How to play Egyptian Rat Screw. I first learned that card game at the Joseph Baldwin Academy, a sort of summer camp for smart kids I attended in Missouri after the 8th grade. I then taught it to lots of folks at my high school and we ended up playing it at almost every speech meet. Our version was a little more violent than this one, though, as it involved a “false slapper” being required to put one of his hands under the pile until the next double. Yowch.

I got two new things delivered in the past 24 hours! The first is my sexy she19 T-shirt urging my fellow American women to “make their mark” by voting in the next election. Dressy yet political. I wore it to work today because I’m funky like that. Second is a big bouquet of flowers set to us by Ma and Pa Snook! The arrangement was apparently called “Golden Birds”, which explains the birds of paradise and weird little fake bird nestled in the middle. Ma Snook also made a point of including gerberas because she knew they were my favorite. Isn’t that sweet? Unfortunately the cat took one look at the arrangement and fled in terror to the bedroom. Thus the flowers have to live in the laundry room when we’re not home to prevent attacks.

Crap. I thought I had at least another 24 hours before I had to go on Amazing Race spoiler alert. Instead I fired up my Yahoo home page and there it was, right in front of me. Double crap. At least it only told which state the winners were from, which limits it to two of the four for me. (And actually that’s kinda good, because it means the team I hate didn’t win!)

Vote for Bush, get hit by three hurricanes. The facts don’t lie!

Jann‘s having another baby! And the Netdecisions family just keeps growing…

New Poll: What the heck do you wear when you get married by Elvis? I’m leaning towards the daggy tourist look – mostly because it’ll be the most comfortable – but I could be persuaded.

What with all this romantic mooshiness, I switched up the default theme on the site to the old “Valentine’s Day” design. (If you don’t notice any change, you have a cookie set so you’ll have to do it manually.) I just figured it was appropriate. Hmm, I should make some new themes already…

More Wedding Stuff
Thank you guys so much for all the wonderful messages! It’s just reinforced the idea that this is the right thing for us to do. I mean, our day-to-day situation isn’t changing yet people still seem so excited for us. To me, this means that there really is something there, some value in making this commitment public and sharing it with all our friends and loved ones. So yeah, it’s a little scary but exhilarating too. I’m loving saying it to people. “I’m getting married.” I said it to the man in the liquor store the other day and he gave us a free bottle opener! I figure this is a coupon I’ll only have once, so I better take advantage of it, right?

On that note, I’ve had a couple inquiries about sending gifts. (Well, really it was only my aunt and my grandma at this stage, but again, limited time coupon…) So if you’re inclined to send us something, we have both an Amazon Wish List and an Amazon Wedding Registry. The Wish List is just my regular one with “WEDDING” comments indicating the things we both want. The Registry is for the stuff they won’t ship overseas, which is why it’s going to my Mom’s address. Note that none of this is traditional stuff like toasters and china, mostly because we already have all the crap. Plus we really, really need a PlayStation. But as the Snook recently pointed out to me, a wedding gift is really just a ticket to the wedding reception, and as our reception will be (at this point) entirely virtual, feel free to take a pass on the gift. We’ll swing by everybody’s towns some day and have a beer together. (Edited to add: If you want our mailing address in Sydney, just drop me an e-mail.)

Read on for more wedding crap.Wedding Guests
It’s so sweet of you guys to offer to join us, but seriously, please don’t bother. We sorta accepted a while ago that with my family on one continent and his on another (and friends everywhere in-between), it’s impossible for us to have the big everybody-together dream wedding. That’s partly why we decided on the Vegas option. If it’s just us, nobody gets left out. We’re definitely doing the Internet stream, though, so hopefully everybody that wants to have a peek can be included. And there’ll be pictures and video on this site, you can bet. So thanks for the offers, but please save up your money and come visit us in Sydney instead. It’s starting to get really nice and warm and sunny around these parts…!

One Last Thing
I just want to reiterate that in no way did I mean my little announcement message to be “hateful” or to impugn anybody that has a “traditional” wedding. (Most people got that, but not everybody.) Anybody that’s been reading this site for a while knows that my feelings about marriage are really complicated. So when I say that I wouldn’t have a traditional wedding, I’m only saying that that isn’t the right option for me. That should be obvious, right? That doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate that they’re important for you, nor am I saying that my way is better overall. So sorry if I unintentionally offended anybody. (These shiny, shiny princesses are so sensitive…)

Just kidding.

Disassembled iMac G5. Oh man, I’m getting excited! Too bad my delivery is still scheduled “on or before October 12.”

Daggiest. Cardigan. EVER.
So today we were in recovery mode from Major’s birthday party yesterday, which also saw us break the wedding news to the Snook’s college buddies. (Hence, lots of drinking and merrymaking.) Despite my fuzzy-headedness I managed to get a lot of knitting done this afternoon. I finished another ball on my main project so I granted myself some reward time on my side project: the Round-the-World Cardigan. It’s my first intarsia project and I’m having a lot of fun with it. Today I finished off the top of South America and most of the Caribbean. The pattern is from a totally daggy 80’s knitting book that Mrs. Morris (who owns the shop) lent me. I love it! I’m using Nova Super Chunky and it’s surprisingly soft and touchable for having so much acrylic in it. (It was the only thing thick enough to get gauge that had the necessary colors.) Hopefully I’ll have it finished before I go home in two months so I can show it off!