Truck's fixed -- brought it back with no overheating. The next step is putting in yet another spedometer gear, in the hopes that it will not get eaten up or melt this time.

Today was quiet. I mostly continued reading For Whom The Bell Tolls, which I'm enjoying rather a lot.

Well, the last few days have been slow. We did shopping on Thursday like a pack of rabid fools, and I spent well over a hundred dollars of my OWN money (Xmas money being saved for the truck, remember) on *ugh* clothes and music -- how teenybopper of me. Still, though, I got that live Robert Earl Keen album I've been wanting (the one with the good stories, like "Robert Keen! Robert Keen! Kin y'come hep me fo'minute!"), some Paolo Conte (The Italian Tom Waits), and that Kristin Chenoweth, whom I liked hearing on the radio.

Dad and I will be going out today, hopefully to buy and replace the radiator on my truck. When I called yesterday, everything was fine until I asked the guy if he had the coolant tubes for an automatic, and he looked at me (over the phone) like I was an idiot and said "What?" I brushed him off, but dug out the Chilton's manual and -- sure enough -- there's a set of turbes running from the transmission to the top and bottom of the radiator. Those tubes are the KEY TO EVERYTHING.

ghoti

Had a nice, subdued holiday with the folks, then went to Conway for the annual tacos-and-lotto-gifts-fest. That was rather fun, too: I received the gift that dad bought, which was a Galilean, er, Galileo Thermometer. I also received a few nugæ and -- drumroll, please -- the grand total of monies from the season gets me enough to buy a radiator for the truck. Yay! I also have £35 in Walmart currency, so there's, I don't know, a new belt, and a mouse, and... some music, or something. Eh.

I finished The Old Man and the Sea last night, and enjoyed it greatly. I then began For Whom the Bell Tolls, but haven't gotten far enough into it to be terribly interested yet. Alas.

Fie festive yool.

Went to church on Sunday with th' folks and Gary Lee and Deborah Strack, and found it enjoyable, if somewhat odd. It turns out all the ritual (which I find myself enjoying more and more) that is part of the Anglican church was thrown out by St. Michael's. No wonder it never felt right: it wasn't. St. Peter's, in Conway, is good: foreshortened nave, wide transept, modern-altar-before-altar-like chancel screen, lots of appropriate (though not very traditional) stained glass. Sadly, the new church faces north-south, while the old church was oriented properly, i.e. east-west with the altar of St. Peter in the west. Some people -- well, I guess you can't expect much from highchurch protestant.

Fixed a lot of computers for Tim & Sharlene yesterday: Tim wanted the mouse and keyboard to work on his machine, and to replace Me with XP, which I did. Then he had this other, semi-faster machine for Sharlene, which I had to set up with 98, and copy over all her old files. Fun -- and I'm still not done with Sharlene's computer, since I can't get it to display more than 16 colours at 640x480. I'll dig up a patch.

Christmas eve, y'all. Yo.

In Little Rock now. Had the Lewis family Xmas; it was nice and subdued, for once in our lives. I've ybouten gifts, or at least some, for the ol' familia, and am getting settled in hereabouts.

Carlos, call me.

Drew had a nice party last night, full of people I already knew, and a large majority of Geeks. At some point Stewart threw up a map of the US on Drew's board, and Rachel got mad, since she's from Michegan, and Stew had essientally left the entire state off. Then there was a big debate over regions, and the mason-dixon line, and that was when I came to the conclusion (probably for the second or third time, at least the second vocally -- Christ, Drew makes strong 'nog) that we were, in fact, a bunch of geeks. But it was fun, you know -- so many interesting people, many of whom I'd never seen before. Tom and I discussed brewing; I sampled his mead, and found it not at all lacking, unlike the Rocky Mountain Meadery crap which I paid £6.23 for.

Going home today; I washed dishes, pulled all the dirty clothes (except the ones I'm wearing), swept, and mopped. Still need to pack up plants, and books, and of course this very computer, but I've got another hour and a half.

Fredrick didn't like my bees site all that much; I've got his suggestions, and will probably update the site periodically in the interests of Academic Prurience. Eventually, I will SHOW them! I will SHOW THEM ALL! MWAHAHAHA!

Vergil's Bees site is here.

I got a 50/50 on the paper for Coon; she suggested I do the Plan of St. Gall for my honors thesis, and I'm considering it, pending an okay from the classics folks.

All done! Well, mostly. As of this writing, I'm still staring at two pages to do for Dave, but the Exam is done, and hey, that's it. The semester is just a few seconds from being done. Excellent! I'll post a link when the site is done. Then I begin to clean house. Woot!

Australian Table Wines

A lot of people in this country pooh-pooh Australian table wines. This is a pity, as many fine Australian wines appeal not only to the Australian palette, but also to the cognoscenti of Great Britain. "Black Stump Bordeaux" is rightly praised as a peppermint flavoured Burgundy, whilst a good "Sydney Syrup" can rank with any of the world's best sugary wines. "Chateau Bleu", too, has won many prizes; not the least for its taste, and its lingering afterburn.

"Old Smokey, 1968" has been compared favourably to a Welsh claret, whilst the Australian wino society thouroughly recommend a 1970 "Cote du Red Label", which, believe me, has a kick on it like a mule: eight bottles of this, and you're really finished -- at the opening of the Sydney Bridge Club, they were fishing them out of the main sewers every half an hour.

Of the sparkling wines, the most famous is "Perth Pink". This is a bottle with a message in, and the message is BEWARE!. This is not a wine for drinking -- this is a wine for laying down and avoiding. Another good fighting wine is "Melbourne Old-and-Yellow", which is particularly heavy, and should be used only for hand-to-hand combat.

Quite the reverse is true of "Chateau Chunder", which is an Appelachian concherle, specially grown for those keen on regurgitation -- a fine wine which really opens up the sluices at both ends. Real emetic fans will also go for a "Hobart Muddy", and a prize winning "Cuiver Reserve Chateau Bottled Nuit San Wogga Wogga", which has a bouquet like an aborigine's armpit.

Paper's done! Carole and Karen both agreed to look at it and see if there's anything wrong with it. It isn't the best, but it's done. Now, on to Latin!

Communications final is -- god willing -- a "B". That makes the final grade a high "B" or a low "A".

I got money from Payroll again; I finished Slaughterhouse-Five, too. Man, that's a good book. I've started Ulysses, too -- likewise enjoyable.

Mind vacant. Come back later.

Okay, so I may not have gotten as many correct as I thought on the Chaucer exam, but I'm still fairly confident I'll have an "A" in there.

Didn't do anything on the website yesterday, as I spent most of the day in the library working on the paper for Coon. Haven't gotten to the major argmentative part of it yet, but I did outline the whole thing, and I've got separate pages for each section. I've decided that, since most of the history articles I've read tend to take a long time getting to their point, I'm going to stop writing papers in the old "one-paragraph-for-each-topic-one-pargraph-for-intro-and-conclusion" mileu, and instead write "introduction-with-interesting-historical-context;-talk-about-historical-document's-origins;-talk-about-releveance-of-document;-conclusion-with-interesting-historical-ramifications." I think it will be good, and I'm shooting for six pages.

I asked payroll for more money, but that was on Friday, and I don't know if I'll get it, but I'll pretend that I will. I mean, I should get it...

Test tomorrow, paper done by tomorrow evening, turn in paper and take Latin exam on Tuesday, website done by Wednesday evening, and I'm free, Jack! I... get... to... clean up the flat. But it needs it, though, and I'll feel good later.

Sold back a lot of books, and went to the Used Bookshop and turned them into other books. Two are on the Modern Library list, and four (plus the two Carole gave me) are on the Radcliff list, and I bought a slender volume by W. Someset Maugham (The Moon and Sixpence), when I was supposed to buy Of Human Bondage, but we'll see if this is any good.

Man, that yellow feeling is coming back -- the feeling that by owning these books, I'm going to end up in a big old house in the Victorian District of some town, having a huge library, three cats, and no life. It's interspursed with the white feeling, though -- the melancholy, abandoned-clapboard-church-in-the-woods feeling.

Am I weird? Probably. Maybe it was the drugs -- but then maybe some drugs make you a good poet. Or not.

Accompanied Carol M. out last night, ostensibly to see a movie, but more importantly to maintain her mental health, as she had broken up with a -- in my personal opinion -- childish, immature, person who didn't know what he wanted from life and a relationship (and no, it wasn't me). She wasn't doing very well until I suggested that we go to PetCo (I think it's PetCo) and look at the ferrets, and the tuberats were so cute that she broke out of it. I've got a pretty good sympathetic ear, I think, and if it wasn't for the fact that she hardly talks in a register I can hear well, I'd have a better one with her, but she felt better after that. Not... great, you know, but better.

Woot! After a few days of blur, here I is again. I bet you missed me, didn't you? Anyway, the important thing is, the website is coming along well, and I think I came out three points ahead on the Chaucer exam, which puts me at 215/200 for the exams, and then whatever he calls that "B" on the crappy paper I wrote, and I'm fairly certain I've got an "A" for the class. Keep your appendages crossed, though.

So, that's two A's fairly well set, and most likely a "B" in Georgics. I know I can get out of Comm with an "A", too; all that's left is to put my all into the paper for Coon, and that's tomorrow's party. Damn, that's going to be a rough ride, but if I take all day Saturday and part of Sunday to do it, I think I can swing it all right.

I ran out of money at the Writing Center, asked Payroll for more, and then worked two days solid and ran out of money again. I don't know if I'm going to ask again; I may just work for free, because I'm there. I don't really need the extra bucks... but that's a lie, actually. Hmm...

Finished the Sedaris book, and I'm going to take up the Lex Drueidis: For every book I buy and read, I must read two other books. That way, I'll clear out the excess of books which I already have by my bed. Likewise, I've started reading the Top 100 Books of the Twentieth Century, and I've added a rule to that that says the books may only come from Dickson Street Books, thereboy supporting both the local economy and my pocketbook.

I'm off and I'm leaving, too,
ICL

Okay, classes ended with a tiny little fizzle. I took a Latin exam -- doing slightly better save the section with all the plants that the old guy was cultivating under the towers of Corcyria where the black Galasian river curves. I got some website done, too, by which I mean the fabulous and hilarious introduction, and of course I've updated the bibliography, since I've started citing things. Coon's paper's coming along as well, by which I mean I have one of what will, at its current quality, turn out to be about six pages.

Then, out of the grey, I got a call yesterday from Drew, so he and I went out -- me being the sort of fellow who'll shirk any responsiblity for a good night of hedonism (and you know, he's right, I can afford to procrastinate a little, despite the little Hermione Granger that is my conscience and nigh-dominant personality). So, though I had had a late lunch, he wanted a later one, so I drank water (since the old ape at the pizza place wanted ID -- the first time I've been carded in sacula saclorum). We talked about Raymond Chandler and other 30s Book Noir writers, and then headed out to do a few errands, erranting our way up to Barnes & Noble in time for me to blow seventeen on David Sedaris' Me Talk Pretty One Day, which I'm enjoying; he's a funny writer.

He dropped me off at the ol' flat-o-rama, and then I swing the hip groove back up to his place after a brief tour of Quicken (got to keep track of those finances, kids). Following this, we fell in with a Mod Crowd, consisting of Stuart, Amy, Amy's SO whose name escapes me at the moment but I think it was "James" or something similar, and -- joining us later -- Aul Tom (who got his power back on and had that and a keen story about riding his bike to tell us), and, for the first time ever in my sight, Rachel, the reporter and Drew's current SO (more on this later) We all jumped over to JR's, which is a loud little joint near The Square, and they had the good grace to just accept my credit card and start a tab without making a scene about it.

What followed was a night of not-exactly-gin-soaked conversation, where we just cut loose and had a good chomping lip session. I had three Guinness Draught Bottles, which comes out to about a pint and a half, so there was still pain being felt when I went home, no worries there; it also matched the slices of pizza I had, and makes two trinities, which I'll consider to be God's way of sacntioning the evening.

So, yeah, Rachel. She's as Tall As Drew (he's been worried about this for some reason), thin without being overly so, and angular. Light accent. Mildly funny. Good stories. I have no idea what sort of person she is, because there were seven of us, and the conversation by that point was focused between Stuart and "James", who were arguing about godonlyknows, so she was left out of the loop.

Between Drew and Rachel, and Amy and "James", being loving without obviously so, I was feeling rather blue about having no SO, but there were three other single men at the table, so we gave each other supporting glances from time to time, or maybe I made that up, but at any rate I felt less blue about it than I would have in bad company. Single men: God's way of keeping orgies from happening in public. Oh yeah.

So, yeah, nothing's done yet, not a lick, and I've still got 50 lines to do for Dave for today, not to mention the website and this cursed paper. Life goes forth, though. Laundry, yeah, I've got to do laundry, and wash the dishes.

Va bene,
ICL

Yehaw! I know what's going to be on Quinn's test, and it's not as hard as I thought it would be. Good.

I began to build a website for Dave's final, but there's still the major snag of their being absolutly no images of beekeeping, bees, or Aristaios in the LIMC[1]. In fact, the bastards tend to leave things out, so I'll say, look up "Apis" and it'll say, "Isis, 31a, 33, 45", and -- by gosh -- those will be the ones it's missing. Funny, that.

Haven't done much for Coon's paper, either, although I just got a thesis and sent it to her; with luck, she'll like it and I can begin writing. In the meantime, man, dig those pretty pictures. Oooh... pretty.

========
[1] Lexicon Iconographicum Mythicae Classicae -- the Big Book of Ancient Images of Religious and Cultural Significance. It's nice, when it HAS WHAT YOU'RE FUCKING LOOKING FOR.

Hm. The past few days have been quiet. Saturday I did very little, aside from laundry, and the Saturnalia, which was nice. Went to church today, and the sermon (to which I can't link today) was very nice -- Father Simmons spoke in favour of "initiating a dialouge for the purpose of blessing Gay and Lesbian unions", and apparantly Bishop Maze is for such unions. It was rather amusing, actually: he (Father Simmons) said that he "had the approval of the Bishop", and all I could think was, "Yeah, but you don't have the approval of Williams, or of Lambeth, now do you?". I hope there's not a schisim over this, or there'll never be any peace.

Been ploughing through the ol' Plan of St. Gall in Brief, which as it turns out is little more than a bloody art exhibit, and as such rather useless with respect to history.

Wow. Okay, so the snow did nothing to our lives, save that speech was lacking with respect to its teacher. No sweat off my nose; I'm done in that class, excepting the final, which is all bookbased.

So, for that matter, is Quinn's Chaucer final, which I really need to know better, so come Thurday, I'm schlepping the Big Book of Chaucer up the hill (because I have to work) and I'm not going home until I've read all the stories I need to know, or until the Writing Center closes, one of the two.

Dave scheduled two more classes of Latin, one next Wednesday and then the following Friday. This on the heels of a test (which I have to take before Wednesday -- don't let me forget, guys!), another test before the following Wednesday, and a website for him. I've about got the topic of the website down, but we'll see.

The Indefatigable M has assigned us a rather interesting paper, for which I sacrificed ten quid and an hour of my life to steal -- by which I mean copy -- the (ahem) *fabulous* Plan of St. Gall in Brief, an oversized monstrosity but ultimately worth it. Some day I'll condense it into double-sided pages, and have some nice fellow bind it, so I can put it on the shelves of my office and say, "Oh, yes, I got that ages ago, when I was an undergrad. Copied it myself. By hand."

Heh. Undergrads belive anything you tell them.

No NPR, and KXUA is playing thrash music nonstop. Woot! No weather information at all!

Hah! "Snow" indeed. Only half an inch at best, and it's all going to just melt away. The ice is off the roads, but nobody seems to be driving, and the School has issued a notice that its "Inclement Weather Policy is in effect", a statement full of sound and fury, but....

It's cold out. It's going to stay that way. Not only that, but Dave wants to have at least one, possibly two more Latin classes, so we can finish book 4, plus an exam somehow. The work is piling up faster than all the damn snow.

There went a vehicle, about as fast as they normally do, so I assume that we're up and running this morning. Better turn on the radio and see.

Snow. In December. In my state, which is like a mini-Australia when it comes to snow. Man. What a wonderful world.

Snow!

Well, there you are, then. Not terribly much exciting has happened in the last, oh, six or seven hours. We got ice, but no snow, and the temperature is rising, so the air is filled with the lamentations of small children. My dreams were normal in their weird ways, and I haven't gotten much done for Coon's class, but I'll fake it if I must (which I must).

Got some weird email this morning. Check it out.

Today is a long day, of course; I'm not looking forward to spending ten hours up top of the hill, but it's got to be done. Ah, well.

Well, I would have done this sooner, but hey, the ol' Blogger was having a fit, and wouldn't let me publish anything. Typical of the last few days, actually: classes are passing in blurs, with little to mark their going save that I wake up one day closer to exams. I've got Latin to do, I've been digitizing these tapes, there's food to be cooked, prayers to be said over swich food, and so forth and so on. It's odd.

At any rate, we're getting rain now, a real freezing drizzle, that'll ice over and pave the way for some nasty broken legs come the morrow. I'm cold, but I'm afraid to turn up the heat, lest I get another damn thirty-dollar gas bill (nigh treble the usual amount, both of fuel and of money). What's to report, really? I've been planting more things now that I've got this potting soil (thanks, Mom & Dad!), but I don't expect half of it to survive the cold and storm. I finished She last night, and started An American Odyssey, which for those of you out there who don't know, is the autobiography (bloated to over 300% with notes and explanations) of Robert Brownlee, an early ninteenth-century immigrant from Scotland. It's rather neat, in a detached sort of way.

Haven't talked to Fran at all in weeks. Don't know if that's indicitave of anything, but then again it may be indicative of everything. It was nice while it lasted, I'll say that much, and even though Satchmo says that it's easier to patch things up than to make a new start, well, I tried that, and it's gotten me one five-second conversation since.

Va Bene, you lovely people, you.

Pacem sereamus pro feministes; non ius est judicare omnes per unum. Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa; absolve me, feministes.

Ah... home sweet flat. Two bills and some music in the mail, cold as ice, and no food in the fridge. Lucky me the ol' parentales brought me up, and were willing to take me shopping, so that part got done.

Oh, yeah, getting ahead of myself here: the dinner with Mawmaw & PawPaw went fine; they're more interesting that I remember (but then I also remember being the quiet grandson in the corner with the book, not doing anything). Mawmaw was interested in my reason for buying a rosary, and I told her the truth: I was going to use it to pray. Of course, I didn't tell her I was going to use it to pray in a medieval sense, i.e. in bad Latin with a poentential bent, but hey, she didn't ask what kind of prayers I'd say....

Am I weird? Probably. Anyway, between there and here was of little consequence, except that I met a fine young wench and rodgered her twice.

(One... Two... Three...)

You don't belive that, do you?