De Congeriei

Three prolific young disorganizers under our roof accumulate a staggering amount of stuff -- clothing, toys, papers, remotes, mutilated pears, cups, wallets, partially eviscerated NutriGrain bars, etc. -- which they discard in the most unexpected places. Trying to keep the place tidy (car keys out of the trash can, etc.) is bit of a losing battle -- especially as the adults who live here aren't pillars of neatness either.

So it was with a bit of trepidation that I clicked on the NSGCD's Clutter Hoarding Scale. On first reading, I brushed it off ("thank you, God, that I am not like other men"): after all, Level II already mentions things like "Unclear functions of living room, bedroom" and it goes downhill to Level V with "Rodents evident and in sight; Standing water..." But a closer reading led to some nervous laughter on realizing that in recent memory our home slovenly home has exhibited all five NSGCD clutter levels:

Level I: "Light evidence of rodents/insects..."
Level II: "Limited evidence of housekeeping, vacuuming, sweeping..."
Level III: "Visible clutter outdoors ... excessive use of electric and extension cords..."
Level IV: "No clean dishes or utensils locatable in kitchen..."
Level V: "Septic system nonoperational... snakes in interior of home... "

("God, have mercy on me, a sinner!") And just to add insult to injera*: just a few days ago I found my wallet, sitting behind the mending pile on my dresser. It was coated in thick dust; I hadn't seen it since July... Well, at least the picture on my replacement driver's license was a big improvement. As silver linings go, this one's pretty thin; but I'll take it.

(The original title, "On Clutter," lacked a certain something; what better way to lend it panache than translate it to a dead language? Welcome, googling Latin students: your pain is our gain.)

(* Construction of a groaner involving an offensive Ethiopian baker is left as an exercise to the reader.)

Strange bedfellows

A young child makes a perfect pillow
on a lazy Saturday morning.
Provided, of course, one has first
deconstructed the conventional "pillow,"
freeing it from bourgeois metanarratives
such as "sleep," and eschewing social constructions such as
"staying put under one's ear" or
"not shrieking with laughter."

Now that's a Sabbath

I think I was 11, or maybe 14, when I first wanted to ride a unicycle. A couple years ago, Suvia called my bluff and got me one for Christmas. Sure enough, I still haven't yet learned to ride it -- I'm no longer 11 so I'm impatient, needing to see progress every few minutes; and there always seem to be more pressing duties (toddlers falling off chairs and the like). Occasionally, I'd dust the thing off, teeter on it for a few minutes, then waste a half hour reading unicycling tips or watching Kris Holm videos on YouTube.

But on a couple of recent Sunday afternoons, as the family napped, I tiptoed out back to try and teach an old dog new tricks. Of several pictures, this one least betrays how heavily I was leaning onto that wooden post, at first. After 45 minutes or so, I found that very gradually I was leaning less onto the post. There's still a long ways to go; but I'm hopeful that the following "unmethod" will bear fruit:

It will take about 15 hours to learn to ride a unicycle.

1. Get on the unicycle while leaning on a handrail or post.
2. Rock back and forth to get a feel for the thing.
3. Do 1. and 2. for about 3 hours, going farther bit by bit.

Congratulations! Only 10 more hours to go.

I have thought of some truly stirring analogies here, but this post is too small to contain them.

Mind those units!

We've never had this much garlic on hand. While shopping at safeway.com, Someone entered "1" next to Garlic, apparently missing that the units were "lbs.", not "heads". (Of all the perils of online grocery shopping, this is one I'd never thought of.) So over the next few weeks we'll need to consume garlic at several times our usual rate -- which will apparently present all kinds of benefits. Chicken cacciatore, Greek lentil soup, maybe hummus ... other ideas? One recipe calls for a whole chicken and 40 cloves of garlic; that would be the easy way out but I'm skeptical.

I once had a physics teacher who just couldn't stand it when we didn't pay attention to the proper units. Getting the wrong answer for mass or speed or charge was one thing, but writing that "the cyclist is moving at 60 km/sec" or "the water temperature drops to -23 K" would guarantee an exasperated little lecture in class. I wish he could see this.

Serendipity

It's Black Pepper Week at the Perk; I just finished a Black Pepper & Mango Sorbet -- tart, bright saffron-colored globes served on fresh mint leaves in a square sushi plate. (Quite a contrast to the whimsical, rough-hewn decor of this dusty coffee/tea/alehouse; odd juxtapositions seem to be the norm here.) Tonight's Open Mic has an unexpected treat: two subsets of local acoustic-speedmetal supergroup ilyAIMY.

I was last here for a midnight performance of the beautiful, uncategorizable music of Might Could. With three acoustic guitars and one part-time bass, musical roots in Segovia, Fripp, and Blue Oyster Cult, intricate play so intertwined that it seems leaderless, and imaginative titles like "Synecdoche", what's not to like? I bought their outstanding CD Wood Knot from them (soon available in stores); there's something heady about seeing truly original music, with an obviously promising future, performed in a cramped, dusty place by a band whose website still ends in ".edu". Someday I hope to point to some household-name on TV and say "I remember when..."

Sitting here, I recall that for several years I lived within a short walk of the (now defunct) Nightstage music club, where I saw mind-bending shows by Bill Bruford's Earthworks, Fred Frith, Bill Frisell, and others. A slightly longer walk away, I (twice) caught Pat Metheny at Ryles, in unannounced, word-of-mouth appearances; a short T ride away I saw Husker Du, Ladysmith Black Mambazo, Adrian Belew, the Minutemen, Birdsongs of the Mesozoic; Brooks Williams would breeze through town several times a year; Harrod & Funck played in the subways. Life-changing experiences we would just stumble across! Those were the days... And yet, tonight I sense that maybe serendipity is making a comeback near here. I'll keep an eye out.

Our favorite hydrocarbon

A few weeks ago, in a bold leap of faith, we agreed in advance to buy a batch of prints of Diesel's school picture. Our expectations were low; you know how school pictures go, especially among the young and restless. On Picture Day (protecting our investment as best we could) we made sure he wore a clean shirt; washed his hair just before breakfast (to try and tamp down his chronic conic bedhead); and hoped for the best.

Well, last week the pictures came back and wow! Hats off to the photographer (ASAP Worldwide Productions, Lanham, MD, whose copyright goons are no doubt headed this way right now) and a hearty high-five to Diesel. The final portrait crops out the best part -- those carefully folded hands -- but it's quite a shot even without them.

As he hurtles towards his third birthday, Diesel's in a very entertaining linguistic stage, in which his Ls, Rs, and Ws all sound very similar to our untrained ears. So once or twice a day he worries that he's lost his "Boing-Boing McQueen." And shifting his celestial affinities, he declared today that "Pwuto is not my favwite pwanet; it's not a pwanet. I wike Saturn."

Calling -- or not

Man, three weeks! -- how've you been? ... There were a whole list of things I meant to write about; some are probably still worth posting, we'll see. "When no-one's listening I've got so much to say..." But OK, here are some pix you might enjoy. For a Sunday School class on Vocation and Calling, it was my turn last week to trace the path of my so-called career. I figured expectations were for a nice, tidy "testimony" so I chose not to pretty it up with a happy ending, a clear theme, or any confirmation of divine providence. (So there!) Instead, I introduced my story with the two pictures you see here [click for a closer look]. (*) Then, inspired by a great xkcd cartoon, I traced a graph of my "Sense Of Calling" over time (a.k.a. Eagerness to Answer The Question, "So What Do You Do?"). This parameter (green line below) peaked at about age 18; plummeted in graduate school; stayed low through several dark "all but dissertation" years; swung wildly in the year before I finally finished my thesis; rose gradually after school, and has declined steadily throughout my current job. (I know -- what a narrow, one-dimensional way to depict life's complexity... But I'd never told the whole gory tale before, so I needed a simple, robust structure to lean on.) In red dots, I also traced my degree of "ministry engagement" over the years (pardon my dualism): this ebbed and flowed through various roles in student and small group ministry; laid low for several years after school; and saw a recent resurgence in a biweekly "worship laboratory" that led me to breathe deep of "emerging church" oxygen.

Are any of the above "my calling"? Um... Check back in another decade; maybe I'll know then. In conclusion, I showed a (surprisingly lifelike) portrait of me by Dylan (now 6!). I love the facial stubble, the dark circles around the eyes, the clumsiness of those hands -- but also its overall inquisitive tone. I'd like to think that's a fair summary of where I am right now -- equal parts ham-handed, off-balance, and hopeful.

(*) I was pleased to see the inimitable Ken Brown back in publishing, after a lo-ong hiatus. I need to preorder "My Parachute is Beige."

Paying attention to autumn

The trees around here have put on quite a show this fall.
I haven't seen colors like this
south of New Hampshire or Vermont
or perhaps anywhere:
rich eggplant, rosy pomegranate, carrot, cantaloupe,
apricot, lemon, and honeydew. The lowliest median strip
glows fuschia or coral. The usual eye-catchers --
4-way stops, detour signs, crossing guards, school buses --
stripped of their usual impact, blend into the insane palette
of a limitless Van Gogh canvas.

I've been photographing our front yard every couple of days.
I'm trying to make a "poor man's time-lapse movie".
This is how it looked one morning last week.

Traveling in the vernacular

As the temperature drops into the low 30s, it's again perfect for bicycle commuting. I'm finally getting back on the bike after several weeks of mostly driving to work. (Once we got a second car last year, the reasons why it "made more sense" to drive on any given day seemed to multiply: running late, overtired, rain in the forecast, lunchtime errands, groceries on the way home..... Enough!) If I can keep this up, I'll once again be able to say I'm a bicycle commuter -- as I'd done for many years. I consider it a rare privilege, in these Washington suburbs, to be able to ride to work; and besides, it's no coincidence: when we moved to the area, I pulled out a map and used a piece of string to draw a 7-mile-radius circle around my workplace: "Here's where we'll live." So far, we've been able to stay well inside that circle... so I am without excuse.

This week's NYT article and video on bicycle-friendly culture, and David Byrne's recent Manhattan helmet-cam ride video (*), have been inspirations. (This post's title is from Portland frame builder Natalie Ramsland's nearly poetic coda to the NYT video, at 3:53.)

In that general vein, I've always thought it'd be fun to list the various spills and accidents (FDGBs) I've had in 30-odd years of cycling. But I don't want to sully this post (or Natalie's or David's good name) with that, so ... another day.

(*) I would embed that video here but it seems LiveJournal's RSS aggregator truncates posts with embedded content.

In my head and now in yours

In thinking about that last post while preparing the next one, the Talking Heads' song "Heaven" has taken up residence in my mind: "The name of the bar: the bar is called Heaven..." I suppose this was inevitable. So, for your enjoyment and (hopefully) my relief, here it is, from the "Stop Making Sense" film.

I saw that film 6 or 7 times at the Brattle Theater in Cambridge, MA, back in the day; bought the DVD on eBay a couple years ago and it's quickly become a family favorite. Awfully hard to stay gloomy after pressing Play on that disc. It seems to trigger whatever innate dance reflex humans have: even little Timo (1-1/2) moves in time to the beat; his brothers run laps around the room.*

The initial "Thank You" you see here is for the brilliant bit of performance art (video) that opens the concert (Mr. Byrne flails all over the stage each time the beat skips a groove). That, the famous Big Suit (video), and the elusive self-interview (video) still feel so otherworldly and unique that we squirm a little. Or maybe it's just me. But "Heaven" underscores the whimsical longing underneath it all.

I've been finding YouTube and its ilk to be a treasure trove of music new and old -- fodder for a future post perhaps. It gets pretty captivating sometimes. "Its hard to imagine that nothing at all / could be so exciting, could be so much fun..."

* 'Course they also do this for Black Flag -- our music of choice when the day is especially dreary (and mommy's far, far away).

My epic night out

I am in teh coffeehouse: dusty brocade sofas, leftover Christmas lights on the walls, free wifi, weekly open mic, outstanding (Original Sin) hard cider, and a sign over the bar: "No Pissy Attitudes". Welcome to the College Perk. Tonight's entertainment: The Glad Version. Last week I knew I'd found some signs of life here when a dreadlocked 50-something played strange beats on a portable keyboard, mumblsinging what I eventually recognized as "yo ho ho and a bottle of rum." Then someone plugged in a projector and showed a strange short film he'd made. I hope heaven is a little bit like this. Meanwhile, I think I'll make this a regular hangout on my weekly Epic Night Out.

ENO is a new tradition chez nous, instituted by my lovely wife: she's taken a night out each week for a few months now; me I'm just starting out. The "E" is reminiscent of my first week, which was anything but epic: I crisscrossed the county looking for something to do; finally settling for an overpriced latte at Borders Books near closing time. But I'm getting better at this. We'll see how it evolves; I've been trying to find time away to read, write, pray, reflect, meet with folks, and take in some culchah ... and this may be part of the answer.

Justice in the burbs

Just finished Will & Lisa Samson's book, "Justice in the Burbs: being the hands of Jesus wherever you live." It's the most enjoyable book I've read in quite a while; not just thought provoking, but quite pleasant to read: it interweaves a fictional plot with a consistently generous, conversational tone. It even ends with a benediction to the reader -- as though the authors were laying a hand on my head and praying for me. (It sounds odd but they pull it off somehow.) By Ch. 2, I'd been gently drawn into the book's story and argument, and didn't want to put it down. Time and again I felt like it had me pegged -- the Mon.-Fri. paper pusher, Sat. lawn cultivator, Sun. pew warmer; who robs Peter to pay Paul and wonders at night, "is that all there is?" -- until I realized how many others 'round here would squirm just as much. Especially memorable was a chapter on mountaintop removal mining, which showed how going with the flow of American convenience and comfort underwrites grievous insults to God's creation and surprising degrees of greed and human misery. Other chapters discussed less dramatic, but also important concerns, such as alienation and loneliness -- also part of what "living justly" is concerned with. I'll be recommending this book to many; it's a persuasive explanation of how anyone can (and why Christians need to) be involved in tangible efforts to "love your neighbor"... both "over there" in places of obvious injustice or poverty, and "right here" with our literal neighbors, and through the everyday choices we make. Several stars.

My only quibble: in guest author Tony Jones' short "meditation" after Ch. 3, he refers to the Holy Spirit as "she" -- seemingly for no other purpose than to get a rise out of more traditional thinkers than himself. As a result (people being what they are) I have to think twice about whom to recommend this to. I wonder what Tony's like at parties.
[UPDATE Nov. 6: I misread Tony's intent. See his clarification in the comments.]

Rumors of my demise / Halloween splendor

I'm back -- It's been three weeks but no towels have yet been thrown in; I just need to stop setting the bar so high that nothing seems worth writing about. Of course, it's a sickly, cyclical thing: as the hiatus grows, so does the feeling that the "comeback post" has to be something really worthwhile... Lather, rinse, repeat. I'm not sure how others break the cycle; but I suppose one way is to write about something really inane. So:

Here are our 3 Amigos attired for our church's Harvest Festival last weekend. Suvia pulled off another great pair of homemade costumes this year: Dylan as Junior Asparagus and Diesel as Bob the Tomato. She even dyed Dylan's sweatpants green for the occasion. They came out rather pale so we discussed redoing them but agreed it ain't much of a living. To our surprise and delight, Dylan's costume won first prize at the end of the evening: he proudly carried home his trophy, a Spirograph set (remember those?). As for Timo: at the last minute we rustled up a hand-me-down costume many sizes too big, so he was a ... Shar-Pei tree frog. He earned numerous "awwwwww"s as he wandered around, babbling inquiringly.

Those who hate gardening need a theory...

Our yard has been an eyesore for several years now; new grass is long overdue. September's the month for this: temperatures are mild(er!) and leaves are still on trees. But, September slipped by and now it's a race before the trees start shedding their massive foliage. Last Saturday I got hoppin' mad at seeing (already!) a growing carpet of sycamore leaves on the lawn: those will all have to be raked before the reseeding process can even begin. But it's a big yard, and in fact the most barren area was only lightly covered with leaves; so I dragged out the boombox, started up some c.1973 Deep Purple and ZZ Top (hard to stay gloomy listening to those) and undertook the dusty, sweaty work of preparing the soil for the seeding itself (the easy part) -- which I finally did on Monday.

Now I've just got to work out how to water the area regularly over the next few weeks. But not overwater it. And, hope that the soil was properly prepared, and that I used the right amount of fertilizer. And, remember to fertilize it again before winter. Mess up on any of those, and it could all be for nought! (Ask me how I know...) This is why I get a bit anxious pushing around the seed spreader: in 10 minutes, I can easily blow through $100 worth of seed -- it's like world-class champagne. So inevitably, I cringe as my mind's eye sees dollar bills shooting out of the seeder. It doesn't help that the seed variety I'm using is exactly the color of money. Sometimes I think I should just confront the pretense, cut out the middleman, and spread shredded money directly on the lawn.

"Those who hate gardening need a theory..." I found that piece of Internet flotsam some 10 or 15 years ago, attributed to (renowned Polish philosopher) Leszek Kolakowski. I thought it meant that forming and testing theories could make anything enjoyable; I found the idea intriguing, and tucked it away for future reference. But more recently (thanks to Google's searchable books) I found the context for that quip: Modernity on Endless Trial, Ch. 21. Turns out the intended meaning was completely different ... and quite a bit funnier:

The General Theory of Not-Gardening: A Major Contribution to Social Anthropology, Ontology, Moral Philosophy, Psychology, Sociology, Political Theory, and Many Other Fields of Scientific Investigation ---
Those who hate gardening need a theory. Not to garden without a theory is a shallow, unworthy way of life. The alternative to not-gardening without a theory is to garden. However, it is much easier to have a theory than actually to garden.

Kolakowski then provides Marxist, Psychoanalytical, Existentialist, Structuralist, and -ah- Semiotic arguments for not gardening. For example:

People garden in order to make nature human, to "civilize" it. This, however, is a desperate and futile attempt to transform being-in-itself into being-for-itself. This is not only ontologically impossible; it is a deceptive, morally inadmissible escape from reality, as the distinction between being-in-itself and being-for-itself cannot be abolished. To garden, or to imagine that one can "humanize" Nature, is to try to efface this distinction and hopelessly to deny one's own irreducibly human ontological status. To garden is to live in bad faith. Gardening is wrong. Q.E.D.

The whole 2-page chapter is similarly clever nonsense -- well worth a read. On days where none of those five schools of thought afford a sufficient basis for not gardening, at least I'll have something to smirk about as I work.

19 mercies

I've finally reached the end of Brennan Manning's Ragamuffin Gospel. Anne-Marie loaned it to me in February; I read a chunk of it in July; carried it with me hither and yon; but it wasn't until September that I gave it the final push. Lots of people have gushed about it online and I basically agree with them so I won't add to the hubbub -- except to highlight the "19 mercies" appended to more recent editions. Each of these is a short reading (1-2 pages), written to foster personal or group reflection, and concluding with a Bible passage or a fragment of poetry. The 19 headings nicely encapsulate the book's main themes:

• Come: Be here, now. Don't wait. Jesus wants to enter into a deep friendship with you. Cry out for the Spirit.
• Encounter: The person of Jesus. The call from the cross. Through Jesus we know Abba. The God who is love. God loves you unconditionally. We cry, "Abba!" The prayer of simple regard.
• Serve: The freedom of serving. Healing through meal sharing. Washing feet. Freedom from your own contempt. Christ in the person next to you.
• Trust: Trust in your Father's delight. Worry is an insult to your Father. The grace of reckless love.

I've begun walking back through these, one a day, to see what might happen.
OK, I wasn't really going to review the book; but here's an excerpt I scribbled down as I was reading:

(p. 203) The first step towards rejuvenation begins with accepting where you are and accepting your poverty, frailty, and emptiness to the love that is everything. Don't try to feel anything, think anything, or do anything. With all the good will in the world you cannot make anything happen. Don't force prayer. Simple relax in the presence of the God you half believe in and ask for a touch of folly.

Kinda hits the spot right about now... One final nugget: someone has posted Chapter 7 in its entirety. Entitled Paste jewelry and sawdust hotdogs, I found this to be the harshest (and maybe the best) chapter in the book: "... The temptation of the age is to look good without being good. If 'white lies' were criminal offenses, we would all be in jail by nightfall..."

That's no moon...

Current position of the ISS

Finally got a chance to see the International Space Station orbit overhead tonight. Dylan and I watched it from the backyard. The ISS was impossible to miss as it raced across the night sky, passing almost directly overhead, brighter than any star. Watching it, one gets an inkling of what people must have felt when they saw Sputnik in orbit -- exactly 50 years ago today.

ISS overpasses like this one only happen a few times a year. The friendly algorithms at Heavens-Above predict them for any given location; but many are obscured by clouds, or stick too near the horizon, or occur in the wee hours. This one was at a few minutes before 8pm, had a brightness of -2.3, and rose to 81 degrees. And Saturday's overpass (in the DC area: SW-NE, 7:06-7:12pm) looks to be even better. That's even before Diesel goes to sleep: perhaps we'll make it a full family affair.

A most entertaining visitor

We were minding our own business, enjoying a peaceful fall afternoon with some good friends. I went to shush the dog; noticed he was barking at something on the deck right in front of him. When I slid open the glass door, I could hear what sounded like the spray of a garden-hose spigot, but intermittent. In the several seconds it took me to identify the source of the sound, ... it slithered across the threshhold and behind a piece of furniture. Um -- sorry to interrupt the afternoon guys, but we have a yellow and black, hissing snake in the house. We all knew the snake was probably harmless, but none of us knew for sure; and this one had an impressive custom of rising up like a cobra and hissing loudly at us. We got a broom and tried to chase him out; he just hissed more, coiled up, struck at the broom, waved his black forked tongue around, and crawled further under the stereo. Finally we decided to open the door again, and leave him alone. This eventually did the trick; once outside, he sped off in a beautiful seamless wave of yellow curves; obviously relieved to be free of us.

I took several pictures of him; I didn't dare get close but thanks to a lovely zoom lens, one or two turned out quite good. (They look their best at full resolution.)

Later I determined that he was probably a juvenile Eastern Hognose; harmless but known as a major bluffer. Apparently the above "show of force" isn't all he can do; as a last resort he plays dead -- turns upside down, lets off a foul stench, and drools. But he's not very smart about it: if you turn him back right-side up, he'll immediately turn himself on his back and insist on playing dead. I'm so sad we missed that! Maybe next time.

Home again

The last couple of days in Boulder delivered about everything one could ask for. Saturday morning, as Suvia slept off her late-night flight, I rode that strange bike partway up infamous Flagstaff Road until my puny sea-level lungs were gasping for air (though apparently the actual "steep" part is further up). Later we visited the Boulder Farmer's Market; toured the Celestial Seasonings plant (favorite part: the Mint Room -- made my eyes sting); dined at the historic Chautauqua Dining Hall, and had dessert at the authentically Tajik Dushanbe Teahouse.

Sunday was a lousy day to visit Rocky Mountain Nat'l Park -- fog, rain, icy winds -- but we drove to Fall River Pass anyway, and climbed Alpine Ridge. We hadn't thought to bring cold-weather gear; but we had all our luggage with us so we layered dress shirts, pajamas, etc. The howling wind gave us both earaches, but those eventually subsided... On the way down from the pass, we caught some elk herds grazing well within range of our zoom lens, and got some surprisingly good pictures. (I'm loving the "image stabilization" on the new camera.)

Made it back into town in time to catch North, where Jeff Davenport spoke about manna (lit. "What IS that?") and flung Wheat Thins around evoking how one might feel when hoping for the Promised Land but seeing only manna. We talked about it all the way to Denver, where we spent the night and caught a Monday morning flight home... to three little boys and their two exhausted grandmothers who greeted us with delight and relief.

We're still trying to get off Mountain Time.

Seven o'clock colors

This close to the equinox, 7 am and 7 pm in Boulder are both luminous. Morning sunlight wraps the foothills to the west in a saffron glow; in the gentle crystal chill you might briefly consider a jacket. Evening sun tints the sky in pastels; then glowing sorbet swirls; then a fiery gauze of clouds punctured by the first stars; as the day's warmth lingers into night and the mountains settle into a deep taupe repose.

Wait, this IS rocket science

Well, that was interesting... A trio of us took a short drive north of Boulder to join DigitalGlobe for the launch of their new "most agile" earth imaging satellite. They fed us lunch, gave us commemorative T-shirts and hats, and we watched the live video feed coming from Vandenberg AFB in California. The footage is now online(*): it's long but the good stuff takes place between about 20:00 (liftoff) and 24:30 (main engine cutoff). The rocket reached 12,000 mph 6 minutes after launch, and orbit 5 minutes later. Given the firm's terrible luck with launches in 1997 and 2001, a good bit of nervous laughter broke out at T minus 2 minutes when someone across the viewing room asked, "So regardless of the outcome here, do we get to keep the T-shirts?" But, everything went according to plan ... so far anyway.

(* Update Oct. 4 -- DigitalGlobe has now posted the good parts of the video in Flash format -- much more useful than the original Windows-only version. I'd embed that here but without its "home" Javascript environment, it starts up automatically -- lame.)