So I was on my way to work today - yes, I work on Saturday's and I have every Saturday for the past three years. And as I was just finishing up my drive to Rockford I drove by a "Steak n Shake" While I can't say a whole lot for the intelligence of the people who named the restuarant I do have a lot to say for the cooks who dreamed up the menu - particularly the frisco burgers. (I am officially craving a burger right now - just so you know). But I'm not going to discuss the golden toasted sourdough bread, or the ground steak used in the burger, or the thousand island dressing (disgusting on everything except this sandwich) or the wide selection of delicious, creamy shakes that really do enhance the whole meal experience (side note: these shakes are probably my favorite chain restuarant shakes - wide variety of flavors and good, consistent quality. My favorite shake of all time is probably Union Dairy, with a close second awarded to Mullen's, both of these are local joints - one in IL the other in WI) I want to discuss Cheese Fries.

There is something inestimably perfect about the combination of cheap, processed cheese sauce that glops out of cans into a saucepan, heated and then ladled out onto a plate packed with crisp (on the outside only) golden fries and then served to you right before the cheese starts to cool and develop a skin.

Steak and Shake does a pretty decent job on their cheese fries. They give plenty of fry's, plent of cheese, serve it on a separate plate so the other food doesn't contaminate its perfection and generally contribute to obesity and heart attacks in America. The only problem is that they decided to go with the shoestring potatoes. This is a problem because it is next to impossible to eat the right amount of a shoestring potatoe. If you pick up one its a complete waste of effort. If you use your fork you get too many and you can't enjoy the taste of good fry slathered in cheese. This downside is just bad enough to pull the Steak n Shake cheese fry out of first place on the list of best cheese fries in America - a list that is headed by the Outback Cheese Fries which prove that the only thing better than eating starches and whatever cheese sauce is - is adding bacon.

on political discussion

ok, in my life the most favorite topic of conversation these days is the political race. Strange since I've gone 24 (I'm now 24 yrs old - wow) yrs without caring (to any extraordinary amount) about anything political. But now that I'm talking about it I figure I'll blog about it as well.
As with most things in life, I don't want to talk about candidates, although I will say that I shocked some people this last week by saying that I wasn't necessarily for McCain and Palin - but thats another story :)
I wish to discuss the difference between the liberal and the conservative mindset. You see, to me the difference between the two has always been one of outlook rather than policy. Most of the people that I know who lean (or are) liberal tend to view the world as a complex, multi-layered organism that is continually susceptible to the butterfly effect (if you don't know what I'm talking about I'll explain in a postscript). Conservatives tend to view the world in terms of choice A or B (sometimes C and D but not always or even often). now, as I've thought about this I've come to realize that I tend to view everything through a prism of simplicity. There are a few reasons for this: 1) the complexity of the world as seen by the left is paralyzing in its totality - nothing legitimate ever gets done because somebody always gets stepped on - creating a new area of disenfranchised, bitter people to be championed and rescued. 2) because every conflict/area of disagreement can be boiled down to a yes/no kind of vote.
The problem arises when I try to offer solutions to the great issues of the day - because no matter how simple the problem truly is, the solution is never simple.

at this point I am tempted to just say that everybody else is stupid and moronic and that I could do a far better job of running everything than the lying, two - faced monsters who pass for rulers in our farcical parody of a government. But it would add nothing significant to the discussion other than giving me a chance to truly rant and rave.

I don't think that the solution to a problem like our environment is terribly simple. Every solution that is being brought forward right now is a stopgap measure at best and in many cases will actually cause more problems than it solves (see the economic cost of a Prius or wind farms if you want an example).
In additiong to the paralyzing nature of the solutions to simple problems I am also having trouble deciding which of the two candidates will do less damage in office. Isn't it sad that the only reason I'll vote for either candidate is because he'll do less damage than the other?
The hard thing is, America as a concept is still a shining city on a hill. Its just that letting people run that city is like covering the walls in dung. But hey, enough about my sentimental, faux philisophical wannabe-ism. the real question is - what do you think?

p.s. butterfly effect: simple actions have extraordinary consequences. a butterfly flapping its wings causes a nation to fall. See also: Good Will Hunting, and The Butterfly Effect.
p.p.s for a really great discussion that prompted the writing of this article see this link.

Why I like Old Movies

Where I live at this present moment I have a constant debate with Nehemiah over new movies and old movies. Now I have absolutely no problem with new movies. I enjoy some of them, I even own some of them, I will discuss them occasionally and will appreciate them for what they are worth. However, old movies hold a special place in my heart - and I believe my reason for liking them is a little unusual and so I thought that I would share it with you, also because I found this picture and it reminded me of why I like old movies


I like old movies not for the acting - although, in most cases, superb acting has gone by the wayside. Not for the stories - some of the stories are exceptional, some are pedestrian. But most of the movies that have survived to this day have one thing in common - they are originals. That is, they presented something for the first time. Whether its the "tough guy against the world" as portrayed by Bogart or proto-(and anti) feminist subtext in Gone with the Wind, from the unbearable suspense of Nosferatu and the chilling creepiness of "Rope" to the stunning portrayal of family politics (and outlandishly good acting) in "The Godfather" Or even to the archetype of the Western (A Fistful of Dollars anyone?) Yes there are cheesy films that are old, some are incredibly dated, but they all did something first or best (best is subjective I know).

I could explain that I always search for the first thing (thats why I read Classical Literature) or the best thing (Classical music here) but its all really pointless because I'm not going to write as persuasively as Thomas Paine, or as pointedly as Jonathan Swift, as complex as Joyce or with as much influence as Dante or Shakespeare. I just think that people should understand that with all of our technology - we still need a storyteller for every village.

Alone at Midnight

There is an old hymn that goes:

"Oh Jesus, my Savior, my song in the night
Come to me with thy tender love, my souls delight,
Unto thee O Lord in affliction I call
My comfort by day and my song in the night

Oh why should I wander an alien from thee,
or cry in the desert my face to see
My refuge my solace, my souls delight,
Oh Jesus my Savior my song in the night

Lord Jesus, I come to thee in lowly despair,
give strength to my fainting soul, the burdens to bare
My comfort, my joy, my souls delight
Oh, Jesus my Savior, my song in the night."

When I hear this song, I always feel like I should cry - not because the words are sorrowful, but because of the truth and beauty that are contained within those words. When you are alone at midnight, your covers on the floor due to your tossing and turning and your eyes wired open, where does your soul find refuge?

link here

Review of things I have watched and/or read over the last couple of weeks

I have been on a movie watching kick lately. I haven't watched this many movies since I was living by myself (when I watched around 12 a week - nothing else to do, I'd already read all my books).
Recently I've watched: Forbidden Kingdom (twice), Iron Man, Speed Racer, The Darjeeling Lmtd, There Will be Blood, No Country for Old Men, An American Crime, The Proposition and The Curse of the Golden Flower (also, many parts of various retarded movies along the same line as Rush Hour 2). I have also read/am reading Fury (Rushdie), Robinson Crusoe, two Agatha Christie's, Mathilda, as well as a few other smaller books whose titles escape me. I have also been listening to/studying some great new music by Haydn, Beethoven, Lizst, and some Renaissance composer (I forget again) (coming soon in this category The Art of the Fugue, of which I recently read a fascinating article whose location on the internet has also deserted my memory - unfortunately).
In spite of the title I am not going to review any of these things (at least, not in any formal way). Others have done so and they have done a far better job describing the works respective faults and strengths. I also tend to like/dislike things for odd or even unknown reasons. For instance, Speed Racer was not a great movie, or even, really, a good movie. It was, however, interesting enough that it has provided humor and headaches since I watched it (they throw beehives and snakes at each other and they have dueling car wheels, also more colors in one 30 second scene than Willy Wonka had in the whole movie).
I would however like to discuss appeal to people - as I have grown older I find that I am appreciating things for different reasons. I find that I appreciate passion for one's craft almost as much as I appreciate talent at one's craft (although execution of a craft is still the most important). In some ways I believe this is a product of the environment that I find myself in, a place where the talent pool is lower but the desire is still present. But back to appeal, it is interesting to me to find out why people like things - even if its very banal: "It makes me happy" "It appeals to my simple side" "It makes me think of cheese" and if I can find out and partially understand the appeal that it has to someone it has become increasingly difficult for me to find fault with the work. So what do you think?

With deepest apologies to all you who have some sort of vested interest in the writing of this blog I am ready to write. Some of the Official Friends of the Blog have told me that they are starting/have restarted/will be restarting blogs because they need to make themselves write (for various reasons). I believe this to be an admirable goal and in that spirit I would like to offer you a semi-firm promise that I will write these epistles to you at least once a week.

I'm somewhat hesitant to write to you about semi-important things. mostly because semi-important things tend to make people upset and then they leave comments that are questioning, or they send me emails about how I'm wrong, or they leaving burning bags of dog poop on my front porch - I don't like burning bags of dog poop.

But I actually do think about important things - like world peace and tree huggers and global economy, the state (or lack thereof) of christian education, problems with a belief system that doesn't support rational thought, or even what you were wearing today - I think about that a lot, mostly to mock you.

So I warn you, there may be IMPORTANT (notice the capitalization and emphasize the word accordingly in your own mind) things in store for this blog. I'm going to marry "The Huffington Post," "The New York Post," "Wired," and "Slate" and add in my own take on other stuff.

Ok, have a nice life
until next time
this is Jaron - spokesperson for J.R. Ledgerwood
signing off.

Family. Photographs. Weekends. Steak.

(Aside: [note: this doesn't count as the beginning, in fact, it should be its own post but I'm to lazy for that] To the thousands out there reading my blog I need to tell you that it really helps to read my posts in "voices" for instance, An announcer voice, A mocking voice, A guru's voice, etc. - If the general reading public so desires I could tell you what voice you use - reader response theory always was a ridiculous notion in my book).

In a predictably vain attempt to bolster my ego and to get people to respond to me I'm going to lead off my post with a question - that demands an answer! - what do you feel about family pictures? I am always torn on these things, most of me hates them with a passion that would put Al-Qaeda to shame. The rest of me thinks more along the lines of "You need those memories for when your old and senile so your great-grandkids can have the ability to make fun of how stupid you looked when you were twelve" (Yes this is an actual thought taken straight from my brain and put into . . . whatever the internet is).

So this past weekend, padre and madre visited the land where I am presently being domestic. We had fun, we went out to eat a couple of times (my steak was heavenly, and the chinese is always above average), we walked around a nice little town, had a nice drive, talked about everything, met my piano teacher (which sounds incredibly stupid but really isn't - everyone would like this guy), went swimming (man I stink at swimming - can I hear it for nerds the world over!), went to church, and we didn't take one picture. And now, as I sit here, I think I might regret that decision.

To make up for this lack of photographs, I post this picture.
I really want my life to be like this picture. And if my family activities were more like this one, the weight of my pictures would cause the state of Illinois to sink in to the earth. Which, all in all, would be a very interesting thing to see.

A link for you

I don't like telling people that they need to do something. But you all need to go here and watch this clip. Where else can you combine finger-wagging, beatles haircuts, pseudo-militarism, jumping around and whistling?

This also serves as a link to a friends blog - which I'm told is a good thing.

Speechless in Shannon

I have some numbers for you
75 x 2000 = 150,000
Remember that number and here's another:
3000
And:
50


Second set of numbers
100
and
8

And one last number
10,000

Now to set the stage for the story.
I had gone to work, just like any other day, sat in my office most of the morning working on bulletins, powerpoints, spreadsheets, etc. all very normal Wednesday activities. Around 11 I started to think about lunch. Around 11:30 I decided I wanted pizza from Casey's, and around noon I got my pizza and went home. I walked in the door all ready for lunch - watch some sportscenter, talk with Kay, etc. Kay is watching a show on the DIY network called "Clean House" which (ironically enough) is about people cleaning up (or out) houses, mostly houses that are lived in by hoarders. Most of my readers will have some type of knowledge about hoarding - some of you may even have stayed in a hoarders house. As Kay and I were eating we began chatting about the show, what we thought of the people, the state of the house, and gradually the talk shifted to other shows that had been watched. Which is when she told me about Oprah yesterday.
(Quick note of reassurance: I don't really have much to do with Oprah, any person as rich as she is doesn't really know how to relate to me - although she does pick good books).
Oprah was/is also doing shows on hoarders (apparently its going to become the new add/adhd - all it needs is its own designer drug) and she had on one of the grossest, most disgusting, shameful exhibitions of American wastefulness I have ever seen.

Remember those numbers? Take a minute and go look at them

Ready?
Here's the explanation
75 TONS of garbage. Thats 150,000 lbs of junk
In a 3000 sq ft house (thats about 50 lbs of garbage per sq foot)
Thats just what was thrown out.

The cleanup operation took 100 people 8 weeks

Oh, that last number - the 10,000?
That was the size of the warehouse in sq ft that they rented to hold the garage sale to get rid of stuff. Needless to say, it was completely filled.

The lady hadn't had any visitors in 12 years. She hadn't seen the oldest son and his family in 5 years. And it took the youngest son and his sister to call Oprah in for help.
Lest you take the cheap way out and blame it on being a redneck - the lady and her husband are very nice middle class people, their house is in an older looking suburb, it has an inground swimming pool, three car garage and is generally a fairly nice house.
FILLED WITH 75 TONS OF GARBAGE!!!!!

There's so much stuff in the house its taking Oprah two days to do a show on it.
Tonight, after church, I'm watching Oprah.

UPDATE: They had a garage sale for all of the saleable items left in this house (actually a lot of this was still reasonable - it had never been touched - it was underneath 75 tons of garbage), they mad $13,000 dollars on a garage sale. This does not count the 3 semi trailer loads of stuff that was donated to Goodwill the dumptruck loads of stuff that was thrown out or the still sizable quantity of stuff that was returned.

To the worst invention ever.

On June 2nd 1875 the world ended.

No more would we be able to ensconce ourselves in a cocoon of solitude. Our "life in the woods" would become a life in the wire. Our communities would be destroyed, our families wrecked, and I would have to answer the phone. On June 2nd, 1875 the first documented sound traveled through an electric wire - a sound that would ruin our lives.

Alexander Graham Bell was the servant of the devil on that day.

I don't want to hear about how the telephone is a good thing because it keeps us connected and informed. Don't tell me about all the good things that the telephone is able to do. I'm not interested in hearing your useless drivel about "oh! I can't imagine being able to not call my friends at any time, not being able to order pizza - oh, the horror!" You only say that because your all idiots. The telephone is horrific - it has produced the breakup over the telephone (and led to the truly despicable: IM breakup), it has created a whole host of new criminals and it has helped in creating a world in which it is easier for me to order authentic Indonesian food at 4 am on December 24th than it is for me to pay my taxes.

All in all, it would be a far, far better thing if all the phones would make up their collective minds to destroy themselves (yes they are sentient beings -BEINGS OF EVIL!), they would rid this world of at least one problem. (just don't destroy the internet - because life then would truly end).

I would call this post "23 times" if that number weren't already tied to a really dumb Jim Carey movie

On this day, March 2nd Anno Domini MMVIII I would like to celebrate the coming of a very special day.
Depending upon your religous affiliation and/or your national heritage you may celebrate Christmas, Hannukah, Yom Kippur, Ramadan, Easter, Boxing Day, ANZAC Day, Chinese New Year, New Years, Corpus Christ, The Day of the Dead, Labor/Labour Day, Guy Fawkes Day or others (look here for a list of all the holidays that I could have mentioned but chose not to). But in all my extensive research (10 minutes on google and wikipedia - hurrah for a college education) I could find no country that currently celebrates one of my favorite days of the year.

THE IDES OF MARCH

This would be the point in which your boring high school teacher would go on a really, really boring rabbit trail about why its called the ides of March and would reference good 'ole Julius (who gave us a calendar, and a good definition of benevolent dictatorship), Brutus (of et tu fame), the Senate (the older, [possibly] more corrupt version - but not the Athenian one, thats too old), and other people who have been dead so long that most historians don't care about them anymore (except for the ones who are like your high school history teacher). Anyway, I don't really feel like putting all the details in for you: you don't care enough to read them and I don't care enough about your willful ignorance of western civilization.
And normally this would also be the point that I would insert portions of Julius Ceasar wherein it has been written "Beware the ides of March" and then lots of other dialogue and then "et tu Brutus?" and then a denoument. But I will refrain from those edifying quotations.

Instead I will give you the reasons for my love of this day.
1. It sounds really, really, cool. Try saying the phrase "the ides of March" without going into your scary, movie trailer guy/demonic - possession voice, try it, its just not possible to do.
2. It signaled the end of an era. After this day the Republic of Rome was no more. We get Marc and Cleopatra's rather interesting love story and Octavian, and then a line of emperors, gradually declining in authority and power that would lead inexorably to the Visigoths sacking Rome in 410, the Vandals in 455, and the eventual replacing of the Western Roman emperors with barbarian warlords in 476.
[in a short, meaningless aside: the Germanic Tribes have the absolute coolest names EVER: who would you pick in an octagon fight: a Cherokee or an Ostrogoth . . . see, not one of you could pick the Cherokee. I would link to a list of their names but I prefer not be responsible for the headless corpses that would result].
3. If its good enough for Shakespeare to immortalize its good enough to celebrate.

I've batted around ideas for how to celebrate and here's what I'm thinking. I'm going to celebrate with a traditional Roman feast complete with: toga's, cushions, a whole cow stuffed with pig stuffed with lamb stuffed with goose stuffed with chicken stuffed with pheasant, eel and fresh-caught sturgeon and my own vomitorium, then I will repose to my room and watch 300, Ben-Hur, Gladiator and A Clockwork Orange (I do have a reason for picking each of those movies); and then finish up with a little Ovid and Catullus.
But what do you think? do you have any suggestions for entertainment? food? guests? if so please let me know soon, THE IDES OF MARCH wait for no man.

A Toast (I promise its only bubbling grape juice - really, truthfully, I don't even know where to buy Dom Perignon) [Assembly Instructions included]

[WARNING: Reading of this post has been proven to lower your IQ to the level of a mud rat. It has also been proven that the author was not of sane mind during its composition due to the level of cheap chocolate-frosted doughnuts consumed before, during and after its writing. READ AT YOUR OWN RISK]

[Impressario]
Ladies and Gentleman
Today is THE DAY
Today is the day that we have been waiting for for decades
When your fathers
[Satirical Aside]
(and mothers -because we wouldn't want this blog to degenerate into chauvinistic demagoguery) were but children, they dreamed of this day.
They would spend hours talking, arguing,
[Astronomical reference]
probing the very cosmos itself, to find all possible avenues that would arrive at this day.
And now that it is here - [Daydreaming]

[Philisophic aside {Nihilism!}]

Well I guess its just here. And then tomorrow comes and then the next day.

[Nursery Rhyming]
This is the way the world goes round
the world goes round
the world goes round
This is the way the world goes round
All in the morning

[Storytelling]
I am, of course, speaking of the resignation of that revolutionary
[Hissing Sounding]
Fidel Cassssssssstro, as president (read: Dictator) of Cuba
[More Daydreaming]
that land of fine (so I've been told) cigars and music and mojitos,
[Sicko reference! {Michael Moore Shoutout!!}]
and also better health care than the US
[Resume Storytelling with a renewed sense of honesty and personal revelation]
I am of course exaggerating a slight bit, the only people who have been dreaming of this day for decades are the
[Name-Dropping to establish bona fides as an intelligent, well studied personage]
Kennedy family and the city of Miami,
[Revelation of Political Stance to encourage discussion/hatred/leaving of comments]
and as an right-leaning independent neither of those two demographic groups can make me evince the slightest degree of interest in their dreams, hopes, wishes or desires.

[Conclusioning]
So here's to the downfall of
[More Hissing]
Cassssssssstro
and here's to reading about
[Friend shoutout in an absurd, pathetically desperate attempt to promote readership]
[Also, use of linking to demonstrate that I'm technologically savvy enough to link to other people, and that I actually have a life too lead]
Lindsey on Heather's blog

[Another pathetic attempt to be profound, only this time, its in the form of a ritualistic blessing]
May your days be shiny
Your nights be soft
Your friends funny
and your enemies slobs

May you always enjoy your food
And may your work never get in the way of reading my posts

[Sportscenter reference {Stu Scott!}]
BOO-YEAH

It's All Happening, or: The World is an Onion

I watched a movie tonight. Normally this event would occur and be promptly forgotten, What makes this event meaningful is that I didn't want to watch a movie tonight. I wanted to go to sleep - I'm exhausted, sleep has been on my mind since the minute I woke up this morning. But I got sucked in and now here it is at 2:30 in the morning and I'm sitting and writing this post.

When I was growing up I had this habit of staying up till all hours of the morning because I was reading a book, I didn't want to/couldn't put it down, even when I knew I would pay for it the next day. I felt that I would lose the story if I stopped reading. I have read hundreds of books, some extraordinary, some outlandish but most of them eminently forgettable. Out of those hundreds I remember very little - a well drawn character perhaps, or a unique twist to a plot, maybe a character quality that I admired, most of it is forgotten. But I can tell you exactly how many books I've stopped reading in the middle (two), where the story was, what the cover looked like, where I got the book, where I put the book down (physical location) and a host of other details. Both of these books definitely fell under the eminently forgettable category.

As my movie watching has ramped up in my life it has (for various reasons) overtaken reading has my primary means of literary intake. Some movies are stunning, some ordinary, most are very bad. Tonights movie was reasonable but nothing extremely special. This coming of age story harped on the theme "It's All Happening". The phrase was used as if it was an absolution, a verbal panacea, giving the speaker the right to be released from every responsibility normally accorded to mankind. However the most powerful use of the phrase occurred when it was applied to time, as in: "It's all happening now". We have so many people whose only thought is for their career, or college, or their relationships, or their job. We look to the past to understand the future, and look to the future to pay for the past. We hope that the sacrifices we make today will be repaid ten-fold in the future. This isn't about living in the present. This is about the Now.

This isn't about "seizing the moment". This is about taking a moment to think of the uncountable untold stories that are going on around you right now. This is about the indescribable beauty of the split second that just whizzed past you that can never be replicated.

One of my favorite authors is Salman Rushdie. The first time I finished a novel of his I sat stock still for a solid half hour because I was amazed at what I had just read. Rushdie had achieved a literary representation of the texture of the world. To this day I struggle describing exactly how I feel about that particular book - I have never read anything that showed the story of the world so accurately - how everything related to everyone, how the urchin in the street caused the kingdom to rise, how the kingdom allowed a girl in, how the girl influenced a shopkeeper, who ran the urchin over, all without anybody having any knowledge of each other. Many of my favorite movies have similar layered qualities to them. My favorite poem is John Donne speaking of the interconnectivity of man. I am amazed at the story of the world, how the world connects, how it moves, how it teaches and how it runs.

"To see a world in a grain of sand,
And a heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand
And eternity in an hour."

Indifference '08

America is a supposed democracy. As in, the people are supposed to be able to make their voice heard and then the leaders are there only to represent the people. As with every system of government it is imperfect. When I was younger I believed in the "white pedestal of power" where any leader was automatically to be trusted and followed, from parents to the president. I somehow got the idea that if you were in charge of something that you were different than me. As I've grown you begin to see flaws in your leaders - the pedestal shrinks little bit, until its on your level - and then it keeps on shrinking.
As we approach a momentous time - that of the presidential election - I find that I am more knowledgeable about the world, America, myself, politics, law, etc. than I have ever been. I've actually taken the time to figure out who stands where for the primaries, (I even started to suffer through political debates but I realized that my sanity was more important than the blathering that I heard) and yet, I couldn't care less who wins the election. Because any candidate is going to be as bad as any other. Nobody reading this blog needs a lesson in American politics (if you do you shouldn't be reading blogs - you should be studying), both of our parties are so alike that the candidate winning will be different in name only. Neither party is particularly interested in solving problems in any real sense, neither party is interested in helping normal people in any real way - both are interested in their own survival. Which returns me to my beginning, America is a supposed democracy - a place where the people have a say. But when the people are being manipulated in such a way that they are choosing to accept the status quo we don't have a democracy, we have an oligarchy.
Don't forget to make your voice heard. Vote for President!

Firsties

I've been feeling the need to write lately - so many little snippets of thought, phrases that teleport into being. And so I thought about writing in a book. But I'm to lazy to actually make that work, and so I thought about blogging.
me (m): I should blog
other me (om): You have a blog
m: I know, I can't decide whether I need to restart or try again.
om: if you restart you'll never hear the end of it from everyone
m: If I don't do something with these thoughts I'll die from exploded head
om: You can't write longhand?
m: I won't write longhand - its too Miltonianish
om: You're an idiot - you just compared yourself to one of the best English writers ever. You are an arrogant fool
m: (smiling) I know. I can't help it.
om: whatever, you should definitely blog, that way I can make fun of you for not being "Miltonianish"
m: ok

And so I'm here.
Peace and Love