1. I tried some of the new Manly Coke Light product; it's about what I expected, not as sickly sweet as regular Coke but with somewhat less chemical afterburn than Diet. It's not the sort of cola taste I would associate with infinite manliness. But the package design assures me that it is, indeed, infinitely manly: the product name ("C2" which is off-puttingly reminiscent of energy drinks and/or goofy alloys hyped up in tool catalogs) is printed in a silver, squared-off font reminiscent of manly death robots, and the usual white text and decorative swirlites have been replaced with black. With black text and swirlies, if you squint at it, the can looks a bit bloodied.

   It's not actually fair of me to associate manliness with violence like this. But the fact remains that this is a very forceful-looking can of cola, and I feel defeminized just by drinking it.

2. L. esculentum var. 'Carmelo' - picked my very first tonight; it was mellow and sweet, with acidic bite in the juice. Very meaty. Though I'm holding back judgment until the plant is really in the full swing of things (and I have the patience to wait the extra day for the fruit to be really properly ripe) I would prefer a more assertive tomato flavor. Should make good sauce, though, and I'm drooling to think of pizza with fresh tomato chunks, basil, and goat cheese...
3. Red wagons - the reviewer of the red wagon is faced with a thorny problem: it is trivially simple to understand why red wagons are awesome. In these circumstances, there's not much one can do to impart value to the review, so the uninspired are left to indulge themselves with curmudgeonly commentary on the cultural forces behind all terrain red wagons or long and pointless philosophizing on the nature of childhood. Rarely does one see the use of Radio Flyer as a jumping point for a discussion of escapism, rationalization, and red wagons in popular culture, and how the red wagon under scrutiny is most effective at escaping from one particular set of troubles or another. Now that would be useful information to have when considering the purchase of a red wagon!

Criminy crickets, I've been meaning to post this since Tuesday; lost it once in a browser-closure, and all the other times have had absolutely nothing to do with a certain promising game of Nethack, not at all. At any rate, an article in the L.A. Times last Sunday looked at ground water squabbles between the Navajo, the Hopi, and a coal mine; read it fast before it vanishes into the money-charging archives.

The story is chock full of quotes about connections between the earth and the sky and our toes, which fit very well into the popular "Indian sheds a single tear for your litterbug ways!" model of a monolithic Native American culture but don't yield much insight into the technical or political issues involved, and the political issues are fascinating. The technical issues are fascinating too, but of course this is exactly my line of work, so who knows what the general public would think. Nevertheless, I'm surprised that there were no statements from the activist with "a Master's degree" on the scientific merits and demerits of the coal mine's technical report.

Not that I'd accuse anyone of allowing a healthy interest in the spiritual relationship between a land and its native peoples to degrade a piece of journalism; I'm just sayin'.

A clear case of government underregulation of the dairy industry: Fat Free Half & Half. Or, rather, sneaky loophole-exploitation by Land O' Lakes, as the official definition stipulates that half-and-half must contain between 10.5% and 18% milkfat.

I demand a more restrictive labeling regime, preferably one where dubious coffee creamers have well-defined geographic labels. Land O' Lakes products should be produced in Minnesota, and Minnesota only, or they lose the subtle flavor of authenticity! This "suppliers in Wisconsin" shit will not fly. Similarly, "fat free half and half" should be relabeled "fat free enhanced dairy product".

That is all. Good night.

Last night I dreamed I was in charge of Walter Mondale's funeral arrangements. We had to keep his body on the couch until I could find a church to hold the service and arrange for pickup by a mortuary. This morning, I learned that
Ronald Reagan died on Saturday! Coincedence? I think not!

In the dream, Walter Mondale was actually a news anchor, and not a former vice-president. So I hereby claim credit for psychic prediction of anything bad that happens to Walter Cronkite today, too.

I forgot how depressing a scrubby brown strip of land can be. By all rights things should be falling down with calm greenness, the same way you fall into a lawn chair with a beer in your hand on summer evenings. Here, it's not so much a falling down greenness as a green that desperately clings to a ledge even though its fingers are bleeding. Which is rather an abuse of the human capacity for metaphor.

Iowa was just fine. Nothing happened that made me think "hey I oughta blog this!" but there was a thunderstorm and tornado sirens, and I kept thinking the bathroom light switch at my parents' house would be oriented in the same direction as my own, but it was orthogonal every time. A couple pictures of wildflowers will be up on the photoblog shortly, or maybe tomorrow. Here are some other things:

1. I secretly want to vote for the Bloc Quebecois, what about you?
2. My biggest, most outgrowingest of its cage tomato plant fell down, so I ate fried baby tomatoes for dinner tonight, with cactus and pesto. The plant will be just fine.
3. In airports, I go from poking the idea of a new laptop with a 10 foot pole, to poking it with a short stick. Pretty soon I'll be tickling it directly.
4. Tillykke til Marty & Laura! - maybe I should finish reading his copy of Invisible Cities and mail it back as a wedding present...