Stretch Before You Vote...

The democratic process remains alive and well here in Rocky Ripple, Indiana; I myself hopped on my bicycle at 10:45 this morning to pedal squeakily over to the Town Hall to cast my ballot. Unfortunately, as this is the first time I've hopped on my bike for several weeks, by the time I got to the polling place (a mere half-mile from my house) my thighs were burning and I had to walk it off for a minute before going in. (Pathetic. To think I used to be a collegiate athlete--albeit a pretty lazy and ineffective one.)

Rocky Ripple is a town of about 300 residents, encased within metropolitan Indianapolis but cut off from the city by water on all sides; two small bridges are all that prevents us from having to swim to the grocery store. Well, no--you could also hike through some scrubby woods and escape that way, if you had to. Anyway, so it's like living in small-town America, except we don't have a Wal-Mart--just houses. Everyone knows everyone, for the most part.... And Election Day is a major event. This is a Town Council election year, and like all small towns we have candidates on the Democratic ticket, the Republican ticket, and the Nutjob ticket. It wasn't possible to vote straight Nutjob this year, as they'd split their forces between Democrat and Republican. So I opted against voting for people who I believe to be certifiably insane, and instead carefully split my vote between the two major parties' uncrazy candidates. My first observation at the polls was that one should never vote straight party anyway; I saw two people in great consternation because they realized (after marking their ballots) that since there is no Democratic contender for Town Treasurer, a straight ticket vote means they cast no vote for that office at all. (not that it's going to matter, as the same lady has been town treasurer for about 20 years and it would probably take a demolition crew to remove her from the office. Hell, she knows what she's doing, I cheerfully voted for her.) My second observation is that the new scantron voting system sucks. Indianapolis used old-style lever machines up through last year, and it was a lot less nerve-wracking. Observation #1 would not have been an issue with a lever machine, it's instantly clear with those things who you've voted or not voted for before you register your ballot. Now mind you, I'm not entirely clear on what happens after you pull the curtain lever in the old machines; maybe they never tabulated my votes correctly, and they were prone to getting jammed and needing emergency fixes on election day. But somehow it still seemed more decisive and reliable than filling in bubbles and feeding my ballot into the orifice of a faintly malevolent-looking machine. So I'm a Luddite. So sue me.

For God So Loved The World....

I have, once again, been shown God's greatest gift to the world. It's not the light of His Love...nor is it His only son, placed on this earth to suffer for our sins.... No, God's greatest gift bestowed upon mankind is The Mulching Mower.

It's true. Anyone who has ever spent all of fall struggling with rakes, leaf blowers, and bags, only to discover the power, ease, and speed of a mulching mower will be with me on this theological bandwagon. Mine happily self-propelled itself all over my yard with only a gentle guiding hand from me, chopping leaves into powder at my command. Two hours and a minimum of sweat later, I was done. Yes, the Lord is good.

Mixed Emotions

Well, I found out yesterday I didn't get the job at the zoo. My efficiency, "can-do" attitude and cheerful demeanor were trumped by someone who was actually--get this--QUALIFIED for the job. Can you believe it? Really, though, I don't blame them.... It's disappointing in that I'd like to have my foot in the door at the zoo (gardening job now, exhibit developer sometime in the distant future? ok, so it was a long shot) and in that I really enjoyed working on the Hort Staff this summer; it would have been fun to keep that up. But when you come right down to it my knowledge of basic horticulture is spottier than a cheetah's backside. I pretty much knew if they could get someone with a solid hort background to accept the modest salary, I'd be out of the running. And so it went.

Naturally, I'm feeling sad about this. No one likes being rejected, even when they understand why it's happened. I look forward to feeling this way again in a few weeks, when I don't get the two jobs I've applied for at the State Museum. But Halloween cheered me up, of course--sugar, gaming, more sugar, beer, sugar. Then today I got a package in the mail from Mil Millington, whose "Things" page is linked over on the left there. (He's sent me a copy of his book, also coincidentally called "Things My Girlfriend And I Have Argued About," and I highly recommend it. So far, anyway.) So that lifted my spirits further. And THEN, to bring me almost entirely out of my dark jobless fog, in the paper today I read this, followed immediately by this. At least when I drop my eventual cell phone down a public toilet, I won't be the first to make national news doing it.

The Bestest Day of the Year

Hooray! It’s Halloween again, and this year I am NOT watching AMC and waiting for trick or treaters to avoid my house and force me to eat all my candy myself. No sir, I’m sidestepping my usual pattern and instead, I’m doing what all good nerds should do on the night of All Souls... I’m playing Call of Cthulhu. (Holy shit, I actually just had two little boys come to the door. Quote: “You were right, Sean. Reese’s must make a ton of money.” Apparently all my neighbors are on the same peanut butter cup bandwagon as I am... Dang. Sorry, guys.) Anyway, my house is decorated with all the spooky stuff I’ve accumulated over the years--but the scariest thing in it, doubtless, is the creepy blue bunny piniata Alex gave me for my birthday, which is full of some of the nastiest, most unidentifyable Mexican candy imaginable. I’m thinking of forcing my guests to thrust their hands into its head and eat whatever they grab, as proof of their Halloween spirit....

As Promised....

The Dish Network came and went today. Yes, the trees on my property betrayed me; the trees were one of the reasons I bought this place, and now this is biting me in the proverbial ass. (And yes, I do have a proverbial ass. Check it out.) The Dish dude searched my entire property for any southwest access not blocked by tree trunks, and failed. So now I'm stuck. Do I keep cable? Do I reduce access to the barest of TV essentials? Or do I give it up altogether? God, what an agonizing choice.

For anyone who hasn't met my friend Jeremy, you may not quite have grasped the scope of his evil genius simply in my telling you about him. He's one of my favorite people for a number of reasons, not the least of which is his ability to pull off practical jokes on a grand scale. No, really grand. He once stole a massive wall hanging/quilt (which I made myself and am obsessively protective of) out of my apartment and replaced it with an equally massive wall map of the Former Soviet Union. That was small potatoes though, he saves his true genius for Sarah. When they were in high school, he helped host a birthday party for her wherein all of the gifts were a) given to her sister as if everyone thought it was HER birthday, and b) were Sarah's own posessions, carefully stolen from her room and painstakingly wrapped. When Sarah ended up living in the same city as Jeremy, she made the mistake of allowing him to apartment-sit for her while she was out of town. She returned, at some ungodly hour of the morning, to find her apartment covered in crime-scene tape, masking-tape body outlines, and splashes of ketchup. His best prank on her, his true tour-de-force, sadly never came to fruition. But this was not for lack of trying on his part, and I highly recommend you read the whole sordid story! It's on Sarah's website, here, and after reading it, you too will Know The Evil That Is Jeremy.

15 Minutes? Or Was That Seconds....?

My figure painting service is being featured on The Miniatures Page! I'm doing a "workbench" project for them wherein they send me some figures, I paint them and photograph the process step by step, and they put the pix up on the website for other nerds to gander at. If you'd like to take a look at the article, it's here.This could mean an increase in business--not a bad thing, as right now I'm closing in on finishing a couple of big jobs. That'll leave me with two regular customers who always have stuff for me to paint, but with the economy the way it is a few more jobs would be good.... Anyway, check out the article!

Fear of Commitment...

Jane's blog asks, "How do you know when it's time to get married?" An excellent question. As I told her in email today, the best time is when your unemployed friend in Indiana has saved enough money to fly to San Francisco for the ceremony. But for me, not having marriage prospects at the moment, a far more pressing question is, "How do you know when it's time to get a cell phone?"

Right now I'm paying $58.02 a month for my cable service. That's just for the extended basic package which doesn't include any "pay" channels.... And frankly, that's nuts. I finally got around to looking into other options, and have settled on DISH Network, which will give me everything I want for about $35 a month, and that includes a DVR. (The major tragedy is that their basic package doesn't include Animal Planet, which I watch like a fiend. But if I get a job, I can expand my package for another $5 or so a month, and I'm still saving money from cable.) The big hitch, of course, is that my house is completely surrounded by trees, and when the DISH people come on Monday they're probably going to say, "Sorry, no signal!" and I'll be left, weeping, to choose between Brighthouse Cable and nothing at all. But setting that whole issue aside, if I make the switch then I'll be saving about $25 a month. For $35 a month, I can have a cell phone....

So how do I know? How do I know when it's time for me to take another struggling step into the world of modern technology? How do I know when I'm mature enough to commit to a two-year contract with 300 Anytime Minutes and Unlimited Nights and Weekends? I could have done it today, at Radio Shack, while sealing the deal on the dish. But I was afraid. Afraid of the contract.... Afraid of another bill in my mailbox... Afraid of my innate ability to lose small, expensive metal objects. What if I drop it down a storm drain or something? That kind of thing isn't unprecidented for me. On the other hand, sure would be nice to be able to call people from the road when I'm out and about. Would have come in handy when I locked myself out of the house the other day. Maybe I really am ready! Maybe I really am a grown-up!

I want one that looks like a Star Trek communicator.

A Wild World of Nausea

Drove up to Ball State University yesterday for my one academic conference of 2003, sponsored by the Center for the Advancement of Early Studies. I've no idea what "Early Studies" are, as the paper topics seem to range from ancient Egyptian artifacts to 17th century poetry and philosophy. Maybe "early" is code for "anything you want to send us a paper on since we're a small conference and we need all the material we can get to flesh out the program." Not that there's anything wrong with this, mind you! I usually go to a huge medieval studies conference in Kalamazoo each spring, and while it pretty much stays medieval (with occasional Shakespeare on the high end) I am usually guaranteed of hearing 2-3 papers which I do NOT understand in the slightest, and at least 1 where some poor young grad student is savaged by the tribal elders for not properly checking her sources. The CAES conference, while tiny by comparison and having far fewer sessions, is a more friendly and inclusive atmosphere, and there are papers given which I actually feel well-read enough to comment on. I don't think I've ever made a comment in a session at Kalamazoo... but I babbled a good bit at CAES about such diverse topics as Margery Kempe, Tolkien's love/hate relationship with Celticism, and Arthurian heroes.

So where was I going with this? Hmmm.... Oh yeah! So the two things I remembered from last year's CAES conference were Greek's Pizzaria, and a little used bookstore called the White Rabbit. (I would have remembered more, I'm sure, but I gave a paper last year and most of the experience was lost in a white haze of nervousness.) The White Rabbit is owned by a guy who is a stereotypical geek--he's erudite, overweight, unwashed, plays RPGs and watches ceaseless sci-fi network. I like him a lot, needless to say, and we had a pleasant conversation last year that made me look forward to seeing his store again. So after a pizza at Greek's, I stopped into the Rabbit, and we chatted for about a half hour about MST3K, Cthulhu, etc etc and so on. Talk turned to bad movies, and of course I had to bring up "Sorceress" and "Legend of the Superheroes." (Which, incidentally, has been responsible for about 60% of the hits I get on this site. People look for that movie on Google every damn day! I have to wonder if they know what they're asking for...) I asked jokingly if there were any bad movies in his video section I should be aware of....

$6 later, I walked out the proud owner of "The Wild World of Bat Woman." MY. GOD. What a total reek of a film. I had planned to let it fester a few days, but Emily offered to watch it with me last night and I figured it would be better with company than alone. It was HORRIBLE. I cannot convey its awfulness in mere words. Yes, Li, it's worse than "Legends." It's still not worse than Sorceress, but it's as close as it gets. The acting stinks. The dialogue stinks. The premise stinks. It combines moments which are just nightmarishly dull with moments that make you go, "I'm sorry, what the fuck are they DOING in this scene??" The best/worst part, really, is that fact that no one in this stupid town where this is taking place seems to think it odd that there is a busty middle-aged woman, wearing a skimpy black costume made of monkey fur and ostrich feathers, with a cult of go-go dancing followers wandering around claiming to fight crime. (Never mind that the only actual crime depicted in the film, a mugging/homicide, goes on right in front of two of the idiot Bat Girls, and they don't do anything about it!) As you can see, I'm still recovering. It may take a couple days.

Jurassic, Schmurassic.

This week (that is to say, last Friday) I got to go on a field trip to the Cincinnati Museum Center with my museum studies intro class. Now, I haven't been on a field trip in quite some time; it was a heady rush, deciding how to spend my pocket money on trinkets and lunch options, and remembering to be back at the bus by 3:30 Ohio Time, which is 2:30 Indiana Time. (Hearing my teacher say this brought back a wash of memories of school band trips to King's Island, which were always punctuated with the mantra, "Ohio Is An Hour Ahead....Ohio Is An Hour Ahead..." I can't blame them, in a crowd of 40 5th Graders you're always going to have a few who just don't get the concept of time zones.) We went there to talk to some exhibit designers about controversial exhibits--how does one handle controversial topics in a museum? It was interesting and thought-provoking. And then we saw an I-Max film and ran around the museums for two hours.

So this brings me back to another controversial topic, namely the Museum of Jurassic Technology, which I mentioned in an earlier post. Nobody who responded in comments seemed particularly disturbed by the MJT.... But for those who didn't check out the link, it's a fictional museum. It exists physcially, you can go to it and see the exhibits pictured on the website... But none of it is true. The information presented in the exhibits about the habits of the Deprong Mori Bat or the works of neuropsychologist Geoffrey Sonnabend is purely fictional. The history of the museum is fictional. It's all one big joke. Yet every element of the museum is presented with the utmost sincerity and gravity, and if you were not paying attention, you might well believe everything this museum is telling you. Which is exactly what happened to about half of my classmates, and when the truth was revealed, they were furious. A lively debate ensued about what makes a museum a museum, whether the MJT can be classified as a museum or not, and whose responsibility it is to ferret out the truth. Personally, I think the MJT is great--it shows up just how easily we are manipulated into believing "facts" simply by trusting in the authority which presents them to us, complete with footnotes. But there were some in the class who were livid that a museum might, under some circumstances, lie to you. And yet we read lies in books and on museum panels all the time, assuming it's true because it's in black and white in front of you and seems to come from a credable source. A healthy skepticism is a valuable tool....

And on that note, Jeremy has some good links this week to info about the Diebold Voting Machine controversy. Books, museums, vote tabulation--it's good to know what's actually backing them up.

Beer. It's What's For Breakfast.

Beer bread, that is. It's been so freakin' cold here that I went ahead and made beer bread on Monday. Talk about a power breakfast; coffee with a slab of baked flour, butter, and beer. I needed it this morning, as I woke up with one of my total destructo headaches.

I really hate this; I've been non-functional for the better part of the day. I call them migraines, but really don't know if that's what they are in a clinical sense. All I know is, I get them once a month (predictably) and for about 8 hours I'll be nauseated, achy, light-sensitive, depressed, and miserable. Drugs help, but for some reason today I just wasn't able to shake it off. So I got almost nothing done. While it's going on I can't really read, or paint, or use the computer for more than a few minutes, or watch TV... I can sleep, but I avoid napping in the middle of the day because it throws my internal clock way off. GAH! Now it's after 5, I've got a game to run at 7, and I finally feel able to concentrate long enough to actually do some reading. Which is what I should be doing instead of posting to my weblog. Right. I'm off, then.

A Little Ray of Commentary Sunshine

Well, the links are there, so let's see if it works. Many thousand thanks to Karen, whose blog uses the same template as mine and who copied and pasted the exact locations of the Enetation code for me to sort out. Not sure why this was so complicated... Probably just because it's me.

All right, well, so the first use for comments is as follows. As you know, I'm embarking on a career in the museum field soon (very soon! Really! Any day now!) and the classes I'm taking this semester are "Intro to Museum Studies" and "Exhibit Design." I've also got an internship at The Children's Museum of Indianapolis. So naturally I'm thinking a lot about museums, why they're important, what it's all about and so on. For class this week, I paid a virtual visit to a unique sort of museum, called The Museum of Jurassic Technology. The class discussion on this museum got somewhat heated, and I'll go into that on a future post. But I'd like to hear what you guys think of it first. Go on, click the link and check it out. Take your time, then come back and leave me a comment telling me what you thought of the MJT. I'll wait.

No Comments, Folks...

It's like a domino effect, I start adding goofy stuff to my web log and then I can't stop. First it was sitemeter, now it's comments. The catch is, I can't figure out if I'm sticking the code in the right orifice, so to speak... Guess I'll see when I publish this tripe.

In other news, I found out last week that my former supervisor at the Zoo (we'll call him Dave, because that's his real name) up and quit; the old I'm-giving-you-two-weeks-notice-oh-by-the-way-I'm-taking-my-two-weeks-paid-vacation-starting-now trick. Sigh.... I'd say I expected better of Dave, except...well... Anyway, so now I'm thinking about applying for his job. On one hand, it's a job at the zoo, working with people I mostly like, it's something I spent all summer doing so I know what I'd be getting into, and it has benefits which I sorely need. On the other, it's the most boring gardening job at the zoo--no animals, no people, just lawn care, flowers, traffic on West Washington street, and a hell of a lot of trash pickup. I tried hard not to let this get to me when I was seasonal, and even with that by the end of the summer I was taking any excuse to leave the perimeter and go work in someone else's area. I once actually abandoned all dignity and begged the Deserts area gardener to pretend he had something for me to do so Dave would loan me out. Dave, being an anti-social sort in some ways, was not particularly bothered by the isolated nature of his area; me, I want a little human contact. Especially because I live alone, the thought of working alone for the better part of each day is pretty unappealing. But still, it's the Zoo for god's sake. It's a job in a museum, in Indianapolis, which doesn't require me to sell my house (at least until I can't pay the mortgage any more.) So I'm gonna see if they'll interview me, and go from there. Cross the boredom bridge when we come to it, you know?

Avast, Ye Scurvey Dawrgs, and Heave To!

Tis International Talk Like A Pirate Day, and frankly I've talked like a pirate so much I've started to repeat myself. I tend to fall back on cliches when speaking pirate. My friend Emily, on the other hand, left a 45 second fluently piratical message on my voice mail that delved into entirely new levels of high seas vocabulary. I was impressed. Also slightly frightened.

Mazel Tov, T & T!

My buddy Tripp in Chicago is gettin' married! And while I haven't yet met Trish, she must be a kick-ass person or Tripp wouldn't be marrying her--such is my considered opinion.

I got to know Tripp while I was at grad school at Loyola; he and Jersild were kind enough to include me in their social activities despite my being a good friend of Jeremy's. Tripp's a great guy, he and I have had some wonderufl discussions /debates on church history, religion, philosophy--all things I love talking about, and all things I don't get to debate that often these days! A while back, he made the big decision to embark on a pastoral career and headed up to Seabury-Western Theological Seminary (in whose library I spent many happy--and a few unhappy--hours researching my master's thesis.) This seemed to me to be a perfect fit; and it gives me joy to know that the friends I have who've chosen the pastorate as a life commitment are people who really embody what Christianity is supposed to be all about--kindness and caring for your fellow man. So congrats, Tripp and Trish! In hoc signo vinces....

Gone Fishin.

Yesterday I added new fish to my tank for the first time in quite a while. Both my neon blue gouramis died last month, due to extremely poor fish-care techniques on my part; I have no one to blame but myself. It's not like when Red died, and I went to great lengths to try to rescue him (though I did evac gourami #2 to a hospital bowl for a day or so to see if it would help. It didn't.) So I did pennance: a massive water change, cleaned the hell out of the tank, added Stress-Cote Slime Replacement Fluid to help the other fish get over the loss.... Then waited a month for the tank to settle itself out. So I'd been reading about these anabantoids called Paradise Fish, and figured I'd give them a try instead of just getting more blue gouramis. (Which are also anabantoids, as are Siamese Fighting Fish. I think it means they can breathe at the surface.) Went to The Reef, my pet store of choice, and found that the Paradise Fish tank was full of albino Paradise Fish. Now, I'm not opposed to albinism on principle, but these fish were frankly creepy looking--and I want more color in my tank, not less. It's a very dark tank, too, the back glass is painted black and the substrate is dark, so white fish would look really ghostly and odd. Instead I say, how about those Black Paradise Fish hiding behind the filter? Reef guy says sure, they're cool, I'll net two out for you--and sure enough, they're gorgeous. Not really black, more dark gold with blue stripes and red fins....actually they look a lot like gouramis... Turns out this is because they ARE gouramis; the Giant Gourami to be exact. The guy at the checkout informs me that the tank was mislabeled, the only Paradise Fish they have are the albinos, and I've got Giants. I say, "Whoa. Don't those grow to be like 20" long?" He says, "No no--there are two kinds of Giant Gouramis. These are the other ones." Riiiiiight. Like I believe THAT. But I bought them anyway, because I was embarassed and didn't want to argue with him.

Damned if there aren't two completely different fish called Giant Gouramis. One is Osphronemus gourami, grows to the insane size of 2 feet long, and is raised for food in its native India and Malaysia. The other is Colisa Fasciata, two of which are enjoying the relative peace of my tank where they are not being constantly assaulted by roving gangs of albino Paradise Fish. They're gorgeous. I'm in love.

An Excitable Boy, They All Said...

Well, Warren Zevon died last weekend. Another great talent lost--though my shallow music collection contains no Zevon albums, I think it’s telling that the very first song I ever downloaded off Limewire was “Lawyers, Guns, and Money.” He’s always been one of the artists on my “love him when he comes on the radio, one of these days if I ever have money I should pick up some CD’s...” list. So, sad to see him gone.

Not much else to mention this week, I’ve spent hours and hours painting, trying to finish up three different commissions at once and save myself an extra trip to the Post Office. My car blew its head gasket (actually that happened over a month ago, but it took this long to figure it out) and I got to spend $860 on the repair. IUPUI’s Financial Aid Office is auditing my application; they are a thorn in my flesh. (I'd blame "Legends of the Superheroes" for both these things, but that'd be giving the movie a lot of credit...) On the up side, though, the kitchen and bathroom are still clean, and it’s been a whole week. Um. Yeah! I ruuule!!

Better Than Sorceress... But That's Not Saying Much.

I'm a big fan of bad films. Mystery Science Theatre 3000 was one of my favorite programs (especially during the Joel Years.... Oh, Joel.... how we miss you and your deadpan delivery...) and during college we made a point of watching every bad sword and sorcery flick Empire Video had on offer. Until recently, my benchmark for bad was Sorceress, a film whose only redeeming quality is occasional nudity. In the words of Aaron Shattuck, " this movie does its best to wedge a tent spike into your soul." (For his full plot synopsis and painfully apt commentary on this horrible waste of celluloid, click here.) Now, I am not saying that Sorceress has been surpassed in my annals of badness; but Rob certainly gave it a run for its money last night.

"Legends of the Superheroes" was a made-for-TV movie on the order of the old "Batman" series, right to the point of including Adam West, Burt Ward, and Frank Gorshin reprising their roles as campy sendups of comic book originals. I loved "Batman," mind you. It's some of the best parody TV ever created. Now, imagine if you will, the "Batman" TV show--without a SINGLE REDEEMING COMIC FEATURE. Now you're getting closer to what "Legends of the Superheroes" is like. It's awful. Spectacularly so. A bunch of supervillains--badsupervillains, mind you, like Weather Wizard and Gargantua--sitting around their incredibly poorly-furnished secret lair, decide to end the world with a doomsday device (a large clock which descends from the ceiling) and to give the Justice League clues so that they'll try to foil the evil plan. They don't even TRY to make that make sense! The Justice League, for their part, goes rushing around trying to find the bad guy lair; the unifying feature is that since apparently they don't have wrist communicators or an answering service, the superheroes plan to leave messages for each other at the corner gas station. Everyone ends up at the gas station at some point or other, and the only--ONLY--funny thing in this movie is the black lady--played by Marsha Warfield--using the pay phone at the gas station: "Child, you would not believe what just walked in here. A big white guy with wings. Yeah, wings. Now he's talking to that ugly dude I told you about...." The movie's piece de resistance is a jet ski battle between Batman and Robin, and some sorceror dude called "Mordu." Oh, god... But wait! There's more! Apparently the producers of this...thing...somehow got the funding to do a sequel, which Rob also has on tape. It's worse. Far, far worse. It's got Ed McMahon. And a musical number from a supervillain. And a guest appearance by one of the most offensive stereotypes I have ever seen in my life--Ghetto Man! Yes. It's things like this that set the civil rights clock back during the 1970's... It's not even funny, it's just painful.

So was it worse than Sorceress? Li thinks so. I'd have to say that comparing the two is like apples and oranges; you have to take the filmmakers' intent into account, and the people who made Sorceress were really under the impression that they were making a quality fantasy film on the order of Conan. "Legends of the Superheroes" was intended to be campy, corny, and stupid. All goals it admirably achieved--without actually being FUNNY in any way shape or form. So Sorceress still holds its place in my heart.... But if I ever have to watch "Legends of the Superheroes" again, I might actually claw my own eyes out.

And One More Thing...

Football Season starts tonight. I finally succombed to peer pressure, and I'm in not one, but two fantasy football online leagues. My first game in Jane's league is against Tripp. Tripp, being a seminarian, has God on his side... All I have is Peyton Manning and Edgerrin James. You're going DOWN, Tripp! DOWN! :] Oh, and also, due to some massive technical meltdown, Lycos Email has been dead for going on 4 days now. If you happened to have tried to get in touch with me using the link button off this blog, I can't get at it til at least tomorrow. Try me at hamaker88 at yahoo.com if you need to track me down in a hurry. OK, so that was two things.

Mais Oui, Apparently.

Make that 6 people--8 if you count my grandfather and my mom--all calling to check in and make sure I'm not soaked or dead. I'm loved. And it was 9 inches in 48 hours, which is some kind of record round these parts. Today it's sunny, and things are starting to dry out.

The sunshine, combined with a certain amount of self-loathing, has brought on a new sense of personal resolve about my house this week. The one thing I truly, truly hate about myself is my inability to keep my house/personal spaces clean and uncluttered. Everyone who's ever visited me knows that I tend to outwardly shrug off my messy tendencies; I've been a slob since I was a kid. But I'm crying on the inside. Deep in my heart of hearts, I hate it, and I hate that I can't seem to do something that other people make look so simple. About twice a year, I decide that I'm going to turn over a new leaf and 1) clean the hell out of my place, and 2) keep it that way. Obviously, I've never yet accomplished #2 for any length of time. But hope springs eternal... I've done the kitchen. I'm working on the bathroom today. Tomorrow is living room and front porch. I just know that at some point critical mass will hit, and while I'm juggling the dining room I'll somehow drop the kitchen and it'll all come crashing down. And if the worst thing about me is that my house looks like crap all the time, well--I can live with that. But I'd like to think I can do better. We'll see.

Apres Moi, le Deluge?

You know it's been raining a lot when not one but two of your local friends call you to find out if your house is underwater. We had, I think, about 4" of rain in 24 hours here, and I live on a tiny triangle of land situated between a river and a canal. Thankfully, I'm on about the highest ground possible, and I'm right on the canal, which can't flood. (well, I shouldn't say can't... but it'd have to rise about 5 feet to top my levee, and since the opposite levee is shorter, it'd flood all of the neighborhood on the other side before it could ever get to me.) My neighbors closer to the river, of course, are ankledeep in basement flooding, and their yards are lakes. Jason tells me he had several inches of standing water in his basement at 5 pm yesterday, and spent the whole evening sucking it out. (With a pump, presumably.) Me, I just had a little water on the back porch, which drained away leaving soggy rugs and gardening equipment but no other damage. Still, knowing my friends are concerned about my well-being makes me feel all warm and fuzzy.... No, wait. That's the mold starting.