--Weird Al

I've got plenty to write about, and too little sleep. Lovely combination. Of necessity, my internal clock got thrown for a loop at the end of the semester, and it hasn't had a chance to return to what I laughingly refer to as "normalcy" yet.

But here's a rundown of miscellaneous bits and pieces:

It may be worth mentioning that I still haven't unpacked some of the stuff I brought with me when I first moved in, over a year ago.

I expect to be doing a thorough cleaning of my apartment, which will also involve a major reorganization of all of my stuff. Which should also involve my finally throwing some things out, and selling off some other stuff on eBay, if I can. (Much of my surviving Dungeons and Dragons stuff will be in the latter category, I think. I'm still debating over the comics.)

Anyway, while looking through my boxes of old stuff, I came across a number of things I had forgotten about, including an old report card.

Y'know, I was a "B" student throughout high school. I got occasional marks in the 70's or 90's, but I was pretty consistently in the 80's, on average. How'd I get to be such a bloody perfectionist?

I know, I know... I started caring about my education, once it was something I chose to do myself. But why ruin a perfectly good rhetorical question?

More to the point, I guess this does reinforce my feeling that it's probably a good thing that I didn't start college immediately after high school. I probably would've just continued the trend. A nice thing to keep in mind, the next time I get depressed about the fact that I'm 26 and still a junior.

Actually, it reappeared at the start of November, but I hadn't noticed until somewhere in the middle of finals, at which point I wondered if I'd just been wrong about its disappearance. At any rate, I didn't have a chance to pursue the matter any further until this week. It seems that some group called the Alt.Sex.Stories Text Repository -- which turns out to have a pretty good website, if you're into this particular subculture -- has taken over moderator and archiving duty, now that Eli the Bearded doesn't have time for it.

Most of you probably don't know what the heck I'm talking about, and I should probably just leave it at that. And, honestly, most of the stories in a.s.s.m. are awful. But there are exceptions, and I like touching base there every now and again; I've lurked there (and, before it showed up, in its progenitor, alt.sex.stories) on and off over the years, and it's nice to know who's still writing, how Celeste is doing, that sort of thing.

So far, I note that Celeste's back in business as a reviewer (which I'd already known, having ventured into a.s.s.d to check on that, somewhere along the line), that Ann Douglas is similarly back out of retirement... and that Taria and M1ke Hunt are still gone, more's the pity.

I sometimes worry that I'll lose the other half of my readership if I get into my outlook on abstinence here.

On the other hand, I suppose my struggle with the contradictory parts of my life might be what draws some of y'all back here, so maybe I shouldn't worry so much.

I just hope nobody's reading this as their "train wreck" journal. And if they are, I don't want to know about it.

Basically, the idea is that they send me e-mail periodically, and I use the links provided, for which I usually get ten points for checking out any given site. There's often the potential to get even more points if I buy something, or sign up for an advertised service, or whatever. Usually, I just take the ten points and leave, but there have been occasional exceptions. I've signed up for a few free web-based services that I never use, and barely remember, just so I could get an extra hundred points or so. And I got 300 address labels absolutely free -- no shipping charge, even -- with a bunch of points to boot, from one offer.

Anyway, last week, I was presented with an offer from Buy.Com, in which they were offering $10 off any purchase of $10 or more to first-time buyers. Plus 300 points.

So I took a look around, and discovered that I could get the second Harry Potter book for about eight bucks. Hmmm. Casting around for a way of reaching $10 without going far over, I thought of The Monster at the End of This Book, which they had for about two bucks. Perfect!

It then turned out that, with shipping, I was looking at a final cost of almost $5. So I turned it over in my mind a few times, decided that it was too good an offer to refuse, and clicked my mouse appropriately. And, lo, the second Potter book arrived on Tuesday, and I finished reading it earlier tonight, on the train back from a housewarming party.

(Intrusive aside: You know, I probably need my own name for readers of this journal. I mean, "Ardent Reader" is pretty much Columbine's, in a journalling context, and Mary Anne has "munchkins"... I dunno. Members of the Soapbox Squad, perhaps? Or does that sound too much like something out of William Safire? Hmmm. I could use some feedback on this one.)

But I digress, probably because I'm half-asleep at this point. Anyway, as I said, I was quite surprised, but happily so, to find out that she'd sent me the third Harry Potter book and the latest Weird Al CD. And there was much rejoicing. Thanks again, Jennifer!

And the rejoicing was not confined to myself; two of my sisters are already lined up to read both Potter books as soon as I finish them. In fact, we've already agreed that I'll be visiting the older one shortly, primarily so that I can hand them over. Although it'll also just be nice to visit her. And she lives near the Brooklyn Museum, so I'm hoping to stop by there either beforehand or afterward, so I can finally see that elephant dung painting the Mayor's been making a fuss about.

Although I'm afraid Columbine has turned out to be completely on target about Al's new look. Frighteningly so, in fact.

This was the first I'd heard of the matter in the first place, and I still can't quite get over it. That was the funniest sketch in the whole show, for Pete's sake.

Oh, well. I think I shall resist going into my whole ADL rant right now; suffice it to say that I really don't like the group at all. While I appreciate their concerns, I think their approach is both shortsighted and counterproductive. Not to mention really annoying. Which is probably sufficient grounds for them to call for the dismantling of this entire website, so don't tell them I said that, okay?

For that matter, if you have contacted me with a general request for a poem, but now want to ask for something more specific (a subject, a form, words you want worked in, a parody of a particular famous poet, or whatever other conditions you can think of), feel free to say so, but act fast. I like specialized requests, though, so don't feel as if you're imposing on me by making them; it both gives me something to work with, and adds a fun element of challenge.