I can't say I watched much of today's commemorative coverage, and really I've felt disconnected to the whole 10th anniversary thing. It's not an emotional thing - I made my peace with what happened a long time ago - and it's not necessarily a reaction to the amount or tone of coverage, as I expected the coverage to be (a) voluminous and (b) occasionally to often over the top. I will say that what I did see was tastefully done, so thanks to all who were responsible for that.

So how to explain my disconnect? I think it comes from a place where I just want us to move on. I know it's ridiculous to feel this way on what is one of those hallmark anniversary dates, but I can't quite get past the idea that, 10 years on, we should take what happened, draw whatever conclusions we can from it, and look to creating a future which will, hopefully, allow us to avoid a repeat of the past.

It's entirely appropriate for people to be emotional and want to look back, but I have no interest in sharing a "do you remember where you were when you heard" sort of story. I want us to realize we have something great here, and that we need to do what we can - in a sensible and forward-thinking way - to preserve it. This isn't something we've always done over the last ten years, but I can hope that we'll do better over the next ten.

I suppose this gives short shrift to the people who died that day and their families, friends, and co-workers, and I don't intend that. I just like to think that we can take their examples and live with them every day, drawing strength from them even when the tendency is there to wallow in the negative. But I know that days like today are going to be reflective and often involve tears, and I hope that helps people get through the day. But I also hope that we can get through all of the days by remembering who we are and the examples of the people who died in the hopes of letting us keep being who we are.

Over a month since my last post? Whoops. Not dead, just pining for the fjords. More later.

So here we are on the first day of 2011, and I have but one resolution to pass along, and it's fitting to announce it in this location. My resolution is to have more posts here that aren't book related. This thing has become about 85 percent book logs, 14 percent Lent stuff, and one percent everything else. I'd like to go back to the way things were when I started this thing almost ten years (!) ago, at least in the breadth of topics if not style.

Not sure why I've become less prone to write stuff here, but I'm going to blame Facebook. It's easy to dash off thoughts as status updates, and looking at past posts the timing seems about right. On the flip side, more people see my Facebook status updates than likely read this, so perhaps I should be more interested in linking this to Facebook. I did try this once, and didn't care for how it dumped a bunch of older posts in, resulting in scores of updates related to "new" entries. So I think I'll just leave this separate for now, which will at least keep it away from the mercies of Mark Zuckerberg.

Quick housekeeping update. As you may have noticed, I finally got around to updating my links, as most of the people listed over there haven't written a new blog post in over a year. They've been replaced with links to some of the blogs that I read regularly, bringing me up to about 2006 in standard blog practice.

Anyway, your guide to the changes, as if you couldn't just click on the links to see what they're about:

538 is a political blog from the same people who bring us the Baseball Prospectus. As you'd expect, their main stock in trade is in applying quantitative analysis to elections and issues. The folks behind it are clearly to the left, but they're at least not of the shrieking, Michael Moore/Keith Olbermann school of discourse.

Adventures in Snack Canyon is a movie blog I contribute to, which is funny given how infrequently I go to the movies.

Jon Couture's link is no longer to his personal blog but to the one he does while covering the Red Sox for the New Bedford Standard-Times, the finest fishwrap on all of the South Coast.

Charlie Pierce comes to us via the Boston Globe, which I take as a small step towards apologizing for the decades of inflicting Dan Shaugnessey on the public. You may know Pierce from his contributions to NPR shows like Only a Game and Wait, Wait Don't Tell Me!

Finally, there's Joe Posnanski, who is now on staff at Sports Illustrated after his most recent stint for the Kansas City Star (which, between him and TV writer Aaron Barnhart, should have made it the pop culture newspaper of record). For the blog Joe writes about pretty much anything that comes to mind, from his love of Bruce Springsteen to a fascination with Snuggies. With apologies to his previously mentioned colleagues (save Shaughnessey), I'd say he's currently the best sportswriter in America. Sadly, he's moving from a self-named location to SI's website, trading in his very pleasing minimalist layout for one that's busier (though, thankfully, not as nightmarish as your average page at ESPN.com).

If you've checked in over at the Bruce's blog, then you know that this will be among the last posts here at the attemptedchemistry.com location. As with most moves, there's a sense of nostalgia with an underlying understanding that it's for the best.

In any case, I'll be moving this to a Blogspot location at some point. I should also start cross-posting things to Facebook, I suppose. I'm not as social network/Web 2.0/buzzword of choice savvy as I should be, so it's not like this will turn into a random assortment of links and tweets any time soon. Though that may be more entertaining.

As you may imagine, scoring the election contest is a bit dicey, hence the delay. Which I know is killing the half-dozen of you who actually participated. At some point I'll score what I can and see if the outstanding races would matter. I'll try to get this wrapped up by Inauguration Day.

Reminders and updates:

1. The Brilliant But Canceled tournament (still to be renamed) will commence Monday. If you have suggestions, please comment or send them along. Thanks to all of you who've given input so far, even if I've been lousy at emailing you back.

2. Next week also sees the start of Euro 2008, so if you've not joined my Euro Pick 'Em group at ESPN.com, get the lead out. Password is cornerkick.

3. While it's in one of the more, uh, "transitional" parts of the South End (SoWa, or South of Washington Street), I'd recommend Gaslight if you're looking for a casual semi-fine dining experience. The food is French bistro, and is very good if not great, but there's a good-sized parking lot next door where you can park for free. That makes up for a lot.

I won't comment on the SoWa name. You can guess what I think.

Sorry for the hiatus, work picked up quite a bit with our May graduation on Sunday, where we added 108 new alumni to the rolls. It went quite smoothly, but given all the other stuff we have to along with graduation it's a tough week to do anything extra.

This week isn't much better, but I have found a little time to blog about the network TV upfronts on Tube Boob, which should now be linked on the right. I've posted there more this week than I have in the last three months.

Not much else to say right now, sorry to say.

It's apparently National Library Week, which seems like one of those things I should know, being kind of a library geek.

Not much more to add to that, other than you think they'd come up with a better slogan. But I suppose there's a reason why they're working with books rather than writing them. At least they got it trademarked, what with the market for bootleg National Library Week merch.

Seriously, though, if you've not been to your local library recently, this seems like a good week to stop in.

You may remember back in the fall I asked for suggestions on a location for a warm weather vacation. Or you may not, given the dearth of suggestions (thanks again to you happy few who did chip in your two cents). Either way, this past week was the week of the warm weather vacation, which saw us go to the Dominican Republic to stay at a resort on the Playa Dorada, which lies on the north coast near Puerto Plata.

I'm not sure if I'll recap the trip here, actually write something up separately, or do as I've done for last summer's trip to Devon and think happy thoughts about a write up before letting it pass. We'll see how motivated I can get to do something.

Anyway, happy to be back, or at least as happy as can be given that it's in the 40s and drizzling.

Not that you care, but I've already lost a game in this madness that is March. I took Temple over Michigan State, as I found myself reaching for upsets. In that vein, you can add Baylor sometime within the next hour, unless there's a serious Purdue collapse.

(Don't take this to be hatin' on the Big 10. Though I may be hatin' on Sparty a bit after last season's NCAA ice hockey tournament spanking.)

With the variety of employers letting people out early today, we again stand resolute in the face of winter weather and remain open. The reason, according to our HR office:


"This is due to the fact that the majority of our students live on campus and require service and support from all areas."

Questionable writing style aside, this is at least more logical (and more honest) than the previous response to wintry weather. Still, an afternoon off would have been nice.

Reading this post from the Bruce has finally gotten me to address the looming Massachusetts primary, which, like California's, will be held on Super Duper Tuesday. After reading his post, I was stunned to learn that there's a decent chance that he and I will wind up voting for the same person. I wouldn't have concieved of that four years ago. Or even four months ago, for that matter.

Now that I'm an unenrolled voter, I get to choose which party's primary to vote in, a first for me. So how might it go down?

Democrats - I have to admit, my decision here is based mostly on personalities and ephemera rather than positions, as from what I can tell the differences between the major candidates isn't that great. I'm discounting John Edwards as I find his populist posturing a little too sudden and opportunistic. And I don't think I'd go for Hillary as I've still got some Clinton fatigue from when her husband was in office.

This brings me to Obama, even though I have the same concerns about him that I did about Deval Patrick, namely that I'm not sure there's enough substance under the inspirational message. On the minus side, the Presidency is a tough job to learn while doing. On the plus side, he'd be able to choose his Cabinet and other staffers to help get things going. But then I think of our current leader and the example of how this sort of plan can go horribly awry. As you can tell, I'm not particularly convinced about this.

There is an outside chance I'd throw a vote to Joe Biden in honor of his "noun verb 9/11" analysis of Guiliani's campaign. It may be the most on point thing anyone has said during this campaign.

Republicans - voting here would be driven by voting against Romney. His tenure as governor was not impressive (granted, he didn't have a lot of support, given how thin Republicans are on the ground here), and I don't buy for a second his "evolution" into conservatism. I tend to think he was always conservative, but played at moderate positions in order to get elected. This hardly makes him unique, but it makes it hard for me to believe what he's saying at any given time. A good rule of thumb with politicians generally, but it strikes me as being particularly important with him.

A vote here would be guided by how candidates have done in the states to come and how things appear to be shaping up in the polls. Were I casting this vote today I'd probably go with McCain, even though I probably more closely aligned with Guiliani on issues. We do have a thing for McCain in New England. It's probably due to his curmudgeonly attitude and fondness for sweaters (which, based on this, may have an odd same-sex marriage/union corollary).

Should Guiliani show some life in Florida, I may throw him a vote. It seems unlikely, although if it would help Romney finish third here it'd up the odds.

The other option would be Ron Paul, even though he's a couple of steps on the wrong side of the good crazy/crazy crazy line. I've probably seen more signs for him here than any other candidate, and had be fared better in New Hampshire I'd be more inclined to pay tribute to the dedication of his supporters.

Huckabee gets nominal consideration based on performance to date. Everyone else is out.

Green - yes, there is Green Party primary here. Most of the names are of party functionaries that I've not heard before. Ralph Nader is on the ballot, as is Cynthia McKinney, best known for her time as a cop-slapping Georgia Congresswoman. I don't know what would drive me to vote here, though I am tempted to cast my first vote for Kat Swift, who will turn 35 this year, just so I can cast my first vote for a candidate younger than I am. But I suppose that day will come soon enough, so I'll likely pass for now.

You can see the lineup for the Massachusetts primary ballots here.

For anyone thinking about getting a passport who may be worried about long application times, you may want to act now. I filed a renewal just before Christmas, and got my new passport yesterday. Pretty good, considering how long the wait times were not that long ago and that the estimated time I was given was 6-8 weeks.

That being said, I may have benefitted from renewing rather than applying first time. Not sure if that makes a difference or not.

The new one is one of the ones with the RFID chip in it, making me a prime target for Big Brother or identity thieves. It's been redesigned quite a bit, comparing it to my old one. The cover is stiffer, and instead of my picture being on the inside cover it's been moved to the back of the first page. And while it's not as bad as my driver's license photo, there is a Whitey Bulger's bagman look to the picture.

The pages have replaced the state seals with scenes of Americana (rocky coasts, purple mountains majesty and so on) and various quotes from famous (and not so famous) Americans. So if nothing else, the propaganda value of the passport has improved.

Merry New Year! I'd like to say that I've been doing something interesting in the time since I've last posted, but I haven't. In fact, I've mostly been sitting on the couch watching TV, frittering away my winter break. I do not look forward to my return to work on Monday.

We have started to have the house worked on again, as the guy who did our living room is now doing our bedrooms. Not only will we have new walls (and insulation), but we'll actually have overhead lights and wall sockets that are up to code (the old ones were apparently too low). The main problem so far is that they were in doing work today, when the temps barely hit double digits. Not so much a problem with going in and out - there wasn't as much of that today as when the rooms were demoed - as with the door to the attic being open all day. Were I smart I would have gone to the library for the day. I may still do that tomorrow, although temps are supposed to be in the 30s, which is balmy by comparison.

Happy Boxing Day! We've been at the in-laws' the last fews days, and had a really odd Christmas. My mother in law was scheduled to work on both the 24th and 25th, so we actually did our celebrating on Sunday. She then didn't have to work on Christmas Day. So we spent Christmas pretty much sitting around doing nothing. But we did have fun seeing family and eating way too much.

Not too much else to add to that, really.

Sorry for the disappearing act, but between the surgery and Monday I was down to one hand, and I quickly decided not to type more than necessary. On Monday they took off the bandages and took out most of the stitches, but the two fingers that were bent needed a couple of days to get used to being on the outside. Thankfully, they didn't go all Brooks Hatlen on me and have taken to life back on the outside as well as can be expected. I'm now pretty much at the same place I was the day before the surgery, but with the promise of increased sensation and function in the index finger as time moves along.

It would figure that we'd have our first two big storms the week I couldn't shovel. The wife did a great job in my stead, and our neighbor's son helped out by taking a pass with his snowblower on Sunday morning. The best I could do was help clear off the car, as that's a bit easier to do one-handed.

On the whole, I wouldn't recommend the experience. But it does give one a newfound respect for the importance of having both hands.

A quick one-handed update: had surgery on Friday, seems to have gone well. I got into the hospital at 6:30 and was home by 11, and likely would have been out earlier if my doctor hadn't been late (a rarity for him, from what the other docs were saying). I remember very little thanks to the sedation. I do recall not feeling my left arm at one point, which would have been pretty disconcerting under normal circumstances.

For the next week to 10 days I'll have my left index and middle finger at rougly a 90 degree angle to my palm, so as to not put tension on the nerve. It's not particularly comfortable, but it could be worse. I do have a sling I'm supposed to wear, but around the house I've mosly just been keeping it elevated.

Otherwise, it's pretty similar to the first few days I had the brace with the original stitches. I'll try not to kill myself buttoning my pants.

You know, I really don't like any of the Blogger templates well enough to keep one. So I'm just going to rotate for a while until one sticks. Pardon the annoyance.

Yeah, trying something different. Not sure if I like this one or not, but it was time for a change. Now I just need to figure out the archives and relinkify everyone.