Journal of a Sabbatical

September 1, 2000

aj.sfm

Today's Reading: nothing

Today's Starting Pitcher: Rolando Arrojo

I set the alarm for 7:00 AM to make sure I had enough time to eat a good breakfast and have some coffee and still allow extra time for traffic along the road to Groton. The radio came on at 7:00 all right. Did I get up? Nope. Morning Edition felt like a rude intrusion on my dreams about classifying lichens and photographing trees in war zones. Besides that, Wilbur wanted to sleep in so if I moved I risked being scratched. By the time I did get up I figured I'd get some breakfast and coffee at one of the fast food establishments along the way.

My ears are stuffed up, indicating ragweed pollen and mold spores converging on my micro-climate. Arrrrrgghhh! I feel like my head is underwater.

Noticing the sweatshirt and collection of baseball caps in the back seat, I figured I'd better move all my junk to the trunk before picking up the children. Not having had coffee and still suffering from pollen/mold spaciness, I opened the trunk directly into my forehead. Ouch. A lump formed but was not black and blue thank goodness.

Lately, to avoid the traffic and epidemic of bad driving on the section of I495 between 114 and I93, I have been taking 133 to I495 in Tewksbury. Believe it or not this is usually faster than getting on at 114. Not today. The IBEW strikers at Raytheon in Andover have multiplied in the past couple of days from a large gathering of shouting union members to an extra large gathering of shouting union members. They're spilling over into the road. Plus they have a small truck with trailer (a 10-wheeler as opposed to an 18-wheeler) from the Teamsters driving back and forth on 133 at 10 to 15 miles an hour to slow down traffic -- so we can hear their grievances as we drive by I guess.

Just before the intersection with I495, there is a big hole in the road with two, count them two, Grad-All type things digging away and blocking the road totally in both directions. Every once in awhile, the cop lets a few cars squeak by the hole. The Teamsters truck turns around at that point because the police are doing a much better job of bringing 133 to a standstill. It's backed up from there to past the lake, almost to the Raytheon plant. I decide I have time to get something at the Honeydew Donuts drive-thru. The guy who waits on me is wearing a T-shirt that says "Too Cool for Words". We exchange pleasantries and I ask him if he's really too cool for words. He laughs and says no they just make them wear those T-shirts. I never thought of Honeydew Donuts as particularly cool before. I get my coffee and the traffic has not moved.

Finally I'm driving south on I495 with plenty of time to meet the young 'uns and brother number 2 at the designated meeting spot in Acton. I notice a ring of coffee in the cup holder but figure the cup just overflowed and dripped down the side. I sip idly at the coffee, not realizing until I am almost in Acton that the bottom of the cup is leaking and I have been dripping coffee onto my Friends of Plum Island Light T-shirt the whole time. A lovely pattern of brown dots surrounds the top of the lighthouse. Oh well, can't exactly go home for a clean shirt at this point.

The kids are into playing SimFarm lately. They showed it to me a couple of weeks ago but today Andrea insisted that I learn to play it. To me, the coolest thing about it is that Massachusetts is one of the regions you can choose for your farm site. It displays little gray blobs all over the place to represent the rocks. Andrea claims Massachusetts is the best place to set up your farm. I think most actual farmers would argue with that, but heck, this is a game.

It's got weather, disasters, droughts, floods, insects, fungi, weeds, you name it. The only threat to farming it doesn't have is the encroaching development of high priced executive homes. Andrea tells me the guy with the farm stand down the street is getting hassled about his goats. I guess people who pay a cool half mil for their house in the country don't want to be too close to goats.

They got their copy of SimFarm from Casey across the street. Just when farming is becoming a quaint touristy thing around hear, kids get interested in it. Go figure.

The graphics are not exactly arcade quality. The tool bar is a little small for my suddenly aging vision. The sheep look like tiny white blips hard to distinguish from the slightly larger white cow blips. Still pretty cool though.

I site my farm in Massachusetts among the rocks, plant carrots, and try to raise sheep. I keep spraying the wrong things on the pests that crop up so the carrots don't do well. I do make a tiny profit on the sheep though. I save my game in case I want to play with it more later.

Andrea's strategy is to raise only sheep and sell them as soon as they get big and will bring a high price. They breed fast and she has to keep adding barns. (See SimFarm Gateway for more tips, tricks, and strategies.) She makes a fortune on her sheep.

For some reason, we did not watch Emergency Vets today. Hope we didn't miss any cool surgeries on sheep or anything...