Bubbly

Vast arcs of cloud ride north like lines of breakers. Vapors drift across Orion, too, and cause Mars to dim and brighten. The moon remains free of them. The air hasn't cooled off as much tonight as it did last night, and the insects are still buzzing as dawn nears. Summer is making one last push against fall, which begins Thursday. The heat won't bother me now, though. I know it's almost over. Even the sweltering days of July and August are fading from my memory. Having survived those, how could mere September intimidate me?

Korean/Brazilian/American designer Ji Lee has an interesting project going. He has printed 50,000 speech bubble stickers and placed them on ads, movie posters and signs around New York City, inviting passersby to fill them in. Then he goes back and photographs the results and posts the photographs to his web site. I was reminded by this of the things we used to do to our Pee-Chee folders when I was in high school. Mine were invariably covered with speech bubbles, as well as modifications of the various illustrations. I recall my Freshman year folders as being particularly rude and filled with double-entendres. I'm sure they were nowhere near as funny as I thought they were at the time. Still, I wish I'd saved one or two of them.

I think I need to stay up for a while today and call AOhelL, to cancel the six month free trial that came with the new computer (the 28th is the billing day.) They are sometimes reluctant to let the suckers customers go, I've heard, and sometimes multiple calls are necessary. At the very least, I'll probably have to endure some long, whiny, lie-filled sales pitch. I hope I don't have to stay on the phone for too long, though. My schedule is screwed up enough as it is.

Maybe

There was rain in the southern part of the state today. There is rain right now around Stockton, about a hundred miles down the valley. Here, afternoon featured no more than a light dusting of cheerful, fluffy white clouds. They began to thicken a bit toward evening, and grew sufficiently dense and pervasive to lend the dusk a delightfully gloomy atmosphere, but thus far they have served only to perpetuate the day's sultry humidity. I keep listening for raindrops, or the distant sound of thunder, but I've heard only gusts of wind that shake the acorns down, releasing an autumnal clatter to disturb the serenity. I would dearly love to have a thunderstorm tonight (though no power outages please, thanks.) Second best would be for the clouds to simply dissipate, so that the heat can escape. I certainly don't relish the thought of a sultry and humid night.

I called to cancel the AOhelL service this morning, and found that I had miscalculated. The free trial ends on October 28th, not September 28th, so I've got another month coming. The sales pitch I got was that, if I continue the service beyond October, I would get their full service for $14.95 a month, guaranteed for as long as I remained with AOhelL. This is still 50% higher than my local ISP (more reliable, quicker connection, fewer disconnects) is costing me, and, of course, AOhelL can't give me the splendid domain name chiconet for my e-mail addresses. Still, I'm letting AOhelL continue for the final month. It does have automatic redial when it (frequently) disconnects, and, in combination with Opera's automatic resume of interrupted transfers, this makes it a handy way to download large files while leaving the computer unattended. Not enough of a reason to sign up for ongoing service, I think, (not even at the discount price) but another free month, fine.

I was also informed of something I didn't know, namely that the lower-priced ($9.95 a month) Netscape Internet service is actually owned by AOhelL! Who knew they had a budget line? Sneaky.