I’m sitting here at work, silently thankful for forgetting my leftovers at home, because if I eat any more stuffing, gravy, or yams, I will explode in a cloud of turkey-scented goo. Our weekend was fun, exhausting, comfortable, and relaxing at the same time. After inhaling the feast (and killing the last four bottles of white wine left from the wedding), we laid around and watched football. Friday we split off into three groups—my Mom and sister headed out to Ellicott City to shop, my father and I went to check out the B&O Railroad Museum, and Jen crashed out upstairs, trying to recover from a chest cold.

The B&O Museum has come a long way since my Dad and I saw it last. We crawled around the engines in the parking lot about five years ago one Sunday when the museum was closed, but the closest I’ve been to the exhibits inside have been drunken paper shows held by the AIGA where I was more concerned with remembering names than looking at locomotives. Last year, the dome over the roundhouse collapsed under the weight of a heavy snowfall, and I think it may have been one of the best things to happen for the museum (damage to some of the priceless exhibits notwithstanding.) They’ve taken the opportunity to expand the whole facility, redesign the interior layout, and add staff. We were surprised to find a long line outside the front doors, packed with young children waiting to see Santa and the model trains. There’s a food concession stand, new model exhibits on extended loan from the Smithsonian, and several newly refurbished engines sitting outside the work shed (which will be open in 2005.) I’ve not seen my father’s eyes that wide in a long time. Saturday we made the Annual Pilgrimage To The Shrine Of Inexpensive Swedish Furniture, and later hit Home Anthology to wade through the midcentury modern goodness. All in all, it was a very good visit.

Plug. We had the good fortune to catch The Shipping News on AMC last night—if you get a chance, check it out. It’s a quiet, slower-paced movie, but rewarding and entertaining. From the director who brought you Chocolat.

Advice.I’m thinking about taking some current freelance cash and finally getting a large-format color printer for the office; I’m leaning towards a Canon but put off by the $500 price for an inkjet. Anybody have one they can recommend?

Holy Fucking God, does Windows XP “Professional” suck donkey balls. I’ve had it running for three weeks and it’s the buggiest, crashingest, most spyware-infected, slowest piece of shit I’ve used since Windows 3.1.