Hi

I'm sure by this time that even The Bat isn't watching this page.

It's been over 6 months. I stopped posting for a few reasons: I have nothing to say, I've been doing nothing interesting and my outlook has become increasingly gloomy. In case you haven't heard everything seems to be going down the tubes.

So what have I been doing? Well mostly playing video games, reading and watching DVDs. See. Nothing terribly exciting. Much to The Bat's annoyance I've been playing the hell out of Pokemon Diamond, Emerald and FireRed. I'm actually trying to catch them all, or at least all but one (I think it was only released in Japan). Right now I am at 73.4% caught (I created a handy spreadsheet to keep track). I've almost reached the upper limit of which ones I can capture on my own. Now I'll have to start to trade them online. It's a bit of an effort. So far I've only been able to trade one. Trying to coordinate times with some one in the UK is a bit of a pain.

I've also started watching Ken Burn's Jazz and started listening to jazz CDs from the library. I guess this really started with the credits of Jerry Seinfeld's Comedian which had Susannah McCorkle's rendition of Jobim's Águas de Março. I enjoyed it so much that the next year was declared the Year of Bossa Nova. While I still enjoy Bossa Nova, I've started to branch out. Mostly into Cool Jazz (so not really all that far) with Dave Brubeck.

With some effort, I hope I can become a jazz tool and turn my nose up at all other music. Even jazz! I just have to make sure I don't fall into the Smooth Jazz trap, the most deadly and shameful of all jazz. I suppose I've already slid a bit down that slippery slope due to my like of Steely Dan.

Oh, I completely forgot about working a lot. We opened two new expansions at work that both took (and continue to take) a large chunk of my attention.

I'll leave you with this.