January 15, 2005 - 6:12 AM - Silver Spring, MD

I'm at the 24 hour greasy spoon just off of Georgia Avenue, near Colesville Road, a few blocks from Vincent's apartment. I'm using the Sharp PC, just like I would do at Bickford's in Chelmsford at zero-dark-thirty ... stopped at the 7-11 for cigarettes (no smoking indoors in Maryland, and it's a frelling cold night ... needed my coat and gloves to catch a smoke outside! :-) ... they were just setting out the fresh donuts at 04:30, so I decided to get some on the way back, rafter than wait for him to finish.

I've spent the last few days over on Varnum Street sorting through Vincent's krink ... culling Phynque's DVDs and VHS tapes from his martial arts tapes and video game disks ... getting his room and the solarium cleaned out before my trip.

The plan is to leave next Saturday (2005-01-22) by train, with a possible layover in Chicago, and arrive in Las Vegas, NM either on Monday or Tuesday, then leaving on 2005-02-04 (Friday a week later), and back on Sunday the 6th ... Pip can spend two weeks in a kennel at $22 per night.

I was going to drive and take my telescope, but calculated that gas for a 2,000 mile road trip (4 days, 3 nights) would be $320 (16 cents per mile, with 12.5 MPG and gas at $2.00 per gallon), so even with a few cases of halal MREs and sleeping in the van, it would cost at least $800 for the round-trip ... and with the crappy weather we're having out west, I might not even be able to use my Celestron and CCD, which was the whole point of driving ... I'll have to see how much it would cost to ship it UPS/USPS and rent a mini-van/SUV when I get there.

The omelet was good, the coffee is $1.75, but bottomless, and now it's 06:30, and time to go get donuts on the way home ... in all, a good shakedown as I prepare for Vagabond Days with just the Bag of Holding and the hard Samsonite brief-case with the leather saddlebags (for the MREs) ... I'll have Orion (the Linux laptop) in the blue knapsack ... I'll take a space blanket, but not a sleeping bag or tent.