I called Nancy today and she answered through clenched teeth – she sounded like someone had smashed her in the jaw and she’d been wired together to heal. In actuality, she’s required to wear bands that force her teeth together (except to eat and brush her teeth) because…

…after 20 long excruciating months, the braces are coming off next week month!

If you had them as a kid you know how uncomfortable they can be – imagine having them when you’re a bit older. Anyway, although she’s not too happy right now, she’s ecstatic about finally losing the metallic smile and having straight choppers! Way to go, babe!

With the arrival of my brand spanking new Mac Mini last week (oh, hadn’t I mentioned that before?) I finally had a good use to which to put the AirPort Express I picked up last September. I configured it to work with my current wireless network and (after correcting some dumb settings that I forgot) I have it in the living room, connected to my home theater via optical digital. I can now play all my MP3s through iTunes wirelessly! Not only that, but I can remotely (and wirelessly) control my Mac (and, therefore, iTunes) from my XP Pro laptop while sitting on the sofa! Is that cool or what?

Wel, I think it is…

A very stressful day today, what with an extended commute to work this morning, a weekend server update having gone not so well – I just feel tired. I feel like going to bed right now, and it’s only 7 PM.

I watched three DVDs this past weekend – Hero (a Chinese sword movie ala Kill Bill and Crouching Tiger), Dodgeball, and Spiderman 2 (which I thought was much better than the first one). The other two were just fine as well. Next in my Blockbuster queue: Stepford Wives, A Day Without a Mexican (pondering the potentially catastrophic results that would occur if California-based Mexicans, who make up over a third of the state’s population, were to suddenly disappear) and The Day After Tomorrow ( a weather disaster flick – where ever did they get the idea for that one?)

Since I’m on a roll, I’ve got two books going: I’m almost done with Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code: Special Illustrated Edition. This is the second time I’ve read it – the first was during a flight delay in New Orleans a couple of years ago. In fact, I think I picked it up at the airport shop on the very day it was released, and didn’t put it down until I was in bed after returning home, almost finished it right then and there. The thing that captured me so tightly was that a good portion of it was set in Paris, which I had just visited the Christmas before, so the locations were very familar to me. This illustrated edition has pictures and drawings of many of the places and things referred to in the text. A great liittle yarn; his next book, being touted as a sequel to The Da Vinci Code, will be called The Solomon Key.

The other is an ongoing project: The New Annotated Sherlock Holmes: The Complete Short Stories, a fantastic two-volume set of all the short stories by Arthur Conan Doyle, edited by Leslie S. Klinger, a Holmes authority. He writes from the point of view that Sherlock actually lived at the turn of the 19th century, that Dr. Watson was indeed the chronicler, and that Conan Doyle was merely the agent that got all the credit. Lots of background information regarding life in London in the 1890s. Very entertaining.

And – what the heck – I’ve been listening to Alison Krauss + Union Station‘s latest release, Lonely Runs Both Ways.

Well, that was therapeutic…