*Still talking to Dr. TNF-A over at Emory. We met during the psychoneuroendo conference here in town. I loved his talk, we talked for 45 minutes afterward, more over lunch, and then some during student presentations that we good-naturedly criticized. I'm hoping to score a postdoctoral job with him. He's got a grant in the works that I'd be perfect for. He even has an interest in running stuff with rhesus monkeys in the present. How I ever came to work with monkeys is a funny, naive process. But that's my specialty.

*Finally finished streamlining all the data for the human surveys. I've been working on them for over, lessee, 18 months. Finished analyzing the first one awhile ago. The more recent one had gone through 2 separate people for analysis and write-up before it came to me. Both of them fucked up. The only time I've seen worse documentation is in Dr. Zhivago's lab. That's a ringing endorsement for electrode-induced testicular seizures.

*Classes started back up. I audit a course in Immunology. The prof is entertaining, I already know the language, and it's filling a lot of gaps in my knowledge. That does have a tendency to happen when you try to write papers and proposals involving brain, behavior, hormones, and immunology.

*I love my job. I even tolerate most of the people I used to despise. 'Course I now despise some of the people I used to like, but what's a busy motherfucker to do.

*Danced this past saturday at the Inferno. Saw Jeff and Mike which was cool. Many other regulars there as well. I'm pretty sure my social coterie there is gonna stay about the same as it is. Which is probably a good thing. Goths and punks, while lovely and intelligently wicked folk, are sometimes not known for emotional stability.

*I kinda miss being more of a geek. My girlfriend lives near a gaming store. I look in every time I pass by. That gives nostalgia like a son of a bitch. I don't have the time for 6 hour gaming sessions, though, and honestly I get my fix writing my own stuff.

*Relationship is just fine. Granted, I wish we had more common interests or talked about feelings and shit, but I've realized that compromise is a beautiful thing. I can only think of 2-3 times where she became overly upset and unreasonable about some shit I screwed up on or just seemed to. She's patient. Most men would kill a fair portion of their existing family for such a lack of argument and discord.

Indeed, a lack of drama is a fine substitution for lots of shared interests. Granted again, there's a fair amount of stress in planning shit to do, making trip arrangements, etc., but in those instances she's working with and not against me.

*I've been wanting to contact old college friends. This started when I attached my old hard-drive to my existing desktop. I re-found out just how many people I used to talk to over the web. A few I remembered, most I didn't, which is par for the course.

*I still talk to and do stuff with Megan and especially Lisa. I had a feeling when I got to know Lisa a year ago that we'd become good friends. There are some new 1st years I've thought about befriending as well. Emily has suggested a few times I invite over couples I know and like for dinner parties. Oh, which reminds me...

*; I bought my first real piece of furniture at an estate sale this past saturday. It's this place that's open 2 days a months, run by little old ladies who laugh about getting stuff from little old ladies and selling. Supremely nice gals. Re: the items, it's a Duncan Fyfe dining set of one antique table, 1 host chair, and 6 side tables, with enough leaves to comfortably seat up to 14 people. Paid 300 for it in a bid box auction down from 400. This is circa early 19th century stuff. To say it's astounding I got the price I did is an understatement. Granted, there are some slight scratches here or there, but they're in excellent condition.

*So yeah, I might actually try hosting some dinner parties. Me. Dinner parties. (Mari I know at least you can appreciate the WTF factor on that one). What has the world come to. Next thing you know, I'll be wearing 1920 architect doublets with a gold pocketwatch and calling myself Gatsby. Actually...

*I've been writing like mad every day for the game project. 120,000 words or so, which I think is the equivalent of two novels. It took me 3-4 years to get to that point, but I do have this other fetish for photography. We have a few new writers, which should make completing the rest of the project easier.

*Partly because of my small summer award for funding and doing stuff with Emily, my savings have taken a blow. I'll be starting back up next month to try scraping together 5k American for a new Canon camera.

*Speaking of which, I now have access to every single print I've ever put up. My pre-September 2004 stuff was on my old hard-drive. This means having A LOT more fodder for future shows.

*I'll mention said future shows soon.

*So things are going alright for me. Nothing to brag about, nothing to complain about. Just a decent sense of life and fulfillment after half a lifetime of destitution as a child and many strange, wonderful, sometimes heart-breaking social thingies as a teen and adult.

I am David Copperfield with a vanilla ice cream cone.

*I still listen to Placebo religiously. And the new NiN album. Gotta indulge the bitterness regularly.

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