At lunch this afternoon, I ate a sports bar that just opened recently. The menu did not have a great selection of items, but it did have some bizarre …. culinary delights. In this case I’m not sure “culinary delights” is the appropriate description, but I’m trying to be nice as possible. Among the typical menu listings of a few dozen versions of the hamburger there was the strangest thing: fried pickles. I had to look twice because the first time I really thought I had read it incorrectly. There really were fried pickles on the menu.

This leads to a series of questions. How on earth does it occur to someone to fry a pickle? What kind of person would think a fried pickle might be a tasty thing? Who on earth do you market this to? My answers: Someone had a really bad dream, or possibly they were pregnant. It only appeals to the criminally insane. Apparently you try to sell it to the kinds of people who frequent sports bars (who if today is typical, boils down to lots of single women).

Yesterday was my birthday, and for some reason beyond explanation I chose to schedule a dentist appointment for the afternoon. In the process of having a cavity filled, the dentist (actually it was the hygienist) managed to chip one of my front teeth. I was more than just a little upset by this turn of events Not only did it hurt, but my formerly smooth tooth was now jagged. I was still in the chair when I discovered the chip, and when I pointed out what had occurred both women showed such disbelief that such a thing could ever happen. They ended up consulting my chart to prove to me that I had the chip before I ever came in. When it turned out that the chip was not documented anywhere, they spent several minutes apologizing and then repairing my tooth. They did a good job, the only way to tell that I have had any tooth repair is that it will glow a different shade when under blacklight.

I really liked the dentist up until the chipped tooth incident. Now, I’m tempted to find a new one. And I keep wondering … why are hygienists so evil?

Back in 2002 I caught wind that a live action remake of Peter S Beagle’s The Last Unicorn was in the works. In 2003 I heard that the release date for the film had been pushed back to 2004. Then in 2004 the release date was pushed back again to 2005. There was an official website, complete with conceptual art and a listing of the talent working on the film. Now, as I look for information about the film, I find little reliable information. The official site seems to have completely evaporated. Everything I find now is just other people’s speculation, and really old information. It’s like the project has fallen apart.

And as Hollywood gets desperate and continues to pump out remake after remake after remake, I was thinking that maybe the Last Unicorn would be an improvement, since I know so few people who ever saw it back in the 80’s. And I know even fewer people who have ever taken the time to read the book. It would be a new story to so many, and if done well it would beat the pants off of the lousy remakes I’ve been seeing listed lately. Does anyone really want to see a new version of the omen or yet another Poseidon adventure, and Steve martin as the pink panther? Come on! (Why is Steve Martin rehashing formerly successful films these days? Can’t he find any new material suitable for his talents? The original Cheaper by the Dozen was so much better than his craptacular film from 2004, and what I really don’t understand is why on earth they put out a second one last year!)

We’re in the midst of a big redesign at the library. At the moment it pretty much means that all hell has broken loose, and if you go to the library to look for something, you might need an entire search team to help you find it.

In fact, as I was shelving books this afternoon I discovered that whoever they have hired to do this redesign doesn’t understand the Dewey decimal system. This does not bode well for the library since this is only the beginning of the book moving. I’m just hoping someone pulls them aside and explains, thoroughly about the whole purpose of having a system is so that we know where each book is otherwise everything is just CHAOS.

Paul and I have started to really get serious about buying a house. So serious we actually made an offer on a cute little place last week. On Monday the inspector went out to give the place a thorough going over. To make a long story short, we ended up backing out of buying it because the seller failed to disclose some rather vital information.

The house hunt continues.