<1513>

I'm using my clunky old Dell while my Mac is in the shop. It works okay, and I got it to connect to the internet in my office. It's just so weird!

We're going to NJ this weekend. It'll be nice to get out of Bmore.

<1425>

Even though I got a new power cord, the place where it plugs in the computer is all effed up, so it's only marginally better. Grrr.

This week was more class, but now it's over and there is just grading to deal with.

In awesome news, my ICA submisions were all accepted!

Today I think we're going to make some cookies.

I also filed my taxes today!

<1154>

Yesterday I mostly watched football and The Wire (with an ep of ProjRun mixed in... I'm still behind one ep). We went to the Wine Source and Whole Foods and made penne arrabiata for dinner. We then watched a ridiculous (in a good way) episode of 1 vs. 100 in which the nerdy contestant beat the mob in one feel swoop when 15 women got psyched out on a question about holiday cards. Later on we watched a ridiculous (in a terrible way) episode of Deal or No Deal in which the idiot hick pig farmer (why are all the contestants on this show female also?) left with 1 cent. You have to be a total fucking moron to leave with one cent. I hate that show so much.

In other news, I called Apple and will be getting a new power cord this week, which is great, because mine has stopped functioning practically.

The primaries turned out to be disappointing, but there is a lot of primary season left. Wednesday night was TV night, and we started Picket Fences, which is random and retro. I also got to play a bit of Rock Band, which I'm kinda glad I don't have access to all the time, although it does make me at least want to buy Karaoke Revolution for my PS2. Thursday night we made pasta fazool. Last night we went to Towson to eat at a BYOB Indian restaurant we'd never tried, and it was tasty and the Alu Dum was super spicy and tasty. Then we watch The Living Daylights, the first of many Bond movies we're sure to watch since I got Joey the full box set.

I've also started watching The Wire, and I really like it so far. I had heard it was slow to get into, but I haven't found that to be the case at all.

<1532>

We stopped at Joe's Peking Duck House in Marlton, which Zagat's had listed as worth the trip. The jasmine tea was lovely, and the hot and sour soup and fried rice was great. Other than that, I was underwhelmed. I got sesame chicken that was not crispy in a bland sauce that was supposed to be spicy garlic. Joe got a decent tofu dish, but they had limited tofu selection. It was also more expensive than our favorite, Towson Best.

After I got back I had to deal with lots of grading crap. I worked so much last week! I've worked fewer hours some weeks during the term!

Today is the first day of the Winter Institute class of 3.5 hour lectures each day for two weeks. It's such a marathon of keeping myself unbored every day. I wish I could watch The Wire on my computer, but I think it would be too obvious.

I'm excited about the NH primaries tomorrow!

<1659>

I got some schtuff at the outlets. DeLorenzo's was delicious and the caucuses were exciting. Can't wait to see how the NH primaries pan out. Friday we didn't do much. Saturday was a funeral for Joe's great uncle that he never met, which was weird. It kinda put a damper on the day. we managed to have a nice dinner at the famous Americana Diner, which was good but no Mastori's.

Other than that I've been watching football, giving out urgent medical advice, and distracting myself with distressing internet reports about my favorite Top Model. We'll head back later, stopping for Chinese dinner.

<2153>

Today it got really friggin cold here. We were around the house most of the day, and then we made tacos for dinner. We tried to go the outlet mall tonight but it was closed, so we'll go tomorrow. Joe's been needing a watch battery for forever, so we tried going to Walmart (blech), but they won't open watches they don't sell (same deal with Kohl's last night) and so Joe bought this jenky watch opener tool that totally didn't work, so then we had to stand in the returns line. Ugh. I told him just to go to the mall.

We thought about going to Columbus market tomorrow morning, but it's supposed to be frozen out, so I think we'll just try the outlets and then get some DeLorenzo's for caucus gazing.

<1302>

Happy New Year!

Last night we went to Mastori's for dinner, but the bar area was too full for chilling, so we came home. Joe's friend came over and we watched the ball drop and various other silly TV (we checked NJ traffic channel several times, but there never was any interesting traffic at the tunnels), and then I got a craving for chicken (of all things), so we adventured over to Cluck U and ordered chicken and terrible fries through a window. The chicken was pretty good -- I think I'd be hard pressed to do their 911 sauce challenge because I got Traditional Death and it was plenty hot.

For 2008, both Joe and I are going to lose weight and not do things like eat chicken at 2 am before bed.

Today I have a lot of grading to do. :(

<2342>

Plugging along on the grading. Joe and I went out after dinner, mostly driving around and then ending up back at Mastori's for the drink we didn't have there last night since the bar area was too crowded. I had coffee with a B-52 combo in it. Yum. I thought I was going to have to get up in the morning to make a phone call, but it got deferred to the afternoon, so that's good. That means we can have a party tonight and be lazy in the morning.