Virtually virtual?

Online life. Pondering the the stuff I put online, and the virtually
eternal life of what I put online, my virtual self. Sort of like
outsourcing my life.

Deciding what is appropriate for where. What to tweet, facebook, blog,
flickr, and to whom. Of course, in the cases where we think we can
control who sees what, friends on facebook, blocked on twitter, public
or private on flickr, we are deluding ourselves. All the calculations
are for naught. Some innocuous update may come back to bite you. I say
picking a healthcare plan, or financial iad package for your kid, or
deciding between a cash balance or traditional pension, or becoming a
rocket scientist, is easier.

But the human urge to connect persists. People can have very real
personas online. Viverant personalities. In a sense, there is nothing
"virtual" about virtaul. It is still our life, still time spent; the
coal burning to provide electricity for the datacenters that are the
"cloud," very much real. As is the techno junk containered to Africa
by the shipful. Oh well.

Long queues at Nina's counter today. I tried to sit it out, but
eventually joined in. I used the gift certificate for the first time.
Sure enough, the barista at the cash register dutifully wrote "$2.31"
on the back.

At first, by the way that she was holding the pen, I thought she was
left-handed, but realized that it was her right hand and elbow that
she was sticking out. I commented, and she responded, tiredly; heard
it before. Something about her mother being left-handed. I shared that
I tied my shoes weird because I had been taught by a lefty. She seemed
to find that mildly amusing.

--
David
www.schons.net

The coffee counter queue

The coffee counter queue stays full. I sat down first and wrote a bit.
Coffee and a smoke, things that I was just reminded are not taken for
granted by all. I sat in the sauna this morning. Stll warm from that.
Two other guys my age in there too, both contractor types, talking not
only roofing, but a particular roof of a prominent building at the
corner of Selby and Snelling. I steamed them out. Such is shared
existence. Guess we'd all be lonely otherwise, right?

Bought a Nina's gift certificate for myself, on which they will keep a
tally of my tab. This in an effort to reduce the number of times I use
my credit card. Credit card fees are a bad deal for small mechants.
Prepaying seems to be trend for me.

IRV voting was approved in Saint Paul by a relatively small margin on
a light voter turnout.

I sit at a table, vigilant, awaiting the refill of the half and half
carafe. Ah. brb.

Life--swirling flecks of dust and viruses. Dorothea texts me just
now--this is very real time--with "what are we doing david?" Dread.
That could be a light-hearted question. Could be something else. The
something else is what came to mind instantly. Old habits die hard. If
at all, really. Perhaps they just keep morphing and transforming.

Dorothea walks to St. Thomas and gets on the bus. I leave the coffee
shop to drive to work.

--
David
www.schons.net

100 words a minute

Or about 100 words an hour. If I was a fast enough typist, wouldn't
take that long at all. Had a nice time with madeline driving over and
back from piano lesson. Actually I just went for a ride. It was the
clearest of bright moonlit nights. The moon seemed to be
extraordinarily bright. I wonder if my iPhone moon app has anything to
say about that. So here I am sitting in my desk chair in my cube with
my back turned to the world and thumb typing like mad, as mad as it
gets for me whoo hoo. So if I get one more line in here I think can
call it a 100 words.

--
David
www.schons.net

Election Day

Election Day. For us here in Saint Paul, Far Siberia, an incumbent
mayor, establishment Democrat, versus a Republican-backed upstart,
Eva. And IRV: Instant Runoff Voting. A weird issue, but a way, it
seems, break the two party oligarchy.

Below freezing this morning: barely--29 degrees. On bike again. At
Nina's, skipping YWCA. Was disoriented by the morning light. I had
bought and got myself configured yesterday with high-powered bike
lights, and was simply anticipating darkness. Dawn instead. The real
test will be on the ride home tonight.

Distracted reading cracked.com while eating my muffin, about the ten
worst places in the world to live. But now the muffin is consumed and
the coffee on the verge of being too chilled.

Quaker Men's group tonight. I am locked and loaded. Back to the
meetinghouse and the Grotto, which will undoubtedly look, after tens
of thousands of dollars sunk into remodeling the building, like the
dumpy basement room it has always been.

Oh yuck, the tone of this narrative is taking a nasty doenward turn.
Probably best if I just wrap up and head to work.

But wait--if you will. I must say that this is Day 3 of my
participation in nanowrimo--National Novel Writing Month. Goal is to
write 50,000 words during the month. 1,667 a day. So far I am on
track. The organization asks "is it a novel?" and answers "if you say
it is." So, I am essentially writing whatever. But hey. . . . . .

--
David
www.schons.net

After Lunch

Sitting in the cafeteria after consuming a fajita. This even though I
have brought a frozen dinner for lunch. I am weak. I just had the
thought in my head that a fajita was the thing to have. Bright blue
sky visible to the northwest out the window. The weather forcast seems
favorable for a week of biking to work. That would delay the
transition to the bus, maybe until next week. Listen to someone talk
about some project management thing. Funny to hear snippets of
techno-talk. On the one hand, sounds very familiar. On the other, I
really have no idea what they are talking about. Well, back to the
cube.

--
David
www.schons.net

Folding and slouching into a Nina's booth, 21As whirl behind

Folding and slouching into a Nina's booth, 21As whirl behind me on
Selby, stones in David's sling. Day One of the rest of whatever comes
next. Whatever comes next. I expect it will have a somewhat familiar
quality. A soft, amoeba 3-d appearance. Death bed scenes.

Biking, 43 degrees, clear, light wind. YWCA, short meditation,
stretching, elliptical. Nina' s, carrot muffin, coffee. Still riding
on the bubble of the fall time change. I am a bit overdressed for
sitting inside. Sign across the room in front of me, advert for the
Wednesday Socrates Club, "why is the meaning of life so important to
our species?" Makes me think "The Secret of the Life of Brian." Dated
10/28/09. Thing, think, thought of the past.

A short while back, in a nearby town, a son, off his meds, shot and
killed his father. The father was my neighbor's brother. Also in the
news: a county sheriff reservist, was hit by a car and killed while
directing traffic. Age 57, Big Mike they called him, son of some folks
who'd lived 50 years in the house across the street from us, until
recently moving out to an apartment. Those folks, husband and wife,
are big people, so as they are noticeable, periodically driving by in
their minivan to look at their old house,

Late on Halloween night, looking out our bedroom window across the
street, towards Big Mike's childhood home, we saw a nonhuman Mohican
standing in the street for a disconcertingly long time, talking into
the open driver's side windows of parked cars and cars that came by
and stopped mid- street.

Just about to move on from coffee shop, and in comes Tony. Chatted
briefly, and went on with our days.

David
www.schons.net
www.twitter.com/davidschons
www.facebook.com/davidschons

Listening to Audio Dharma podcast, Equanimity and Investigat

Listening to Audio Dharma podcast, Equanimity and Investigation. The
teacher raises a good point in a comparison of thoughts and thinking.
He uses the story of seeing a pickup truck with a blue tarp over the
back, of instantly getting the thought that there's a dead body in
back of that truck, under the tarp. He had no control over his brain
generating that thought. The brain just creates thoughts, that is what
it does. It is the thinking you do about the thoughts that gets you in
trouble. Also, the thoughts that come up, we invest them with meaning
and value--good and bad-- which feeds the thought process. Not that
thoughts and thinking are bad; sometimes we need to think, certainly;
but most thoughts-- perhaps we'd be better off ignoring,

David
www.schons.net
www.twitter.com/davidschons
www.facebook.com/davidschons