Lisa, pretty good plan, but I was halfway amused picturing the staff at my local Irish pub being like "*How many tiaras?! and you want to do*what* on our pool table?" But I'm kind of hoping I'll be transplanted by then, anyway.

I love you guys. I hadn't realized how much I missed you. Seeing bits and pieces on FB and elsewhere just isn't the same.

msbelle, you are pulling quotes that totally make me laugh! The spider one is perfection.

Gah, remember that Mary Sue she wrote where Spike made her a vampire? I've never forgotten that. Possibly the most believable self-insertion I've ever read.

I love you guys. I hadn't realized how much I missed you. Seeing bits and pieces on FB and elsewhere just isn't the same.

This. I have drifted away due to lack of time on teh interwebs (and spending most of that time on Twitter because it's easy in, easy out) but I really miss the camaraderie when everyone is here posting over and under each other.

Why does it always take a tragedy to illuminate how fleeting and wonderful life is?

I think I figured it out, what's been bugging me the past couple days. It's kinda out there, so hang on.

It's like being on a starship. You're on this starship, right? And there's constant noise; engines, environmental systems, consoles and whatnot. This constant susurrus of just...you know, noise.

And you get used to it. It becomes this background to your life, this ever-present hum and thrum of your existence.

And then one day the noise stops.

And you're going nuts! What the...what's different? Why am I afraid? What the...WHERE'S THE NOISE?!

So I'm back here, on b.org, pushing buttons and turning valves and the noise is back and...okay. It's okay. I'm okay.

But the noise is different. There's something...off about it. It's not quite the same noise. But it's noise, so, I guess it's...okay, but...

I just have to get used to the new noise. I'm back and the noise is here and it's comforting, but it's not the same and I'm just going to have to let the new noise become the old noise, the background noise.

But it's going to take some time.

That's beautiful, MM.

One thanksgiving, in order to see ita I drove in a blinding rainstorm in Kat's Miata to pick her up for an ER trip. I thought I was gonna die driving over those passes. And then we get to the ER and I remark I feel severely underdressed-it was a stupid swank waiting room (valet parking, wtf?) and that lead to riffing on who was there for what. I think we decided I was the charity case, not sure.

What followed after was the most hilarious and wrong set of conversations. Not limited to her charming damned everyone and then remarking on their hotness factor when barely from earshot. I don't recall what the hell else we talked about in any more detail. It was a distressing thing, on one level, they were having a helluva time getting a line, but she was hectoring them the whole time.

So yeah, my date with ita was in the ER. I'm glad she asked me.

I didn't see her as often as I would have liked, but that's true of most everything delightful when you have to move to past tense. I know what she means to me. That'll stay present tense.

Allyson, I think you're going to have to buy more goat. Also,you guys have the worst job in the world, but the biggest hearts as well. That is why you were chosen and why you chose those around you to carry it. It sucks. Take care of those hearts. Sometimes that means saying '"I can't" and handing it to the next in line. There's nothing wrong in that.

I'm awful at logistics and calls, so those things I leave to my betters. I'm a pretty good listener, so I always offer that.

Of course, when the noise stops on a starship, it probably means you've been kicked out of the airlock. Which is kind of how this all feels.

I am still in March of 2001

"Alan Cumming is in the same category for me as Tim Roth. It's the "What a strange little man. Can I keep him?" category."

an aside. I am going to have FaceTime on I think most nights in the near future.