I'm back in hometown Eugene; the Willamette valley gives me peace. Waking up earily after a late fun night in SF, coffee, BART (where a really friendly mildly retarded woman and husband and I had something aproxomating a conversation), iPod, short United flight, PDX Light Rail (more and more hip-hop heads in Portland; interesting cultural shift), Amtrak (ticket counter guy still referencing 9/11 to old ladies at the counter; wtf?)... finally the observation car. There's a kind of green here that's unique. You forget about it when you're away, but then you remember. It goes well with the clean smell of the air, and the comforts of home wash over you.

But, unfortunately, there's also a flipside. I get mail from the IRS at my mother's house, and apparently I owe them a fair chunk of change. I may have been 21, just out of college, scraping by, and then -- here's my own sucker bit to leech off tragegy -- thrown into near-destitution by 9/11's impact on the NY economy, but they want what I owe them from 2001, plus penalties and interest. Which I suppose is fair, and to be expected really.

So I'll need to start looking around for more income, and going back on my austerity budget. That's ok. I needed focus anyway, and better to be spurred to action by taxes as than by death. Thanks Uncle Sam?