The scene: our bedroom, last night. We are debating whether or not to rent The Ninth Gate at Pär's urging, despite my growing doubts about Johnny Depp's ability to choose good movies, and over my protests that we've already seen too many apocalyptic here-comes-the-devil movies in the past couple of months. I point out that those movies included End of Days, some Tales from the Crypt thing starring Billy Zane, and Stigmata, all of which were pretty bad. Pär protests that all those movies were totally great! Privately, I agree, but I know that good taste is my ally in this debate so I hold to my position.

As an alternative to apocalyptic films, I suggest a movie I suspect will be junk [it later proved to be rather lovely], but it's got Val Kilmer in it: Thunderheart. Pär promptly refers to it as "Thunderbutt". In retaliation, I refer to Stigmata as "Big Shmata" (It's Yiddish, look it up).

Out of the blue, Pär suddenly sits up in bed with a fanatical look in his eye.

"Overpowering urge to implement a feature!" he announces.

"What feature?"

Pär begins to speak rapidly, staring into space at an imaginary screenful of code. "When you commit an edited object in the developer interface, it should export the XML of the object state into a text file in the file system according to the object name hierarchy. Because then, cold-starting the system will restore the original state space."

There is a long pause.

"Sometimes," I say, "I get an overpowering urge too. Like, to eat chocolate."

"Go for it!" Pär says.

"No, I'm just giving you an example of the sorts of overpowering urges I get."

Pär manages to contain his urge for the moment, and we end up watching The Ninth Gate. It's got a predictable ending, but it's entertainment.

I've been virtuous all day long today and got lots of work done, so I will be able to rent another video tonight with full enjoyment and no guilt. I'm going to make a huge batch of my favorite munchie: Stinky Popcorn, I'm going to put on a cotton nightie, and watch a mediocre film!

Pär came home from work, fell into bed, and took a short nap while I finished up on the computer. After a while he stirred sleepily, and I came out to lie next to him.

"Would you like to rent a video again tonight?" I asked him.

"Yes! We could watch... Buttcrack!"

"It's not 'Buttcrack'."

"No... Thundercrack!"

"What's the real name?"

"Thunderbutt! Thunder...max. Thunder."

"Thunderheart," I say.

"Thunderheart! No, really? It's called Thunderheart?"

He begins to quietly sing a little song about Thunderbutt. It is a lonesome prairie tune about a butt thundering over the plains, seeking its mate, and... thundering. It's not much of a song. I'm easy, though, so I just go ahead and fall in love with my man all over again anyway.