August 24, 2003 So we went to the Maryland Renaissance Festival yesterday. It was a lot of fun, but all the pictures I have are for before the festival with Sarah or after at Vaccaros. Abby, Pat, Sarah, Genny, and Abby's sister Lucy came with us. I don't think I've ever put Genny on my site before, I think I was building my site when she was in England abroad. Now the oddest thing is seeing someone dressed up in chain mail answering a cell phone. Weird. We got to see human chess, where people had to duke it out with swords, quarterstaffs, fists, whatever to take the board. It was awesome! And the Pyrates Royale were there, and much merriment ensued. I bought some lovely rose oil at the herbalist's delight and I'll be back again on Scottish Weekend with Rep. It's thanks to her that I've gone to the trouble of updating my site a tad. You'll now notice that the less used parts of my site have been collected in the archives, and my friends have a direct link on most all my pages instead of the six degrees of Mei page. Besides there is always Friendster for playing that game. August 18, 2003 So I've got this great new job and I've just been released from my education class to be on the floor, waiting for folks to call me. Well, released is the term I keep hearing, but it reminds me too much of the term being released from prison or from a mental institution. Speaking of mental, a former employee went postal last week, killed a man and ruined quite a few people's lives. I can't help feeling sorry for the victim's daughter. The murderer wasn't man enough to stick around in this world and face the consequences for his crimes, but he'll answer for it in the next one. Why is everything so crazy? I guess it's kind of odd to mention that I went to a shooting range just last Thursday with Peter. I got to fire a 22, a 9 millimeter, and he fired a 40 and 45 mm. Peter pulled this little trick, putting blanks in the 9 mm because I flinched so much from it, so after three duds didn't go off I hit the target in the center with a live round...and didn't even knock myself senseless with the richocheting shell. He's a good teacher. Yesterday, Abby and my brother Phil called on the same day and I missed them both because I was at Andy's house. I hadn't really heard from Abby since Ira squished the living daylights out of me in New York as a hello from Abby in Vancouver. I'm not quite sure if I can consider that hearing from Abby either. Turns out Abby is in town for two weeks and bro is coming home around Labor Day weekend. He's got some big decsions to make about OCS no one else can make for him. And I feel like Charlie Brown today. He said that everything he touches is ruined. I can't really explain what I mean by that just yet. But more to come. Want more?