I've only included those things that are confirmed right now. The last week of July and the first week of August isn't planned yet, but here's my East Coast trip calendar, along with the answer to the most frequently asked question, "When will you be in Michigan?" (A: August 15th)
Friday, July 11, 2008
Blog by email
I'm not sure why I would be more likely to do this than just sign on
to blogger, since gmail and blogger are a single sign in, but look, I
can blog by email! I also got a nice twitter feed set up on the side
for those who just can't get enough of my mundane life.
to blogger, since gmail and blogger are a single sign in, but look, I
can blog by email! I also got a nice twitter feed set up on the side
for those who just can't get enough of my mundane life.
Blog Reborn
I've totally let this blog fall into disrepair, but I think I'm going to start it up again. At the very least my friends and family need a way to keep track of where I am at any given time. Who knows, I may even set up some geeky SMS feature or something.
Right now packing has taken over my whole apartment, including my bed. Luckily I can sleep in the recliner, because I am FAR too tired to move everything off the bed.
Right now packing has taken over my whole apartment, including my bed. Luckily I can sleep in the recliner, because I am FAR too tired to move everything off the bed.
Wednesday, October 10, 2007
Call for Spanglish T9
So I have a cell phone that I use sometimes. I even have entered the 21st century and text on it sometimes. Here's my pet peeve: it makes you choose Spanish or English for the autocomplete function. Now I am an English speaker. In fact, what I speak in Latin America and Tucson's south side could barely be called Spanish. But even so, I find myself putting Spanish words into text messages far more often than one might think, and I have to spell them out. Considering most Spanish speakers I know, especially teenagers, tend to use a mix of the two languages liberally, I doubt I'm the first person who has wanted this technology.
Wednesday, May 16, 2007
Alumni Bob!
Alumni Bob was Chrisaboo's alumni interviewer from Dartmouth. Displaced New York Jews, he and his wife live in Charleston, West Virginia, where Bob works for the Charleston Gazette.
He also apparently eats poison ivy, as documented in this video:
Watch it, favorite it, give it five stars. We want to make Bob an internet sensation!
He also apparently eats poison ivy, as documented in this video:
Watch it, favorite it, give it five stars. We want to make Bob an internet sensation!
Wednesday, March 21, 2007
YubNub
Okay, I apparently have been missing something for a while. Anyone who has known me for any length of time knows how much I prefer the keyboard over my mouse. I just found this:
http://yubnub.org/
It is important to note that the reason this is viable for me is because by default it searches Google, which is what my Firefox search box already does. But then it gives me a million gazillion (no really, like 10,000) command line options for search, and allows me to add my own. The only requirement is that the search engine uses a get request to pass the parameter, just like with addons like DictionarySearch. And it has a Firefox search bar plug-in that can take the place of my Google box (and the entire drop down menu for searching Wikipedia, IMDB, Amazon, eBay, OED, and Merriam-Webster, among others).
If anyone wants to give me a job searching the Internet, you can rest assured that I would be really, really good at it. Pre-YubNub (seriously, I will now refer to this era as PYN, commit that to memory) I was pretty good, now I am a search savant.
http://yubnub.org/
It is important to note that the reason this is viable for me is because by default it searches Google, which is what my Firefox search box already does. But then it gives me a million gazillion (no really, like 10,000) command line options for search, and allows me to add my own. The only requirement is that the search engine uses a get request to pass the parameter, just like with addons like DictionarySearch. And it has a Firefox search bar plug-in that can take the place of my Google box (and the entire drop down menu for searching Wikipedia, IMDB, Amazon, eBay, OED, and Merriam-Webster, among others).
If anyone wants to give me a job searching the Internet, you can rest assured that I would be really, really good at it. Pre-YubNub (seriously, I will now refer to this era as PYN, commit that to memory) I was pretty good, now I am a search savant.
Wednesday, March 07, 2007
I am a marathoner!
So three and a half weeks ago I started training for the San Diego marathon. I haven't run consistantly in the last 7 or 8 years, and the last year has probably been my least active year ever. A normal person would be like "I'm going to start exercising three times a week for 30 minutes." But using my usual form of problem solving, I decide to train for a marathon.
It all started with a plan to run the half marathon that will be held in Tucson on March 17th. But then I made plans to go to Seattle for that weekend. My friend Jenne has been planning on San Diego for a while now, and she asked me if I wanted to do it. I asked if they have a half, but they don't. She said "think about it."
So a few weeks later I realize we are closing in on 16 weeks away, and I start to think about it. Mostly I think it is a completely crazy idea. But then I think about El Tour, and how that was a completely crazy idea too, but I still did it. So I start looking for marathon training books, and I find A Non-Runner's Marathon Trainer. The running schedule looks reasonable. But what hooked me was the first chapter, which focused on developing an internal locus of control, or in non-psychobabble, developing the belief that you can do anything you set your mind to.
That is an issue I struggle with a fair amount, and for some reason, it seemed like the marathon was what I had been looking for. I have reasonable expectations. I don't think running one marathon is going to fix all my problems or cause me to never doubt myself again. But I think on many levels, it is what I need. I need to prove to myself that I *can* do this, that despite all the reasons I think I will fail at this, I can complete a marathon.
So this week's mental assignment is to start thinking of yourself and referring to yourself as a marathoner. Honestly, I have my doubts. I missed some training runs due to illness, and some others when Jackie and Mason visited. I was tempted to quit, feeling like I had missed too much training. And then I calmed down, I refocused, I read this week's chapter. And now I am hesitantly committing to "I am a marathoner." I don't believe it yet, but I'm going to say it anyway. I am a marathoner!
It all started with a plan to run the half marathon that will be held in Tucson on March 17th. But then I made plans to go to Seattle for that weekend. My friend Jenne has been planning on San Diego for a while now, and she asked me if I wanted to do it. I asked if they have a half, but they don't. She said "think about it."
So a few weeks later I realize we are closing in on 16 weeks away, and I start to think about it. Mostly I think it is a completely crazy idea. But then I think about El Tour, and how that was a completely crazy idea too, but I still did it. So I start looking for marathon training books, and I find A Non-Runner's Marathon Trainer. The running schedule looks reasonable. But what hooked me was the first chapter, which focused on developing an internal locus of control, or in non-psychobabble, developing the belief that you can do anything you set your mind to.
That is an issue I struggle with a fair amount, and for some reason, it seemed like the marathon was what I had been looking for. I have reasonable expectations. I don't think running one marathon is going to fix all my problems or cause me to never doubt myself again. But I think on many levels, it is what I need. I need to prove to myself that I *can* do this, that despite all the reasons I think I will fail at this, I can complete a marathon.
So this week's mental assignment is to start thinking of yourself and referring to yourself as a marathoner. Honestly, I have my doubts. I missed some training runs due to illness, and some others when Jackie and Mason visited. I was tempted to quit, feeling like I had missed too much training. And then I calmed down, I refocused, I read this week's chapter. And now I am hesitantly committing to "I am a marathoner." I don't believe it yet, but I'm going to say it anyway. I am a marathoner!
Wednesday, February 21, 2007
A trip down memory futon
I just got back from visiting Jackie and Mason in San Diego. Peep trips tend to trigger a walk down memory lane for me, and so I went back and looked through a bunch of pictures that Jackie posted for us a while ago. Never before have two people connected by a common piece of furniture stood out so obviously from a set of pictures for me. And so I bring you Darren, Heather, and The Futon.
We'll start out with a relatively normal one, of us sitting on the futon apparently talking.
The futon was frequently the end destination of our evenings, where Jackie would force us all to drink an entire Britta of water.
Look carefully, we're actually wearing different clothes than in the first picture, which means they were taken different days. Jackie calls this one "Heather and Darren Fall in Love."
The next one is maybe the worst picture ever taken of me, but I'm illustrating a point, so go with it. Where are we sitting? Oh, that's right, the futon!
And finally yet another futon picture. I still have those boxers.
We'll start out with a relatively normal one, of us sitting on the futon apparently talking.
The futon was frequently the end destination of our evenings, where Jackie would force us all to drink an entire Britta of water.
Look carefully, we're actually wearing different clothes than in the first picture, which means they were taken different days. Jackie calls this one "Heather and Darren Fall in Love."
The next one is maybe the worst picture ever taken of me, but I'm illustrating a point, so go with it. Where are we sitting? Oh, that's right, the futon!
And finally yet another futon picture. I still have those boxers.
Wednesday, January 31, 2007
Friday, January 26, 2007
Traffic and the unexpected
I ride my bike to and from work, for a sum total of 13-25 minutes every day, which gives me lots of time to think about how not to get hit by cars.
Our neighborhood subscribes to some sort of newfangled school of traffic flow design. It seems that rather than the relatively predictable "you are on a side street, you must stop at a stop sign at every cross street" design, they chose a design that minimized how many times you had to stop on each street. So if you are driving up Treat from 6th to Speedway, you stop at 5th, but not at 4th, then again at 3rd, then again at 1st. So you only have to stop at every other cross street.
This is great when you are driving around the neighborhood in your car. Having to stop at every cross street is annoying and maddeningly slow. But here's the problem: people are creatures of habit. The either want to stop at every cross street or at none of them.
So yesterday I make my usual turn down Treat, and the people on fourth have a stop sign and I don't, so I proceed to ride my bike through the intersection. But for some reason the person making a rolling stop at the 4th St. stop sign doesn't seem to think they need to actually stop. I'm not sure what they were assuming - that it was a 4 way stop, that bikes don't actually have the same status on the road as cars, that they just aren't subject to traffic laws - but what was certain was NOT that they were thinking "Hey, that's a stop sign, that means I come to a full stop and look before proceeding". Similar things happened twice on the way in this morning too.
Stuff like this happens all the time. The rather hysterical converse happens as well - I'll be stopped in my car at the Treat stop sign, and the person on 5th with NO STOP SIGN will yield to me. WTF?
I don't have a solution, other than to say that humans are creatures of habit, and maybe we should try to make things predictable for them rather than more efficient. Efficiency doesn't seem to be working that well, and I personally am of the opinion that getting hit by a car would be pretty inefficient.
Our neighborhood subscribes to some sort of newfangled school of traffic flow design. It seems that rather than the relatively predictable "you are on a side street, you must stop at a stop sign at every cross street" design, they chose a design that minimized how many times you had to stop on each street. So if you are driving up Treat from 6th to Speedway, you stop at 5th, but not at 4th, then again at 3rd, then again at 1st. So you only have to stop at every other cross street.
This is great when you are driving around the neighborhood in your car. Having to stop at every cross street is annoying and maddeningly slow. But here's the problem: people are creatures of habit. The either want to stop at every cross street or at none of them.
So yesterday I make my usual turn down Treat, and the people on fourth have a stop sign and I don't, so I proceed to ride my bike through the intersection. But for some reason the person making a rolling stop at the 4th St. stop sign doesn't seem to think they need to actually stop. I'm not sure what they were assuming - that it was a 4 way stop, that bikes don't actually have the same status on the road as cars, that they just aren't subject to traffic laws - but what was certain was NOT that they were thinking "Hey, that's a stop sign, that means I come to a full stop and look before proceeding". Similar things happened twice on the way in this morning too.
Stuff like this happens all the time. The rather hysterical converse happens as well - I'll be stopped in my car at the Treat stop sign, and the person on 5th with NO STOP SIGN will yield to me. WTF?
I don't have a solution, other than to say that humans are creatures of habit, and maybe we should try to make things predictable for them rather than more efficient. Efficiency doesn't seem to be working that well, and I personally am of the opinion that getting hit by a car would be pretty inefficient.
Tuesday, January 23, 2007
Exahustion
I'm writing this post at the end of my work day, 6:30 here, meaning I worked for 9.5 hours. I realize plenty of people work long hours, but I'm simply not used to putting in extra hours at my job. There was stuff that needed to be done, Will was here almost all night last night due to a server explosion. At least when I'm busy I'm not clock watching.
I'm listening to Sarah McLachlan's Christmas album. My dad burned me copies of some CDs and mailed them to me, and I've been trying to listen to them when I'm alone and uninterrupted at work. Christmas music in January, especially since I've been so resolute about not celebrating Christmas and probably heard more kwanzza music this year than Christmas music, is a little weird. But at the same time, with my first true "I don't celebrate Christmas" year behind me, it's nice to reflect a bit on why the season is so meaningful for my family and pretty much the rest of the Christian and quasi-Christian world. I'd reflect publicly, but my thoughts are pretty nascent and difficult to articulate at this point.
I'm listening to Sarah McLachlan's Christmas album. My dad burned me copies of some CDs and mailed them to me, and I've been trying to listen to them when I'm alone and uninterrupted at work. Christmas music in January, especially since I've been so resolute about not celebrating Christmas and probably heard more kwanzza music this year than Christmas music, is a little weird. But at the same time, with my first true "I don't celebrate Christmas" year behind me, it's nice to reflect a bit on why the season is so meaningful for my family and pretty much the rest of the Christian and quasi-Christian world. I'd reflect publicly, but my thoughts are pretty nascent and difficult to articulate at this point.
Friday, January 12, 2007
/geek
Isn't the desire to customize every system in your life to make it perfect for you part of the geek ethos? I'm surprised that places like thinkgeek and jinx can ever sell t-shirts, because while some of them are funny, none of them are quite right enough for me. I'm not a level 12 paladin, I'm a level 60 mage. And even though I love to /dance, my main is a gnome. And it seems to me that whenever they make a shirt in women's sizes, the emphasis is on "hey, girl geeks are sexy, check me out". What if I'm a girl geek who's just a geek?
Enter Zazzle.com. You can design your own t-shirts. They come out costing a bit more than the premade ones, but you can make them yourself. I'm definitely making one with a picture of my toon when I'm around level 63 (60 is too round a number for a shirt) to copy the "I am not a geek!" shirt. I actually did this at lvl 46 too but never actually ordered it. And I also really want to make one that says "Real women roll gnomes". I'm not really sure what that even means, but I think it sounds good on a t-shirt.
The only problem I have with them is that I'm really sort of devoted to American Apparel's women's tees, and it appears that's not what Zazzle offers. So if someone can point me to a similar service on AA, that'd be teh awesomezorz.
Enter Zazzle.com. You can design your own t-shirts. They come out costing a bit more than the premade ones, but you can make them yourself. I'm definitely making one with a picture of my toon when I'm around level 63 (60 is too round a number for a shirt) to copy the "I am not a geek!" shirt. I actually did this at lvl 46 too but never actually ordered it. And I also really want to make one that says "Real women roll gnomes". I'm not really sure what that even means, but I think it sounds good on a t-shirt.
The only problem I have with them is that I'm really sort of devoted to American Apparel's women's tees, and it appears that's not what Zazzle offers. So if someone can point me to a similar service on AA, that'd be teh awesomezorz.
/yawn
I was at work at 7am this morning. Miracle of miracles! Getting into the office early is actually good for my productivity, once I get over the fact that I'm still waking up. The problem is convincing myself the night before that I really want to be in bed early enough to get to the office early. Our office coffee maker has made the proposition slightly more likely, although I'm still working on making coffee that doesn't kill the people who drink it.
I am making a good faith effort to keep this blog up to date, which makes me realize just how mundane my life really is.
I am making a good faith effort to keep this blog up to date, which makes me realize just how mundane my life really is.
Thursday, January 11, 2007
Some random thoughts from this morning
1. If I want inspiration, I'll buy a Chicken Soup for the Soul book. If I want leave-in conditioner, I'll buy leave in conditioner.
Apparently the fine folks at Herbal Essences just can't get enough of their own cleverness. These are the literal instructions for my conditioner:
use me: massage a quarter size into wet or dry hair. yield to my powers. take on the world.
Uh, yeah, sure. Or I could just use it to smooth out my split ends. By the way, a shout out to Bearolyn for pointing out to me that people with long hair need conditioner. Sometimes the obvious just escapes me.
2. If you want a sure fire way to ruin my day, pee on my clothes.
Thanks, Megatron. Megatron (aka TinyCat) is our new foster-to-adopt kitten. She's five months old, and seemed to be doing fine with the litter box, until this morning when I discovered she had peed on a pile of my clean clothes. I'm still inspecting this shirt, not entirely convinced she hasn't peed on everything I own. And god knows where else in the apartment.
3. I am just not excited about doing my taxes this year.
Maybe it's because it's the first year I have to deal with self-employment income, or because I strongly suspect we will owe money, or because we're no longer poor enough for the awesome retirement savings credits or free file, or perhaps I have recently begun to resemble a "normal person" who doesn't like doing their taxes. Last year I was so damn proud of myself for finding a bug in TaxCut online (if you chose one education credit over another, it incorrectly calculated the credit - if you follow that through to its logical conclusion, yes, I was using software to do my taxes but actually checked all the rules/math/etc.), the year before I was psyched about maneuvering to get us a giant rebate instead of owing several hundred dollars. This year there is nothing exciting. Seriously, being middle class is totally boring, tax-wise.
Apparently the fine folks at Herbal Essences just can't get enough of their own cleverness. These are the literal instructions for my conditioner:
use me: massage a quarter size into wet or dry hair. yield to my powers. take on the world.
Uh, yeah, sure. Or I could just use it to smooth out my split ends. By the way, a shout out to Bearolyn for pointing out to me that people with long hair need conditioner. Sometimes the obvious just escapes me.
2. If you want a sure fire way to ruin my day, pee on my clothes.
Thanks, Megatron. Megatron (aka TinyCat) is our new foster-to-adopt kitten. She's five months old, and seemed to be doing fine with the litter box, until this morning when I discovered she had peed on a pile of my clean clothes. I'm still inspecting this shirt, not entirely convinced she hasn't peed on everything I own. And god knows where else in the apartment.
3. I am just not excited about doing my taxes this year.
Maybe it's because it's the first year I have to deal with self-employment income, or because I strongly suspect we will owe money, or because we're no longer poor enough for the awesome retirement savings credits or free file, or perhaps I have recently begun to resemble a "normal person" who doesn't like doing their taxes. Last year I was so damn proud of myself for finding a bug in TaxCut online (if you chose one education credit over another, it incorrectly calculated the credit - if you follow that through to its logical conclusion, yes, I was using software to do my taxes but actually checked all the rules/math/etc.), the year before I was psyched about maneuvering to get us a giant rebate instead of owing several hundred dollars. This year there is nothing exciting. Seriously, being middle class is totally boring, tax-wise.
Wednesday, January 10, 2007
Ouch, and some thoughts on osteopaths
I woke up this morning with my trapezius in total spasms. Not in the usual spot - higher and involving my neck. I've been bad about the stretches and exercises I'm supposed to do, and I have a feeling this is the punishment.
Possibly the best thing that happened when we moved to Tucson is that I found the best osteopath EVER. In addition to the skeleton cracking high-velocity manipulations I was used to from my old osteopath, he uses passive techniques to gently make everything happy and back to how it is supposed to be. He even taught James how to do the passive technique on my constantly spazzing trapezius, and it's probably saved me 10 or so trips to the doctor now.
Anyway, James was already gone this morning - I popped some pills but am still in constant pain. As I rode in to work today, I couldn't help but wonder if some of the marked improvement in my mood when we moved here was due to a reprieve from the pain. Not only did I feel better physically, but some of the functional limitations of chronic back pain can make life pretty crappy - not being able to drive any sort of distance, avoiding bending over the counter to cook and chop things, not being able to turn in any weird direction for fear of making things worse.
Honestly I'm so happy to have a relatively permanent solution for the problem, I'm not even upset that it took me more than three years to find a doctor who could undo my pain. It makes me wonder how many people who have failed to find pain relief from the allopathic medical community just need a really good osteopath.
Possibly the best thing that happened when we moved to Tucson is that I found the best osteopath EVER. In addition to the skeleton cracking high-velocity manipulations I was used to from my old osteopath, he uses passive techniques to gently make everything happy and back to how it is supposed to be. He even taught James how to do the passive technique on my constantly spazzing trapezius, and it's probably saved me 10 or so trips to the doctor now.
Anyway, James was already gone this morning - I popped some pills but am still in constant pain. As I rode in to work today, I couldn't help but wonder if some of the marked improvement in my mood when we moved here was due to a reprieve from the pain. Not only did I feel better physically, but some of the functional limitations of chronic back pain can make life pretty crappy - not being able to drive any sort of distance, avoiding bending over the counter to cook and chop things, not being able to turn in any weird direction for fear of making things worse.
Honestly I'm so happy to have a relatively permanent solution for the problem, I'm not even upset that it took me more than three years to find a doctor who could undo my pain. It makes me wonder how many people who have failed to find pain relief from the allopathic medical community just need a really good osteopath.
Tuesday, January 09, 2007
This is how people end up with children
I know, I'm a year late. Last year everyone was blogging about the NY Times article The Cute Factor and cuteoverload.com. I am SO 2006. But in case anyone was doubting that cuteness actually serves an evolutionary purpose, I give you this:
Tuesday, November 14, 2006
Some boring stuff about sleep and coffee
I woke up this morning in a panic, because I was awake but didn't hear an alarm going off. That almost always means I have slept through my alarm, and that was in fact true this morning. I had planned on being at work at 8 or 8:30, and I didn't wake up until 9:15. Hopped in the shower, left for work without brushing my hair, only to discover upon my arrival that I don't seem to still have a hairbrush at work. But Will made me coffee, which pretty much made my morning. The idea was I got coffee because I was coming in to work early (well, technically on time), but I got coffee anyway. I think we may have just officially broken the reward system for arriving at work on time.
My body really seems to be forcing my hand on the sleep issue. I didn't sleep last night until a little before 2, and apparently my body demanded 7+ hours of sleep. Last week was a sleep nightmare, and I made up for it by basically sleeping my whole weekend away. Which of course has already screwed things up for getting back on a regular sleep schedule for this week.
My body really seems to be forcing my hand on the sleep issue. I didn't sleep last night until a little before 2, and apparently my body demanded 7+ hours of sleep. Last week was a sleep nightmare, and I made up for it by basically sleeping my whole weekend away. Which of course has already screwed things up for getting back on a regular sleep schedule for this week.
Tuesday, October 31, 2006
These Hips Don't Lie
My iPod, using its exquisite discretion as usual, decided to randomize all three versions of "Hips Don't Lie" in a row this morning. It's like it KNEW that my hips don't lie. /dance
Friday, October 06, 2006
Obligatory Blog Post
I haven't had much I've felt like writing about lately. I've been procrastinating grad school apps, schoolwork and workwork, playing too many video games, and not getting enough sleep. All in all not really anything worth reporting. However, I know how much my faithful blog readers want to hear the intimate details of my life, so here are some of my recent accomplishments:
- managed to accrue $64.75 in library fines at TPPL, blowing my previous library fines record out of the water
- completely stopped cooking and now can recite the take out menus of about 80% of the restaurants in Tucson
- reached level 60 with my gnome mage in WoW
- downloaded both of the newer Shakira albums and danced an insane amount to Hips Don't Lie in my living room
Thursday, September 14, 2006
Mazzy Star
I'm currently in love with the Mazzy Star cover of Wild Horses. I've been intermittantly in love with Mazzy Star since I was 13, but for some reason I had totally forgotten about her. Then a few weeks ago I was at Chipotle having a fabulous lunch of chips, guacamole, and a margarita (yeah, it got me some weird looks) and "Rhymes of an Hour" was on their stereo. You probably remember it from the Leonardo DiCaprio / Claire Danes Romeo and Juliet movie. She's so sultry and sweet at the same time. Everything I want in chick music to listen to at work on a Thursday afternoon. Thanks Mazzy Star!
Come to think of it, I think I really need a Shakespeare film festival this weekend. Bring on the Zeffirelli Hamlet!
Come to think of it, I think I really need a Shakespeare film festival this weekend. Bring on the Zeffirelli Hamlet!
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