The Haps

Behold the 'Mo!


Ah, yeah. It's coming along nicely.

We're at the halfway mark, which means there's still plenty of time to get in on the action. It's tax deductible, and it's an important cause, both for the research and for the education. If you don't have a few bucks to give, please at least give the men in your life a little nudge to get tested for it. I had a guy come up to me at work yesterday and ask me what a prostate was. He wasn't kidding. "Would I know if I had one?" Oh, dude. I can't even explain it to you without getting sent to HR, but yes, you most likely have a prostate. Maybe I'm more aware of the issue because my grandfather died from prostate cancer, and my dad's dying from prostate cancer, and so many other men I know have had it. It's amazing to me that it's not something that every man knows about and gets tested for.

I'm almost done with the first front of Sienna, although I'm pretty sure I managed to screw up my improvised shaping. I'm going with it anyway because, like Big Guy, I'm all about moving forward. I don't have pictures of it yet.

So many fascinating things happening in Bananaland! We moved onto the friendliest street in Contra Costa County. Our new neighbors sold us one of their keg refrigerators, so now we have beer on tap in our garage.

My parents are getting remarried in three weeks and we're inviting two hundred people to the wedding. I've now found a reason to get back into a physical training regime. I'm planning on wearing a dress that absolutely does not fit me as of this moment.

I took the train down to see them last week, and my mom lost track of what time I was supposed to arrive, so I sat at the Hanford train station for two hours. I met some lovely people and learned valuable life lessons. I learned that, while "I'm black and you're white, and we get along fine, right?", it's just not possible for blacks and whites to get along with Latinos because, in the words of my new friend Anthony, "wetbacks won't ever give you a dollar, man." I also learned that I have something called "woman ways", and if I'd really needed another dollar to call my mom from the payphone, I could have used said "ways" to get it. Unfortunately, I don't have pictures of Anthony, Miss Budweiser-in-a-Big-Gulp or the Latino gentleman who denied Anthony his very reasonable request for money, because I didn't want to take out my camera in front of them.

Instead, please content yourself with this lovely shot of Mount Diablo, taken from my very own bedroom window just this morning. Sure, the keg refrigerator and the bonfires in the courtyard are nice, but this is really why we moved.