ah ... foresight ... I'd forgotten transit systems could actually do that. DC's plan seems to be "wait until everything's so badly backed up no one can get anywhere and then shut down ... but don't tell anyone until they're stuck between work and home".

The Queensland floods earlier this year took out the banana crop, and the farmers' lobby group is preventing imports so they won't have the competition next year.

Wait, floods took out a banana crop? How does that happen, short of actually killing the trees (which I assume would make the next several years banana-free ones as well)?

As of yesterday (Metro press release), DC Metro wasn't planning to shut down. Although, to be fair to NYC, DC is quite a bit farther inland.

DC did shut down for Isabel. Made the decision easy to shut down the governent for the first day.

It is Friday the 26th of August and you've reached ita ! de la O's voicemail. I will be in all day, and return your message as soon as possible. Thanks.

Fie upon you.

I asked my sister a question about Jamaican folklore. She blew me off. I said, Sav, you're a anthropology PhD who works at the major Jamaican university, who else do I ask first? "Well, I don't know." "Can you ask?" "I don't want to." "Can you tell me where to look?" "Not really."

I'm actually pissed at her right now. Not only did my father direct me to three web sites and my mother direct me to a family member on the same topic, my sister will email me Word tables for me to sort for her. She can fucking help me with a fucking ghost. Especially since she believes in the damned things.

I wonder how many times I will go downstairs today. I am wearing difficult shoes. Biker boots. Heavy boots. I will get a stretch.

Bananas don't grow on trees, BTW.

Franny's AG doll has curly hair which had gotten a bit ratty. I was a bit frustrated at the thought of the bringing her in to the AG beauty shop, but the stylists told me the secret for how to brush her hair and keep the curls in it. So at least they are nice at the AG store.

... aaannnnd, now I need to go find out how bananas grow.

The things you don't know:

The banana plant is the largest herbaceous flowering plant.[4] The plants are normally tall and fairly sturdy and are often mistaken for trees, but their main or upright stem is actually a pseudostem that grows 6 to 7.6 metres (20 to 24.9 ft) tall, growing from a corm. Each pseudostem can produce a single bunch of bananas. After fruiting, the pseudostem dies, but offshoots may develop from the base of the plant. Many varieties of bananas are perennial.

Leaves are spirally arranged and may grow 2.7 metres (8.9 ft) long and 60 cm (2.0 ft) wide.[5] They are easily torn by the wind, resulting in the familiar frond look.

Is Sara the only kid without an AG doll? Actually she has a Bitty Baby, courtesy of Barb, but not one of the girl dolls.

Well, 20-to-25-foot stalked flowering plants then. But aren't the fruits up high enough that they wouldn't be threatened by floodwaters? I didn't realize the flooding in Australia was that deep...

Now I'm wondering if I could open an American Girls cemetery. It could offer services appropriate to the doll's time period. There would be a variety of expensive caskets available.