This is why I rely on my diary: my memory for actual events is terrible! I have a decent noodle for things, heuristics, trivia even-- but what actually happens slips through my hands like so many droplets of water. Or! Like tears. In. Rain. Let me try to get this down, or at least give it a gloss! Jenny & I left for North Carolina to visit her parents late in the afternoon-- she scurried to pick up some funny jodphur sweatpants slash harem pants in Manhattan, then we grabbed a cab to the airport. Getting through security was a mess-- there was no line & all of a sudden it was belt time! Laptop time! Shoe time! Coat time! & for all the scurrying, I still accidentally snuck a box cutter through. Oops? I had one in my bag for work purposes, & never took it out. Nice work, TSA! We had a few drinks at the bar in the airport; that place cracked me up. Also: a "large" beer? They asked me if I wanted a "small" or a "large" when I ordered a Guinness? A "large" is like, one of those Spring Break giant yard of beers. Practically! The flight was no big thing, I had the center seat but the aisle seat was an attractive lady doing a crossword, so no troubles. Landed & we were picked up by Jenny's dad (my father-in-law!) & then another hour & a half drive to the mountains. Then, there we were! Jenny's parent's have a house past where the state maintained roads go; it was touch & go getting up the hill in the pick up, in the snow. We got there though, & without getting out the tire chains. Then there was stocking opening, & some soup & some bread. Jenny's dad is really into no knead bread, & it is tasty. Then, bedtime!

Then: it was a Black Xmas! That is right, ladies & germs! Forget wondering about snowfall-- in the night two trees fell & knocked out the power in two separate places, so it was dark! All a-blackout. We opened gifts & there was some cheer! Then eventually the power DID come back on. Then it became a very Wii-ful Xmas. Of all the games: the Rock Band of both Pop & Beatles varieties, the Mario Brothers, the Wii Sport expansions...the most popular game managed to be...Big Game Hunter. The in-laws (see what I did there?) have the shotgun thing for it, where you insert the wii remote & well, that is pretty cool. They hunter in the game is kind of a dick, but also, the game is kind of fun. Though I never did kill those three leopards at the end. So, that repeated itself for a while; plenty of gaming was done, mostly by Jenny, me, & Jenny's mom. Then dinner was a huge slab of meat, but I think the real stand out was the wilted greens, fresh picked from the back yard. After dinner there was probably something, but also, maybe it was just straight to bed? Oh I think so. Also, because of the lack of power, it was a no-shower, all pajamas day!

The next day was much more outdoorsy. I have become citified in distressing ways: I have no good outdoor boots! I am going shopping on zappos today to remedy that. Still, Jenny's dad had a pair I could borrow; I tugged them on & we went out shooting. I was...miserably bad? I kept even missing the target! I was shooting the Glock 9mm, & I just couldn't even tag the paper! What the hell was...oh! The sights must be misaligned, or the barrel out of whack! I wasn't shooting embarrassingly: the gun was akilter. Jenny's dad put up a second paper & from nearly point blank it was coming off with a wide pull to the right. I wasn't shooting that badly; my shot groupings were not the tightest they could be, but whew. The Glock is Jenny's mother's, & it has a laser sight; I was using both, & the sights are aligned with each other; Jenny's father said he thought I was shooting poorly until he paid attention & saw that the red dot was dead on the bull's eye. So! Still, nice to run some rounds though, freshen up. Don't choke the pistol, Mordicai! Loosen up your grip. Then her dad brought out a 20 gauge shotgun; I haven't fired a 20 gauge in a long, long time. Still, I sure do like shotguns. More like "shotFUN" am I right? After that, it was time to go hiking! Jenny's parent's (my in-laws!) own a nice chunk of a mountain, so that was our destination. To get there you need four wheel drive, so it went: Jenny's dad & me; I got left behind for a while to read my werewolf book alone in the middle of the woods, then they came back. We hiked a bit, up to a motion sensitive camera that Jenny's dad has set up. It had snapped some deer, raccoons, as you might expect, but also a bobcat & a coyote. Neat. The big cat was particularly cool, & had come through fairly frequently! Jenny's feet were hurting, so she went home-- so there I was left alone in the woods again! I didn't see anything. Then eventually Jenny's dad came back & we hiked all over the mountain for a nice long while, all the way to the top. Saw some huge turkeys! Then back: dinner that night was smoked salmon on bread; but like, tons of it. Then we capped everything off with a game of Settlers of Catan, which Jenny's mom won-- really only her & Jenny were in the running.

Sun's day we went to see Avatar. In short, it is verrrrry prettttty. I mean-- I was told in advance it was visually stunning. Then I had people say they knew it was good looking, but not how luscious it was. Then people who had heard all about how gorgeous it was coming back to say how absolutely stunning it is, visually. Ad infinitum. So I was pretty prepared for it. Still, gosh it is very nice to look at. The plot is exactly as problematic & insulting as you might think-- golly, can the white man save us? Thanks, great white hope! Yeah; but once you accept that it is the same stupid liberal guilt that still reinforces the supremacy of straight white males (aren't they greatfeel your pain, guys!) it is pretty okay. Sure, the na'vi are absolutely the Noblest Savages, with a deep link with nature & all that. They are kind of cool though, & at least had diversity in their population. Still bugs me that the language & the biology had all this design go into it, which was then thrown away to make the na'vi blue humanoids with boobs. Seriously, you could just put extra bones in their arms at least to show what happened to their extra limbs-- everything else on the planet has six limbs, the blue lemurs have them bifurcating at the elbows even-- you had the evolutionary chance! Anyhow, it is worth seeing, but also worth keeping in mind that it has a problematic subtext. We went back to Jenny's folk's place & ate a whole bushel of shrimp. Seriously, a hellacious amount of shrimp, with rosemary & such dressing; it is a family recipe? Jenny made it for me once in college, & I fondly recall it. I probably ate half a kilogram of shrimp. Then more Settlers of Catan, this time randomized, & this time, I won. Good for me! Then while I was brushing my teeth Jenny sprayed my coat with enough perfume to mace a robber. While we were laughing about it, & brushing the tears from our eyes, Jenny's dad called upstairs to ask what the smell was-- it pervaded the whole house!

The next day, we came home! Not too bad a commute, again, though Charlotte's US Air terminal is stupid; there are like six gates at the end with enough chairs for two gates. Plan better! The flight wasn't too bad; I had a window, so once we were over Gotham I hung out it with my tongue out. Home! We took a cab home-- cabs take weird ways home from LaGuardia. Home was a sandwich-- gosh I was hungry-- then Manor House & some Band Hero. With some champagne & vodka. Then this morning I threw up! My stomach was a tousle. Now I'm playing Rock Band with James & Emily. If I don't feel sick again I'll go to the gym.

It is the time of year for loot; when I revise my character sheet from Pride & Hope to Greed & Charity.


toughlad & skycornerless gave me The Wizard Knight Companion, by Michael Andre-Driussi, the same guy who wrote the Lexicon Urthus. I was chuckling about it; The Wizard Knight is soaked in allegory, mystery, & subtle allusions to mythology & fable, especially Norse & the Round Table, & lots of inside jokes about Three Hearts, Three Lions. Even so, it is maybe 1/25 the size of the dictionary for The Book of the New Sun? Ha!





& Jenny got me these framed Exploding Dog prints! Man, remember like a decade ago when my desktop just rotated from one expodingdog image to the next? I sure like it! Plus, "vampire in a rocketship" is pretty much a perfect distillation of what Oubliette is about. Nice work, Jenny! These are going to go above the bed, & the spider & beetle prints will go above the desk. I'm pretty excited; it is nice to have nice things! & there are more presents waiting for me in North Carolina, which is where we are going in a few hours.

Jenny opened all the presents I got her, which were: a "framed butterflies" collection from the Evolution Store, a framed print of the thistle she has always liked & wants a tattoo of, the complete DVD set of Manor House & a big book about the show, a business card case, a ring holder shaped like a bird, a glass made from melted down green glass from the beach, a Sound of Young America shirt with a squid on it, &...maybe that is it. Not a bad bunch of swag! & I got James a Bathearst shirt & Emily a Kate Beaton Bronte Sisters shirt.

Someone made this Flatiron Building mask for the work Halloween bash, but then abandoned it in the Sales Department somewhere along the line-- It has been sitting in between my desk & Kelly's desk since then, & the other day Kelly took some pictures of me wearing it. Of which this is the best. So that is where this picture came from! I'm terrible about taking pictures, I know-- no matter how often I resolve to be better about it, I never actually am. Oh well! So-- currently hanging out in my pajamas, just finished my coffee & a videogame blitz-- I was stuck in Metroid Prime trying to get the Power Bombs. I kept dying! So I had to sit down & stop half-assing it, the momentum of which carried me the heck all over, & netted me the Grapple Hook in the mix, & an Energy Tank, & some more Missile Capacity. Have I mentioned that I really like Samus Aran? Anyhow, now I need to take a shower, hit the gym, shower again, & then hang out with fordmadoxfraud. Then tonight I have DnD-- I haven't gamed in forever & a month of Sun's days!

Since I had drinks with Pierce on Odin's day & have dungeoncrawling tonight, I decided to just hang out at home yesterday-- spend some time with my wife. Except! She never came home! I called her & she was like "uh, duh 2000, I am having dinner with Kira tonight?" & I didn't remember that! She claims I was sober when she told me, but I feel like I must have been drunk. So instead I hung out with Emily, & we played some video games. Jenny eventually did come home, & fell asleep on my lap while watching Glee. That is a funny show-- I am a sucker for song & dance, & I quite like Kurt & Rachel isn't all bad, but the rest of the character's are just so loathsome-- okay, Sue gets a pass for being that way on purpose. I like the show, but the plot is hinged so much on failures of communication, which is normally such a pet peeve of mine? I think Glee isn't the worst offender, though, because they actually have some kind of plot. Things eventually do get addressed. Still-- it isn't a perfect show, but I do like it, despite those misgivings. Anyhow-- I read for a while, finished up my vampire book, & then hit the hay.

In other words, nothing much to report. We have lived with James & Emily for about half a month now? They are churchmice, which is working out. No complaints on that field, & if things continue like this, I think it will be acceptable for the duration. Hooray for non-disasters! We had two Thanksgivings-- the first, the "official" Thanksgiving, was with Kira & Nino & Robert & Judy, featuring Arturo, Donna, Lee & Carrol, & Jessica. That was a big success, & the theme of the night was "that's what she said!" Second Thanksgiving was all us-- I'd been hording points at the grocery store, & got a free turkey! So last Sunday Jenny brined it using Alton Brown's recipe, & we cooked a feast for us, James, Carla & Kenneth, featuring Claudio the dog. Oh, it is worth mentioning! Palo Santo is the name of the Thanksgiving mascot, the turkey dressed as a Pilgrim. He shoots you with his blunderbuss & makes you fall asleep till Black Friday.

Kat's Halloween bash, being killed by (some of) the people from Clue.

I shouldn't really be updating here, I should be working on my NaNoWriMo novel, Watchtower Gothique. I'm at 6668 words, but I didn't write at all last night, since decided to maek grilled cheese, eat it with the leftover squash soup, go to the gym, & hang out with Jenny. Then today I haven't written at all, either-- I was too busy voting! I was going to take a picture of the knobs inside of the voter booth, but then suddenly-- I wasn't listed in my district! Probably because the DMV changed my address to "7th ave" arbitrarily. I had to fill out an affidavit vote, which is much less exciting. Still, my duty to the republic is discharged. Here is how I voted: Bloomberg for mayor on the Independent/Jobs & Education line. Maura Deluca for public advocate on the Socialist Worker line. John Liu for city comptroller on the Working Families line. Reginald Boddie for judge of the civil court on the Democratic line. Marty Markowitz for borough president on the Working Families line. David Pechefsky for City Council on the Green line. I voted yes on both ballot proposals.

This weekend past was a pretty big blowout. Argh, I really shouldn't talk about it, I should be writing on my stupid novel! I will though, I need to get this down for posterity, or whatever. Friday during the day I helped Nick & Rachel move. Nick was one of the soldiers who showed up to boogie down when I moved, so I was obligated, but I would've done it anyhow! For a while it was just the three of us, & Nick & I dominated the task of bringing stuff from the upside-world of his carriage house apartment down the spiral stairs. Don't worry, the stairs fold up! Then Rachel's parents showed up, & then Leslie & Matt. THEN! We drank some beer & ate some pizza. Nick & Rachel's apartment has a killed view, but even more envy making is the washer/drier. Boy wouldn't that be nice! Then I went home & Jenny was sad. But I left her anyhow!

I was trying to make my way to Kat's for her Halloween bash. It was...a disaster. I had the stuff for some kind of costume-- or as my joke was, "I'm not wearing a costume." You know, black cape! Weird Halloween gloves! Lightsaber! Just another day of Darth Malleus. I even brought the tube that screws into the lightsaber to make it have a neat glow-beam part. You know what I mean. Anyhow-- the F train was diverted to West 4th, which is fine-- Kat is only a few blocks from there. I was going to walk from 2nd ave, but no sweat. "Oh," I then realized. "That will take me near the parade. Well, I will just remember to switch sides underground & none will be the wiser." Ah, if only it were that easy. The cops had blocked the whole thing off! You couldn't switch sides. I don't cotton to complaining about the cops like they are evil, unless they are being such, but this was poorly planned. If your trains are being diverted from their regular station, & the solution is to take an opposite-bound train to reach the by-passed stations, you have to let that happen. & the cops also decided to not allow anyone exiting the trains to use the turnstyles-- everyone was funneled into the emergency exit, which meant it took me about thirty minutes to get out of the station, with the insane crush of people. Then outside, it was raining, & the waves of parade goers were acting particularly like a crowd of morons. So I wandered around, holding my bookbag so it didn't get soaked, getting jostled, unable to cross the street to go to Kat's because of the parade. Ended up lost in the West Village, which is redundant-- I could just say "in the West Village" & you could assume I was lost. Eventually I escaped. I seriously Mister Miracled out of it. Then finally, only an hour & a half later, I was able to walk five blocks to Kat's.

Nick's poem sums up Kat's party better than I ever could. I brought a bottle of the Brooklyn Special 2, & it took me a little of that & about an hour to stop griping about my train ride. I am a baby about things sometimes, & I was being a baby then! Still, eventually I settled in. The joint was banging, & the shindig escalated all evening. Kat's has a concrete "backyard", & adjoins the courtyard out front, & there is an alleyway in between-- & of course three rooms in her apartment. Well, all of them were pretty well filled. I spent most of the evening in the hallway/alley, with the occasional trip to hang out in Kat's room. My partners in crime were mostly Toy, Jocelyn, & Nick; honorable mention to Nicole & Matt S., though. I like when people know they can flirt with me, because I'm just a huge flirt, not like, trying to pick them up. Eventually Matt & Katie showed up, but by that point, I was getting ready to leave. Well, forty-five minutes later, at least. Probably the highlight of the evening was tracking the couples hooking up. There was some earnest making out & finger banging going down! Good for them. Then when I got home (midnightish?) Jenny was still up; we hung out for like, two more hours just the two of us. It was awesome.

Yesterday I got lunch with Marie at Le Pain Quotidien. We split a Tuscan platter & a seaweed salad & she picked up the tab-- how nice of her! We talked about things, & I circumlocuted a few times, but it is always lovely to see her. Plus, galleys for the second book of her Kronos Chronicles are in, so it was a good reminder for me to lay hands on one so I can read it. Leaving we made a loose concept of a plan to see The Plan the Battlestar Galactica movie, & to see the DVR version, since, well, it has boobs in it. Then it was back to the beehive!

That evening was the Halloween party at work, which started a little inauspiciously-- Nichole & I went to buy wine for the party & then got carded! Since I wasn't wearing my coat, I didn't have my identification, & since she was all purse swapping for her costume-readying, neither did she! So there was a bit of Keystone Kops going on. We took care of it eventually, & I sussed out her & Andy's martial arts styles-- he is the "Ruthless otter" while she is the "Shifting Manticore" & her finishing move is "Poetic Justice." You figure it out by asking people what their totem animal is, & then who their favorite villain is & what trait of theirs they most admire. Voila! Eventually we came back to a party in full swing. Our parties often turn into company parties instead of just department parties, because we throw a hella fun bash. Jenny came up & we wore shirts that light up the closer we get & dim the farther away from each other we go. Too sweet! Too gross! All the company executives showed up, & the CEO & Jenny & me had a little hello, too. I became very drunk! But not obnoxiously, or overly. Just party drunk. We stuck around to help clean up & then Jenny & I went home, ate burittos, & watched Community & Mythbusters. At home, I think I was drunker than I was at the party!

Yesterday was a fine day, just fine. Went up to a park at 10:30, selected numerous vegetables. Fed my aching body a Chinese food breakfast-- fresh off the wok. Went to the gym & lifted some weights: another hour & a half. Not unproud of that. Then! A text message telling me all previous intelligence was invalid, & that the Jenny Lewis show was...pronto! Hopped in the shower, scrub a dub dub, met up with Peter & zoom! Off to the races. "Hey, do you actually know how to get to Battery Park?" I asked on the train, "because I was just heading to where Carla used to live in Battery Park City; it ought to be near there, right?" Between Peter & I we found it without too much ado, & nice walk along the piers lining the Hudson river, to boot. The set-up in the park was kind of annoying-- there was only one entrance to the show & you had to weave through a labyrinth to get there; but you had to find start of the maze, which was the tricky point. At the mouth, there was a worker-- enter here for the show. Guy, I don't need you at the entrance, I need you elsewhere to tell me where the entrance is! In we went though, & found ourselves a decent enough spot; Jennny Lewis! James (showing up to meet us) elaborated on my old chestnut-- "Pretty sure Jenny Lewis has a soul; pretty sure you don't-- into the new team motto: Jenny Lewis Is Not A P-Zombie. I tried not to get too annoyed at human beings-- seriously, such rude apes; makes me so mad. This is why I don't go to shows! But free is the price that flips that math. She ended with "Born Secular" & for a crazy moment I thought it was going too segue into "Big Guns," which-- anthems for war on heaven are all I ever want from music. Instead they left the music resonating & left the stage. For no encore!? Sad. Conner Oberst next so...we absconded with quickness.

Took the boys to Aperitivo to sing for our supper. Or well to just eat our supper I guess. They were putty in my hands, ordering what I recommended. I like it when that happens. Take my advice, it is always good for you! James had the beet gnocchi & Peter had the pasta with the three different kinds of mushrooms. I had a bresoala salad, which was arugula, goat cheese, truffle oil, & some smoked meat. Yo, the salads at Aperitivo are always worth a damn. Then for my entree I had linguine with chicken liver, sage, & a white wine & cream sauce. I took half of it home, rather than over-eating; the boys said I should text Jenny to let her know how responsible I was being. We also drank some Italian beer. I forget what it was called.



We were going to swing by the sake house on the way back-- says me "You are profiting from all the dates I go on with my wife!"-- but they were closed. What! Well I'd gotten the boys hearts set on sake, so we went to the wine shop & bought a bunch. Or at least, Peter & I did; James got shochu, which no one noticed till we put it in our mouths & did a spit-take. I got "Summer Snow," which was recommended to me by the sommelier-- which was very nice. Peter & Alicia's first time with unfiltered sake; leaving Alicia unconvinced, which is a first for me, since everybody else likes it. James's bottle was, actually-- looking at it now, it isn't shochu, it is sake-- komekome-shu, which is maybe like-- some kind of sake? Anyhow, it is a weird thing. Not bad, but...not any taste I was expecting. Peter's bottle I heated up; heated water & then soaked the bottle in it thus. The label peeled off though, so I don't know what is was called. There was much MarioKart & LifeForce, lo. In the middle of all this, Alicia arrived, wearing Peter's clothing & bearing a gift: a painting she made me!



& then we started flexing & had a gunshow waterfall.



Alicia was feeling crappy, so she & Peter left (after Peter went to go get a burrito & chips, missing the chance to play veterinarian & check out our sick pythons); James & I grabbed sake & climbed the fire escape to the roof. Talked about being in the wizard's city. I say: most American day! Italian food, Japanese drinks, then Mexican snacks, then fireworks. America. We watch the fireworks, & the superintendent & his family come up to watch them too; meaning we can get down via the actual staircase, instead of the fire escape. Which, we do! Then James & I split a couple mouthfuls of wine, I have him roll me a cigarette, we go outside & then I bid him farewell. Goodbye, I'll see you tomorrow at play practice. & then I'm up another hour being a lovesick sap, then bed. Which puts me at today. I'll leave this entry with the most patriotic thing I know of.

Being sick all weekend was not awesome. Which is odd for me, since I'm usually totally great. I mostly just sat on the couch, in various passive modes. I played a bunch of MarioKart-- I finally went online & found out how to unlock all the players & karts, but I'm not really good enough to get a lot of them. Tricky. What really dominated the big holiday weekend was Jenny sitting on the couch with me & watching tons of episodes of Angel. We're into season three now, & Fred has just elected not to go home to Texas. So the crew, sans latecomer Spike, is complete.

Monday was our wedding anniversary, cunningly arranged to put it on a long holiday weekend. Our first year of being married! Which is an arbitrary milestone. I don't feel particularly moved by it-- like a birthday or similar, it is a point on an analog continuum, & so it is kind of weird to summon up vim for it. Oh, & I was still sick, but in recovery mode at least. We talked about blowing it off-- the "paper" present I got her isn't hear yet, & I was sick, she had slept poorly-- but when we started counting out the plans of the next few weeks it became apparent that Monday had to be the day. Carla had given us a gift certificate for Blue Ribbon, so we went to the Brooklyn one. Lilly was in Massachusetts, so it was all kosher. Two of the oyster types were better than the other. The steak tartar's mustard was kind of great. The endive & fennel had so many things in it-- basil? Olives? Oranges? Oil? Jenny had me order the Surf & Turf, since that is...kind of hilarious. I must have appeared pretty henpecked to the waiter; I was not out of it, but not really in it, either. Jenny did most of the ordering, & when I ordered my steak, she corrected me on how she wanted it cooked! None of which is weird, but my malaise made me self-conscious. Eating lobster is weird; it is messy, so being is public is tricky, & plus, I don't know how to eat it. It has secret meats! Who can find them all? I cracked it up plenty, though.

(photo by rbl)

Threw a party this weekend. Correspondingly noticed that I've embraced the Metropolis definition of "party" as a gathering of people at a bar. When I first moved here, the term was anthem! Parties are at places, houses, abandoned factories, something, not a bar. Ah, well, here we are. It was an extravaganza, a feast for the senses. Maybe fifty people ended up coming out? The core clutch, a work cohort or twelve, darlings, sweetmeats, former co-workers, yarbos, jabberwocks, some babies, a real menagerie. I ducked out around midnight, my sober & nearly-recovered from sickness wife leading me by the hand. Loot: an hourglass, a book I already had, a book I really wanted, a painting in the works, a wand of excellent prismatic spray, a bottle of gin, a xenomorph, this & that. This would be an appropriate place to put in details, or memories, but here: it happened, I was there for it, maybe you were too (a lot of people where there).

Sun's day started off with me fainting! Like straight up passing out, almost. I got up in the wee hours of the morning to use the head, flushed, & then boom-- dropped my water glass, knees buckled, Jenny running in to see if I was alright. I was! What the hell was that, though? Brain tumor or dehydration are my guesses. The day was pretty lazy from there. I wracked my brain about stuff; maybe I'll talk about it some. I mean, I certainly will. After the wrackin', I met up with Maggie & we went to play rehearsal ("I didn't go to theater school to go to practice!). Oh man I need to memorize my lines, but Greg being there to tell people what to do is great. Oh man I need to memorize my lines. Daile, Maggie, & James cliqued up afterward. Hooray for us is the motto of the Lion Pinball Players! Next one Tyr's day, oh man I need to memorize my lines.

World DnD Day? That is my kind of holiday! James ran, & there were a bunch of players who didn't come, but it ended up as a Kit Marlowe reunion-- James was the DM, I played my tiefling warlock Opera, Peter played his human wizard Kale & David played a dragonborn cleric named Kril. James says his campaign is the opposite of mine, since my game is full of imaginary politics; but for all that we sure got caught up in the labor struggle! Here is a clever way we thought to describe his campaign: what if Marie Antoinette had been rescued, but by Voltaire & Descarte? Today's game was mostly antics-- I'm hardly the biggest lunatic though! We snuck into a flying castle (with wings-- Modenkainan lives there) & when it came time to bluff of be diplomatic? Peter declared he was a Clock Inspector (we'd smuggled ourselves in with a shipment of custom made clocks that ran backwards) & I teleported out of the crate, came around the other side, & demanded to know how the inspection was going. It was going well up until Peter's character pushed someone off the side of the flying island! Don't worry though-- he also cast featherfall on her (!). It sort of set the tone; we merry band of lunatics going through the labor disputes between the castle & the orcs who pull the chains to beat the giant wings (temporally displaced, so the wings can beat fast enough). We sort of are clever, & sort of are absolutely the opposite of clever; we stumbled through things in a pretty chaotic fashion. It was David's first time playing in a decade! Holiday declared a success. Promotions all around.



Getting up in the morning was rough-- last night after the Battlestar Galactica finale, James bought whiskey & we got wrecked & watched The NeverEnding Story. Apparently we got through the whole film, but when we started it I said "we have to at least make it to the Southern Oracle" & that is all I remember. Today I've been been washed out & ruined; woke up at like, 1:45, didn't get my act together until a few minutes before everyone arrived for game.

( Pictures of the boys )

Last night was Craftsgiving! I like to celebrate extra holidays for Jenny; Second Christmas, Unbirthday, Half Birthday, that kind of thing. Last night, after I luxuriated in a couple glasses of wine & some hauntings (an indulgence!), Jenny came home! She'd been out with her friend getting Pour when she's on her way to give the wine a chance to breathe! The people at the liquor store were very excited to see me-- I've been orbiting fancier wine shops, I have. Wine Shoppes. So yes, eventually my lady love arrived! I'd made the card (seen above) & there were banana chips for her, & a chocolate-covered pretzel covered in chocolate bits, a pecan tart & vitamins. & wine, & champagne! Candles were lit. There were presents-- three craft books. She came & was pleased! & was drunk. So we played some cooperative Guitar Hero & then we played around on the monkey bars. All in all a very successful Craftsgiving-- I also made my boss at work a couple of data cds worth of music. Oh & someone new started at work this week! Which means I am no longer on the bottom bottom of the totem pole.

Alive somehow, despite being shattered on New Years Eve. By my own hand, my own device. We threw our little party. Folks attended; Carla came first. She had a terrible mishap in the freezing cold, dumping rumaki-makings all over her. Which sucks. Also, carrying metal trays when the outside is sub-Arctic is ruinously cold on the old digits, let me tell you. Peter & Alicia tumbled in next, all kinds of bundled up, & then James & Emily & then Pamela & Brando & then David & Maggie. & Eventually at the end there were Kira & Nino, too. I think I’m catching everybody; I was pretty dead on my feet at the end there. Be it ever so humble, our home was pretty nice, all decked in the leavings from X & shirt tails tucked in. The champagne (er, Prosecco) was flowing freely, & so was the vino & the biru. Gosh, I’d like to narrate what happened but I am terrible at remembering things, you know me. At one point I even joked about how I wouldn’t remember saying I wouldn’t remember—but I did end up remembering that! I tried to have Truth or Dare but it didn’t really get off the ground—yet somehow later in the night David’s beard was shaven into a pornstache? Alicia sewed buttons onto her face? I don’t know about any of this, my eyes were lidded. Maggie threw up everywhere again. Beats me! The first of the new year (2009—the year of the cape—I saw two women wearing capes on the train today already!) was spent curled up with Jenny & doing laundry. We watched Tropic Thunder, which was funny, & then some of Angel season one. Oh, & I read most of the comics David lent me-- Iron Fist is still good!

( Dark Photos below )

So with Jenny under the weather, feeling the sniffles, dogged by the plague hounds, I've been double whammied with Operation Shut-In. Okay, she's actually gone out? Wait, that doesn't seem right! Well she has, but while she's been home, I've fed her orange juice & tea & all that rot. We've kept occupied in only the barest, vaguest way. Well, we did a deep clean of the apartment-- or okay, mostly she did. I do a lot of upkeep stuff, she is the boss of project stuff. I rearranged some bookshelves. Lamps were hung (lamps are being hung as I type in fact). Papers were tidied-- I have lots of scraps of paper with Important Notes™ on them. I popped out like a million cute ice cubes shaped like hearts or jewels.

I also consumed some media, mediocre & otherwise. I watched some old Star Trek: the Next Generation; the two best episodes of that show, probably-- "Best of Both Worlds" parts one & two. Man, those are at least okay, & you have to remember too-- they up & killed Yar, right? Who was to say that Locutus wouldn't be the big bad of the show & Riker would get the helm with Shelby as Number One? There was legitimate doubt. I've said this a number of times, but if TNG had been the Passion Play that Roddenberry wanted, with the Borg as the Devil & Q as God? It might have been brilliant instead of okay. I also watched, for no particular reason, Superhero Movie. I guess it is meant to be a spoof? It really is pretty much a failure as a spoof, since it just adheres to the cliches? & I watched The Simpsons Movie which I didn't need to do; the bits & fragments I'd seen up to now were fine. I probably watched a few television programs-- we had an episode of Jon & Kate Plus 8 we hadn't watched because it was a "feel bad/feel good" episode about how they donated toys to Saint Jude's, & we finally forced our way through it. Stuff like that.

A holiday with the usual suspects-- the first in fordmadoxfraud & Maggie's new apartment in Gowanus, which means that lovely & I can just pop over there. So we loaded our loot up into the laundry cart & off we went. kromelizard & wolvus were three hours late (or well, Peter at least-- Alicia was only one hour late) so we had a chance to watch some Rankin & Bass films (not the Frank Baum one, though, which I find mystifying) & then White Christmas. For those of you who have never seen White Christmas let me sum it up. Bing Crosby & Danny Kaye start off in the post-apocalyptic future, after the Fourth Reich has risen. Bing Crosby & Danny Kaye since a song to lull everyone into death gently-- the movie starts with the mass euthanization of the remaining humans on Earth. After that, they go to Heaven-- the Fourth Reich might have destroyed the souls of all the non-Aryans, because they even have an all-white minstrel show. It is pretty weird. Anyhow, they leave Heaven to go to the Inn Between The Worlds. The go there on a train & find the leader of the War, their general, a Fallen Angel. The angel wants to go back to Heaven (we always do) but he isn't allowed, so Bing & Danny bring Heaven to him. Along the way they fall in love with a couple of Genies. So it was a pretty okay movie.



For dinner, David made rabbit (named Beautiful), & duck, & veal heart. It was my first time eating heart; I think I am now immune to a cow's breath weapon. There was a ridiculous amount of other food as well: mashed potatoes & whipped sweets, brussels sprouts & asparagus & corn, all kinds of appetizers, from cheese & crackers to pate to endive with stuff on it, soup that no one ate (to David's chagrin) & so on & so forth. There were oceans of champagne & wine, & Jenny had made her eggnog which Maggie realized she liked. Peter & Alicia brought coquito rum, which both Maggie & I thought was "cookie dough rum" even after we had been told better. The evening was rounded out drinking absinthe (with water & sugar, though not cubes) & watching the new DC comics cartoon The Brave & the Bold which is, uh, kind of awesome. More pictures at my photostream.

repeal day is a funny thing-- i'm not entirely sure of my opinions. lots of people take it as evidence that making alcohol illegal is impossible, but that isn't really the whole story, is it? i mean, the laws were all a set-up, traps to bust the irish, italians, & black people. & they were staggered, leaving the drinker absolved of any wrong-doing. basically a set-up that created organized crime out of whole cloth. just funny to look at the current "war on drugs" & see the parallels. anyhow, jenny cooked a pot roast & then we drank two bottles of wine. it was nice; i like her better than i like anybody else. also yesterday i put some ducks in a row regarding writing systems-- the agath started as pictoglypic scratches on bones. given my new anthropological theme for the synod-- sacrifice-- it is a perfect fit. that turned into calligraphy, & chops, & poet-tongue. only geographic backwaters still speak the agath, but the writing system is the signifier of the elite. the more characters you know, the more well educated you are considered. the logos is going to be written in an abjad-- i'm just going to call it the abjad. so consonants only, with lots of vowel & other pronunciation marks.