Arrived on Vermont soil at sometime Wednesday morning. I had a redeye flight which was basically like skipping a night of sleep. I got on board, started to read, and two hours later the sun was coming up. Goodnight moon. As I was flying into Burlington, I was amazed at how green everything was. The neat thing is that I say this every year and yet still it has the power to capture my attention. Greg and I hung out in Burlington rather than going home, because was flying out the next day [sister's graduation -- congratulations Robin!]. So, I got to make the drive back to my place, with all the accompanying apprehension, alone. Of course, the place is fine, about as messy as I remember it and someone had dressed up the yoda head in anticipation of my arrival. Only one major thing had changed, the dial-up number

As I've discussed ad nauseum, I pay by the minute for dial-up access as well as paying monthly for my ISP. I've had four ISPs in the past five years. The current number I call is a capped line, meaning that my charges max out around $22 per month. This is bearable but not optimal. There is no hope of ever having DSL or cable modem, it's just too far. I am not complaining, there are many other fine benefits to carefree rural living. So, just to spite me it seems, my current ISP changed from an actual phone number three towns over, to a "virtual number" meaning a number that is supposed to be local, but isn't. My options were to stick with them and pay long distance fees to get online, or go with the new game in town. The new game in town is a service provided by my phone company, Topsham Telephone. $20/mo and a geniune local number to call. They have partnered with a company with the confidence-inspiring name of Nickelville. As a former ISP employee, their sign-up form set all my alarm bells off: the supposed ISP has no website, no mention was made of what my email address would be, what my storage limits were, and refunds would only be given after five days with no email. Additionally, instead of some sort of online secure signup system, I got a piece of paper to fill out which asked for my social security number [I didn't provide it, and they said that was fine, begging he question of why they ask for it in the first place], my preferred user name, my credit card number and my password. I guess they'd keep this on file in case I forgot it. My password, written on a piece of paper!

I have found that playing the slick country mouse and being a pain in the ass about stuff like this is a great way to assure yourself of a long lonely summer in town and slow phone repair, so I asked a few questions, offered to design a web page for them and plunked down $30 [$10 signup fee, natch] along with my piece of paper. They said my account would be up in 1-4 days. This was after I had driven the 15 miles to the phone company office, just to make sure it wouldn't take a week. By the time I got home, my account was activated and there was a phone call from the phone company to let me know this, since the confirmation letter probably wouldn't arrive until Monday. Hello Vermont.

My two heavy bags are packed and my desk is totally cleaned off except for this computer and a list entitled ToDo [meaning "all" in Spanish I think...]. I decided to leave my laptop here in Seattle Since I already have four computers in Vermont. Yes, four. When I called Greg to ask about bringing the laptop he said it might be a good idea because even though there's four computers (4) there still isn't one that can be plugged into the printer to print stuff. I figured it would be easier to solve that problem some other way than to carry eight pounds of laptop through the airport metal detector. I generally wind up half-undressed, carrying more of my clothes than I wear, once I've taken off my belt and jacket and boots and jewelry and hair doinkers at the airport. I was wondering about the etiquette involved in just showing up in your PJs for a redeye flight but I am trying to be less conspicuous, not more. I did pack the PJs just in case.....

Trivia went well, questions are linked here. I am happy to be done with it for now, it was a lot of damned work. I also hate saying goodbye to people so there is a weird relief that I'm all done with that. It's a strange sort of goodbye because it's not like goodbye forever, but it's more than goodbye for the week. It's a goodbye to couples that may not be couples when you get back, and goodbye to your single friends that may have new partners by the time you return. And breakfasts in restaurants that may go under, or get popular, and buildings that may be rubble, or holes, or new buildings, come November. It's weird, I don't have this same issue in reverse. Vermont, and the people there, and my family and friends on the East Coast, seem more used to my changes -- I did leave them for years a decade ago -- and the landscape is more stable in Vermont. Maybe not in Boston, but I never did like Boston much anyhow. The hardest goodbyes will likely be the housepets here, because not only am I leaving them and their unfailing companionship and their early morning wake-up routines, but I'm also leaving housepet pseudo-ownership for another six months, though some might argue that living with a boyfriend may have some of the same characteristics, I'm not convinced.

So, I saw one of the best movies I've ever seen last night, in a tiny crowded theater that we got to at the last minute. The movie is called For All Mankind and it's basically a collection of home movies from space. All the astronauts that went to the moon between 1968-1972 [when I was just a tiny kid] were outfitted with 16 mm cameras. This movie puts a lot of that footage together, and adds a lot of tense shots of mission control, music from Brian Eno and voice overs by the astronauts themselves describing what it was like to be the first people to ever see the Earth from anyplace that was not, well, the Earth. The film seem to take place in a time before irony, when people were really eager to do the best job they could and a lotof the narration which would seem cheesy if talking about any other subject, becomes reverential. Even the planting of the American flag on the lunar surface -- an action that nowadays would take place with huge amoutns of chest-thumping and "we're number one!" crap accompanying it -- seems like an achievement for the entire planet, not just the men who did the moonwalk. The film also has a sense of humor, and you see the astronauts clowning around, taking pratfalls on the moon, messing around in zero gravity and complaining about the bodily functions of other atronauts.

There's also a solar eclipse coming up on Monday, for all you folks in the Western US. Check the sky right about 5 pm.

I finally did it, I transferred my last domain away from godforsaken Verisign and to my preferred domain registrar, Gandi. They're French, they charge in Euros and they do everything by email. So long Verisign and your bogus renewal notices and your complicated interface and your incredible assertion that trust is really what you should base your business relationships on, as oposed to say, good service, low prices or just general lack of shitheadedness. It went seamlessly. Thanks again to eskimo.com who has been hosting my major domains since 1996.

I'm tired of linking to new trivia questions, all further trivia pages will be linked here. This week trivia attendance was down almost 70% so I did two rounds, saved the good questions for next week, and drank a coupla [free] silly cocktails. Thanks for everyone who showed and stuck with me through the Vice Presidential Trivia category. Next week will be my last week as trvia master for probably six months, so if you've been meaning to show up, this would be your week.

For my East Coast readers, 4th of July weekend BBQ will be happening again this year. Details, such as they are, are here. Everyone is pretty much welcome, and thanks to Fred, I have a croquet set.

I always feel that if I start a month with a vengeance, I can get away with slacking off later on. This weekend got me going on a Wumpus Hunt, a puzzle hunt of sorts through downtown Seattle where rhyming clues brought us a number of places to find phrases that needed to be filled into acrostics whch itself fed a meta-acrostic containing the final clue. There were about four teams, maybe 20 people, and the sun was out and the ride free area was, well, free. I had a great time, thanks mucho to Dan and Lisa for organizing and running the whole event and my lovely team Robert,Jane and Manuel. Then I went home and wrote trivia questions, read a whole book, slept in preparation for yesterday in which I..... went to brunch, ate too much food, tried to convincingly admire other people's babies while resigning myself to never being able to finish a sentence, and enjoyed both the sunshine and a fire in the fireplace. Then off to a Blank White Card Game where the owner of the gelateria [with a fire in the fireplace, again] was so intrigued by our strange scribblings that he gave us all two-for-one gelato coupons. New cards are in the same place as the old cards. Nina just let me know that there is an article in Games Magazine about BWC this month, exciting.

After a quick trip home to put on something fancier than the same pants I'd been wearing all week, I went out to my friend James Whetzel's house for a house concert . James is an accomplished musician in a lot of different cultural traditions and last night he was playing some Indian classical music, doing some Tuvan throat singing and showing us a bit of palm wine guitar music [though not all at once]. He was accompanied by his friend Lowell Lybarger on tabla who did an impressive tabla tutorial for us and, if this is the proper verb, just whaled on those tablas [wailed? waled?]. We all got to view this in the comfort of James's parents living room and get served beer by his brother and play with the dog, what a neat evening.

This week I pack, next week I leave. I'm having a BBQ for the 4th of July weekend which anyone in the Vermont area is welcome to come to. Sparse accomodations but lovely company.

You know, it seems that in a day and age where people are still made to admit they're Jewish before being murdered by extremists, you'd think people might want to be more careful about their "shyster" characters not inadvertently resembling lousy Jewish stereotypes. You might think that, anyhow.