Absquatulate

BlogWhore

Today I chatted very briefly with Megnut. She was kind enough to return an unsolicited IM from me regarding her blog. Whatta gal!

TypePad

I've been checking out TypePad and noodling over collaborative blogs and whether or not I should migrate Absquatulate over. Things I like:

• Categories. Now all my recipes can be in one spot
• Automatic archives
• Comments when I so choose
• Trackback links, when I feel like testing the waters
• Ability to directly edit html/css &tc. for layout, so I'm not locked into one of their templates
• Photo albums. 'nuff said.
• WAY more for my $. I pay an embararssingly large amount for hosting now, TypePad is half the cost and a kajillion times the service. Yay!
• Password protection if I want it, and it only applies to individual blogs, not all of them.

Things I am not sure I like:

• having to edit html, css, &tc. around TypePad tags. Which won't be too hard once I get it figured out, but it seems like it'll be a pain to make changes and see them almost real time.
• No search. Not that I have it now, but I thought that was an option? Maybe I missed it somewhere?
• relying on someone else's code. It's no different than hosting your site on a server at FastNet of course, but at least with traditional hosting you get...
• ... email. I really wish there was some way to keep my domain email active while using TypePad. Is there any way to do this withouth resorting to Yahoo?

Smile

I am a sucker for photo blogs. So here are three gems sure to put a smile on even the dourest of faces:

• Heather Champ


• Oliver Daily at Textism


• Will Yurman and his duck

Dinner Time Conversation

Names have been changed to protect the innocent.

The Location: Friendly's on 31F in Rochester, NY

The Time: 6:45 pm

The Company: The Male, The Female, and their Friends with their two children, aged 2yr. 10mo. (aka the Toddler) and 5.5 mo. (aka the Baby), respectively.

The Seating Situation: Adult male sitting next to the Toddler. He is not the father.

The Conversation:

Toddler: Why are you not having any ice creeeeeem?

The Male: I had my dessert before. See? *points to empty Fribble glass* I kind of shot my load at the beginning of dinner.

The rest of the table: *stunned silence* *jaws hit table in a series of thumps* *hysterical laughter*

The Male: What? Isn't there an alternative meaning for that phrase?

The Mother: Um, NO.

The Father: There is pretty much only one meaning for that.

The Female: What is the MATTER with you?

A Learned Hand, Indeed.

I am not, by any stretch of the imagination, a political savant. I know precious little about how real politics and law work. I have my opinions, sure, based on what I do know and how I interpret the facts. But that doesn't mean I can present a logically sound argument for or against certain political or moral points since one college philosophy course does not a philosopher make. A trap that everyone one can fall into is to only listen and read to people who share your same opinions. You only get false reinforcement without fully considering alternate points of view. The responsibily of any thinking person is to test your ideas and theses to see if they still hold water lest you become mired.

And so I encourage people to go read Michael Pollard's blog, "Scrutineer". While I can't say I agree with him on most points I find his arguments quite refreshing in that they are heavily grounded in logic (probably due to that pesky philosophy degree of his. :^) Go take a look and open your mind to what he writes. You may not agree with it, but you can at least appreciate a rational presentation of a point of view. Or you might agree with it and have some food for thought.

Your moment of Zen.

The Duel (courtesy of August.)

Crap in a cup

I play at a local indoor sand court volleyball place. If you are currently laughing at the absurdity of the previous sentence, I curse you with 2 inches of snow which will undoubtedly bring your silly southern city to a standstill and cause all supermarket shelves to be barren of WonderBread (on a side note, I thought "website analogy" went out of fashion YEARS ago. What a crappy site) and milk!!!

So anyway, I was at Hot Shots enjoying a post game brew (surprisingly, it's not that bad) with my teammates and there is a gentleman with red hair and a Budweiser fleece vest wandering around with a big 20 oz can of Bud. I thought him strange because he was either looking for someone or hopelessly lost, which in a place that is as small as Hot Shots really shouldn't be an issue. He traversed the dining area a few times and then I forced myself not to stare at him. I'm not a regular but I've been there enough to have the right to stare at people acting like idiots.

Right around the time my compatriots and I were noticing the big game table with uprights and BUDWEISER splashed across the side this gentleman approached our table and offered us a pitcher of beer. We all looked at each other like he was crazy as he followed up the offer with, "I work for Budweiser, and we are here on a promotion. *laugh* I'm not some nut job that just goes around passing out beer, it's my job!" which immediately elicited a round of chuckles. We tentatively accepted the pitcher of Bud.

After a longish wait, he returns and gives us his thanks for giving Bud a try. We pour a few glasses and take a sip.

The most accurate description of the swill that passed through our lips came from my darling husband, who described it as, "Beer with melted butter." It was like drinking a putrid oil slick. I couldn't believe that not only people drank this swill, but they did so WILLINGLY. Please, people, for the love of PETE, try something that actually tastes like beer.

So here we are, choking down our first taste and this guy returns with a clipboard. "So, what are your names so I can sign you up for the paper football game?" Oh Lord. Save me now. We hedge and he goes into his schpeil about how cool it would be and you can get an all expenses paid trip to Texas for the finals if you win regionals if you win here, and come on and won't it be fun to do!? He assures us he'll return in a few minutes.

Here's a clue: NO. Your beer tastes like pig vomit, you are annoying, and paper football is SO middle school. Here TAKE your beer back, we don't want it. We left three quarters of the pitcher on the table and scooted out before he could return.

PSA: never take beer from strangers, kids.