2002-10-07 - 4:19 p.m.

Cold-ass weather last night. I was loving it. Came home with chilly hands for the first time in forever. These Mexican guys in the park, they can play some volleyball. They'd be pros if they were normal volleyball guy height. Dedication: Unparalleled. They got me all cold watching them for so long, no breaks, just diving everywhere for anything. Smacking the cold, hard ground to start out what would be a three-minute volley.

I sit down, I watch more Sopranos third season. A little Friday treat to myself a few weeks back. Kevin's right, the opening sequence elicits a Pavlovian response. Ya just know, he says, that whatever happens, the next hour is gonna be allll right and full of top-notch entertainment. I rarely fast-forward through it, either. This time around: the one where Tony beans the narcoleptic Jesus freak in the head at the Thanksgiving table.

Lauren's home, extremely basic cable is GO, so Angel premiere is next. I don't know what's going on with me excactly, but I think my reserves (my gas tanks, if you will) for caring about Joss Whedon television series have almost run dry. I guess once I "got it," I realized whatever I got isn't quite as amusing repeated for a third season. Sassy California dialog wears thinner than its Jersey equivalent, I guess. Lauren's gonna be heartbroken if someone ever tells her this, so don't. Ha.

Then it's make black tea so I don't fall asleep reading Baxter and Salinger (which I do -- blissfully so -- at 11pm). Sleep is heavenly. Dreams involve old bosses that I liked in Ann Arbor. And traveling through weird places with a large group of people, as usual. Like a circus or an army or a touring musical. Something in me must be craving that dynamic.