Waiting to Get There. Usually on the A/C/E in Chelsea, New York City.

When I came home from work yesterday, I would have parked in the driveway except for this ginormous blown-down tree. Here's a tally of how much Tom owes me: On Saturday, I told Tom he should move his car from its normal parking spot or I would probably burn a hole in it. He begrudgingly complied. He was very "busy" upstairs playing with his computer. I noticed his sour look despite my welding helmet, which really does a number on your capacity for astute observations. I crank it up to the max-14 total-darkness setting. Which is why I have a tendency to weld thumbs and fiberglass autobodies. Tom re-parked completely over on the bleeding edge of the driveway. He knows this. Later that afternoon, we went to the City for a long weekend. Which meant Tom's car was still parked way over there when the tree fell down. And crushed the exact spot where Tom's car has normally been parked every single day since forever. After I paused in stunned surprise and quietly google-ey

While vacuuming: "Wow, look at this little Hoover go. It really sucks! ...I mean, in a good way." .

We were ten minutes late for the 7pm appearance of John Hodgman at the Barnes and Noble on Union Square. Luckily, John Hodgman was also late. At first, I was happy we didn't miss anything, but then I started to wonder how many Karma points I had redeemed in the transaction. This bothered me until I found two shiny pennies on the street on the way home and I knew I was square with the gods. To keep the mostly pasty-white and bespeckled geekmo crowd occupied until his tardy arrival, Hodgman had commissioned an opening act, a folk singer named Jonathan Coulton . Later, we learned that Jonathan had been born feral and raised by woodland creatures in Connecticut, but outwardly he exhibited few traces of his seedy past. Except his buckskin shirt and Davy Crockett hat. Initially, I enjoyed Coulton's songster antics with an air of flighty inattention, but when he recited all the U.S. presidents in precise historical order, I realized the act was a potential Learning Experience. John H

What if you were riding on the train with your husband, or anybody really, sitting in one of the butt-to-butt two-seater benches. The window on the left and a metal arm rest on the right sandwich you both in place pretty squishy-like. And what if somebody rolls up and asks if they could sit down between you. "Excuse me, could you shove over a bit? I can get in there. I know I can get in there." They try to Vulcan mindtrick you into believing they can mash their whole self into the two-inch sliver of unoccupied space on the bench seat. Maybe they'd like clench their hiney cheeks together in an effort to appear less horizontal. You'd be like, say what? and get all scowly-eyed and intractable. Or maybe you'd pull a New York and pretend you didn't hear anybody talking in hopes they just silently give up and go away. I ruminated for an hour over this possible circumstance. I have to plan out my reaction just in case.

A photo of Michael and Tom at the Festival of 504 Lights last Saturday came out great, some even describing it as "amazing." The picture, part of a larger work-in-progress by the visionary self-portraitist Michael, was taken at approximately 11pm and represents the zeitgeist of that twilight hour... the time betwixt the first cocktail and the one right before a hard-nippled gentleman of the hands-on variety started whipping out his junk in the backyard. "Michael spent an inordinate amount of time in the planning and conceptual phases of the photograph," said bystanders close to the shoot location. "He said he strove to achieve an allegoric representation of the unbearable lightness of being." Experts are divided as to the artistic inspirations underpinning the photograph. The largest opinion pool posits that both the choice of subjects, the pose and the moodiful lighting closely emulates the famous Charles and Georges Durand-Ruel painted in 1882 by Pierr

Subsequent to The Giant Green Chair Catastrophe of 2002, I am fully onboard with the notion that bringing home measurements and fabric swatches is a worthwhile pursuit. Things look different in real life than they do in the store. Which is why I asked Rick, the excitable carpet salesman, if I could take a slice of #63 Honeydew Flotaki carpet to test it out in situ. To my dimay, Rick claimed he didn't have any Honeydew for take-out. What a pill. Yet I was not to be deterred, launching immediately into a persuasive and rational dissertation on why Rick should spare me a square. Certainly he could count on me to return it. I have a well-deserved reputation for bringing back carpet swatches, even when nobody wants them back and is frankly surprised when I show up with a pile of matted pile. I made it clear to Rick that I'm a relentless, guilt-ridden greenie and carpet is made from a petroleum derivative. Rick remained steely-eyed, limp wristed and completely unmoved by my unimpeach