Two more weeks, and my manuscript goes out to editors. Right after labor day. Finished polishing the final proposal and sample chapter, it's all good, I guess, and now I just have to sit and wait.

I think the suspense will surely kill me.

And I still can't believe I've gotten this far.

Well, there is that whole Old Testament thing where Jacob's tribe had to kick everyone else's ass to show that their God was winning. So maybe that's the textual basis for hate-style Christianity.

In related news, I got proselytized today by Mormons. They were busking down at the main square and hailed me in Greek. I walked over and said in English, "You know what you are doing is illegal here, right?" The guy I was talking to kind of blinked with surprise (I guess he didn't expect an American) and I left before I could get the standard answer of "We're not proselytizing! We're offering people the opportunity!"

In other OMGWTFBBQ news, I was in a meeting earlier where a staff person said that as soon as someone successfully completes her program, she deletes them from the database. Wow, because there's no reason to know what went on last year, right?

Oy. I had to deal with that on my previous job. Historical reporting - all the kids are doing it.

In some ways, in re virii, I'm glad I'm a little technophobic then. It makes it easier to go through my Stupid Little Tech Stuff and say, if it doesn't work "We're gonna need a bigger boat." Of course, it also made it really easy to forget that keyboards plugged in, once.

I listened to Smooth Criminal, and feel much better. Five stars, baby!

Now it's The Beautiful Ones by Prince, which always mellows me out.

Reminds me, I just saw a license plate that said 17 DAYS, which confused me until I saw the license plate holder reading "It's a Prince thing/U wouldn't understand."

In related news, I got proselytized today by Mormons. They were busking down at the main square and hailed me in Greek. I walked over and said in English, "You know what you are doing is illegal here, right?" The guy I was talking to kind of blinked with surprise (I guess he didn't expect an American) and I left before I could get the standard answer of "We're not proselytizing! We're offering people the opportunity!"

Are these people you're going to have to bail out of jail later?

My new desktop wallpaper: [link]

Those are some fine-looking children, Gud. And Leif really seems to hide his true nature well.

"We're not proselytizing! We're offering people the opportunity!"

More for the People Unclear On The Concept file!

Note to world: calling a drowning a "liquid breathing influx opportunity" does not unmake the drowning part of the equation. Lawyers are twisty like that, and have thought of all the newspeak already.

Are these people you're going to have to bail out of jail later?

Possibly. Well, not me or the DH, since neither of us are working in the consular section this tour. But the embassy, yeah, maybe. Depending if the Greeks decide to enforce the law. Sometimes they do, sometimes they don't. The Mormons hit the hospital near my house a LOT, and the Greek police will tend to arrest them there, I think mainly because the priests at the hospital call them.

(And to be really technical, the embassy can't bail out Americans. We could take them magazines and make sure they get a phone call and legal counsel. But their families/church probably would send bail.)

I neglected to identify myself as affiliated with the embassy, however.