I’m full on panicking that I won’t be able to finish the work I need to before leaving on vacation. AAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH I hate the feeling. It paralyzes me, which of course means I don’t get anything done.

I work in a secular world. I saw no ashes today during the work day, even though on the hospital intranet they were advertising free ashes for today only in the chapel. Finally, in the parking garage the man who always asks me about work and today showed me a keychain with a picture of his granddaughter (wearing one of them fancy-shmancy baby headbands that look like giant elastics) bore the smudge. There was a quick flash where I noticed it and almost told him he had something on his face.

Must work now. Must not animate.

I have to stop wasting my nights on foolishness, but here’s the latest silly M. animation:

(It’s pretty big, because I haven’t figured out how exactly to work with sound. Also, because I haven’t figured out the sound, there’s some fucking loading problem. Once it’s fully loaded, it loops and more or less syncs up. It was relooping the sound so there was a weird echo thing going on, but only on some players.)

CLICK!

Ash Wednesday has to be one of my favorite Catholic days, especially now when Catholicism is a distant cultural relic to me. (By the way, I thought it was one of theHoly Days of Obligation, but it’s not. Duh. It’s not even mandatory. But since there’s some story about a guy getting killed in a boar hunt after not going, you might want to think about it.)

When I was a kid, just about everyone was Catholic, but I don’t really remember people walking around with ashes all day. I think maybe we didn’t get them until an evening mass. I have a hard time imagining everyone in town getting up wicked early for mass.

Now, as an adult, even though I know exactly what’s up with the ashes, when I see a random ashen forehead, I feel like helping the person rub it off. You know, hand them a tissue with a little spit on it maybe.

Also on the Catholic front, I was just surprised by a commentator on the local 11 p.m. news saying something about Mardi Gras in New Orleans would be “winding down” tonight and the rest of the week, or something like that. What the fuck, winding down? What about ending? It’s suppose to stop, end, fini with the beginning of Lent tomorrow.

I was there at least a decade or so ago, and it was fucking amazing. At some point around dawn when it was clearly Ash Wednesday, everything shut the fuck down, the streets were cleared, and all partiers were to cease partying. There could be no stragglers.

OK, I confess, I have no fucking clue what time on Wednesday it all ended, since at some point prior to dawn the word “blackout” had a whole lot of shades of meaning. The drinking on Tuesday had begun in earnest at a 10 a.m. breakfast/brunch party. Some time during the late afternoon, I passed out at another party. My companions stapled a note to my dress with directions to the next party. After a quick little catnap to fight off toxic effects I roused myself, saw the note and met up with them on schedule. After a few more parties, meandering through the streets of the French Quarter and a few more parties gaining access to prime balcony real estate above the streets, there was nightclubbing to be done. Eventually, after smoking a little weed with Tyrone down from Baton Rouge to make a few business deals involving the product we just shared, who chivalrously poured me into a cab that I snuck out of on the other side, and just saying “no” to a threesome involving two, cute Aussie students, I did end up at my hotel at some unknown time. As did, Kevin, my partner in crime long ago lost in the madness and crowds.

Anyway, at some point on Wednesday, I remember going to the French Quarter. It was a relative ghost town. I could see my feet, impossible in the crowds the night before, and I could see a truly awesome amount of empty nitrous oxide canisters. You could shuffle your feet through them like leaves in autumn gathered in the gutter.

It was so done and the streets were so quiet, I practically felt pure and Lenten and clean.

Also on a religious note, I think it seems very American the hew and cry about the violence of Mel Gibson’s new flick. Um, the dude (Jesus not Mel) was whipped, stabbed with a spear, beaten a tad, forced to hike for a bit with a heavy load and left to die in the sun like a dog, if you believe the story. That couldn’t have been pretty. Across the world, in those messy, non-sanitized, little corners where Americans don’t typically hang out, realism is totally a part of the deal. Blood and gore are fucking holy. The whole story is about the blood. It ain’t symbolism if you have faith in that whole transubstantiation thing, it’s holy blood. Very hip and goth-like.

Check this out:

The people who made that wouldn’t be whining about icky gross violent death, and what about the kids? WHAT ABOUT THE CHILDRENS?

Americans are such pussies.

Happy Ash Wednesday (or serious and pious one any way) to anyone who feels the Lord

I should be sleeping, but instead there is this little Flash thing:

CLICK!

Even better is this version in Quicktime with sound track, special effects and whatnot. I guess there should be a version in which the music doesn’t end abrubtly, huh? (Unfortunately, something happened with the export and the blocks of paint from the original drawing. Gives the man a bit of a jigsaw look.)

One could say this is an early birthday offering. Or maybe I’m just filling a puzzling void. Puzzling because I have no idea what this fulfills:

CLICK!

Don’t know what I did in the joy of sitting around yesterday, but I seemed to have pulled something slightly above my left asscheek. Most of the time I’m OK, but if I shift a little, fucking ouch.

One thing that is cliched but absolutely true about getting older, sometimes you just wake up and it hurts.

Quick political observation: Nader is a complete tool. In 2000 there was a debate on as to whether he was giving a much needed wake up call to the system or a wrong-minded egomaniac. I think four years later, we have an answer. My conscience is clear, I voted for Gore.

On the single chick front, I guess the big news is that ““Sex and the City” c’est fini. Apart from the frightening moments in which I drew parallels to their fictional lives and my own actual one (clearly a bellwether of my impending psychotic breach), I will miss the show. Although, I never get so devoted to a show that I see all the episodes in chronological order, so it won’t really matter to my repeat habit.

A friend of mine, currently vacationing in Mexico, will be very disappointed at the rather happy ending of it all. She was rooting for Carrie or maybe Samantha to end up with no one, as some sort of validation of sisters doing for themselves or whatever. I think to my friend the show will have lost something, as though it is saying the whole fabulousity of singleness the show portrayed was a lie, because in the end all women must have a man. Or something like that.

I, myself, am not too sure. I liked the ending. They all have had messy shit ruining their neat little lives, which balances the equation. And, I don’t know, maybe I have a sentimental streak, or maybe I’m pragmatic or realistic, but come on, it’s pretty natural for every member of the human race to want to reach out to someone else in the dark and not go everything alone. I enjoy being single, but not so much that I won’t make the occasional sacrifice, if only to get laid.

I don’t think a happy ending where you end up with a guy necessarily means you have sold out a feminist dream. Of course, maybe I’m tainted at the moment, as I happen to know a guy with whom I like to spend a lot of time.

Working on this today. It’s stupid and undone, but I like the main character. Check out them cheekbones.

CLICK!

Ever now and again it is great to just have a day where nothing is expected. I have no place I have to be, no one I have to talk with, nothing.

I’ll probably do a little work, and I hope to work on some animation ideas, but other than that, I’ve been sitting on the couch. Sitting, sitting, sitting.

If I weren’t so happy to be less quick than a sloth or a slug, I’d mention a few ideas about comedy, shows, sketch and what I like and what I hate. But, fuck it. Sloths shouldn’t have opinions.

Dropped M. off at the airport a couple of hours ago. It seems a bit quiet around here without another person around. Of course, that sounds dramatic and self-pitying, but it’s really just an observation. I actually don’t mind a little quiet every now and again.

More importantly, even if I miss him this week, I’ll see him next week. And, this coming week I have shitloads of work to do, so I wouldn’t have a lot of time to be with him anyway. It’s all for the best in the best of all possible worlds, like Pangloss might have said. Or maybe it was Candide. Who the fuck cares, really?

Other than that I’m sitting waiting to see whether a friend or two call. I am an impatient waiter. I never know whether to commit to say making some dinner for myself or to continue waiting.

I’m feeling a lot less stabby, if you know what I mean.

Maybe the lightened mood is partially attributable to the impending arrival of the weekend. Maybe it’s just that the only appallingly stupid person to call my office at work today isn’t even that appallingly stupid. She’s more ignorant combined with capable lying.

Whatever the cause, I almost feel productive and useful and all sorts of good positive words today. Good words, like toast.

I realized something today. There are several weblogs I read not because I find the musings of the site author interesting, but I look for the comments. I’m a little fascinated by how the uninteresting and sluggish can have interesting, witty friends. Of course, being a mirror owner of substance (I have a whole hallway decorated with differently framed mirrors at heights to lofty to be useful to me), I do know that the same could be said of this little steaming pile of web narcissism.

Therefore, to ensure balance in my life, I will now strive to only hang out with the dull and dismal. In their shadow I will appear as a burning super nova. Probably more likely a Chevy Nova, not so much burning as sputtering.

What are you doing tonight oh you reader of this site, who must surely lack wit or you would turn away?

Anyway, on the pop culture front, here’s a little something more World Wide Web-ish. I can’t decide whether to love or hate this 15 minutes of fame. From this guy I learned about this guy. Judge for yourself.

And for your pondering pleasure might I suggest this ditty.