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  • “True nostalgia is an ephemeral composition of disjointed memories” Florence King

    My start time at work keeps getting earlier and earlier.

    It doesn’t bother me much, the fluctuation gives me something to think about as I’m trying not to pass out from being there three hours earlier than I normally am.

    The anniversary of my father’s passing happened two days ago, so my work schedule really started making me think about his job when I was very, very young.

    From our home, he would travel by bus to Downtown Houston.  I can’t imagine how long that actually took for him to do, daily, but I’m getting an idea now as my commute gets radically longer or shorter depending on what time I have to be there.

    So, we’re a single car family, he’s saving cash by taking the bus (which would take FOREVER, even in the 70’s) and then walking home from the bus stop.

    One time, before I was old enough to “cross the street by myself”, I found myself running across the street to the school and looking down the road to see if he was walking toward the house.  I thought I was pretty sneaky, since I made sure to run fast.  Traffic was never really an issue with our neighborhood so I didn’t get hit or anything, but he did end up seeing me run across the street.  He wasn’t supremely mad (that I can remember) but as my brother and I were left to our own devices 90% of the time, I suspect his anger was misplaced.

    I can still remember him walking down the road toward the house. It’s etched in my memory.

    I wanted to find a nice clean shot of that street, but if you clicked the link above you’ll see that everybody and their brother was around that morning. Even the crossing guard is waving at the Google Car. Google Maps updated the ‘hood in March of 2010. I’m kind of bummed that I didn’t get a good pic to throw in, but seeing that the homeowners of my old childhood home cut down one of the big trees was pretty surprising.  And seeing the condition of the lawn/yard the HOA must be going nuts. They didn’t like us (for whatever reason) but at least our yard was in good condition.

    Miss you dad.


  • “Distance is a great promoter of admiration!” Denis Diderot

    I ran into kind of an interesting quandry today. Nothing earth shaking, really.

    Today I saw that one of my friends had become friends on Facebook with Jim Heath aka The Reverend Horton Heat. My knee-jerk Facebook reaction was, “Geez, I need to add him.”  As a fervent Google+ user now, my first inclination was to study why it was that I felt I needed to add him on Facebook.

    Sure, there’s a small element of being in touch with one’s heros, etc, etc. I’ve talked to him quite a few times (being in Dallas tends to give one a lot of exposure to the Rev) But really, with his 1000+ friends, did I really think that he was going to see one of my posts one day and think, “He really is my friend”? So I thought about it a little bit more. He made all his pictures public (thankfully) so I was able to see a bunch of really early photos of his without having to friend him. Nice.

    My facebook feed is flooded with all the burlesque people adding more and more people. So, watching the Rev add tons of people daily didn’t have much appeal.

    So, my next thought was, “If he was on Google+, would I add him?” At this point I’m not sure. What information would I share that I think he would want to see? What information would he share with me in one of his circles.

    Again, I faced this dilemma (minor as it is) when I got home. I checked my G+ and another famous dude is on there. When I look at his page, I think to myself “I wouldn’t call him a friend, and I’m sure he feels the same.”  But this same dude has turned me on to some great stuff. I’m just a fan.

    So the dilemma is that I already want to use Google+ to weed out all the crap that I really don’t want to see, but to what extent do I want to shield myself from it this early on.