I'm getting all sorts of email from people who insist that they enjoy reading my bitchings and whinings.

You people really need to get a life.

Kidding!! I'm loving all the email, and I do feel better about keeping the journal. I've heard from some new people, which is always cool. I see the hit counter go up, and I wonder just who all my readers are. I figure I can account for about thirty, maybe forty of them. The rest? Who knows, but I hope they're enjoying it!

It was pouring down rain when I got out of work yesterday. It had been fairly nice when we'd come in for our shift, so no one had an umbrella, and we huddled in the doorway until the shuttle showed up to take us out to the employee parking lot. The rain was sheeting down with unbelievable force, with no break in sight, and just in the twenty-foot dash to the shuttle I got thoroughly soaked. But, half a mile up the road there was no rain at all, and in fact, Slidell was bone dry. I drove an hour, soaked, to my house where the sun was shining, birds were singing, and all that other crap. Welcome to the Deep South and its summer thunderstorms.

But, I'd rather have the occasional cloudburst to cool things off a bit than the 100+ temps that the northeast is suffering through. It has actually been a rather mild summer here, especially compared to last year. (I know, I managed to escape the South for most of last summer, but I remember how hot it was before I left.)

Ah, but the big news of the day is that I got Official Word from the Sheriff's department that I've been accepted to the reserve academy. Of course the actual dates of the academy are still in question, but I've been assured that I'll be contacted.

So this, of course, means that I passed my psych eval. I was talking to a dealer at work who's a retired state trooper, and I told him that I was officially Sane. "No," he replied with a twisted grin. "It means that you're suited to be a cop. And that really calls your sanity into question!"

But sane or not, I was glad to get the official acceptance. I've been on serious pins and needles wondering whether I was ever going to hear back. Now if they would just hurry up and schedule the class...

Funny thing is that I heard a rumor (and I have no idea how true it is) that part of the reason that the class is delayed is that only three people out of all the applicants passed the psych eval. How can anyone not pass that thing? Come on, people... When they ask you if you hear voices, say No!

But the real joy of the day was my trip to the dentist for three fillings. I have a truly superb dentist who manages to make the injections as close to painless as humanly possible, however I have some sort of funky nerve structure in my lower jaw and he had a hellacious time getting the lower left side of my mouth numbed enough for him to drill. He finally ended up using a slightly different anesthesia, and injected it straight into the bone. Well, my body didn't care for it obviously, because I started feeling really light-headed, and my heart started pounding a million miles an hour. This was not normal for me--I have essentially no dentist-anxiety, so I knew it had to be caused by the drug. I told my dentist and he took Appropriate Steps and it went away after a minute or so. He apologized and explained that by injecting right into the bone it dumped straight into the bloodstream, and my body decided to have an adrenaline reaction.

But finally everything got numbed up--in fact I was numb up to and partially including my eyeballs on the left side of my face thanks to the gajillion injections--the teeth got filled, and I was sent on my way with instructions to not try to eat until some of the numbness went away (I couldn't feel my lips or tongue--there was no way I was going to attempt to ingest food) and a bill for an even thousand dollars.

Gulp. Thank the powers that be for insurance.