* * *
I had a strange dream the other night. In the dream, the writer of one of the agrarian-type blogs I spent the weekend reading was trying to sell me a couple of acres of his land. He and I tromped all over the land as he pointed out the good parts of the land, and where a garden could go, and perhaps a couple of cows. This was a lovely piece of land, but I was unconvinced that I even needed two more acres of land.
At one point I realized that I was accompanied not by Fred, but by Mister Boogers. Mister Boogers seemed to disapprove of the land, and at one point the seller of the land started having a discussion with Mister Boogers, only instead of “Mister Boogers”, he referred to him as “Curtis.” Mister Boogers seemed to take this name in stride, and we left the farmer with a promise to seriously consider buying the land.
I woke up laughing because the only “Curtis” I know of* is Curtis from 24. For those of you who don’t watch 24, Curtis basically exists so that when Jack Bauer is in deep trouble and needs to be transported back to CTU headquarters, they tell Curtis to transport him back, and ALWAYS Jack Bauer knocks Curtis out or beats him up and escapes. In the most recent season of 24, when they told Curtis to transport Jack back to CTU headquarters, you could almost see Curtis flinch.
*Well, my brother did have a friend named Curt (or possibly Kurt) in high school, upon whom I had a very brief crush. In fact, I had crushes on all of my brothers’ friends at one point or another. I was an equal-opportunity crush-er; the guy upon whom I had a crush didn’t have to be particularly smart, charming, or good-looking. Some of the guys I had crushes on were brutally beaten with an ugly stick at the moment of their birth while simultaneously undergoing a personalityectomy. I’d say that I had a crush on most every male who attended my school with only one exception that comes to mind, and he was some horrific mess. If he was a guy and the slightest bit cool**, I entertained a crush upon him for at least five minutes. I probably would have had crushes on all of Tracy’s friends, too, but he graduated from high school and left home before I really got old enough for crushes.
**Let’s just say I had a weird idea of who was cool and who wasn’t.
* * *
I was in Target one day last week, and as always, I was checking out the books to see what had been released recently (
note to the interested: The new Jennifer Weiner book is out today!), and I discovered a fairly new, somewhat disturbing trend.
All those authors who wrote romance novels back in the day to make ends meet and who are now non-romance-novel big-time authors (or at least fairly popular) are starting to re-release their romance novels. I don’t care for this trend because I find that, basically, the old romance novels aren’t nearly as good as their current stuff (Janet Evanovich has been re-releasing her old stuff for years now, and I don’t like any of the re-released stuff a tenth as much as I like the Stephanie Plum books), and it kind of pisses me off that someone might see the name of an author they like on a book, think it’s a new book, and end up with a cut-rate romance.
Tami Hoag is doing it and so is
Kay Hooper, and for that matter I’m sure there are other writers doing it as well.
I’m just saying, be aware that they’re doing it when you’re looking at books. I’d hate for you to get all excited about a new Tami Hoag book, then get home to find that it was originally a Loveswept book, re-released to capitalize on her popularity.
* * *
I just got home from the gastroenterologist’s office. I made Fred go with me in case the doctor said something I didn’t understand, but I think I pretty much understood everything the doctor said.
“Uh…. I dunno!” isn’t that difficult to interpret, after all.
He doesn’t think any of the drugs I’m taking are the cause, he said there was no sign of cirrhosis in the liver sample they took and tested, nor signs of fatty liver disease. “It’s a very nonspecific diagnosis” is what he said. There’s just one more thing to test for –
Primary Sclerosing Cholangitis – but he doesn’t think that’s it, because it tends to present in young white men. In any case, I’m scheduled for an
MRCP (basically, an MRI applied to the hepatobiliary and pancreatic system) next Monday afternoon. It’ll take at least a week for the results to come back from that, and then he’ll give me a call.
In other words, another two weeks of waiting. If I didn’t feel so damn good, I might be worried. As it is, I’m not.
As always, I’ll let you know what’s going on when I know.
* * *
I stopped by Sam’s on the way home from my appointment after I dropped Fred off at work. On my way out, I stopped so that the guy standing by the “out” door could look over my receipt and make sure I wasn’t getting away with anything I hadn’t paid for.
“How are you today?” he asked as he looked over my receipt.
“Good!” I chirped. “How are you?”
“I reckon I’m all right,” he said, and it was all I could do not to say “
MmmHMMM” back to him.
* * *
Curtis and his patented “Is that a serial killer I see behind you?” look.
Ya puts your left paw in, ya puts your left paw out…
* * *
Previously
2005: No entry.
2004: No entry.
2003: It’s a good day, indeed.
2002: FUCKING telemarketers.
2001: I turned to Fred and said “He looks all dilemmanated, doesn’t he?”
2000: Trip to Tennessee.]]>