Winter things

[kodalai]

I'm feeling a certain sense of inevitability over this cold. Three of my roommates have been down with it, and it's going around at work, as well. The only real hope for it would be "Get a lot of sleep," but that's not something I'm very good at. *rubs tingly nose and sniffs*

In surprising news, it snowed today! The weather report had been hyping it all last week, but I had some doubts that it would actually appear. But it did, and a small amount of it even stuck. I was actually worried for a little bit that if the temperatures dropped, the roads might ice over, so I hurried home from work today, but it all turned out to be nothing. More snow scheduled for tomorrow. It is somewhat surprising to get it so early (or, in Seattle, at all,) but then, they have been predicting an El Nina winter for us for months.

Going to see Harry Potter tomorrow. I was in no particular hurry to see it on Opening Night -- I was never a huge HP fan, and the way the series ended rather disappointed me. Still, out of a sense of completion (and because it's the New Big Thing) I will definitely go.

Rather less looking forward to flying to Boston in a month.

Comments

[diatomacearth.livejournal.com]

Well, hey. You have more winter weather than WE do, right now. I have a frickin' plant out on the front porch that's still green and healthy, with flowers, so we still haven't our first frost.

Damn, but I wish we had a good national high-speed rail system. A cross-country trip like yours would still take a while, but at least it would be a viable alternative to the ever-more-tortuous experience of taking a commercial flight. For years, I've liked to invoke David Welsh, who explained that he disliked flying not because he was afraid of it, but because he found every aspect of it ceaselessly irritating. I'm thinking of downgrading "irritating" to "humiliating, disempowering, and anxiety-inducing."

Re: Harry Potter: I'm with you. On the other hand, I've consistently enjoyed the post PoA-movies far more than I liked the post-PoA books (the PoA movie and book continue to war for dominance in my esteem), and I thought the director did a wonderful job of making the off-putting, poorly-handled hormonal stupidity in the last movie *far* less annoying than it was in the book. Since he directed this one (and I hope the next one?), too, maybe he will continue to spin...well, silk, or cotton, at least, out of the strawier aspects of the final book.

[ayelle.livejournal.com]

What are you going to do? Opt out? I know you are an experienced flyer and generally get through security very quickly without a fuss, but I have enough real-scientist-friends (who know more about xrays than I do and have been reading about the studies, official Letters of Concern from major scientist groups and such, extensively -- I am not talking about ignorant people who alarm easily) who are convinced that backscatters are a real health concerns and we should really not be going through them, and yes, it's worth opting out. Of course, while some airports/TSA agents will just do the pat-down professionally, others will get angry and aggressive about it, either because they are abusing their power (I think this is rarer but still a genuine concern), or because, basically, they *have* to make the pat-down more and more unacceptable in order to get the rates of scanner acceptance that they need (I think this is the real issue). I'm worried about you and the parents. Thoughts?