A Holiday…

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Today is the Commonwealth of Massachusetts’ first ***sales tax holiday|http://www.dor.state.ma.us/forms/SalesTaxHoliday.htm***. Normally we have a 5% sales tax (which really isn’t that bad), but today on items $2500 or less, you don’t have to pay sales tax. A great place to use this would be to purchase something like a new computer. Fortunately, the Apple Store is making this very easy – they will be open for 24 hours today at all three Massachusetts locations. Unfortunately, not only do we not need to buy a new computer, we also don’t have anything else we need to buy. Going shopping today would only motivate us to buy things we don’t need (which, of course, is exactly what the Commonwealth and Commonwealth businesses are hoping for).

That doesn’t mean that there’s nothing I *want*, of course. If you hadn’t noticed already, I’m keeping track of such things in the new ***Stuff Peter Wants|http://prwdot.org/?p=stuff_peter_wants*** page. It’s on the left navbar of our main website.

In more exciting news, we had some folks over last night for a little party to celebrate the 2004 Athens Olympics. There were nine people there, including Becky and I, which is just about as much as our living room can hold. 🙂 We did some Olympic trivia, watched the opening ceremonies, and had lots of food and desserts. Becky made a ***watermelon whale|http://gallery.prwdot.org/craftiness/IMG_8797*** which she filled with fruit salad. There were also various munchies, and several delectable desserts: peanut butter cheesecake with chocolate topping, which Jenn brought, strawberry cake, and ice cream sandwich cake. Recipes are available. if anyone is interested. 🙂

One other thing I missed posting earlier was that I attended the ***BMAC|http://www.bmac.org/*** meeting this Wednesday. You can see the ***photos I took|http://gallery.prwdot.org/bmac_august_04***. The topic of the meeting was “Stump the Chumps”, where people bring in all sorts of Mac problems they are having and try to stump a panel of Mac “chumps”. Many of the questions were beyond arcane, but it is always an interesting study in Geek group dynamics to see all of these people interact. Of course, the free ice cream at the end of the meeting was a nice bonus. 🙂

Can you believe that we are halfway through August? Before you know it, it will be October — which means my birthday (see the aforementioned ***Stuff Peter Wants|http://prwdot.org/?p=stuff_peter_wants*** page), Dad’s birthday, and our second anniversary! 🙂

Gracias, Thanks, Merci Beaucoup!

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To Dad: Thank you for knowing so much about cars and for trying to teach me how they work. Yesterday there was a scary blinking light on my dashboard. Yikes! Because I was on my way past the mall, I turned into AutoZone and pulled out my car manual. Lo and behold the solution to my problem was right there! I popped the hood, checked the coolant level, and went inside to buy some more. After double checking with the friendly desk help I refilled my coolant tank up to the optimal level. Good bye blinking light! My auto problem skills are getting better!

To Auntie Susie: Thanks for recommending, ***Lucia, Lucia|http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1400060052/worldwidewood-20*** by Adriana Trigiani. This story of family, life, love and risks was very heartwarming. I couldn’t put it down…and occasionally I think of Lucia’s life story and it feels like I heard it from a real person. Trigiani’s descriptions of Greenwich Villiage in the 50’s and her details into the fashions of the time challenged my imagination. All in all it was a great summer read, not too intellectually straining, but not complete fluff either. It was lovely.

To Mom: Thanks for passing Lucia, Lucia on to me when you were finished!

To See What We Could See

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The weekend was great! We had a wonderful and peaceful time at Mount Greylock.

We got to our campsite late on Friday night. Boy, was it cold – about 50 degrees! We huddled in our tent to keep warm as best we could. We decided that the next night, we would wear some extra layers of clothing. 🙂

On Saturday morning, we got up early and had breakfast, and took a 1.6 mile round-trip warm-up hike to the Cataract Falls.
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Call of the Wild

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Don’t look for us in Beverly this weekend. Heck, don’t even look for us in Eastern Massachusetts. Look, instead, to the West. To the Berkshires. To the majestic peak… of Mount Greylock!

ppp|Mount Greylock
Mount Greylock State Reservation|ppp

We will be camping, hiking, and enjoying a bit of an outdoor getaway. There shall be photos when we return!

I don’t need a date…

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But I did recently register at ***friendster.com|http://www.friendster.com***. I only did it at first because ***jill|http://www.theholtsite.com*** did and she was looking for friends. I thought it was kind of cheesy and figured that I’d spend two minutes on it and that would be all.

I’ve discovered, however, that it is rather addictive. I don’t have a whole lot of friends listed, but it’s fun to try to find people I know. I was able to reconnect with my childhood friend Meghan. She and I practically lived at each other’s houses in middle school so it was good to talk to her again.

Over all I think that friendster is an interesting place to surf around. I’m not looking for new friends or dates, but it’s fun none the less. The website itself could use to be a bit more user friendly, though. I find myself having to scroll up and down and click here and there just to find the most basic of information.

So, anyway. Go on friendster and be my friend 🙂

iPod Cozy

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I arrived home today to receive a wonderful little gift from Becky: an iPod Cozy!

ppp||ppp

She knit it herself with a pattern she found at ***Craftster|http://www.craftster.org/forum/index.php?topic=10239.msg79567#msg79567***. See a more complete selection of photos ***here|http://gallery.prwdot.org/ipod_cozy***.

Fare-Will

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My hostee, fellow Apple fan, and friend ***Will Farnham|http://pulchersentio.prwdot.org/*** is leaving for Japan to fulfill a one-year contract with the ***JET Programme|http://www.jetprogramme.org/***. Drop by his ***blog entry|http://pulchersentio.prwdot.org/001906.html*** and wish him farewell!

a survey

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After wanting to read it for a while now, I have finally finished ***Corelli’s Mandolin|http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/067976397X/qid=1091057930/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/102-1093109-7623326?v=glance&s=books***, by Louis De Berniernes. I found it to be a very touching story with just the right amount of historical context to be interesting. Beware, however, it caused me to shed many tears!

Having just finished my latest book, ***The Blue Journal|http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0399148027/qid=1091056631/sr=1-4/ref=sr_1_4/102-1093109-7623326?v=glance&s=books***, I have found myself without a new read. Normally, I’d just go to the Library and walk around until some title catches my eye.

I thought that today I’d see what you, our fine readers, might recommend to me. Leave me a comment and let me know your favorite read, or the most recent thing you read. That way I can go to the library with purpose. And maybe I’ll read somthing that I might not have otherwise 🙂

Oh, and I think that I would relegate my latest read to a list of beach books. It was somewhat enjoyable, but mostly I felt gypped by the ending. It was just a good, mindless, easy read.