Well I have returned from vacation to discover my laptop power cord not working. I have no access. I am at the library currently. Once it gets up and running again I will post.

I am having a grand old time in the overcast skies of Oregon. I head up to more overcast skies in Seattle tomorrow. I really miss this weather. I am hoping to get a feel for how badly I want to try and find a job in the Northwest. Maybe I'll have some pictures of my cute nieces and nephews in a few days.

I have been listening to some lectures on Beethoven. I can't believe everything he went through. His father, who sat around the house all day and got drunk every evening, beat him to make him play the piano and stay at the piano until he could be a better child prodigy than Mozart, who was a mere fourteen years older than Beethoven (talk about a drastic difference in style in such a short time-Beethoven really changed things about music). One time he woke him up at one in the morning after he got home from the tavern and made him play the piano until sunrise. I'm surprised he could stand to see a piano after those experiences. A study concluded that he had about 100 times the normal lead content in his body by his death. His love relationships never worked out, due mostly to the fact that he always chose unavailable women. It has been very interesting to learn about him.
I am off to vacation in Seattle tomorrow (mainly because my parents are driving and so it costs nothing for me to go there). I will be gone for about ten days. It should be lovely to be back in my hometown.

This is a U2 tribute band playing one of the songs that U2 has never played live; it also happens to be one of my favorite songs.



The singer does a great job imitating Bono. He must have seen Rattle and Hum like a thousand times.

There is not much going on with my life currently, so I suppose now is the time wax philosophical, but I seem to be dry. I guess I could mention that I have a goal to finish reading all of Charlotte Bronte's works. I am currently on the last novel-The Professor. She is not that spectacular of a writer and Jane Eyre is probably her most concise and artistic work, but Vilette is haunting.
Something I find very funny is that she uses the word subaltern several times in Shirley. That is a word meaning someone who is oppressed. Subaltern Studies (which basically studied the lower classes in India during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries) informed my thesis. My nineteenth-century transatlantic committee chair (who should have been familiar with the Brontes) took the most issue with me using that word to describe the lower classes and those without power in the novel in Hawthorne's novels. Bronte and Hawthorne were contemporaries. If only I had known this I could have brought it in as more evidence that I wasn't off my rocker in my choice of theory and work.

I thought this was a hilarious Monty Python skit about Thomas Hardy writing a novel.

Since the job outlook isn't so great, I thought I would post a few pictures. With the snowfall that come down a week ago I wanted to take a picture of the tree outside our balcony. I think I am obsessed with close-up pictures of trees. I don't know why.

My friend pointed this diagram out to me. Hilarious.

Don't know if you've seen it yet or not (chances are you have), but this kid just left the dentist and is havin' a really "good time."

HAPPY NEW YEAR'S!

It turns out, thankfully, that the pain in my thumb from the accident is just a sprain, not a fracture.

Merry Christmas everyone. Mine was great (despite the following:).
About two weeks ago, I rear-ended another car. My first accident in fifteen years. Everyone was okay (well almost, I am having some pain in my thumb that is getting worse, so I may have to go to the doctor to see what's up), but I still find it quite scary that on the information exchange between the two people involved I have to put my address. That woman could hunt me down. The other car didn't appear to have any damage, but I thought I would post pictures of the damage to my car.





The frost outlines the damage to the top part of my windshield (which was not done by my head thank goodness-although I don't remember the rock hitting it).

My younger brother is going to have a baby. The first grandchild for my parents in about three years, which is quite some time in our family. They are excited.

Tomorrow is the shortest day of the year. Yay for days getting longer.

Ahhhh, my home teachers gave me a mini gingerbread house for Christmas. How sweet:). I noticed that there was nutrition information given on the bottom. Do people actually eat those things?
They also gave me a copy of The Testaments (which my parents had already given me years ago), and I lied flat-out when they asked if I already have a copy.

A while ago I posted Bono and the Corrs doing a version When the Stars Go Blue and so I decided to check out the original version. It was great.



I also liked his Desire.

This is how I spent some of my time with Jen in California. Yes, I am hooked on the show. It doesn't compete with U2, but I am indeed hooked.

I had a great time in California. Sad to be back.

This has probably already been around, but I saw it on facebook today and thought this little LDS spoof of Twilight pretty good.

Twilight Years from Tom on Vimeo.

I've turned in the last thing I ever need to for my thesis this morning. Double wahoo.
I made a mega yummy acorn squash quesadilla today. Onions, green chilies, squash, cheese-yum, yum.
I am off to visit my friend Jen in California until Wednesday. Wahoo.

My interview for the online university job did not go as well as I hoped. I was really nervous. And whether it was due to my bad interview or the fact that two Hornes already work for my would-have-been future boss, I didn't get the job.
But to help us all forget about it I am including the following hilarious parody of history and the Beatles...