Romance or Exercise Bike?

My 9-year anniversary with Mike is in two weeks. After 9 years, I now understand how my parents can let anniversaries like 23 years just go by without more than a card and an extra kiss.



By 9 years, it's not that romance is dead, it just doesn't seem necessary. It's frivolous. And we didn't really like it to begin with anyway.


Last year we got each other nothing. This year we've agreed to split the purchase of an exercise bike to put in front of the TV in the loft. Because nothing says "I love you" more than saying, "You've gotten a little fat. Let's avoid getting fatter, shall we?"


But one of the great things about 9 years is that we can say things like that to each other and laugh about it.

First pic of Heath as Joker

First glimpse:



First thought:
Yikes! He actually looks terrifying. I guess this isn't going to be your grandpappy's Joker -- no Cesar Romero or Jack Nicholson here. Can't wait to see him in action!

The USPS's crafty trick

That dimwit who "invested" in $8,000 worth of Forever stamps should've read this article from Slate.com first.

The postal rate climbed 2 cents on Monday, about a month after the United States Postal Service introduced its new "forever" stamp..., which lock in the 41-cent rate for eternity. One man in Pennsylvania walked into a post office and made an $8,000 investment on his own. Should we all be stocking up?

Absolutely not. Since 1971, postal rates have increased more slowly than the actual inflation rate, as measured by the U.S. Consumer Price Index. So, despite the numerous rate hikes over the last 36 years, stamps have actually been getting cheaper. The 20-cent stamp from 1981, for instance, would be equivalent to 45 cents in today's dollars -- which makes today's rate 10 percent cheaper than it was 26 years ago. Should this historical pattern hold, you'd be paying more for today's forever stamps than you would for any stamp in the future, no matter how high the rate goes.

Is it bad that this news made me happy?

I know it's probably automatic points-off to dislike a religious figure, but Jerry Falwell spent too much of his time promoting hate, bigotry, stereotyping and close-mindedness that it brightened my day just a little to learn that he won't be doing it anymore.

Commuting Diaries #4

I spend a lot of my train commute writing in my diary. Until this morning, I had never seen anyone else doing the same.

Sitting across the aisle from me was a man who was in his early 30's. Blue shirt with tie, khakis, gray socks and black dress shoes that were very worn and scuffed. He was writing when I got on the train and he was writing when I got off the train: he wrote straight through for an hour. He filled nine pages, back and front, of an 8x8 hardcover red book.

What is he writing? The curiosity was frustrating. At first I figured he was writing things like I usually do: yesterday I did this, in the future I hope to do these things, today I thought about this and it made me feel that, I remember when I went here and it was great because blahblahblah.

But nine pages? Then I thought, maybe he's going through a divorce or someone just died and he's writing it out. I tried to see if he had a wedding band on but couldn't.

The curiosity became so overwhelming that I started hoping he'd put the diary down beside him and forget it so I could take it and read it. I've never read someone else's personal diary. Someone's completely unfiltered thoughts.

Then I started thinking about just snatching it from his hands as I existed the train. I immediately felt guilty. If someone did that to me, I wouldn't so much mind them reading my personal thoughts because they are just like everyone else's anyway, but I'd mind losing my records. My diary pages are stuffed with news print-outs, cards, notes, pictures and receipts because I'm keeping a thorough history of myself for future reference.

Trained Animals

When Chris and I saw the circus last year, certain things occurred to me that never did when I was a kid. Things like an appreciation for the mindboggling precision required for three people to ride three motorcycles inside a small iron sphere. And other things like, how can such a big production be on the road indefinitely?

It's one thing when bands tour. U2 has their own plane to cart all the tons of lights and stage apparatus around the world. But what if you have six elephants? How do you tour them? And what if you have six elephants and twenty horses and lions and tigers and two hundred people?

The answer, it would seem, is as nicely old-school as the circus itself: They do it by train.

All last week, a train, each car bearing the Ringling Bros logo, has been parked on the tracks just outside of Providence, where they're performing at the Civic Center.

I don't know how many train-cars long it is -- I haven't been able to count -- but it's long. And there are different kinds of cars. Some are clearly cargo, and others are passenger cars -- the windows have things hanging in them, doo-dads and stuff. I wonder what it looks like inside? How would a circus performer decorate his or her little rolling apartment? What would cover the walls? Posters of clowns? Letters from home?

It makes me wonder, too, what all the circus people do when they're in Providence. The show was here almost a week -- that must allow at least a little spare time. Do the acrobats have lunch at Uno's? Does the lion tamer stop at Macy's to pick something up?

Have you ever seen the Ringmaster buy socks?