More concerning On-Line Journals: Yesterday it was that WSJ story <1>, today while reading Scott Anderson's "Words" I come across this entry where I discover that one of the first people to do this is the Girl in the (dry) Bathtub with the Laptop - this photo, looking down, was a cover for an issue of U.S. News and World Report, but I more strongly associate it with that 24 Hours in the Life of Cyberspace book. Her name is Carolyn and her site went static last December; follow the link on Scott's page if you're curious (and thanks to him for the flags idea)...I've never been very fond of Laptop Bathtub Girl - am I now counted among her company? It's ancient history anyway - article from April last year, entry from August - and me so cutting edge I never even really knew of them until February, days before I started my own.

This weekend's This American Life was about compulsive liars. A quote, about the kind of liar who, as L once said, "exaggerates to tell a better story":

Maybe you have to embellish it a little bit so it is interesting. Probably what is more likely the case is that, when your lie is believed and it doesn't solve your internal pain, that you have to crank it up a notch, so that, this time, maybe "I'll feel better - maybe this time I'll be acceptable to myself" and maybe that's what pushes people ever-closer to the brink and ultimately to a point where their lies are preposterous."

Just completed the afternoon's carrot juice ritual. What's a little eerie about this place and time in my life is a how the kitchen geometry is such that a narrow ray of sunshine illuminates the juicer's transparent-plastic output cup. This makes the orange carrot juice glow especially. What's amazing is how often I catch the setting sunbeam this way, since its duration is brief and time of appearance ever-changing.

Today's entry contains my personal "international flags banner" - these are the countries I've visited, in alphabetical order. The more astute flag-watcher will recognize that two are obsolete: Yugoslavia's and Hong Kong's have changed since I was there. I could've also included East Germany (but I couldn't find DDR flag clip art) as well as Iceland and South Korea, but I don't count those last two since I've just been to their airports. The DDR flag was just like West Germany's but with the added Communist German's symbol: an upright engineer's hammer and a draftsman's compass (in contrast to the sickle with its slanted hammer). The compass's legs were pointed down, at either 4:35 or 7:25. At the time of the reunification I recall talk of a new, United Germany flag: to replace this symbol over the dull horizontal German bars with one of their stylized eagles (this may have been my imagination). So the former East Germans live under "their" flag, instead of living under what could have been a new, "our" flag.