Worked all day, then went to the office. Oh, I was in contact with the office; I love the IM meetings, and they’re far more efficient than getting up and walking over to online, which is in the Doomed Building across the street. The land beneath has been sold, and I expect it to come down in the next few years – good riddance, too, since it’s a blunt box of brick so hideous it belongs in a 70s college campus.

Speaking of which: downtowns and suburbs got their share of bad 70s architorture, but few places got hit as hard as college campuses – the prevailing style before the seventies was usually brick & columns, smothered with ivy for that noble look that says Here, Knowledge Is Imparted. The sixties and seventies additions usually reflected the worst of the prevailing theories, and clashed horribly with their neighbors. The U of M escaped the worst of it, though – the Mall, a great broad classical parade, was so overwhelmingly grand that the architects felt compelled to blend in. All the buildings were in the exact same style, same size, same columns. There were two empty spots at the end of the Mall, though. The Fifties addition was entirely featureless save for thin fluted columns that nodded to the neighbors; the 70s addition, Koltoff Hall, went all post-modern on yo arse and detached the columns and the portico from the building itself, as if to say: okay, well, if I must. But they won’t even pretend to be structural.) There’s a skyway between the Strib building and the Doomed Building; it’s always hot and close, but every time I take it now I realize that this view – walking over the street, suspended in air – will be lost in a few years. When the building goes down this particular perspective will never be seen again. That’s what happens when you knock things down.

Many, many years ago I did a writing job for a guy who’d developed some new kind of engine – the particulars are unclear, but in retrospect the project had SCAM stamped all over it. The guy hired a bunch of college students to write the prospectus and description, took us out to dinner, regaled us with stories while he smoked thick cigars, then put us up for a night in the Sheraton hotel. Odd. For all I know, he was a prophet of Ethanol; can’t say. But I do remember sitting in the hotel window at night looking at the city. The hotel was demolished in the previous decade after a brief run, and the particular view I had is lost for good, or at least until someone builds a 25-story structure on the same spot. Lesson: everyone should take pictures of everything all the time. Just to be sure.

I went to the office to clean out my desk, move my stuff from one drawer to another, and wipe down the surface of the desk I was vacating. Common simple courtesy. There’s still grot on my new desk I can’t remove without a chisel. How the human body generates thick black grot I don’t know and don’t care to know, but there’s like two decades of secretions and accretions on the lip of the desk. I’m not entirely Ungeresque in these matters, and I recall well my own sad past as a bad homemaker; once when I went away on a trip my fiancée, now my wife, stole into my apartment and cleaned it, because she could not bear the accumulated grit she knew lurked in the unilluminated corners. I remember calling her and hearing the distress in her voice, and while I was abashed, I thought of a Richard Broderick novel in which the main character dealt with his lousy housekeeping by buying small-watt light bulbs. Sixty watts, you see things. Ten watts, it all looks fine.

Anyway. I hit the fiche tank to get some material for buzz.mn, then went home to finish the Diner. Now this. Then Buzz. Casualties: email, life, conversation, peace of mind. I was sitting in the parking lot waiting for Gnat’s bus today, typing out a buzz entry, coordinating a meeting for next week with someone who already has his –

Oh, no complaints. Gnat just came out to the Gazebo to wish me goodnight and ask for an apple so her tooth could fall out although she doesn’t want to come out in the night because she sleeps with a tiny cloth Pikachu and she doesn’t want to get him bloody. Reasonable concern. Anyway, the ritual of the evening requires that I head upstairs to work while she sleeps, because the sound of my typing down the hall is one of those things that she needs, and it’s one of those things I am honored to provide. Back in a bit.

Later. Put her to bed; she wanted me to read her the Ratatouille book, and I was happy to do so. It’s not a storybook, but a study of the characters and locales. She was fascinated by the overview of the restaurant, and wanted to relive the movie by tracing the various events in the specific locales. I ended up reading it in a bad Fronsh accent, and she fell asleep with one small hand on a picture of Remy.

It’s the sort of thing you want to photograph and send to the people who made the movie. See? It worked. Bless you.

Now I have to finish the day’s work. Tune in to buzz tomorrow, as we bring back comics from the 40s. Specifically: Lance Lawson! Yes, it’s Lance Lawson Cliffhanger Thursday, a new feature.

Oh – two new motels, here, and here. There’s more, but I just haven’t had the time. Not that I’m complaining! A richer life I’ve never had. On the other hand, I woke at 3 AM from a very bad dream in which the phrase "Euthanasia Suppositories" had a significant role. So the subconscious still has a few things on its plate, apparently.

See you at buzz.mn!