Well, since I never heard back from the enigmatic Yo Mama, I suppose I'm free to blog about whatever I want tonight. Yo Mama, you still have an entry coming for you whenever you want it.

I had some excellent news on the freelance front today. First of all, I turned in my entries for this month, which is just a huge relief, and when I sent those in, my editor asked if I wanted extra entries if some were available. I don't know if she means extra once this next batch is done at the end of May or extra next month, but either way, I'll take it. And then I got email today from the professor whose book I proofread in February, asking if I want to proofread the journal she edits. I'm not totally clear on the details, but I think this would be an ongoing thing, so that's great.

Tomorrow morning I'm getting up and taking a walk, provided it doesn't rain, and then I have no plans at all for the rest of the weekend. Last weekend was the birthday party, and next weekend is Mother's Day, so it'll be nice to take a little break from all of that. I read that Kennywood, Pittsburgh's amusement park, is opening this weekend, so I was trying to talk Robbie into going on Sunday, but he thinks it'll be too crowded. I haven't been there since my freshman year in high school. I hear they have a new ride based on the comic strip "Garfield," so they don't seem to be going in an especially good direction thematically, which is unfortunate.

Comments
Yo Mama: Alas, I'm not enigmatic--just ask EV! But I am delighted to be a "winner." I think I'll reserve my blog-of-choice for awhile, until I think of the perfect topic--or my coupon is about to expire. :)

EV: Yeah, I had a feeling "Yo Mama" was the same person it is on my blog... which should make it considerably clearer.

Matthew Lippert: Since you didn't hear back from Yo Mama, can I, as the runner up, choose a blog subject?

Jess: Sure. But Yo Mama still gets hers when she wants. So what's yours?

May I just brag, for a moment, about my Pregnant Sitcom Actress Mojo Hand? At some point late this winter I noticed that Debra Messing was looking a little rotund (yeah, I know by the time she left "Will and Grace" for the season you'd have to be blind not to notice she was pregnant, but this was earlier) and lo, she was. Then last week I noticed that Courteney Cox was looking a little less gaunt than usual, and tonight I noticed it again, and it turns out she's pregnant too. What is especially impressive is that I noticed this based only on her facial fullness, not on any waist expansion. I'm like a fetal clairvoyant. Of course, I guess this also proves that I'm behind on the celebrity news, because I'm sure this was all over the entertainment pages months ago, but you can't have everything.

Today was, I believe, one of the most educational days in my mother's life. While I was there today, I gave her brief life-retrospective sketches of George Clinton, Bootsy Collins, and Gil Scott Heron, none of whom she'd heard of before (she'd gone to college with a girl named Bootsy Portmanteau or Bootsy Boutonniere or something, but apparently she and Bootsy Collins have almost nothing in common), taught her the lyrics to the SpongeBob SquarePants theme, and gave her a short overview of the history and current usage of Mormon undergarments. I also put the lyrics to "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised" on her bathroom mirror, and as I said to Robbie, I expect we'll start to see results shortly. I fill these young minds the best I can. And my mother did explain to me who Whitney Young was, so all in all it was a mutually mind-expanding day.

And now I'd like to announce a contest. The first person to tell me, in a correct and Internet-verifiable way and before noon eastern time tomorrow, who was the eighth emperor of the T'ang dynasty (he would have died or abdicated in 712) will, in return, receive a blog entry on the topic of their choosing tomorrow evening. I desperately need to know in order to wrap up one of my freelance pieces, but as far as I can tell using online encyclopedias and Google, this information is nowhere.

Comments
Yo Mama: Here is a list of all T'ang dynasty emporers. It lists emperor Juei Tsung, AD 710 to 712. http://www.calgarycoin.com/cast3.htm

matt lippert: It seems the years 710-712 were a little rocky for the middle kingdom. It seems that when the 7th emperor Li Xian died in 710, his son Li Chongmao briefly took over, but was never really enthroned. Instead, Li Dang, the 5th emperor who in 690 had been kicked out of power by his mother, staged a comeback and took over in a coup. He only lasted one year before abdicating to his son Li Longji.

matt lippert: Anyway, this is from http://www.geocities.com/CollegePark/Union/7050/tang.html. which also gives the posthumous temple names. There's similar stuff at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tang_Dynasty with slightly different tranliterations. The names given at Yo Mama's site skip Li Chongmao and use the posthumous names, with another transliteration scheme. Enjoy!

Jess: Well, that was very educational. I'm slightly bewildered by all the posthumous/transliteration differences in names, but still, I feel that Yo Mama is probably our winner. So what's your topic, Yo Mama?

EOL: This is not (in one sense) Yo Mama's feedback. I just want to observe that today must surely be as educational a day for you as yesterday was for me.

Matthew Lippert: You're certainly right that the multiple Chinese transliteration schemes really doesn't help anyone out. It's like VHS and Beta; it's better to have a suboptimal standard than no standard at all. And, come on, who really needs a posthumous name anyway?

JR: On an entirely different topic, I have a Bootsy Collins story. I was at a trade show and I looked over at this guy who looked at lot like Bootsy Collins. I said to the guy running the booth, "Why do you have a Bootsy Collins impersonator?" and he said "That is Bootsy Collins." I was sheepish. The end.

Phew! Well, I'm done writing my entries. It went fine except for the last two, which are basically summaries of two countries' histories from antiquity to 1500. The maximum length is 600 words, and that's fairly long, but the hard part is that for both of these countries, power switched back and forth between two leading groups for about two millennia. So it's easy to write a 50-word summary (power switched back and forth between the X and the Y forever and ever) and easy to write about 2000 words (in 101, the X gained power in the capital, but then they lost it to the Y, but then they got it back in 103, but then ten years later they lost it again...) but the mid-length is tricky. I know from experience when I worked full-time at this company that if you leave out a tiny detail like a power switch in 200 AD that was reversed three years later, some librarian, somewhere, will call the sales department and lecture them, and then the sales department will come and lecture you. I'd feel even more righteous about this if I didn't know that, were I myself a librarian, I would totally be the annoying fact-finding phone-dialing kind.

But it's done, and I have a sense of satisfaction now. I'd have a bigger sense of satisfaction if I didn't know that some of my pieces need major revisions, but I have two days to revise eighteen pieces and some are quite short, so it shouldn't be a big deal. And I had some other job-related news today--a few weeks ago I sent my resume to a publisher that was looking for copyeditors, and they wrote back today saying that I'll be getting a sample to edit in a couple of weeks. It seems that they have authors choose their own copyeditors (I don't know if they're a vanity press, but it seems possible) and so they give the samples to the authors to choose from. So it's not by any means a guarantee of work, but I like this system, because I think my work is stronger than my resume at the moment, and so I'm glad that's what I'll be judged on. And if I do get work, it'll help my resume a lot. And, best of all, the work would be starting in June, which is when the last of my current writing freelance dries up (although I may still have some editing freelance). So we'll see.

Oh, so we had some good news today. Robbie's high school friend Stefan is coming to town this summer to study Bulgarian, and he called us today to let us know he had a lead on a sublet four blocks from our apartment. We walked over there tonight and checked out the outside, and it looks really nice and is certainly in a great neighborhood (schmancier than ours, for sure, and the deal he's getting is fantastic), so Robbie called him to report on it and he thinks he'll take it. I know Robbie's really excited to have one of his friends so close by, and I'm excited too. And maybe now we'll reach a critical mass and start drawing visits from Chi, too--not to mention all the Bulgarian-language scholars we'll be squiring around. The 'Burgh is the place to be, I'm telling you.

And now I'd like to propose a plan for group social action that I think we should all embrace: boycotting any episode of any show that NBC bills as the most shocking ever. Obviously "ER" is the worst offender, but "West Wing" is getting pretty bad too. I've gotten to a nasty passive-aggressive place with "West Wing" where I'm actually glad to hear when it's a repeat, because I know I'll end up watching and being annoyed with any new episode they produce. It's like it's gone from being the favorite cousin at the family reunion to the cousin that you're secretly glad to hear has caught a cold. I guess I could just stop watching the thing, but I'm not quite there yet. And tonight was actually okay, despite the breathless promos. Maybe it's all about lowered expectations.

Comments
Chi: that's so cool that stefan's going to be in town! unfortunately, while nothing would please me more than to be able to make a trip to the 'burgh, it looks like I won't be able to get out there anytime in the immediate future...

Today was extremely uneventful, though productive. I wrote five entries for my freelance, and now I'm much less stressed out about that than I was. I have another five to write tomorrow (yes, I did save the hardest ones for last--but I still don't think it'll be all that bad) and then I'll polish them up on Thursday and Friday. I also did a bit of work for my mom, and that's pretty much it.

Oh, Robbie sent me Alex Madonna's obituary today--he founded the Madonna Inn in San Luis Obispo, which is hands-down the weirdest place I've ever spent the night (well, and paid for the privilege). We'd sort of had a running joke that the Madonna Inn decor, while highly complimentary of Alex, had a prematurely eulogistic feel, but now I suppose it's official. He was 85 and according to the photos at the inn, palled around with John Wayne all the time, so I think he had a rich, full life. I am, however, eager to see what new heights the pro-Alex decorations will reach now that he's actually gone--Matt Lippert will have to fill me in.

Today there was a hailstorm. Although I'm extremely glad that winter is over, it does seem that between the hail and the thunderstorms, we've moved into weather that can be fatal, not just annoying, and this can scarcely be called progress. I've never liked thunderstorms, but it had never really occurred to me to have a fear of hail until I was watching it today and didn't much care for the cut of its jib. I mean, large pellets of ice coming down from the sky at great speed? Who came up with that? It seems like the sort of thing that, if it didn't exist, would be completely implausible.

I got back home about half an hour ago and I don't know who Robbie's on the phone with, because he was on when I got here, but apparently he and his phonemate are in charge of deciding the future of Turkey. Me, I just want some dinner (turkey would be fine at this point, actually). So I'll distract myself by bloggernating.

The party yesterday was very nice. A lot of people came who I hadn't seen in forever, and no one came who I didn't want to see ever again, so it was a success. Plus, the cakes were good. And only one person asked me when I was going to have kids, and I like her, so I'm going to let it slide. It amazes me that people ask this, though. Maybe I'm just paranoid, but I'd never ask anyone I didn't know very well when they were going to have children, because what if that person was having trouble with it or something? (Not that this is an issue here--but I'm just saying. The people who ask me don't know that. Well, I guess now you all do.)

So, that was yesterday. Today we took Dottie to the psychiatrist, and it was going smashingly until we had lunch before her appointment, when Dottie started throwing up. I'm pretty positive it was psychosomatic, because it started more or less when the food touched her lips, and I think she was just overwhelmed by the amount of food on her tray (she has some pretty odd issues with food) and started psyching herself up to get sick. And sick she did get, for a good hour or so while we were waiting for her appointment. Finally the psychiatrist's nurse took over and gave her a little plastic basin and, as soon as her vomiting was accomodated in a formal manner, she pretty much got over it. One thing that cracked me up, though, was that I had the nurse give me another little plastic basin just in case we needed one on the ride home and put it in my purse, and during the point in the appointment when the psychiatrist talked just to me and my mother, he and I were chatting for a bit and then he said, very neutrally, "Now, I see you have an emesis basin in your purse, and I'm wondering what that's about." Like, I don't think you're supposed to be the crazy one, but I'll cover that base just in case.

And now I'm back here. It's looking like I'm going to be the apartment manager next year, which apparently comes with a free parking spot, and Robbie has been trying to convince me to give it up in exchange for more off our rent, but now that it's street-cleaning season I'm giving the big thumbs-down to that idea. Usually six-thirty is a fine time to find a spot, but today it was a huge pain. Not having to worry about it will be great--and I'm usually the one parking the car, so I feel I'm allowed veto power here.

Comments
EV: If Robbie was deciding the future of Turkey with anyone besides Jesse, Jesse is going to be decidedly put out.

Jess: I thought it was Jesse for a while, actually, until Robbie mentioned that his friend Jesse used to live in Turkey. Then I figured it must be Brett. Turns out it was Stefan.

Heather: Get the parking spot.

I think it's official now--more of my in-laws have read my blog than members of my own family. Of course, I have more in-laws than I have members of my own family, so maybe it's not a fair comparison. Actually, and I wasn't even counting my brothers-in-law there--just, you know, adults. If you count them too, then it's not even close.

Today was a lovely day, but I'm pretty tired now. We went to the compression-hose store to buy compression hose, which was every bit as exciting as it sounds--I was horrified when the salesman asked if they were for me, but it turns out that they're sold based on calf measurement (which is logical, but my mom had only given me Dottie's height and weight). I figured there's no way she isn't the smallest size, so I got a few of those, and saved the receipt just in case. Then we had lunch, took a walk around the park, did some shopping, and then had dinner with Tizzed and his girlfriend, whom avid blog readers also know as my high school friend. I taught them how to play Speed Scrabble, and even though Tizzed whupped me soundly (and his mystery date beat me a few times as well), I had a great time. Tizzed played some very questionable words, though, and I think if Adam were there it would have come to physical violence.

And now it's off to bed for me. Tomorrow is the big birthday party, and I want to be well rested, in case we end up having wacky fun with compression hose puppetry or something. Ah, and since Heather and Matt are leaving on their anniversary weekend tomorrow, I wanted to wish them a happy anniversary today, even though their actual anniversary isn't until Monday. The main thing I remember about their wedding ceremony is that I wept copiously out of one eye and the other eye was completely stoic, which I thought was fitting. Oh, and also that Robbie had big plans, when he did his reading at the ceremony, to either go up to the lectern, pretend to look for the reading Big T left up there for him, and then start pounding on the lectern and yelling "Ya screwed me, Hoeink! Ya screwed me!", or to present a five-word summary of their wedding with one of the words being "shotgun." Oh, the fun we had.

Comments
Heather: I promise you that if he had said the Hoeink thing, I would have laughed and laughed and laughed. And, thanks for the happy anniversary wish!

Tonight we went to see Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, and I really liked it. I think I didn't like it quite as much as I liked Adaptation, but I can see how some people would. Anyhow, it was really good. Now all we have to do is see Monsieur Ibrahim (which, conveniently, is playing at the bottom of our street) and I'll have seen everything I want to see that's out.

The other big event of the day is that Robbie, my parents, and I are going to the Fingerlakes in May for my mother's birthday. We used to go there on vacation every summer when I was a kid (well, minus Robbie), but I haven't been there since sometime in college, and I'm really excited. My parents have set out an ambitious wine-tasting itinerary, which will be fun, but I'm also hoping to squeeze in a little non-wine-oriented sightseeing. Originally Robbie was especially excited about the trip because the last time the four of us went on an excursionary vacation, to Montreal in the summer of 1996, I slept on a cot in my parents' hotel room and Robbie had a whole separate room to himself, but I told him he was out of luck this time. I think he's still excited, though.

This weekend is Dottie's 90th birthday. I asked my mother tonight what she'd like, and she suggested support hose and shower caps. I guess it might be nice to reach a point where your life is so streamlined that you don't want or need many material goods, but--no, I don't think it is. Anyhow, Sunday is the big event. We aren't having a party because Dottie's sort of a loose cannon these days, but we're having an open house with cake. This made perfect sense to me when it was suggested as a plan, but now that I write it down, it sounds like a party. I guess it differs from a party in that the guests can get out of Dodge if things start to get rough, and that's a good enough reason, really. Also, a fair number of the invited guests have long-standing, litigious grudges with each other, which is another good argument for flexibility. I anticipate French farce of the highest order here.

Today at my mother's I learned how to transplant tomato plants. This was very informative, although I'm not sure I needed to have the lesson reinforced on sixty seedlings. By the way, would anyone like a tomato plant? There are also cucumbers, although I didn't transplant any of those. There are fewer cucumber plants, but I see much less use for cucumbers--I suppose I could make pickles, but I don't like pickles. Maybe a kosher-dill-pickle stand would be a hit with Orthodox Jews walking past our street on the way back from synagogue, though...

And that's pretty much it. I did a little editing tonight and ate some pork. I was supposed to take a walk with my friend, but it ended up raining too hard, so that was kind of a bust. All in all, it was a dullish sort of day. I didn't even get to wear my capri pants, because of all the playing in dirt. And "Friends" was truly unremarkable. It's obvious that Ross and Rachel are going to get together in the end, but I figured at least they'd pull it off in some clever way, and now I'm starting to suspect that they won't. "Scrubs" was better, except for the last five seconds, which I didn't care for at all.

Comments
Dr. Tizzed: Since when was 'Friends' ever clever?

JR: (reaches across the table) Can I have your pickle?

I did something today that I never thought I would--I bought a pair of capri pants. It doesn't sound like much, but this represents a whole lifestyle shift for me. It's not that I've never owned any cute clothing, or that I have any animosity against cute clothing, but this is my first foray into an entirely cute genre. For a long time I felt about capri pants the way I felt about, well, hair highlights, but now I'm pretty much converted all around. Anyhow, these are slate blue, linen, and very nice. And I'm short enough that they don't look too whimsical.

And there's another thing, too. And about this thing I have great shame--shame, yes, but also a nascent pride. I think I'm going to start scrapbooking. I mean that not as "I have made the decision to start scrapbooking," but more in the sense of "I think I'm coming down with a cold." I fear it's inevitable. My mother and I went to Joann today and I was hanging around waiting for her to park the car, and I was looking at the scrapbook papers, and it was all so nice and shiny, and now that I've been putting my photos in albums I've realized how many more photos I have to go, and it would be nice for them to look nice, and--I don't know. I'm all messed up inside.

The thing is, I've never really had any illusions that I was hip, but I always felt that around scrapbooking there was a line that I would not cross. But as I get older I realize that in fact there are no lines anywhere, and also that I like pretty papers. I know that I'm susceptible to suggestion, and so the simple solution would have been for me to stay out of craft stores entirely, but I have to go in there to get the photo corners for my Santa Barbara albums and, I don't know, it just happened. I would like to promise that I won't do any of the really wootesy stuff, and just use pretty papers--oh, and I think there's something you can do with edges that I might do too--but I'm reluctant to promise you anything at this point.

So, other than staring into the dark fluffy pink interior of my soul, today was pretty uneventful. Oh, when my mother and I went to get potting soil, I saw some newborn kittens. No, seriously. I usually hate kittens (like cats, hate kittens) because the big-ears thing just doesn't do it for me and also they tend to smell, but these kittens were so small that their ears were all folded back, and they were very cute. It's kind of amazing to see something entirely catlike, but the size of my cell phone.

And the only fly in the ointment of my day was that the trivia question on the radio when I was driving home was "What television show was originally named 'City Of Angels Investigations'?" For the benefit of Tizzed, EV, and all the other know-it-alls who read my blog, I won't give the answer here, but suffice it to say that of all the useless trivia in my head, this is the question I was born to answer. So I tried to call in, but I kept not getting through, and then the guy who finally answered it correctly had the nerve to say that it was a random guess. Random! I turned off the radio in disgust. I watched every single episode of this series, even the ones at the end when the shark had been long jumped. I paid my dues. Oh well. Maybe the prize was Celine Dion tickets. On the other hand, what if it was capri pants and scrapbooking supplies? It's probably best that I'll never know.

Comments
Dr. Tizzed: FYI, my original guess to the trivia was wayyyy off. I guess I kind of knew it was off when I read further into the paragraph and found out that you had seen every episode. So, I concluded my guess of "Dragnet" was not right. Indeed it wasn't.

Lizzie: Hey Jess . . . I was always very wary of highlights too, but then this year I got some and I liked them! They were subtle though, well, until now they are starting to grow out so they aren't at their best but . . . cute when freshly done. Also, scrapbooking doesn't necessarily equal a loss of one's soul. They DO have really pretty papers, and some pretty cute stickers too. =-)

Jess: Oh, yeah, I get them now too. But before I got them, I thought they wouldn't be my thing. I don't even know if you could even call mine "subtle" anymore, actually, but I still like them.

Heather: They are lovely highlights. As are Megan's, by the way.

Robbie: Tizzed, I guessed Dragnet at first too....

Today was a highly productive day. I got all the research done that I need to do this month, except that I couldn't find any information on a mythical Japanese sea goddess that I need to write about. I went through all the books in the main section of the library, looking for information, and found nothing, and then I was very excited to discover that there was a separate East Asian section of the library on a different floor, so I trotted down there. Little did I realize that all of those books were in Japanese... I must have looked pretty silly marching into the correct aisle, then marching back out confusedly a few seconds later.

Oh, I also found a hilarious thing in a book from 1903 about Japan and its people. The book had a whole section devoted to whether or not the Japanese were inferior intellectually to Europeans, and although the author was willing to take the liberal view that maybe they weren't all total lunkheads and were actually good at repetitive tasks, he did allow that they were probably unable to handle any abstract technological innovations. Hahahahaha. I hope the writer was alive to buy, you know, a TV and a VCR and a DVD and a camera (although I suppose the odds are pretty low).

I also discovered that it's nearly impossible to do any research on early Cambodian history, because 95% of the books on Cambodian history have titles like Cambodia: Fields of Bloody Gruesome Death and almost no one has written a book on, say, the two thousand years before that. (Well, that's not fair, I suppose--but if they have, the Pitt library hasn't bought any of them.) Naturally, I found couple of books about Pol Pot and, if I'd been braver and less respectful of libraries, I totally would have tried to steal them for Heather. In the end, though, I was afraid I'd get caught and have to explain that my friend and I had an inside Pol Pot joke, and I think then I'd kinda feel like a jerk.

OK, now it's laundry time for me. I'll leave you with some wisdom that I found written on my carrel today: "She was giving me the eye, and I just sat here like a chump. Now I can't study." Poignant, no?

Well, sartorially this was a challenging day. The drawstring on my favorite shorts finally wore out and broke, and then later this afternoon the strap on my flip-flops snapped. (So now not only am I short a pair of flip-flops, but I have "Margaritaville" stuck in my head.) The shorts are still wearable, but I think I'll have to go on a shopping trip this week anyhow. I could use some more shorts, and the shoe situation is not good. The problem is that I want basically the exact shoes that broke, which I bought in 1999, and they seem to be not so much the style now. So if anyone knows where I can get a pair of leather two-strap flip-floppy sandals, let me know.

Tonight we played Trivial Pursuit, and I'm pleased to say I won. I'm less pleased to admit that I clearly got all of the easy questions, but still, a win is a win. It was fun, though. I don't know if it's the warm weather or the new, delightfully configured kitchen or both, but I lately feel much less inclined to watch TV in the evenings than I usually do--I'd rather do something else. Before dinner I did watch some of this documentary on the history of Mexico that I taped a few years ago, and that was kind of interesting (I really taped it because I used to need to know facts about Mexico for work, and not because of any inherent interest in the country), but I kinda felt too peppy to be sitting on the sofa watching for very long.

Anyhow, I took it easy in terms of work today, and it was pretty nice. I finally got some editing done on my book, which I really slacked on last week, and so that was good. Other than that, I didn't do too much--I wrote a few of the freelance entries I need to write, but I'm still a bit behind on that. I think I'm going to go to the library tomorrow, and that should finish up the research I need to do for this month's entries. Then I'll only have, uh, sixteen entries to write by the end of the month. Yep, definitely behind.

Comments
JR: I am completely addicted to all these TLC and BBC America makeover shows. This talk of drawstring shorts makes me want to fly out to Pgh and be your stylist. What do you thinkst?

Jess: Huh. One never really knows what to say when one is offered a makeover. It's rather like getting a gift of deodorant soap.
I think I'll pass. But you're free to come visit me and not make me over...

We rearranged the kitchen, and it looks good, so you all can stop your constant wringing of hands. In the interest of full disclosure, I should tell you that we modified our plans a bit, so that the stove, while still in the window nook as planned, is turned ninety degrees. It looked a little odd at first, but I'm getting used to it, and this way we can still walk to the window easily.

Other than that, I worked a bit, and made salsa chicken for dinner, and that's about it. Ah, and I talked to Heather, and I also got some information on the Internet about my high school reunion. It's going to be this Thanksgiving weekend, so I think we won't go, because Robbie's high school always has its reunion that weekend as well and I told him a while ago (I think around the time of his fifth reunion, actually) that we could go there for his tenth. He's kept better friends with more people from his high school than I have with people from my high school--for that matter, I've kept better friends with more people from his high school than I have with people from my high school--so I was surprised to find that I was actually a little disappointed that they were on the same weekend.

So, now I'm sitting around waiting for Heather to call me back with the results of her big evening adventure. See--you know how you have at least one person in your acquaintance who, for absolutely, utterly no reason, has captured the imagination of you and your friends? Such that you discuss that person, and sort of, well, surveill that person, and toss that person's name around? And it's not out of either fondness or un-fondness, but it's just the way things have developed somehow? (Or is it just us? No, I really don't think it's just us. I think this is a fairly universal phenomenon.)

For example, when I was growing up there was a guy my mother and I used to see at the mall sometimes who had a really splendid toupee, and we used to talk about him all the time and speculate about his personal life, and call him "L'Homme" (I was about thirteen, which is my excuse for the total non-subtlety of that nickname, but I'm not sure what my mother's defense was), and I don't think we were making fun of him, or his toupee (because he wore it with a tremendous amount of dignity), but he'd sort of caught our eye, and we were fascinated. For another example, Robbie and I use the name of one of our college classmates (who does not, to the best of my knowledge, read this blog) as an all-purpose proper noun, and we also make dirty jokes about this person, and there's no justification or even ironic justification for this, because this person is about as middle-of-the-road in terms of behavior as a person can get. It just sort of happened. Anyhow, the point of all this explanation is that Heather was going to see the person with whom she and I have a common fascination this evening, and she promised to let me know the details, so I'm waiting patiently. Actually, I told her not to run home and call if the alternative was to observe this person further, so I hope that's what's going on.

Comments
EV: I'm now curious about the all-purpose proper noun.

Robbie: You are totally worried that it's you........

Heather: Well, I should let all of Jess' readers know that the person in question was not at the event after all, much to our disappointment.

EV: I'm not worried that it's me, because she said she doesn't think the person reads the blog. And I think it's pretty clear that I read the blog. Unless that was a red herring... But actually, the middle-of-the-road behavior thing is a dead giveaway it's not me.

Jess: Hee. No, not a red herring. But, to reemphasize my point, it doesn't matter who it is. It could be anyone. In a sense, we are all this person. (In another, more factual sense, though, we aren't.)

EV: Now I am really trying to figure out the riddle.

It's mid-April and our living room temperature is approximately ninety degrees. I anticipate a long hot summer. On the up side, though, we just now realized that the space heater still puts out a trace amount of heat as long as the pilot light is turned on, so we turned it off and that should help things. At least our bedroom has air conditioning.

It was a lovely day today, though. I got up early and went for a walk with my high school friend and then out to lunch. The park where we walked was filled with fishermen because it was the first day of trout season here, and it was neat to see so many people out and about. Then tonight we had dinner with my dad and some of his old friends, and that was fun. The daughter of one of them lives about a five-minute walk from here, so we met at her apartment and then went out for dinner.

And that's about it. Tomorrow we may rearrange the kitchen, or I may just lie on the sofa and fan myself theatrically. We'll see how it goes.

Comments
Robbie: I've seen a preview, it is very theatrical fanning....

Lizzie: I had to put up the window fan in my room last night. It is not so much hot outside as it is just not good at circulating the air INSIDE. But things got much nicer with the fan. I am reluctant to put the AC up yet, as it boosts my electric bill up about $20 a month sometimes. . . =-) Have fun with the rearranging OR the theatrical fanning, or do both!

EV: RIght now, for the first time in history, it is actually absolutely fucking gorgeous n Boston. It's about 60 degrees and sunny, and I live in mortal fear of its demise (like tomorrow, when it will be mid-80s. For the marathon. Cripes.)

Dr tizzed: Theatrical fanning is best done with a wad of dollar bills.

The grant proposal is in. It was pretty close at the end there, and I was afraid we might not get it in, but we squeaked by and I think we did a pretty good job. But I'm exhausted and I still need to get some work done on the statistical freelance, so this will be a very short blog entry. After we finished the proposal, I went back into town to get Robbie (no pleasant task, since it was in the eighties today and I was stuck in rush-hour traffic with what appears to be a broken air conditioner), and then we went back to my mother's for my cousin's daughter's birthday party. It was very fun, and I think both she and her brother (who turned four a month ago, but because of all the brouhaha with my aunts and so forth didn't get a birthday party from my parents until tonight) liked their presents. Then we came back here and now we're watching the Red Sox, and soon I'll begin to work.

It looks like a gorgeous weekend here, by the way. Maybe spring is actually here to stay...

Comments
EV: congrats. i wish i could finish one goddam thing.

I worked twelve hours today, which may be a lifetime record (well, I'm sure I put more than twelve hours a day into my senior thesis at points, but I can't remember a workday that lasted that long). The nice thing about getting paid hourly, though, is that I know all of those hours are worth something, which is pretty nice. Most of today was spent at my mother's working on this grant proposal, and most of tomorrow will be as well. The proposal is coming along, but there's still a lot to do.

So I came home from that, did some work for my hourly statistics freelance, and watched "The Apprentice." The decision went pretty much as I expected, and I thought the episode was actually a little dull, but I think I may be developing a crush on Donald Trump. Believe me, I'm as shocked by this as anyone. He's nicer than I expected, though--I'd believe that he's not as nice when he's not on television, but still, I'm surprised that he was as nice as he was. Also, I noticed that Jessica Simpson seemed a lot smarter (well, less dumb) on "The Apprentice" than she does on "Newlyweds," which wouldn't be troubling if "Newlyweds" weren't produced by her father. I suspect my father would rather beat himself senseless than make me look stupid on national television, and I don't think he's in the minority of fathers out there.

So I have a new crush on The Donald, and I've also developed another new interest over the last few weeks--Newfoundlands. Robbie and I have been joking about moving to Canada so he can reclaim his roots, and we've been saying that if we moved there we'd get a Newfoundland because, you know, when in Rome, and originally it was a joke but I've been reading up on them and frankly I'm intrigued. They're massive, but extremely good with children, which will be useful if we ever happen to pass one on the street or something, and they have webbed feet. In 1919, a Newfoundland rescued something like 92 people from a sinking ship. I'm not sure how I'd cope with a dog that was obviously so much more useful to society than either me or Robbie, but I guess we'd work it out.

Comments
Robbie: Just to make things clear, while a number of my ancestors lived in Canada, to my knowledge none of them were Newfies (as in someone from Newfoundland).

Megan of Pedregosa A.: Never be ashamed of where you come from, Robbie. Never.

Ween Doggy Dogg: ... Especially if you come from the Biggest Little State in the Union!

Heather: Last night I thought you were crazy for having a crush on The Donald, but this morning we watched him on the news, and Megan and I both see where you're coming from. He was _way_ nicer than I expected, though I suspect that you're right that he's not always that way when he's not on television. Still, though...

Megan of Pedregosa A.: For me, I think it is the absolute confidence thing (and maybe a bit of the ruthless-bastard simmering right beneath the surface). Isn't that just like me. I think it is interesting that Heat and I both firmly agreed with you, but for such different reasons.

It looks like this week will be pretty busy too, as it turns out--I have a grant proposal I'm working on with my mother that's going to take all day tomorrow and probably some of Friday, I have nine pieces to write for my freelancing (some of them are short, though), and I have to work--let's see--five more hours on my statistics freelance. Actually, when I write it out like that, it doesn't look quite as occupied as I feel it'll be. I do think I'll be busy over the weekend, though, which is nothing to complain about considering how often I'm not busy on weekdays, but is certainly a change.

Anyhow, I worked at my mother's today, and then I came home and planted more tomato, basil, onion, and pepper seeds, since all of the original seedlings died except for three pepper plants that seem to be hanging on. I suppose it was foolish to think that I could just toss seeds in a pot and have them grow, considering all the seed-starting accoutrements that every single website says you need to use to start seeds, but this is how we learn. Hopefully some of these will grow--Burpee's certainly provided extensive enough instructions.

So, predictably considering that I have no time to do any of it, I've been having a fit of domestic-planning mania. (Astute blog readers will note that when I'm not employed, I tend to watch a lot of History Channel and eat Wheat Thins and generally am not any sort of domestic goddess.) We're mostly thinking about rearranging the kitchen. For those of you familiar with our kitchen, we're thinking of moving the antique stove to under the window, the table to where that stove is now, and the kitchen cart around so that it's basically where it is now but facing the kitchen door instead of the refrigerator. As with any life-changing decision, though, like having a child or invading a foreign country, this move would have pros and cons. I think it would open up the usable space a bit, and make eating at the table by artificial light much brighter, but the table wouldn't be by the window anymore, and now that the days are getting longer we'll probably eat by natural light most of the time. But we would prepare food on top of the stove, by the window, and that might be nice. Thoughts?

(Actually, I've noticed an interesting thing about blogging, which is that when I specifically ask for thoughts, I get nothing. It's only when I let it be and don't ask for anything that I get a torrent of comments. This doesn't seem to happen with anyone else's blog, but then, I always knew my friends and relations were contrary people.)

Comments
EV: 1) I am not yet familiar with your kitchen.
2) If I were, the axiom would still hold that I don't give a shit about these things and have no capacity to evaluate them.
3) But good luck.

Adam: Moving around lares and penates? Sorry, you're going to have to help me use that in a sentance.

Jess: Actually, I just looked it up, and "lares and penates" can be either household gods or household possessions. So kind of, I guess. Although I bet it's more often used for cherished household items, and not the stove that was in the apartment when we moved in. So, your lares and penates are your prized collection of Reunions beer cups, I guess.

Megan of Pedregosa A.:I don't know your kitchen, but I have a basic philosophy of rearrangement. Just try it. My living room is the product of at least 10 arrangements, 5 changes made in one day. My downstairs neighbor REALLY REALLY hates me. But he's British, so I don't care.

Jess: I totally agree, unless it's the Thrill, in which case, I love that kid.

Well, we're back in the 'Burgh. The drive back was a little hair-raising at times, especially going through Philadelphia and Wilmington, because the rain was reducing visibility quite a bit. The bursts of heavy rain never lasted for very long, though, and once we dropped Adam off in Baltimore (a city that rivals Gary, Indiana for glamour, or at least the parts I saw today) and started west, the rain let up a lot. So it ended up okay, and the traffic was really light, which was great.

Oh, I learned a new game last night, although Robbie won't play it and thus my opportunities for playing will be minimal. It's called Speed Scrabble and is like Scrabble except with no board and a time element. Basically, everyone picks tiles one by one and makes words in a Scrabble fashion, picking a new tile whenever one person has fit all their current tiles into words, and the player with the highest score once all the tiles have been chosen wins. (It's a little more complicated, but that's the gist.)

So, Robbie refused to play right from the outset, and Adam got into a snit because of some cheating and misspelled words (but totally innocent--who wouldn't think that the singular of "lares," as in "lares and penates," was "lare"?) and said he'd never play again, so it was just me and AJ and Robbie's dad, and it was fun but now I think I won't get a chance to play often. It won't even go on the burgeoning list of Fun Things I'll Get To Do When Heather's Only Four Hours Away, because I think she would hate it with a white-hot passion previously reserved only for the perennial favorite game called No, Of Course I'm Not Angry, Have You Done Something To Make Me Angry? Maybe I'm Angry, Just A Bit. And have I mentioned that only someone with a total tweaked-out samurai code of ethics would get so het up over "lare"? Sheesh.

I usually refrain from political commentary of even the mildest sort on my blog, but who on earth chose Bush's tie tonight? I was mad enough that we couldn't watch "24" or "Scrubs," but the visual assault was just too much. Now, if it'd been covered in grammar mistakes or addition errors I'd think it was just a slap in the face of liberal intellectualism, but this was an attack on all sighted people. Naturally, I suspect that he's trying to blind us for a reason.

Comments
Robbie: That tie is only for battle. The idea is to blind your opponent with luxury....

Dr. Tizzed: "lare"? why not just spell 'real' or 'earl' instead?

Jess: It fit nicely like that. That was one of the reasons I was so excited about it. Maybe I can play Speed Scrabble with you...

Anthony Foglia: Scrubs was scheduled to be a rerun anyway, Jess.

matt lippert: I'm glad he at least had the sense to realise that the awful red SOTU tie neither made him look tough nor disoriented his audience. But that tonight's pattern wasn't nearly enough to distract me from the fact that he doesn't seem to know who's his secretary of state.

EOL: I may be wrong about this, but couldn't "lare" be an ablative? Would that count?

Adam: Lets be honest - it was more than just "lare". BOIN!

Jess: I had nothing whatsoever to do with "boin," though. Your dad and AJ were making up words--I was just misspelling them. And Mom, you may be right, but it all depends on what an ablative is.

Dr tizzed: No matter, when we play I'll have to bring along my official scrabble dictionary. (which didn't include lare) BOIN that!

Heather: I don't know what was up with Scrubs. It was scheduled to be a rerun, but I watched it anyway and had definitely never seen it before, but I couldn't tell if it was a new episode or one that I had missed. In any case, it wasn't the episode that My Yahoo told me it was going to be. Also, I didn't think it was all that funny, which was disappointing because it was Megan's first episode.

Chi: that's so weird, my cousin Josie just taught me Speed Scrabble this past weekend! it must be the new "in" thing.

Well, here I am. We're having a good time. Saturday, Adam and Robbie and I went into New York to see "Hairspray." The driving in was enough of a pain (and I wasn't even the one driving) that I'd lost a lot of enthusiasm for the event by the time we got to the theater, but then the show was great and in the end I was really glad we went. Harvey Fierstein was hilarious, and the rest of the cast was also good, although obviously they were totally overshadowed by him. So that was fun.

Then yesterday we went to see a movie called Bon Voyage, which was also great. I'd wanted to see Monsieur Ibrahim, which was playing at the same theater, but I got outvoted, and then Bon Voyage had a cameo by General de Gaulle (well, not the real General de Gaulle, obviously, because I think he's not looking too good these days, but a de Gaulle character) and I think we all know about my platonic crush on de Gaulle, so that sold me on the movie right there. And the parts of the movie that didn't have General de Gaulle (approximately 99.95% of the screen time) were also quite good. Then we had dinner and gave Robbie's mom her birthday presents (her birthday is today, but Brett had to go back to New York last night). Robbie's dad got her these frog sculptures that she really wanted, and it was very cute because obviously she thought he was going to get her something she would hate, so she was pleased, and it all worked out well. I'll point out to any friends of mine who may have been disappointed by rotten spousal birthday gifts in the past that the key to happiness does seem to be low expectations.

And now for the final cleanup paragraph. Please note the new blog in my sidebar, maintained by Heather's sister Meagan. Also, congratulations to Matt, who just officially got his job offer in DC. And finally, I would like to reiterate to anyone who will listen that the pony at my fifth birthday party was not, to the best of my knowledge, gay, not that there's anything wrong with that, and I don't know why Robbie is running around telling people that he was. He was a perfectly normal pony, as far as I know, and it was a lovely party.

Comments
Robbie: Thanks for making me sound like a pony homophobe......

EV: If I had a nickle for every time I begged my mom for a gay pony...

Jess: You had a gay cat, though. You should be thankful just for that.

EOL: If I recall correctly, that pony had many years before been surgically encouraged to put aside the lusts of the flesh. And, as far as I know, he did.

Jess: And if _I_ recall correctly, the pony lived to be something like 40, which just goes to show what being abstemious can do for you.

I've almost made it to the end of the week! Huzzah! Actually, it wasn't as bad as I anticipated, and I'll tell you the secret reason why--other than working for money, I did almost nothing I wanted to do. I feel surprisingly okay about this. Maybe it's because I'm actually earning money and, especially when it's tax time, that always feels good, but I just couldn't bring myself to care about the other things I'd set out to do. Tomorrow, though, I'm going to bake apple pie squares (and do some more paying work, I think, although I'm not sure what's left that I can do), so we'll have something to eat in the car.

So, this weekend we're journeying east to the Land of Sedgewick. I spend a lot of time at my in-laws thinking about the only thing I know about families, which is that they're all different and all totally loopy, in diverse and fascinating ways. I think you've all come to understand now that the family I grew up in is completely, jaw-droppingly insane, but the great thing about getting married is that you get to know a new family almost as well as you know your original family, and they'll be crazy too, but in a totally orthogonal way. (I should say here, for a variety of reasons one of which being that they all read my blog, that I'm extremely fond of my in-laws, and you shouldn't think differently just because I also find them to be nuts.) For example, today at my parents' house, I sorted through six weeks' worth of junk mail that my mother had been keeping on the stove and then I cleaned the mold off their front door, and by tomorrow night, I'll be eating pate at the fetched-from-Denmark Danish table and playing video games on a television the size of our car. It's enough to give one the bends.

But I'll try to blog at some point this weekend. Since my favorite guest blogger went and got her own blog, I feel like I oughtn't to ask her to watch mine while I'm gone--it's kind of like having your babysitter discover boys. Or something. Anyhow, I'll be back on Tuesday.

Comments
EV: Fun! I love the S'wicks 2 (mine are the S'wicks 1, but you can switch that from your perspective if you'd like). Go to the Haven for me. Like six times.

Heather: Hey, you led this babysitter to the boys, my friend.

Jess: True, true. And on so many levels.

Danielle Pierce: Hello, Never before have I been a blog-reader, but out of a nostalgic feeling, I decided to google people with whom I went to school. I came across you: Although I am not completely certain, I believe that we might have gone to the same school (and been in the same class) during 2nd and 3rd grade. If so, I would love to say hi. Either way, I love the blog - keep up the good work!

Jess: Whoa! Danielle Pierce! I remember you! You were friends with Becky Hansen, right? Oh, this is so neat. What are you up to?

Danielle Pierce: Living in DC. Working. Married. All the normal. We should get together sometime next time you are around here - would be cool to catch up!!

Today I did two things: research for my non-hourly freelance, and double-checking taxes. The research went well--I spent six or seven hours in the Pitt library, which was way longer than I expected it to take, but it was fun. I'm writing pieces on several different topics, so it wasn't like six hours of research on one topic, and that made it more interesting. Some of the topics are a little daunting, though. I need to write 600 words on Ceylon from prehistory to 1500, for example, and since I started out knowing nothing at all about Ceylon from prehistory to 1500, it was hard to sort out the important bits of information quickly in 300-page books devoted entirely to Ceylonese history.

The double-checking taxes went fine too. I discovered that in the rough draft of our California taxes, I'd overreported our income by $30, and I was all excited about that, but fixing it only reduced our total tax burden by something like 60 cents. I guess I knew that was the tax rate, generally speaking, but I was hoping for something more somehow. Oh, and to address EV's comment from yesterday, we need no more good reasons to buy a house, but we do need some sense of permanence or quasi-permanence (so, not while Robbie is a postdoc). And we won't have that for at least three years or so. In California it was almost okay because there was a renter's tax credit, but if you live in tax-exempt property (so, married student housing) you can't claim it.

And now, after that whirlwind of a day, I'm heading off to bed. I suspect tomorrow will be just as riveting as today, so be sure to tune in.

Comments
EV: Just remember, getting on the equity train is what it's all about, even if you only stay in your first house for a year. Just sayin.

Jess: Yeah, I dunno. My dad said he didn't think it was worth it for two years. I think it may depend somewhat on what you think the market will do in the time you're living there--and it's certainly not going up in Pittsburgh.

I'm bloggernating the villages and peasants early today, because I'm in a sort of super-efficient-and-yet-super-inefficient mode where I have to finish any daily task that comes to mind as soon as I remember it. Also, there's a rumor, started by me, that Robbie and I are going out for sushi tonight, and I want to free up a nice chunk of time for that. So here I am.

I finished our taxes today (no time like the present, eh?) and I'm pleased to report that we only owe, after summing up the various over- and underpayments, $130 to various state, local, and federal agencies. I was fearing much worse, and in my early rough draft of the taxes it was a lot higher, but it turns out that I'd miscalculated on the California form. Among the many reasons I'm glad to get out of that state is the ridiculously complicated nonresident tax form (yeah, I know that doesn't make sense). It's all pro-rating and adjusting and multiplying by percentages and large complicated charts. The Pennsylvania form is basically "Take your income, multiply it by 2.8%, and mail that to us." Anyhow, it's good to have that done, although I still want to check them over one more time.

Oh, I forgot to mention that yesterday was the first wedding anniversary of Big T and Dr. J. I wasn't in their wedding party per se, but I took a managerial role and made an enormous spreadsheet, and it was one of the most fun weddings I've participated in. My personal highlight was when Helen, who was the Reception Site Team Leader (and thus was entitled to her own copy of the spreadsheet, a privilege afforded to only a few) called me as Heather and I were lacing Julie into her dress and said, "Now, I don't want to alarm anyone, but is there supposed to be a cake somewhere?" Good times. But the cake was found, the couple was married, Tizzed danced like a crazy person, all the Germans drank heavily, and now here we are a year (and a day) later.

Comments
Dr. Tizzed: For the Ca taxes, I just eventually said 'fuck it' and totalled up my CA W2s and looked it up on the tax table, but the PA forms ticked me off with a lack of a standard deduction. I did indeed dance like a crazy person, and I also helped with the car.

EV: If you need a reason to buy a house, it's that you get a frickin windfall come tax time.

Matthew Lippert: Amen to that, EV.

Yep, this week is going to be insanely busy. That isn't a bad thing, and I think actually in hour terms it's quite doable, but something about the variety of tasks I have to get done (three different types of paying work, helping my mother with stuff, and the regular writing and editing that I'd be happy to put off for a week if I didn't know I'd feel horribly guilty as a result) makes it seem like there's more of it to do. I guess that's something that freelancers adjust to, and I'm sure I will, but right now it's unnerving.

I did start on my hourly freelance tonight, and I'm having a good time. It's working with statistics (nothing high-level, just inputting them into a database, with periodic math required) and it's the perfect counterpoint to creative work. I really don't find it boring, although it is repetitive--when I was working full-time for the group I'm doing this freelance for, I think my co-workers thought my fondness for statistics was kind of odd, but I never minded doing them. On the down side, because I like them so much, today I blasted through the set I was given that was supposed to last for the rest of this week, so I'm going to have to find something else to fill my ten weekly hours.

Oh, and Robbie and I decided after long debate that we aren't going to go to the Social Event of the Millennium after all. We really, really want to, but it's just not something we can justify doing right now. I do hope to see lots of pictures, however, so all of you who are going, be sure to take a few for me.

Comments
EV: WHAT?? WHAT?? grrrrrrrr.....

Jess: I know. I'm disappointed too. If it's any consolation, though, we will be in RI at some point this summer, and you can come down or we'll go up. And you're welcome to come see sunny Pittsburgh anytime.

EV: Rhode Island it is!

Lizzie: Too bad you guys aren't coming! I think you would have had fun. Plus you could have stayed at the cheap motel with the infamous Walling-Doty's and Megan-of-Switzerland. Ah well . . . maybe next time one of us gets married in Boston.

Lizzie: Oh yeah, and me Liz-of-the-Panty-hose fame (whatever that means); I am staying at the cheap hotel too. =-)

Jess: Pantyhose-fame Lizzie, you are the only Lizzie in my life at present. I know a Liz, but I don't think she knows about my blog.

EV: I think if that Liz knew about your blog (or mine), we'd know about it. I just have a feeling.

Today was a slow day punctuated by various pleasant experiences. I spent some of the day reading a great book about the Mountain Meadows Massacre (catchily, the book is called The Mountain Meadows Massacre). It's really depressing--there's probably not really a cheery treatment that you can give to the Mountain Meadows Massacre--but it's fascinating too. It's all he-said, she-said (well, he-said, he-said) and so there's kind of a whodunit aspect to it.

So that was good. Then for dinner we went to the foofy pan-Asian restaurant in our neighborhood and I had a Vietnamese tofu curry that was very tasty. And before that I talked to Heather. And then, just now, I was browsing Weddings and Celebrations and discovered, completely randomly, that this guy my roommate had a huge crush on in college got married this weekend. That has to be one of the most obscure pleasant experiences out there, but a pleasant one nonetheless.

So all that almost made up for the fact that I don't think it ever got above freezing today, there was ceaseless biting wind, and once or twice I saw bona fide snowflakes. Also on the bad side, Dottie went back to a nursing home--not the one she was just at, but one she's been to in the past--and I guess the adjustment went pretty badly at first. I counted and she's moved seven times since around Valentine's Day, so I really hope she can settle in here and have a rest from all the moving around. It would be incredibly disorienting to anyone, and I can't imagine how rough it would be on someone who's heavily medicated, and not totally aware of her surroundings even under ideal circumstances.

Comments
EV: Thanks for protecting me, but it's really ok to out and say the roommate was me. There's no one who doesn't know about that crush. No one, including the new bride. But I agree it was altogether pleasant to learn about.

Megan of Switzerland: I'm so glad I am not the only one who reads Weddings and Celebrations every week.

Heather: What the hell is Weddings and Celebrations?

Jess: It's the wedding (well, and celebration, which is gay-wedding) section in the NY Times. You know--"until 2000 the groom's father was employed by Volvo"? Those people.

Heather: Oh, _those_ people. Yep.

EV: I just suddenly had an image of affluent middle-class little people dancing around my livingroom.

Well, we didn't go to Erie, due to an extremely misleading forecast, but we ended up having a lovely day nonetheless. We walked to a neighborhood called Regent Square, about a mile or two away, because Robbie was captivated by the name, and we had a very nice time walking around, and had lunch at a cafe with delicious food and extremely, er, unobtrusive service. Then we walked back through Frick Park, which I think has nicer walking trails than the park nearer our house, Schenley. We took photos, because we were so flattered by Evie's affection for our photo essays, so I'll have that up soon.

Then we went out to my parents' house. Dottie is home now, although likely not for long because she's taken to falling down all the time and that's more than my mom can handle, so we gave my parents a break and watched Dottie and Ethel while they had dinner and did the grocery shopping. Dottie's medications have been switched around--her anti-anxiety medication is way up and her memory medication was dropped entirely--with the end result that she's totally happy and easy to get along with, but makes no sense whatsoever and is hazy on who we all are. I think this isn't a bad thing, though. When she was on her old set of medications, she was very angry and weepy all the time, and it's nice to see her happier. It's upsetting to see her memory so much worse, of course, but as long as it doesn't depress her, I think it's okay.

I just read that the Volvo woman-designed concept car has a cutout in the headrest for a ponytail, and I think this is the most brilliant thing I've ever heard. It sounds stupid, but driving with a ponytail is incredibly uncomfortable. I look forward to seeing this in the cars of the future.

Well, as predicted, I had a very Glengarry Glen Ross day. Unfortunately, instead of being Al Pacino, I wound up as the sad elderly man who keeps saying "I can't do anything with these leads! These leads are no good!" See, the prospective tenant never showed, and I sat out on the porch in forty-degree weather for an hour and a half waiting for her, and then she finally called and said she couldn't find parking and had decided to give up because she wouldn't want to rent an apartment with no street parking anyhow. Overlooking the fact that in the hour and a half I was out there, while parking was admittedly tight, I spied with my little eye several parking spots, and also overlooking that she was planning to rent a garage spot anyhow so it would never be an issue during the actual rental period, the mind reels that she couldn't slow down the car long enough to shout at me, clearly visible on the porch, that she was leaving, so that I could get out of the cold. But she did call forty-five minutes later, because she "didn't want me to think that (she'd) blown it off entirely." We will leave my thoughts on this comment as an exercise for the reader.

So, that kind of blew, and I was feeling, homophonically, kind of blue. Fortunately, when I called my mother to vent, she correctly ascertained with her maternal eye that I was actually looking for constructive criticism on my personality, and pointed out that despite today's setback, in fact I might make a fine Dave the Key Man substitute because I am charming "when I want to be." This is depressing and I don't think it's even true. When I want to be charming, I think I actually repel people. However, she also made the observation that as a Key Man, I'd have to learn to meet people's problems on their level, and I do agree with that one. For example, today I wasn't thinking on the level of being an inconsiderate chucklehead, and that may have affected my reaction to the day's events.

So I had a cup of tea and watched the History Channel's history of the electric chair, which put me in a surprisingly good mood. Honestly, I think it's better to have a day every so often when several things go wrong than to have bad things spread out. Tomorrow is Saturday and we may be driving to Erie, because Robbie is laboring under the misapprehension that it's a touristic playground, and although I've been to Erie and know it's not great shakes, it should be a fun excursion anyhow, driving through the countryside in the spring and watching the syringes lap against Lake Erie's shores. Now I'm going to have another cup of tea, because coffee, as we all know, is for closers.

Comments
EV: You guys and your hilarious road trips. I can't wait to see the photos of Gary. And Jess, even if you're not charming when you want to be, you're definitely charming when you don't want to be, which I think in the end probably shakes out better.

Dr. Tizzed: So, was it an 'Alan Arkin' day or a 'Jack Lemmon' day? I'd guess Arkin because it'd be pretty tough to hav ethe Lemmon day..

Today I took another spin on the Wheel of Random that is a visit to my parents' house, and did the following: replaced two taillights on my mother's car, planted pepper seeds dating back to 1975, and took a brief excursion to find buttocks wash. (I know that Buttocks Wash sounds like a town in England, but no, this was really buttocks wash. It wasn't for me, or for my mother. Or my father. And the cone of silence shall now descend upon the buttocks wash.)

In order to create a more perfect union, I also got our hubcaps removed. It cost $4.56, a small price to pay for maintaining tranquility in the Sedgewick family household. I was so delighted by this that I honestly would not have been happier if it had been free. I had no idea that you could have any labor done on a car, even in this relatively cheap city, for four dollars and fifty-six cents. Oh, and my mother and I went to a new Italian deli-market and got stuffed mushrooms and prosciutto for lunch, and took it home to share with Ethel, and this may have been the highlight of my day. Ethel obviously hated the lunch, but she is a lady of such excruciating tact that she'd never come out and say it. Instead, every thirty seconds or so she'd say some variant of "Well, this is certainly a... different.. sort of a meal." She was exactly like the Japanese taster women on Iron Chef, who say "The salt flavor, mm-hmm, definitely comes through quite clearly in this dish," and you know they're basically eating brine. It was fantastic.

Tomorrow I'm showing the apartments. I'm pumped, I'm telling you, pumped. I'm totally going to get the Glengarry leads. I also talked with Dave the Key Man about the possibility of my being Jess the Key Woman next year (Dave is moving), and I think it'd be a great thing to do. I'd show apartments, deal with lockouts, and call the plumber when necessary in exchange for a break on rent and a free parking spot. Sounds like a good deal to me. I still need to talk to the landlord about it, though, and he may be planning a different arrangement next year for all I know. So we'll see.

Comments
Robbie: Remember, ABC.

Adam: Man, I was going to say that. So I'll resort to: coffee is for closers.

EV: You Sedgewicks and your inside jokes. And the Wheel of Random that is a visit to your parents house never fails to be, well, totally random.

Jess: As it turns out, it went as poorly as a real estate encounter can. But more about that (oh, much much more) when I blog tonight...