Life – Page 5 – King Rat

Rule of Three

I have a rule of thumb. I’ll try three times to make plans with someone else without a definite response. After that, it’s up to them whether or not to do something. For instance, when asking someone out if I get three non-committal maybes, I won’t bother to ask the person out again. If they were secretly hoping for a relationship but were following some set of advice that says to play hard to get, it didn’t work. Or if they are just too busy to carve out an hour to hang out, I’ll know their time management would annoy the hell outta me if we were to date. This rule of thumb applies to making friends, business relationships, etc.

Any kind of definite response triggers the end of the rule. A no is obviously a no and I’m not going to pursue it. If the answer is yes, obviously the rule no longer applies. If the answer is something along the lines of I can’t do X, but how about Y that also counts as a definite answer.

It’s important to remember this is a rule of thumb, not something I apply rigidly. It depends on the person and the level of relationship I already have with them. But as a rule of thumb it keeps me from wasting my time.

Sometimes people just have to say maybe or cannot commit to a plan. But after three times it tells me they have a fundamental problem (perhaps justified) with being up front. It’s pretty demoralizing to keep chasing something while being strung along. I refuse to be strung along.

2012 Democratic precinct caucuses

Washington Democrats logo

Last Sunday I participated in the Democratic caucuses. I also participated in 2008, but that was a very different experience. In 2008, I lived in Ferndale for 5 days of the week, and was here on weekends. It was in the midst of the primary between Obama and Clinton, so TOPPS school was packed to overflowing with people there to participate. I had to be back in Whatcom county the day of the caucus, so I couldn’t stay for the whole thing. I stayed long enough to register my preference for Clinton, but couldn’t stay longer.

This year, with only Obama on the ballot, participating was quite a bit lower. My precinct caucus was in the Montlake Community Center. Precinct 43-2001 had only three participants. Me and two women who had never participated in a caucus before. One had been working in France for a decade and had to vote absentee. The other was an Obama campaign volunteer whose parents were American and German, and she’d been living in Germany as a young girl during World War II.

They asked me to be precinct caucus chair, since this is my third caucus. So we all voted for Obama, and then had to select delegates to the county convention and the District 43 caucus. Due to votes in previous elections, 43-2001 had 7 delegates allocated to it. The other two participants could only attend the District 43 caucus. nevertheless, we voted all three of us as delegates.

We also got to propose resolutions that eventually could be made part of the Democratic platform. Those are not debated or voted on at the precinct caucus level. Every resolution proposed is forwarded to the county convention. I assume the organizers combine similar resolutions to avoid duplication at that level. The older woman had seen a resolution on auditing the Department of Defense, but had forgotten to bring it and couldn’t remember the lengthy wording (or any detail at all). So I proposed a short broadly worded resolution for her in the hopes that someone in another caucus was proposing the resolution the woman wanted, and the organizers would combine them. There was a global warming resolution being passed around, and we put it on our list too. I added a resolution that the Democratic party support marriage equality and the referendum on marriage equality that will likely be on the ballot this November.

The district caucuses and the King County Convention are next weekend at 10 a.m. (one event each day). At the point, I’m planning on attending both, if I can find out where they are. The locations were undetermined as of the caucuses last weekend.

Two loops of … well, not raisins

I am still walking around Green Lake 4 or 5 times a week. Today I was feeling a little depressed over stuff, and halfway around I decided I was going to go for a second loop. Work off some of the mood possibly. I worried though that I might go into zombie non-thinking mode and head over to the car after one loop, forgetting the second loop. I do that a lot when I’m pre-occupied. Sunday I meant to swing by U.W. Bookstore and pick up Sly Mongoose from the science fiction section, but forgot despite thinking about it when I got in my car. Today though, I went into zombie mode and actually kept walking around. My preoccupation actually got me to do what I wanted to do. Got 5.6 miles of a very brisk walk in.

I do need to figure out how to keep the little rocks out of my shoes though. At a swift walking pace, my shoes pick them up just enough to fling one or two of them inside a shoe about 4 times in a loop. So I have to stop, remove my shoe, and shake it out. Multiple times. I wonder if spats would work. That has the added bonus that I would be the dorkiest guy at the park.

Sounders vs. Seattle Pacific University (exhibition)

In addition to buying season tickets for the Sounders Men, this year I bought a season ticket for the Sounders Women. After they signed a bunch of women’s national team players, I figured it might be the only chance I get to see such great players regularly. The team is an amateur team, so it can’t normally get top flight players. But with the demise of the W.P.S., they want to play somewhere and apparently it’s for soccer-crazy Seattle. If WPS revives, we might not get a team simply because of travel costs.

Anyway, last night was the first match of the season. It was an exhibition against Seattle Pacific University. Seattle Pacific is out of season, so they didn’t have a lot of their players. Basically, we all expected a rout, and that’s pretty much what we got. SPU’s second half keeper was pretty good, and they had a forward whose play I liked as well. I didn’t catch either of their names. It was a chance for all of them to say they’d played against Hope Solo, Sydney Leroux, Alex Morgan, etc.

I noticed two big differences between the teams. First, the Sounders were much faster. They could run rings around SPU. And did a couple of times. Second, SPU players were really indecisive. When a ball dropped somewhere, Sounders immediately moved. Some moved toward the ball to pick it up or challenge for it. Others immediately moved for the pass. Even though they haven’t played together much, their experience tells them what their role should be. Their execution wasn’t always crisp, but they knew what to do. SPU players took a half second to decide, and they frequently appeared to change their minds two steps after starting.

Final score was 5 to 0. Hope Solo had maybe one save, and she spent a fair amount of time wandering around the midfield. If SPU had the skill, they could have easily scored on her with one well placed kick from midfield. But the Sounders dominated so much that wasn’t going to happen. Things will be different when they start played the regular season. But first another couple of exhibitions, one on Friday.

Dropping weight

I haven’t walked around Green Lake every day, but I’ve managed to do so most days since I realized a couple weeks ago that my weight was climbing toward 200. Between the walks and an emphasis on eating at home, I’m down to about 186 lbs. Eight pounds lost in two weeks ain’t bad.

Where stuff will get difficult is when I hit 180. I’ve dropped to that amount a number of times in the last 10 years, but always start having trouble from then on. Ideally, I’d like my weight in the 170 to 175 range, and it’s been a while since I’ve been there.

Weight and exercise

I weighed myself Friday. It looks like I’ve gained a bit, as I am around 195 lbs. (my scale is not particularly accurate or exact). Which means I need to pay attention to my diet (stop eating out so much, cook at home!) and get more exercise.

Today I did not do the former, but I did get some exercise. After a late brunch, I headed up to Greenlake and walked one go-around. I finally started the audiobook of Charlaine Harris’ Living Dead In Dallas, which I had purchased in February while on my road trip but hadn’t gotten to. I will probably do another circuit tomorrow as well.

At some point, I need to make use of my 24 Hour Fitness membership.

Out three times

This last week I went out three times. I’m usually more of a homebody than that.

Tuesday night Faderhead played a show at Chop Suey. I got there fairly early thinking all the Goth kids would be out, and I wanted to get a spot. Turns out that it wasn’t that crowded. Opening band was Pixel Pussy. Not bad music. Awful stage patter. Dude had black and white makeup to look sorta like cat whiskers, and kept on making cat rowr noises while exhorting people to come closer because he doesn’t bite. Second band was Graverzeit out of Spokane. I wasn’t impressed at all. His outfit and schtick just screamed, look at me cause I’m trying so hard! Then Faderhead came on. The guy has charisma. His look reminds me of Steve Saunders with a mohawk. I danced most of his set, except for the couple of ballads he played. It’s hard to pull off an industrial ballad.

Thursday night I drove over to Ballard for a board game night that has met at various coffee shops in the neighborhood. They just moved to Ballard Coffee Works, which is officially opening today in the old Tully’s space on the corner of Market and 22nd. I liked the coffee shop, though I hope they get more comfy chairs and something to mute the noise level a little. The gaming group had a couple dozen participants, and at least 4 tables worth of games constantly going. My cousin Sarah enticed me to go by telling me that there were single women there, one of whom she though I should meet. I played a game of Taboo matching girls against boys that we abandoned after 45 minutes or so. The women were kicking our asses something like 30 to 8. We were not going to catch up. Second game was Cloud 9, which had okay game play but I didn’t find it too particularly compelling. As it was I came in third, 26 points behind the winner. I stayed for another 30 minutes and kibbitzed on a couple other games in progress, but decided to bail after that. I get antsy bouncing around from thing to thing, so I can only usually do a couple of activities.

Last night I went to the Sounders match against Houston with Kim. I don’t think of Kim as much of a sports person, but she seemed to dig the experience. That match was fun. The Sounders played decently though not as well as Houston. The home team attempted a lot of combinations and passes that just didn’t quite work. I’m glad they were trying them though, as that’s my preferred style of play. They ended up winning based on some luck and hard work rather than skill.

After the match I went over to the Central Saloon. Two of the guys who occupy the row behind me at the stadium are in Dapper Jones which was playing there. They had invited me to stop in and see. There were four bands playing, and the first three each ran over. The third band started late, took really long to set up, and played an 80s style hard rock which didn’t seem to go over well. By the time they finished, the Central was nearly empty. Dapper Jones was setting up in the aisle so they could walk their stuff up and get going as quickly as possible. It turns out I liked them a lot. They reminded me a little of R.E.M. or Cheap Trick, but faster. And then they did a cover of Cheap Trick’s Surrender which kinda solidified that impression. They told me a bunch of times I didn’t need to feel obligated to stay for their set, but I’m glad I did.

Death and taxes

I know I’ve mentioned this before, but it bears repeating, if only because I like hearing myself talk.

I hate taxes. Not paying them. I’m fine with paying my taxes. What I hate is the recordkeeping. I am a crappy record keeper. Or rather, I’m a great record keeper, but a lousy record organizer. I always have something more entertaining to do, so I tell myself I’ll deal with some set of papers at the end of the week. But I don’t. So they all go into a box. And then the box fills up. And then I need to assemble all the tax stuff from the stuff previously filed when I did it and picking out the stuff I need from the box. Then I have to track down stuff I think I need, but I don’t have immediately at hand in my box of papers. This usually entails calling brokerages who ask me a security question I can’t remember because I only call them once a year and they set up the security question on that phone call two years ago. Or having to figure out whether my brother or my father has the record I need, and then making the trip to Everett to get it.

I should explain that last sentence. I’m not only doing my taxes, which are fairly easy. I’m also doing the taxes for my father, a trust set up for his benefit, and my mother’s estate. Hopefully this is the last year for the estate. The money has been distributed, but the paperwork ain’t done. Last year I also had taxes for my grandparents and my grandparents’ estate as well as the previous four entities.

Actually doing the taxes won’t be tough. I’ll take all this paperwork and dump it off on an accountant. (Except for my personal taxes, which I can handle on my own.)

But getting all this together is both frustrating and mentally tough. I get a sense of dark ominous dread when trying to sort through all of it, which makes it even tougher to do, so it gets put off. That makes the dread worse, and the spiral intensifies.

I’ll get it all done. I always manage to break through. (Or I don’t, and I will pay a penalty that isn’t threatening to life or limb…)

One thing that occurs to me as I write this was how much easier mentally doing my grandparents’ estate and taxes was. In that case, I had a lawyer who laid everything out and essentially acted as a project manager. I’m a pretty good project manager, but not for myself.

On the plus side, this should be the last year I need to do any taxes for my mom’s estate. And the records for my father’s and his trust’s taxes should be simpler, because all the accounts are now consolidated in just a couple of places. One of which is my personal broker, with whom I have a great relationship. If I can’t find something for my dad’s trust, I know I’ll be able to get it from him with a minimum of fuss.

Sounders at Santos Laguna

Wednesday night, in addition to being the second leg of the Sounders/Santos Laguna C.O.N.C.A.C.A.F. series, is also Taco Wednesday at the Roanoke Inn. $1 tacos and $3.50 taco salads, they’ll put the Sounders match on, and I usually have half a dozen friends who go there for tacos and alcohol. Since the Sounders match started at 5, I got there early.

First half wasn’t the best, but we kept up with Santos. I saw some troubling signs though. Second half we fell apart. Four unanswered goals by Santos. After Santos went up 4 to 1, I started paying more attention to my friends than to the match.

In the post-game comments, Sigi Schmid talked about not winning the 50/50 balls. Those are the long kicks and headers that are directed in the general direction of a few players, hopefully playing in the opponent’s half, that the team hopes someone from our team can come down with. For some reason that I don’t know, Sigi’s Sounders have played that style of football for years. If your team has a size advantage, it’s not the worst strategy. In M.L.S. we generally won’t have much of a size advantage. Mexican teams tend to play smaller players who utilize speed rather than size. However, we still lost a lot of those 50/50 balls.

Rather than pin the blame on the players who just didn’t do a great job of it, I think Sigi really needs to reconsider the strategy. A) You need a size advantage. B) Those balls are harder to control than other methods of advancing the ball. c) The ball winner needs a person to dump the ball off too who is in the right place. You see the Sounders employ this strategy even on throw-ins. Last season whenever James Riley or Leo Gonzalez would take a ball from out of bounds, inevitably they waited 5 to 10 seconds , few players would move, and then they would throw down the field into a mess of players. I’d much rather we used methods that emphasize possession.

I don’t have a problem with our offense. We had a number of chances where Sanchez improbably saved a goal. It’s getting the ball down the field that was killing us. That and some really lackadaisical defending. I don’t know where our defenders were. Travel killed them? The heat? I don’t know the altitude where Santos plays, but perhaps that? Thoroughly outplayed on defense.

To sum up: 6-1 in the match, 7-3 in the series.

Ouch.

Last of the cassettes

I got rid of most of my cassettes 18 years ago, but kept a few. I got rid of my stereo 5 years ago. I am now going through the leftover tapes still on my shelf. Why did I keep these?

Baltimora – Living in the Background. Ok, this one made sense to keep. It was hard to find for a while.
Phil Collins – …But Seriously. But seriously, I don’t remember any of the songs on this tape.
Dire Straits – Brothers In Arms. Great album. Coulda replaced it with a CD or MP3 long ago.
Icehouse – Icehouse, Man of Colours and Measure for Measure.
The Polce – Every Breath You Take – The Singles. I kept a greatest hits tape on cassette? What was I thinking?
Two Hooters concert bootlegs. My favorite band ever. I need to find a way to transfer these to MP3.
Tom Petty – Full Moon Fever.
U2 – The Joshua Tree. I used to listen to this tape over and over and over. I think my musical tastes have changed.
Aerosmith – Big Ones. Someone left this at my house and I didn’t want to give it away in case they came back for it. In like 1991.
Two tapes labeled Matt Bender. I don’t remember what these are, if they are tapes of my brother speaking, mix tapes he made for me, or possibly recordings of his memorial service.
5 tapes of people telling their stories at a sober conference in Breckenridge that I went to in 1993 and 1994. Will call the Seattle office and see if they would like these. Otherwise, I have no need to keep them anymore.
A tape of Abbott and Costello routines. I’m pretty sure most of these (Who’s On First?) are on Youtube now.
Pump Up The Volume. Not the soundtrack. I recorded the audio from the movie.
Copies of albums made from CD: Was (Not Was), Lotus, and Don McLean. Not sure if I can find my Lotus CD anymore, but that will be hard to replace. The other two…

I swear I’m not a hoarder.