He doesn't do it as much (though that may change with retirement) but dad likes fashioning stuff out of seemingly unlikely parts. We have lamp from a radiator from a jet(?) engine, a giant brass shell casing that is the umbrella stand (that's not too unusual, I don't think) and art piece that is some internal timekeeping guts from a telescope (size of a loaf of bread) in a casing he built from the same metal. A lot of it was channeled into making solutions for the workbench. He must've picked up the habit from his father and grandfather who were machinists in a die factory(?) He certainly inherited their beautiful tools (some homemade as well.)

Oooh... my web guy (who is also quite an accomplished cartoonist) sent me this link to the longest version of the Wolverine trailer that I've seen yet-- complete with Hugh pimping for free comic book day.

le swoon

[link]

So I was putting in my time off and remembered I've got a holiday I need to use (as opposed to vacation.) So I'm taking a Closing Holiday.

For some reason, I find this funny.

Closing Holiday

This should involve a ritual sacrifice. With pie.

My mother, the forger.

Our moms must be related.

I've had car salesmen try to sell to my boyfriend and not me. He even said, "Her car. Her money." When the Ford guy kept selling to him, we left after explaining, in no uncertain terms, why we were leaving. The next dealership did better. After the "her car, her money" statement, my BF no longer existed in the salesman's eyes.

So, I have some weird muscle thing going on with one calf -- it feels like I had a charley horse earlier, but I don't remember having one, just the tight aftermath feeling for a couple of days. I just tied my heating pad around it -- does that seem like a reasonable plan?

Huh. The coordinators for my internship in '96 contacted me and provided a link to the other participants as well. Most of those they've been able to find got PhDs . And the professional-track ballet dancer has taken up dancing again (when I met her, she'd been sidelined recently with a knee injury and was told she should give up ballet.) She's a professor. The woman who got to fly AF jets in Italy before leaving the Academy is an astronomer at a telescope in South Africa and is on the staff of MIT.

It's just...huh.

Yeah, that's pretty much why I avoid the back pages of my alumni mag.

Oh and the dancer is dancing professionally again. I'm happy for her. Back then, it was very clear she really hurt over having that dream denied.

And the annoying, socially offputting guy got married!