Tornado sirens haven't gone off in 10 minutes. I hope that means we're in the clear.

Yeah, looking at radar the worst of it just crossed into Lake Michigan.

Tornado watch and post is more fun than earthquake watch and post, I think.

But nothing tops Labor Watch And Post!

I swear, L&D is why god made Twitter.

I have one cousin. Actually, thinking about it now, I guess that's not true, but it still feels true. Hmm. My mom's oldest (half) brother had two kids. The one time I remember meeting the half-uncle, he was a raging asshole to me. Though I've been informed that he was more polite when he met me as a newborn. He had two kids, both boys, that I never met. Apparently, their mom was also crazy, and both boys were mean and crazy. And sometimes they were in jail. So they were also stupid. I did have two cousins for awhile growing up, but one of them died when I was 13 and he was 16. So then I just had the one cousin. Luckily, he is my favorite cousin of all my cousin.

Oh, wait! Actually, I have two more cousins. I keep forgetting about them because I've never met them, or their mom, and also they're new. I think they're around two? Or maybe three.

Huh. So I suppose I have three cousins and two half-cousins. Or should it be four cousins, counting the deceased one, and two half-cousins? And yet, I still feel like I've only got one cousin, and I haven't even seen him in, geez, 12 years? That's so strange. There's a heck of a lot of estrangement in my family. Which is too bad, since I've always wanted to be part of a big one.

I have 16 first cousins, that I know of. (I have a half uncle in Sweden I've never met.) There is 30 years between the first and the last, and the last was born the same year at the first child of a cousin. The range may be larger if you include the half-uncle, but I literally know nothing about him. And contact was lost when my grandfather (his father) died 22 years ago. Weird to think.

I'm in contact with a lot of other umpteen-removed cousins, partly because the maternal last name is limiting. We're in contact with family that goes back to great-great's siblings. Mostly by fluke- my mom went by maiden-married name in LWV when she moved to NM , a young college student at NMSU made the connection with the maiden name she shared as primary and after talking to her family, discovered they were cousins. And she was my first babysitter. And I was the first babysitter of her child, now in her 20s! Thanks to Robin, a whole segment of family was rediscovered, and reconnected. The connection no longer flows through mom Robin, but through the whole family. It's rather neat. What are the odds of two farmgirls from the midwest, 20 years apart, ending up in my hometown by totally independent paths, that come from the same family, so long separated?

I have never ever had a tan ever, but I've had a few sunburns.

I cannot imagine, not one bit.

I'm very happy for your day, Kat. And incredibly jealous.

One thing I don't like about LA is its lack of green space. I was reading the LA times recently and apparently it has the least of any major US city. And I don't think any of the sparse little stuff is near me. There's wilderness-type canyon, which is its own sort of very cool, but nothing I'm up to these days.

No chance there's a Huntingdon-lite in my area, huh?

Maybe I can make a Thursday when I'm jobless.

Then I have to cancel my dialup and see if I can get temp auto-reply& forwarding. Or send out the dreaded "update your addressbooks" to everyone in my email.

I heartily recommend you get an email address that's independent of your connectivity provider/web host. I recommend it for everyone. Which reminds me, one of my web hosts went poof! Luckily it's for one of the low-volume sites, but still. My entities page is unavailable.

Hey, Serenity is on my TV! Have I mentioned that I have to get up at 5:45? This isn't good.

No chance there's a Huntingdon-lite in my area, huh?

There's the Botanical Gardens at UCLA.

I heartily recommend you get an email address that's independent of your connectivity provider/web host

Oh, I do have one! But not everyone in the past < decade is aware of it. And I'm realizing that in opening it up, makes me more findable, because I use a variation of my name here. So I may get a second more anonymous for this purpose. Mind, I started using the isp email in the days before I thought of shit.