14 February 1998: A Little Wobbly, Isn't He?

Saturday, 14 February 1998:

A Little Wobbly, Isn't He?

Saturdays seem to be bad for me lately. I stayed in bed 'til 11 because I was feeling down (again) about work and life and stuff like that. Contemplating a need for some sort of change at work because otherwise I think I'm just going to become a drone, and also contemplating that the advantage to being a drone is that I save most of my mental energy for other things.

Eventually I got up and showered and went out to run errands, which helped me feel better. Unfortunately, it seems like whenever I'm down on a Saturday my main coping mechanism is to go out and shop, which isn't exactly good money management.

But today I shopped for things I needed before buying things I wanted. I went into a bathroom specialty store and bought a new (and nicer) shower curtain and a new mat for the bathroom, making it seem a little better in the process. Then I visited Cost Plus World Market, which is a favorite haunt of some friends of mine. They did have some yummy-looking food, but the big purchase was a nice gray throw-blanket which I put on the end of my bed, hoping to persuade the cats to sleep there, mainly, and thus reduce the build-up of cat hair on the rest of my bed. They seem to like it; it's nice and soft and cats just like to lie on something when given the option.

As I type this it sounds like the cats have decided that the shower curtain makes a nice swishy sound when they run their paws over it. Silly cats.

Then I came home and watched three of the Babylon 5 episodes I had saved on tape, editing out the commercials for my master copies. Two more to do tomorrow. Right now they're in the mediocre part of the second season, where between "The Geometry of Shadows" and "Divided Loyalties" there are only a handful of really good episodes (in particular, "Soul Mates", which is the funniest episode of the series, and of course "The Coming of Shadows").

Tonight I finished reading The Faded Sun: Kesrith, which is clearly the first of a trilogy (I wasn't sure if this was a trilogy in the "three books but one story" sense, or "three related books, but basically separate stories" sense). It's really just prologue. Not terrific stuff, but good enough to keep reading.

The premise - the consideration of the last few survivors of a once-proud species - is a worthy one. I'd once considered writing something similar as a sequel to H. Beam Piper's novel First Cycle (which I think is greatly underrated, but then, I'm a big Piper fan). I'll see what Cherryh does with the idea.

I have actually felt vaguely ill tonight, and have been consuming a lot of liquid. I haven't feel outright crummy in any way, just somehow on the weak side. I felt well enough to go down to the coffee shop tonight, for instance. I'm trying to consume a little more solid, sugar-less food right now hoping that that's the problem. I didn't eat a whole lot today, bread-with-blueberry-preserves being the main component of what I did eat.

Seeing couples came into the coffee shop following what I presume was their own celebration of The Contemptible Holiday was kind of amusing. I just don't 'get' why people dress up for such things.

I'm stirring up a little controversy on the Red Sox Mailing List. Last week, the list manager asked that people refrain from forwarding whole articles through the list, and included a useful post with guidelines for what he considered "fair use" of such articles on a list intended to be a discussion, not a news, list. Since then, several people have posted articles clearly in opposition to these guidelines, and I've called them on it. I personally dislike the practice, and the list manager says that many other members dislike it as well. I'm often all-too-happy to step into the role of gadfly in such cases.

A couple of people have since commented that it would be better if I sent such objections to the individuals in question rather than to the whole list. This seems a fair request. What I think I'll do is to simply mail them a copy of the list manager's article on the matter with a request to please refrain.

Michael Rawdon (Contact)