i've got to share this one, 'cause they're just so cute.



this post actually concerns the oldest of the three. he's a blogger himself, and an online boggler, so I'm very proud of him, but he's also found a game called runescape (I call it cockroaches on astroturf) which is a current obsession. recently a character lured his character into the woods where they set upon him and killed him temporarily, all for a couple of arrows and a little gold bullion change. i was a little disturbed at this story, but it happens all the time, i guess. i need to get a little thicker skin. such is life, bringing up boys in the modern world. the others have their own passions too...a pretty intense crowd. not to mention the eighteen-year-old, on the edge of freedom and adulthood. the abyss. my heart goes out to you...but "not too close to the edge!" as my mother once said, at the rim of the grand canyon. more later.

on weblogging

i've become militant about my swimming, refusing to let anyone schedule noon meetings for any reason, and it's very related to weblogging in the following way. in the same way swimming works for me - it puts oxygen into my back and shoulder muscles, and releases stress in the places where i store it - weblogging does the same thing for my professional life. if you get the appropriate muscles moving, the flow of stress through you is not a bad thing. if on the other hand i continue storing stress in my shoulders, but only exercising my legs...well, then, i'm not a happy camper.

the output on the esl front has resulted in what i'm calling the january blizzard, mostly because it just keeps coming, at the expense of other things in my life. i've developed all these theories over time, and over careful observation in the process of teaching, yet i've never organized them coherently (and still haven't). write first, organize later. but swim every day...

just for old times' sake. i used to throw these in, but they've been rearranged a little.
i'll organize, i promise...

my friend dave made a link poem...but so far isn't going in with me on the poetry contest, which has been dormant for, oh, about 7 months. link poetry is an idea whose time has come...to something.

these days i spend my late nights playing boggle (works best on safari) with various family members: boofer (my brother), my daughter J-Funk (if she's on), my 13-year-old son (goes as "eagliths.blogspot" or "J-Funk ROCKS") and possibly his brother, and scores of other people whom I admire, who make up their own names, including laia, oniondip, mispeled, team axolotl, blue suede schubert, vowelmovement, annecentral, and the almost unbeatable bush - kozyol (whoever that could be). Some are teams, undoubtedly; sometimes we are a team, if we're in the same house. you have shouters and typers. alone, i go by "trolling for mcgurks" or some such, at least until i find them. it's a gas. try it!

if i did not wish you a happy new year, come celebrate with people from all over...it's amazing how people do stuff like this. thanks to jessie yeh for the link.

and then, come to the times square of the web itself!

-on the local fame issue, the article actually appeared on the web for a few hours, then disappeared again. ???? ...then, my friend dave, a gentleman and a blogger, showed me link poetry that predates mine. hope he hangs on to that link! i've become a "practitioner" and "historian", as opposed to an "inventor." such was my ten minutes of fame!

southern illinois friends may have noticed a large article in the local newspaper, the the southern illinoisan. it was well-written, for the most part, and i want to thank marleen shepherd for the publicity and make a few points.

first, it's time to retract the assertion that i "invented" link poetry. these are actually my own words, and i have been using them for years on poetry site, but the person who invented hypertext is really the person who "invented" it. i am merely its first active practitioner, and even as far as that is concerned, i can hardly believe, even today, that no one else is into it or has really developed it. my wife is the one who pointed out how pompous that expression made me sound, and i didn't really mean it that way...in fact, i wouldn't mind if someone came along and proved me wrong.

second, the article mentioned and listed seven blogs that i have and run; i gave marleen only seven url's but there are actually more...one is entirely a list of people's weblogs; another is for web design and is serving as a repository for links at the moment. there are dozens more at work, and a few left over from the days when i was trying out other servers (i'm still basically very loyal to blogger...

finally i'd like to point out that both poetry showcases are unfinished products; and, as has been stated in this space before, an accident at work has left many of the picture slots, throughout the web and the weblogs, empty. rebuilding has been slow and has taken a bit of time from the other stuff. much of it is, in fact, an unfinished product. such is life on the web...an ongoing thing.

back from a break...a clean break from everything except the house & family. no work, no blogging, no thinking about the accident that messed up the web or the assault on linguistics.

well there's always the commercialization of christmas, etc...which i hear folks complain about. i've just tried to concentrate on doing the good stuff: lighting the way (illuminaria), cookies, lots of games & puzzles (this year: online boggle and sudoku), homemade cards and new year letter, lots of movies & popcorn. global warming has made it possible to spend almost the entire dec.-jan. raking & weeding, which is very restful to the soul. oh to be able to do the same thing to my web, or my file cabinets.

some other developments: both my band and my son's band are heading into the studio; a younger son has become an avid blogger; the local newspaper has found us and is writing about blogging (take a look tomorrow-TH- or FR), and, my play is muddling along, could go quicker, but I'm enjoying the break. more later...