Don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind’s blowin’.
Terrible news out of a neighborhood near ours:
Fire coursed through the shops of the historic Eastern Market on Capitol Hill early Monday morning, gutting the southern half of the 134-year-old landmark.
Those of you whom have visited us have been to the market, but if you don’t recall what it looked like, we have some photos from our friend Travis’ visit to DC in 2005.
The other day I came home from work to see that we finally had some nice vegetation in our yard.
Here’s a cute picture of Stewart sleeping too.
If you ever get water in your ear…make sure to get it out. I’ve now had my ears plugged for two days and it’s pretty annoying. So with constant ringing/plugged ears, I’m going to work everyday…
Speaking of work is crazy lately, I left at 8:45 tonight. Tomorrow won’t be quite as bad, but I’ve got a lot to learn with the two jobs. It’s been fun so far, but the sheer amount of work is mind numbing.
Things should die down, so no need to worry, but I wanted y’all to know why things are dead around here…
I’m always trying to let people into the world of music that I enjoy and that’s what I hope to do with this post.
Click the audio player button below to hear the song “Heretics” by the delightful Andrew Bird. And click into this post to watch a video of Andrew playing his song, “Plasticities” on the David Letterman show.
Andrew Bird is an incredibly talented singer-songwriter from Chicago. He’s been around for a long time, but has receiving more and more recognition for his talents lately. In the video below, Andrew’s friend Martin Dosh is playing drums. Dosh has recently become another favorite musician of mine as well. Enjoy!
No matter how corrupt, greedy, and heartless our government, our corporations, our media, and our religious and charitable institutions may become, the music will still be wonderful. If I should ever die, God forbid, let this be my epitaph:
THE ONLY PROOF HE NEEDED FOR THE EXISTENCE OF GOD WAS MUSIC
~ Kurt Vonnegut (1922-2007)
Well, things may be quiet around here for awhile. I found out today that I got a pretty big promotion at work. Our current Director of Operations is leaving our office and she recommended me for the job. The boss accepted her proposal and I start Monday as the new Director of Operations for our office. I’m really looking forward to the new challenges that this will bring, but things are going to really hectic while I work with her to learn her job. In addition, I’m keeping a lot of the responsibilities that are associated with my current position, which will add to the madness The plan is to transition some of my more menial tasks to someone else in the near future, but we have some overlap right now, so I think I’ll be able to do both just fine.
Here’s to new beginnings!
I had a pretty decent trip to Nodak. Although, I came down with a cold the first day I was there and that made the rest of the trip pretty miserable. I’m not sure if I caught the bug in ND, or here, but I am quite sure that my room being located directly above the smoking section of the hotel the first two nights directly contributed to my feeling really terrible by Wednesday.
Nonetheless, I managed to see some friends and family, and that’s always great.
I also managed to catch some cool shots from my 13th floor corner room in Fargo:
I finally had a bit of time tonight to work on this site and was able to implement a new feature, which I hope to use more often: it’s a slick little audio player, which you can see below.
I’ve chosen a three minute section of one of my favorites songs, “Milano” by the Icelandic band, Sigur Ros. Sigur Ros have been playing “Milano” for the past several years, and it was finally released on their 2005 album Takk. I encourage you to take three minutes and listen to the song below, it’s a gem. Enjoy!
Rosser Street under April Snowfall
I’ve mostly avoided the topic of how soldiers are being treated during this war, but this piece in the Nation is pretty upsetting.
The article details the story of Specialist Jon Town and his experience of getting hit by a rocket in rocket and then being honorably discharged under Regulation 5-13, relieving the US Government of all responsibilities of caring for Specialist Town and providing him with benefits. 5-13 is a classification for Army discharge that stipulates a soldier is suffering from a personality disorder, one that was present before service. What’s particularly telling about the discharges however, is that all soldiers are screened before entering the service.
Specialist Town was standing in a door way that was hit by a rocket, which knocked Spc. Town unconscious. He is now suffering from pretty severe short-term memory loss, has problems controlling his anger, and lost a considerable portion of his hearing. However, the Army discharged him under 5-13 and is not caring for him.
Aside from the larger picture of the article, I find it particularly upsetting that the Army doctors don’t think it’s a good idea to speak to family members about the problems soldiers exhibit after a traumatizing incident, before they diagnose them as having pre-existing personality disorders.
(Army doctor) Knorr admits that in most cases, before making a diagnosis, his doctors only interview the soldier. But he adds that interviewing family members, untrained to recognize signs of personality disorder, would be of limited value.
However, Keith Armstorng, who has been counseling veterans for 25 years at the University of California, disagrees:
Armstrong takes a very different approach. He says family is a “crucial part” of the diagnosis and treatment of soldiers returning from war.
It seems to me that family would be a very important piece of the puzzle in diagnosing a soldier’s illness, especially if that particular doctor has never met a person before.
Combine this with the pathetic situation at Walter Reed Medical Center and it seems pretty clear that those in the Administration whom claim to “support the troops” are just pandering to people not paying attention. But that shouldn’t surprise anyone…
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