Hi all;

Big news this month is Clayton and Danielle. There ain't no Clayton AND Danielle any more. This solves our accomodation problems at Penticton this summer. Clayton walked out and Danny's ego got taken down a few notches (which Laurie privately opined is not necessarily a BAD thing). Danny is in counseling for help coping with the loss - which I assume is somewhere on the trauma scale near Divorce - she was with the guy for six years, after all.

All this is complicated by the fact that Clayton genuinely SEEMS like a nice guy. My kids have certainly taken to him, I would have enjoyed having him as a Brother In Law, I think...But 'tis not to be, alas.

Of course, this now means I have to do the clutch on the Tracker the HARD way, since I can no longer ask Clayton to borrow his dad's shop and engine hoist. Ah well, will still get it done.

We've managed to borrow a car for our "back to the Temple and Second Honeymoon" trip to Seattle next week; so the need to get the Tracker fixed up is not immediate. Actually, that piece of tin is running pretty good at the moment. I certainly didn't think it would make it all the way through winter. It helped that we had a particularily mild winter, recent snowfall notwithstanding.

I've been taking advantage of the odd clear breaks in the weather to bike to work. This HURTS! for the first week or so, but I seem to be getting my 'wind' back. I don't bike when it rains, so my rides are occaisional only. I got up at 5 am one thursday two weeks ago and looked out the window - seemed fine, a little windy perhaps...suited up and stepped out the door at 5:30 and looked up: "you have GOT to be kidding!!!" sez I. The snow was falling pretty thick and fast, and it's already MARCH for goodness sake!

I bought a new bed recently, and this almost caused me to be late for work, as I (1) had trouble getting to sleep and, (2) slept so soundly that I slept thru the alarm (BOTH of them). What troubles my sleep, of course, is the War...

I wondered after I wrote the bit Sept. of last year what the heck the US was waiting for...it certainly was NOT permission from the UN. Now all the waiting seems to make sense, as 150000 US armed forces personnel who have been sitting on their butts in the heat for MONTHS and want to go home are ready to take out all of Bagdad if that's the price of the ticket...

It was disturbing to see the footage of downtown Bagdad on a typical weekday morning. Except for the air-raid sirens, here was a typical city such as the one you and I live in...only the people here won't be going to work this morning...they'll be huddled in their poly-sheeted and duct-taped bathrooms, clutching a flashlight, listening to Saudi Radio, and praying to Almighty Allah that whatever is coming passes them and their families by. In short, they are in EXACTLY the same place you or I would be if the "threat" George Dubya talks about ever becomes real.

The US Military announced the development of the MOAB: Massive Ordinance Air Blast. (or, unofficially: The Mother Of All Bombs) One of the criticisms the US has had to endure is that with the world's largest working Nuclear Arsenal, they will NEVER actually use it on anyone! Now with the MOAB, they have all the destructive capability of a small tactical nuke, without all that messy fallout and radiation sickness...Weapons of Mass Destruction, indeed. It is almost guaranteed that the MOAB will be used...but on whom?