So maybe it's like this: King Of The Cats, in a bygone time, created the illusion of a virtual world. I'd develop friendships within KOTC, but it was really a solitary activity, and the world of Fleattle was merely shapes on a computer screen. Then the Get-Togethers happened and suddenly I was bowling and dining with people I'd previously known only by assumed names like MCP Kitty, Smirk, or Velvet Paw, and by the words they'd type onto my computer's screen. I remember thinking, at the time, that it was like meeting the puppeteers behind the show I'd seen only as a audience member.

Geocaching is different than KOTC in the fact that the world geocaching creates already exists in the real world. The computer is only a reference point. Still, when we bought our GPS receiver, I thought of geocaching as a solitary activity. Maybe someday we'd run into a fellow geocacher out on a hunt, but we'd come to know them by their logs on the website or by the style of their cache hides. Maybe we'd learn what they look like from photos they'd post. Still, in the beginning, when we set up our geocaching account, I didn't know that someday I'd be in a U District pub, drinking beer with Markta, Dayspring, Global Girl, Jitters79, Fishiam, and whole roomful of other people behind the logs. I met the puppeteers.

I went to the "1st Annual Tiresome Usual Suspects' BrewHaHa" yesterday evening. It was our first geocaching event. I didn't write about it last night because I was tired, but mainly because I'm still sorting out my feelings about it. I had a great time - no doubt about that. I got to meet the humans behind the geocaching logs. I talked with fellow practitioners of the sport, swapped stories and strategies, and learned how our cache hides are truly thought of.

Yesterday evening was a moment when a computer screen became something much more. That's the feeling I'm having trouble sorting out. I'm still not sure where this log is heading.

Meanwhile, I wrote that I went to the BrewHaHa because the original plan was for Phillip and me to meet there - it was at a pub in the U District, close to Phillip's office. But yesterday morning, Phillip woke up with back pain. He drove to work and made an appointment with his doctor in the afternoon. I took the University shuttle from work to the BrewHaHa, expecting Phillip to be there already. I spent most of the evening with an eye on the pub door, expecting Phillip to come walking through at any moment. I caught the 43 home and learned that the appointment had run longer than expected, so Phillip had gone home. I understand, but I'm sorry he wasn't there.

While I was doing some web surfing last night, I stopped by Muslim Wakeup! to re-read the interesting editorial in support of gay marriage (or, more specifically, a condemnation of the condemnation of gay marriage). That led me to Muslims For America, where I found the Muslim Christmas story. I had never heard it before. That led me to my (English) copy of the Koran. I found the story told twice.

It is a slightly different version of the story I know from the Bible. There are no Wise Men. There is no manger. There is no Joseph. It is a woman's story. It is Mary's story, until Jesus is born. Mary gives birth under a palm tree, which showers her with fresh dates. A stream springs up at her feet. No one believes Mary has a child without a man, until baby Jesus speaks to the people.

Adventures In Scheduling, Continued

A patient came up to the front desk today, demanding to speak to "the person in charge of the phones." I told him that I didn't understand what he was asking. "You know," he said, "Whoever runs the phone system." I still didn't get it. He told me he'd tried to call our clinic (the hospital's telephone center, actually) and got "put on hold forever." I understood him then. I guided him to the complaint forms, and he filled one out. He returned the form to me, and I dropped it into the outgoing mail. Then the patient asked me to schedule the soonest appointment with his doctor - the reason he'd called the telephone center.

"The soonest we can get you in is Monday, the 23rd," I told him.

"Do you have anything sooner?" asked the patient.

"No, that's the soonest," I replied, "Monday the 23rd. We have 9:00, 10:00, and 10:30."

"I'll take the ten and the ten-thirty," he answered.

"Which one? The ten, or the ten-thirty?"

"I want both."

He lost me again. "You want two appointments on the same day?"

"One's for my friend."

"Who's your friend?" He gave me a name I didn't recognize. "Do you have his hospital ID, Social Security number, or birthday?"

"No." - and he repeated his friend's name.

I looked at the growing line behind him, despite having three of us at the front desk. I imagined the patient and me on the phone together, and each one of those people in line being on hold, waiting for us to finish our conversation. I typed in the patient's friend's name. The computer found seven patients by the same name. Fortunately, the first person I selected came up as being a patient in our clinic. I confirmed his friend's city of residence with the patient - he knew that much.

I scheduled patient, printed the confirmation slip, scheduled his friend, and printed that confirmation slip. The patient took both slips and stepped away from the front desk. The guy in line behind him took a step toward me. The patient turned around, in front of the other guy, and came back to me.

"Do have anything later in the day?" asked the patient, "We're coming in on the ferry."

"Not on that day. We'd have to go with a later date, if you want a later time."

"No, I guess we'll keep these. Can I call back later to see if there's been a cancellation?" I said that he could, as I remembered the complaint form in the outgoing mail.

The Best Use Of A Cell Phone I Saw Today

I scheduled a patient this afternoon for a February 17 appointment. As I was printing the confirmation slip, the patient dialed a number on his cell phone. "I want you to write this down," he said to the person on the other end, "February seventeen..."

Meanwhile, as Pet sits laughing about what she calls "the bunny dream," it occurred to me today that my dreams seem to rely on off-screen voices a lot. Maybe everyone's dreams do - I don't know.

(I forgot to mention that the inhabits of the mansion - except for the bad dancers - were heard but not seen.)

New Year's Eve came and went for us without fanfare - without recognition, actually. I fell asleep watching the Twilight Zone marathon on the SciFi Channel, while Phillip had gone to bed before then. I don't know what happened. It just didn't feel like New Year's Eve to me. I could blame my cold.

My cold lingered on New Year's Day, as we took Craig out for pizza at Zeeks. I had an enjoyable time, as usual. As usual, I was reminded of just how rich I am, in the scope of the world.

After leaving Craig, Phillip and I went geocaching. There was a Travel Bug in one of the caches I found on Friday, and I wanted to help it on its way. The goal of that Travel Bug was to see beaches around the world, and there was a cache at Matthews Beach I wanted to drop it in. I was driving from memory - the GPS receiver was in the trunk - and I took us to Magnuson Beach by accident. It was a fortunate mistake, because there were wind surfers at Magnuson Beach, and the Travel Bug got to see two beaches with us. We found the cache at Matthews Beach, and dropped off the Travel Bug. There were two nearby caches that I'd written down, but I was tired, and we had plans with Colin and Martin, so we went home with our one cache find for the day.

The plans with Colin and Martin fell through, so we postponed them until today.

Last night, Phillip couldn't sleep, got up and saw me working on a puzzle cache. Phillip suggested that we go find it - my solution put in on the UW campus. I wasn't so sure that I'd solved the puzzle correctly, because my solution also put the cache in the center of a busy street, but I agreed to some night geocaching. Along the way, we looked for the one cache I couldn't find on Friday and, after showing Phillip which bench the cache owner had confirmed, Phillip spotted the cache container in about five seconds. We didn't find the puzzle cache I was working on, which confirms my suspicion that I don't have the right solution yet. (We didn't actually look in the middle of the street.)

I had an interesting dream this morning. I happened upon an old video arcade game. The object of the game was to cool rabbits down with an electric fan. It looked like fun, but I was reluctant to play it because of the cost - three games for four quarters. Eventually, I decided to play it. I dug through my pockets for quarters, deposited them, then touched the fan icon on the screen to choose "one player." Then the game began. The game was played outside of the arcade machine, however. The arcade machine was in a large, otherwise empty, room of a large mansion. The game was played with a real electric fan, and I was cooling down real rabbits. I'd run around the mansion, finding rabbits, or groups of rabbits, and earning points as they lifted their faces toward the cooling breeze. After a while, it got harder and harder to find rabbits, and I got worried that my time would run out in the game. So I went upstairs. I found a rabbit upstairs that I suspected was actually a cat, despite assertions from the rest of the inhabitants of the mansion that it was actually a rabbit. For a while, the short, pointed ears and long tail had me, too, convinced that it was indeed a rabbit. But then it started meowing, and I convinced the other inhabitants of the mansion that rabbits don't meow. Then I found a group of people - people I knew - trying to learn how to dance together, and not doing a very good job of it. I stopped to watch the dancers and forgot about the arcade game. (There seemed to be some sort of narrator telling the viewers of the dream that I'd forgotten about the game, because at the same time, I didn't seem to be aware that I'd forgotten about the game.)

Then Phillip woke me up. It was eight o'clock, and the 14 bus to downtown, to the museum, was scheduled to leave at 9:20-something. My cold had hit me full blast. I got up, took a shower, and shaved for the first time since Thursday - but all I really wanted to do was go back to bed and sleep for the rest of the day. I considered asking Phillip to go without me (again). In hindsight, I'm glad I didn't.

We found Lynn outside of The Seattle Art Museum. She was first in line. I enjoyed the show a lot - better than I thought I would, to be honest. There is a lot more to the works of Louis Comfort Tiffany than lampshades. I had no idea.

After the museum, Lynn and Phillip and I had lunch at The Pike Place Brewery. Then we said goodbye, Lynn caught her bus home, Phillip and I caught the 49 home, and I went right to bed and fell asleep immediately. Phillip had to drag me out of bed two hours later, when it was time to go visit Colin and Martin.

I wish we could have had a longer visit with Martin and Colin. Colin wanted us to play a game of Scrabble, and that sounded very good. But Martin had plans, I needed some sleep, and Gladden needed to be fed. Phillip and I went home, I went right to bed, but I didn't sleep as much as I had earlier in the day.

Now it's the middle of the night, and I'm suddenly awake.

I meant to type the December Church Council meeting minutes on Friday. Then I meant to type them on Saturday. Then I meant to type them on Sunday. Then I meant to type them today.