a silly retro band called the A-Teens

Um...these are the kids who did the cover of "I Can't Help Falling In Love With You" on the Lilo & Stitch DVD, yes?

Interesting.

I have different music in my cave, but otherwise it seems very familiar.

Deb, I requested Famous Flower at the libray today, and the librarian who helped me promised she'd order it. Now I just have to wait for the horror of post-Christmas bills to subside and then I'll get my very own copy!

Mine should be coming in at Borders any day now! Huzzah!

Amy, you should have the cluestick handy. I was just cleaning out my email files and came upon a couple about your novel. Which is safely in a file on my hard drive, just so you know. But I had neglected to write myself an after-holidays note about it, and it had gone completely off my to-do list. Which is on my 2005 planner pages. Which are still in their package in the top layer on my desk. The planner is on the third-from-the-bottom layer. My desk is an archeological tell, at the moment.

Sigh.

Bev, I haven't even bought my new planner pages yet. It's all up here (taps forehead) and that's a bad, bad thing.

Well, that's not entirely true. I do have my brand-new Edward Gorey 2005 Evil Garden calendar hanging up, but so far that's all kids' appointments and school stuff.

I have a very sexy new O'Keefe day planner.

I have a Michael Parkes calendar up on my wall in its usual spot, plus my friend Pieter just sent us a Gorey desk calendar, and a jaw-dropping gorgeous San Francisco calendar in black and white, which alas, will not even remotely fit the only space I have for a wall calendar.

Kristin, I pinged you elsewhere, but insent.

I wish this upside down thing was talking to me. Hmmm. Maybe....

I'm in urgent need of a wall calendar. Remarkably, I didn't get one for Christmas, and I haven't had a chance to hit World Market and B&N for after-holidays calendar shopping. I'll be there tomorrow for a meeting, though. Surely there'll be some left.

Need to get Mom one, too. Her bank didn't do freebies this year.

Ooh, Deb, before I pitch it, do you have any use for a 2004 wall calender with photos of 1930s Paris?

Anybody else with a crafting need for Paris photos? Going, going....

World of Wonder

Ocean, sky, in my face. Boardwalk, terrifyingly far below.

I'm at Coney Island with my brother. He's managed to talk me into a swinging car on what, to my ten-year-old eye, is obviously a medieval torture device called the Wonder Wheel.

"I don't want to."

He explains the physics. Mistrustful, I allow myself to be strapped in, and the car swings out, as it's supposed to.

As we hit the top, the power goes out. Turns out it's borough-wide. Yet the car keeps swinging.

For the next five hours, my heart, my trust in the universe, the universe itself, are all upside down.

Oh, oof. At ten, no less. How miserable.