Where To Start

It's only now, a week later, that I realized a week away from the HoB feels strange.

Due to a March 1st deadline in addition to several self-imposed ones, I managed to get myself cornered by paperwork, PC work, building the company website and about 27 inches of snow. About the only thing, other than Kaia, that's looking up is the fact that my windows weren't entirely obscured by snowdrift.

This coming week, like the last one, sees a lot upcoming: a party this coming weekend, a lot of work between now and then, and the option for me to speak to a perspective client about possibly moving into one of his buildings. Aside from the party, which I'm looking forward to but not focused on at the moment, is a ticking time bomb. I know I need to be there, and odds are good I will get there to help my friends, who are ostensibly throwing this shindig. But with all that's on my plate and all the real responsibility floating over my head and bearing down on my shoulders (this will be the last time I ever use the words "head" and "shoulders" in a sentence), I'm pretty much just glad to get home at the end of the day, slide in, get some work and some TV in before I settle in with Kaia and the cordless for awhile before I pass out.

Not the stuff of excitement, true. But considering these days are filled with deadlines, requirements, statutory filing periods and not much else, I am just happy tomorrow is Valentine's Day. True, Kaia and I are on separate coasts at the moment: but between her schedule, which is packed, and mine, which is equally if not moreso, we pro tempore agreed to hold off on celebrating this year until she's in NYC next month for my birthday. The truth is, I'd even prefer it if she came in early; celebrating "days" -- even special ones, like birthdays and Valentine's Day, isn't as important to me as celebrating us being together, so if March 9th turns out to be the date on which she's flying in, then that's the date to which I'm looking forward. Or, as they say, I'd much rather have a genuine, sincere excitement to see her than ramp up some excitement over celebrating a day either by myself or with her so far away. Next year we'll celebrate Valentine's Day, and every day, together: that's good enough for me.

Aside from a huge bank of snow, there's not much else on the horizon: I've been focusing on the international protests in connection with the Mohammad cartoon about which I wrote last in this space. My take on the entire situation hasn't changed, and if anything, I'm even more amazed at the universal, consistent talent that Arab Muslims seem to have at complaining and protesting than I was last week. Take a half million uneducated, paranoid, indoctrinated morons, tell them they have been wronged by the Jews, by America, by the West and by everyone on the planet, and you should have an effective, able machine to do a lot of damage. The problem is the damage is, for the most part, confined to the world in which the machine lives. The Middle East, other than Israel, is a cesspool of hate, protest and paranoia. The sneer on Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's face is nothing new: but to me, it smacks less of Muslim indignation and pride and more of nationalism, the same kind of sneer that propelled Adolph Hitler into power and the same kind of sneer that helped Germany ride the crest of the wave of Nationalism.

It might not be that bad, but I don't see any signs suggesting it's getting any better, and I fully expect it to get worse now that Iran has reconvened it's refinement of uranium.

Perhaps now it's clear why I am so focused on deadlines, work and pressure. Better to handle that which I can control than that which I can't.

Besides, it's not like I possess the technical skill to draw political cartoons of Mohammad.

But if I did...