What does the Xero Magazine Web site, the site for the small-press literary magazine that lordfuckbeast and I publish, have in common with the National Organization for Women; the College of Humanities and Social Sciences at Carnegie Mellon University; the “Lloyd Doggett for Congress” Web site; A-1 Radiators of Seattle, Washington; the Holocaust Memorial Project; the Department of Astronomy at Smith Community College; The Odyssey, the ancient epic poem by Homer; the Info-Mall T-shirt shop; the British Conservative Party; the official Liza Minelli fan Web site; the Peaceable Texans for Firearms Rights; the Washington, DC Disability Guide organization; The Navarra, Spain chapter of the Red Cross; Keep America Beautiful; and the Jewish Teen Center of New York City?

Give up?

Yesterday:

Celebration with kellyv, lordfuckbeast, and scarlete. Why, you ask? Because Symphony is finally complete (and selling!), and we’ve received official notification that our patent is now in the works. Yes! It’s been a long, hard, expensive road to get this far.

My computer room has been turned into a miniature assembly plant for Symphonies.

Also yesterday:

Went and saw “8-Legged Freaks” with my friend K. Nobody else wanted to see it–too bad, too, because it was one of the funniest things I’ve seen in a very long time.

Go see it! No, really, I mean it. It’s highly entertaining. The bit with the cat (you’ll know it when you see it) is hysterical.

I do not like them, Sam I am.

Where to start? It’s been quite a successful week.

Well, they do say a picture’s worth a thousand words, so I’ll start there. Spent a good deal of time in the darkroom, printing and teaching some friends how to print:

Almost completely finished with my model plane; I just have to finish mounting the servos, pack the radio receiver, and run-in the engine. Going to try to go to my first Tampa model airplane club meeting a week from next Saturday.

Things with Lori are very very good–much better than anyone engaged in a relationship betwen an essentially monogamous person and an essentially polyamorous person has any right to expect.

kellyv still loves her new Matrix. It’s definitely far more practical than the sports cars we’re accustomed to, and she’s been happy as a clam. And we can carry people around without forcing them to ride with their knees in their nose.

And I’ve been thinking about green eggs and ham.

When the email appeared in my mailbox, you could’ve knocked me over with a feather, if you were of a mind to. I worked with her many years ago, though our friendship didn’t ever really seem to develop into its full potential; then she was gone, all the way across the country and working somewhere else. I would long since have thought she’d’ve forgotten all about me.

Before she left, I got her a copy of “Green Eggs and Ham,” the Dr. Seuss book. She’d never read it, even in spite of the fact that she’s far more literate than I am–an oversight I felt compelled to rectify.

Her: ‘I do not like that Sam I Am, I do not like that Sam I am.’ Hey!
Me: Don’t worry, it has a happy ending…

So now she’s doing very well for herself, and we’ve started talking again, which is cool.

These past twelve months will, I think, be remembered at the year of new relationships established and old friendships renewed. And that, I think, is awesome.

Yesterday, we went out to look at new cars, since kellyv‘s Eclipse was getting a bit long in the tooth. Needless to say, we came home with a new one:

It’s much more practical than her old Eclipse, and light-years ahead of my del Sol in practicality. Not that practicality is necessarily the best measure of a car, of course; but she kept saying things like “driving people around” and “long distance” and “carrying stuff” and who am i to disagree?

It was actually a cooperative effort between her and Lori. I was incolved only at the end, to sign the paperwork; she and Lori sat down on two different computers three thousand miles apart and coordinated a new-car search, so when we walked into the dealership she already knew exactly what she wanted and how many were on the lot. Gotta love technology; it makes taking money out of the consumer’s pocket so much more efficient.

It’s a cool car. Toyota is becoming the Apple of the car industry; from a user-interface point of view, the matrix is the most well-designed car I’ve ever seen. It’s also clearly aimed at the thirtysomething GenX crowd–it has a lot of gadgets with “Gee whiz” tech appeal. Which is, of course, very cool in my book.

Bumper sticker of the week:
“Well-behaved women rarely make history.”

========

L. is back in California, after a week visiting us. Yesterday, she sent us flowers:

It was an intense, turbulent week, all about extremes. Parts were very good, parts were not so good, nothing was mediocre. (Not that I would have expected it to be; L. is highly passionate, and nothing about her is mediocre. But even by the standards of our relationship, it was quite a ride.)

My wife kellyv and M. were both quite patient with both of us, which was really nice. L. and M. got along even better than I had expected them to, which was also quite nice. The downside: It will probably be six months before we can see each other again, and I suck at long-distance relationships.

L. took this picture of me while she was here:

I would very much like to take her with me on a photo shoot.

Bumper sticker of the week:
I found Jesus!
He’s in my trunk.

=========

L. is with us, having conquered her phobia and flown across the country to spend a week in Florida. She braved one of her worst fears just to be with me. What else can I say?

=========

Last week, the Mormons came into my office to try to convert me.

(Danger, Will Robinson! Danger! Rant ahead…read at your own risk. You have been warned…)

Continue reading →

This morning. 8AM. One of my clients calls me ont he phone. “Franklin? You have a snake, right? Do you want a fifteen-foot python? My husband’s friend runs an animal rescue shelter, see, and…”

I should have known then.

L. called me soon thereafter. She is having a great deal of difficulty with this long-distance polyamorous relationship thing, and it breaks my heart to see her so unhappy.

Later, on my way back from a client’s site, it’s a hot and muggy Florida afternoon, when without warning the heavens open up and it starts pouring down hail.

Hail. In Florida. Like, chunks of ice as big around as my little finger.

I’m driving home through a blinding hailstorm, and Pow! The car two cars in front of me gets nailed by a lightning bolt from the heavens. The bolt is so close I can hear the snap, smell the ozone, and the thunderclap feels like it’s going to make my head cave in.

When L. is sad, the heavens and the earth feel it.

I don’t mean i dislike spam; I mean I hate spam.

So much, in fact, that I will go to great length to track these bastards down. Exhibit A, from a piece of spam I received last night:

The Spamvertised Web site

http://rd.yahoo.com/2681/?http://penispill.redir.net

de-obfuscates to

http://penispill.redir.net (responsible party: ev1.com)

and redirects to

http://31290dsady896d8sa7d9jkldaslkdyiouhieqwklndkashduas6d79dyasiodhkasbdkjasbgduyasrd87astddd:hjkhaskjdghvdkastd78a65sd79yas8dyua89@www.az.ru/beaner21/

which de-obfuscates to

http://www.az.ru/beaner21/

which in turn redirects via “encrypted” HTML to

http://dick.playuhcom/dasddkjcz87897das98dnklnklen2h3jhkljaskhdjg12fhj.php

which de-obfuscates to

http://dick.playuh.com/dasddkjcz87897das98dnklnklen2h3jhkljaskhdjg12fhj.php (responsible party: sprint.net)

which redirects to

http://www.albionmedical.com

The Spamvertised Web site responsible party:
Leading Edge Marketing (support@leminfo.com)
2414 4th Avenue
Greeley, CO 80631
US
720-528-8091

The spamvertised Web site DNS services provided by Hurricane Electric (“he.net”)

The spamvertised Web site credit card processing provided by

https://secure.multicards.com/cgi-bin/order2/processorder1.pl
Merchant ID: 305030

============

This Web site is being advertised by unsolicited commercial email. This spam is originating from America Online accounts, because mail from one America Online address to another has no headers, and the spammer believes nobody will take action against him if his email has no headers.

Thank you for your attention to this matter.

—————–
Forwarded Message:

Subj: Enlarge your penis with a PILL!!! *guaranteed*
Date: Wednesday, June 26, 2002 3:15:31 AM
From: Yeaaaaah
cc: TacitR, Anarchy For Eva, GuitarTBM, Jerizan, Laval1975, Oh so perceptive, SurfMan107, XXsUgANSpIzEXx, AMPUNK4U

ADD UP TO 3 INCHES WITH A PILL!! CLICK HERE
http://rd.yahoo.com/2681/?http://penispill.redir.net

On my way to work today, I noticed my fuel gauge was a bit low…and when I say “a bit low,” I mean “below empty.” So I pulled into a gas station and put 9.912 gallons of gas into a 10-gallon tank. I have got to get gas more often.

Friday lordfuckbeast and I saw “Minority Report.” Steven Spielberg finally got it right. He fucked up his first effort at doing cyberpunk (“AI”) beyond all recognition, but everything he got wrong in AI, he got right this time. I particularly liked the targeted advertising in the movie. And you thought popup ads were annoying…

Still trying to get a handle on making a long-distance poly relationship with a monogamous partner working. Evidence so far suggests i suck at long-distance relationships. Thank God everyone involved, including my wife kellyv, has been so patient with me…

Now I’m in the office trying to put together a Flash animation for a client. Is it my imagination, or deos macromedia Flash have the worst user interface ever conceived since Ventura Publisher?

Fron another shoot I haven’t finished printing yet–and sadly, no, the Titanium Powerbook isn’t mine.

Now, for a trick question: Name the object of lust in this photograph…