There are some more pictures of Bearmicks in his gallery. He's done several interesting things, including watching the fish, sleeping, sleeping in Emma's bed, sleeping in my bed and sleeping in a drawer.

Sara and I played Ticket to Ride last night and she beat me, 127-122. She did really well, especially for her first time. She built the longest route, going from Vancouver to Toronto by way of Santa Fe and Atlanta. She got all four of her high-point destination cards, while I had six lower point cards and missed one of them. Check the gallery for a picture of the gameboard.

My three year old daughter, Emma, is very particular about her radio habits in the car. Luckily, she does not make me listen to Radio Disney. Here are some of my favorite musical moments of the past week:

1. Emma saying, "Mom! (She is in the backseat of our SUV, a '95 Trooper which doesn't do much to reduce the wind noise outside--hence the exclamation point.) Play the 'Jitterbug' song! (This is what she calls 'Wake Me Up Before You Go Go', one of her favorite songs on my 80's mix.)

2. Much like number one: "Mom! (still noisy in the backseat) Now I want 'Radio Staw'. ('Video Killed the Radio Star').

3. After driving to work on Monday (which takes about one minute), Emma had an important question. "Mom, why did they say 'The Planet'? They are supposed to say 'The Buzz'. (I had turned the radio to a different station during commercials. Apparently she shares my affection for Lazlo.

I love that kid.

Adrian Bank has become the sponsor of Swap Shop, a call-in show on 92.1 KMOE in Butler, MO. We created a series of 60-second ads and I was asked to help. We recorded the ads on my laptop using Audacity. I wrote and voiced two ads about online banking:

Fourth Location

Id Theft

If you live in Bates County area, you can tune into Swap Shop from 11:25 am to noon Monday through Saturday.

Email: personman2@gmail.com

Skype: dannysaraemma

I was getting ready for bed the other night when I realized that my toilet seat was up. Not being a regular occurrence at the Ferguson household, I realized one of our many guests of the evening must have committed the offense. I then delved into my memory bank of past toilet seat mishaps and realized that I have shut the lid many times when people come to visit. It is then tha tI had this revelation, which I will share with you now. First, a little background:

When I visit a person's house, I inevitably must use the bathroom. When the deed is complete, I ALWAYS shut the lid. I think I have always assumed this is what one should do after using the restroom, particularly one that is not yours. (There is of course one exception: the toilet that has no lid. College students, I feel your pain.) The reasoning behind this somewhat OCD pattern, I guess, is that it makes the bathroom look nicer (is that even possible?--everyone knows what goes on in there) and that I have always done it that way.

Anyway, I suddenly realized that I had made a judgment error. I finally understood--other people have totally different expectations as bathroom guests. Perhaps they even have well-planned bathroom etiquette such as mine, except they have arrived at a completely different conclusion. Maybe they leave the lid up for ease of use; a courtesy applied to the next commode visitor. Or maybe they prefer the open look, the outdoorsy type. At any rate, I realized that for far too long I have been slighting these well-intentioned persons and taking away their ability to serve others in this capacity.

So, from this day forward, I vow to not say those nasty things in my head as I close the toilet seat after someone has used it. (I would say that I will forevermore leave it open, but we just got a cat who is interested in all sorts of water containers and I would hate for it to fall in.)

Oh, and by the way, if you have ever been a guest in my house, this was not meant as an insult; I really wanted to share my newfound knowledge with the world. Please continue to visit, and leave the seat as you wish. As I would imagine Oprah saying, if I help just one person end their cycle of toilet seat shutting, I have done my civic duty.

I worked the drive-through window at the bank on Saturday for the first time. We had a lot of customers come through, but one sticks out in my mind. He had a rifle setting in the passenger seat of his car. I wasn't really nervous because I knew that he was just cashing a check on his way to go hunting and he probably didn't think about what he was doing. And the bullet-proof glass made me feel safe, too. It's nice to live and work in a small town where I don't have to assume the worst about people.

Last night we had my parents and sister over for dinner. Jenny's boyfriend Casey came later and once we could tear Dad away from the History Channel we played a couple of board games.

Banana Republic
This is a card game where you try to bribe some politicians and get the most votes. The winner becomes the president of the republic. You can also play killer cards on a stack and try to off an elector so no one gets the vote. Up until last night, Mom had never lost this game. Here are the final votes:

66 Diane
24 Casey
18 Jim
0 Sara
0 Danny

Tikal
Tikal is a tile-placing, piece-moving, board-exploring, treasure-collecting kind of game. It won the Spiel des Jahres in 1999. Casey jumped to an early lead and spent his time building up a temple to level 10, which I promptly took over and put a guard on, giving me those points for the rest of the game. Then he tried to poach two of Jenny's temples, which she had built up to 8 and 9 repectively, but she put a guard on those and stranded his players. Nice work, Jenny. Final scores:
172 Danny
112 Jenny
106 Casey

I just ordered a new board game. Matt has got me into German board games and I thought it was time to have one of my own. Ticket to Ride won the Spiel des Jahres (Game of the Year) for 2004. And it's supposed to be good for beginning gamers (read: non-geeks). By all accounts it's a very fun game and I'm looking forward to playing it. I found it for a good price at an eBay store called Clarified Games. And shipping was only $5, which is very cheap for eBay.

My brother Mike finally added some pictures to his gallery.

Now in German: Mein Bruder fügte Mike schließlich einige Abbildungen seiner Galerie hinzu.

Now in Dutch: Mijn broer Mike voegde definitief sommige beelden aan zijn galerij toe.