From yesterday's episode, you'll recall how Otto the Love Van turned Jacek and Loydie into dervishes of romance, near-mythic beings of untold romantic weight. Kristanne and I have experimented with Otto's effects on the romantic neophyte for lo these many weeks now, using double-blind testing, multiple placebos, and controversial time-space codpiece techniques to arrive at doses of Otto that do not reduce subjects to mewling, drooling, lovebots.
Based on this exhaustive research, we felt comfortable exposing Jacek and Loydie to Otto's charms. Had we only known our folly before it was too late! Jacek was scheduled to deliver a timely lecture at a conference of biologists on the relatively tame topic, "Nematodes -- Our Happy Friends In the Garden." After his brief session in Otto, though, he spent the entire night in feverish labor, not resting until his new lecture -- "Mechanism of Sexual Isolation in Sexual Transformation" -- was complete. At the top of this page, you see Jacek at the crescendo of his oration, declaiming wildly on the "relationship between sexual isolation and DNA sequence divergence."
Pretty steamy stuff, I'm sure you'll agree. As you can imagine, the audience
was neither prepared for nor receptive to Jacek's groundbreaking theories. They rioted.
Went clear off their beans. Bloodlust, I tell you. Jacek, though wily, was no match for the mob. They fed
him to the Schaefers' Akita, Dasher, who was only too happy to oblige. Alas, poor Jacek -- we
knew him well.
Ok, ok, so I made all that stuff up. Jacek's lecture was great, but to be perfectly honest, I didn't really understand a whole lot of it. So, I wrote down two quotations from it and made up a story. We can do that around here -- I'm pretty sure it's Extreme.
Since we've been in Boulder so long, we've kinda set up shop in the local Kinko's.
As luck would have it, there's a live phone connection in the corner for the UPS Shipping machine that never
seems to get used. Now, I just hate to see a phone connection go to waste. So,
we managed to duck behind that counter you see there at the left, unplug the
UPS machine (which you don't see), and go to town with my laptop. It was
a pretty slick set up, so naturally, I had to let loose a little covert
Extreme Gesture.
The first time we did this, that handy counter wasn't there -- we just had
to hang out behind that wall, not looking conspicuous in the least. But,
by the time we returned for a second go-round, some Unwitting Extreme Fellow
Traveller added virtual walls to our office! It was great -- I could stretch
out and enjoy my work. There was even an empty box for a little desk!
I was tempted to ask for coffee,
but thought better of it.
I'm pretty sure Kristanne's job is even tougher than mine. Once I'm ensconced
in my Kinko's Cybernest, I'm pretty much there until the job is done. Not Kristanne,
though -- she's working the floor like a regular paparazzi, getting all the angles
with the digital camera to bring the goods on home to you. She's got crazy skills --
she can pirouette on a dime over by the stationery and have a low-angle,
in-tight shot on my canned ham of a mug before a Kinko's employee even knows
what for. That's what it takes if you don't want your Odyssey to founder on the
shoals of poor photography (which, incidentally, are located right next to the
reefs of mixed metaphors...check a map for the specifics).
By the way, are all of you out there practicing your Extreme Hand Gestures? Here you see my version of Kristanne's favorite Extreme Gesture, the "modified two-point spinky." It's a saucy little gesture, but not so cavalier that it'll get you noticed in shopping malls. Now, the one below, that's me starting to dive into a full-on "Clam of Extremity!" This one, you save for those moments of utter abandon, when you need to really "cut loose" and just "go for it." Be careful with the hand position, though, or you can devolve into a "Stinky Oyster," which is not Extreme at all. You'll be mocked for that one.
It occurs to me that in yesterday's Kamping Korner, we promised an action shot of the ACAnywhere Inverter. Never ones to turn our backs on a promise, we provide a shot of the Inverter renovating our digital camera batteries. Ah, sweet energy!
Join us tomorrow as we leave Boulder behind and head for fairer climes. See you then!
Total Miles for 6/17=About 26 (I know, I know...we're coasting. Check back tomorrow!)