What kind of place is Riverside?

It's the kind of place that's by a river, one would assume. Also, the kind of place that's the future birthplace of one J. Tiberius Kirk. It's the kind of place that appears in forty states, many of which have no rivers to speak of, but apparently not in Canada. Huh.

there are quakers on the moon

No, just people who dress like Quakers. But before you move to the moon and start dressing like a Quaker, find out which religion is right for your complexion.

'Tis a gift to be simple. You are blessed with a complexion that can bear the harsh light of day. (But don't forget your SPF) Flaunt it. Be out. Be outside. Your simple, yet stunning, sense of style is best expressed along the Mennonite line. I'm thinking Shaker, Amish, maybe even Quaker.

Go with sundrenched yellows, bleached whites, springtime greens. Christ has risen. And so too, has a new fashion sensibility. Fresh! Bold! Crisp! The fabrics of nature best express your sunny outlook, cottons, linens, simple silks and woolens.

There's macaroni and cheese, from the box, with frozen mixed vegetables and possibly tuna. There's frozen stir fry plus odds and ends. There's pasta in various shapes, with sauce from a jar and whatever vegetables. And that's it, really, for the no-wait no-think on-hand easy meals, at least in my house.

It's getting dull. Tonight, as lazy and hungry as I was, the thought of mac'n'cheez was just too much. I made a casserole. Peter's going to make fun of me when I pull it out of the oven, I can tell - and I deserve it, I put rice crispies on top. We're low on groceries.

So what are the staple meals that you keep around, all the time, for an attack of the lazies?

I refuse to kiss the sweet ground in L.A. - god only knows what kinds of car drippings have permeated the soil. But I am back, safe and sound and only wondering what kind of person refuses to run pushing and shoving as fast as they can to the baggage carousel, and why these people always get their luggage unloaded first.

The curiosity I build up after seeing the same bag circle five times could never, ever be satisfied by the mundande spectacle of underwear and beach reading.

Anyway, to prove to you that I really was in Iowa, there are some pictures of corn and soybeans and pigs over in the photoblog.

Is my blog HOT or NOT?

Having ignored the comment box for a while, it's time to return and answer an old, but clearly urgent, query:

why is a mouse when it twirls?

The real answer has to do with neural whisker processing and the conservation of angular momentum, but you can think of it as a jelly donut. You know how the jelly in a jelly donut always squooshes out to the side right as you finally, finally penetrate the outer layer of dry choking flour? That's why.

Meanwhile, someone else has a different sticky situation on their hands:

"Stranded, on toilet isle..."

You know, I've been eating rather a lot of sweet corn this week, and the thing about sweet corn is that it's got a tremendously high fiber content. I swear, I never knew it was possible to poop this much.

Volthoom

Onomatopoeia.

i like sweet corn and crazy yellow and purple websites

And I like you, sweet cheeks. Now get the hell out of that smelly computer lab and I'll give you some corn when I'm back, nudge nudge, wink wink.

http://www.monkeylaw.org

Hot damn! A web comic about monkeys who seem to live just down the street from the house in which I was born. There go my plans for the evening's appliqué.

Yes, I'm in it for the ego trip. I'll say that right up front, because I'm going to mention a few other things I've got out of this deal and I don't want to sound like a zealot. I am tickled out of my gourd when someone enjoys this stuff, or decides that I am an interesting person because of it - particularly if that someone happens to be erudite and entertaining, and has never dealt with my spit-up (sorry, Mom and Dad). And that's why I keep doing it - I still need external validation.

Does one ever stop needing external validation?

So I've been feeling more honest, more straightforward, less willing to put forth the effort to rationalize, to build pretenses, to hide. I can't tell if this has shown up to the people around me, but it's made a shift in my inner dialogue, and I really want to blame the blogging. After all, being blunt and unapologetic takes practice.

I'm not sure if that last paragraph actually meant anything or not. I got distracted, reading my own archives and marvelling at how clever I am. I forgot all of the other things I was going to say.

It's probably just as well.

If anyone cares, I have been in Iowa since Thursday, and will be returning to the City of Smog (heavily laden with sweet corn) on Sunday. If nobody cares, I have still been in Iowa since Thursday, and will still be returning on Sunday - but perhaps I won't have quite as much sweet corn along.

I am continually thinking I hear the phone, which is absurd, because I am also squatting on the phone line like an obese woman might squat on a kitten. I suppose it's time for bed.

For a quickie, though, do you ever notice a difference between anyone and anybody, or noone and nobody? I don't, unless I'm counting syllables.

Christian game theory. Homosexuality revealed as a zero-sum game! Pascal's wager revisited! My spleen vents frustration with a quick sideways shudder.

As you can see, the same science of Game Theory that I and my fellow Defense Department tacticians used to defeat the Godless Soviets during the Cold War can be used to defeat Godlessness here in our own land.

Fiscal solvency is in the air, tra la, tra lee, tra la la la lay - in the space of twenty-four hours I gained a job, and another job. Both webby things, doing faculty home pages for the GPS division and digitizing boxfuls of material for the Caltech-Occidental concert band. Hopefully enough to keep me off the streets and out of trouble for the rest of the summer.

Bored again, made two new style sheets. One is the bright yellow and purple layout I've always wanted to have the moxie to make. The other just has some celery greens. Let me know if they're unreasonably disfunctional, eh?