Why do I always seem to finish my Adult Ed classes on the Saturday night before I teach the class on Sunday?  I knew I was teaching this class two months ago, but then I waited until last Sunday to begin reading from my sources.  I didn’t even start typing until this morning (it’s Saturday evening, by the way).  I seem to recall that I used to do this with my college term papers as well, and yet, I never missed a deadline.

I am such a procrastinator!  But I also appear to be one who can accurately judge exactly when to start, such that I finish just under the wire… so is that procrastination, or is it a fine example of the economics of time?  Am I being efficient?

I can’t really answer that, but I can tell you that objects in my peripheral vision are moving right now, except they aren’t.  Too much coffee and too little sleep have put me in some sort of a caffeinated stupor.

I hope, as I proof my work tomorrow morning, that it’s not absolute gibberish.  I’m sort of hoping that the Holy Spirit stepped in while I was half asleep typing this and made my “class project” workable, if not downright cogent, despite my efforts.

I’ll let you know after tomorrow morning.

It’s sad that I mostly still get the newspaper so I can grow my rubber band ball (3 yrs in the making, more than 1000 rubber bands).

I do like the business section and the comics.  The rest I can pretty much get on yahoo news or Huffington Post.  At what point will papers stop delivering paper?

Wow, try to connect the dots on this one.

So I’m reading the book Linchpin by Seth Godin, and in that book, he references a TED presentation by Elizabeth Gilbert (author of Eat, Pray, Love) on Nurturing Creativity (http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/elizabeth_gilbert_on_genius.html), which really is a presentation on the pre-Renaissance idea of inspiration coming from an outside source.  Gilbert’s ideas come from multiple sources, but Seth Godin states that her main source is from The Gift by Lewis Hyde.  I haven’t read the book, so I don’t know if this is correct, but I just ordered it… and I’ll let you know soon.

Anyway, the Greeks called this outside force a daemon (a term I know from SunOS/UNIX programming – their Daemon lives in a box!).  This Daemon, not to be confused with a demon, was some form of divine inspiration that would interact with a person from time to time, allowing that person to do extraordinary things.  The Romans called their “spiritual sprite” a genius (from where we get the term Genie).  Their Genius lived in the walls of an artist’s studio and would come out from time to time to inspire the artist.

To me, this is a lovely notion because it means that if you do something extraordinary, you can’t take the credit for it because the extraordinary bit was done by your Genius.  It wasn’t until the Renaissance, when man became the center of everything (Humanism) that men became geniuses, rather than interacting with one.  Pre-Renaissance, men and women had a Genius; post-Renaissance men and women (where we are today) were the Genius.  Like Elizabeth Gilbert, I believe that the pre-Renaissance idea of having a Genius is a nicer notion.  It keeps artists humble, knowing that they are not entirely responsible for their work.  It also keeps depressed artists from killing themselves because the burden of being a genius was too much for them.

 

Get the genie out of the bottle!

Release your genius and get unburdened!

You are not the center of the universe!

 

Genius comes and goes, but if you are tenacious and do your part (show up and work), a genius will occasionally visit you and you’ll do extraordinary things.

Now, I am an unabashed Christian.  I know where my “genius” comes from.  It’s God.  God inspires me on occasion to do good work.  It’s not a genie or a daemon; and hopefully not a demon that does this.  God grants gifts to people, and these gifts are on loan.  The possessor of these gifts may feel like they own them, but they do not – that’s simply post-Renaissance ideology talking.  No, when I am inspired, I give praise to God because I know that He is the source of my “genius.”  And like the Greeks, the Romans, and Elizabeth Gilbert, I speak to my Genius; in my case, through prayer; recognizing that he is more than a spiritual sprite, he is the creator of all things.

God requires us to have faith, to love, and to endure suffering. These three should be enough to keep us delightfully busy. We should deal with everything else as it comes along and let God worry about how it all turns out. If we don’t want to listen to what God says in his Word he punishes us by simply letting us torment ourselves for no good reason. — Martin Luther

Here’s God’s word on the matter (using the Message version of the Bible)

Matthew 6:25-34

^25-26“If you decide (you are) for God, living a life of God-worship, it follows that you don’t fuss about what’s on the table at mealtimes or whether the clothes in your closet are in fashion. There is far more to your life than the food you put in your stomach, more to your outer appearance than the clothes you hang on your body. Look at the birds, free and unfettered, not tied down to a job description, careless in the care of God. And you count far more to him than birds.

^27-29“Has anyone by fussing in front of the mirror ever gotten taller by so much as an inch? All this time and money wasted on fashion—do you think it makes that much difference? Instead of looking at the fashions, walk out into the fields and look at the wildflowers. They never primp or shop, but have you ever seen color and design quite like it? The ten best-dressed men and women in the country look shabby alongside them.

^30-33“If God gives such attention to the appearance of wildflowers—most of which are never even seen—don’t you think he’ll attend to you, take pride in you, do his best for you? What I’m trying to do here is to get you to relax, to not be so preoccupied with getting, so you can respond to God’s giving. People who don’t know God and the way he works fuss over these things, but you know both God and how he works. Steep your life in God-reality, God-initiative, God-provisions. Don’t worry about missing out. You’ll find all your everyday human concerns will be met.

³⁴“Give your entire attention to what God is doing right now, and don’t get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow. God will help you deal with whatever hard things come up when the time comes.

In the immortal words of Bobby McFerrin, Don’t worry, be happy (in God!)

 

Yesterday I (re?)learned that just because you can do something doesn’t mean that you should.

Also, no surprise to anyone, but work can really get in the way of those things you find significant if work is not the thing you find significant.

(I first wrote this in September of 2002 for a fantasy football blog of all things.  All rights reserved.  Enjoy!)

“I miss Tom”

“Amy, we all miss him,” Bery said softly, consoling his sobbing daughter.  “He was like a father to us all, and I wish we had time for a proper burial, but someone’s going to have to push him into the Bay now.”

“How can we stop them?  I’m just tired, tired of all this.”

“I don’t know how to stop them, no one does; wish I did.  I’m tired too.”

“I’ll go push him in dad.  It’s my turn anyway.”

“No, I’ll do it.  Where’s the gas.”

 

The world no longer belonged to the humans.  Massive monsters had invaded the earth three years ago tomorrow, and an unprepared world could not defend itself from their attacks.  Nothing had stopped them so far — not conventional weapons, not even weapons of mass destruction.  The deployment of those had killed more humans than monsters.  These otherworldly monsters, it seemed, thrived on radiation.  It only encouraged them.

The sea monsters, Leviathan, were devouring all the sea creatures.  Who knows how many fish and sea mammals had become extinct in just three years.  The land creatures, Jumanji, were just as ferocious, and their lust for meat was no less.  Unfortunately, they did not discriminate between man and beast, and in fact, since the humans had been more “pesky,” in their attempts to defend themselves, they were a much more frequent target at suppertime.  Bravado meant nothing to these creatures.  Courage cost lives.  Now there were few people left — pacifists and survivalists mostly; only those who chose to hide had lived.  Now with most, if not all the earth creatures gone, even the few remaining humans were frequent targets.  Each surviving pocket of humans felt that they were the only ones left on earth.

The amazing senses of these creatures allowed them to sniff out any meat-eating creature.  Herbivores were tracked by their feces.  The surviving humans had learned long ago to go vegetarian, start no fires, and to keep all their garbage (including fecal matter) a long way from where they lived.  Now, most people lost their lives on trash runs and trips to the can because the monsters were drawn to the scent of all this.  Lysol and double-bagging couldn’t stop that — only gasoline seemed to help cover the various scents.  That’s why the survivors of San Jose had moved to the refinery in Benecia.  Bery was the one who came up with the idea of going there. Pat had the idea of using gas instead of water for the toilet, which helped hide the scent.  Brian had come up with the idea of creating a trash catapult that could reach the San Francisco Bay, but this was not perfect, and the rotting trash that didn’t reach the Bay did keep some of the Jumanji close — perhaps 200 yards — and that was unacceptable.  The trash that did reach the Bay was quickly devoured by the Leviathan.  Those bottom dwellers were not such a threat to the humans because they kept to the sea, but the land-based Jumanji were a constant threat.

In the refinery, one of the now empty massive oil tanks was the San Jose group’s home.  Another connecting tank had been converted to a garden with some success, but the group all wondered what they were adding to the vegetables they grew; probably lead at a minimum.  Another tank was the catapult site — not a catapult actually, but a trebuchet, since a trebuchet was more accurate once dialed in.  Its smooth action was also much less likely to break a bag and scatter trash.  Still, it wasn’t perfect and today, a bag had broken so the trash needed to be cleaned up before the heat of the day lessened the amount of protective gas fumes that helped hide the group.  It was Tom who was next in line to clean up the remnants of the broken trash bag.  Tom had bought it near the Bay, just as Joe, Todd F. and Carrie had done on previous runs.  Since he was covered in gas, the Jumanji couldn’t smell him, but there was still the matter of their visual acuity, which hadn’t been solved yet.  The Jumanji could see the fumes the gas gave off, which was a blessing and a curse.  Once anyone was outside the safety of the oil tank fumes, his fumes could be seen even before they themselves could be seen by the Jumanji.  With Tom now gone, only Brian, Bery, Amy, Shaun, Mike, Wes and Pat were left.

_____________________________

“Team purple, do you see any life?”

“No.”

“Team green?”

“No.”

“Shall we rid the planet of our pets?”

“We’re ready to go Flyers.”

“Same here.”

“Shall we kill some pets Ekim?”

“We shall Hplar.”

“Purple and Green:  Deploy the weapons!”

____________________________________

“What was that?”

“I don’t know, but it was loud and bright.  I hope it wasn’t another nuke.”

“Do you think dad will be OK out there Brian?”

“From the blast, or the Jumanji?”

“The blast.  Both.  you know.”

“Let’s pray.  Dear God, please protect.  .  . Bery!  You’re safe!  Thank God!  What happened?”

“I had just gotten to Tom when a Jumanji spotted me, probably the same one that killed Tom.  He had me dead to rights when a blinding light appeared in the distance, followed by a loud bang.  I was running for a place to hide when a fierce wind knocked me down.  When I looked back, the Jumanji was gone; just gone.  One second, I could feel his breath on my neck, the next second — nothing.”

“I’m just glad you’re safe.”

“Me too dad.”

__________________________________________

“What’s your reading Flyers?  Hplar, can we land yet?”

“Still a few sea creatures left Ddot.  OK, they’re evaporated.  Team green, you won’t be eaten anymore.  You’re OK to land and start terraforming.  The planet is ours.  Team purple.  .  .  Hang on a second.  I see some indeterminate life-form readings at coordinates 10.2.7.7 by 42.3.56.1.  Can you investigate?  Be careful Tnerb and Nevs; some of these lifeforms have smarts.  Exterminate with extreme prejudice.

“Don’t we always?”

“Let’s be honest Nevs, Team green has been kicking your posterior flap on the last seven planets.”

“But I do have more planets under my belt.”

“True, but I’m interested in getting my commission on this planet.  You remember how badly you failed on that red planet last year?  You tried twice and the inhabitants of that planet beat you, beat our creatures, beat everyone.  We didn’t get our commission.”

“Why don’t you send team green to that red planet.  You know they can handle the colder climates better than we can.”

“Anyone can terraform a planet under ideal conditions.  Get to work Nevs.”

________________________________________

“I’m going back out to get Tom.  It’s almost sunset.”

“Be careful Bery.”

“I’m going too.”

“No Amy.  Stay with the group.”

“But I’m already gassed up.”

________________________________________

“Team purple to Flyers”

“Go ahead”

“Your life-form is a recently dead creature. Bipedal.  Big Brain.  Can we proceed?”

“There’s movement in the large circular structures behind you.  Proceed with caution — the material in those tanks is flammable.  Use passive weapons.”

“OK. Purple out.”

“That Hplar really bugs me.”

“Ya, but what are you going to do Nevs.  They are the master race.”

“It still bugs me Tnerb.  Maybe we should deploy some pets in his ship.”

“We could do that on one ship, but then there’s still Ekim to deal with.  You can’t get them both if they stay apart, and they always do.  So long has they travel in pairs, we can’t touch them and you know it.”

“But I hate the idea that with one touch of a button, they can end our lives.”

“Let’s just concentrate on our job.  There are worse ways to earn a paycheck.”

“Name one.”

__________________________________________

“Amy, I told you to stay back home!”

“My turn — remember?”

“But we can’t be out here together.”

“Don’t worry, the Rinaldo family name will live on.”

“We stand a better chance of that if you go back to safety.”

“Dad!  What’s that by Tom?”

“Don’t know.  It’s new, and ugly too. Wonder if they had something to do with the Jumanji’s disappearance?”

“They look pretty fragile.”

“But those weapons don’t.  We need to warn the others.  Let’s get out of here.  They’re coming this way.”

________________________________________

“Sure, .  .  . Travel the universe.  See exotic planets.  Meet exotic creatures — and kill them.  I’m suing the alliance.  The brochure never said anything about sadistic, life-threatening overlord Flyers.”

“Shut up Nevs.”

_______________________________________

“New creatures are heading this way!  Not Jumanji”

“Will weapons work Bery, Amy?”

“Looks possible.  Let’s use gas and electricity as a backup.”

“What about fire?”

“I’m willing to set this place on fire if we have to.  I think this is the next wave of creatures.  They look smart —  not like the Jumanji and Leviathon.”

“I haven’t seen a flame for a while myself.  Let’s do it.”

________________________________________

“Tnerb, How’s your sister doing?”

“You tell me, you saw her last.”

“Did not.”

“What’s that?  Those creatures are shooting gas propelled projectiles at us.  Registering hits on our armor; electrical current on the ground as well.”

“They started a fire too.  Yawn.  Is this the best these creatures can do?  Better adjust our armor to max cool before we heat up too bad.”

“Just so long as that flame doesn’t go away anytime too soon.”

“The coolers do work a little too well in this armor.”

“Flyers!”

“Yes team purple.”

“We found some lifeforms.  Not much of a challenge.  Cleaning up.”

“OK.  Once you’re finished there, proceed to the terraforming site.”

“Will do.  Out.  .   .  What a Jerk.”

“OK Nevs, you take that side, I’ll take .  .  .  What’s that . . . freezing mist!  Can’t move arms to adjust armor.”

“Me neither.  Let’s get out of .  .  . ”

__________________________________________

“What happened?  I thought we were toast.”

“We might still be if we don’t get out of here.  Looks like the fire suppression system went off.  And I didn’t even know they had one here.  Makes sense though.”

“Mike, you OK.”

“Man, I was hot, now I’m cold.”

“Dante’s Hell?”

“Blue Devil.”

“Whatever.  Let’s go.  It’s hard to breathe in here.”

“Was it the halogen?”

“It was probably the cold that killed them.  They were doing fine in the fire.  Let’s grab the extinguishers on the way out.  We may need them as weapons.”

_______________________________________

“Nevs!  Tnerb!  Come in!”

“No use Ekim, their life signs are gone.  For some reason, they couldn’t adjust their armor in time.”

“They had the old manual ones the Domites made?”

“Ya, the ones with the cheap Aztek power supply.  Nevs and Tnerb were Domites after all.  It would be unpatriotic of them to buy good armor from outside their dome.”

“Shoot, and I always thought I’d do them in.  Especially Nevs.”

“Ya, I know what you mean.  I always did want to press the button on him.”

“I’m going to anyway.  They may have found a way to escape our detection or give a false reading.”

“Just the purple team.  We still need team green.  Call ’em.”

“Team green?”

“Here Flyers.”

“Team purple ran into trouble.  Can you go help them out?”

“Again?”

“Yep.”

“OK.  Out.”

“Hope we get our commission.”

__________________________________________

“Two more just arrived over there.”

“I see ’em”

“Should we extinguish ’em?”

“Very punny.  They have weapons, and now they know we’re here.  We’d better be cautious.”

_______________________________________

“We’re here Flyers.  Where are the lifeforms?”

“To your right team green.  Nhoj, flank them.  Ddot go right in.”

“And team purple is where?”

“They aren’t doing so well at the moment.  I told them that some of these creatures had smarts, but they didn’t listen.  Proceed without them for now.  You may join them later.”

“Don’t you mean they’ll join us?”

“Whatever.”

“Purple Slackers!”

______________________________________

“One went off to your left Shaun.”

“I think they’re going to try to attack from two sides.  See anyone on the other two sides?  Wes?  Pat?”

“Nope.”

“No strange, alien things over here.”

“Man, these guys are cocky.  They don’t even try to hide.”

“They must have some sort of force field or something.”

“Not very good ones if it can’t handle cold.”

“.  .  . or Halogen.”

“Right.  Remember, not until you see the whites of their eyes.”

“Does that really apply here?”

“Probably not.  Shoot ’em when you recognize a feature.”

“Again, does that really apply?”

“Ten feet or less!”

“I can work within those parameters.”

_______________________________________

“What do these creatures have for weapons?”

“Their weapons are thermal based; some sort of coolant in a canister.  Not very effective against this armor.”

“We’d better warn team purple to adjust their suits.  They’ve got manuals.

“Backwards Domites!  They live in comfort, but they never produce anything good.”

“Nevs, Tnerb. You there?  Team purple?”

“Flyers?  Where’s purple?”

“Please proceed without them.  You have the better armor.”

“Duh!”

“See, even the Flyers know about Domite design.”

“Firing!”

______________________________________

“Retreat!  This isn’t working!”

“Maybe they’ve adapted like the Borg.”

“You watched too much TV.”

“I’m pinned down.”

“Me too.”

“Amy, stay down!  You’ll get hit!”

____________________________________

“Yeeoww!”

“What’s up Nhoj?”

“I don’t know, but whatever it is, it’s hurting my eyes.  I can’t see.  Better move away and come get me.  That female creature must have a defense mechanism.”

“I ran away from home because of females.  I was surrounded by them.”

“Me too, and they scared the hell out of me.  But I mean it; get over here.  My skin is starting to itch.”

“So far, I’m unaffected.  Coming around to you.  Yeeeeaaah.  I see what you mean!”

_________________________________________

“Daddy, I’m scared.  Now there are two of them and they have their weapons pointed at me.  Daddy, I’m scared.”

________________________________________

“Why don’t they shoot?”

“I don’t know Wes.  I’m just glad they don’t.  Looks like they’re retreating.

“Retreating?  They’re falling!”

________________________________________

“Carry me Ddot.  I can’t move.  I feel, I feel, helpless, week, pain, must move, yet, I cannot.  Aaaaarrrrrgggghhhh!”

“Aaarrrrggghhhh!”

________________________________________

“Shoot!  Lost team green.  Hplar, let’s get out of here.  There’s nothing more we can do.”

“I’m with you buddy.  I shudder to think what they have down there that could harm us.  I guess we forfeit our commission until we get another cleaning team or two.  Can’t say as I am disappointed to see Team green and team purple go though.”

“Copy that.  Whoever wrote in that brochure about leading teams to victory never met these guys.”

________________________________________

“It’s like they melted.”

“Woah, what a mess.  That stain is gonna stay a while.”

“Smells like cheese.”

“Is it over dad?”

“I think so, for now.  You can stop crying.”

“Please, crying makes me feel weak.”

“Scares the hell out of me.”

“Me too.  I feel helpless.”

“Me too.”

“Me too.”

________________________________________

And so, the human race was saved, for the moment, by a power so incredible that no man, alien or otherwise, can stand against it.  Estrogen.

BY MICHAEL LACHER

By now you’re probably wondering what this is all about, why FBI agents pulled you out of your barista job, threw you on a helicopter, and brought you to NASA headquarters. There’s no time, so I’ll shoot it to you straight. You’ve seen the news reports. What hit New York wasn’t some debris from an old satellite. There’s an asteroid the size of Montana heading toward Earth and if it hits us, the planet is over. But we’ve got one last-ditch plan. We need a team to land on the surface of the asteroid, drill a nuclear warhead one mile into its core, and get out before it explodes. And you’re just the liberal arts major we need to lead that team.

Sure, we’ve got dozens of astronauts, physicists, and demolitions experts. I’ll be damned if we didn’t try to train our best men for this mission. But just because they can fly a shuttle and understand higher-level astrophysics doesn’t mean they can execute a unique mission like this. Anyone can learn how to land a spacecraft on a rocky asteroid flying through space at twelve miles per second. I don’t need some pencilneck with four Ph.D’s, one-thousand hours of simulator time, and the ability to operate a robot crane in low-Earth orbit. I need someone with four years of broad-but-humanities-focused studies, three subsequent years in temp jobs, and the ability to reason across multiple areas of study. I need someone who can read The Bell Jar and make strong observations about its representations of mental health and the repression of women. Sure, you’ve never even flown a plane before, but with only ten days until the asteroid hits, there’s no one better to nuke an asteroid.

I’ve seen your work and it’s damn impressive. Your midterm paper on the semiotics of Band of Outsiders turned a lot of heads at mission control. Your performance in Biology For Non-Science Majors was impressive, matched only by your mastery of second-year Portuguese. And a lot of the research we do here couldn’t have happened without your groundbreaking work on suburban malaise and its representation and repression in John Hughes’ films. I hope you’re still that good, because when you’re lowering a hydrogen bomb into a craggy mass of flying astronomic death with barely any gravity, you’re going to need to draw on all the multidisciplinary reason and analysis you’ve got.

Don’t think I don’t have my misgivings about sending some hotshot Asian Studies minor into space for the first time. This is NASA, not Grinnell. I don’t have the time or patience for your renegade attitude and macho bravado. I can’t believe the fate of mankind rests on some roughneck bachelor of the arts. I know your type. You feed off the thrill of inference and small, instructor-led discussion. You think you’re some kind of invincible God just because you have cursory understandings of Buddhism, classical literature, and introductory linguistics. Well listen up, cowboy. You make one false move up there, be it a clumsy thesis statement, poorly reasoned argument, or glib analysis, and your team is dead, along with this whole sorry planet.

I’ve wasted enough time with chatter. Let’s get you over to mission control. Our avionics team needs your help getting their paper on gender politics in The Matrix properly cited in MLA format.

I had a good friend tell me last week that he envied me.  At first, I couldn’t understand why.  He then went on to explain that he would love to be unemployed for a while, as I am now, because unemployment brings freedom.

In the middle of the week, another friend confessed to me that he’d like to be doing what I am doing now – trying to make self-employment work – because he hopes to do the same someday.  He is watching my progress with extreme interest.

Another friend merely covets my car, and wants to know if I’ll be selling it soon, now that I don’t have a job (the yellow one, not the blue one).  He could be seen as more of an opportunist than a friend, but I know he is joking… sort of.

How did my situation become an object of desire to so many?  I began to think about this.  You know, this is everything I have always wanted as well: to not work a 7 – 5 job, to have abundant free time to do… well… whatever I’d like to do, to have a wonderfully supportive family, to drive a fun car, and recently, to have wealth dropped in my lap, thanks to all those stock options my former company kept giving to me over the years.  I AM an object of envy; I’m living a life of luxury; not a life of frivolous spending mind you, but I have great “wealth” right now, and I am truly blessed.

The question I posed to myself a while ago, as I was preparing for my inevitable unemployment, was this:  What does one do with eternity? This is a two-fold question: one part deals with the “eternal” feel of abundant time, and the other deals with eternity itself.

The unemployed and the retired will feel the stress of abundant time if they don’t have a hobby or a passion; if they didn’t plan ahead.  Retired folks often die shortly after retirement because they had nothing more to live for!  I wanted to have a plan (so as not to die).

And as for the truly eternal aspects, I put my trust firmly in Christ.  After all, we’re only here on this earth for a short while, but eternity is… well… eternal.  I want to arrive in the right eternal place; hopefully taking as many of my friends along with me as I can.

So, I’m in this enviable position right now; living a life of luxury.  How am I doing so far?  Well, I’m still resting and learning to enjoy post-work life.  Soon (very soon), I should begin to think about all those things I promised myself I’d do should I ever find myself cash-rich and unemployed (or self-employed or retired) with abundant time, as I am now.  I really should be doing those things while I can!  When else would I?

So rather than just sitting around and dreaming about it, I should act.  I should write the Great American Novel.  I should travel around the world.  I should create a sustainable self-employed income while I still have a safety net.  I should act… or regret will follow some years from now when I’m back in a 7–5 job, never having accomplished anything on my list.

For this all-to-brief moment of time, I have a huge window of opportunity.  I should go for it.

So rather than being envied, I’d like to be an inspiration to others by actually doing something significant that others can aspire to.  Inspiration beats envy every time because inspiration is based on what you do, while envy is often based on what you have.  It would be a shame to become an object of ridicule because I was in an enviable position and did nothing inspirational with it.  That would be a wasted life.  God has given me this rare opportunity to do something significant, so I should DO something significant!

In 1996, I had the good fortune to be in Europe during the Olympics.  Not that I attended any of the events (they were in Atlanta), but I did get to see the Dutch and Belgian versions of Olympic broadcasting.  It was far superior to the US version, and it was broadcast on four channels so that not a single event would be missed.  The coverage was fair, balanced and without regard to country.  It was nonpartisan.  It was beautiful.

In 1994, I had a different encounter.  That year, I was in Europe during World Cup Soccer.  Because I had landed in the Netherlands, and because I had no real affiliations to the sport, I began to root for the Dutch (Go Orange!).  This worked out great so long as I was in the Netherlands.  It worked out less well when I was in Italy.  That evening, I was in Rome watching the game from a rooftop restaurant and I was rooting for the Dutch as they played Italy.  I almost got thrown off the roof – literally!  I did not know until a little later that Soccer in Europe is very close to a religion, and one simply does not root for the opposition.  (In 1996, I met a guy who was a “tank driver for soccer events.”  This tank had a high pressure water nozzle on it, and it was specifically used to quell the rowdy crowds.  This might be an indicator of how passionate the fans are about the sport).

In 1999, I was in France during Tour de France (an annual professional bike race), so I began to watch that.  France has such spectacular scenery!  Watching the bicycles race was like watching a really slow chess match, but at least there was always the scenery!  Some American guy won the race that year… and kept winning for the next six years.  These days, I’m a huge fan of the sport, and I never miss an opportunity to watch the race live when it comes to my town during the Amgen Tour of California.

For me, Europe and sports go hand-in-hand.  The Europeans are very passionate about their sports, and those sports are different from our sports.  Experiencing European sports needs to be a part of any European visit!  Sadly, on our most recent trip, we missed most of the major sporting events this time around.  At least we had the opportunity to watch some of the European sports on TV prior to the trip.  World Cup Soccer was in May/June (Go Orange!), Wimbledon Tennis was in June/July.  Also in July — the Tour of France.  This event goes on for the entire month of July every year! And even if you don’t want to watch Tour de France for the racing, it still offers one of the best opportunities to see what Europe looks like.  I know it sure got me excited about my upcoming trip when I watched it!

I think Sting had it right when he penned the phrase: “contestants in a suicidal race” in the song “Synchronicity II.”  For years, I actually thought he was singing “despots in a suicidal race,” which would also have worked (A despot is an absolute ruler, a lord or prince – a tyrant.).  At least where I drive, there seem to be a lot of “despots” around me; most of these self-important drivers are in SUVs (talking on cell phones!).  They routinely try to push me off the road, since they apparently own it.

With my particular “shiny metal box,” I get no love.  I drive an old civic hatchback.  Most would assume that since this is a commuter car, it doesn’t go fast and that I’m not much more than “road furniture” – in the way and easily dealt with.  In my case, they would be wrong.  Sure, the little car takes 11 seconds to get from zero to 60, but once it gets there, watch out.  It’s nimble and it corners great.  I put performance tires on my car!  The nimbleness of my car surprises the average driver.  In a straight line, I get passed all the time, but once we come into a corner, I’m in and out of there rather quickly, retaining much of my speed.  This is where my little car becomes a go-cart, stealthy and low to the ground.  It zips on by those SUVs, and frustrates the drivers who want to pass me.  This is the part of the contest that I win.  Once we’re back in the straights, my job is to then use the other cars to block anyone who wants to pass me (if they’re being jerks, or if I’m feeling like a jerk).  This is a game I like to play, and it’s a lot like chess, except with one wrong move, you can get a big owie.

Some have said that driving with me is like having a religious experience, though most will also admit that I’m a better than the average driver – I’m always thinking ahead, thinking in contingencies, and I do not lose focus.  I am an attentive driver.

 

My first two cars were old GM racers, but they only went straight.  They also got lousy gas mileage.  When I got the civic, I gained an air of respectability, and I no longer had to go to driver’s training courses on a regular basis (I could teach that class!).  My driving habits didn’t change much, but anyone looking in my direction (like the police), wouldn’t give me a second thought because no one driving a civic could possibly be a miscreant driver (though I do get looks for my off the line reaction time and initial speed – from zero to 20, the civic actually goes really fast, it’s in third gear where things start to fall off).  Because I own a civic, I have a “cloak of invisibility” with regards to the police.  This would change if I drove a performance car (say, a bright yellow Porsche) because guys will look at such a car even if it’s not moving.  I sense that this kind of car would be a dangerous and expensive car for me to drive on many levels.  It’s probably best that I stick with the civic for commuting, though maybe I should mash up the sides a bit, put a spiked metal grate on the front, and find a bumper sticker that says “ramming speed” for the back bumper.  This would signal to anyone: “he’s crazy and he’s not afraid to make contact – give him some room!”  Yes, if I did that, I think my commute would improve.  I would be the Kim Jong Il of my commute – crazy, but with nukes.