Thanks to those who commented on the new design. Per Eric P's suggestion, I lightened the gray to make the text more readable. I like the colors for now, even if they make my blog look like Anarchic Not Random (nice one, bruce). I picked red and black because they were my team colors at Mason City High School in Mason City, Iowa, back when I really was a tormented 15-year-old writing awful poetry:

I kneel at the edge of a pond
staring deep into its silvery depths.
My reflection leers up at me as if
in mockery
challenging me--
Who are you?
What are you?
I can't answer those questions.
I don't suppose anyone can.
Years I have spent
casting and cultivating a false image
until I have fooled even myself.
I am trying to destroy this wall I have created
but sometimes I do catch a glimpse
of the actual me--
and he scares me.
So I thrust him back behind the wall
like a child pushing away a terrible nightmare.
A burning tear trails down his cheek
and drops into the pond.

I don't write poetry any more. Praise Jesus.

The drawing at upper left is not of Jerry Seinfeld's Uncle Leo, as norbizness imagines, but "Fettered Man," a 1927 ink drawing by German artist Käthe Kollwitz. Those of you who have been peeking in my bathroom window while I shower know that I have this image tattooed on my left shoulder.

Walter Christensen was the only one to correctly identify "Fettered Man," and scores his third shout-out of the last two weeks. Walter confessed that he right-clicked on the image, selected "Properties," saw that I had named the image "kollwitz-fettered.jpg," and let Google do the rest. Cheating? That's what you say. I call it adapting and overcoming.

+posted by Lawrence @ 2/03/2004 10:53:00 PM