I am poised to spend a significant amount of time socializing with not one, but two people that are not Ian, Jessica, Miles or a family member within the span of seven days. For me, this is a nearly unprecedented level of social flightiness!
This past weekend, Shena (Shena has a livejournal too!) came to visit. She read through and gave me the highlights of the awesome box of Blue Ribbon Digests I recently received in the mail, and was sometimes-frustratingly relaxed about what to “do” over the course of the weekend. We made it to Coney Island, a delightful Malaysian restaurant, a disturbingly Gene-less Burp Castle, and a night of drinking with Ian and Jessica (Jessica also has a livejournal!). It was good to see Shena, and to have new people to participate in super-familiar settings such as “Ian, Jessica and Chris drink in a L.E.S. dive bar” and “Chris and Miles discuss the news of the day”. Not to mention uniquely Shena-related activities, like Malay cuisine, comic strip gossip and an indulgent ear for discussions of old and obscure science fiction and comic book errata.
With Shena safely returned to the bucolic plains of Kansas, I have but a few days of workaday sameness before Liz (holy crap, who doesn’t have a livejournal these days?) arrives from the A-T-L. She will be engaging in some degree of Catskillery, but will still hopefully be on hand for a little celebration of our Flag and Country and Bootleg Fireworks and Charred Meat.
Plus — Explaining to Extended Family What Exactly a Degree in Media Studies is, Round 2! I need to remember to print out a few papers so everyone will realize that it isn’t just TV Guide Cheers & Jeers style reviews.
In camera phone news, behold these photographs!
It’s hard to see from this low-res picture, but this is a kicky, slightly trashy cocktail dress on display at a boutique just a few hundred feet from my home, with a crudely reproduced likeness of MF’in HONEST ABE LINCOLN on the hip. When I saw this, a single thought consumed me — I would adopt a daughter, and upon her reaching the flower of adulthood, she would be married wearing this dress. I am contacting the proper social services tomorrow.
Speaking of adoptions, my brother recently became caretaker to a Great Dane puppy named Mickey.
Mickey has reminded me of what it is like to have an actual dog around. Yes, my family has had Cassie around for over a decade, but she is a tame dog in her twilight; so long as you do not perch your food on top of her muzzle, she will not go after it. And she’s certainly not going to just randomly decided that it is time to eat your shoe.
Mickey is a dog. He is also about 95 pounds, able to reach pretty much every counter, table and shelf in my parents’ house. Oh yeah, and he’s still a puppy. If he can manage to put his mouth on something you leave lying around, odds are he will. This is a major adjustment. My father works in the shoe business. Since Cassie was a puppy, he has picked up sample slippers for Cassie to use as her ‘babies’; she devotedly totes them around with her, offers them as signs of devotion, arranges them around her bed. It is a familiar tradition around the house, one that makes you feel almost guilty about having Cassie spayed, until you remember her running out to meet you getting off the bus, wearing a menses-stained pair of Fruit of the Loom briefs. But regardless, Cassie’s babies are an adorable if spittle-flecked part of my parents’ household.
This is what happens when Mickey gets a hold of one of Cassie’s babies.
I guess we should be grateful it was not an actual baby dog.
