Vox Lucens

Today has been a very lousy day - one of those steady progressions from wanting to pull one’s hair out, to wanting to put one’s hand through a wall, to deciding killing two birds with one stone is better and just wanting to put one’s head through a wall. Though my office walls are yet undamaged, due to steady exercise of self-control and some well-timed water breaks, the emotional scars remain.

Long-time readers of this blog may recall this. I now offer the following update.

It all started yesterday - a day of promise and potential, for it was Download Day. And I downloaded, marveling at the 15,000 bug fixes in Firefox 3 and rejoicing at reports of its infinitesimal memory footprint. After downloading comes installing, and after installing comes that magical checkbox which says, “Launch Firefox 3.”

I attempted launch, and waited. I wasn’t happy with the error box that came up and told me Firefox had crashed. (One is given to wonder how something can “crash” before it even launches, but such semantics do not portray the depth of my present emotional grief.) But alas, at mid-afternoon yesterday I did not have time to fix it, so I simply tryed uninstalling and reinstalling and deleting and redownloading a few times, all with a remarkable lack of success.

This morning I foolishly assumed that I could use IE and survive. I was wrong. Even I, adamant Firefox fan though I am, had forgotten the depth of the slowness and horribleness of that terrible program. I had indeed forgotten that it destroys the formatting of things like the Weekly Reminder. In desperation I tried everything I could think of to fix Firefox’s fatal flaws–and failed. I edited program files. I read web help forums. I tried to find a place to re-download Firefox 2. I tried changing profiles and user info. I even found out what a “command line argument” is. Nothing worked.

So I did what any sane person would do: I downloaded Opera. It is quantum leaps faster and more secure than IE, I will give it that. It has some helpful features. But Firefox it is not, and in spite of my best efforts to make it all work, Opera simply does not cut it. It lacks features I rely on.

So at this point I know not what to do. My laptop got me through today, but I still have no Firefox at work. In my depth of futile anguish, iambic pentameter is my only solace…

Of IE I tried just a bit,
To see if its code just might fit,
But no, it did not.
My attempt just begot
The frustration that comes from the pit.

So Opera next garnered my gaze,
An improvement, it seems, anyways.
But features it lacked,
(And it’s background was blacked)
So short was this one browser’s phase.

I’m a one-browser man, it is true.
And yet, I know not what to do!
For the Firefox dream,
Has gone up in the steam,
Bringing tomorrow’s frustration anew.

Remember has been blessed with a hard-working summer intern, who has made some of my back-burner projects become reality. One of those is the creation of a YouTube account to show off Remember’s videos.

Check it out! (4 videos ready as I write; many more to come.)

Last night I headed north for a weekend in North Carolina with friends - “old” friends, and new friends. A friend from high school, her new husband, and a couple of more folks…and a weekend of hanging out, catching up, and relaxing. (Incidentally, it is the same friend whose wedding I was trying to get to when this happened.)

But all the catching up has gotten me thinking. I’m really very bad at keeping up with people, the people that God has brought into my life to bless and enrich it. I’ve moved a lot, leaving a trail of memories, but not always keeping up with the people that share those common memories.

I regret that, but I’m not quite sure how to fix it. The Internet is a great tool, and I’ve enjoyed my limited foray into social networking, and of course my attempt at blogging, as a tool to keep in some semblance of touch with friends both old and new. But even that limited foray is time consuming, and time is something that I simply don’t have a lot of.

Is anyone good at keeping in touch? How do you do it?

…And another begins.

http://members.calbar.ca.gov/search/member_detail.aspx?x=256289

Praise the Lord.

I was highly fascinated by the BBC’s coverage of American elections, as broadcast by PRI on my little Pacific island. But as I was sitting in the Detroit airport during a long layover yesterday, I found the most highly prescient statement of current American politics I’ve ever heard.

Problem is, despite the news blaring around me, I found it in the book I was reading - a history of Burma. On page 216 of the fascinating book “The River of Lost Footsteps,” the author actually thought he was talking about 1940s Burma!

…the political parties inhabited a strange middle space between responsible government and theater.

Much of our work being done, we had the chance to explore our little Pacific island today. It was exhausing…and worth it.

I took so many pictures that I needed a good way to narrow them down - and here it is. You get to come with us on the first portion of our day: a hike.

It started here.

Yay, we made it!

Except not.

Definitely not.

But we made it down, and the view was awesome.

Eventually we decided that we should head back towards our starting point on the following picture’s rocky promontory.

And this vertical trail made a complete wimp of me.

So I rested a lot. (Except it didn’t really look like this.)

And here are a few more shots I couldn’t resist but include.