Just a general update from this weekend. No earth-shattering news or really interesting politics this time, so feel free to move on ahead, nothing really to see this time. :-)

Well, the three day weekend was a serious mixed bag.

I've come to the conclusion that living in a big city is both a joy and a terror, in equal parts. Friday night--for the first time in a long time--my princess and I decided to take in a movie. We went and saw "White Noise," which in itself was a bit of a disappointment, but the real hassle was the memory of how supposedly grown adults act in a movie theater.

Now understand, as I've said before, my princess has Tourette's syndrome. Now, it's not a terrible case--she doesn't burst out with swear words--but she she does have occassional vocal tics. Most of the time she fakes a small laugh to cover them up, and I still confuse her fake laughs with real on a regular basis, so unobtrusive they are. But in the interest of being good neighbors, when we go to the theater, we sit on the very end of an aisle in the most undesireable seats we can find. In other words, we're trying to put space between us and the rest of the audience so that we won't disturb them.

After this weekend, I've come to realize just how silly that is.

It cracks me up that people who are not affected with such a vocal inflection will instead, choose to be annoying.

First of all, if you're late for the show, don't ask me to change seats so that you and fifteen of your friends can sit together. The answer will be no.

If you don't like the movie, leave. Don't sit there and groan loud enough to be heard by everyone in the theatre everytime a scene plays out on the screen which you find annoying. Trust me, the scene, no matter how badly acted, isn't half as annoying as your reaction.

And most of all, no matter how quiet you think you're being, if someone asks you to please stop talking, then you're being too loud.

On the other hand, after a dismal Friday night at the movies, we hit Pike Place market early Saturday morning and picked up fresh salmon, live muscles, portabello mushrooms and ripe avacados. For lunch, we had steamed muscles for an appetizer, broiled salmon with lemon pepper and portabello mushrooms sauted with fresh garlic and green onion in a sherry cream sauce. Dr. Atkins would be proud. :-)

Then, as Monday was a holiday, I managed to crank out another fifteen or so pages on the novella. With lots of computer gaming filling the gaps, it turned into a rather splendid weekend.

In spite of the groaning jerk at the movies.

You take the good with the bad, I suppose. But it's easy when the good is fantastic and the bad is just annoying.

Joseph Haines, signing off from The Edge of The Abyss.