Does that somehow make me sick? All the news anchors and weathermen seem to assume that I couldn't possibly want six feet of snow to land on us by tomorrow. I think they overassume. It always irritated me from even early ages when they would assume that their viewers wanted no rain. Um, hello? It was Indiana. There were plenty of farmers watching that I'm sure would have appreciated rain.

Don't be so presumptuous.

I remember seeing at AAG a couple years back a presentation about how certain weathercasters were more successful in helping people during extreme events because of cultivated trust, to the point that some people consider newcasters to be close to family members. Though these relationships are only one-way in terms of interaction, it's still very real to the people watching the news.

And on top of this, there were certain on-air personality and appearance traits that cultivated this trust, which ultimately had nothing to do with forecast accuracy. It was a truly interesting study.

Then again, the other side of this is what we learned during our exclusive (and yes, I do mean that not many people get to go there) tour of the Weather Channel when we chaparoned my dad's class trip to Atlanta a couple years ago. Beyond being in an unmarked and undisclosed location somewhere in the endless hillside office parks of the northern Atlanta suburbs, The Weather Channel headquarters and studio had multiple layers of security, including front desk people, a doorman behind these people, and three sets of doors worked by cards, thumbprints, and codes before you could get to the elevator.

I naively asked why so much security was necessary, whether it was some sort of crazy 9/11 thing or whatever. The tour guide replied that people become very obsessed with the television personalities, and that they've had serious problems with stalkers before.

Apparently, to some lonely people, the commonality that those folks share with the weathercaster about continously and illogically not wanting rain was enough to strike such a nerve.

I was, needless to say, somewhat stunned.

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We're down to three puppies, somehow. In the last few days, Adelaide, Boston, Dakota, Fargo, and Georgia have all gone to their new homes. Indy is due to leave tomorrow, which just leaves Colorado and Houston. Maggie has also garnered some interest. My current profile picture is me with a handful of puppies, which is all of them minus the unexpectedly early-departing Adelaide.

It's kind of sad to see them go, but it's nice. They're all going to nice homes where they will be the doted-upon new dog (and in some cases, the only dog). It will certainly be nicer for them than bickering for food with (and rolling in the poop) of seven siblings.

It's pretty bittersweet that Maggie is getting interest. I've been worried that no one will want her, even though she's very sweet, smart and cute. I mean, it's been amazing how vain people are with the puppies... I can't imagine how mean they'd be to a less-cute older mother dog who still has some semblence of milk-filled boobies.

You remember those shitty suburban fucks I talked about before? Well, there was another application that applied for Boston (a cute spotted puppy) that was scheduled to visit on this Friday. After Boston went home tonight to a nice family in Michigan, Amy emailed them to let them know that, while Boston had gone home, there were still two other cute little puppies without spots. She received a reply tinged with the sound of an upturned nose, saying that those puppies weren't as cute and didn't think the applicant's son would want one of the others.

People are so fucking vain. A puppy is a puppy is a puppy. Adelaide and Dakota (the other two spotted ones and probably the cutest), in terms of behavior and interaction, would have been my absolute last choice from this litter. Boston, on the other hand, was an all-star in all departments, but these jerks didn't know that! It's just sickening, though, that the other puppies aren't good enough because they don't have spots, and that behavior doesn't mattter.

They are animals, and not home decor.

On a similar note, Amy and I caught on the news last night that this odd hippy pet store found in a couple of Cleveland malls, was in trouble for mistreating animals. The concept was at least creative, putting bongs and other stupid new age shit with animals and stressing nature, but.... they treated their animals like shit. When we were there about a year ago (and not long after the opening) Amy tried to give advice to the owner about animal care, who actually listened but apparently didn't implement.

Anyway, this same owner, who's accused of neglecting the animals, was on the news because someone bought a puppy from him, and the puppy died. He was saying that, to him, the dog is ultimately a commodity and everything around it was a business decision. In his defense, the customer didn't contact him within the 14-day guarantee period or anything, and waited until after the puppy had been to the vet and had died before doing anything. Then again, the guy didn't seem too bright or compassionate anyway.

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So, some random good news from the day: I submitted a short one-credit course to the University as part of a pilot program aimed at introducing freshmen to college and to different majors. The aim was supposed to be one of creativity and interdisciplinary methods, and the program is to eventually replace part of freshman orientation.

The course I submitted was entited "The Geography of the American Roadtrip" which looked at some various popular literature written about road trips (a uniquely American phenomenon, I might add) and extracting various notions about space and the meanings of such trips.

Anyway, the class was one of 25 chosen on campus for this pilot program, and I've been instructed by the chair of the department to lay it out more and give him more details so that it can be implemented. It's mostly an honor to be involved, but yes, I'll supposedly get a small stipend for it as well.

Not bad, not bad.

This more-detailed outline will need to be turned in tomorrow... just what I need this week. Of course, this class means I'll be (and already have been) re-reading some of the favorites of road trip literature: Kerouac's On the Road, Steinbeck's Travels with Charley (a long-forgotten personal favorite that influenced the name of Charley, our dog), Sinclair Lewis's Free Air, Pirsig's Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance or even more contemporary things like Chuck Klosterman's Killing Yourself to Live (basically a book I always wanted to write but he beat me to it).

To me, this class is an accomplishment. Yes, it's nice to be chosen from an untold number of possibilities, but that's not the all of it. It's an idea of mine that I've brought into enough of an academic platform that I'm encouraged to make a new class from the ground up.

I feel like a grown up academic now!