a pat on my back

tonight i was sean (i.e., i was an offensive juggernaut). during our pregame soccer warm-ups, rebecca reported that sean was at home on the couch; the flu had transformed him into a miserable blob of snot. and after that chat, i knew that i had to serve honorably as his replacement; i had to let his legacy shine. and how better to remember sean then to score a goal? so i did (my first ever, i should add). and then i had an assist for our second goal of the night. whooohooo! unfortunately, the opposing team mounted a comeback during the second half, and we only managed a 2-2 tie, but there's still an itsy-bitsy chance that a tie will be enough to propel the WE PLAY BETTER ON GRASS into the title game.

gooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooaaaaaaaalll!

father of the s.o. "look out. here come the crazies." ocean shores, washington.

blood diamond

rating: 11 of 17

my roommate didn't bother to see this movie. he said that one diamond can never be that valuable. he then told me about diamond cutting and a fiery natural gas leak somewhere in the deserts of africa. after speaking with my roommate, i headed to the cinema and found that in addition to being fictitious, the diamond that propels the plot in blood diamond is pink but not sparkley. it looked like something you might find in my mom's rock collection. nonetheless, this stupid stone (and lesser pebble-like diamonds) sent characters careening across the screen with shovels, machetes, and machine guns. blood diamond reinforces this growing sense that despite my tendency to read big books or react to the world in a spirit of open-mindedness, i'm still an ignorant helpless american. i'm not a cnn-junkie or an activist--i had no idea that diamonds fueled death raids in sierra leone during the '90s. i hardly know how to spell sierra leone.

in the midst of it's ceaseless cruelty, blood diamond attempts to communicate hope and empowerment, but i walked away from the film in a psychiatric state of paralysis. films like blood diamond, hotel rwanda, and schindler's list make me feel helpless. i'm over here and they (substitute the victims of nearly any bloody current event) are over there. and there are too many over theres. perhaps i can deal with here--if that fictitious pink rock were my mother's and portland, a blood bath, yes, then i'd cry, take a side, demand justice--but how is a clueless english major to save the world?

really, it'd be much better if the world were on fire because of a natural gas leak. then i might have a chance. my roommate tells me that copper tools and explosives work best.

you can see other reviews on the left column of the blog. the 17 point scale reviews are marked by an exclamation mark (!). here's a link to a real review (christianity today):
11.blood diamond - brutal, bloody
and an addendum to this post:
http://the17pointscale.blogspot.com/2007/01/blood-diamond-addendum.html


andrew david. "smiling cause we're happy" somewhere in canada.

a blogging tutorial

i am told that as christianity struggles to remain relevant in a fast-paced, anything-goes culture, a new kind of church is rising from the empty pews of the mainline protestant denominations. it's a church that seeks to provoke thought and kiss off complacency. it's a postmodern or emergent church. the pastor may drink beer or vote democrat. the worshippers may sing hymns or play crashing guitars and accordions. and the church treasury may sign checks to support human rights groups, evangelists, or artists.

i happen to attend a church like this, and every winter we do our part to encourage the arts. members of the bethany community volunteer to teach classes to fellow church-goers or folks in the north seattle community. the classes--thai fusion cooking, card making, ts eliot poetry, digital photography, salsa dancing, cheese making, classical guitar, lectio divina, etc, etc, etc--are advertised throughout the community and occur in homes, coffeshops, and the church basement.

last year, beth the s.o. and mari (she doesn't yet have a 17 point scale deidentifying nickname) both taught several classes for the bethany arts college. this december they nobly approached me to see if i might also teach a class. i say nobly not because it's a strange funny-looking word but because my 2 year attendance at bethany community church has been nearly devoid of service. that is, i show up on sunday but give almost nothing of my time. i am a christian parasite (yikes!), and beth and mari's recruitment efforts may perhaps represent an unconscious attempt to reform me and precipitate some kind of evolutionary event in my soul.

"you could teach a class in blogging," they said.

besides my initial gut reaction--"that's nerdy"--and an overwhelming sense that a class on blogging would be very unfun, there would be something akin to hypocrisy if i were suddenly deemed master blogger. you see, here's what i would teach as the three most important keys to successful:

1. stay on topic. if you meander between discussions of books, sports, and religion, the bookworms, athletes, and clerics will usually look somewhere else for their blogging pleasure.
2. visit other blogs. post lots of comments on blogs that share a similar topic to your blog (notice that's a similar topic not similar topics). posting comments gives other surfers a link to follow back to your blog. and back-links are the secret to good position on google.
3. post briefly and post often. people will only return to your blog if they're confident that they can find new material.

now, how many of these tips do i follow? zero.

moreover, i am again considering a blogging hiatus. sean tells me this is a bad idea, but i'm worried that i spend to much time staring at my computer screen each evening. email, googling, blogging, uploading pictures to istock, checking sports scores....it's too much! and i haven't had much to say recently.

here are the last of my saskatchewan wedding photos.



unknown. "i'm too lazy to title these tonight, but that's nathan, andrew, beth, danny, and alison." shekinah, saskatchewan.

initiative measure 937 (i-937)

the 17 point scale endorses a no vote for initiative measure 937 (i-937)

what is i-937?
if passed, i-937 would impose new conservation guidelines on utilities in washington state. i-937 is a statewide initiative.

i-937 would encourage utilities to explore renewable energy sources like wind. more particularly, by 2012 three percent of all utility energy would have to be from renewable sources; by 2020, fifteen percent.

sounds good, right? why a no vote?

get this: "examples of eligible renewable resources include wind farms, solar panels, and geothermal plants. with limited exceptions, use of fresh water by hydroelectric dams and plants is not included as an eligible renewable resource." now, according to the energy information administration (apparently the home of "official energy statistics from the US government"), water is a renewable resource--it's cheap, doesn't burn fossil fuels, doesn't create pollution, and, as far as i can tell, it doesn't usually dry up--so the exclusion of hydroelectricity seems strange.

the proponents of i-937 argue that similar methods have been successful in 20 other states. i'm happy for those states, but the comparison isn't apt. washington state is unique. for example, utilities in the united states provide the majority of their energy from coal (48%) and only 8% from hydroelectric sources; in contrast, puget sound energy (like other washington state utilities) provides the majority of its energy from hydroelectricity (42%; pse stats courtesy of earthshare of washington; other sources have said that more 60% of washington state energy comes from hydroelectricity). in other words, other states (a) at baseline are depending far more on non-renewable resources than washington state and (b) it seems that washington state has a huge advantage in the availability of a renewable resource. i think it would make more sense to play to our strengths.

anecdotally, i recently met a dude from portland. as i was teasing him about the shrinking size of his wallet due to higher rent in seattle, he said that it's all balanced out because of the utilities. "what?" i asked. "yeah, the utilities are half the cost--maybe a third--of portland utilities. it's cause of the hydroelectricity...."

in closing, i tend to agree with opponents of i-937: this initiative could result in the sale of our cheaper columbia river energy to california while we fulfill our needs with other more expensive foms of renewable energy. if they revamped this measure to include hydroelectricity i'd be all for it!

andrew david. "buy a honda; they're don't necessarily use renewable energy, but they get good gas mileage" blackfeet nation bison reserve, mt.

additional info for i-91:
i-91 is a seattle-only initiative. if you're voting yes on i-91, see thurday's blog. if you're still voting yes, don't do it because of the following two reasons: (a) the sonics gouge their fans; only middle to high income fans can afford games; or (b) the sonics suck; who cares if they leave?

(a) you obviously haven't gone to a game in a while. cheap sonics tickets (with a good view) cost the same as a movie. it's $10 to see a game at the key. now, if you try to eat at the key, that's a different story. but come on, that's what dicks is for.

(b) they may be 0-2 but as of 7:05pm it looks like they might start changing their losing ways. they're currently leading the lakers 45-38. but even if they lose (and keep losing), sports are cyclical. the mariners sucked for twenty years before 1995 and 2001. now they may stink for another twenty years. therefore, the value of a team to community should not be measured based on it's record.

happy halloween

here's an update of what's in the works for upcoming 17 point scale posts:

1. a conclusion to the ongoing saga of the other andrew; in this post i will finally address the original topic that rallied so much support among my unfortunate readers;
2. the launch of a new grammar oriented feature;
3. a book review blurb for image update (james perry walker's the reverend);
3. the official 17 point scale endorsements for the november 7th elections. i doubt i'll endorse any candidates, but i'll take a stab at some of the initiatives. (by the way, both the times and the pi endorse a no vote on the evil i-91. as expected, the stranger endorsed a yes, but surprisingly, it's a luke-warm yes that is nuanced with a realization that i-91 is an 'angry,' 'nasty' initiative that could prove deterimental to the city. but i'm getting ahead of myself. i'll explain why we must vote no on i-91 in a later post....);
4. a masterpiece post that i've been working on for a long time but may not finish for another few months;
5. a return to the sequential presentation of my pictures rather than a blatterskatch method that i've been using for the last month. blogger still isn't working for me, but flickr seems to do the job okay;
6. something else that i forgot....


andrew david. "lunch & the s.o." somewhere, mt (day 2).
312 to go.

enya makes everything poignant

alright, i'll admit it, i'm a closet enya fan.

some people use enya like ice cream or bubble baths. after a stressful day at work, they slip shepherd moons into the cd player and let enya do her magic. for others enya is something of a thought elixer. like inspirational gregorian chant, the peaceful pleasant chords melt into the background and help thoughts to crystallize.

however, i tend to associate enya with boxer briefs. at the sound of that simple perfect voice, i think back to my college roommate. he'd perch his battering ram of a cd player on the bathroom sink near the shower and then chant right along as he showered. then, clothed in nothing but fruit of the loom, he'd hit the books--our room was an academic enya sanctuary.

as i listen to enya again, it's funny for a moment, but enya is mightier than my laughter. she is more powerful than underwear. she somehow endues everything with meaning. the ridiculous yet entirely reasonable antics of my roommate are suddenly a puzzle piece in the journey of life. a brief subway ride with beth, jacinda, and matt (see below) is an elysian image of earthly romance. my roommate's boxer briefs are somehow a symbol of our human fraility. have i gone crazy? maybe, but blame enya....

jacinda basinger. "elysian romance 1, 2, & 3" nyc, ny.

seattle needs help

last weekend beth and i joined nathan, telia, steve, and trisha at the nurmi cottage on cypress island. it was a lazy weekend. we soaked in the fire-fed hot tub, tempted deer with wheat bread, and ventured guesses about the upcoming seahawks season. and, between us two teachers, one engineer, one editor, one mfa coordinator, and one divinity student turned environmental conservationist, we solved the problems of life: the middle east, the education system, the schism between catholics and lutherans--easy as pie.

unfortunately, our informal council met one week too early. on tuesday, seattle sonics owner (or former owner) howard schultz announced the sale of the seattle super sonics to oklahoma entrepreneur clayton bennet. the general consensus is that this will spell the end of seattle basketball. despite promising seattle a one-year window for negotiating a new lease deal, bennet is well-known for his attempts at wrangling oklahoma city an nba team. pundits guess that clay's rhetoric is most likely a laundry list of sugar-coated lies. so, how to mend chasm between (new) sonics ownership and our tight-fisted seattle council? if only we could convene an emergency session of the cypress island sextet.

okay, this is a bit over dramatic, but to a sports fan, the loss of a home team is a little like the death of a friend. in some (shallow) way it's even worse -- few feel sympathetic for a fan and his (or her) dearly departed sports team, especially in seattle.

i really don't belong here. seattle is a fine city for liberals and zombies, but i'm neither liberal nor zombie. well, perhaps a liberal conservative, but definitely not a zombie. sorry, i should use that 'z' term with more discretion, but i'm a bit overcome by the strength of the anti-sonics. it seems that everywhere i surf, people are shouting 'good riddance!' they sputter the same million dollar logic back at one another, the same nonsense about pro-athlete salaries (yes, a million-a-month is absurd, but protesting dwyane wade's contract is a bit like telling the sun to go down), and the same complaints about the win-loss record. and the funny thing is, i might just be a zombie after all--i really can't shout back. their logic is hardly foolproof, but i'm too stunned to fight. i can't believe they don't care like i do.

i guess we're all zombies in one way or another, but it's funny that i never noticed. why is it that five guys in baggy shorts and tank tops can engineer such ardor? aurora has a prostitution problem, why am i not bothered that everyone just pretends that all is well? as a christian, shouldn't i be bothered by the fact that seattle has one of the lowest church attendance rates in the country? what is it about those guys in green? what does this say about me?

i'm not sure how to answer my questions. as usual, i'll have to think about it. in the meantime, i'll let you read a form letter from the man that's the most important of all of the anti-sonic zombies, city council president nick licata. if you don't recall, he's the man that once proclaimed the sonics to be of no cultural value AT ALL to seattle. anyway, he was kind enough to reply to my email.

and for you one or two folks that share the sonics sadness, here's a site that's attempting to garner support for a sonics future in seattle (or bellevue).



andrew david and mystery employee. "ess-a-bagel bill" nyc, ny. at first bill seemed like your stereotypical new yorker--gruff, and sarcastic. but then a delightful sweetness broke through his rough exterior. in fact, i bet he's a closet seattle sonics fan. anyway, he wanted us to take the 2nd picture and then send it to him. i'm still working on that last part...

an update on (some of the) craziness

good news, i found some corroborative evidence for yesterday's post. the bentleys are indeed making a cross-country trek (there are some cool pictures too). and, from the looks of things, paul seems lucid. mark (my roommate, friend of jed), had me thinking that paul's 'west nile virus' had progressed to the more advanced stages, including severe inflammation of the brain and a resulting semi-stupor.

now, speaking of brain inflammation, check out this "cold telephone" poetry--the first one's a mind-bender, but the cartoon haikus are a bit clearer (and funnier, and darker). just in case you're lazy and don't like clicking links, here's a sample (and please excuse the objectionable content, it's not mine...):

mickey mouse
my face is frozen.
i look excited when i
piss myself. i hurt.

ummm...so why the sudden interest in strange poetry from other blogs? well, if my google sleuthing is still spot-on, then i suspect that "mickey mouse" and cold telephones is the resting place of my childhood friend pj's 2003 poetry. and, in case you failed to commit sentence four of yesterday's post to memory, pj happens to be the son of the crazy (yet not entirely taken over by the mind plague of the west nile) wandering bentleys.

here's some more wanderers:

andrew david, andrew david, and beth the s.o. "romeo and juliet" central park, ny.

is it bad taste to speak lightly of an illness like the west nile virus? especially if paul actually had the virus? and what about 'haikus'? isn't that an odd plural word. it doesn't really work. you lose the ooh. i'm tempted to say "hi, cuz, long time no see." and, speaking of japanese poetry, i continue to despise photoshop (but not enough to convert to gimp--sorry, mark). it took hours and hours of wasted time to isolate the statue in that center picture. so the least that you could do to make my time seem a bit more valuable is to check out his left hand. is romeo being a bit naughty? actually, now that i look at it again...i think that's juliet's hand....okay, enough rambling....

no more free movies

i'm sad to report that my trial period of blockbuster online expires on july 10th. that means no more free movies. but perhaps 'free' isn't the way to go with rentals. that is, i've watched a string of rather disappointing films (listed in order of preference with commentary and approximate 17 point scale rating in parentheses):

1. munich (10 - long; i feel like the film tried to do too much)
2. searching for the wrong-eyed jesus (11 - quirky; this rating is a bit like a blind dart toss toward a bull's eye--i don't exist in a context where the film makes any sense. the film is a documentary of the south that lacks a formal narrative. while it may be particularly fitting that the characters wander in and out of the story, i had difficulty finding the cohesive themes that make the moments relevant. i expect that my rating would improve with a second viewing or after reading some more flannery o'connor)
3. brokeback mountain (10 - i think the movie had some some poignant moments that rescue it from mediocrity, but i really felt the movie was waaaaaaaay tooooooo lonnnnnnng. however realistic it may be to have your lead actors drawl slowly back at one another, it makes for some boring cinema. i'm also surprised that the director couldn't capture the scenery in a more moving fashion. beth and i recently traveled through brokeback territory, and i kinda' feel that any amateur photographer could get the same shots as brokeback's director: it just was never stunning like films 2, 4, and 5 from this list. the renowned film critic sean meichle has argued, to the director's credit, that this may have been a deliberate mirroring of the depressing tale which brokeback mtn encapsulates. still, if you're not going to entertain me with a moving plot, give me something to look at! alas, i find myself thinking that brokeback may be an important film that is unfortunately mostly hype. i could say more, but this was supposed to be brief...)
4. dandelion (9 - strange characters, disjointed plot, pretty flowers. the film is a big blubbery ball of awkwardness. i know i'm falling into the "intentional fallacy," but if the film's awkwardness was unintentional, i feel that it deserves a 5. if it was intentional, an 11 may be more fitting)
5. new world (5 - beautiful scenery, cliche in its attempt to be uncliche, long, boring; beth and i gave up half way through)

if you don't care much about plot, i heartily recommend the last four films. despite my disparaging comments about brokeback, each of these films takes a national geographic-like approach to cinematography. there are beautiful scenes from the backwaters and byways of the south, the rocky mountains, the rolling hills of idaho, and coastal virginia. the problem is just that i wasn't planning on watching the travel channel.

speaking of beautiful scenery, here are some pictures of my puerto vallarta travel companions:


andrew david "girls" puerto vallarta, mexico.

to my bored reader(s) and neighborhood thieves

i recently received some blunt criticism regarding the 17 point scale. a loyal reader frowned and said "your blog hasn't been very good lately." and that's it. no request for expanded seahawks coverage or spicier cooking tips. no call to cut out the photography. not a mention of how i might ammend my errant ways. well, what the crap do you want me to write about?

and speaking of crap, why would someone steal a tent pole from my backyard? thanks for leaving the tent, but what are you going to do with a single tent pole?

oh, and has anyone seen my headlamp? in any case, i'm leaving for saskatchewan on thursday--with or without my tent pole (and head lamp). thus, i won't be posting until i return next week.


andrew david. "the rejects 2: hand jive; our casa complex; a fence; the way; untitled #43" yelapa, mexico.

the colors in 'our casa complex' are not digitally altered. i don't know where the greenness came from...

'untitled #43' was a picture that i really liked. i played with it for awhile, but i couldn't find a good crop. another interesting idea that just didn't work...

google searches & house tour

my cyberpet, the statcounter, attempts to track how many people visit my blog and their method of doing so. during the last 100 visits, there were 5 visitors who arrived by google and 2 by yahoo. here are their queries:

	4 visits	36.36%	the 17 point scale
	2 visits	18.18%	http://the17pointscale.blogspot.com
	1 visits	9.09%	interracial photo sessions
	1 visits	9.09%	failed blog
	1 visits	9.09%	god laughs and plays
	1 visits	9.09%	lekkerman
	1 visits	9.09%	history of church on yelapa

failed blog! hah. i have no interracial photo sessions to share, so i thought i'd share another little chunk of my mexico photos instead. by the way, after a few months worth of posts, i'm finally nearing the end of the good photos from that trip. anyway, here's a tour of our $95 accomodations in yelapa (that's right, only $95 bucks! crazy ridiculous good deal; in case you're wondering, this is at casa isabel):


a view from beth's bed; a view of beth, angie, and our front porch; a view of beth's bed and the kitchen from my bed


a view of of beth, the kitchen, and some ladders to the girls' rooms; angie's bed; the bathroom sitting room

my bed and views from my bed
the shower (well, kinda')
the bathroom (kinda)

a pg-13 post [3]

[previously on the 17 point scale]
then, momentarily satisfied, it slithers to the synapse machine and taps out a quick command to the rest of the brain: n-o-s-t-a-l-g-i-a. beth sighs...

[not the conclusion of a pg-13 post]
something about this house seems familiar, and not in an everyday-my-boyfriend-lives-here-so-i-make-occasional-yet-obligatory-visits kind of way.
despite a blizzard of memory calisthenics, she can't quite place it. stepping over some obituaries and a front page or two, beth makes her way to my couch.

i greet her with a kiss, coke zero, and grilled cheese sandwich. “that was some sigh,” i say. and it was, but let's face it, i'm a guy: my mind is about a million miles from everything but that kiss.

it was a little like kissing an elf. don't laugh, i don't mean a cuddly holiday elf. beth might look stunning in leotards and a floppy green hat, and her will ferrellian enthusiasm for christmas is legendary, but there wasn't even a hint of peppermint mocha on her breath. no, this was an altogether different kind of elf. this was a salt-sniffing, sea-dreaming elf.

beth snaps open her coke....

[to be continued...]


andrew david. 'an elf and some arches' puerto vallarta, mexico.

Seahawks 20, Redskins 10

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1. andrew david 'Girl with a Blue Blanket' DC3 parking lot (Seattle) -- alex scrounged up a nice, free parking space for us.
2. andrew/beth the s.o. 'Qwest Field' Seattle -- obviously the pic's a bit dark. i think i took this, but beth might disagree. for the remainder of the pics, i will write 'andrew/beth' for pictures of where the photographer is uncertain.
3. beth the s.o. 'Seahawk Couple' Seattle -- yep.
4. beth the s.o. 'Cheer' Seattle -- actually, someone out there in real space deserves some credit. i'm not sure if its nathan, jonathan, danny, or steve; but somebody gave me the football bug. and without them, these pictures would have never been possible (whether i'm implying that without my fanship the seahawks would have suffered yet another playoff loss or that i simply wouldn't have been at this game, you can't be sure).
5. andrew/beth the s.o. 'Some Dude' Seattle -- this is beth's favorite pic game pic. there's another pic (not shown) of him using his cell phone as a camera or a lifeline to a fellow hawks fan; can't be sure, there were some scary moments early in the game.
6. andrew david 'Out of Focus Scream' Seattle -- this was her first NFL game, but hopefully not her last. in fact, she didn't even browse through one of her magazines during the game.
7. andrew david '12th (WO) Man' Seattle -- i'm still amazed that she scrounged up these tickets. thanks mary!
8. andrew david 'An Action Shot' Seattle -- i forgot that i can digitally zoom these photos once back at the computer. therefore, i didn't think to take many pictures of the actual game. besides, its difficult to watch, cheer, and take photos at the same time.
9. beth the s.o. 'Rag Time' Seattle -- my voice is still hoarse from that game...
10. andrew/beth the s.o. 'Victory Mob' Seattle -- yes!
11. andrew david 'Fworks' Seattle -- detroit here we come! (almost)
12. beth the s.o. 'Victory Smoke' Seattle -- whoohooo!