Saturday, February 02, 2002

Most Frequently Challenged Books in the US in the early 1990s (link via Technomancy)

Why in heavan's name is How To Eat Fried Worms on this list? People are stupid.

Posted by: Shannon M.: 9:37 AM |

Five billion plus Cheese Doodles are produced every year. The things you learn from T.V....
Posted by: Shannon M.: 3:27 PM |

Friday, February 01, 2002

So. I did it.

I got it all cut off.

It feels -so- _good_....
Posted by: Shannon M.: 5:08 PM |

I set the record -- longest length of hair ever donated at the salon. How long? Twenty-three inches. Yes, nearly two feet. Everyone at the salon was impressed and amazed that I wanted so much taken off, which made me want to laugh. It was driving me absolutely _nuts_, it wasn't -that- hard a decision.

C, the girl that cut my hair, asked me if I was sure, and told me A) that once she made the first cut, she probably couldn't fix it, and B) that if I started crying, she wouldn't take it personally. I told her I knew, and that I'd be okay... She started in the back, where I couldn't see it. She'd sectioned it out into seven strands, and as the chunks piled up, I could only think of my great-grandmother's braid, about the same color, length and thickness as my own hair, lying in a box... I can't remember why it had to be cut off; it might have happened after her stroke. I was a little sad, but as soon as she'd finished with the back, the cool air hit the back of my neck and I knew it was the right choice.

The other part of it is that my hair went to someone that would love and cherish it, someone that would be transformed by such a simple gift. It's not hard for me to part with something if I know that it's going to help someone out. So, if you have hair that's at least a foot long, and you've been thinking of getting a crewcut, look up the Locks Of Love salon nearest you and help change two lives instead of only one.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 5:21 PM |

I'm gonna take a nap. More later.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 5:44 PM |

You know, Scrubby, you have to be one of the most brave, amazing people I know. I couldn't do your job -- I'd kill someone and kidnap their kids to a life better than the one they currently have. I say that the next time you see your Good Parents, you tell them how much you admire them/appreciate their efforts/love the fact that they're so involved/love them, period. I don't know how often -the parents- hear praise and encouragement, but I'd bet that it's not nearly as often as the kids do, and that they'd probably appreciate it.

I have no advice to offer you in this field, surprisesurprise. But I do have my admiration and respect to offer, because man, it's not my thing. I'm sorry you've got kids in trouble, and I'm thinking of them -- and you. *Hughug*
Posted by: Shannon M.: 10:55 PM |

Wednesday, January 30, 2002

Watch the Jeff Corwin experience tomorrow/later today (depending on where you're located). He's going to be in AK! The musk oxen in the preview clip are out at The Musk Ox Farm, where my aunty Kel has an adopted musk oxen named Blue. Well, okay, it's not -hers- hers, but she -does- help to feed him and keep him in good shape.

I'm hoping the episode's going to be a good treatment of my state. Corwin's pretty good about not making a trip to Borneo or Ecuador sound like it's tantamount to going to Mars, so...
Posted by: Shannon M.: 12:00 AM |

The dog woke me up from a perfectly good dream about these darling little houses that were part of some giant FFX-like game, in which I was the main character. Fortunately, unlike -my- recent experiences with FFX, I didn't get attacked by monsters... And the houses looked like the houses from Ushikai's pixie sets.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 9:59 AM |

Aww! Aww! *Small giggle* Aww! I'm -such- a sap... *Continues cooing over the successful birth of yet another orca at SeaWorld* *Loves That's My Baby* *Will shut up, now*
Posted by: Shannon M.: 10:53 AM |

One more reason to love Google.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 11:39 AM |

Blergle. If I wanted information on/ictures of Alaskan or Siberian huskies, I'd put that in the serch terms! McKenzie River huskies are either A) on the verge of extinction or B) all owned by people that are so incredible responsible and loving that they only disseminate breed information and puppies through a Qabbalistic underground network. Or I'm misspelling something, or something.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 11:54 AM |

Von Fenwald kennels have some wonderful pictures of Shepherds.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 12:01 PM |

*Laugh* Von Der Teuth captures the true essence of Sheperds, I think -- Beautiful, regal, smart... And absolutely ridiculous. *Grin*
Posted by: Shannon M.: 12:09 PM |

Faaaascinating. *Blink* In the three GSD sites I've visited, none of them have used the word 'bitch' to refer to their female dogs. Fenwald used 'females', Teuth didn't bother, and Draggahaus uses 'girls'. I wonder if that was a conscious attempt to avoid stereotyping, or if it just kind of happened...
Posted by: Shannon M.: 12:18 PM |

This is interesting -- it seems that the eyeliner-like streaks and black masking is pretty common on long-haired GSDs. Yasminda looks like a few of these dogs (under photos) -- and she looked like the dark 'typical' puppy when she was a baby (yes, ears and all...). Also, Sassy looked like Digby.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 12:35 PM |

Poor word choice is a sad thing... The AKC doesn't -recognize- plush-coats, solid white, black, blue, or liver-colored as being part of the 'breed standard'; but they are -accepted- as being part of the overall breeding package. Yasminda's AKC registered, and has a good solid pedigree. She's just not a show dog. She could do utility, agility, or SchutzHund; she could do therapy or search and rescue. She's smart and willing to work, as long as you're willing to feed her... *Snicker*

And besides, you really don't -need- a dog that conforms perfectly to the breed standard if you're -not- going to show or breed your dog. In fact, I wouldn't recommend breeding for anyone that's not willing to do the research and the work it takes to maintain the breed standard they were so keen to get in the first place. And there are hundreds of thousands of Shepherds in shelters and rescue groups with pure blood running through their veins; they should be taken care of first. Shepherd puppies are a lot of work, like any other puppy, plus they can be independant, willful, stubborn, and just plain destructive, moreso than other breeds. They're -noisy-. (Well, okay, babies _and_ adults are noisy, but man... Crate-training for Yasminda was just NOT worth the yowling and scrabbling.*) And they need exercise and grooming and food and all of the rest of the usual doggy things.

* Crate-training is recommended for puppies because it is _supposed_ to give them a den they can go to when they're scared/tired/need to be out of the way when furniture is being moved/etc. Yasminda didn't like her crate because then she was missing out on all the fun. What fun there is in listening to three people sleep I don't know, but she was convinced that the world would end if she wasn't out and about. Her reaction to being crated was to yowl at the top of her lungs (and she had amazing volume even as a baby) while clawing at the crate door. We gave up due to the noise and the fear that she would hurt herself with the attempts to dig through the wire... Later in her life, we lived in a neighborhood where the houses were only about twenty feet apart, so we decided to crate her while we were gone during the day. She chewed through the wire bars in one part of one window, and bent the wire on the door... We eventually gave up on it after not being able to get home to let her out in a timely fashion a few times; the resultant mess and shame on all parts combined to cause us to find an alternative.

Yasminda likes to be outside, so she doesn't mind being out on a run or on a long lead tied to a tree (or in the current case, the back deck)... She -does- mind being tied up while we're doing something else not involving her. *Rolls eyes* I think she's just afraid that it's food-oriented and she won't get any. In a slightly radical subject-change, I was thinking of making teacakes for her using ground dog food in place of flour. It would be marginally healthier for her than regular teacakes, which she -adores-. I invariably manage to drop one on the floor in the cookie-sheet-to-cooling-rack transfer, so it goes to her once it's cool enough to eat.

Huh. My original point was 'pay attention when you're writing so that you say what you -mean- to say', and I ended up blithering about Yasminda.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 11:28 PM |

...I'd rather have a slightly wonky dog with good breeding and a great personality than anything else anyhow.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 11:34 PM |

More fuzzy dogs.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 11:38 PM |

A teeny little snip, probably Kelvath/Avrath, mostly Kelvath:

01.30.02
Love-bites. He turned his head a little, lifting his chin to get a better look at the little red marks ringing the base of his neck and fanning out down his shoulders. Love-bites, passion-marks, proof of ownership... He discounted that last one, not because the concept of ownership was foreign to either of them, but because he doubted his lover would see it that way.

He closed his eyes, sense-memory sweeping over him, doubling the number of ghostly fingers running along his spine. A sharp breath, fresh and recalled arousal welling up... Sharp teeth sinking into his shoulder, a hand slipping down to squeeze whatever curves it encountered...

Posted by: Shannon M.: 11:46 PM |

...looking into a mirror. If that's not obvious.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 11:47 PM |

Tuesday, January 29, 2002

I think I dreamed about blogging. *Blinkblink* I like dreaming, because it means I sleep. However, my dreams...are odd. And I don't really remember much of them, usually.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 10:36 AM |

Oh! I also dreamed that I was going on a trip to Homer or somewhere with my mother, family, a bunch of students from somewhere (I couldn't decide if they were ECA or what), and Danny. I was packing, and we got a warning that we should pack supplies (like a couple of days worth of clothes, food, music, etc.) Just In Case. I freaked out and told my mother I'd forgotten my meds. She said we could swing by the house on the way out of town and pick them up, so I was relieved. I was terribly awkward around Danny, surprisesurprise, and he was just kind of...there. It was a very strange dream. *Shakes head* I don't want to know what it means, I just wanted to mention it.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 10:42 AM |

Camgirls article

I'm really picky when it comes to designs -- violent green and purple, or blue and green color combination, are not what I would call 'gorgeous'. Layouts that are made up of one big image sliced into a bunch of smaller images are okay, for the most part. For one thing, it loads faster. The only drawback is when the designer decides to use anti-aliased non-monospaced text at a very small size: I can barely read it. Sometimes, when that text is on an intro graphic, it's not just annoying, it's downright frustrating.

I don't really have any objections to camgirls per se. If they want to make a site that does nothing but pander to their own narcissism and friends, fine. Doesn't bug me. If they want to belong to 7337 wEb dEsIgN sKiLlZ cliques, okay. The snobbery and 'you're not -good- enough to be part of _our_ group' attitude bugs me, but hey. It bugs me no matter WHO it comes from. There are plenty of other cliques/rings/groups/etc out there that I -can- join, and that don't care if my page is 'pretty' or not.

The big thing that gets to me about camgirls is the posts that typically run something like this:
yo peepz...so like i got hoome relly late las nite hehe... i wouda updaited but like i wuz to tired cuz i dnased allllll nite...

Granted, there are plenty of posts like that on sites that -don't- have anything to do with cams. It just seems more prevalent on cam sites. It bothers me that people who -want- the publicity for their site can't be bothered to at the very LEAST use proper sentence structure and make a stab at proper spelling. No, I don't spell every single word on this blog correctly, but I _try_. And if I'm really in doubt, I'll pop open my word processing software or go look it up in my Webster's Ninth.

As for the assertion that 'geeks' should be afraid of camgirls, that the camgirls are fomenting a revolution "complete with gossip, lip gloss, and eyelashes". -I- can gossip, -I- own lip gloss, and baby, I've got lashes for -days-. Without mascara. So I may not have a cam, and I may not have "Photoshopping and Illustratoring chops", but you know what? I don't have Photoshop or Illustrator. I can't afford either, and I would sooner gouge out an eye with a rusty spoon than use Illustrator. I would nearly be willing to gouge out someone -else's- eye for a full copy of Photoshop with ImageStyler and ImageReady bundled with it, though.

I don't think camgirls are starting any sort of revolution. First, not every camgirl does her own layout or design. Secondly, if I were someone looking for a website designer, I'm not necessarily going to go troll camgirl websites for potential hires. Thirdly, a lot of layouts are just not well thought-out. In Ed's comments (where I found the Shift link), a person mentioned in the article posts another of her sites (the green-tea one). It suffers from the Enter graphic with the non-monospaced anti-aliased teenyfont problem (it took me a few minutes to figure out that it said 'go ahead! what are you waiting for?'); and what I was -waiting- for was the rest of the site to load. The Enter graphic is in the upper-left hand corner, so I assumed that there was more to come. The 3 100K+ graphics, and the half dozen other graphics up to 100K that the status bar told me I was loading led me to believe there was more coming.

About five to seven minutes after I opened the window (and, I might add, -without- my browsing in any other windows), I -finally- had a completed page...that was still mostly white. What the hell were all of those huge jpgs I just downloaded? -Where- the hell were they? Puzzled, I cllicked on the Enter graphic. Bam! There they were! Busy, covered in teenyfont, with navigation that was difficult to figure out -- are those the links, or-? I only stayed long enough to determine that the design didn't appeal to me and wasn't all that well laid out.

I also visited all of the sites mentioned in the article. Of them, only one really caught my eye with its simplicity and clean lines -- and it still had failings. The Enter graphic did not say 'enter' on it, and it too was in the upper-left corner, implying that there was more to come.

Of course, one of the biggest problems with writing about 'pretty' sites is that the only thing that's static on the web is a website that's been abandoned. It is entirely possible that the sites I view as ugly now were indeed lush and gorgeous and made you want to just sink into them through the screen a couple of weeks ago. People that make layouts _like_ layouts, and like to -make- them. To them, there's nothing wrong with swapping layouts once, twice, three times a month or more. Some take more time, of course, but they still change them. -I- change layouts, infrequently, but I do. And I try to choose layouts that A) fit my screen/resolution B) don't hurt -my- eyes and C) will pretty much work in anyone's browser. Everyone's priorities are different.

So, apparently, my problem with camgirls is their apparent lack of brainpower when it comes to communicating more than their design skillZ. Of course, that bothers me about a _lot_ of people, not just camgirls, so... I don't know what I'm really trying to say, other than whoever wrote the article is probably mildly deluded and I don't hate everyone. Or Something. *Blink* Also: Ed's site isn't ugly. It's simple, relatively small, and fairly easy to figure out.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 12:05 PM |

The author's definition of 'clique' is not -entirely- accurate. There are more than 'web design' and 'layout' cliques out there.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 12:07 PM |

I have Toaster Pastry residue stuck to my left palm. Ick. The worst of it is that it came from my bedframe, which means... I have no idea. I don't wanna think about it.

In other news, I think I'll make phonecalls and upload stuff to zuutzuut.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 12:16 PM |

...and wash my hands.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 12:16 PM |

Misawa-sensei gave us all DumDum pops last night during the chapter 5 test. Mine is cherry, and tastes about like you'd expect. I think I did pretty well on the written part of the test, though the oral part was accompanied by much umming and erring and face-scrunching. We were taped, I had to go last, and I wasn't all that prepared for the tape part. I -always- make faces when I have to answer questions in another language -- it helps me think, or something. I hate it -- why can't I just answer the questions -without- looking like it's taking all of my braincells working together at top speed?
Posted by: Shannon M.: 12:26 PM |

Free Hair Vitamins. No, thank you, my hair is healthy and vigorous enough on its lonesome. In fact, I'm off to call a Locks Of Love affiliated salon right now.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 12:37 PM |

Okay. Thursday, 10:15 AM, I'm doing it. I need to get Ev to take a before picture...
Posted by: Shannon M.: 1:13 PM |

Tonight may be Laundry Night. I'll see how I'm feeling after class... I figured out that I've got enough money to go down to Cleaning World and do all my bedding/current pile of dirty clothes and have plenty of gas money left.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 1:18 PM |

I think I'll go to Cleaning World tomorrow.

FYI: The Technomancy RPG Invocation doesn't work if you forget the character's name that you're invoking... My characters keep getting eaten by monsters. *Grump*
Posted by: Shannon M.: 11:19 PM |

Y'know... I have a hard time buying someone's line if they use 'scent' when they mean 'sense of smell'. Hm.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 11:27 PM |

Wow. A hissyfit that's supposed to be funny, but isn't. I think that's a first... *Blink*
Posted by: Shannon M.: 11:54 PM |

Monday, January 28, 2002

While I find the misspelling of 'Britney' as 'Briney' terribly amusing, I decided to fix it.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 12:06 AM |

I'm so damn picky... 'desperado', with the 'ra' pronounced like the 'ra' in 'radish', is wrong, wrong, wrong. It's dess-per-ah-do, like Colo-rah-do, not dess-per-ay-do, as in Pla-Dohª. *Goes to bed*
Posted by: Shannon M.: 1:09 AM |

Continuing my usual theme of avoidance and procrastination, I present My Favorite FameTracker Quotes Of The Day:

From the 'Things we'd never know without commercials' thread in TV, re: Tiger Woods not being a sellout: "Check out his down to Earth hat."
From 'Commercials: The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly', re: Bittner's Slow-Roasted Ham: "Because who needs love when you've got ham?"
Posted by: Shannon M.: 11:32 AM |

You know, I haven't watched the X-Files regularly since early season 7. I really liked the Scully/Dogget dynamics, because Scully wasn't sure she should be working with/trusting him, and he wasn't too sure he -wanted- to be working with _her_, but he was determined to do the best he could with what he had where he was. -And- it looked like Dogget and Scully had the potential to be solid collegues, good friends, and a formidable team.

But... All the other crap that was going on -- Gibson Praise, Mulder's absence, etc, was just -tiring-. From what I've heard, I haven't missed anything but Dogget/Skinner slash potential (which I -did- get a few glimpses of when I still watched. *Snicker* And I -liked- it! *Ahem* anyhow.) and a little bit of Kycek. Am I sad? Only marginally. From what I'm gleaning from FT's board, I'd hate the recent season with a passion. It's so very -sad- when things simply -don't- live up to their potential. RIP, XF. You had some incredible moments.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 12:13 PM |

Er, the Skinner/Dogget liking it thing is a reference to my introduction to XF slash, when I learned there were Mulder/Skinner fans -- I didn't like the idea of the pairing, and I didn't -see- the flashes that the writers were working from. (Well, okay, I hadn't seen much of the X-Files at _all_ at that point in time...) So... Yeah.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 12:19 PM |

I'm a plain brown Doc. What a surprise!

Are they really as cool and comfy as they're rumored to be, Reesa?
Posted by: Shannon M.: 12:47 PM |

Yes, I'm feeling a little odd. I have got to go shower and do homework... Hmmph.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 12:51 PM |

Sunday, January 27, 2002

Gee, here I thought wolves were attracted to areas of land where prey was plentiful. Turns out I was wrong! -White-tailed deer- attract wolves.

...so someone tell me why we have wolves up here again? *Snorts and rolls eyes at the writing for the moose episode of Animal Planet Safari*
Posted by: Shannon M.: 12:41 AM |

I'm going to bed. G'night!
Posted by: Shannon M.: 1:35 AM |

X'an deftly plucked the little octopus from its hiding place. ÊWith a swift movement, he partially crushed its head with a rock. ÊThe creature spasmed a few times, then died.

Neat trick, considering that an octopus is pretty much -all- head, and the only 'crushable' part of them is their beak... My motto really should be "Not everyone reads as much as I do", and I should have it tattooed on me somewhere.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 12:30 PM |

I have to go to the library, to return my books... And then it's off to Value Village, for Real Live Bedsheets! Ooh.

...and probably a couple of grey T-shirts. Heh.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 12:38 PM |

I have now seen more of Jeff Corwin's upper inner thigh than I have ever even vaguely wanted to. *Blink* There are some things that I'm perfectly happy imagining, thanks.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 5:42 PM |

I have sheets! And a matress pad! Value Village is a lovely institution.

The sheets: bright yellow checks; purple, yellow, green and pink polka dots on a white background (half of a Barneyª sheet set -- I don't care for top sheets, so I don't have the dimbulb anywhere in my room; and kind of a industrial/hospital-ish pale green. The cheery yellow sheet is currently covering up the plain white matress pad, which in turn is covering up the dull Serta blue of my matress.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 5:45 PM |

While I did -not- buy any T-shirts, I did buy music. CDs are 2.99 unless marked otherwise, and cassettes are .99 unless marked otherwise, a downright volatile combination when mixed with me with money in my pocket. My swag:

Tapes:
Enjoy The Silence; Depeche Mode single
"We All...Every One Of Us"; Sweet Honey In The Rock album
City Kids; Spyro Gyra album
The Internationale; Billy Bragg album (it has 'My Youngest Son Came Home Today', in a bizarre twist of coincedence -- I just read the lyrics this morning on Lori's blog.)
Gonna Make You Sweat; C&C Music Factory single
The Trouble With Andre; Shakespeare's Sister album
Disintegration; The Cure album
Legacy Of Sound Featuring Meja; Happy single
Die allerschšnsten Kinderleider; Various Artists album ------------
CDs:
Baby Animals; Baby Animals album (and I have to admit that I mostly picked this album up for the cover art, featuring the lovely lead vocalist/guitarist....)
Split Level; Global Transistor album
Sinomatic; You're Mine single
Nonpoint; Endure single
Wilshire; Wilshire album

With my luck, I will fall deeply in love with the music made by groups that no longer exist and/or whose music is out of print... Oh well.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 6:00 PM |

I'm Jane, of Daria. I figured I'd either be her or Daria, so that's not too surprising... As long as I'm not Britney, Kevin, Chuck, Ms. Li, or the cranky man-hating teacher whose name escapes me at the moment, I'm happy.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 6:12 PM |

Oh, and just to let you all know -- http://zuutzuut.tripod.com will be the new site, with https://zuutzuut.tripod.com/blogstuff/index.html the new blog addy. There's nothing up, there, yet -- probably later this week, or next weekend.
Posted by: Shannon M.: 6:14 PM |