From the Archives

I sent this in with the payment for a speeding ticket way back in the year 2000. (Which still sounds like the future.) I just found it while going through my computer looking for something else:

August 6, 2000

Circuit Court
807 Main Street, Room 104
Oregon City, OR 97045

Your Honor,

I was going way too fast,
When the officer I passed.
Flashing lights, I had to stop,
For the speed enforcing cop.

Now the money that I owe,
I send to you so I can show
Up at work and earn some more,
To spend at school (the learning store).

This starving student sure could use
Money for books, tuition, and shoes.
I know the fault’s completely mine,
And so enclosed is One-Oh-Nine.

But if in your heart perchance you see,
A snippet there of leniency,
To reduce the fine I pay,
Would make this one a happy day.

I am sorry for my speed,
Excessive, yes, I see the need,
To keep streets safe from speeds like mine,
Repentant me, pays you the fine.

Sincerely,


Michael Kadel
Summons #37281

Pests II

I too just had a moth in my house. It was fluttering up against our rear security door because it:
a) Wanted to get outside and
b) Wasn't smart enough to fly out the more than adequate space between the door and the and the top of the door frame.

Midge was very interested, but because she boarders on being morbidly obese, she's not much of a jumper. She'd look up at the moth and half-heartedly knock on the door with her paw, I suppose in hopes that the paw-force of a cat her size would create a vibration adequate to send the moth tumbling to its death in her mouth.

I felt a little sorry for her so I nudged the moth with my finger, but I guess I inadvertently nudged the pixie dust off its wings because it fell off the door and started to walk around on the floor.

Midge has grown accustomed to food being provided for her, so she didn't really know what to do with a moth at mouth level. She'd look at it, then poke it with her paw to make it walk a little, then stare at it again until it quit moving. Then poke. Then stare. She was very gentle.

Midge was entirely satisfied with this arrangement until Clayton came in, spotted the moth, pounced, then ate it. Midge looked a little disappointed as Clayton crunched away at it, like maybe she'd lost a friend.

Since then she's been sleeping a lot. She's either depressed, or she's a cat. I'm thinking it's probably the cat thing.

Vroom, Vroom!

This evening Flannery and I went to a warehouse in West Oakland where a oddly majestic cardboard track made several loops through the air and passed through a cardboard mountain. Watching over the track was the front of a cardboard ship with a cardboard lady on the front. Those scared of spiders may not have enjoyed the giant cardboard arachnid, but everyone would have like to see the tiny cardboard people living in the intricate cardboard mountainside dwellings.

The point of all this papery goodness was to divide ourselves into teams and drive cardboard covered, radio controlled cars around the track. There were four different paths to take, and you had to follow each path to completion to win. My car, The Olde Broad, only made it around a disappointing three times, two of which were on the same path, and one of which was made possible by the helping hands of the crowd after the motor crapped out. My team (Flannery, Lori (a guy from Scotland), Robin (a girl from Montclair)) and I came in third.

Oakland is strange and entertaining and I have the pictures to prove it.

We've Arrived?

Had anyone noticed that we are living the future? In the same week I've heard about:
- Hybrid cars being attached to houses to contribute to power production.
- The Astronauts returning from hanging out in the space station.
- A teenager building a fusion reactor in his parent's basement.

And after drilling some holes in a shelf in my living room I had my robot vacuum it up.

Somehow I thought it would be more exciting.