Thursday, June 23, 2005

Surgery and other time wasters

So,

I finally got the Surgery radio blog up and running. It took a while to secure the ftp space and a little while more to figure out (with help) the most effective linking system to open the files. They're all there now... seven 1 hour shows worth of blips and bleeps and hums.

Otherwise things have been going all summery w/ tickles... in the throat that is. It seems like I'm coming down with my third cold/flu so far this year... making up for not having one for such a loooong time in years preceding. Or maybe it's just hypochondria. Do hypochondriacs worry that they're becoming hypochondriacs? Do they worry they're not going to the doctor when they're sick because they worry others will think they're becoming hypochondriacs? Is there a more accurate term for this quandry?

I lost a week of my life to rain and television last week. Housesitting and kitty sitting resulted in incidental exposure to satellite television for the first time in a long while. It was rainy and cold for the whole week, more or less giving me positive reinforcement for the idea of zombifying myself for hours on end. The scary part is the potential I have for going without sleep while sitting in front of the thing. Late night talk shows, months old movies, even sci-fi reruns keep me vaguely conscious until late night/early morning... then I'm taken in by the early morning news. I may have averaged 4 hours sleep a night.

On a not unrelated note, my new guilty pleasure is the series Veronica Mars. I'm not going to explain it to you... just watch it and make your mind up. The other one I've been watching but haven't decided about is The Inside. It's created/produced/written by people who've worked on Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel, but it seems a little too flat footed... makes too much up front of the main character's troubled past... and it features Peter Coyote who seems to coat everything he's in with a little slug trail.

So much for TV.

Today's highlight at the store was an exchange with a sun cracked and oiled up gentleman with a full-to-bursting carrying case of cassettes:

He: Do you buy cassettes?
Me: Not for about 4-5 years now.

He: I just need about $2 to get a case of beer.
Me: Have you tried the Trading Post (a nearby pawn shop)?

He: Yeah. The guy's gone. Would you buy the carrying case?
Me: I wouldn't have any use for it.

He: Some of these are good tapes. I have Willie Nelson.
We: We don't really do much with Country. And we don't sell tapes.

He: It's the one with "Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain." That's a good song.
Me: It sure is. Maybe one of your friends would like to buy it.

He: Ah. I'm just a little short for a case. I don't ask people for cash, I mainly do bottling. How about I leave these two tapes here and come back later for $2?
Me: I really can't use your tapes.

He: Well. OK thanks anyway.
Me: No problem.

And so it goes. Gotta cough now. Keep well.