on the other hand, the letterman method is legitimately newtonian

the second leg of my late-summer atlanta tour is drawing to a close. i fail at life and didn't say good-bye to everyone before i went to bed last night, and though i was up a little after eight this morning, i only caught my brother and l. before they left for work. i'll leave them a love note.

on saturday we spent the day lazing around, visiting the condos my brothers bought and are trying to sell (if you have $180,000 and are looking for a nice place in the atlanta area, they're charming as all get-out; i'd buy one, but am lacking the $180,000+, woe woe), and watching—of all the movies ever produced in the history of hollywood and the entertainment industry—harold and kumar go to white castle and team america: world police. in between movies m. grilled salmon, entire civilizations were built around the sweet potato, and i made the ice cream run with my niece and nephew to go with our pie.

my sister c. had come down with a sudden and violent case of bronchitis that she thinks she contracted in the hospital when she was having three stitches sewn into her pinkie finger last tuesday, but she was feeling much better yesterday. i went out with her and the boys for lunch and a quick visit to the lovely piedmont park, though it would have been much lovelier if it had been twenty degrees cooler. our conclusion: everything is better in the fall and winter. after an hour of chasing around the kids in the sun, she took herself and the boys home so everyone could take naps; and i went back to the house, where my nephew was working through piles and piles of homework. i kept him company downstairs and continued reading a heartbreaking work of staggering genius: i'm, like, five years late to the party, i know, but it's an awesome book and a funny, interesting read. in case you're five years late to the party, too.

we all met up with c. and the boys again for dinner at an indian restaurant, empty but for our large party, and a party we had. i got a graduation gift of a shiny blue ipod that—did i mention?—is shiny and blue. the monsters on sesame street sing a song about being fuzzy and blue, and that's what's in my head. when we got home i charged it up, named it belle, and sucked the new music off my brother's computer. then my brother a. loaded it up with lectures from the teaching company (including—but not limited to— einstein's relativity, detective fiction, explaining social deviance, and contemporary economic issues, which a. calls the best economics lecture ever given) and al franken reading his own lies and the lying liars who tell them. also senuti, a third-party client that will get all these lovely bits of media *off* my shiny, blue ipod and onto my computer when i get home. i can't believe there's no native program that does this already—this is intuitive, right?—but the problem is solved regardless.

i'll call silentfire sometime soon, when i'm sure she'll be awake. and we will watch more television together and be stupid over john sheppard. plus she'll probably make me work on my harry potter proto-fic. maybe one day it'll get out of the proto phase.