I was really sick of dealing with Mac OS's default perl install, which is just weird enough to be a big pain in my butt. I installed from source, which was fine, but it meant I had to install a lot of modules again. (I was not interested in adding /Library to @INC; I have an irrational fear of what would happen.) Now that I have SOAP::Lite installed, my blogging script will crosspost to use.perl again, and I think I will start writing more regularly again.
We built our cavy cage! So far, our guinea pig expenses are about $125, and that's with no guinea pig! Most of those are one-time expenses, though, and my prediction is that it will be relatively cheap to keep the piggies. I'm keeping a ledger of cavy costs, and I'll post my estimated monthly guinea pig costs once I have an idea what they should be. First, of course, we need piggies.
Gloria's sent some emails and web forms to local-ish adoption places, and I've called a few local shelters. So far, no joy. We're getting needy! We went and looked at Superpetz and the stores in the Westgate and Whitehall malls. None of them were inspiring. They all had one or two nice-looking cavies, but most seemed itchy or unhealthy. There was a really cute one at Westgate, but she looked large with children. The clerk said she wasn't, but also said he wasn't sure which cage was the girls and which boys.
The store at Whitehall was atrocious. They had four pigs in a tiny cage (1.5 square feet or so) with a wire floor. We were tempted to take some home just to get them the hell out of there.
For now, though, we have an empty nest.
Since I've felt so unmotivated to work on software projects, I'm working on another little project, my D&D Campaign. I'm trying to get my campaign world designed in adequate detail, my player's rules handout completed, and the various story plans laid out. I made a lot of progress, mostly on the setting, and I'm now trying to get a set of players together. I'm hoping to start the game in a few months. Toward that end, I get to install the i-Installer again, so I can install teTeX. I wish it was more like a normal Mac OS package.
This week, Jay from the UK is here. It's an odd visit: he's going to sit at the empty desk in my office and read the Llama and Alpaca books. If he has a question, he will bug me. I think that's the entire plan. Jay's a nice guy, so I'm sure it will be a pleasant visit, but it seems weird.
