Nothing much to see here. Time to tie up some loose threads.

I haven’t done much writing recently. With the summer vacation season underway, Reader’s Digest (Canada) has more assignments available and I have a tough time saying no to paid work. So I work on stories of fish and logs and, in one disappointing case, material that James Randi would sadly shake his head at.

I visited my optometrist last week. He recommended an adjustment to my left, good eye – a weaker prescription, in fact. My right eye is much worse than it was two years ago, but I didn’t need an optometrist to know that. My right eye has 20/400 vision, and it’s only correctable with a hard lens. Even though the opthalmologist would not prescribe a single hard lens, I think it’s time for a second opinion.

I handed “Sheep’s End” to an actress/producer I met at Alex’s book launch. That’s a perspective on the story I haven’t consulted yet. Alex has on his site posted some of the photos I took at the launch. You know how to get there, right?

We have six more animals in our house: three small fish and three mantises. (We had six fish, which arrived home as birthday-party loot bags. Three are now toilet treasure.) We also have some beetle larvae, food for the larger mantis. We’re rejuvenating the old terrarium for the mantises.

I haven’t given a baseball update in a while. I think only my brother cares. Nevertheless….

My team sits in fourth place, but is only five points out of first. Frank, in first, is there because of two unnatural phenomena: Tom Glavine and Alfonso Soriano. While Frank just added Roger Clemens, it won’t be enough to keep him on top.

I’ve had a swarm of injuries to my pitching staff, which is now anchored by John Smoltz, Greg Maddux, and Odalis Perez. I’ve managed to maintain a decent WHIP, but my ERA is unusually high. I’m falling behind in wins, too. On the bright side, Woody Williams is back this week and I snagged Chuck James at the June 1 roster adjustment. Our next draft is tomorrow. There are seven moderate-quality players available, in my opinion, so I’ll be able to juice my lineup more than the teams above me. I don’t think I’ll get Jorge Julio or Matt Kemp, but Alay Soler should be waiting for me.

.292 batting average (1st)
133 HR (2nd)
503 RBI (1st)
59 SB (7th)
4.73 ERA (7th)
1.39 WHIP (4th)
35 wins (8th)
17 saves (6th)

We spent an anxious three hours today.

Children One (almost 12) and Two (nine) went to a neighbourhood swimming pool with a mutual friend around 3:30. Two hours later, Child One and the friend came home. They didn’t know where Child Two had gone.

Well.

Child One told us that Child Two did not want to swim, and said she would hang out in the park. When it came time to leave, Child One could not find Child Two and assumed she had come home, so Child One and the friend came home alone.

We and our dear houseguest Stuart drove around for half an hour, in two cars to cover more ground, but we couldn’t find our daughter. We called the police and they sent over an officer to take a report.

Now, this wasn’t the first time something like this has happened. Last summer, all three of my spawn went to a pool and the girls lost Child Three. He was found hiding in a bush near the entrance to the pool. You’d think that the scholarship-winning Child One would have learned something from that, or from the babysitting certification course she took this past year. You’d think, wouldn’t you?

So, my gentle-hearted, beautiful – really, she is, objectively – Child Two was nowhere to be found. We returned home to meet the police officer, who was a mother herself. While I was livid with Child One for separating with her little sister, I was impressed with her ability to converse in French with the officer.

During that conversation, we learned that while Elvi (the wife) had assumed that the kids went to the Benny pool, the kids had actually gone to the pool by the hockey arena. That pool is farther from our home, which made us feel worse, for its distance, and better, because we’d centered our search around Benny.

The stepfather of the kids’ friend was out looking for Child Two. While the police interviewed Child One, he called: he had found and retrieved Child Two.

Child Two was extremely upset. She’d taken a nap under a tree in the park and when she woke up, the other kids had disappeared. She spent close to an hour alone, waiting. She didn’t ask a stranger to borrow a phone, including the pool staff, and she wasn’t sure how to get home. When found, she’d been wandering in the wrong direction.

You can’t help, in a situation like this, once in a while thinking the absolute worst. It happens. How could a family go on after a nightmare like that?

There is a punch line to all this. Child One’s plan for the summer is to make money running a babysitting service. I hope she doesn’t ask me for recommendations.

Good news, everyone!

Katey Sagal spilled the beans on late-night TV: we can expect 13 new episodes of “Futurama”. Look at the comments following the post that link leads to. Somebody who may or may not be John DiMaggio (Bender) threw his two cents in.

The New York Post has confirmed the news. These 13 new episodes come on top of the “Futurama” movies announced earlier this year, according to Can’t Get Enough Futurama.

No news on whether the creative staff has signed on, but I can’t imagine the show without all that talent. For my money, the “Futurama” commentary tracks are some of the most entertaining of any DVD set. The booth was often writer-heavy.

While you wait for new episodes, check out IMDb’s huge collection of “Futurama” quotes.