Aurochs

Via Newark…

I’ve just ordered another all-singing, all-dancing Pocket PC. The plan is to use it for photography, videos, mp3ery, skypery and general messing about on the web. Blogging even. I’m extremely excited about it all. Should arrive in a few days time, end of the week maybe. After my Palm Zire 72 experiences I’m a little wary but I’ll soon get over that. Behold the glorious dawn of: IPAQ rx3715 Catchy name, no?

Got me tickets back to MX too today, Alaska Airlines no less, chosen primarily for the nice, cool, frozen imagery their name conjours up to this sweaty, overheating, ennervated Expedia user… Righty, off to tea… Don’t forget to comment…

So last night after a lovely meal at Maggie’s pub-restaurant (Fish & Chips x 4 & surf’n’turf for the record) frequented by all the local ex-pat Catholic pedagogic population, Martin innocently commented that he didn’t think the headlights were on. Next minute, neither was the dashboard or radio or the engine. This sounded grimly familiar as the same scenario happened to me on the way to a conference in Berkeley before all kinds of alternator-related fun. Everyone jumped out and I started pushing the car along Imperial Highway in me flipflops. Not ideal footware for motorway maintenance, and true to form they broke and fell off along the way. Sally & Sita are lifelong AAA (the America AA) members so they were soon on the blower to get towed. After 2 hours, multiple phonecalls, one police incident (ask Sally- on her new email address, kilcarsally (at) hotmail.com) and one member of the party going AWOL on the buses later and we got back to Downey, where I got hiccups again. Hiccups resurfaced at regular intervals in my sleep. Sita had to decamp in the middle of the night as the bed was shaking too much from them. Anyroad, today is the day of packing before the big off.

I went to check on our dear little rodents in the back garden and was delighted to discover that they’re back in touch with their lapine instincts of burrowing. Klem was nowhere to be seen, Lulu (gordito that he is) was halfway through the hole and the dog was running around enjoying the mayhem. I sent Atticus indoors, yelled ‘Jailbreak’ to Sarita and we put the emergency plan into action. Klem was hiding under the cage, Lulu was still digging, I scooped Lulu up and threw him back into the cage. Sarita cuddled Klem (klem’s not big on cuddles) to scold him and then he got locked up too. I’ll have to work out how to implement the new security features in their run. Maybe an ID card scheme. Or face recognition technology at the back yard gate… anyroad, wandering back to the kitchen, Atticus is gallivanting about Dalen St. but luckily comes when he’s called… So for now, bunnies are are locked up tightly, we’re not really packed, Atticus is contained, Martin’s off alternator & battery shopping and all’s quiet again for a minute or two. Give or take some yard sales on the road. Glad the minor disasters are happening before we set off rather than after, that’s fer sure.

Phone calls to blighty’s next on the list. As I keep mentioning, get yerselves on skype. Octagenatian and Nonagenarian relatives are excepted…

While you’re waiting for something worth reading in these pages, have a stare at this…

My scrabble rating’s at 995 after a quick succession of blinding games. Maybe this weekend will be the watershed millenial game, or i may just plunge back to the 800s. It depends how late I’m out tonight with the usual crowd. Last night Sarah, her sister Betsy, Sita and me went to a few cantinas. La Fuente, (de rigeur on any cantina trip), La Maestranza, (for all your bull fighting memorabilia and 90s indie pop needs) and Los Molachos (named after the original owner who was indeed molacho , or missing lots of teeth). Still managed to make it to another productive day at work. They finally read over what I’ve been doing and are suitably impressed. Go me! (he wrote in a fit of self-congratulation). Business cards tomorrow and next week there’s going to be a sales person on the case, as they’re hiring a pushy young lady to go out and rain make or whatever they call it in marketing parlance. That would be good… Other plans: Tonight, more cantinas. Tomorrow, Tlaquepaque craft & photography, possible fiesta in the evening, Sunday, Laid back philosophical discussion, gauloises and strong coffees or maybe The Pink Panther remake. Whatever it is, you’ll read it here first. And last.

We get the keys to our new place today and if the weather holds we’ll be moving in over the next week. I’ll post the address on here with a password, ‘cos i’m not so sure putting our address up for all to see was such a good idea with Koshland Av., although i’m fairly sure no one’s stolen my identity yet. People can’t do the accent for starters. Then there’s the teeth… but I digress.

The bunnies have been lolloping around the kitchen this morning because they’d been cooped up in their cage while the UCSC Stasi came round to inspect the state of the apartment. They’re looking forward to their new pasture. I’m going to miss the broadband we have here and am busily downloading everything I could possibly need. Like 5 gigabytes of Linux… Thanks for the tips, Jesse, I’ve partitioned the hard drive and am trying to follow the inscrutable instructions to install it all…

We went to the cinema to see “What the BLEEP do we know?” which has to be one of the worst films i’ve ever paid good money to see. I would have walked out before I fell asleep, but Sita wasn’t having it, by the time I woke up she agreed and we both left the cinema. I’m looking forward to reviewing it, watch the film review page in the next few days.