Ben's Dispatch

This dispatch provided by your humble correspondent, Ben Wing. This week the continuing vitality of Thursday Night Dinner was demonstrated by many new faces, including a demonstration by Chris C.? of some cool Windows software of his that provides you lots of info about San Francisco history, even letting you play "Fill in the Bay!" by matching disembodied landfill pieces to where they belong. Many regulars were missing, though, perhaps depressed by the recent spate of bad weather or the lack of energy at the Internet Anti-Censorship Protest earlier in the day. (This event was livened up, however, by a speech from Cyborganic's own Jonathan Steuer.) This correspondent notes with dismay the complete lack of reporting on this issue in the next day's New York Times, despite a front-page Business Day article on the Telecommunications Bill. (This article did, however, spend a couple of paragraphs detailing the exact dictionary definition of "fungible"; perhaps if we dedicate the next TND to All Things Wild and Fungible, we will get our two paragraphs of fame, too.)

Let us pause a moment to gratuitously insert the word "fuck" into this missive, since it may soon be illegal to do so.

The theme for this week's festivities was "Come As Your Mother", and Ian McFarland took the cake by showing up in his best full- length gray dress, complete with realistic-looking falsies and not-so- realistic beard and combat boots. (Patrons of nearby Red Dora's Bearded Lady cafe might beg to differ, however.) Meanwhile, Cyborganic diva Jenny Cool showed up with an artist's paintbrush holding her hair in place (in honor of her mother's endeavors in painting) and guest chef / spacebar maven Merin McDonnell donned a motherly apron and flowered dress and served up homemade Beef-A-Roni with freshly grated parmesan. Vegetarians were left with plain -A-Roni, and carnivores (and this correspondent in particular) felt specially valued. In honor of the meat-eating occasion (and of last week's scrumptious honey-roasted ham), someone even drew a ham on the kitchen whiteboard and wrote "Yum" by it.

Neato factoid of the day: Did you know that Merin rollerblades seven miles each day, to/from the train station, her house, and work at NASA Ames? This correspondent, whose primary exercise comes from pounding too hard on the keyboard, was impressed.

Tune in again next week for the Mystery Cyborganic Winter Solstice Dinner Night. (Revelers, take note of another cause for celebration: It's Kat Kovacs' 25th birthday.)