Today is the day that I go to the bank, cough up over thirty thousand dollars, and give it to a lawyer who will, in return, produce the keys to a house across town. Friday we get those keys from her and from that point onwards the house belongs to "us" (i.e., the bank). Payday is Friday, and we're cutting it closely enough that when the account is emptied later this afternoon we'll be running on fumes, fiscally speaking, for about twenty-four hours.

I've known several people who have named their houses (Question House and Seventh Maze come to mind), and naturally I've considered the possibility. I don't have any immediate ideas, although we've agreed that "House of Larry" is a pretty good name since Larry (my father) provided us with a significant chunk of the down payment (I assume my mom had something to do with it too, but the appeal of "House of Larry" is undeniable). After all, we live in an age where wealthy corporations and individuals purchase naming rights for large buildings. Should small buildings be any different? Speaking of which, if anyone would like to purchase the naming rights for my shed, I'm accepting bids.

One more bit of good news comes to mind. We spoke to our real estate agent yesterday, who mentioned that she sold a bungalow down the street from us. The buyer is a massage therapist who will be running a clinic out of her house. Moreover, she is apparently quite interested in the lavender that grows in large quantities in our front yard -- obviously as scent for massage oils. Hmmmm... I wonder what we can ask for in exchange for the dried lavender?

In response to a reader comment, Eric posted a link to me from his blog. His application for membership on my links page was already being evaluated, and this gracious act of supplication finally pushed him over the edge. Flattery, Mr. Lippert, will get you everywhere.

However, knowing that I would end up getting a bunch of hits from that great blog demographic of JScript .NET coders, I realized that a new entry was called for, particularly since recent visitors have been greeted by "God is on our side" as the top subject line. Far be it for me to turn away potential readers.

But even more remarkable than Eric's link to me was his link to Dr. Orbifold. Yet another good friend joins the blogging world! And his motives are nothing if not virtuous: to prevent himself from going insane and building a shack in the woods. Dr. Orbifold, I applaud you. Your application has been fast-tracked for approval, and your blog has been added to the links page.

I also added in Not Invented Here, which I discovered by accident and have been glancing at occasionally. And there are one or two more blogs that are in the evaluation stage. All in all, the links page is filling up. Everyone please try to space out your postings better -- reading them all is taking up a lot of my time. Thank you.

Wow -- this hasn't happened before. I composed this rant yesterday, but only noticed this morning that I had never submitted it. So here it is in the cold light of the following morning.

Watching the American Empire slowly implode is a hobby shared by many. The point is, there would be nothing novel about any rant I could reasonably be expected to produce in this forum. I could complain endlessly about foreign policy, runaway corporations, warmongering, copyright law, litigiousness, voting machines, GMOs, obesity, environmental destruction, and on and on. But you've probably heard it all before.

So if I believe that there's no point belabouring these subjects here on thingo, why the meta-rant? Well, every now and then something happens that infuriates me so much that a little of my American Schadenfreude spills over into writing.

That happened today with this article about Gen. William G. Boykin, the U.S. deputy undersecretary of defense for intelligence. He's been causing a bit of a stir with some of his comments and opinions. Here are some choice exerpts:

• Muslims worship an idol, not a "real God."
• The war on terrorism is a crusade.
• God put Bush in the White House to fight terrorism.
• The United States is a Christian country.

The article goes on to say that despite these inflammatory remarks, the General won't be removed from office because he's such a distinguished officer. So I guess that means it's better to piss off the rest of the world than to deal with closed-mindedness at home. The guy's entitled to his opinions, but he should recognize that he's in a high-profile position and keep them to himself.

Different members of congress reacted differently. I liked the quote from Mike Pence from Indiana: "God is not neutral in this cause in the struggle between freedom and tyranny, between dictatorship and human dignity. Let it be said that in this Congress, God is on our side. And may it ever be so." I'm sorry, but the moment you resort to "God is on our side," you're lost. Any God worth his salt would punish you for arrogant presumption. Thinking back through history, "God is on our side" usually hasn't led to a positive outcome.

My, my, my. Nearly halfway through October already. What has been happening over here at Thingo Central?

Well, perhaps most frightening is that in about two and a half weeks, we'll own a house. And a lovely house it is, too -- I'm very much looking forward to living there. The neighbourhood is rather remarkable. As I mentioned previously, the current owners have been going out of their way to get the house ready for our arrival. Plus, they did in fact hold a party where they invited the rest of the block in to meet us. So we already know our (very nice) neighbours before moving in. It's a little daunting though, because our house has apparently been the centre of the community for many decades. It used to be the gathering place for the forty or so children who lived on the block (including the eight kids in residence) -- they would congregate every weekend to watch the neighbourhood's first television. In the winter, our backyard was turned into a skating rink, which explains the fact that the yard is about a foot and a half lower than those of the neighbours on either side. I don't mind the idea of being the centre of a community, though I have some qualms about the current owner's usual practice of shoveling the sidewalk for the entire block on snowy mornings.

At the party, one future neighbour expressed concern over a planned city-wide zoning change that would allow six storey apartment buildings to be built on our block. She urged everyone to attend an open meeting the following week. Well, I managed to go, and based on my comments and the comments of the other residents of the block who turned up, it looks like the planner is willing to roll back the zoning on our block to restrict it to detached and semi-detached housing only. Yes, this does potentially lower the resale value of the house in a greedy-land-developer sort of way, but it helps to preserve the character of the neighbourhood, which the neighbourhood itself considers a higher priority. How very... civic of me.

Work is busy but rewarding these days. I was particularly stressed in the days leading up to the 3rd -- I had to submit a grant application for internal review, and I was giving a big invited talk in front of the department. Fortunately, I got the application in and the talk went quite well. I also received very positive feedback from students for my teaching over the summer, to complement the embarrassingly good reviews at ratemyprofessors.com. My ego has been borne on a new tide of optimism, one that has carried me into a generally productive phase that I am attempting to prolong as long as possible (notwithstanding diversions such as this blog entry). Good thing too -- I've got a number of important deadlines coming up this week and the next, after which I'll need to step back and devote some attention to the completion of the home buying process.

As an honorarium for the invited talk I gave last week, I received a gift certificate to the university's bookstore. I went to cash it in on Neal Stephenson's Quicksilver. I decided to use up the rest of the free money on the fifth Harry Potter (which we had borrowed) and an SF anthology. When I got to the cash, I was informed that fiction, mystery, and SF are always 25% off the marked price (which seems sort of silly), and that I had therefore not used up the value of the gift certificate. I eventually settled on adding in Daniel Quinn's Ishmael, because my mother keeps getting told how it's a life changer. Combined with Villa Incognito on loan from Jamey, it's shaping up to be a busy reading season.

Zebula starting walking a couple of weeks ago (in time to meet my parents' incessant demands to get her walking in time for their visit last week). Now she's walking up a storm. Apparently, when I was her age, I took a couple of steps, fell, and in despair refrained from walking again for another six months. Zebula is more like her mother -- constant practice and hard work. Even when she does the Maggie Simpson thing of falling on her face every five steps, she gets right back up and keeps moving. Also, she likes saying "EEEeeeeeeeeeeeee-Yo". I'm trying to get her to develop that into "beeeeeeeeeeee bo", as in Primiti Too Taa, but no luck yet.

That's the news from Thingo Central. Now I thought I'd try a spot of work...