Ed Batista just propgated this meme to me.

OK… here goes.

Four Jobs I’ve Had

1. Newspaper boy. My first job. My next door neighbor, two years older than me, had the paper route. I was his sub — did it 2-3 days a week when he had soccer practice. Got pretty good at carrying a huge stack of newspapers on my head, and I knew the exact shortest path between every door in my suburban Long Island neighborhood.
2. Baker’s Assistant. My second job was cleaning up after Mort the pastry baker. I’m pretty sure that the heat from the ovens had denatured his brain proteins — he was crazy. Or maybe it was from listening to right-wing talk radio. The job was more fun than it sounds, though, mostly because Mort usually left around the time I arrived.
3. Costco checkout dude. Well, actually it was Price Club, just before they merged with Costco. Two interesting things about this — first, I was a paid-up Teamster. Second, it was in the days before checkout scanners, which means I had memorized a few hundred SKU codes. Still think a few might be rattling around in my head somewhere. And my ten-key’s not half-bad either.
4. Science toy salesman. I spent 3 summers behind the counter at Out of This World in my hometown of Port Jefferson, NY. I never need another job that involves dealing with tourists.

Four Movies One Movie I Can Watch Over and Over

I love movies, but I really have a hard time watching most of them more than once. I’m not sure why. But one movie stands out for me:

• Brazil. Hands-down my favorite movie of all time. A moment of hallicunatory distopian genius. An everyman against the system. A beautiful girl. DeNiro. That music. And lots and lots of ductwork.

Four TV Shows I Love to Watch

1. Battlestar Galactica. Talk about not being what you’d expect. It starts with the end of the world, and picks up from there. It’s dark, gritty, and political. It’s not about spaceships and Cylons — it’s about genocide, terrorism and the morality of choosing between the unacceptable and the unthinkable. The characters are complex and conflicted. The writing is tight, and the production values are fantastic. I was as surprised as you are.
2. Gilmore Girls. The cheesy, guilty pleasure that Molly and I like to share. The stories are dumb, but the dialogue is often very crisp.
3. Lost. I’m watching it as I write this. Despite the fact that the writers don’t seem to have any idea where the story’s going, it’s just plain unsettling good fun.
4. Local News. Because it’s just not a complete day unless I’ve caught up on all the car crashes, murders and sex offender incidents.

Four Places I’ve Been On Vacation

1. The Methow Valley. It’s a gem of the North Cascades with some of the best cross-country skiing in the world.
2. Capri. The highlight of a short trip through Europe during a semester in Denmark. Heart-stoppingly beautiful cliffs rising straight up out of the ocean.
3. Vermont. I’ve been going there since I was literally in the womb, and now that my folks live there, I still have plenty of excuses.
4. Key West. If you’re gonna go, you might as well go with your college ultimate frisbee team. There’s nothing like cruising through the Keys at sunset in a Club Wagon with a suitcase of beer in the back and Jimmy Buffet on the stereo.

Four Favorite Dishes

1. Lobster, cooked at home.
2. Cuban barbequed chicken sandwich from Paseo. Secret sauce, homemade aoili and best goddam grilled onions I’ve ever had.
3. Slices of cheese pizza from Collosseo in Port Jefferson Station. About the only thing I truly, truly miss about New York. Don’t get me started about what passes for pizza here in Seattle
4. Really fresh hamachi from any half-decent sushi joint. Kisaku in Wallingford is way up there.

Four Blogs I Read Daily

It might shock you, but there aren’t any blogs that I really read every day.

Four Places I’d Rather Be

1. Hiking somewhere in the North Cascades
2. Almost anywhere on the Oregon coast
3. Skiing at Whislter, BC
4. Anyplace warm and sunny (February in Seattle can be long and dark)

Four Bloggers I’m Tagging

I think I’m gonna break the chain. I hope nothing bad happens to me.

Sometimes, here in Seattle, it seems like it rains all the time. Sometimes, though, it actually does rain all the time.

That’s right, we’re heading into our 25th consecutive day of rain.

Just in case you were thinking of moving here.

Eli just got the first season of The West Wing on DVD, which we’re watching with Molly’s folks down here in Olympia. With the series in its final post-debate-episode flameout, I had forgotten just how damn good the first season was. Damn, it’s good. It’s all about the dialogue.

It’s one of those classically gray-and-rainy Seattle early winter afternoons. A day where the sky and the water and the land snuggle up right close until there’s no point in trying to tell them apart. A salmon spawning day — I saw the coho wriggling their way back up Piper’s Creek this morning. I consider how on the one hand I can feel my motivation ebbing like the tide, even as I marvel at the sheer orneriness of life fighting its way upstream against all odds.

Yes, I will be seeing Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit this weekend. Molly says I like Gromit because he’s a dog. Maybe.

Update: It was fantastic. I don’t think I’ve ever laughed so hard — except maybe at the fart jokes the first time I saw “Blazing Saddles.” But hey, I was like ten then.

I could try to explain what it’s like to get ovenracked. But I won’t.

You’ll just have to come to Web of Change next year to find out.

If you’re an avid NPR listener, you’ve probably hear the series This I Believe, an ongoing series of short essays on “personal philosophies and core values” by ordinary (and not-so-ordinary) Americans.

They’re soliciting submissions from the public, and a couple of my fellow board members at Washington Toxics Coalition have taken up the challenge. I’ve haven’t finished mine yet — it’s a surprisingly hard writing challenge. But I encourage you to take it up, too.

Ruy Teixiera recommends checking out this new study about the values and politics of Generation Y

Very nicely done parody of the new government “food pyramid” site. Too bad they’re not building a list…

Welcome to MyPyramid.org! USDA hopes the updated food pyramid, MyPyramid, will help to ease much of the confusion that has come from so-called “doctors” and “scientists” claiming that their independent, repeatable experimentation has shown red meat, processed foods, agrichemicals and irradiation to be unhealthy for people and the planet. Many of USDA’s top officials have worked in the Agribusiness industry, providing the expertise necessary to develop a pyramid that best represents the truth about healthy eating — it’s not what happens to the food before it gets to your table, but simply that you eat substantial servings of all foods — Following these guidelines will help ensure the health of American families while guaranteeing the health of Agribusiness Corporations around the world.

Aimee Mann has a new album coming out in a few weeks: The Forgotten Arm. Yay!