Well, things are looking much better, even though it’s a dark, gray day outside, courtesy of Tropical Storm Isadore.

First off, I’m feeling better, even though I’m not at quite 100%. In talking with the doctor yesterday, the best we can hypothesize is that I took a glancing blow from the stomach flu, and while it didn’t hit me full-on, I got some of the nasty lingering after-effects. Fortunately, the effects seem to be fading with time.

Starting tonight, the craziness of the weekend begins – yes it’s takaza and Duncan’s Pride Party 2002! Let’s see, rustitobuck is coming in first, around 5 PM. Not long after, Aerofox and Loriana should be driving in (just a short jaunt down from Ohio). linnaeus and datahawk will be coming in on a 10:45 PM flight, along with the peripatetic Cheetah. brophey and rasslor should be driving up from Atlanta either late tonight or tomorrow morning. All of this is made utterly fascinating by the fact that my parents are supposed to be driving from New York to South Carolina today and mentioned they might crash for the night at our place. They’ll get along famously with our friends, I’m sure, but it’ll certainly be an interesting clash of worlds for us…

So, what’s on tap? Well, we’ve got a free party for 25 tomorrow night at Jillian’s (think Dave and Buster’s for smaller markets). Free food, and free video games, yay! I intend to play many rounds of Panic Park. After that, we’ll head out for dinner.

On Saturday we’ll head up to Durham’s Duke University East Campus for North Carolina Pride 2002. It’s a nice, low-key parade and festival that was a whole lot of fun last year. At last report the weather is supposed to cooperate, so it should be a really enjoyable afternoon.

And on Sunday…well, we don’t have much planned for Sunday, and that’s a Good Thing. Maybe a short hiking excursion if folks are up to it, but that’s about it.

We’ve been having lots of fun with menu planning, too. While we’re not cooking every meal at home – sure fire way to make Duncan a complete burnout – we’re doing up some nice meals. Let’s see, tonight we have steak au poivre with a brandy cream sauce, garlic mashed potatoes, spinach, and homemade chocolate chip cookies for dessert. Saturday morning we’ll make up some nice French toast and bacon on the side. On Saturday night, we’ll have roast pork with herbs, oven-roasted potatoes, steamed broccoli, and molten chocolate cake (yum!). Sunday brunch will be quiche Lorraine – well, sort of. Tastes as good or better, in my opinion. We’ll supplement that with fresh fruit and homemade cinnamon rolls. And we’ll finish off everything Sunday night with a dinner of hamburgers, homemade French fries, and salad.

Whew. Sounds like a lot of work, but with folks pitching in to help, we’ll eat well and have a good time too (and actually the dishes aren’t that hard or time-consuming to make – we made sure of that).

Unfortunately, with all that planned (and a lot of shopping still to be done!) I’m stuck at work today, though I’m taking tomorrow off. So I’ll slog through the rest of the day and hopefully take off by 4 PM so I can shop and put the finishing touches on the house.

Back to work, tra la!