Reading: John Fowles, A Maggot

Listening: Swing and speeded-up John Williams with-that-beat-added aerobic music.

Moving: step

Viewing: My form in the mirrory, dark window. Back flat, abs tight. Later, ER.

2 December 1999: This isn't...too bad

Shelly was late today and we were all gabbing for a few minutes waiting for her, and when she did get there she led an amazing class. Swing is great to work out to. The Indiana Jones theme should probably be left alone, but however defiled, its theme was still there, still working its magic on me. I leapt over chasms, ran away from big rocks, swam to a submarine, beat up a few Nazis, and, by the end, got dragged behind a truck. In the Latin alphabet, Jehovah starts with an I (which is why that trap, when it was laid a millennium ago, featured an I, the Brothers of the Cruciform Sword having precognition).

In A Maggot, the 18th-century equivalent of a one-man grand jury questions three witnesses. Fowles's recreation of the period's English is superb. His witnesses are a maidservant, an innkeeper, and a curate, and his ear for their various levels of education is exquisite.

I called my father for an aunt and uncle's address and for Christmas ideas. Sheryl picked up the phone first and called me "hon'" continually. So does BDL. I do not cotton* well to endearments like that. Call me Lisa, call me Li, call me a nickname that I earn, like Tigger or Unmentionable the Second. I say nothing: it's my fault; I'm the prickly one. Lis I do not tolerate, but "hon" from people whom I should call my stepparents but don't (see "prickly," supra) I can at least not bristle at.

*Can I say that or has that got bigoted roots?

I ordered some books for my father and grandmother today. I got some ideas for Sheryl: my sister introduced her to Maeve Binchy (whom she pronounced "Mauve Bingy" which I--I do not want a videophone--did not laugh at) and I am going to introduce her to Rosamunde Pilcher. I got River Horse for my dad, and The Great Shame : And the Triumph of the Irish in the English-Speaking World. Pandering to his Irish chauvinism. Though I won't to my mother's Dickens with blinders. Maybe I'll buy her Bleak House or Hard Times since she enjoys Dickens so much? For another perspective on her village? And I got a bunch from A Common Reader for my grandmother. I was going to get the Kenneally from A Common Reader as well, since that's where I read about it, but that company doesn't list William Least Heat Moon and there'd be two shipping charges and it was 20% cheaper and what was I just saying about independent bookstores? Anyway, for Granny I bought Stillmeadow Sampler, My Own Cape Cod, Lighthouse in My Life, and Common Years.

And I am going to indulge myself getting books for my kidlets.

For now, I'm going to dig out and string up Christmas decorations, and I'm not going to believe anyone who says there's a light not working on one side so he'll take to his workshop and and fix it up there and bring it back there, not even if they get me a drink or some antlers to wear on my head.

'Tis the season.