Yeah yeah yeah... another late posting day.

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We had a heat wave yesterday. It got all the way up to 80. People here were bitching about how hot and humid it was. [rolling eyes]

I got a little warm, but that was only because I ended up walking all over Seattle in search of toy guns, which we needed for the nefarious toad-napping caper that we perpetuated. (Remember the Toad? This is the stuffed toad that we have in class--the Verisimilitoad that people hold during critques.)

So anyway, yesterday after class, Eric, Daniel, and I toad-napped, tied up, and blindfolded the toad. Daniel and Eric put on Groucho glasses and held toy guns to the head of the toad while I took pictures, and this morning, before class, we slipped a picture of the hostage-toad under the door of the classroom with the note, "Ditto, or the toad gets it!"

(A note about the "ditto" reference: during critiques it is standard practice to say "ditto" if you have a comment about the story being critiqued that has already been said. If "ditto" is not employed on a regular basis, the critiques can take forever and we end up staying in class until late in the day. This is unacceptable since we also have all of this reading and writing to be doing. And lately, people have been slack on saying "ditto" instead of going on and on in their critiques.)

So, as soon as I get back home to my scanner, I will share pictures of hostage toad.

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The other big event of yesterday was the fact that I had a date. Turns out that a guy I dated back in college, over ten years ago, lives in Seattle now and works at Microsoft, and so he took me out to dinner last night. Of course, that presented another problem, in that I had nothing to wear. So yesterday afternoon I dragged Daniel shopping with me, and I actually got incredibly lucky and found an absolutely terrific dress for a very reasoable price. In fact, this dress is so terrific I think I will wear it for the Hugo awards also.

But the date went very well. It was a very enjoyable nostalgia kind of date, with lots of catching up and talking about people we knew and what they were doing now. Really a great deal of fun overall.