Random Updates

Using bulleted lists is a great way to avoid having to write coherent segues:

• My cat (the aggressively nice brown and black one) is still hanging around. He seems to come sneaking out of the bushes every morning when I come out on the porch. The white one is still hanging around some too, and they seem to get along well. I think she's his girlfriend now. I hope at least one of them is spayed/neutered.
  
• I picked up a Tai Chi DVD a few weeks ago and have made what are probably some hilarious attempts at learning something. I do tend to get tickled 'though since all the moves seem to have names, and they come at you sort of rapid-fire. "Now we will do 'Parting the Wild Horse's Mane'... now 'Moving Hands Like Clouds'... now 'The White Crane Spreads its Wings' ... now do 'Inserting the Broomstick into the Donkey's Butt'." (The last one is just to see if you were still paying attention. Actually, I misheard "Moving Hands Like Clouds" the first time and thought it was "Moving Hands Like Clowns"; it gives you a totally different impression of the movement, doesn't it?)
  
• One of my colleague's tells me that a major problem on the last assignment he graded was students saying that "3³ = 9". I told him it probably resulted from someone asking the smart German exchange student "Is 3³ = 33?", to which he responded, "Nein."