I can't sleep; I can't lay down without coughing; and I'm pissed off about it. I can't hardly even smoke. Have to take very light drags, makes it almost worthless. Almost. Worthless. Interesting concept, there. Maybe it really is worthless, and I ought to stop it.

      Well, that's pretty stupid. Of course I ought to stop it. I am simply amazing. Nothing can stop me... er... nothing can make me stop.

      I got distracted there, I had to go stop a cat fight. Heard the yowling and went into the kitchen to find Cowboy in a standoff with our neighbor's cat, who outweighs him by a factor of two. So I ran the ruffian out (I'd never known him to come inside the house before) and he was immediately attacked by Scroungy. Scroungy must've run him inside in the first place. Now they're fighting in the neighbors yard, right under their bedroom window. Good; let them worry about it, I won't.

      Group dynamics are interesting, getting back once again to the Archipelago thing. Open Pages now has a maillist, and I hope that we can do all of the necessary discussions on it, and not air our dirty laundry in public any more. Also interesting is the fact that I say that after yesterday's guest editorial. But the point is, Mike was upset about it. And there were quite a few others who were too, as evidenced by the email that I got. The others were not quite so outspoken, however.

      Design changes... seem to last me about three months. I was looking back at some of my first efforts, and they were really pathetic. Lots of grafix and bad HTML prevailed. This progression has been very enjoyable. I love learning new things, but doing it in public is a handicap. I had a lot of help along the way... Willa pointed out some things for me, as did CeeJ and numerous other people. I have had a lot of good constructive criticism along the way, and hardly anyone has insulted my writing style or content. OK, that "pedestrian" comment still stings. But generally it's a lot of fun.

      Speaking of fun, Evan from Why has once again decided to not close his book, and I am happy that he has chosen not to. Go say Hi to him and welcome him back! (He didn't really leave, but his foot was out the door.)

      I are now an official Reverend. Reverend Doug Franklin, at your service. I got my certificate from the Universal Life Church out of Modesto, CA. I kinda like the way that sounds:

      Officiating at the ceremony was the
      Reverend Doug Franklin;
      The audience was hushed as he delivered
      the eulogy.

      I'm really getting into this stupidity thing tonight, ain't I?

      Actually, I would rather do weddings than funerals. From what I've heard, people get drunk at weddings and give the reverends money. Or is that the brides? Whatever, weddings would be a lot more fun. Unless you didn't like the guy that died, but then you wouldn't go to that funeral anyway, would you? Much less say pretty words over his body. Unless somebody was paying you...

      Yeah, that's right. It all comes down to money. That's really sad and really true. Was there anybody out there that didn't know that already? No? Just me? Again? Damn. I've gotta find some way to maintain a clue.

      OK, it's time to try to get some sleep again. I've chugged the last of my Nyquil (not really, but the bottle says it's the same as) and smoked my last cigarette. His Last Cigarette? (GASP!) No... wait! Is it really...

      No, silly, smoked my last cigarette before I go to bed! Gimme a break, willya?

More likely later maybe....

      Karen is off to Lawrence to see Bryan, and Matt went with her for a change. Brian was supposed to start playing soccer yesterday, but Thursday he was playing on a jungle jim and twisted his knee badly enough that he can't even walk on it.

      You'd have to know this kid to understand how fearless he is. Maybe reckless is a better word, though. When he runs, he runs as fast as he can; when he plays, he plays as hard as he can. He shakes off thumps and bumps and falls like a professional athlete. I'm kinda hoping that the knee injury will slow him down a little bit, let him know that he is indeed mortal and can be hurt. I know that there are many that admire an all-out attitude, but this is my grandkid, I don't want him getting hurt!

      It's gonna be a beautiful day here, I can just feel it in my bones. I think that I'll get out and get some stuff done before Karen gets back, so that maybe we can go for another walk or do something else fun.

      Once again, more later....

      And, once again, it's later. I've been re-doing my poetry, and I've gotten about half-way done. And the time, it has been a-flying! In fact, it's already 20:24, and I've gotten very little else done. Many of the poems I just prettied up using tables and colors, but quite a few of them wouldn't load at all. They looked fine with MSIE 3.1, but MSIE 4.0 is much less forgiving. Most of them I hadn't closed the title block properly, so MSIE 4.0 (and probably NS, too) thought that the whole thing was the title.

      So, if you've tried reading my poetry before and couldn't, you can try it again... please let me know if there are any problems, and I will accept criticism on the poems themselves, should you be so inclined.

      I've been having a lot of problems with my ISP today, so I might not be able to get this up. But I'll just keep trying!