creativeI woke up around eleven-something-ish and did things online. Then I went and gave the plasma. Doing that always invigorates me, because it's doing something good and I get Random Expendable Budget that goes toward writing nights out with the girls, laundry, groceries, fuel, and generally some left over to be completely random with. Like the pastry-oid breakfast for work on Sunday. Dad got paid enough to do impulsive gestures like that on a grander scale (see: "Seismic Salad"), and while I can't do that, I can definitely show the love with bagels, doughnuts, muffins, and Danish.
(I've said it before and I'll likely say it again, but one thing Dad is really good at is figuring out what people really want, and making it happen. Not necessarily their deepest dreams, and he doesn't cheat at cross-ball, but when he can arrange something simple that would bring joy to someone's life, he does.)
I've been reading The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test while giving plasma for the last couple weeks, because that's the best chance I have to read un-interrupted. It's a fascinating book. I'm sure it was a profoundly weird era to have lived through.
Construction on the Phoenix Metro light rail is intense, especially in the three-mile zig-zag from Bethany Home and 19th Ave down to Camelback, over to Central, and down to Indian School. I love the concept, especially given that I use public transit so much, but I have mixed feelings about driving through all the construction. But it's so exciting to see it in progress!
I wound up in Target. I found a GE telephone headset for a reasonable price. I took a look at the rubber wrist strap jump drives, but I was a good girl. I eyed one of the inexpensive guitars longingly (again), but I was still -- a good girl. I was profoundly shocked and amused to see a $20 cellphone that takes prepaid cards. I guess I've been out of touch with the cellphone market, because the last time I saw disposable cellphones they were in something cyberpunk and then hot girls were walking out of convenience store fabricators. Granted, the $20 cellphone was dinky and played like a really cheap calculator on the display model.
But.
This is science fiction. It was science fiction in 2000. This is 2006. Granted, that was a near-future type story, but it was a 20-years-from-now near-future type story. That's a quarter of the time.
The new headset feels like a work headset, except the microphone seems to be nicer, and the plug doesn't quite fit into the jack just right. And the work headsets have a conventional telephone receiver plug, RJ-11, rather than the teenytiny ones that are measured by inches or centimeters or whatever.
Came home to find that I'd somehow managed to whack the espresso machine on, and it doesn't have a safety cutoff switch. Nothing was on fire, but the box of chocolate covered espresso beans that had been parked on top of it had grown slumped and internally sticky. I switched it off and hoped for the best. I fear it's ruined forever. It has a profound smell of overheated equipment about it. I'm just glad nothing caught on fire.
Then I wound up going over to visit
trystan_laryssa and her new computer. Her computer is an Acer, just like Allegra. Well, a couple generations removed from Allegra. It was nice to have brand recognition. Her computer has a 10-key pad. So. Jealous. Fruits Basket, yay.
Taking
trystan_laryssa to school after we wake up -- the matriarch of the household usually does the rides, but as she's got another engagement this morning, she's out of the running, and I'm in. So, I sleep.
