It snowed almsot every day this past week. It's cold enough to keep my winter jacket zipped. But it's a sunny day today and most of the snow has melted. I drove through Brookdale Park this afternoon and the playgound was littered with kids and their parents. I drove down a side street and saw a woman on the sidewalk video taping her toddler daughter next to her infant sibling, the father watching all three of them on the steps of their house.

Everybody wants it to be Spring.

My guess is we've got one more storm coming. This past week was a bitch, and certainly feels like a "Last Hurrah", but I'd be willing to bet that there's going to be one more storm before warm weather settles in for a duration.

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There's a protest going on in New York City. Last night I dailed around the TV, Channel 11 mentioned it and happily trumpeted how they can be the ones to tell you how to make your way around the city and "avoid the chaos." I'm trying to remember if they use that phrasing when describing the Thanksgiving Day Parade.

I was at the protest last March, the one that wanted to stop the war. That was when I saw one of the best pictures I didn't take: a bunch of protesters on the subway, their protest signs hanging in their laps, talking jovially, right under the subway sign that announced its last stop is the World Trade Center.

There was, what, some 100-300 thousand people at that protest. It was bitter cold. As the crowds grew the police kept closing the exits. The protest started around 49th street. Last I heard, when I finally left the area, you couldn't get in until at least 60th street. Soon there were mobs on Second Ave protesting the fact that they couldn't get to the protest. They blocked the road compeltely and the cops came in dressed in riot gear and on horseback, lining up and walking into the crowd to push them back.

I got some good pictures, then.

I'm still ambivalent on the whole protest thing. I think it's a great way to vent and air feelings but, as a tool, protests are very limited. The real change happens behind the scenes and there's rarely someone who can be both at the protest, and involved in the crucial moments when the decisions are made. Protests are like neon signs, basically, flashing to get your attention but not really doing more than that. I'm glad they're there, I'm glad they can bring in the numbers and make the opposition known, but it does so little besides that, and though it makes for nice headlines, that's hardly enough.

Still, if I didn't go to the office today to get some work done, I'd have gone into the City. It seems a bit silly, really. What are they protesting? So it's the anniversary of the second Gulf War. This alone confuses me: this marking the first anniversary of the war. It seems like such false presumption on peoples part to make the occasion as something meaningful. I have no doubt that invading Iraq wil be a notable moment in history. But events in history are noticeable for the gravity they have, for effects that reach beyond the immediate moment. The chain-reaction started by invading Iraq has not finished, nor will it for several years, and to act as if it is a moment that can be fully comrephended and understood--let alone appreciated--strikes me as an act of extreme arrogance.

Likewise, protesting said moments seems equally fallacious. I can understand why their doing it--if you want to protest U.S. occupation of Iraq, choosing the anniversary of the start of that occupation certainly makes sense. And as long as your protesting the ongoing situation, as opposed to a moment of time that has already come and gone--the War itself--then at least the event has a sence of relevancy. But no amount of protesting is going to change things. You can stand outside with signs and chants for as long as you want, but all you'll accomplish is setting a new record for standing outside with signs and chants.

The real opportunity for change, the one moment where any citzen will be able to affect policy--for better or wose--is still seven months away. It seems to me, those interveening months would be far better suiting in preparation of that day, then sprinkling large-scale protests in between.

This merely spotlights a problem that's apparent on all sides: No one seems to be able to think long-term anymore.

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I haven't written anything Blog-wise for almost a week. This is the longest gap in quite I while, I think. I apologize, you faifthful half-dozen readers. Work has been stressful, and it seems like I spend nine hours a day slogging through mounts of mud simply to stand still. This is why I spent a little over four hours at the office today: I finally got to file paperwork that had been lying on my desk since January. that filing paperwork provided me with the greastest sense of accomplishment at my job in several weeks should tell you the state of affairs at my office. Yet I still get praised, so I must be doing something right.

The past week had a large amount of personal distress, and I'm afraid it's all under the juristiction of Setec Astronomy. Mostly because I feel that, having wallowed in things enough inside ym brain that I doubt spewing them on my Blog is going to change anything, other than show how much I dwell on things and enjoy scuplting moutain ranges out of molehills.

But it was a dissapointing week, and it occurs to me, as Spring begins in Spirit if not in Body, that the first quarter of the year is done with and I have very little to show for it. My Vendetta site is still hopelessly overdue; supposed to have been done by January, then February. April is ten days away and as of . . . Monday, I think, I decided "my visual timeline lookes like shit and why even bother?" I'll be looking at it with fresher eyes tomorrow and we'll see what I decide then. Meanwhile, in three months I've done zero productive work for Bright-Matrix.

See--even that should've gone by way of Setec Astronomy, because now that I've typed that out I'm started to get depressed all over again. I am now doubly glad that I haven't bitched about what's really been on my mind this week.

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I have an active evening tonight: dinner in half an hour with Amii and Bob. Evening at my co-worker Pete's house, then the main event with Mia, John, and Tricia at The Harb and Bard. So I have to get going, shave, and put on a decent shirt for tonight.

There are several people--including a few who read this blog--that I haven't spoken to in a while. Don't think I've forgotten you.