Saturday, May 31, 2008

Hey now, hey now

"Don't Dream It's Over" by Crowded House



I think it's hitting me that my vacation is just about complete. We've been back in Vegas for almost three full days now, and I return to work on Monday. My self-imposed challenge of blogging every other day is calling me back too, and after not (really) having blogged for the past ...however many days (too lazy to figure out the math, despite it being really simple), it's difficult to bring myself back into the rhythm, and harder still to type it all out.
I think I'll forgo the month-end word count and movie reviews. I will say that May was another lackluster month for movie-viewing, but I expect June to be much better, especially since all the 'appointment' programs are done now. (Hi, Lost and Survivor!)

So. Vacation.
Steph, as usual, did a bang-up job covering ...pretty much everything already. She even included a youtube video in her post. You can't top video. I mean, unless you're reporting things live, which would...um...not really be a blog entry. (Yet.)

That being said, I should probably report my account of the trip, just for posterity's sake.
As stated before, the Reno-Vegas drive is a highly unpleasant one. I know I said it. I know Steph said it. But it really bears repeating. Out of all the drives in the world, I suspect this is on the top ten of Worst.

The good thing about having it be the first of the drives on the way up is that it got out of the way. (The bad thing, of course, being that it's the final drive on the way back.) What helped alleviate the boredom of the drive up was that we had some audio books of the first 4 "Howie" books - spin-offs of the Bunnicula series. These were entertaining enough to help pass the time. We also had an audio book of Redwall, but we never did finish listening to that...

Medford was good, again, and if we wound up there, I wouldn't complain. It's green, and it gets rain, and it's Oregon, which is an all-around pleasant state. Seriously, I don't know if it's the air, or the water, or what, but people in Oregon are just nicer than they are here. I mean, they pump your gas for you, no matter where you go.

Portland, though, has my vote for 1st pick, now. And I know that people who live there don't really want more influx of people moving there, but, you know, maybe if the place (and the populace) wasn't so damn enjoyable...

Yeah, it rained the entire time we were up there, and the temperature s were lower than Vegas (and even, supposedly seasonally lower than normal) but it wasn't that bad. I was even wearing shorts on ...Sunday? Saturday? I can't remember when, but I was able to tolerate the chill in the air. It certainly beat the triple digits I'm going to be suffering through for the next three months.

The conference was great, as usual, even if, as usual, (and very similar to Steph's feelings - which is why we're such a great match :)), I felt that I didn't really break out of my shell enough. The funshops were entertaining enough, and, really, there is nothing quite like the atmosphere of an unschooling conference. The hotel was fabulous, and was in a great location - right across the Columbia river, literally half a mile over Washington's border. We crossed state lines so many times over the course of 4 or 5 days.

It was also really good to see Chance & Brett - Steph's brothers who live in Portland now. Yet another reason for us to move up there.

After the conference ended, we still had another night in the hotel. It was eerie seeing it all quiet after having had it be constantly filled with unschoolers of all ages and ALWAYS having things going on for the past 4 days. When we checked out on Tuesday, I believe we may've been the last of the Life Is Gooders to leave the Red Lion. :(

But I supsect we'll be back next year. In a perfect world, we'll live in the area. It would certainly save on commuting time. Heh.

...Let's see. I feel pretty strongly that
a) I'm forgetting stuff
b) I'm not expressing the greatness of the entire experience *nearly* well enough
c) I'm too tired to really care (it's much later now than when I originally started this)

but, oh well. I'll have to relay all this info (and more, no doubt) multiple times on Monday when I go back to work. Joy.

Oh, right. Some stats on the vacation:

Stalled vehicle count: 79
Highest gas price seen: $4.75
Highest gas price paid: $4.09
Number of times "Five Dollar Footlong" was said and/or sung: aprox. 5739
Number of times we had a Five Dollar Footlong: Zero.
Greatest meals eaten: Abby's Legendary Pizza, Burgerville (twice), tuna sandwich in the hotel room (I was starving, and it was good tuna)
Worst meals eaten: McMenimamanin's (just not worth it, sorry.), Westside Pizza (meh)
# of people "killed" by the P@inator (that's me being a Terminator): 2 (Harper in Medford, and Harper in Vancouver)
# of decibels emitted by Harper's screams when seeing the P@inator approach: aprox. 5739
Funnest funshops: Let's Build a Fort [resulted in a cardboard fort the size of a small room]; Up, Up, and Away [balloons and foam rockets and frisbees all played with outside in the liquid sunshine]; Cootie Catcher [horrible name, fun craft]; Barefoot Boogie [not a funshop per se, but still a whole lot of fun]; Talent Show [ditto].

And with that, and the fact that it's now 11pm, I'm clicking publish post.

Thursday, May 29, 2008

home again, home again

oh, man. so tired.
note to self: never drive from reno to vegas again. (longest, most boringest drive EVER)

conference was good, portland/vancouver [hi, min's state!] is AWESOME, much too much stuff to cover now and much too much blogging to catch up on (other people's.), and there's still the unpacking of our clothing and the resting from the vacation to do. *sigh*

overall, though, no complaints at all. Expect a gigantic post in two days after I've had time to process everything.

Tuesday, May 27, 2008

Keep watching this one.

I'm doing another CAST. (That's Continue-A-STory, for those of you playing along at home. Wherein, I blog the beginning of a story, and the next installment(s) are told in the comments by readers. Hooray!)

Previous CASTs are here, here, here and here [man. that last one is just sadly neglected.] Any and all of these are able to be added onto, of course...

The interesting thing about this go around is that I'm not actually present to see it posted, or to see how the story develops, and I won't be until Thursday...

that being said, let's begin.

She ached.

That was the first thing she noticed upon coming to. Her entire body ached. Nothing unusual about that, not at her age, but, still, this amount of pain was indicative of something wrong. Additionally, it made it hard to focus. There was a dull throbbing in her head, and when she tried to rub her temples, she was stopped by the handcuffs attached to her wrists.
That was a new development.

She opened her eyes, suddenly much more alert - and frightened - than she had been. The pain was still there, but she was now realizing that it may be the least of her worries.

The room she was in appeared to not be her own. She was still in her bed, which was interesting,and she was still wearing her nightgown, but the room itself was not one she recognized. It appeared, in fact, to be a jail cell. It was quite sparse. No windows, only one door - closed - and nothing on the walls. Another interesting thing she noticed was that there was a ceiling fan with a dimly lit bulb above her head. This appeared to be identical to the one from her bedroom. Odd. Why duplicate some of the materials from her bedroom? She then noticed a small video camera in the upper corner. It was pointed in her direction. She glared toward the lens. She muttered something under her breath. Nothing happened.

She examined the cuffs. They were attached to her bedpost, giving her very little amount of room to navigate. She turned her attention back to the camera. Assuming that her captors were presently watching she addressed them.
"What do you want from me?"
She had plenty of other questions she wanted answered, but this one would do to begin with.

There was no response to begin with, and then, from a speaker in the wall that she had not noticed before, a male voice said, "We know that you are a witch, and we know how to neutralize your powers. You will do as we tell you..."

Sunday, May 25, 2008

And all I have to show for it is this awesome vacation

Dude. Yesterday was my 13 year anniversary at the station. Thirteen years.

I don't know whether to laugh or cry. So I think I'll laugh. HA!! (Because I'm in Oregon, not thinking about work whatsoever. I'll cry when I get back on June 2nd.)

Friday, May 23, 2008

The Tribe Has Spoken

A Survivor style funshop would be kick-ass fun at an Unschooling conference. We're going to have to give this more planning/thought....

Wednesday, May 21, 2008

I'm not really here.

Hopefully this is working, and this post will show up after Wednesday at 9:21pm, regardless of the fact that it was actually written days beforehand. (Time is meaningless!!!) This does raise some questions about the nature of time. I mean, everything that is read is actually about things that have already taken place, because they were written in the past, even when it's about things that haven't occurred. Um. Yeah, I'm not sure about what I just wrote. Eh. I'm basically filling for time (heh!) because I don't have anything to say as I type this, but what's crazy is that when you are reading it, that won't be the case any more.

We'll have driven aproximately 1,500 miles, and will be in (or near) Vancouver, Washington. Undoubtedly there will have been plenty of things to have blogged about. Undoubtedly pictures well have been taken. And undoubtedly, I'll be pretty darn tired by that point. (Driving = exhausting) But for now, that's all in (my) future. Bah. Time travel.

Speaking of Time Travel - we bought T2 today. (Um. I mean last Sunday.) It was in the bargain bin DVD pile for only 5.50, so I snatched that sucker up. I then had to give Harper the reader's digest version of the plot of The Terminator. She's pretty excited about the whole thing lately - I suspect because of how often I play "Terminator" with her, and the bits and pieces of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles that she has seen. We haven't yet watched the movie(s) though, but once we do, I'll be sure to let you know what she thinks about it/them.

Lastly, I saw this sign at the mall today (er, again, last Sunday):

"In 2007, American's spent 16 billion dollars on bottled water."

Which led me to wonder - how much did we spend on misused apostrophes? [yeah, probably not what the writer's (HEE!) of the sign were wanting me to think, but that's the way my brain works.]

Monday, May 19, 2008

Whoops!

It's already 9:30 in the morning, and we are just now waking up. So much for being on the road by 9. You know what they say about plans...

Anyway. We should be able to get out of here by 10:30. If, you know, I stop doing non-important things like blogging...
Speaking of, I've got the vacation days covered. I wrote them all out yesterday, and if I can't get to a computer before they post, cool. If I do, then I'll just stop them from showing up. Win-win!

In other news, I really want to take that Death Cab for Cutie song (I Will Possess Your Heart) and create an Indiana Jones video to go with it. Checking youtube, I'm amazed (and disappointed) that nobody's done it already.

Okay! Time to get going!

Saturday, May 17, 2008

Dear Michael Bay

Please. Just stop.

Sincerely,

All of Humanity

Thursday, May 15, 2008

Super/Awesome/Posting

Three posts in one!

I was originally going to give a recap of the season finale of Smallville as my blog entry today, since that aired this evening. (Just finished about ten minutes ago, actually). However, I only saw the last 30 minutes, and also, it was a pretty lackluster episode from what little I witnessed, so... consider this that entry. All you need to know is
Brainiac was killed (by Clark).
Supergirl is trapped in the Phantom Zone.
Lana is no longer a zombie, but she left Clark a Dear John video. (Which made him give Lois a comfort hug.)
Chloe got arrested by the Department of Homeland Security for doing her illegal computer hacking (because Lex turned her in).
Lex found the Fortress, finally learned the truth about Clark, and in the final two minutes of the show, he & Clark faced each other in the Fortress, and Lex used some crazy sphere to destroy the entire building, leaving the fates of both characters unknown.

Moving on to the next post.

This is the the coolest coffee table ever. It's from the aptly named blog, "Ultra Awesome". The writer of said blog obviously has a lot of spare time and dedication to his projects. I really want one of those coffee tables, though.

3rd post!

Thus far this year, i've done quite well on my goal of blogging-every-other-day. However. We're going on vacation beginning on the 19th (I could still blog before we hit the road that day, so the real 'trouble' won't start until the 21st). I don't know whether I should compose my blog entries beforehand, and pre-date them, since Blogger now has the feature set up that any blog written in the "future" will automatically show up once that date arrives. Meaning I could write my blog entries for the dates that I won't be at the computer and just have them show up... or, I could try to see if I can find a chance to blog on the road. Or, I could just wait until we get back and back-date all my entries.
I really don't know what I'll decide to do yet. But I guess I have a few more days to figure it out.

Tuesday, May 13, 2008

OMG! It's like, an Upfront!

Ahh, May. Time when the networks traditionally have their Upfronts. I've blogged about upfronts before.

This year's upfront took place in the afternoon (early evening for the East Coasters), whereas every other year (that I have been witness to, anyway) has happened in the morning, so that was a little weird.

Maroon Five was the opening band, and they were, you know, adequate. The main problem with them was that they just kept going. After the 2nd song, I really thought they'd be done. (I seriously thought they'd be done after 1, but two wasn't out of the realm of possibilities) But they played 4. Dude. It's an Upfront, not a concert.

Anyway. After that came probably the shortest Upfront Presentation to date. Dawn Ostroff really just zipped through the lineup, and for once they went in order, rather than jumping around the week, which was nice.
Before they got to the schedule, though, she had to give some blah-de-blah about how the CW is all about the "3D's" - "Demographic", "Desirable", and "Destination".
The CW is keying in on the Demographic of young women (18-34), with Desirable programs for that demographic, and is the best destination for shows for that target audience. (Yeah. I know. People actually get paid to come up with nonsense like that.)
Anyway. The point is that (this year, at least) the CW is going to be going after women pretty aggressively, and wants to be the network known for "OMGTV". (Sigh.)
That being said, here's the lineup for fall of '08 (with new programs in bold):

Mondays:
8pm - Gossip Girl
9pm - One Tree Hill

Tuesdays:
8pm - 90210
9pm - Surviving the Filthy Rich

Wednesdays:
8pm - America's Next Top Model
9pm - Stylista

Thursdays:
8pm - Smallville
9pm - Supernatural

Fridays -
8pm - Everybody Hates Chris
8:30pm - The Game
9pm - America's Next Top Model ("encore" of Wednesdays episode)

Sundays -
????

So. Yeah. 90210 is, as you've probably read about, a spin-off (some 10 years after the original show ended) of Beverly Hills, 90210. From the limited amount they showed of the program, it looks like it's going to be Gossip Girl, just set in California. Five years ago I probably would've tuned in out of curiousity (I did watch the original 90210 in the early years. I was a stupid kid, okay?) but now... no. Just not my cup of tea - at all. And, dude. I'm totally old now, and all this show will do is serve to remind me of that. No thanks.

Surviving the Filthy Rich looks to be another teen-age soap opera, and I guess is based on a novel of the same name? Basic premise: Young 20-something in college gets recruited to be a tutor to some ultra-rich teenage sisters (who are party animals, and are totally supposed to represent the Bush daughters, imo) in Palm Beach, Florida. Bonding and life lessons - as well as bikini-clad women - ensue. Pass.

Stylista is, in a nutshell, The Apprentice set at Elle magazine. A bunch of reality tv contestants try to become fashion designers and magazine editors. ...in a reality tv type of way. Yeah. I don't think I'll be watching that, either.

Smallville will be in Season 8, and has new producers and no more Lex Luthor. But, I'm sure I'll watch it anyway, because I really do not know how to stop. Plus, I'm curious how bad it will get.

Sunday wasn't really touched upon, which was ...troubling. All that Dawn said about Sunday was how the CW has made a deal with ...um...some company that I can't remember the name of right now - and they will be producing the shows that air on Sundays? So basically it was, "We don't know what we'll be airing on the night we have to fill 5 hours, but it's gonna be something!" Yikes.

Reaper is coming back, but not until midseason.

What. Eva!!

Sunday, May 11, 2008

Moms are awesome. End of story.

Friday, May 09, 2008

...and there's nothin' on.

Remember when I scrolled through the radio stations and then blogged about it?
Well, today, because I'm a huge ol' nerd, during lunch I decided to do the same thing with the tv.

The following occurred between 11:22am and 12:02pm.

I started with the lowest channel (2) and wrote down whatever was on, then switched up to the next channel. I think I stayed on each one an average of 35 seconds (although I haven't done the math to really figure it out). If I was able to know the station/channel that it was, I indicated it. Here we go!

2 - This is labeled the "Pentagon Channel", and is currently showing cemeteries while stating facts about the number of vererans that are buried each year. Gloomy!

3 - KVBC, the NBC affiliate - a commercial for Amica insurance

4 - CCTV - two old woman talking...about composting?

5 - KVVU, Fox 5 - I changed the channel as soon as I heard someone say, "I'm a life coach".

6 - KVCW, the CW affiliate, and one of the stations I work for - Family Feud was on at this time. It was the lightning round, and the question I stuck around for was, "Name a color of socks a guy should never wear." The contestant gave the answer "Red". (I watched to see if the family won 20,000 at the end - they didn't - and the #1 answer to that question was "Pink")

7 - TBS - an ad. Why choose Ziplock? To stop freezer burn, apparently.

8 - KLAS - the CBS affiliate - some unidentifiable (to me) soap opera. Next!

9 - A Spanish Soap Opera. Next!!

10 - KLVX - the PBS affiliate - the end credits to the program, It's a Big Big World, which I've never watched.

11 - QVC - currently selling a "minimizing bra".

12 - KVMY - the MyNetwork affiliate, and the other station I work for. Ugh. It's Maury. Lots of bleeping as Maury tries to determine the parentage. I quickly change the channel to...

13 - KTNV - the ABC affiliate, which is airing a commercial for the Fantastik Indoor Swap Meet. Ahh, daytime TV.

14 - KTUD, the local station with no network affiliation. When I switched to it, it was the last few seconds of a commercial for Triple A insurance, and then the end credits for The Cosby Show. Jazzy!!

15 - A Spanish soap opera. Next!

16 - WGN is airing a baseball game. It's AZ vs CUB, and AZ leads 1 to 0 right now. (Bottom of the first inning). Next!

17 - HSN (Home Shopping Network) currently selling some sort of body salts.

18 - TNT. an episode of ER

19 - All I can tell is that the Nasdaq is down 24%

20 - CNN - some guy looking at websites. Um. Isn't that what we have computers for? Why would I watch television to see someone surf the web?

21 - Fox News - Iraq is great!!!!!!

22 - Headline News - Myanmar relief

23 - Nick Jr - Um... someone who looks passingly like Flava Flav is dancing with colorful robots. Kids shows today are messed. up.

24 - FX - the movie Dude, Where's My Car?. Um. I'm assuming. It's Ashton Kutcher, and it doesn't look like That 70s Show, and it's not Punk'd, so yeah, I think it's DWMC.

25 - A commercial for the 2008 US Open.

26 - A cat food commercial. Make your cat healthy!

27 - BET - apparently they're in the midst of a countdown. #6 is plaing right now, and it's a song I've, not unsurprisingly, never heard of. But they're rapping very quickly, whatever it is.

28 - Playhouse Disney - a computer generated kangaroo is counting

29 - SpikeTV - Oooh! It's that World's Most Amazing Police Footage or whatever. They're currently showing a burning car on the side of the road. Explosiony goodness!

30 - ESPN - Next!

31 - ESPN2 - Golf. Heh!! People actually did the golf-clap!

32 - A&E - ..I dunno what this is. Something about a trial from the '70's.

33 - A cat food commercial.

34 - USA - a J. G. Wentworth commercial.

35 - CNBC - Oh, look, the Nasdaq is down 24%.

36 - There's a shiny new razor that has aloe and shea butter on it. Mmmm. Shea butter.

37 - MTV - Oh, lord. Reality TV of some sort.

38 - MTV2 - An ad for some music download to your mobile phone thing. Damn kids with their technology and their music ....grumble grumble.

39 - VH1 - Oh, lord. Reality TV of some sort.

40 - A black & white movie with... Robert Redford? (I realized later that it was actually more likely to be Paul Newman. And I'm still not absolutely positive, but the face was familiar). He's playing a soldier of some sort in a wheelchair... this is almost intriguing enough to keep watching, but...

41 - TVLand - a commercial for Hidden Valley Ranch dressing

42 - Food Network - Some dude is preparing corn.

43 - History Channel - Ooh, historical re-enactment... about pirates. If I weren't on a mission to get to all the channels, I'd probably stop here and watch this. Of all the things I've seen so far, it's the most interesting.

44 - Weather Channel - It's currently 83 degrees with wind gusts of 22 mph.

45 - SciFi Channel - Boo!! It's a commercial for Lasik Plus. I was hoping for something good.

46 - A commercial for... binoculars?

47 - MSNBC - Hulk Hogan is in court? Because his son ran someone over? I'm so out of the loop.

48 - A chef is demonstrating something with... fish roe. Yuck.

49 - PSN, whatever that is, is showing a documentary about Joe Frazier.

50 - A soccer (aka football) game. LA vs RSL, tied at 2.

51 - an infomercial about foreclosure.

52 - AMC - some old black & white movie with... John Wayne, maybe? Some guys in snow, and a plane flies overhead... but doesn't see them. It's very sad.

53 - Bravo - a stand up comedienne is being applauded, but I missed the joke. Now she's talking to a guy in the audience about proposals to his girlfriend... and I'm bored.

54 - Court TV - reporters talking about some political hoo-haw.

55 - HGTV - a reality make-over your house, or at least one of the rooms in your house, show.

56 - Comedy Central - the show is Comic Remix. First there was a comic talking about life in the 'hood. By the time I finished writing that down, it had changed to a comic talking about child abuse. Beating kids up is teh funny!

57 - CMT - a video from Trace Atkins... or someone.

58 - Animal Planet - Eew. Animal surgery.

59 - ABC Family? Maybe? It's an ad for the movie Love Don't Cost a Thing, which is airing on ABC Family tonight.

60 - Discovery Health - Some guy is happy...about whatever. Next!

61 - Some home shopping channel....selling a dress.

62 - An ad, in Spanish.

63 - A Spanish soap opera.

64 - Spanish news.

65 - Cartoon Network - Mucha Lucha. This was actually occasionally funny.

66 - Some commercial for Flomax.

67 - a paid program for Food Saver

then it skipped a bunch of channels (the premium ones, that we don't pay for at work, I suppose) to:

95 - the TV Guide Channel.

And that brings us back to 2.
Hooray!

Wednesday, May 07, 2008

I have only myself to blame

Why do I continue to check out (and read) Dean Koontz books? I'm currently 150-ish pages into The Darkest Evening of the Year, and it is horrid. Like, "hurl the book across the room" bad.

And yet... I know I'm going to finish it in the next day or two. And, undoubtedly will pick up whatever else he publishes. Except for the Odd series. Which, ironically enough, I've heard are not half bad. It's like, "a good Koontz book? I won't stand for that!"

What books/authors/movies/tv shows/whatever do you torment yourself with, despite knowing that you really shouldn't?

Monday, May 05, 2008

Cayenne pepper induced wackiness

Still suffereing from the sore throat from hell. It's been one week now, and despite the fact that it ebbs and flows (and was completely gone this morning around 12-2am [I could swallow again! It was heavenly!]), it hasn't entirely left my body yet. So, today, I decided to look up some home remedies online, and read all about how cayenne pepper being gargled is supposed to be a great fixer-upper.

Once I got home, I tried a little bit, and found myself weaving in and out of consciousness on the couch as it did it's magic. (Verdict seems to be that it is much less severe right now than earlier in the day, but still not the panacea that the website people made it out to be)

Anyway. During my semi-sleeping-state, I had some thoughts/dreams/story ideas, and will now share a little bit of them:

Her final words were, "Do females have souls? I have the eggs!" - the banshee then evaporated.

*****


Let me tell you, once you're turned, you know it's just a matter of time before you're discovered. And when that happens, you better be prepared to kill the unfortunate soul that has found out your secret.

******


Vampire strung upside down in a snare-trap [see I Am Legend]. Hunter guy approaches and angrily asks, "How many? How many did you kill?"
The vamp growls something inaudible and adds, "Plus one." and way too quickly springs itself out of the trap, disemboweling the hunter guy all in a blink of an eye.

*****


...and there were some other dreams/thoughts about Barack Obama that I can't remember now. I don't think that he's a vampire, though.

Saturday, May 03, 2008

This day in history

Went back through my old journals. Here's what happened on 5/3 throughout the years...

1998:
So you want my stord story. It's not that unusual of a tale, but it is a remarkable one, nonetheless. It begins, as all good stories do, with

The End.

Um....

I need to start a good story. This is the problem. I'm unmotivated.
I just suck at writing.
It's hot in here. Time for sleep. 5-3-98 10:22pm [607days]

1999:
Mulan was pretty good. I'd give it a 7 or an 8. Maybe an 8.5.
We're 1/2 way = maybe less- thru "The Opposite of Sex" w/ Christinia Ricci. It's a comedrama, and it's funny. But it's stuff you shouldn't laugh at, but do anyway. It has (so far) no redeemable characters, but I still like them. It's weird. Good writing/acting/directing, I suppose.
Steph's back feels a lot better. Whic his good.
I have to work traffic tomorrow. Bad.
Tomorrow is the birthday of both my dad and Cyndee. Small world.
Speaking of small worlds, I re-introduced Cassie into my little universe today. And oddly enough, it was by chance. As I was driving home, I stopped at a red light. The car in front of me suddenly poked out a female head - Cassie.
"Hey, Pat!" she yelled.
I rolled down my window, poked out my head, waved back, "Hi!"
When the light turned green we drove, pulled over to the shoulder & got out and talked for a few minutes (I was giving Troy a ride home, she was going to pick up one of her stepdaughters from school, so we had to make it brief). Got her #, and that was that.
Again, small world.
I made dinner tonight. Chicken & spaghetti. It was bad, but ya gotta eat, even if it's crap.
Saren is takin' a nap bath. Now she's brushing her teeth. We Steph cleaned & baby-proofed the guest bathroom, so Saren can go in there and use the potty as she deems necessary. She's growing up so fast.
It isn't fair.
A naked baby just blurred past me. I gotta go. 8:32p 5-3-99

2000:
Again with the short entry. I thought those days were behind me - obviously not. Went back to work today - it sucked. Apparently nobody covered my shift yesterday so a whole lotta crap was left to do plus today's crap.
Jared was carjacked a few days back! I guess some guys got into his car, pointed a gun at him & told him to drive. They saw someone walking. They grabbed him, beat him up & took his money, then got out of Jared's car. Jared leads the strangest life sometimes.
Well, I guess I'll go get in bed now.
I want a computer. 5-3 11:30pm

2002:
Would I be excused for not writing today since I'm sick as a dog? Well, now I don't have to put it to the test. I called in today. Spidermeh was average. I'm so hot I can't stand it.

2003:
Stephanie moved the world map into the living room, where we have placed all our postcards around it, and put stickers on the places we've received postcards from. Man, that sentence was unweildy. Unwieldy? Gah. Why do I keep saying things I don't know if I mean?

Anywhat, not much to blog about. We went to the library yesterday, and I checked out My Story by Marilyn Monroe. Research! I also got the 2-disc Oingo Boingo Anthology CD. ...Except that it only has one disc. Doh.
But it was quite fun to dance around in the living room today. The girls had a fun time too. I think Stephanie was simply glad that nobody else was able to see it. (My dancing is ...something else.)

I'm nearly done reading The Culture of Make Believe. I wish I had something else in store to read once I'm finished. Nothing really seems to grab me anymore.

Ooh! Email!

2007:
Of the 15 or 23 people who read my blog, the following will only be of interest to maybe 4 or 8 of you. Yep, I'm talking Lost.

It's not a fully developed theory, and I don't know how much of it I buy myself, but ever since the seed of the idea came into my mind (sometime after "Catch 22" aired), it's been growing.


Spoilers for season 3 up through at least "The Brig" are below:

What if Smokezilla is God?
Not exactly the God of the Bible, but still, an omnipotent judging....being.

In Neil Gaiman's books, gods fade out of existence if people stop having faith in them. I really like the idea that god(s) have to survive on faith. What if that is what the island's security system has to live off of as well?

My island time line would go something like this: First, Dharma arrives on the island, and they either discover Smokezilla or create it. Either way, they start to worship it, maybe. And for a while, Smokezilla lives on a strict diet of Otherosity. That is the only "religion" that it knows, and everything is hunky-dory.

Then, Danielle and her crew show up on the island, and accidentally (?) cause an illness that kills pregnant women on the island.

Now, the Others have to start recruiting people to get to the island.

Somewhere along the way, Smoke(God)zilla learns that there are other faiths. So, since it wants to learn more about them, it begins to bring people of different faiths to the island - Desmond was a monk, Eko was a priest (actually Yemi was, and it brought Yemi there first), Jack has faith in science, John has faith ...in the island (which might be why the Others think he's "special"). Maybe the Island/Smokey/God is looking for a religion that it can call it's own. Maybe God is Lost, and wants to be Found.


Eh. Like I said, not a fully fleshed out theory, and I can confidently say that I would be floored if the show did go in this direction, but if it does, remember that you heard it here first. :)

2008:
It's evident to me that based on my past writings I am not a television show, because the stuff I write during "sweeps" is most certainly not my best. :P
It is funny (or sad, depending) how over the course of ten years I was:
starting various stories (and not finishing them)
complaining about work
sick during the month of May
marveling about how quickly the girls were growing up
theorizing on television shows

The more things change...

Thursday, May 01, 2008

I can ride my bike with no handlebars

"Handlebars" by the Flobots


Happy New Month!

This, I just realized, is my 1201st post on this blog. Jeezum, Crow, that's a lot of posting. I had more, but a while back I went on a deleting spree. No more of that. From here on out, anything in the past remains there, for better or for worse. (Really, the "better" entry was bloody brilliant, imnsho. Ya'll should (re)check it out.)

Anyway. It's May Day, and the idea of posting a story that had to do with the distress call crossed my mind (the rebooting [hee!] of "Roger" being the prominent choice, natch) but as is always the case lately, my Muse has gone missing.
So instead, I present a little game that everyone can play on their own blogs, if they so choose. (Yeah, it's another meme. Kinda. I guess. Sometimes these things spread, sometimes they don't.)

This is the drop-down-a-to-z meme!

In your address bar, type each letter of the alphabet, and list the first site that the computer selects.

Here are mine:

http://ape10.blogspot.com/ - HA!!!
http://www.blogger.com/home - Heh.
http://crankymatty.com/ - Oh, and look! He's posted again! Hooray!
http://www.defectiveyeti.com/ - only recently discovered, but I like this blog.
http://epigone.blogspot.com/ - Amanda, you beat out ebay! (I don't know why my browser doesn't list the sites alphabetically.)
http://forums.buffyguide.com/cgi-bin/wwwthreads/postlist.pl?Cat=&Board=regular&page=0&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=21
gmail.com
http://heathallyn.com/human/
https://ilsweb.lvccld.org/patroninfo~S12 - Heh. The local library website, which we use to order books in, see if they have them in stock, etc. I don't know if it'll load for everyone. [shrug]
http://www.johnniewalkerrvs.com/listings.php
http://kiddley.com/
http://lasvegas.craigslist.org/rvs/
m is mail.google, which is the same as g. I don't think that's fair. Skipping that and going to the next m site listed gets us to http://mothering.com/discussions/ - a site that Steph frequents. I call the people there "Mothering-dot-communists" because I like to pretend I'm witty.
http://noirbettie.com/blog/ - Hi, Annika!!
http://oslowe.livejournal.com/ - Hi, Will!!
http://pierrecoghil.livejournal.com/ - I keep telling Steph that she needs to tell Chance to update more. In case he's reading this himself, I'll just say, "Chance. You should update more." :)
q was listed as 'quikorder.pizzahut.com/phorders2/maincoupons.php', but when I clicked it, the site forwarded me to pizzahut.com. Skipping all the quikorders... we get to http://quizfarm.com/test.php?q_id=3074 which is a "What Lost Character are you?" type of quiz, but it's not a very good one.
http://ranprieur.com/ - One of the many many things to love about Ran's site is how it always just loads automaticaly because there so little there. It's all just text and links. No fancy banners or music or photos or ads.
http://slashingclaw.proboards55.com/index.cgi - One of Saren's role-playing Warriors based websites.
http://televisionwithoutpity.com - Still hate the redesign.
http://unschoolingmama.blogspot.com/ - :)
http://www.vibramfivefingers.com/productSupport/store_locator.cfm?state=ca#
http://wamu.com - sigh
http://www.xkcd.com/406/ - heh.
http://yahoogroups.com/ - 2nd was youtube.
http://zennioptical.com/cart/home.php


Ta-dah!!