THE GREAT DEEDS OF RONALD WILSON REAGAN

• Ronald Reagan invented the first smart laundromat card.
• His letter-writing campaign single-handedly convinced Coke to bring back its classic formula.
• He dreamt the entire series run of Hill Street Blues.
• Not only did he invent the "Baby on Board" sign but he also coined the phrase "Talk to the hand."
• His number one hit, Shall We Dream A Love? has been covered by more artists than any other song in the history of popular music.
• He didn't design the Magic Fingers device for hotel beds, but he held the patent.
• He was the first person to solve the Rubik's Cube, but only because he received the first prototype model for evaluation.
• Mixing hops and barley together in a year long since forgotten to us, he sacrificed the first beer to his Sumerian god Ba.
• He was the one who suggested the phrase "pompitous of love" to Steve Miller.
• Ronald Wilson Reagan leapt from life to life, striving to put right what once went wrong and hoping, each time, that his next leap... would be the leap home.

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June has finally arrived and with it the sweltering heat we were waiting for. Well, all right, perhaps "waiting" isn't the right word to use in these circumstances -- some might prefer "expecting with a resigned indifference" or just "dreading" -- but it's here and I'm vainly trying to get some kind of crossbreeze through the third floor hermitage as I pick my way through CDs I didn't think I still had.

OPERATION: CLEAN THIS CRAPHOLE is by all accounts a resounding success, starting sometime Saturday and, while still not complete, a measurable degree of completion has occurred. Enough has occurred that we may now consider it a big victory in the war against crapholes. This success is due in large part to Jo, who showed up on Sunday with a bunch of large contractor's trashbags, some fried chicken, a vacuum cleaner, and a real positive attitude towards clutter. Together we took in around $8 worth of redeemable soda cans, ate outside on the makeshift deck table (plywood board on crummy sofa!) and then scared the bejeezus out of the cats with the vacuum cleaner. I also had a few bottles thrown at my head, but we can forgive such trangressions in the name of cleaning. Now I owe her a few roller coaster rides to say major thanks, which I can definitely scare up sometime soon.

Part of the nice thing about the newly-cleaned place is now I get to live in it and enjoy it. Previously I only did major cleanups right before a move, which helps me not. I had a whole week in Cambridge in a beautiful, spotless apartment, and it just wasn't enough, darnit!

Yesterday there was an ad hoc rehearsal for Phillip Glass Buys a Loaf of Bread held without a director and without one-fourth of the group. Even so, Mare and Jamin and I did admirably, self-policing ourselves through a bag of trail mix and working page by page. I think I've got the first four pages memorized, which is a plus. Afterwards we hung out at Jamin's where he showed us this wonderful CG short called Same Difference. It was done by a local guy, and the quality is amazing. The story, involving five identically-programmed robots (who are identical until, of course, Something Happens to bring out their individuality) is cute and poignant without getting syrupy or preachy. Especially important is the robot who ponders, at one point, "What kind of meathead would program a robot to want pudding?!"

I'd really like to see it at next year's 24-hour Science Fiction Marathon because it's exactly the kind of thing the audience will enjoy. We screened Robot Stories this year, with a little director Q&A afterwards, and the film was extremely well-received. Greg Pak, the director, remarked how wonderful it was to finally screen the film with an instantly appreciative audience. (Of course, we Marathoners are a fickle bunch; the first question after the screening of the tragically bad Niagaravation in 1996 was "Why did you make the film suck?")

Still no word from OT on the gig they thought I'd be good for. Dammit. I try to be persistent but sometimes it just feels annoying. I'll have to call twice tomorrow to make up for the fact that I was busy vacuuming today. And now I am busy with the last beer in the fridge. You would be, too. It's just that kind of day.