New Year's Day

Great, now I have an expiration date: according to The Death Clock, my personal day of death is Friday, May 5, 2028. The Death Clock estimates your longevity based on factors such as age, weight and smoking, and calculates the date of your death based on your birth date and your predicted lifespan. So, it now being 2005, I have 23 years, five months and five days left, barring any accidents, violence or the inevitable end of the world. Put another way, I have approximately 8,550 days left. How, then, will I spend today?

Apparently, watching football. Yes, today's the big day for the Bowls, and even though I'm now eliminated from the family pool, I can still cheer against Witch Doctor Jim. However, with only four games left to the season (as I write - there're two more games left today), the Witch Doctor holds a three-game lead. At best, my sister or the BiL can tie him and win via the tie-breaker (total points in the Orange Bowl). Here, the Witch Doctor is at a slight disadvantage - with 48 points picked against my sister's 38 and the BiL's 58, a total score has to be between 43 and 53 points for the tie-breaker to go Doc's way, and the average point total so far has been 56 points. So I find myself in the unusual position of having to cheer for Texas (Rose Bowl) and against Pittsburgh (Fiesta Bowl), and I hate Texas while I'm fond of Pittsburgh. . . but not nearly as much as I want to see the Witch Doctor lose!


Last night, I saw the New Year in at the Zen Center. It was a small turnout - sensei, myself and about six others; a couple others had left before midnight, apparently having a better place to be when the ball dropped, but another couple showed up shortly before midnight. Afterwards, we had a small (but illegal) bonfire in the back yard despite the open burning ban in Atlanta, and I allowed myself a single glass of champagne (technically, I don't drink, but I made an exception to celebrate the holiday).

I wish all a happy new year!

Congratulations in advance to whoever wins the football pool, even if it turns out to be the Witch Doctor.

Best wishes and a swift recovery to all of the tsunami survivors in Asia.

Best wishes, too, to Petra Nemcova and Simon Atlee.

And here's to a successful recovery from dioxin poisoning to Viktor A. Yushchenko.

May the New Year bring peace, prosperity and wisdom to George W. Bush, Donald Rumsfeld, Condoleezza Rice, Dick Cheney, Vladimir Putin, and Michael Crichton, even though I will continue to make fun of all of them in 2005.

Gassho to all the bodhisattvas, arhats, Buddhas, senseis and all of the other Shokais on the Internet.

But most of all, happy New Year to you.

UPDATE: The bad news: Texas just failed to cover the spread, so Witch Doctor Jim has won the Football Pool. The good news: no more spread sheets need to be posted. . .