kapgar

No time for losers...

Wow, it is getting truly wicked out now. Visibility from the window outside my office is maybe 1000 feet. Beyond that, all whiteness. It's almost like I'm coming close to living out my own Jose Saramago nightmare.

It's times like these that I feel I should have an overnight bag ready to go for work just in case I get stuck here. I can't imagine what it would be like to be stuck at work overnight due to weather that is unplanned. Sure, I've pulled overnight shifts, but they were known ahead of time and I was able to plan accordingly. But this? This is nuts. And I really don't want to be stuck. Not now. Two days until Christmas, for Christmas' sake!

Oh please may the roads be plowed before I have to leave.

Totally Unrelated Aside (TUA): Do I look?

Do I dare to actually look and see how it all played out? Oh hell, I guess I'd better...

 

I WON! I WON! I never win fantasy sports! I've been known to play upwards of three leagues in a single sport at one time and never placed higher than second or third. In the three years I've played in Brandon's DOWN WITH PANTS league, I placed seventh and 11th... pitiful. This, though, is awesome!

Okay, enough tooting of my own horn. Now I get to go ball up in a corner and cry that the season is over and I have to wait another eight months for the next season to begin.

But, before I go, can someone please tell me what the hell RW's avatar is? Looks like a booger or Slimer from Ghostbusters. I know I've seen it before or maybe it just reminds me a bit of the smiley from the cover of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

Wildcats, football... Wildcats, football...

There are pros and cons to having been subjected to the flu this past weekend.

• Pro #1: Without going into any details, I feel the thinnest I've felt in a couple years.

And, actually, that might be the only pro.

• Con #1: I was sick during Katie's first weekend after her classes ended. The weekend we should've been celebrating not only that she was done for the semester, but that she pulled in another 4.0 GPA. I'm ridiculously proud, but couldn't do much to celebrate.
• Con #2: My diet becomes Katie's diet. She's not a big fan of cooking for one. So she was eating the same bland crap I was. Chicken noodle soup, noodles, etc. Not that there's anything wrong with those foods, but, after a while, you kinda want a little more.
• Con #3: Missing one of her family Christmas parties. I guess we only have three this year instead of the normal four. But it still kinda sucks.

I'm not completely over it just yet. But hopefully soon.

Moving on...

I've got a third Five Questions to run through. This set comes from my neighbor to the north, Nat! Here is a link to her 5Q.

1. You recently shared a 10th anniversary with Katie. If you could give her anything in the world what would it be? (She's already had your hunka-hunka burning love.)
You realize Katie laughed her ass off when she read "hunka-hunka burning love," don't you? Thank you for that. I would give her a baby. Simply put. And we will, SJ. Fear not. Mini-Me will happen soon.

2. I have noticed (I could be misunderstanding) that you take it personally when specific Chicagoans or Americans do dumb things. I think "ashamed" was the word you use. Why do you think that is? (And weren't the Bush years just a bit brutal on you?)
You're not misunderstanding. Not in the slightest. I realize what a tenuous relationship the USA has with the world as a result of the Bush Administration. Although I'm not placing all the blame on him, his admin certainly does deserve a big chunk of finger pointing. So the reason why I feel so ashamed is because, even though I realize that stupid people are typically the minority of any population, they are the ones that achieve the headlines in the news. And, given the World Wide Web, these news stories circle the globe faster than the fallout from that meteor in the beginning of Armageddon. And, when that person receives such notoriety combined with the low expectations the world already has of us, it tends to reflect on the rest of the population of the USA as though we're all complicit. Maybe I'm being overly sensitive, but it's truly amazing how often you hear "stupid American" or "ignorant American" while having done nothing personally to deserve it. Know what I mean?

3. Football. I don't get it. I mean you get more people at college and high school games than we get at the Grey Cup. What's up with that?
As sung by Woody Harrelson, Wesley Snipes, and Goldie Hawn, et al, in the movie Wildcats, "It's the sport of kings, better than diamond rings... football."

It's hard to explain the appeal of American football sometimes. It's even harder to understand why they use the word "football" to describe a sport where feet only touch the ball (or should only touch the ball) a grand total of a few seconds per game. But, in my mind's eye, it's a fantastically fun sport that requires a lot of strategy, balls, and luck. It's organized war. Their playbooks in the NFL are larger than those in a war room, I would imagine. And some people are fanatical about it. No different than football/soccer in the rest of the world. Both sports have equal levels of fanaticism. In fact, considering the movie Green Street Hooligans, I'd almost say that football/soccer has greater levels of fanaticism. I've never seen street gangs fighting and killing to support the Bears over the Packers. Seriously people. It's a freakin' game! Well, except maybe in Texas. But that's a whole other story.

4. I am toying with running the Chicago Marathon in 2009. Care to join me?
If by "join" you mean "stand on the sidelines and cheer like mad," then sure!

5. What one obscure film do you think everyone should see?
Oh, for you documentary buffs, I would highly recommend a little known, barely seen film called Barbed Wire Pioneers: Inventing a Community. Not sure where you'd obtain a copy in all honesty, but I would recommend it if you are creative enough to nab it. And, no, it wouldn't have anything to do with the fact that I helped make it in grad school.

Want to be part of it? Follow these instructions:

1. Leave me a comment saying, "Interview me."
2. I will respond by emailing you five questions. I get to pick the questions.
3. You will update your blog with the answers to the questions.
4. You will include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the same post.
5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions.

Totally Unrelated Aside (TUA): Oh great, I've lost Katie forever. Thanks a pantload, SJ.

Click on the image to be taken to this shirt on SJ's Zazzle storefront.

Oh tidings of comfort and joy...

We interrupt this week-long 5Q Extravaganza to bring you... SNIPPET WEDNESDAY!!

FreeLee
I am an unabashed fan of Amos Lee. Have been since Katie and I first saw him perform live as the opening act for Norah Jones some years back. And I'm doing my part to promote his fantastic music by blogging when he releases new music or material. Well, he now has a five-track Live Session EP available on iTunes. While I would highly recommend just going over there and buying it outright for yourself (it's only $4.49 and it's iTunes Plus, meaning that it's higher bitrate and DRM free), I'm going to give away a copy here. The deal? Leave a comment saying you want to be entered in the contest. The catch? You have to be an iTunes user as this is an iTunes-exclusive album. Come next Monday at whatever time I decide to write my post, I'll close the contest, assign numbers to the entrants, and use some number randomizer to pick one of you to receive a copy. That simple. And, no, this is not limited to just people who have commented here before. Maybe this will serve as a bit of a delurker carrot-on-a-stick if you will. C'mon out and play!

Blogrolling
The third-party Blogrolling service has now been down for more than two months. Apparently they were hacked and are both fixing their security holes and upgrading to what they're calling Blogrolling 2.0 all in one fell swoop. And it's pissing those of us who still use the service (because we're too damned lazy to just handcode our rolls) off severely. I have a ton of people I need to add and some I just discovered desperately need to be updated. My blogroll still has Hilly's old Typepad URL for chrissake! So any of you more recent reads, don't think I'm dissing you. I'm not. I just can't make an update. If it's not fixed soon, I may have no choice but to handcode. I'll give them until the New Year or until I'm so inclined to do it myself, whichever comes first.

Faced
Just when you thought Facebook and other social media services were our friends comes this little bit out of Australia about a couple who were in default on their mortgage. After months of trying to find them and serve them with legal documents about their situation, lawyers convinced a judge to allow them to serve these docs, legally binding, via their Facebook accounts. The one condition was that they couldn't be posted in a publically visible area of their profile. Wow, if ever there was support for Miss Britt's belief that Facebook and MySpace were evil and used for stalking (listen to the episode dated 12/03/2008), this is it. Tip for anyone hiding from authorities of any sort... don't keep using social media accounts while on the lam, 'tay?

Cube'd
I found my ideal Christmas gift. It has to be one of the coolest things ever... the Cube Clock. Basically, it's a cube-shaped clock made to look like a Rubik's Cube. No, it doesn't have the full twistability (is that a word?) of its inspiration, but it does twist in at least the top layer. If you look at the top right cubit, you'll see a sticker indicating time (facing), alarm (right cubit), calendar (not visible), and temperature (also not showing). Simply, whichever of these panels is aligned above the clock face controls which mode the clock is in. And the three cubits underneath the display help with settings. I wonder if you just smack the top of the cube for snooze.

Blago
Okay, I'm sure you're all sick to death of me ranting and raving about busted Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich, but I have one more thing I need to share with you. And I'm sure when you hear that it was sent to me by everyone's fave Sheila over at Charm School Reject, you'll likely read attentively. And it's also sort of a holiday song. Sort of.

"Blagojevich" by John McHugh
(to the tune of "God Rest Ye, Merry Gentlemen")

Get packin', Rod Blagojevich
The state's in disarray

The Tribune wants you unemployed
At least by Christmas Day.
The TV pundits want your head
Could there by pay to play?
Oh tidings of comfort and joy
Save Illinois!
Oh tidings of comfort and joy

Good riddance Rod Blagojevich
Your Elvis look's inane,
The Senate's mad, so's Lisa's dad
You drive us all insane.
Our transit's broke, the state's a joke,
The Tollway's one big pain.
Oh tidings of comfort and joy
Save Illinois!
Oh tidings of comfort and joy

Good luck old Rod Blagojevich
The feds have quite a place
Fitzegerald's poked his nose around
And if he has a case,
George Ryan's moving stuff around
Creating extra space.
Oh tidings of comfort and joy
Save Illinois!
Oh tidings of comfort and joy

Until next week, I bid thee adieu!

I'm back in the saddle again...

After a two-week hiatus during which he saw the world, reinvigorated his persona, and bedded many other blog theme days, Snippet Wednesday makes his triumphant return!

Razr
Yeah, I'm back on my Razr for a little while as I had to send my Nokia E71 back England way yesterday. I may have griped about a few issues I had with it here and there, but it is certainly a great phone and I will miss having it around. Dammit.

Comments
So did you all notice anything new about the comments here? 

Yep, Typepad implemented a new comment system for their users. It's opt in only so not all the Typepad blogs you visit may have it rolled out yet. Basically we now have an avatar system (although you need to set up a free Typekey account, which is apparently now known as a "Typepad Profile," so your avatar will show up), nested comments with direct replies, and e-mail notification should a reply be posted to your comment (also requiring Typekey). The fact that it requires Typekey/Typepad Profile kinda bugs me, but it's a step in the right direction.

War
When Katie and I bought my camera the other day, I opted for a four-year warranty. The 20% off that I received covered the cost of the warranty, so why not? Anyway, the woman at Sony asked me if I was aware that the warranty covered X, Y, and Z, but not A, B, and C, with "C" being "acts of war."

Me: Acts of what? You mean the warranty actually says that?

Her: It does now.

Me: I'm guessing for reporters in warzones?

Her: Yep.

Me: Wow!

Panda
Jesus, we can't win for losing with movies on Netflix. First it was the travesty known as Fred Claus and, last night, it was Kung Fu Panda. Maybe it gets better the further you watch into it, but we got through the first half hour or 45 minutes and were bored to tears. We hadn't even chuckled once by the time we shut it off. I'm on the verge of deleting all films from our Netflix queue and just populating it with TV discs. Okay, not really, but you get my point.

Nottie
Speaking of bad movies (and I admit I brought this one on myself), I was flipping through the on-screen channel guide and saw that some channel was playing The Hottie and the Nottie last night so I flipped it on out of sheer morbid curiosity. "The what and the what?" you might be asking. It's a Paris Hilton attempt at an acting career. Need I say more? I got through three minutes and 32 seconds before flipping the channel. Simply put, David Caruso can out-act Paris Hilton and that's saying something. What it's saying, I'm not sure, but it's something. The fact that this movie came out earlier this year and is already on extended cable also says something... about it stinking like year-old eggs, perhaps, but still.

It's so cool, it's so hip, it's alright...

'nuff said.

Totally Unrelated Aside (TUA): I like when certain Web sites dynamically change the proverbial little things each time you revisit them. For example, a Javascript-based image rotation or how Flickr welcomes you in a different language each time you log back in or reload the page. I like that sort of thing.

FeedBurner does the same sort of thing. It's a corny message about "your feed" and what it's capable of. And last night's message certainly spoke to the geek in me...

Heh heh. Sorry, it's the little things in life for me.

A wise man once told me...

Typically, today would be Snippet Wednesday and I tried, I really tried, to come up with enough snippets to populate a post. But I kinda blew that on Monday with what was effectively a bunch of snippets, but on the wrong day. Oh well. So we're fiddling with the format a bit today. Why? Because I need your help.

I'm looking for a wise man (or woman, lest I be called sexist)... someone I can turn to for spiritual advice or guidance. A person whose actions are of such reproach and whose judgment is free of moral and ethical question (by my standards, of course) that I would feel comfortable, in a difficult situation, simply asking, "What would such-and-such do?"

But it's not just mentally asking the question, I feel the need to make it known to the world that I look to this person for this assistance. To achieve this, I will need physical reminders around me at all times. Do you remember the old WWJD ("What Would Jesus Do?") bracelets from several years ago? Yeah, something along those lines. I want a magnet on my office cabinet, a coffee mug, a mousepad, and a bracelet, maybe more, so that no matter where I look, I will see the solution to my nagging problem, the light at the end of the tunnel. So obviously this person must not only be wise, but marketable.

I'm turning to you, my blogopeeps. Who gets me better than all of you? That's why I want one of you to be that person.

I began considering some of you and came up with a list of positives and negatives, which I have detailed in this post. Do not feel offended if your name is not listed below. If you feel you would be a viable candidate for this role, nominate yourself! Tell me why you would be a good soothsayer. I will certainly take you under consideration.

Be my sage.

So far, I have:

Avitable
Let's see... What Would Avitable Do? I think the appropriate question here is more What Wouldn't Avitable Do? And the answer scares me. Plus, WWAD looks too similar to wad, like "spitwad."

It's Me... Penelope
I love Penelope too much to wear a wimpy bracelet in her honor. Seriously! WWIMPD. "Wimp" right in the middle of it!

Delmer Wells
What Would Delmer Wells Do? WWDWD. That's truly a mouthful, but kinda looks cool on paper.

Snackiepoo
What Would Snackiepoo Do? I dunno. Kinda reminds me of Return of the Jedi, "Bantha poodoo."

Karl Erikson
What Would Karl Do? See "Avitable" above, but realize that, by comparison, Adam has shown considerable personal restraint.

Iron Fist
If I want to be a world dictator, this is the way to go! What Would Iron Fist Do? He'd rain down hellfire and brimstone, I tells ya!

NYCWD
What Would Watchdog Do? If I split "Watchdog" in two, we get What Would Watch Dog Do, WWWDD. A FULL HOUSE, baby! My favorite hand in poker. That's gotta be good for something, right?

Wil Wheaton
What Would Wil Wheaton Do? That's a lot of Ws. Even more than the World Wide Web. So I, like the World Wide Web Consortium (abbreviated W3C), will have to shorten it to "W4D" to make it easy. It's nice and concise as well as memorable and I feel I can trust Wesley Crusher to not guide me astray so long as I can get over the idea that the acronym sounds like a lubricant spray.

Dave2
We all know Dave is evil. He declares such on a regular basis. Why would I want to use someone who has dedicated his life to the pursuit of all things evil as my daily inspiration? It's simple, evil gets stuff, be it items of wealth or favors or praise. Who wouldn't want that? Besides, that bracelet would read WWD2D, which sounds an awful lot like a certain Astromech droid who, through six Star Wars movies, made his vast knowledge and ability to accurately read a situation quite apparent, even if few people listened to his chirps and tweets. Plus, I could then make a What Would Bad Monkey Do? bracelet.

So what do you all think? One of the above or another blogger altogether?

And, baby, I'm the walking dead...

Dear Lord,

I pray you grant me the strength to survive tonight. It will be one of the biggest challenges of my life to go into the heart of the lions' den and come out with my wits intact and my hands free of blood from having throttled people who clearly know no better.

I pray you grant me the patience to brush off and hear through the insensitive cooing and sighing and screaming that will no doubt occur at his very first appearance and more than likely every instance thereafter. I can't say I entirely understand their level of love and adulation, so I will need your help to weather the storm.

And I pray you grant me the ability to forgive my wife for buying tickets for the opening night of Twilight. But, like me, you know that she loves those damn books.

In your name I pray.

Amen.

Totally Unrelated Aside (TUA): My head is swimming right now.

Why?

Both Gmail and Typepad have hit me at the same time with all kinds of new features and I'm not sure what to do with myself.

Gmail now has themes that have been pushed out to a select group of users (I say "select" as opposed to "random" to make myself feel specialer). Now you can pick any one of a few dozen different display themes to make your Gmail experience, I suppose, cooler. Some of them are just strange, some are cool, and some, like the one I chose, could be so much cooler than they are. I chose "mountain" because I live in the wonderfully un-hilly region of northeastern Illinois and desperately miss the mountains that I've seen when visiting Colorado or flying out west. But, while it's a beautiful photo, it needs to fill more of the available screen. Too much of my monitor is covered in the slate grey fill color associated with the theme. I'm sure these themes will improve with time, though.

Typepad has a whole new blog entry interface. They've been talking about it for what seems like a year now and only now am I finally having it rolled out to me. It has a much better RTF toolbar with greater functionality and more choices. But, key for me is the built-in image editor. Sure, I'm a Photoshopper and will still use this. However, if I happen to be blogging from another computer that doesn't have Photoshop installed, it's nice to know I can still do some basic work to images before posting them. Yeah, there are several online options and I've used them. But their use is so infrequent that I can never remember which one I've used and then have to get accustomed to a whole new control panel for a single image for a blog post. Not fun.

Now, if only I can talk Typepad HQ into implementing an image library so I can easily choose an image to use over and over again. As of now, the image uploader only looks on your computer for new images. Something to work on, Typepad.

BTW, you can click on either of those images to get a full-size version for closer examination.

So it looks like I've got some new toys to play with.

Rollin', rollin', rollin', keep them doggies rollin'...

Facebook
Even though Katie and I no longer work at the gym (we still work out, just not work at), we still talk regularly with many of our former coworkers and we've become friends with some of the newer employees by extension through our continued relationships. Since I'm a guy who doesn't often think of himself as actually being 33, it's cool to have these "friendships" because they help continue my delusion of youth. The other day, though, this came crashing down when, during a discussion of a picture on my Facebook account of me with my BiL, Scott, that one of these gym girls thought made us look like twins (poor me), the other said, quite bluntly and clearly as an age jab (I hope unintentionally), "you have a Facebook account???" Um yeah. Thanks.

Rustling
Ha! Times are so tough that people are digressing back... way back... like 1800s Old West back. A cattle rancher in Maple Park, IL (two towns west of where I live), reported that six of his bull Holstein calves were stolen over the weekend. One has since been recovered. If one of them was named Norman, we could pin blame to Billy Crystal. Or, I guess it could be PETA reps since his plan was to ween them to full size and then sell them for meat. But, regardless, this is only the second case of cattle rustling in Illinois in the last 15 years. Giddyup!

Apple
Apparently, the apple on the cover of the book Twilight bears a bit more significance than it may seem. Robert Pattinson, who plays vampire Edward Cullen in the movie version due on November 21, was caught shopping in the Manhattan Apple Store. See? Vampires have taste... and for more than just blood. Suck on that, y'all! Get it... "suck on that"... vampires? Of course, don't pay any attention to the freaky seven-year-old's request to be bitten that is actually the substance of that IMDb post.

Obamac
Oh yeah, speaking of Macs, according to Famecrawler, President-Elect Obama is a Mac user, too. My officemate said, "just when I thought my love for Obama couldn't get any greater." Yeah, she's a Machead too.

Ankles
I finished my second yoga session several hours ago and my teacher (Yogi? Berra?) is impressed with what I'm able to do as a beginner. It's kinda funny, but several moves are ones that I used to do in pre-practice stretches for football in high school and they've stuck with me through the years. Who knew football would prepare me for yoga. Today, as I was sitting with my feet pulled in and the bottoms of them together, she expressed how impressed she was with the flexibility in my ankles and insteps. And to prove it, she asked if she could stand on them... on the bottoms... as they faced upward. That was, er, weird. Thank God she weighs only like 95 pounds soaking wet.

And thus we wrap Snippet Wednesday #24.

I feel fine and I feel good, I'm feeling like I never should...

Hey all.

Sorry, I really thought I'd have something more meaningful to say than "hey all," but I suddenly realized, late last night, that I messed up the importing of about two dozen CDs into iTunes. I had the import functionality set to MP3 format at 128 Mbps (very low quality for you non-techies) because I was creating ringtones some weeks back. And for a few hours, I've been trying to reimport some CDs I still have at better quality, lossless settings (yes, MP3s can actually lose quality over time if reimported or moved around or otherwise messed with enough times).

Thankfully this doesn't affect what I've purchased off iTunes and Amazon.

I've found about a half dozen of the CDs, but I've had to go on the library Web site and re-request a ton that I have already checked out. That won't raise any eyebrows amongst the librarians, will it?

Anyway.

So I'm leaving you with a video. File this under "How in the name of all that's holy did I miss this one when it came out earlier in the month?" I just cannot forgive myself.

Thank you to Funny Or Die for the embed code that the original Huffington Post did not provide.

Oh, and I have a meme for you in the extended post.

Out cold...

Guess what! Snippet Wednesday can now legally drink! #21, y'all!

Plurk'd
In the midst of my frustration over being frozen out of Twitter (which has allowed me back to play in their sandbox, BTW), I went ahead and signed up with sue on Plurk. It's a far different experience than Twitter although both are marketed as microblogging social network sites. Instead of being message on top of message, like Twitter, the messages you post are listed in a timeline and you can continue a conversation based on a single Plurk (?) in a threaded box as opposed to having to dig around to find a reply if your respondent forgets to throw the @ to make it a Twitter direct reply. I also like that it's all Ajax based and dynamically updates itself. It's pretty nice. The only downside is that there aren't nearly as many people in Plurk as there are in Twitter. So I'll use both. For now anyway. Gotta up my karma rating. ;-)

Griping
A friend forwarded this to me and, as a Web designer, I gotta admit that I love it. Thank you to vilain.com.

[click on image to increase size]

STD
It blows my mind to think that a Web site actually exists that allows a person to send an e-card to people that they may have infected with some STD. Yeah, you read that right. If you have contracted an STD, you can enter all the information you have about former lovers and have an e-card delivered to them informing them that they should get tested. While it's better than no notice at all, I'd really think that there must be a better, and less anonymous, way.

Single
I think I can now consider myself at least a tangential San Francisco 49ers fan. Why? Because my man, "Samurai" Mike Singletary has been named head coach of the team after the sacking of former head coach Mike Nolan. Need a reminder of my love of Singletary? Here you go...

Nokia
About a week and a half ago, I got a killer invite. Some site asked if I would be willing to trial a smartphone and write about it on my blog. It's a Nokia E71-NAM and it's a gorgeous phone, here's hoping the functionality equals the form factor. I began talking with the rep at this site and she seemed pretty gung ho about sending it to me. Then the ball was dropped. I could only have it for two weeks and I was required to pay for the service on the phone. First, two weeks is not nearly enough time to really get a feel for the phone. Second, it's a load of crap that if you are solicited to review something that they are not paying for it. You're using your time and your resources for it, right? It's one thing if I could take the SIM card out of my AT&T Razr and put it in this phone to try it, but this phone is locked to T-mobile. A week ago I asked them how much the service would cost for the two weeks and they have yet to get back to me. It could've been so much fun to play with this phone. Dammit.

Punched
If I never buy another game for my Nintendo Wii, let it be this one... a revised version of the classic Punch-Out! with all the same characters and even the same music, but updated and looking FINE! The only problem is that I have to wait until 2009 to get my grubby mitts on it.

I get so weary...

People ask me why I'm so cynical of human nature. Why do I, who otherwise seems like such a nice and easygoing guy, mistrust my fellow man so horribly.

It's because of stories like this.

Basically, two people in Villa Park, IL, who have prObama signs in their yards received notes in their mailboxes from an unidentified future Darwinism victim that read:

Get the Obama signs off your property -- now. Failure to obey this order will result in the immediate death of all family members.

I realize this is the minority... the bottom of the barrel... the shallow end of the gene pool. Yes, there are many really great people in the world doing fantastic things to make life better for the rest of us. And yet these lowlifes are the ones who dominate the news. Not only do they give the Republican party and American politics in general a bad name, but they cast a pallor on all those people who try to be all that they can be (no Army Reserve comments, okay?).

So you'll forgive my dour outlook on humanity.

Sorry if that bugs you out.

Totally Unrelated Aside (TUA): I just received a couple e-mails that have made me very happy this morning.

The first came from Ginger Snaps and her friend Dave Delaney. You see Dave had the same thing happen to him that happened to me on Twitter. He got satisfaction through a site called, well, simply, getsatisfaction.com. On this particular thread, several people griped about how their Twitter accounts were nixed for the same non-reasons as me and their cases were summarily resolved. Considering my Twitter Support e-mails still remain unanswered, I'm giving it a shot. Let's hope for the best as I would hate to have to try to remember all the people I had on my friend list. Thanks to both Ginger and Dave!

The second came from my local library and they now have copies of B.B. King's One Kind Favor, Jenny Lewis with the Watson Twins' Rabbit Fur Coat, and Darius Rucker's Learn to Live awaiting my pick up.

I love the blues and B.B. is literally the king of them so how can you go wrong?

Jenny Lewis (right) is the lead singer of Rilo Kiley, the former actress who starred in The Wizard with Fred Savage (the movie that introduced the world to Super Mario Bros 3), and is currently my favorite female vocalist. She has a killer voice.

And Darius Rucker... yes, Hootie and the Blowfish Darius Rucker and his turn as a country singer. I've heard a few songs off this album and actually kinda dig it. I'm strangely looking forward to hearing the rest of it.

Where do we go...

In case any of you have been wondering where I've been off to instead of Twittering away, I'll tell you.

I want to say last Tuesday, I actually logged into my account (as opposed to using Twhirl or my cell phone) and noticed a little header saying that there was suspicious activity on my account. However, when I refreshed or surfed to any other page in my account, the message was no longer there, so I pretty much gave it up as a fluke. We all know how readily something wonky happens on Twitter and we get the dreaded Fail Whale. So I chalked it up as a temporary glitch and thought nothing more of it.

However, on Thursday night, I logged in again to check some @replies because I had posed a question that I was looking forward to some answers about. When I got past the login screen, I found this waiting for me...

A Fail Owl? WTF?

So I clicked on the Suspended Accounts link to see what could possibly be the problem and there is absolutely no useful information on the page. Crap about potential violation of the Terms of Use, which I did not do. I next filled out the complaint form and, five days later, I have yet to hear jack from them. I received an auto notice about my complaint being received and they gave me a tracking number and that's about it.

When I logged in to check on the tracking, thinking they were possibly just negligent in e-mailing me follow-up information and had been completing stuff directly in my support file, I found this... "USER IS flagged antisocial!" (their emphasis).

WTF does that mean??? Because I don't login every ten minutes and play with all the Twitterati, I'm not a good user? Because I use my cell phone to post messages, I'm a bad person? I mean, seriously, what the hell kind of judgmental crap is this? I login to my Amazon account once every couple of months and they don't cancel me out. e-Bay hasn't killed my account even though I haven't used that one in more than a year.

Hey Twitter, get your collective heads out of your collective asses and realize that some of us have jobs where we can't login from work and we have family lives so we don't login from our houses every freakin' day and night. Cut us some slack, okay? Oh, and HOW ABOUT RESPONDING!?!?

Asshats.

So do I just give up on Twitter? Do I wait it out for them to respond? Do I create a whole new user? If the last one, help me come up with a cool new name.

Totally Unrelated Aside (TUA): I need a laugh right about now. So howsabout this...

Simply put, greatest out-of-office notification ever (names have been changed to protect the innocent).

From:     Adam.Ant@email.com
To:         Me
Subject: Adam Ant is retiring

I will be out of the office starting 10/16/2008 and will not return until 01/01/2025.

I will not be responding to your message.

Yes, I did receive this last week. The only thing that might've made it better would be to say "Assume I have moved on with my life."

Stop kickin' my, stop kickin' my...

Once in a while, I like to take a gander at Google Maps and see what I can find. Just spend some time looking. I love Google Maps. I'm thoroughly enthralled by it. Yeah, I know, simple strokes for simple folks, right? Oh well.

Anyway, I was on there recently and I noticed a bit of an abnormality in the downtown area of the city where I live. Here's what I found...

Community Hospital? I thought the only hospital in my town was almost literally across the street from where I live. So I started checking out the crossroads and it hit me where they were talking about.

Simply put, so not a hospital. Here's how not a hospital it truly is...

1. A brand new and amazingly cool Life is Good store
2. Bridal and baby boutique
3. Store that sells freakishly high-end (read: "ridonkulously expensive") strollers
4. Artsy fartsy crafty interior decorating store
5. Egg Harbor Cafe... good stuff
6. Michaelangelo's Deli... damn good stuff
7. Wildwood Steak, Seafood and Pasta... also good stuff
8. Galena Cellars Vineyard and Winery... you on a plane yet, Penelope?

I can think of one place that might help cure what ails you but certainly not in a medical sense. I'm just curious how Google got the idea this was a hospital. Not even close. Considering what Shodeen (developers who pretty much own half of Geneva) charges for rent in the downtown area, I doubt a hospital could ever afford to viably operate there.

I wonder what other abnormalities Google Maps has to offer.

Totally Unrelated Aside (TUA): As some of you may have read the other day on Twitter, I was at a college women's soccer game in Naperville, Illinois. Katie's cousin was on the visiting team and this is a fairly reasonable distance for us to drive from home to be able to see her play, so we did.

I played soccer... er... "non-American football" for two years as a kid and clearly all my knowledge of the game is gone. I picked back up on a little of it here and there as I was watching, but something happened during the game that I couldn't explain. Thankfully, for my sanity's sake, nobody else could explain it either. The girl on the home team tangled up with a girl on the visiting team trying to get at the ball. Home Girl (HG) wound up literally wrapping herself around Visiting Girl (VG) at the waist (yep, they looked like a lower-case "t") and pulled VG down to the ground on top of her. The ref blew her whistle and gave VG a yellow card.

Huh? How's this VG's fault? Can someone explain this to me? That was all instigated and perpetrated by HG, not VG. Hey ref, get your head out of your arse!

I might have to go to more of these. It's fun.

Jump in...

I swear I'm having the worst time keeping count of Snippet Wednesdays. I always have to go back at least one or two to figure out which number I'm on. This one should be #20. I hope.

Flowers
So, even though Katie and I said "no gifts" for our anniversary this year (to each other, that is), I still did buy her some roses. I had to. Sorry. But I forgot to order them ahead of time to have them delivered to her work. I'm kinda glad I did forget, too, because I wound up buying them from a place near where I work, Dave's Floral, that has a cool recycling program going on. For every box from their shop as well as vases or baskets from any shop that you bring back to their store, they will give you credit for one free loose rose. How cool is that? Katie and I have a ton of vases and baskets sitting around that we don't use and now, instead of simply throwing them in the recycling bin, we can get something for them in exchange. The owner told me that one guy brought in 40 used vases and now has 40 roses available for him to pick up at any time for any occasion. I really like this idea a lot and wish more people would do it.

Nuke
Everyone (at least I hope everyone) has heard the phrase "Jumping the Shark," right? It's in reference to an old episode of Happy Days where the Fonz jumps his motorcycle over a pool with a shark in it as a stunt. Most people point to that scene as being when the show Happy Days got bad. Real bad. And now, people can point to that line in the sand for any TV show or movie or musical act and say that's when they "jumped the shark." However, an article on Cinematical talking about the pending new Ghostbusters film seems to coin a new phrase (well, it's new to me anyway) that I really like. The author, Elisabeth Rappe, says "Nuke the Fridge" in reference to the most recent Indiana Jones film in which Indy survives a nuclear test blast and subsequent throwing and tossing when he gets stuck in a refrigerator. This scene alone really blew the film for me in all honesty and I love the idea of now using "nuke the fridge" as a replacement for "jump the shark." Any other good ideas?

Eli
I'm so happy because one of my favorite new shows from last season, Eli Stone, finally returned with a new episode last night. I really enjoy the fantastical elements in Eli Stone because they are not too terribly over the top. You realize that anything truly strange is a vision in Eli's head and that makes the show all the more believable. Plus it has one of the coolest casts on TV. So bring on more Eli!

Cheadle
The Hollywood scene is abuzz with the news that Terrence Howard, who played Jim Rhodes in this year's Iron Man, has been replaced by Don Cheadle. I've read that it was an inability to come to terms on a contract and I've also read that the filmmakers plan to take the character in a different direction. Who will ever know the truth, really? Whatever. I don't care. I love Don Cheadle and feel he is one of the finest actors working today and can't wait to see him take on the role of Rhodey.

Story
I think this is one of the greatest spoof trailers I've seen. And, much like the twist on the Stand By Me trailer from a couple years ago, this shows that the right amount of altered atmosphere can severely darken even the most whimsical of films.

Radio, someone still loves you...

Say a prayer for me...

Make a wish...

Send good tidings in my general direction...

Will me some karma...

Light a candle...

Tie a ribbon around the old oak tree...

Why?

Here's why...

And tonight, I'm Karl's guest. Granted nothing is showing up in his upcoming shows list, he said we were doing it. So let's hope it's still happening. Otherwise this post is going to seem pretty stupid, isn't it?

What are we going to talk about? Hell if I know. He asked what I wanted to talk about and I had no idea. We might just make this like an episode of Seinfeld, no purpose whatsoever. I can only hope it will be about as much fun. Hell, I'd consider having 25% the fun quotient of an episode of Seinfeld to be a success when I'm involved.

So get on over to Talkshoe and register to listen or to participate in the message boards or both. It's up to you. The show is set for 9 p.m. tonight, CDT (we are still on daylight time, aren't we?). I believe that's GMT -6 so do the math for your own time zone and tune in. Or you can visit the site tomorrow and listen to it after the fact from the Web site or by downloading to iTunes.

Totally Unrelated Aside (TUA): This morning, Lilly was wandering the living room and started smelling a few little fuzzballs on the carpet. Rather than risk her eating them, I decided to pick them up and throw them out.

As I reached down and touched one, it scooted away. It was a freakin' spider! Gah!!!! And I touched it!! Blech! Icky! Icky!

(I sound like such a little girl, but I HATE HATE HATE spiders!)

Oh, and I smashed the little bastard with my boot and flushed him. Sorry Charlotte.

What the world needs now...

Snippet Wednesday #19 is here. RUN!

Thanks
I wanted to take a moment to thank all of you for your comments on yesterday's post. Even though we may not have all seen eye to eye on the topic (nor should we), you were all very respectful and nice in how you worded things. I was terrified to post that because of how hot topic politics are in the blogosphere. But I feel better about what I wrote and how it was received. So thanks again!

Senate
I think Iron Fist had the best idea, though, in that a blogger needs to petition Illinois Governor Blagojevich for what will (if recent polls hold) be the upcoming open Senate seat in Illinois. And, since I live here, why not me? So that's it. Let's make it official. I'm pushing to receive Blago's nomination to the Senate under the PRB party banner. Anyone want in on the campaign?

Lilly
Guess who's our houseguest again until about Sunday? Yep, the Lilly Monster. Woo hoo. Fun times will ensue. Oh, and for those of you wondering and did not get the note in Twitter, she is fine. It was an abscess in her gums caused by gingivitis, not cancer.

Silverman
Dammit! Dammit! Dammit! I hate when I accidentally hit the wrong button in iTunes and buy a whole something or other instead of just downloading the freebie that is being offered. Did it once a couple years ago and it worked out in that the album I got was pretty decent. This time, though, I subscribed to the entire second season of The Sarah Silverman Show. D'oh! Nothing against Silverman. I've heard the show is great. But that's $18.99! GAH!!!!!

Mob
I've been pretty addicted to an application in Facebook called Mob Wars. Fun game kinda like a really watered down SIMS about mob life. However, to really do anything good or to survive fights, you need a big mob consisting of all your friends. Yeah, I have a lot of Facebook friends, but only a small number are interested and have signed up to join my mob. However, MadIrishMan tipped me off to a Firefox plug in and a script that will invite people to join your mob even if they're not your Facebook friend. In a few days time, I jumped from 18 to about 140. I feel dirty; but I like it!

XRT
One of the only reasons I still buy the occasional physical compact disc has come a month early... the OnXRT: Live From the Archives collection. Annually, WXRT 93.1 FM Chicago puts out a collection of live performances they have recorded in studio or at local clubs on a single disc and sells it with all the net proceeds going to charity. And this one -- volume 11 -- is pretty good. Check out the playlist...

• "Mr. Jones" - Counting Crows
• "Teen Angst (What the World Needs Now)" - Cracker
• "Bubble Toes" - Jack Johnson
• "Polyester Bride" - Liz Phair
• "Rain on the Scarecrow" - John Mellencamp
• "Touch of Grey" - Grateful Dead
• "Love My Way" - Richard Butler
• "Ecstasy" - Rusted Root
• "Waiting on the World to Change" - John Mayer
• "Turpentine" - Brandi Carlile
• "Time Zones" - Widespread Panic
• "(The Angels Wanna Wear My) Red Shoes" - Elvis Costello
• "See A Little Light" - Bob Mould
• "Come Home" - Back Door Slam
• "Big Love" - Lindsey Buckingham

Your own personal Jesus...

Welcome to Snippet Wednesday #17!

Authentic
Katie was driving this morning when she passed by a church with "Authentic Jesus" on its front sign. Can anyone tell us what constitutes an authentic Jesus as opposed to a fake Jesus and what studies have been done to validate these findings? Can I take them on their word on this? If they're lying, who would I file a complaint with?

Domobacca
I'm starting to wonder if these two little beasts were separated at birth. At left is one of the Target Domokun Halloween plushes and at right is the Mighty Mugg Chewbacca. Eerily similar, aren't they? And, yes, that's a candy corn in Chewie's mitt.

Henson
Speaking of little creatures, happy birthday to Jim Henson, creator of The Muppets and so much other great stuff that has entertained me throughout my life. You are a true artist.

Mattingly
My BiL Scott sent this bad boy my way. It's an oversized (5" x 7") 1985 Topps Don Mattingly card. Back in the day, I was a diehard Yankees fan (I was born in New York and raised a bit in Connecticut, so I'm excused) and "Donnie Baseball" was m'man. I collected all kinds of Mattingly baseball cards until I stopped collecting sometime in the very early 90s. Scott, who got back into card collecting recently, has been sending me the occasional Mattingly card for kicks. Two of them are in magnetic frames on our fridge while this one is now displayed on my overhead cabinet at work. Thanks Scott (and Becca).

Dairy
Winter twatted this morning about a report that PETA is asking Ben & Jerry's ice cream company to start using human breast milk as opposed to cow's milk. Seriously? Well, as she said, that would be one dairy I'd like to see.

Dew
When the first thing you do upon entering your place of employment in the morning is to head to the breakroom and buy a Mountain Dew, you know something is wrong.

Which is the way that's clear...

Don't ask why, but lately I've been forced to share my time of late on different computers. My arsenal of computers includes my G5 iMac, G3 PowerBook, a Dell desktop, a Dell laptop, and a Lenovo laptop. Plus, there can be any number of other computers I just happen upon to do something.

In one regard, it's kinda nice because I get to see what these computers are all about and run them through more paces than when you sit in a computer store and try a few menial tasks and are forced to make a purchase decision based on that scant information. Not that I'm necessarily shopping at the moment.

However, what drives me nuts are the differences between all of them. On one computer I may be typing up something and hit a long horizontal enter key, others are shorter, and a final may have a reverse L shape. My fingers never quite hit it just right on all of them. On the laptops, the function keys are combined with all these other options that require the use of a blue Fn (function) key and none of the additional functions, nor the Fn key itself, are ever in the same place. The Dell laptop has it just inside the Ctrl key while the Lenovo has them flipped. This is really messing with my use of control functions. Then there's the fact that Page Up, Page Down, Home, and End keys on Mac never work quite the same way they do on Windows machines (this is one of the few things that drives me nuts about Mac).

And finally, the trackpads and mouse buttons on the laptops are all over God's green acres. The Dell has the mouse keys spaced about a quarter inch from the bottom edge of the laptop. On the Lenovo, the mouse buttons run right up to the edge of the computer. After using the Lenovo last night, I had to figure out why, this morning, I was tapping my thumb below the trackpad on the Dell and nothing happened. I was hitting solid plastic. It's the space differential from the edge of the computer where the buttons sit. My hand sits in one place and becomes accustomed to finding the buttons at a certain angle on one, while that seemingly meager quarter inch completely threw me off on the other.

I think it's time to lock all these "form and functionality" designers in a windowless closet and force them to come up with a damn standard already. I know how to type, but this hunt and peck method I need to employ to get used to where things are from one computer to the next is for the birds.

Totally Unrelated Aside (TUA): I don't know how many of you watch Mad Men, but I just started recently. I finished season one late last week and am now catching up on the two months worth of episodes from season two that have been sitting on mine and Katie's DVR. Last night I even twatted that I was finally catching up on Mad Men (along with last week's episode of Fringe).

This morning, I check my e-mail to find out that I'm being followed on Twitter by @bettydraper. I can only assume it's because of my Mad Men twat. If you know the show, you know that Betty Draper is the unsatisfied housewife of lead character Don Draper and is played by the stunning January Jones (of American Wedding fame). Of course, while it would be nice, I realize this is not really January Jones. But whoever did do this is having some fun. Not only do they have the Twitter account, but they set up a LinkedIn account for her detailing her work experience as a housewife and fashion model. It's pretty hilarious but clearly marks the beginning of the end of any legitimacy that LinkedIn may have had among business professionals.

Well done, @bettydraper.

Heh, and I just received a follow notice from @bertramcooper, one of the co-owners of the Stanley Cooper agency where Don Draper works. I wonder if the whole cast of characters have Twitter personas run by fans. This is kinda fun.

No one is gonna stop me now...

It's amazing the things you encounter while driving.

For example, on the way to work this morning, I was behind some moron practicing the fine art of douchebaggery (I thank you for that one, Karl). As we approached an at-grade train track, he began to slow down. I'm fine with this considering my suspension system isn't the best and going over potholes, speedbumps, and train tracks tends to rattle my truck to a level I'd prefer to avoid. Basically, I assumed he was just slowing down so as not to hit the tracks too hard.

I was wrong, he stopped completely. For a school bus or a truck carrying kill-me-instantly grade chemicals, I don't mind the stop. But this was just a passenger sedan and, to add confusion to anger, he stopped not before the tracks, but ON THEM!

Dude, I hate to break it to you, but if you're worried about a train nearing the intersection and you don't trust the crossing arms to notify you, STOPPING ON THE TRACKS IS NOT GOING TO SAVE YOUR LIFE! Typically, just the opposite, in fact. Correct me if I'm wrong. Please.

Totally Unrelated Aside (TUA): Remember that I Love This Blog award I was graced with by Winter last week and passed out to a few of you? Well, I actually received two more of them as well. First from martymankins and then from DutchBitch. Big thanks to both of you!

However, since I've already passed it on, I'm not going to do it again. Sorry. That's another 14 people to link up. Not that there aren't that many of you out there that are deserving of it, I'm just trying to keep this post short. So, if any of you want to know who in the blogosphere I think is great, just check out my Blogroll on the right. Anybody that is listed in there is totally deserving of your reading. Seriously. And I'm discovering more all the time.

Don't let the sun go down on me...

Well, apparently sunlight doesn't suck enough to not shine down on me right now thanks to Winter over Sunlight Sucks. She hit me up with the "I Love Your Blog" award.

Winter and I are pretty new to each other. We've both heard of each other for some time either from other bloggers in our circle talking about one of us or by reading the comments that each of us has left on some other blog. Why we didn't hook up (in a purely platonic blog reader sense, of course!) sooner is beyond both of us. But, hey, we're reading now and that's what matters. And I've made enough of an impact to merit one of these bad boys! So that's pretty swank.

However, like any blog award, there are rules. The blogosphere is, of course, a pay it forward kinda community. So here are the rules:

• The winner can put the logo on his/her blog.
• Link the person you received your award from.
• Nominate at least seven other blogs
• Put links of those blogs on yours.
• Leave a message on the blogs that you’ve nominated.

Just seven?? Okay fine, I'll try. And I'm going to stick to blogs that are all relatively new reads for me. I also hope to be giving this out to people that haven't already received this from someone else. Or at least they haven't posted about it yet. Who knows if they've already received it, right? Can't read every post out there. ;-)

• BlondeBlogger of So a Blonde Walks Into a Blog
• Jeff of View from the Cloud
• Marie of Marie's Blog Cafe
• Memarie of Memarie Lane
• Sue of Beggar's Shot Glass
• Sybil of Sybil Law
• whall of the blog of whall

Of course there are many more of you out there and just because I didn't list you doesn't mean you're not great. Honestly. No B.S. (for once in my life).

Hey, got a meme for you in the extended post.

I've got my spine, I've got my Orange Crush...

Snippet Wednesday #16 is upon us. Tremble! Or not. As the kids say, "whatevs."

Wally
I had to go shopping at Wal-Mart yesterday during my lunch break. I know, I know, I feel dirty enough as it is. No need to rub it in. Especially since I was stuck in the line of the slowest cashier in the history of man. Holy crap was she slow. She was planning out her bagging strategy as she scanned. So instead of grabbing the next item and running it across the scanner, she'd rummage through the items on the conveyor and pick what she thought would go best in the bag with something else already in there. While that's nice for the person who will be carrying the bags, it's AGONIZING AS HELL for the rest of us. Combine her with the fact that I had a woman two ahead of me in line that was contesting every item's price as it's scanned and I was ready to go Wally on the place (that's what I'm going to now call "going postal" in a Wal-Mart... I'm goin' Wally on yo ass!).

Bleeked
But I did make it out of Wal-Mart with one item that I'd be wanting for some time but kept forgetting to buy... orange Tic-Tacs! Yeah, I'm rockin' it Paulie Bleeker style!

TRL
Well, I guess it was just a matter of time before MTV killed one of the few remaining shows that had anything even remotely to do with music. After 10 years, Total Request Live, also known as TRL, a semi-music related show that made Carson Daly "famous" (and I use that word very loosely) was axed. I wonder what poorly acted series this move is making room for?

Microsoft
Not that it's any big surprise, but the second Microsoft/Jerry Seinfeld ad is meeting with criticism much like the first. Admittedly, I can see Avitable's point with the ads. The more I think about it, the more I can understand what he suggested. But the point of advertising is that it should hit you right away assuming that you may only ever see the ad once. Advertising should not be like watching an Orson Welles film where you have to go back and watch it again to see how all the clues fit together to reach the ending. You should be moved to take action immediately and these ads just don't. Well, they do move me to want to buy this t-shirt if only they were available in more than just small and medium. You've seen pictures of me. I could fit my arm (singular) in a small or medium.

Audiophiles
Speaking of kick-ass t-shirts, this one is right up my alley and available in a size that could reasonably fit my generously sized upper torso. But I'm curious why it goes up in price by $2 from large to XL and then back down by $1 in the XXL and XXXL ranges. Strange.

Fey
Not that you haven't seen already, but it's just so damn cool we should all watch it AGAIN...

Why are there so many songs about rainbows...

Yes. YES. YES! (please no "I'll have what he's having.")

The following comes to you courtesy of my old grad school buddy Bobbybng. We lost touch after graduation but recently found each other again thanks to Facebook.

I asked him about this karaokeish routine he used to perform. It's Kermit the Frog's "Rainbow Connection" but he does it with nearly a dozen different Muppet voices. No, it's not a mix of voices he edited together... he actually performs them himself. He is simply amazing when it comes to voices and impersonation and this video is proof of his talent. And I finally got him to record it. I would've been happy with an MP3 file, but he went ahead and did it on YouTube. Daring mofo.

It is one of the funniest things I've ever heard and makes me cry from laughing so hard. And I've already watched it like a half dozen times since I received the link yesterday.

So without further ado, I present Bobbybng as Kermit, Piggy, Fozzie, Rowlf, The Swedish Chef, all of Electric Mayhem and some others performing "Rainbow Connection"!!

Totally Unrelated Aside (TUA): Okay, dude, a dress shirt and sport coat work fine with jeans. Not a problem there.

Throw a tie into the mix and it gets a little weird, but is still marginally acceptable.

However, when you decide to finish the ensemble with white socks and khaki Crocs, I think those of us around you are permitted by law to kill you. I do believe that's in the rulebook somewhere.

Shame my camera wasn't around. You deserve the humiliation.

Don't forget to remember me...

For some reason, I'm having severe trouble mentally reconciling the fact that today is the seventh anniversary of the felling of the Twin Towers, the attack on the Pentagon, and the crash in Pennsylvania of United 93.

I remember how pretty much the entire day transpired like it was yesterday. I'm thankful it wasn't yesterday, of course, but the knowledge that it happened the better part of a decade ago is just a bit much.

And no matter how many years ago it was, it still never seems right to just throw out the normal mumbo jumbo on my blog on September 11. I have done it in the past and I always feel bad about it. Like I'm almost obligated to make mention of it here as a way of honoring the memories of all those who lost their lives.

But it's just too damn painful. Even for a guy like me who personally knew no one who died in the attacks.

Two years ago, I took part in something called Project 2,996, a blogger attempt to write memorial posts to all those who died that day. One blogger - one victim - 2,996 posts in total. It was one of the toughest things I've ever written. Not that I couldn't find the words, I just couldn't string them together in a way that, to me, served as a sufficient memorial; especially since I was given a firefighter, a true hero, to memorialize.

I wrote anyway. And I've found myself rereading what I wrote many times in the two years that have since elapsed. Sometimes I'm hitting myself in the side of the head when I think of something I could've written better. Other times, I just let the enormity of it all wash over me. What my guy, Lieutenant Geoffrey E. Guja, did on that day was done with no regard for his own life whatsoever. He lived, and died, serving others.

So, yes, I do keep referring back to this post each year. But that's simply because I feel it's important to never forget... not a single one of them.

Here are some links to posts of some of my regular reads that I found before heading out. More may show up throughout the day:

• Clearly Crystal
• Hello Haha Narf
• Lady Jaye
• No Celery Please
• martymankins
• Miss Britt
• Tori Blaine

These are in no particular order and I may have missed some as I was racing to get this final bit done before running out the door. So forgive me if I forgot one.  If you have written something, feel free to link it up in the comments.

Every sperm is sacred...

Time for some snippets! It is Snippet Wednesday #15 if I recall.

Zazzle
I don't get it. The night before last, I created four items at Zazzle to tie into my declaration that I shall heretofore be known as "kapgar ocho cinco" (a declaration that true believer *lynne* reflects in her blogroll... y'all take notice!). Three of those four items were linked to in the post because they were approved immediately. They were the mug, sticker, and keychain. The fourth item, a pair of women's Keds sneakers were on hold pending approval by the "Zazzle Content Review Team." And they were sweet shoes. The kind even I would've worn if they made Keds for men. Yesterday, I receive an e-mail stating that my shoes were declined due to me violating their "No names or images of celebrities" policy. Well, okay, I guess on the extreme fringe I can possibly understand this. I am using, verrrryyyy loosely, a derivative of the name of a celebrity on my product; unless, of course, they're referring to moi as a celebrity (but I think I'd give me permission, wouldn't you?). So I go check, expecting that my other items were pulled, ex post facto. And they're all still up for sale. Now that's what I call consistency in policy enforcement.

Fringe
Speaking of fringe, I'm on the fringe regarding Fringe, FOX's new supernatural, paranormal, extra-terrestrial, semi-believable, über-weirdo, X-Files-channeling series that debuted last night. It was something that I had no desire to watch whatsoever, but, for whatever reason, actually tuned into. It was slow going. Not terrible, but far from great. If this was still summer and if my regular season shows weren't going to start within the next month, I'd likely keep watching it. But with all these other shows to take up my time, I'm not entirely sure. What did all of you -- if any of you watched it -- think about it?

Palin
I know exactly who I'm voting for in November! Thanks to occasional fish, via edenza's Google Reader account.

Seizure
I know this has been talked about before, but I thought it had been voted down. Apparently not. I ask, is anyone else terrified of the fact that the U.S. government can just up and take your electronic devices after international flights terminating in the U.S.? No rhyme or reason and no guarantee on when it will be returned. Sorry, but this scares me to no end. I know it says that this is only for people coming to the U.S. from foreign countries, but that doesn't necessarily mean it cannot happen to U.S. travelers returning home from overseas, does it? I can see the envelope being pushed to include that. Sometimes, the country I love scares the ever-loving bejeebus out of me.

And even when your hope is gone, move along...

It finally works! It finally works! It finally works!

[Do note the subdued sense of self satisfaction, will ya?]

For a while, I've had some issues with Yahoo, which was the host and registrar of my domain www.kapgar.com. Yes, that's right, I've actually been in possession of this domain for quite some time (I think about 2001) and used it all the time when I was just doing plain old static HTML web journaling. However, once I moved over to Typepad as my blogware, I gave up using my domain because Typepad and Yahoo refused to play nice. If I tried to create a META redirect from Yahoo to my Typepad account, I received all kinds of error messages from Yahoo that I was in violation of my hosting contract. And Typepad, at the time, didn't have instructions for mapping my domain from Yahoo to Typepad. I was also having problems getting my domain name transferred to another registrar; some vital piece of data I needed to confirm I owned it that I couldn't find.

So I just kinda gave up and stuck solely with my Typepad account completely neglecting what I had at Yahoo. And this despite some people saying how frustrating it was to type in www.kapgar.com and not get my real blog.

Until recently. I logged in to Yahoo and discovered that they now supported WordPress blogs on their site (hence my expressed intent to move from Typepad to WordPress). I figured it was finally time to defeat the bitch known as WordPress and use my own domain name again. So I set up several different ones trying to figure out which I liked best. From time to time, it worked nicely; but other times, I was having nothing but problems.

In one case, updating from an old version of WP to a new one killed my logins and I lost complete access to my blog. In another, I had the thing nearly ready to go, but none of my feeds would work at all; both my post and comments feeds were completely dead and no one was able to help me figure it out in the WP forums. As I'm wont to do, I gave up yet again.

It was about this time that I started questioning why I was really bothering in the first place. I've never disliked Typepad. It's always been good to me. Sure, you can't take a cool free template from some Web site and tack it on to activate a whole new look, but who cares? There are things I can do in WP that I can't do in Typepad; but on the flip side of the coin, there were things I loved in Typepad that I couldn't replicate in WP. Plus, I would've had to sift through three years of posts and change all my self-referential links. So why was I doing it?

I couldn't answer this question.

Today, though, I made a move to solidify my dedication to Typepad and logged back in to Yahoo to deactivate all those WP blogs (including one Moveable Type blog I set up in my frustration over WP).

That's when I noticed it... information for mapping a domain from Yahoo to Typepad that wouldn't violate my hosting contract. So I checked it out. After some mental translation, I implemented the steps. Then I went about waiting the 24-48 hours they said it would take for Yahoo to register the DNS setting shifts. But, we all know how overanxious I am, so I checked it out after a mere half hour. And, surprise, it was done.

That's right! My domain now belongs to my blog... the way it always should have been! So now you can access my blog via either my Typepad URL @ kapgar.typepad.com or my real URL @ www.kapgar.com.

Just as a note, there is no need to change any links to me that you have either in your posts, blogrolls, or feed readers. They should all still work. But it is now that much easier to find me.

Yay!

Totally Unrelated Aside (TUA): Don't ask me why, but I have a Star Trek: The Next Generation marathon on the TV right now. I've never really watched this show before, save for maybe an episode or two many, many years ago. I just never had an interest. But for some reason, I can't bring myself to turn it off right now. Sick and wrong, but...

Oh, and yes Wesley, there's a lot you need to learn about poker. ;-)

Welcome to the new dark ages...

I do believe we have now hit lucky number 13 in Snippet Wednesday! Woo hoo!

6669
Katie started her fall classes last night and had to pick up her campus parking permit before class started. I received a call from her on my commute home about it.

Katie: "You'll never guess what my parking permit number is... 6-6-6-9."

Kevin: "Wow! The best of both worlds... Satanism and sex!"

Katie: "Um, yeahhhhhh."

Segel
Avitable and I were having an e-mail conversation about Freaks & Geeks this morning and the fact that it was recently re-released on DVD (at a much lower pricepoint than the $160 set I had to pass on a few years ago). If you haven't seen the show, I highly recommend it. Fantastic cast. Great writing. It's one of Judd Apatow's early forays into entertainment and you could see the promise just oozing out of every episode. Hell, the only negative was that it was so short lived. Thinking about it made me realize how much a fan of Jason Segel I've become. You've got F&G, How I Met Your Mother, Knocked Up, and Forgetting Sarah Marshall, among many others. And now I want to see Forgetting Sarah Marshall again. I mean like desperately want to see it. And it won't be out on DVD for another month. DAMMIT! But, when it does come out on September 30, it will be in three-disc set glory! Oh I can't wait.

Microsoft
For years, I've watched as Microsoft has fallen further and further behind the times. First it was their inability to fix bugs and security holes in their programs. Then they sat on their laurels as other companies like Mozilla and Apple developed better Web browsing software than their Internet Explorer. Recently, they finally decided to try to curb the exodus from their Vista OS by hiring Jerry Seinfeld as a commercial pitchman (as detailed quite nicely by Dave). And yesterday, I read an article that describes how IE8 is going to have a feature called "InPrivate Browsing." Microschlock's PR people are making it sound like the second coming. As though Web users have not known browsing until they've tried this simply because it will allow them to not record cookies, files, logins, etc., while surfing. As IE8 program manager Andy Ziegler says in the article, "Users should be in control of their information. That's at the core of privacy." Well duh. And before you strain yourselves patting each others' backs, perhaps you should realize that this has existed on Safari for three years or more. It's called "Private Browsing." Not only are you just now getting caught up on 2005, but you can't even come up with a more original name.

Whoring
Yes, I'm going to keep whoring myself out for votes until the contest ends this Sunday. I am almost in double digits! As Vahid pointed out, I'm beating Perez Hilton! That's big time, baby! Head on over and vote. Only 661 more to go and I can tie the Comics Curmudgeon.

Oh, and for every ten votes I receive, I'll put a piece of clothing back on! Sound like a deal? Haven't we seen enough of Avitable's nakedness lately? Wouldn't you rather see me clothed?

Election day...

I'm never going to understand the bio-logic of this, but the night before last, I toss and turn the entire night. I get practically no sleep whatsoever. And, yet, during the day, I'm fine.

Last night, I sleep like a baby and today I'm dragging ass.

Damned if you do, damned if you don't. WHY??

Totally Unrelated Aside (TUA): During an e-mail back-and-forth with BlondeBlogger yesterday and today, I find out that li'l ol' me has been nominated as a Hot Blogger Calendar.com Hottest Male Blogger! Holy cow. This is sweet. I've received a couple blogging awards direct from some of you in the past, but never nominated for the sort of thing where you can vote and whatnot.

Well, I know the site says "it's an honor just to be nominated" and I even put that graphic in my sidebar, but I say SCREW IT! Let's turn this mother upside down and give the win to an underdog! Some dude named Comics Curmudgeon seems to be winning. I don't know who he is, but he apparently has quite the following. And, yet, languishing down with very few votes are Karl, Dave, Vahid, Neil, Jester, Marty, and me (I'd mention that Adam and Dawg are doing it too, but, comparatively speaking, they're kicking our asses). There are also several sisters in arms out there in the running like Hilly, Miss Britt, MochaMomma, Sybil Law, and BlondeBlogger. So c'mon! Get out there and vote for us! Let's show them who's got the best readers around!

But, seriously, I am honored that several of you thought about me for nomination. That's pretty sweet.

Oh, and to that one person who offered up a vote for Ann Coulter... burn in hell.

On the road again...

Hey all, just remember that you can check out updates on Lilly's condition throughout the day on her Twitter account. And you don't have to be a Twitter user to just read the posts. So head on over if you'd like some news.

Otherwise...

Hello, you have reached the answering service for kapgar.
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He is busy taking part in the official blogjacking at The Dutch Files.

If you'd like to leave a message, you may do so after the beep.

*BEEP*

If you start me up...

I feel bad leading into the weekend on such a somber note, so I'd like to leave you with something a bit more lighthearted. But I didn't feel right putting these on the Lilly post. So you're getting them on Saturday.

These are about the funniest damn teasers for the fall return of television shows that I've ever seen...

Here's a second one that doesn't have embed code available just yet. Maybe soon. I don't want to know what "Hide the Hamster" is, but I'd totally rule "Pizza Making."

Gimme money...

I swear to God, every time I now think the words "Snippet Wednesday" in my head, I wind up singing a strangely bastardized version of The Bangles' "Manic Monday." That can't be right, can it?

Anyway, we're on to Snippet Wednesday #11! And there was much rejoicing!

Begging
While in Chicago for Davecago, Katie and I saw our fair share of beggars asking for money. I don't know why I thought this, but for some reason, the concept of these guys as actually having a lot of money hit me. What if they'd had such fantastic luck panhandling that they had tons of money and continued to play the role of poor just because it was so lucrative? Is this really such a stretch? We only see a little bit in their buckets, guitar cases, hats, etc., at any one time, but this doesn't mean that they hadn't removed big chunks of cash and put it in a pocket to make it look like they had nothing. What if they do return home at night to really nice houses and families and the like? Do you think this could be possible? Remember Orlando Jones in Office Space? He said he made more selling magazine subscriptions than he did in his software design job. Why not for panhandlers, too?

Van
On the way home from Chicago, we were driving near one of those big Ford conversion vans with all the windows blacked out and heavy duty, aftermarket locks welded on the back and side doors. Katie's response, "yeah, somebody is tied up and drugged in the back of that van." I think I agree. But I also think we may be watching too much CSI and Criminal Minds.

Homero
I think I'm going to find a quarter and etch Homer on it then return it to general circulation kinda like what happened here. How cool!

Gymnastics
I have always loved Olympic gymnastics. I really have no idea why. It's not something I ever wanted to try, it's nothing I'd ever be capable of doing, and the kids are so freakishly young and small that I actually said about one Chinese gymnast last night, "She's so tiny I could fold her up and put her in my pocket," so it's certainly not sex appeal (well, except Alicia Sacramone who I think is the first gymnast I've ever seen who actually has a body and doesn't look 12 years old and, yes, I feel horrible for her after what happened last night). I think I may have finally figured out the real reason, though, while listening to a commentator during the women's gymnastics routines last night. I think it might be because it's the one time you can say something akin to "she's got great spread in her legs!" and not be arrested for indecent public behavior.

Pryor-itized
Thank you, Cinematical!

Scraps
Are any of you scrapbookers or stampers? If so, and if you live in the Chicago area or are willing to pay for shipping, my mom is having a big scrapbook and stamping supply sale this weekend. Here are some of the details...

Rubber Stamp/Scrapbook Supplies Closeout Sale

Many Thousands of New Items

Everything Must Go!!!

Rubber stamps, card stock, envelopes, ribbons, embellishments, punches, stamp pads/re-inkers, storage units, handmade cards, embossing powders, adhesives, markers, specialty papers, handmade cards and much, much more!

Friday - Saturday, August 15-16, 9 a.m. - 4 p.m.

I know my mom said it's okay to post her address and phone number, but I still feel weird about it. You never know what kinds of freaky people are crawling for that information. So, if you're seriously interested, e-mail me at kapgar5@gmail.com and I'll give you her information. Sound good?

Get down tonight...

Sadly, another Davecago has come and gone. I say "sadly" simply because it feels like it will be another eternity spent waiting for Davecago the Fourth to happen next year. I really do enjoy meeting up with fellow bloggers even if I am a bit of a social outcast.

Jeez, there were a ton of cool people there. When Katie and I were heading downtown, I didn't really know who to expect to see since it seemed like a lot of people were unable to make it this year like Kim and diane. I did figure on Tori being there if she could find parking (ha!) as well as Jenny, RW, Mrs. RW, and Gary. But, other than them, I really didn't know.

Mocha made the trip, which always makes me happy because I totally PPH her! And I met a bunch of other people I'd never met in real life before like *lynne*, Leah, and Robin. Plus somebody who was introduced to me as Suzanne, one of Dave's blog stalkers. That's pretty cool in a very creepy, cloak-and-daggerish way.

I have some pictures here for you from the event, and from walking around Chicago beforehand with Katie and Dave. They're in a pictobrowser, so you may need to click through from your reader or you can just surf on over to Flickr to see them.

But one of my favorite things about the whole event was commiserating with my fellow bloggers on things that bug us about the medium. From people squatting on blog names (ever wonder why RW's site is misspelled without a "y"?) to not having the amount of time you'd like to read each and every site to the give and take of commenting to coming up with ideas to keep things fresh.

Do you have any idea how good it feels to know that I'm not the only one who feels bad that I sometimes have nothing more to say in a comment than "I totally agree with you"? That's one of the many things I struggle with in blogging... finding something meaningful to say to show support for all of you that I read. I don't want to be that guy who simply says "I agree" but I also know that for some of you, myself included, that's all you want to hear. That's why we write what we write, to get it out and get feedback to either confirm what we are saying or to let us know that we are nutso beyond compare. And sometimes that seemingly meaningless "throwaway" comment is the easiest way to show that support.

But because there are so many blogs we read and so many posts we agree with and so little time to complete it all, we just don't. It's completely understandable.

So I guess what I'm trying to say is, just because I don't comment or because someone else you think is a reader of your site doesn't comment all the time does not mean we are not reading or we do not agree or we do not value what you are pouring out of your heart of hearts. We are and we do. Just know that. 'Tay?

Oh, and I got a killer brownie recipe from Tori that will definitely be a future Damn Fool Network episode. Stay tuned. ;-)

And I'm free...

Yay for Vimeo!

The Damn Fool Network: Pizza from Kevin Apgar on Vimeo.

Totally Unrelated Aside (TUA): Let's try a little social experiment, shall we?

I'm going to tell you -- nay, I'm going to insist emphatically -- that you not look at Avitable's post for today as it will burn your retinas beyond the point of recovery. How many of you will listen and how many of you will click through out of sheer morbid curiosity?

Last chance.

Av, can you check your stats on this one for me? My eyes still hurt. Thanks.

Are you diggin' on me...

Are you ready for Snippet Wednesday #10??

Yeah, I'm not either. Just thought I'd ask in case. But, yanno, I have now broken into the double digits. That's a big accomplishment considering we bloggers usually have the attention span of gnats and give up on regular things like this way too quickly.

Oh well.

Tube-Tied
As you all know from my paltry post yesterday, YouTube decided not to play nice. Well, I can't really fault them as it is their policy to not accept videos longer than 10 minutes in length and I was openly defying that. But it sucks no less. However, thanks to Marie and Hilly, I've now discovered Vimeo and am in the process of uploading videos there. Much nicer user interface and so far it's playing well with what I'm giving it. One video done and processed and another one in the works. I'll try posting the new video tomorrow. Wish me luck... I'm cooking yet again!

Wal-phone
Katie and I have pretty much ruled out getting iPhones again. Even though they've dropped in price and whatnot, they're still comparatively expensive and we just don't have that kind of a budget for a phone and don't plan to anytime soon. However, I'd still like a smart phone and have discovered the Palm Centro. What I like about it is that it works just like the Palm Pilots that I've been using for years now, just with a phone in it, so I know it will work on Mac and PC and sync with my Outlook account at work. Plus it has threaded SMS messaging so you can maintain a conversation with someone kinda like using Gmail and not have to search all over God's green acres for past messages. That's pretty sweet. The biggest bonus, though, is that they're currently available at Wal-Mart of all places for a mere $18.88 each. And that's taking into consideration that we're not new AT&T users. The free Centro deal at Best Buy this week is for rookies only. I hate that. I'm still having trouble wrapping my mind around the idea that we're thinking about buying cell phones from Wal-Mart. That's just strange.

Knighted
The Dark Knight has broken $400 million... in a mere three weekends. That's just insanely cool. We all know it's repeat business that is driving this one and Katie and I have seen it twice. How many times have you seen it?

Homely
I take issue with this headline... Joss Stone playing homely wife in "Tudors." Sure, the character she will be portraying was not known for being good looking. But this is Joss Stone. You do not make her play "homely." No no. Never.

Scooter
In celebration of Marty's birthday, I am going to celebrate Scooter Wednesday (yes, all this happened this past Saturday, not today, deal with it). More photos are available at Flickr.

I do not feel ashamed...

I had a great post. A follow up to The Damn Fool Network post from last week, in fact. I had it all edited. All output to the proper format. All of it uploading to YouTube.

All that was left was for it to be processed by YouTube's servers.

And they reject it for being two and a half minutes too long.

And I've got nothing else ready to go.

YouTube... you bitch.

It's a beautiful mornin'...

Hey all, I have three things to help you ring in this new week and I hope they're as good for you as they are for me.

First, I'm guest posting today for the second time in nearly as many weeks for another good friend Penelope. This time, I won't be writing about how scared I am to guest post, I swear. Nothing cheesy like that. Nope, no cheese... just w(h)ine. So click on through and check it out.

Second, I'm prepping for Davecago 2 (it's 3... sorry) this weekend! That should be great. Okay, correction... I don't think "should" is the proper thing to say as it's Dave coming to town. More like "will." It's always fun when Dave comes to town. And I do believe Katie and I will both be there. Anybody else planning to be in attendance?

Third, I've got a fun little joke for you courtesy of my wife. It's a long one, so to keep my homepage a bit uncluttered, I'm putting it in the extended post.