the long goodbye

reader, some of you know that the brother was recently here for a week's visit, having called the baron 6 days before his date of arrival to say, 'hey. i have a week off. can i come visit?' the baron and the husband were - of course! - delighted that the brother chose to spend his free week with them... he is, after all, a super easy house guest, requiring essentially no entertaining; more often than not, they'd find him in the sun room, deep into his book.

the baron became quite accustomed to having the brother there, seeing him at lunch and cooking for three at dinner. he is, as ever, good company, sober and silly and sentimental and spiritual all wrapped up into one really tall package. the only drawback to having him there came when he and the husband would jointly decide to rebuff the baron's requests. her personality, though forceful, is not enough to overcome the likes of this (their response to her request to take a picture of the two of them):

the husband: really?
the brother: come on, the baron, do we have to?
the husband: he's too tall. i'll have to stand on a stump...
the brother: hey, you know what we should do? we should do it like in 'lord of the rings', like gandalf and frodo!

the brother: i'll stand back here...
the husband: ok.

the brother: lemme see that picture.
the husband: that is great!
the brother: that's so good! it's exactly right!
(hearty laughs all around. the baron did not participate, but could be heard to mutter, 'stupid'.)


the week's visit passed too quickly, as all good things do, and the brother left last thursday. *sniff, sniff.

happy, happy

reader, today is the brother's birthday! the baron is staggered by the fact that jonathan is 28 years old - she remembers him younger, softer around the middle, with a haircut only a mother could give. his face - always so round, and his eyes, so big and mischievous - has changed into something leaner and harder; it has beautiful edges now. reader, do a mash-up of the two faces below... he kind of looks like that now.

but can you play basketball?

this weekend, the baron finished her re-watching of 'veronica mars', season 2, and moved on to season 3. she was three or four episodes in - an episode where wallace is having a hard time balancing his mechanical engineering schoolwork with his intense basketball schedule - when she recognized someone on the screen. not one of the series regulars... not wallace, or the guy who plays the coach, or the guy who plays wallace's best pal on the team... someone else.

reader, she recognized someone from her own life, someone she's written about before... the brother!

it had quite escaped her memory that the brother played an extra on 'veronica mars' during season 3. any basketball-centered episode, you can bet he's there in the background. he's even in some of season 3's cafeteria scenes, but it's hard to pick him out.

anyhoo, the baron recommends that, should you be watching the third season of 'veronica mars', you be on the lookout for number 14.

and, if you were wondering... no, he can't really play basketball.

4 minutes to 10

the photo above was taken the other afternoon. unless you, reader, are either privy to some kind of psychic insight or you were standing over her shoulder as she took this picture, the baron is guessing you won't be able to tell where this photo is... after all, one tire doesn't say much.

it's the husband's car, on the curb at the national mall, in front of the air and space museum. it turns out that one cannot legally park on the curb at the mall until 10am! the husband had driven the baron and her brother to the museums for the day, parked the car and headed off to work with a "wait here until 10 so we don't get a ticket!"

the time was 4 minutes to 10, and no ticket was issued to to the silverado.