Translated from iguana hieroglyphics scratched into a log

"Yesterday, I almost made it to freedom. As one of the cannibals reached to grab me I made a decision to run for it. I leapt onto the cannibals face, and using the element of surprise, jumped to the plush cave floor. I scampered for the entrance to the cave but could not get out. Traveling further along the wall, I found many logs of various shapes and sizes, all of them with ample room for me to hide behind them. The cannibals hunted me down, but I was able to hide behind a very tall log where the cannibals could not reach me. One of the cannibals was very strong and pulled the log away from the cave wall. I darted past the door again and scampered under what what appeared to be a blue log. The strong cannibal lifted that as well and snatched me up for my daily soaking. I'm guessing my skin is too tough for them. I don't mind the water, but I am forced to take some type of pink liquid as well. I can only imagine it is something to fatten me up for their stew. Today I sit waiting, ready to try my escape once again."


I hope everyone has a good weekend. Tomorrow night we will head over to Starkville for a Cowboy Mouth show. This is the first of 4 shows over the next month. I can use the relief. I never knew how stressful adding a new pet to the mix could be. Plus, my geometry class just took a turn for the worse. I have very little clue what we are doing so I'm starting to panic. My professor is busy this weekend preparing for a high school math competition here at UA, so I can't talk to him until Monday. I'm going to get rid of the negative energy and have a good time, if just for one night. For your enjoyment, here's a live version of So Sad About Me from All You Need Is Live.

Here's yet another reason to hate Bush. Who thought he was the best person to run this country? I just shake my head in disbelief.

Poor little Aztec has a sore on his front leg. It looks as if a molting didn't finish properly and caused an abscess. At least that's what the vet told me during the five and a half hours I spent at the vet Friday and Saturday. Every day, he has to soak for 15 minutes, take some medicine and then have ointment rubbed over his wound. Needless to say, he is not a happy camper, but he is a trooper. He has gotten used to his habitat, but is still scared of people. Getting him out nightly for his medication is an event as he flicks his tail and runs around the cage. After removing him from the cage, he squirms a little and tries to run away making holding him like holding a fish out of water. No matter how many times I tell him that he doesn't taste like chicken, he's still afraid I'm going to take a bite out of him. He should be finished with the medication by next Wednesday at the latest. We will see what the vet says when I take him back for a check-up this weekend.

Taming Aztec is going to be extra challenging since every time he's taken out, he thinks it's time for medicine. I don't know how long it will take, but we hope eventually he will see us as parents and not cannibals.

A letter in The Crimson White on Monday as well as the reactions on the news recently forced me to address the Jena Six issue. The following is a comment I added to The Crimson White's web site. The original letter is here.

Ms. Deller,

I encourage you to follow your own advice and do some research on the subject (Jena Six).

The Crimson White is a college newspaper. The goal of a college newspaper is to provide news of local interest to the readership of the newspaper. If you notice about 80-85% of the paper is LOCAL news. And I don't mean local to Tuscaloosa, but local to the University. Typically, the font page stories are those that are of a major concern to students. While I think all the hubbub over a bar staying open one hour later one day of the week is a bit much considering it doesn't affect me, it is of concern to enough of the student body to be a front page story. Were the Crimson White a city paper, I have no doubt that there would be coverage. However, until recently, I doubt that the Jena Six incident was more than a small story buried somewhere in The Tuscaloosa News. I don't read that paper, so I could be wrong.

What I fail to see is why you insinuate that the teens being held in jail are innocent. They committed a crime. When a group of people consciously decide to attack a person and initiate that action, the crime is committed. Regardless of the race or ethnicity of the victim or the offenders, it is still a crime to beat someone up.

I think most people will agree that the nooses should not have been hung at the tree. But the people that did that were punished based on the offense. Hanging nooses is not a crime. The school reacted based on the offense. It was the group of teens who attacked another student that broke the law and must now face the consequences. Whether or not it was attempted murder can and will be debated in court, but at the very least, the teens are guilty of assault and conspiracy to harm another person.

While the whole incident is racially motivated, the punishment is based on the offense, not the race of the accused. The teens were not "fighting back against the systems of oppression and injustice" as you so eloquently stated in your letter Monday. There was no injustice in the punishment for people hanging nooses in a tree. While the act was offensive, it was not illegal. However, vigilante justice as a result of the offensive act is a crime and should be punished based on the severity of the crime.

Sunday, Erika and I became parents again, this time to a little green iguana. It will be a few years before we find out if it is a he or she but I decided to name it Aztec. I don't think that's a very feminine name, so hopefully it is a boy.

We have worked to make sure its living environment is perfect in every way, but this hasn't come without worries and stress. Perhaps I feel partially responsible for my previous iguana's death and want everything to be correct. Just the position of the light was a thoroughly researched and discussed issue last night as Aztec climbed up to the top of the cage to bask.

Aztec hadn't eaten anything (as far as we could tell) today. It looked like he hung out up near the light all day, so after dinner we tried to get him to eat something. We took him out of the cage and he squirmed a little, but eventually calmed down. I think he was just scared. After several minutes of trying to feed him by hand, I returned him to the cage, but sat him down in front of the food dish. He just stood there for a few minutes and grabbed a piece of food which lead to another piece of food and then another. And just like a parent, I was delighted the little guy ate. Although he shouldn't eat that late because it hinders digestion, I didn't mind.

I think the activity tired him out. He sprawled out and went to sleep soon after eating. We ended up turning out his lights early because he fell asleep under his branch. Here are a couple of pictures that Erika took yesterday after we brought him home.

It was nice having a weekend to relax after being swamped with office work and geometry homework. I got to enjoy some football and a movie. Surprisingly there was a movie out that I wanted to see, and it didn't suck though many "professional critics" disagree. That movie was Shoot Em Up, a ridiculously, over-the-top action movie. Maybe it was just because I had a busy week and needed something mind-numbing, but I thought Shoot Em Up was great. You can read all about in my review posted above.

Today I learned that it isn't appropriate to show a student's work to a class and discuss how it could be improved. It's not that I said the portfolio sucked, but just mentioned ways that it could be improved, and then showed another portfolio that demonstrated some of the ideas I mentioned. This really irritated me that people basically attacked my presentation while no one game me a clear idea of what I was to be presenting. On top of that, the teacher that is co-teaching a class with me thinks that I can't grade assignments on the same level that she does. While it would be logical to just have her grade one class and me another, she's worried our grading won't be consistent. I don't know why she's so scared. It's a one hour pass-fail class. If they do the work with a minimal amount of effort they should pass. No matter though, it's better than teaching at ITT.

Here's Supersonic from Voodoo Shoppe. It's an awesome bass song and is really pumping, a great song to start a weekend.

• Get up
  
• Play a little Zelda
  
• Go to Work
  
• Meetings, Workshops, Class (Tuesdays and Thursdays) - If I'm lucky I get more than a half hour for lunch and get to sit at my desk an hour or two
  
• Workout
  
• Eat Dinner
  
• Homework
  
• Hour of Calm Time before bed
  
• Sleep
  
• Do it Again.