my edward gorey mug amuses me.

today a woman went through my line while another person was training on my register, and while they were talking, the guest said that every person should work retail for a year, and especially work through the christmas season.  i think that is a fabulous idea and should be implemented immediately.  maybe then we would get fewer people digging through purses for change they don't have, forgetting their coupons until after they've been rung up, and my biggest annoyance--people who fill out the register before the check, making me wait even longer to run it through.  i understand the theory behind it, but i get a score on how long that takes you, and if it brings my average down that reflects on me. 

clearly i am annoyed with work again, but it's not so bad as usual.  people are just stupid and the heat makes it worse. 

i think that i might have an idea for photographs to use in the alumni exhibit.  out of the following that are my top three right now, i need two: shoes, sky, king chapel.  i am very much at an impasse and could use as much input as possible.  i know they don't really go together thematically, but at this point i'm running out of time and couldn't care less.

also: my dad joined my mom for a couple of days of the insanity that is ragbrai, and grant is with tim, so it is just stephanie and i for a few days.  dad before he left, "no parties."  stephanie, "who would we invite?".  and, i am still working on death sentences.  it's only 150 pages, but i got stuck on page 50 for a few days.  i have made my way past it and am smoothly moving on.  lastly, you will notice i have written a whole post without using parenthesis once.

a story told in pictures

i tried to get them down to as few as possible, but you know how i am.  also, check out my sky photos of which four out of the five i took the two days i was gone.

hanging out with clay and kathy at the mill, and neon lights in a bar on the way back.

shopping.

at the java house.

stephanie's new shoes.

eating pizza at pizza on dubuque.

i had fun being there doing things i like to do, eating places i like to eat, and seeing people that i like to see.

beam me up, scotty.

jimmy doohan passed away.

you know you're a nerd when...(part 3)

not only do you stand in line at wal-mart for the release of the newest harry potter, but you have it finished at 4pm that same day (and that includes a full night of sleep).  of course, such quick reading means that you know how it ends but you have ABSOLUTELY NO ONE TO TALK ABOUT IT TO!

the big bad wolf

i was reading the world is flat by thomas friedman, and near the end he wrote "We need our president to restore September 11 to its rightful place on the calendar--as the day after September 10 and before September 12.  We must never let it become a day that defintes us.  Because ultimately September 11 is about them--the bad guys--not about us.
"We're about the Fourth of July, we're about 11/9 [the day the Berlin Wall fell]."

and i thought that was really great.  especially in light of what happened recently in london, and how they reacted versus how we reacted (to the bombings with "how to protect yourself", etc., but also in a sense to 9/11).  i mean, we're still talking about it (that being 9/11).  and i'm not going to deny that it was awful and senseless, but we also need to move past it as a country and learn from it, and as friedman says, not let that define us.  that's why i get so sick of this pseudo-patriotism that almost borders on the same fantaticism that we accuse the same people we are fighting of having.

guh.  sorry if i am incoherent or something.  i'm tired, and it's hot and so while i know what i'm trying to say i'm not sure if it's the same thing that is actually coming out of my mouth.  so i will just leave with this quote:
"The people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country." Hermann Goering, at the Nuremberg trials.

no pictures here

bride & prejudice is fabulous, and i'm sad i didn't get to see it sooner.  "plus my crib has it's own hot tub bath with super jets."

ah, gurinder, i did like your last two films, but with the next three being re-makes what are you giving me to look forward to?

summer photos

every fourth, ottumwa is annexed by missouri

at least, you might think so by the amount of illegal fireworks being set off in a public forum with no repurcussions.  we do like our pyrotechnics.

indecisive much?

anytime i say "well, i don't know..." i need someone to punch me.