3:07 a.m. Well, the server fairies and sprites have worked their magic and my pages are back. The people at Dreamhost even stopped in their magical ministrations and managed to write me a little note telling me that they were working diligently and valiantly on my behalf.

Thus, the day feels rather wasted, what with all the hand-wringing and recriminations. I know we have to expect a few bumps in the intellectual superhighway, and except for today, the service at Dreamhost has been perfect. And once the system was up and running again, no data was lost, so for that I'm grateful.

Meanwhile, it's now too late in the evening for coherence. I've watched a longish movie that I didn't think would be very good and I wasn't disappointed. If you're at the end of your movie-renting rope and you simply must have a film to see and there's nothing else in the store, you can rent Playing By Heart.

It's not particularly bad. It is a paint-by-number movie. No actor's career was damaged. Angelina Jolie was surprisingly good. So good, in fact, that you can forgive her her fabulous face. But poor Gillian Anderson, an actress I think has Bergman bones, did not have a good-hair movie.

There was a stray lock of hair, a largish clump, actually, that was too short to stay behind her ear and way too loose and freshly washed and curled to stay in any one place neatly on her forehead. Stupid, stupid hair people. Have you no gel?

The hair hank was in every single scene with her, including her one critical crying scene in which she was actually wearing a big black hat. She was in movie-mourning, and that always calls for a hat. I've never seen one in real life, but there must be a stock room full of them for the graveyard scenes. Mercifully, this one didn't have a veil.

So, there's this largish porkpie type of turned-up-rim black straw hat on her head and she is crying opposite Ellen Burstyn ... and the loose hunk of hair actually obscured her entire right eye just like a pirate's patch. The scene was long. It was, I think, a two-shot? When they go from Ellen to Gillian, Gillian tears up in the one free eye, back to Ellen ... plenty of time for one of the highly paid hair folks to run up with a comb and some spray, but no.

She was a hair-pirate. Actually, there were a lot of people in this movie. Madeline Stowe, with very long, sometimes lank hair. One expression throughout. Sean Connery with no hair. Dennis Quaid, getting chubby. Anthony Edwards, no hair. Gena Rowlands, but you know how her hair always looks. Same lines, too.

Jon Stewart in bed with a huge St. Bernard. The guy from Action, wan and dying. We were going to rent South Park, the movie, but Igor came back with South Park the TV show, Vol. 1, by mistake.

It's been that kind of day. Best thing to do is to put it out of its misery and hope my dream du nuit is not about math class, dinner parties, or Snoods turned nasty.

See you tomorrow. If the server agrees.