• I’m stepping down as Art Director for Gemstone Publishing’s line of Disney Comics. My last day will be Wednesday, November 26th.
• Two days later, we’re loading up a truck and moving to Columbus, Ohio! (Thanks in advance to Rae Whitlock, who’s already agreed to round up some strapping young church men to help us unload the truck over the weekend.)
• I’m looking to take on some additional freelance web design and optimization clients. If you know anybody who’s looking for that, you can get yourself a 10% referral bonus (because I’m cool like that—also because I hate cold-calling). Just go on over to the “Feedback” page and pick your favorite way to get in touch with me.

UPDATE: According to Google Maps, this might be where we’re moving:

Our local library is running a reading contest this month: kids vs. adults. They’re doing it with the local elementary school, which is totally unfair—the teachers can force the kids to read! Apparently the adults were trounced heavily last year, so the points have been tweaked in our favor this time around. Adults get 2 points for every book read (including every early reader and board book read to a child). I read seven in a single day without even putting much effort into it.

Heh heh heh.

Nicole won’t take part in my shenanigans; she thinks it isn’t fair to the kids. I say, if one adult reading voraciously is able to singlehandedly beat every under-18 reader in the school district? …well, then those kids earned the embarrassment that’s coming. (Of course, if they don’t care about reading, will they care about my beating them in a reading contest? No matter. At the very least I might be able to shame their parents and teachers.)

And that’s what it’s all about.

(Pictured above: me reading Neil Postman’s Teaching as a Subversive Activity. It’s good stuff.)

• Marietta, PA
  Yup, I moved to a small town with its own website. Would you expect anything else from me?
• Susquehanna Valley Chamber of Commerce
  See that photo above? I pass by that sign coming home each night.
• Marietta Factsheet (Wikipedia)
  Just in case you want to know what the latest census figure were.
• Marco’s Restaurant and Motor Inn
  Love the food and the atmosphere here. Wish they had a web site.
• Borough of Marietta, PA
  Okay, now it looks like this is the official web site. (Added May 13th, 2008.)

Did you know the Wall Street Journal displays trackbacks at the bottom of its articles? I didn’t realize this until I started getting a bunch of comments on Friday from people I didn’t know. Friday may have actually been my highest-trafficked day since starting this blog.

Of course, I had to be moving at the time.

We’re in Marietta now. Boxes are all over the place, but everyone seems to love the new digs. (I was really worried there would be something that Nicole hated about the place—she never saw it before Saturday!)

I want to take a moment and publicly thank our friends and family who helped us move: on Saturday, we had Nathan Bartlebaugh, Steve Cole and Brian Powell helping us take our junk down from our 3rd-floor apartment into the moving truck (and special thanks for getting the treadmill! That think must’ve weighed half a ton…). Brian and his wife Jo came up to the new place that evening, and brought us dinner (perhaps the best lasagna I’ve ever had)! On Sunday, my mom and dad, Jordan, Naomi and Sarah came up to help us unload, and our new neighbor, Jason, pitched in too. I think this may be the first time I’ve been invited to a neighbor’s home for dinner before we’d moved into our new place!

Unpacking is going well, but I’m still looking for some nuts and bolts so I can reassemble the end-tables in the living room…