9/1: Went down to Angell for the second weekend in a row. This time I bought myself a new roommate, a young grey-haired boy named Grady who will move in with me on Tuesday.

8/11: Had a blast at DrASK's annual Where's George BBQ in Lexington. It was made doubly good because the proceeds from this year's raffle are being donated to my Pan-Mass Challenge ride, in honor of Doomer and Xine, making this record year even better in terms of fundraising.

8/9: Despite not feeling very well, I went to the Peabody Essex Museum up in Salem with my mother, brother, and niece, and toured Yin Yu Tang, a merchant's house that has been moved in toto from southeastern China.

8/8: Spent the day with my mother, brother, and niece, who are in town visiting. We hit the interesting Museum of Printing up in No Andover, and then drove around Gloucester, including visits to the hospital I was born in, the house we lived in at the time, Good Harbor Beach, and the Fishermen's Memorial.

8/6: Enjoyed a relaxing and wonderful day wandering around Provincetown with Sheeri on the day after this year's Pan-Mass Challenge. In addition to shopping and eating, we made our way up the Pilgrim Monument before finally heaidng back to Boston to close another absolutely wonderful PMC weekend. more

8/5: I and thousands of other Pan-Mass Challenge riders made our way up the length of Cape Cod to Provincetown on an absolutely perfect summer day. Again, I rode easily, in company of friends like Charlie, Matt, Jennifer, Emily, and David.

8/4: At 93°, this first day of this year's Pan-Mass Challenge ride was a real baker. However, I rode very easily and enjoyed a relaxed day in the saddle with a bunch of my riding friends from Quad Cycles.

8/1: Chances to see culture jammers Negativland in concert are few and far beteween, but I caught them as they made a stop at the Middle East. They haven't lost any of their edge, but the "It's All In Your Head FM" show came off really heavy-handed, when a more subtle treatment of the subject of religion might accomplish more good.

7/26: Moseyed down to Berklee to see a great performance by Count Chocula and prof Matt Jensen's Acid Reggae Xpreience. Jensen has injected a lot of energy into his Berklee students, and in addition to his original music -- an awesome combination of reggae, dub, and funk -- the ensemble also reinterpreted Steve Miller and Stevie Wonder. See them whenever you can!

7/24: Attended an author talk at the Harvard Coop by Princeton academic Anne-Marie Slaughter, who was in town promoting her "The Idea that Is America: Keeping Faith with Our Values in a Dangerous World". It was great to finally hear someone bring values into the American political equation without using them to justify greed and hatefulness, even despite her Kohoutek hairdo!

7/18: Optaros party at Bob's house. No pictures yet.

7/13: Bought myself some shock cord and took my old digicam out and created my first set of bungee photos! Some of the results were pretty interesting, too! Check 'em out!

7/11: Two years ago I set up a LiveJournal PMC community, but it has yet to take off. However, today I created a Pan-Mass Challenge Flickr group for pictures and discussion about the ride, and hopefully we'll have a core group of people who will post their pictures of this year's ride!

7/11: Dragged my CIMC buddies Janine and Mark out to a fairly offbeat author talk at Borders by Lama Surya Das, then followed it up with my first trip in many years to a P.F. Chang's: the Cheesecake Factory of Chinese food.

7/5: Moseyed over to Bromfield Camera and picked up a Nikon S200, a tiny little 7Mpx P&S that does image stabilization, movies, and even time-lapse movies! With these features and its tiny size, it's the ideal camera for taking on the bike, and particularly on my Pan-Mass Challenge ride next month!

7/4: My coworker Jay-Bob joined me for what could be the last occasion to bike ride on Storrow Drive, then Janine joined me for my other Fourth tradition: Indian food! After Namaskar, we caught Pirates of the Caribbean 3 at the Somerville Theater.