Neil Patrick Harris; Daniel Radcliffe in "Equus"; Clothes Shopping - Part III; River Rocks and Such; Lizards

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Although I'd heard rumours about Neil being gay for several years, I was very happy to have confirmation of it. He's always been one of my favorite performers. He's been very lucky to have such a variety of roles.

His first movie was as a teenager with Whoopi Goldberg in "Clara's Heart" when he was 13 or 14. And he plays himself in "Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle." Actually, he plays the guy who played Doogie Howser on TV.

On TV, he did the iconic "Doogie Howser, M.D." Now he plays the semi-insane Barney Stinson on "How I Met Your Mother." And has even played the head of a group for ex-gays on "Will & Grace."

On and off Broadway, he was the "Master of Ceremonies" in "Cabaret" performed at the old Studio 54 building. Also in 2004, he was Lee Harvey Oswald in Stephen Sondheim's "Assassins."

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Daniel Radcliffe is scheduled to play Alan Strang in Peter Shaffer's master work "Equus" in early 2007. I've read of this on and of for months. One reason being that he will be totally nude during part of the production. The fact that he will be 17 has some folks in a tizzy. Of course, most European countries have a lower age of consent: in the UK it's 16.

The other evening, I came across the truly brilliant poster for the play. "The poster, which uses Radcliffe's nipples as a fusion point as his body morphs into the head of the horse, is a graphic triumph."

But then among the comments, someone points out that it bears a resemblance to a 1933 photo by Man Ray. And indeed it does. (Visit Man Ray, Minotaure, 1933.)

"This is something that I rarely do - shop for clothes." Or so I said a couple of times of late.

Two things missing from my wardrobe are sweatpants and sweat socks - strange that one of these is one word; the other, two. So today, as I made my third or fourth visit to WalMart, I lingered in the men's clothes area. I think this is one of the reason I hate shopping. The same item will be available in a dozen variation. By accident, I found a very inexpensive pair of pants in the shelves. Here again, there's the problem of size. I need something that is at least 34 inches in length. Well, this equates to a 2XL, which means a waist size fit for Jumbo the Clown. When I got them home and pulled the draw string, there was enough cord left over to fly a kite. I finally hit on the idea of cutting off all but a few inches of cord.

While at WalMart, I bought a package of large river rocks that are the most colorful I've seen so far. Also a package of smaller stones.

In my looking for rocks, I've noticed packages of stones called "decorative gems." About the best description I can come up with is something akin to marbles with a flat side. They also look like some kind of candy, something a notch above Skittles. I bought three packs at $0.96 each and filled the two ceramic bowls someone had given me. I really think I may need another pack.

I keep intending to mention this. A couple of weeks ago, I walked into the bedroom, and there was a chameleon on the bed. Since I've frequently written about my appreciation of the wee beasties of the world, I wondered if he had come to have a cup of tea. But I immediately realized that I needed to remove it before the felines became aware of its presence. So after a quick grab or two, I was able to sneak it outside without my feline friends being any wiser.

How he got in is a mystery. If he came in under the door, then how did he make it to the bedroom. So this will go down as one of those unexplainable curious events of existence.

Today, another one appeared. Not a chameleon, but colored a dark brown and much smaller. My first attempts to catch it were to no avail. Later though, I noticed that Be'ard had seen it, so I scooted furniture left and right and found it on the side of the bedspread..And I was fearful I'd not be able to grab it, but it was no problem. I headed for the back door and released it into one of the beds.

Now this is even more mysterious. Maybe they are coming in on my clothes. That's a good possibility, hence that's how they would wind up in the bedroom.

PAX!