So, yesterday, we saw a Marissa. And a Mark. And a Timprov. We met at the Other Change of Hobbit, and fended off Will's attempts to sell us many, many books. Will is a persistent fellow. One protests in vain that one has a large stack of unread books at home, or that one has overspent one's book budget. The reminder that one bought a wodge of books from him not a week ago mollifies him only slightly.

Escaping from the den of bookbuying temptation, we went to Au Coquelet, where we were joined by a couple more folks: the mysterious David (he's quiet, so I guess he gets to be mysterious) and the fabulous Karalee (who studies Classics, and shares my affection for the purple edition of Vergil's Aeneid. Arma virumque cano!) And then some of us went out for noodles, where we were joined briefly by Zed.

Then some of us went to Mondo Gelato. I had green tea gelato, and black sesame flavored gelato. The black sesame was very strongly flavored, but I liked it, even if it does look like Play-Dough.

I like it when Marissa writes books.

Spent this morning reading about Mass Spectrometry. I don't imagine that many of my readers find themselves with a burning need to know more about mass spectrometry, but there is an excellent on-line tutorial from the American Society for Mass Spectrometry on the subject.

Went to writers group meeting. No stories this month. I always feel vaguely guilty when that happens, like it means I haven't been writing enough. Silly me. But even without stories, a few of us got together and chatted. I got to talk everyone's ear off about my job interviews. I swear, I'm like a kid with a new toy. I just hope I manage to stay this enthused about my actual *job*.

Stopped at Cody's on the way back, and got the new copy of Seed magazine, and read an article by Laurie Garrett on the Bush's appointments to scientific and medical posts in his administration. Grrr. Not to go too much into gory details, because I don't really feel like making myself angry all over again right now, but Bush has politicized these appointments to a much greater degree than any previous administration. AIDS prevention programs are being overseen by people who think that homosexuals are "sick" and "demented." Proposed appointees to the Army Science Board are having their history of campaign contributions checked out -- and being rejected if they donated to the election campaign of somebody other than George W. Bush. Even down at the level of NIH panels that review grant proposals -- which have long been regarded as relatively unsullied by politics -- the Department of Health and Human Services has been nixing lots of nominees with politically "problematic" views.

Aaaargh! I expect politicians to play politics, up to a point. But, really, who comes up with ideas like, "Hey, let's take all the appointees to a non-partisan board that advises the armed forces on technical matters, and see who they donated money to during the last election. And if it was somebody else, let's kick 'em off the board!"? And who listens to that, and thinks, "Yeah, what a great idea?" Gaaaah!

There, aren't you glad I didn't feel like getting angry? I'm sure glad I didn't get angry. 'Cause if I got angry, you know, I might have to do something. Like, um, um...writing a letter to my Congresswoman. Yeah! I'll write a letter to Barbara Lee, and she'll tell 'em. Yeah! Not like they'd listen. Um. Well, let's see. Um, I could, like, vote for somebody else in the next election! Yeah! That's it, I'll vote for somebody else in the next election, just like I would have done anyway. That'll show 'em. Er.

Sigh. I mean, I actually have great faith in the power of letter writing to bring about political change, as anyone who remembers my recent ramblings on Amnesty International should know. But it's not always very satisfying, you know?

Okay, enough politics. I'm going to go think about things that do not make me angry.