Pork Pie Hat and a Coat of Polyurethane
Picked up on this little meme (I don't know why, but the thought of saying "meme" out loud gives me the creeps.) from pal magicfirefly. The explanation of this... thing is as follows:

1. Leave me a comment saying, "Interview me."
2. I will respond by asking you five questions. I get to pick the questions.
3. You will update your LJ with the answers to the questions.
4. You will include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the same post.
5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions.

In a moment of weakness, I requested an interview. So, without further crap...

Here are your questions, Subtropic:

1. When, in your childhood or youth, was the first time you felt there was more to this life than reason can explain?

Reason is highly underrated. My choice is to take science and reason over dogma and faith. Not saying I have all the answers, but you can't deny the biology: we're a bunch of violent, oversexed apes with an overpowered brain. Like a drunken teenager driving a Lamborghini with a .45 in the glove compartment, trouble is always just around the corner.

That's not to say I don't believe in spiritual experience, just that the ability to experience it is part of our internal neurology. We're internally wired for it.

2. Today when things catch your eye (details that catch your eye for any reason, or for no reason), note them and write what they are.

First day in a few weeks that we've had any rain to speak of. I went home during lunch and got to absorb some of it
- coolness of coming rain on the breeze
- lazy rolls of thunder back and forth above the clouds
- the sharpening smell of ozone freed from wet earth
- raindrops splintering into droplets on the hood of the car
- rain rippling and cascading down the windshield, onward to intermittentent wiper skirmishing.

3.Roald Dahl, in the epilogue to his book "Danny, the Champion of the World," said every child
deserves a sparkly parent. Is this true and how does a parent do it?

Of course it's true. Kids deserve at least one sparkly parent, preferably two. To be sparkly is simply to not be flat. Flat is the adults in the Peanuts/Snoopy shows, or Mr. Poe in the Lemony Snicket books. It's really not that hard to be sparkly. Kids provide all the spark, you just need to be able to reflect it back to them. It's all in your eyes - love. Note: in my experience, it's an absolute requirement that young boys be wrestled and tickled on a regular basis.

4.Do we overlook the asshole in all of us or do we confront each other?

To each according to the size of their own asshole. You're talking to Mr. Nonconfrontational here, so I tend to overlook more often than confront. Obviously, society would break down if overlooking were not an option, so it's a matter of picking your battles.

5.The French call it “la petite vie” - the little life - meaning getting the newspaper in the market square, talking to the butcher, seeing Mrs. Holroyd walk past with her trolley of black bananas and bread for the pigeons, coffee on the outdoor terrace: Is la petite vie dead or alive in your neighbourhood?

No quaint market squares, non-grocery store butchers or Eccentric Pigeon feeders in my neighborhood. The majority of the people I know wouldn't have time to notice them. I live in what's considered an older part of the county - the houses were built in the early 70's. Sense of place is definitely lacking here. Still, we do say hello to our neighbors, invite each other to parties, etc. And let me tell you, there's nothing like a natural disaster (Hurricane Andrew, for example) to develop a sense of community - quickly.


There you go then. Count on any questions I create being from way out in left field. (Spider?)