I suspected it was more Janet that concerned her mother than outside forces.I began unloading groceries as Janet had made herself comfortable on one o... the dining room chairs. It became apparent that this was going to be another time that she waited in Lucy's ... my ... apartment for her mother to come home. She was far more pleasant a visitor than the troubling figure of the bus driver which Alex and I had experienced earlier today."So, if it's not rude," she asked seeming not really to care. The doctor opened a drawer in his desk and handed me a ruler. "Measure it."I did and handed him back the ruler."Well?" he said.I blinked and swallowed. "Eight inches," I said, "and maybe a quarter." I'm going to call it eight and a half," he said, opening a manila folder and writing."You won't tell my mother."He smiled and said, "Of course not. Keep it clean, especially under the foreskin. Wish you'd been circumcised. And exercise it regularly, best way is with a girl. Understand? Nothing wrong. I'll get back to you within a few hours with a suggested schedule. I look forward to a productive meeting."The rest of the spiders introduced themselves, including a certain Hanglointherlastimmenos, the Minister of Information and Communication. Notably, she was the only one of the group who did not offer a shortened form of her name for Doug's convenience.Doug had not yet told anyone, including Scrag, that the people of his galaxy now operated in a surplus economy where all manufacturing was. The other two giggled."I'm not mad, it's like, really cool actually, thank you," Britneysaid as she smiled at Margaret.She hadn't had alcohol in what seemed like forever. She was sort ofexcited to be drinking it all of a sudden. She gulped down the rest ofthe glass quickly."Whoa child! You keep that up and you may give old grandma here a runfor her money in a few years! Let me get ya another one!" Margaretsaid with a laugh. She got up and refilled Britney's glass from apitcher on the.