Like a hurricane
The last and only time I saw New Orleans was in September of 2002. Corporation X had flown 100 of us there and put us up in the Wyndham New Orleans at Canal Place downtown, right across the street from Harrah's, for a week of training-style meetings, Power Point presentations, spooky morale event graveyard tours, and unscheduled bouts of employee drinking. What no one had planned for in making these arrangements, however, was the arrival of Hurricane Isidore. 
Downtown shops began to dutifully board up their storefronts and send home their employees a day after we arrived. In some cases they seemed to do so with a joking air, as though it were a rote schoolyard fire-drill. Tourist attractions closed. Bourbon Street was eerily bereft of tourists. Hotel guests were advised by remaining skeleton crew staff to stay inside the hotel as the storm was due to blow that night through town. Dinners and activities were tabled, and employees gathered, muttering, in the hotel bar to drink it out. New Orleans got lucky that day. The hurricane lost its momentum on reaching the US, and was downgraded to a tropical storm. That night, it rained. Three of us ventured outside for only a moment and were instantly swimming-pool soaked, through our raincoats. The wind blew hard, hard enough to scare you a little when you held out your arms.
By morning it was over, and the sun came out. We likely walked to Mother's Restaurant for lunch, because it was back open again, and everything was, thankfully, business as usual.
Much is made of boys and the things they collect. Entire cultural reference points revolve around mint-on-card 
Like most pre-teen girls, I kept sticker albums, organized by theme and brand, and had distinct opinions about the merits of various designers, e.g., I detested Lisa Frank, purveyor of fussy airbrushed unicorn and Betty Boop fantasy-scapes, essentially the 
OoL, Origin(s) of Life, in production this August, is a new handimated short film, dramatically illustrating theories behind the origin of life from a microbial perspective. It is soon to be brought to a random West coast film festival near you by the creative team of 
By way of explanation, I had wanted to hyperlink "handimation" to some brilliant Wikipedia dissertation on the topic, but the internet is surprisingly bereft of data about this popular filmmaking technique, in which hands move objects around, e.g., those persistently ticket-hawking paper bags of Fandango infamy. Suffice it to say that Brandon has a storied history of handimated filmmaking and set design from his long-distant days in the choose-your-own-major program of a chimerical Californian university, followed by years of editing films as a profession, and thus brings some heavyweight credentials to the handimation craft. For her substantial part, Raven has an impressive biochemical education and a mean way with a needle and thread, forming both the backbone of OoL's scientific ideals, and the form and substance of its principal characters. More of her creative work in the arena of science can be seen at 
Various novice voice talents have been drafted to play key roles; see more at the 
It might seem a little early to start thinking about this now, but you might need the lead time to talk yourself into it. I'm referring to 
I am sure you remember that this was a lemon bundt cake, which was your designated birthday cake flavor, and afterwards we went to the mini golf place, you know, the one with the giant fiberglass head with the sombrero. It was of course, probably 100 degrees outside on that day, quite possibly 30 years ago today. How time flies, little pal. 
Nobody makes cooler compliation CDs than Nup. See what 
When I was in college, there were these two guys in a neighboring dorm who were determined to live the early 90's hipster lifestyle to the hilt. On every given day, these dudes, whose names I entirely forget (odds favor that one of them was a Jason), were decked out in a melange of conflicting popular disaffected cool dude styles, culminating in an overall effect that could best be described as punkabilly Danny Zuko skater boy: sideburns, check. Crispy, shellacked Vince Vaughn hairstyles: check. Comically oversized pants with torn pant cuffs and dangling pocket chains: check. Gas station attendant shirts from Thriftway with iron-on name patches, once belonging to guys with actual jobs: check. One of them may have even had Buddy Holly horn rims with the lenses punched out, I'm not too sure. My friend Peter, a sardonic classics major with a yen for reading inscrutable Greek tomes, wryly deemed them "The Maintenance Men." 
There comes a time in every relationship when you realize that the probationary period is safely past, and it makes sense for that person to keep a toothbrush in your bathroom, so that they stop using yours. 
There is also this matter of his friendlessness. Every fish tank is a potential 
