One minute update.

It occurs to me, that while I'm fairly certain I know all the people reading this, there might be one or two slightly creepy stalker people who don't know exactly what I've been up to.

Here are the three most exciting things that have happened in my life in the last while:

1) I graduated. I am now a Master of Library Science. Doesn't that sound impressive?



It's less impressive that I never could figure out how to wear the master's hood properly.

2) I went to Ireland (this gets an exclamation point because it's much more exciting)!



Cliffs!



Sheep!



Fantastic, beautiful scenery!



More fantastic, beautiful scenery!



Can there possibly be more fantastic, beautiful scenery?



Oh, but there can!



It's a very nice place, Ireland.

3) I had a perfectly ripe peach and some fancy cheese for dinner this evening while I watched Pride and Prejudice. Simple tastes, you know. I am easily satisfied by the very best.

My, what an exciting life I do lead.

Wait, Brett said what?! O no he di'int!

What's going on in Wisconsin today, you might ask?

I'll tell you what's going on in Wisconsin today - Sports. Sports. Sports. And sports. Sports. More sports. Oh, and someone (who played sports) was struck by lightning and Milwaukee has a gang problem, but who can concentrate on those things when Brett Favre is sending text messages?!

Evidently not the state of Wisconsin.

I enjoy sports, and the Brewers are my baseball team of choice and the Packers are the Packers, so I don't mind sports being in the news, but this is all I've heard about all day. For two days. They've even stopped talking about the weather, there's so much to say about the sports. Sports and weather, that's what we know about in Wisconsin.

It might be just a little silly, is all I'm saying.



I mean, this is the state that invented the racing sausage. We must already know sports are at least a little silly.

Though now I've got a hankerin' for a brat with some Secret Stadium Sauce...

(My favorite article about the Sabathia trade is this one, which declares, "Sabathia turns 28 on July 21 and will become a free agent after this season. The Indians selected him the first round of the 1988 draft and he has been with the franchise ever since." So... he's been playing professional baseball since he was 8? The kid's got talent!)

Happy Birthday, Country!

In Milwaukee, as I'm sure they do around the United States, the big ol' fat daddy of fireworks displays is on July 3rd so as not to take away from the smaller surrounding towns and their much smaller, slightly pathetic fireworks displays on the actual holiday of Independence Day.

That said, I think I prefer the smaller fireworks extravaganzas and it is thoughtful of Milwaukee (well done, city) to do this. They remind me more of when I was a wee child and we watched fireworks sitting on the hood of our Firebird (not at all unlike this beauty - there's a car that is not messing around. It's definitely making some sort of statement. That statement might be "Driver is slightly redneck!" or "Hey, I've got a bird on my hood! I can't wait to tell my friends, none of them have a bird this big!" but at least it's going for something). Now fireworks have become this hour-long bombardment that probably sounds more like the London blitz than happy celebration time. See, it's a happy bombardment so it's okay.

Also, everything I saw said that the fireworks started at 10:30. Evidently this was Special Eastern Time, which is an hour and ten minutes ahead of Central Standard Time, because the fireworks actually started at about 9:20 while I was still walking to the lake and I was all, "Dadburnit, they done started without me!" But you know, it's thoughtful of them, for those citizens watching Milwaukee's fireworks from the Hamptons.



WOO PATRIOTISM!!

Happy Birthday, America. You're a good country, even though you get picked on a lot and sometimes you deserve it. I still like you and I hope your 233rd year (golly, you're older than dirt, lil' buddy) is the best ever.

Oh dear, but it has been a long time, hasn't it?

It seems I've neglected my poor Blogger blog for more than a year. I thought the trial separation was going rather well but apparently the universe had other ideas. Now, since other people I know and like have started using Blogger, I will make an effort to do the same. Who doesn't like pictures? You like pictures!

Yesterday, I went camping! Showing here:



In this place where there was camping, there was also a tree chock full o' kayaks!



In addition to camping and kayak trees, there was nighttime. Fancy that!



It was a very nice camping excursion. I have a bit of kayak I'm planning to plant in my parents' yard to grow my own kayak tree. That would make up for the fact that my kayak, currently in Maine, would cost $575 to ship here.

A little steep for a kayak worth $300. Luckily, when my own kayak tree grows, I'll be able to pluck them from the branches whenever I wish and pay no shipping whatsoever. Delight!

Ooohhh...


...that's all.

Not really. This is Bounday Waters. Boundary Waters is the best place. It is my favorite place, at least. This is not my favorite Boundary Waters picture (and my scanner is apparently very dusty), but I would feel weird posting my favorite one because it has people in it who may one day stumble upon themselves in a picture on the internet, and having done that before myself, I can tell you it is weird and slightly uncomfortable.

I had wanted to go back here sometime this summer, but now it is on fire and they (the mighty Forest Service, who, bless them, really are trying) don't think they'll be able to put it out until sometime this fall.

THIS FALL!?

Do you know how much burning can happen between May and FALL? A lot of burning! Quite possibly too much burning! Such a shame.

So instead I'm going to Ohio.

Not quite the same, but at least it isn't aflame.

(I like adding "a" to the front of words. Aswarm, alight, abed, aghast... If only "ghast" were a word by itself.

...it isn't, is it?

Alas.)

I got a Nikon camera

Aha, a new low-end digital camera. For several reasons, I went camera shopping yesterday and remembered how much fun it is trying to get someone to help you at Best Buy.

Maybe not You, but Me.

I stood next to the camera I thought I wanted for 25 minutes while other people around me came and went as salespeople approached them and offered assistance. Nobody offered me any assistance, even when I started haphazardly waving around the thousand-dollar SLR cameras on the other side of the table. And I thought I was so approachable, alas. Something I need to work on.

Eventually I bribed someone to unlock the cabinet with cookies so I could buy the camera, which worked, but the coupon I'd brought with me did not work because the camera was apparently on secret-sale. I asked if they had any cameras that weren't on sale because they all had what was evidently a "sale" tag, and was immediately offered six dollars off the camera I was buying.

Was I haggling? My question was really out of pure curiosity, "Oh... I don't get it, are all your cameras on sale? They all have those yellow tags," and all of a sudden I'm feeling like a haggler. $6 is probably worth the wait. It certainly didn't ruin my life, or even my morning.

That's it, I'm clearly a natural haggler. I'm ready for Marrakech.

It seems like a nice camera. It's a point-and-shoot Nikon and it doesn't have a rechargeable battery or a viewfinder (grrrarhrhghrtrgrah! You can't get a camera for under $200 with a viewfinder - how hard would it be to stick a little window on top? Apparently $80 worth of hard.) but it takes nice enough pictures of statues from behind. This is Solomon Juneau's bum.

Prosit!

I think Germany got it right when they invented the beer stein. Martini glasses? Might be cool, but only if you are a skinny blonde woman or James Bond (while I enjoy martinis, I am neither and thus probably look silly). Margarita glasses are similar, and those goofy tropical drink glasses they stick umbrellas in with big pieces of fruit and those plastic flamingos all over the rim are even worse. However, everybody knows someone drinking out of a stein is not messing around.


Of course, this is not a real stein. This is actually a lamp. I mean, maybe it was a stein at some point and has fallen from grace far enough that it's now just a lamp, but it sure is trying. I think it's doing all right.