A painful fall from grace
News ·Monday December 31, 2007 @ 23:59 EST (link)
20071226: 0200: Watched Stargate (09.13, "Ripple Effect"); opened Mom's wok, fixed the handle, found the tempura grill. Up 1300; neighbor Brett Newell called from our house; I had him reboot the computers in the study and the cable modem; it didn't seem like it helped, but after he hung up we did get connectivity back (~1350). Downloading the Doctor Who Christmas Special ("Voyage of the Damned") via μTorrent, wirelessly. 0330: Watched Stargate (09.15, "Ethon") and had a snack (trail mix/Nesquick cereal) (after joining fark.com and doing some math at 0220).
I've learned that one week at Christmas is plenty; it's not really beneficial to travel 3500 miles (2500 back... go figure) to watch DVDs that you brought with you or be alone doing other things—everyone's very busy; even shopping is best done at home, although that let us spend time with Dad which was good. Maybe a little more than a week, to hit Christmas Eve and New Years? I tend to miss our home if I'm gone too long.
20071227: Left around 1345; drove to Newmarket to Uncle Murray's place, arriving about 1730: we played some poker (chips, no money involved) and euchre with dad and Mike, some people played pool; Uncle George read my IEEE Spectrum magazine (I finished it so he could take it home); had pizza and dessert, and left around 2308. Jamie and Karen's twins were there, frequently caterwauling; perhaps a little too young to be brought to such an event?
Large rant elided; boiled down to Julia's boyfriend Joshua staying overnight on one couch—he should have gone home, he lives about 15 minutes away; Julia's 15, it's preposterous for her to have a boyfriend stay overnight—and so Mike ("My-kool!") had to sleep on the couch that we were sitting on, which was an annoying disruption.
20071228: (early am) Went upstairs, watched Charmed. Up 1300 (got to sleep about 0500); had breakfast, ate Honey's biscotti since it was gingerbread and she didn't want it. Started plans for the new photo database (should that be 'new new'?), although I'll go back and update all old photos too.
20071229: Watched another Charmed ending at 0045; talked to Rebecca and Theo about bad airlines, and showed them gethuman.com so they could register a complaint. Wrote up a new photo database plan (backend, viewer, manager, import, and overall changes).
Up 1300. Ate, played Quiddler (just us, no points, Honey quit when I kept going out early), Dad made some bread, and made turkey sandwiches at 1800. We watched House 1.1 and The Bells of St. Mary's with Dad, but didn't play Scrabble as planned.
20071230: Various magic systems (thinking especially of the TV show Charmed and D&D) require words, gestures, and physical components (sometimes quite rare ingredients) for spells. Who's supposed to be listening? or are the ingredients, words, and gestures supposed to be naturally powerful? The latter idea seems totally incongruous/nonlinear and thus impossible; so if there's Someone listening, clearly they have a strange sense of humor and like to see people jump through a lot of odd hoops. At least with Belgarath (from David Eddings' Belgariad etc., which presents a more logical and linear system) we know where the power comes from; there are no quantized spells per se.
20071231:
Went to the evening meeting, and afterwards waited for singing practice and got a ride with cousin David to Anna and Drew's for some food and Fawlty Towers and car ogling (Drew has a new VW Rabbit, and we were looking at mods online); quite a few people there; Honey was home sick. Snowed while we were there, so Dave did some drifting on the way home; pretty nice. Back home around midnight; watched Stargate, did more math with Honey. Didn't get to sleep until around 0545.
Didn't do much all day—started reading User Friendly through, from the beginning (November 17, 1997); am now (1830) caught up through May 31, 2000. Watch night service at 1930 tonight (at Brockview); going someplace with Dave and Steve and others afterwards; they won't say where, but it's probably some other spot they've discovered to put down a few old pieces of furniture and have a fire.
After service was going to go with the young people on a scavenger hunt in St. Catharines (Steve and cousin David got us together 2130, probably left around 2145), but I fell off a roof (at Brockview, fortunately—the shed out back) looking for a clue; I managed to walk around after lying on the ground winded for a few minutes, and thought I was good to go, but fifteen minutes or so of being squashed into the back of Shaphan's truck convinced me otherwise, and my back and (sprained) right hand (used to break my fall) started to stiffen; parents had already gone home so they came to pick me up at around 2215 and we stayed in to see in the new year.
20071228: (early am) Went upstairs, watched Charmed. Up 1300 (got to sleep about 0500); had breakfast, ate Honey's biscotti since it was gingerbread and she didn't want it. Started plans for the new photo database (should that be 'new new'?), although I'll go back and update all old photos too.
20071231:
Went to the evening meeting, and afterwards waited for singing practice and got a ride with cousin David to Anna and Drew's for some food and Fawlty Towers and car ogling (Drew has a new VW Rabbit, and we were looking at mods online); quite a few people there; Honey was home sick. Snowed while we were there, so Dave did some drifting on the way home; pretty nice. Back home around midnight; watched Stargate, did more math with Honey. Didn't get to sleep until around 0545.