Manhattan Lodestone closes. Thousands of students sent out to the street to sell pencils.

We TVFTed last night. I thought CP might join us, but he was apparently too busy making money at his day job (and also trying to convince Jules that the authors of Nostrum couldn’t possibly have been lost in the snowstorm in which they were lost because the snowstorm didn’t exist—this is over at the Nostrum Nation blog—which is sort of like Richard Dawkins lecturing at the Vatican, but that’s another thing altogether) so it was just the usual suspects. But it was interesting. We attacked tournament management, and in 45 minutes barely got started. Rather than do a 3NR-type 20-hour podcast (wink, wink, but I listen to those guys myself on their less esoterically polician issues, and you probably should too, just to keep up) we decided to break it up into parts. In other words, more to come. At least this time we actually recorded it, and it was worth it, as compared to last week when we didn’t record it, which was better still because it sucked eggs. This one also includes naughty bits, although my swearing and O’C saying “Bleep bleep” after the fact isn’t really what I would call effective airwaves management.

Bleep bleep indeed!

Speaking of Nostrum, one of the things about being an old mentor to the lads is that I get to find out what’s going to happen before anyone else. (The Panivore thinks there’s something odd about this, but as a general rule, the actors in a play know get to know what’s in a play at a point before the audience finds out.) I was able to share a few tidbits with O’C, not enough to give anything away but enough to keep him on the edge of his seat. He seriously thinks that he’ll be spoofed in the series at some point. Hmmm. I do know that the list of characters on the Nostrum Nation site keeps growing, and that O’C is tracking it obsessively for clues (the fact that Manhattan Lodestone’s ultimate “e” had inadvertently not been bold-faced sent him into conniptions; I had ask Jules to fix it or face losing O’C to the darker more padded reaches of Bellevue). ’Tis a strange and glorious world we live in.

Catholic dinner tonight, poker tomorrow, Grands on Saturday. Great entertainment all around, if you ask me.