I can tell you what I'm working on.  Sort of.

Anyone who has called the house in the past week -- and for those of you who have called in the evenings this past week to keep me company while Jeff's working insane-o hours, I thank you dearly -- knows that I've been hard at work on a quilt.

Here's the problem:  technically, I shouldn't post pictures.  Why?  It's intended for someone whom I know reads this site. 

Here's the solution: the photos are friends-locked on flickr.  It means the photos won't syndicate on solecist.net, and I can control who sees them on flickr.  Problem solved.

If you're curious to see the quilt that named itself "red shift," pop over to this set on flickr. Users on my friends list will see multiple photos; those not logged in or on my friends list will only see the shot of The Unhired Help:

Ever have a moment where you read over what you've just written and realize why your co-workers think you're a little touched in the head?  I just did:

This coder is new to me.  This means I can't vouch for his development style.  I have no idea if he uploads barely-finished dev versions expecting the userbase to do major crash-testing, or if he is cautious and only makes code available right before a stable release, expecting only minor tweaks from the userbase.  3.x could be barely usable or it could be almost finished.  Dunno.

Later on...

[module] released an initial, alpha version for drupal 6 this morning.  You should assume that it will explode your computer and eat your children, and as such you should not use it for anything mission-critical.

Since pixels don't come with smell-o-vision, I must tell you that these words are being typed in a quiet house that smells of fresh salsa and roasting bell peppers.  The laptop (old, beaten up) is positioned so as to block out the setting sun, which does not come directly through my front door but close enough to force my pupils to readjust.  I have a small party to be at in an hour's time.  I must not be late, so I must write fast and speak rightly the first time.

The place, now: Huntsville, Alabama.
The place, then: rural Arkansas.

I was a child of the late 1970s, whose memories just missed Jimmy Carter but remembered Reagan dimly through an apolitical child's eye.  Those who read this site know my story well; I came from a union family in a former mining town.  My tiny hometown, well under three hundred souls at the time, all looked like me because they were almost all related to me.

Congratulations to Jason and Crystal, who threw a rockin' masquerade-themed wedding on top of Burritt Mountain last night.  A few of us:

[Original: "We'll never tell where the money is" on flickr; from left to right: Suzan, Dana, Asai, me]

Jeff: "You've kinda got that Harley Quinn action going on there."

For those who came over last night for the rather epic rounds of Werewolf: the cats have forgiven us for the herd of people we brought into 'their' house. Mostly.  Edmund may still eat my skull, though, purely on principle.

One of my favorite entries on this site is the 2001 entry, Southern political girl.  It has remained one of my favorite tidbits I've ever posted on my site, and every election cycle brings it back to memory.  I have always liked it for its remembrance of the collision of national politics with everyday life; how I saw that particular election from a viewpoint that was different from most of my fellow citizens.

A sign that, perhaps, that your coding isn't going the way you hoped:

# This can only be described as a godawful, vomitous,
# appalling hack. I hang my head in shame. But it really
# does look like I can't just pull events for a single
# 24-hour day, but instead have to resort to godless
# ugliness such as this. To whoever reads this after
# me: you have my abject apologies. Hope you never
# have to modify this mess.