I reading Chuck Palahniuk - Lullaby - which means I really wish I had a hippie handy. Admitedly, solely for the purposes of smashing his face in with a brick, but still there's just never a hippie around when you need one.

K. Steeze and the Professor will soon be gone. Things around here are about to become incredibly depressing, especially since both the Mountain (Ann Arbor) and the Guy (East Lansing) are a) busy with school and b) at least an hour away.

I'm starting to hate the cat. Look, asshole, I'm trying to pet you, but I fucking won't if you walk away, sit down, and then come back two minutes later expecting me to pet you. I loved the old Sam, the surly, rat bastard of a cat who didn't have any use for us except feeding him and letting him out on demand. I loved that self-centered, cruel son of a bitch. To me, cats are supposed to be mean. That's their charm.

{Deep Space Piracy For Fun and Profit}
I keep working on the space pirate project, unsure how to proceed. Do I continue to consult with Steeze and the Professor (and possibly Zach Nie!), making all decisions by consensus? Or proceed on my own, in whatever direction strikes my fancy? Or perhaps two very similar, parallel projects, one developed with the group, the other on my own. It is critical to agonize over the details of a television show that will never get made. Critical.

{Anyway, here's an extremely preliminary cast}
Our Hero - a college kid who wins a pirate starship in a card game and realizes his lifelong dreams of instersteller raiding and pillaging; Jason or Sean, maybe...
His Best Friend - his best friend, along for the ride, probably a fat kid named Toby...
Their Other Friend - not as close a friend, but up for the adventure, he desperately wants to steal Our Hero's girlfriend, who has been left behind and all but forgotten...
Girlfriend Back Home - still in love with Our Hero, even after he becomes a pirate; Tawny, perhaps...?
Toll Booth Girl - the "victim" of the crew's first raid, who enthusiastically joins up; she's only 16, but disturbingly hot; Alex, Parker...
Old Engineer - the only remaining member of the old crew, "Old Nick" doesn't have enough money to retire with his comrades; once the master of the Scarlet Narwhal, now he's the drunkard of an engineer; the Professor describes him as essentially a seventy year-old Nick Neu...
Snobby Alien - his (his? do they have genders?) race is a bunch of uppity jerks and while he's more tolerable than most, he's quite crabby about being stuck on the ship; Lorix? maybe they're all named Lorix? naw...
Robot - what's the point of making sci-fi if you don't have a robot running around? Pewter, who really keeps the ship running...
Pilot - do you know how to fly a starship? Because I certainly don't. Aditi, a devil may care Texan beauty, maybe ex-IASA (which is the united Earth space force?)...
Indie Pirate - the shaddiest member of the crew, he's the only one who knows what's going on in the pirate world; perhaps a 1/4 Sirlakin, beneath his gruff exterior be he friend of foe...

Once one thinks about it, the chances of the crew of the Scarlet Narwhal doing any actual pillaging are pretty slim. These are, well, at least Our Hero and his two friends are, ordinary kids who stumble into something extraordinary. They aren't theives, much less bloodthirsty killers. Yet, here they are on an armed pirate ship, wanted by the law - for allegedly kidnapping Toll Booth Girl - what are they to do? I think they'd start playing Robin Hood, raiding pirates and protecting the innocent, in their own incompetent way. Plus, searching for the nigh-mythical pirate ship the Star of Canberra.