Hey, my sister‘s raised over 10% of her marathon fundraising goal! Congrats and keep it up, Aim. Thanks to everyone who’s contributed!

The Snook and I watched a fascinating documentary on the ABC last night called “The Anti-Fat Pill and the Bushmen”. It’s about the San tribesmen of the Kalahari Desert in Africa and this amazing “Hoodia” cactus they’ve cultivated for centuries. Their hunters would chew a bit before going out after game and they wouldn’t need to eat again for days! So naturally several companies have seized upon this discovery as the cure for our big fat gluttonous Western culture of obesity. They’re working towards developing it in a pill form right now. The documentary focused more on the tribesmen and their fight to share in the profits from the drug, but to be honest all I could think about was this miracle pill. The interviewer tried some and then wasn’t hungry for twenty hours! Sign me up! I want some now! No matter how much I exercise and no matter what foods I eat, I’m always hungry. This Hoodia thing could change. my. life.

Check it out! It’s my first computer (the Atari 800XL down at the bottom). Well, it wasn’t technically mine so much as my family’s. We had the cassette tape drive and everything. Can you find yours?

Co-Worker: Well, that person has obviously entered a fake name on their form. I’ve looked through the White Pages and there’s nobody in there by that name. I looked under “Bill”, and “B”, and “Billy”–
Me: Didja try “William”? *rolling eyes*
Co-Worker: Oh. *pause* Okay, well, there’s a name there, but that doesn’t mean…

Ebert answers the question: “Why do good guys in movies and on TV always use Macs, while the bad guys always use PCs?”

Just as I was starting to think my computer had spontaneously fixed itself, the display died again. I’m going to have to take it into the shop. Oh look, there’s that G5 commercial on TV again. Hmm… Oh yeah, that’d only be three months rent. Sheesh.

As I know John‘s been looking for a good eggplant recipe, I present to you Dr. Atkins’ Shortcut Moussaka. I’ve made this a couple times for the Snook and he likes it a lot. You don’t have to use ground lamb if you can’t find it; I’ve used plain old hamburger and it turns out well.

The Amazing Race is over and we have seen the end. My self-imposed Internet blackout is now over. Read on for my thoughts on the winners. (Aussies: Don’t read any further unless you want to be spoiled! And try to avoid the “Recent Comments” list over there on the right.)As I said earlier, I didn’t have any serious problems with the final three teams. None of them were even remotely Flo-like. That said, my hope going into the last two episodes was that Chip and Reichen would pull it off, if only for the politics of having the gay couple be first. They’re not guys that I like a lot personally, but I thought it was more important for a gay team to win than a girl (this time). They were acting like such jerks in the Australian legs though that I completely reversed my opinion. I started cheering for David and Jeff. Sure, they’re dumb and boring, but it suddenly occurred to me that they’d never whined or bitched at each other or took out their frustrations on a service person. That’s the kind of behaviour the show should award. Of course, since I have a terrible track record at picking these things, as soon as I switched mental alliances the “Goats” made their fatal Sydney maneuver. Ouch, boys.

I’ve been thinking about what they did (taking the immediate flight to Sydney in the hopes of getting a good flight from there). I almost think I would’ve done the same. There’s always a risk in leaving the pack, but it just as easily could’ve given them a huge lead going to the finish line. It was a gamble I probably would’ve taken.

So Chip and Reichen made it. Good for them. I was really hoping for a kiss, though. (What’s up with that, CBS? They did it on Dawson’s.) It’s funny to think of a victory on a game show as being a civil rights achievement, but we’ll take what we can get, I guess. Good on ya, Chippendales.

Friday Five:

1. When was the last time you laughed?
About an hour ago when I went to the bathroom and realized that the Snook, in preparation for our house inspection today, actually put the toilet paper roll on the little holder. He never does that. It cracked me up.

2. Who was the last person you had an argument with?
Hm, the last real argument I had would’ve been with the Snook in Italy. Not good.

3. Who was the last person you emailed?
What lame questions. I send about thirty emails a day at work. The last one is hardly significant, but I think it was to Kyrenia asking her if she was ready to go home.

4. When was the last time you bathed?
Ten hours ago. I went over to a friend’s house for dinner and drank way too much wine, and when I got home I figured a shower would help ease any potential hangover icky feelings the next morning. It wasn’t an entirely successful plan.

5. What was the last thing you ate?
My friend Kiri made us crostini with ricotta and olives (so good!), grilled asparagus with parmesan (even better!), lamb chops with rice pilaf and rocket (yum!), and stewed pears with ice cream (drool). I need to hang out with people who can cook more often.

I’m having a terrible day. I’m trying to write some ASP code and I just don’t get it. My problem is that my brain is very literal and I write code the way I would do something, but not necessarily the way a computer would. The frustrating thing is that I know enough now to know that my way isn’t the best way, but I don’t have enough technical knowledge to do it the way I know it needs to be done. My co-worker is trying to show me but it’s all a big mess of objects and methods and arrays and loops. So I feel stupid and that’s when the damned tears spring to my eyes. This always happens. I hate it so much; it makes me feel like a big emotional girl. And my anger only makes it worse and I have to flee to the bathroom before the entire office thinks I’m insane.

Does anybody else have this problem? Is there any way to control it? I try to take deep breaths and remain calm but it never works. I get upset right now just describing it. Why don’t guys get this way? It’s not that I’m tearing up over the stupid code; it’s that I’m tearing up over my own inability and frustration. And short of having my tear ducts removed, I don’t think there’s a damn thing I can do about it.