I got my April Fool’s joke yesterday with a half a foot of snow covering my city.
Out Like A Lion by Laura Moncur from Flickr
It was spring snow, so it melted off the driveway by noon, but still, I keep forgetting that it’s not spring in Utah until May.
Next time we have a yard sale, print up this checklist so that I don’t forget anything.
I received this in the mail on Saturday. At first, I couldn’t tell if it was a joke or not. With a name like Christ Meat of The Word Sanctuary & Fellowship, it’s hard to tell what’s real and what’s parody.
They are having “Worship Services” at the Megaplex. That just made me think that it must be some movie making fun of Christian fundamentalism and you can meet at 9:30 am for “Bible Study,” which means that you can find other people who think the whole Christian thing has gotten silly.
Sadly, it looks like it might be a “real” church.
Can a megaplex theater actually provide sanctuary? I’m sure that you can find sanctuary of the mind in the humblest of places, but if Quasi Modo were to run into the megaplex screaming sanctuary, would he be spared?
Maybe it’s just a “Word Sanctuary” and only words are safe within the megaplex walls.
I wonder what Christ Meat tastes like.
I would think that they meant Christ Meet, but they consistently spell it “Meat,” so they must mean the flesh of Christ in a strangely cuisine-oriented phrasing.
Religious freedom is one of the foundations that the United States was built upon. I strongly believe in Christ Meat of The Word Sanctuary & Fellowship’s right to form a religion and meet in the local movie theater every Sunday. I just wonder why they chose such a name that is neither catchy nor descriptive. It’s like they need a marketing bishopric to ensure that they don’t sound like a parody of themselves.
I love makeup. It’s a little bit of art that I get to do every day.
I am the canvas and the beauty of it all is that the canvas is ever-changing from year to year and I am never left bored.
RE: One Word: Primp
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When Mike did his book signing for SAMS Publishing back at Comdex 1996, we had no idea that it was going to be a once-in-a-lifetime experience. They used to have a booth at Comdex every year and give away piles of books for free to the people willing to wait in line. The very next year, they stopped doing that so Mike’s book signing was a unique experience for us.
Here is the line of people waiting for Mike’s book.
Here is the board with the schedule of author signings.
Here’s Mike sitting at his table with a nice board telling the world who he is and which book he wrote.
This is a photo of the first guy in line at the signing.
Here is Michael signing books and me handing them to him.
They ran out of books before these guys got one. It was the first day and they could get one tomorrow, so I didn’t feel bad asking them to pretend to look really sad that they didn’t get one of Mike’s books.
SAMS did so much promotion for his book that they even had a huge copy of it on the side of the Comdex Bookstore. I was so excited about it, but Mike really wasn’t. I forced him to stand next to the book cover for a photo. Can you tell?
Looking back at that time makes me feel happy and wary all at once. I took all these photos with my beloved 110 camera that I got from my grandma in fifth grade. I recently scanned in all the Comdex 1996 photos for a series that I did on the Gadgets Page, but I thought I’d share these personal favorites with you.
Is it just me, or am I the only one who still likes Rick Astley and his song Never Gonna Give You Up?
I understand the concept of sending someone to a site that is a complete non sequitur as a joke. I even understand the humor of sending them to the SAME non sequitur on multiple occasions, but the “aversion” that people seem to feel for the song is too harsh.
What’s not to like? A handsome man, a beautiful voice, a catchy tune. I liked it in the Eighties and I still like it. Play a joke on me and send me to YouTube to watch his video and I’ll watch the first few seconds of it. I watch Rick long enough to listen and I’ll close the window once the blondes start dancing poorly (sadly, that’s at the ten second mark).
I don’t mind having the song in my head all day long. I know enough irritating songs by heart that it could be far worse. Pleasure and Pain by the Divinyls comes to mind.
Really, why does Rick Astley get all this aversion when the Divinyls were behaving so poorly with just as catchy a tune?
Either crochet a Rock Band Drum Cozy for myself or buy one from FunkieFresh for 40 bucks.
Why didn’t I think of this?
Via:
I’ve been working at home for almost three years now. After spending all day in the house writing, I want to get out of the house in the evening. Unfortunately, it feels like there is no place to go. We can go out to eat. We can go to a store or a mall. When I have a full belly and a full life, there really is no place to retreat.
I’ve enjoyed eating at home. Mike is an excellent cook and the food at home is inherently healthier than the food in restaurants solely because Mike cooks it that way. Even when we do opt to eat at a restaurant, a meal lasts no longer than an hour and we are left wandering the town, unwilling to go home.
Going shopping loses its meaning when you feel like you have enough. We rarely need anything anymore, so going to a store usually means that we walk up and down the aisles. We people-watch, but that only lasts for so long at Wal-Mart. There are interesting sights to see, but once you’ve seen the crazy that Wal-Mart (or the mall) has to offer, it pales quickly.
What I need is a clean, well-lit place like in Ernest Hemingway’s story of the same name. I’d like a place to go where it is clean, well-lit and comfortable to spend a few evening hours. I don’t want a bar. I don’t want a coffee-shop. I want a fashionable salon or a club where I can sit, talk to like-minded people and get out of the house for a few hours.
Anyone have any idea of a place that would be good for me?
This video shows some of the video games from 1972 to 2007.
I’m offended by only one of the omissions. He included Viva Pinata, which was a game that was merely a derivative of Animal Crossing, which was not included. Other than that, it was an enjoyable walk through memory lane.
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Don’t shake my tree by miss_rogue from Flickr
I love this saying,
If you don’t want my peaches, then don’t shake my tree.
I’d take it one further. If you don’t want the peaches, don’t even go into the orchard. Sometimes those crazy trees just drop peaches on you without provocation.
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Bobka’s Eggs by Laura Moncur from Flickr
Over thirty years ago, my great-grandmother, Dora Klem, made these Ukrainian Eggs. Some of them have survived well. Others have cracks and holes. They all smell like rotten eggs a bit.
When my grandpa died last summer, Stacey found a stash of these eggs in the basement. It has taken this long for me to photograph them, precious as they are to me.
You can see the entire set here:
I just found this website showing how to make these eggs. I think next Easter, I shall have some of my own to display:
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Discarded Honor by Laura Moncur from Flickr
I couldn’t believe my eyes. It was a valedictorian medal at Thrift Town. Jessica L. Eriksson graduated valedictorian from Viewmont High School in 2005 and just gave her medal away to a thrift shop. It made my heart ache to see it there.
When I think of how hard I worked to get as far as I did, it makes me sick to see it. Our school was so competitive that a 3.96 GPA wasn’t good enough. Neither was a 4.0. You had to take all the AP courses that were weighted and still we had two people with a GPA over 4.1. Suzanne Clark and Aracelli Rojas were our valedictorians at Kearns High in 1987. I wonder if they got a nice medal this shiny and clean with their names engraved on the back?
Two bucks. That’s what it cost me to buy a valedictorian medal. Is it just easier now? Did Jessica not care about it? Did it somehow get lost with the old clothes and end up at Thrift Town on accident? If it had been me, there would have been no mistakes. That thing would have been framed and mounted on the wall. There would have been no way for me to lose that accolade.
Jessica, I see you won fourth place in the State Finals for the FBLA in Accounting in 2005:
I also noticed you ran the 5K in 27 minutes and 38 seconds in October of 2004.
You finished in 64th place. Is that good? Is that bad? You beat my best 5K time by three minutes. Three minutes and 0.3 GPA points. That’s the difference between a winner and a loser in these little races of human competition, but how fast do I need to run in the race of life?
Jessica, if you want your valedictorian medal back, you can’t have it. I’m pretending it’s mine now.
I woke up and turned on my Nintendo DS to play a little Animal Crossing before Mike woke up. My friends greeted me with a birthday cake!
My mailbox was filled with letters and presents from my friends and my “mom.”
I love this one! I’m “almost an adult.” I guess I won’t graduate to full-blown adult until I STOP playing Animal Crossing!
It’s turning out to be a most excellent birthday. Who says that having imaginary friends is a bad thing?
Is it wrong for me to feel like this postcard from PostSecret is a personal birthday message for me?
I like to imagine that all those great people out there who influenced me over the years are thinking that I turned out alright and they had something to do with it. It’s true, you know…
PostSecret‘s beneficiary is the National Hopeline Network. It is a 24-hour hotline (1 (800) SUICIDE) for anyone who is thinking about suicide or knows someone who is considering it.
The Joy of Tech comic: Blogging Warnings
I got this warning sticker from the Joy of Tech this morning. Sometimes I need to remember this advice.
Note to self: Make a business card cube like this one:
I am speaking at Valley High School today. Their teacher asked me to answer this question:
As the time grows near for me to leave home, what is the most important message or belief that you hope I will take with me and remember throughout my entire life?
The biggest thing that bugs me about motivational speeches is the idea, “Believe in yourself.”
I think that’s a load of baloney.
Every stupid movie you see nowadays keeps repeating the mantra, “Believe in yourself. Believe in yourself,” over and over, but I’m here to tell you that it’s wrong and it will steer you wrong more often that not.
I had a teacher when I was in ninth grade who taught us to “Question Everything.” That is a much more livable philosophy in my mind. Question everything, including yourself, and keep questioning until you get the answer that works.
My husband and I run the oldest quotations site on the Internet. We have over one million unique visitors to our site every month. If you type the word “quote” into Google, we’re number one. We started the site in 1994 when the Internet was young. We’re actually OLDER than Google. We have an email from Jerry Yang himself saying that he was adding our site to his web directory called Yahoo!
Did we get where we are by “believing in ourselves?” Nope.
We started the Quotations Page because quotes were something that we liked. By the time 1998 rolled around, we were paying a TON of money for bandwidth to keep the site running. At that point, we had a choice: figure out how to make the site profitable or shut it down.
Neither one of us thought that we could ever make the Quotations Page profitable. We just kept asking the question, “How can we keep the site running without going broke?” The answers came from all over. We joined a few of the ad networks, dealt with the angry visitors who didn’t think we should have advertising and kept it up and running.
Since both of us suffer from low self-esteem, we never in our wildest dreams believed that the Quotations Page would eventually make us enough money to live on. We never thought that it would be our one saving grace during the Dot Bomb. We never had that stubborn “believe in yourself” attitude that all the heroes in the movies had. The only thing that saved us is that we were willing to question everything and keep questioning until it worked for us.
I’ve seen too many people butt their heads against a wall because they “believe in themselves” instead of asking the right questions to become successful. You don’t need confidence. You don’t need high self-esteem. You don’t need to believe in yourself. All you need to do is question EVERYTHING, and keep questioning until you get an answer that works.
Lola Jo Lipe by Laura Moncur from Flickr
This is a photo of my grandmother as a young girl during the tail end of the Great Depression. If she could live through that, then so could I, but articles like this make me paranoid:
Here are some great ideas to survive a economic downturn:
I was raised by 1970’s Jehovah Witnesses. Armageddon was always around the corner back then. Now, I don’t fear God’s wrath. We humans can make each other far more miserable. I guess I better find some land in the middle of nowhere and a wind turbine…
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It’s rare when I REALLY laugh out loud and not just chuckle to myself and say that I LOL. This video was one of those REAL LOLs!
My favorite part was the corporeal cuddling for punishment (it works) and cat yodeling!
Via: Cute Overload! :) An Engineer’s Guide to Kittehs [eye roll]
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Note to Self: Embed Bobka’s eggs in resin.
Then they’ll last forever and won’t smell like rotten eggs.
I’ll have to practice on non-Bobka eggs first so I don’t screw hers up.
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I received this email the other day:
While researching the “Rock Concert Movements” for a video of mine, I found your post. (Nice list, by the way…!)
You might or might not enjoy this, but I created my own video for “Time to Start” using the popular online game CITY OF HEROES. You can find it on my website at Samuraiko Productions (it’s the video called “Time to Start”). Alternately, you can find it on my YouTube profile.
Cheers,
Michelle Travis
aka
Samuraiko
You can see Michelle’s video here:
I was wondering how she was going to do Rock Concert Movement #4. You’ll have to see for yourself!
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This video for Lykke Li is the best creepy music video since Charlotte Sometimes by the Cure:
Just in case you missed it back in 1981:
I noticed that someone had linked to one of my photos online. She was asking for help:
HAIRR! helpp?
ok how do u get hair like this: Image – TinyPic – Share the Experience!™
& this:
Image – TinyPic – Share the Experience!™
& this!
Image – TinyPic – Share the Experience!™
to look like this: Pick Me! » Self Portrait Tuesday: Straight Hair
or this:
110907-beautiful-hair.gif (GIF Image, 447×332 pixels)
Here is my answer:
Since you used one of my pictures as an example (Straight Hair), I thought I would answer it. Thanks for using my picture, by the way. My hair usually looks like this (Curly Hair), so getting it straight is a 45 minute chore.
I wash my hair with the cheapest shampoo I can buy (Suave or Kirkland brand from Costco). I use a similarly chosen conditioner either the free stuff that came with the shampoo or something from Aussie Naturals.
I blow dry my hair holding my head upside down with no product. I continually brush while blowing it dry. When I’m finished blowing my hair dry, it looks just like your before photos: frizzy and BIG.
After the hair dryer, I put about a grape-sized amount of Bio-Silk on my hair (I have long hair, so use less for shorter hair). Then I partition my hair and use a hair straightener on each and every strand.
The reason my hair looks so healthy and shiny (despite the grueling hair blower and straightener) is because I only straighten my hair once or twice a year. The rest of the year, I just put some Three-Minute Miracle and hairspray on my wet hair and let it air dry.
It took me ten years to learn how to straighten my curly, frizzy hair. Now that I know the secret, I rarely bother with it. The moment I decided that I wasn’t going to bother with my hair anymore, my life became simpler and happier, but I distinctly remember all those years wishing I could have sleek and shiny hair. When I finally got it, however, I found out I was the same person I always was.
Now, I only go straight for special occasions. Maybe I’ll straighten my hair today just for the fun of it. Nah… I have better things to do with that 45 minutes.
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Andy Baio really outdid himself the other day. He converted an old BBC program that he had sitting around on a VHS tape and uploaded the hour-long show to Google Video for all of us to see:
He also did research on everyone who was in the video telling us where they are now:
In 1993, I had just graduated from college and was working at a biomedical testing lab. I used a Mac to work every day. By 1994, we went to our first Comdex, so seeing this video is like a walk through memory lane for me.
More importantly, I’m surprised at how spot on the predictions of some of the people interviewed were. When Denise Caruso is talking about the two-edged sword of the “Information Wants To Be Free” debate, I was sincerely awed by how forward-looking she was. We are still in a conundrum concerning copyright laws and online privacy. She predicted it fifteen years earlier.
There is an interview with Howard Rheingold where he mentions the loneliness he encounters writing in his room every day and how he combats it with a UseNet addiction. Today, building community online AND offline is still a major focus. He was social networking before social networking was cool.
Thanks for posting this video, Andy! You can’t imagine how much I enjoyed watching this!
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A couple of years ago, a Japanese animated movie for Animal Crossing was released. I talked about it here.
It still hasn’t been released in the states, but here is a translated version of the movie on YouTube:
This is the whole movie and it automatically plays Part 1 through Part 7.
I’m surprised at the differences in the names. Some of them are the same, such as Apollo, Cesar and Cyrano, but Alfonso’s name changes to Halberd, Whitney’s name changes to Bianca, Rosie’s name changes to Bouquet and Margie’s name is Sally. I have to admit that the movie captures the feeling of a year’s worth of playing Animal Crossing in just an hour or so. Right down to the blue roses, allusions to the acorn festival and the grief for an animal friend that moves without telling you ahead of time.
The beauty of this movie is that, just like the game, you could make many more with other plots. Ali could meet Dr. Shrunk, Lyle, and the other town visitors that were only alluded to in the movie. It’s a shame this movie didn’t make it to the United States. I’m so grateful to taellie for uploading it to YouTube for us to enjoy!
Via: The Bell Tree
Thanks for doing all that work so I don’t have to.
Suffragettes with flag by The Library of Congress from Flickr
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(c) 2003-2007 Laura Moncur
