I’ll be hosting the Carnival of the Godless this Sunday (May Day). Writers with a godless perspective will be submitting their posts and essays, I’ll review and summarize, and you get to peruse the entries at your leisure. Chock full o’ heathenistic fun! (Wanna play? Send your entries to cotg-submission@brentrasmussen.com

In other Radical News, Iva and I spent a wonderful weekend at the Oregon Coast in Astoria. We hooked up with our friend Karri and went to the Clatsop County Crab & Seafood Festival, which should be called the Wine and Seafood festival, given how much oenophilia was occurring there. I got my hands on a local late harvest Gewurtztaminer that Iva calls “candy wine”. Yum!

We also sat in on Karri’s radio show at KMUN 91.9 radio. It’s a community radio station, all volunteer. Karri was sitting in for the folk show, so we played so good stuff — Elizabeth Cotten, Joni Mitchell, Bob Wills & the Texas Playboys, Kris Kristofferson, and Tom Waits, among others. Never understood the appeal of Tom Waits; he sounds like he gargled razor blades.

I played my first professional gig as an Oregonian. I made my debut with The Modulators, which happened to be their finalé. The drummer, guitarist, and female lead singer are all quitting. No matter, as the other guitarist and keyboardist are going to join Kenny and I to form a new band. It was nice to be onstage again, that’s for sure.

OK, now the big news. The Writ may be on something of a hiatus for a few days. I’m having surgery on my wrist this afternoon. I have a nice ganglion cyst on my right wrist. Years of typing code, writing blogs, and playing bass have taken their toll. Normally, I wouldn’t opt for surgery, because I’m generally against cutting up my body without a good reason. But the cyst has grown from about M&M-sized to bottle-cap-sized and it has been giving me some discomfort as of late. And I have a wife who nags me about it and tells me it is not getting any better.

Interesting how this blog started as a diversion after surgery on my feet and it’s lasted up to the surgery on my wrist. I’m just falling apart here as I get old, huh?

Oh, I almost forgot! We also picked up a new kitty for our apartment. Our current kitty, Isis, is about 6 years old. She’s an all-black domestic shorthair with a fat belly. She’s grown bored and needy so we thought we bring her a friend. Karri volunteers at the Clatsop County Animal Shelter, so we went there and picked up an all-white 1-year-old domestic shorthair. The special thing about this kitty is she has a zig-zag tail. It has three 90-degree bends in it near the tip, and it makes her tail look like a lightning bolt. No name yet. I’ve suggested “zigzag” and “lightning”, Iva’s leaning toward renaming them both as “yin” and “yang”. We’ll see how this works out.

I’ll see y’all after surgery. Remember, no keeping me alive in a persistent vegetative state! To my Christian friends and family, put me in your prayers. Sure, I don’t believe in God, but you do, and I might be wrong. I’ll put up some pictures of the new kitty, the wrist, and the crab fest over the week.