• Family style injustice

    I am a procrastinator. “Whatever is worth doing today will still be worth doing tomorrow,” is my creed.

    In this regard, Cheryl is my polar opposite – but you knew this already, or you wouldn’t be reading this right now.

    I wait until the last possible opportunity to fill up my tank at the gas station. With a four-cylinder Japanese import, two gallons in the tank is fifty miles of highway bliss. I’ll have you know I’ve only run out of gas once (God bless you, inventor of the dashboard “idiot light,” whoever you are).

    Now here’s a typical errand-bound conversation, Kauffman style:
    “John, could you stop and get some gas?”
    “I guess, but isn’t the tank 1/3 full?”
    “I’m a tank is 2/3 empty kind of gal, and besides, I may not get the chance to stop for gas tomorrow.”
    “Doesn’t your car get 20 miles to the gallon?”
    “I guess.”
    “Then you’ve got somewhere in the neighborhood of 100 miles in the tank, and,”
    “John, are you going to do what I asked you to do or what?”
    “Yeah, but,”
    “BUT WHAT? I COMMAND THEE TO DO MY BIDDING!”
    “o.k.”

    Believe it or not, these conversations are rare. That’s part of the problem.

    Cars have been interchangeable at our house for a month now. Combine the rarity of the above style conversation with my proclivity for procrastination and Cheryl’s gas pump assiduity, and you have the makings of a real problem. I can never remember to go to the gas station, I rarely need to.

    Naturally, this is all Cheryl’s fault. If she were a little less diligent then I would have to pay more attention to fuel levels. I would have an interest – self preservation. As it stands now, I’m heading for a fall. There’s going to be a day when Cheryl isn’t around to fill up my tank and I’m going to end up stranded on the interstate in rush hour traffic.

    What we need is a little compassionate conservatism, a little tough love, a little something to foster personal responsibility. Cheryl, you’re not allowed to drive my car anymore.

    Yep, that ought to do it. Color me responsible.

  • Review: Laughing Corpse, by Laurell K. Hamilton

    This is the second book in a series: Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter. I’m not really sure why I bought this book. The first book in the series didn’t knock my sox off. It was mostly o.k. – but it wasn’t something that sent me teetering on the edge of obsession to get the next book. I guess the author’s Merry Gentry books swayed the decision. I just read the first two books of THAT series, and although they were as much soft porn as fantasy/horror, they were pretty darn good. (Though I’m wary to go much further, the soft porn thing is something that gets expanded on in later books, if reviews at Amazon are to be believed.)

    After reading the first two Merry Gentry books, this one was a disappointment. I thought about this book quite a bit this morning, thinking of this entry. Why didn’t I like it? There’s good action, there are good characters, there’s a really good main character, but somewhere I got lost. I had to make myself pick it up again. Maybe it was the zombies. Maybe I’m not a big fan of zombie books.

    Then I read the author’s after-word. In it, she pats herself on the back for writing successful “mixed genre” books. There must be a lot of people out there that really like them, because each new one ends up on a best seller list. I think I like “mixed genre” books too, kind of. Several of Charlaine Harris’ books come to mind. However, I’m not sure the author did quite as good a job mixing her genres in this one. The whole was about as good as the sum of its parts.

    Laughing Corpse @ Amazon

  • Pop quiz

    You are filling your coffee mug from the tap at your office, when you smell a distinct metallic odor. Do you:
    a. dump out the water in your mug and seek another source;
    b. stick your nose in your partially filled mug to determine if the smell is coming from the water;
    c. put your mouth under the tap to see if it tastes like metal too; or,
    d. pretend you never smelled anything and finish making your cup ‘o joe?

    If you answered “c” or “d,” you are what people in the life insurance industry refer to as “bad business.”

    If you answered “d,” then I’d like to offer you a cup, the smell of lead lends a wonderful bouquet to your average cup o’ joe.