So much to do...

[silveradept]

...amazing how time flies. The beginning of the year seemed a short while ago, (well, relatively), and yet, here we are in the middle of it.

Today was a productive computer-type day. With much help from rimspace, aoanla, and the Kubuntu IRC help channel, I fixed a problem I had with my microphone not recording and... got my printer to work in the new distribution. Just took a complete uninstall-reinstall. We're very happy about this. Also, book money arrived today - just in time for the birthday. Well, book/PLAY! ticket money.

Also, went to the Zen Buddhist Temple in town today. Very relaxing to just sit for a bit, although my mind probably wandered more than it should have. The talk afterward was also good to listen to, and there was tea. I think I'll try and go back again next week.

Have some stuff to do tomorrow morning before I go to work. Work'll be fun, though - get to help the kids play Pokemon and Nintendogs and such. I think it'll be great.

Pennsylvania does not pass marriage amendment - but that's because they recessed before the differences were hammered out of the various bills. Not because they rejected the idea outright. How many legislatures are there that have actually voted down any "marriage protection" amendments that came their way?

bladespark linked a "body image" quiz, which always bring up some interesting material. This is bladespark's entry on the body image quiz, and the comments that show up are worth reading. The quiz itself may not be worth the electrons it uses, but the discussion it generates is great. There's already a full-tilt analysis of the questions used and their flaws in there. Body-image seems to be something that everyone deals with in one way or another. Too thin, too fat, too wiry, too bulky, too tall, too short, too everything. So finding the people who love you for the way you are is a big thing these days, especially with television and media saying that nobody is loved the way they are unless they're famous and anorexic/six-pack't. Besides, I can look in the mirror, frown at what looks back and me, shrug and say, "Oh, well. Someone else might see this as handsome/cute, but I don't." That's not bad body image, that's just not seeing the ideal image that you want to. It hasn't magically changed for wanting something a little different, and there are still people who say that what I've got now is cute. I dunno - I guess I don't care enough about it to change it - which probably means that my body image is "good", because I'm not obsessive about it.

Anyway, something more... light-hearted?



You scored as Fantasy Goth. You are a Fantasy Goth. You may or may not actually be a goth, but "normal" folks see you as one of those weird kids, and you are probably considered a geek by quite a few.

</td>

Fantasy Goth		71%
Understanding Outsider		63%
Anything-Goes Goth		63%
Romantic Goth		42%
Ethereal Goth		42%
Cyber-goth		42%
Industrial/Rivet-Head		38%
Perky Goff		29%
Old-school Goth		29%
Confused Outsider		29%
Death Rocker		13%

What subcategory of Goth best fits you?
created with QuizFarm.com</table>

Comments

[sharpsight.livejournal.com]

N) (...must resist urge to get embroiled in complicated discussion of self-referential 'should's...)

*imagines: 'Argh! I shouldn't have let my mind wander: at this rate, I'll never learn that there is no 'should[n't] have'!' (Actually, there might be a 'shouldn't have' but not a 'should have'... unfortunately, I have no idea what I'm talking about. Oh well.)*

*second imagination: 'Argh! That person should have been paying attention, that way we'd have been able to teach him that there is no 'should have'!*

...these scenes are probably only amusing to me because I don't understand the subject well enough, but... ah, well. *for the moment at least, finds them amusing*

[woodburner.livejournal.com]

Huh? I'm not sure I follow... What I was trying to say was, the purpose of meditation is not to keep the mind from wandering - it's to gently bring it back to attention once you've noticed it's wandered. The mind will wander, that is what the mind does. It's impossible to keep it from doing that. "My mind shouldn't have wandered so much" doesn't make sense, because it's only the mind's nature to go wandering off on tangents.

The Zen point of view is that there is no should or shouldn't have in meditation, or, for that matter, in life - what happens happens.

[sharpsight.livejournal.com]

N) *nods slightly* Understood (sort of): it's just the self-affecting/-referential nature of the concept of the mind's wandering preventing it from learning that its wandering thus doesn't matter that amused me. (I'm strange like that... I like concepts about self-affecting things, such as an LED (or small filament lamp, but LED less controversial example) in a sealed box that keeps itself on only because of the light--from it--received by an LDR in the same box. (It needs something to start the whole thing, of course, but... past that point, the idea is very pleasant. *smiles*))