Well…looks like everything's mostly back up to speed. For this I"m pleased; the implementation was pretty smooth.

I'm still going to try to hack together a page that looks something like this page for the users whose browsers hork on valid 4.0 code. I'm not going to spend a ton of time on it, though. But surely there's some sort of way.Saw Traffic tonight. That completes the list of all five Best Picture nominees. My picks, in order of preference:

1. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
2. Traffic
3. Gladiator [tie]
4. Chocolat [tie]
5. Erin Brockovich

Many things on my mind today.

Grocery shopping done. I got my CDs in from SecondSpin—more CDs purchased because I found music on Napster and wanted copies that I could play on the stereo and not just on my computer. Got my knives resharpened. Talked with friends.

More mundane:

A relief: the vet pronounces Tenzing almost completely well. He says his eardrum is a bit ragged from the infection, but that it's starting to heal. The swelling is going down, and the little purrball should be completely well in another week.

A happy and relieved kittymommy.Did more planning for the Great Adventure To Canuckistan[tm] today. Andy confirms that he will be going. So far, that puts the list of attendees at Jeff, myself, Heather, Jess, and possibly Gareth. Then, of course, there's Brad, who will be thoroughly terrorized by the time we're gone.

It is raining.

There is comfort to be had here. The softness of the light, the sound of falling drops splashing onto shingle, the sensation of dry skin relaxing in the presence of atmospheric moisture. Prismatic globes of water trapped between the strands of a finely-meshed storm screen. The rain howling down, slanted by wind until it rained at a sharp angle.

The Shenandoah Shakespeare Express was in town this week for three shows. Slated for performance this year were Hamlet, A Midsummer Night's Dream, and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead.

Midsummer was first up on Wednesday night, and it was sold out. Heather and Jess were able to get tickets at the very last minute. I got a glowing report, but didn't get to see the play. (Only a little disappointed, I was.) The next night they called me up from the ticket line and said, "We have you a ticket, but you have to come NOW. We're going to sit on the front row again, and you need to join us."So I did. Ahhhh, Hamlet. It's one of my three favorites of Shakespeare, but up to now I'd never gotten to see it performed live. We hung around for a few minutes afterward and had a few pictures taken—and bought tickets for Friday's showing of Rosencrantz.

The god of smaller things gave me a gift today: for cleaning up my kitchen this evening, I discovered the tiny battery-powered radio that I had given up for lost a few weeks ago.

While in this house, this radio had become a daily link with the world. Our large stereo has trouble tuning in to the weak signal of WLRH, our local NPR affiliate. But the little one does not, and I can carry it around the house with me as I do chores.Through it, I listened to Morning Edition in the mornings, and All Things Considered in the afternoon. I've found their news to be much less sensationalist and more in-depth than anything else I can get locally.

Oh, and we discovered this morning just why the drainage ditch on the far side of our house is so steep. I did not realize how heavily it rained last night until I raised the blinds in the master bedroom.

The water is several feet deep in the ditch, running fast, and is about five feet from our house.

It would take probably double or triple the heavy rains last night to come close to our house because of the size of the ditch, but it was still quite disconcerting to see so much water close to my window.Oh, and if we can find one, we're going to plant a Japanese red maple in the front yard. Perhaps a flowering cherry tree in the back yard, close to the house. But farther away, I'm thinking about planting an oak tree.

Given how mobile twentysomething geeks are, I think it highly unlikely that I will ever see that tree at its full height—but someone will live here at that time, and they'll appreciate it.

Next up on the list: fulfill a few design promises I've made over the past few weeks/months/years. I spent today taking care of one, and I'll move on to a couple more tomorrow.

John Wilson has been wanting me to put together a site design for him for some time. He wanted something clean, simple, and easy to maintain for his site, Jot & Tittle. (site is down as of late June 2001; link will return when the site does)

So, I run my logs for the first time in a few months. Scary. Someone's actually reading this drivel!

What's even scarier is how they're finding this site. Here are some choice tidbits gleaned from my logs…to show you how some people have stumbled across domesticat.net:

ahhhhh, Atlanta. Back at Sean's parents' house again. We are doing the slow dance of preparing for a Saturday afternoon of errands: going to a nursery to shop for herbs, my snooping for culinary supplies, Jeff's search for a pair of dress shoes.

We are here for a college friend's wedding. Missy, whom I have not seen in a year or two. It will be a chance for Jeff to re-establish contact with college friends that have drifted to the waysides of work and marriage. An afternoon's chance to find out where the people who once populated his everyday life have moved to.

A hard freeze is scheduled for tonight. My tender plants have been brought safely indoors, but I'm crossing my fingers tonight in the hopes that my irises—so perilously close to blooming—will not be terribly stunted by this last freeze. I'm hoping to get a few good closeup shots of the blooms to use as a potential thematic idea for domesticat, and I'd prefer not to have to wait another year.

Assuming the weather warms appropriately, I'll be doing a lot of work in the garden tomorrow afternoon. I need to prune our existing crepe myrtles and get a couple of the new ones planted. This will be entertaining—I've never been great at manhandling shovels and dirt, especially when packed Alabama red clay is concerned. Time to learn, it seems.If my life ever had a theme, I believe it would read thus: "Things need doing. Guess I'd better get to it, hm?"

Just when I thought I was done—just got an email from my mother. My dad's got to go in for some more tests on his eye. Apparently he's been having problems with blurred vision, and the doctor can't tell if it's an infection affecting his optic nerve or if he's had a minor stroke that is impairing his vision.

Day two. My back is counting the days until this is done. It is very unaccustomed to spending mornings shoveling rocks, and spends the rest of the day complaining about it.

Unfortunately I didn't do as much today as I would have liked. I am reminded of the adage to go easy at first before ramping up into serious work; I know this adage, so why did I forget it? Instead, I went at things full-tilt, as I always do.

I think we're all prepared for tomorrow's gardening extravaganza. The rototiller and various tools have been obtained. Due to the rain, we won't pick up the compost until tomorrow morning.

Sean promises this is going to be much easier than I think it's going to be. That's good, because I'm thoroughly dreading it.

Kat's mother confirms that she's going to try to get me some of Kat's grandfather's camellias from down in New Orleans. I love this—the thought of having a garden comprised of pieces that other people have loved and cared for makes me very happy indeed.

My first iris is blooming, close to the door. Dark purple and light purple; once my camera returns with Heather from D.C. I'll have to take pictures. Heather has my point-and-shoot while she's out in D.C., but, come to think of it, this kind of work would do better if I used my manual-everything Pentax anyhow.