For the record, I do think Ross and Rachael will end up together in "The Last One."

Last night I mowed the lawn. I successfully spent 2 hours in the yard without a single neighbor criticizing me! This really is cause for celebration.

Then randomly went to dinner with some friends at my favorite Tex-Mex place, Mely's. Yum, those margharitas really pack a punch. I don't know if the food is really as good there as I think it is, because after about half a drink, I'm hazy for the rest of the night. I know, I'm a lightweight.

Something very flattering happened this morning. I love when you write something and someone didn't know you wrote it and then they quote you. That's funny. Of course, that person will figure it out after reading this entry.

I'm not feeling as cheery today as I was yesterday. More defeatist. I'm going to go cheer myself up by buying a new car. That's the solution -- spend more money than I reasonably have, and that will make happiness come back. The cool news is tomorrow I have a sim (yeh sims!) as an LSO. I'm going to have to use this to satiate any and all desire for flight control in the immediate (and possibly far) future. Someone told me I should submit another resume to Scaled Composites, and maybe I can spend more time as an operator because their vehicle is likely to be flying before the space shuttle is. But I am going to try to have faith in the NASA-system. How brainwashed have I become?

They named a new astronaut class today. They used to jokingly call the last astronaut class the "penguins" because there were so many astronauts, some of them might never get to fly. And I thought the line to be a FDO was long! Some of them are really cool though. At least one Georgia Tech alumni. One who spent his childhood going from Mexico to California with his family of migrant workers. Three who currently work here. One who is married to a girl I flew on the Vomit Comet with (ok, that's like a third degree of association, but...) A pilot who did two tours in Afghanastan. Three teachers, including a 29 year old woman (wow, that's young!) and one who taught at international schools (maybe I should go do that... I'll add it to my Peace Corps and/or Foreign Service future).