November 29. Tuesday Night.

Hi Journey.

Sometimes I think I will never get to really look good in a new set of wheels. Saw a beaut today on my way in to work, Journey. A brand new Jeep Liberty Renegade, with a set of fog lights mounted up front. Looked like it'd fit my frame just fine far better than the girl driving it. She looked to be a freshman in college, tops.

Note to self: Schedule oil change for the Corolla later this week.

Think I'm caught up from the weekend. It's not easy staying up half the night talking to Dakota. Even with five cups of the Blue Mountain I still couldn't listen fast enough. So far, the work week has been slow. Not so, the family Trino.

Yes, Journey, Casey has moved. Yes, she took the astronomer with her. Funding for his “job offer” with the observatory Down Under dried up. Me, I think she's linked up with another stray. Not that I'm going to tell her that, Journey.

Of course, Casey's connections came through.

The leader of the French tourist diving group she was translating for there in Maldives had an industry friend from Paris rang him up in a panic. There was a group of anthropology students from Japan heading down for a three-week extended stay in New Caledonia and their translator had just ended up in hospital with a dreadful bout of pneumonia and did he possibly know anybody in that area of the world who could speak both Japanese and French and might be available for the next three weeks? Conditions might be a bit primitive; they were going to learn to build an outrigger canoe.

Casey would have swam to Melanesia and lived on bread and water to partake in the project. Build a real outrigger? Of course she'd be there. Oh, and by the way, was $250 a day about right for translation? And, could they spare room for one of her friends to come along?

Yes, Journey, Casey would have translated for free, but she is our Father's daughter, after all.

So Case just typed out her last email to me from an internet café in Noumea . At least she seems to be getting on well with Julian Maxwell. But now she's asked me to dig out our old backyard telescope and take a look at Cassiopeia. They can't see it from their new latitude.

Casey didn't have time to fill me in on the details, but I believe there is some type of dispute involved.

And a wager.

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