(Yes, I intended to write an entry for every day. Alas, my parents� net access died the day I got there, and thus I�m posting the paper journal entries I wrote instead a few weeks late. Sorry �bout that.)

12/29:

Well, not a lot happened today, either. Mom got a phone call at 9 a.m. from someone at AT&T offering to help with the DSL. Foolishly, she told him to call back in a half hour when she was ready to deal with him, and of course he didn�t ever call.

Ironically, some guy from AT&T came out here in person this afternoon to do something or other, and volunteered to try with the computer. Alas, he couldn�t fix it either. Drat, and I was hoping I�d get the net access back a week early. That won�t happen, I fear. Mom says I�ll have to be in charge when the guy comes on Friday. Yikes.

This has, in all honesty, been the most pleasant long period of time I�ve been home in years. I may gripe all through these entries (and do!), but it�s hard to describe the more peaceful, relaxed, TV watching, eating, present wrapping moments. (Though it looks like Mom�ll give up on the tree, unless she ever gets around to doing lights before New Year�s Day.)

Today was a nice, docile, relaxed day. As a kid, I used to dread Saturdays because that meant a cleaning binge, but that didn�t really happen today. Instead, we watched movies.

The first one was Worth Winning, which is always pretty cute. The plot�s fairly simplistic, but it�s the performances that really win the movie for me. Mark Harmon (playing Taylor) is a charming, 80�s-pastel-wearing stud who chats with the camera and is generally having a great time. His prissy shrink so-called best friend Max thinks it�ll be good for Taylor to get dumped for a change (some best friend, huh?), and sets up a bet that will most likely lead to that: get engaged in three months to three women of Max�s choosing. Bachelorette #1 is a blonde virgin goddess who works for a football team, #2 is Madeleine Stowe as a bitchy pianist (I love her), and #3 is Lesley Anne Warren as a miserably married woman who�s dying to get laid. Ironically, the one he ends up liking the best is Madeleine, as they have some snarky verbal battles and then "once she stops busting your balls," she�s fun. It�s cute.

The other movie this afternoon was Finding Forrester, which is good and could be billed in a great double feature with Wonder Boys. It�s about a 16-year-old writer boy/basketball player from the Bronx who makes friends with shut-in Famous Writer William Forrester, who teaches him how to write. (Though speaking as a writer, I wish they�d go into more writing stuff. And er, mention what the hell Forrester�s book is about. How am I supposed to know what�s significant about the guy if I don�t know what he wrote about?) Their friendship is quite adorable, and I was all, "I wanna hang with Sean Connery and eat Chinese food!" There�s a really mean teacher who decides Jamal must be plagiarizing someone (not that he can prove it, or even tries to find a source of where the words came from!) because this poor black kid couldn�t make that good of an improvement ... and Jamal�s showing off his literary knowledge just pissed him off. Bleah on him!

I also spent some time reading The Prestige, by Christopher Priest, which I highly recommend. Holy crap, this is good, and I only wish there were much more of it at the end, or a sequel or something (I don�t think that there will be one, though). Alas, I cannot really get into what�s so brilliant about it without getting into major crucial plot details that kept on blowing my mind. It�s a book that upon finishing, I had to go back and start reading it all over again with the information I now knew in my head, and all the bits that made no sense before suddenly did. About all I will tell you about the plot now (I, for one, won�t read a book without some clue of the plot) is that it focuses on two rival magicians in the late 19th/early 20th century, both of whom do very mysterious disappearing/reappearing acts. The secrets of these acts are the heart of the book.

Oh, I can�t believe this- on the news just now they said someone was trying to put in an ordinance in SF saying that panhandlers begging in certain places would get them a $500 fine and/or up to six months in jail. Oh, come on! They�ll never get that money out of panhandlers of all people (Mom claims that�s the reason for the fine, but it still sounds like something that�ll get ignored in practice). As for jail, hell, three hots and a cot might make jail sound awfully desireable.

By the way, I finally got to Deacon Dave�s tonight. After Christmas, the crowds were gone, so it was quite nice and quick to go through. He did a "Toyland" theme this year. My favorite bits were the computer set up and playing Elf Bowling and the teddy bear assembly line, which featured bear parts on one side and finished bears on the other.

He has a wishing well, and this year I made my usual wish, as well as wishing for something more urgent. I�ve heard it�s a bad thing to blab your wishes, so I won�t, but you can probably guess what they are anyway.

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