Sep 30, 2007

I'm in a sharing mood

So, a few weeks ago I talked about all the people who were sharing waaaaayyyyy too much with me. Well, today, I want to share a few things with you.

The first thing I did that I thought was pretty darn cool, tho I admit to poaching this from several people’s sites *grin*, is you can now see some of the more interesting posts I’ve found on my blogrolling searches. (Surprisingly enough, called Sharing the Geek ) I finally found my way around my Google reader and how to share stuff that strikes my fancy and how to post it here on my blog. It’s in the sidebard. Cool, eh?

You’ll find writer-ly posts, editor-ly posts and likely a web design post or two, all things considered… hm, now that I mention it, I haven’t really shared that with y’all… This past summer, I went back to school to become a Webmaster, and not only am I now doing web design, but I’ve been hired on at the same school I just graduated from as a teaching assistant. And I gotta tell ya, even though I never saw myself doing the teaching thang, I totally love it. Almost as much as I love the web design thang.

Another thing that seems to have become a bit of a common theme around my world is the rather important need for computer backups. A few of the Samhain editors have had hard drive crashes, even Francis Ford Coppola had his computer and his backup stolen. I’ve really quickly become a giant fan of Mozy, which is an online backup program. It just hangs out quietly in the background while you’re working and runs backups of whatever you tell it to backup every day. There are other companies out there, but Mozy gives you a couple of GBs for free. (this increases exponentially as you refer people, so, uh, feel free to click the link to sign up and we both get more storage space. )

Oh, and this supercool website? Is determined to get people off the cell phone while they’re driving and is giving out free headsets specially designed for your phone. Even better, they’ll ship it for $3.94 anywhere in the world. Tho, to be perfectly honest, I don’t see much difference in my focus whether I’m on the phone or on a headset, so I tend not to use the phone while I’m driving anyway, but it’s still kinda cool either way. (And yes, I found out about it cuz I watch Rachael Ray. Every day. I know. I’m so ashamed. But at least it’s not Dr. Phil.)

What about you? Find anything supercool on the Web that you wanna share with the class?

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Sep 10, 2007

Let's talk Idol

Most of the blogs I frequent, and I confess, it’s been rather limited lately with all that I’ve had going on, pretty much don’t talk Canadian Idol. Granted, it’s probably because a rather high percentage *aren’t* Canadian, but there you go.

I confess, I was a little bitter this year when my favourite went home in week six. I was a Greg fan all the way (though, I don’t recall liking him at all in top 32 last year…), and his leaving marked the first time in Idol history – Canadian and American – that I didn’t call who was going to win. I called Melissa O’Neill right from her first audition…

But sitting here watching the finale, I’m having a tough time making a call. Completely and totally, Brian deserves to win. They wrote the song for him (you can usually tell by ‘the song’ who the judges/producers want to win…), and he’s been kicking ass just about every time he’s performed over the past few weeks. (And his Hallelujah tonight gave me shivers)

But Jaydee… ah, he’s an anomaly. He’s adorable. Zack called it a few weeks… as soon as Hollywood comes knocking he’s gonna be wiping the floor with Zac “look, I’m not gay, see I have a girlfriend, she’s naked and everything’ Efron. And the giant voice that comes out of him is you gotta hear it to believe it. Unfortunately, tonight, he’s sorta been personifying the term “choke”.

So, what’s Canada gonna do? Are they gonna go with cute and marketable or are they gonna go with the true sing from the heart talent?

I’m rooting for Brian, but everyone I’ve rooted for this year has gone home.

I was going to sample them for you, but most of the clips on YouTube have been pulled. This one isn’t really their best performances, but it was the only one I could find that they were both on…

It’s long, so, if you don’t want to sit through the whole thing, Jaydee starts at about 1:20 and Brian starts at 6:30…

[youtube=http://youtube.com/watch?v=qY7k9ndfqPA]

So what do you think? Are you watching? Are you voting?

Who’s gonna be our next Idol?

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Sep 05, 2007

I vant to be left alone

A few weeks ago, the phone company called me with an offer to add call privacy to my line. Basically, it means, unless you identify yourself as a real person and not an autodialer or telemarketer, you’re not getting through. I gotta tell ya, it’s pretty darn cool. I went from getting as many as ten annoying calls a day to three or four a week. And when you work from home, as I do, you’re disturbed by each and every one of those calls.

The thing is, I now need to figure out what to do for my front door. I have the world’s smallest hallway. No, seriously. It’s about 3 feet by 6 feet – wide enough to open the front door and then you have a set of stairs up to the main level of the house. Add the seven trillion shoes I have next to the door, and there’s barely room to turn around, let alone swing around a cat. Worse, with the door closed (and locked…always… I live alone. I ain’t leaving it open for nobody), it’s usually pitch black down there. I’m not sure what they were thinking when they designed my house, but the placement of the patio doors to the balcony and the kitchen window are both blocked by giant walls, meaning that the whole left side of my main level, including the front hallway, are really dark. So, when my front door was being replaced a few months ago, I was given the option of putting a window into the door.  I jumped at the chance and it has made a huge difference as far as lighting up my house. I love that part of it.

The thing is, there’s a giant freaking window in my door. There’s no hiding and pretending I’m not home when someone knocks. It’s not like you can say, oh, I wasn’t home, when the lights are on, there’s music or tv blaring, and you can see right into my living room from the front door. (i do most of my work sitting on the couch with my laptop, so you kinda can’t miss me)

And again, there’s the whole work at home thing. So, um, I’m home a lot. Like all the time. And I get all sorts of door-marketers. Daily. Thanks, but I’m not paying you weekly to deliver advertisements to my door. I’m not interested in hearing about your really cool religion (tho, I’m sure it is really cool), and dude, if I were thinking of selling my house that I live in because some guy thinks he wants to own cheap rental property, (!!!!), I would have called a real estate agent, not waited for one to come knocking on my door.

Can I have a door privacy? You know, some kind of block on my front stairs that’ll keep you from getting to the door unless you’re actually here because I invited you? *sigh*

I’m not sure what it is about me, I must have that kind of friendly face that makes you want to open up, cuz I’ve had to deal with some serious TMI(too.much.information!) lately. (like the real estate agent… really. don’t need one. thanks.) The worst has been the guy at Mr. Sub. Despite my repeated and failed attempts to eat healthier, I’ve been finding myself there a fair bit lately. (it’s not *quite* as bad for me as Dairy Queen’s burger, fries and sundae deal ) But the sandwich dude who’s there every.freaking.day is really not one for keeping things to himself. I didn’t need to know that he doesn’t drink beer or that he hates fish. Or that he used to cook for John Travolta. (uh-huh). But when he stopped me from leaving, sandwich in hand, and a grumbly tumbly, to tell me about his lack of girlfriend, wife, ex-wife, good job, finances and real estate, and because of that he’s planning to go back to school to be  a truck driver, because he can get away from his newly wedded ex who he’s still completely and totally in love with… uh, dude, we’ve crossed the line. Seriously. All you needed to know about me was that I don’t like spices or mayo on my tuna sub. All I need to know about you is that I owe you $7.13. And maybe a nice comment about the weather. We are Canadian after all. But any more than that? TMI. (also, please don’t flirt with me when I’m going into another restaurant with my boyfriend. um,  we’re not holding hands cuz we’re brother and sister…)

So, while we’re sharing… (or, uh, the sandwich dude is sharing ), have you had any random TMI episodes lately? Anything you want to share?

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