The web is disappointing me today. The most amusing thing I've found is a story about a stolen Krispy Kreme truck. The best part is this: "They abandoned the truck when they were spotted by police responding to reports of a dangerous driver who was losing his doughnuts."

I had an idea when I was on the bus today. I'm not sure how many people would be willing to do this, but I'm going to ask anyhow. I have a new project, that isn't really a project as much as it is a thing. A... what would you even call it? I don't know. (My writing is strange because I just read The Body Artist by Don DeLillo and now words are putting themselves together differently than normal. This happens to me, although it's usually most noticeable when I read Austen.)

'Okay,' you are thinking. 'Get to the point already. Blah blah blah.' So here I go. The point: Chain books. Kind of like chain letters, but better, and none of that 'bad things will befall you if you don't send this on' kind of mumbo jumbo. Just take a book, preferably one that you really really like, and pass it on. If you don't want to give up your copy, buy a new one. I'd recommend trade paperback or hardbound, since the mass market paperbacks tend to fall apart more easily, but it's not a huge deal.

Once you have the book, don't lend it to someone, or anything like that, just give it, and tell the person to read it and leave a little something in the book and pass it along to someone they think will find it interesting. They can tuck a poem or a drawing on a scrap of paper in between the pages, or sign the inside flap, or make a little note in the margin (although too many of those would make it irritating for future readers). If they hate it, they can write that on the inside cover and pass it on. The important thing is to keep passing the books on.

I thought of this because Barbara, a woman at my bus stop, gave me a book to read yesterday. We talk about books when we see each other on the bus, and she had mentioned this book once and said she'd carry around until she saw me again. I had expected her to lend it, but instead she told me to just pass it on when I was done with it. It reminded me of when I was in college and a bunch of us read Stranger in a Strange Land and signed the inside cover. That book went through quite a few of us, and for all I know, it's still floating around. I think there should be lots of books out there and the whole POINT of them should be to float around from reader to reader.

I'm going to start my book off soon. I'm going to buy another copy of Ex Libris and give it to Barbara the next time I see her. Maybe I'll find a few others to pass on as well...

And with that, I kick off the Book Passy Aroundy Project Thingy. If you think this is a fun idea and you have a weblog, you should tell your readers to participate and then there will be lots of floating books and happy readers and all that good stuff. Won't that be fun?

Last week, I was on the bus with a woman who thought she was in the movie "Titanic." She was standing by the back door, balancing herself on the pole. Her arms were outstretched, and she stood on one leg as the bus sailed through the streets of downtown Portland. When the bus reached her stop, she stayed on one foot, pointed the toe of the other foot at the ground, pirouetted, and pranced out the back door.

He's 12, quite possibly a genius, and he's my little brother. He's also writing three or four books and has started drawing a comic strip. He rocks. I've just updated the book he started a year or two ago. Missions by Luke T. Edwards is now available for your reading pleasure.

I feel the need to publicly confess my affection for Morrissey's music. Moz just has good lyrics. Lyrics like "I don't have any skin, but that's just the way it goes." Or, "I will not change and I will not be nice." Lyrics like (okay, this is The Smiths) "Nothing's changed, I still love you, Oh I still love you, Only slightly, only slightly less than I used to." Beautiful. Simply beautiful.

Are you worthy of the BBC?

This couldn't describe me less. Although the ad on the previous page made me laugh. It said, "Get $10 OFF your love meter." Huh???

I think I should issue a standard apology to those of you whose search for porn has landed you on this site. There are many of you, according to my site referrers. In fact, there are probably more porn seekers than people who actually *want* to be here. Oops.

But whatever you are looking for on this world wide web, I have an important piece of advice. Are you ready? Okay, here it is: Never switch cereal brands just because you think another brand is healthier than the one you like. It probably tastes like crap. Specifically, I'm talking about my recent bad decision to buy Total Raisin Bran over the preferred Raisin Bran Crunch (because I ran out of Froot Loops). Never again.

Yesterday, I remembered why I like the web so much. First of all, there's google. Then there are all these neat little sites out there, sites made by people who are funny or interesting or both and who share stuff with us. I like these people, even though I only know what they choose to tell the world at large.

My favorite find from yesterday is easily gwentown.com. I especially love the illustrated stories.

This is how I feel today.

So, I'm considering making the switch to blogger. The site would still be here, but I'd update it on-line. I have heretofore prided myself on the fact that I do all my coding by hand, but HTML's easy and what was once a source of pride is getting to be more like a source of irritation. If I had a server that could handle ASP or JSP, or if I knew PERL or had time to learn PERL (something I've been saying I'd do for years now), I would just write my own content management system and feel all proud and "look at me" about it. But that's not going to happen anytime soon.

Another reason for considering the change is that I'm tired of how this site looks. I last revised it well over a year ago, and now I find it boring. So, what do you think, fair readers? Do you even care? If your name is Dale, I already know the answer to that. What about the rest of you? Any good/bad experiences with blogger? For reference, a good blog that currently uses blogger is littleyellowdifferent.com.

In other news, it looks like there's a nerdyboy.com out there. There was one a couple of years ago that was supposed to be a men's e-zine, but it went away. Now the domain is run by Bart and Mike. Main topics of interest for them seem to be gadegtry and porn. Looks like they also use blogger. It's everywhere!

No house for me. Sad. Well, if they decide that they want me to have the house so badly that they are willing to pour a footing and fix the foundation, I suppose the deal could still go through, but otherwise, it's a no go. There's a big crack in the foundation. I realize that foundations can crack for a number of reasons and it's not always bad, but this is the San Andreas Fault of foundation cracks, and it goes all the way down, all the way through the entire foundation wall. Where it's cracked, the foundation is separated and has shifted slightly. No good. Also, there's no footing, which is the wider base that the foundation wall should be resting on (I just learned that term yesterday).

This all makes me sad because it was such a cute house AND I don't want to look for another house AND the interest rates are going up again -- have gone up -- I lose the 6.8 I locked in to. Damn damn damn. At least I'll get my earnest money back. Also, luckily, my stepdad is a licensed building inspector, so he came and did the inspection for me free of charge. I took him out for Indian food, but he had to get the tip because I forgot to take enough cash. D'oh! My stepdad is way cool, except that he always kicks my ass at pool. Guess I'll just have to get better before he comes to inspect the next one.

Ouch. Celebrity boxing was sad. So very, very sad. But then it got better. I almost stopped watching after the first fight because I felt so bad for Greg Brady. The fight was not a fair one, and I was embarrassed for him -- he's clearly no athlete. The fight between Vanilla Ice and Willis Drummond was much better -- much more of a fair fight.

Then there was the third fight: Paula Jones, who forgets why she's famous Vs. Tonya Harding who forgets that nobody likes her. Yikes. The physical matchup wouldn't have been as unfair if it weren't for the advantage Harding has when it comes to instinct alone. Paula Jones has the survival instincts of a puppy. I'm surprised she didn't lick Harding and pee on her shoes. Even I know not to turn your back in a boxing match. Ever. Harding, on the other hand, has the instincts of... well a thug. She's just a thug.

Luckily, I didn't have to watch it alone. Chris brought over yummy German beer and suffered with me.

Check it out. Someone threw pee at Britney Spears.

In other news, the bullets are flying in downtown Portland these days. First, a dude in a cowboy hat with a bandana over his face walked up and shot a man on the street. He died at the hospital. Then, there was a bank robbery where shots were fired, but nobody was hit. Here's my favorite bit of reporting from that incident: describing the two men fleeing the scene of the bank robbery as the police gave chase, kgw.com reports, "When the second person saw police, he said 'Oh, no!'" Now that's some hard-hitting journalism.

My fortune cookie from the Lotus Express today tells me "It is impossible to please everybody. Please yourself first." Okay. I'll let my boss know, and then head home to curl up under a blanket as I read a book and sip some red wine while I wait for the masseuse to show up. Thanks, Fortune Cookie! You're the best!

The thing that upsets me the most about celebrity boxing is the idea that they have finally got me. Without even putting much thought into it, I have almost completely avoided the waves of trashy prime time TV being thrown at us over the past few years. I never watched Survivor. My knowledge of Temptation Island is limited to what I saw on the commercials. Fear factor? Never seen it. Caught about 15 seconds of The Chair or The Chamber (not sure which) on accident one night. I saw John McEnroe and wondered what he was doing on prime time. But here is something equally trashy, brainless and sad. And I don't think I'll be able to resist. Vanilla Ice is fighting Todd Bridges. Paula Jones v. Tanya Harding. Danny Bonaduce v. Barry Williams, for crying out loud. It's a train wreck -- a TRAIN WRECK, I tell you -- and I want to look away, but they have found my weakness, my Achilles heel. Damn those TV execs. Damn them!

Wow. I guess the owner of the house I'm interested in and I have agreed on terms and all systems are go. Well, nothing is final yet. There's still the inspection, appraisal, and escrow to get through, but we're headed in that direction. Yikes. I guess I'll just have to wait until I get my tax return next year to go to Europe.

Once again, yahoo's headlines page is pissing me off. Today, it froze my whole browser; I suspect it was their banner ad that did it. Grr. I think I'll have to start using google's headlines.

In other news, I will soon hear back on the offer I made on that house. I have a feeling they are not going to accept it. Actually, I mostly hope they won't accept it right now -- the whole monetary aspect of buying a house has suddenly become very real. It seems like a better idea would be to use all that money to go to Europe.

Oh geez. Celebrity boxing. Yikes. The really scary thing is that just this weekend a friend of mine told me about the fight between Harding and Fisher, and I said, "You know Paula Jones is going to end up on there." Yessiree, I've got my finger on the pulse of trash culture. My guess is that the participants don't see the sad side of what they're doing and who they've become. Says Paula Jones, "I just got my nose done, and I don't want to mess it up." It's her "first concern as a woman."

I found a house that I like!!! Also, as far as I know, it hasn't been sold yet like the last two I liked. Always a plus... Anyhow, I think they're asking a little too much, so I'm going to make an offer and see what happens. Keep your fingers crossed!