Apparently, even scientists don't really know . Who'da thunk that something so... traditional, old, simple, whatever you like, could conceal indecipherable secrets within such transparency?

I'm definitely not used to getting up earlyish. For volunteering this morning, I had to wake up before seven-thirty, after being up till one last night; not bad in itself, I guess. However, tonight it's up in the air just how many hours I'll be at work... at least nine, maybe more like ten or more... and I did want to at least feel rested today! No luck. And, of course, tomorrow I'll be in no shape to play guitar at church--so I'll be there an hour and a half later than I normally have to, which will help--but then there's a big church thing going on tomorrow afternoon/evening that I really want to go to, so I'll somehow stay awake the whole day if I have to sleep ten hours tomorrow night! I'd be napping now, but I'm waiting for Mom to make pancakes for lunch. I did attempt a nap earlier; the air conditioning prevented comfort though.

I'm Wednesday Morning, 3 a.m. ! Which Simon and Garfunkel album are you?

One of my best friends had a job delivering pizza for a very short time... and I'm glad now she quit. Apparently pizza delivery (and other forms of driving-sales) is the fifth most dangerous job in the country . Consider what it's like to look in a box that appears normal, only to discover a jar of dead cockroaches... yep, cockroaches floating in some sort of preservative (that is non-hazardous, as the label hastened to point out). Country music today at work, instead of the rap/pop. All things considered, I like this radio station much better. Funny thing is, sometimes the songs played are something I'd expect on a Christian station instead of a secular station. Perhaps country music isn't as compartmentalized as the rest of the music genres. It's a refreshing thought, anyway.

...if you haven't guessed. Seriously, I used to collect them. And I ran across one of my old favorites just yesterday, in a lovely math/logic book. Suppose you're on a game show, where there are three doors--one of which conceals an Aston Martin in mint condition, and the other two of which conceal goats. (Obviously you're aiming for the Aston Martin.) You are told to pick a door, then the host--who knows where the Aston Martin is--will open one of the other doors to reveal a goat. You pick door number one; the host opens door number three, exposing a goat. Should you switch to door number two or stick with your original choice? The answer is completely and unbelievably counterintuitive. (Oh, yeah, that other riddle... the probability is 1/125, at least in my opinion.)

My job, mindless though it may be, does have its funny moments. Like the time someone had to touch a bag full of dead frogs--not the frogs, just the bag--and the other girls were a little too grossed out to do it, so I did. Or the time I discovered we sold bulk Gojo. (As in, at least half-gallon jars!) And the variety of customers! These addresses make me think of random songs, occasionally, if the city in the address resembles some lyric or just reminds me of a song through an inexplicable series of associations. So sometimes I simply start singing right in the middle of dealing with a bunch of boxes. Nobody can hear me though, or nobody cares. The reason? Besides the machinery drowning out everything, there are radios everywhere blasting the local hit radio station... so I hear more rap and pop each day at work than all I have ever heard before I started this job.

Once in awhile I find something rather interesting in my dad's various magazines. This month it was a riddle: "Four people each flip a fair coin five times. What is the exact probability that they each get the same number of heads?" I have my answer. It's pretty easy.

My sister got "Enchanted" out from the library this week, but she watched it last night without me... and I wanted to see that again! (I've only seen it once.) So this morning I invited Bee over for a little me-and-her movie time, and we watched it. (She likes it very much.) The Prince Edward character is just annoying; the Queen gets the best lines (in proportion to her speaking role!); and I like... oh, what WAS the girl's name? You know, the star of the show! You'd think I'd be able to remember that. Giselle, that's it. I like her hair best when it's sorta curly, but not up in an '80's-style poofy 'do. I don't like her name at all. Evelyn would've fit better, I think. Bee and I love the big dance song in it, the one in the park with the steel drum band! :-)

So this op-ed summary caught my eye in this morning's NYT e-mail: "If Leona Helmsley’s $8 billion charitable bequest to dogs were only a matter of wasting her own money, no one would need to care. But she is wasting ours too. " For obvious reasons. I was thinking, "OK I knew there was some eccentric lady who left a fortune to some dogs, but is this what it sounds like? Is some dumb government agency footing the bill for a dog museum or something?" And it's nothing of the sort! It's simply that the NYT is jealous of her fortune (and doesn't think she's spending it well--but that's a different story), and the 45% of it that would be taken in taxes if it hadn't been "donated" to a "charitable" cause. According to the NYT, "The charitable deduction constitutes a subsidy from the federal government... her $8 billion donation for dogs is really a gift of $4.4 billion from her and $3.6 billion from you and me."

First item of news: My family now has cable internet at home!! Second item of news: I'm enjoying the cable internet! Third (and real) item of news: We'll be junking the old car (the Subaru) tonight. And just for the fun of it: Peanut butter and strawberry jam on a tortilla is amazingly good. Especially if you butter the tortilla first, I might add.

Ah, good ol' Independence Day. When everyone gets a little patriotic, for once. I had to work today, oddly enough. Apparently it's the first time this company's done this (in the memory of some of the seasonals anyway). Short day, though, and the company fed us all sorts of ice cream on one of the breaks. :-) Then immediately after I got back from work, we went to see fireworks! Now, my family didn't used to be able to see fireworks much; all we caught were glimpses of the city fireworks from the camp we usually attend over the Fourth. But, both this year and last year the camp managed to miss the weekend of the Fourth--it was scheduled over the previous weekend both times, I think--so we've been able to actually see fireworks, after years of missing out on 'em!