I am home and Terz indeed has a mild bruise from the close encounter with my fist this morning. I am contrite and calculating the appropriate penitence, barring the extreme solution of getting separate beds. For one thing, our room is too small for separate beds.

My brother sent me an e-mail, moved by yesterday's journal entry, to assure me that Singapore in an earthquake-free zone. See, the thing is: I know all this. I am not about to rush out and stock up on boh chye and pretend to get ready Survivor-style before Oct 21. I'm too rational for that. But that irrational part of me ist hinking: if you fear it, it won't happen; if you ignore it, it will happen --- so fear it, but don't act on that fear, and all will be well.

My mind works in mysterious ways --- truly.

Since I brought up Survivor, I think it is appropriate that while I am in this penitential mood, that I confess that I plan to watch the next season of Survivor when it airs on Friday ('live' from the US, i.e. midday, though it will be rebroadcast at prime time). This is not a product of well-honed devotion to the TV show. I disdained the concept when the first season made its debut, refused to have anything to do with it, and freely disparaged people who were hooked on it, including my friends. With the second season, a couple of insidious forces infiltrated my home and the next thing I knew, one fine Friday evening, as the two tribes were about to merge, there it was: Survivor, coming to you from a big TV screen in my apartment (it was you, wasn't it, G?). And then we kept watching --- partly because my husband and the aforementioned G thought Elizabeth was cute, mostly because it was oddly addictive and unexpectedly funny. (That whole thing with them carving idols and tossing them over the gorge still cracks me up, as does Jerri and Colby's 'getaway' to the Great Barrier Reef where Colby stole coral.)

And now, we're on season three and I should know better, but here I am, twiddling my thumbs in anticipation of episode one on Friday. I've never seen an entire season before. I might have tried to watch earlier episodes of season two if they hadn't nixed the half-Asian guy in episode two. I haven't bothered to catch reruns of season one that have been playing on Sunday evenings. But I will give season three a shot and see what irreparable damage is wreaked upon my brain as a result --- or maybe I'll just spend every Friday night cackling for an hour as a result, which would be suitably therapeutic after I get home from my International Economics class.

Terz already found the cute chick that he's going to watch for this time round. She's not as cute as Elizabeth, but Elizabeth truly epitomizes the term 'cute as a button'. I think he's got his eye on some advertising chick this time around, though...