Longtime Wesoteric readers and pals might recall my mother's HIV-positive stalker, whom I've taken to calling the Stampman because of the creepy animal stamps used to decorate greeting cards. Well, he's back. Actually -- technically -- he never went away. He dialed back his activities after Mom was granted a six-month peace order last October, but resumed his calls shortly before it expired in April and has been calling especially often in the last month. Granted, the Stampman hadn't approached his previous record of forty times a day, but he'd gotten a lot bolder.

For example, since she hasn't been answering when his name shows up on the caller ID, he's been calling and leaving inane messages to the effect of "you missed a fantastic cookout; I had two plates!" despite Mom's insistence that he stop calling her altogether. In fact, when she answered the phone about two weeks ago to reiterate the point, the Stampman plainly stated that he won't stop calling until she apologizes to him. During that same call -- and don't ask me how the conversation got to this point; I keep telling her that she shouldn't actually engage him in any remotely extended dialogue -- he apparently mentioned how much he missed being in Vietnam and loved "watching gooks' heads explode."

Anyway, though she tried to get this done last week, it wasn't until yesterday that she was finally able to block the Stampman's number. And guess what? Last night, between 2:30 and 3:00 AM, there were four calls to the house from four different pay phones. Which leads me to believe that this fucker is driving around to pay phones in the wee hours of the night, all for the purpose of harassing my mother. There was even a call from an unfamiliar number in between the third and fourth calls, which I'm betting was somehow from the Stampman too. He's flipping obsessed.

Oh, did I mention that yesterday Mom also received two calls from a neighbor of the Stampman? Apparently he's been telling this woman about various ways in which he's going to vandalize the house and harm my mother at any opportunity he gets, and this woman is willing to testify to that effect if Mom decides to contact the police. This is really, really crazy shit.

I used to have my DVD collection listed at DVDSpot. It was great! Unfortunately, for some unknown reason, DVDSpot shut down this week. This development made me very sad. 🙁

Anyway, I've since taken to listing my DVD collection at Chasing the Frog, but because that site lacks an option for me to import my old collection I'm currently in the process of manually adding every. single. entry. to the list. (I'm in no hurry, so I'm doing like a handful whenever it occurs to me to add some more. I imagine I'll be finished by February 2009.) Being hosted by Amazon, the database also lacks entries for some of the more obscure foreign titles. Ah well.

My (now outdated) collection is still up with DVD Profiler, though I haven't used that since they started charging money in order to use the full functionality of the program. Maybe someday I'll feel like it's worth the $30 so that everyone can see precisely which DVDs I own, but that day has not come yet. By the time it arrives, they'll probably want $60 for the service. 😛

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Remember that ridiculous religious play that I wrote about attending last month? Well, I've finally gotten around to reviewing it on Scary-Crayon! The review contains my thoughts on other parts of the trip as well, including a brief visit to a Biblical tabernacle reproduction and my first and god-willing last encounter with shoofly pie. Feel free to check it out!

Also, I find these survey results to be highly discouraging.

I've written before about how CNN.com journalists are apt to insert sly humor into articles. Here's the latest example, a piece about howa former Hillary Clinton supporter plans to endorse John McCain. I was particularly amused by the last two paragraphs:

"This is a hard decision for me personally because frankly I don't like him," she said of Obama in an interview with CNN?s Joe Johns. "I feel like he is an elitist. I feel like he has not given me reason to trust him."

Forester is the CEO of EL Rothschild, a holding company with businesses around the world. She is married to international banker Sir Evelyn de Rothschild. Forester is a member of the DNC's Democrats Abroad chapter and splits her time living in London and New York.

I can almost hear Mark Preston giggling to himself.

In other news, I was amused by this Huffington Post piece -- not because of the article text, but because of the title when coupled with the image therein. I mean, the photo has Fiorina looking like she's about to shout, "Ta-daaa!" and the title says that she will now disappear. Bloody hilarious.

And completely unrelated to politics, there's this. Is anyone else reminded of Amy? I hope the daughter doesn't end up as a rat!