The tree is standing now.
It fell over twice earlier today... nobody in the room the first time.
Nothing on it yet, and nothing spatially under (yet) either, so lucky break there.
I have suggested a brick or two to weigh down the stand. But that would be a lot of dust.

• There are so many alternate-name versions of Monopoly that the "original", by its very original-ness, uses that as its own marketing gimmick.

• Ralph Nader has gotten into writing fiction. His first (that I saw) work is called Only the Super-Rich can Save Us, in which 17 billionaires and close-to-billionaires realize that even if they tried to take it with them, what good would it do, might as well put it back to improve the quality of life for those still here, and do so while they're still here to oversee and watch it happen. (No, I haven't bought it, if anyone on my list is reading this.)

Fundamentally done with shopping, only took me two days (and the second only because the hazelnut people don't come to the Market on Tuesdays.) This is good since we head for Florida on Friday. I like the way my captions will shape up.

Turns out the cable outlet in my room here is TV only, while the outlet in the living room has enough signal to split for both TV and Internet. Not sure if our wireless router will still work, so we're limping tech-wise. And we didn't bring our old TV (bigger screens for less weight can be had)...
Washer and dryer didn't fit in the laundry room, first day at William's will likely just be wash day.

Yesterday the complex we're moving to had its holiday get-together. So we went up there (had to pay the first association dues too!) and met some of our new neighbors. Turns out there's a Scrabble group already (but the sort I might scare off, oops). I'm now the resident Tall Guy (the previous one was in fact the fellow we're replacing!). On the other hand I may be the youngest person in the complex by a mile. But it's not like everyone was there.
Today, there's more packing stuff. Tomorrow seems rather normal (Mike, I found a couple of the things you've loaned me, I have some other things you'll likely be interested in. If anything else of yours turns up, I'll get it back to you, but things can get buried. Especially when some of the things in this place have been seemingly undisturbed for 30 years...)
Wednesday evening there's a holiday sing-along with the Symphony.
Thursday we'll be up at the unit, taking delivery of the washer and dryer. This will be the first time the Place Considered Home has even had a dryer. (Hey, seven months out of the year we could get away with it no problem...) Any locals wanting to check it out, address will follow. BTW, I didn't know you could take a home phone number with you, I always thought they "belonged" to the house. But we're keeping ours.
Friday is The Big Move. The beds are also being delivered that day.
( Now for the actual location... )
More concerts on the weekend, the Medieval Women's Choir on Saturday, the Esoterics on Sunday all the way in West Seattle, that's going to take some time to get to (Google Maps thinks an hour and a half each way, almost longer than the concert itself!!)
And then sometime around the 20th, we go to William's. Will I get to do any shopping?

• I support the right of individuals to make individual decisions- even when they are clearly induhvidual decisions. (Thank you Scott Adams for that neologism). The moment someone proposes a National Standard Behavior and there will be Consequences for those who Diverge from The Mean... that's a direction I don't want to go. Just imagine if everyone were your interpretation of Perfect... that means everyone's all the same... wouldn't that be, excuse the term, boring as hell? However, stupidity that does direct damage to others... now that I'd clamp down on. (Yes, winterene, that was your post that started this.)

• I cannot accept a thought system (call it X) that holds that the ultimate transgression against everything is... to disagree with the very thought system X. And face it, every religion eventually goes through a stage like this (some never grow out of it, hence the problem). Dissent is not a crime, Being Different is not a failing. It is the differences between us, the imperfections, that make this world interesting, that make life bearable even.

I'm a fan of weird signs (I linked to a whole Flickr community of them from the main blog) and now I've just found another gold mine of them. Check it out.

Had I completed my Cal Open post, I would have coined a new phrase: to make a Brass of oneself. Meaning: to not only humiliate oneself, but actually do oneself an injury in the process. (The unfortunate Mr Brass suffered an own goal and a broken nose.)

Moving to more familiar territory, solar "panels" that look more like fiber optic cable.

Believers, maybe you shouldn't ask so much from The Big Fella, or It'll just do this. Then where'll you be?

M minus 11 days...

By the order of the tiles yesterday, I really should have gone 4-4 against the Vancouver team, which would still be a 14-point rating pickup from the San Francisco Massacre.
But two opponents misfired late, allowing me to steal games to go 6-2 and gain almost 70.
First Evan Kramer, holding AAEIOX? for a last rack, with an N ready to be first or second, missed both ANOXEmIA (which I saw, for 110) and ANOrEXIA (which was certainly in his consciousness, if not his cardbox), either of which would in easily. Instead he took 26 for the X and painted himself into a corner.
Then two rounds later, (I may post these later in the week), nagekinoki really should have taken this one. With 3 in the bag, unseen to him were AEENORST?1 (don't know the one)... one bingo line even remotely available, a quad-hook job back-hooking (BO)-U-R-I... and then he doesn't block it, basically daring me to hit it. My last play was a fish-off of an E, drawing to AENST?... R. Ding. ANESTRi 83, one more for the South Team.

Nice job by rafij52 for going PERFECT against a rather formidable-looking side... and to the Vancouver C and D divisions for swamping their Seattle counterparts.
Portable passive hypnosis gear, how to work this into my outfit for future events?

The real estate people handed over the keys to the condo just 10 minutes ago. The move likely in about two weeks. See how long it takes us to adjust our autopilot. Should have asked what the phone number is there.

All told, it would have been quite an effort for Henry to not handle that ball. Hand there just 'cause that's where he was standing, ball bounced right on it. Not surprised if the ref- even if he saw it- just ruled that the ball played him, rather than vice versa...

My original e-mail address has become an ad-magnet. Fortunately, my other two addresses are (basically) junk-free. To reach them:
Use my LJ username, at either (gmail or hotmail).com ... whichever your preference. Or message directly, which comes to gmail. That is all. Thank you.

Found at Venice at Bagley:

A labyrinth of oddities...
A salute to what passed for science in the early 20th century...
A hall of microscopic art works made of butterfly wing scales...
A proposed explanation of why we seem to remember things before they happen...
all this and more...
It's The Museum of Jurassic Technology.
I didn't know the dinosaurs had technology.
Whatever, it is awesome in the way shopping at Archie McPhee is awesome.

2-Mon: Down to Santa Cruz, out on the wharf, up to see the surf at Davenport. Much wilder bit of coastline than the Olympic Peninsula for the same weather conditions...

3-Tue: Ed takes us to a movie while the beets cook (setting up for Mom's borscht, which rules*, even though it's out of the Microwave Gourmet and she doesn't use the 'wave)... the movie is Paranormal Activity... which I can only recommend to those that thought Blair Witch Project to be great stuff.
*At least according to all the borscht aficionados who have experienced it.

4-Wed: Travel day. Bus SJC-Stockton, train SCK-BFL, bus BFL-LAX... gets to LA a couple of hours before the Coast Starlight. Funny. Dinner at Greek restaurant on 2nd St Long Beach, now with uncle on Mom's side.

5-Thu: Join Steve on beach walk, then up to the Queen Mary tour. The Ghosts and Legends thing is a bit cheesy, but worth it (they hired that guy for the voice). Mom loves Art Deco. Play a few games of Quiddler in evening.

6-Fri: Another museum- the Norton Simon in Pasadena. Smog not as bad as Beijing but they still have work to do. Really need two days for it... your eyes can only take so much neat stuff. Mexican for dinner, cousin Catherine joins us. Discover one thing about Quiddler... you can't afford to eat a card.

7- Sat/ today: Transfer day to uncle on Dad's side, cousin Leilah joins in from Palm Springs, all to Canter's Deli on Fairfax. They got stuff you like. And probably too big a portion. I should have gotten the "Mishmosh" soup (matzo ball, noodles, kreplach) and the sweet potato fries, but opt for the BBQ chicken sandwich (I'm still smelling the sauce on my hands)... On the other hand: egg cream. What might elsewhere be called a "chocolate soda." Continue to the Folk Art museum close by, neat craft market alongside. That about catches up to the moment.

8-11, loss of something like 150 rating points. (EDIT after looking-- 102)
Even if I was playing perfectly*, I would not have been more than maybe 11-8. My picks were just that ugly, even though I get the sense that I will probably find that I got 25 blanks when I count them up. Just that nothing else worked.
I suck. But if I didn't, the universe would collapse in on itself. (Hey, there has to be SOME reason...)
At least I enjoyed the city, what I saw of it...
*At least, to the level I know I can do. When there's at least 5 games when it's just sit there and watch oppo play, including at least one rated 1300 or so, it just ain't workin'.

I've never been to SF. So this'll be new all around.
Anyone want to mention someone in their club who's going -and is likely to make some noise from well back in the ratings? (Sort of this event's answer to wantonhalo a year and a half ago at O-Tile?)
Anyone have a concept of someone they're totally hoping to be scheduled against in the first day? From my spot in the second row (if they do groups of eight), I would have hoped to draw a round 7 match against Payne, or Peter Armstrong, or Robinsky... just 'cause I've never faced them before.
Anyone else have something they want to ask, trash-talk, whatever?

First, a Scrabble sighting: NAIRU% defined and described.

Switching fields, I could start in again on saying that it doesn't work to assume that everything has a cause except the entity doing all the top-level causing... or I can just drop this link which is a lot more understandable.

The problem with thinking that humanity is somehow not part of nature means we end up treating the rest of the world as ... needing to be subdued, but we really can't survive without it. We are part of nature. Deal with it.

A comment thread recently questioned my stance as far as rejecting the separate-ness of the consciousness. Simply, brain science has drawn the links between what part of the brain does what part of self-awareness. I'd been looking for a reason to put this in anyway.

Finally from the webcomics pages, it's all the TV programs from the 60's and 70's all thrown into the same blender. It's Doctor Who meets Star Trek meets Star Wars meets Superman meets M*A*S*H meets King Arthur meets ... I didn't even get some of the references.