I know how to do some things...

...things you only imagine. I could tell you what sorts of things they are, but I'm not going to, and I'll tell you why. It's not because they don't have words. They do, and if I used those words, you would understand the sort of things I was talking about. The problem, though, is that I have a very particular - pure, even - connection with what I know how do to. If I put words to these things and show them to you, you'll muddy them, and that's no good. I want to spend time with my pure things, and I don't need you to know what those things are to enjoy them. I'll just love them here on my own. Thanks.

I don't know if that really happened...

There's a game I play online. It's entirely text-based. I like it perhaps a little too much. In it, there are six major organizations: four cities and two forests. I have a character in every one of these places. The most recent one is in the "dark forest," in a guild of druids who praise the spirit of Crow. Crow has four "Aspects:" Blood Thirst, Black Sorrow, False Memory and Dark Spirit. For an advancement task, my character wrote about one of them:

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CONSIDERATIONS ON FALSE MEMORY

Of the four Aspects of Brother Crow: Blood Thirst, Black Sorrow, False

Memory and Dark Spirit, False Memory captivates me the most. The

significance of the Aspect is that everything in Crow's past is

wonderful; no ill has every come of His actions. False Memory tells us

we are able to re-write our histories to fit our perfection, a

perfection born from serving the Glomdoring.

Of course this is indisputable. However, False Memory, as all Aspects,

may be interpreted differently among individuals. Crow, a known

trickster, is able to alter His past, so banishing any semblance of

weakness or wrongdoing. What memory is false here? Perhaps it is that

Crow conjures successes to cast away His failings. A trickster such as

He will happily insert tales of greatness into a checkered past, some of

which may not be true. He floods the world with False Memory painting

Him in a superior light.

I disagree. I believe that the failings are the faulty recollections. I

cannot accept that Crow, beholder of the pure Dark Spirit, could ever

have been a futile creature in any respect. Rather than swarming the

past with False Memory to cowardly disguise, Crow instead purges False

Memory from record, expunging unfounded accusations of imperfection.

There are many slanderous claims issued towards Crow from around the

Basin; there are many who claim Crow to be an inferior and menial force.

By the power of His Black Sorrow Crow recognizes these claims as the

result of a fear of Him, and of envy. In hopes of disfiguring the beauty

they cannot themselves achieve, they bombard Crow with tales of

ineptitude and loss. These comprise the False Memory Crow faces, and

thus it is His foes who rely on deception in order to serve their

purposes.

Because of Crow's perfection, His foes struggle to invent condemnations.

Much of what they say, then, rests upon the the changes in Crow's life

and work. They distinguish change as admittance of a past mistake, be it

a mistake in means, methodology or pursuit. This is fool's logic. Crow,

with Blood Thirst thriving within Him, works diligently towards His

goals; at every turn He executes carefully calculated actions that bring

Him nearer to His infinite, ultimate end. A change in means is to be

expected as the world shifts. A change in methodology is applied

precision, whereby Crow aptly deals with situations individually. A

change in pursuit does not exist for Crow; it is His foolish desecrators

who mistake short-term goals with the long-term goals He flies towards.

Thus, a blind outsider might think Crow changes, might think Crow has

been wrong in the past. In fact He is never wrong. He simply does what

is needed when it needs doing, even if what He does resembles a fault in

the eyes of the ignorant.

Some may think to disarm this argument by mentioning Crow's renown for

playing tricks. "False Memory is only deception," they demand, "for Crow

knows only how to lie." What they do not understand is that Crow is

playing the tricks, not relying on them like some crutch for the weak.

Crow's games are for His amusement and pleasure; they are a ridicule of

those slander-spewers who do lean upon deceit to get by. His trickery is

His pleasant respite in His continual efforts, and by no means is it a

sign of weakness. Crow has no weakness, and any indication of such is a

False Memory, requiring dispelling.

Praise be to Brother Crow.

How to build a flower

So a few weeks ago, my grandparents invited me to dinner. My grandfather called me up one day and invited me for food the next day. Now, every time we get together, there's somebody else there. Every time they invite me over, my aunt or cousin or uncle or great aunt or great uncle or some friends of theirs or some combination thereof will also be there, making it a group event, and keeping me from just spending time with my grandparents. I've actually once tried to spend time with just them--it was the first time I called and asked to come over. When I got there, my great aunt and uncle were there. I didn't mind so much, because I like them a lot, and I don't know dinner with just my grandparents would be (potentially a little awkward). When I got the call the other week, though, my grandfather very specifically mentioned "there's no lineup of people; it'll be just us the three of us." I was looking forward to it, out of curiosity, largely.

When I got there, we spent a little time watching Olympic coverage, and then I was told we were going out to a restaurant to meet some friend of theirs. I wasn't surprised, really. We were going to an Italian Place in Mountain View called Frankie, Johnnie And Luigi, Too!. We were to be dining with a couple: Bob and Antoinette, along with a man who apparently is simply called "The Doc." I was really looking forward to meeting this guy. When we got to the restaurant, my expectations about the man with the mysterious appellation. He was a white-haired shorter, older man hunched over a can, wearing thick-rimmed glasses and inspecting things with a fittingly somewhat evil-looking appraisal, especially when he was having trouble hearing something. It turns out he was really nice, as with everybody there.

After we had some nice delicious dinner (I had chicken fettuccine alfredo), we were sitting around chatting in our nice little corner booth. When we got there, the place was crowded, but by the time we were finished eating, it was pretty much cleared. While we were idling, I did what I usually do at restaurants: make a flower from a napkin. It's something I learned a long time ago in a book called "The Giant Book of Sneaky Feats," which is very literally a book teaching the reader how to be a show-off. From it, I also learned how to slice a banana without disturbing the peel.

I had had some dessert, and as a result, I had an ornate glass goblet, on which I placed my flower. That's the furthest I usually go. This time, though, I had Antoinette encourage me to continue on. The final product was pleasing to me. We happened to have a sugar cube from somebody's coffee order, and also some cherry stems from my ice cream. While we were waiting to be seated, I knocked a toothpick from the holder, and stuck it in my pocket, so I had that to carve a little hole into the sugar cube, into which I stuck the cherry stems. I set that on the flower and sprinkled some yellow pepper flakes over the result, giving me the best restaurant flower I've ever made. Whee.