Happy birthday! I sincerely hope it's a good one, and, as always, I wish you only the best.

A Mother enters her daughters bedroom and sees a letter on the bed. With the worst premonition, she reads it, with trembling hands:

Dear Mom,

It is with great regret and sorrow that I'm telling you that I eloped with my new boyfriend. I found real passion and he is so nice, with all his piercings and tattoos and his big motorcycle. But it's not only that Mom, Im pregnant and Ahmed said that we will be very happy in his trailer in the woods.
He wants to have many more children with me and that's one of my dreams. Ive learned that marijuana doesn't hurt anyone and we'll be growing it for us and his friends, who are providing us with all the cocaine and ecstasy we may want.
In the meantime, we'll pray for science to find the AIDS cure and for Ahmed to get better, he deserves it.
Don't worry Mom, I'm l5 years old now and I know how to take care of myself. Some day I'll visit you so you can know your grandchildren.

Love,
Judith

P.S. Mom, it's not true, I'm at the neighbor's house. I just wanted to show you that there are Worse things in life than the school's report card that's in my desk drawer..... I love you Mom.

I've mentioned in this blog that I've had trouble with my left foot, including heel pain and a nasty bout of plantar faciitis. A good dose of prescription anti-inflammatories helped for a while, but it was slowly coming back...

Well, one of the things I've tried is various kinds of inserts for my shoes. The latest was gel heel cups that fit down in your shoes to cushion the heel.

Oh, and I bought a pair of fairly expensive leather shoes that are famous for being comfortable and supportive...

Anyway, Zoë was fascinated with the blue gel thingies in my shoes and kept fiddling with them, taking them out, carrying them off, etc. I kept finding them, but eventually I got to where I could only find one, so I put it in the left shoe and figured I'd find the other when I found it, expecting it to be very soon.

Turns out it wasn't quite as soon as I expected, and that the combination of the new shoes and a single heel cup mostly fix the problem. I'm thinking now that one of my legs is shorter than the other (I did have knee surgery on that leg years ago, perhaps there's some shortening due to that, I dunno), and using the single heel cup seems to work really well.

So, in a weird way, I have Zoë to thank for providing me with a way to deal with the wretched pain I sometimes get in my foot (or feet, but mostly just that one foot), by losing the gel insert. I also rather suspect that spending the extra money on really good shoes is worth it.

So there you go. No moral to the story, mind you. Just another weird and probably boring incident from my life.

LaChania Govan said she got bounced around by her cable company when she called to complain. She made dozens of calls and was even transferred to a person who spoke Spanish - a language she doesn't understand.
 
But when she got her August bill from Comcast she had no trouble understanding she'd made somebody mad. It was addressed to "Bitch Dog."
[...]
In another case, Peoples Energy customer Jefferoy Barnes started getting letters addressed to "Jeffery Scrotum Bag Barnes."

The owner of a CCTV surveillance shop which was robbed by a hooded thief has said the incident was "the biggest boost to business imaginable".

Every time I go to the shopping centre (well, a mall, but Aussies don't call it that), I see that the 70s are coming back to haunt me. Brown is everywhere, and now I see turquoise all over the place, and those multi-tier gypsy skirts and blouses with ties at the top and embroidery around the neckline...

I am, at this very moment, wearing a brown t-shirt. Mind you, I bought three, and two of them were black, because as far as I'm concerned brown is the new brown and black is still black, but I did get a brown t-shirt because the color looks okay on me and they didn't have any orange ones (which look very good on me, despite the fact that I don't really like orange all that much).

And I just got a haircut, and it's the haircut I had when I was about fourteen and a half. Collar length, layered, with shorter layers around the face, that which we used to call "feathered". I looked in the mirror and just kind of smirked... The glasses are very noughties (small and oval) and to be really 70s they'd have to be huge with plastic frames (I really hope those do NOT come back into fashion!) and I've got very 80s earlobes and an odd dangly earring (just on the one side, heh), and also a very 90s piercing in my other ear, but you can't see it because it's up high on the ear and the 70s haircut which is in fashion again and which I'm now wearing doesn't really show your ears.

Everything old is new again, but I promise I will NOT be wearing any platform shoes or those lace-up-the-ankles espadrilles that have recently come back, and I will not be wearing any corderoy. I can give in on the hair (hey, I like feathered hair, it works for me) and the brown t-shirt, but I think that's about as far as I'm willing to go. Well, other than those decidedly flared jeans I got the other day... *sigh*

Infants have been stopped from boarding planes at airports throughout the United States because their names are the same as or similar to those of possible terrorists on the government's "no-fly list.

I read a couple of blogs that post controversial subject matter and allow people to comment and debate. That's cool. I can get into that. I participate in that sort of thing, myself, if it's a topic that interests me.

As you can see, I haven't got comments enabled on this blog, though. It's not that I'm especially controversial (well, I can be; I just choose not to be overly controversial in this particular context, heh). It's mostly that I just don't want to host that sort of thing here.

You'll notice there is no guestbook, no forum, nothing openly interactive anywhere on this or any other of my websites. That's deliberate (I promise, I can set up a guestbook and/or a forum, heh). See, I've been on the net for more than 11 years now (yes, really) and I'm convinced that there are too many idiots out there to allow them access to my webspace. Yes, the majority of folks are okay, but the few who will abuse my bandwidth and goodwill are enough to make me just say, "Nope, go find your own sandbox to play in."

So, well, if you ever wondered why I don't enable comments here, that's why. I just don't wanna. Too much babysitting to keep the spammers and the morons at bay...

Corndogs. You know, hot dogs dipped in a cornmeal batter and deep fried? Corndogs. I miss corndogs.

Mind you, I don't crave them very often, but they're one of the few things I really can't get here in Australia. I could make my own (been looking at recipes) but I haven't got a deep fryer and I'm not sure how good they'd be if I shallow fried them.

Anyway, people sometimes ask if I miss anything about the United States and my usual answer is, "No, not really," which is true. There are a couple of people there I'd like to see if I could, yeah, and I miss all-night food places like Perkins (mmmm, ham and cheese omelettes at 2am), but mostly, no, I don't miss it.

Just corndogs. And sage pork sausage, although I do make my own (and it's very nice, thankyou, much more lean than the standard American stuff).

Pencil pushers and programmers from Microsoft and Google faced off this week for the greatest of geek glories: the Golden Penguin Bowl.
[...]
The quiz competition's announcer dubbed the match-up a battle of "good versus evil," alluding to Google's famous creed of avoiding evil deeds. But officially, this was a battle of Microsoft employees comprising the "Nerd" team against Google's "Geek" squad.

Australian scientists have developed a technique to use waste plastic in steel making, a process that could have implications for recycling scrap metal that accounts for 40 percent of steel production.

By the time I got done reading the collection of quote on The American Taliban page, I felt pretty sick. Granted, some of those people are extremists or members of fringe groups, but some are actually members of government, saying incredibly ignorant, downright bigoted things.

FELLAS accused by women of never listening to them now have the perfect excuse.
 
Their brains simply aren't designed to listen to women's voices - at first it thinks it is music then has to analyse what they are saying.
[...]
Dr Michael Hunter, who led the research, said: "The female voice is more complex than the male, due to differences in the size and shape of the vocal cords and larynx.

*sigh* Now when I have to repeat myself two or three times to get that man to hear/understand/pay attention, he's going to just point to his head and say, "Sorry, my brain thought it was the stereo!"

This also goes to support the theory that the reason women say about twice as many words per day as men is because they have to repeat themselves to men all the time....

Handle Me With Care is a very dark but compelling story. I'm finding it hard to put down, actually, and I don't say that lightly. My poor Palm is always lagging in battery because I've got it on at every opportunity to read just a few more paragraphs...

Note: Strong and adult subject matter. The cover isn't G-rated, although it's not too horrible (everyone's dressed, anyway). Proceed at your own risk (probably work safe, unless you have an extremely restrictive work environment).

ANYway... Games Empaths Play has been released, and it's got my cover. Please consider buying it, as I get royalties.... [insert a winking smirky type expression]

Imagine, if you will, a geeky woman who looks like your average fat suburban housewife with dyed hair opening a package and going, "Oooh ooh oohh" something like an excited ape.

That's what just happened here. The "Oooh oooh ooohhh" noises are "happy geek noises" and you hear them whenever geeks get some new geeky thing, whether it's a motherboard or a game console or some other geeky gadget.

I have a new PDA. Oooh, ooohhh, ooohhh. It's still charging, so I haven't been able to do much with it, but it's got twice the memory of my "old" one (I say "old" rather than old because the thing's only about three or four weeks old!), a built in dictionary/thesaurus (well, you never know when you'll need to look up another word for "sheep" or something, right?), and it's got a color display. Before buying, I did my research and the reviews I've seen of the product were all positive with the exception of a problem that sometimes came up with the charging/sync cradle going on the fritz when exposed to static electricity. Since the cradle I'm using is the one for my "old" Palm (they're interchangable), I'm hoping this won't be an issue, but I've got a sync/charging cable ready to try in any event.

Andrew's going to get my "old" PDA, which should suit him fine. It's a nice little thingy, I'm quite fond of it. As I told him, "I love my Palm so much, I want you to have it." And, well, he just had a birthday, and his current Palm is very non-current (it's a Palm III, I believe, very old OS, can't even run Adobe PDF on it) AND it requires batteries in the sense of "have to put in some new batteries", which is a pain in the neck. Now he can have a cradle at work to charge/sync his Palm or he can do it from home, and we can share stuff back and forth, etc.

Pretty cool. Oooh, ooh, oooh....

You wouldn't think that someone would have to start a blog to tell people that staring is rude, would you? I mean, isn't it common knowledge that it's rude to stare?

Unfortunately, it's not, and the young man who keeps this blog has a fair bit to say on the matter. He's got a couple of medical issues that draw a good deal of negative attention, including stares from strangers...

Anyway, his blog is worth reading, particularly if you're someone who thinks it's okay to stare or okay to let your kids stare (I'm sure none of my regular readers fall into that category, of course).

Two sisters, one blonde and one redhead, inherit the family ranch. Unfortunately, after just a few years, they are in financial trouble.In order to keep the bank from repossessing the ranch, they need to purchase a bull so that they can breed their own stock.

Upon leaving, the redhead tells her sister, "When I get there, if I decide to buy the bull, I'll contact you to drive out after me and
haul it home."

The redhead arrives at the man's ranch, inspects the bull, and decides
she wants to buy it. The man tells her that he will sell it for $599, no less.

After buying him, she drives to the nearest town to send her sister a telegram to tell her the news. She walks into the telegraph office, and says, "I want to send a telegram to my sister telling her that I've bought a bull for our ranch. I need her to hitch the trailer to our pickup truck and drive out here so we can haul it home."

The telegraph operator explains that he'll be glad to help her, then adds,"It's just 99 cents a word."

Well, after paying for the bull, the redhead only has $1 left. She realizes that she'll only be able to send her sister one word.

After thinking for a few minutes, she nods, and says, "I want you to send her the word "comfortable".

The telegraph operator shakes his head.

"How is she ever going to know that you want her to hitch the trailer to your pickup truck and drive out here to haul that bull back to your ranch if you send her the word, "comfortable?"

The redhead explains, "My sister's blonde. The word's big. She'll read it slowly ........"com-for-da-bul".........

I found the Draw a Pig Personality Test amusing. You may have seen it before, as its been around a while, but the automated (Flash) version is pretty fun. And do visit the gallery of piggies when you're done, it's well worth seeing some of the stuff in the "Hall of Fame" area.

Well, I like my PDA so much I'm buying another one. Okay, not for me. Andrew just had a birthday and I decided to get him a PDA to replace the very old one he's got now. I ended up finding one that I'd like to have more myself (color display, heh), so I figured I'll buy the new one and keep that one for me, and he can have the one I just got a couple weeks ago. As Andrew noted, "Happy birthday, honey! Here's my old Palm."

I just can't believe how incredibly useful these little devices are. Wow.

Well, I'm reading a lot of ebooks lately, so I thought I might just mention what I'm up to in that area. Why the heck not? And I think I'll only list the ones I particularly like, because why give publicity to books I don't recommend?

Recently read: Adventures of the Soul, which I found to be a very funny, very sexy, very different novel.

Currently reading: Silver Fire, a story with a setting that I find quite fascinating, and definitely very different (and yeah, this one is pretty sexy, too, heh).

More recommendations as I get to them...

There's something incredibly satisfying about watching a painting come to life, slowly, bit by bit. I'm working on another book cover at the moment, and it's taking form, and that's just so fulfilling. I love to see it grow, layer by layer, into a finished cover.

I also, I admit, LOVE being given inspiration. I've always been one of those people who has trouble thinking of "what to draw", and inspiration can be in short supply. The thing I LOVE about doing illustrations and book covers is that they give me clear parameters to work in, which is how I like to work. I've never been good with a blank canvas, but give me restrictions and requirements and I'm off and running.

This, of course, is why I'm mostly a graphic designer and/or illustrator rather than a fine artist. There's a saying that graphic design is all talent and no inspiration (and fine art is all inspiration and no talent, ha ha, although of course that's not true; I've known plenty of talented fine artists).

Anyway, I just wanted to say that I'm really loving the book cover gig.