I think I'm going to cut my hair. Not too much, but to about elbow length - the minimum donation for Wigs for Kids and Locks of Love is ten inches, so that's what I'm going to do. It's around my hips now, thirty-six inches long from crown to tips. I want it shorter, both for practicality's sake and to try something new, and I may as well help somebody else while I'm at it. (It's more than half my hight, so I figure I can spare ten inches, can't I?) It grows slowly, but I figure I can have it back to the way it is now in about three years if I want to. It'll be strange having it gone, though. It's like a cross between a garment and a fifth limb - which is part of why I want it shorter. Swing dancing gets unbelievably complicated. It won't stay in a bun for any amount of time, but if I braid it, it whacks people and if I leave it down it gets stuck in their hands and yanked out.

I wonder what it's like to have so much hair cut - such a physical thing, the sound of a blade through a braid. It's like that scene in "The Gift of the Magi."

"I buy hair," said Madame. "Take yer hat off and let's have a sight at the looks of it." Down rippled the brown cascade. "Twenty dollars," said Madame, lifting the mass with a practised hand.
"Give it to me quick," said Della.

Christine and I are going to the Celtic Festival on Saturday, which makes me very happy. I've always wanted to go as a non-morris dancer, and now I finally am. I'll get to go without the red pants for once. Ah.

It's taken me twelve years, but it seems I've finally got the hang of succeeding in math and science courses. I was doing my vectors homework for physics last week and actually enjoyed it - actually figured out how it all fit together, with forces and cosines and angles and all. I was ecstaticly explaining this at the dinner table that night. "So once you've got the acceleration, you can find the amount of force needed to get it moving that fast - "
"In foot-pounds?" Dad said, inserting the only thing he could remember of the subject.
"In Newtons."
"Oh."
"I think we've got some of those in the pantry," Mom offered. I love my family.

October 7
NOvember 2