OK, so rather than sitting on a 747-400 right now, I'm sitting in Logan's terminal E, where I'm still a good two hours from boarding. Apparently, somewhere between Amsterdam, D.C., and London, there was a problem. So our getting to the airport nice and early, while a worthy plan, came back to bite us on the collective ass.

One could have presaged this from the cab ride to the airport, where the cab went no more than 20 feet from my building's front door before getting a flat tire. A second cab arrived in short order, but if you're into omens, it was an auspicious start. Did I mention that Sarah broke a mirror yesterday,too?

The good news? I found my tie. It was on the shelf in our closet, put up with some other clothes.

In any case, here's what I can tell you about our adventure so far:

* Duty free stores are kind of scary, like all the vices rolled into one. Multi-carton packs of smokes, big bottles of booze, five kilo Toblerones. And just in case you drink/eat/puff yourself into incontinence, you have the half-gallon sizes of perfume to cover up.

* The E terminal at Logan is the international terminal, and it sucks. It's just old enough to look shabby, is kind of dour, and has little by way of distractions (outside of this lone public access terminal). I get this feeling that a sister airport terminal opened in Prague in 1983 and was hailed as a Historic Achievement in Socialist Aviation.

The E terminal is Logan's answer to Foxboro Stadium.

* I think I've found the last Hudson News in North America that carries Games magazine. The article this month is about some family known for their flogging of novelties, like chattering teeth and huge sunglasses. Wow.

* I think I'm over my concern regarding the big plane. Now I'm just concerned about our big plane.

* We did get a food voucher, which for the E terminal means you're getting Au Bon Pain, Sbarro, McDonalds, or Wok and Roll. And, because the 4 of us got one voucher for the group, we all had to eat at the same place. We decided on Wok and Roll, and I've had dry mouth ever since. OK going down, but apparently all the MSG that the other Chinese places aren't using wound up here.

* The CNN Airport Network is showing the Niners-Cardinals game, which promised to only add to the tedium but has kept reasonably close. I do wish I'd gotten a chance to see the entire Fins-Vikes game. Saw the opening drive and figured Miami was en route to a big day. Wonder if our London hosts have sattelite TV, and if they get ESPN...

* The security procedures went fine. For all the hullaballoo, it's not that much of a bother. Unless you wear Rockport shoes, which have a steel shank in the sole. You have to wonder how many people will go barefoot in airports before the Rockport people go with something else.

Not much more to say about the terminal or the trip so far, unless I can find some way to further describe what's been pretty damn dull so far. Maybe I'll try to take a nap or something.

We're heading out for the airport (or, more correctly, the shuttle bus to the airport) in a few hours. This would be exciting except for one thing.

I've lost my tie.

The suit I'm wearing for the wedding is green, and I have a green tie that I bought with the suit. I took the tie yesterday and, so I think, put it over a door handle to give it a chance to hang for a while. That's the last time I saw it.

I know, I can get another tie, but it's the principle of the thing. Just as you don't walk away from a slow elevator because you don't want to let it win, I don't want to give up on the tie. I have a feeling that it was stuffed in a corner somewhere during a fit of cleaning (not by me!), and won't turn up until April sometime.

Anyway, this will probably be that last post for the year, so best wishes for the holidays. And if the holidays don't cheer you up, at least science has cleared up this grave danger to humanity.

I started with a larger post about each of the suggested designs for the new World Trade Center. I ditched that for a more general overview. Blogger ate that (note to self: talk to Boggie about moving to Moveable Type when I get back). So, my basic three statements about the plans.

1. I don't know if I'm crazy about building another really tall building. It's like the people who live on the Cape that rebuild their houses on the shore line after their old house falls into the sea due to coastal erosion. Nice to get back on the horse and all, but obstinancy has its down side, too. I suppose I'm OK with tall, but the 2100 foot tower that one of the proposals has seems a little much.

2. What's with all the bends and angles and crap? I suppose it's the thing now to create highly non-linear buildings, but in some cases the resulting design looks like something Frank Gehry drew to pay a bar tab. I tend to favor the more conservative plans. Boggie had mentioned being in favor of the one with the "kissing" towers, and I suppose if you have to go with something po-mo (or are we on po-po-mo?) this plan would be the least objectionable. I won't even go into the problems I have with THINK's World Cultural Center.

3. The general plans for memorials and public space are good, but I'm a little leery of the "sky gardens" and other crap on the top of towers. THINK has a "sky park" that's on top of some lower buildings, which seems fine, but I don't know if we need hanging plants at 1200 feet or whatever. I also tend to like the plans that leave the old building footprints open.

From looking at the designs, I'd actually like to take parts I like best from 2 or 3 of them to make one plan, but the resulting architectural goulash would be unsightly at best. I suppose that's why I'm not an architect. That and the can't draw thing.

It may not seem possible, but MTV is further limiting the videos it plays. Apparently, they'll be focusing on clips by big artists with proven drawing power, with some room left over for developing acts. Or, as they're known nowadays, groups who'll be playing the state fairs six months from now.

In large part this is a move by MTV to shore up its viewership base. Rather than serve the music industry by making stars, MTV is putting the onus back on the industry and artists to prove that they're worthy of heavy rotation. Probably a sound business decision, but one that further means the world of popular culture will be dictated by 14 year olds. Then again, that's probably always been the case.

Remember when MTV showed genres of music? When you could watch showcases like the Headbangers' Ball and 120 Minutes? Unless you're part of the readership here that's over 25, probably not (and even then, diversified programming on MTV may be a hazy recollection from your childhood).

In some ways this doesn't matter, as the proliferation of MTV and VH-1 channels provides an outlet for different styles. But it's hard not to lament the old days, when there was some mystery as to what video would get played next. Whittling down the rotation to a number I can count on my fingers and toes takes some of the fun out of things.

In a related note, if you can catch the episode of Frontline called The Merchants of Cool, do so.

One of the things I love about Amazon.com is how it recommends everything about a given subject if you do anything that suggests an interest in it. For example: I just added The Art of the Steal by Frank Abagnale (the Catch Me If You Can guy) to my Recent Reads list on Amazon (which should be linked over on the left if I've not screwed that up).

I now get recommendations for every book written about scams, frauds, protecting your identity, and so on.

You can imagine how the page looks after writing questions. The suggestions after researching a bonus part on Kim Catrall's book about female orgasms was, well, let's just say educational.

So I'm going to England on Saturday, and you know what my biggest concern is? That the plane is too big.

We'll be going to Blighty in a 747, a plane which has serviced trans-Atlantic routes for decades, never mind all the work 747s do around the Pacific Rim. The 747 is a popular plane, with millions of miles behind it, all culminating in the flight I'll be on.

But I'm sitting in row SIXTY-ONE. I've never been on a plane with more than, say 35 rows. I'm sitting in what amounts to a plane tacked on to the back of another plane. As I've been saying to people the last few days, it's going to be like flying an office building.

From talking to Sarah, you don't really even notice the flight as you're going, the size of the plane apparently negating the usual bumps. She did say that you spend a lot of time at an angle on take off, given how long it takes for the plane to get to altitude.

I'll take her word for it, but I have the final scene of Say Anything... running through my head, where Lloyd and Diane are sitting tight, waiting for the seat belt sign to dim, the final signal that everything's going to be OK. I suppose I can make do with that.

One of the features of the flight that I didn't know about before doing some looking around is that there's a map (either in the cabin or available on the seat-back monitors) that shows the plane's position in real time. This has two possible negative applications:

1. It may reinforce the idea that it's a really long flight. I don't think I'm going to look forward to spending some time in a book, looking up, and then seeing that, hey, we're still over water.

2. The reminder that we will, for large chunks of the flight, be over water. I've never flown for a significant chunk of time over the wet stuff, mostly just skirting the coast or going over or near a Great Lake. I've had a mental dialog going about which emergency landing would be worse, but have come to the conclusion that it probably doesn't matter. I do have bad visions of me manning a life raft in the north Atlantic, though. In mentioning this conflict, one of my RAs noted that she's heard that drowning is a very peaceful way to go.

I've already decided how I'm going to sabotage her performance evaluation.

Really, I'm not that nervous about this, but rather have some anxiety based on it being a new thing. I don't do many new things anymore, given that most new things would either be physically painful, embarrassing, or both. This is an exception, and outside of my combination of awe and fear at the combination of weight, speed, and height involved, am pretty excited for my first European excursion.

In other news, I am happy to see that at least two of my fellow bloggers have endorsed the idea of me taking over the Boston archdiocese. Then again, both are Lutherans (I think; one I'm pretty sure about, the other is a putative Lutheran, given his ethnic background suggesting it as the most likely choice), so the Vatican may not be sold yet.

My fantasy football season is over. Thanks to the 4 TD day from Clinton Portis, I am currently 30 points behind, with my opponent still having one player to go. I suppose Troy Brown probably won't turn the ball over 15 times, or become an emergency kicker and shank several extra points. Suffice it to say Oakland picked a bad day (for both of us) to have their offense turn in an average performance. Then again, I took Miami to win in all the pick 'em games I'm in. Had I been smart enough to play my backup, Brad Johnson... I'd actually be something like 32 points behind. Even with my best possible combination, I'd still be down something like 20 points. Sometimes, a loss is just a loss.

I suppose the only thing I can say about Carson Palmer winning the Heisman is meh. I'll agree with Cooch that Ken Dorsey finishing fifth is silly. Two words explain this turn of events: Gino Torretta. A Miami QB, led team to national title, won a lot of games, completely tanked in the NFL. All sounds pretty similar up to the NFL part, and you have to think that some voters (considering how many of them apparently don't cover football) made a connection that doesn't hold up.

The guy I feel worst for is Larry Johnson, the latest 2000 yard back to not win. It probably didn't help that the schedule included games against the likes of Central Florida and Louisiana Tech, or that he had less than 100 yards in Penn State losses. But still, you average 8 yards a carry, put in 20 TDs, and you finish third?

The Bruce has told us Sox fans to be happy about Jeremy Giambi, and to be honest I'll be happy about anyone not named Tony Clark. (though I'm sure I'll miss Tony the Tiger's defense when the other Giambi boots his first grounder). I also feel badly that this may be the move that sends Brian Daubach packing.

Unrelated to all of this, I pulled number 50, the next to last position, in the student affairs Yankee swap today. That's good, in that I get the next to last pick. What was bad was that there weren't any gifts left. Turns out that one of the participants had to leave early, planning to return it seems, but didn't. I was saved by someone who split their gift, giving me two of the Harry Potter books. As I already have them, I turned the books into a 27 piece tool kit. I now own a hammer, ready to nail more sneakers to boards.

So Bernard Cardinal Law is out as head of the Boston archdiocese. In for the moment is Bishop Richard Lennon, who was serving as rector of St. John's Seminary. The open question is who should get the job permanently. I have an idea.

Me.

I am Catholic, male, of Irish descent (not required but it helps around here), and a life-long resident of the area. I'm a genial yet no-nonsense administrator, maybe not so good with keeping my desk clear, but probably better at Law than seeing how having priests around who like to fondle kids could be a problem.

Admittedly, I'd be a non-traditional choice. I'm not a priest, monk, friar, or other clerical person. I am engaged to be married, and don't intend on changing those plans. I suppose that would preclude me from getting some sort of instant ordination (like they did way back when), but I'd be OK running the show without the title.

Heck, I'd even be happy splitting the job with Bishop Lennon. He can handle all the stuff I wouldn't be able to do, like say Mass, confer sacraments, etc., while I can take care of the other stuff.

To wit, the order of business when I get the job starts with these three things:

1. Settle all lawsuits. Should have done this before. It'll cost, but it would cost less than actually going to court or filing for bankruptcy (including cost to public opinion, prestige, etc.). The longer the media circus goes on, the less chance you have to start anew. I think of it as the penance required for decades of negligence.

2. Start getting people back on board. Not surprisingly, abuse charges have a way of driving people away. Work needs to be done to bring folks back into the fold. Getting out to talk to parishes, lay groups like Voice of the Faithful, and classes at Catholic schools would be one way to give parishoners a chance to address their fears in small groups with people who can effect change. Part in parcel of this would be verifying that the new policy regarding priests and abuse is solid.

3. Allow parishoners to stand during the Eucharist. When we were going to St. Ignatius over the summer of 2001, the parish allowed for either kneeling or standing during the Eucharist, noting that standing was consistent with early practice. I don't know if that's a diocese-wide policy, but if it isn't I'm making it so. Wouldn't be required (you could still kneel if you want to), but the way I look at it, standing simplifies the Mass by taking out one of the options. You either sit or stand. Also, at a time when there's a very modern scandal going about, it couldn't hurt to get back to some of the early traditions. Especially if they're this easy to initiate.

There are a number of issues I didn't touch on here, from priestly celibacy to abortion to ordination of women to the return to conservatism under John Paull II. I'm saving those for when I run for Pope.

I learned via the mailbox today that Lance Armstrong was named this year's Sports Illustrated Sportsman of the Year. Fortiuitous timing, considering I just finished It's Not About the Bike, Armstrong's autobiography written just after his first Tour de France win.

You'd have thought that Armstrong would have won already. Heck, Greg LeMond only had to win two Tours to gain the honor, and he only had to overcome a hunting accident. Double your wins and God knows how many times you have to multiply to equal Armstrong's cancer, and he should get something else, too.

I have mixed feelings about the book. It was detailed where it had to be, more vague in other places. We got the message that Lance has no time for his real or adoptive fathers, is as devoted to his mom as she is to him, and has a wife who he continuously calls a "stud." He also mentions that the cancerous testicle that started it all was the size of an orange when removed. Ouch!

The inspiration of Armstrong's story, from his childhood to his win over cancer, is palpable. But there's still something about the book that rubbed me the wrong way, and I can't quite put my finger on it. It may be that I wanted more about his fight against cancer, or more about pro cycling. It could be that he's still a bit cocky, and it doesn't sit right. It could be that I know more about his wife and what they went through to have a child than I wanted to.

But, in the end, I think I still have the same level of admiration for Armstrong now than before the book. Certainly, I've enjoyed watching him blow away the competition in the Tour every year. So good for Lance.

From the mailbag...

Chris Rosenberg notes that, when talking about ridiculous holiday parades, you'd have to include Philly's own Mummers parade on New Years. Consider that when Penn State played in the Fiesta Bowl for the national title some time back, the game was pre-empted for parade coverage.

On the Kikkoman front, Dwight passes along more scary Japanese-themed animation that you can check out here.

Finally, in linguistic news, Matt Boggie passes along the German word Wannefreude, meaning "fallen joy." Trust the Germans.

I was in the back room earlier tonight goofing off on the computer when I heard what sounded like a student in some sort of vocal distress. Or a child being smothered by hot asphalt. Or some sort of youngish animal being mauled by a jackal.

Turns out it was only Avril Lavigne performing at the Billboard Music Awards.

The three minutes or so that I was subjected to before walking out to the living room and shutting the TV off showcased perhaps the most inaudible musical performance I've ever witnessed. This includes nursery school graduations, drunken renditions of the BU fight song, and my own mocking of a variety of current musical faves.

It was enough to make one wish that someone would fire up her CD so Avril could mouth along. I'd take one more faked live performance over the earwax-curdling display that actually aired. One can only imagine the suits at Fox recoiling in horror, trying to gin up a technical difficulty so they could end the nightmare.

Lavigne was up for a couple awards, but women not named Ashanti fared poorly. Not surprising considering Ashanti apparently appeared on every R&B, hip hop, pop, rock, metal, country, adult contemporary, new age, gospel, Latin, jazz, Dixieland, zydeco, a capella, electronica, house, club, thrash, acid, trip-hop, folk, and easy listening single released in the past year.

On top of it all, Cher got some sort of career artistic achievement award. Still not sure if it was for music or the sculpting done to her face.

A few more pieces of mental detrius for you.

I want the tote bag with a picture of the umbrella So we're watching what's probably the five millionth broadcast of Fleetwood Mac's "The Dance" reunion concert on one of the PBS stations here (which tells you just how little is on TV tonight), and the shill hosting the pledge drive starts off her patter about giving us the programming we want by saying something along the lines of "we've heard you, and know that you like concerts."

Funny thing is, the only time they show them is during pledge months. Luckily for them, it seems like 10 of the 12 months of the year are pledge periods. Personally, I'm not giving them one thin dime until they fill a pledge month with science and history programs (The American Experience and the like, not Ken Burns' home movies).

Neologians wanted! In an email exchange, I was given a question: shouldn't there be a word for that feeling you get you find out that the woman you're just getting interested in reveals that she's got a boyfriend?

(I assume this works for all the various couplings, but left it in the original phrasing)

My suggestion was "oohh," as in "oh," but it's doubly disappointing. It's not bad, but may be a little on the nose.

So, I'm putting out there to all of you to come up with something. Drop me an email with suggestions, and we'll parade the suggestions out here.

Turn out the lights, the party's over... Roone Arledge, the man who created Monday Night Football, helmed 10 Olympics for ABC, and led their news division to new heights, passed away today at 71. Sports Illustrated once listed him third, behind Muhammed Ali and Michael Jordan, in a list of the 40 most important people in sports over the magazine's first 40 years. Life tagged him as one of the 100 most important Americans of the 20th century.

As sad as any one passing is, what makes this even worse is that the type of sports and news coverage he pioneered is out of favor, replaced by shallow commentary, flashy and pointless graphics, and softball, soft-light coverage that sucks drama and emotion out of even the most inspiring story. Just when we needed Roone Arledge the most, he's gone.

It's the blog equivalent of a clip show - the enumeration of random thoughts.

MedWatch Update Saw the doctor yesterday, and the rash on my legs is apparently "contact dermatitis," a moderately fancy way of saying a persistent rash caused by something that irritates the skin. From what I've read about it it can last 2 to 3 weeks if untreated, which would suck.

My doctor gave me a "dose pack" of medication that should clear it up. It's a six day course of medication, which started with six pills yesterday, five today, and so on. I was thinking I'd had some improvement, but I just had an itchy spell that makes me less excited.

As for the bumpy things on my hands, they are apparently viral in nature, and probably got some freedom to be fruitful and multiply when my body was paying more attention to the rash. They should go away, too. I used to get them from time to time in high school, but only one or two bumps at a time. It is apparently something related to (and I'm not making this up) hand-foot-mouth disease, something which usually affects children. My mouth and feet are clear, though. Good thing, as I' d be embarrased to have something that one of my nieces or nephews could have as well.

Hail the alma mater! The mighty Hornets of Manchester Jr-Sr High School (or is it Manchester-Essex Regional High School? I've seen both) are primed for their first EMass football title game since 1999, as they will take on Marian High School, the Catholic Central (Small) conference champs. Manchester bested the top defense in the division by beating Madison Park HS (Boston North champs) on Tuesday.

A quick word on how we do football in eastern Massachusetts: schools are in one of seven divisions, based on enrollment, with one as the biggest and seven the smallest (I'm still not sure how we're not in Division 7, given that we're one of the smallest high schools in the region, but it could be from added students from regionalization). Each division now has four conferences (with some schools moving to accomodate this), and each conference champ goes to the playoffs (Division 7 is the lone exception, where there are two conferences and three independents; I have no idea how the independents affect things). This sets up a game structure where most teams played on Thanksgiving, then on this past Tuesday, and will play in the finals (or "Super Bowl," as we're wont to call them) this weekend.

[Note that central and western Mass. use a different, three division system, which results in us not having a true state title game. So when I say "state title," it's actually "eastern Massachusetts title," but for all intents and purposes it's a state title.]

It's actually not a bad system, when you consider that the transitional system resulted in divisions having 2 or 3 titlists. That was the case when Manchester won its last title, a 12-6 win over O'Bryant (now in Divison 7's Boston South conference). Before that, there was a BCS-like ranking where teams got points for wins, added points for wins over teams in higher divisions (or subtracted points for wins over lower division teams), and then added points for each win by a team you beat. It was pretty complicated, but not that bad a system. Except that only the top two teams in each division got to play for the title.

That was the thing that kept us out of contention for the first three of my four years on the team, as we would win the conference but suffer one loss along the way (twice to non-conference, upper division teams). My brother got to taste the thrill of victory twice, being on the 1981 team that pasted Dorchester 49-6, and the 1982 team the beat our rivals from Nantucket 28-6.

Anyway, think happy thoughts about the boys on Saturday. Once again, I'll be out of state and won't be able to make the game. Fellow Gerbil Shawn DeVeau is in the same boat, as his Chelmsford Lions battle Acton-Boxboro, hoping to avenge a loss to the Colonials earlier in the season.

Bring our your dead My second attempt at entering a dead pool is nigh, with the season starting this weekend. My ten-person entry only saw two successful conversions, Dudley Moore and Milton Berle. My selections for the choir invisible this year are politics-heavy, based on seeing how many Cold War-era folks are still kicking around. Some of the perennial favorites are back (Hope and Pope), as are some of my upset specials (Shelley Winters, Harry Morgan, and Barbara Billingsley).

Part of me feels bad that I've passed a putative death sentence on June Cleaver for a second time, but I keep reminding myself that I don't have that sort of power over people. Yet.

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow We're getting more snow today, after getting 3-5 inches before Thanksgiving. I think we've gotten more snow in the last week or so than we did in any single month last winter. Nice to see things righting themselves, I suppose, but I still think we've screwed the planet up somehow.

We're still in better shape than all those folks down south who still can't seen to figure out what to do when the white stuff falls. Two words: rock salt.

People hate us The results of a world-wide poll indicate that folks outside the US like our stuff, but not us. Which I suppose raises the question of who really is at fault with regards to cultural imperialism. I'm OK if people don't like the US (well, maybe not OK, but I can understand it), but don't call us the Great Satan and then go watch Corky Romano while drinking a Coke and eating Doritos.

They did it eBay! First you have the guy who bid $99.9 million for Eminem's old house and backed out, then you add in the California man who was recently arrested for allegedly scamming bidders for roughly a half million dollars by running fake auctions for computer hardware. Whatever happened to guys selling stereo equipment out of vans?

The Kikkoman soy sauce animation that I linked to a couple of weeks ago was hard to get out of my head, between the off-key singing, bulked-up men with non-human heads, and the fact that 96% of the thing was in Japanese. Having questions I couldn't answer, I called in a specialist. Kudos to Eddie Roth, a former BU colleague and current Northwestern University area coordinator, whose knowledge of Japanese allowed him to answer my three main questions.

1. Did the cat hang himself? Was he hanged by someone else? And what was the reason for the hanging? According to Eddie, our fish-headed hero belled the cat (so to speak) when the cat questioned what condiment he should use to top his food. To consider anything but Kikkoman soy sauce was an affront of apparenly homicidal proportions.

2. What's the deal with Fish-Head bedding the woman? Eddie's not too sure what's going on with that. There's not much by way of explanation. The writing on her shirt means "dragon girl," which may or may not have anything to do with their eventual coupling.

3. The fish-head guy is pouring out soy sauce, another guy's dispensing sugar cubes. What's the white stuff the third guy pours? That's apparently vinegar, based on what's printed on his shirt.

I hope answering these questions puts minds at ease. I know they've been keeping you up nights.

Back from the holiday weekend, having survived festive occasions involving family twice in three days and the horror of the Macy's parade (and its unusual pre-game coverage, which was heavy on Broadway show "performances").

I use the quotes because all of the live entertainment was apparently pre-recorded, sometimes in an incredibly obvious fashion. Seriously, at what point do we just stop expecting that musicians will actually perform live? At least the acts at halftime of both Thanksgiving day NFL games were plausibly live, even if they were incredibly intrusive (why is Vanessa Carlton playing at halftime? If she's a fan, can't we at least get her into a jersey?).

While in Maine, though, I did get to play another edition of Mystery Allergic Response. For those of you not familiar with the game, once every few years I have an allergic response to something I can't pinpoint that results odd physical responses. Past installments included:

* A fall 1991 attack that started as hives on my legs and ended with me double-timing it to Student Health Services as my throat narrowed (not the total closure seen with anaphylaxis, thankfully). Got to spend the afternoon napping in the infirmary, doped up on Benadryl.

* A late fall/early winter 1992 episode which let me spend some quality time in the St. Elizabeth's Hospital ER. It was actually less severe than the previous one, but happened at a time when on-campus health options were closed.

* Went on the road during the spring of 1994, as something in my grandparents' house sent me to the hospital in a wheezing fit (I had a pretty good write-up of this floating around somewhere).

No visits to the doctor (yet) for the latest chapter. At first I thought it was just my legs itching from dry skin, which I get when the weather turns cold and dry. Tried the usual creams, but rather than soothing the itch the affected areas of my legs turned red and kind of bumpy. I also have rashes on the inside of my upper arms, but they seem to be responding (slowly) to hydrocortisone cream.

The oddest aspect to all of this are a bunch of tiny bubbles that have appeared under the skin of my hands. Very strange.

So, while not the emergency assistance sort of reaction I've had to things in the past, my latest bout with mystery allergens (though I'm guessing there's some combination of cat, cigarette smoke, and down mixed with dry heat involved) may be more annoying, as it's slow to dissipate.

More than you probably wanted to know about the way my body like to have fun with me, I suppose. At least I didn't include pictures.

Thinking about Thanksgiving leads me to ruminate on one of my least-favorite holiday traditions: parades.

It's not that I have anything about parades per se. I love a good Fourth of July parade. But I've never been much of a fan of the parades we get this time of year, starting with the Macy's parade and winding up with the Tournament of Roses parade.

The Macy's parade seems especially stupid, given its interpretation that we should give thanks by looking at giant Garfield-shaped balloons and hitting the stores at our earliest convenience. TV coverage doesn't help, as every nitwit morning show person gets in the booth to provide pointless commentary about what is clearly visible on the screen. Adding in all the actors to flog whatever show they're on doesn't help, either.

There was a brief time when the Hollywood Christmas parade was shown out here, but we've been spared for the most part. My fear is that we'll get some sort of Disney electric holiday fun parade instead.

For New Year's Day, I can remember a time when it wasn't 14 channels all doing coverage of the Rose Bowl parade. Many was the morning we watched the Cotton Bowl parade, with my dad adding his own pre-DVD commentary track based on his growing up in Dallas. The highlight of this parade were the Kilgore Rangerettes, a cross between the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders and the Rockettes.

Now, with the lack of any variety, morning programming on January 1 takes on this either-or situation where every channel is either showing the carnage from Pasadena or is trying to sell you something. Nothing like ringing in the new year with infomercials.

Thankfully, we'll be out of the country for the new year, and thus spared the parade (though I imagine there's some sattelite channel that will probably have it, showing Britons from Land's End to John O'Groats just how silly we Yanks are). Not sure how I'll dodge tomorrow's event, but I'm planning on a combination of sleeping in and reading which will hopefully go the distance.

With Thanksgiving coming, time to consider what's on the menu.

Turkey I really like turkey, so sad to say we won't be having any this year. We'll be making another round with capon this holiday, after the one at Christmas went so well. In some ways, poultry is poultry, but there's little I enjoy more than picking over the caracss the day after.

I would highly recommend either the brining method that Alton Brown displays on Good Eats, or the deep fried turkey.

Potato Mashed regular potato is the traditional choice, but there are a ton of options, especially if you include the sweet potato here. I don't care for the sweet potato much, so I'll pass on the varieties available there (unless you include them in the mashed root vegetable concoction that Emeril had on one of his shows, which I've made a couple of times and like.

Sarah's mom makes roasted potatoes, and I really like those. They pretty much drive the idea of mashed right out of my head.

Veggies It's pretty much all good here, from the green bean casserole straight out of the 1950s to plain old boiled carrots. I'm not much of a squash fan (outside of the yellow summer squash), but can work through it if it's savory (sweetly spiced ones don't go down well).

Given my druthers I'd go with the casserole and baby peas. Carrots are fine, regular green beans too. Corn would be traditional, of course. Even some less traditional veggies, like broccoli, brussels sprouts, or asparagus would be fine. Some of the more regional veggies, like okra, maybe not. Unless you fried it with the turkey.

Sarah's mom will usually roast some onions with the potatoes. That's very good.

Stuffing Of course. As long as it doesn't have oysters I'm on board. Sarah's mom makes a wet stuffing using sausage meat (the British thing), and while it's very good it gets its name of "deadly stuffing" for a reason.

Breads Rolls favored to loaf, both favored to cornbread, which I've started to relegate to the barbecue ghetto. But I'd eat whichever appears on my plate.

Relish tray When we ate at my grandmother's, she always had a relish tray set out with a variety of goodies, including deviled eggs, celery and cream cheese, olives, gherkins, pickled tomatoes, etc. It worked as both appetizers and palate cleansers. I've never cared for sweet pickles, but otherwise was open to any of this.

Dessert I'm not big on pumpkin pie. I have one piece every 3 or 4 years and it pretty much takes care of things. I favor fruit pies more often than not. My mom was a mincemeat fan, the only one in the family, so she had that pie all to herself (which generally meant she ate one piece and the rest of the pie disappeared somehow, probably by being tossed or brought to the nursing home she worked at to share).

Other desserts would work, too. Like many of the foods here, I'm not one to turn down dessert unless it's something I really don't care for (maple walnut ice cream, for example).

I only remember eating out for Thanksgiving once, and even then it was at the restaurant of a family friend who closed for the day to have family and friends in. I was very young (under 10), and don't remember too much about it. Which is probably why I consider eating out on Thanksgiving kind of a cop out, within limits (you're alone and don't want to fire up an 18 pound bird, etc.).

Football Duh. We used to listen to local coverage of high school games while driving over to my grandmother's, watch NFl over there, and finish up with scores and highlights at home.

We only played one Thanksgiving day game during my time on the team. We went down to Holbrook to play them, and it wound up being my first varsity start (regular starter suspended for a game after being goaded into a fight by a player on our arch-rivals, Georgetown High School). I didn't do too much; it was pouring rain and the Holbrook offense ran behind the one guy on their offensive line who weighed over 160. I was at defensive tackle on the other side, and they ran about 3 plays my way. They all ended with gang tackling by the mighty Manchester Hornets defense, so not much business. Still, it was fun. Until I got to dinner and bit the inside of my lip three or four times because I was tired.

They've since moved the Manchester-Georgetown game to Thanksgiving, which is where it should have been all along. Should the Hornets win this year they'd be off to their second state title game in three years, so let's keep our fingers crossed.

Had a little more fun with the baby names, notably a couple of iconic '90s names:

Dawson: in 1997, it was at 744. In 1998, it was up to 198, and remains in the top 200.
Mariah: number 268 in 1990, but in the top 100 from 1991 on.
Britney: 446 in 1998, 206 in 1999. Still in and around the top 200
Christina: A slow decline over the decade, from 26 in 1990 to 81 in 2001. Ms. Aguilera's skankiness isn't helping.

Sadly for some of the Creekers, neither Pacey or Joey made the top 1000 (well, Joey did for guys; Josephine is in the top 1000 for women).

I'm slightly more famous!

After years of sending in questions to The Straight Dope, they finally got around to answering one. And, in what I like to think as true fashion, it was a question of great import. See the intellectual exchange here.

The good folks over at TeeVee ran a piece today that used the Social Security Administration's list of the 1000 most popular baby names to try to explain the sudden popularity of the girl's name Madison. They posited it had to do with Daryl Hannah's character in Splash (one hopes it isn't related to the porn star of the same name). Which, of course, got me thinking about how other names wound up. To wit:

Shaquille: first appeared in 1991 at 743rd, peaked in 1993 at 185, fell off the chart completely after 1996.
Kobe: debuted at 567 in 1997, and hasn't been out of the top quarter since.

Wonder if that'll change now that it's been shown that Bryant can't get the Lakers wins.

Mia: at 353 in 1990, now in the top 100 at 77.
Nomar: not in the top 1000 at all since 1990.

Soccer moms are apparently more rabid than Sox fans. I'm actually not surprised.

The Simpsons: Homer, Marge, and Bart are nowhere to be found (even when using proper names). Lisa is slowly fading, while Maggie is slowly climbing. Many supporting characters aren't there, either. Supporting characters whose first names do rank in the top 1000 (aside from obvious ones like John Frink and Carl Carlson): Jasper, Edna, Waylon, Nelson, Abraham, Julius, Kodos (OK, I'm kidding about the last one).

Venus: not in the top 1000 ever
Serena: in the top quarter, in the top 1000 the entire decade.

Richard Williams is more powerful than we ever expected.

Randy: slipping towards 300, currently at 285.
Curt: not listed, but Curtis is in, and just ahead at 275.

I suppose I'd take the Cy Young over this.

Al: not there, but Albert is in and around the top quarter
George: slowly sliding towards 150 after spending most of the decade in the top 100.
Ralph: bottom half, consistently so
Pat: top 100 all decade, though falling.

Good thing this doesn't decide things. We've already had one President Buchanan, and wasn't that enough?

Annika: just got on the list at 990 in 1995, now at 357 after rising every year.

She's just not a power in the LPGA, apparently.

Adolph: no
Sadaam: no
Osama: no
Leona: no (think about it)
Benito: barely in at 985, a slow decline over the decade.

If you make the trains run on time, you're apparently forgiven your psychotic excesses.

Scientists have revised their estimates on hazardous asteroid impact, saying that the Earth would only suffer a strike at that level every 1000 years rather than every 200 to 300 years. Why does this not make me feel any better?

It reminds me of those people who rebuild on a 100 year flood plain after a flood only to get put underwater the following year, who then ask where their 99 year grace period went. Just because there's a nice big number that describes the average risk, don't think you can't get hit next year or next week. Don't take things like this for granted; to quote Toby Ziegler: "You wanna tempt the wrath of the whatever from high atop the thing?".

The Montreal Expos: NAFTA's Team!

I claim this catch-phrase as my own! I know, big deal.

So MLB announced the scheduled dates where the Expos would play in San Juan, but I can't get the tentative schedule for the team off their website. I suppose they had to wait until this was a done deal.

This may help out the master plan of attending opening day in Montreal, if the April series in P.R. is early enough. I did notice on the Red Sox tentative schedule that they have games in March. March! Don't know if they're exhibitions or we're getting to the point where baseball is sliding towards a March 15 to October 1 operating schedule.

In any case, watch this spot for future Expos opener information!

Whatever else you do today, please look at this site. You may have already gotten to it through the Bruce, but if you haven't, it's worth the click.

Did I mention that I've been getting jerked around by AT&T Broadband?

We'd been pondering upgrading to digital cable for a while, nothing too fancy, just the basic package to get some of the channels we'd enjoyed back in the days of the dish (BBC America, National Geographic, etc.). I finally got off my ass and went to AT&T Broadband website, and discovered that you could order service on-line. I tend to favor any method of purchasing goods or services that doesn't require me to talk to anyone, so I filled out the form and sent it in. I was promised a response with an appointment time within 24 hours.

To this day it still hasn't arrived.

I waited about a week, and then called in when I discovered that a co-worker who also lives on campus was getting digital cable. We were both scheduled for last Friday. She got hers hooked up - after getting a call from the techs that they'd gone to Wellesley College and needed some help finding us over here at Babson. And after discovering that it didn't work - they had to come back out some number of days later to fix what they'd just put in.

They never arrived at my place. No phone calls, nothing.

So I went into work in the afternoon, called, rescheduled, and got a credit. They were now scheduled to show on Tuesday morning between 9-11.

They never arrived at my place. No phone calls, nothing.

So I went into work in the afternoon, called, rescheduled, and got a credit. I also got in touch with Babson's contact with AT&T Broadband to try to get some support there. They were now scheduled to show on Thursday morning between 9-11.

They never arrived at my place. No phone calls, nothing.

Our contact did do some calling around, but in the end the result was the same. I have no digital cable. At this point, if I ever do get it, I have two free months. I am now supposed to call the field manager to set up an appointment.

I suppose some of this may come from being on a college campus. The billing address I had to give for my account is one that AT&T's software recognizes as a USPS-approved valid address. My box on campus doesn't fit the bill. Instead, I have to use the street address and put Wellesley Hills as the town.

This strikes me as automation run amok. If I can't give the address that best assures that I get mail on time, there's something wrong with the program.

At the same time, it's not like my phone number and email address (assuming my on-line order is still kicking around somewhere on an AT&T server) don't work.

I've been thinking about my time as a subscriber to DirecTV a lot lately, and while I'm probably biased by recent events, it makes me think that, once I have my own place, I may never deal with a cable company again.

Finished my TV catching up from last year by watching the last two hours of 24 last night (rented the final DVD rather than tried to find our tape, as it's probably buried or been recorded over). In some ways the promos for this season set us up a bit - Hey, where's Teri Bauer?- and I had a vague understanding of how things ended, but it was enjoyable nonetheless. I will say that Sarah was much more irate at the ending than I was, though I felt it was kind of a cheap shot. There was an alternate ending with producer commentary, in which it was explained that the ending they used felt right to them, and underscored the idea that there's no predicting what'll happen on the show. As if the previous 23 hours, 59 minutes, and 48 seconds didn't get that point across.

Then again, it was better than another bout of amnesia.

I'd like to make special note of Penny Johnson Jerald, who played Sherry Palmer. She was like a mix of Nancy Reagan, Hillary Clinton, and Lady Macbeth, but without the charm. You may also remember her from her recurring role as frieghter captain Cassidy Yates on Deep Space 9. And, of course, I'd be remiss to not give props to Homicide alum Zeljko Ivanek, who played Andre Drazen. I'll never look at Ed Danvers in quite the same way again.

Took some time last night to catch up with some TV. Got reasonably caught up with both The West Wing and Ed, and was reasonably happy with both.

There's a lot of talk about how The West Wing is slipping this year (to go on top of you all who complain about the show given its politics). I will say that it seems less focused this season, which may be from trying to maintain both the election and Qumar plots at the same time. Either would be fine, but together you get the sense that each one is big enough to drain the other a bit. Kind of a division of forces, but with creative energy rather than infantry. It's not a good idea on the battlefield, and perhaps isn't such a swell idea with a TV show, either.

One thing I do like is the prospect of trading Rob Lowe for Josh Malina and Danica McKellar. Malina is known to many as Jeremy Goodwin from Sports Night, while Danica McKellar will, for better or worse, always be Winnie Cooper from The Wonder Years to a generation of TV viewers. While neither bring the Brat Pack cred or dashing good looks that Lowe supposedly gives the show, Malina gives a good energy, his character here being less frantic but as equally committed to the job. McKellar would increase the female presence on the show and go younger to boot.

Malina also brings with him the honor of being the first actor to hit for the cycle and be in A Few Good Men, The American President, Sports Night, and The West Wing. A number of people hit two of these (including Sorkin himself), but I don't even think there's someone in three of the four. I'd have to check more comprehensively.

I don't know what the plan is with this (from the business end), and I've not watched the election episode to see if the set-up is executed there or not. Anyway, it'd be cool.

For Ed, the show is showing more promise than last season, but still seems stuck a little. The last episode I watched had Ed and Carol get over the strain in their relationship casued by her marrying Dennis. They were helped to that point by the break-up of a local DJ team played by Chris Parnell and Horatio Sanz. Their roles were funnier than 97 percent of everything they've done on SNL, by the way.

The episode was also refreshingly Cheswick-free. That gave a nice feeling to things... until I stopped to watch a bit of Galaxy Quest on ABC and found Justin Long playing some show-obsessed teen. He's like that bit of toilet paper that gets stuck to the bottom of your shoe.

Not much going on lately, lots of little things that have taken up time.

Participated in a "How to Host a Murder Mystery" dinner on Saturday night. I was not the killer. Boo! It was a lot of fun, and I have to wonder if the drinking enhanced or detracted from the experience. Probably enhanced.

Watched most of Notre Dame's loss. Can we now put the green jerseys to pasture?

Did almost nothing of note on Sunday other than watch football and The Simpsons season opener. Pats managed to further confound me, and the promos for the opener gave away a lot of good stuff. Still, not a bad way to spend a Sunday.

Caught a backhandedly entertaining moment on Lingo last night Lingo is a game show on the Game Show Network where teams try to guess five letter words, and is more entertaining than it sounds from my feeble description). The team that made the bonus round didn't perform all that well, but managed to win by pulling the right numbered balls (you win by making a "Lingo," which is pretty much like bingo). The women, who were pretty demonstrative anyway, start jumping around.

Only to have one woman sock her teammate in the eye.

Chuck Woolery almost couldn't end the show properly as he was trying not to bust out laughing. It was funny in a "OK, you've not been blinded" sort of way.

Forgot to endorse someone in one race:

U.S. HOUSE - Stephen Lynch is the incumbent in my district (Massachusetts 9th), having won a special election last year to fill the seat of Joe Moakley, who passed away while in office. He is also running unopposed. I have no problem with Lynch per se, but would like to take this opportunity to invoke what's I'm calling the Silvio Conte Rule.

Conte represented the 1st district, based out in the western part of the state, from 1959 to 1991. He was, quite often, the only Republican in the Massachusetts delegation to the US House. From that, I've developed the rule in his honor, that a state with a delegation the size of Massachusetts' should always have at least one person from both parties. Even if there's only one of ten, it's nice to not have total domination by one side.

The reason I choose to invoke the rule here is that (a) it's my district, and thus of direct interest, and (b) there is actually a Republican I can endorse who lives in Southie like Lynch, so they don't lose the pride of having the Congressman come from the neighborhood. I just hope they don't mind that he's an Anglophile.

Blogalicious endorses: W. Scott Monty of South Boston (write-in)

It's getting to election time, and just like all the print publications, it's time to put out endorsements. Herewith are mine for a variety of Massachusetts races.

GOVERNOR and LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR - There are five choices here, and none of them are particularly overwhelming.

The one that you non-Mass folks have probably heard of is Republican Mitt Romney, who took over the Salt Lake Olympics when it was such a fiasco. Folks here like the job he did and drafted him into the Republican primary, forcing incumbent acting governor Jane Swift out without a second thought.

Romney's been pretty aggressive in the campaign, running on a reformist, "clean up the mess" line. Not that he's given many specifics as to where the cleaning will start. He's focused more on the short-comings of his main opponent, Democrat Shannon O'Brien.

And that's helped Romney, as it's drawn attention away from his lack of ideas and past as a corporate blood-sucker. His level of conservatism is also hard to pin down, as his stances on some of the litmus-test social issues, like abortion and gun control, have a murky quality to them.

Romney's running mate is Kerry Murphy Healey. She's window dressing (so to speak), an attempt to soften Romney and attract women. That she's likely more conservative than her possible boss (at least based on the one ad of her's I've seen) isn't well-known, as she's apparently not allowed to speak when campaining with him (which is the only time you see her).

The other main candidate is Democrat Shannon O'Brien, the state treasurer. I have deep distrust for that office, as in my lifetime (and probably before) it's been corrupt on the level of pro boxing. O'Brien's taken hits on her management of the state pension fund, and her "watchdog" role that may be closer to Romney's portrayal as a basset hound than she'd like. There's also the influence her lobbyist-husband may have had on her job performance. She can be aggressive, too, but has toned down a bit of late, trying perhaps to latch on to some undecided voters who are sick of the rhetoric.

Her running mate is Chris Gabrieli, an entrepraneur who spent a ton of money to defeat two opponents who had little money and no visibility during the primary. That he did this to gain the nod for a largely ceremonial post, and seemingly emptied his coffers enough to not put on the wall-to-wall media blitz in the general election, too, seems kind of stupid.

These two are running neck and neck. One kind of hopes they'll both strangle themselves on the finish line.

The three minor candidates aren't that fun. The Green Party put forth Jill Stein, a folk singer turned doctor who is clearly too understanding and prepared to hold high office. She offered statistics and analysis during the first debate with all five candidates- what was she thinking? Seriously, though, she's probably the most rational of the five candidates, which only further suggests she won't win.

Carla Howell represents the Libertarians, a party she joined after having trouble navigating the health care system and discovering that party's plan to overhaul things (which apparently involve putting the infirm on ice floes). Howell is always on message, never straying too far from her mantra of "small government is beautiful," not even to crack a smile, shake a hand, or otherwise appear human. Seriously, it's like Harry Browne put her together in a lab.

Finally, there's Barbara Johnson, the independent. A lawyer and activist in the fathers' rights movement, she's the loose cannon in the crowd. Her performance in the all-in debates was rambling and always over time. She suggested Howell get 30 days of psychiatric observation during the first debate (unkind, but perhaps not a bad idea). Her voice, raspy from years of chain smoking, reminds me of a shiksa Doris Grau.

Johnson has some ideas on issues that no one else is talking about. Unfortunately, most of them came out in the space of 30 seconds during the last debate. They included "aquaculture" and "fish farming," which makes me wonder how much money the Soylent Corporation has kicked into her campaign.

She's also bought ad time on the Internet. You may have seen her ads when you logged out of Yahoo! Mail. She's also the only one of the three minor candidates whose lieutenant governor I know anything about. He's a carpenter from Agawam. I only know that because I saw five seconds of the lieutenant governor candidate debate on Saturday (hey, ND-FSU was on).

So, who to pick? When Sarah and I had friends over on Saturday, we lamented the candidates at large and thought there should be a balanced ticket, one with a conservative governor to show a steady hand and a liberal lieutenant governor for balance. To that end:

Blogalicious endorses: Shawn DeVeau of Beverly and Matthew Harper-Nixon of Needham (write-in)

Other races and ballot questions:

TREASURER: There's a Democrat, a Republican, and a Green. Using the time honored selection method of "one potato, two potato":

Blogalicious endorses: James O'Keefe, Green Party

SECRETARY OF STATE: Bill Galvin, long time office-holder and Democratic hack, squares off against Jack E. Robinson of the GOP. You may remember Robinson from his hilarious (unintentional) Senate race against Teddy Kennedy. I'm less worried about Robinson holding this office than I am that Galvin will run for something important if he loses his sinecure. So:

Blogalicious endorses: William Galvin, Democrat

AUDITOR: Joe DiNucci is the only state auditor I remember. Not that the average person would remember the list of people who held the post, but DiNucci has a stranglehold on the office. There's a Libertarian and an independent in the crowd, but you can't argue against someone who is buried like a tick in the hide of state government. Not to mention I think DiNucci would have to go on unemployment if he lost; he may not know anything else but state auditing.

Blogalicious endorses: Joe DiNucci, Democrat

ATTORNEY GENERAL: Tom Reilly is the only guy running. Blogalicious endorses Reilly, for no good reason.

GOVERNOR'S COUNCIL: I have no idea what district I'm in. I don't even know what this body does. OK, according to the state web site, the Council acts on things like payments from the state treasury, gubenatorial appointments, and commutations and pardons.

These all seem like things an already existing body could do. I hope these folks don't pull in a full salary.

Blogalicious endorses: Write yourself in

US SENATE: John Kerry is running against Libertarian Michael Cloud. Kerry is probably going to run for President in 2004. I don't like the idea of him bailing to run for President, or neglecting his office to seek a higher one. But I don't like the idea of voting for this Cloud guy, either. Heck, I could use a promotion.

Blogalicious endorses: Mark Coen of Wellesley (write-in)

QUESTION 1: This question would abolish the state income tax. This is Carla Howell's brain-child, if you couldn't figure that out. As much as I don't like paying taxes, I also don't want to make us Baja New Hampshire.

Blogalicious endorses: a NO vote on Question 1

QUESTION 2: This question would eliminate bilingual education and replace it with English immersion. I don't know what I dislike more about this question: the racist and nativist overtones, or the likely underclass of people who will skip school because they don't know what anyone's saying and thus be undereducated, underemployed, and a bigger drain on the state (and if both this one and Question 1 passes, look out).

Blogalicious endorses: a NO vote on Question 2

QUESTION 3: This question seeks to repeal the Clean Election law that was enacted by ballot initiative. It's written asking if people support using taxpayer money to fund elections. It was put on the ballot by people who want the question to fail, giving the legislature (which has never liked the law) ammunition to overturn it. Warren Tolman may be the biggest thing the folks who wrote this question have going for them, as his negative ads using public money pissed people off. Still, I prefer this to the current system, where the money comes from God-knows where.

Blogalicious endorses: a YES vote on Question 3

QUESTION 4: This is Wellesley only. It's about establishing a fund that would go towards obtaining and preserving open space, historical resources, recreational land, and community housing. Creating a fund makes the town eligible for matching state funds. It'd come from a hike in property taxes. Considering I like open spaces, etc., and don't pay property tax (and work for an entity that doesn't, either):

Blogalicious endorses: a YES vote on Question 4

And while I don't get to vote on it, if you live in a district that has the question asking if you want to instruct your state rep to not vote for Tom Finneran for Speaker, Blogalicious endorses a YES vote.

Finally, there's a measure on the ballot in Holyoke asking if the town wants to legalize casino gambling. I'm not going to take a stand either way, but if it does pass, Governor DeVeau will probably move the state capital there.

Anaheim Angels win World Series. Almost as odd sounding as New England Patriots win Super Bowl.

I wasn't really rooting for either team in this year's affair, but did lean towards the Giants. Not so much for Bonds, but for the other old-timers on the team- Santiago, Lofton, Dunston, and throw in Snow- who may not get another shot. Bonds will at least have his MVPs, home run chase, and sure Hall of Fame induction. He'll lament not having a ring if he never does get one, of course, but there's plenty of other stuff he can look to with pride about his career.

Speaking of which, I am a little piqued that Bonds didn't win Series MVP. I know, his team didn't win, but consider the numbers he put up over the Series, and the way the Angels avoided dealing with him at all costs. He did look a little lost in left field the last couple of games, but nothing egregious. Not that I'm pissed about it, but I think there's a case to be made.

I suppose the one way this win ticks me off is from the media angle. Pre-game coverage by Fox seemed decidedly pro-Anaheim (perhaps not surprising given their LA headquarters), and there was that shot of John Travolta hugging Michael Eisner at the end of the game. Ack.

Flipping channels during a break in the Bills-Lions game, I saw the least expected cable programming ever.

Kenny G on BET.

The debate is open as to which letter Mr. G most fails to meet, the B or the E.

I had some completely random thoughts while attending tonight's BU/Nebraska-Omaha tilt (Terriers win 6-4, but tried their hardest not to; they blew a 4-1 lead to make it a 4-4 game early in the third).

First, if you eat yellow and blue M&Ms together, do they give the same benefit as eating green M&Ms?

And second, whatever happened to the concession stand pretzel with all the salt on it? They've been conspicuously absent from Walter Brown Arena for a while. For the last 2-3 years the regular pretzels were kind of damp and had a suggestion of salt (wonder if the steamer used salted water). This year the pretzels are in a case with heat lamps, no salt at all. Instead, there's plain and two filled varieties- apple cinnamon and jalapeno cheddar.

I place the blame for this at Pizza Hut's feet. They started it all with the wretched stuffed crust pizza.

Somewhere, there's a cranky email waiting to be written on the topic of concession pretzels. Except that I think I know who would get it at BU, and that person is kind of a jerk. He'd probably drop the regular ones and only offer filled varieties. Ack.

Anyway, back to the game for a sec, I think I saw something for the first time ever (for me, at least): the shorthanded penalty shot goal. One of the UNO guys threw his stick on a breakaway, which to me seems like as stupid a penalty as, say, a defensive lineman kneeing the QB in the groin to disrupt a pass.

It was odd enough that we were on a breakaway, not so much because we were shorthanded, but because we couldn't do anything with the puck during uneven situations. Other than let UNO score; at least 3 of their 4 goals were on the power play.

I don't know the last time I saw a penalty shot in Walter Brown, but I'm thinking it was during my undergrad days. Back when the puck was made of vulcanized chicle and the goalies didn't wear masks, much less helmets.

If I were a prospective Democratic US Senate candidate in 2004, I'd take the bus. First Mel Carnahan, now Paul Wellstone. It's a little creepy, really.

Also on the death front, Richard Harris passed away yesterday. It says something about him that his death made people remember him from so many different things. One woman on the oldies station requested "Macarthur Park" in his memory. Young'uns will remember him for playing Professor Dumbledore. Others still for Camelot.

I'll remember him for his great appearances on David Letterman. Great stories about drinking with Richard Burton and Peter O'Toole and the British theater days. He once appeared on the show wearing a coat he said he'd made out of bedsheets from a particularly desired romantic coupling. You knew you were in for some quality entertainment when Richard Harris was on the guest list.

I forgot to tune in to Letterman to see what they said, but I think they still tape two shows on Thursday, so I can tune in Monday to catch it.

So it looks like we have a honeymoon destination for next year. Now we just have to pay for flights, a car, and whatnot (the lodging is free, bonus weeks from timeshare company). Of course, there are ways to defray those costs, too.

Speaking of which, we need to register for regular gifts, too. Suggestions from the married folks out there are welcome.

I'm kind of like Jesus, but not in a sacreligious way..."

From today's Daily Free Press, BU's student daily:

Bread and wine turned into doughnuts and beer last night and youthful pop culture met age old scripture as Chi Alpha Christian Fellowship, a Boston University group sponsored by the Assemblies of God, held its second lecture to discuss how Jesus Christ was similar to Homer Simpson.

The larger group split up into four smaller groups to discuss questions the group posed about the episode it had just watched. This session's episode was "Homer's Odyssey," in which Homer attempts to make all of Springfield safe by putting signs up throughout town.

David Hill, a School of Management senior, said Homer Simpson is a character most people can relate to.

"We kind of like the way he lives, he has a simple life," he said during the discussion. "Homer strikes me as a purposeless person. He wants to provide for his family, drink beer and have a good time."

The discussion looked into the character of Homer Simpson in regards to "finding a purpose," as well as comparing the ways both Jesus and Homer would react to a situation.

"I think that they are pretty much polar opposites," Hill said. He said, however, that Simpson was like Jesus because, "he was always overcoming obstacles."

Chi Alpha Christian Fellowship sponsored this event as a way to mix popular culture with Biblical studies, basing its discussions off the book, "The Gospel According to the Simpsons," by Mark Pinsky.

"The book opened the door for us," said Scott Miller, the director of Chi Alpha Christian Fellowship and a university chaplain. "The concept is working."

The last meeting had a "full house," according to Miller, and this meeting saw a large turnout as well. "The Simpsons" allowed for a more youthful audience, which is less religious at times, to take a look at the Bible.

"I think there are some people who are apathetic, but I think some people are looking for something that is real," Miller said. "They aren't finding it [elsewhere]."

Miller also said it was interesting to see how many men came out to the last meeting, and while women do show up to the meetings, the majority of the group was primarily men. This time, however, there was almost an equivalent number of men to women.

Previous discussions had examined how Lisa Simpson cared for others, and whether or not she spoke for Jesus. The discussion is based on one episode of the show, which the group watches in its entirety before making comparisons to the Bible.

Chi Alpha Christian Fellowship is an SAO group that tries to "represent Christ on our campus through our lives, activities and relationships," according to the group's website. The group is interdenominational and open to everyone.

Chi Alpha plans on holding more events in the future including a discussion session this Friday, and more "Simpsons" discussions, which have yet to be scheduled, according to Miller.

Wow, that actually worked.

Apparently, there's a configuration problem on the Blogger side of things that'll clear itself out if you switch to no archives, publish something, and then switch back. So now all the historical goodness of this little page is available for your perusal.

But I have to fix the link from the archives back to the front page. Still set for BlogSpot.

Rather than work, I'm actually trying something to fix the archives.

There is no reason to panic.

So the move seems to be complete, with one exception. I can't get the archives to work. At this point, the archives only point to the first and last month of the blog's run. That year in-between is missing. It still shows up at the old BlogSpot archive page, though. Very strange.

Busy weekend past, as it was Family Weekend at Babson. I got to "run" registration, which I put in quotes because my co-worker who was in charge of the weekend did most of the work for me. She said I didn't seem that confident about my role, and to be honest I wasn't. On the other hand, though, registration isn't the most complex process in the world, and had she worked with me to go over details it would have been fine. But I think she was worried I wouldn't meet her standard for the event, which is probably a valid concern.

This was one of the tasks I was "nominated" for by my former boss before she left. Thanks!

Part of Family Weekend is a casino night, which this year had a Maverick theme. So I got to work the money wheel for a couple of hours wearing a sheriff's badge and a large foam cowboy hat. The hats made a re-appearance the next day at the Brandeis TRASH junior bird, as one of the players (also an RA) collected hats for the entire team. That it was open house weekend at Brandeis only made that better.

As you've probably seen elsewhere, I am back on Babson College Radio with a show called "Pardon the Blatant Ripoff." We don't quite live up to the Pardon the Interruption format (we don't keep to time that strictly, or have bells and buzzers to get us to move on, or have a Stat Boy), but it's not bad for free radio. Listen live from 7 to 8:30 am (Eastern time) on Tuesdays, or whenever via the BCR archive, whenever those get fixed.

I was subjected to the first episode of girls club on Monday, and it was everything I expected. It was kind of like a show written by first year law students- plenty of jargon to make it sound all legal, but with the least plausible courtroom dialogue in the history of fictional jurisprudence (including the line from Gretchen Mol about "I hope you don't think I'm the kind of lawyer who represents guilty people").

How did the show go? The blond one (played by Mol, don't know the character name) defended a guy on a capital case by herself, without seeming to have the experience that would lend itself to proper defending. The readhead got a settlement on a case where a doctor fainted during a gyno exam (as seen in ads), but the guy she's working with is sexually harrassing her (because every workplace has a guy who is so totally inappropriate that his misdeeds are never suspected by anyone), and the brunette called another female lawyer a "dyke." That, I think, was the "coarse language" we were warned about during the show.

I really think David E. Kelley has had a stroke and not told anyone. Or he's had his brain transmogrified. Or he was able to hide his hackish tendencies with his earlier work.

That's really the only new TV I've watched so far. The Fox Friday night combo of Firefly and John Doe looked mildly interesting, but I've not been around on Fridays to watch or even tape. Heck, I've got 3 hours of The West Wing still to watch, not to mention the last two hours of 24 which we have to get through before the new season starts. I kind of know what happens, but would like to see it unfold.

I've been mildly impressed with the Bruins, but would be moreso if their road trip had wins over Detroit and San Jose rather than Calgary and Edmonton. Still, they were looking like they'd be a horror show, and their opening loss to the Wild pointed to that being the case. But perhaps they'll keep it going, even without John Graheme.

Then there's the pre-season suckitude that's been Vin Baker. Let's not even consider that.

I'm on call again this week. I really am sick of being on-call so much, especially as my level of on-call does practically nothing. We'd tried to make some changes last year to improve this, but they've not really taken hold. I miss the days when I was part of a ten person on-call rotation and only had three weekends all year.

Speaking of work, I should go do some. More later.

Rare honesty among fantasy sports prognosticators:

"Start him, but lower your expectations some. Then again, we said the same thing for Sunday's game in San Diego, and Holmes still managed 159 total yards and a touchdown. We'll shut up now."

Sarah, as she was leaving work yesterday, overheard two BU students talking about the new arena that's being built. They were wondering why it was being named for Harry Agganis when he already had a street named for him. "I wonder how much money he donated?" was the ultimate question posed by these ill-informed co-eds.

I should be angered, but I can see where the run of the mill, non-athletically minded BU student may not know much about Agganis. For those of you not familiar with the greatest Terrier athlete of them all, you are hereby required to read this bio from the Agganis Foundation.

OK, let's see if this works.

We're moving.

Not me and Sarah; we're still enjoying the rent-free digs at Babson. But us here in Blogalicious land, we're pulling up stakes and heading to a new home.

Nothing against BlogSpot, one of the better freebies on the Web these days. But we do have a lot of server space over at the Gerbil, so like Matt Boggie I'll be running things out of there. Not sure if I'll make many other changes, though the addition of the ubiquitous comment widget can't be far behind.

For those of you with links, I will be moving to http://www.greenfieldgerbil.com/~coen starting, oh, Friday. Give folks a little time to get that squared away.

Just realized that Friday is tomorrow. Meant to give another day, but then we get into the weekend, and who among us will bother with any of this then?

This whole week's been off for me, date and day wise. Columbus Day is the easy to point at culprit, but then how do you explain me thinking it was late September the other day when Sarah was reading expiration dates off of yogurt? I was really befuddled why she'd think October 13 was a problem, but when she then added the 7th I realized the error.

And, thankfully, I didn't inadvertently poison her.

Recent choice on whatsbetter.com:

Joan Rivers versus eugenics.

Some days the jokes write themselves.

Quick hits.

When is a hockey tournament not a hockey tournament? When it's hosted by Maine and has a field of the host, Quinnipiac, Lake Superior, and New Brunswick. That's right, the mighty Varsity Reds of the University of New Brunswick. Look, I know a lot of schools have exhibition games against Canadian universities, but in a tournament? Come on!

And it's not like Quinnipiac or Lake State are blowing anyone away. Quinippiac may be the cream of the MAAC, but that still puts them at roughly the same level as UMass. Maybe Providence. And Lake State's only felt the sweet caress of a winning record twice since Jeff Jackson left the school after the 95-96 season.

Let's just say that the Black Bear Classic was no Lefty McFadden Invitational.

Pats Suck! Now this was the team we were all expecting last year. Just with a shorter QB.

I only hope that they spend the week off watching the Denver-Miami game film in preparation to face the Broncos. The Fins won the game by (a) running the ball- something the Pats have decided to give up on, and (b) showing some guts. Jay Fiedler finished the game with a broken thumb, for cryin' out loud! No one in Foxboro is allowed to complain until they finish a game playing with a fractured digit.

How much does it suck to be a New York sports fan? Yanks out of the playoffs, Giants lose to the Falcons, Jets lose to, well, anyone, and the Knicks may just give the 9-72 Sixers a run for their money. Rangers and Islanders are sitting on the bottom of their conference in the NHL.

You can almost hear people asking how long it is until spring training.

IRS to use debt collectors to get back taxes I know this is only going to add to the people who trumpet the IRS as the ultimate big government bully. In most cases, I'd agree with that sentiment. But there are $200 billion in uncollected taxes out there, and as someone who files regularly and pays when required, I'd like to see that money come into the coffers. We can work on all the other problems with the IRS after they get their money.

Worst Slogan Ever Sadaam Hussein is running unopposed in a presidential referendum. His campaign slogan? "Yes, yes, yes, Sadaam." Didn't Gary Bauer use that?

The Baath party is hoping to improve upon the 99.96 percent of the vote won in the last election in 1995. Perhaps they should study the Illinois returns from the 1960 presidential election.

Snoop Dog off the wacky tabacky In an interview with Access Hollywood, Snoop Dog says he's no longer smoking weed or drinking gin, but is getting high on life instead. Good for him. But will he have to give back his Stoner of the Year award?

Sarah and I went up to Manchester yesterday to see the priest at my home church to start the process of getting married in the Catholic church. Process may be too strong a word, but it is more than just showing up. We both had to go in individually with Father Harrington and affirm that we were entering the marriage freely, etc. It was not, as we'd both sort of feared, a latter-day outpost of the Inquisition.

I'd not seen Father Harrington since my dad's funeral, and I'd forgotten how much I liked him. For all the grief the Catholic church has taken over the last year or so (from major media, the general public, and even crappy weblogs like this), it's clergymen like him that remind me why I still have, at some level, an interest in the faith at all. It didn't hurt that he has a very nice dog.

We also were talking and it turns out that at one time he was headmaster at a school and had (now) former BC head coach Steve Cedarchuk as his head hockey coach. Apparently, he did the same thing at this school that he did at BC- promise scholarships and spots on the team that he didn't have.

In any event, perhaps more notable than this step along the path to matrimony was our drive up to Manchester. We left the BU campus at, let's say 4:15. We got to the Route 1 North on-ramp at 5. It took us 45 minutes to travel about 3 miles.

Our appointment was at 6. At 5:45 we were still in Revere (just getting into Saugus). That's about 8 to 10 miles. Maybe. Traffic didn't really break until we got to the 128 North exit, and even then didn't really thin out until we got into Danvers.

All told, it took us 2 and a quarter hours to cover what is, normally, a leisurly 40 minute drive. And the Big Dig will do almost nothing to correct the traffic situation after the Tobin Bridge (and blessed little on Storrow Drive, though you can argue secondary effects by supposed smoother traffic on 93).

I can't see how people drive this every day. I'm convinced there is some level of insanity that descends upon people when it comes to cars. I know that not everyone lives or works in close proximity to a commuter rail or T stop. But I'd be hard-pressed, after months (or years) of commutes like yesterday, to see how driving was any better than making the effort to use public transportation. There's a huge garage in Lynn next to their commuter rail stop that's heavily underutilized, for example (then again, it is in Lynn).

The state could also help the situation by expanding the T and commuter rail networks. But why do that when you can spend $15 billion on a roadway system that's over-budget, behind schedule, and probably won't do a damn thing to improve congestion?

Do you remember when, in the comic strip Bloom County, the Meadow Party had its 1988 convention broadcast by MTV but had the audio replaced with Judas Priest songs? Our local cable folks are providing something very similar.

For the past week, for whatever reason, C-SPAN 2 has had, as its audio, Jam'n 94.5, the home for Boston's blazin' hip hop. There's nothing like watching Craig Thomas (R-WY) debate the Iraq resolution to the strains of "Move Bitch."

A couple of items from yesterday.

1. I was incredibly pissed off when I saw Bud Selig and Carl Polhad at the Metrodome last night taking in game 1 of the ACLS. It doesn't seem fair that a commissioner who wanted to OK the team's dissolution and the man who most stood to profit from it should get to enjoy the team's success. At the same time, though, I did feel like my anger was a little misplaced. I mean, of course, the commish and the home team's owner would be at the game. Where else would they be?

Selig is taking great pains to note that the idea of contracting the Twins was a decision made by all owners, which he had to spearhead as commissioner. I don't know if that makes things any better. For me, it underscores the reason why the commissioner needs to be independent of ownership and players. Why should I believe that Bud would do anything but support any move agreed to by his peer group? An independent commish may have to do the same thing, but that person would at least have the independent status to (a) act as devil's advocate to argue against contraction with the owners, and (b) have more public credibility to work out generally agreeable solutions.

As for Polhad, he really does remind me of a much older Rachel Phelps from Major League. I just hope there isn't a naked life-size cutout of him in the locker room. Has anyone started the rumor that Polhad was the model for Monty Burns?

Anyway, I was irritated, perhaps rightfully so, perhaps not.

2. Krispy Kreme has finally opened its first New England location. It's on the Berlin Turnpike in Newington, Connectict. Future stores are supposed to open elsewhere in the Nutmeg State, Rhode Island, and Medford, MA.

I have to admit, I really don't understand the hype. The doughnuts are OK. Fun to watch them go through the production line, but that's about it. I don't have that transcendent experience with the hot glazed ones that everyone else seems to have.

Then again, I'm not a fan of gushy, sticky, drippy foods. I don't really care for jelly, lemon, or boston creme doughnuts. The apple ones are OK, but the filling there is much thicker.

The one exception to this is a Greek dessert whose name escapes me, which is basically balls of fried dough soaked in honey. Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

I suppose I'm a Dunkin Donuts partisan, even though I don't drink coffee. I'm not claiming their doughnuts are perfection or anything, just that they tend to suit my tastes. Though they don't have a really good sugar doughnut, like the ones independent bakeries make. I used to work with a woman who, on her way to the office from Revere, would stop at a place and pick some up. I say again, mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

I've not said anything about the Angels beating the Yankees, but this pretty much trumps anything I could say.

As some of you may know, Julia Roberts was in town this week filming part of her upcoming movie Mona Lisa Smiles at Wellesley College. And, imagine my surprise at being involved in a brush with greatness this very same week.

Just not with her. Or Kristen Dunst. Or anyone else involved with the movie.

This morning, while waiting to be seated at Vidalia's Truck Stop, a little diner-themed place in Wellesley center, I noticed a man standing in half-profile not more than 3 feet away. I thought to myself, "hey, that guy kind of looks like Peter Gammons."

Then the guy started to talk to one of the kids working behind the counter. It was, indeed, Peter Gammons.

I didn't say anything to him, as he was talking to people and I didn't want to interrupt. Plus, what would I have said? "Hi, Mr. Gammons. Like your work."? That's not much of a compliment, and I'm not a big enough fan to gush.

I know some of you out there would have been better equipped to handle the situation, so apologies for not being able to pinch hit for you.

Kudos to the Bruce for calling out Brian "Sports Guy" Simmons on his latest piece of misogynistic claptrap. It managed to be both irritating and banal, which is a mix you don't often get.

Speaking of the irritating and banal, does anyone pay attention to Jerry Falwell anymore other than journalists waiting to hear his latest bigotry? I know, there are. Sadly. I suppose it wouldn't be worth the effort to point out to Falwell the irony of calling Muhammed a terrorist while representing a religion that's done its share of violence.

Fellow Terriers, rejoice! Sports Illustrated ranked BU the 76th best sports school in the country. Hockey, hoops, and women's cross-country were highlighted, and there was no mention of our late, lamented football team. We ranked ahead of "major" sports schools like Virginia Tech, Georgetown, Louisville, Rutgers, West Virginia, and Temple. For locals, we ranked ahead of UNH, Brown, Yale, Dartmouth, UMass, Providence, Vermont, CCSU, and Holy Cross. Sadly, we were beaten out by BC (54th) and Maine (70).

For likely readers from other schools:

Michigan (10)
Northwestern (89)
George Washington (185)
Harvard (41, which is also the number of varsity sports the Crimson offer)
Cornell (74)

It's only division 1, so sorry to my readership base at South Dakota State. William College, though, was given kudos for being the best division 3 sports school.

All this just whets my appetite for BU hockey, as did the arrival of my season tickets this week. The strips honor Jack Parker's 30 years as coach, with each strip showing a picture of him at a different stage in his career. You can actually follow his hair as it goes gray and falls out. There's also the matter of his evolving wardrobe, which in the early years the less said the better.

All kidding aside, I'm happy we have 30 years of him to celebrate. I'd hate to think of him toiling in despair with the Bruins and their penny-pinching management.

And now, the conclusion to my vacation.

Wednesday September 25 We'd planned an early start to get the most of our day in Charleston, but got off later than planned due to renewed conflict over people not wanting to go. We were further delayed by the various points on US 17 that slow down to 45 mph, mostly through the first half of the drive. This put us in Charleston around noon.

We opted for a minibus tour of the city, given that we (a) didn't have much of a plan by way of knowing ahead of time what we wanted to see, and (b) the growing specter of rain. This proved to be a decent selection, as about halfway through the tour, as we were down by The Battery, it started to pour. Rain continued, heavy at times, for the rest of the day.

The driving tour, while keeping us dry, didn't exactly keep us on schedule, as the minibus stalled a number of times. We then had a 15 minute wait at one of the historic homes to swap buses with one that didn't stall (and had better AC).

As for the tour, we mostly drove through the historic district and saw the many, many nice old houses. We also saw some that were in less pristine condition, thanks to a civic interest in preservation that doesn't allow for the destruction of any building over 75 years of age. They can be left to the caprice of nature and the immutable law of gravity, but don't think for a second you can bring in the wrecking ball. In any case, it did add to a sort of shabby gentility, which is one of those phrases that seems to describe any number of southern locations (at least to us up here).

Given the weather and scope of the tour we did not see as much of the city as I would have liked. I would suggest running through John Heaton's Carolina Breakdown for a better description of the city's charms.

We did decide, after the tour, to head up to the open markets on, surprisingly enough, Market Street. It's kind of a combined tourist trap, flea market, and craft fair. Seagrass baskets are the local handicraft item of interest, and they are very nice. Just very expensive. At this point we started to run into our late afternoon theme- every time we were out from under cover, it rained. Or, rather, deluged. Dumped as we were going from the visitor center to the market. Poured as we tried to get back to the car after dinner. We were soaked, even with the hastily-bought umbrellas.

The drive home was marked only by the possibility of running out of gas in the Francis Marion State Forest, but found some ramshackle general store with two pumps to get us through.

The night was devoted to drying off and preparing for the next day's excursions: shopping for the women, golf for the men.

Thursday September 26 The XY contingent set off under overcast skies to chase little white balls around River Oaks Golf Plantation, located just across the highway from the timeshare. It was pissing rain as we got to the club stand and made the decision to press on. Sarah's dad and uncle used their free rounds, and my round got discounted (thanks in part to club rentals and ball and tee purchases, I'd have to think).

We got in the carts and started to drive over to the Bear course (the facility is made up of three nine hole courses, so you play two of the three in a full round). About halfway there, it begins to pour. Biblically. Take the loved ones to higher ground pour. We hunkered down in the carts for a minute or two, but with no end in sight headed back to the clubhouse.

We waited there about five minutes, and the monsoon devolved into spitting rain. Having already shelled out to play, we figured to give it another go.

The sun was out and the temperature climbing by the time we reached the third hole.

Like much of the newer development in the area, the course was built on what was, to the best that I could tell, former marsh/swamp/forest land. The water tables are high, making drainage- especially after heavy rains- difficult. This set a tone for the day, as the rains turned some sand traps into impromptu water hazards and made the fairways play more like rough. In fact, it was almost better to be in the first cut of rough, as it was usually less waterlogged than the fairway.

The most interesting part of the day- outside of my demonstration of links ineptitude- was watching Sarah's uncle, who is I guess legally blind, play. For someone who has to feel the ball and club head before driving, and have someone help him line up his shots, he plays very well. He beat me, though that may not be the best measure of success given how rarely I've played.

I did make some memorable shots. Such as on the fifth hole, when my drive made a loud thwacking sound off of one of the condos that encroach upon the course. Or on a later hole, when I put a shot into some murky water. Some searching not only located my ball, but about a dozen others. Occasionally I did put together some honest to God golf shots, such as my drive on the fifth hole of the Fox course, which made me realize why people play this game.

Then there were the multitude of shots where the ball's travel could be measured in inches. Those made me realize why this game drives people crazy.

So what did I shoot? Let's just say that my score was lower than the number of points Georgia Tech put on Cumberland College in 1916, but higher than the number of homers hit by the Detroit Tigers this season.

The rest of the day was kind of a wash. Watched the Red Sox play a lackluster game against the White Sox, more time at the pool, and general relaxation.

Friday September 27 By virtue of a late flight we actually had most of the day to do stuff. Which explains why we spent most of the day by the pool. Seriously, it's like a sickness or something.

Had dinner at a little place the women found while shopping. It's a good case of not letting appearances fool you. Located in a shopping center, it looks like the sort of place you'd go to when the Old Country Buffet is closed for renovations. And as short as it was on amenities, the food was very good. I took the all you could eat fish as a dare and managed four helpings of flounder down the chute. I actually had quite a bit of fish on the trip; had some catfish when we were out on Monday night, and tilapia at a place in Charleston on Wednesday.

While on the subject of food, I would be a very happy person if hush puppies and sweet tea were available at every meal here as they are in the south. I would weigh 700 pounds and have no teeth, but would be happy.

Got to the airport to find out from the Delta folks that Atlanta is all screwed up, so in order to actually make sure we got home they rebooked us onto a US Air flight that would go from Myrtle Beach to Charlotte to Boston. We went to the gate waiting for our regional jet or puddle jumper. We got a 737. Apparenly, they needed the plane back in Charlotte. So, 30 of us trooped aboard for our 27 minute flight. That was very strange.

Charlotte has a very nice airport. Better than Atlanta, I'd have to say. Newer, and the commercial aspects are less in your face.

Flight home was on an Airbus 319, which has the oddity of only being able to raise the middle armrests halfway. I thus spent the trip with the thing in my lap, as it was discomforting in either the full down or up positions. The armrest on the aisle, however, was fully retractable. I'd have moved except that every time I sit on the aisle I get whacked with the drink cart. Honestly. Every time.

Boston was pretty well socked in, to the point that I didn't see land until we were over the airport. We waited some ungodly amount of time for the shuttle bus to "economy" parking. I use quotes because they price "economy" parking very strangely, assessing charges for hours and parts of hours up to four hours, and then charging one price from four to 24 hours. This allows them to ream you on partial day charges. Thank God Massport isn't some hack-infested bureaucracy that was recently run by a publicist who had no transportation experience.

Oh. Never mind.

Anyway, got home about the time we'd have been touching down if we'd had our original flight, so no complaints there.

Saturday and Sunday September 28-29 Went down to Connecticut for my brother's wedding reception. This was the piece for people who didn't go to the wedding and were invited to the full-blown nuptuals originally planned for this weekend.

The reception was in a pavilion along Southport Beach, and was very nice. There was a clambake theme, which tied into the nautical theme of the wedding itself (lots of lobster iconography). Good view out to Long Island Sound, very close to the water. I managed to not have to give my blessing again (it being a dinner blessing and not requested until after everyone ate), danced poorly, and had quite a number of seabreezes (the beer being crap).

Stayed at the Westport Inn, which didn't make much of an impression on me, honestly. I wonder if it's one of those places whose reputation precedes it enough that it can coast in some ways. The AC was underpowered and the bathroom could have benefitted from a newer shower and some form of ventilation.

Anyway, a fun capper to a full week and a half away from home.