Up early for a 7:30am meetings. Ugh. Then another meeting. Got to work about 1:00am and into more work stress. Got out of work around 6:00. I hate these super-long days.

Lauren had told me to be at the Local at 8pm, so I headed that way for dinner. And she wasn't there. John had arrived home just as I left, and indicated (via cellphone) that he would join me. So at least I wasn't alone for dinner :-).

About 8:20 I called Lauren and left a message. Two minutes later, who should wander onto the porch but Psycho Jenn, who was approached from up the road then by Clair, Pete and Lauren, the last of which was distracted by seeing Craig (her brother) wandering into Tortillas. What a conjunction of persons.

Jenn sat out on the porch with me and John as we ate dinner, chatting away. I like Jenn; she's pretty cool. I learnt something new about her today - she's Pete's sister. How odd. In a good way.

I didn't stay late, heading home before 10pm, and in bed, asleep, by 10:30pm. I went out like a light and, initially slept very hard, but did not sleep well after about 12:30am.

3 July

Up early again, although not as early as yesterday, as I had a meeting to replace my current rental car with another. This should be the last month of me with a rental car - I shall be finalizing my car choice this weekend, with the buying to happen the week of the 15th Assuming all goes well, of course.

More meetings today, and then I spent the afternoon rebuilding the electronics and wiring of a vending machine. That's a little of an overstatement, as all I was doing was taking a vending machine controller, installing it in a machine that had been stripped, finding all of the cables to reconnect, fixing broken cables, locating missing cables and then making it all work. And then, once the power came on and the machine started up, fixing the machine errors and configuring the beastie. I also worked on another machine with similar problems, but one which was also lacking in a coin channger. This last I couldn't fix, although I should be able to sort out the remainder of this machine's problems on Friday.

Because of tomorrow's holiday, most people had left early. I got out around 5:30, which was rather nice. I think I might sleep in tomorrow.

4 July

The best way to spend a day off work: sleep in, play Civ III, watch some TV, go to bed. Perfect.

5 July

While many had today off to get a four-day weekend, others of us didn't. I was in, granted later than normal, and was able to accomplish one or two things without the usual distractions. I also took off early, to run a special errand.

As I may have stated before (I'll need to check that up), as of July 1 I am on a full US salary and no longer have the benefit of a company (rental) car and expensed rent. This means I need to buy a car. Quickly. The agreement on the current rental car expires on July 23, and I really should buy a car before then.

So I went out with the aim of test driving a few more vehicles and seeing what I liked. After driving a couple, including a Ford Focus, I knew that what I really wanted was a Taurus. So I found one that I liked and set to negotiating with the dealer. And what a process it was. But we finally came to agreement on terms.

And that's when things got bad. I was denied the terms by the finance people. Why? Because I have insufficient credit history. I have four years of US credit cards, but no loans or other significant purchses. So they wanted a larger downpayment. Over twice as much as I had proposed. Ugh. Everyone (finance manager, store manager) came to see if there was any way I could get the money for the downpayment (the rest of the terms were reduced, and it was 0% financing, so it was a good deal). In the end I said I would have to get back to them.

So, over four hours spent at the Ford dealership, and no car to show. I was quite disappointed.

But no matter, because tonight there is a party at the Chocolate City! Yes, a party spread between Lauren's loft, Clair's loft, and Pete's place. Woohoo. John and I decided to walk down (see, we can be sensible sometimes), and we collected Jen (Montogomery, PsychoJen) along the way. When we got to Glen Iris we bumped into Brad Baker, who was also heading along to the party.

The gate was having issues, so it took us a while to get in. But in we did get, and an enjoyable time was had by all. My artificial memory should help in illustrating who was there - check out the pictures page. (If the pictures aren't up yet, it's because I've been too busy. Honest.)

John and I left a litte after 5:00am. Our walk home took us past McDonald's for a bite to eat and then bedtime.

6 July

I think today was a slow day. I know I did end up watching lots of movies. John was in control of the remote, but I think he did a good job. We saw Final Fantasy and Shrek. And probably others that I can no longer remember.

For dinner we went up to The Dark Horse, in the hopes of seeing Charlie. And he was there, at the bar. Working the bar (and hence serving us) was Crispin, who I had forgotten was working at the Dark Horse. So we had a good old chat with everyone, ate some food, drank some beer, and then went off in search of other entertainments.

Our next port of call was The Imperial Pint. It turned out that Berrak and Charlotte were there, so we stayed for one drink and then headed to the Local.

7 July

8 July

Let me tell you how a bad day goes in my job...

Get up at 4:30am to catch a plan to Baltimore Washington International airport. I'm sorry, but 4:30am is bed time, not wake up time. The flight is delayed.

Arrive at BWI and wait for my heavy bag (contains tools) to pop out of the carousel. Waiting waiting waiting.

Meet Greg and make the 40 minute drive into Washington, DC. Arrive at the client's office and straight into the field.

Get to the first location and the vending machine doesn't have the correct connectors installed.

Get to the second location and (a) one of the vending machines doesn't have the correct connector; and (b) our devices are not making a successful call to our communications center. I do obtain data captures from one of the vending machines onto my laptop.

Go to the third location and still no successful communications. Obtain data captures from the new vending machines. Do find a machine that I know very well and know that we can install in, except that the comms coverage is non-existent.

Return to DC. Get a bite to eat (it is 4pm and no food has been consumed since the snack on the plan at 7:30am). The sandwich (open-faced roast beef snadwich with mashed potatoes and gravey) is rather tasty. Then it is back to the hotel room to work out the reason for the communications failures.

After much testing, talking to NZ, a trip to the hotel bar/restaurant for a drink and a bite to eat, and several hours of banging my head, it is determined that network (the carrier shall remain nameless) was taking up to seven minutes to register the devices. After that they are working fine. Ugh. Ugh. Ugh. Sleep is not restful.

9 July

And it continues...

I did not sleep well, got up early for an early start on the job (7:30 at the client's office).

Go to the fourth location. The operator of this location is nowhere to be found so we can't get into the vending machine, even though test calls are firing perfectly.

Go back to the second location and there is still no successful communications.

Go back to the third location and throughout the areas we checked yesterday there is no coverage. Except on the top floor! So I go through the install process, feeling the first success of the trip immenent. But no. Problem one: the insulation door won't close with our device mounted. Problem two: communications is not happening happily now. Fuck. So I uninstall everything except the antenna.

We did find another spot in the third location that did have acceptable coverage. But one of the machines had the insulation door problem, and the other machine had an insulated ceiling that was going to causing difficulty for mounting the antenna.

Go to fifth location and none of the machines are of the class that we can install in.

So, having deemed this trip a failure in terms of successful installations, it was time to get some food and return to the airport. BWI doesn't have a Crown Room. I hate BWI.

10 July

Today's R-rated web page of the day (courtesy of Damian): Playboy International's Brazilian Women's Football Team Edition. Please do not look at these pictures if you are under the legal age in your jurisdiction to look at naked women. Yeah right.

11 July

12 July

13 July

Got up and showered and went down to the car to call Lori to see if she was ready for the day's adventure. I had to call from the car because my battery was flat and my charger doesn't work since I blew it up in New Zealand.

I headed over to pick up her and Brian, stopped to picked up some food, water, and money and then we headed south on I-5. With Lori navigating, it was with little difficulty that we found our way to Mount Rainier, the second tallest mountain (and volcano) in the US.

However, it turned out that we had come to spot that was great for camping and tramping (hiking) rather than general sightseeing. Seeing as we were ill-equipped for the former activities, the park ranger gave us a map to a much better location, Paradise, that was about a two hour drive away. So off we went.

Well, two hours turned into three and a half as we stopped at some absolutely gorgeous spots and beautiful views. Lots of photos were taken. So many that my camera complained of low battry before we had reached the visitors center at Paradise.

The visitors center is a long way up (about 7000 feet) and is very cool - with snow all year round. The peak of the mountain is another 8000 feet further up.

After hanging around at the visitors center for an hour we headed back to the car and the trek home, via Tacoma.

I dropped Lori and Brian home, with the intention that I would be back around 9:30pm to go to the club with them. I headed back to the hotel to clean myself up a little and have dinner.

I ate at the restaurant next door to the hotel, which had been recommended to me by Lori. The recommendation was correct. I had the special of the day, which was grilled Marlin, with a pineapple salsa, and rice and vegetables. It was fantastic.

After dinner I wandered back into the hotel and ordered a taxi to Lori and Brian's. Brian had injured himself so only Lori and I went to the club. The club was pretty cool. The best thing (aside from all the friendly people) was the fact that drinks were a very reasonable price and you got a lot (A LOT) of alcohol in them. Take a double old-fashioned. Put some ice in it. Fill it to 90% with Absolut Mandarin. Add a splash of Sprite. Have a nice drink. Oh yeah...

I remember leaving the club at some point. I remember getting a cab. I remember Lori getting out of the cab at her place. End of story. My next memory is waking up the next day. I think the taxi driver got a pretty fat tip...

Pictures from Seattle can be found here.

14 July

I roused myself out of bed and threw myself at the shower. I stopped with the throwing when I realised that the shower was only spurting hot water. It was unable to spurt cold water or warm water. Bother. So it was a no shower day. It didn't really matter that much, seeing as I was going to be spending most of it on a plane, any way.

I checked out of the hotel and made my way, labouriously and indirectly, to the airport. Checked in, went to the Crown Room, couldn't get on line (I must have left my modem cable in the hotel). Then it was a five hour flight back to Atlanta.

Went to the Local for dinner with John. That was about it, really.

15 July

Today can be summed up in one sound: ugh.

First, I was up early to get to the periodontist at 8am. Unfortunately, Dr Jones didn't make it there until 8:40ish. And once she was there I was in the chair for well over an hour. On the bright side, they did an impression for my tooth-to-be, and in three weeks time I should have a tooth in my mouth.

Next was work. What a day at work. One day I will be able to talk about some of the issues that are going on right now, but just at the moment I can't. These issues are causing me headaches. Not just me, of course, but this journal is about me, so heh.

Another thing is that although I have renogtiated my salary, it appears that I got paid under my old salary today. This is not good, as I have several large payments to take care of based on the new salary, and the old salary just isn't going to cut it. I shall know definitely tomorrow - and then words will be had...

Work continued long and hard. I was the last person out the office, at 7:45pm. My phone battery was flat.

Anyway, the day finished well, having dinner with John at Hand in Hand.

16 July

I did not sleep well. The alarm went off at 7am, but I couldn't drag myself out of bed until 7:55. And then it was a long, busy day at work. I spoke to Ed about my pay and it turns out he hadn't turned in some papaerwork even though he had sent an approval email. That got sorted and my next paycheck will include this periods missing cash. Ugh. I managed to get out around 7:30pm. Ugh.

I stopped at Wendy's to pick up some food and headed driectly to the couch when I got home. I turned on the TV. It was on HBO, which was just starting Swordfish. This is not a particularly good movie. It does have one redeeming feature. Well, two actually - Halle Bery's breasts. Aside from that, it's not worth the effort.

I was distracted from the bre..um movie, by a phone call from Lauren. Lauren was feeling as lethargic as myself. We both decided that we were too tired to do anything much and that we might do something tomorrow but we'd work that out later.

After talking with Lauren I did find some motivation and set to changing my sheets and tidying my room. I sorted through a lot of magazines, throwing some out, sorting some for work, and filing those that I want to read (but probably will never get round to reading). A deserved feeling of accomplishment.

John had gotten home at some point from his mentoring, and then went for a bike ride down to Borders to pick up a football magazine, and also came back with CDs. Heheh, I know that style of shopping. We listened to the Tenacious D album I had recently acquired. It was very funny. I liked it. Including most of the tracks I had not heard previously. Then we watched The Daily Show (amusing as always) and then it was bedtime.

17 July

Today was long and I left with a bloody awful headache. I came home and lay on my bed in the semi-darkness for about an hour and a half. After searching for (and failing to find) my glorious bottle of Aleve, I popped a Tylenol PM and waited.

John arrived home around 9pm and, knowing that I should eat even though I wasn't hungry, I went out get some food with him from Market 1 (formerly Harry's In A Hurry). I picked roast lamb with herbed roast potatoes and zuchinni (courgettes). It was tasty. After watching South Park, I went to bed and crashed out almost immediately.

18 July

I slept solidly until 4am, and then slept dodgely until my alarm went off at 7am. I hit the snooze button four times before finally getting up at 7:55. I showered, but didn't bother shaving, and hit the road for work.

Work was a little slower than yesterday. I released some documentation, sorted some project issues, and then left the building at 1pm to embark on a purchase. I returned three hours later, purchase complete. It was a good purchase, I think.

A couple of the guys from work were going for a couple of beers after work, but I had already been given my instructions by Lauren. It would be a visit to the Local tonight, where the first round would be on Pete, and I would not have to spend money due to the purchase I had made earlier in the day.

I have a new car!

19 July

Didn't want to go to work today. Once there, I wasn't particularly motivated. I did a bunch of stuff, but nothing that got me really excited. Took back the rental car.

I came home from work and uploaded pictures from the Gay Pride/World Cup night, Chocolate City party, and my trip to Seattle. I still need to edit the descriptions on the picture page, but I can do that later.

Amy's flight was due in at 8:50, but there were delays. Lots of them. So John and I went down to Eric's place to get the party started. I had one beer and took off to the airport to get the girl.

I didn't have to wait too long. Amy marvelled at my new car. Of course. And then we went straight back to the party rather than via home.

The party was pretty damn good. Lots of people and quite a bit of alcohol. Very much fun, although I really didn't drink very much (new car and all). Amy and I left relatively early; John got in around 4 or 5am

Inspirational statue collection of the day, Inspirational pictures of the day, and The Brick Testament.

20 July

Amy was feeling a little rough, so I was the first to get up and do things. Reading was one of those things I wanted to do. We tootled up to Einstein's for a couple of bagels, and played Scrabble (won twice) and watched TV. Amy took another nap and I watched Psycho Beach Party. That was really cool.

Amy went across the road at 4pm to check out an apartment.

When she got back, we went for a drive to Little Five Points and Candler Park to look at more rental options. We passed a couple along the way, and I also took the details of a couple of houses that are for sale. When we got out to Little Five Points, I found some houses that attracted my attention. Still on the pricey side, but they were the sort of thing I would look at.

We came home via The Righteous Room (for food) and Market 1 (for water and ice cream) and hung out, waiting for John to return from the cook out he had gone to. There was a message from Stacy on the answering machine, and so after another game of Scrabble we went down to the Local to catch up with Stacy and Dill.

We were at the Local for quite some time, catching up and generally having a good time. Then we headed off to a workmate of John's housewarming party. Nice house, nice food, nice alcohol, nice party.

We left the party around 1am and headed back to Midtown. We dropped Amy home, because she was rather sozzled, and then we went back to the Local. There we caught up with the usuals, and also encountered Pete and Jen playing darts. Much merriment ensued, and in the end, we closed out the bar.

21 July

John's 31st birthday.

Another slow start to the day for John and Amy.

Scrabble wasn't working out for Amy, so John finished her game and managed to beat me by two points. Bastard. Oh well, it's his birthday.

For dinner we cooked out; early, because Amy's flight was at 8:40. Psycho Beach Party came on TV mid-afternoon, and Pete arrived soon after. Joining the group over the course of the afternoon were Sarah and Alice, Jen, Lauren, Clair, Jen (see, too many Jenny derivatives in this journal).

Loads of fun and cooking and eating and talking. And then I had to take Amy to the airport.

When I got back, there was Simpsons to watch and apple pie to eat (well, for the others; I had vanilla ice cream and buzz bars). Then it was time for Sex and the City, and then random channel watching until The Man Show. And then bed. Amy's flight was delayed in all sorts of ways, but only announced at the time they were supposed to be boarding. Ugh. But she got home safely in the end.

22 July

Yay for Monday. Work was kind of slow, although there was still plenty to do (as always). I was also quite pleased to receive an email from Peter. I have been lax in maintaining my communication with Peter since his return to the UK for surgery (and recovery), so it was good to hear from him.

Then, at lunchtime, the day turned weird...

George and I headed out to Willy's for a burrito for lunch. Nothing unusual about that. But as I was making my way down the line through the burrito preparation process, a girl walked in who gave me pause and caused me to do a double-take such as I have never double-taken previously.

If I hadn't known better (and I did have to consider my sanity for just a moment), I would have said hello to my sister. Her hair was cut in a similar manner to my sister's; she had a similar facial structure to my sister, albeit a little rounder than the last time I saw her; she was about the same height as my sister; she was dressed in a manner that my sister might wear. The resemblance was uncanny, if a little unnerving. Her build was slightly different, and, like I said, she was a little rounder/fuller in the face, but someone who had met Celise only once or twice might have assumed it was her. And some of the expressions on this girl's face as she was deciding what she was going to order were just so familiar.

It was the face in profile that I saw first, and which really threw me. When I saw her straight on the differences were more obvious. Bizarre. Very bizarre. And no, I didn't go up to her and say, "Hey, you look just like my sister." That would have been just too freaky.

The rest of the day was somewhat more mundane.

I came home, decided not to do laundry as I had sufficient underwear and shirts for at least one more day, and grabbed a left over steak from the fridge. I munched on that and set about filling in some more gaps in this journal. I had my web cam on so that Amy could watch me (although with a refresh period of 60 seconds, I can't have been that exciting to watch) from work. Now it's time to upload all these changes so they can be read by the masses.

Time to take a break. During the break I ate some potato salad and a Crunchie bar, and watched Grounded For Life. I like Grounded For Life. I think the wife/mother is cute. Oh, and the show is funny. During the show I went through my mail, finding bills and turfing requests for donations.

After the second episode, I tidied up a bit around my desk and chatted to Lauren via Instant Messenger.

23 July

I slept rather well last night, which is always extremely pleasant. It started oddly, though. I turned out my light at 11:06, and must have fallen immediately asleep, because I woke up having had a rather vivid dream and it was only 11:21. I fell asleep quickly again and didn't wake up until close to my usual wake-up time. I was tired, but felt like I still had a good sleep.

While at work, I tuned into Chocolate City Radio, the Live365 radio station that Clair has set up. It helped me through the day, quite nicely.

Thunder and lightening were threatening (and indeed did more than threaten), so I left work at about 5:40. I did not feel bad in any way about this, as I had a short lunch break. And besides, I usually work a bit from home anyway. Although I wasn't going to tonight.

No, tonight was laundry night. And do-more-work-on-home-page night. And maybe something else quiet and inexpensive.

On my way home from work, there was a story on NPR about a bill being introduced to the government that would require all aliens, irrespective of residency status, to report any change of address within ten days of such change, or face a maximum penalty of deportation. This is a little concerning. The story went on to say that there is current legislation that states that aliens must notify the INS of address changes, but it is never enforced, because the amount of paperwork required is too much for the INS to actually enforce it. Given that there are roughly nine million legal aliens, and at least as many illegal aliens (who will hardly be likely to file change of address forms to the INS), it is no wonder that the INS is balking at such legistlation being reinstated. Of course, aliens (such as myself) are concerned about the threat of deportation if one should move and forget to send the right form within the ten days. Of course, the people proposing the law say that the only people who should be concerned are (suspected) terrorists. This is not a good proposition.

Yay for CivIII to help me relax and pass away an hour or two....

24 July

Peter Short's birthday. Happy birthday, Peter

Somewhere along the way, somebody fucked up. I received my latest 401(k) statement the other day and it just doesn't add up. It doesn't help that my company fucked up my first paycheck of the year, and then fucked up my 401(k) deductions for the first two months of the year, and then fucked up the deductions from my bonus in March. This makes trying to make sense of how much has been deducted from my pay and how much has actually made it into my 401(k) extremely difficult to reconcile.

I am not going to Trivia tonight. I am, instead, staying at home and saving money. I don't know what I'm going to have for dinner, but I do know that there is potato salad still left over from the other night. That will probably sort me out nicely.

Instead, by 7:40 I was well entrenched in my continuing game of CivIII and I had done the dishes. Woohoo for being productive.

25 July

As I write this a few days after the day itself, I can't really recall much about work, except that worked on a bunch of different projects. Yay for work.

After work is another story entirely. I got home, got changed and headed to the Local for a chicken philly wrap, fries (with mayo) and a pint of Newcastle Brown Ale. Then Tim and I headed to the Tabernacle to see Wilco play. We got there in time to see probably half of the opening act, Preston School of Industry. PSIA were pretty good; I'd see them again, I think.

Wilco's first set was slower stuff, mainly from their new album (which I don't have). It was good, but it didn't leave me in wonderment. The next two sets, however, had me jumping. A mixture of stuff from Being There, Summerteeth, and Mermaid Avenue, along with a few new tracks. I truly was blown away.

After the show, we headed back to the Local and hung out there for a while. I left around 1am; John closed the place out...

Oh yeah, ran into Brad Baker, got his phone number so I shall keep in contact. He was there with an art student friend named Jen. See, this is a problem - there are far too many Jen/Jenn/Jenny/Jennie/Jennifer people in this world (and a high concentration in this city). No more, I tell you! Let me be able to reference someone without having to use additional qualifiers!

Clair, Pete, and Jen were there, playing darts. And I think they had a fourth body as well. I did not come away from that encounter unscathed (he says rubbing the bite mark on his neck...

26 July

I was a little tired at work today, but I made it through in one piece. There was some stress as some planning for dealing with a customer was not handled particularly well and I was the one who inherited the problem of sorting it out. Combine that with the fact that I am going to Jacksonville of three days next week for a half-day meeting. It's a long and complex story that I might one day talk about, but I shall be working out of a hotel for two days. Yay good fun.

After work I again went to the Local for some dinner before heading out to see a band. This time my compatriots, (who I met up with at Masquerade were Clair, Lauren, and Jen. Pete also managed to make a brief appearance. Clair was a schoolfriend of the lead singer for the band, The Dictatortots. This was well worth the $10 invested.

The band has nine (count 'em) members, including a cellist and an armaments guy. This latter individual spent his time firing toilet paper and cheese balls into the crowd. It made for an interesting ambience. The music and lyrics were suitably tied to taking the piss - crass, obnoxious, mysoginist, and a whole lot of fun. Highlights of the set - a heart-rending cover of Sister Christian, and their final song of the night, El Camino.

When the second band came on, Lauren and I knew it was time to relocate back to the Local, where we spent an enjoyable couple of hours talking and drinking.

After dropping Lauren home, I returned to my place of abode and we chatted on the phone for a little while. Then I decided that I needed to continue the inebriation process, so I called a cab and went back up to the Local. I stopped the cab a bit before the Local when the driver started proselytizing. As I've said elsewhere, I am an atheist and I don't appreciate complete strangers trying to persuade me with hole-ridden arguments.

So I was back at the Local and hanging out with John and Ben and Daniel and Jen (you have to guess which one), and probably some other people. We closed out the pub. We do that sometimes...

When we got home, John and I decied to watch the Mullet Men video that Brad (from work) had loaned me. We called Jen to see if she wanted to come over, and she did, and so we watched and drank more.

The video was hilarious. It was about a guy in New York who decided to enter a mullet-throwing contest that is held at the Florabama Bar and Lounge each year. Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. In any case, I think it was about 5am by the time we all went to bed...

27 July

Woohoo!! I slept through until about 12:30pm. A very nice (and much needed) sleep in. I wandered down to the store to get some Powerade and then spent much of the day playing Civ III. The game I had been playing since my return from New Zealand came to an abrupt end after the Americans build the United Nations and won a diplomatic victory. Bastiges. So I had to start a new game, which, I must say, isn't going quite as well as it seems it should. We shall see.

For dinner, Lauren and I went to Cafe Lily in Decatur for Lianne's birthday. There were a good bunch of people there, and the food was outstanding. I had halibut, with baby spinach and garlic mashed potatoes. The halibut came with a particularly yummy sauce, and was simply divine.

After dinner, Laurn and I stopped by Sue's place where she was having a combined housewarming and goodbye party for Craig, who is moving out to Portland, Oregon next week. We didn't stay long as we were both pretty tired and half falling asleep.

We stopped by Blockbuster on the way back and picked up But I'm A Cheerleader. I didn't know anything about it, but it turned out to be a very entertaining movie. Great recommendation from Lauren's brother.

After the movie, I headed on home, but rather than going to bed (as I should have), I instead ended playing Civ for a couple of hours. Silly boy.

28 July

I woke up early. Much earlier than makes sense for a Sunday morning where I went to bed at 3am. But the sun was streaming in my windows and John was up getting ready to go mountain biking and I could feel a stirring in my bladder, so I was awake at 8am. Oh well.

Just because I was awake did not mean that I got up. Oh no. I lay in bed for the next hour and a half, hoping to fall back into slumber, but was unsuccessful. So it goes on a hot, sunny Sunday. Eventually I did drag my sorry arse out of bed, grabbed the latest issue of The Economist and headed to the deck. It's hot (at 10:53am, The Weather Channel claims that it is currently 83�F and feels like 87�F (30�C) - and it's going to get hotter), so I only stayed out long enough to read the regional reports. And I had a ginger ale. I should cook some eggs, too.

Next stop was a shower and then I wandered downstairs to put my newly arrived license plate on my car. Then I took some photos of my car. Yay for my car.

The next hour or so was spent updating these glorious pages with tales of the last few days, and talking with Clair via the wonder that is Instant Messenger. I was about to go and cook some eggs when John and Earl arrived home with the ingredients for making pizza. So I halted my egg plans and joined in the pizza-making exercise! Can I get eggs on that pizza?

29 July

Still no sign of expense check.

Air conditioning down at work

Not going to Jacksonville

Going to New Orleans for Halloween

Sat on deck and read latest Discover until the light was no good

Had some salami, an english muffin with butter, and vanilla ice cream for dinner.