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Weekend Wrap Up
Saturday, I went to the movies with Autumn’s Mom. We went to see “Walk the Line“. I’ve never been a big Johnny Cash fan, mostly because I’m not really into country music. Nothing against him. So, not being a fan, I didn’t know anything about him, except that he wore a lot of black, was married to June Carter (I only knew that because they died so close together a couple of years ago), and that he….well, that’s all I knew. The movie was really good…I definately enjoyed it. Very interesting, very well done. Did he come off looking perfect? No, far from it. It’s the story of his romancing…
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The Man Owns Us….
Just finished the taxes. I feel kind of like this guy…not the bull, the other one.
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Why My Daughter is “Underprivileged”…thankfully
From the truly nausiating world of people-with-more-money-than-God-who-should-learn-about-charity-or-savings-or-maybe-just-give-me-some-of-it, comes this column from Salon, on the hyperconsumeristic spending habits of very wealthy parents of overindulged infants.My favorite quote? “…and what’s more anxiety-provoking than, My god, I have a baby?” Or maybe: “I have never seen a clearer acknowledgement that children have been reduced to accessories.” I believe you have to have a subscription to Salon to read the whole article, so I’ll copy and paste it into my ‘comments’ section, in case you’re interested. 🙂 And I know what you’ll say…”My goodness, who cares.” And you’re right, except for the editorial comment that I feel sorry for these poor kids, and the…
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Rambling Thoughts on MySpace, et. al.
I was listening to my favorite radio station this morning, and they were talking about “MySpace.com”, and whether it is dangerous for kids or not. One man called in and said that he doesn’t think that legislating or policing the site is the ultimate answer, because kids are smarter than we are, and if they’re going to do something, they’re going to do it. So, the key is to TEACH your kids what is safe, what isn’t, and why. Teach them why they shouldn’t want to do something, like go meet people that they’ve only met online, because it might not be safe. Coincidentally, I just started a new book,…
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I Really Liked This Book
From Powell’s Books website: ————————————————————————————————– For thirty-one-year old Cornelia Brown, life is a series of movie moments, and “Jimmy Stewart is always and indisputably the best man in the world, unless Cary Grant should happen to show up.” So imagine Cornelia’s delight when her very own Cary Grant walks through the door of the hip Philadelphia café she manages. Handsome and debonair, Martin Grace sweeps Cornelia off her feet, becoming Cary Grant to Cornelia’s Katharine Hepburn, Clark Gable to her Joan Crawford. Meanwhile, on the other side of town, eleven-year-old Clare Hobbes must learn to fend for herself after her increasingly unstable mother has a breakdown and disappears. With no…
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Apropos of yesterday’s post….
Looks like HBO has a new show coming out about a polygemous family…I wonder if I can buy it on iTunes, like Ted does with Battlestar Galactica? I doubt it. Probably I’ll have to wait for the DVD. I’ll be interested to hear if it’s any good, though. HBO Rocks.
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Feminist Polygamy?
Do you ever listen to “This American Life” on NPR? It’s an interesting program, where they basically choose a theme and put together different kinds of stories on that theme. It’s a lot more interesting than that sounds. I download the show via audible.com onto my iPod, and listen to it when I’m walking the dog, or walking back to work after dropping Maya off at school (though we haven’t been doing that as much lately…gotta work on that). You can listen to it for free on the radio, of course, or if you are willing to sit in front of your computer and listen, but my mind wanders when…
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Why I Prefer Showers…
So there’s this website called Post Secret, which is an ongoing community art project where people mail-in their secrets anonymously on one side of a homemade postcard. This one pretty much sums up my feelings for bathing (see # 76). A jacuzzi, however, is different. Take a look…some of them may speak to you. I found it via The View From Crazy. Mail your secrets to: PostSecret 13345 Copper Ridge Rd Germantown, Maryland USA 20874-3454
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In Case You Were Wondering…
What’s wrong with missionaries, and why I don’t give my ‘charity’ dollars to religious groups…I mean, they go and bring education and medicine and try to help people, correct? But at what price. The fact of the matter is that the whole goal of missionaries is to try to convince the ‘other’ that the best course of action is to change from being ‘other’ to being ‘self’. To be a bit more clear, those people over there have a problem, and the best way to fix it is to make them more like us. Because, you know, we’re doing so damn well over here. We don’t have problems with poverty,…
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Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill
SPOILER WARNING We watched this movie last night on DVD. It was really pretty amazing. If you’re not familiar with the story, I’ll fill you in. There is a flock of parrots that live on Telegraph Hill in San Francisco…no one is sure when or how they got there, but there are many theories, including that they escaped from a ship that was here from South America, that an old woman owned them, and when she died, the person who came to clean out her apartment released them, and many others. Those parrots have not only thrived, they have been breeding for about 20 years now. There is a man,…
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Why I’m afraid of going to Africa
Two posts before I leave the house? This is getting stupid. I’m insane. I’m still in my jammies. ACK! The worst thing is that I dreamed about this post…I was peacefully sleeping, and I dreamed that Autumn’s Mom wrote a post about either going to Africa, or the Toto song, I’m not sure which…maybe both? I don’t know. Anyway, it made me remember why Africa is the last continent on my list of travels: Look here… and/or here (Hint…my maiden name? Ward.) I remember reading about this when it happened, and I lived in San Francisco, and I remember thinking maybe the Terminator was behind it, and was going to…
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Flashback Friday
I was going to skip posting for a few days…maybe until Monday…just to show you all that I don’t HAVE to post every day, and I DON’T have a ‘posting problem’ or anything. But apparantly that’s not true. Is there a support group out there for blogging? Maybe this will be my only post for the day. Maybe. Anyway, here’s where I rip off TWO friends at once! First, Autumn’s Mom, who sometimes posts about music from the 80’s on Friday, taking us all into a slightly uncomfortable yet somehow pleasant time warp, and second, Jeffito, who has a link to a THIRD blog, Drink at Work. It’s the Drink…
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Junk Mail (aka Spam)
Do you ever read any of the junk mail that gets through the filters? Since I’m working from home today, my work email isn’t quite the same as when I’m at work, and I have to open an email in order to delete it. Of course, I don’t open the attachments. I stopped and read one today, and I thought it was kind of funny. Here you go. Nothing has been omitted, except for the attachment. Enjoy: Nor was that all. what do you do? in 1893 Of course not. But instead of weeping with exalted grief as she should have done when Misery expired giving birth to the boy…
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Puke…
So last night, Maya said she felt cold, freezing cold, but I assumed it was because it was getting cold out, and she was wearing a thin, short sleeved shirt. She didn’t feel feverish, and we took her temp…99. So I didn’t worry about it too much. She got in the shower, still freezing, and got ready for bed. She wanted help brushing her hair, so I was doing that, and she said, “I feel queasy….” then barfed in the sink. Twice. Poor kid. Good thing we had draino, becuase those little bathroom sinks aren’t meant for puke. She brushed her teeth and got into bed. Took the temp again,…
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Best Meatloaf Recipe
As you know, I received many Barnes and Noble giftcards for my birthday this year. Well, I spent most of the money on the books over there to the right (scroll down), and on Monday I managed to spend the rest of it on a new cookbook. I got the Barefoot Contessa cookbook, which I would not have gotten if I hadn’t had the gift cards, because it was EXPENSIVE (not so expensive on Amazon, but it was at B&N). But the pictures are beautiful, and that is key for me. I guess I’m a visual person. Well, we tried a recipe on Monday night. I made the Turkey Meatloaf,…