A woman was beaten and raped a week ago in a subdivision north of ours. It's an affluent neighborhood, well populated, with a great jogging trail. She left her house at 6:26 in the morning for a run and not ten minutes later she was being pistol-whipped and raped. In broad daylight. She was beaten within an inch of her life and her injuries were so brutal that she was physically unable to talk to detectives for several days. They have a description of her assailant, but haven't caught him yet. The attack has been haunting me ever since I heard of it. I always thought we lived in a safe neighborhood, a safe part of town, but of course crime doesn't care about geography. It can happen to anyone, anywhere. I wake up every morning thinking of this woman, hoping that her attacker gets the punishment he so justly deserves.

Two weeks ago, when Mindi and David called to invite us to stay with them at the beach, I was a little worried. Excited to see them, yes, but nonetheless a little worried. It had been since Christmas 2003 that we last saw them. Before we moved to Florida, we'd spent countless hours with David and Mindi. We met them in 2001 at a mutual friend's wedding and instantly hit it off. From then on, we saw one another whenever we could. But after we moved, life got in the way and we didn't stay in touch as often. So naturally I wondered: Would it be awkward? Would we be able to pick up where we left off? What if they had changed? What if we had changed? As soon as we got there, though, I realized that I had nothing to worry about. They're just as they used to be. A little more careworn, as are we all, but nothing else has changed. It was a great couple of days with two wonderful friends, and we picked up just where we left off.

I tried to send a letter to my mom the other day, an article I thought she'd like to read. I folded it carefully, put it in an envelope, stuck a stamp on it, and went on to the beach for a couple days. Upon returning, I noticed that the letter was still in the mailbox, unsent, only this time with "1 cent needed" written on it. HUH? My first instinct was that the mail carrier had made a mistake. I just bought those stamps a couple months ago, when we finally used the rest of the 40-cent stamps from before the last piddly increase. So I looked it up online and lo! Stamps had indeed gone up again. Another measly penny, AGAIN. As if I needed another reason to hate the post office. I have a roll of perfectly lovely 41-cent flower stamps! Now I have to schlep to the post office and buy 1-cent stamps for the privilege of sending a letter that may or may not arrive at its final destination? Riddle me this: Why can't they just raise mail rates to 50 cents and leave it for a couple years? Is that really asking too much? Is it?

A while ago, the great Emily blogged about Her Thing, a bodily Thing that she has that occasionally needs maintenance, but is so unspeakable that even her husband doesn't know what it is. Naturally, she refused to mention what specifically this Thing was, but it generated a firestorm of comments and blog posts as people hither and yon revealed their own Things. And it certainly got me thinking: do I have a Thing? People were coming out of the woodwork to unburden themselves about their Things! Sweaty palms, ghastly body odor, ugly feet, fat ankles, you name it! And then panic set in: am I weird if I don't have a Thing? And then it hit me. My Thing is that I chew my fingers. This is not chewing fingernails, mind you. No, no. It's quite different. You can find any number of people who chew their fingernails. I'm talking about fingers, specifically the skin thereon. When I'm stressed in the slightest bit, I start picking at the side of my right or left thumb with the index or middle finger of the same hand (I'd draw you a diagram, but it's just too early for that). Then, inevitably, I loosen a bit of skin and... and... and I nibble it off. [Am I seriously admitting this???] I don't ingest it, mind you. I'm not a candidate for cannibalism, much less self-cannibalism (is there such a thing?). But yeah, finger biting. It's my Thing. What's your Thing?

We're headed to the beach for a couple days and since I'm not bringing my laptop with me (gasp!), I won't be blogging. See you later this week!

If at some point you find yourself losing hope amidst the endless news cycle of war, natural disasters, gas prices, pollution, and any number of other dreadful stories (it's easy to do these days, is what I'm saying), I bring you a beacon of light: Watch. This. Video. If it doesn't at least make you smile, you're officially dead inside.

Me: Is Amy Winehouse not the ugliest woman in the world?

John: I don't know who she is.

Me: Well, she's a singer... [shows him a picture]

John: OH MY GOD! [recoils in shock]

I got an email from my friend Ben (hi, Ben!) last night, after he'd read yesterday's post about songs that trigger certain memories for me. His subject line read "It's like I don't even know you anymore" and the text of the email said only "Neil Diamond?". And when I replied I explained it the only way I could: it's a personality flaw, by which I mean a quirk, something you wouldn't expect. What occurred to me later is that Sweet Caroline is just the tip of the iceberg in that regard. Here's something else: I love watching lumber sports. You know, logrolling, Jack and Jill sawing, and the like? What those men and women (do we call them athletes?) do just flabbergasts me. I can't get enough. I watch lumber sports like some people watch football: loudly, whenever I can, and if I find them on back-to-back, well, so much the better. I think John still can't believe it.

We all have songs that trigger certain memories in our past. And while they aren't all necessarily the big memories, like the first dance song at your wedding, they're all important in their own right. So here are a few of mine, in no particular order.

• Green Day, Good Riddance. Even if you don't know any other Green Day songs, you know this one. "It's something unpredictable but in the end it's right. I hope you had the time of your life." Always, always, always reminds me of K-State, Manhattan, and-- of course-- Kimmie.
• Anything by Ani Di Franco. That crazy summer that NellC and I lived together. Good times.
• Neil Diamond, Sweet Caroline. Okay, I might catch some shit for this one, but I adore Sweet Caroline. It makes me want to go road trippin'... sadly John hates it, so much so that when I contemplated serenading him with it at our wedding, I opted not to for fear that he'd annul the whole thing. Ah well.
• Sir Mix-A-Lot, Baby Got Back. Freshman year of high school. I knew all the words to that song. Sadly, I probably still do.
• Gonna Fly Now, from the movie Rocky. Heaven help me, I don't know why, but whenever I need motivation I listen to this song. When I was writing my preliminary exams four years ago, up all night for three nights, I listened to Gonna Fly Now over and over and over again.

I normally don't know how much I weigh. Despite the fact that we own a scale, I rarely step on it. A couple months ago, though, I felt compelled to weigh myself. And then I did it again over the weekend. And folks, something amazing had happened. Without trying (that is, without exercising, watching what I eat, actively dieting, or anything), I had lost eleven pounds. You may well ask, how I accomplished such a feat? It's certainly a question I asked myself. And the only thing I can come up with is this: I ate ice cream. In the interest of full disclosure, I must confess that I'm not the world's biggest fan of ice cream. When John and I started dating, in fact, I once told him that I didn't even like ice cream. But a couple months ago, we bought a box of mini ice cream sandwiches. And then another. And, well, one thing led to another, and now it's common at the end of the day for one of us to say, "Hey, it's ice cream sandwich o'clock. You want one?" So there you go: the ice cream diet. And they said it couldn't be done.

Two weeks ago, we signed up to get a flower share from Rosie's Organic Farm, the same place where we get our weekly vegetable share. For just $25, we get five weeks of beautiful fresh flower bouquets that we pick up with our veggies every Saturday. And I can't tell you how lovely they are! It's like having a little bit of spring brought to our doorstep.

I lost track of how many night terrors I had last night. I don't remember them at all, but I remember my heart racing so fast afterwards that it felt like it might just leap out of my chest and get a room at the Holiday Inn so that it could get some rest for pete's sake. I also remember John getting very frustrated at being violently woken up so very many times. And I distinctly remember feeling very small afterwards, so very small and so very broken. I must have laid awake for at least half an hour at one point, not daring to fall back asleep lest John and my heart decided then and there to leave forever and never look back. Night terrors are such tricky things, so ill-understood by doctors and sleep specialists that the only things they can prescribe are sedatives to knock you out and force you to sleep through the night. That's not the kind of life I want to live. So I remain, at 30 years old, perpetually wary of sleep, and so very broken.

On yesterday's Today show, Heather Armstrong gave a short interview in which she defended (again) why she blogs in general and why she (occasionally) blogs about her daughter in particular. (In case you're not up to speed on the situation, I'll sum it up for you briefly: "mommy bloggers" have been in the news lately and have been catching a lot of flack for blogging about their children, as critics claim such bloggers are violating their children's right to privacy and putting their children in danger.) Heather's argument has always been that she finds blogging to be a wonderful creative outlet that puts her in touch with a larger community and, in the case of blogging about her daughter, makes her feel less alone to know that other mothers and parents struggle through the same problems. Furthermore, she argues, putting her child's photo on the web doesn't put their family in any more danger than walking down the sidewalk, since children often get kidnapped at random. (You can read her entire, much more articulate argument, here.)

But logical, well-reasoned arguments don't stand a chance against Kathie Lee Gifford, who during the interview declared that while she "doesn't know much about computers," blogging about one's children seems "dangerous." Ahem. I find it ironic that when women like Kathie Lee or Kelly Ripa or any number of other celebrities trot their kids out on national tv, it's just fine, but when women like Heather Armstrong and others post photos of their children on their blogs, it's somehow RECKLESS and DANGEROUS. What gives?

We know return to your regularly scheduled programming.

Ever since the semester ended, I've taken to getting up around 8 and not showering right away. Instead, I hang around the house (working, yes, don't worry) in my pajamas for a few hours until the mood strikes me to take a shower. (N.B.: This is what happens to you when you work from home. Do not desire it.) John, of course, is a willing and able accomplice in all this and sometimes manages to out-do me in the Dance of the Shower Postponement. This is all fine and well, of course, until the doorbell rings. And then we both get that deer-in-the-headlights look and suddenly our lives devolve into all-out negotiation. It's a battle of wills, really, of Stubborn v. Stubborn. And when one of us finally breaks down and goes to the door, after innumerable rounds of PLEASE GO GET THE DOOR FOR ME! I'LL UNLOAD THE DISHWASHER! and OH COME ON, IT'S NOT THAT BAD- JUST GO ANSWER THE DOOR!, inevitably the person at the door has left. Hopefully they assumed that the people inside were on important conference calls to London, not sitting around, unwashed, holding talks about door-answering responsibilities.

So, it sort of dawned on me over the weekend that we'll be moving next summer (fingers crossed, knock on wood, salt over the shoulder, and all that). And, along with that move, we'll also have to sell our house. Our first house. The house we've been working on since we bought it four years ago. The house that, thanks to our hard work, has been stripped of its 1980's cedar paneling, has bamboo floors throughout, has updated appliances, and has cheerful landscaping. (And gutters! This week we're getting gutters!) But with weekend realization, I've started to think less and less about what improvements we could make that we would enjoy, and more and more about what we could do to make our house more desirable to prospective buyers. It's a subtle shift, I suppose, but it's a weird transition nonetheless. It's odd to think of other people-- strangers-- living in our house, our home.

When I'm queen, people will know how to bag groceries correctly. Grocery sacking in this country is a travesty. It's far worse than the economy, folks. So when I'm queen, I'll institute a few simple rules with regard to bagging groceries.

• Fruits and veg should go in their own sack. Put more robust fruits and veg, such as cantaloupe and onions, at the bottom of the sack. Delicate items, such as berries and leafy greens need to be at the top, lest they get squished. Under no circumstances should a heavy juice container be placed on top of bananas. Such cross-pollination of groceries will not be tolerated under my reign.
• Refrigerated or frozen goods should never be placed alongside goods in paperboard containers, such as cereal boxes and the like. Inevitably, the cereal box begins to take on the condensation its chilly neighbors, and its structural integrity begins to fail. And nobody wants that with breakfast.
• Liquids, such as milk and juice, shall go in the same sack/s. Likewise, any toiletries or paper products shall also go in their own sacks. (See above note, regarding cross-pollination of groceries.)

As you can see, all of these simple rules follow a basic concept: like with like. If we can all follow these basic procedures, the world will be a better place. Long live the queen!

I woke up the other night with a start. John was still awake.

Me: "I had a dream... well... I think it was a dream."

John: "Okay..."

Me: "I dreamt that I left out a bunch of food. Food that makes alligators big and strong."

John: "... ..."

Me: "And a bunch of alligators came and ate it."

John: "And did they get big and strong?"

Me: "...yeah."

So recently, my laptop has been acting... funny. And by funny, I don't mean "ha ha" funny. No, instead it has taken to... well, crashing. Sometimes it crashes a program, sometimes the entire computer locks up, sometimes (sob!) there's a kernel panic and I get a friendly message saying I need to turn the computer off. Now. Naturally, when the kernel panics, I follow suit. I have a Mac, and Macs don't crash. They just don't. So I knew something was wrong. While I started wondering if I needed to shell out money for a whole new laptop, John wondered if the RAM had gone bad. We ordered new RAM, and waited for its arrival. I had two choices: use my current laptop, and hope like hell that it stopped crashing, or use my old laptop which is slow as molasses and has none of my research on it. I opted to use my current laptop, and counted no fewer than 10 crashes, of varying degrees, between Tuesday and Wednesday morning. When I finally had to shut it down after the last kernel panic yesterday morning, I was at a loss. What could I do without a laptop?!? My laptop is my means of communication, my means of research, my means of employment... I finally opted to clean the house, and was just a few minutes into that task when the FedEx guy arrived with my new RAM. Whew! I'm happy to report that my laptop is working like a charm now, and I'm breathing easier again. Though I have some suspicion that Steve Jobs has a plan to get us all completely dependent on our Macs, then unleash us on the world to do his evil bidding...