Yes, I'm still here. In case anybody is paying attention.
A friend is interested in starting a blog, so I'm demonstrating how easy it is to post on one's blog.
Setting up a blog to get it ready to make posts is, let's just say, a little bit more complex and time-consuming....
Dear Carbonite:
Don't lie to me. My backup cannot possibly be up to date when at the same time it's telling me I have 805 files pending for backup!
As one of the mandated duties of the federal government. Right next to that wall of separation between church and state.
Show an appalling lack of consideration, thumping around in the bedroom closet at 11:30 in the morning. Makes it hard for a girl to sleep on the job.
I'm just saying.
For the second week in a row, the Yahoo! news front page has shown a photo of Bristol Palin and Mark Ballas with a headline about another cut having been made from "Dancing With The Stars."
And for the second week in a row, Bristol and Mark are SAFE.
In other words, they have NOT been cut from the show. Yet.
We report, you decide.
From the label on the back of a bottle of drain opener:
Isn't enough the federal gubbermint is taking over our healthcare? Now they have to take over our bathrooms too?
Look out... the bathroom police are coming for YOU!
No, that's not the newest curse.
I just saw it. On the sidewalk in front of Walgreen's. No, really. Honest.
No, that's not an obnoxious text-message or Twitter abbreviation. I'm talking about an old school acquaintance whose first name starts with an R, with whom I briefly connected on Facebook the other week. R, if you're reading this (and I hope you are) I intended to answer your last message--but then you vanished. Was it something I said??
I wanted to ask you about the novel you're writing, and other things.... E-mail me. The address is right over there in the sidebar. ---> Or call me. I'm in the book.
... I wonder how many of the same people who are screaming nowadays that gays MUST be allowed to marry, it's their RIGHT, don't you know...
... were the same people screaming 35 and 40 years ago that marriage meant nothing, it was just a piece of paper....
Just curious.
In my copious spare time (the last five minutes or so) I researched the topic of miscegenation. (Yes, that's a ten-dollar word. So sue me. And look it up yourself. Do I look like a dictionary?)
And I got to wondering whether the same people (or rather, the same political party) who agitated most in favor of anti-miscegenation laws in our nation's history could possibly be of the same political party or persuasion that agitates the most in favor of same-sex marriage?
Well... the three or so US legislators mentioned in the above Wikipedia article, who proposed very tough anti-miscegenation laws in generations past, were all. . . .
Wait for it . . .
Democrats.
We report, you decide.
Via the folks at Yahoo! food news, a list of the top 11 foods people either love or hate. And because inquiring minds want to know, I am listing my own preference (or lack thereof) for each item on the list.
What do YOU love or hate?
1. White "Chocolate." Chocolate ain't chocolate unless it's brown, preferably DARK brown.
2. Cilantro. Keep that stuff far, far away from me. Apparently I do not have the cilantro-loving gene.
3. Eggplant. Slimy, stringy, pretty tasteless. What's the point?
4. Coconut. I don't have a problem with it, but I don't generally seek it out.
5. Tomato. Bring it on. Especially if it's home-grown, vine-ripened. Yummy! Where's my salt shaker?
6. Anchovies. Bait. And I am not a fan of fishing. Or fish. Never have been.
7. Black licorice. All the more for me.
8. Stinky cheeses. Ah, the gorgeous gazonga cheese, as Kerry's mother once pronounced it.
9. Mayo. Makes the sandwich slide down easier--but not TOO much.
10. Bell Pepper. Green--mweh. Red--bring 'em on!
11. Beets. When I was assigned garden-watering chores back in adolescence, guess which part of the vegetable patch I always "forgot?"
... did THIS get through the Department of Motor Vehicles as a personalized license plate??
No, I did not have the camera handy, so you'll have to trust me on what it said:
HRD AWN
I kid you not. And no, I did not get a look at the person driving the purple pickup truck that wore the plate. But I am reminded of a piece of timeless wisdom, found in a long-ago issue of MAD Magazine, to the effect that those who brag the most about certain things, actually in reality have the least bragging rights, if you know what I mean.
Samantha (who lives in New York) tells me that the grocery stores near her carry Eight O'Clock Coffee.
Yep. What'd I tell you? East coast thing. Mostly.
Old friend and frequent commenter Bum informs me that Eight O'Clock Coffee is supposed to be available at Wal-Mart Superstores. The nearest of those to me is about 40 miles. If I'm over that-a-way anyway, I might stop and check, but even this fanatic is not driving 40 miles just to buy cheaper coffee. Kind of defeats the purpose of being pathologically Scottish.
Bum also asks how to comment on this newfangled version of the blog. Unless I am severely mistaken, one needs to sign in with a Google ID to do so. If you have a Gmail address, that is your Google ID. Otherwise, just go to Gmail and sign up for an account. That should do it. I think. (And the first step to commenting is to click on the "0 comments" place at the bottom of the post. Then see what it asks you to do. You may be able to create a Google ID with your non-Gmail e-mail address. I think. But you do need a Google ID of some sort to post a comment.)
And no, I have no idea why the flag icon sometimes turns into a photo of a person, but I will check into it. In my ::snort:: copious spare time.
There. I think that covers all the bases on this fine, slightly soggy Monday morning.
For those who may have heard that half of California is up in flames... the nearest fire is over 30 miles from me, and the wind is blowing the other way, so no chance that one's going to get me.
So far, 3000 acres have burned, and they have it only 15 percent contained. Several homes have been lost--but no injuries have been reported.
Good friends Caro and Suzanne are nowhere near the path of the fire, for those who might be wondering. To get to them, it would have to travel several more miles, take a sharp turn to the west, and jump across at least one major highway. So I think they'll be fine. At least, this time....
Earlier this evening I was at a dinner. The man sitting next to me took a phone call from his elderly mother, who lives 7 miles from where the fire began--upwind, thank heaven. She wanted to clear some brush around the house--but he had to admonish her not to try to start up the chainsaw on her own. In fact, he left the dinner early so he could go wrestle the chainsaw out of her hands.
Ah... life in rural America. Nothing quite like it.
One week ago today, I rented a car at the Nashville airport and drove off to explore the countryside a little. Being of a pathologically Scottish bent all my life, I had requested the cheapest skateboard in the Avis stable of cars. (I chose Avis because they opened the earliest the next morning, and returning the car as soon as they opened gave me plenty of time to get checked in and make my flight home.) Apparently they had no skateboards available, so they gave me quite an upgrade (at no extra charge, of course) and I found myself tooling around Nashville in a silver Mitsubishi Eclipse. Fun little car, if you like climbing into what feels like a hole in the ground. You barely touch the gas and it takes off like a bat out of hell.
Anyone who has read this blog for a while knows I enjoy chasing wildflowers. Being in Tennessee (a new state for me) I took the opportunity to see what grew locally, and found my way to the lovely Radnor Lake, which is not far outside Nashville. The nice lady at the visitor center desk asked me how strenuous a hike I wanted to take, and when I admitted I had only had about two hours of sleep, she suggested the lake trail, which is a little over 2 miles and circumnavigates the lake on level ground.
I got a few good pictures, which I will post a bit later.
Now to the curious part. On the way back into town, I took all surface roads because one can drive on a freeway anywhere. A wide spot in the road on the outskirts of the city boasted a used bookstore, so I stopped, in search of a book about local wildflowers so I could identify what I'd seen. Go figure. The store owner was only able to find me a nice book of ... California wildflowers. I actually bought it because it has some nice pictures in it. She asked me how I was enjoying Nashville, and I said everyone in town is very friendly, but out on the hiking trails, nobody looks at you and nobody says hello. In California, it's the opposite. People are not terribly friendly in town; but on the trail, everyone says hi, beautiful day, enjoy your hike, etc.
Tomorrow is the Big Sur Marathon, and as usual the girls and I are doing the 10.6 mile walk. I'm meeting them in 10 minutes at the expo where we pick up our bib numbers, T-shirts and bus tickets, so I'd best dash on down the hill now.
... yes, I am still alive. More or less.
My back isn't as bad as it was... but it still reminds me every time I do something I shouldn't. Such as bend over the sink. Or bend over to peer into a lizard house.
What with that nasty galloping crud I picked up on the cruise, I coughed so much, I popped a rib cartilage, or something. So now I have pains both back and front. And I am still coughing and sniffling a bit, though not nearly as bad as before.
I've been sleeping a lot more than usual. Today good friend Sara stopped by and presented me with a bottle of Bailey's. She retired from 35+ years of teaching just about the time I semi-retired from my job, and she is giving herself plenty of time to be lazy and enjoy "slumber and sloth," as she put it. "And a good slug," she added, pointing to the bottle. Great. Not that I needed justification, but if she can do it, so can I.
Of course I managed to get my sleep schedule entirely screwed up over the weekend. Friday morning I was to take the young sailor (who is now commenting on my blog as "bin V." which means son of V.) to the airport so he could go home to Ohio for Christmas. This was only the second time he had ever traveled by himself, and it was a good thing I went inside the airport with him so I could help him figure out what to do. His flight to Chicago was going to be delayed due to weather, and thus he would miss his connection to Ohio, and there were no further flights that day that would get him home. The best they could offer him was standby the next morning, with of course no guarantee. At first he was going to fly to Chicago and take his chances from there, but then he decided he would really rather not; and since he had gone through all of the bureaucracy and paperwork to get signed off the post and officially on leave, he didn't want to do it all again, and asked if my couch was still as comfortable as it was when he was in the 4th grade.
So at his mother's insistence, he took me to dinner (Olive Garden) and he crashed on my couch. We had to get up at 3 a.m. to get him to the airport (an hour and 20 minutes from my house; he flew out of San Jose because it saved his parents about $400). He had already sent his duffle bag through and he already had his boarding pass, so I dropped him off at the curb at 5 a.m., and told him as soon as he got through security, to find out what gate he was supposed to go to, and then go make friends with the gate agent and see what they could do for him. Meanwhile, I was heading over to Denny's and I would wait there until I heard from him.
Long story a whole lot shorter, he did get a seat on that flight (and I had breakfast and lots of coffee). I think he got bollixed up again somewhere in the midwest before he finally got home, but I am assuming he got home because I have had no further e-mails from V. on the subject. Presumably we will not go through this hokey-pokey when he comes back in a couple of weeks, because if his flights are delayed, he can just call me when he's about to board a plane for San Jose, and then I can just look up the estimated arrival time for that flight online.
So I headed straight home, and straight back to bed, where I slept another 5 hours. Saturday night I slept a full 8 hours--and then took a 4 hour nap Sunday afternoon.
Other than that, it's been mostly a pajama weekend. My various familial appendages are scattering in all directions tomorrow, so I may or may not go over to my mother's. It will depend on how I feel.
And now... back to bed with a book!
And a very Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night.
