13 May 2006

Scare your teens with this

I hate meth. I hate what it does to people, how it makes them act, how much it contributes to child abuse, how horribly addictive it is. I think meth is the wrongest drug out there.

Check these horrible meth before-and-after mugshots. Wow. The lady with the bandaid on her face pretty much says it all.

Show them to your teens. It might just save someone the trouble.

BlogHer contest countdown to the end

The super-easy contest to win a pass to the BlogHer convention in July ends Monday May 15 at 6 pm Pacific (I just added the 6 pm part because it is going to take me some time to count votes).

All you have to do to win is post a comment to any of my posts after March 24. Each comment counts as an entry. How easy is that? I tried to make this contest as suck-free as possible since I am sick of small print and things that look cool but actually stink.

If you win and are already going to BlogHer, you may grant the pass to a cool woman blogger of your choice. That would kind of double the fun.

The pass is a $258 value and I can't give you cash instead because a) I don't have it just now, thank you IRS, and 2) the pass is already paid for and is non-refundable.

So comment away. You have nothing to lose except a few brain cells at the poolside cocktail party.

My blogger dilemma

I'm sorry about all the linkposts lately.

I am kind of in a quandary about what to write. I feel like I can't write about work. It's not that I don't have plenty to say, but I don't want to get dooced.

Fortunately my family doesn't give me much writing fodder. We all speak to each other, no one is in jail and no one is beating, molesting or threatening each other as far as I know. Besides, I don't feel it is my business to drag my unsuspecting family out in public with me.

How do you deal with these work & privacy issues on your blog? I am of course assuming you have a blog. Doesn't everyone?

11 May 2006

Linkalicious

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Her Bad Mother Contest for good Mom Bloggers

Here's the idea from Her Bad Mother

So: sometime between now and Mother's Day (Sunday), write a post about the women in the blogosphere that have made some difference in your world. It doesn't have to focus on just one blogger (I don't know that I'll be able to restrict my celebratory post to just one blogger), but you absolutely must single out the objects of your celebration and give them lots of linky love. And if you want to write about how Dooce or Amalah or some other supa-stah or near-stah blogger has enriched your life, that's great, but if you do that, you are required, by the terms of this assignment, to also celebrate a lesser known blogger (extra points if you seek out someone who is not on your blogroll and write about what a great discovery they are.) By this weekend, I want to see all of our names in virtual linky lights.

I'm in! But I am going to go minimalist because honestly I could spend all night at this. There are so many good mom bloggers out there to know and love. I will restrain myself and just post about 2 very different kinds of moms.

First up is Michelle from La Vie en Rose...A Sweet Life. This beautiful young woman writes so poetically and so thoughtfully that she has given me a whole different view of motherhood. I already knew about the snot and the nights and birthday parties and all that kid stuff. People are always complaining about their kids because it is funny. I actually think it takes a kind of bravery to tell about the heartful tenderness of it.

Michelle puts a sweet, grateful light on being a mother. She digs deep and tells the truth about her fears and her hopes and dreams for her son. I love her writing.

Then on the other hand there is Madness Rivera.

Madness is that cool hip funny girl from high school that you always wanted to be friends with but you just knew you never could be because she was way too amazing and popular. Then one day in photography lab she started talking to you and you became even more amazed to learn she was nice, too and you walked around in a daze thinking "Did that just happen?" and then every time from then on in the hall that she said hi to you, it startled you because you just hadn't been able to convince yourself that she would remember who you were.

At least that is how I imagine her. Now she has grown up to be a cool, fun mom. I admire how she is raising her daughters so much. She loves them fiercely but has managed to hang onto her separate identity in a way that many moms find difficult, I imagine. The girls are smart and strong and she is honest with them in a really cool way.

One of her daughters, Maya, is also going to do martial arts at the Junior Olympics in Atlanta this summer and is selling the cutest rubber bracelets to raise money. $10 gets you 4 - one says "Go confidently in the direction of your dreams." Too cool. No, I do not know her personally and yes, I know I am shamelessly shilling.

Those are my nominees. Do you have any?
To my neighbor who got the rooster: I would like to meet you. And not in a "Hi neighbor, I brought over a plate of cookies" kind of way, either.

Please, God, make it stop. I know I said I was an early riser, but 3:45?? Too early.

10 May 2006

No longer a cold and lonely universe

I have major girl issues about clothes and hair and nails etc.

Soul Gardening perfectly expressed my feelings in her post, and some of the comments resonate with me as well.

Non-girly-girls, unite!

09 May 2006

BlogHer contest reminder

Only 5 days left in the BlogHer contest. I would appreciate any link love to get the word out.

Here's how to play again: simply leave a comment. Each comment counts as an entry. Go back and comment away (on posts after the 24th of March, at least, because that is when I last recorded who had commented, and if you go back further than that it would be a real mess!)

That's all. The winner already has their BlogHer 2-day all event pass paid for. If you have already paid your BlogHer entry and you win, you can grant the entry to another woman blogger you like. No, you can't have the $250 in cash, sorry - it is already in the BlogHer account.

Thanks to everyone who has been playing. I love all the comments!

I'm pig-biting mad

I have no idea where the expression "pig-biting mad" came from, but it works for me, especially right now.

An article in The American Prospect says that the doofuses over at ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox TV all refused to air an ad from the United Congregational Church.

The UCC wanted to promote the idea that they are open to all people, so their commercial shows a single black mom, a gay couple, a Middle Easterner and an old lady with a walker being catapulted out of their pews.

The they have the tag line "God doesn't reject people. Neither do we."

The networks say that they can't run the ad because they won't allow advertising that puts down one religion and promotes another. Hello? Now we can't make the point that it is wrong to discriminate because that is...um...er...discrimination?

What kind of wimpy weirdness is that? It makes me so angry that they are so afraid of the Christian right that they won't even run anything that is even slightly pro-gay (because you KNOW that's what this is all about, don't you?). Everyone kowtow to the Bigot Block, because they are organized and powerful and have a really mean Jesus on their side.

(Sorry, Jesus. I know it isn't about you.)

Argh.

08 May 2006

Total utter randomness

Edmunds tested popular ways of saving gas. The good news? You can run the a/c all you want. The bad news? You're going to have to stop driving like an idiot.

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From the WTF? file - a story about a guy who deliberately infects himself with hookworm to cure his asthma.

It works, but the story is not for the faint-hearted:

I became infested almost immediately, it must have been either the first or second day I spent walking barefoot through the latrines...Seeing me the locals would often get fairly aggressive, wondering what the hell a white guy was doing walking around barefoot in their toilets...An angry man with a machete when you are standing isolated and alone in such an alien place is trying...

It apparently also might work for Crohn's Disease or other auto-immune problems.

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I read this long article from the New Yorker about a guy who falls for the Nigerian Spam Scam. I thought I might learn why people do it. 5000 words later, I am still baffled.

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Speaking of people who are easily scammed - Nicole Kidman still loves Tom Cruise???

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From the "Day Late and a Dollar Short" file"
Zacharias Moussaoui says he's not guilty. Uh, dude, you shoulda thoughta that before the trial.

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First falling iceballs. Now, marauding chimps. More reasons to stay indoors.

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And finally, an ad for some talented artists in my neighborhood. I have the necklace with the little chips of irridescent glass and I have gotten more compliments on that than on any other jewelry I have ever worn. It is incredibly pretty in person.

07 May 2006

Your hint for daily living

From the National Institute of Standards and Technology

Are noon and midnight 12 a.m. or 12 p.m.?
This is a tricky question. The answer is that the terms 12 a.m. and 12 p.m. are wrong and should not be used.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

To illustrate this, consider that "a.m" and "p.m." are abbreviations for "ante meridiem" and "post meridiem." They mean "before noon" and "after noon," respectively. Noon is neither before or after noon; it is simply noon. Therefore, neither the "a.m." nor "p.m." designation is correct. On the other hand, midnight is both 12 hours before noon and 12 hours after noon. Therefore, either 12 a.m. or 12 p.m. could work as a designation for midnight, but both would be ambiguous as to the date intended.

Under the wire, by the skin of my teeth

I finally got the cash together to get my BlogHer conference entries paid for.

I needed 2 all-event passes for the conference. One for me, one for the lucky winner of my Big BlogHer DeLurking Contest (everyone who comments up until May 15 can be entered!)

I had thought this purchase would be happening a lot earlier. Like when I got my bonus from work in March. But then I found out one tricky thing about my bonus - they deposit it into our 401k accounts, not in our paychecks! That means we pretty much can't get at it without major tax penalties.

Great! You can imagine how happy I was to hear that after I had already set this BlogHer contest in motion. So I had to come up with some other cash source. Thank you, freelancing.


I went to the BlogHer site, found the entry form and filled "2" in the little box for all-event passes. My completed form got rejected. Why? Not enough spots were available. Huh? My palms started sweating a little.

I went back and put "1" in the box for the number of passes and tried again. Bingo. I was in. Apparently I got THE VERY LAST all-events BlogHer pass.

Then I was in a quandary. What about the contest? I needed a spot for my winner, or I couldn't go because I would feel ethically bound to send the winner and stay at home myself.

I went back and filled in the "Foundation Scholarship" spot and got the confirmation. Apparently they had some spots left for scholarship people, and they had already said I could go that route for my contest.

So I am going and the contest winner is going. I am either insanely lucky, incredibly stupid, or a little of both.

I can't wait to find out who the winner is, and I can't wait for July!

Joke or serious Christian weirdness?

You decide. JesusPets is hiring heathens and agnostics to take care of pets belonging to Christians after their owners are raptured.

GandhiRules, are you available?

It's a rough life for a dog. Yes, that IS the couch she is sleeping on.
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