. I believe in balance.

Those who revolt are losing out because one must adapt, to a certain degree, in order to compete.

Those who blogtwitpoketextsendetc and rely upon the direction technology is going in are often unwittingly socially distant from real world interaction. The reason I want to emphasize the fact that the latter group is generally unconsciously "distant" from the "real world" is that I think these people are caught up.

>interlude of definitions<

Distant: unaware. (I will expound upon this later)

Real World: a hug or conversation that isn't contingent in any way upon anything besides that instant of human interaction

>end of interlude<

One may be able to know what is going on in all corners of their city, state, country and world through twitter messages, RSS feeds and bulletins, but how deep will these things impact the person if said person is merely skimming through due to the profusion of information coming at him/her? I am not denying that staying informed is important, but I think some people are taking it too far. I will not point any fingers, but some of these Internet social networking schemes are starting to irritate me so much that I am blogging against bloggers right now... oh shit... hypocrite or unhinged?

The distance I see in extreme techies is the idea that maybe they think they can be machines. A computer can process the amount of information that the common-techie is receiving on a daily basis, and it doesn't matter how much time the computer puts into the data, because computers do not think! The difference between man and machine is that we are given the ability to mentally process, actively form and connect ideas, in a time-consuming manner. It takes time for humans to fully process things, and that is okay. In this technologically spiraling world, we need to stay human, be more aware and thoughtful, instead of thinking we can cyborg ourselves to try and become as functional as machines.

Be aware. Notice your breath or your heart beat shift as you go to give a hug. Sometimes I feel like people are becoming more in tune with the hum of their vibrating blackberry than they are to the cadence of the human heart beat.

This brings me back to the Wilco quote I have as today's label: Every moment's a little bit later. The way I interpret this line is through hippie-kumbaya colored glasses: take each moment for what it is, at the size it is - don't try to overload your moments. Live in a comfortable pulse; think drizzle rain windshield wiper blades, not downpour mode.

I am really into balance lately. Balance. Just say it, it is such a calming word.

He said I'm not normal

But I blushed when he smiled when
we both noticed the passenger ahead of us
tapping to a no-name song
playing on our car radio
in traffic behind the construction men

And I smirked when we woke up and turned
to see the other awake already,
accomplishing nothing but comfort
and kindness -
with a rivulet between us

I laughed that a liter of whisky
was finished in one sitting.
A conversation pending.
A night both worth and
hard at forgetting.

"Normal" sounds like a cat from
a Garfield cartoon sent to Abu Dhabi
for being a nuisance of questions

And Tom at the Beat Bookstore
said I fire 'em like a pistol
And he himself can't quit from persisting
to spew riveting information.

So, I must have one-uped someone
un-one-up-able
in the realm of "Nermalness"

And, sure, I wonder why we've never
kissed,
but what else could ever come of this -
our abnormal, untouchable relationship?

: a hug that lasts, persists and twists
into an anomalous tag-team
break from actual existence

is it.

What a word means to me.

what a word means to me is
a silver dollar, stolen
from my mother

what a word means to me -
a favor, reciprocated in
the day that follows

What it means is
a dollop of butter on a
fresh-out-of-the-oven biscuit

It means a moment noticed
A bookcase polished
Attention focused

It means 'I love you' meant it
Dollars spent worth spending

It means your mother kept it:
the hidden notebook
tucked for forgotten

the words you wrapped up
in a blanket, shoved
under your childhood bed, it

means love love still exists
though yesterday you faked it

Sentiments left on paper,
lost to be found twelve years later

A word means memories, they follow
and though you never meant
to call her

Your speed dial trumped you once again
and yes, even the leaders follow,
eventually everyone falters -

but the word, it's there as fodder . . .

Obamamatopoeia

THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE, OBAMAFIED.

Check out this article, where Slate.com created a widget for "the unabridged Encyclopedia Baracktannica."

My buddy Andy is in town, visiting from Brooklyn, and after a lengthy day of traveling to Estes Park for Bloody Mary's at the Stanley Hotel, getting lost with me as navigator (surprise, surprise), and Margaritas & Quesadillas, Andy and I attempted to uni-lucid dream. When that didn't work, we got up and perused the internet for the latest political news. This is when we ran across this article and decided to participate in the political process of wordplay.

Obama Mama - any mother in support of Barack Obama

Obamathon - an all-night fundraiser in support of Barack Obama

Barawkward - an uncomfortable exchange of forced pleasantries between candidates

Obamadeus - a young prodigy capable of composing oratory masterpieces

Baraille - tactile political paraphernalia in support of Barack Obama

Baright - the luminescent Barack Obama auras given off during exceptionally inspirational speeches

Barackitis - a contagious ailment afflicting Obama-supporters; side effects include skipping work for Obama rallys, bouts of hope and sporadic yelps of "Yes we can!"

O'Bama - the temporarily adopted last name of Obamaphiles on St. Patrick's Day

Obamabellum - the area of the brain regulating all coordination of Obama rally events

Wash your hands before

you write! You'll get dinner's remnants on the blank naked column between the thin teal lines and it will sit there like an unwanted freckle people assume to be a mole or, worse, a wart - something mutated on the face of the page and we all know title and covers are judged despite proverbial warnings...

Even after we stretch,

we feel the tendons pull. They yank at us, muscles taut- with oxygen, or lactic acid or something unspecified by science -it occurs in such a way, we feel we've lost all our youth. How could we be so oblivious to its slow departure? Its achingly gradual thump that echoes deep in the past of our legs, our skin, our heads and perforated hearts of fissured innocence. Our naked anatomy grown so slow, we become body hollowed out with yellow toxins, then repaired by anti-oxidants, eventual skeletons of self removed slightly from former self, removed slightly again from self that came before that self, pungent bulbed onions of yesterday husked away like a patient garlic peeler - each day, a half-life, a cross-section of a former self.

I made a List.

I made a List,
and I felt good about the list:
Potential tasks for the day.

But what is potential
but a mocking carrot
we writer's chase in lists
and forget about
when we see the rabbits
run past us in pursuit -

We admire their persistence and write
a witty (or humdrum) note
about their eternal
perseverance of the unattainable.

It was a start,
but my initial enthusiasm withered
after the finishing of the List, it seems.

The List inhibits efficiency for me.

"L.A. Times: Barack Obama for Democratic Nominee"

The L.A. Times | February 02, 2008
By L.A. Times Editorial Board

But just because the ballot features two strong candidates does not mean that it is difficult to choose between them. We urge voters to make the most of this historic moment by choosing the Democrat most focused on steering the nation toward constructive change: We strongly endorse Barack Obama… No public relations campaign could do more than Obama's mere presence in the White House to defuse anti-American passion around the world, nor could any political experience surpass Obama's life story in preparing a president to understand the American character. His candidacy offers Democrats the best hope of leading America into the future, and gives Californians the opportunity to cast their most exciting and consequential ballot in a generation. In the language of metaphor, Clinton is an essay, solid and reasoned; Obama is a poem, lyric and filled with possibility. Clinton would be a valuable and competent executive, but Obama matches her in substance and adds something that the nation has been missing far too long -- a sense of aspiration.

Source: http://www.barackobama.com/index.php

Follow up.