Dragon Con is in town, and so are my brother and his wife (a/k/a Valentine Wolfe - see links at right). They are finding the con a mixed bag, as my brother wrote on his blog. It's kind of reaffirming what I've suspected about Dragon Con for a while, that it sounds like a lot more fun that it'd actually be, at least for me. Day One they spent most of their time standing around, trying to figure out which of several dozen things they wanted to do, and not getting into the things they chose. I don't yet have a report from them on Day Two (Saturday) but I hope it went better.

There weren't any Dragon Con activities they were interested in until early evening (6PM) so yesterday afternoon Alan and I went down to my mom's to join them. We ate cheese and crackers, grilled burgers and brats, drank wine and soda, and had some great conversation. It was a lovely day.

We also brought Sarah her birthday present - only three months late! Go me! Her card was on time, though. Bo's birthday was the 24th so I had a giftie for him too. He has to deal with this guy at work who's obsessed with flip charts. Whenever there's a meeting, the guy is totally unconcerned with the agenda, the discussion points and the results of the meeting but completely obsessed with making sure they have a flip chart and markers. That's all he wants to talk about and the only thing he concentrates upon. So I got Bo a flip chart and a big package of assorted Sharpie markers for his birthday. He looked at the beribboned flip chart with this hilarious expression of total disgust and said, "You suck. You totally suck. But y'know, so do I, because I should have totally seen this coming." He forgave me, though, because while he was inside stowing away his valuable flip chart, I produced his real present, an assortment of Chimay that included a logo glass.

Here is Sarah modeling her gift from us - that lace-up bodice/top thingy.

I took some pictures of the two of them but my brother was grumpy about having his photo taken so I won't post those.



This is a close-up of the lovely fresh-cut flower arrangement Mom had on the picnic table.

That's about all I have to report: not an eventful day, but a thoroughly enjoyable one.

Before I go, a Skanky Neighbor Update: since the flurry of activity last Tuesday during which a massive quantity of crap was relocated to the garage, there has been a grand total of absolutely nothing going on, so, in keeping with Skanky Neighbor tradition, apparently someone cared enough about the state of things to hire a crew to clean it up, but not enough to hire the crew for long enough to complete the job.

In closing, here's some more Goth Eye Candy, a/k/a Sarah. Because can you really ever have enough hot goth chicks on your blog????