Well, good. That's pressure off me, then. I can pretend I was a loyal viewer till the end.

What do you suppose is going on here? [link]

"We told you - absolutely no one will be seated after the start of the show!"

What do you suppose is going on here?

Are the lizard-people wearing shirts made out of other lizard-people? Because... dude, that's just wrong.

A couple of craxy Firefly fans are being intimidated by lawyers from Universal.

Is this, like, a gratuitous attempt to make Egyptology more "sexy'?

BALTIMORE - Today, it sounds like a spring-break splurge on the order of "Girls Gone Wild": Drink huge quantities of beer, get wasted, indulge in gratuitous sex and pass out — then wake up the next morning with the music blaring and your friends praying that everything will turn out all right.

But back in 1470 B.C., this was the agenda for one of ancient Egypt's most raucous rituals, the "festival of drunkenness," which celebrated nothing less than the salvation of humanity. Archaeologists say they have found evidence amid the ruins of a temple in Luxor that the annual rite featured sex, drugs and the ancient equivalent of rock 'n' roll.

...

"We are talking about a festival in which people come together in a community to get drunk," she said. "Not high, not socially fun, but drunk — knee-walking, absolutely passed-out drunk."

The temple excavations turned up what appears to have been a "porch of drunkenness," associated with Hatshepsut, the wife and half-sister of Thutmose II. After the death of Thutmose II in 1479 B.C., Hatshepsut ruled New Kingdom Egypt for about 20 years as a female pharaoh, and the porch was erected at the height of her reign.

Some of the inscriptions that were uncovered at the temple link the drunkenness festival with "traveling through the marshes," which Bryan said was an ancient Egyptian euphemism for having sex. The sexual connection is reinforced by graffiti depicting men and women in positions that might draw some tut-tutting today.

"Tut=tutting"? ::groan::

[link]

But back in 1470 B.C., this was the agenda for one of ancient Egypt's most raucous rituals, the "festival of drunkenness,"

Shouldn't that be "Ra-cous rituals"?

Shouldn't that be "Ra-cous rituals"?

Hee!

Ugh. Use a pun...and you know what happens!

Yesterday, Fela and I did a corn maze in the country. V. fun...and quite silly. The 'stalk talker' who did the orientation kept using terms like, "Please be cornsiderate." It was...not exactly painful...but a bit, ya know...

To get through the maze, one had to answer a bunch of trivia questions about bats. Not wanting to be obstreperous, I didn't challenge the answers (especially since doing so would not have gotten me out of the maze any quicker) but I DID have some concerns. Shoulda printed out a wikipedia article to take with or something.

Still? Fun! And on an organic farm dedicated to education about locally grown food and stuff. I felt good about giving them my dinero.

Also bought 3 huge pumpkins that will be carved tonight. I usually do 3. One with a word (this year will be VOTE!), one with a really intricate design (which always gets ooohs and aaaahs from the hundreds of t'nters we get each year) and a fun one (this year, it will be covered in flashy-glowy eyes, just like a cave of bats!)

At the moment, it seems to be warmer in Chicago than it is in Los Angeles. I reserve the right to have five seconds of "IM IN UR FACE STEALIN UR RAYZ" before it begins snowing.