Stratovania

We drove down to Pennsylvania last weekend, and went to Hersheypark on Saturday, as we still had extra tickets that we bought in April. I think it was the next to last possible day we could use them. It was cold, especially for my toes, but still not AS cold as you'd expect for that time of year. We got there quite a bit later than we wanted to, as the valve came off one of my tires when I was trying to put air in it. Fortunately, we were still near my dad's house, and he and Margaret were able to take off the tire and bring it in to get it patched. After that, however, the tire pressure warning light on my dashboard stayed on, even though the air level was fine. I'd just gotten my car serviced, but I waived the suggestion to have the tires replaced, as it was expensive, and would probably take a lot of time as those tires are hard to come by. I brought it in again today to have that done. We probably should get a new car soon, as I've had this one since 2009, but that's a big decision. But anyway, we rode Wildcat's Revenge for the first time, as it was still under construction on our last visit.

It's a refurbished version of the wooden roller coaster Wildcat with steel parts added, like what they did with Twisted Colossus at Magic Mountain.

They still had the Christmas decorations, a little awkward to see after Christmas, but it's technically still Christmastide until Epiphany.

The Dry Gulch Railroad was lined with lights showing the gifts from the Twelve Days of Christmas.

Afterwards, we ate at the Cocoa Diner, which I guess is somewhat of a tradition now, mostly because it's open late and has a very recognizable name. I've never bothered to check whether cocoa is actually on the menu there.

On Sunday, we exchanged gifts with my family. My siblings and my brother's wife and son were over at my dad's in the afternoon, and we had lunch with them; and later we had dinner with my mom. I was pretty late getting some of the presents, as I'm a terrible procrastinator. That said, even if I'd bought them early, I'd probably still feel like I was doing last-minute shopping. I received copies of Lin Carter's Dragonrouge (the sequel to Kesrick), Mark S. Smith's The Early History of God, and of Super Mario Wonder. I suspect Beth would be better at that game than I would, but I'll give it a try. My sister also gave us a stuffed cat that wasn't originally intended as a gift, but her cat inexplicably hated it.

We showed it to Nellie, and she seemed pretty indifferent. We rang in the New Year at Beth's mom's house, which didn't involve that much ringing, but Nellie did have bells on her collar.


Last night, we went to see Spamalot, which was a present for me from Beth, along with the soundtrack album. As you probably know, it's Eric Idle's reworking of Monty Python and the Holy Grail into a just as meta-referential Broadway musical. From the little I've read, some of the other Python members were confused by the whole thing, and I know Neil Innes took issue with not getting royalties for the songs he wrote, "Knights of the Round Table," "Brave Sir Robin" and "Run Away" (the latter was cut from the movie, but is in the show). I'm not sure what the royalty situation was for the Finland song, which I understand Michael Palin wrote. I found it very enjoyable, although it seems like most of the best jokes were the ones everybody already knew from the film, and expanding on some of them didn't make them funnier. Some of the adaptations to a different medium worked, however, like the Holy Hand Grenade exposing the killer rabbit's puppeteer, the expanded cast of French stereotypes, and how the Holy Grail was found (which of course it wasn't in the original). It also worked in a lot of other classic Python references, which is understandable. The story was streamlined a bit, with some of the side characters becoming the knights (as opposed to just being played by the same actors). The main new character was the Lady of the Lake, presumably because there weren't any significant women in the movie, and she was played as a total diva. There were a few more topical references as well, including George Santos appearing in a list of famous Jewish people involved with Broadway.

Last weekend was our trip to Pennsylvania. The original plan was to drive to Pittsburgh on Friday, go to Kennywood on Saturday, and then to Knoebels on Sunday. The thing is, Knoebels was only open for four hours on Sunday. We'd checked it before, but got confused. So instead, we went to Knoebels on Friday, when it was also only open four hours, but late hours rather than early ones. It was also raining on and off all evening. Still, we managed to ride most of what we'd wanted to. It was the first time either of us had ridden a Roll-O-Plane, which they called the Satellite.

They've also installed a Rock-O-Plane, but they haven't trained the employees to operate it as of yet. This is something Beth has been looking into recently, and she told me that these and the Loop-O-Plane are three different kinds of old rides, but the Roll-O-Plane is sometimes called the Salt and Pepper Shakers. I'm not sure how that name makes sense, but I guess the "shake" part is accurate enough. We also rode the Flying Turns, which is sort of a combination wooden roller coaster and bobsled track. On the sled parts, it rides up pretty high on the sides. They had scales set up to make sure the cars balanced out properly. I forget which ride it was that made me feel a little queasy. Beth said the Impulse bothered her, but I was fine with that one. The Antique Cars had a special setup for Halloween, as did the Pioneer Train.

They call this time of year "Hallofun," and while I probably would have included the W, nobody asked me.


Kennywood is 125 years old this year, and has a few attractions that are billed as the last of their kind. The Turtle was closed, but we did ride the Kangaroo for the first time. The gimmick to it is that part of its cycle goes over a ramp to produce a hopping effect. It also makes springing noises.

Noah's Ark is a walkthrough that's also the last of its kind in operation, and we did the Halloween version that was entirely in the dark with people jumping out at you.

I felt they let us in too close to the people in front of us, so most of the scares were spoiled. On the other hand, we could follow their voices, so it was a mixed blessing. Ghostwood Estate is a haunted ride that doesn't only run during Phantom Fall Fest (their name for the Halloween season), where you're supposed to shoot at targets to scare off ghosts. I wasn't very good at it. There's a guy who guides you through it named Lord Kenneth Ghostwood, but did he have that name when he was still alive? There's a new ride called Spinvasion, which has an alien theme and cars that swing while the whole thing spins around.

We walked through two of the haunted attractions, the zombie-filled Kennyville Cemetery and Malice in Wonderland Unleashed. What we didn't get to do was ride the Auto Race, which broke down while we were in line.They had a lot of Halloween decorations, and these prizes at one of the games kind of reminded me of Dragon Quest.

I guess there's nothing particularly DQ-related about spherical creatures, but that's where my mind went.


I had originally wanted to drive maybe halfway home after this, but since it was an exhausting day, we instead stayed in Altoona and went most of the way on Sunday. We did stop on Saturday night at a place called Dean's Diner, after ruling out an understaffed Denny's and a closed Applebee's. I overheard a kid at the diner mention that there was a shooting in Indiana, which is where I went to college. We ate on Saturday afternoon at a cute restaurant called Fox's Diner, which served only breakfast on weekends.

And on Sunday, we had a meal at a surprisingly crowded Perkins. And I guess that's just about it for amusement parks this year, although we do still have tickets to Hersheypark.

On Thursday evening, we went to see Kevin Geeks Out at the Nitehawk Cinema in Park Slope. That one is more convenient to get to than the one in Williamsburg. Before the show, we got some food at Dog Day Afternoon, a nearby hot dog place. I had the kielbasa with mustard. Kevin Maher's co-host this time was Amber Dextrous, and the theme of the evening was dinosaurs. Kevin started by listing the various types of media stories involving dinosaurs, including the period piece, the period piece with liberties, time travel, dimensional travel, the lost world, and the dinosaur theme park. The liberties usually mean humans living alongside dinosaurs, The Flintstones being the obvious example, but there were plenty of old movies that did the same thing in a less intentionally comedic way. The example for dimensional travel was Land of the Lost, but I actually thought of the Super Mario Bros. Movie, which was addressed later on in the show. For theme parks, Kevin forwent the one everyone knows in favor of the Martin Short film Clifford. I forgot if there were any more categories; I guess dinosaurs on another planet could be one, but that's kind of just the lost world with space travel. Paleontologist Riley Black, who had consulted on the Jurassic Park franchise, did a remote segment discussing prehistoric animals. Corey S. Powell talked about whether dinosaurs and humans could be friends, bringing up Sleestaks, Barney, and Dino. And Chris Cummins had some thoughts on comics featuring dinosaurs, starting with a batshit crazy Chick Tract that I remember talking about before, and also bringing up how DC's Star Spangled War Heroes series eventually started using dinosaurs. He showed some of his favorite dinosaur-related panels, including Fred and Barney talking about participating in a genocide from the gritty Flintstones comic, and the Kool-Aid Man meeting the Purplesaurus Rex.

I'm kind of surprised he didn't include this Spider-Man one that I see a lot online.

The Kindest Cut was something called Pterodactyl Woman from Beverly Hills, with a medicine man turning Beverly D'Angelo into...well, you can figure that out from the title. They finished with a clip from the last episode of Dinosaurs, where Earl accidentally causes the Ice Age and extinction. I actually saw that one when it was new. Incidentally, they showed a few clips from Tammy and the T-Rex before the show, and I thought the dinosaurs from that movie looked similar to the ones from Dinosaurs. I don't think there's any real connection, but it was made during the run of the TV show.


On Saturday, we went to Six Flags Great Adventure. We used to go there kind of a lot, and even had season passes for a few years in the early 2000s, but it's been a while since our last visit. While we went to a lot of amusement parks last year, this wasn't one of them, even though it's fairly close. It's in central New Jersey, so it's about the same distance from where Beth grew up and where we live now. Fright Fest, their Halloween event, had already started, so there were a lot of appropriate decorations, and at night some employees walking around in costume, many of them dragging shovels along the pavement.

If nothing else, that's certainly a grating sound. Perhaps because it's so long before October, the park wasn't all that crowded, and most of the rides had pretty short lines. The longest wait we had was for Wonder Woman's Lasso of Truth, and that was more because of the way the ride works than because there were all that many people waiting; there's no way the lines can't move slowly for something like that.

It's a park that really focuses on roller coasters, and there are a lot of them there. We rode two that hadn't been there on our last visit, the Joker and the Jersey Devil Coaster. The former is one that not only goes along a track but also flips the cars around, while the latter has a narrow track that's quite twisty.

One weird thing about both of these is that they don't have anywhere to temporarily leave loose items while you ride, so Beth and I took turns on them. If the lines had been longer, I probably would have sprung for a locker. Skull Mountain, Nitro, Superman, and the Runaway Mine Train were all the same as they ever were, as far as I could tell.

Batman: The Ride is the same, but they got rid of a lot of stuff to see while waiting in line, and Alfred no longer does the ride announcements. We'd only been on the Dark Knight Coaster once before, but I remember it as having TV screens along the route, and they aren't there now.

Medusa was briefly rebranded as Bizarro, with a new paint job and some relevant decorations added along the track; but it was later restored to how it was before. I have no idea why the rebrand didn't stick, but I like the classic design better anyway. Presumably because it's right next to where the Joker is now, the small coaster Blackbeard's Train is now Harley Quinn's Crazy Train.

It's short, but they ran each load of passengers twice. I don't know if that's standard practice or just because there weren't many people in line. Kingda Ka and El Toro, which apparently both have a lot of problems, were both closed. We've ridden both before, but the former was having technical difficulties when it was new as well. The non-coaster rides we went on that I haven't mentioned yet were Houdini's Great Escape, the SkyScreamer, the Swashbuckler, Justice League: Battle for Metropolis, Cyborg Cyber Spin, the Big Wheel, the Carousel, and Parachute Training Center. I'd never been on the first one, although it's been there for a long time; I don't think I really noticed it before. The seats move up and down a bit, but most of the movement is illusionary, with parts of the room moving around. The SkyScreamer is like the standard swing ride, but goes up a lot higher; while the Swashbuckler is the kind of ride that pushes riders against the outside.

Battle for Metropolis is the kind of ride that's also a game, where you ride along a track and shoot at stuff on screens, with a story involving trying to rescue some captured members of the Justice League from the Joker and Lex Luthor. I don't think we'd been on any rides of this sort prior to this year, when we went on three (this, Toy Story Midway Mania at Disneyland, and Reese's Cupfusion at Hersheypark). By the way, Six Flags seems to have started doing candy promotion themselves in addition to the Looney Tunes and DC Comics stuff, with Mars as their sponsor.

Ferris wheels used to scare me despite being very tame rides, and I think the reason was that, due to the way they have to load, you're just stuck sitting up in the air for a while. Other rides go a lot higher, but don't stay there long enough for you to really absorb it. But the Giant Wheel didn't bother me this time. 


We don't see a lot of plays, but Beth was drawn in by an online ad for Death of a Salesman, so we saw it at the Hudson Theatre on Monday. She didn't really know anything about it, while I sort of did. I think it was something I was supposed to read in high school and didn't, but was able to gather the gist of it from class. Maybe I would have read it if I hadn't had so many other assignments at the same time. Or maybe I was just lazy. I don't know. Anyway, this production has Black actors playing the Loman family, with Wendell Pierce as Willy and Sharon D. Clarke as Linda, both reprising their roles from the recent London production.

Andre De Shields appears as Willy's rich brother Ben, who pretends to be wise but is really just full of crap, kind of like the Wiz.Its critique of measuring success through money and the American dream is still relevant today, although nowadays I'm pretty sure even a more successful traveling salesman wouldn't be able to afford a house in Brooklyn. Before the show, we ate at a nearby family style Italian place, which was quite good, and not that expensive when you consider that we were sharing the entree, baked ziti bolognese.

Okay, I guess that's all there is for now. It's supposed to get a little on the chilly side this weekend, but our building really cranks the heat up starting around the fall, so we'll probably still need fans and such.

Christmas is over now, even if traditionally there's more than a week of it left. I've noticed that some promotions using the idea of Twelve Days of Christmas use the twelve days BEFORE the twenty-fifth, rather than after. Last week, we went to Tavie's new apartment in the evening and watched a bunch of stuff, some of which I reviewed in my big Christmas media post. She gave me a 3D printed Tin Woodman in Return to Oz style.We went to Beth's mom's house on Thursday night after work, and that week we did our annual viewing of Home Alone. While I don't think either of us would consider that a great movie, it's not a hate-watch either. On Christmas Eve, Dorothea came over, and we watched Christmas Evil and Silent Night, Deadly Night. Beth and I had already seen those (twice in the former case), but Dorothea hadn't. It was surprisingly warm on Christmas Day, which was good in a way because I really don't like getting bundled up to go out, but it can't be good for the plants. Presents I received included a book of They Might Be Giants setlists, a guitar book of country songs, the games Legend of Legacy for DS and I Am Setsuna for Switch, a stuffed Buzzy Beetle and Boom Boom, two Mario T-shirts and a Wizard of Oz one, the Mountain Goats' Ghana, and Molly Crabapple's Drawing Blood.
Most of the stuff I bought for Beth hasn't arrived yet, but I did give her Yoshi's Crafted World, since she really liked Woolly World.

I've always been somewhat of a last-minute shopper, and since I don't know when I'll be able to give presents to my family, I'm delaying even more on those. I've also been trying to not use Amazon for everything, but that's kind of difficult. I mean, there have been albums I tried to buy directly from the band's or label's site, and they just directed me back to Amazon. Anyway, we're back in Brooklyn now.


I played the Toy Day event in Animal Crossing on Friday, which I don't think I'd done before in any version of the game. There's a reindeer named Jingle who shows up and asks you to deliver presents for him, and there's also a toy exchange between neighbors. I think I accidentally gave one of them the same present he gave me, but that's kind of difficult to avoid without a spreadsheet or something, and most of the gifts given are from among the same few toys anyway. I assume Toy Day is a way to acknowledge Christmas without dealing with the religious aspects. Even Santa doesn't actually appear, although Jingle says he works for him.

It must suck when your birthday is also your busiest day of the year.
You can get items from Nook Shopping related to a lot of holidays that aren't otherwise mentioned, including some exclusive to Japan. AC is a game that I kind of feel I should play at least a few times a week, and while that's good in a way, it also means there are a bunch of games that I want to play and still haven't. Last week, I tried to fight the Ice Vellumental in Paper Mario: The Origami King and got clobbered. I have more idea how to proceed next time I try, but those timed puzzles are way more frustrating than anything in AC. So far, I've found the Vellumental battles way harder than the ones with the Legion of Stationery. I've watched a few video game playthroughs online, and I can't help feeling a little guilty that I didn't just play them, even though some of them are difficult to come by and I don't think I'd be very good at them. But it's not like I'm trying to get credit for playing them, more to understand the world-building each game adds. Still, I wish I had more time and energy to devote to actually playing games.

I'm still taking guitar lessons, and Beth bought a book of Christmas songs for me a few weeks ago, and trying them out has been fun. The book includes some more recent stuff that I didn't try playing, including something from The Polar Express and another called "Text Me Merry Christmas," which sounds like a pretty low bar. I mean, I do that with some people, but I'm not trying to get with them. Apparently the song was co-written by the late Adam Schlesinger (continuing the tradition of Christmas songs by Jewish writers) and Kristen Bell sings on it, which makes it seem more legitimate than the title suggests. Beth also said that I should try Duolingo, so I've started with Greek, I guess mostly because I'm a fan of Greek mythology. Of course. classical Greek is different from modern Greek, but apparently not AS different as most languages are from their counterparts over 2000 years ago. But I do remember that the letter psi is the one that looks like a trident, the symbol of Poseidon; and the word for water is nero, like Nereids. I suppose there's no connection to the Roman Emperor of that name; I think "nero" in Latin might mean "black." Then again, in Revelation, the beast associated with Nero is said to have come out of the sea, so who knows? The Duolingo format is kind of weird, because it just jumps right in with translating sentences, admittedly very easy ones at first, but when I took languages in school they'd always start with the basics. There was no overview on verb conjugation, so when that's something I have to do, I often mess it up.

We've lived in Brooklyn for two Halloweens now, which means we weren't far from Tarrytown, which has a haunted association due to Washington Irving. He gave a valley about two miles from the town the name Sleepy Hollow, and set his tale of the Headless Horseman there. There are a lot of Halloween events there these days, and they sell out quickly. We finally got around to going up there this past weekend, bringing along our friend Stephanie. The two events we attended were Horseman's Hollow and the Great Jack O' Lantern Blaze. The first is a haunted trail that runs through several prop buildings. It's pretty high-budget as far as such things go. I would have liked it better if the people in front of us hadn't been bitching and moaning the entire time, but I think it's impossible to find one of these attractions where you DON'T hear someone either complaining or being snide. The Horseman showed up towards the end, and I think that is a real horse he's on.

The Blaze (not the Glenn Beck network, although I can't help thinking of it when I hear the name), in nearby Croton-on-Hudson, is really impressive.

In addition to plenty of individually carved pumpkins, there are large figures made primarily out of them, including a sea serpent, the Statue of Liberty, a grandfather clock, a circus train, the Pumpkin Zee Bridge (named and modeled after the nearby Tappan Zee Bridge, in case you didn't get it), and even a carousel. The pictures don't show how impressive these things were up close, but I took a lot of them anyway.






We were still using the air conditioner at night not too long ago, but we had to break out the comforter last night. Can't we get something in between for a while? It's usually warm in our apartment because of the heat, but they haven't turned it on yet. Right now, though, I'm using a fan; and I felt kind of hot in a long-sleeved shirt at work.

This past weekend was the thirty-sixth semi-annual Monster-Mania Convention in Cherry Hill. Okay, I think that number also counts the ones in Maryland, but still, it's been around for a while. Two of the main draws advertised on the program are John Cusack and Louise Fletcher, but neither of them did question-and-answer panels. While Beth did once get an autographed picture of Sid Haig some years ago, the lines and the cost are a bit of turn-off for meeting the guests. In retrospect, though, I do kind of wish I'd gotten something from Captain Lou Albano, what with my fascination for the Super Mario Bros. Super Show. Anyway, the first actor whose panel we did see was Kristy Swanson, who was in a whole bunch of stuff in the eighties, including Flowers in the Attic, Ferris Bueller's Day Off, and Wes Craven's story of human-robot friendship Deadly Friend.

She was also in the original Buffy the Vampire Slayer movie, which I did see, although I can't say I remember it very well. My sister rented it once. I never got into the Buffy television show, which was apparently not much like the movie, although I know a lot of people who loved it. After her came Ted White, who played Jason Voorhees in Friday the 13th Part 4; and Kane Hodder, who played the role in the seventh through tenth films.

C.J. Graham, Jason from Part 6, was supposed to be there but was stuck at an in-costume autograph session. White is ninety-one years old, and used to double for John Wayne. The twins from The Shining made a return appearance, along with the guy who played Danny, who is now a college professor.

The last time the twins were there, they only gave very brief answers, but it seems like they stepped up their game a bit. They're still about as English as it's possible to be, though. The next panel had Kane Hodder return with Adam Green, not the guy from the Moldy Peaches, but the creator of the Hatchet films that star Kane as serial killer Victor Crowley.

That's not Kane, just some Victor Crowley cosplay.
He had also made a movie called Frozen some time before the much more famous film of that name came out.

The reunion for The Karate Kid had Ralph Macchio, William Zabka, and Martin Kove.

That wasn't a horror movie, of course, but sometimes stars of other films manage to sneak in (not literally), and I generally don't mind. I'm still not sure what the big deal was about Boondock Saints, though. Oh, well. The most crowded panel we attended had three of the stars of Stranger Things, and while Beth watched the first season of that, I only saw the first episode.

I feel kind of bad that the room cleared out quite a bit after that session when there was another one after it for John Carpenter's The Thing.

Wilford Brimley was there, but I'm actually not sure where he was sitting; he wasn't behind the table with the others. It's weird how people of later generations often know actors for things other than their acting; I've seen The Thing, but Brimley is probably always going to be the Quaker Oats guy in my mind, sort of like how I knew Jane Fonda had exercise tapes before I'd heard anything about her having acted. The last panel ended an hour earlier than usual, so we had more time to get to Friendly's for dinner, as we pretty much always do. They have the all-you-can-eat shrimp again, and while it wasn't as good that night as it sometimes is, I still enjoyed it.

So what else? There's supposed to be a snowstorm tomorrow, even though it was warm several days last week. From what I've heard, work is still going to be open, but it sounds like the subways won't be running, so I might have to take the day off anyway. I guess I'll see for sure in the morning. I'm never quite sure how I'm supposed to prepare for snow, but we have enough toilet paper and don't drink milk. Well, okay, Beth takes Half and Half in her coffee, and that's similar. And we watched Star Trek VI tonight, so a review should be forthcoming. Also in the works are somewhat new looks at aging in Oz, Toad from the Super Mario Bros. games, and the newest Magnetic Fields album. I wonder if anyone will read them.

We actually had something to do on both Saturday and Sunday, which is kind of unusual. On Saturday, I had to go to Flushing Meadows to take a civil service test for Paralegal Aide positions. I'm not sure how well I did, as it seemed a little more difficult than most such tests. Afterwards, I met up with Beth to visit the Queens Botanical Garden, which is really quite small, and a lot of the gardens were closed for winter anyway.

Not that it felt like winter; I found myself carrying my jacket because it was too warm while wearing it. As much as I like being able to go outside without a jacket, it does make me concerned for the future. Like, are we all going to burn to death next summer? We'll all take turns; I'll get mine too.

Regardless of the unseasonable warmth, not too much was in bloom, but there were a few roses still intact.

After the gardens, we visited the old site of the 1939 and 1964 World's Fairs at Corona Park. They Might Be Giants filmed their video for "Don't Let's Start" at the New York State Pavilion from the '64 fair, which is still there, but you can't go in it anymore.

Well, at least you couldn't when we were there.

It looked like they were doing renovations, which means they probably got rid of that chipped-up map.

Both Johns from TMBG visited the fair when it was a going concern, as did my dad and Beth's mom. All my mother-in-law will say about it is how uncomfortable her shoes were, though. Right near there is the Queens Museum, which had an exhibit about both fairs.

It's pretty fascinating, largely because I don't think they would ever have anything like that these days. I mean, nations and corporations getting together to present an optimistic view of the future? Who'd put money into that in our current climate? I guess Epcot Center preserves a lot of the feel. It's interesting that they still have the Omnisphere and some other stuff fifty years later.

I compared some maps of the fairgrounds to what's there now, and apparently there's a skate park where the Astral Fountain used to be. There's a message in that, but I'm not totally sure what it is. Another exhibit at the museum showcased the work of Zhang Hongtu, a Chinese artist who moved to New York in 1982. His art combines Chinese themes and criticism of the hypocrisy involved in Chinese communism.

We ate that evening at Kane's Flushing Diner, which wins points with me because they had free refills on soda and gave us garlic bread before the meal.

Yesterday was our friend Stephanie's annual holiday party. She knows a lot of people, so there were quite a few guests there we didn't know, but a few we did. It was held at a bar in Park Slope that has both indoor and outdoor parts, but due to the unseasonable warmth, we mostly stayed outside. It did get a little chillier after an hour or so, but never that bad. We won a few prizes for answering trivia questions.

I had a dream a few nights ago that John Flansbugh of TMBG and his wife Robin Goldwasser were my neighbors, but I was too nervous to speak to them. Not that I usually talk to my neighbors anyway, but I have to suspect that would be really awkward, especially if I ever wanted to listen to any of their music. Not to mention that I've heard quite a bit about TMBG fans who really didn't respect the band members' boundaries. Still, it's not like I've ever had even remotely famous neighbors in the past. Well, okay, the woman who lived across the street and dated my dad for a while wrote some children's books that are fairly well-regarded, so maybe that counts. The dream I can remember from last night involved my being asked to go to school (I guess it was high school) in the middle of the night to test some software. It turned out there were a whole bunch of people there and I had to wait in line. And even though I came alone, Beth and Tavie also showed up for some reason, as did our cats.

Our cat Reagan seems to be under the weather, and I don't mean that literally, although with all the snow we've been having recently that would also be pretty bad. No, when bethje and I were in bed on Sunday morning, we heard a cat repeatedly throwing up, and assumed it was Wally because he has a habit of eating too fast and vomiting. Wally seemed all right, though, while Rea was hiding. She came out later in the day, but was lethargic and wouldn't eat, and we're talking about a cat who's pretty much always hungry. She went back to becoming active in the next few days, but still wouldn't eat, even when we put food she normally likes right in front of her nose. She'd just sniff at it and turn away. We took her to the vet last night, and she couldn't see anything obviously wrong, but did take some bloodwork and give Rea an antibiotic. This was quite expensive; they really need to expand Obamacare to cover cats. The vet also gave us some high-calorie cat food with a consistency like pudding, and Rea ate a little of that, but not too much. We'll have to wait until Friday for the results of the bloodwork, but I hope she gets better soon!

I'm supposed to work tomorrow evening, but with the weather as it's been I'm not sure I'll be able to. I guess we'll see what happens. I don't think I can be disciplined for calling out when there's a state of emergency, even though the store never closes for them.

I just remembered this morning that today is the Megaworm's birthday. The Megaworm is something my dad came up with when I was a kid, and for some reason I decided its birthday was on 13 February. I also decided Winnie-the-Pooh's father was a giant bear named Beartish who lived on the Sun. The imagination of a child can be a strange thing.

It's strange how non-motivating having a lot of free time really is. It's basically what I longed for when I was working, but it's not all it's cracked up to be. I can use the heat as an excuse for not getting anything done, but that only goes so far. It is pretty bad, though, especially living in the upstairs part of a house as we do. And when I say I'm not accomplishing much, that counts things I'm doing just for fun. So what have I been doing? Aside from sweating, I've done some reading and played some video games. I'm still playing Sims 3, although I'm thinking I could use another expansion pack. Unfortunately, those cost money. So do the new Oz books put out by Tails of the Cowardly Lion and Friends. There was recently a Royal Podcast of Oz with Chris Dulabone, founder of the publishing house, which was pretty interesting. While the quality of the books they release varies, I appreciate Chris's desire to put out Oz books by many different hands. I can also identify with his desire for at least a basic continuity between them. And hey, I liked Bucketheads in Oz, although I agree that the sheer number of characters means some get pushed into the background.

On Wednesday, bethje and I celebrated Independence Day by going with some friends to an Indian restaurant. Makes sense, right? I will mention that, even though I asked for mild food, what I had was still a little too much on the hot side for me. I'm not really that familiar with Indian food as a whole, but I do like naan. Maybe next time I should just get a lot of that. {g} After dinner, Beth and I took a train to Hoboken to see the fireworks, but ended up not having a very good view. Oh, well. By the way, the Fourth was also the 150th anniversary of Lewis Carroll first telling the story that would become Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.

Last night, I finally got around to watching the newest Futurama episode, "The Thief of Baghead." In this one, Bender becomes a paparazzo, which is something Homer Simpson has also done before. That said, while that part of the premise might have been totally non-futuristic, the stuff with Langdon Cobb definitely was. I've found that the weaker episodes of the show are the ones that don't really use the science fiction theme in their plots, and I know I'm not the only one who thinks that, so the plot device of Cobb being a quantum lichen was appreciated. Also to the episode's credit, Bender being the last person to still use film and Cobb's fungal guard dog became significant later on. For what it's worth, I have a feeling we haven't seen the last of Calculon. If nothing else, I suppose he can load his brain into another body. So yeah, a pretty good episode.

Hello, readers. At the time I'm writing this, it's 2:34 PM on a Sunday. I have to leave for work in half an hour, I can't stop coughing, it's raining, and the power refuses to stay on. What an auspicious beginning to the day. Anyway, bethje and I had originally planned to go to Ocean City yesterday evening, but it was raining then too, and by the time it had abated it was already night. So instead we walked on the Boardwalk at Atlantic City. I wish I could think of things we could do as a couple that didn't involve wearing out my legs by walking, but I'm rather incompetent in that respect. What do the rest of you attached people do for fun together (aside from sex)?

I keep having dreams where I really want to play video games, and that kind of carries over into my waking life. I have several games that I've started, and some others I haven't even checked out yet. I guess I'm sort of waiting for my Certified Archivist test to be over, even though it isn't like I'm spending every free moment I have studying. I've done some studying, but it's really hard to tell what's important information from the sources I have. Also, I feel like I shouldn't get started on a game until I'm finished catching up on the Internet. No beer until you finish your tequila!

Speaking of Futurama, here's a review of the most recent episode:

Futurama: Fry Am the Egg Man - The part of this one with Fry hatching an egg was kind of amusing, but mostly struck me as not too original. Even the Futurama wiki mentions the similarity to the Simpsons episode "Bart the Mother," with Bart taking care of orphaned eggs only to find out that they were actually monsters, but he wanted to protect them anyway. I think that's part of why this episode had a "been done before" feeling. That said, I liked the beginning with the bizarre menu items at Fishy Joe's and the trip to the farmers' market, and I feel it picked up again once it reached the Scotland-like planet of Doohan 6. By the way, can anyone who's played Dungeons & Dragons tell me whether there's any significance to the Monster Manual identifying a Bone Vampire as a Type J, which Amy immediately understands but no one else seems to? A quick Google search revealed mentions of Type J treasures and poison in D&D, but not monsters.

I guess that's about it. I have a feeling, however, that as soon as I get to work, I'll think of something else I wish I'd included in the post. I guess I can always write another one.