Quick note.

I love you all. I'm just not going to be around to relay this for a bit.

Work must be done by this Friday, and my next four days will involve a good seven hours per day of shuffling through papers and making checkmarks at high speed. (The remaining half hour will involve carrying loads of paper around and collecting stickies.) My hand and arm are still cramping, I need to be back at work in eleven hours, and my willingness to deal with people in any way shape or form is being eroded.

(I haven't even been reading my online comics, for god's sake. I forgot about Fans!. I *never* forget about Fans!.)

So I expect to turn back into a moderately social electronic presence ~Monday. Night. Late. Not this one.

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For those of you who might be moved (Ottawa only, I expect): the Comic Book Shoppe on Bank is having an art gala on Sunday. Starts at 7:30 p.m., dress to impress, one-night liquor license, cash credit and Interac accepted for buying art (not sure if it's strictly a cash bar), go now to pick up your (free) ticket for two.

(I am going. Partly because I expect to see decent art, partly because I like excuses to dress up, and partly because I try to make it to struggling artist's shows when I can.)

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Toby in at vet again today. Urine sample taken without a problem, peeing and vomiting in carrier afterwards was apparently due to stress and fear rather than any physical complications. Staff was very kind, arranged for his towel to be laundered, gave us a spare towel to take him home with. He is now shedding happily in his sleep upon my clean-but-not-put-away laundry.

And just think, once this is over, they both need their annual checkups...

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Tim Horton's new raspberry-flavoured smoothies are nice.

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From Miss Manners, the sections on death, bereavement, grieving, and mourning:

Of course life goes on. The strictest instructions about old-fashioned mourning always ahd to include the information that the widow should cease to wear mourning immediately upon selecting her second husband. Do you think the Victorians didn't understand the charm of woefulness, or how fetching many ladies look in black?

Don't you think that nowadays, in modern life, the old-fashioned custom of the condolence call is out of date?
Why is that? Is it because people don't die anymore, or is it because the bereaved no longer need the comfort of their friends? Miss Manners is always interested in hearing about how life has been improved by modern thinking or technology.

Incidentally, found out recently that the custom of getting married in a white wedding dress came about in the Victorian era.