(no subject)

Dear California. I'm sorry baby. Won't you please take me back? I know I've strayed in the past, mainly for that tramp Nevada, but this weekend in Michigan really didn't mean anything to me. I know you're jealous of her mysteriously hand-like physique, her seasons, and the fact that due to the vagaries of the electoral college, my vote would actually mean something there, but I promise I won't ever stray again. You're the one for me baby. Do you know how many tattoos I saw out there? Two. And they were both butterflies. The one mexican restaurant we visited featured the use of nacho cheese heavily and had a class of menu items entitled tostaguacs, which is really just too unsettling to think about. What can I do to prove my fidelity to you? I was going to just randomly start making out with people at the Airport/Colosseum BART stop to prove my love, but they all looked really surly, and I wasn't sure you'd want me spending my first night back in the emergency room. Just give me some sign that it's all ok between us. Please?

All of which is to say that I was in Detroit(esque) this weekend for a cousin's wedding. It was very strange. Or more appropriately, it wasn't very strange at all, which made it pretty god damned alien to my twisted subcultured bay area psyche. There was a church involved. It was admittedly a Unitarian Universalist church, but there was still a moment of trepidation that I might burst into flames as I crossed the threshold (upon further reflection, I have realized that this wasn't actually my first time in a church, as I had been repressing some junior high school memories that involved a trap snow/ski trip that involved a lot of attempts to tell me about jesus). Will mentioned that he thinks this is the first wedding he has attended in quite some time that didn't feature at least two bridesmaids with sleeve tattoos. Also, Baby Got Back was far and away the coolest thing played at the reception, which was... disturbing. But all told, it was pleasant, and I got to see some of the few members of my non-immediate family who actually register on my radar as more than people who I happen to share some genetic code with. Seeing as I discovered recently that I am very, very, very, very distantly related to the Bushes through my incredibly disfavored blue blood grandmother, you can imagine just how little I value shared genetic code. As an aside, this recent discovery means that if I ever get my hands on a functioning time machine, I'm nuking the Mayflower to rid myself of this taint. So, just be prepared for that little ripple in the space-time continuum.

Also, note to self. If you ever find yourself on a plane ever again for some reason, maybe you should pack some reading material that is not either an Abstract Algebra text that is impossible to concentrate on properly when the shifts in pressure are giving you a sinus headache or a book that makes you cry every other page. Just a helpful suggestion to retain any niggling sense of macho-ness you might have left.

In other news, three new math texts showed up today (algebraic and differential topology and knot theory), and I promptly ordered seven more (Differential geometry, more knot theory, game theory, probability, general logic). Somebody stop me before I purchase again.

And tenderly you tell about the saddest book you ever read, it always makes you cry. The statue's crying too and well he may