thursday, the twenty-fourth of may, two thousand one
Watching: Nothing. I will be, though, tonight, Sports Night, woo-hoo, the shining ray of light in this era of season finales with no summer Survivor to look forward to.

Reading: The glut of posts at MBTV about the X-F season finale. My favorite so far: David Duchovny, go away already. We get it. You're unhappy doing the show, but remember buddy, you used to host THE RED SHOE DIARIES (hello my name is Jake and I read soft porn letters to my dog), so take the hand that feeds you (FOX) out of your mouth and say "thank you." There's also some good shipper vs. noromo debate going on about the last scene.

Glossary: "shipper" [n., deriv. relationshipper]: someone who feels Mulder and Scully are destined to ride off into the sunset, hand in hand, or hand in hand with their kid in the middle. "noromo" [n., deriv. no romance]: someone who feels that the relationship should stay platonic and thus has no patience for mooshy ooey gooey love stuff. (For clarification, I am not a noromo, but a disillusioned shipper who is bitter because we didn't get to see any of the ooey gooey, and I don't mean just the hot monkey love, I'm talking about anything that gave anyone any clue that there even was hot monkey love going on offscreen.)

Wondering: Pirate's Booty. What is this stuff, anyway? Why is everyone talking about it?

Attending: The baseball game last night. We had great corporate seats and ate hot dogs and peanuts and drooled over the funnel cakes (funnel cakes!) but they were five bucks, so we passed. And it was unseasonably chilly, which everyone else was bitching about, but I thought it was great.

I saw the most ridiculous story in the world on the Today show this week, and I'm serious.

I was only watching the Today show because my friend Tara, the one who makes me look like a financial genius, came to my apartment at 6:30 in the morning to take a shower because they shut off her water.

She was ready to go by 7:15, but didn't need to be at work until 8:00, and since she works practically around the corner from where I live, we sat around and had coffee and watched Matt and Katie.

Anyway, this girl in Florida, this 18-year-old honors student, was suspended and arrested and charged with a FELONY because the school security woman found a knife in her car.

A steak knife, people. She had moved over the weekend and somehow a steak knife fell onto the floor of her car and because of this stupid pointless asinine zero-tolerance policy crap, she was arrested and spent nine hours in jail and will not get to walk with her class at graduation.

That is crap, and I wish I was a really good lawyer so I could get up in front of a judge and argue the hell out of the unconstitutionality of zero tolerance.

I have to say, I do wonder from time to time how people get addicted to prescription drugs. Not the addiction part of it, but how they are able to acquire enough to feed an addiction.

See, back in December, almost six whole months ago, I went to the urgent care center about my back and got a nice little prescription for Vicodin, 30 of them. I had to take them twice a day for like a week, and then just as needed, when my back was feeling squirrely.

I ran out like a month ago, and I called my regular doctor yesterday to see if she would mind calling in another prescription for me, just so I could have them on hand in case I had another attack. I was actually nervous doing this, because I didn't want anyone to think I had a problem. I stressed the fact that it had been almost six months since I had the initial prescription, and I just ran out, and I felt like screaming into the phone "It's okay, I'm not addicted, honest!" which of course is exactly what you say when you are addicted but don't want anyone to think that.

And then the doctor's office called back and said I'd have to come in and see her again to get the prescription. And I felt busted, even though I honestly, seriously, do not have any issues with Vicodin whatsoever.

I know that money can do a lot for you, and maybe I'm being naive, but I get the impression that I could be the Queen of England and my doctor would still make me come into her office. So do celebrities just have unethical doctors? I do wonder about this.

I have decided on a new hobby. Well, actually, just a hobby, as 'new' hobby implies that I have one already, and unless you count lying on the couch watching tapes of shows that have been cancelled, I actually don't have one already.

Pottery. I'm going to try pottery.

Elise has been potterying (pottering? potting?) out in California, and she sounds like she's been having fun with it. Then I went to this party last Friday night, and I noticed the plethora of pots and bowls and vases and pitchers strewn about (but very tastefully) the kitchen, and my co-worker's wife told me about the Kansas City Clay Guild, which is where she does her stuff. And then last night at the baseball game I mentioned that I was considering this, and one of the girls I was with said that she used to go there and she really enjoyed it.

I've actually tried it before, forever ago, my senior year of high school. We moved to Virginia the summer before my senior year, and I had to take an art class in order to graduate. (Art was not required at my previous high school, so I stayed well away.)

As I am completely unable to draw a straight line and as the photography class was full, my only remaining option was Clayworks. I actually enjoyed it, except that we did in fact have to draw for the first quarter, and I sucked, but fortunately we were graded on effort, not talent. Once we got to the clay part, though, I fared much better, and had a lot of fun with it.

So, I think I'm going to try it. And just look out, everyone who is in line to get Christmas presents from me. Although, you never know -- by December, I might actually be good at it!

Right.