I thought I was going to Tacoma today to work on stuff for RTG but Phil said he doesn't need me today so I'm going to continue to work on this stuff from home. But meanwhile, I now have all day to work on my various projects. So what do I find myself doing but completely wasting my time sitting here catching up on WWW reading.

You can read the short name analysis for Pamela which is scarily right on. I should read some other names of people I know well and see if they match. You can look up your own name here: http://www.kabalarians.com/gkh/your.htm.

Robert sent me this story: Urban Death Match by a bike messenger -- stressed me out just reading it.

At some point during my blogging travels, I found Davezilla and bookmarked it and this morning I actually spent a very short time there and managed to dig up some very entertaining URLs.

Check out the Chronicles of George who was "the worst helpdesk technician ever." And for the all time waste of time, and I sat here laughing for quite some time check out these flash movies -- I recommend pepper v. banana. And I checked out this guy's main page and he's my birthday twin -- except born the year I graduated from high school.

Tonight we went to a lecture at PSU called The Shamans of Prehistory: New Perspectives on World Rock Art. This was my idea because I have this fascination with petroglyphs. I did not expect this to be a popular event so you can imagine my surprise when we arrived and the ballroom was packed to the gills mainly with retired age couples in L.L. Bean-wear who were very passionate about the subject matter. The lights were on in back when they started the slide presentation and I thought we were going to have a riot. The ballroom was completely full so we ended up in the adjacent room -- the equivalent of the nosebleed seats, except no elevation. Jean Clottes, from France and David Whitley from the US. They talked about rock art at sites in France, South Africa and California and in particular about the role of the shaman in creating some of this art. It was a lot more interesting than I'm making it sound.

I took another look. The actual plant of eggplants is very pretty -- I would grow them again. I found a small eggplant the size of a ping pong ball and something had pulled it off and gnawed on it. We must have some hungry critters back there because everything gets nibbled on and I found an apple in the front yard with teeth marks in it. I think I'm going to go ahead and pull up most of the garden.

I'm thinking about putting the garden to bed this weekend. This is about 4 weeks earlier than usual and I think a couple of years ago I didn't do it until November. But it's been such a big disappointment this year and it's not doing much. If I took care of it now it would be one less thing to deal with out in the yard. I'll have to go out there and take another look. Maybe I'll pull up everything except the two biggest tomatoes.

A brand new 76 station opened on the corner of 39th and Main St, right across from this gigantic Arco station. I detest that Arco station. I don't understand how Arco can sell its gas so much cheaper than everyone else. But the station is virtually ALWAYS super crowded and it's a huge corner so there are always people zipping around at 180 mph to get the most recently vacated pump or to zip into the convenience market for a beef stick or 82 oz. pop. Also when I used to go there and I'd go inside to pay the people that worked there could never be bothered to look up or make eye contact or return my "Good Morning." I'm sure working at a gas station isn't the dream job of most people but you can make your little corner of misery a wee bit brighter by enjoying friendly people. So I switched to the Chevron station on Mill Plain which was more expensive but less crowded and the people who work there much nicer.

Now there's this new 76 station. When they opened their regular gas was $1.29 to Arco's $1.24. I noticed Arco would still be packed while there was no one at 76 and I couldn't believe that people would want to wait in line to save .05 cents on gas. Let's say your tank needs 20 gallons. You mean saving some time and aggravation isn't worth a buck? I have noticed more people at the new station in the last week or so. Yesterday I saw that Arco had dropped down to $1.21 and can't help but wonder if this is a reaction to the new station.

Last night I had this really depressing dream. It was like I was an old woman and I was in an assisted living place. I think this comes from watching the The Sopranos and Tony's whole thing with his mom. The woman who assists me keeps telling me what I'm doing. I'm standing there and she says, "You just got home. Would you like to go to bed?" And I say yeah. I get in bed and it has this depressing worn pink quilt on it and as I'm getting in bed I'm thinking that I don't feel so old. I get up again and I'm standing there and the woman says, "You just got up," and it annoys me because I'm not daft. I don't need her to tell me what I'm doing.

I've finally been cleaning up some stuff on pamrentz.com. I deleted the old stuff and updated a bunch of files so the directories are semi-normal. I think it's pretty much up to speed right now.

Today has been hideously lazy. We woke up at 5:30am (not on purpose) and got up and went through a whole waking up routine and then ended up going back to bed. I did a little work in the yard and have enjoyed a few refreshing adult beverages. Now I'm going to watch those last two episodes of The Sopranos (1st season).