I forgot to mention that, while in Seattle, I had a chance to check out the new library. It’s really a great space you should see if you’re in town – it’s modern and very funky without being overpowering or distracting, and it’s gorgeous.

In a ridiculous move, the City of Somerville is considering divesting its holdings in companies that do business with Israel. Thankfully, the mayor opposes this legislation and there seems to be a fair amount of public opposition, too. Do they have nothing better to do?

I’m back from NYC after a nice holiday visit with the fam. In addition to eating lots of good food, we went to see The Incredibles – great movie! My aunt and I also squeezed in a little time to work on the camera and sucessfully riveted the two metal arms in place. Look for pictures soon.

Since I’m apparently on a movie kick, I went to see Garden State last night and really enjoyed it. Zach Braff and Natalie Portman are both quite charming (and easy on the eyes), and the movie was well-written, funny, and touching in a way that doesn’t insult your intelligence. Check it out.

Still left on the “to-do in Seattle” list: have a cupcake from Cupcake Royale. I came so close this trip – I even bought a cupcake to eat on the airplane, but then left it, in its bright pink box, at the check-in counter. By the time I realized I’d left it, the fate of my cupcake had been sealed as I was through security and didn’t have time to go back for it. Ah, well, it’s another reason to go back to Seattle…

I spent some quality time last night making a new part for the Rollieflex – check out the update here. Next step is to make the rivets to hold these two parts on, and I’m hoping to enlist the help of my jeweler/aunt this weekend.

I went out dancing last night at Blues Underground on Capitol Hill – it really redeemed Seattle in my dance eyes as my experience on Monday night at Sonny’s wasn’t so hot. The scene last night was great, though – lots of groovy music, good dancers and great dances. Check it out if you’re in town on the 3rd Friday of the month.

Back to Boston tomorrow!

Here’s the view this afternoon from where I was staying in Seattle:

I saw Sideways last night and really enjoyed it. It’s not the best film ever, but it was definitely worth my ten bucks, and it made up for Alexander Payne’s previous film – the abysmal About Schmidt.

I’m off to Seattle tomorrow for a week split between vacation and work, and although I’ve been traveling a lot lately, I’m looking forward to being back on the West Coast and in Seattle. And the frequent flyer miles don’t hurt, either.

If you’re in need of any advice on repairing an old camera, Ken Ruth is your man. He spent almost half an hour with me on the phone helping me think through a fix for the Rolleiflex (essentially, I need to make a very small rivet to replace one that broke) in spite of the fact that me doing the repair means no money for him. And I was referred to Ken by another great repair-man, Harry Fleenor. I guess there are fewer and fewer folks who’ll do repairs on old cameras, but the ones who’re left seem damn good.

The official, version 1.0 release of Firefox comes out today. Check it out for all your pop-up-free browsing needs.

So I posted some stuff up on Craigslist last night in the Free section, and was instantly innundated with about 75 emails in 10 minutes! The responses ranged from “Gimme everything!” to “My dying grandmother told me her last wish was for a junky old Mac laptop computer that only barely works, so please, even if you’ve promised it to someone else, can I have it?” From the 75, I found the first folks who replied in a reasonable fashion and have started getting rid of some stuff (old APS camera, junky laptop, SCSI scanner, etc.). So liberating!

I got some good woodworking done this weekend (hopefully not the last with such good weather) and made progress on the piano bench. It’s slow going, but the end is definitely in sight…

I was in Indianapolis for a couple days at the end of last week – if you can avoid Indianapolis, do. I head off to Seattle in a couple days for a week, and that should be a much nicer trip.

Really? Him again? It’s really depressing.

What makes me the most unhappy isn’t that he won – I’m almost ready to accept that 51% of the country voted for Bush. The thing that gets me is that he and his administration somehow view the election as a mandate that they’re 100% right. Nearly half the country thinks you’re not doing a good job, George – don’t you think some change is warranted?! Probably not… Too bad there’s no proportional representation in the presidency.

For Halloween this year, I went as a cubist painting:

Matt and I independently came up with costume ideas on Friday night and spent Saturday afternoon at my house making them. Pictures of his (awesome) costume should be up on his site soon.

As you can see (more or less, anyway – sorry for the blurry pic), the costume wasn’t really conducive to talking or drinking due to the lack of mouth on the mask. Note that these two activities tend to take center stage at Halloween parties such as the two I attended on Saturday night. So, in fact, I spent much of the time with the mask off carrying on conversations and imbibing. But it was a good concept.

Yesterday, aside from being Halloween, was the end-of-the-season tournament for BUDA Fall Hat League. This marked the end of my frisbee playing for this year, and that’s sad. Our team, Opa!, went 3-1 on the day and had a blast – the weather was unbelievable for October 31st, the ground was prime for laying out, and we definitely came together as a team. Fun stuff.

And the election is tomorrow?! I don’t really want to start making claims about leaving the country if Bush wins, but, all the same, I’d be really unhappy if Bush won. How a man can be so oblivious to reality really boggles my mind.