at last.

Just now, for the first time in my post-software-industry life, I had a feeling that normal people must have all the time: I had no idea what some geek was talking about. Listen:

"You know you’re rooted when someone asks if rooting is like jailbreaking their iPhone and you laugh in their face." 

Being rooted? Jailbreaking? No idea, and frankly without the word iPhone in there I wouldn't have known they were talking about technology at all. But here's why: they're talking about phones. And I think we know the VDuck position on phones. But still, it's a sign.

(BTW, if you're curious: rooting, jailbreaking.)

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Yesterday: went to see the World Press Photo exhibit at the Oude Kerk, except it wasn't there anymore (the exhibit, doh), so we just took pictures of a large organ (!, above) and 350-year-old graves in the floor.

Then we celebrated our attempt at cultural enrichment by going to La Perla for a pizza (nduja) and a bruschetta (fennel, arugula, capocollo) and of course some peoplewatching.

After which we came home to find the Valenteener just finishing a pot of handmade pasta with pesto (she's from the home of pesto, don't you know). How fortuitous. It was a pretty luscious second/third course, and got us almost all the way through the increasingly soapy pleasures of Downton Abbey's Season 2 (which, truth be told, was markedly less impressive than Season 1. But apparently there's a reason that not every series can run for 86 episodes or just be nonstop legendarily good). 

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i reach out from the inside.

If you know me at all, you probably know I don't like telephones.

Illustrative anecdote: It's 10am, I just came in from a long hot shower (our shower is out in the hallway). From upstairs I heard the sound of the white noise generator aka Taifun aka loud-as-hell antique-looking black metal (!) fan, so I assumed the Mara was still asleep.

Suddenly the house phone rings (vs. one of our mobiles), a semi-shocking, impolite, and unmodifiable sound. Roughly five people on earth have this phone number, and at this hour it can/should not be anyone we know unless they've just been shot or stabbed or otherwise intruded upon, but the idea of someone calling us as an emergency measure is pretty tragically misguided.

It rings again, jolting me out of my "who could this possibly be" thoughts. Instead of continuing to think, I immediately execute my default pre-noon phone-ringing behavior, which is to deftly remove the phone cable from the phone, thus returning The Pod to its preferred state in one swift antisocial motion.

A beat of silence, and then from upstairs I hear, "You dipshit, it's me."

This would be an artifact of days gone by, when our house used to be of a size/shape where the person just waking up in the upstairs bedroom would call the already-awoken person downstairs in the kitchen to request delivery of one or more breakfast items (or tiems, as I just typed).

So: pleeeeease. Don't feel bad if you call and I don't answer. It's so not personal.

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