Nobody Knows Anything

Welcome to Diane Patterson's eclectic blog about what strikes her fancy

Psychic and physical clutter

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Every Sunday I check Minerva’s horoscope in the SF Chronicle. Why? Old habits die hard. Anyhow, this week’s entry says:

LEO July 22-August 21
Do it! Do it now. A home office of some sort has tickled your fancy for some time. Maybe it’s a suite, maybe a small corner. Whatever, the size, time and effort spent there can change your life. Family matters are iffy, maybe even bittersweet. Perhaps you’ll use your home office for a little writing. Something meaningful like “Raising Children For Fun and Profit.”

Well. There’s always a fairly high probability that your horoscope will speak to you in a significant way (particularly sun sign horoscopes from the newspaper, and I can explain to you why this is so another time), but this week is just so on.

We’ve been in this house for nearly five months now and I still don’t have access to my home office because it’s stuffed full of boxes. The guest room and what will eventually be Simon’s room also have more than their fair share of crap in them. But my office is the one that’s making me crazy, because I have no place in this house that’s mine. The pens, paper, and scissors? They have to be stored up and out of reach in the kitchen, or else they disappear. I have nowhere to put my computer, so I’m still camped here at the end of the kitchen island, annoying both me and Darin. And the extras connected to my computer, like the Palm dock and the iPod dock? Fuhgeddabouddit.

We have no pictures up and we still have boxes everywhere. We have a 2800-sq.ft. house and we’re crowded into about half of it.

And some people we know are having their housewarming today. They moved in three or four weeks ago. True, they only moved about ten miles.

We’ll probably have our housewarming right around Simon’s second birthday. He’s only 17 months now. Is that enough time to finish getting this place in shape, do you think?

Another reason to love SF

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There are so many reasons to love this area, but a local magazine giving the Voight-Kampff Test from Philip K. Dick’s Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep?—you know, the replicant/human test from Blade Runner—to San Francisco’s mayoral candidates has got to rank in the top five.

SUBJECT 1: ANGELA ALIOTO

The Wave: Reaction time is a factor in this, so please pay attention. Now, answer as quickly as you can.

It’s your birthday. Someone gives you a calfskin wallet. How do you react?
Angela Alioto: I’d accept it.

TW: You’ve got a little boy. He shows you his butterfly collection plus the killing jar. What do you do?
AA: I’d look at it. What do you mean what would I do? As opposed to saying ‘how horrible?’ I would tell him how beautiful it is.

TW: You’re watching television. Suddenly you realize there’s a wasp crawling on your arm.
AA: I’d knock it off. It’s something I’m used to doing in politics [Laughs].

TW: You’re in a desert walking along in the sand when all of the sudden you look down, and you see a tortoise, Angela, it’s crawling toward you. You reach down, you flip the tortoise over on its back, Angela. The tortoise lays on its back, its belly baking in the hot sun, beating its legs trying to turn itself over, but it can’t, not without your help. But youæ± e not helping. Why is that, Angela?
AA: That would never happen. I wouldn’t turn it over in the first place, and the thing with it being in pain is out of the question. Let me ask you, John, how does this fit in to the bigger picture when you ask me about the dying tortoise and the dead butterflies?

TW: They’re just questions, Angela. In answer to your query, they’re written down for me. It’s a test, designed to provoke an emotional response. Shall we continue? Describe in single words, only the good things that come into your mind. About your mother.
AA: My mother? She’s beautiful. She’s an artist. She’s a renaissance artist.

CONCLUSION: Her defensiveness over her lack of empathy for the butterfly is telling, as is the comparison of a political rival to a wasp that should be knocked off. I think we can safely say that Angela Alioto is indeed a replicant, albeit one that “loves” the implanted memory of her mother. Keep an eye on her.

(Via Alas, A Blog)

Stork margarine?

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I was reading this entry in the Taking Children Seriously blog when I ran across the phrase “one block stork margarine.”

What is “stork margarine”?

Update 7/31/05: Annnnnnnnd…we’re done. I don’t know why this is the favorite target entry of morons who want to post stupid things, but no one else gets to post now either!