I'm currently trying to push out a biggish blog entry, but I haven't quite pinched it off yet. In the meantime, here's a little something something.

My overachieving friend, Johanna, who is an ex-surgeon/visual designer/nutritionist/photographer/candlestick maker?, is currently putting together an interesting project. She's creating a book of anonymous secrets, which will be displayed at an art show here in San Francisco later this year. She's gathering the secrets via her web page, and will then create an actual book, which will only be readable under black light.

She's a good egg, and letting go of a secret in an anonymous way is a liberating experience, so I encourage folks to contribute. It's cheaper than therapy.

http://www.johannarogers.com/invisiblebook/

On a totally unrelated note, despite my disdain for the holiday season, I'm forced to admit that the last couple weeks had quite a few high notes.

First off, The Plumber Who Saved Family Holiday, soon to be an annual Christmas-time special on the Lifetime channel. Jeffrey was part MacGyver, part saint, and all neighbor. I still owe him.

Secondly, I took tons of great walks with my daughter. As it turns out, age five and a half is the perfect age for this. She's able to walk a couple miles, is chatty, and is interested in most everything we see. One day we took an epic 3-hour hike that featured walking sticks, crawling through brush, a rope swing, and clambering straight up a hill sans path. Another day, we took a walk during a rainy evening, featuring flashlights and boots. Much splashing occurred.

Thirdly, I even got to run with my daughter. The day before Family Holiday, she declared that she wanted to go for a run with me. So, we suited up and she jogged a full mile, up and down the hills of San Francisco here in our neighborhood. We followed this up a week later by also including my wife in a family jog. I can't quite express how much joy it gives me to go out for a jog with my wife and daughter. I was beaming the whole time. We got many "how cute!" looks from the neighbors.

Fourthly, after we had that epic house-cleaning session, it was soothing to exist in a non-cluttered environment. I enjoyed that for the hours that it lasted.

Lastly, although it's been a while since I had an exciting New Year's Eve, we did have a few friends over this year, and we had an enjoyable evening. Like all good geeks, our celebration included cramming stuff into the microwave to see what would happen. I can at least halfheartedly recommend microwaving Ivory soap. The stuff foams up with a surprising consistency. If it weren't for the semi-nauseating soapy smell that infected my microwavables for the next day, it would have been a wholehearted recommendation.

Back to work tomorrow.