Meet Scrappy and Mireille
Both of my dogs are terriers which means they never outgrow the puppy phase. They are about five years old and they still fight over toys and chase and nip at each other.
Here is a little video I got of them a couple of days ago while they were fighting over a tiny rubber chicken. The very end is the best part, that’s when Scrappy (the smaller dog) runs so fast in front of the screen you barely see her. You can hear her feet galloping. Fast.
Oh, and that was laundry day, so, excuse the house.
Text The Google
Something I have found quite useful lately is texting messages (SMS) to Google for information.
It is so easy, I prefer it to using the internet on my computer or iPhone for things like movies and showtimes, defining a word, getting directions, or finding a restaurant.
This is useful for people in the US, so keep that in mind. Yes, i know people abroad have been using this, but we haven’t gotten into texting so much because our mobile voice calls are so cheap.
Any phone with texting ability can be used for these free Google services. On my mobile plan I get unlimited texts, so I pay nothing to send or receive texts.
If I want to know what movies are playing in my area, I text “M” to 46645 (which is GOOGL on the number pad). Within five seconds I receive a free text message with three movie choices. If I don’t like these, I reply with “Next” and get more movie choices. Along with the movie choices, I get showtimes and cinema locations.
If I want to define a word, I text “d” and the word. Voila, the answer in five seconds and no bunny trail of search results.
I could even get directions using this thing. Sports scores. Stock prices.
Go check out this simple tool. I know it’s been around for a while, but even my teenagers who RULE when it comes to texting didn’t know about this. It might end up helping them get out of a jam in the future.
Google explains it best right here. You could also just text “help” to 46645 just to find out what you could do with this thing.
Carry
You know the way some girls keep getting asked over and over to be a bridesmaid? Well Blane keeps getting asked to be a pallbearer, over and over. Tomorrow will be the sixth time in just over a year that he “carries.” (This one isn’t tragic, he had a great aunt pass of old age.)
That’s how they say it in the business. Carry. Blane’s father, a funeral director asked Blane yesterday, “Are you going to carry?”
It is of course an honor to be asked to carry. People know that in life, Blane carries a lot of people. He’s a save-the-world-hero type. Always doing amazing things for people and never asking for anything in return.
There are very few people who will do things for you without keeping score. Blane is one of them.
As odd as this may sound, Blane did not carry me over the threshold on our wedding night. We forgot to do that. It wasn’t important. He’s always there to carry me when I need it. That’s all that matters to us. I’ve done the same for him.
Since I can’t be there with him tomorrow (this is out-of-state, he’s flying there now), I’d like to honor of my hero, Blane, for what he will be doing tomorrow. For what he always does, symbolically. Carry.
Here is a video by My Chemical Romance. It’s gothic, shows the beauty of a Christian funeral. I especially like the ending with the pallbearers and the umbrellas.
When Dogs Fly
Every once in a while Blane asks me if it’s true that I saw our dog fly. First of all it’s hard enough to believe our well-behaved Mireille would steal food off the counter. Secondly, she’s just not tall enough to reach the counter-top with her mouth.
But I saw her steal that pork chop. Barely. It happened so fast, all I saw was a white blur, two back paws, and then an empty plate. I heard her jaw snap. Next, she went into self exile in the washroom. Proof of her guilt. Proof that pork chop didn’t disappear into thin air. She couldn’t even look me in the eye.
Blane claims I told him it happened in slow-mo, her long white ears like airplane wings, gliding through the air. I’m thinking his imagination added that to the story.
Spanky says I told her too that it was in slow-mo, that Mireille looked just like Scar attacking Simba in “The Lion King.” I couldn’t have told her that because I know I saw back legs, not the dog coming at me head on. That dog would never be able to fly through the air while looking dead at me and steal. Not Mireille. I think Spanky’s imagination added to that story, too.
Blane and Spanky believe everything I tell them. They just ask me if it’s true because they want to hear the story again. They believe Mireille flew for that pork chop.
She did. There was no slight of paw involved. She flew. That’s how we saw it.
The Telemarketer Who Changed My Life
I don’t remember what it was that made me want to listen to her, what it was in her sales pitch, but I remember sitting on the floor listening to her rattle off a list of magazines she was selling. Something kept telling me to buy something from her. She got to the end of the list and there was nothing for me. Then she said something like, “There’s another one, it’s not popular but… Writer’s Digest.”Within a month of reading my first issue, I was over at the college taking writing classes.
I have been in college classes for almost my entire adulthood. I got my nursing degree when I was about 21 and then went back to school within a couple of years to study other things. Since I’ve always had children, the school/work/family thing was difficult. Then Blane decided to go back to school and get his master’s, so for a few years the evenings were his to go to school since he had the weekday job.
As a nurse I was able to load up all my work hours on the weekends while he watched the kids. During the week I watched them. There were times when I could only take two classes per semester. Although I only ended up with a degree in nursing and then one in real estate/brokerage, I have majored in pre-dental, biology, theatre, and anthropology. I also took six semesters of French, but those were not for credit (didn’t need them).
So that day when I got that call about the magazines, a day when I was knee-deep in trading online stocks (forgot to tell you, did that too, self taught), I listened to a call in which writing seemed to find me by chance.
I wonder where I would be had I not picked up that phone. I haven’t taken classes for two years now, but I’m in a writing workshop, so I’m still turning in assignments.
I’m Liking Weird Fishes/Arpeggi
Radiohead have finally released their experimental album “In Rainbows” on CD and for download from iTunes ($9.99) and here at Amazon for $7.99. I know Radiohead have done some experimental music before, but what was different about this one was the way it was first released.
Radiohead offered the download for sale over the internet in November 2007. The price? Whatever you wanted to pay.
Since it got such great reviews, I decided to buy the entire album. I prefer hard copy if I’m buying the entire CD, so I had to wait until it came out in stores a couple of weeks ago. (It is no longer available as a pay what you want download.)
I’m liking it, especially this track, “Weird Fishes/Arpeggi.” It has a liquid sound.
The animation is “Wind Along The Coast” by Russian animator Ivan Maximov.
Paid In Full
Poor Blane, right after we got back from the AT&T Store he asked if I was going to blog that he made good on his IOU. He did, and not only did I get a new phone, but so did the girls. Their phones were free just for signing up for new service. Not cheesy phones, but cool sliders with an mp3 player and 2 mp camera. Blane was already on AT&T through his work, so he didn’t get a new phone.
I ended up going with the iPhone (over the Tilt) because it’s an Apple product. They are reliable and work as they should. It’s simple, when you get something from them, you turn it on, and it’s ready to use. You don’t even need to read an instruction manual.
I am yet to even read the quick start guide. The phone plugs into my Mac just as the iPod does using the same cable. iTunes knows what it is and tells you what to do. It activated my phone for me.
I’m making calls, texting, watching YouTube videos, taking photos, sending and receiving email, listening to my playlists… i even got lost (yes, already, in my own city) and used the Google maps function to get out of that jam.
All this without cracking open a single manual. I did go to AskDave to find out how to move my contacts to my iPhone from my Treo. (If you ever want to know how to do anything Apple related, he has the answers)
I don’t have a single complaint. I thought the keyboard would be a bitch because it is touchscreen, but it is actually better and faster than typing on those tiny Blackberry keys.
Okay, I lie. There is one complaint. I wish I could unlock this phone so I could change out the sim card while traveling. Still, I could at least use this phone while traveling abroad on ATT networks if needed. I couldn’t do that with my other phone. Also, if I find a wifi spot somewhere? Watch out, man, I’ll be travel blogging. Live.
No trips planned yet, but you can bet I’ll be bringing this thing wherever we go.
Now if I could just get this thing to bang out screenplays…
My Freak Self
A friend of mine just got a new Mac and is having a damn good time exploring Photobooth. It works with the Mac’s built in camera to warp the images and is gauranteed to make anyone laugh.
We’ve been emailing each other freak photos of ourselves, “Top this, biotch!”
It was Photobooth that saved my ass when I got this Mac without asking Blane first. He finally stopped being rude about it after he turned that thing on and had a laugh fest.
It’s more fun than doing crunches and burns the same.
So let’s do some, I’ll serve up my own rag face for this:
I love the way my ear looks all Shrekish (above photo).
Can you believe this is who you’ve been hanging out with on the web!?!
Wait, wait, one more:
Don’t believe everything you see on the internet.
The avatar I use is me on my prettiest of days. And it was Photoshopped, you fools.
You still want to hang out???
Birthday IOU
That’s what I got from Blane a couple of days ago for my birthday, an IOU. Oh, and a candy bar. One. Cadbury. Chocolate. Bar. WTF was that supposed to mean? At first I thought, Oh, the cheap bastard had to pay more for the Cadbury, so I just got one. Doesn’t mean he thinks they’ll go to my ass or anything like that.
Still, I had to investigate the matter. I ran over to his secret candy stash drawer and saw what he got for himself. A bag of M&Ms, Milk Duds, and huh, a Cadbury bar. Being my mean and vengeful self, I stole all of his M&Ms.
I do not even like Cadbury, he should know that from years and years of marriage or at least by reading my mind. He should know I am sentimental about candy, dammit, I go to the ghetto side of town just to buy his favorite, Jolly Joe’s and when I do, I come back with a case. It doesn’t even have to be his birthday, either.
I’m not asking for Godiva or Ferraro Rocher, just a crate of Hershey’s with almonds would do.
Okay, upon further investigation, Spanky was with him at the store and she said she liked Cadbury, so he thought I might like it too.
He also made me a cake and this time it looked like a cake and not an asshole like the one last year. He even allowed the girls to put sprinkles on it. Blane hates sprinkles because they end up all over the place. They managed to keep them all on the cake and he was so proud of them. When I blew out the candles? Whoa, I blew sprinkles into every corner of the entire kitchen. That was even funnier than Sweetpea coughing all over her cake when she blew out her candles at her mega-birthday bash at the age of four.
Here’s why I got the IOU. Blane asked me two days before my birthday which tablet I wanted for editing photos. I told him I changed my mind, that I must have the iPhone and although he hates all things Apple, he was just going to have to bend because it’s my birthday.
I am also finally free of the shackles of Sprint Mobile after five long years of being put under new contracts just for changing little things about my plan. I have not been able to get a new phone credit in five years and my phone just sucks. It is a family plan, however, which means the girls must also switch to AT&T and choose new phones. Maybe by the time I actually get the phone the next gen iPhone will be for sale.
Also, Blane gets a discount on AT&T services through his employer and my birthday was over the weekend. I thought he still should have just gone to the Apple Store and just gotten the thing to show me a sign that he capitulated to my wishes. I wonder if he thinks I’ll change my mind? I won’t, I’ve been wanting that thing since before it even hit he market last summer. He knows this. He didn’t even need to ask what I wanted. He just didn’t want me to have it because he has Mac envy.
The girls gave me hand-made birthday cards. Those are absolutely my favorite things to receive.
Thanks again to all of you who wished me a happy one.
Twenty-Five Thousand Dollar Baby
Down Bayou Lafourche in Louisiana, snow is so rare it only happens once or twice in a lifetime.
The first time my mother saw snow was the day I was born. I imagine she was a bit upset about having to watch it through the hospital window, she likes rare and odd things. Usually.
Just after the doctor delivered me, just after he said, “It’s a girl,” she looked at me in horror.
“Take her away! I don’t want her!” She screamed over and over again.
It’s true, she did say that. My dad and my aunts all heard her say it. The doctor who delivered me told me the same years later when he removed my tonsils.
This sounds like a horrible mother story, but it isn’t. It’s not the whole story.
She had been heavily drugged for the delivery (this was before epidurals) and thought she had given birth to a monster. She said I was so covered in vernix that I looked like “a cement baby.”
The next day, a childless couple went to her hospital room. They had overheard her screams. They offered her twenty-five thousand dollars for me. That was a lot of money back then. That’s a chunk today. And that was just their starting bid. Who goes in with their highest offer?
Of course, my parents didn’t even entertain the idea, so there’s no telling how much these people were willing to pay.
I could tell you I have deep psychic pain over being rejected in the first seconds of my life by my own mother. But I’d be lying through my teeth. The way I saw things, I was priceless, my parents had been tested. Proof with a bottom number that I was loved.
There were days when things weren’t so great with my family, days when I would daydream how my life might have been if I’d been sold to the people with a suitcase full of money. I’d imagine being dropped off at some exclusive school with “Imaculate Conception” in the name. My driver would open the limo door for me. My “parents,” who looked like movie stars would never be around. I could jump on the mattresses and leave my plate on the table for the servants. The daydream would come to a screeching halt when I couldn’t imagine getting as much as a hug from my rich fantasy parents. I’d snap back to reality, happy that my real parents (or I, literally) could not be bought.
I used to tease my brothers, tell them I was worth a ton of money to some family out there. I’d work the supply and demand angle. Tell them if it had been one of them born that day, they might have been sold because I was the only girl and they were one of four boys. I left them wondering if our parents might have at least gotten to the negotiating table if it had been one of them instead.
These days I wonder if there is any amount of money my mom would take to have me back to herself again? I see her and Blane at the negotiating table, my mom pushing away stacks of money, “No way man, you keep her.”
So that’s how I was born. On The Bayou, covered in cheese, rejected, worth maybe millions, and then some… All on a rare snow day.
My Whacked Travel Tales All in One Place
I made a page with links to most of my travel posts and put it in the sidebar.
Check it out if you have time.
I’m going through my photo albums and have a lot more stories to write (The US, Belize, Mexico, Canada, Germany, Belgium, Portugal, Wales, World Cup France, Tour de France…)
Double Dog Dare Ya
Blogging every day for a month was a little difficult but fun. I can’t keep up with that pace, however, and I do think people need a break from my blog so they can go read and comment on other things out there.
For those of you from Holidailies who would like to continue to blog every day, I double dog dare you to sign up for a year-long blogathon at Blog 365.
Last time I checked, about 800 people had signed up for the deed.
Max over at Celluloid Blonde blogged every day last year. Go Max! She did it on her own, though, without a group. I hope she continues to blog every day. Reading Max is sort of like my morning paper. She usually posts about the same time every day which is about 2 AM for me. Sometimes I find myself at the computer waiting for her next post to come out.
Hope you all have a great 2008.
