I've moved

I've moved here. I'm password protected, but if you write to me and can prove you're not an insane criminal or a member of my family, I'll give you the password.

Oh what a tangled web

You're a Spider!

It seems like you have eyes in the back of your head sometimes, and
you have an uncanny knack for creeping people out with that ability. You really
enjoy eating wraps, though you like them even more if you made them yourself. You
work tirelessly so that you can eat, but are good at getting rid of annoyances for
other people. There's always just a little more drama than necessary when you're
around. Oh, what tangled webs you weave!


Take the Animal Quiz
at the Blue Pyramid.

Did I ever tell you about my pet, Tools??

You're Watership Down!

by Richard Adams

Though many think of you as a bit young, even childish, you're
actually incredibly deep and complex. You show people the need to rethink their
assumptions, and confront them on everything from how they think to where they
build their houses. You might be one of the greatest people of all time. You'd
be recognized as such if you weren't always talking about talking rabbits.


Take the Book Quiz
at the Blue Pyramid.

The value of me

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Test Result

I'm recently back from vacation -- my house needs cleaning, I'm a few thousand email messages behind, and about 100 blog posts behind. I also need to post much information on my own blog.

SOOOOOOO -- naturally I stop for a meme

The Which Lolcat Are You?

Your Score: Longcat
78% Affectionate, 27% Excitable, 37% Hungry
Protector of truth.Slayer of darkness.Loooooong.Longcat may seem like just a regular lengthy cat, but he is, in fact, looong. For proof, observe the longpic. It is prophesized that Longcat and his archnemesis Tacgnol will battle for supremacy on Caturday. The outcome will change the face of the world, and indeed the very fabric of lolcatdom, forever. Be grateful that the test has chosen you, and only you, to have this title. To see all possible results, checka dis. My test tracked 4 variables How you compared to other people your age and gender:


You scored higher than 94% on Affection


You scored higher than 5% on Excitability


You scored higher than 22% on Hunger


You scored higher than 0% on Felinity

click here to find out Which Lolcat Are You?

Vacation in the Minivan .....

Vacation in the minivan Day #1.

Wake up too bloody early. Finish packing, do laundry. Go into my office where I had a couple of small items to attend to. Get home, take shower, and dress in business casual type clothes (not what I normally wear to drive). Finish packing the minivan and drive to the movie theater. What?? That's not how you normally start a vacation.

Trade places with Spouse and kids in the line at the theater. Spouse takes kids off to feed them lunch, and I stand in line for an hour and 1/2. Am rejoined by Spouse and Chip, stand in line for another 1/2 hour, and then spend a very few minutes getting picture taken with, and talking to James and Oliver Phelps (more commonly known as The Weasley Twins). Pictures later.

Hop into Spouses sedan and "continue" on my road to vacation by driving to Golf Course Suburb for a baby shower. Niece #1 is having my first grandnephew, so we delayed the start of our vacation travels until after the shower. Chat with family and friends, and then a few hours later, Spouse, Chip, Princess, and GMA-W and GPA-W arrive in Golf Course Suburb. I hop in minivan with all except Spouse. He's not joining us on vacation, as he started a new job last week and (a) it's not really a good plan to take vacation right after starting a new gig and (b) since he's on contract he only gets paid for the time he works -- after a bit of time with no income, we can't afford a week with no pay when there's an option for a week WITH pay.

Drive for a bit and call spouse "where's the camera" (which was used to take pictures of Chip, Ramblingmom, and the Phelps twins)? "In my pocket" so you'll see no pictures from vacation until my return home (and my camera). Now, since we're travelling with GMA-W and GPA-W (a/k/a the inlaws) we can borrow their camera at times. We're also meeting SIL and BIL and their kids. BIL is a very avid photographer or so he pretends. We often see him posing people for pictures and taking pictures and doing all sorts of things with cameras, but we never actually see any of these photographs.

So we drive a few hours, get some dinner, and then drive a couple more hours and find a room with a pillow top mattress (and internet access).

We we're going there may not be Internet access, so you may get the rest of the trip much later.

Order of the Phoenix -- impressions after 2 viewings

We saw the movie at the midnight release and then a day later Chip *WON* two tickets to another showing for Saturday so ---- I mean what else could we do??

Anyway, now that I've seen it twice I have a few impressions

One thing that always disappoints me about the movies is that they can never match the books. I understand that there's not enough time in 2+ hours to catch everything. They do sort of "fill in" the books for me. For instance, now I have a much better picture in my mind of Luna Lovegood. And let me say that I *LOVE* Evanna Lynch (I think Chip thinks I have a "girl crush" on her). She catches that dreamy/spacey quality of Luna so well. Don't worry, you're just as sane as me. Kudos to casting on THAT casting call.

No quidditch :^(. Didn't get to hear "Weasley is our King".

Jason Isaacs -- WOW -- I really hated him as Lucius Malfoy in this movie - I mean I LOVE the way that Jason Isaacs portrayed Lucius Malfoy and made me hate Lucius. Now lets everybody just calm down... shall we?

Now I might have disliked Mr. Malfoy -- but Umbridge really got my goat (or Centaur in this case). Pure evil. I kept trying to think that maybe if the Ministry really thought that Dumbledore was waging a war against the ministry that might excuse some of her behavior but I couldn't forget that (from the book) she had ordered the dementor attack on Harry. I can't find an excuse for that.

I'm thinking Tonks for Halloween.

What follows is a spoiler for those that have not seen movie 5 AND have not READ book 6.

Cornelius Fudge resigned as Minister of Magic (it was a headline of the Prophet that passed by). Book 6 starts with the introduction of the new Minister of Magic. I've loved Robert Hardy since he was Siegfried Farnon in All Creatures Great and Small.
I'm going to miss him in the Potter movies.

BYE BYE Siegfried (though I wouldn't cry if somehow Peter Davison managed to get cast in an HP movie).

nearest book meme

This has been going around. Since I have a lot of "closest books" to my computer (there's a 6 shelf bookshelf nearby -- which is the closest book? The one on the first shelf or the second or the third?). I did have Dora the Explorer Madlibs Junior ON the computer table -- that that doesnt' have the required number of pages.

So I decided that the next time a book lands on my computer table, I'd use that book for the closest book meme. (If you look at my last post - you may understand how this book came to be on my table)

And here goes ...

The game:
1. Grab the nearest book to you.
2. Open the book to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the text of the next 4 sentences on your blog along with these instructions.
5. Don't you dare dig for that "cool" or "intellectual" book in your closet! I know you were thinking about it! Just pick up whatever is closest.

From The Yale Book of Quotations edited by Fred R. Shapiro


David Byrne
Scottish-born U.S. Rock musician, 1952

1 And you may find yourself behind the wheel of a large automobile
And you may find yourself in a beautiful house
With a beautiful wife
And you may ask yourself
Well, how did I get here?

"Once in a Lifetime" (song) (1980). Cowritten with Brian Eno.

2 And you may ask yourself
What is that beautiful house?

(OKAY -- so that was a bit confusing as the punctuation is weird enough in a book of quotations so I just counted end of sentence punctuation marks and went from there).

What was I gonna say???

Ran across the following on Reuters.

Remember your home phone number? Forget it!

LONDON (Reuters) - Can't remember life before mobiles? Chances are you'll also struggle to recall your home phone number and family birthdays.

According to a survey released Friday, the boom in mobiles and portable devices that store reams of personal information has created a generation incapable of memorizing simple things.

A quarter of those polled said they couldn't remember their landline number, while two-thirds couldn't recall the birthdays of more than three friends or family members.

The tech-savvy young fared worse than older people. The under-30s could remember fewer birthdays and numbers than the over-50s, according to the survey.

Two-thirds said they relied on their phone or electronic organizer to remember key dates.

"People have more to remember these days and they are relying on technology more for their memory," said Ian Robertson, professor of psychology at Trinity College, Dublin.

© Reuters 2006. All rights reserved. Republication or redistribution of Reuters content, including by caching, framing or similar means, is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Reuters. Reuters and the Reuters sphere logo are registered trademarks and trademarks of the Reuters group of companies around the world.

What about the folks between 30 and 50? What do they remember? (Or did the pollsters forget to poll those folks??)

I believe (though I can't verify) that Einstein was quoted as saying that he didn't memorize his phone number because he wouldn't be bothered to memorize something that he can look up.

(I use that philosophy often in my work doing income taxes - no I bloody well don't have the tax tables memorized).