Happy 10/10/10 everyone.. one of the the few ‘binary’ dates (only 1’s and 0’s) we’ll have this millennium. … so what ?!?!)..
I spent the day celebrating the pure binary nature.. either doing nothing .. or working like a nut..
While DIane is away at a yoga training.. my instincts to do anything good for me (eat, sleep, exercise, relax, play) are about half what they usually are.. that’s all stuff we tend to do together.. Even so, I did manage to get outside some to enjoy the awesome fall weather..
I took the dogs up running in the mountains.. kinda a bummer that it’s also bow season.. the dogs wore their hunter orange.. I looked rather deer like I’m afraid. I gotta say.. walking on a fall day on these trails in the moods is among my favorite things in the world (I think it’s about number 7)
Gabe was at a dance last night.. so I whipped up my favorite bachelor meal.. no one else would eat it.. black beans, braised seitan (wheat gluten) and an insane amput of hot sauce.. .. that’s the one advantage of eating alone.. you can eat stuff others wouldn’t eat.
I ended up spending yesterday doing lots of small errands.. it wasn’t until 11PM that I actually started my main project. I’m uilding a larger musical tesal coil.. It’s one of the more advanced things I’ve tried to build… hope I’m up to it.
My friend Scott and his friend Aub helped me by doing some machinining of some plastic parts..job one last night was to assemble them.. Aub had done such a nice job on the machining !
The next job was to wind about 20 feet of copper tubing through about 50 small holes. Thank goodness I had Gabe helping me hold and rotate the thing. It was a ton of work..we were sweating and cursing and laughing as we got it all done. It was about 1;30 am when we got the first part done..
By 2am .. it looked like this.. not bad for a nights work.
Today I did soem odd jobs around the house, took Gabe into work, went for a run, then sat down to start the next step on the tesla coil.. the secondary.. .. it means winding about a quarter mile of wire perfectly. around a 4 inch pipe.. .. I built this jig and started turnign in the beutiful fall light outside..
It’s a long job.. this is 30 minutes of work.. and I have another 11 and a half inches to wind.. yawn..
Around 3 I headed over to homer’s.. we’re doing some maintainance on the giant pumpkin robot for the haunted forest.. I’m giving it a radio control option.. it was nice to see the thing up close again without it’s haunted forest costume on.. It looks scary to me like this
Homer and our friend Jim had another project going at the same time (how come none of us can do one thing at a time ?! 🙂 .. he is tryoing to breath life into this wonderful 6 axis router he’s been been building out of stuff he baught at action.. I just happened to be there for their first test in wood.
Things actually worked.. though.. you can see by the smoke something wasn’t quite right.. turns out the bit was turning backwards.. that didn’t stop the huge machine from pusing it through the workpiece anyway.. This thing is awesome .. I’ll put in more movies as it starts to do more !
Last stop this afternnon was to pick up Gabe and go shopping. it was a guys only food fest.. .. I’ll hilight our creatoions through the week.. .
Now it’s off to homework.. gabe’s and mine.. More tomorrow
nite everyone.. nite diane if you’re reading this.. we miss you ! nite sam -me
Can’t write long.. it’s 2AM. Today was an unintentionally lazy day.. Diane’s out of town.. so it’s just Gabe and me hanging out here. Gabe had homecoming all day at MMU .. leaving me to hang out here.. I had a huge list of things I wanted to get done.. but for one reason or another.. I didn’t seem to get to any of them,.. at leats not until 11 this eveing.. when I got my burst of energy.. I ended up spending the day doing odd errands and household tasks (fix the car, take gabe to school, cut the grass, run with he dogs.. ) .. Mid-afternoon i just had to surrender to the fact that i was not going to get any of smy big project started (a new tesla coil, a new wireless control for the giant pumpkin. ) I know I need down time.. but.. it’s just so boring when I get it.. Is thta why they call it ‘down’ time ? Oh well.. .. I’m relaxed at least.. haven’t been for weeks.. so that at least is good..
ok.. that’s gotta be all for now.. Nite folks, nite sam -me
Just watched Gabe’s last soccer game for the year.. it was sunny and bright as I drove to the field.. minutes after I got there it turned cold and rainy. As we huddled under our wind torn umbrellas , Bucky.. our friend the English teacher taught us two new cool new words
The first was zeugma.. which ask.com defines as the use of a word to modify or govern two or more words although
its use may be grammatically or logically correct with only one. Rhetorician Edward Corbett offers this distinction between zeugma and syllepsis:
in zeugma, unlike syllepsis, the single word does not fit grammatically
or idiomatically with one member of the pair. Thus, in Corbett’s view,
the first example below would be syllepsis, the second zeugma.
Examples:
“You are free to execute your laws, and your citizens, as you see fit.”
(Star Trek: The Next Generation)
“He carried a strobe light and the responsibility for the lives of his men.”
(Tim O’Brien, The Things They Carried) ..
“But Ted Lavender, who was scared, carried 34 rounds when he was
shot and killed outside Than Khe, and he went down under an exceptional
burden, more than 20 pounds of ammunition, plus the flak jacket and
helmet and rations and water and toilet paper and tranquilizers and all
the rest, plus an unweighed fear.”
(Tim O’Brien, The Things They Carried)
“The theme of the Egg Hunt is ‘learning is delightful and delicious’–as, by the way, am I.”
(Allison Janney as C.J. Cregg in The West Wing)
“You held your breath and the door for me.”
(Alanis Morissette, “Head over Feet”)
The second was Chiasmus.. which ask.com sadefines as a verbal pattern (a type of antithesis) in which the second half of an expression is balanced against the first with the parts reversed. Essentially the same as antimetabole. Adjective: chiastic.
Note that a chiasmus includes anadiplosis, but not every anadiplosis reverses itself in the manner of a chiasmus. Examples of chaismuses.. (chiasmi ?) include
Nice to see you, to see you, nice!”
(catchphrase of British TV entertainer Bruce Forsyth)
“You forget what you want to remember, and you remember what you want to forget.”
(Cormac McCarthy, The Road, 2006)
“In the end, the true test is not the speeches a president delivers; it’s whether the president delivers on the speeches.”
(Hillary Clinton, March 2008)
“I had a teacher I liked who used to say good fiction’s job was to comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable.”
(David Foster Wallace)
“I flee who chases me, and chase who flees me.”
(Ovid)
“Fair is foul, and foul is fair.”
(William Shakespeare, Macbeth I.i)
Which . introduced me to the word syllepsis which I learned is a kind of ellipsis in which one word (usually a verb) is understood differently in relation to two or more other words, which it modifies or governs. Adjective: sylleptic. See also zeugma.
“I live in shame and the suburbs.”
(Uncle Fester in Addams Family Values, 1993)
“When I address Fred I never have to raise either my voice or my hopes.”
(E.B. White, “Dog Training”)
“We consumers like names that reflect what the economy does. We
know, for example, that International Business Machines makes business
machines; and Ford Motors makes Fords; and Sara Lee makes us fat.”
(Dave Barry, “Dave’s World,” April 8, 2001)
“Piano, n. A parlor utensil for subduing the impenitent visitor. It
is operated by depressing the keys of the machine and the spirits of
the audience.”
(Ambrose Bierce, A Devil’s Dictionary)
“I finally told Ross, late in the summer, that I was losing weight, my grip, and possibly my mind.”
(James Thurber, The Years with Ross, 1959)
“She tracks sand in as well as ideas, and I have to sweep up after her two or three times a day.”
(E.B. White, “On a Florida Key”)
“The ice trays show deep claw marks, where people have tried to pry
them free, using can openers and knives and screwdrivers and petulance.”
(E.B. White, “On a Florida Key”)
Bryant Gumbel’s well-publicized memo ticked off the Today Show’s troubles–and other personalities on the top-rated show.
repetition of the last word of one line or clause to begin the next.Anadiplosis often leads to climax (see also gradatio). Note that a chiasmus includes anadiplosis, but not every anadiplosis reverses itself in the manner of a chiasmus. Like
“Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger
leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering. I sense much fear in you.”
(Frank Oz as Yoda in Star Wars Episode 1: The Phantom Menance)
“At six o’clock we were waiting for coffee,
waiting for coffee and the charitable crumb . . .”
(Elizabeth Bishop, “A Miracle for Breakfast”)
“When I give I give myself.”
(Walt Whitman)
“Our doubt is our passion, and our passion is our task.”
(Henry James)
“All service ranks the same with God,
With God, whose puppets, best and worst,
Are we.”
(Robert Browning, Pippa Passes)
“The years to come seemed waste of breath,
waste of breath the years behind.”
(William Butler Yeats, “An Irish Airman Foresees his Death,”)
“Aboard my ship, excellent performance is standard. Standard
performance is sub-standard. Sub-standard performance is not permitted
to exist.”
(Queeg in The Caine Mutiny, by Herman Wouk)
“The laughter had to be gross or it would turn to sobs, and to sob would be to realize, and to realize would be to despair.”
(Howard Griffin, Black Like Me)
“The land of my fathers. My fathers can have it.”
(Dylan Thomas on Wales)
“I am Sam, Sam I am.”
(Dr. Seuss, Green Eggs and Ham)
“Only the brave deserve the fair and the fair deserve Jaeger.”
(advertising slogan for Jaeger Sportswear)
“The general who became a slave. The slave who became a gladiator. The gladiator who defied an emperor. Striking story!”
(Commodus in the movie Gladiator, 2000)
That lead me to gradatio which is a sentence construction in which the last word of one clause becomes
the first of the next, through three or more clauses (an extended form
slow day.. isn’ t that cool ? I had things I was supposed to do every night this week.. including one night out of town.. and .. i decided not to do any of them… .. I really needed a break. I was running so fast I didn’t know if I was coming or going. folks even commented on it from reading my blog.. so I just hit the breaks. I didn’t think I could do that.. and it wasn’t easy. get all fidgety when I know there are other places I should/could/would be .. but .. my brain was getting warped from too much time spent racing to and from things. I feel like a slacker when I slow down.. but I wasn’t getting any peace in my life.. and .. readers will remember that that is one of my main goals for the year. I’m gonna try and keep things slow through the end of next week. I know I can’t control external stuff.. but I’m going to do my best to say ‘no’ to everything for the next week or so. wish me luck. I’ll keep you all posted on how it’s going…
