Sick, sick, sick.

I don't get outraged very often at current events, but today is an exception.

Today I woke up to hear Danny Pearl of the Wall Street Journal had been executed by his captors. Warren said the newspaper reported he'd been hanged; I only heard someone had been sent "a videotape of his execution."

Danny was just doing his job. Like most of the rest of us journalists, he was doing his job: To get the truth out to as many people as possible. Some hoodlums (and that's much too nice a word for them) decided in their peewee-sized minds that somehow Danny "must" be working for the CIA. What his murder told me was these kidnappers don't want the truth to get out.

I never met the guy, but all the videotape and coverage of what kind of reporter -- and human being he was made me eager to meet him. Like me, he was a journalist. He was also an accomplished musician on violin, keyboards, and guitar. He seemed like the kind of guy who could show up at a filk con and fit right in.

The guys who kidnapped him seemed determined to kill him from the start. That to me makes the whole thing worse.

To top it off, on the home front my neck is still swollen and feels like it's getting more swollen. I finally heard from rheumatology today, but they won't get back to me till tomorrow morning at th eearliest. It turned out I did test positive for lupus, and yet somehow I fell through the cracks. When someone tests positive for lupus you're supposed to keep running a battery of tests on them to confirm the diagnosis. They did run a second test back in June, and that one came out positive, too, but not positive enough to make a firm positive diagnosis.

No matter what this is, my neck is swollen, and if it were an allergic reaction it'd most likely be gone by now. If I have more trouble swallowing I'm going to have to go to the emergency room. This sucks. I'm not running a fever; in fact, my temperature is way below normal (95.8F). Something is very wrong, and I wish I knew what it was.