Spend Some Time Between Dodridge and Lane

Dudes,

Hey, Columbus! It's really, really bumming me out the way the city is driving half of North-of-Campus out of business with the High Street construction. I'm hearing rumblings of lots of closings, and it's no good. It's really annoying to go anywhere between Dodridge and Lane. I know all about it. Do it anyway. This construction isn't gonna be done for another YEAR, and all those little local shops are suffering, even institutions like the Dube. It would make you sad if these places closed.

Reasons to Take Your Ass to the Construction Zone

I'm already sad because I heard a rumor that Black Market is going under. Guys! Kelly Martin is our local fashion hero! Why aren't we buying all her dresses? She was just on freaking Project Runway! Go to her shop. Go there. Buy dresses. She's a cool girl and it's a cool shop.

There's that new little restaurant, Sage, which is really good! And Clintonville needs restaurants. But they're going to die if we don't brave the construction and eat there.

Did you know Taj Mahal has a bar in it? It's open til 1. Here's my review of Taj Mahal: Food: pretty good. Patio: excellent. Weird, unexpected lounge: RAD. You don't think about going there. It doesn't occur to you. But you should. I think no one is going there, so maybe you and your friends should. We went there Sunday night (Sunday is karaoke and ladies night in the Taj Mahal lounge. The ladies night drink specials are nuts--I got both KT and myself DRUNK for 12 bucks, girls. THEY'RE CRAZY FOR LOW PRICES. Take your titties in there and get some cheap drinks.) It's cool in there. It feels kind of like Inarra's whorin' shuttle on Firefly. I'm sort of obsessed with Firefly right now, though, so maybe it's just me. But it's all red and there's couches and stuff. It's like you're having drink in someone's really cool living room. We parked on Oakland. It was easy!

You can go to our local hardware store, Schriener Hardware, where once the man who worked there gave me a huge discount on a knife because I told him I wanted to carry it for self defense. (Then this partially reformed Mexican gangbanger that I used to know (Where did you go, Isaac? Hope you're ok.) taught me all these knife tricks.)

You can rent, like, any movie at North Campus Video, and yes, that old man with the pierced cheeks will be mean to you, but isn't that part of the charm? He's been being mean to me since I was 18. It's sort of comforting at this point.

And Smoker's Haven! It smells so good in there, and even though I don't smoke I spent something like 20 minutes looking at cool pipes and smelling tobacco and talking to the nice man who worked there. He told me that it is cheaper to smoke a pipe than a cigarrette, and it's not addictive because you don't inhale on a pipe. Maybe I should smoke a pipe.

I don't need to remind you about the Dube, right?

Dick's Den. Why Not?

Cazuela's! It's open AFTER THE BARS CLOSE on the weekends. You can go there for fourthmeal.

A lot of places down there have parking lots. It's not so bad, it's just unpleasant on High. You can handle it. You do unpleasant things every day. Come on!

O-H-

We are so Important here! This is the only time ever that we get to feel important. This state is nuts.

Here is my favorite part of this article:

Diane McDonald, an occupational therapist, is voting for McCain even though she thinks Obama is "articulate, intelligent, unwavering."

"So why don't you vote for him?" Hawkins said.

"Because it doesn't mean I believe in his politics," McDonald said. "A lot of women have gotten in trouble because of men like that."

Coast to coast, LA to Chicago, western male
Across the north and south, to Key Largo, love for sale

Face to face, each classic case
We shadow box and double cross
Yet need the chase

A license to love, insurance to hold
Melts all your memories and change into gold
His eyes are like angels but his heart is cold

No need to ask
He's a smooth operator

Don't trust a smooooth operator, ladies! He'll take your Flower and skip town, and America will be left wandering around like Delta Dawn in her bedroom slippers with a faded rose pinned to her dress, waiting, always waiting, for that Smooth Dark Stranger to return.

In Franklin County the Obama people are out in much greater force than the McCain people. Franklin county is one of the only counties Kerry won. WE TOLD YOU SO, OHIO.

In Butler County, where my parents live, the McCain people and the local GOP are hammering pretty hard. The other day when we were there there were two different anti Obama robocalls in a row. It seems like a waste of money to me, since Butler County is where all the crazy maniacs live--McCain is going to win Butler no matter what. I guess they're trying to energize their voters--not about McCain, but against Obama. Even so, there is much greater support for Obama than I've ever seen for a democrat in Butler County. The man knows how to reach people, I tell ya what.

This reminds me of a story: in 2004 the Butler County GOP people sent out such a constant stream of big glossy swiftboat crap that my enraged father taped a big note to the mailbox that said, "Dear Mail Carrier, please do not deliver ANY ITEMS from GEORGE BUSH or the REPUBLICAN PARTY to this address. Thank you."

The mail lady wrote a note back that said she had to deliver whatever was addressed to him and fitted with appropriate postage. Poor Steve.

Man, all this talk about Butler County has me craving a Richard's Pizza! Mmmmmmmmmmm, Richard's Pizza.......

Go vote, everyone!
Bruce

Some self-reflection, aka what Brax has been up to!

Ok, guys. I know I haven't blogged in a long time and have been generally slacking this summer. Part of it was because I went through a big ole life change and moved and had technology problems, but part of it was also because I got really lazy about blogging. Brucie, I'm sorry! But from here on out, I vow to be much more on top of the blogging stuff!

Overall, I have been treating this summer as a big vacation, like we used to have in school. I have been working a little bit, but I've mostly been slowing down, going for walks, knitting, and drinking wine on porches with friends. It might not have been the most responsible decision to quit my job and move to Columbus, but it sure feels like the right one.

I spent two years in Toledo, doing nothing but working. At the time I took the job, it was really important for me to move away. I had graduated from college and worked 2 jobs for about a year, and I was starting to worry that I would never have a "real" job or generally amount to anything. And while I really loved my friends here, I was experiencing that thing that happens inside of every recent Bachelor of Arts graduate: the furious recognition that I wasted $40,000 on an education that may very well have me waiting tables forever, and the urge to jump in the car and drive it straight to the ocean. So when I was offered this job, it was like a miracle.

At first, I was so excited! I worked 50-plus hours a week, turning that office from a disorganized free-for-all into something I could be proud of. I got SO much experience running a business. But after work sort of plateaued, I was just left with a job I enjoyed less and less as the months went by. I didn't have any support system, and I really began to realize how bad I am at making new friends. I'm really shy and I have trouble talking around big groups of people I don't know very well, and this always tends to come off as total snobbery. Of course, my solution is usually to just get really wasted, which doesn't win me any friends either. Nobody wants Conceited Obnoxious Girl at their party. After about 6 months I sort of decided that if I DID meet someone I could be friends with, I would have to explain to them that I had lived in this town for 6 months and didn't have any other friends yet. That fact alone embarrassed me into giving up on meeting people in Toledo.

Of course, there were some pretty awesome people in Toledo who I'm discounting here. Abby, a totally cool girl I served with in Columbus, was living in Toledo and going to school while I was there. Sarah, of Skeins and Beans fame, is a super sweet and super fun sock-knitting diva. Both of those girls were amazing and genuinely tried to draw me out of my shell. But I think that I eventually just had my heart set on moving back home.

Over Christmas my Grandfather passed away, three weeks after being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. It was a very sudden blow, and I felt completely alone for it. It sounds trite, but a few weeks after the funeral I sat down and made a list of things that are important to me, and things I want to do with my life. My list didn't include anything about having a lot of money, and it didn't include anything about having a job with an impressive title. It didn't include any of the reasons I had moved to Toledo in the first place. I decided then and there to stop living my life with the idea that "someday" I would make a move toward friends, a job I enjoyed, and generally being happy. That was basically when I decided that come summer, I would quit my job and move.

Obviously, just changing locations doesn't fix everything in your life. There's still things I need to work towards. But I think that if nothing else, the past 2 years gave me the perspective I needed to begin to improve myself, and to believe that if there's something cool I want to do, I should just DO it! In the next couple weeks, you will all start to hear more about Bruce and Brax's Special Project, which is (for both of us) a huge step in that direction.

Anyways, sorry for the big long post with only one picture!

Love,

Brax

a lot before my coffee.

Brax,

1) There are 22 year olds running around my neighborhood selling magazines and pretending it's for a good cause, because it's for a contest or program or something that is for young entrepreneurs. A young man in a hemp-and-seashell necklace knocked on my door when I was puttering around in my pajamas, pre coffee, hair standing straight up, and really incredibly groggy since I had bizarre sleep last night (details in a minute). He started off by saying that he wasn't collecting donations so I didn't need to punch him. I was so confused. Then he went into this big thing and kept handing me things to look at and finally I said, I don't understand, what is it again? And he said it was a "communications contest" for young entrepreneurs to see who is the best communicator. And I said "I still don't understand, are you asking me to buy a magazine?" And he said "yes. I know you don't need any magazines but you should buy one just to help me win the contest."

Then he started asking me questions to try and tie my life back to one of these magazines but I was crafty and didn't answer with anything that was magazine-related. like "what do you do for fun?" I answered, "reading." No magazine! At least not on his list. "Do you like to work out?" NOOOOOOOO. "Huh! Coulda fooled me!" Then he asked if I had kids or whatever, and I said no, and so he asked if I had a husband or boyfriend, and I said yes. And he said, "what does he do for fun?" And because Matt just told me last night that he wants to learn to sew so he can make himself ties and vests, and because I knew that it would weird out this little Douchbag In Training, I said "he likes to sew." WELL.

"No way! Wow. Does he like to cook and clean too?"
"I don't need any magazines."
"No one needs magazines! Just buy one to help me out."
"No."
"If you buy one I put a tag on your door so that none of the other people doing this will knock on it. If you don't buy one they'll be knocking on your door all day."
"No."
"Is it because I'm a jerk or something?"
"No, I just don't want any magazines."

Then he turned around and swore like he'd just missed the big touchdown. He was seriously pissed off.

So now I'm hiding in my office with the downstairs all locked up in case more business majors try to sell me things that I admittedly don't want or need but which I should buy "to help them out." I would also like to note that he called me "Ma'am" at least 150 times in the 5 minutes he was at my door.

I think those kids are in the WRONG NEIGHBORHOOD. You know who does really well on my street? The HRC people, and the Obama people, the union people. This is not a neighborhood full of people who want to "help out" business majors. This is not the kind of neighborhood where we want to "punch" people collecting for charity, but are happy to buy some crap we don't need so you can win some communications prize that I don't understand because you have not communicated it to me clearly. Huh. Look, it was just a lot before my coffee.

2) It is an excellent day for lounging in your window seat.



3) My bed is a horrible nightmare. I never sleep through the night and the right side of my lower back hurts all the time because the bed dips down in the center. We can't afford a new bed right now because of that time I quit my job to find myself and I didn't have any income for a month and a half and then started a big secret project which will mean money soon but not right now. This whole bed situation came to a head last night around 3 AM, when I got so frustrated that I woke Matt up to bitch. We moved to the futon in Matt's office. I had forgotten what it felt like to sleep deeply. I slept so deeply that it took an hour to really wake up, and I felt like I'd been sleeping for days but I hadn't. My back feels a whole lot better too, after only one night. ON A FUTON. That's how bad the bed is--the futon was like a temperpedic to me. Sucksville.

4) MADCRAFTING! For one thing, I signed up for a sewing class so I can learn how to sew correctly. For another, a few weeks ago I went to the national quilt show with Matt's mom, and while I was there I kind of randomly picked up a needle felting kit and a bunch of pretty roving. Now I'm going to totally needle felt something rad onto this bat fabric I picked up the other day.

Look at how awesome this bat fabric is. LOOK AT IT.


If you live in central Ohio, and you like fabric, then you need to go to Sew To Speak. They've got bat fabric, man. It's the cutest, friendliest shop. Go there!

5) My office chair needs a cushion. Cascade Magnum! I'm lookin' at you. I don't want my cushion to be a whole big thing. I want it to be knitted in an evening, stuffed full of fiber fill, and cushioning my butt tomorrow. So maybe I'll start that. If it works out I'll share the pattern with you guys.

End transmission--I'm starving.
Bruce

too too too too tooooo darn hot

Brax,

It is too hot to blowdry my hair. My hair is really thick and by the time I'm done I'm so sweaty that I shouldn't have bothered showering. It's also too hot to care that my hair looks crappy.

We have central air but we are not using it unless it gets above 85 degrees inside the house. I am proud to say that I have only had the air on four times this summer. All of those times, it was about 4 PM and the house was boiling, and I just turned on the air until the sun went down. My carbon footprint=reduced. I'm lucky in the sense that fans really make a difference in my house. In our old apartment there was absolutely no air circulation--sometimes it would be 70 degrees outside and about 400 million degrees inside. Anyway. We all need to do our part!

It is not exactly too hot to knit, but it is hot enough that my crafty mojo is sort of...lethargic? I've been doing some stuff. The Alexandra top:

Progress has been made, but now I've increased so much that it really looks like a crazy blob on those 24 inch needles. I get to separate the sleeves in a few rows here, then it will really look like something.

Also, birthday yarn!!!!!

Blogger is just DYING to upload my pictures sideways. Why? Why? Anyway, you can turn your computer sideways and see that this is my pretty pretty birthday-present-to-myself yarn worked up into a brioche stitch scarf. I always assumed brioche stitch would be hard. It's not. It's fun! It's sproingy.

I onlt bought 220 yards of the stuff, so it will probably be a pretty short scarf. A scarfette. Anyway, it will be nice and warm and soft and pretty.

And! Now that we live in a house with a yard, we can have plants! My dad gave me some zucchini seeds and Matt planted them. They poked up, like, immediately.

I'm a little nervous about them, since Aunt Purl had a hostile zucchini takeover. But I'm taking the chance. At this point, I think I'd be thrilled at a hostile zucchini takeover. Hooray! Zucchini!

See, I'm reading Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver, and it's one of those books that you can't read without reexamining the most basic assumptions of your day to day life. I know that is a vast claim to make, but it's absolutely true. I'm only about 50 pages in and I'm already all "NO MORE ASPARAGUS OUT OF SEASON! WHERE THE HELL DID THIS APPLE COME FROM? WHO LAID THIS EGG?" And so on. (Go on, send my husband a sympathy card, I won't be offended.)

I mean, I'm not going to go living off the land (yet). I live in the city! But next summer I'm going to garden something fierce, and I'm going to immediately renew my commitment to the farmer's market, which lapsed when we moved. I don't know what market to go to here. Any Columbus readers have a recommendation?

Sincerely,
Bruce

P.S. Cheer up!

Re/Defining The Fem/In/Ine

Brax,

It's a beautiful day here in the heartland! The sun is shining and the birds are singing and my neighbor is listening to an awesome country record real loud. I'm glad she's rocking out on a Saturday morning. Obviously she didn't stay up all night reading or she wouldn't be so perky.

I was reading Jamaica Inn all night. This was the second time I've read it. I love it. Look, people don't seem to know about Daphne Du Maurier. I never got assigned her in school or anything. She's another one of those authors that I am only lucky enough to know about because I have a very well read mom. You should check her out. (Start with Rebecca.) She's a first rate storyteller and a damn good writer.

I'm on this Daphne Du Maurier trip right now because
a) I was reading Jamaica Inn again and
b) yesterday we watched the Hitchcock marathon (hooray!) on TCM, and they showed The Birds and I remembered how I kept meaning to read that book, which is, coincidentally, by Daphne Du Maurier. I went ahead and ordered it.

She was apparently one of Alfred Hitchcock's favorite writers, because he adapted three of her books into movies (Jamaica Inn, Rebecca (Oscar winner, best picture 1940!) The Birds). I think this is really interesting considering how CRAZY SEXIST he was. Most of Du Maurier's books have interesting, strong, complex female lead characters. I haven't read The Birds yet, but I am pretty excited to see what the source material is like, since the movie is one of Hitchcock's lady-hatingest. If I ever went back to college for another useless liberal arts degree, I'd probably write a thesis called something like Re/Defining The Fem/In/Ine: Women in Hitchcock's Du Maurier Adaptations. I'd get an A on it, too. (Actually, that sounds really fun. Hm. Part of me could have really enjoyed academia if it didn't require so many deadlines and stuff. And if I felt like it had practical applications beyond intellectual circle jerks.)

Anyway. I started a new project!!!111@1!

It's a little early to tell, but that there is the Alexandra ballet sweater from Fitted knits. The yarn is Debbie Bliss Chunky Donegal Tweed. (I am ripping out the Cozy V-Neck sweater from Fitted knits in order to make it.) I was going to invent my own beautiful cabled cardigan pattern, and then I remembered that I wanted to go on a knitting vacation. This pattern is fun and easy! And really wearable. Plus I think it is a better use of the yarn than the V-Neck sweater. I'm so excited to be knitting for fun with some of my favorite things --green, tweed, chunky, raglan, cables. Updates to follow.

Sister is ready for winter.

Luv,
Bruce

The coffee today...

It is terrible. I seriously can't handle it. I'm about to drive through McDonald's and get some fries and call it a day.
-Brax

Bruce's news round up

Brax,

It’s another one of those days where I have opinions on a bunch of stuff in the news! Today there are two items of good news for animals and the environment! Nice! Good news! As usual, lots of all caps.

1) Wait, farm animals are animals too? Like a cat? Or a dog?



2) For months, the interior department has been putting off making a decision on whether or not polar bears are a threatened species. Like when I put off budgeting because I know I spent too much. I think their reasoning goes like this: “But…but…but…if the polar bear is a threatened species (and we can’t reasonably say it’s not) then we have to take action to protect them which means we have to actually do something about global warming! OH NO THAT WILL MAKE EXXON MOBILE SO MAD AND THEY SIGN THE CHECKS.”

Anyway, now this is happenin’. Thanks, judicial branch, for doin’ what you’re s’posed to do.



3) I don’t get what the big deal is about Miley Cyrus. I don’t know. I feel like I see way, way, way creepier shit than that all the time, like sexy-lingerie-wearing-dead-tied-up women on Law and Order and other crime shows, and honestly even the “Baby One More Time” video. It’s funny: when a woman is all dolled up and being sexualized, it is A-OK (Victoria’s Secret, Britney Spears at barely 18), but when they look kind of natural and regular and they’re being sexualized, it is TOTALLY CREEPY AND WRONG AND SOCIETY IS GOING TO HELL and OH MY GOD I AM SO OFFENDED (American Apparel ads, Miley Cyrus).

4) Reverend Wright: I’m not saying you’re wrong. I agree with some, maybe most, of what you said. But if you don’t shut your big mouth you are going to ruin our chances of having the most progressive president in decades, maybe ever. Oh my God, will you please shut up? Yesterday’s speech was about your big stupid ego, and nothing else, and you’re forcing Obama to keep talking about you, to defend himself because of you, when he needs to be focusing on getting elected and starting to clean up this abysmal, disastrous mess that we’re in. Do not ruin this for the world.

Ok, Karida says she has something awesome to show me, so I have to go look at it.

Later buddy!

Bruce

P.S. The awesome thing Karida had to show me was a delicious crab cake kind of thing only it was made of tofu and veggies, and I think it was genius and I'm going to try and make one at home.

the news of the day

Brax,

Part of my job is reading the Washington Post, the New York Times, and the Wall Street Journal every morning. The news usually ruffles my feathers, but I think this week I’m feeling pretty crotchety, and two things, one vastly more important than the other, made me mad. Here’s some comments on both of them.

1) Meghan McCain: I know that a lot of blogs are being mean about her, and I don’t want to jump on some sort of train of people who wish she would please put on a classy suit like Chelsea and just stand there behind her dad like a good girl. On the other hand.

I am just TIRED of seeing her pretty little face everywhere. For one thing, it is gross that that old grandpa, who was probably 105 when my dad was born, has a daughter younger than me. For another, it is quite irrelevant to me, to you, and I suspect, to the soldiers in Iraq, the people about to lose their homes, the polar bears, people without health insurance, and people waiting for their unemployment checks what a rich, privileged 23 year old thinks about anybody’s shoes. I don’t mind that she has a blog and her own life and stuff, but I really, really wish the nation’s major news outlets would stop telling me about it.

2) Nukes to Taiwan : You guys. DOD accidentally sent a bunch of nuclear missile parts to another country and then they didn’t notice for two years.

In fact, they never actually noticed. Eventually Taiwan was like, “um, this box you sent us says “secret” on it. We thought it might be important.” (I'm paraphrasing.)

How, how in Holy Hell, do you accidentally send nuclear missile components—some of the most dangerous and, theoretically, strictly controlled objects on the planet—overseas?

The department of defense gets the single biggest chunk of our tax money, you guys. They are supposed to be protecting us.

This has really restored all my faith in the government. I totally believe that all nuclear weapons are secure and there’s no way a terrorist could possibly obtain one, and I think we all owe DOD our gratitude. Thanks a lot, DOD. It’s a good thing that YOU GUYS get all the money instead of schools or parks or roads or food stamps or health care. You’re obviously putting it to good use and I don’t know why us liberals don’t just shut up and trust you.

Grumbles,
Bruce

Whatever, March.

Bruce,

In like a lion, out like a lamb? Bullshit, I say. We just got our first March snowstorm on Tuesday. A warm-ish, rainy day slowly turned into a colder day. By the time we had to leave work, the rain had all turned into an icestorm of terror! Slushy ice rained from the sky! I had to chip off a layer of ice an inch thick on my car before I could even leave work. I saw plows out on the roads, but they couldn't salt fast enough for this terrible onslaught of wintery mix. (Thank you, Natalie Dee, for drawing what's in my soul)

What else happened on Tuesday? I feel like there was maybe something else....Oh yeah! The latest in a long line of Super Tuesdays! I totally voted, and I got one of those stickers that I smugly wore on my lapel until it fell off. I don't think the weather deterred too many voters...one major bonus from all those Democrats turning out to vote is that every single tax levy passed! Hooray, firemen and schools!

(Yes. In Ohio, schools have to whore themselves out to the voters and get real estate tax levys passed every few months in order to do stuff like "pay teachers" and "keep music and art programs." Schools in districts where poor people live get way less money and are falling apart, while public schools in wealthy districts have fancy, state of the art buildings and computers and offer A.P. classes. It's been ruled unconstitutional by the state supreme court, but schools are still funded the same way.)

Anyway, we awoke Wednesday morning to a bright, sunny day....complete with 4 inches of snow blanketing a layer of ice on the ground. Here's my street:

It was a red light guys! Don't worry.

Anyway, I know that this week has probably been in the 80's in D.C. and you have probably all been working in your bikinis or something. I just thought I'd bring you back down to earth and remind you of just how long winter lasts in Ohio.

Later Gator!
Brax

There are seriously people who are pissed off that he gets his own day...

...which is a great reminder of why he has his own day.

2008 better be totally great

Brax,

I would like to start off by saying that I am watching the Republican debate and Giuliani just talked for around 6 hours about how America has the best health care in the world. Somebody had better tell our infant mortality rate--obviously it hasn't heard or it wouldn't be the second worst in the industrialized world. Oh Christ, now he's talking about how nuclear power is going to save the world. I don't even know why the hell I'm watching this. Excellent, I've changed the channel. Britcoms! I love Keeping Up Appearances. Hyacinth reminds me of my grandma.

I knitted some Christmas presents! I didn't document the process here too much, obviously, but here are the finished products.

Here's my mom wearing the scarf I made her. Most moms deserve cashmere scarves, my mom especially. (I blogged about this scarf when it was just a baby scarf.)

As moms deserve cashmere scarves, so dads deserve warm feet:

The pattern is Felt Clogs by Fiber Trends, and the yarn is Lamb's Pride Bulky. You're supposed to use a worsted wool and double it, but pffffffffft. A single strand of bulky worked fine, and I didn't have that whole keeping-track-of-two-tangled-skeins-while-two-cats-try-to-destroy-
everything problem. It felted FAST though, so if you're thinking of making these, watch 'em like a hawk. Also they needed a haircut after I finished them...the Lamb's Pride folks throw in a dash of mohair that makes this yarn felt up pretty fuzzy.

Here's my dad playing with his new amplifier while wearing his new slippers. See the amplifier? It is the size, apparently, of a briefcase, but has a remarkable sound. Modern technology!

It was a lovely Christmas.

So I know you had a good New Years because I was there. Here we are! (Readers, the two gentlemen in this photo are our former roommates. We all four live in different cities now, so it is always nice to see one another again. You may have seen them before, I think they're pretty popular on certain subscription-only websites.)

So yeah, that's us at the beginning of the night.

Cute, right? We are clear-eyed and pretty and ready to greet the new year. We're all upright. We're all dressed. Let's fast forward a bit...


Happy new year, my beauties! Readers, it only got better from here. I am refraining from posting any photos from later in the evening. This is all you need to know.

All lushery aside, it was fantastic and nourishing and energizing to see everyone this week. I love the people with whom I spent New Years Eve. They're the reason I'll be able to power through the last leg of this particular adventure. Yes, even (or especially) this guy:

I hope all of you had as good a holiday as I did. I've got high hopes for this year.

Luv,
Bruce

p.s. Special thanks to KT for being awesome and hosting the madness.

Okay.

Bruce,

I just opened the water bill at work, and inside was a flyer for Toledo. The headline is "Toledo: A Business Friendly City of the Future." Underneath, it has a bunch of awards and rankings from various magazines including:

Ranked a "Top 10 City of the Future in North America"
Awarded "100 Best Communities for Young People"
"Top Five Cities with the Best Tasting Drinking Water in America" (hence the flyer's apperance in my water bill?)
...and my personal favorite,
Ranked #1 "Most Business Friendly City in North America."

I wonder what magazines said all this. The "Please Don't Move out of Toledo Journal?" I would agree with none of these! Except the water one. I guess our water is pretty tasty. I mean, I hardly ever even use my Brita anymore. But City of the Future? I guess the future involves no money for infrastructure and roads falling apart and sewers backing up and strip malls everywhere.

Hmmm...sewers backing up...maybe I should use my Brita after all.
Brax

Wow!

Brax,
Today there is a big Washington Post expose on worker compensation for American nuclear weapons workers who have cancer. Whaaaaa? OK, it's not an expose for those of us who have been working on the issue, but it is to a lot of other people. I have to say I am a little irritated, because if your experience with this issue was limited to just reading that article, you would have nary an inkling that grassroots have been working on this for years at every site and nationally. But I think there is an old saying about a gift horse and a mouth, or a baby and some bathwater, or something like that that probably applies. The important part is, people are being treated abominably and the Post is bringing national attention to it. We even got a little OH..........IO! shout out.

Did I ever tell you that when I was a kid, I thought "abominable" meant alive or animate, because of the Abominable Snowman? The outstanding feature to me of the Abominable Snowman was that he was an ALIVE snowman, not that he was a meanie. So, for example, if someone were to say "How is your Grandma's pneumonia?" I would respond, "She is very sick, but at least she is still abominable."

....24 hours from now, I will be in the old faithful Corolla, probably somewhere in West Virginia, begging Matt to stop for Pizza Hut and playing with my little magical music player, gearing the hell up to sit in the grass drunk with my dog, with Barb and Steve and Topher, and with your sweet self. We are going to have so much fun! For one thing there is a new pony, which I know is sad because of Silas colicking so bad and dying so young. But they had to get a new pony to keep Milton Burro company. Look at that face...that little guy needs a buddy.

So we can meet the new pony, Shelby. And also we can drink wine and eat food and git bit by mosquitoes and have jam sessions. Practice "Raised on Robbery" on your drive down, I want to try it out. Hooray!

See you...um, TOMORROW.

-Bruce