A rose by any other name...

I have developed an extended definition of a common word, and am considering submitting it to Webster's.

Catwalk n: the movement of a feline across a keyboard, particularly a laptop keyboard, esp if the movement involves jamming the keys.

We suffered a catwalk recently when I inadvertently left Mister's laptop open. Didn't matter if it was running, the cat stomped across the keypad, did her little circle dance and then plunked down for a nap. Later I attempted to copy some files using a desktop shortcut. Because the shift key had been jammed, all I managed to copy was about 50 desktop icons three times. Do you have any idea what a desktop looks like with 150 icons crowding around? (Please note, this is not my laptop. You wanna know why there's 50 icons on the desktop, ask Mister. My desktop is clutter-free, unlike the house that surrounds it.)

After much cursing and ugly faces directed toward the cat, I managed to unjam the shift key, delete the excess icons, swear at Mister for having so many icons anyway (and that's after I've cleaned it up a bit, creating folders for certain categories, all of which he blithely ignores), and get back to business. And this time, I won't forget to close the lid!

Mission accomplished, future catwalks curtailed, life goes on.

What it is

Suppose a couple with an emotional history split and then got back together. Is she correct when she assumes that his idea to get tattoos with their names means "forever," especially when he says something along the lines of "Baby, you know we're gonna be together forever."

If you said, "Forever means forever," then how can "forever" mean "until I say so."

See, I'm not a guy (a situation which I'm certain makes Mister sigh with relief) so I don't know how a guy's mind works, or a guy's emotional roller coaster.

Plus, there are different kinds of guys: laid back, protective but not smothering, insane jealous, etc. Just like a woman, it's difficult to put detail to a man's perspective, no matter what type of guy he is. Why does he do/say/think the way he does--a question as impossible to honestly answer as "Do you think she's prettier than me?"

And what exactly does, "I just need a little space," mean? Or, "prepare for the worst, but hope for the best"? Or, "I can't put a time limit on a separation."

I'm trying to help my friends. They have a history of mistakes, tried counseling (he blames it for "[screwing] him up even more and won't go back), split and made up. Now he says he's been "faking it" for the past X years, and he just can't do it anymore. He's told her to find an apartment nearby or "go back home," and has signed a 6-month lease on his own apartment. He won't talk to anyone, including his best friend, and even risked a formal reprimand for being "very ugly" to his OIC.

This has all come out of nowhere and has occurred in the last 4 days. Just this past Sunday, I was over chatting with them, and I couldn't detect even a moment of tension until he mentioned he wanted to spend over $300 on a ticket to a NASCAR race, and she was shocked. I sat up until way past my bedtime listening to her tell her side of the story, and I have to agree: if he's "been faking it," he deserves an Oscar.

I don't get it, and I'd like to help both of them as best as I can. I recommended that even if he doesn't go, she should get counseling, and that her medical plan will pay for it. I offered to kick his arse straight to the moon. I offered to take him out for a beer so that maybe he'll talk to me--we have this "love big honkin' redneck trucks" connection. I offered to keep the kids while she pours her heart out to him (she called today to take me up on that).

What else can I say? What else can I do? I don't understand this "bottling up" thing. I mean, we all do that to a certain degree, even me. But eventually, the rational thing to do is talk it out. How can a person, who's been bottling things up, just walk? How do you just piss away a history, a connection, a family (this has damaged his relationship with his own parents, too), without at least "fighting it out"?

Anyone?

Crow is not delicious or nutritious.

So I'm checking out my daily news which I get not from any so-called "reliable" news source but from several compilation sites which link odd and interesting news when I run into a bit of backpedaling today. These sites are Fark, Obscure Store & Reading Room, and News of the Weird.

So why am I eating crow? Well, the blogkeeper at NOTW asks his faithful readers to join his google group to have the 6-days-per-week blog emailed to them. And so I did. I joined a google discussion group, and now I can leave messages or directly email my horror/chagrin/embarrassment to the blogkeeper. (The main blogsite for NOTW does not offer comments)

Anyhoo, check these sites out from time to time. I'm still Soo on OS&RR and NOTW, but Rollersnake on Fark (longer, dorkier story that you don't want to hear). There are truly bizarre stories to be found on each, some overlapping, most unique. Also, the comments are rather interesting. They range from profound to outrageous to downright trollish and unconscionable.

At any rate, for the next time, I'll have that crow grilled.

Yes, indeed, the laws of irony yada yada

Well, I took a quiz to see which video game character I am most like. If you guessed I am most like the short, chubby, Italian plumber dweeb otherwise known as "Mario," please stop by customer service on your way out to pick up your prize.

If you'd like to take this quiz to see which character is most like you, then click here. Your choices include Mario, Link, Sonic, StarFox and Megaman.

Yeah, Murphy and Irony, their laws are like constant companions... which barf on your shoes every now and again.

A man's home is his castle. Allegedly.

If this is the case, I certainly hope Mister loses some weight whilst on his deployment. After nearly 10-11 years, we have finally (nearly) completed the 3-D castle puzzle Nanaw sent us for Christmas back in the day.

An attempt had been made once before, a couple of years after we received the thing. Why didn't we try it out sooner? Welcome to Procrastination Central. I'll tell you more about that later. Anyhoo, an attempt had been made but was a rather dismal failure owing to lack of storage and the presence of small rugrats who just couldn't resist touchy-touchy/eaty-eaty.

So we put it away, until I broke down and transformed an occasional table into our family's Very First coffee table in December, 2006. Naturally, the first move by a resident of the household was to put their feet up on it (Reason Number One for why I never had a coffee table in the first place). In brainstorming ideas to combat this problem, I remembered this puzzle. I got it out and started putting it together.

Since its last breath of fresh air we added an extra rugrat, and all are old enough now to touch but not eat the pieces. So, all were welcomed to "help out" putting the puzzle together. This truly was a group effort.

All that awaits is for Dad to return in order to finish what he started all those years ago, because when you get down to the brass tacks, persistence is the key to success. Cliche, anyone?

Further stats and useless trivia regarding said puzzle:

• This puzzle traveled from Ohio to England, from England to California, from California to Georgia, and from Georgia to Virginia, for a grand total of nearly 14,700 miles.
  
• This puzzle is now missing 2 pieces. They are probably still in England.
• This puzzle is of a castle in Bavaria, Germany. My mom bought it because we were living in a country full of castles. In England.
• Mister visited this castle whilst on TDY in Germany about 25 years after his own father toured this castle whist completing a tour of duty in Germany thanks to a draft card during the Vietnam Conflict. He did not know at the time that this was where his dad was stationed.
• We bought a gift tin shaped like a treasure chest full of foodies for Mister's parents. It had a picture of this castle on it, but we didn't know that until years later.
• I bought a boxed bottle of wine celebrating some German anniversary (no, I don't know what for, I don't know German) and it has a picture of this castle on it. And yes, we still have the wine.
• This castle is the one Disney used as the inspiration for Sleeping Beauty's castle.
• The German prince who built this castle is probably the factual basis behind the "psycho prince" story for the "Curse of Darkcastle" ride at Busch Gardens Williamsburg.
• We live right down the road from Busch Gardens Williamsburg.
• I'm done now.

Thank you, Mister Romance!

I'd just like to take this opportunity to personally thank Google for making my Blogger experience decidedly more miserable and difficult than it was before.

Sure, my posts load up with lightning speed. But my sign-in has gone from a quick dance across the keypad to a nightmarishly long email address along with that crazy "at" symbol and yet another password to remember. Was it really necessary, Google? Did I need to create yet another account I won't use just to keep access to the one account I do use?

I"m going out on a limb here. I'm saying this bites. It blows. I'm dismayed, disappointed and disheartened. The pointlessness of the Googlefying boggles the mind. If Bill Shakespeare were sitting through this, his head would explode with the tragedy of it all.

To be fair, I did peruse what Google offered in their "account" they forced me to open. Wow. Let me just say that again: wow.

• I can change my email, or my password (as if I'm not confused enough already, let's change it up some more!).
  
• I can open Blogger. Well, there's a bonus I wasn't expecting.
  
• I can use "AdWords" and find people wanting to buy stuff I'm selling, except I'm not selling anything so that's hardly helpful.
  
• I can get my search results emailed to me (Wait, what? I have time to punch in a search but no time to wait for it? I really am a loser!).
  
• I can create my very own mailing lists (Isn't that what my ISP email program's address book was for? What the hell, I'll do it again!)
  
• I can create my own discussion groups (Uh-huh. Yep. I'm fairly certain anything I want to talk about has already been talked to death, and no one listens to me anyway).
  
• I can "access and manage" my search results at any computer. Manage search results? What the hell does that mean?!

Yeah, I can see I'm gonna be using my Google account every freakin' day. 'Cause it's so useful. I mean, managing my search results is totally gonna rock my world. Maybe I can use AdWords to sell my soul to Satan as well.

Update: Obviously, I was quite the lazy sod and forgot to speelchek. Noted and completed.

Bully!

I have been bullied into updating my blog to the google account. I think we can safely say that just about anything good that google gets its hands on will soon be wanky.

But then again, I think to myself, it's a free blog, what can possibly go wrong?

The Adventures of Sgt Smell of the Mess Brigade

All any parent wants is for their children to grow up into well-adjusted adults who spread their wings, exploring their independence...... Somewhere else.

So this morning we're on our way to school when I mention to The Boy that his hair needs trimmed. He panics slightly because he thinks I'm suggesting I take him to the salon. Poor guy has been traumatized by his grandmother, a hairdresser. She has "trimmed" his hair before, never ever giving him what he wanted, and at least once making him cry about it. Now he won't go to any salon, ever. So I started to cut it because he was driving me nuts.

I'm no trained hair stylist. I was absolute crap when I gave him his first "trim," which was more like what you do with hedges rather than what you do with hair. I have developed a talent for "5-inch, all-over layers." And lately he doesn't look like his stylist is a monkey with seizures.

A thought occurred to me, and I voiced it: "What are you going to do when you grow up and leave?"

All too quickly, he replied: "That's why I'm never moving out!"

Suzy Homemaker Scores Again!

I am the hostess with the mostest!

For those of you who were unable to attend my Super Bowl Soiree, let me say how sorry I am for you. For those of you who were invited but were too lame to attend my Super Bowl Soiree: Bwa HA HA HA HA!

Excellent food. Excellent people. Bizarre game. Phone call from Mister. Chocolate cake.

What more could have been done to make this party even better? I just can't think of anything--except Mister being here for the party as well, but we have to take what we can get, eh?

Here comes the rain again

Maybe it's just me, but I thought January through April was part of the "rainy season" for the area of the planet from the Middle East all the way to the eastern edge of the Asian countries. If I'm wrong, go ahead and tell me.

So I'm checking out BBC's news page, since I no longer watch the BBCA thanks to their dedication to inappropriate timing of raunchy commercials. I find this article about flooding in Jakarta killing people and leaving them homeless.

People are being dragged under by the currents, NINE people were electrocuted (?!), and several more have been lost to 'sickness,' possibly the dengue fever that has broken out due to the high levels of 'pollution' in the floodwaters.

It also seems as though the entire country was taken completely by surprise. However, the end of the article caused me to smack myself:

The central government is blaming poor urban planning for the disaster, our correspondent says.

One Jakarta resident, Elan Manoppo, told the BBC there was "no integrated development plan" for the capital, adding: "Most of the city's drainage systems are not taken care of."

Good Lord! Can you possibly make things any worse for yourself?!

This can only end well...

This is amazingly scary. Oily, yellow snow with a distinctive "rotten" odor to it.

Don't eat it, don't even let your mammals eat it. We don't know why it happened, we're doing some tests, and we'll get back with you.

Oh yeah, and we're Russia.

I'm absolutely certain that when the Russian authorities are through with all their testing, the rest of the world will hear all about it, even if it's very bad. Yup. Sure they will. Just like Dubya's gonna finally pronounce 'nuclear' correctly whilst saying something profound that he thought up all by himself.

Oh yeah, one more thing: is it just me, or does Dubya's head make him look like a little monkey?

I'm having a bad joke day.

I'm sorry. I just have to, you know? Here it is:

A Chinese guy with a parrot on his shoulder walks into a bar.
The bartender says, "Hey, he's neat. Where'd you get him?"
The parrot says, "China, there's a billion of 'em."

Found this on a 'favorite joke' website while looking for a joke with the exclamation "Duck!" in it. No joy for me today, except for the gem which is posted above.