{{{Drew}}}

Daniel, that is SO exciting!

o_a, running stoneware through the dishwasher occasionally is a good idea, but don't put soap in that cycle. One of the great things about stoneware is that it seasons over time. So, if you add soap, for a while, your pizza is gonna taste like soap. So, no soap.

Nora and I had SUCH a good Bitch time last night. You all would have totally approved. SO MUCH FUN. We must do again soon.

Brain not yet on (~5:40 A.M.). I keep thinking "Call me Ismael", and that is probably not what you are looking for.

Bonny - is your profile addy good?

ION - I woke up at 5:30 before anyone else in my house and was not gronky. This event has a number irregularities in it. Warning to anyone venturing outside - look for pieces of sky in low places.

Jars!!! We see you in a week!!! Very much with the squee. (OMG what am I doing? How am I going to get everything ready and also win the lottery?)

BillyTea - I want to see that religion -

"The difference between the almost right word & the right word is really a large matter--it's the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning." Mark Twain

'Cause you've finished paying it off, right?

Yes

If so, congrats! I can't wait for the day I'm debt-free

Well, I'll be student debt free...

ETA:

...and I just set up the online payment for tomorrow, because it's due the day after and I want to be sure they get it.

I had toyed with the idea of sending the last $19.67 (partial remainder payment) certified or registered, but in the end opted for my convenience.

Some time ago there was a book - a graphic of some sort - called Motel of the Mysteries. It posits a group of future archaeologists excavating a motel and theorizing what the various items are. I remember one panel showed a member of the dig team showing some of the religious items and his proposal of how they'd be used - he had a toilet seat around his neck and was holding a toilet brush as a scepter. (And just imagine what they posited for the Thighmaster!)

And for those who refuse to read the early sources of various horror genres (Dracula, etc.) - stupid people! It's always good to know the historical sources of some of this. And for those who want fluffy bunny vampires, they should read Bunnicula.

Motel of the Mysteries

I remember that. It was the Toot 'N C'mon Motel!

"Call me Ishmael" was the first thing I thought of, TB. After all, what could be more evocative than:

Call me Ishmael. Some years ago - never mind how long precisely - having little or no money in my purse, and nothing particular to interest me on shore, I thought I would sail about a little and see the watery part of the world. It is a way I have of driving off the spleen, and regulating the circulation. Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth; whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul; whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of me, that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately stepping into the street, and methodically knocking people's hats off - then, I account it high time to get to sea as soon as I can. This is my substitute for pistol and ball.

Evocative Tolkien:

"In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit. Not a nasty, dirty, wet hole, filled with the ends of worms and an oozy smell, nor yet a dry, bare, sandy hole with nothing in it to sit down on or to eat: it was a hobbit-hole, and that means comfort.

"It had a perfectly round door like a porthole, painted green, with a shiny yellow brass knob in the exact middle. The door opened on to a tube-shaped hall like a tunnel: a very comfortable tunnel without smoke, with panelled walls and floors tiled and carpeted, provided with polished chairs, and lots and lots of pegs for hats and coats--the hobbit was fond of visitors. The tunnel wound on and on, going fairly but not quite straight into the side of the hill--The Hill, as all the people for many miles round called it--and many little round doors opened out of it, first on one side and then on another. No going upstairs for the hobbit: bedrooms, bathrooms, cellars, pantries (lots of these), wardrobes (he had whole rooms devoted to clothes), kitchens, dining-rooms, all were on the same floor, and indeed on the same passage. The best rooms were all on the lefthand side (going in), for these were the only ones to have windows, deep-set round windows looking over his garden and meadows beyond, sloping down to the river."

I want a hobbit hole. Or a Rivendell condo—I'm flexible like that.