Rocks and birthdays

Finally done with the paper!!! I am very relieved. If anyone needs me, I'll be in Starbucks with the Brothers K, celebrating.

Today I was in a gross mechanic's waiting room, trying to write the paper, and this really old man came in and tried to make conversation. I was nice but didn't offer any openers, because I was cranking the paper out. Then another really old man came in, and they talked about biscuits and gravy and blackberry pie until they realized that they used to play baseball together as kids. When old man number 2 left, the first guy leaned over and said, "I didn't want to say it in front of him, but they beat us almost every time we played, so we'd rock them pretty bad afterward!"
This didn't actually make any sense, so I asked him what he meant. He said, "throw rocks at em! Sure!! Well-I mean, they'd always throw them back at us too!" There's really nothing you can say to that, so I laughed inappropriately and then went to the bathroom.

In other news, our favorite Jackie's 24th birthday is today! So give her a call if you are her friend, it'll be a nice vacation from thinking about boxes and moving trucks. Also, if you forgot Tami, she might still forgive you if you can find her. Her birthday was Saturday. That's her up there in today's picture, with me eating my hair.

Last night i watched this great documentary on Russian brides--not mail order brides, but close. Apparently Russian men are scarce and lots have big struggles with infidelity and laziness and alcoholism, and so when 23 year old divorced-with-kids Ina met 55 year old John-from-LA who is geeky but kind and rich, everyone's happy. The documentary was kind of portraying it like, "oh, look at these sad beautiful Russian women, they are so desperate to get out that they'll marry these losers" but it didn't seem that sad to me. They were showing the women in these big fancy houses, painting pictures because they don't have to work, and going to sunny parks with the kids, the chubby new husband, and the au pair. I mean sheesh. It's probably just as much of a compromise for the guy, who has to wonder if she's only using him.