last night's dream

Ok this trumps the one in which I was an Egyptian Sungod living in an abandoned subway tunnel.

Monster and I were staying with some friends in a big city who lived in an apt that was underneath a tram and it was cool to hear the noises of the tram that ran overhead. That part isn't really integral to the rest of the plot of the dream, but it was still cool.

Monster was still a kitty but somehow she and I could understand each other. Its not like she talked or anything, but it was like somehow when she or I thought something, the other knew and we were friends instead of cat and cat owner, if that makes sense?

Anyway, these flamingos met us and told us that if we followed them down to meet their king, he would give us presents and grant us wishes, etc., but the King Flamingo lived down in these series of caves underneath the city and we had to follow them to where he was. So Monster and I started walking through the caves to the king flamingo and for some reason I was like 'w/e, i'm gonna go back, this is dumb, ' so I turned around and went back, but when I was back at the apt, I felt bad because Monster was there all alone and I knew that probably the flamingo minions were not telling us the truth about everything and she was in danger. So after a while, I headed back to the under-city caves and hurried to catch up with her.

So finally I did and then we entered the chamber where the king flamingo lived and he was giant, like sorta raptosaurus big, and he had teeth in his beak and I knew he was evil and that we'd been brought here to be his dinner. So I struck first. I attacked the king flamingo, placing a choke hold around his neck strangling him. He fought and tried to bite at me with his big toothy beak, but he couldn't reach me. The minion flamingos for some reason weren't helping the king, and finally he died when I stabbed him under his jaw with a pen or knife.

Monster and I stood there for a moment wondering why the minions weren't coming after us, but we decided it was best if we took off and got back to the city main level, so we left and went back to the apt and the original flamingos that led us through the caves showed up and gave us tshirts with flamingo icons on the front.

Courage

From wikipedia:
Courage, also known as bravery and fortitude, is the ability to confront fear, pain, danger, uncertainty or intimidation.

Since I read this definition, I've had problems with it, but didn't understand until last night what it was. Any definition should answer who, what, where, when, why and how.

Who is the person is doing the act (or not)
What is the ability to confront ....
Where is anywhere the person is tested
When is anytime the person is tested
How is the method with which they confronted x

But the definition doesn't address the 'why'

I think the why is that the person who is being tested by having to face something frightening has to have a hope that something of equal or greater value to the fear/pain/risk of loss might come as a result.

The main bulk of terrorists do "courageous" things (courageous in the sense that they are taking their bomb laden selves to certain death) because they feel that the result of the act will be something of greater value than their life, namely a place of honor in an afterlife or in history. That says to me that the key to stopping them from commiting these acts is not by making them fear death (a thing they've already come to terms with) or making them ashamed to cause their country to be destroyed by war (again this reality to them is not what matters), but the key to stopping them is to chisel at that hope that their acts will be looked upon with favor by God and history. By creating doubt of the result, you take away the foundation of the courage.

Today I turned in the notarized form 2 of 3 of the divorce papers that James signed. It was so far the hardest part. This divorce is painful and has caused me to lose something incredibly precious to me, but I have done it with the hope that from this, I will become someone who doesn't hope to not wake up in the morning. In a way this courageousness is closely resembling desperation. Did the Greeks remember to dream up a god of desperation when they defined the goddess, Fortitudo? They should be twins.

Happy Birthday G!!

Happy Birthday beautiful Gloria. I hope you have a perfect day today.

Nelson 5k

I beat my Chuy's time by 4 minutes. I haven't until now been able to beat it. I did the Nelson 5k in 28 mins and Katherine gave me some huge tips after the race of how to run better, so I get to practice that probably tomorrow :D

ROBOSAURUS OMG!

Tonight I went to the Robosaurus event at the Alamo Drafthouse. Robosaurus is a 60ft tall car eating dinosaur/robot. It was raining and umbrellas were not allowed, but it was still awesome and worth sitting in the rain.

Robosaurus preparing to eat the car. The cars were smashed and literally torn in half before he was done with them.

He's clearly worried about the advent of Robosaurus and his ilk beginning to populate our city.

This is me, rained on. Jess from work saw me, and I sat near him and his girlfriend in the stadium seats. I told Jess he is not allowed to tell anyone I was there because I've been decorating IT with transformers and I don't want anyone to make the connection about where they're coming from.

And yes, he even breathed fire.

More Pics from my Atlanta Trip

I left Austin and arrived in Houston late and missed my connecting flight to Atlanta by only a few minutes. I'd thought I had a good chance of making it to my flight even though it was a mile from the arriving terminal to the departing terminal, a train ride, and then another 1/2 mile run, but no go. But I thought it was ok because even if I had made it, my bags probably wouldn't so the delay would be good because I'd have my bags.

I was wrong.

Even though my bags had an extra 2.5 hours to make my rescheduled flight, they did not arrive in Atlanta with me, so when I got to Atlanta, I booked a room near the airport and scheduled to pick up my bags the next day. When I got to the room I didn't have power cords, sundries, toothbrush/paste, socks or anything and I was going to figure out where a Super Walmart was and buy some, but when I called Mero and told him where I was staying he said "where are you? Lock your doors" So I went to Walmart in the morning.

But this 1/2 day delay due to my bags meant I wouldn't be arriving in Hagen early enough to go to Savannah with Jaeda as I'd scheduled, but it was ok. By the time I did arrive in Hagen, it was dinnertime so we went to dinner and watched movies the rest of the night. Fennec and Kalus argued with each other most of the time and it was entertaining to listen to.

Grits!

I'd never had grits before and I figured it was appropriate to eat grits for the first time in Georgia. In addition to making me grits for breakfast, she made sausage, bacon, eggs, and toast. And when I finished my meal, she wanted to know why I wasn't eating more. It was crazy.

This is Jaeda. She's beautiful and doesn't know it.

This is Fennec and Kaluschan, Jaeda's sons. They were entertaining. I asked Fennec when I got there if he was going to teach me any more dirty words like he liked to shock me with on the game and he blushed, looked away, and said no.

Inside a Giant Alien

This is the Marriott downtown in Atlanta. I didn't stay there, but I was taken to see it. I think it looks like the inside of a giant alien.