Not as unbearable now

I hate it when blogs that no one reads apologize for not posting on a regular basis, so I shall offer no apologies. I should say, though, that it was for a good reason. Long story short: 31st birthday, stolen traffic cones, next day kidnapped to Portland and made to endure all manner of sin, tail-between-legs train ride back to Seattle. That's the Reader's Digest version. It was good times.

Fortunately, my scurvey crew of friends and my lovely wife footed most of the bill for the trip, so all I had to supply was a steady stream of one-dollar bills for nefarious purposes. Use your imagination.

As an extra birthday gift, I got a part-time job with Flexcar as a sort of contract local marketing wallah. I preach the gospel of car sharing to the masses and they pay me for it. If you aren't familiar with Flexcar, check out the site (http://www.flexcar.com) and see if we're in your area. The only problem is it makes me feel fantastically guilty about still owning my POS '85 Mazda RX-7. Looks like it's time to put ol' Trigger down.

On a completely unrelated note, that mellow-toned Midwesterner Garrison Keillor sends me an e-mail everyday (because we're such great pals, not because I signed up for it) with a link to NPRs "Writer's Almanac" for the day. Today's reminded me it's Robert Lowell's birthday. Why should you care? Well, when I was a young buck of an English major, I thought poets had to have serious drug addictions and at least tried to kill their wives before they made their bones.

But Mr. Lowell showed me you could be from a good home and merely be bat-shit crazy to be a good poet. Happy birthday, Robert. Go read my favorite poem of his, For the Union Dead, and wish him a happy birthday.