I found my gigapet.
Back in 1997, I was in seventh grade (some of you are weeping, stop it). The tamagotchi thing was all the rage, but I don't know anyone who actually had a geniune Tamagotchi. Here in the Midwest, we all had Nanopets, and we called all such little digital pals gigapets. For those not versed in the language, Gigapets were made by Tiger (who make all those electronic handheld games), Nanopets were made by Playmates (who make, umm, practically nothing now), and the Tamagotchis were made by the Japanese.
I have a Nano Double. This means that I get to take care of both an electronic puppy and an electronic kitty. (Currently, their names are Sherman and Sheba respectively.) I didn't have one until the middle school decided to make a big stink about them. Some of the very earliest models didn't have features to turn either the sound or the live mode off. Mine has both, but I rarely used either of them. They tended to need attention first thing in the morning, during lunch, and during my science class, all times no one was paying attention. Though I'd forgotten until this morning that they wake up much earlier than I do now. Try quarter after seven.
Anyway, I found some batteries for the thing and have been walking around with them clipped to my belt loop, just like the old days. My brother, I think, used to have a Gigapet alien, which is probably valuable these days. (Confirmed, found one being offered in the packaging for almost 90 bucks.)
In real news, I dropped Nephews 1 and 2 back at home this past weekend. Instead of turning around and driving another eight hours back home, I drove two down to DM and stayed with the grown ups.
I was lucky. It turned out that Saturday was the last night of an improv show run by someone I thought had moved to New York for good. She was the acting coach for my high school until the year I graduated. I don't know exactly why it was the year I graduated. She had two kids who were both older than me; the younger one was two years older than me, so there was plenty of time for her to leave before that. I've often wondered, vaugely, if she was just that interested in enough of us in my class that she stayed.
Anyway, she directed the first play I ever wrote, and we recieved straight ones at state. Didn't go on to All State, but we could've. I still say that the best time in my life was probably the night we won (though I think The Boy might be a little hurt to know that). So, I really owe a lot to her. Since I thought she'd moved out to NYC full time, I hadn't even considered the fact that I'd be likely to see her again in DM.
I'm not coming close to describing how important this was for me, but I think to really understand, it'd have to be a lot clearer who I used to be and who I am now. As she even remarked, I seemed happy now. That was sort of a new thought for me and I discovered that in the last few years, it had become true. Although I never realised in in high school, I discovered shortly after leaving that the world was generally good and not out to get me. I was, in fact, happy.
My ivy is teeming with little tiny flying insects. It's also beginning to die for reasons I can't fathom. I may just ditch it and go get some more, since I picked it up from the arboretum for free.
The CD player in the car is doing strange things, and I couldn't tell if it needs to be cleaned, or if it gets too hot. (Really, right in the dashboard where the sun shines on it, what a brilliant place to put a piece of equipment that reacts to temperature changes.) Anyway, it meant that listening to CD's was out in the 16 hours of driving I did this weekend and I went searching for every single NPR station between here and Iowa. Commercial radio is so rarely songs I actually want to listen to, no matter how few commercial breaks they take commercial breaks to tell me I'm not hearing.
So, I heard the same episode of Car Talk twice, I listened to different parts of Whad'Ya Know? three times and all of Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me! twice. I also managed to hear A Prarie Home Companion once and something I'd never heard before called Radio Lab.
It's completely and totally different from anything I've ever heard on the radio. This particular episode is actually a couple months old, according to their website, but it's about sleep. Just check it out if you've never heard it, it's really unique.
I'm reading a book of short stories by Neil Gaiman. He's my kind of guy. It's like science fiction, but with fantasy and an assortment of other stuff infused.
So that's what I know.