There are few things more surreal than waking up to a Russian-accented voice announcing in your bathroom, “Drano smells good, yes, I will give you that.”

Vladimir the plumber arrived this morning. Chad and I were still crashed from D&D the night before, so I’m not exactly sure what he did to our bathroom, but I hear it cost $200. (That our landlord is going to pay, thank goodness.)

The game last night was great, and I’m more than a little sad that we won’t be playing again until 2002, and maybe even February. It’s not easy, coordinating so many folks' schedules. We all seem to have Lives outside of D&D. Amazing.

I’m headed into The City tonight, on my beloved public transportation. I’m turning my study upside-down looking for my favorite pocket map, a copy of the one I envied from Jen’s purse, over a year ago now. It’s teeny-tiny and perfect and makes sense to me, which is more than I can say for some of my other maps. Most of all, it’s teeny-tiny! Where is that confounded map?

Since I’ve been in varying degrees of back pain for the past six months, I broke down and made a massage therapy appointment with my coworker’s massage-therapist boyfriend. I’ve saved my pennies and tomorrow I will receive a whole hour of pain respite. At least I hope that’s the end result. I’ve never had one of these.

At least it’s cheaper than Vladimir.