A new mural is going up on the wall of a running-supplies store I pass on my way to work. It's going up very slowly, which may have something to do with the fact that it never stops raining omg. So for about a week there was only a parchment-looking background, and then for a while there were three pairs of roughly outlined running legs. Then some of the musculature was roughed in, and then running shorts were added (allowing us to tell that the runners were two men and one woman).

And then one day one of the legs had been painted out and a prosthesis had been added instead.

A recent conversation reminded me of a strange pattern in my friendships, which I'll discuss further under the cut. But first, a poll:

Edited to add: When I say "an addiction," I mean other than tobacco.



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So suppose you could do anything you liked, anything at all, and know that you couldn't do harm to anyone, including yourself, or suffer any negative consequences. (Think of it as a personal reset button, if you like.)

What would you do?




This question went around my old job for a while, and I was always very surprised at the answers I got. The Tech Goddess said, "It would involve a police car and a mall with a big glass window." The spouse said, "LSD."

Me myself, I don't have a lot of violent desires that I'm aware of, and I dream so vividly that the idea of an acid trip bores me, and I already drive as if I lived in a virtual world. Give me a reset button and I'd have a lot of sex, with a lot of variety in the areas of gender and number, and I would do a lot of nonviolent looting.

Maybe I'd throw some watermelons off of freeway overpasses.



Now: what would your favorite characters do?

(Yes, I'm bored; how did you guess?)

This morning at the gym I was reading a Bill Buford New Yorker article about chocolate. (I don't know how I'd ever keep up with the New Yorker if I couldn't read it on the elliptical machine.) Buford interviews chocolatier Frederick Schilling, and Schilling takes him to Bahia to meet cacao farmer Diego Badaró.

Cast of characters: Schilling comes across as feverishly intense and kind of a nutcase; Badaró never uses a full sentence when one word will do, drives scary fast, and gives me a sort of Ronon vibe. Schilling's not bad looking, in a semi-shaven slacker sort of way, and Badaró is flat-out hot. (You can see a not-great photo of them here; the one in the issue was more of a close-up.) I have no idea what Buford looks like, which is probably a mercy.

Anyhow, the more time we spend on the cacao plantation, the more personal and physical the prose gets. (This may be because Buford is doing stuff like chewing toxic wild tobacco leaves and eating cacao beans in large quantities while Badaró says, "It will make you alert," and I'm picturing him smirking the way Ronon does when the crazy Milky Way people put things in their mouths without asking questions about them.)

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You know what somebody ought to invent? A commuter train (or, better yet, bus) with a gym in it. Get on, work out, take a shower, get off at work.

You know what else somebody ought to invent? A way to recapture the energy people put out while working out. That way, the commuter bus could run on human effort instead of gasoline!

And maybe then somebody could install an energy-capture elliptical machine in my living room, and tell me I couldn't use the computer till I'd generated enough energy to run it.

I've finished going through my aunt's books. Here's a statistical breakdown:

Total books: 46
Titles containing the word 'fire': 6
Titles containing weather words ('wind,' 'storm,' and so on): 7
Title that covers both bases: Winds of Fury, Winds of Fire
Titles containing the name of a British estate: 5
Silliest estate name: Wyndespelle
Titles consisting only of a woman's first name: 8
Chances that the author's name will be even more overwrought than the heroine's: about 50/50
Most overwrought author names: Gimone, Ariadne, Aola

There should be Romance Novel Cover Bingo.

Cleavage would be in the Free spot, of course, since even if you open the book and find the heroine lamenting her flat-chestedness, on the cover she'll always be courting lower-back pain.

Castle ... ship ... horse ... full moon ... cloak ... Stonehenge ... flames ... Bingo!

Now I've finished listing the books, and caught up on all the reading I missed while I had the Russian death cold, and I'm bored. Almost bored enough to read gen. Almost bored enough to go to bed early. Almost bored enough to write, even. But not quite.

Today I saw a guy trying to pull-start a gas-powered leaf-blower, while talking on a cell phone. "What are you doing?" "Trying to start this leaf-blower. What are you doing?" "Running over a blind pedestrian."

Also, randomly, it occurred to me while driving today that we've got a recognizable one-handed sign for "Fuck you," but none for either "Thank you" or "I'm sorry." Tells you something about us.

Typo hall of fame: Self-pimposed.

Also, in my search for good tofu dishes, I discovered ( that this is heaven. )

I like to read the Wanted To Buy/Trade section of the classifieds, because it's full of stories. (One time I saw a guy who had a used snowblower and wanted to trade it for a Rottweiler.)

This morning I found this ad:

Wanted: Verbal Advantage or other vocabulary blinding systems.

Today's best spam "From" name: Herkenratt.

I'm going to be saying that all day long. Herkenratt. It sounds like a cat hacking up a hairball. It would make a terrific oath. "Herkenratt!" she cries as she stubs her toe on the piano leg again.

(German-speakers? Does it actually mean anything funny? Or does it just sound funny in English?)

Week's best spam subject line: "Do you love me?"

laurakaye: Just what we need. Codependant spammers.
resonant: Needy spammers! As if I don't have enough demands on me as it is!
julad: neurotic spammers with low self esteem
Julad: this place is going down to hell, i tell you
LauraKaye: Herbal viagra! Make millions at home! All I do is give and give! What about MY needs?
LauraKaye: The least you could do is look at my webcam!