First, thanks to Vincent for telling me that he and about "a billion other Indians and Middle Easterners" do not eat the kernel part of pomegranate seeds. I didn't exerience any untoward gastro-intestinal effects, but the kernel doesn't really add anything either. Apparently, you have to develop "nimble teeth" so that you can get all the good parts of the seed and then spit out the rest. He does agree that the pomegranate is best as-is, though.

Saturday was every bit as busy as I expected, starting with a last minute change of venue for yoga, as well as a new person dropping out at the last minute. It was an excellent class, though, and we ended up going about half an hour long without even noticing. We're taking all of October off because various people's schedules are not coordinating. I'm really going to miss it; it's just not the same doing yoga alone. On the other hand, I am quite attached to the idea of four free Saturday mornings in a row.

During lunch with Ed at a new Japanese restaurant (Wasabi, near Allisonville & 82nd street for you local types) I had an idea for the next RPG I want to run. I was desperately trying to work out the details for the Teenagers From Outer Space Game I had scheduled to run after lunch, when a competely different idea popped into my head. I also managed to morph the idea into something workable for the TFOS campaign, so that was a great two-for-one.

The new campaign is going to be play-by-email, as all the characters will be competing against each other. Basically, it's the Great Race, sponsored by Queen Victoria, with a considerable prize for one lucky winner--or more likely, one ruthless, sneaky, and devious winner. I'll admit right up front that the actual name of the campaign, The Grand Ellipse, is a complete ripoff of the Paula Volsky novel of the same name. The game's set in the early 1880s, and I'm going to run it using GURPS mechanics. It's not the best system out there, but most people have at least a passing familiarity with it and it's easy to learn. I've got about a dozen players now, and I'm willing to take up to twenty. Ed's even interested in playng, and he's mostly a computer-game guy.

Anyway, the TFOS game went pretty well; a few things that happened in previous games are now having repercussions, which is always fun. I've also got the setup for the next game--the school's Fall Fundraiser--in place and ready to go. One of the characters gave me an opportunity I couldn't resist, and I simply had to take advantage of it. The player is very experienced and probably knew she was walking into something--and did it anyway because it was consistent with her character's personality. I love it when players do that!!

After the game, I had a little bit of time to relax before I went out for the evening. My mother teaches ballet at one of the schools run by the local professional company, Ballet Internationale. One of her perks is season tickets, and last night we saw Giselle. It's one of the classics; in the first act, Giselle falls in love with a prince who is disguised as a huntsman. One of the other men in the village is in love with Giselle. He tries to tells Giselle about the prince's real identity, but she doesn't believe him. The prince's finacee passes through the village on a hunting party, and Giselle dies from shock, after a brief period of insanity. In the second act, Giselle becomes a Wili (vengeful ghost of a woman who died before her wedding). The entire act takes place in the cemetary, where the village man is danced to death by the Wilis, and the prince almost is, but for Giselle's intervention.

The thing is, I have trouble taking Giselle seriously, for personal reasons. The first time I saw Ballet Internationale perform it about five years ago...well, it wasn't good. The first act was seriously underrehearsed, and Mom and I had been very quietly making rather scathing, witty comments to each other. The second act was somewhat better, until the point when Giselle dramatically drops flowers at the feet of the lead Wili. The props department had used plastic flowers, and they all sort of hit the stage at once with a series of loud, very artificial clicks. My mother started laughing, albeit fairly quietly. And because I can't resist making a bad situation worse, I leaned over to her and whispered "I can't take you anywhere." As soon as that registered, she was laughing even harder, simultaneously trying to be quiet and catch her breath, and had tears running out of her eyes.

The other thing was that for this performance, the company had brand-new sets and costumes. I tend to think that conventions of ballet costuming are kind of funny in general, so I was prepared to be entertained one way or another. The peasant girl costumes are usually based on dirndls, but adapted for ballet. They had these vestigial aprons that I thought looked rather silly, but I was willing to go with it. What got me was the Wili costumes. They had to have wings, so that you can tell that they're supernatural. However, it's not easy to design wings that won't interfere with the actual dancing. As a result, traditional ballet costume wings tend to look like a three-dimensional version of a child's drawing of a butterfly. They're fairly small--perhaps a foot or so across at most--and you can't even see them if the dancer is facing directly forwards. They're also fastened on fairly low--about where the bodice of the tutu meets the skirt. When the first one turned around, I immediately thought that it looked as though a giant moth had landed on her ass and gotten stuck there. This doesn't do a lot for the mood of the second act, especially when you have about 24 dancers in the same costume all in a forward bend sort of position, facing upstage.

The Indianapolis Opera is doing Der Fledermaus in November. I want to go, partly because I have only ever been to one other opera, Nixon in China, which is minimalist, and therefore kind of a rip-off in my mind. (I think that opera is supposed to be high baroque, to the point of being excessively ornate and overblown.) I also find opera conventions very amusing--like the fact that if you're wearing someone else's hat, nobody can recognize you.

Today did not go as well as I'd hoped. It started out well enough. All I wanted to do was clean my living-room carpet. Ed and I had planned to borrow his parents' deep-cleaner, so we were going to go out to breakfast someplace near his parents' house, then pick up the machine. We drove around Carmel for about twenty minutes, and couldn't find a single restaurant that was open for a full breakfast, other than Bob Evans. Fine, we shrugged it off and went to his parents' house directly. We picked on the cleaner--the thing is at least fifteen years old, awkward, and heavy--and went to a nearby place that Ed's mother recommended. I think it was after 11:30 by the time we finally managed breakfast.

On the way home, we made a brief stop at the mall so that I could pick up GURPS Steam Tech for the Grand Ellipse game, and headed home. I managed to get most of the spots out of the carpet, and started in with the rug shampooer, moving it very slowly because it steered with all the grace and maneuverability of a heavily pregnant warthog. I got about four square feet done when it suddenly veered to the side, made a disturbing plastic-breaking noise, and tipped over forward. The brush guard snapped off, and it toppled over onto the floor. Ed was at the gym, so I was home alone, and all I could do was stare at it for what felt like about five years. I actually cried because I felt so bad--not because I had broken the carpet cleaner per se, but because Ed's parents are such wonderfully nice people, and I had broken something that I had borrowed from them. As soon as Ed got home, I made him go out with me to replace it...after he got me calmed down. He's even agreed to tell them about it for me. I don't expect that they'll hold it against me; I just hope that they like the replacement. I couldn't find the same model, so I went for one that had as many similar features as I could find. I'm afraid to even take it out of the box.

Also, today is the day that one of my very best friends heads out to Cleveland for surgery. I've known S. since the summer after my junior year of college. We have very similar thought processes, we're both amateur historians, and we more or less understand each other very well. It's similar to the way that siblings don't have to explain their family to each other, because they've been there. (We have different perspectives, but I don't have to tell my sister what my mom is like.) Anyway, S. is headed to the heart clinic in Cleveland to have his aortic valve either repaired or replaced. He's known about the problem with the valve since before he was old enough to understand it, and the actual surgery has been put off for nearly thirty years, because until a couple of months ago, it was totally asymptomatic. The surgeons in Indianapolis kept trying to push a mechanical valve as a replacement, "like it was a used car," S. told me. They kept telling him it would last a lifetime, but it's actually only good for about 25 years. Apparently most people who have valve replacement have it some time after age 55, in which case, it probably does last a lifetime. But S. is only two months older than I am--31--and with his family history, he could easily go through two mechanical valves and require a third at an age when that surgery would be quite risky. In Cleveland, he can get a permanent fix, whether the valve is replaced or repaired. I still can't help worrying, but he's otherwise very healthy and he's going to have the best care available. His surgeon is considered the best in the country, and is one of very few people who are capable of repairing the kind of valve defect that S. has. So, lots of deep breaths, and good wishes heading east with him.

There is one bright spot, at least. The weather has been really nice, and my allergies are calming down enough that we've been able to turn off the AC and keep the windows open. Our house was built in 1976, so it isn't sealed tight the way new construction is, but it was getty kind of stuffy in here. Soemhow or other I've gooten the idea that we're in for a long, cold winter. Our last few have been quite mild, and I'm actually looking forward to a good winter. I think I have a touch of reverse seasonal affective disorder. I can't stand summer--too hot, too humid, too bright. I want to spend June through August in cool, dark places. On the othe hand, I find winter both calming and invigorating, especially the really cold, clear days right after a snowstorm. It's as though I can pull energy right out of the crisp air. And as far as I'm concerned, nothing beats the sight of a full moon on the horizon in winter twilight, as seen through gently falling snow.

9/27/2002

Home by 4:30 yesterday, with groceries no less!

When I finally got myself to the grocery store, I ended up buying lots of fruits whose names start with “p”—plums, pears, and pomegranates. (No peaches, as they were more like brightly-colored baseballs than actual fruit.) For the last couple of autumns, I’ve been looking at the pomegranates and passing them by. They’re odd-looking things--round, about the size of a large grapefruit, with this little cylindrical stem end rising out of the deep fuschia globe like a crown. This time, I decided to go for it. I had absolutely no idea what to expect; all I knew was that you were supposed to eat the seeds.

I got the thing home and pulled out my fruit cookbook. There wasn’t much information, but it did have instructions on opening the thing up. It also said that you could roll the whole fruit around to loosen up the juice, and simply stick a straw in it, but I opted for disassembly. The best way to find out how something works is to take it apart, right?

In order to open a pomegranate, you pull out a paring knife and cut about a quarter-inch into the fruit all the way around, from stem to end to stem. Do this again about 90 degrees from your first cut, so that it’s in quarters--like you would cut an apple or tomato. The rest of the process should take place in or over a bowl, and you’ll want to have some paper towels handy. Pomegranates are very juicy, and it will splatter.

Take the scored pomegranate in both hands and twist it open over the bowl. Inside, you’ll see the ruby-red seeds in clusters, surrounded by yellowish-white pulp. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to remove the seeds from the pulp, intact. This is best accomplished with fingers. The seeds are set into the pulp in a manner reminiscent of corn on the cob, only much easier to remove. Now, the seeds are surrounded by the edible part of the fruit, which has a firm consistency similar to barely-ripe table grapes. The seeds in my pomegranate were not uniformly red; I don’t know if they’re supposed to be or not. The juice was concentrated at the end of the seed opposite from the one that attaches to the pulp. Consequently, one end of each edible bit was red, and the edible part faded to transparent at the attaching end. Inside, I could see the “seed” part of the seed, which resembled a tiny white popcorn kernel. It was actually a really cool effect, and for a moment, I found myself wondering if Photoshop could do that. Or more to the point, whether I could figure out how to make Photoshop do that.

Cautiously (to no end, I got pomegranate juice all over my glasses) I pried a few seeds loose, and popped one in my mouth. The taste is incredible—acid-tart and sweet and fresh, somewhere between good cranberry juice and tiny, new strawberries right off the vine. The kernel part of the seeds is slightly crunchy, and as far as I could tell, edible. I continued removing the seeds, as little spurts of juice occasionally shot out all over my hands, my clothes, the cutting board, the counter, my face, and a variety of nearby objects and cabinet doors. One pomegranate produced at least a generous cup of seeds. There are several seed pockets in one fruit, and you do have to break it down into fairly small chunks to get at all of them. I was intent on getting as many out as possible, occasionally eating a few more seeds as I progressed. Fresh juice ran down my fingers, and I am not embarrassed to admit that I licked my hands occasionally while I was working. I was the only one who was going to eat it anyway. I was completely focused--the kind of "living in the moment" that I'm always trying for in yoga, and only occasionally manage. I was one with the pomegrante.

I'm sure that there are all kinds of things you can do with pomegranate seeds, but I have no idea what they are. My fruit cookbook suggested soaking the seeds in orange liqueur, but I think that would be overkill. I suspect that mostly, you would use the seeds as a topping for something else--a salad, pilaf, or possibly risotto. I ate mine right out of the bowl. For dessert. With my fingers.

You may want to skip the next paragraph if you don't care to listen to me complaining.

Every once in a while, I get extremely annoyed at my employer. This is one of those days. They can't seem to get us a decent health insurance plan. Every time the rates go up--and they've doubled twice in the past two years--my employer refuses to contribute anything additional to cost of health insurance. At this point, I am paying about $750 per month to cover the two of us. (Ed's employer is a small business and doesn't even offer health insurance.) I was already ticked off, and when I did the math, I found out that health care and insurance combined are costing me over $10,000 a year. That's our biggest expense after the house, and costs almost as much! So, I'm trying to do something about it, as my employer's insurance rates are about to double again and I can't afford it--particularly as they tend to tell us about it retroactively. I have a line on a couple of different options. Unfortunately, one of the options is not that great--instead of a copayment on prescriptions and doctor's visits, everything simply counts towards the year's deductible, after which it's paid 100%. It also doesn't include dental or vision, not that I usually spend that much on dental and vision, but it also means I wouldn't get the prices negotiated by the insurance companies. According to the insurance agent, it would save us about $3500 a year, but I don't know if that's just on the premiums, in which case, it would only save us half that after the cost of prescriptions and so on. No details on the other lead yet, but next week will be Insurance Week at our place. With any luck, I'll be able to get something decent that doesn't suck up over 25% of my annual gross income.

I actually managed to get home just after 7:00 last night, only 12 hours after I left. I went to the gym right from work, then to the lab. Bruce and I got a fair bit of editing done on one of our major documents at the lab. Most of what's left of our share of the work is graphs and tables. Those will be time-consuming, but not difficult. The data analysis part of Excel has some nifty tools that save a lot of time, once you've managed to figure them out. Of course, the time it takes to figure them out probably sucks up all the savings in time from the next couple of projects. I can't wait to get that thing done, especially as we've got another urgent major project lined up, one that will involve a lot of writing. Fortunately, we've had a couple of very productive meetings this week, so it feels like we're actually getting things done. The annual conference is in a couple of weeks, and we'll have plenty to talk about. I just hope we're going to be ready for it. Personally, I don't feel very prepared; on the other hand, I don't think I have that much to do. I probably ought to look into that.

The day job is going well, for a change. All the servers seem to be behaving themselves nicely. I'm editing test scripts and test cycles this week. It's not particularly difficult, which is good, as I've not done it before. It involves a lot of copying and pasting, and I've been creating MS Word macros left and right to get rid of as much repetition as possible. I think that Record Macro may well be my new favorite function.

I managed to finish up Gold Coast last night, and started in on Rasputin: The Saint Who Sinned. I feel another Russian history reading jag coming on. I've been working on The King of Elfland's Daughter, but I'm only reading it while I'm on the stationary bike at the gym. It's good motivation; I've been there three days out of the last four, and I'm planning to go again tonight.

9/25/2002

I finished up Dreams of the Compass Rose and it was every bit as good as I'd hoped. The stories actually do come across as very dreamlike, with POV and main characters shifting around. I'm now about halfway through The King of Elfland's Daughter, which is proving every bit as good as everyone tells me it is.

Yesterday, I forgot to mention that I'm also working on Kim Stanley Robinson's Gold Coast, which is one of three future California novels. (Of course, I only remembered because I tripped over it last night.) He's probably best known for his Mars books, (Red Mars, Green Mars, and Blue Mars) but I like most of his other work better. Both Antarctica and Escape From Kathmandu are quite entertaining, and The Years of Rice and Salt is fabulous.

I don't know how I find the time to read. Last night was the second night in a row that I didn't get home until near or after 9:00 PM. (And of course, last night I simply couldn't go to bed until I'd watched my tape of the season premiere of Buffy.) I hope that I can get in by 7:30 tonight, but I've got a bad feeling about it. Thursday will be errand day, Friday and Saturday are both booked solid, and on Sunday, we've got to clean the carpets. (Not just because I need a solid reason to stay home; the originally sand-colored carpet is taking on a distinct leopard pattern.)

I'm not doing anything on Sunday. I hope.

Random Lunchtime Musings
One of my non-work projects today is to catch up (via email) with people I haven't conversed with in a while. I've been far too busy for far too long, and I've neglected my friends and acquaintances in my quest for extreme overemployment. Fortunately, I have forcibly ended that quest, although I fought myself all the way. My first test came today, when I actually turned down a job offer for "only five or six hours a week". I must admit that I considered it briefly, but the entire point of quitting the radio station was to get back five or six hours a week, and I want that time. I feel a little guilty and selfish about it, because the person who offered the job really does need some help around the office, and he is a nice guy and all. On the other hand, I've been making a big deal about needing time to have a life, and this would definitely be an obstacle.

T. was over again last night for her sewing lesson. I picked her up at her house and we went over to the fabric & craft store to get her all set up with a basic sewing kit. We also picked up some fabric for her next project. She's already got a Halloween costume, so for a joint sewing and embroidery practice, she's going to make a Halloween witch doll. (Her idea) The trip to the fabric store took up most of our time, so we probably won't start until next week. After the doll is done, she's ready to start in on clothes.

T. was accepted into a charter school, which sounds like it's a lot more like an actual school and less like Stalag 17. the way she described leads me to believe that it's informal without being unstrucutred. The students are allowed to work at their own pace, and aren't bogged down by myriad petty and conflicting rules. At her previous high school, for example, if you were late to class three times, you were required to take a drug test. Combine this rule with the another rule that bans backpack, and the fact that the campus is very large. Joseph Heller and/or George Orwell would've had a field day. (Can you imagine what might happen with those two in a room together!)

I've been off the Zyrtec for about 36 hours now. The weather has cooled down, and whatever was making me sneeze seems to be winding down its pollen/spore production. Still a bit sniffly, but much, much better. I love autumn, and not just because everything I'm allergic to is about to die. Ballet, theater, opera, and hockey are starting their new seasons. The weather is absolutely beautiful, and we should be getting some fabulous leaf colors in a couple of weeks. The last of the silly summer movies are out and with any luck, there'll actually be something worth seeing this weekend. Clementine tangerines will be available in a few weeks, which always remind me of Elizabeth (my sister's college roomate and my ex-coworker), who introduced them to me. Perhaps I'm all backwards, but for me, autumn is a time for new beginnings, rather than spring.

On Top of the "To Read" Stack
I'm nearly finished with Vera Nazarian's Dreams of the Compass Rose. It's a nonlinear set of interconnected short stories. If you're the sort of person who really needs a timelime, read the stories out of page order, but read them. My memory is (extremely) random access, so I've just been going with it. Other things near the top of the pile are Claudia Roden's The World of Jewish Food, Joe Haldeman's Forever Peace, and Lord Dunsany's The King of Elfland's Daughter. That last is one I've been meaning to get to for some time now, especially as I have this mental image of Dorothea scolding me for not having gotten around to it in the eleven or so years since she brought it to my attention.

The entire point of yesterday was apparently to remind me that nothing is ever as simple as it seems. Or possibly that the best laid plans of mice are apt to go astray. (To quote Douglas Adams, "What have men got to do with anything?"). Or that Murphy's Law is self-enforcing. Or all of the above (my vote for most likely).

Sean once told me that any project you complete with fewer than three trips to the hardware store is a success. However, I cannot find a way to describe replacing a light bulb as a "project," and anyway, it only took two trips. Windows did not get reinstalled on Tartarus because of server problems at the lab. It was actually faster to download a teeny little diagnostic program on our 56K dialup at home than it was from the DSL line at the lab. I forgot to bring the books with me to return to the library. I didn't get to the gym because a migraine suddenly slammed into the back of my head as I was finishing up the last thing I had to do before I left.

I thought I was doing well today when I managed to only hit the snooze alarm once. However, I forgot that I'm driving Anne to and from work on Mondays, and she nearly gave me a heart attack when she knocked at 7:00 this morning. By the time I actually remember on a consistent basis, she'll probably need to change her schedule. (See, I can be taught.)

And Dorothea has gone and got me thinking again. (Read the September 23rd entry "What I can't not do".) This got me onto one (actually two) of my peeves, which is a) how any kind of work that involves taking care of others is so vastly underappreciated, and b) more often than not, women get stuck doing it. Now, I know that's not always the case--one of my pals from Shotgun Reviews took care of his dad (who'd had a nasty accident at work) for several months, but it's not just on a personal level--nurses, home health care workers, day care workers, and teachers are all grossly underpaid for what's expected of them. And don't even get me started on parents. I am not now, nor have I ever been a parent. Most of the reason is that I don't have it in me to do that kind of thankless work for the rest of my life.

It took me a long time to realize how lucky I was as far as parenting. My mom was smart enough to let me make mistakes, which had to have been rough on her, but she did it and helped me deal with the fallout. And I never doubted that she knew what she was doing. as for my dad...when I was younger, I thought that my dad was way too overprotective; in retrospect he probably just had a harder time watching me make stupid mistakes. I don't think anybody could have tried harder to be a good parent than my dad did. Probably the best sign of their success is that we all get along and deal with each other as adults now. I have far too many friends who either don't get along with their parents at all, or whose parents can't see them as independent adults.

Wow...that didn't go where I expected.

And is it me, or is there just something inherently stupid about the fact that it's taking me 2 minutes to edit a document and 20 minutes to check it into our document-control system?

Fortunately, this weekend is turning out to be much better than expected.

Yesterday didn't seem nearly so busy as it was. I slept in until a quarter to ten, which was great, as all last week, my body was awake and ready to go at about 5:30 AM. (The brain was another story entirely.) So, I rolled out of bed, pulled myself together, found my glasses, and headed out to my yoga class. Normally, Sondra teaches yoga, but one her other students, G., was substituting for her.

Now, G. is a great person, not to mention a very good teacher, particularly for someone who hasn't been doing it very long. She's concerned that she's imitating Sondra, and although there are certain similarities, you'd never confuse one for the other. G. is really an amazing person--resilient, bright, empathic, and more forgiving than I could ever hope to be. When she first started yoga, she was very unwell--lots of chronic pain and muscular-skeletal problems. She looked like a ghost of the person she is now. When I met her, I probably made the same mistake that a lot of others did, assuming that because she was physically fragile, she was mentally fragile, too. Actually, nothing could be further from the truth. She quit taking far too many medications, and started doing a lot of yoga. Although she still has good days and bad days, she's off the couch and having a life. She still feels the need to apologize for things unnecessarily--reminds me a bit of T. that way--but not quite so much lately.

Unfortunately, just as she was starting to get better, she and her husband of 13 years started having problems with their relationship. I'm going to skip the details and just say that her husband made, and continues to make, unwise decisions. As a result, G. is taking a rest cure from home and has just gotten herself an apartment. I was kind of surprised when she asked me to help her decorate, but it's my kind of project. I was very enthusiastic about it, and I hoped it would be a fun and positive experience for G. We were actually supposed to start last Sunday, but we kind of missed each other in passing. So, she went ahead and got herself a few things to start with (and apologized for shopping without me--not that I mind; the last thing I want to do is hold her back). She's starting almost completely from scratch, as she wants the apartment to be hers and hers alone. I was there yesterday, and it's a gorgeous space, with a view of a large pond from almost everywhere in the apartment. It's bright and open, with fresh paint and new carpeting. I'd live there in a heartbeat if I was in an apartment-dwelling part of my life.

Anyway, after yoga, we went out to lunch and then on to look for stuff for the apartment. We found some fabulous curtains for the bedroom and yoga room, a small area rug, and a great patchwork comforter with elephants on it, and matching pillows. She did seem to be enjoying it, trying to find the perfect this, that, and the other. It was the comforter that started her off, I think. As G. doesn't work full time, her husband is paying for her new apartment. She'd already spent most of the money budgeted for the month, partly because he had talked her into ordering an extra piece of furniture. The comforter was perfect for her, but it was discontinued and the store didn't have a layaway option. She decided to go ahead and get it anyway, but when we were actually at the cash register, she started getting terribly upset, because she didn't want her husband to get mad at her. G. has been more patient and forgiving of his unwise decisions than I ever could be, and frankly, I think she's due a little consideration. Maybe I have a bit too much Buffy-the-Vampire-Slayer vengeance demon in me, but I really don't think he's got a whole lot to complain about. His only control over the entire situation is financial, and that does not bode well. I hope that once the apartment is set up, both G. and her husband will be able to relax. At any rate, that seemed like a good time to call it an afternoon.

It was about 3:30 by the time I got home, and just as I was getting my stuff out of the trunk, Ed got home, too. Most of the rest of the day was spent in productive puttering. Dishes, laundry, general housecleaning, and so on. I managed to finish up Big Chief Elizabeth, which goes back to the library today. Ed and I even popped out to a bookstore last night. He was getting antsy and needed new reading material at around 7:30 PM. One of the things he picked up was the recent bio of John Adams by David McCullough. I can't wait to get my hands on it--after Ed's done, of course. No, really. I can wait...for a little while.

Today's shaping up to be similarly busy. Finishing up the laundry, a trip to Lowe's (I just discovered that there's an undercabinet lighting fixture in my kitchen; I need to replace the bulb, so I can find out if the bulb was out or if the fixture itself is broken), a quick stop at the library, and a trip over to the lab to reinstall the operating system on Tartarus. (Our naming convention for the terminals at the lab is names for hell from different mythologies. Dad was not too keen on it until I promised to name one of them Newark.) I might even find the time to do some more work on Lori's website. (Lori is Ed's sister-in-law, and she's starting up a decorative painting business.) There's not a whole lot I can do at the moment, as I'm waiting for some content and files from her, but maybe I can figure out how to make the &^%#@ frames work. I had an Intro to Dreamweaver class this spring, but I haven't had a lot of time to work with it until now.

And all this time I've been telling my grandmother that I was going to try and be less busy...

Well, it's still raining, and today is shaping up to be a wash as well. It was only fifteen minutes into my work day that I started thinking "I got out of bed for this?". I wonder what will happen this afternoon. (The Good: Leaving work at 3:30. Fabulous suggestion for housewarming gifts from Dorothea. Getting to the grocery store before the 5:00 rush. The Bad: Hard drive crash followed by an hour of scan disk & defrag. Severe storms practically statewide. The Ugly: Tornados, possibly bad enough to make the national news. Fortunately, not in my immediate area, but still...Yikes!)

I forgot to take my Zyrtec. The test database is unavailable until who-knows-when. Tonight's D &D game is off, when I had finally figured out how to deal with my character's relationship to the other characters in the game. The single bright spot is that Mom got her season tickets to the ballet, so I have the dates and times for all the performances. The first one is next weekend, which is something to look forward to...and I need something to look forward to, as all that this weekend has in store for me is housecleaning and laundry.

It's finally raining, which is appropriate as the entire day was more or less a wash.

Ever have one of those days when you're working but you can't actually manage to accomplish anything? I've got two major tasks right now, which are helping with the testing of and writing/editing the online help for this new software product. I've been trying to write a particular sequence of test scripts for a week now. By yesterday, I finally had everything I needed to get to work. Naturally, that was when I began experiencing technical difficulties. My new definition of "computer" is "a kind of perpetual frustration machine". I don't know how full-time software testers can stand their jobs. I also had one of those conversations in which I end up more confused than when I started out. Fortunately, I think that person I was talking to did manage to get the information he was looking for, in a roundabout kind of way. It's entirely possible that communication occurred--even if only by chance--but I've been fooled before.

Anyway, after all of that, I was ready to a fun evening. T. was supposed to come over for her next sewing lesson. Ed had gotten her a gift certificate from the fabric & crafts store for her birthday last week, so I was going to help her get set up with the basics--needles, pins, tape measure, scissors, and so on. Fifteen minutes before she was supposed to arrive, she called to say she'd gone home sick from school, and wouldn't be able to make it. She sounded so disappointed, and was excessively apologetic. She'd meant to call earlier, but had fallen asleep. I didn't want to wait another two weeks, and I don't think she did either, so if she feels better by Saturday afternoon, we'll try then.

I did manage to get to the gym and to finish up Joe Haldeman's Forever War, so the day wasn't a total loss.

Ed is now on Day 6 of what is allegedly the worst nicotine fit in the history of smoking. Monday was very interesting at our house, what with me not eating and him not smoking. Once again, I'm glad we don't have any pets or kids, as I doubt they would have survived. At least he's not so dizzy anymore. "My brain is getting too much oxygen" is one of those things that I never actually ever expected to hear any rational human being say. It's right up there with "Try this candy--it tastes just like a cricket." (Said by one small child to another.) If it doesn't work out this time, then next time he attempts to quit, I'm going to make sure he stays in a coma for the first week.

On a happier note, Ari, Kim, and Scout are about to close on a new house--October 1st, I think. I'm very excited for them, but at a loss for housewarming gifts. Normally, I would bring a houseplant, but they're in Oregon. Mom has already swiped my second idea. I'm bound to secrecy as to what it is, but I can emphatically state that everyone ought to have one. I was going to send a gift certificate to a home store, but as they prefer avoid shopping at chain stores, that's problematic. (Ari and Kim do anyway--I don't think that the cat does much shopping. I expect that Scout prefers to have Ari and Kim do the shopping for her. Any of you homeowners out there have any suggestions for something under $50 that I can easily mail to Oregon?

Notes to self:

Never start an exercise/weight loss program when something that starts with a "P" is going on, i.e. Passover, PMS, peanut butter cup craving
According to several religions, fasting improves one's focus. This appears to be true. In my case, I focused a lot on how nice it would be to have something to eat.

Friday night, my character got put through the ringer--not just because of some bad die rolls, but by the other characters as well. As a result, she's one smartass remark away from ditching the group and striking out on her own. This is not good, as the campaign has only just started and the group hasn't even really started to come together yet. The only way to avoid causing the gamemaster inordinate amounts of trouble would be for me to leave the game. On the one hand, I'd rather not, as it's one of the evenings that I've specifically set aside for fun and relaxation. I know me--I'd feel compelled to find something productive to do instead. On the other hand, I'm really unhappy with the game situation.

Normally, I can shrug it off when my character has a bad night. Bad karma usually equals good plot. However, this one is sticking with me, and it's making me profoundly cranky. Ed's also been cranky the last couple of days--with good reason--and it's rubbing off on me. I'm getting to the point where I don't even want to be the same room as myself. I'm going to stick it out next game; I have an idea that might work. But I suppose that it comes down to deciding whether or not I want to change the character or change my schedule.

Is it me, or was yesterday very much like a dystopic Fourth of July?

One of the things I like least about the modern workplace is that everyone in the office, or at least on the team, is supposed to be a family, or a big group of best friends. I have a family, thank you very much. I also have friends. Not that I’m averse to making new friends, even at work, but not while I’m actually at the office. That’s what long lunches are for.

Perhaps it has something to do with the casual use of the word “friend”. I’ve got plenty of acquaintances at work, people I say hello to, chat with, and eat lunch with on occasion. However, proper office behavior isn’t conducive to forming close personal relationships. The necessary degree of professionalism gets in the way. There are plenty of things that close friends do and discuss that coworkers do not.

Now, there are a few people whom I’ve met at work who have gone on to become friends…but I don’t consider someone a friend until I’ve known her/him outside of work for a while. People act differently—as they should—away from the office. I’ve been surprised on more than one occasion. I think this is the source of office party faux pas. People tend to forget that if they’re at a work-sponsored social event, they’re still at work, and therefore fail to act appropriately.

I suppose it comes down to the fact that I come to work to work, not to make friends. The vast majority of people I’ve worked with, while perfectly nice, simply aren’t people I’d socialize with if I didn’t work with them. They have different interests, and most of them have friends of their own. When I worked at the World’s Most Dysfunctional Office, I actually had to fill out a survey that asked whether or not I had friends at work. So long as I get along with my coworkers and we get the job done, who cares? I don’t think there’s anything wrong with keeping your work and your personal life separate. In fact, I think it’s healthy, maybe even necessary, to do so.

So, I guess everyone else in America is thinking about September 11, 2001, what with the anniversary being tomorrow and all. Personally, I didn't have a very remarkable day. I was driving into work when I heard about the first plane. I was on Pennsylvania Street, just about to cross 21st Street on my way to the State Government Center downtown.

When I got to the 4th floor, there was very little work actually getting done. Everyone was trying to get news on the radio, the Internet, wherever. There was no way anyone was going to get CNN or MSNBC, so I started trying the BBC, the CBC, the Australian ABC--any reliable, English-language news I could find. So did everyone else. When we finally got a picture of the WTC, we all just stood around staring at the tiny laptop screen.

Just as we got word of the plane hitting the Pentagon, the sirens at the fire station next door went off. This happens occasionally, but usually, the noise starts moving away from the building. At almost the same time, my co-subcontractors started getting calls to leave the government center. I knew I wasn't going to get any work done there, so I left as fast as Windows 98 would shut down. It's not a particularly remarkable story.

Now, the first year after that wretched day is approaching. We're on "high alert," although we've been in one state of alert or another for a year now, so I don't know if it really means anything. There are all kinds of memorial services and special events marking the anniversary.

You can't get away from it, even if you try. Fine. Here's what I want to remember. I want to remember the incredible cooperation and efforts of air traffic controllers all around the world to get our planes landed safely. There's a thankless job if there ever was one. I want to remember that Canada, especially, stepped up and couldn't have been a better neighbor, taking in planeload after planeload of stranded passengers. I want to remember that entire United Kingdom was ready to come over and make tea for the Eastern Seaboard. Mexico, France, Germany, Japan, and almost every other country on the planet was ready and eager to help. I want to remember that more blood was donated just after September 11th than at any other time in my life. I want to remember to thank each and every police officer, firefighter, EMT, rescue worker, medical professional, and helpful civillian...not just in New York and Washington, but everywhere. I want to remember that I was scared to back to work at the Government Center on September 12th, but I did it anyway.

I want everyone to remember that it really sucks that it takes a previously-unthinkable act of terrorism to get some global cooperation around here.

I'm going back to work at the Government Center tomorrow, and I'm not afraid. I'm going to try and have a normal day. I hope everyone else does, too.

Mind like a steel ping-pong ball today. I apologize in advance.

Football season has arrived at last. The good news is that Ed is no longer complaining about how much he misses football. The bad news is that he’s watched every game that’s been on TV since Thursday. I did manage to drag him out to the movies last night—we finally saw Spiderman.

Spiderman is actually better than I expected. The computer animation is rather obvious in several places, but other than that, it looked good. The ending was much better than I expected. It’s open for a sequel, but I felt that the story was complete. My congratulations to the casting directors for choosing a male lead who looks like an ordinary person. Willem Defoe did a fabulous job as the villain—able to take the role over the top without too much extra cheese. I have no idea whether or not the movie closely follows the comic or not, and frankly, I don’t care. It’s entertaining for those of us who haven’t followed the comic. Stan Lee was an executive producer on the film, so I believe he had the opportunity to make his opinions known. If he’s happy with it, why shouldn’t the fans be happy with it, too?

Non-Sequitir Alert

Dreams are strange things. Sometimes, you know that a dream is your mind’s way of telling you something. I always know when it’s past time to quit my job when I have a certain dream. The details change with the soon-to-be-ex job, but it generally involves my coworkers invading my bedroom and acting as if they’re at work…on my day off. Other times, dreams are obviously the mind’s way of taking out the trash. For instance, the past week or so, my dreams have been bizarre concatenations of whatever I’m currently reading, the last film or TV program I watched that day, and other miniscule details of my life. They make no sense whatsoever, and it’s really disturbing my sleep. I can’t describe them to myself, let alone anyone else, but suffice it to say that if the dream was a surrealist film and I were a film critic, I’d pan it.

And now--the weather. It’s September and today’s high is supposed to be 94°F. Tomorrow’s is supposed to be 92°F. Just for kicks, I have a few other places set up on my MSN weather page. Centro Met. Antarctico is looking pretty good, with a high of 26° today. If anyone Canadian is reading this, could you please send us a blast of Arctic air?

Yesterday was mostly spent in allergic misery. Go back and read Thursday’s entry again; it’s all the same stuff, and I’m not going to write about it again.

I’ve finally decided that it’s past time to lose the extra weight I picked up in graduate school. I’ve tried to do too much for too long, and always put losing weight at the bottom of my to-do list…right after dusting. Now that I’ve managed to establish a consistent sleep schedule, not to mention getting my Sundays back, it’s as good a time as any. Frankly, I’m tired of looking in the mirror and seeing an overweight person, which is so at odds with my self-image. I’ll probably never get back down to my high-school weight of 95 pounds. On the other hand, most of the time that I was thin, I was unhappy. Still, there has to be a happy medium, or at least a happy size 8, somewhere.

Part of the problem is that I’m a lousy dieter. I deeply resent having my food choices limited by anything other than my own personal preferences. Counting calories is a pain in the ass, let alone weighing out portions. I don’t even measure when I cook. It’s not as though I’ve got bad eating habits. I actually like fruits and vegetables, most of the dairy products I buy are lowfat, and most of my animal protein lately has been fish. I’ve been slowly eliminating “bad” foods over the past couple of years. I’m almost completely off fast food, but that was relatively easy. In the grand scheme of things, most of it doesn’t taste very good anyway. I’ll admit to a weakness for milkshakes, but only if they contain actual milk and ice cream. That simple criterion alone makes it fairly easy. I’ve also drastically cut back on soda. My maximum is once per week, but most of the time, I don’t even bother. I've found that it’s much easier to cope with limited intake than it is with giving something up altogether. Another thing that I have noticed is that if I actually give in to a craving for something that I know is “bad,” the idea of it is usually better than the reality. It makes it much easier to resist the next time. Given the choice between good ice cream once in a while and all the artificially-sweetened, fat-free frozen yogurt I want, I’ll go for the ice cream every time.

The answer is fairly obvious—more exercise. I know that. Doing it is another thing entirely. An hour of yoga and an hour of Pilates a week isn’t enough. It’s helped—I dragged myself to the gym today and put in twenty minutes on the stationary bike for the first time in a few months, and when I was done, I did not feel like death was imminent…unlike last time I went back to the bike after a few months off. It’s encouraging. I just want to feel healthy again…although there are some great clothes I’d love to fit into. Being short is bad enough when it comes to finding good clothes; being short and heavy makes it nearly impossible!

On a happier note, the writing is going well. I got a draft of the first installment of the radio program on paper, and am about to send it off to my co-writer for her changes. I've also got an introduction to the Hugo Award article, and a list of winners to contact. I've got at least eight or nine books waiting for me at the library, and perhaps I'll be in the mood to do a review. In the mean time, I'll just recommend Rudy Rucker's Spaceland as enthusiastically as possible.

As promised, few comments about indexing:

• It’s harder than it looks
• If you ever use RoboHelp, do not rely on the allegedly Smart Index Wizard
• Do rely on Nancy Mulvany’s Indexing Books (Thanks, D.!)
  
  That comprises the majority of what I know about indexing.

And now, a little exposition. I’ll be brief. My husband’s best friend has a 16-year-old daughter (almost 17), whom I’ll refer to as T. She has something of a social phobia, and has had a lot of trouble at school—mostly not going, and the effect of that on her grades. While most parents of teenagers seem to complain that they can’t get the kids to come home, this one’s mother complains that she can’t get her out of the house.

It occurred to me that perhaps this girl needed a good reason to get out of the house. One could argue that school counts as a good reason, but frankly, high school was bad enough when I was there, and I don’t even want to think about post-Columbine public schools. Anyway, I asked her if she would be interested in learning to sew. It’s a useful skill, and it gives her something to look at and say “I made that.” She was quite taken with the idea when I suggested it over the phone.

Last night, her mother dropped her off at our house. She walked in looking as if her doom awaited her--eyes darting around madly, shoulders hunched up practically to her ears, and arms wrapped around herself so tightly I thought she was going to need a crowbar to let go.

Fortunately, she managed to get her jacket off, and we went to work. Every ten minutes, I had to reassure her that she wasn’t any trouble at all. I thought I’d start her off with a fairly forgiving project, preferably one we could finish in under two hours so she’d have something to take home. One look at my couch provided the answer; a pillow. We dug through my remnant collection and pulled out two coordinating fabrics.

Remnants being what they are, we had to figure out how to make the available fabric fit our project. After a few minutes of eyeballing measurements, T. came up with a workable solution that also produced a very good design. It was immediately obvious to me that her problems at school have nothing to do with her intelligence; she probably doesn’t respond well to traditional teaching methods and she definitely resents the draconian measures that her school uses to keep the kids in line. (If you’re late to class three times, they make you take a drug test!) In fact, the whole time we were working, she kept chatting about how she wants to study Greek and Roman mythology in college, and go on to work in a museum.

To make a too-long story a little shorter, T. seems to have a knack for sewing, and did a great job on her first project. When it was finished, she was alternately hugging the pillow and waving around to show my husband. This kid was all but bouncing off the walls. When I took her home, she not only showed it to her mom, she got out her pet sugar glider (a small, flying-squirrel-like marsupial) and showed it to him. As far as I could tell, the sugar glider wasn’t impressed, but what do you expect from someone who lives in a fleece-lined pouch?

For the entire drive home, she kept thanking me, with the kind of enthusiasm that only teenaged girls can muster. I had to stop myself from saying “it’s no big deal,” because to her, it is. I can’t help but wonder if there’s any correlation between diminishing arts education in public schools and a rise in cases like T.’s. All she needed was a little encouragement—and a lot of reassurance—and she was off and running. She wants me to teach her embroidery, too. I hope I can keep up.

9/5/2002

It's not a happy day. You've been warned. Tomorrow I'll try for something happy…or at least something inoffensive, like indexing.

Allergies suck. I've taken my prescription antihistamines and I feel like someone with mild allergies who hasn't had anything OTC. Granted, it's a vast improvement, but I feel like four of the seven dwarves-Sleepy, Grumpy, Dopey, and Sneezy. Plus, I itch…in places one really ought not scratch, like the eyes and the inside of the mouth.

For as long as I can remember, I've spent most of August and September sniffling, sneezing, and trying to stay awake. My metabolism is convinced that there's no such thing as a non-drowsy antihistamine. Fall's not a good time to have allergies-as if there was a good time. Still, it's when school starts, the weather finally starts to cool down and become comfortable, and everyone else seems to have a burst of energy for starting new projects. Not to mention the fact that Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur fall right in the middle of peak allergy season. I may well be the only person in the state who's sober for the calendar New Year and has only the vaguest of memories of the Jewish New Year.

I played medication roulette for several years, and when I finally found something that worked--Seldane-D--it was taken off the market shortly thereafter. Claritin was great, for the first three weeks. Then it turned on me. I know that theoretically it shouldn't be possible to have an allergic reaction to an antihistamine, but that's certainly what it felt like. Zyrtec works as well as anything that's currently available, I suppose, but it does nothing for congestion. And frankly, I have better things to do with my time than blow my nose every five minutes. I certainly hope that you do, also…although the fact that you're still reading my extended ranting doesn't bode well.

Here's hoping for a hard frost, and soon!

9/4/2002

The last entry in Tsar Nicholas II's personal diary reads something like "nothing happened today". He was shot to death in a cellar in Ekaterineburg later that day.

If nothing happens to me, I'll just skip the entry for that day, thank you very much.

I did get a rather nifty writing assignment today. A couple of months ago, I volunteered my writing services to the head of publications for TorCon 3, which is next year's World Science Fiction Convention. I'll be interviewing Hugo award winners for an article in an upcoming Progress Report. I haven't decided whom to interview yet, but Neil Gaiman's American Gods just won best novel, and I've been trying to work up the nerve to interview him for ages. For the record, American Gods is truly fabulous. I've always thought of Neil as a post-punk Joseph Campbell, and this proves it. Go read it, and as soon as I know whom I'm interviewing, I'll let you know.