Tuesday, August 1, 2000

10:34 p.m. Well, I think I've got all the burrs carded out and all the kinks smoothed and I think everything will go up on the server slick as buttermilk on a warm August morning. My new little set of designs and links and counter-sunken screws, all puttied over real nice. I hope.

You should notice nothing amiss.

And welcome to August -- the last month of summer. Big communal sigh. Let's squeeze every bit of sunshine out of it, shall we? Let's all dance in the light and read our mail on a lawn chair and pause outside as the sun goes down, and keep watch over the beams. Can't ever get enough summer.

I think I'd live on the equator, if I could. Or, I'd like to move to Australia or New Zealand at the end of September, watch the fall turn into the spring, and not come back to the Western hemisphere until May. Meanwhile, I'm on the lookout for any sudden mad desires for creamy white food, which, I'm sorry to say, I've already had two of this week.

I'm going to stock up on chamomile tea, and I'm going to drink it at the first signs. Maybe sip it under a sun lamp this year. Desperate measures must be taken to keep myself from blowing up like a homemade loaf of seedy rye. And, I must not think too much about bread, either. No matter the question, white food is not the answer.

Is there an answer? That is the question.

I've been watching the level of demonstrations in the street of Philadelphia with a certain wariness these past few days. If you want to illustrate two diametrically opposed types of police response, I don't think you can do better than to place a Philly cop next to an LA cop.

Try making small talk; try joshing around a little. Now, I wouldn't make any sudden moves or snap judgments toward either police force, but it looks to me like the guys in the city of Brotherly Love have been issued much longer fuses, and it also looks like the protesters are merely practicing their moves for the big show in two weeks.

I could be wrong. I've been known to be wrong.

Meanwhile, if all goes well, it's looking good that I, myself, may attend a real-life launch of the Titan missile in two weeks. I am so proud. I am so going to pack new batteries, whether I believe in them or not.

Enjoy the sun tomorrow, if you can!