is out of coffee.

Riot commencing in 3... 2...

Go to this website & sign the petition. Thanks!

... my fiancée, the one-&-only hotpantsgalore, is the most fabulous woman I know. The latest proof of her amazing-ness?

On Saturday she attended her first practice with her Team in Training team! That's right, hotpantsgalore has signed up to train for the Olympic-distance Lone Star Triathlon, to be held in Galveston on April 24th. She is going to raise $5,000 for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, so they can continue their stupendous work of eradicating cancer.

Isn't that an amazing goal? Ending cancer. Obviously, LLS focuses specifically on the blood cancers, but to my way of thinking, research that helps fight blood cancers surely helps in the fight against other kinds of cancer. I love the idea of a world where no-one dies of cancer. In such a wonderful world, I would not have to write posts like these:

for Grandpa
for Sarah
for Sydney
for Kurt

It's such a good system - Team in Training challenges & trains people to complete endurance events, in the process improving their health. And those people raise money for LLS, furthering their cancer-ending work.

But it only works if people like you & me donate the money to the athletes doing the training. I know it's been a rough year economically. But even $25.00 - or any amount you choose - will be very welcome. Please click on this link, read hotpantsgalore's blog entry about her first training day, & make a donation. Thank you so much.

I think for once that I'm glad I'm not living in Philadelphia.

This weekend:

1) On Saturday, Sunday, & Monday, the Phillies are hosting the Yankees at Citizens Bank Park for the next 3 games of the World Series;
2) On Sunday, the Eagles are hosting the Giants at Lincoln Financial Field for a battle for the top spot in the NFC-East;
3) The Flyers have a home game at the Wachovia Center on Saturday;
4) the last concert ever to be held at the Spectrum is tonight, & it's a little band named Pearl Jam;
5) oh yeah, it's a Saturday-night Halloween; AND -
3) SEPTA's union is considering a strike that would start at 12:01 AM tonight.

OH SNAP

The URS-Austin office has a Water of Life Society. I have found Paradise.

I am 36 years old today. 36 is a pretty fun number, divisible by 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 9, 12, & 18. 6 x 6 has a particularly attractive symmetry, so let’s look back at my life on the sixes.

AGE 6 (1979)
Let’s see, we were living in Cherry Hill, New Jersey (the first house I ever lived in). We had a Giant Schnauzer named Greta (the First), a Siamese cat named Bach, & a really cool backyard with a tree swing & a giant vegetable garden. My best friend was Stephanie, & she lived right down the street (she still lives in that house today). I think I was in 1st grade this year, so my teacher was Mrs. Braungart. I wanted to be a paleontologist & I remember doing a huge chalk drawing of dinosaurs.

AGE 12 (1985)
I had just started 7th grade at Pine Hollow Intermediate. My two years at this school were among the most miserable of my life. The fashions of the time were long cable-knitted sweaters over leggings, with long strings of fake pearls which you wore in a knot. I was a bit obsessed with Duran Duran. My friends were Gina, Lynn, & Amy. I can’t remember exactly the count of the Ledgerwood menagerie at this time, but we had a Giant Schnauzer (Gabby), a Yorkie mix (Sliver), Bach, a second cat named Patches, possibly our Airedale Terrier Suzy, two rabbits (Carmel & Blacky) & I had two tanks of freshwater tropical fish.

AGE 18 (1991)
I was a freshman at Cornell. I was just starting to date Matt Tata, who was my first boyfriend, & I was crushed out on the boy. I was a chemical engineering major. I lived in a dorm room with two roommates, Ana Laura & Stacey. vulgarbarbarian, chaosvizier, saracendancer, hlw1970, karstyl, & oetam all lived in my dorm. This was one of the best years of my life.

AGE 24 (1997)
I was living in Wisconsin with Daaave. Our relationship was starting to fall apart, but we still had six or seven months of trying to make it work left ahead of us (what a waste of time that turned out to be). I was a recycling specialist for the Waukesha County Division of Solid Waste, taking my first turn as a hapless government bureaucrat - & hating it.

AGE 30 (2003)
I celebrated this milestone birthday at The Brass Monkey, my favorite pub in Edinburgh. I had just started my master’s degree program. katieledge & vulgarbarbarian had come up from London to celebrate, & we had a really great night. I was dating Stacy at this time, but since it was a long-distance relationship, she was in Delware. chaosvizier gave me a Trogdor T-shirt, & I still have it. This year turned out to be super-fantastic in many ways.

AGE 36 (2009)
Living & working in Austin, TX. Nursing a somewhat sore right shoulder after this morning’s swim practice. Completely in love with my fiancée hotpantsgalore. This year could end up being one of the best yet!

AGE 42 (2015)

Anyone care to guess?

By satyrblade, via etcet:

http://satyrblade.livejournal.com/277519.html

In an effort to 1) eat healthier; 2) save money, & 3) have fun, I have been cooking a lot lately. Sunday I made banana-walnut muffins that were devoured straight out of the muffin tin by hotpantsgalore & C*. Comments: "OM NOM NOM DOUBLE THE RECIPE NEXT TIME NOM." I also made a fritatta on Sunday. The muffins & the fritatta are both breakfast foods - I eat a muffin before swim practice, then heat up a slice of fritatta when I get to work. Healthy, inexpensive, & convenient.

Last night I made Moosewood's Pumpkin & Porcini Soup, which was OMG so good. hotpantsgalore doesn't agree; she found it bland. But I loved this soup's bright color, blend of herbs & spices, & heaping servings of healthy yellow vegetables. It's a little low on protein though.

hotpantsgalore has a 4-year-old Acer laptop that has recently developed some super-annoying features. In particular, it can't seem to run a word processor to save its life: he cursor jumps around between lines (in fact, it does that on webpages too - dammit, that's annoying), it seems really slow, & generally it just seems to be running poorly.

She says she's run some anti-virus software checks on it, & it hasn't helped (I think she ran Kapersky?). What else should she do? Can we take it somewhere & get everything wiped off of it? I know she just wants to buy a new computer, but we really don't have the money right now.

Here's a photo of the non-human members of our nursing corps. Mostly they provide moral support.


And some heating, I guess?


Hip-hip hooray! Some of the Lil' Lucy Woman's friends sent her delicious chocolate-covered strawberries as a get-well present. OM NOM NOM.

Sweden approves same-sex marriage.

Overriding governor's veto, Vermont legislature OKs gay marriage.

Iowa - wait, IOWA??

Best comment on that last development came from hotpantsgalore: "Who knew there were so many corn-fed brothers & sisters?"

And no, we're not planning to go to Iowa to get married. We're still hoping California will take their cue from more cutting-edge places (like Iowa) & re-legalize marriage out there.

OK, I sense that wedding planning is going to become a major new theme in my LJ. Starting now, I will put all wedding planning posts in a separate filter. If you want to read these posts, comment here & I'll add you.

etcet has created a Pandora radio station that plays the classics of classical music. I have been listening to it nonstop since its announcement yesterday because I working on the Stupidest FEMA Assignment Of All Time. The soothing tones of strings, woodwinds, & other melodious instruments are what prevents me from going postal on FEMA. Sooooothing.

Anyway, the radio station just played Tchaikovsky's famous 1812 Overture. Everyone knows this piece - it's the one where CANNONS are featured in the percussion section! My parents had it on a record when weedweasel & I were toddlers, & we used to get them to play it. During the grand finale (which again, features CANNONS) we would march around in the living room, & everytime a cannon volley was heard, we would fall down. Toward the end of the song, the cannons are firing pretty frequently, so we'd be falling down, jumping up, falling down, jumping up, & laughing our toddler asses off.

In summary: etcet's new radio station will make you (slightly) less pissed off at your annoying co-workers & may cause you remember hilarity from your childhood. Check it out!

No, I'm not actually posting. More just checking in, making sure no one's rearranged the furniture in my absence, etc.

How are you all doing?

I love Dinosaur Comics!

The California Courage Campaign reports that Ken Starr (of Clinton-Whitewater-Monica-Lewinsky infamy) & the Prop 8 Legal Defense Fund will present their case to the California Supreme Court starting on March 5, 2009 demanding that the Court void 18,000 marriages of same-sex couples that were legally performed between June 16 & November 4, 2008 in that state. The same court that ruled that citizens of the State of California could not be denied the right of marriage by mere virtue of their sexual orientation will hear Starr’s pleas to not only deny those self-same citizens of the right to marry, but to validate the idea that a minority’s rights are subject to plebiscite. Ken Starr & his minions will, in essence, seek to force divorce on all those couples who simply took advantage of their right to make a legal bond with the person they love.

The Courage Campaign's website is featuring an incredible video with a simple message: "Don't Divorce Us". The song in this video is entitled “Fidelity” by Regina Spektor, who gave full permission to use it in the battle to overturn Prop 8 in California.


"Fidelity": Don't Divorce... from Courage Campaign on Vimeo

As Americans who believe in the rule of law and fundamental civil rights, we know that Ken Starr and the Prop 8 Legal Defense Fund's shameful attempt to nullify these unions will not be vindicated in the eyes of history. We know that, ultimately, love will prevail, no matter how hard they try to fight it.

So simple, right??

Edmund Burke said all that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.

Do something. Sign the petition.

Heh.

Heh heh heh.

HEH HEH HEH WHOOOOOOO BOY.

I just got a reply to an email I sent the pastor at my church in San Francisco last week. His reply included the following attachment:

wedding_booklet.pdf

O man we're really gonna do this. I think I need to sit in the corner & hyperventilate for a second.

Man, I have really come to love Gov. Crazypants Blagojevich of Illinois. He has nearly supplanted former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld at the top of my list of Most Quotable Crazy Public Figures. In his latest fun quoted-filled interview, he likens his impeachment to Pearl Harbor, & claims that the state legislature wants him out of the way so they can get on with the evil schemes to raise taxes on all the people of Illinois.

Poll #1336228 Is he crazy? Yes/Yes
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: None, participants: 19

Is Gov. Blagojevich....