Rock Candy

Candy can make your breath smell better, make your teeth rot, and act as a disease vector.
Photo Source: Baylor College of Medicine

When you’re seventeen reachin’ for your dreams

Don’t let no one reach it for you.

Stretch out take a chance.

If it can be done, you can do it.

—Montrose

Friday Night Lights

I learned tonight that I only like close games when I am not attached to either of the teams. I never minded when the Cowboys had a close game because I always knew that they could pull it out of the fire at the last minute. Whether or not they did so was another question.

But tonight the kids’ high school team played and lost a fairly tight game. They took the lead early. Then they relinquished it and played catch-up the rest of the night. Neither team played very well, but it was a high school game, after all.

Since I really wanted the kids to win their Homecoming game—especially since some evil administrator forbade a dance—it was a long night.

Friday Feast

Appetizer: Name a great website you would recommend to others.

http://www.bloglines.com/

Bloglines provides a simple interface to manage your favorite RSS feeds (blogs, news, whatever) and access them from anywhere. You don’t have to have a copy of your selections on a USB key to see what’s happening when you’re at work, at Starbucks, or anywhere else.

Soup: On a scale of 1-10 (with 10 as highest), how often do you dream at night?

Almost everybody dreams every night. The question is whether or not you remember your dreams. I used to be a 10; now I’m closer to a 1. When I was a kid, I would dream movies—plots, character development, and all that. I would even go back to sleep and rewrite the ending of dreams if I didn’t like the way they turned out.

 

Now I hardly ever remember my dreams, unless they are bad enough to wake me up—and that happens more often now than I like. When I remember them, my dreams are more often than not just me floating somewhere in a vast sea of information trying to categorize and file all the random bits that are streaming in.

Salad: Did you have a pet as a child? If so, what kind and what was its name?

Do you have a couple of hours? I almost always had a dog, and a variety of other pets came and went over time. Just no cats. My mother and I were both allergic to cat dander.

 

I grew up with so many dogs that I am often accused of being one. I get along better with dogs than I do with most people. Dogs are honest. They don’t lie. If they like you, they like you. If they don’t…

 

Dogs also understand hierarchy. They like to know who is in charge. If you feed them, love them, and show them a little kindness and respect, they are more than willing to let you be in charge. But you must be willing to remind them occasionally.

Main Course: If you had the chance to star in a commercial, what would you choose to advertise?

There are really two answers to this question:

1. First, I don’t have a product that I am in love with enough to back with my own name and reputation.
2. How much are they paying?

Dessert: What is your favorite kind of hard candy?

I don’t really like hard candy. If I had to choose one though, it would be those free mints they give out at Mexican restraints.