Vox Lucens

Anyone who has spent any time with Katie and I knows that we really like to cook.  We’ll cook anything that sounds good…and I have pretty eclectic tastes, so our culinary willingness leads us to many the exotic taste (and being homemade, it’s generally exceedingly cheap).

But early in our marriage, I had not yet learned how far we could go in our search for homemade exotic deliciosity.  This lack of knowledge on my part was quickly rectified, in a quick and highly delicious manner.

We had not been married too long when Katie asked me what I wanted for dinner, and I answered, “Chinese.”  She agreed that this would be delicious, but expressed a certain amount of chagrin when I began to look up the number to the closest take-out restaurant.

To my foolish brain, you see, eating Chinese always began with calling the local take-out place, speaking specially chosen numbers into the headset, and picking up the finished product in cardboard cartons in 15-20 minutes.  (Anybody else with me on this?)  To my enterprising wife, though, eating Chinese was no different than anything else she cooked.

To my credit, I quickly acknowledged the error of my ways.  Shortly thereafter, Katie used her magical recipe source to find a version of my favorite dish.  And to this day, if you come to our house and order the Number 1, you will probably end up with this:

You can find our recipe here, though we do make some changes (notably substituting the horribly American ketchup for more attemptedly authentic hoisin sauce for a fantastic taste; I also add chili oil to mine for a nice zing).  We’ve made it many times, and shared it with many friends, and so far no one has objected!

Also to my credit, I was smart enough to buy my enterprising wife an ice cream maker.  Perhaps a post on that to come?

Many of you undoubtedly saw the LivingSocial phenomenon that was the offer of $20 on amazon.com for a mere $10. I am delighted to report that I have such nice Facebook friends that, after posting a personalized link on that venue, I managed to get my $20 gift card for free.

Such bliss, my friends, comes with a very distinct price. The price of decision.

A long time ago, I heard Ravi Zacharias state that, whenever he went into a bookstore, the first thing he had to do was find a restroom, because he would get so excited at the prospect of so many books that he would need to go rather urgently. At moments like these, I sympathize.

…And, I’m back.

In logic, my friends, a “dilemma” traditionally has only two horns. I believe that what I find myself in is a dilemmammammammamma.

So, what will it be? I ask your advice.

Classics?

Law?

The stuff on my “must-get-to-eventually” list?

Policy and work-related stuff?

History?

Pure unadulterated fun?

This could go on for a long time, but I’m now open to votes.

We’re back.  Actually, we’ve been back for a while, setting up our home and digging out of boxes and piled desks.

I really like saying “we” and “our home.”

We had just a wonderful wedding, thanks to the tireless effort of my bride and countless willing and able helpers, and had an excellent trip home, managing to avoid a blizzard one day and survive 90 degree heat two days later.

But most importantly of all, my best friend is now also my wife.

(With a huge thanks to Kelly for these pictures and the ones we have yet to see!)

…but I have to admit I like the looks of this.

One of the joys of having both my work and personal e-mail accounts plastered all over the Internet is that I get lots of spam.  Spambots just love people like me, I’m afraid - more interested in letting people get in touch with me than in protecting my contact data.

But that gives me the chance to kind of watch the spam trends.  Recently, there was a deluge of Russian spam - kind of pointless, as I don’t read Russian.  There was also a spate of spam in which the subject line was “Re: [random number here].”  Also rather pointless, as there was absolutely nothing that would even remotely encourage me to read (even assuming I did want to re-finance my mortgage or purchase medications through an unsolicited bulk message).

But the best spam trend of all is occurring right now.  The spammers are sending me tons of e-mail with fake news headlines.  Some of them have been startling–

Beijing Olympics Cancelled

UK Prime Minister Forced to Quit

Man Killed by Flying Cocktail Glass

Others, more entertainingly, have been random bordering on hilarious–

Paris Hilton Considered for Mother Teresa Role

Obama Converts to Judaism!

Playing Poker Prevents Alzheimer’s Disease

Many of the latter have caused me to snort rather violently before compulsively hitting the “delete” key.  But I really sat up and noticed when I was perusing the CNN headlines on my iGoogle home page, and dismissed one of them as being spammishly amusing.  It took me a good 10 seconds, and a number of re-reads, to realize this was actually supposed to be a news headline.

“Bush Peace Dream Iffy for ‘08, Olmert Says”

What?!?!?!  We’re not going to have peace in the Middle East in the next four months?  After centuries of conflict, I’m shocked that our leaders can’t solve the world’s problems in the upcoming weeks.  Thank goodness CNN is there to report to us on their shortcomings!

I think I’m going back to reading my spam now.

After getting the top of my head wickedly burned a couple of weeks ago, I decided that I don’t want that to happen again. So, as annoying and weird as it may be, I decided to put sunscreen on through my hair.

And I discovered that sunscreen is a more than adequate substitute for hair gel. It’s even lighter and less stiff, while holding the hair in place quite nicely. I only hope it also keeps me from getting burned…

I’m weird.