Coals To Newcastle

Every month we ship off a box to the Seattle area where Donna’s brother Scott and his family live. This month’s care package includes a gift & card for Scott because his birthday is coming up, but usually the boxes just contain books and a few small toys for Baby James (who used to go by the name The Baby To Be Named Later, but now doesn’t because he has, uh, been named) and some of those complimentary coffee packets lifted from the hotel rooms we have stayed in for Baby James’ mother & Scott’s wife, Beth.

Why are we sending coffee to an area of the country where it is every citizen’s right to not ever be out of sight of a Starbucks or independent coffee hut? Leave a guess in the comments and if you are right I will mail one less packet of java to Beth next month and send it to you instead.

I’ve added another category of links to the side bar that will be used for links that I want to save because I find them entertaining, but don’t fit into any of the other categories. The category is called Salmagundi which is Cardassian for — entertaining, but not fitting in.

Check out Joe Posnanski, he used to be a sports writer for the Augusta Chronicle, but has moved on to the greener pastures of Kansas City. Because I really don’t read the sports pages I was unfamiliar with his writing, but now that I have stumbled on his blog, and if he wrote in the paper like he does on the web, I’m sorry I didn’t read him. Read this post entitled The Play (with bonus Augusta coverage) and tell me if this guy isn’t great. The only bad thing is he has just been blogging since October of 2007 and that leaves only 317 more posts of his to read…

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Snippy Receptionist

An older gentleman had an appointment to see the urologist who shared offices with several other doctors. The waiting room was filled with patients.

As he approached the receptionist’s desk, he noticed that the receptionist was a large unfriendly woman who looked like a Sumo wrestler. He gave her his name.

In a very loud voice, the receptionist said, ?YES, I HAVE YOUR NAME HERE; YOU WANT TO SEE THE DOCTOR ABOUT IMPOTENCE, RIGHT??

All the patients in the waiting room snapped their heads around to look at the very embarrassed man.

He recovered quickly, and in an equally loud voice replied, ?NO, I’VE COME TO INQUIRE ABOUT A SEX CHANGE OPERATION, BUT I DON’T WANT THE SAME DOCTOR THAT DID YOURS.?

You Don’t Know Jack

Sung to the tune of Scott McKenzie’s San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Some Flowers in Your Hair):
“If you’re going to walk Hitchcock Woods
You’ll be sure to get spiders in your hair
If you’re going hiking in the woods
You’re gonna see lots of animals in there”

On our walk in the woods this morning we saw several humans, some with dogs, some on horses and a couple on foot. We saw a fox squirrel and lots of spider webs, even some with spiders still in them. We heard several different species of birds. We saw a toad, a salamander and a snake. A SNAKE!?!

He was a decent size one too. just lying there across the trail, probably 4 foot long. When I first noticed him he looked like a little krinkle french fry, all wavy like. Must have been asleep because when I poked him lightly with the end of my walking stick he smoothed right out and kind of looked up at me. Flicked his little red tongue at me several times and just stayed where he was. I’m thinking he was kinda pissed at me for waking him up because he pulled his head back like he was going to strike. I was still standing back away, just close enough to poke him again with my 4′ walking stick.

He didn’t like me poking him, but he still didn’t move off the trail until I kicked sand at him for the second time. He looked up at me once more, as if to remember my face, and slithered away slowly biding his time, probably planning when he could catch me unawares at another time.

Just after he left the trail Donna said, “Take it’s picture.” Good idea I thought, if I only had a camera. I did, like I always do, it was right there one the end of my walking stick. I just didn’t think to use that end of the stick, I was too busy poking with the other end.

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Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/08: 341

81,000 Trinkets & Geegaws

On the way home this morning from our visit to Aiken’s Makin’ (the city’s big craft show) the Emperor passed through the 81k mark.

Because we enjoyed the Jesse Stone flick Stone Cold so much yesterday we decided not to wait on Netflix and went to the local video store to rent the remaining three. Then we watched them all this afternoon. No self control. I think I’m going to get me ball cap with a big PPD embroidered on it.

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Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/08: 340

Dude Where’s Your Car?

That’s right, we rode the tandem to work today. Even though Tropical Storm Hannah has weakened and there was only a 30% chance of rain we still got slightly damp on the ride home.

Hannah also played havoc with the MMC’s scheduled trip to the Food Lion Auto Fair in Charlotte, NC. The Club (and I use that term loosely) had planned on going to the Spring version earlier this year, but it was going to be a rainy day, so we canceled and rescheduled to go to the fall version. Well, somebody is trying to tell us something, like don’t go, because there is a 60% chance of rain there tomorrow too.

If it was only, say an hour away, we might have taken a chance, but to get there it is at least 2-1/2 hours which is just too long a trip to end up in the rain.

Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/08: 340

Chrome

There is another entry into the browser wars and it is from the company that is out to unseat Microsoft as the ruler of the computer world — Google. Welcome to the front Private Chrome.

I tried it and it has a look and feel that I like, but it won’t (probably) ever replace Firefox. The deal breaker is no Adblock Plus. I read somewhere that because of the way the browser was written you can’t easily tweak it with extensions, etc just yet. Plus Google makes tons of money that is generated from their ads, so why should they want you to have the ability to block them.

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Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/08: 340

Photo Manipulation

Turn your photos into cartoons at BeFunky and then add a cartoon word balloon at SuperLame.

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Miata Top Transitions since 01/01/08: 327