I woke up before Bugglesworth this morning, and read Wittgenstein in peace for twenty minutes, first thing. It soothes the soul to have done a part of one's work before breakfast.

I'm told that Wittgenstein is either the most or one of the most important philosophers of the twentieth century. I'm not so sure what it means for a philosopher to be important, but I think he's important to me.

The Mystical Meaning of Cat Excrement

Today is Ash Wednesday, the day when, each year, I wade out unprepared into the shocking obligatory waters of tradition. This year is no different: I have given no thought to Lent, despite my act of foresight of last year, viz. having put a warning of the imminence of this year's Ash Wednesday on the calendar. I do want to do more this year than the bare minimum of barely fasting on the required days. But I also want to do out of some motive more pious than a spiritual agonism.

So what makes sense is for me to pray to be made pious this Lent.

In other news, today is going to be the day when I finally change the cat litter. Now I know that changing the cat litter is something you are supposed to do everyday (unless you don't have a cat), but for me it is not that easy. Changing the litter is a symbol of rising above the everyday squalor of life and taking charge of things for once, and maybe for good. Every time I change the cat litter, I think, maybe, Amos, maybe this is only the first in a long series of days in which I ply the clumpy gravel. Maybe I am pulling myself together this time.

Two People Overheard Agreeing On An Elevator

A: I don't care what the words are, if a song has a good beat, I like it.

B: Yes! It doesn't matter whether it's country or rap, or you're black or white, if the song has good words and a good beat, I like it.

I think they were agreeing that sometimes one thing's being the case does not prevent another thing's being the case.

Bad bad bad

Just when I thought today might be all right, I realized there were not one but two meetings I have to go to scheduled for this evening--one right before I go to work at 6PM and one right after I get back, which means I'm booked from 5PM to at least 8PM, covering the three hours during which Buggle is at his most terrorsome. No one around here is going to be happy about this.

Haste Makes Waste:The First in a Series of Political Allegories

I always think I can do a bunch of things at once because I've always been able to do it in video games. But the truth is that one thing at a time is hard enough for me and two things at once is just out of the question. Last night while clearing the table after a delicious dinner, I found myself standing in the kitchen with two Tupperware containers of chickpea salad stacked one on top of the other, all afire to seal the top
Tupperware and refrigerate both. Friday, who had her hands full with garbage, asked me to open the trash for her. I obliged without a thought for the precarious balance keeping the salad safely stacked. The consequence you have no doubt divined: I scored a clumsy but solid shot in the good old game of throwing Tupperware into the trash.

I think my wife might have been angry that I wasted her good cooking had I not explained to her that throwing away perfectly good leftovers is real good for the economy.

Questions About The Economy

Would Wall Street have any money if no one trusted faceless inhuman monsters (e.g. "banks") to invest their money? If Wall Street didn't have any money, would the rest of us have more of it? If we invested in ourselves (e.g. by acquiring and developing resources for production, by using extra income to buy time to develop our skills and learn to create value), would we be freer, more independent, more capable, more productive, and therefore wealthier? If we invested in endeavors we believed in, would the world look more like our dreams?

Bring on the Student Loans!

I knew the Department of Education had to be good for something.