I’m grateful that I live in North Dallas instead of South Dallas.

July seems like it’s never going to end. It feels like it’s been three times longer than the other months this year.

I don’t think I’m a very good fish owner. You’d think looking after a fish would be the easiest thing ever … especially since it seems to be one of the preferred pets parents buy their children to teach them responsibility … or maybe because fish are inexpensive and easy to replace. Also, if they get out of their tank they have a tendency to flop around on the floor until they die instead of going feral, gorging themselves on whatever food items have been left unattended in the kitchen, and setting up house in the hall closet.

In some ways I’m very surprised that Jasper Darling Higgins has lived this long. He has not had the easiest life and has proved remarkably resilient considering the trauma he’s been put through. First off, he used to live in my old broken and disabled blender. It turned out to be an unsuitable home because it had a tendency to leak despite the super-amazing supposedly watertight sealants I used. His current home has been attacked several times by the Resident Menace a.k.a. Chester the cat who seems to be more interested in the air filter system than in the actual fish. Anyway, it turns out that lately I keep neglecting to feed Jasper for a hours at a time. I’m afraid that in awhile it will go from hours to days.

I hate to admit it but right now: Fish = Forgettable.

Paul downloaded a trial version of Star Wars Galaxies and let me know that he wants me to participate in the game play because somewhere he has gotten the idea that I’m creative. I did get to write a cheesy bio for the character we created. So add another one to the list of Games I’m in the Middle of. So far the brief amount of actual online interactive playing I’ve witnessed has reminded me how much I dislike other people. Paul told me that it’s okay, and that our character can be a complete loner with the absolute minimum interaction with other people. This is probably for the best, otherwise my aggressive male wookie might go postal in a major way.

My mother called me this morning from an airport in California to tell me that this weekend Lucas allowed the official announcement of the name of the Episode III film at a comic book convention in San Diego. (It’s not really why she called me, she called me to tell me about her visit with the patriotic middle child, and somehow managed to slip in information about Star Wars. ) Revenge of the Sith. It looks like Lucas didn’t chicken out this time. Or maybe I should say yet. If you recall, The Return of the Jedi was originally The Revenge of the Jedi. My mom even saved a flier for Jeremy with the original title, I like to marvel at it whenever I see it. That was before Lucas decided that the word Revenge was too gruesome for children or some such nonsense and changed it to Return. I have a feeling this was when he began to show himself as yellow, and also probably when his chin began to disappear.

We took a trip to a huge mall in Frisco recently. Well maybe it wasn’t that huge, I’m not all that sure. It was so shiny and sparkly that I spent most of my time there in a state of disorientation. The whole reason for the trip was so that we could have a Cheesecake Warehouse experience.( I know, I know, it’s really a Cheesecake Factory but for some reason the word warehouse comes to mind first, so warehouse it will remain. ) We stood in line outside the Cheesecake Warehouse but inside the mall for about 20 minutes before we were seated.

It was an instructive 20 minutes. I should have started a list of Things Never to be Worn in Public. It also crystallized my decision that people should really begin dressing to their body type instead of in clothing they think is trendy. I was particularly intrigued by this one observation I made. There was a rather pretty young woman obviously on a date wearing a strapless top that was remarkably longer than most and she had paired it with some jeans. When I looked across the way I saw another woman wearing the exact same top in a different color, but this second slightly larger woman was trying to pass it off as a dress.

It was the single most disturbing image I’ve ever seen in the past month.

It was a thing of nightmares.