Hardware: the parts of a computer that can be kicked.

Marking the seasonal transitions in Arizona:
Summer is here - hot water comes out of the cold faucet
Autumn has arrived - you don’t need to run the AC all night
Winter rears its only slightly homely head - you turn on the electric blanket
Spring has sprung - sandals

Aside from one PDF file and the artwork, Year Two is ready for CD production. Hope to have it sent to Victory Studios by next week. That’s a major box soon to be checked off.

Slarkey (adj.) a category of food that simply must be eaten in certain situations. It requires very little chewing, contains maximum calories in minimal volume and tastes good without having strong flavors of any kind. Slarkey food is called for after strenuous physical work, when hunger and fatigue arrive in equal measures or after three or more healthy meals. Slarkey meals can be found at Burger King, Denny’s, IHOP and Pizza Hut. It should be eaten quickly and downed with large amounts of either Diet Coke or cheap coffee. It is, by definition, loaded with all the things they say are bad for you, and a slarkey meal includes at least 50% of the daily allowance of salt, saturated fats, sugar and carbohydrates. There are no vegetables in a slarkey meal. Silverware is used only if the items fall in the breakfast category (i.e. eggs and anything that takes syrup).
Vegans, vegetarians and whole food whackos don’t eat slarkey food, which is how we know they’re dangerous subversives and miserable people. Few things satisfy the soul like a slarkey meal, and the world would be a better and more peaceful place if everyone ate at least two slarkey meals every week. Want to pacify North Korea? Bring peace to Somalia? Stop the Taliban in their tracks? A: Feed them slarkey meals on a regular basis!
Trust me on this one! Next time you’re feeling too hungry, too tired, too busy or too anything, eat a meal of slarkey food and watch everything get better!

We got a notice in today’s mail that the county assessor has denied our appeal. The appeal form had room for two comps to justify our appeal and we had no problem coming up with comparable houses within a mile that had sold since January for significantly less than our appraisal. The denial letter explained that their numbers are derived from a large sampling of homes within a very broad geographical range. So they asked for two because...?
No big surprise that we were turned down, though. Maricopa County is so far into red ink that if they lowered assessments in any significant numbers they’d have to turn out the lights and lock the doors. Over 10,000 homes are in foreclosure here (April figures) and those homes don’t generate any tax money.

Time for some Suns b’ball. That girlie zone is giving L.A. some grief. Has Jackson figured out a way to deal with it? We’ll know in a couple of hours.