the long, cold snowy weather shows signs of breaking, finally, so i've started riding a bicycle again- for what it's worth. later in the week i'll give a presentation at cesl that should be working me up more than it is- it's a busy week, lots going on, and a big birthday season too. abe, miguel, noey (today, actually, given that it's now 12:37), george- all big ones. miguel is a young friend of elias'.

a break in the weather gives a person a chance to clean out the car, take the cardboard to recycling, open the windows maybe. could be a healthy thing. absolutely a necessary thing, i still feel only half moved in, with hidden boxes of important stuff, like my suit, still in the garage. may need that suit someday, not to mention the old license plates, the perler beads, old poetry & cartoon books, tons of stuff we know is out there but have somehow misplaced. some of it's got to be valuable or we wouldn't have thought about it in the time since we moved. yet it's still so crowded out there, you can barely get around the clutter to look at the labels that are supposed to be written on the boxes.

in the midst of this clutter-anxiety, another month of hindered access to things that could make me feel more prepared for life, along comes some friends of ours with plans to go to africa, and take their children. actually, this has been a semi-dormant dream of mine for years, reawakened somewhat by the adoption of little corey, a dream my wife may not share or may have to be persuaded into. nevertheless i've immediately given them my two favorite sites, the weblogs of
ethan zuckerman and pernille baerendtsen, two westerners each with a foot planted firmly in the lost continent. but what i'd really like to share is the festival in the desert, different part of africa i realize, but hey, if you can't go out and hear a little music, what good is the web?

and, speaking of which, here's a youtube of margot. fantastic as always!