I don’t know if you plow wheat, or harvest wheat, or smoke wheat cigarettes, or what the fuck you really do with wheat (make bread, blah blah), but apparently something involving wheat is a common greeting in the Great Midwest: “It’s a good day to plant wheat!” And this is something I learned tonight, at a cookout in Highlandtown. I also learned that diet Pepsi black-cherry vanilla tastes surprisingly well. (I also confirmed that I’m a pretty lousy parallel parker, but, surprise surprise, I don’t get a lot of practice at it here in Timonium).

When I got home, Tippy let me scoop her right up, and when I dropped her onto the bed, she collapsed into a puddle of mushy fur (think Odo reverting to his gelatanous state in DS9) and was content to fall asleep purring while I rubbed her head. I don’t know what she’d been doing in the few hours I was down livin’ dangerously in the Big Bad City, but I can guess: some of my redneck neighbors apparently had family over for a cookout here in lovely suburban porch/deck-less Timonium. They moved the party into the narrow strip of grass between the east side of my building and the overgrowth of trees and bushes that no one seems ever to trim.

Anyway, thankfully I wasn’t home, because, since I live in a “terrace level” (read: basement) apartment, if I’d opened the blinds in my bedroom window, I would’ve had a low-angled view of about a dozen fat rednecks lounging around in cheap lawn funiture while the chief redneck cooked up some Superfresh-brand hot dogs. This explains the empty beer cans I saw illuminated in my high-beams when I pulled into the parking lot tonight.

So, I’m pretty sure Tippy spent a good chunk of the night on the bedroom window sill, between the window and the blinds, allowing herself to be tormented by chunky redneck children. I’m also pretty sure Tippy is stupid.

In any case, it’s 10:15 and I’m bushed. I’ve been watching the History Channel’s Star Wars: The Legacy Revealed and I’m just rolling my eyes full time. Hidden symbolism, analogies, give me a break. So far, no one’s talking about the “hidden symbolism” of the Special Edition: revisionism!

I’m off to bed.