Front row, rock concert

My mother just called. She broke her ankle awhile back, and still gets around on crutches sometimes. Right now, she's at a rally in Cleveland with 100,000 other Kerry - Edwards supporters. They took pity on her, with her bad ankle, and put her in front row seating.

"Kerry's going to be here in about an hour," she told me. "Bruce Springsteen is coming on next." At 74, my mother is attending her first rock concert -- and a democratic one, at that. "It's like a second childhood," she said.

My father cleaned the gutters this past weekend, and he thought he'd play golf. My mother cold-called 400 would-be Kerry voters and encouraged them to vote. This has caused great glee in my family -- all nine kids and their spouses and grandkids saying, "Go, Grandma, Go!" My father is the lone Republican. I almost feel sorry for him.

He's been a bit gloomy of late. "I'm not really that into politics," he told me on the phone on Saturday.

I'm still trying to get hold of the guy at Autodesk so I can decline the very nice job offer. The executives scripts are done. I've got one project firing back up on Thursday - the guy who lost a daughter has begun returning to work. And another next week. My jury duty has been postponed until February. So basically, my life is returning to normal. Whatever that is.

Strangely, I am losing things. Like my date book. This has never happened. "Have you lost three things yet?" J from work asks me. "Yes," I said. "Does that mean I can't lose anything else?"

Instead of writing my next story, I went to Loehmann's and bought a purse. It's purple, Italian, and looks like a totebag with pointy corners. I love it.

It's a gorgeous day in San Francisco. I begin volunteering tonight with the Taproot Foundation. It's allowing me to develop information architecture muscles. It's all good.

NEWS FLASH: My brother M just sent an email. He's going to Iraq in January. "So vote Kerry," he says. "Or I'm going to die." He's the photographer.

Fingers crossed for the democrats tomorrow night. I'm buying filet mignon and champagne for my friends, just in case.