A week of affectionate smalltalk for my OT friends

[catlady_de_los_angeles]

Happy Saturday. I have a week of HPfGU and HPfGU-OT (I read OT first) 
to read: I was out sick Monday-Tuesday-Wednesday, then Tim had the 
same thing Thursday. It's not fair, he got better so much faster than 
I did. (I didn't go to the doctor for a diagnosis but it was something 
that involved a lot of throwing up.)

Hugs to Sofie Elisabeth -- I hope that your operation is *totally* 
successful. 

Hugs to Vicki Morrigan. Here's hoping a very fantastic job finds you 
quickly.

Dee, I am SO GLAD you and Ian survived the car accident!

Oh, dear, Tabouli, I don't believe it possible to make any part of my 
home cat-hair free... I'm not sure it's possible to make any of my 
*clothes* cat-hair free. Please take an antihistamine before we meet 
in person! 

Belated natal anniversary congratulations to the illustrious Heidi 
(and her Time Turner) and the habile Rose Woofenden and the very 
young Saitaina. Belated egroup anniversary congratulations to the 
bewitching Wanda, who spreads cheerfulness all around. Or 
congratulations to *us* for having them!

Lloyd Alexander's Prydain Chronicles come from a real world (Welsh 
traditions). Its discussion group could have a thread of locating the 
characters in other books, such as the surviving medieval texts, and 
Evangeline Walton's tetralogy based on the Mabinogion.

John wrote: << it allows you to get in contact with old school 
friends from both your secondary and primary school.>> Why would one 
want to? One of the compensations of getting old is that one 
associates with Much Nicer people.

Like Naama, my kneejerk response to Jen's ""what if  a burglar comes 
and I can't even call 911???" was "Don't you have a cell phone?" 

Just a couple of years ago, I got cell phones for me and Tim because 
he is always late picking me up and I always start panicking about 
automobile accidents at the 20 minutes late mark. So I can call him 
in his car from whatever bus bench I'm waiting for him on  and hear 
that there was no crash. Tim is supposed to take his phone with him, 
powered on, whenever he leaves the house, but he often forgets.

I am serious enough about that being the purpose of the phone that, 
even tho' I carry it with me in my purse at all times, I never power 
it on except to place a call. I have given my intimates my beeper 
number (the beeper which my job put on me because I am on-call 24/7, 
but in fact it very rarely calls) and told them firmly that I will 
call them *back* on the cell phone. 

I always feel embarrassed to admit that I have a cell phone, because I 
am ashamed to admit that I do something so *normal*.

Al wrote of cell phones: << most Brits my age, after all, just use 
theirs to make quick 10 second calls to establish 1) where we are, 
and 2) where we're meeting >>. I have the impression that most 
American kids (that is, people 18-21, your age) use theirs for 
endlessly long meaningless conversations. Of course, this is just 
based on glancing at them in public.

Sofie asked about people who got their nicknames from babytalk. 
Rightwing commentator and on-off presidential candidate Pat Buchanan 
had his sister Bay Buchanan as campaign manager. Previously, she was 
Treasurer of the United States under Richard Nixon and caused a mild 
scandal because of her official signature on the dollar bills because 
Bay is her nickname (her formal name is Angela) and no one had ever 
signed the dollar bills with a nickname before. The newspapers 
explained at that time that she got the nickname 'Bay' was what she 
called herself when learning to talk, trying to pronounce Baby.

I loved the LOTR Diaries. Go Cassie! Thanks, Indil. Wink, Stacey.

I loved the Alternate Ships. Go Judy!

I loved the deep philosophical discussion of comparative fault.