I should turn into a computer hardware person for a while. A friend replaced the keyboard on his Dell laptop, and said it wasn’t too much of a pain; Lazarus’ keyboard is different, though (Dell was getting as bad as IBM with their “every model must be completely different” mantra)—non-standard shape, and all—but it turns out I can get a replacement keyboard online (and cheaper than going to a repair place) and according to the instructional video, it’s not hard to install. That’d be more professional-looking, too, than hooking up a standard keyboard to Lazz through the USB port.

And if that works, I should consider repairing on my own “Justin,” the big Dell desktop I bought surplus from the Farmer’s Market. I think—but have no way to test—that the reason “Justin” isn’t working is his on/off switch is broken. Solution if that’s the case is to replace the on/off switch. Justin, I was told by the expert who tore into it for me, is a custom-built “gamer’s” computer, with oodles of RAM, a big hard drive, and very high-resolution graphics—exactly what I need for my work. If replacing the on/off switch is as easy as I think replacing Lazarus’ keyboard will be, it’d be a lot cheaper to do that instead of taking a day to trek to Portland with it.

Words that rhyme with “samba”: I’ve already used “Hamas,” “drama,” “mama” and “pajamas” (yes, they all can be made to rhyme). “Okhrana” (the Russian Czar’s secret police), “Donder” (the reindeer) and “lambda” (the Greek letter) are probably too obscure, and “Osama” and “Obama” too current-events (I’d said I didn’t mind, but there are limits). “Dalai Lama” would probably be okay, though (I knew—an aside—somebody who had a llama named “Dolly”), and so would “McDonalds.” And “trauma,” “sauna,” and even “bomber” and “manana.” Yes, they will all rhyme when I’m done with ‘em. More?

I don’t have to have everything rhyme with “samba,” of course; in that first (and at this point only) verse, I’ve also got “Wall Street” and “Main Street,” and “proper” and “opera,” and in the ending tag line there’s “December” and “remember.” But the more words I have trying to rhyme with “samba,” the more sense it will appear to make. I have no hope of it really making sense; we will have to rely on appearances.

Though I refuse to force these things, I would like to be done with it before the weekend; I have a class to help teach on Friday, a funeral to attend Saturday—and maybe a writing seminar to attend, too.

A lady in the audience at the library Saturday videotaped me playing “Naked Space Hamsters in Love” with the group; she did ask if she could post it on YouTube (and the answer to that one is always “yes”), but I haven’t seen it yet. I got to hit up the musicians—the rest of them are collectively the Ocean Bottom Blues Band—about performing at the 2012 Relay for Life July 7-8, and they’re interested. I’ll hit up the folks at the Rapture Room tonight, too; there are folks from two or three bands that regularly come to that. I expect the hardest part will be finding bands willing to play in the middle of the night—but the event is a 24-hour one and somebody has to. And the Relay folks don’t want just bands, either—they’d like all sorts of acts. There are three dance schools in Tillamook, and the square dancers (if there are enough of them around during the winter)—but I know some unconventional entertainers, too. How would Relay for Life feel about standup comedy? Or a fire dancer? (That would be cool in the middle of the night.) I’ll have to ask…

Joe