The Reason Alternators are Important

Well, I never expected to find myself in a completely dead car with Brian's father, sitting in the third lane of six - literally in the middle of Chicago bumper to bumper rush hour traffic. But that's where I wound up last nite. Needless to say, that was a bit of an experience to get out of. We did tho.

Other than that little electrical failure, the trip went smoothly. After landing in Chicago, I got to nap on the black leather couch in the Southwest Airline's Pilot's lounge until Dutch got off work. Then, once the car was towed, Brian and I spent the night in Geneva at his parent's place. Now we're in Iowa City. The leaves are all red and gold. Brian's house is a brighter white than when I left, but otherwise not much is different. I am finally getting some semblance of a layout for this town. Without mountains or sun (most of the time), I find it very difficult to get my bearings.

More House-Sitting

The foothills are literally outside my window. A lot of spiders live in the rocks and apparently make their way into the house to grow to rather large proportions. They fit the house tho. This place is huge. In the living room, a cluster of three couches barely takes up a third of the space.

It was great to see old friends last weekend. And young friends. For some reason I'm always astonished when extremely small children talk.

Today I have painting. Wednesday I have an Art History test. Thursday I get on a plane and fly to Chicago. From there Brian's mom will relay me to Brian and we'll make our way to Iowa City. Brian says the weather has been cold. Cold like thirty or forty degrees. On Sunday morning, riding with Meryl, I got a sun-burn. It's been in the high eighties here. I hope I don't go into shock.

It's going to be very good to see Brian again.

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Eight more days and I'm off to Iowa again. Fortunately, I have some new winter clothes on the way.

In the meantime, more website work. Shawn's site is growing, tho still sparse. I'm soon to add a bit more to Erik's site, and the family site makes it debut.

Lately the air feels cool as soon as the sun goes down. I do enjoy the fall.

For the Coming Post-Chocolate-Milk Paradigm: Other Drinks That Can Be Made by Just Adding Chocolate Syrup

BY MATTHEW WEBSTER

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Chocolate water

Chocolate orange juice

Chocolate Coke

Chocolate green tea

Chocolate beer

Chocolate chocolate milk

Translation

I sometimes think it really is too bad ballroom dancing has gone out of style. It looks like so much fun. Unfortunately, whenever I hear Antonio talk, I think of a cat wearing boots.

I've only danced the tango once, and I didn't know what I was doing.

Today I potted petunia's and a small palm. I fed the horses while Pedro cleaned the corral and I felt stupid because the only words I know in his language don't even begin to form a sentence. My inclination is to speak to him in French. Which doesn't help at all.

And somehow I don't think he'd get it if I yelled gleefully, "Estoy mucho lomo!"

Nothing Like a Sister

It's nice to ride with Meryl. For one thing, she knows Jak far better than I do, so has a much easier time figuring out which of his behaviors are mere antics and which are genuine concerns. I like Jak a lot, but he's so clever he can be exhausting. It's nice to ride with only myself and my own horse to worry about, but have the added enjoyment of company.

For another, she is the only other person I have ever ridden with who can collapse into gales of helpless laughter while riding at high speeds and not risk falling off.

Yesterday a truckload of cowboys whistled at us as we worked in the arena. Tommy got scared and tried to bolt.

House-sitting

My pillowcases are satin, but the bed's smell is alien to me. I lounge with the windows open and listen to the distant yip of the coyotes. Two stories below, I can hear the click of the bloodhounds' toenails as they patrol the strip of cement beneath my bedroom. And although the night breeze is wonderful, the crickets are so loud I might have to close the window to sleep.

Memory

Suddenly, I'm having dreams about a three part harmony and a face I haven't seen in nearly five years. It is true that time heals what reason cannot, but sometimes it takes an awfully large amount of time.

Expansion

The beginnings of two new sites for clients.

Cottonwood Environmental

Shawn's will be viewable soon.

And a third new interested party called today.

Funny how you can start something and it will just grow. It's exciting. To be fair, I owe it all to Sukha, who got me the job at the museum.

But also, I learned today I need to start thinking of this more like a real job. With all this new work, I had hardly a moment of spare time today, so all my plans for various rides and hobbies fell through. I believe I deserve Sundays off.