Some things I remember/learned/was reminded of during the course of the week:

You can watch fake boobies fall to the pavement when you are in Greenwich Village. You can then watch the man who lost them bend over, pick them up and re-situate them.

If you have a silly idea that involves stuffed animals and photos, Kanuck is your gal. She has no fear and will ask anyone to pose for a silly photo.

Meggin will walk around with you in the rain and be patient as you and Kanuck take many photos – some of which involve a silly stuffed animal. She will also sacrifice her granola bar to help you get close-up pictures of a squirrel.

Going to a museum with emjaytee and Kanuck? You’ll be there all day – and love it.

Al will risk life and limb by driving from Long Island to Little Italy as quickly as possible so that he can get to lunch. As an added benefit, his arrival was a sign to Jon that a plot needed to be hatched to pie AirSteve.

Pie tossing is always fun.

Tribefan works very hard to put together a fun lunch.

Lisa is a huge fan of the show and quieter and more sober than her sister. She recognized Tribefan from photos in the gallery. She thinks we should all try out for the show.

Joni could be a substitute fire alarm if needed. She’s super nice and ready to help anyone have a good time – whether they want to or not. Considering how drunk she was at TARcon (actually, she was damn drunk before the show even started), she must have amazing recuperative powers as she was bright eyed and bushy-tailed at TES…where she accosted me. Her husband is a bit quieter and their son is a cutie who said it was weird seeing his mom on TV.

Jeremy is a tool who also likes to point to himself on TV. It was interesting, however, watching his face when BJ & Tyler crossed the finish line. I was kind of standing under one TV while looking across the room at another one. I could turn my head just a bit and watch Jeremy as he relived loosing the Race. His face was full of emotions.

Wanda tried her best to get some food into Joni to help sober her up a bit – she said it reminded her of sequesterville.

bluelena gets freaked out when the bats fly out from under the Congress Ave bridge.

BJ likes to lick “Give me some Bedouin lovin'” buttons when they are being worn by Jeremy. He, however, doesn’t like it when Joni puts her tongue in his ear.

Tyler honestly doesn’t mind if you grab his ass and will happily play along. He will also talk to random strangers on the phone if you ask him.

ToniW is still glowy and wonderful – she doesn’t need a sparkly outfit to sparkle. She’s also got a new neck.

AirSteve is a very cool and funny guy – even if he does ditch you and leave you behind. He’s also one of the best TARflies pimper I’ve ever seen.

Al and Jon are 100% energy. And they like to carry Brian Paolo around. Also, Jon has a lovely wife and adorable kids who clearly love their Uncle Al.

Billy Gaghan has a wry sense of humor that he likes to unleash when you aren’t expecting it. Kind of like his dad, but with fewer blue overtones.

Rooming with PepeNY after TARcon will turn the both of you into silly teenage girls when you should be sleeping. “And did you see when…..?”

KonaKini and emjaytee like to kiss Phil. (Well, who doesn’t?)

Kenny is a completely delightful person. I had no idea we were the same age – too bad I don’t have his young heart and quick wit.

Gerard is equally delightful and I will not start a rumor about him and his au pair. Nope. Not gonna. He also has no fear and will say things like, “I thought you were gay” to current Racers.

Fran and Barry have a relative who will question you for a long time if you mention that a TARfly has some sort of connection to Fran but you can’t remember the exact details.

Elise is too beautiful. She’s also very nice, so you can’t hate her for that beautiful thing.

DariaG and Zzard have the amazing ability to randomly choose your dinner place as their after dinner drinks place.

Lucinator’s cheerful nature and great smile is infectious. Don’t hang around her if you want to be in a bad mood.

michellec will sit with you in the quiet corner while the rest of the room goes insane.

Don’t let Blurry be the first person to get food off of a plate – the rest of the table won’t stand a chance.

tallskinnylatte, Heide and Denise are a party waiting to happen…and you don’t have to wait long.

Get Phil a little drunk and he will say things to Eric like, “Here’s the horniest man on TV!” and “have you and Danielle consummated that relationship yet?”

DougInNYC is still tall, dark and handsome even if he is no longer in Texas (or therapy). He also has to wear fancy clothes to work.

whereverthefck still has dimples that go on for miles. But she didn’t bring The Krazy with her, so we all missed out on much pointing and laughing.

When you are on the 23rd floor of the New Yorker, your cell phone will let you call your voice mail, but it won’t let you listen to your messages.

Elevators in the subway smell like either piss or vomit.

Vibbs has a fantastic hair-do of which I’m very jealous. Speaking of hair, JenEx is on my swinging jealous list too.

I would say that Guiseppe is the cutest person on the planet, but that title just might belong to M. Darcy – who is, of course, a saint. Evil, but still a saint.

Lori and Dave are a totally hot couple. Lori is cool enough to take an inflatable pink flamingo to parties.

Babalu is totally sweet and will hang out with you on the sidewalk when you need fresh air but aren’t quite ready to leave yet.

Lake will let you pin a button on him. Well, he would have let Tribefan if she’d been paying attention. Instead, I held his drinks so he could do the pinning himself. Both he and Michelle are much hotter than they were on TV. When I first saw him out of the corner of my eye, I honestly thought he was Phil.

Tammy is almost as adorable as her daughters – they win only due to the cute age factor. The whole clan, in fact, is disgustingly adorable and I hate them all. (Only not.)

If you get tickets to The Daily Show – show up early. Very early.

Big Slick has gone fuzzy.

In a bar full of TARflies and Racers with your back up against the wall? Be prepared to stay there for awhile because going anywhere will take much effort and bumping of bodies.

Crumpler bags are cool. Crumpler backpacks? Not so much. Also, the store opens later than you think – better check on that before heading there.

Looking for companions for a little 1am post party snack? No problem. Just grab PepeNY, lucinator, pinkgodzilla and djeber. The group will probably attract a newman and a grasshoppergirl along the way.

At least once a day, the door to your hotel room will refuse to open no matter what you do.

It is possible to give away a random onion ring in a diner in NYC in the middle of the night.

Try as you might, you won’t get to talk to everyone you want to and will miss some of your favorite people.

It really sucks when you have to leave right after The Early Show and don’t get to hang out at DimSum.

You can be totally shy, socially awkward, hate crowds and go to huge, crowded parties and have a good time – as long as those parties are populated by TARflies.

I’m sure I’ll remember many more things as time goes by. If I left someone out, or didn’t mention someone, it’s not because you weren’t memorable or I didn’t enjoy your company. It’s just that I have a swiss-cheese brain and I wrote this in a very stream-of-conscious manner at 4 in the morning and am posting it as-is.

Dr, my hip/leg hurts.

Yeah?

Honest.

Does it hurt when I poke here?

No

Here?

No.

Move your leg this way. That hurt?

No.

This way?

Fuck yes.

That way?

A little bit.

We need x-rays. (Fills out sheet of paper.)

Okay. (Reads sheet of paper with addresses of places to get x-rayed)

Pay co-pay. Pay parking fees. Drive 8 blocks. Park.

I need x-rays.

Okay. Sit and wait.

…

How much longer?

We are backed up.

…

Okay, come back here. Take your clothes off and put on that nifty robe. Lock that door. Open this door when you are done.

Okay.

Get up here, lay down, put your knees flat on the table and put your feet together.

My feet don’t go together if my knees are flat. I’m severely knock-kneed.

Let’s try it.

That hurts.

Try this.

That fucking hurts. *hiccup*

Put your feet together.

Not possible. *hiccup*

Try.

Not possible. *hiccup*

*glare* We’ll just have to try. Don’t move or breathe.

*hiccup*

I said don’t move or breathe.

*hiccup*

*glare*

Repeat that last bit over and over again until we finally got 10 good x-rays.

Leave. Pay more parking fees. Go to work 4 hours late.

Weee!

I was walking out of the house to go over to my mom’s to borrow a trash can (my yard is littered with limbs thanks to all the recent storms). As I reach the end of the driveway, I see this huge and lovely butterfly in my lantana bush. Forget the trash can – I ran back into the house to grab my camera.

Thanks to a helpful article in Veerle’s blog, I now have a spiffy little collection of Flickr thumbnails in my sidebar. Although, I doubt the author would appreciate the way I nest block level and non-block level items…

We can stop the genocide in Darfur but we must act now. Fill out a postcard to become one of the million voices for Darfur.

More pictures yesterday. This time at Zilker park. This one seems to be the most popular.

“Radiating Places – A Requiem of a Special Kind” is an archive of photographs documenting street art in the abandoned town of Pripyat, near the Chernobyl nuclear power plant. The pictures and art are haunting.

The National Geographic website has a feature on Chernobyl that includes a flash photo essay from a photographer who recently went back to the area. Take a look and then view the photo gallery.

Can it get any cuter than this? And, they aren’t only cute, they are functional and help penguins who have been exposed to oil/pollution. Very cool.

Twenty years ago this month, a routine maintenance test at the Chernobyl nuclear plant in northern Ukraine veered wildly out of control.

Here’s an excellent story by NPR about Chernobyl and its survivors. They have more stories as well:
Chernobyl Copes with Fallout, 20 Years Later
At Chernobyl, Building a Shelter for a Shelter
Covering the Chernobyl Crisis

When news of Chernobyl reached the US, I was getting ready for a trip to Germany. Mom was worried, but I never gave it a second thought. After arriving in Germany, I was going up the stairs to my host’s apartment and noticed that people were laving their shoes outside their doors. Was that a tradition? “No,” she said. “People are worried about radiation.” Until that moment, the danger had seemed so far away.