{{{askye}}} And much, much peace to your mom.

I don't know which is more horrifying, Fay, the fact that that poor boy's mom beat him for misspelling "also," or the fact that she saw nothing wrong with telling you about it. Though I suspect they're two sides of the same vile coin.

yay meara for starting to carve out a social life! You're doing better after a month or so than lots of people (myself most definitely included) can manage after a year.

And, randomly, one more Sesame Street clip: B or not a B?

I'm waiting to hear back from a cousin who lives down in The OC with her new-ish husband whom I haven't yet met but who's up here for the weekend; hopefully we can get together for coffee sometime today and she and Matilda can meet. If that doesn't work out, the day will likely involve a ramble in GG Park, possibly with a carrousel ride and some feeding of the ducks. Aside from that, the day is quite altogether planless, which feels nice.

moving ~ma to you, -t!

Oh, bah. Two of Tom's closest friends (who are married to each other- they all lived together at university) are separating. The husband just called, Tom's talking to him now.

They were celebrating their 10 year anniversary when Tom and I were first dating! Sigh.

Well, maybe things will work out... sometimes a separation can help clear out the issues.

Thanks, Nora. God luck to Tom's friends. That's a tough situation for him (and you, I bet).

Enjoy the planlessness, JZ! I hope the day is blissfully pukefree!

The movers just called, they will be here "within the hour, plus or minus 10 minutes".

Nora, ~ma to your friends. I hope they can work it out.

TCG and I are going to a craft fair today. It should be fun.

Two large spiders have apparently decided to make their home in my bathtub. They were there last night, but I had hoped they were just having a meeting there. The fact that they're there this morning makes me think they've moved in.

I may just have to abandon that bathroom altogether. That's not overreacting, is it?

ma to your friends nora and tom

and if you let your spiders take over the bathroom, the terrorist have won, Emily. Of course, I have been known to leave the house after killing bathroom spiders in case their friends come looking for me

Moving ~ma to -t!

Nora, that's very sad. I hope it works out best for both of them, one way or another.

Emily, ack! Are they clearly visible? If so, paper towels and the quick swoop attack are your friends.

Coffee and Pumpkin Pie:

Today's "Writer's Almanac" introduced me to an unsung hero:

It's the birthday of the publisher and editor of The Little Review magazine, Margaret Anderson, born in Indianapolis (1886), who never fit in when she was growing up in the small town of Columbus, Indiana. She said, "I saw no reason why I should continue to live in Columbus, Indiana, and not breathe." So she moved to Chicago and founded a magazine called The Little Review, which she described as "A Magazine of the Arts, Making No Compromise with the Public Taste." She had a hard time getting financing, and eventually had to move in with her parents to save money, but she kept it going.

In 1918, the poet Ezra Pound was trying to get James Joyce's new novel, Ulysses, published in the U.S., but most publishers thought it was too obscene. Anderson accepted it as soon as she read the manuscript. She wrote to Pound, "We'll print it if it's the last effort of our lives." She serialized the novel over the course of three years, and later said, "The care we [took] to preserve Joyce's text intact. ... The addressing, wrapping, stamping, mailing; the excitement of anticipating the world's response to the literary masterpiece of our generation ... and then a notice from the Post Office: BURNED."

Three issues of the magazine were ultimately confiscated and burned. Anderson was charged with obscenity for publishing the book, and at the trial, the judge wouldn't let the offending material be read in her presence, because she was a woman, even though she had published it. She was convicted and had to pay a fine, and issues of The Little Review began to come out less and less frequently. The last issue came out in 1929.

Margaret Anderson said, "I believe in the unsubmissive, the unfaltering, the unassailable, the irresistible, the unbelievable — in other words, in an art of life."

Ick, Emily. I vote, kill 'em!

I'm in Chicago, and our flight seems to be on time. This has been far too easy of a travel day. I expect my luggage not to arrive.

Also, it is really interesting to watch traveling parents. I've seen amazing parenting today and some REALLY BAD parenting, including one parent just telling their three-year-old, "Life is a waiting game. The sooner you learn it, the better." Um. Ok.

Immobilize them first with a beauty product. I like a nice extra-strength hair spray myself.