We are fully prepared for Brad's arrival. The signs are made, the airport greeters have been chosen. Jess got inspired on these signs—we'll have to send them home with Brad as souvenirs. Poor guy. He called last night, and it was all I could do to NOT blurt out to him, "You have NO idea what you're getting into!"

But we sidestepped that by just yelling "ph33r m3!" a lot.Everyone who has arrived so far—Heather, Kat, Jess, and Terry—came by the house last night for last-minute preparations. (i.e., making signs) As usual, we ended up playing lots of music really loudly and romping with the orange-and-white wonderkitties. Tenzing, especially, was fascinated by posterboard…and the sound it makes when you shake it back and forth. Silly cat.

Our house has been officially dubbed "the geek Country Home." I love it. It's terribly appropriate, too—when they come out here, they're usually coming out here to rest and relax…

I can tell now that I'm going to be completely and utterly worthless at work today. I'm bouncing, dammit.

Tally from last night…all that remains to be done:

• Clean/mop the kitchen.
• Change the sheets on the master bed.
• Add the new songs to our mp3 database so that they're available for Saturday's party.

I keep a package of two pop-tarts in my desk for emergency purposes. I'm rather hungryish, but I fear that if I put any more sugar in the bod today, that I'm going to start flitting around the room on the strength of my adrenaline rush.

La la la. Guess I should try to look productive again for a while.

Productivity has failed me. I am remaining bouncy even through lunch coma.

The crew went to Tim's Cajun Kitchen for some tasty lunchtime eats today. Didn't realize how popular that place was until I went in there. At 10:55, there was no one there. By 11:02, the entire room was filled. Seems like everyone knows that the lunch special starts at eleven…

We had a good, geeky lunch. Kat fixed the annoying problem I'd had with my cell phone—helped me delete some old numbers on there that I no longer needed.

Brad and I will probably teach them how to play Hot Death Uno tonight. Eeeeeevil, we are.

So this is what it's like to have a social life…

This hurts.

I'd intended for my commentary today to be about all the fun we had this weekend, but considering I just got back from the bathroom with red eyes and a sniffly nose, I think you can guess that it's the furthest thing from my mind right now.

I happened to think to check my home email account a few minutes ago, and got kicked in the pants by what I found. Mom emailed me at about one this morning to let me know about what happened this weekend. My aunt Mildred, the one who is battling bipolar disorder, shot her son (my cousin Clint) in the hand this weekend during an argument.

She swears it's an accident.

All I know is that I feel like someone kicked me in the stomach.

I just don't know what to make of this. I just don't. We've dealt with the problems of dealing with her problems for as long as I can remember, and I guess in my mind I've always hoped that it would never come to this—to violence. But evidently it has.

I called my folks last night—there was more to the story than what I'd been told. The problem is that the more I hear, the worse it sounds. Evidently my aunt Mildred's pretty much gone off the deep end—drinking heavily and not taking her lithium. I gather she got in a fight with my grandmother, and that my aunt also attacked my parents.

Thus my parents took her to the hospital. Again. She did what she does every time this happens—fights, screams, yells, curses, and tries to hurt anyone who comes near her. Apparently she directly attacked my parents, too. Because of how the laws are, the hospital can't keep her against her will. As soon as she's stable—meaning her lithium levels are back up—she can't be held against her will.

Whee! Today I'm working (again) on my proposed redesign for my company's website. I've put in a LOT of hours on this. It's my fourth design for these guys—I've not been very happy with my previous three. This one, I think, has possibly got the goods. It's still way down deep in alpha, but you can see it on the screenshot for today (September 7).

For your amusement, I've added a webcam to my desk. It takes a new picture every sixty seconds; the webpage should refresh every thirty. It's possible that there are still some bugs in this, but then again I've not totally gotten it tweaked like I want it.

There's a link in the contents box. I'd link it here, but since I think I'm going to tailor the link a bit so that it pops up a separate window and such, I'd rather not have to change the link here as well.

Let me know if you have any problems.

I just got curious and pulled down my stats for today. I thought I'd see if any of the friends I emailed actually took a look at the catcam page. Now, granted, it refreshes every 30 seconds, but 700 hits in less than eight hours?!?!? Don't you guys have day jobs?

Seven hundred?
("thirty-seven?? thirty-seven??")

Tonight: I'm not doing a damn thing. It's Friday. I'm going to read. I'm going to harass my cats. I'm going to cook up some really good pasta-y comfort food, and that's going to be it. I'll probably study up on PHP too.

Tomorrow—going over to Kat's. We're going to rent a DVD, I think, and be generally lazy over there and admire their new TV.

After an inauspicious start, today got better as it went along. I woke up at six this morning with nasty stomach cramps. The evidence seems to be piling up that I just can't eat pizza any more (sigh.). So I was in and out of the bathroom for a while, then decided (groggily) to sleep in the living room so as not to wake up Jeff.

I ended up dozing on the couch until about eleven. I woke up a lot, especially when the cats were playing (I ended up being a human race track for a short amount of time).It rained today. Not a lot, but every half-inch here and there helps in the drought we've got. Jeff and I headed out for lunch and I actually had to turn on my windshield wipers—it's been quite some time since I've had to do that. After we had lunch, we went shopping for computer desks. I'm not in a position to buy a new one for myself right now, but I will be in a few weeks.

Okay, so I woke up this morning and said, "Hey! Let's change this puppy around a bit!"

Gotta love style sheets. They make doing this so easy.

Kat's here—she and Jeff are trying to work through some sticky differential equations. Ahhh, the fun that occurs when undergrad EEs meet up with my graduate-student EE husband! You'll note that I'm hanging out here in the computer room with Edmund and avoiding all the joyous calculus.

I'm trying to figure out where the weekend went. I slept longer than usual Saturday while recovering from that small bout of the yuks, and I think that's where part of the weekend vanished to. Today's been quiet—I bought groceries, cleaned up the kitchen a bit, and rested. Really rested. Brain rest is good, because tomorrow morning I need to wake up, go to work, and crank out a mind-boggling second-level navigation proposal for my company's website. Yeah, I can do this on a Monday morning.

I'm contemplating an ice cream bar. I've been craving sweets all day—rather unusual of me, since I usually don't crave sweet things.

Today's Snippet Of Amusement is brought to you by Sean Berry:

*** Message (#75) from SeanB at 4:43 PM on Sep 11, 2000 ***
>You're sufficiently bright to qualify as a co-geek: a spouse of a geek also
>qualified as a geek in her (or his) own right. If you weren't we'd have to
>classify you as a geek-spouse: that sorrowful state of someone who is married
>to and presumably tolerates a geek, but does not have the geek-nature. That'd

mmmm. Last night was fun—spent most of it over at the wondergeeks' consoling a group of geeks who had had a Very Bad Day[tm]. I'm saddened to report that Kat's day was made worse today by the death of her grandfather down in New Orleans.

Kiddo, I know you read this. It hurts me to see you go through this. I went through the same thing in '96, down to very nearly the exact same circumstances, and it took a long time to heal. The first six months were hellish; the loss of my grandfather was an empty void in my soul that I felt from the moment I opened my eyes in the morning (on really bad days, even before then) and didn't go away until I went to sleep that night. The next six months weren't as bad; by that time I was learning how to live with grief.

Props to Gareth for giving me the five-second explanation on how to fix the annoying problem I was having with my javascript pop-up windows.

Here's how to do the pop-up window (of any size you want) without having the base page jump around after you click on the link:

link textYou can't use spaces in the name of the window or in the width/height tags for the new window.

Glad to finally get that fixed. I've been too tired to do the research myself.

Much better after staying home, resting, and getting a good night's sleep. I'm about halfway through Christopher Buckley's The White House Mess. Should finish it this weekend.

I have cat hair all over my red shirt this morning—Tenzing was absolutely determined that cuddling was going to take place before I left for work. I wasn't given a lot of choice in the matter. So this morning I was eating my cereal with my right hand and cradling a ten-pound lump of purring orange-and-white cat in the crook of my left arm.

Been meaning to post this: http://vanderwoning.com cracks me up.

Today must be the day to find funny stuff on the web. I got pointed to this: http://www.standonguard.com/. I laughed until I had tears rolling down my face. Maybe I should buy Brad a t-shirt.

Must get back to work. I've got a lot of work to do for a particular client.

on music…
While headed out for lunch today, an old comment that I read once popped into my head unbidden. I remember reading some music critic discussing the differences [s]he perceived between Mozart and Beethoven. (At least, I think it was Beethoven.) The description of the difference: while Beethoven's work sounds carefully composed and constructed, Mozart's work had an aura of uncreation—almost as if he had just found the music whole and entire, and done nothing except write it down.

I got rear-ended on the way home today. My first accident ever. Boo, hiss. I'm lucky, though. I saw the woman coming up behind me and had enough time to brake and swerve, which prevented the accident from being worse.

The feeling of my car lurching out of control was a very sickening one indeed. Especially since I saw what was ahead of me—an embankment built out of concrete blocks. My brakes stopped me about three feet from the embankment. Had they not, things would have been much worse.She hit my car. *sniff sniff sniff*

Dammit. Sigh. Thank goodness for insurance.

Right now I'm going to sit down and eat some dinner. Right after the accident happened I called the wondergeeks—Jess and Kat still had a house key, so they came over and fed the kitties for me. While they were here, they left me food for dinner tonight.

I'm not sure if I woke the cats up, or vice versa. They crawled in bed with me about thirty minutes ago, all quivering inquisitive (cold, wet!) noses and rusty purrs. Nothing like twenty pounds of kitty coming to rest on your stomach.

(My bladder said hello.)

I started thinking about tonight's wreck and it really does have me rattled. I think that's just my way of dealing with things; a short-term high level of shock, followed by sheer and utter competence. I'll be fine when daylight comes. But the light of reality is harshest at two a.m., when there's no one to talk to and nothing to take your mind off of the events of the day.I suppose I was snoring in bed; I woke up and Jeff wasn't there. I wish he'd been there. (I write this in the full knowledge that he'll see this sometime tomorrow. Sorry, hon, but it's true.)

From an email I sent to most of my friends this morning:

I'm okay.

Got the car looked at this morning. Over $2000 worth of damage. You'd better believe I'm blessing 1) my insurance coverage and 2) the fact that I was hit by a fully insured driver.

The liftgate for the trunk's got to be replaced, as is my back bumper. My driver's side back quarter panel is buckled, and because of that the small window on that side doesn't seal properly, and the door doesn't shut properly. There is the possibility of some frame damage, but we won't know that until the car's actually repaired.

My 'check engine' light is also coming on intermittently. There's probably a damaged sensor in there somewhere.

Revision to earlier statement. I feel cruddy. My neck is sore and stiff, and my chest is sore from where the seatbelt kept me from chowing down on the steering wheel.

I'm going to give this a bit longer. See how I feel tomorrow. If it's not better I'll think about going to the doc to get it checked out. I don't think it's anything serious, but I'm sore.

I've gotten virtually no work done today, between getting my car looked at, filing reports at the Huntsville Police Department, explaining to co-workers that I'm mostly okay, and generally just having trouble concentrating.

Kat's going to take me to Birmingham tomorrow. A quiet outing—a bit of window-shopping. I'll wait and see how I feel. I wish I had some sick time to take, but as far as I know, I don't at this point.

Tonight I think I will just curl up on the couch and hibernate.

So I went to the clinic after work, right? Everything was fine and dandy until I said the phrase "car accident." At that point, the nurse-on-duty did the quickest backpedaling act I've ever seen. She flatly stated, "We cannot treat you. Go to the ER."

Tonight's thumbs-up comment goes to Lee Cornelius out in the Huntsville ER. Seinfeld-esque bedside manner—while answering my annoying questions to boot. I hate x-rays. I've had way too many of them in my life, and these were the most pain-free ones I've dealt with in a long time. Has more to do with his good cheer, flippant sense of humor, and general tolerance of my mouthiness than anything else.

Kat and I went to Birmingham today. I think this was a good thing, although I came back tired. We talked a lot.

I also finally found the bathrobe I've been seeking for a couple of years now. Full-length. White. No funky logos. Soft and absorbent. Dilemma—keep for myself, or make available to guests?

Can I get away with both?

I've been trying to stick with the drug regimen to help my neck and upper back recover from Thursday's crash. I'm not as painfully tender and sore as yesterday. Today I just ache—and I tire easily. Funny how things like that will mess you up.

I took the muscle relaxant pill about thirty minutes ago. As soon as I finish this, I'm going to bed. I'm starting to get a bit fuzzy-headed again. I don't need them for pain during the day (I'm a tough and creaky old bird) but getting some uninterrupted sleep certainly can't be bad for me.

Olympics:
Oh, my. I'm thoroughly convinced that Bob Costas is a puppet. Think about it—do you ever see him get up from behind the anchor desk? I'm betting there's a little guy hiding underneath it, manipulating strings and levers through his…wait, that's an ugly thought.

I'm in agreement with Jess. I think Ian Thorpe needs to be on a Wheaties box. Preferably wearing as little as possible.

Speaking of Aussies, I cringed while watching the Australian female gymnasts do their vault rotation. The girls were clearly being told to do vaults they weren't comfortable doing—it showed in their faces.Americans and their sports:
In the past couple of years I've really come to appreciate both soccer and hockey. I've often wondered why they aren't particularly popular in the States. Yesterday afternoon, while in a half-doze, a thought came to me:

"It's the scoring."

I've put some new stuff up on domesticat. These are things I've had on castrovalva but just haven't had a chance to move over. So, if you saw these on castrovalva, don't bother looking—it's the same stuff. I've added travel pictures and cat pictures.

Heather cracks me up. She told me this evening that she spent a little while today just watching the three webcams. Mine, Brad's, and Sean's.

What's really scary is that all three of us spent most of the day doing the same thing—head propped up on one hand, staring into our monitor screens. Three people—one in Huntsville, one in Atlanta, and one in Victoria—and they might as well all be one image.

This, for some reason, cracks me up.

I didn't understand why people watched my webcam until my friends put up cams. ("Hey! He moved! Did something interesting happen?")

I'm up way too early this morning—I have to go to Birmingham with Cathy today. It's not the "with Cathy" part that I mind—I like her a lot—but the "Birmingham" part. Yukyuk. I've got to train a client today, and to be honest, this is the least favorite part of my job. I'd be happy to be a computer jockey, and keep my client interaction to a minimum.

Tenzing woke me up at 4:30 this morning. Evidently, it was time to be cuddly. It took me a while to go back to sleep, and I was thinking about some of the friends I've gotten to visit. The Typical Geek Complaint, of course, came unbidden into my head:"Oh, if only all of my friends lived in the same place!"

There's something comforting in looking into someone's life and realizing that while the immediate motions are different, the overall pattern is the same. It reaffirms my faith in humanity—that at heart, most of us are pretty decent folk. We try to care about the people that are part of our lives. We've lost people that we cared about. New people move into our lives, and we learn to care about them too.

It's a bit odd to be sitting here right now. Big Spring Jam is quickly gearing up—Huntsville's annual music festival is less than half a block away from where I'm sitting right now. I've been listening to Michael McDonald do his soundcheck. There's a surreal quality to all this.

Sean has arrived. We spent a good while pestering each other today while I was ostensibly working.

Sean is being kind enough to loan me his extensive CD collection for today. I'm using this quiet morning to create new CDs to listen to at work. This pleases me immensely. If you've peeked in on the catcam then you know that I spend most of my working day with my headphones on. New music is always welcome.

I've got a dishwasher full of dishes that need doing now. I'll get to them in a little while; Jeff is still sleeping and I'd hate to wake him up. So I'm in here, writing a domesticat entry a bit earlier in the day than usual.

Brad pointed me to his site yesterday. His ranting commentary for September 22nd contained a paragraph that really just summed up why I've done my best to keep this guy in my life since first corresponding with him in 1994:

More rain today. It's got to be frustrating for the farmers here in northeast Alabama—no rain all through the growing season, and just as they start to bring in what little cotton grew here this summer, the deluge (courtesy of tropical depression Helene) comes.

Overall it's been a positive day—very quiet, very restful. I had a good shopping trip—I had a coupon for a nice percentage off at Lane Bryant and so I used it today. There were some good end-of-season bargains, and I'm sure that my co-workers will greatly appreciate my having a couple of new shirts to wear!I think what's got me disgruntled is this email that I just got from my mother, back in Arkansas. Here's the first part:

Amy:

A little better now, yep. Thanks, Heather, for dropping me an email. It was nice to get a human's input on all of this.

I've got thirty minutes to go, and then I can go home. I haven't quite decided what I'm going to do this evening. I doubt it will be computer-related. I got all the needed repotting done yesterday (yay for catnip and creeping thyme!) and did some pretty heavy trimming of the airplane plant. It should—hopefully—start recovering soon.

This is Day Two of "Extremely Tired Amy"[tm]. Last night I went to bed at something like eight-thirty, because I was wiped out. I've done a little better tonight—10:15—but I can feel the tireds creeping in on me, and I know that as soon as I curl up in bed, I'm going to go to sleep.

It's worrying me a bit, because I know that someone at work was sent home with influenza today. I'm just trying to rest and take care of myself in the meantime.

Other news: it's official. While it's been official for some time now that I was going to D.C. for my vacation, it turns out that I'm going to be spending my birthday in one of the few major American cities I've not yet been to—New York City.

ohmygosh.

Today I admitted defeat. I came in early—at 8:30—and left many many hours early—around 11:00 by my count. I was exhausted, bleary, and feeling worse by the hour. So I took my work with me and went home.

I stopped by the grocery store on the way home and bought a few sundries (milk, munchies, something for dinner tomorrow).

I petted the cats, settled down to work at the computer for a little while after eating some food, and then realized that my exhaustion wasn't going to go away if I didn't rest. So I decided to take a nap—and woke up three hours later.I probably could have gone back to sleep. It was difficult to wake up. I remember opening my eyes and trying to fight my way out of what felt like a thick fog. I don't know how long it took for me to actually wake up, but it was quite a while. It helped that the cats were swirling around me and meowing.

I'm going to warn you now. Some of you are going to finish reading this entry and scream TMI. ("Too much information!" for the abbreviationally-challenged.) If you keep reading past this point, it's all your fault if you're offended. It's my stinkin' journal, for goodness' sake.

I'm thinking of going back on the pill. I've been off for ten months now—and yes, it does take me a while to come to decisions like this, hush! I'm still not totally sure I'll do anything about it; perhaps I'm waiting for things to get so annoying that I feel I have to get back on the pills NOW or it's all going to drive me crazy.My prescription lapsed in January. For those of you who remember, I was finishing up at my helljob at the credit union in January. I didn't have enough time to curl up in a ball and cry, much less get to a doctor.

A snippet of lyric from the song currently playing:

it possesses me controls me it makes me run and it makes me kill

I don't feel quite so guilty about working on personal stuff tonight. I got the kitchen and living room reasonably tidied. Jeff cleaned the guest bathroom, and I tidied up the guest bedroom. Laundry's going now. This house is in much better shape than it was 48 hours ago.

I even got a bit of work done on the site for Andrew and Joy. After much tweaking I finally got around to sending them a proposal for the front page of their site.

All this…after getting my spouse to the mall this morning. Dillard's had some pretty sweet end-of-season sales going on today, and Jeff finally has some new pants and shirts. We got a few pair of pants, about four dress shirts, and a pair of shorts—for $70. Once I get the pants hemmed, he's set.