Nom de Plume

Voyeuristic and not just a little creepy.

Postcard Secrets via boingboing

Steve got his new surboard last week, and has been itching to get up on it. So we’re planning an Oregon surfing trip this weekend–only to get up this morning and find it raining cats and dogs. According to weather reports, it’s supposed to rain in Cannon Beach all weekend.

I have been informed by Steve that we can’t have a dinner party until we do it properly, which means ushering in the warm weather with a good old barbecue. That we don’t have a barbecue didn’t phase Steve at all when he made this pronouncement; he was on the verge of buying a Big Green Egg.

The Big Green Egg, for those of you who don’t know, is a ceramic smoker/grill/barbecue that is supposedly the best thing since sliced bread. The testimonials, which take up vast tracts of space on the company’s brochure and web site (duh, www.biggreenegg.com) say things like:

“The egg has to be the best stress buster in the world, because there is nothing like coming home and firing up the egg. I treat it like a child, and to me, there are no other grills.”

“HOLY RIB ROAST BATMAN! THIS GRILL IS AMAZING. WE PURCHASED IT ON MONDAY AND HAVE NEARLY WENT THROUGH A BAG OF CHARCOAL ALREADY. THE FOOD IS ABSOLUTLY AWESOME. YES, THE GAS GRILL IS ON THE CURB AWAITING THE GARBAGE MAN’S ARRIVAL.”

“I have been an EGGcited man for three years and I’m proud to say this will be the last grill I will ever use!”

“It’s not just a way of cooking food. It’s a way of life.”

“I once was lost but now I’m found. This is the best investment I’ve made in years. I now have two other grills pulled around to the side of my house.”

“Fine,” I said. “When are you going to buy it?” You have to understand, I’ve been itching to have a party. Steve hopped online and started researching prices.

Big mistake. He then found the Kamado.

“So no Big Green Egg now?” I enquired.

“Ha!” he scoffed. “The BGE is a rip off! It’s for fat white trashy guys.” I couldn’t argue: I’d seen the spelling and grammar of the testimonials. (Although one of the Kamado’s testimonials states, “I had a BGE in another life with a different wife…Don’t want either of them back. Got a #7 and a new wife, and both are a great improvement over their predecessors!” )

So the Kamado is the original ceramic cooker, and it comes in all sorts of pretty ceramic tiled designs that are completely over the top and would fit right in the emerging Japanese garden.

“Great, so you’re buying a Kamado?” I asked. In my head I was calculating when it would arrive …

The only problem is that there aren’t any dealers in Washington. You have to order from their San Francisco office. And then there’s that pesky 8 percent sales tax. “I know, we should take a road trip down to San Francisco–we can surf on the way–and pick one up!”

In other words, we’re not having a party anytime soon.

Just checked my web stats, and am wondering what the person who typed “rip roaring sex” expected from his google search.

Anyone willing to let me have a puppy? - $1
Reply to: anon-69595425@craigslist.org
Date: 2005-04-21, 8:06PM PDT

Can anyone help? We need home protection. Dealing with a stalker ex-wife, it was either a pistol or a dog. I have a 2 year old and am not comfortable with guns in the home.

Things with the ex have gotten out of control. It’s apparent she’s off her meds. To say we’re at the recieving end of crazy and unstable outburts would be an understatement.

The police won’t enforce the protection order yet. Rather than wait for the inevitable, I’m getting proactive.

We live in an apartment and have a 2 year old, as well as 2 cats, so please keep this in mind when suggesting a breed. If anyone has a (preferably male) puppy of good potential size they could either donate or sell for a low cost, it really would be a godsend. I’d also like a breed which is capable of getting nasty about protecting his family and home but is still safe with us.

We both love animals and are great pet owners, please keep in mind this dog will be pampered to death by us, as it’s also a family member.

Thank you in advance!

My last day at Write Image. And I still have a ton and a half to do. Oh well. I am so looking forward to the weekeend. I would sleep until noon tomorrow, but we’re going out the the “plant sale of the year” at Magnuson Park. And we need to get there early …

It’s been a long, long time since we pulled ourselves out of Seattle and went on a road trip. So yesterday, we packed up and headed out to the Skagit Valley for the last bit of the tulip festival. Alas, not a tulip in sight, but Steve and I did manage a lovely drive up Chuckanut Drive (yes, that’s its real name), and did a short little hike down to the beach at Larrabee State Park. The dog cavorted himself into oblivion and snored the entire way home.

That’s pretty much it.

If a factoid is a mini fact, a factlet is a mini factoid. So let me throw down the factlet…

Did you know that Word spellcheck doesn’t recognize the word blog?

Now that their TOS has changed, I can answer that burning question for you. I average about 5 cents a day.

Sigh.

Alternatives to the boring old lorem ipsem for greeking. (Dummy copy in unfinished pieces.)

There’s hillbilly:

Tar reckon dumb, aunt havin’ butt jezebel consarn tools fer cain’t. Locality fire, huntin’ throwed stinky broke heap firewood, caboodle cowpoke, gal work whomp, where. Broke cipherin’, mud skedaddled hootch hold skinned catfight dirt mobilehome. Smokin’ snakeoil quarrel city-slickers work shotgun tobaccee jig grandpa polecat co-op rat gospel fer bull. Catfish ever neighbor’s havin’ tar no give. Preacher slap fart muster yippie, soap grandma, fish been. Heffer barrel preacher whiskey rent ails whoopin’ naw hairy lament.

Or marketing:

Snappy soothing flavored high-tech yummy can’t flavored care tough soaking spacious secret hello. Care all but opportunity going sold goodness reduced sensational tempt shine plus smile more, jumbo. Guaranteed pennies quickly stimulates families purchase crunchy adore appearance going pleasing.

Or even technobabble:

Proxy pc extended remote processor deviation ethernet messaging. Plasma disk, dithering system, connectivity transmission encapsulated, ethernet, device, generator, broadband. Adaptive scan boolean bypass generator infrared read-only. Reducer n-tier log broadband with, element harmonic anomoly silicon, data services, resistor audio, hyperlinked.

link via Boing Boing

Plundering all the books I can get my hands on for references to the elusive Queen Razia of Delhi. And while there were references to the Delhi Sultanate, they were few and far between–and zippo on Razia. Not a single reference. Sigh.

Teaching archaeologist Emma Fielding (pun intended, apparently) jaunts off to a dig in rural England just as one of the students disappears. Populated with your stereotypical suspects–the lord of the manor, the irascible developer, the brow beaten husband–the mystery eventually peters out to an anticlimactic end.

I don’t think I’m a the stereotypical Gen X-er with the attention span of a flea caused by too many commercials and video games. At least, I never thought I was–until now. I fully expected to devour this book about the history of various spices. But while some of the information was interesting, Dalby leaches out the flavor with pedantic, plodding prose. It’s riddled with “We discover that …” and “As we discussed earlier.” Well, he may have discussed something earlier, but I must have missed that part. It was too boring.

So what would Michael Jackson look like if he were normal? Age progression pictures according to forensic artist Stephen Mancusi.

link

Wanted: Lots of things——-mostly collectables

I’m not going to lie here, I’m looking for a deal, who isn’t, everyone wants a bargain, either on a new car or that trinket at the yard sale, nobody wants to pay top dollar, even if its something for yourself to keep or resell we all want a deal. Here are some of the things I’m looking for, diecast toys, matchbox, hotwheels, older metal cars and trucks, could be newer limited toys. They don’t always have to look mint or brand new. Old car ads like dealer ads, like when you go to a car show and they hand out the new car ads, remember when you dad would go to a car show and he would come home with a bag or two full of free stuff from the show and years later their hidden in the attic or basement somewhere. Old gas station stuff, pumps, oil cans, signs, ads, really anythings along these lines. Old wooden fishing lures, reels, flys, fly rods. Anyways you get the idea, I am open to other things that are collectable too, but the list could be endless with all the things out there, so what do you have and is it going to be a bargin. You right I will resell somethings and their are those things that I will keep to add to my own collection. I will always consider helping you take pictures for you to sell here or on ebay and if you don’t understand ebay and I’m sure there are a few of you I wouldn’t mind helping you out, I’d even list your collectables and sell them for you on ebay, let me guess you will want a deal too. Lets talk. I also have a great idea for a dating site if someone is interested and has enough programming knowledge. Hey if you read all this thanks for your time, none of seem to have alot of free time. Have a great day or evening.

It’s not that I believe in them exactly. But I don’t NOT believe either. Here it is:

You’ve been trying to figure out what that feeling is all day. You woke up with it this morning and you just can’t shake it. Well, don’t be surprised if you realize that it’s quite familiar to you. It’s called passion, and it doesn’t just apply to someone you find seriously attractive. There are all kinds of passion. You’re experiencing the whole range, and you’ll keep feeling it all day long. Use this gift wisely

I feel I’ve made the right choice.

I am back in the wide world of freelance writing again.

You’ve been thinking about it for a while, and you’re just about sure that this is what you want to do. You’re ready to forget your job and abandon your routine. You’re done, you’re over it and you’ve had it with trying to pretend otherwise. But before you do anything rash, shouldn’t you at least talk to an elder who’s been there? Someone who can give you the benefit of experience? Yes, you should.

Now Blogger’s working.

I still think I’m going to install wordpress though.