. . . from my gun-magazine days.

"Too bad you missed the SHOT Show," he remarks. "Again."

"It happened simultaneously with CPAC," I tell him. "There was no way. Next year we can hope that they'll be disjoint." [Note: they will be. The SHOT Show will be on January 15-18 in Orlando, FL; CPAC will be February 26-28.]

We catch up on what various gun writers are doing, and we talk about the Presidential horse race, along with the future of the various media we keep tabs on. He agrees to advise me on technical matters when I start my podcasting this spring.

"So." I take a bite of my gnocchi. "I'm starting to think I might be a bit of a bitch."

"You're starting to think that, huh?" He smiles. Concho Kid has long been aware that I have a . . . strong personality.

"Well, it just seems that sometimes I feel that I'm being a bit arch, but I don't mean any real harm. Yet I draw blood anyway."

"Continue," he tells me. "I don't want to get in the way of your self-discovery."

"My friend Joe has informed me that I often use a machete, in the apparent belief that I'm simply playing with a paring knife. He says I don't know my own rhetorical strength."

"That could be."

"Alternatively, it could be that I hang out with people who are brighter-than-average, and that such people tend to be hyper-sensitive."

CK gives me an odd smile. We had a hell of a falling out back when we were working together, and yet I stay in closer touch with him than I do any of my other colleagues from that time. And it's been over a decade. I call that a happy ending to any story.

I find myself thinking about what Martin G. used to say. (It's Martin's anniversary today. Yes: he got married on Leap Day. You know how mathematicians are.) Martin always maintained that one never really understands any given chapter in a college textbook (or, by extention, in life) until one was in the middle of the next chapter.

For years I thought that meant I was somehow behind schedule. Now I see that it's perfectly normal. It's also the reason I tell people my age: I have no desire to be confused with a 30-something—never mind that I look like one.

Everything I've ever figured out in life has cost me too much for me to turn my back on it now.

Including the fact that I can be a real bitch, without even meaning to. I keep thinking it would be worse if I weren't able to be a bitch at all.

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for no reason at all, except that I wanted to post this pic on his birthday, but my computer was acting up. It lets me post pix when it is in the mood, and at no other time.

Trivia question: what Southern California pier was this taken on?

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and the company will be out hundreds of thousands of dollars.

But Laura will be happy. So stay home if you're sick, even if you're under deadline!

The question of the day being: When does the American work ethic/way of doing business conflict with sound public health policy?

Seriously: I used to work for a company that had me shipping a "book" (a magazine) every two weeks. Getting sick wasn't an option. I used to keep a stash of cough syrup in my desk drawer, and I switched from coffee to tea-without-milk, so I could muddle through when I was sick. I had to be there.

And my mother the schoolteacher helpfully reminds me that in one's first 1-2 years in a public school, the human immune system is utterly overwhlemed, and one is sick half the time—or better.

So, teachers: stay home. The kids will entertain themselves, and your immune system won't get "over the hump."

But Laura will be happy. Has she never worked somewhere where she was actually, you know—necessary?

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Zendo Deb on why this school shooting was different from other recent ones that have received a lot of publicity. I dated a girl in high school, and we tried to be discreet. But the gay and bisexual guys were the ones we had to be very protective of, and extremely secretive about.

Because if someone found out about girls having affairs with girls, we'd mostly get taunted (e.g., the girl in my anthropology class who'd exclaim "dyke," every time I showed up). The stakes with guys were higher: if any of the supposedly straight guys were found out to be bi or gay, they might get beaten up.

Or killed.

So don't talk to me about the gay fuckin' agenda, okay?

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