� Vanessa via e-mail this morning doing happy postmortem on dinner, revealing some history with unfathomably-by-me shaky confidence (and, to my mind, making an incorrect diagnosis) but also giving me a warm googly feeling of fellowship and a shared look, from our more contented and self-valuing perspectives, back into the sugar bowl of fond remembrance

I thought I�d get back to the flirting stuff this time, but I�m a little slow in the head and have an uncharacteristic amount of work to do, so I�ll post what I�ve got and then go be diligent.

Would you like to know my secret today? Underneath my proper office-girl shirt I am wearing a camisole, super tight, with spaghetti straps, that has a loud print of overlapping American flags. It was manufactured by the company my sister works for (read: it was free), and I find it heinous and righteous in equal proportions; when I am wearing it the joke is that I am on my way to be in a Kid Rock video. When I woke up this morning, groggy after the dinner debauch, the thought of going to Gastro and sitting in an office all day positively made me whimper, and for a moment I felt real dread, but then I realized that I was in danger of starting my Friday with a shitty attitude and I got a flash of no-I-must-be-strong and, and then I remembered Penn and the Nazi flag and I knew what I had to do. And do you know what? It�s working. Dinner was big boozy fun, with the antipasti so properly ravaged that we skipped the salad course and went straight to dessert. Dubonnet, many bottles of wine, Evan Williams bourbon that was on sale for the same price as Maker�s Mark. Everyone�s new favorite cheese is Peilloute. I mounted the I-could-die-tomorrow defense of my willingness to spend thirteen bucks a pound on cheese and my culinary profligacy in general, and it was all true, there are not many things in life that I like better than making delicious food and giving my friends the pleasure of eating it � every time I realize this all over again, it is another occasion for liking myself a lot and digging the evidence of what my priorities are. Sorry to get all Hallmark on you, but that's the way it is, I cannot express my sentiments any other way. Art�s car may be almost ready for the junkyard. Everyone got along like the proverbial house on fire. I really hope that Gastro does not make prospective new hires pee in a cup. Oh, and the prof says I passed chemistry. Rock and roll.

So tonight the plan is to do the kitchenful of dishes then head over to Vanessa�s with the mafia documentary and my DVD player, with which in a perfect world we will displace her VCR and in the imperfect one tinker for a while and then give up and head to Blockbuster. Maybe early to bed, maybe I�ll go running tomorrow morning, and then Saturday night will find me headed to three different parties. This is extreme, but I don�t want to miss either of mine and I don�t want not to be the plus-one at the other, so I�m making the sacrifice. Then next week I can start counting down to my sister visiting. And do some Christmas shit. Right, Christmas.

I found out Wednesday that the birthday of Steve�s big-time ex, whom he dated (typo: "hated"; ha!) for seven yes-you-read-that-correctly-seven years, is one day before mine. At least mine�s not the same as his mom�s or anything. Ahem! And also, last night I had cause to refer to someone whom I regard, when I do, with the opposite of fond remembrance � not Todd � and for some reason when I said this person�s name I whispered it. This morning it occurred to me that people are often portrayed as doing this for "cancer" and the whisper for this person�s name suddenly seemed hilarious, so perfect and the best joke ever, and I have decided to adopt it as policy. One of the downsides to having a public diary now is that I can�t say here who it is, but if you are dying of curiosity, ask and I will tell you.