So, if one of us had a fantastically dramatic fall on an advanced route in the climbing gym, and that person actually managed to pop their leg out of their hip socket (and immediately back in, thank the gods), and that person ended up unable to walk for the entire day and was propped up for hours pressing a bag of frozen peas to their thigh, which of us would you guess that person was?

Me, of course.

I feel much better today. And Tony had a great time carrying me up and down the stairs in my underwear.

Tony flew to LA yesterday to start voice recording for CSI. He's recorded four of the actors so far. He grabbed a pile of video games (ours) before he left, to hand out as thank you gifts, and discovered that several of the actors have game systems in their trailers! Very cool. He had to find a Best Buy to stock up with more games after the first pile got gobbled up on the first day.

Much less exciting here. Shopping, computer repairs, another new book illustration. I'm addicted to the graphics tablet.

Tony is going berzerk. He's still going on "the busiest day of his life," getting set for voice recording on the CSI product. Looks like he's flying to LA tomorrow to record four of the actors. Awesome. He spent the day working out the nuances of the contracts -- racing against the clock to have it all locked down by tonight.

Still pending.

Not much I can do to help other than cheering him on and ordering lots and lots of chicken to be delivered when he gets home.

Both of us were sick all weekend. We're more or less okay now, though I am in a rotten mood. My emailbox is full of bad book news, bad personal news, spam, and quintuple-forwarded political manifestos. Someone send something good, quick.

Hoping to see the new Harry Potter tonight, and also planning a trip to Home Depot to spend about nine thousand dollars on light bulbs. Sick of the house looking dim and dreary by five in the afternoon. In the meantime, I'm raiding the kitchen for lowfat ice cream.

Afternote: Tony just got home with impending great news for the CSI game. More details to come...

Been too groggy with painkillers to post. Had the second half of my root canal on Thursday. Went fine but hurt a lot afterward, and I guess I took one too many Vicadin because I ended up sleeping away all of Friday. Too dizzy to manage the stairs without falling down, so had to call Tony to please hurry home and feed me.

Now it seems as though he's getting sick. Hacking cough. This is a shame because we hoped to compete in the Cranberry Crank -- the fall climbing competiion at the gym -- this afternoon. Between his coughing and my falling down, I don't think we're going to win.

Waiting for Tony's train to get here so we can head out climbing. We're both feeling tired from our days, but we know we'll be happy we went.

We bought a graphics pad on Saturday. (It's a Wacom Intuos2, for those in the know.) Almost returned it within ten minutes of taking it out of the box -- I couldn't draw AT ALL. Hardly a stick figure. Tony thought it might be a learning curve problem. Kept at it for another hour and ended up drawing at about my second grade level. Discouraging. But after some practice on Sunday morning I was up to fifth grade, and by evening it was feeling pretty normal, and suddenly today I can draw things I wouldn't even attempt using pen and paper. Wow.

(Funny thing is, I still can't write on it. My handwriting comes out blocky and weird, like a kindergartener's. Anyone else experience this?)

First big storm of the year. Tony's train was stopped twice on its way home because the crossing guard arms (the ones in the intersection that go down and say 'ding-ding-ding') kept being blown into the sides of the train. Our patio is covered with leaves and mud. A roaring sound in the bathroom ceiling suggests that there is a leak in our attic. And we lost our web connection for about twenty hours. Ugh.

While doing graphics tablet research I came across the -- gasp -- new tablet PCs. Been rampaging around the house and repeatedly bothering Tony at work to inform him of how profoundly I need one of those.

(By the way, things are still looking quite exciting with the book, but I'm restraining myself from posting all the ups and downs here because I don't want to jinx anything.)

Tony is having another insane week. We still found time for climbing on Tuesday (I climbed my hardest wall yet!) and for Mom's birthday dinner last night, but the lists of things we still want to do are piling up. So are shows on the TiVo. So are shipping boxes in the office, filled with new goodies. Can't wait for the weekend.

I'm shopping around for a graphics tablet. Does anyone have any experience with these? Is a 4x5 drawing area just too small?

Went climbing on Friday. And again on Saturday. Our friend irene visited us on Sunday; of course, we took her climbing. Many adventures on many new routes. Tony tends to be more of a power climber, attacking the same route over and over for a heavy workout; I'm more of an adventure seeker, always wanting to try something newer, something harder, something higher.

Tony wrestled with the DVD writer all weekend. Buying cables. Installing the video capture card. Dealing with media conflicts. He's very close now, though, so within another day or so he'll be a DVD-burning maniac.

At the moment, the only rational response to my week is to either go climbing or to buy six bags of leftover Halloween candy. Going to try climbing first, as soon as Tony's train gets here. Can't wait to try that 65-foot wall again. And if that fails, I think the supermarket will still be open when we're done.

Or maybe not. We just bought an extremely snazzy video capture card to go with Tony's new system, and I'm getting that graphics pad after all (hey, it's tax deductible now that I'm semi-officially an artist) so tomorrow should be fun. The one thing that's better than a post-Halloween binge is a technology binge, right?