Hungry Like The Wolf

Hello World,

And so here we find ourselves poised on the very brink of the last weekend in October, and we all know what that means. If you answered Daylight Saving Time on Sunday morning, you'd be right, but only temporarily. Apparently the brain trust in charge of this ongoing boondoggle and the bane of mankind (or NAMBLA, as Jon Stewart always says) have decided once again to tinker with the formula and change the weekends when Daylight Saving Time starts and stops. Beginning in 2007, it will start earlier in March, and end later in November, so just when we've all gotten used to the first Sunday in April and the last Sunday in October, they pull the rug out from under us once again. Of course, everyone knows what I think of this whole Daylight Saving Time nonsense in the first place, and which I can only describe in words that would make a sailor blush, but will desist out of consideration for the KGB agents who may be monitoring my email, and leave it at that.

In other news, they did in fact have another named storm after Wilma, and they did call it Alpha, so those of us fans of Greek and Roman mythology holding out for new storm Xerxes were left with our own disappointments. As a matter of fact, they had even yet another storm after Alpha, and called that one Beta, so we've stepped out firmly into a new and previously uncharted territory in the hurricane annals. And alas for poor King Xerxes, with nothing to show for it, and more's the pity, I'm sure.

Speaking of weather, Bill tells me that we only needed about 50/100ths of an inch of rain by Monday, to not only be the wettest October of all time, but of any month for all time, since they've been keeping records, lo these many years now. And I don't mind saying, it certainly felt like it, whether it breaks the record or not. I know that for myself, I've seen about as much rain as I'm interested in seeing for a very long time. Since I complained about the leak in the den, and having to cover the furniture with plastic, Bill suggested that we might put a tarp over that spot on the roof where it seems to be leaking in from, and see if we could cut down on the indoor precipitation somewhat. Of course, we all know that if we did, it would usher in the longest period of severe drought that has ever been seen in the history of the world, especially on top of Bill buying new windshield wipers, and I'm sure we would all rue the day.

This turned into a rather trying week at work, where I considered it a highlight of the week that I didn't kill one of the sales reps that calls on the hospital. And I don't mind saying, it was a close thing there for a while. When I hadn't gotten back to a coworker on a question that she asked me earlier, I said I wished I could say that I was running around stamping out fires, but so far, all of my efforts seemed to have had the effect of pouring kerosene on them instead.

In a week like that, I probably should not have taken a chance on the employee blood drive that they had on Thursday in the Auditorium. As I did for the one earlier in the year, I left work after lunch, dropped off my things at the car, and then walked back empty-handed to the blood drive to make it easier. In order to manage the large numbers of staff that they expect, they keep you moving from one station to another, each doing only one part of the process, and carrying things with you all along the way is a significant drawback. For some reason, this turned out to be another one of those events where no one showed up, and with only a half-hour left, they still had under 25 donors. I felt sorry for them, and was glad that I went, so at least they had one extra pint than otherwise. Plus, they give out goodie bags that include a T-shirt, cap, meal vouchers and handy beach mat, which is always nice, not to mention their usual wide array of cookies and juice that we've come to expect. I was even more glad the next day, when they called to say that I won one of their raffle prizes, so you know there had to be some kind of slip-up somewhere, but I wasn't complaining. Of course, after I left the blood drive and walked all the way back to the parking lot, the Tempo wouldn't start, and it cost $150 to get it back on the road, but that was just par for the course the way things were going during the week.

One bright spot at work this week was the annual Service Awards, where they invite employees having their anniversaries of employment in 5-year increments, to a cocktail party at a local country club. Everyone gets a pin, and shakes hands with the President, as well as the Chairman of the Board, and has their picture taken with everyone else in that same anniversary year. They also honor people who have retired during the previous year, and give out special awards for excellence, or as they're known by people who haven't won them, favoritism. We only had to listen to one boring speech, and the rest of the evening was a swirl of fun, good food, drinks, new friends, familiar faces, and to top it all off, wonderful desserts. I thought it was not a bad exchange for one boring speech.

My favorite part of the Service Awards dinner was when people at my table were discussing bloopers in movies, such as a Civil War epic with TV antennas in the background, or a science fiction tale where the space aliens have neglected to remove their wristwatches. One of our engineers chimed in with a story about "Ben Hur," where you can see a sports car in the arena where they have the famous chariot race scene. "And," he chortled, "that movie is supposed to take place, I think, in the 1600's or something like that!" Well, as for myself, I'm thinking that would have surprised the Romans, the Israelites, and probably even the horses, not to mention the Renaissance Italians, if that were the case. It's those famous 17th Century chariot races, that I'm sure we all remember from our history classes, along with the emperors and gladiators, making their mark among the rebirth of art, music and literature throughout the civilized world. Frankly, if that's not revisionist history, then I don't know what is.

We can file this story in the "revisionist geography" category, when a coworker said she was rooting for the Chicago White Sox in the World Series, because she wanted the East coast team to win. I said to Bill that I would expect that to come as a surprise to the people in Chicago, not to mention Ohio and Indiana. Also at work, we got another in a series of horrible catalogues of business greeting cards, and everyone already knows what I think of tan cards with blue trees, or navy cards with gold squiggles, that say things like "Greetings of the Season" or "Warmest Wishes to our Customers." One of the horrible sample cards in this horrible catalogue had an imprint from the WadCam Company, which I'm hoping is a made-up name, but even still, I certainly wouldn't use it as an example for anything. And if there is such a company as WadCam, first of all, they should go out of business right now, or failing that, change their name, and they certainly shouldn't send out imprinted Christmas cards to anyone. Another horrible offering from this horrible catalogue was a 2006 desk calendar featuring pictures of wolves, and you just have to wonder who comes up with these ideas? Do you really want your customers to associate the name of your company, right next to all of these wolves, every day of the week for an entire year? It would certainly make me start to feel like a sheep, and want to run in the opposite direction, no thank you very much.

In the "Confluence of the Seasons" department, when we went to CVS after dinner tonight, we noticed that they were playing one of their spooky sounds CDs for Halloween, just as we walked through the door and bumped into a display of boxed Christmas cards on sale. While we're in a holiday frame of mind, I'm happy to report the good news that "The Polar Express" is returning to IMAX in 3-D during November, and if you are anywhere within 2 states of a theater showing it, you should spare no expense and overcome any obstacles to go see it. It is more than well worth it, if only for the remarkable technical achievements of the special effects in 3-D, and it is an indescribable experience that you will not regret. It's sort of like an Italian Renaissance chariot race, but without the sports cars.

One For The Books

Hello World,

I suppose it would be obvious to anyone by now that I have absolutely no pull whatsoever with the weather control people around here, because things have certainly not been going to my liking and that's putting it mildly. After ten days of drenching rain in our little corner of paradise, I discovered that my bird feeders had gotten all moldy, even the ones that hang up on our porch and out of the rain. In the house, we had leaks in places that we didn't even know we had places, and the den looked like an exhibition of performance art, constructed from a variety of buckets and basins, soggy newspapers and plastic bags over the furniture. When I accidentally kicked over one of the cats' water bowls in there, I said to Bill that it was really carrying coals to Newcastle, and then some.

So you can imagine our surprise last Saturday, when we awoke to find all of this strange yellow stuff coming out of the sky right in our yard, and not a drop of rain to be seen. I told Bill to call the Police, in case it was space aliens landing or something, but the Police brushed us off by saying that there was no such thing as yellow stuff, and the anomaly we were witnessing was just a temporary lull in the normal weather, which would surely be more rain. But they were wrong, the yellow stuff kept up all day, and it was a glorious sight to behold, and I don't mind saying, a welcome change after the recent deluge.

Fortunately, there is good news on the weather front, at least according to Bill --

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In other news, hurricane season is over! It has to be -- they just used the last name on the list!

(from AOL news - abridged to fit the extent of my interest)
Updated 05:23 AM EDT
Cayman Islands Brace for Tropical Storm
Wilma May Threaten Gulf Coast as Hurricane Later This Week
By JAY EHRHART, AP

GEORGETOWN, Cayman Islands (Oct. 17) - Tropical Storm Wilma formed south of the Cayman Islands on Monday, tying the record for the most storms in an Atlantic hurricane season and following a path that could potentially menace the U.S. Gulf Coast later this week as a hurricane.

Wilma is the 21st named storm of the season, according to the U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami. The only other time that as many storms formed since record keeping began 154 years ago was in 1933.
===================================

They went on to say that the 21 named storms ties a record, the 12 hurricanes ties another record, and the 6 severe hurricanes in 2005 set a new record in that category. As to what happens with the name if there is another storm after Wilma, Bill said what they do is start over again at Alpha, then Beta, etc. I said, "No, they don't! They can't say that's what they 'do' when this happens, because it's never happened before. If there is another storm after Wilma, and they call it Alpha, then that will set the precedent for any subsequent time this happens. But they can't say that's what they 'do' if they've never done it before."

Of course, I realize I'm a stickler, and we want to thank AOL for their coverage and information about the situation with Hurricane Wilma. (I don't know about anyone else, but I've been singing the theme song from "The Flintstones" ever since I first heard about Wilma last week, and you can believe by now, I'm pretty tired of it.) But it was also on October 17th, that the AOL Welcome Screen surprised many of us with this screaming headline --

===========================
Braves Pushed To Brink

Astros Ride Oswalt in Game 3
===========================

I had to wonder if it was me, or did AOL step into their Way-Back machine for that story? According to our friends at mlb.com, the Astros beat the Braves 7-6 on Saturday, October 8th, to take a 2 to 1 lead in the series. So this headline from ten days later, long after the Braves had been eliminated from the playoffs, should have raised some eyebrows among the Welcome Screen crew, and not just at my house. In fact, it might even be considered a reasonable expectation that someone would have checked that for accuracy, along with everything else on the page, before they post something for all the world to see that makes them look like they have no idea what they're doing. Or, at least that they don't know what day it is.

Of course, as we all know, and God help us, things can always be worse. Earlier in the week, I told Bill that I couldn't send him any email from work, because as the young man in our crack IT department explained to me, "The Internet is down." Here I'm thinking that would surprise some people! And not the least of which was Bill, who was connected to AOL at the time, and the Internet seemed to be right there where he left it, and chugging along as usual without a care in the world.

Bill also told me that he heard back from the woman who complained that she had received the wrong amount of decals. (" ... you'll be pleased to know Karen McKay was able to figure out she needed 10 additional decals. I have a sneaking suspicion the quantity is somehow related to her personal 'digital' calculators -- the ones with the rings on them.) I said that people who have trouble with numbers obviously can't be considered illiterate really, so I think they should be called "innumerate" instead. And I don't mind saying, their name is legion ... oh wait, I forgot, they can't count higher than ten without using their toes.

In other news, everyone knows that I'm not much of a game player, never have been, and the idea of people spending hours in front of their computers playing games has never made any sense to me. But I stumbled across a game from our friends at pogo.com called Bookworm, and I have to admit that it really caught my fancy. It's true that for the hard-core gamer, it fails the first test of Internet gaming, namely that you only play against yourself, you don't win anything, it doesn't remember you the next time you play, and there's no way to know how well you're doing compared to the top score attainable. But it's a free game and one doesn't like to complain, in fact, there may very well be a paid version of the game that addresses all of these issues. I found it deceptively seductive, and unknowingly spent hours late into the wee hours of the morning, making words out of random "Scrabble"-type tiles, while trying to keep the occasional burning tiles from setting fire to the library. I would finally get so groggy that I would find myself making words like VRAEJ and QUUWIH, while overlooking perfectly adequate words like BENT and DOVES right under my nose. I retired with the rank of Master Librarian, which for all I know, might be the first step up from Total Moron, before you get into the more accomplished grades. But I had fun with it, and would recommend it to anyone with time to waste for no purpose.

I'd like to close with an anecdote from one of my favorite authors, Emily Kimbrough, and if you haven't read anything by her, you should definitely run, don't walk, to your nearest purveyor of used books and snap up anything of hers, especially "Our Hearts Were Young and Gay" and "Forty Plus and Fancy Free." She is a treasure for all ages, and I can't get enough of her. I just love this encounter from one of her lecture tours, out of "It Gives Me Great Pleasure," another one of my favorites --

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A HOTEL IS NEVER LIKE HOME

I changed from my traveling clothes to wrapper and slippers, and when the ginger ale came, I settled down to enjoy it and the mail from home. Before I went to bed I did a little light washing and was put out to find that I had been given a bathroom with a shower, which I abominate, instead of a tub. It was too late, and I was too undressed to change, but there was no hanging space for the wash, not so much as a door to the shower over which to drape my pretties. They hung nicely, however, over bars of the coat hangers in the closet, and I went to bed.

[After her lecture at the local university the next day, she is escorted back to the hotel by one of the professors, and is surprised and chagrined when he makes a passionate declaration of his affection for her, which she tries to graciously but firmly refuse.]

Then I walked away and looked out the window, partly because I thought that would make getting away less awkward for him than if I watched him, and partly because that is what women on the stage and screen do.

Looking down at the street, though not very successfully, because the Venetian blind was down, I heard him walk heavily across the room, open the door and slam it. Simultaneously with my turning around, I heard a thrashing, tramping sound in my closet. The door of the closet opened violently and he burst out. He did not look at me, and I had nothing that seemed appropriate to say, but as he covered the four feet between the identical doors, opened the one into the hall with a force that very nearly took it from the hinges, and stormed through it, I saw, pasted down his back, three wet rayon stockings and a net brassiere.
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Anyone could see that there's no way to improve upon that!

How Dry I Am (NOT)

Hello World,

Well, anyone could see that Columbus Day has been and gone, and I don't mind saying that anybody in this area who was trying to make a nice long weekend out of it certainly had reason to complain about the weather and then some. I believe that it started raining on Friday of last week and hasn't let up since. By the time today rolled around, you would probably be hearing some pretty foul language from the locals, and that's just in our house! I found that the rain didn't have that much effect on our long weekend, but you know what I always say about those short weeks at work, and this was one for the books and that's putting it mildly.

I was looking forward to having a day off from work, so I could catch up with some things around the house, which I did, but apparently too many days off in a row had a noticeably deleterious effect on my brain, with unfortunate results. On Tuesday morning, I went to pick up the newspaper out of the driveway, and found that I had locked myself out of the house. Later at work, I scheduled a meeting for the wrong day, and had to call everyone back again to clear that up. Also during the week, I wore my boots to work and was supposed to carry my shoes to change into, but left my shoes at home instead. I was so bad that I realized I became contagious, when one of our buyers, trying to type a purchase order for some seats and tables for our Day Rooms, ended up instead with something he called "Sled Base Ding Chairs" with the upholstery fabric as "Clarrett." I think it was after that they began circulating a petition to keep me from taking any more days off, purely in the public interest, and I can't say that I blame them.

Of course, no account of the week's activities would be complete without a sports update, and to say that there is no joy in Mudville would be an understatement of epic proportions. The local fans could take no pleasure in the Red Sox losing to the White Sox, when their mighty Yankees suffered the same fate at the hands of the Angels soon after. The Braves also took an early exit from post-season play, courtesy of the Astros, maintaining their perfect record of consistently making it to the playoffs and then consistently losing. Hey, don't look at me, I wasn't anywhere near Atlanta!

Bill would like to make it plain that he disavows any comments that I may have attributed to him, especially concerning the idea to replace the NHL referees with small flying robots. Bill is of the mind that officials in all sports serve only to detract from the game itself, and would support a ban on them altogether, mechanical or otherwise. I misinterpreted his opposition to them as being merely human and prone to errors, usually against his favorite teams. So I'm glad we had a chance to clear that up, hopefully before anyone sank their life savings into stock of the company making small flying robots for the NHL.

He also provided this cogent exposition on the topic of four-dimensional furniture from last week --

=================================
However, I also have a suggestion about your fourth dimension equipment. If you recall, Einstein or someone like that said that TIME is the fourth dimension. Fortunately, your requisition takes that into account, because the last number is "54H", which obviously stands for "54 Hours". Now all you have to figure out is whether that represents the shipping time or the limited warrantee.
=================================

Now that's more like it! While we're on the subject of last week's note, for anyone who hasn't already checked out the list of retired hurricane names (this happens to be from about.com in their geography section) here is the information:

==================================
Usually, the six lists of names for tropical storms and hurricanes repeat every six years. However, if there is an unusually damaging hurricane, the name is retired because using it again could be considered insensitive. The name is then not used for at least ten years. Here is a list of names that have been retired.
Chronologically1954 - Carol1954 - Hazel1955 - Connie1955 - Diane1955 - Ione1955 - Janet1957 - Audrey1960 - Donna1961 - Carla1961 - Hattie1963 - Flora1964 - Cleo1964 - Dora1964 - Hilda1965 - Betsy1966 - Inez1967 - Beulah1968 - Edna1969 - Camille1970 - Celia1972 - Agnes1974 - Carmen1974 - Fifi1975 - Eloise1977 - Anita1979 - David1979 - Frederic1980 - Allen1983 - Alicia1985 - Elena1985 - Gloria1988 - Gilbert1988 - Joan1989 - Hugo1990 - Diana1990 - Klaus1991 - Bob1992 - Andrew1995 - Luis1995 - Marilyn1995 - Opal1995 - Roxanne1996 - Cesar1996 - Fran1996 - Hortense1998 - Georges1998 - Mitch1999 - Floyd1999 - Lenny2000 - Keith2001 - Allison2001 - Iris2001 - Michelle2002 - Isidore2002 - Lili2003 - Fabian2003 - Isabel2003 - Juan2004 - Charley2004 - Frances2004 - Ivan2004 - Jeanne
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Now, personally, I think that naming a hurricane "Fifi" of all things is just plain stupid. You call a toy poodle "Fifi," not a natural disaster capable of killing thousands and causing millions of dollars in property damage. I would have to put "Hurricane Hattie" in that same category, no thank you very much. What I find most remarkable about the list is how many of them I simply have no recollection of whatsoever. I don't remember Alicia one single solitary bit. And even Juan and Allison, who were within the last five years, I can't recall hearing anything about them at all. On the other hand, a hurricane that I remember very clearly, and did a lot of damage on Long Island, was Belle (might have been 1975 or so) and she didn't get retired. Of course, the NHC might be one of those exclusive clubs where it's not what you know, it's who you know. For the statisticians among us, C leads the pack with 9 retired names, followed by A and F with 7, I with 6, D and H with 5, J has 4, B, E, G, L and M at 3, K with 2 and one each for O and R. I stand by my conviction that they could certainly come up with better L names than Lee, since they've only retired Lenny and Luis since 1979 when they began using male names. But I admit that I have to tip my hat to the NHC for being able to keep coming up with I names, with 6 of them on the retired list already. And that was without coming up with a "Hurricane iPod" or something else equally ridiculous.

During the week, I had to leave work and run down the block in the pouring rain, to open the doors at church for the fire extinguisher people, so they could update the tags on our fire extinguishers before, God forbid, we had an organ fire or something. I had been chasing these people around for two months, and couldn't get my hands on them, so when they called, I flew out of my office with my coat-tails flying behind me and heedless of the weather. I very plainly said to the young man on the phone that I would meet him at the front door, which is where I was standing with the door open and the rain blowing in on me. I found him later at the side door, where he had let himself in after I had opened all of the doors on all sides, just in case. He said, "Man, I got soaking wet coming over here," as if it was somehow my fault, and I hadn't splashed over from all the way up the block myself. It made me wonder if he thought that I actually had some sort of Christian force-field that I could invoke to keep the rain off of me, while it poured down on the rest of the heathen world out there. For the record, I would certainly vote for that, if there was any such option in the offing, and I would call it "Dem Dry Bones." Hallelujah!

My other favorite work story of the week was from Bill, who said, " ... our friend Karen McKay was in the inbox, complaining that 'somebody' didn't order enough decals. You realize we just make up the quantities on these orders, right?" It seems like everyone was suffering from the same "short week syndrome" that I was, and as far as I'm concerned, I'm the only one with a valid reason to use that excuse, because as we all know, no one celebrates Columbus Day around here any more. So all of the rest of these people had just better shape up or ship out, and no bones about it. At least not Dem Dry Bones, which like the flying robot referees, the world is still waiting for, along with Hurricane iPod.

The Puck Stops Here

Hello World,

Happy Friday! Some place in this great big world, people probably consider this the beginning of Columbus Day weekend, because according to the calendars, Monday marks the observance of Columbus Day. I pass this along only for those people who might be interested in what is turning into a sadly arcane and overlooked holiday, since in most of the country, Columbus Day has been relegated to the also-ran category of neglected observations, like Arbor Day and Armistice Day. Most businesses have long since given up Columbus as a reason for a day off, and even in New York, where they love a good party, the Columbus Day parade is a pale imitation of its more famous cousins in March and November. Seriously, without the green beer and media circus over the gays marching, this is just another walk in the street.

One good thing that happened this week was the return of actual professional ice hockey in actual professional ice hockey rinks, with actual professional ice hockey teams and players wearing actual and recognizable professional ice hockey uniforms. Of course, none of those players were on the same teams as when last we saw ice hockey two years ago, but only the small-minded and captious would point that out, rather than be grateful and delirious just to have hockey back at all. They also took advantage of the time during the hiatus to change some of the rules and standards, in an effort to make the game more competitive and exciting for the fans. For instance, they replaced the outmoded concept of fallible referees with small flying robots, who zap the offending players into a parallel universe to pay the penalty for their infractions. Oh wait, that was actually one of Bill's suggestions that wasn't implemented under the new system yet, so I guess we still have that to look forward to.

Last weekend was a sad time for most of the fans of the boys of summer, especially those of us whose teams would not be continuing with post-season play, as it was the end of the regular baseball season for another year, and more's the pity, I'm sure. In a perverse twist, the Mets picked the last two weeks of the season, after they had already been eliminated from the wild card race, to play some of the best baseball of the year and put together a winning streak that might have made all the difference earlier. In fact, many of the divisional races were crowded and exciting, some being decided at the very last moment. But still, it's sad to see the season that began bright with hope in the spring, come crashing apart on the shoals of October.

Speaking of things crashing apart, Bill said the other day that this new storm Tammy was the 17th named storm of the season, the most since 1995. Anyone can tell you that T is the 20th letter of the alphabet, so as far as I'm concerned, the people involved in this hurricane-naming hogwash had some 'splaining to do. Here's what I found out, courtesy of the handy National Geographic web site, and it turned out to be a lot more interesting than I expected --

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For every year, there is a pre-approved list of names for tropical storms and hurricanes. These lists have been generated by the National Hurricane Center since 1953. At first, the lists consisted of only female names, however, since 1979, the lists alternate between male and female.

Hurricanes are named alphabetically from the list in chronological order. Thus the first tropical storm or hurricane of the year has a name that begins with "A" and the second is given the name that begins with "B." The lists contain names that begin from A to W, but exclude names that begin with a "Q" or "U."

There are six lists that continue to rotate. The lists only change when there is a hurricane that is so devastating, the name is retired and another name replaces it.

Hurricane names for 2005: Arlene, Bret, Cindy, Dennis, Emily, Franklin, Gert, Harvey, Irene, Jose, Katrina, Lee, Maria, Nate, Ophelia, Philippe, Rita, Stan, Tammy, Vince, Wilma.
==================================

By my count, Tammy is 19 on the list, but I'm sure the weasels at the NHC have some trite rationalization for why Tammy was the 17th named storm of the season, instead of 19, as it should be. After all, they made up the whole idea of naming storms in the first place, and they can just go ahead and make up the rules as they go along, and there's nothing that anyone can do about it. They're not elected by anybody, so they can't be voted out or anything. Although I would have to say that I would be in favor of that, and if you're thinking that I won't be sending any Christmas cards to the NHC this year, you'd be right. And I have to tell you that I think Lee is about the most ridiculous name for a storm, because it could easily be a girl or boy name, and if you only have six lists to alternate, that means you only have to come up with a whopping THREE boy names that start with L, and I think anyone could do a whole lot better than Lee, for crying out loud.

While we're on the subject of natural disasters, I love this capsule review from the "Best Bets" section of our newspaper's TV listings --

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"Landslide" There's more to a disaster movie than
cool footage of stuff collapsing, burning or sinking;
it needs characters worth caring about and at least
one worth hating so that he can be killed off.
This one doesn't.
=============================

Ya gotta love it! Meanwhile, Bill had to pass along a request he received for a Sneaker Keeper sign from a woman representing some place that called itself SOS Playland Services. He read my mind when he said, "I hear you! Would you trust your child in an 'SOS' Playland?" Honestly, who comes up with these ideas?

Just when you think you've seen it all at work, along comes this order from our Phlebotomy Lab for a computer workstation that they describe on their purchase requisition as a "BALT Totally Adjustable Mobile Workstation 30x24x27 52H." I see they've entered the mystical Fourth Dimension in our Lab, and although I've never personally seen any four-dimensional furniture, I admit that I'm somewhat wary of wandering over there to check it out. After all, that last dimension might be poison ivy, for all I know, and I certainly don't need any more of that.

After dinner, we found racks of Christmas cards on sale at CVS, so anyone could tell that we're coming up hard on Ramadan, not to mention, the Jewish New Year. Pretty soon, the gift-giving frenzy will really be upon us, because after all, what is Veteran's Day without presents? (Don't answer that!) Everyone knows that I'm nothing if not helpful, so if your search for the perfect gift leads you in the direction of some four-dimensional furniture, feel free to contact our Lab for the details. Tell them Christopher Columbus sent you.