All carbon, all the time

So I've already plugged my friend Eric's book The Carbon Age.
But last night, he was on The Colbert Report, which is awesome. And I'd say he does damn well there. See for yourself.

Speed demon

Today, I learned that it is just as fast to bike to work as it is to drive.
I wouldn't want you to think that I learned this by actually biking to work. Heavens, no.
I learned this because some guy on a bike, wearing a brown t-shirt and carrying a box of wine, meandered out on the street in front of me as I drove to work. He rode some on the sidewalk and some on the street, and disappeared from my view for a bit, and then nearly ran me over in the parking lot at work.
Now, obviously, my drive to work was a little slower because there was some wine-carrying moron weaving all over the street.
But I suspect his ride to my work was also a little slower because he was weaving all over the road.
I'm calling it a tie.

Before the dawn

So last night I went to meet my friend who lives in Boston for a movie (See? This is what I'm talking about.).

Specifically, The Dark Knight.

Now, one nice thing about not having TV is that I have really not been exposed to any of the hype around this movie at all. So things were surprisey. It was great. Anxiety-inducing, a little, but great. Tremendous political commentary, too, although I am not sure the filmmakers and I are on the same side of certain issues.

And now I want to talk about some stuff, but I don't want to spoil anything for anyone who hasn't seen it yet, especially since the stuff I really would like someone to explain to me is from the endish of the movie. My go-to comic book guy has not been able to help me, which probably means my understanding of this is beyond helping (maybe because it actually didn't make sense). But if you have seen it, and are burning to discuss this movie, particularly the part that doesn't make any sense, get in touch.

Oh, and about images on here. Yeah, some of them are weird. I am trying to only use images in the public domain. This is not always easy, but it is often hilarious. I mean, right?

Aww

I had about the sweetest e-mail of my life from a regular reader today:

"Life is empty without new City Mouse Country posts.
"How are you doing?"

Aw. I miss you guys, too.
Last week was a rollercoastery week. Here are your updates (and downdates, I suppose):

• The computer has been replaced, and is working fine. Hallelujah.
• My parents' dog died. She was old, but we didn't know she was dying, and it has thrown me just a little more off-kilter than I already was. My parents are, naturally, devastated.
  
• My college roommate and her kids came to visit last weekend. We had an outstanding time, complete with turtle-spotting, playground time, cheeseburger pie, ice cream, and lots and lots of reading. Good stuff.
• My friend is moving to Bermuda, which means I have a reason to go to Bermuda. Also, his farewell party this weekend featured lots of special guest stars I hadn't seen in years.

I am doing all right, but I am staying very, very busy, part by design and part by coincidence.
There will be loads to post about in the coming weeks, as:

• Many many cousinmice (largely from assorted cities) will be coming to visit.
• Also: one more city visitor.
• Also: a worlds-colliding-type birthday party for an old friend.
• Also: the miracle that is summer stock theater.
• And maybe an amusement park trip.

Keep watching this space.

How do you like them Apples?

So, Sunday night, I was feeling sort of gloomy, and my friend came over to take me to dinner.
And we had a lovely dinner, and then went out for a drink or two.
And I walked home and went to bed.
I woke up to the pitter-pat of rain outside several times, but it was still so so so so hot that I had to drag my mattress into the living room, where the air conditioning is, to sleep. I didn't sleep well, but I did eventually wake up.
And realized that before dinner I'd left my Mac out on the deck, where it stayed until morning, in the rain.
I was obviously already running late when I discovered it, so I brought the laptop in and put it face-down on a towel, and then ran out of the house. I came home from work a little early, and did what I could to dry and revive my poor computer, but it was no use. Pressing the "on" button made a little scary crackly noise at first. Now it does not do that, even.
Then I went to sleep for fifteen hours. So while the computer story is true, it may also be a metaphor.

Image by someone called "Shorelander," who wants credit.

A little more about New England

After yestiddy's post, there was some discussion of a Saturday Night Live sketch from the early 1990s. It is not the first sketch or joke ever done abut New England geography, but it is hilarious. And we still do not have a clip to show you here, but thanks to vigilant commenter Joe Coombs, we do have a transcript.
I suspect that how funny you think this is is directly proportional to how much of your life you've spent in New England.
Joe and I have both been reduced to tears, 500 miles apart. See you in Framingham, pally.

About New England

It has come to my attention recently that several of my friends are not from New England, and do not have any sense of how it works. Possibly, this is true of some of the thousands of people who read this blog and do not know me, as well. Those who are generally interested in learning something about geography should read this whole post. Those who are only interested in geography as it may pertain to their relationships with me are permitted to read only the parts in bold and italics.

New England is not like "the Southeast" or "the Midwest," where people discuss whether certain states or metropolitan areas really count. New England is six specific states, period: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. (That's alphabetical. If you want help figuring out what's what on the map, Maine is the big one all the way to the east. New Hampshire is due west, and Vermont is west of New Hampshire. Massachusetts is the one with Cape Cod jutting out, just south of New Hampshire and Vermont. Rhode Island is south of Massachusetts, on the coast, and it is teeny. Connecticut is south of Massachusetts and west of Rhode Island. The ocean is on the right.)

Look at the map above and notice how tiny all of New England is. Look at wherever you're from and notice how much bigger it probably is.

Unfortunately, in Northern New England (that's Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont), the roads aren't always straight, and they aren't always good, which means sometimes it takes longer to get from where you are to where you're going than the map suggests. Even still, I do not think there is anywhere in New England that is more than a two-hour drive from at least two other states or Canadian provinces.

I live sort of in the middle. I am less than a two-hour drive from all of the New England states if I speed, from five out of six if I obey local laws.

According to Google maps:

• I am about two hours from Boston.
• I am about two and a half hours from Burlington, Vermont.
• I am about two and a half hours from Providence, Rhode Island.
• I am about two hours from Hartford, Connecticut.
• I am about an hour and a quarter from Manchester, New Hampshire.
• I am about three hours from Portland, Maine (darned Northern New England roads!).
• I am about three hours from the Canadian border (which, as my coworker says, is a good thing to know).

If you are going to any of the New England states, you should let me know, because the chances that I would just meet you somewhere for coffee or dinner or drinks or lunch are very high. Last night, I went to Boston after work, just for the evening. I wouldn't do that every weeknight, but it's not out of the realm of possibility. I will go to Brattleboro, Vermont, or Northampton, Massachusetts, almost any time, possibly even for lunch on a work day.

A moving story, Part 6

(Part 1 here.)
(Part 2 here.)
(Part 3 here.)
(Part 4 here.)
(Part 5 here.)

Yeah, you knew it was coming. Sorry it's been so long, for those of you still hanging on that cliff.

Anyway, the movers showed up just a few minutes earlier than they said they would, which was great. They looked like regular movers, like you might see in a movie. They were men, roughly between the ages of 25 and 45, who seemed entirely capable of lifting heavy things, which they did. Neither of them were visibly pregnant, either, even though we know that pregnant does not necessarily mean incapable of lifting things.

They were friendly and helpful and fast — sometimes too fast for me to be entirely sure where things should go, but they were patient about it, too. At some point, my mother showed up to help me out, which was fantastic.

And then, as they were unloading my desk from the truck — my desk, which, you may recall, was one of the main reasons I paid someone to move me at all — one of my movers said, "[The Guy] told you about the desk, right?" And my mother and I looked at each other, frozen for what could have been anywhere from a split second to half an hour, before saying in chorus, "No."

The movers brought in my beautiful desk with the front left foot smashed off. And a pile of what might generously be described as "kindling," but would more accurately described as, "large splinters." And while I fought tears, my mother assured me it would be all right. And then (some of you know my mother, but if you don't, just know that I am on my way to growing up to be just like her, but she is soooo much better at this than I am, and you will have some idea of the perfection with which this was executed), my mother said to one of the movers, "Hm. Well, I think we won't pay for this until that's taken care of. Don't you think?" And the mover said, "That's what I'd do." And I smiled a lot and gave them a huge tip for their awesomeness.

Then, several things happened, in roughly this order:

I discovered all kinds of things about this moving company. Apparently The Guy and His Business Partner had had a falling out, and she'd left the company, and she was really the glue holding the enterprise together. Apparently, there had been one little issue, years before, when he'd moved an antique dining room table for my family and promised to fix it before storing it for us, but now that we thought about it, no one had seen that table. Apparently, he'd been increasingly losing his temper and periodically acting irrationally. We managed to put this together through a combination of family and community gossip.

and

I had a series of conversations with The Guy about my desk and his payment. To recount them all would be very long, so I have consolidated them into this one, which covers several of the highlights:
The Guy: So, I'll come pick up your desk and find someone to work on it.
bzzzzgrrrl: No, thanks. Find someone to work on it, and then you can come get my desk and bring it directly to that person.
TG: But I don't know who it will be yet.
bg: Right. Let me know, and then come get my desk. I'm sure you understand, under the circumstances, why I might not want to have you loading and unloading this particular piece of furniture a lot of times.
TG: Huh?
bg: You broke it.
TG: We didn't break it loading and unloading, we broke it on the steps outside your apartment.
bg: In Virginia?!?! And you didn't tell me?
TG: We didn't want to worry you. We'd tell you about it when we got it up North.
bg: But then you didn't.
TG: Obviously you were going to see that the whole front foot of your desk was broken. Now, pay us and we'll get it fixed.
bg: Um, no.
TG: Insurance will pay for your desk, but I need my money.
bg: I'll give you half when you get the desk to be repaired, half when I have it back.
[Repeat, often, with variations in angriness and ease of getting in touch, mostly with more talk about money and some shock at my lack of trust.]

and

My mother had a series of conversations with The Guy (who started calling her), and his lawyer (who immediately sided with my mother when he heard our side of the story), and Preggo (who was still answering phones).

and

The Guy lied to us about one million times about having found someone to repair the desk, and then actually did find someone, and then actually did pick up the desk.

Two months later, the desk was ready. There were more glitches and weirdnesses, of course: I took time off from work to wait for the movers; The Guy had the wrong time; The Guy showed up (late) by himself because his movers were lost because he'd given them the wrong address; we sat around chatting awkwardly for a while; the movers showed up; The Guy made me write him a check to himself personally and not to the moving company; my desk was finally moved back into the house in gorgeous condition.

Yea!

I think I said there'd be seven parts to this story. Really, the story's over here, finally, already. Part seven is more of an astonishing epilogue. Stay tuned. Any questions before we get there, that I can answer either in the epilogue or in the comments?

The right to keep and bear cherry bombs

Happy Fourth, everyone.
"But wait," you say. "Bzzzzgrrrl, you're sick. What the heck are you doing up at nearly midnight?"
Well, fireworks are legal up here, including, apparently, in my neighbors' yards.
Some of you may have seen this champion of freedom on the Colbert Report. He's a local guy, known personally to many of my friends and relations:

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
Difference Makers - Steve Pelkey
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor Fox News

In other news, I did sleep in three of the four beds in my house today.

And in still other news, know what I'm doing tomorrow? Going to a staged reading of the Declaration of Independence at the local meeting house. Having salmon and peas for dinner. And that, my friends, is how we do the Fourth of July.

Sick again

You may recall that I am whiny and irritating when I'm sick. And also, that I consider it to be your job to entertain me.
Well, I'm home today with a really painful sore throat and less painful but still troubling body aches. I suspect I caught the camp crud from a certain group of young men (who are actually at camp) that I spent the evening with on Tuesday.
So, the comments are yours. Tell me what to look at.

Also, is it

• sweet
• pathetic
• sweetly pathetic

that I am about to have a bowl of ramen noodles for breakfast?
And is it better or worse that

• I plan to eat them with the chopsticks my brother-in-law gave me for Christmas?
• I plan to eat them while watching Traffic?
• the flavor is called, "Oriental"?

Things that affect me differently in the country than in the city

Welcome to a new potentially regular feature I call, "Things that affect me differently in the country than in the city"

The U.S. is slipping compared to other countries when it comes to access to affordable high-speed Internet. The U.S. ranks 22nd when it comes to cost (it’s cheaper in Portugal and Turkey). Broadband penetration dropped from #4 in 2001 to #15 in 2007.

... Rural Americans often don't have access to high-speed Internet connection.

Yeah, those rural Americans. Like my boss and coworkers. And, until recently, parents.

Animal planet

So, sure is a lot of nature around here.
Sunday morning, I was driving around a little. On my first twenty-minute drive, I spotted:

• An enormous live deer in someone's front yard, very close to the road
• Two live cows, with a person but untethered, ambling up the road (Yeah, yeah, domesticated cattle aren't "nature." You still don't see 'em wandering the streets of Arlington, Virginia.)
  

In my second twenty-minute drive, I swerved to avoid:

• A dead porcupine in the road, because quills in my tires would be very bad
• Another dead porcupine in the road, because quills in my tires would be very bad

Last night, on my way to Main Street at about 9:00, I saw:

• Four little creatures that I could not identify in the dark, but that seemed first like possum and then like geese, walk single-file into my neighbor's front yard

And on my way home from Main Street at about midnight, I saw, just in time:

• A live skunk in the middle of the sidewalk, preparing to spray me

I'm guessing the possumgeese were actually skunks, in retrospect.
I will say that I can move very quickly across a street under those circumstances, and I am just lucky that there were no cars coming. I did not get sprayed, which is also good, because getting sprayed would have involved me walking back to Main Street, to the convenience store, because I obviously would not have wanted to walk home to get my car, and hoping against hope that Cumberland Farms sells tomato juice in large quantities.
I was in no mood.