Sara: Yeah, I remember the days of you coming on my face and chest, way way back BEFORE WORK SUCKED AWAY MY SEX LIFE!!

Do not tick off a sexually deprived, overworked Sara.

I've moved the discussion into private mail, because I've got other stuff to report besides head butting. Just wanted to say thanks again to all of you dear readers all over the world and from every sector of the Kinsey Scale. You guys rock, and you made me feel very appreciated and loved.

A bit of bad news from the home front yesterday. As you know, Lucy, our neighbor across the street, is a flight attendant for Delta. I saw her in the afternoon, going off to work and to pick up Ricky. She said he'd had a crappy day and could use some cheering up, and suggested that taking Angel over to play when he got home would be a good way to do that.

Well, he got home, talking about taking a resume up to Athens to look for a new job. (Inside voice: Ahhhhh! Noooooo!) I said, "Yeah, Lucy said you had a crappy day." He said, "It's Lucy who had the crappy day. We had to fax in her request for one year of leave without pay today. She's really upset about it, and she was crying."

Man, it just breaks my heart. Lucy loves her job, but she's only been at it for two years�just long enough to pay her dues with Delta, but not long enough to get far enough up the totem pole to have much of a choice. She could ask for a year's leave without pay, or most probably get laid off permanently. So, Ricky and Lucy just lost 40% of their household income. Ricky is going to try to find a higher-paying job, and that may take them back out of the city and out of our lives.

Please, please, I don't want that to happen. Next to the neighbors who put out, Ricky and Lucy have been the best neighbors ever.

Deb and Jake and I sat on Jake and Sara's front porch yesterday evening, talking about our days and watching a spider spin its web. The evening was the perfect kind of cool, the air laden with moisture of impending rain, the breeze gentle but not chilling.

I'd spent the day at home, talking with a contractor who's bidding on doing the renovation and repair work for our utility room. Remember when the ceiling caved in months ago? We still haven't had that fixed. And then we had heating guys come in the afternoon and install a thing that would let us be able to slide a new filter into the furnace. Whoever installed our furnace in the first place, positioned it so that above the filter were floor joists, and below it was the hard-packed clay of Georgia, so there was just no way to change the filter. Two hundred and fifty dollars later, that's fixed. Owie.

Jake had found out why the motorcycle is leaking oil. Apparently it's an inherent problem with the 1995 Suzuki Savage 650. It's nothing serious; we just have to keep an eye on it.

And Deb had a pretty boring day at work, but was the envy of all when she showed up at Jake's plumbing class to bring Jake some dinner. All the hungry future plumbers were sooooo jealous, and reminded Deb that next time, she needed to bring enough McD's for everybody. I don't think I've mentioned yet that Jake is studying to become a plumber. It's a long, long process.

This morning, after the morning dog walk, I had just finished checking my guestbook in the study, walked into the living room, and the front door was standing wide open. Angel was nowhere to be seen.

Oh. Fuck.

I guess the door didn't latch properly, and the wind blew the door open. I ran outside, looking all around, calling the dog. I ran back inside, shook Deb awake, told her to get dressed and come help me look.

Strangely, I wasn't really panicked at all. My heart was calm. My brain was functioning. I was trying to determine her most likely direction of departure. Calling. Calling. Looking at all the possible directions she could've gone. I had no idea how long she'd been missing. But I figured she probably headed in the direction of the most cat smell.

Deb came out and suggested that I get in the car and drive around the block. I decided to call Angel a couple more times first. And then she came bounding up the street toward us. WHEW. It did look like she'd been behind the house with the most cats.

I'm thankful it was early in the morning before we start getting much traffic. Getting a fence for our back yard is now higher on my list of home improvement priorities. Not like it would've done any good in this scenario, but it would still be a good thing. So would getting a new storm door for the front door. Remember when the wind sucked it off the hinges last spring? We still haven't gotten that replaced either. It's on the list for the contractor.

So that's what's been going on at Rancho Lesbiano.

Mason and Luke are back together, but we're all worried that they're just in the make-up phase of the cycle of domestic abuse. We've still only heard Luke's version of things, so it's all speculation. I just hope it turns out okay.

I'm six pages of content short on one of my magazines, so I'm going to have to scramble to fix that today and tomorrow.

No dates in sight. Not only is my page red, but Deb is bleeding, too, so our hoped for sex date tonight probably won't happen. Sara has zero time these days. That 3-11 shift sucks for me. I hardly get to see her, and neither does Jake.

Enough for today. Need to go get some food and back to work.

Oh, and for those of you who wanted to know, it's "Leatherwomen III", edited by Laura Antoniou, where one of my stories is published. The other is in the June 1995 Penthouse. If you're willing to buy the book or find the magazine, you deserve to know my real name. If you get the book, you have to guess which story is mine, though. I've already given enough of a clue to figure it out. :) Just let me know if anybody actually tracks one of these fine pieces of pornographic literature down. I want to hear what you think of the stories.