Greeting from New York City!

I believe I checked off every item on my to-do list for the past week - much to-ing and fro-ing - except I didn't vote this morning. I feel bad about it. I always vote. *sigh*

But! Now I am here in NYC. K greeted me, gave me food and water, and has gone back to bed. I will follow her example soon.


Bedtime reading: Smoke and Mirrors, Neil Gaiman

:)

Tonight the 200th episode of SG-1 was on.


Today's earrings: leaves, flowers

Bedtime reading: Fragile Things, Neil Gaiman

Sunbird

"Sunbird" is Mr. Gaiman's attempt at a Lafferty story. He doesn't do too badly, either. It's just... R.A. Lafferty wouldn't have his characters go haring off to Cairo, Egypt. A big part of Lafferty's ethos is that the exciting, exotic stuff all happens within streetcar distance of Tulsa, OK. His characters may visit other planets, but they don't see any need to visit parts of this world much beyond Ponca City. Sending them to Cairo, Illinois would have been a stretch. Lafferty would have sent his characters to an aptly-named neighborhood or suburb of Tulsa. (And if there isn't one, he'd have fudged up a folk etymology that made it aptly-named. He did that sometimes.)

The plot, though, and the underlying gimmick - those are very Laffertian.


Today's earrings: dragonflies, other dragonflies

Bedtime reading: Fragile Things, Neil Gaiman

Rain, rain go away

Dear Rain,

Please stop falling on me and go be snowpack in the Sierras instead.

Pleadingly,
iiii


Today's earrings: scarabs

Bedtime reading: "Sunbird," Neil Gaiman

Happy Presidents' Day

- - Patrick Moberg

Today's earrings: rockets, estrogen molecules

Bedtime reading: Fragile Things, Neil Gaiman

Something strange

On the bus this morning, there was a woman wearing headphones, singing gospel. That's not the strange part. The strange part was that she was only singing in one key.

I repressed the urge to burst into "Simple Gifts."


Today's earrings: pineapples, peas

Bedtime reading: Fragile Things, Neil Gaiman

Dim Sum

@ Yank Sing. mmmm, dim sum. I was reminded that a) spy music is fun, and b) it would be better if I verified business hours before I propose an activity (sorry!). The Festive Lemming hooked up my new VistaVision monitor. Most excellent birthday (observed).

Today's acquisitions: 1 red dress, 1 monitor

Today's earrings: amethysts

Bedtime reading: Fragile Things, Neil Gaiman

Good evening

b2 gave me a Mutual of Omaha wall calendar and the Puppini Sisters album with "Walk Like an Egyptian" on it, then took me out for sushi.


Today's earrings: compasses

Bedtime reading: Fragile Things, Neil Gaiman

Challenge

Tomorrow, I get to figure out how to separate lines, each consisting of a string of text followed by a row of numbers, into separate text and number columns. I mean, I know how to do that, but I don't know how to do that for 10,000 lines at once when the text strings are all different lengths and have a variety of terminal letters. Oh, and there are numbers mixed into the text strings.

If anyone has any ideas, let me know.


Today's earrings: tree frogs, fish

Bedtime reading: Fragile Things, Neil Gaiman

41

Today at work I got several birthday emails, and one coworker came up and whispered, "Is today your birthday?" It was all extremely gratifying.

Lunched with b2. The pizza people gave me a free slice because she was standing behind me pointing and mouthing "it's her birthday" to them.

After lunch, I got a new hard drive from corporate IT in Detroit. My friendly local IT dude says he'll install it tomorrow morning before I get in. It's a Velociraptor. No, seriously, that's what the label said.

I took myself out to dinner at Fancy Restaurant. I found out what 'mache' is. (Cloverlike, chlorophyllacious and delicious.)

Got home to find a birthday voicemail on my machine. :)


Today's earrings: flowers, bunnies

Bedtime reading: Fragile Things, Neil Gaiman

My eye

It's a little swollen, like maybe from a bug bite or something? Anyway, people have been looking at me funny all day. It's making me paranoid. I desperately want to spend tomorrow curled up with a hot compress, but to work I must go...


Today's earrings: moose, theobromine molecules

Bedtime reading: Fragile Things, Neil Gaiman

89 cents

Stopped at the store on the way home, and found they had avocados for 89 cents apiece. Decent sized, too. So for dinner tonight I cubed some bread, diced an avocado, and tossed them together with a little sausage and white wine reduction. mmmmmm.


Today's earrings: turtles, other turtles

Bedtime reading: Fragile Things, Neil Gaiman

Gran Torino

The story of an elderly and extremely well-armed white curmudgeon in an all-brown immigrant neighborhood. Surprisingly little actual gunplay.

I rather liked it.


Today's earrings: roses, green eggs

Bedtime reading: Fragile Things, Neil Gaiman

Revised opinion

Just saw the gas-mask kid episode, and whatever else is wrong with the series - I still blame the writers big time - I really really hate Eccleston as the 9th Doctor.
Hate hate hate.

Haaaaate.


Today's earrings: amethysts

Bedtime reading: Fragile Things, Neil Gaiman

L'Heure bleue

As I always say.

I know you do, although I don't believe I've ever actually heard you.



-- Edward Gorey


Today's earrings: sapphires, aquamarines

Bedtime reading: Fragile Things, Neil Gaiman

I had no idea

Look familiar? It seems to be a common subject in skater film.
(Which you should not watch if you don't want to see people wipe out onto the concrete below. Skaters are nuts.)


Today's earrings: tree frogs, coins

Bedtime reading: Fragile Things, Neil Gaiman

2nd credit line obtained

After drinking we checked out the windows @ Gumps, then went to Macy's. b2 is a most luck-bringing shopping partner; I came away with a really cute sweater and 4 pairs of stockings.

Sadly, the luck-bringing was not reciprocal. Sorry!


Today's earrings: flies, fish

Bedtime reading: Fragile Things, Neil Gaiman

Stacey's is closing

Which is awful. However, there is an associated sale. Anyone want to come into the city for bookshopping purposes this weekend?


Today's earrings: scarabs

Bedtime reading: "Sunbird," Neil Gaiman

On the current Doctors

At first, I thought it was Billie Piper. And I do find her fairly annoying as Rose Tyler. Then I saw her as Fanny Price in Mansfield Park, and I realized that Billie Piper qua Billie Piper wasn't the problem.

Then I wondered if it was Eccleston. Things improved so much when David Tennant took over. But no, Eccleston's done plenty of good work. He's not the source of the trouble either.

Then I caught the episode about the scribbling alien who was possessing the little girl, and I realized it's the writing, mostly, and the direction. That's where the trouble lies. I mean, who were they trying to kid with the "torch of love" crap? Nonsense scribbled on a anvil and thrown at my head, that's what that was. Much like the episode that made me bail mid-episode on Nine, with the idiotic philosophical conversations with the last condemned Slitheen - they wrote a silly bit of self-importance, and asked the actors to deliver it pontifically.

I blame the writers.


Today's earrings: leaves, crows

Bedtime reading: Smoke and Mirrors, Neil Gaiman

Worked late

The Troll left around 6:30. I thought I was the only one left in our end of the office. Really, I did. So I started singing aloud to the music in my headphones. It was mostly Johnny Cash, which is not too bad, but have you ever tried to keep up with the lyric to "I've Been Everywhere"? Anyway, just after 7 Newbie wandered into my field of vision; she was peering down the hallway, apparently looking for the source of the sounds. oops! I told her I'd thought I was alone, sorry about the singing...

I did not ask, and she did not volunteer, why she was hanging out in the break room at 7 when her shift ended at 5:30. Life would be nothing without its little mysteries.

I'm kinda glad I wasn't singing along to Sublime.


Today's earrings: hands, basketweave spoons

Bedtime reading: Smoke and Mirrors, Neil Gaiman