Welcome Back to the Land of the Livin'... Now Pick Up a Shovel and Get Digging!

Fact: I have two big work-related projects to do, which will require a lot of work and focus, and will yield satisfying financial results.

Fact: I am thrilled to get the work and look forward to performing the tasks.

Fact: I had almost a full day today to get to either one.

Fact: I did squat.

Fact: I am lazy and lack adequate self control and self discipline.

Honestly, I blame Havah. :D I have to! She "invited" me to play some of the mindless games that she's hooked on over on Facebook, and I figured "why not?" and gave a couple a try. Now I'm likewise hooked. Now when I try to work, I hear the siren call... ok, I know I can't blame Havah, I'm sorry. I have to assume full responsibility. But it was such a beautiful southern California day today! I couldn't just spend the day cooped up in my office working! So I spent the day cooped up in my office playing mindless games instead! To recap, it is vital that you stay in your homes!

OK, that's not all I did. We went to a baby shower this afternoon for one of the young ladies at church. The wife and I are both social minimalists, but for different reasons. I like everyone, but I'm inexplicably uncomfortable in crowds, so I get antsy and want to split. Wifey has a small handful of people whose company she prefers; that's just the way she's wired. She'll gravitate toward her group, visit for a bit, and be ready to split as well. So we put in an appearance, ate some great filipino food, visited for a pair of hours, then came home. Saw a lot of the blog regulars there in person, which is always nice. Abbie, Rebekah, Shannon, Jayson, Grace, Keno, among many others.

Whoops, getting too verbose, better throw in a Funny Picture to loosen things up...


Sorry, my archive of Funny Pictures is getting really low... not much left that will crack a smile even... I had to put a White Ninja comic instead...

Hey, I have a surprise book review for you! Before diving into the final Mistborn book, I decided to read a small book from my library that I recently got back from my sweet mommy, to whom I had loaned it a ways back...

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A Review: The Girl with the White Flag, by Tomiko Higa

The Battle for Okinawa in WW2 was an incredibly devastating and brutal protracted battle, made doubly horrible by the fact that there were over a quarter million civilians living on the island, unable to flee, as 100,000+ Japanese soldiers defended the island against the largest amphibious assault of the Pacific campaign. The battle took 3 months and killed over 220,000 people (140,000 civilians, 66,000 Japanese soldiers, 12,500 Allied troops), with many times that wounded.

One such civilian family were the Matsukawas, descended from a line of Samurai from back in the day, living in Shuri. The youngest child of this family was 6 year old Tomiko, the eventual author of this book, which chronicles her attempts to survive the battle, separated from her family and alone, for the three months the battle took. Often walking around in the midst of the battle itself, bullets flying and bombs dropping, trying desperately to find a safe place to hole up, to rest, to scavenge food, to survive in the "every man for himself" chaos of the battle, the account is stirring, to say the least.

The book is written in the simple, clean style of one for whom English is not the primary language, augmented (I'm sure) by the author's desire to tell a clear, unambiguous story. The simple, effective style is likely the main reason why this book is classified Young Adult, in spite of the often harrowing content. I don't know how to explain what I want to say... I keep starting and erasing this sentence... lemme try again... the book strikes me as the logical fleshing-out of very old, but vivid, impressions and emotional snapshots. The author was six at the time, and didn't write the book - or even tell anyone about her experiences - until the late nineteen-eighties, when the photographs of her as a child holding the white flag on the day of the surrender surfaced, with someone else claiming it was them in the picture. Tomiko was put out, to say the least, that someone else would dare to do such a thing, and resolved to set the record straight, if only for her own sanity.

That's 40+ years after the fact... I can barely remember things that happened last year, much less from when I was six, and she recounts conversations that took place, feelings she had, things she ate and how they tasted, places she hid... I suppose, if circumstances are traumatic enough, they will leave vivid, long-lasting impressions for some. This must be the case for this author; how she can recall the details of her weeks alone as a 6 year old is stunning to me. Just because I can't remember what I was wearing yesterday doesn't mean someone else can't remember 40-year-old childhood conversations from random encounters, etc.

But I digress. The book is brief - barely 125 pages long, and a quick read. I finished it in two sittings, over about 3 hours. Just because it's a quick read doesn't mean it won't take the breath out of you, and make you long for the day when war and death and extreme suffering will cease for good. Kids shouldn't have to experience things like Tomiko did. No one should, but kids especially. It's no wonder she kept her story buried for so long.

Summary: Strongly Recommended 5/5

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And now, this...

Gooooaalll!!!!! I'm curious how he was able to get to the ball... and how he was able to run around celebrating afterward... you'd think he would have been tackled and dog piled. Must have been a really boring game... stay conscious... you're going into shock...

I have nothing left for today. Nothing. At. All. It's nice to see that you've all bonded through this disaster...

Until tomorrow, remember, that was longer than a heartbeat.