"Lock the doors and close the blinds -- we're going for a ride..."

Shavuot -- the Jewish Holiday of "Weeks" is in its second (and last) day today. It began on Sunday evening.  An interesting holiday, it falls exactly 49 days (7 weeks, hence the name) after the second night of Passover.  It was originally seen as an agricultural pilgrimage festival where Jews headed to Jerusalem during Temple times to offer up sacrifices of their first fruits.  Later on, it was associated as the holiday when Moses ascended Mount Sinai and received the Torah.  We're not really observing it this year in full furvor, which makes me feel a tad guilty.  But then again -- one of the traditions is to stay up all night studying Torah while eating cheesecake, which would likely make me feel even more guilty.

Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - The Radio Series:  Amazing. The third episode of the Quintissential (Fifth) Series debuts on BBC4 this evening; I'll be looking for the BitTorrent of it soon after.  For those of you who haven't heard any of it -- whether it be the first two seasons released in 1980 and 1981; the third series released last September, or the fourth and fifth series currently being broadcast, it's quite amazing.  The last three series really keep to the spirit of the last three books, but allow for some adaptation for the new millenium and the jokes associated with pop-up ads and novelty ringtones.

It's Flag Day today -- but, more importantly, voting day here in Virginia! Yes, today is the day where we have statewide primaries.  It's a pretty special day in that there are primaries for both the Democrats and Republicans -- as there are two Republicans vying for the Gubernatorial nomination and four Democrats looking to be Lieutenant Governor. Add to that the primary for our District Delegate and you have a good, fun race.  I like local politics in that you really can get some good fact-finding done without having your thoughts polluted by negative campaigning on the most part.  I'll be voting for a guy name "Chap" and a guy who happened to be serving at the Pentagon on 9/11. I hope there's some substantial turnout at the polls...

Negativity:  Yes, yesterday I was frustrated beyond belief at work. I even blogged and expressed my frustrations about how I feel that I'm the only one with a work ethic "here." And that became interpreted as "here" being Mindsay. Which was never my intention. So -- I erased the entry.  Apologies to those who thought I was slamming them specifically.  (And yes, sandyquill, I'd be happy to take the kids for a day and make them vaccuum our home and clean our bathrooms. It would be my pleasure...)

Your random stream-of-consciousness moment of the day:  Michael Jackson
was found not-guilty on all ten counts.  Michael Jackson had a hit with
a song called "Ben" in 1973. "Ben" was the title song for a creepy
movie about a boy and his pet rat. And we have rats in our backyard that seemed to have manifested as soon as I cleared out that "jungle" a few weeks back.  Both our next-door neighbor and we have called our respective exterminators to put out traps.  And we're both afraid of letting our respective toddlers play in the backyard! Hopefully we'll be rat-free soon. I just don't get what's attracting them back there -- there's no food, no garbage. Just... trees. And bushes...

And that's my acrostic.  I dare you all to do the same on your blogs...