Category: Life

Surrender, Dorothy. I don’t know when I read it the first time (it wasn’t in 2003, 2004, or 2005, ’cause it’s not on any of my reading lists), but I don’t remember what ultimately happens in the course of the book, so I’m going to finish reading it. It’s a short book. As an aside, every time I see the title of the book, I think of Quinn screaming “I’m DORFY!” I’m not crazy about Meg Wolitzer – I really didn’t care for The Wife at all. All I can guess is that I forgot she wrote The Wife and that I’d read Surrender, Dorothy, and someone somewhere highly recommended Surrender, Dorothy in their blog or an email, and so I put it on my wish list. Generally speaking, if I read your blog or journal and you recommend a book and make the story sound even slightly interesting, chances are good (if I haven’t already read it) that I’ll add it to my wish list. As long as it isn’t dick lit, that is. And speaking of my wish list, great big thanks to reader Susan, who bought me The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things off my wish list! You rock, Susan!

* * * Dumbass things I did yesterday: 1. At some point during the day I pulled a muscle in my right shoulder. It hurt a LOT, and I decided to take it easy (bwah! As opposed to my usual hard-working day of sitting on my ass in front of the computer or TV, I suppose!). I started dinner – chicken noodle soup – and then decided to pull out the refrigerator and vacuum and mop behind it, because I’d mopped the kitchen floor the other day and got a huge dust bunny from under the fridge. My shoulder did not thank me for pulling out the fridge, believe you me. 2. I was looking for my checkbook to write a check, and couldn’t find it. So I grabbed another book of checks from out of my desk drawer, wrote the check, and set the book of checks to the side. Two minutes later I looked over at the book of checks and said “Oh, that’s where the checkbook is. I can’t believe I didn’t see it there before!” It took about ten minutes before I realized that it was the book of checks I’d taken out of the desk drawer. Doy. * * * So, on Dr. Phil last week was this two-part show entitled “Is My Son a Sexual Predator?” On the show were two parents of a 19 year-old boy who, they were worried, was a sexual predator (I bet you never would have figured that out from the title, eh?). Also on the show was the boy himself – Mikai – and his three brothers. The parents were worried that Mikai had been “inappropriate” with girls as young as 13 and – here’s the kicker – they were worried that he’d molested his own sister when she was 2 years old, and had instituted a “two brother” rule. That is, he was no longer allowed to be alone in the house with his sister; there always had to be a second brother present. The most disturbing part was when they showed video of Mikai and his little sister wrestling on the floor, and he glanced over to see if anyone was watching him, and then his hand slid down between her legs for a few instances. To me it looked deliberate and it seemed to bother Dr. Phil and Mikai’s parents as well. Most of the first show was talking about the problems with Mikai and him denying that he’d done anything with his sister, that he’d ever been “inappropriate” with anyone, that it was all a big misunderstanding (every time) and that he’d been molested many times as a child so the only way to interact with other people was sexually. Finally, Dr. Phil asked Mikai if he’d be willing to take a lie detector test, and he said he would. The lie detector test didn’t actually take place until the second show. But they hyped the holy hell out of the fact that the kid was going to take the lie detector test. Every single time they went to commercial, every time they had a commercial about the show, they showed Dr. Phil beginning to read the results of the test, then they’d cut it off before we got to the actual result. And just so you know, I just KNEW that the lie detector test was going to show that Mikai had never molested his little sister, never acted inappropriately with young girls, that none of that stuff was true. I just KNEW IT. Because remember when Dr. Phil had the woman on and then wouldn’t show the piece they’d filmed for the show because if he did, DHS would be on her doorstep when she got home? Well, if it was found that Mikai had molested his sister, wouldn’t the same thing be true? Wouldn’t the police be there to arrest him? So I was pretty confident that the lie detector test was going to show that Mikai was telling the truth. You could have blown me away when the test results were actually read, then. Question 1: “Did you ever touch your sister’s vagina or breasts with the pre-understanding that this was meant as a sexual activity.” Answer: “Your answer was ‘no,’ and the results indicate strong deception on your part. The results indicate that you have in fact touched her in a sexual way on her vagina and/or breasts.” Question 2: “Did you ever have sex with anyone against her will or with anyone under the age of 14?” Answer: Mikai answered no; the test results revealed clear deception for both. Dr. Phil confronted Mikai, Mikai denied it some more, and then Mikai’s father said “You’d better tell him the truth; you’re dead to us.” and Mikai finally admitted that it had happened. Like I said, a seriously intense and disturbing show. The parents and brothers were understandably devastated and so was Mikai. I swear I had chills by the time the show ended. Say what you will about Dr. Phil; at least he’s willing to work with Mikai and his family (who said several times that they want nothing to do with him anymore); he’s willing to foot the bill so that this family can find a way to heal. I cannot imagine much that’s more horrifying than finding out that your own child is a sexual predator, that he’s molested another of your children, and that he’s had forcible sex with girls, and sex with girls under the age of 14. * * * His Majesty is displeased.]]>

drive-bys. From the February 14th issue of People magazine, in the “Scoop” section:

In case you can’t tell, that’s Julia Roberts, leaving her house. In the left picture, a nanny is carrying one of Julia’s twins, with Julia about two feet away. In the center picture Julia’s husband is carrying “supplies”, and in the right-hand picture is a close-up of the twin an “assistant” is carrying. From the March 7th issue of People magazine, in the “Mailbag” section: To: editor@people.com From: me Subject: “Mailbag” Regarding the letter in your “Mailbag” section from Erika Gebhardt of Chula Vista, CA. Erika Gebhardt, who said “What kind of mother doesn’t carry her own children?” is amazing. She saw a picture that captured one instant in the life of Julia Roberts and her children, and instantly discerned that Julia is an uncaring mother. I guess that Erika Gebhardt has never allowed anyone else to hold or carry her children – if she indeed has any. Bravo, Erika Gebhardt! What America really needs is more mothers like you who sit around and decide that viewing one moment in a celebrity’s day is enough to judge the rest of her life. By the way, Erika: who watches your kids while you’re busy reading PEOPLE and firing off those indignant letters? Robyn And3rson * * * I think that Erika Gebhardt is a bit of an asshole. I think her real gripe is that Julia Roberts can afford to employ nannies and assistants to get her kids from the house to the car. I mean, please. Because for one fucking instant Julia Roberts isn’t carrying her children, Erika Gebhardt questions her fitness as a mother? I mean, has Erika Gebhardt never put her children down so she could take a shower or a nap or pee? Does she have her children surgically attached to her so that the little dears never for one instant in their lives have to be an entire foot from their judgemental asshole* of a mother? Those must be some seriously well-adjusted children. *Yeah, yeah, pot-kettle-black. * * * Pet store kitty pics from Monday are here. * * * From my comments: Hey Robyn, My favorite part of your journal is the petstore kitties. How do you manage to work there every week and not bring one home? Second is the adoption rate pretty high? I live in rural east Texas and unfortunately our Animal Control is a far cry from a pet placement organization. I have two young cats and I am considering another . Have you made any observations about deciding a kittens future temperment? I have 4 kids. We adopted both of our cats full grown, now the kids are set on a kitten. I just know it needs to be a pretty confident cat to handle our house! Have you every adopted a pet and it did not work out? I would love to read anything you would like to share about the petstore and choosing your own cats. Thanks! There are days when it is really, REALLY hard to put all the cats back in their cages and leave them there. I guess that main thing that keeps me from bringing home cats is the knowledge that the shelter I volunteer for is a no-kill shelter, so even if the cats don’t get adopted while they’re at the store, they’ll just go back to the shelter and live a pretty happy and pampered life there. Also, if I started bringing home cats without discussing it with Fred first, I’d get my ass divorced. Heh. The adoption rate seems to be pretty good – I think they had 70ish cats and kittens at the shelter last month and around 20 adopted out. I think that’s a pretty good rate, since adoptions kind of fall off at this time of the year. In a few months when all the unspayed (grrr) cats are having their unexpected babies, which are dropped off at the shelter, adoptions will pick up quite a bit. The highest number of adoptions tend to take place (if I recall correctly) between June and December, then drop off for a while. In my experience, you can get a pretty good idea of a cat’s temperament as long as you spend a few minutes holding the cat and playing with it. For example, when I first held Miz Poo, she howled at me until I picked her up and started petting her, which is when she rubbed her face against mine and just generally acted like a little princess. That gave me a pretty good idea of what she was like, and to this day she thinks she’s a tiny little princess. We got an idea of what Mr. Boogers’ temperament was like when we saw this picture: That picture, right there, tells you all you need to know about him. We could tell he was feisty and wouldn’t take shit from anyone, and that’s held true. I guess, basically, what I’m saying is that you generally know right away what a cat is like, as long as you can spend a few minutes in a quiet place with them and really pay attention to how they act. We’ve never had a cat who didn’t work out, but a few years ago we did adopt a dog and ended up returning her to the humane society. We found out pretty quickly that we’re cat people, not dog people. We felt bad for returning her, but better that she go back to the humane society and have the chance to be adopted by someone who would spoil her, you know? And lastly, it’s been my experience – I’m sure this doesn’t hold true across the board, and that there are exceptions – that if you’re going to bring a new cat into a home where there are already cats, it’s best to bring home a kitten, because they seem to adjust better than older cats. If you’re lucky, you’ll find a feisty cat who will hold his or her own and will happily play with the older cats when they try to put the smack down. Good luck, and let me know how it goes! * * * I don’t think that’s exactly a look of love Spanky’s giving Miz Poo… * * *]]>

The Bachelorette spoiler; skip to the next section if you haven’t seen the final show yet. Ugh. Man, what a travesty. I was no big fan of John Paul (I keep wanting to call him Jean-Paul) because something about his lips kinda creeped me out, but I did feel sorry for the little guy. But, what the hell? I mean, what the HELL can she possibly be thinking? Like that chick from the audience asked, what the hell is it going to take for Jen to find love? Okay, I know that this show has a stupid premise, because most people can’t meet someone, date him (at the most) once a week for six weeks and know for certain that they’re soulmates – I mean the fact that the couples from this show have such a poor track record should prove that it doesn’t really work. I wasn’t a big Jerry fan, either – I really liked Ryan and Ben the most, and I think Wendell would be fun to hang out with – but I sure didn’t like seeing him being DUMPED ON NATIONAL TELEVISION. For god’s sake, Jen seemed really convinced that he knew what she was going to say, but he looked a little shell-shocked to me. I mean, I think he was probably RELIEVED, but still taken by surprise. Why couldn’t she have just taken the ring and then broken up with him quietly later when they were alone? I understand that if there was no spark, there was no spark, but she used that excuse with a bunch of the other guys too, didn’t she? Maybe she’s just not trained to spot a spark when it happens. She’s spark-deficient! Jerry looked a lot better with the shorter hair, by the way. Oh, and the whole thing with Ryan’s family and his parents talking about Thailand constantly back when she met his family a few weeks ago? I don’t know if Jen was just trying to be funny, but her snarky “Let’s see, there’s Thailand, and Thailand, and, oh, Thailand!” comment made me want to scoop her eyeballs out with a fork and serve them to her with a nice chianti. She complained that they didn’t really make an effort to get to know her, but THE STREET RUNS BOTH WAYS, LADY!

* * * Hey, remember two years ago when I put up an assload of reader pet pictures? Well, I’m in the process of moving entries over to Movable Type (it’s going very slowly) and in the interest of saving space I’m deleting those pictures. I’ve already deleted the ones from March 2003, and tonight or tomorrow I’ll be deleting the ones from February. I just wanted to let y’all know, in case you were wondering where they went. * * * From my comments: AND! This is bugging the shit outta me! I run Windows 2000…WHY when I load your page, when it starts to load the right hand column, I get this error message: A Runtime Error has occurred. Do you wish to Debug? Line:1 Error: Syntax Error. I have NO clue. Does anyone else have this problem? Anyone know what might be causing it? Okay, here’s what I’ve never understood about nightgown wearers…doesn’t that thing ride up to your armpits whilst you sleep? I used to wear gowns as a child and I can remember waking up with a sweaty upper-body and cold legs. Now I sleep in an old tshirt and flannel boxers every night and I’m quite comfy. Don’t you get cold too? Wearing a gown around the house…the air just blows right on up through your legs! I do have to agree with you on sizing, you want pjs that are a few sizes too big…so comfy. I never have a problem with my nightgown riding up to my armpits… because I sleep nekkid! 🙂 I put the nightgown on every night around 9, when I’m getting ready for bed, then wear it ’til 11 or 12, when I toss it on the floor and go to sleep. I wear it for a little while in the morning if I have to do some chores before I go work out, and then I put it on for a few minutes after my shower. Most of the time that I’m wearing it I’m upstairs, and I don’t get cold because the second floor of our house is about ten degrees warmer than the first floor. I will occasionally wear something to sleep in – like when the spud and I were in Hawaii last year and I didn’t want her to see me nekkid and be blinded for life – but I never sleep as well as I do when I’m not wearing anything at all. Hey, on the catnip subject, have you ever tried giving them valerian? (You can get it at places that sell herbs.) It smells a little bit like socks, but man, do the cats ever love it. Even Lena, who turns her nose up at catnip, gets all stoned on that stuff. We do have a bottle of Valerian somewhere – or at least, we used to. We don’t use it much because it smells awful and all the cats like catnip, but every now and then we’ll get it out. It’s been a while, though – I’ll have to see if we still have it. Know what else gets some cats high? Lily bulbs! They’re poisonous to cats, so you can let them have direct access, but I put a lily bulb in a small plastic container last year, and Mister Boogers would get totally, completely looped. It was hysterical, but the other cats weren’t interested at ALL. * * * My lord, have you seen the latest Shania Twain video? I think the song is called “Don’t”. In the song, Shania is wearing a dress that showcases her breasts – she has spectacular breasts, by the way, in case you’ve never seen her. Anyway, at one point in the video she’s wearing her breast-showcasing dress and is on a horse, and the horse is at a full trot or gallop or whatever (I don’t know what you’d call it) and Shania’s breasts are bouncing so hard that it makes my own breasts ache. Bouncing like that just can’t be a good thing. * * * I’ve taken to occasionally drinking a cup of peppermint tea lately – I think I heard about it over at The Fat Diaries, and it sounded kind of good, so I thought I’d give it a try. I bought a box and it sat in the pantry for a few months, and then finally I decided to see if it was as good as it sounded. With a lot of Splenda, it tastes exactly like one of those red-and-white peppermint candies, so on days (like today!) when I’m freezing, I brew up a nice, warm cup of tea and drink it. The other day I thought for sure that my breath must smell really good, so I said to Fred “Hey, does my breath smell all minty?”, and blew a breath into his face. He sniffed, thought for a moment, sniffed again, and said “It kind of smells like pot.” Oh. * * * “Yes, I’m laying in the bed that Miz Poo has claimed as her own. She wasn’t here, so I’m laying in it. And I ain’t moving. She can smack and hiss at me all she wants, but I’m not going ANYWHERE.” (And he didn’t. You can imagine how pissed off Miz Poo was, and she hissed and smacked at him, and he just gave her this look and refused to move.) * * *]]>

new logo! This one was created by the lovely and talented Ann. The look on the Booger’s face just cracks me up. Thanks, Ann!

* * * March 1st, and it’s friggin’ FLURRYING outside. Ugh. Also, with the wind chill factor it feels like it’s 20 degrees out there. Double ugh. * * * My parents finally called from Hawaii over the weekend. With the time difference between here and there, they’d forget to call until it was the middle of the night for us, so it’s been a few weeks since I talked to my mother. She seems to be having a good time, what with the warm weather and the beach. They’re in a different hotel this time, this one overlooking a marina. She said, at one point, “You know, it’s not too late for you to make plans to come over!”, and let me tell you – I was tempted in a big way, because like I said, I’ve forgotten the head-to-toe rash and the urge to kill my mother from last year. But finally I had to say “Yeah, it is too late – the only time we could come over would be during Spring Break and that’s only a few weeks away.” Which is when she said “Well, we’ll just have to not let your father retire, so he can come again next year!” and then she said “And he looks like he agrees with that!” Heh. Then she told me that he might be going to Virginia Beach in the fall for three months (for work, this is), and I said “That’s so close that we might have to drive up and visit him while he’s there!” Of course, a check of Mapquest tells me that it’s a 12 or 13 hour drive, but hey – I was willing to drive to Myrtle Beach last Fall, I’m sure I can handle the couple extra hours to Virgina Beach. Besides, I’ve never been to Virginia Beach, I’d love to check it out. * * * Great big thanks to reader Debbie, who sent me Wil Wheaton‘s book Just a Geek from my wish list. Y’all know I just love getting surprises in the mail, and I totally wasn’t expecting this, so yesterday was an awesome mail day for me. I’m looking forward to reading the book – I read and very much enjoyed Dancing Barefoot a few months ago. So, thank you, Debbie! You rock! * * * Speaking of books, I managed to make my book-a-day-in-February quota with an extra book, even. Go, me! I’ll be glad to get back to my regular reading schedule, though, where I don’t have to make sure to get a book read every day. That was stressful! Maybe for my next goal, I’ll go through all the books I have, and make a pile of the ones that I’ve had for several years, and get those read! * * * Fred has noticed something that happens quite often on 24, and it always makes us laugh. There’ll be a room full of people, and some guy will walk up to Jack and say “Damn it, Jack, I need to know the truth! What the hell is going on?”, and Jack will glance around at the other people in the room, then he’ll grab the guy by the arm and pull him away from the crowd to tell him what’s going on. Except that instead of pulling the guy AWAY from the crowd, Jack will pull the guy like TWO FEET from where they were, with the crowd of people still around them, and tell him what’s going on. He never pulls the guy out into the hallway or into another room; no, he just thinks that pulling the guy two feet from where they were somehow puts a magic bubble around them, and doesn’t seem to know that the people who were there, crowded around, are STILL RIGHT THERE, probably eavesdropping on the conversation. I think I could totally write a scene for 24: Tony: Jack, what the hell is going on? I need to know the truth! Jack: (glances around, pulls Tony two feet from where he was standing) Tony, I can’t tell you what’s going on right now. I’m asking you to trust me!(Jack’s always asking people to trust him.) Tony: Yeah, sure. Jack: Okay, fine. THE END. I’ll just sitting over here waiting for my Emmy, thanks. * * * So, I needed to get a new lamp for the computer room. I did a lot of looking around, and then decided I’d found the perfect lamp. When I was ordering it (online, at BedBathandBeyond.com), I needed to choose a lampshade. I didn’t want a plain old white one, so I opted for the faux leather lampshade. It arrived last night, and I put the lamp together, and… well… does the lampshade look like it’s made out of human skin to anyone else? It’s kind of ugly, but it’s going to be so much easier to dust than the lampshades on the other lamps in the house. And that’s always a plus! * * * I was talking to Liz last night, and she said “What’s the phrase they used on that episode of Seinfeld? Sweet Moses? Something like that?” “Sweet fancy Moses!” I said. “Yeah, that’s it!” she said, and went on to tell me that someone she works with is a Seinfeld fan, too. But I tuned her out for a moment because you know what? sweetfancymoses.com would be an excellent domain name. (PS: Both Jerry and George said “Sweet fancy Moses!” regarding Elaine’s dancing. In case you were wondering.) * * * Also, a couple of you asked about my nightgown, so I took a picture of it. I know, it’s ugly. And it’s about two sizes too big for me, but it is SO freakin’ comfortable that I’m having a hard time getting rid of it. I got it years ago from the Lane Bryant or Roaman’s catalog and I’ve worn it nearly every night since then. I’m actually surprised it’s not in worse shape! * * * I think someone’s been sniffing the catnip again… ]]>

1. What time did you get up this morning? Around 7:15 – I meant to get up at 6:40 when Fred left for work, but I stayed up late last night, and wanted to snooze for a while before getting up and getting ready to hit the pet store. 2. Diamonds or pearls? Diamonds, I suppose, though I don’t really wear any jewelry at all. 3. What was the last film you saw at the cinema? It was in Maine after Christmas, so I’m thinking… National Treasure? 4. What is your favorite TV show? Desperate Housewives, Lost, The Bachelorette, 24, The Shield. I can’t choose just one! 5. What did you have for breakfast? Half a blueberry bagel with a smear of peanut butter, and a scrambled egg. 6. What is your middle name? Leslie. 7. What is your favorite cuisine? I’m partial to Chinese food, though I do get cravings for Italian from time to time. 8. What foods do you dislike? Anything with green peppers or deer meat in it. 9. What is your favorite chip flavor? I don’t eat chips all that often, but when I do, I like sour cream and onion. 10. What is your favorite CD at the moment? The Cold Mountain soundtrack. 11. What kind of car do you drive? I’ll pass on this one for the time being, but there should be news in a week or so. 🙂 12. Favorite sandwich? If made at home, I like a ham and cheese sandwich. At Subway, I like the BMT on white with mayo. 13. What characteristic do you despise? What do you call the characteristic where someone sees a snapshot of an instant of your life and judges everything about every second of your life from that moment they see? 14. Favorite item of clothing? My nightgown. My poor, bedraggled nightgown. It’s ugly and it’s been washed so many times you can pretty much see through it, but it’s the most comfortable nightgown I’ve ever owned. It needs to be tossed, because it’s started to tear in places, but I can’t seem to make myself get rid of it. If I had the sewing skills, I’d use the nightgown as a pattern to make another one (or more!) of the same nightgown, but I am woefully unskilled when it comes to sewing. I’ve bought a thousand nightgowns, but none of them even come close. 15. If you could go anywhere in the world on vacation where would you go? If I could get to Hawaii without the 12 hours on the plane, I’d go in an instant. 16. What color is your bathroom ? Our entire house is painted the same color – a slightly pinkish warm cream color. The master bathroom has blue-gray towels and a matching bathmat. The spud’s bathroom has a cat-themed shower curtain and towels. 17. Favorite brand of clothing? As long as it’s comfortable and I like the color, I don’t care about the brand. 18. Where would you retire to? Maine in the summer, Hawaii in the winter. Except that that would reallllly freak out the cats, that 12-hour plane trip. I’ll say Maine in the summer, Florida in the winter. Money being no object, of course. If I had to choose between the two, I’d say Florida, since it’s warm year-round. 19. Favorite time of the day? Dusk, when my family is in the house and we’re all doing our own thing but I know where they are and don’t have to worry. 20. What was your most memorable birthday? They all kind of blend together, really. Maybe the birthday when I turned 21 and could legally drink and got looped on one single strawberry dacquiri. Heh. 21. Where were you born? Bangor, Maine. 22. Favorite sport to watch? Ice skating. I’ll watch poker if I know the people who are playing. Especially Annie Duke and Howard Lederer. Although Annie Duke annoyed me when she was playing some all-stars poker tournament (I don’t remember exactly what it was called) and she knocked her brother out of the game and apologized profusely to him. DON’T APOLOGIZE, ANNIE. YOU’RE JUST PLAYING THE GAME. 23. What fabric detergent do you use? Tide. Every now and then I’ll give something else a try, but I always come back to Tide. 24. Coke or Pepsi? Diet Coke, preferably from McDonald’s. 25. Are you a morning person or a night owl? More of a night owl, I’d say. 26. What is your shoe size? 9 wide. 27. Do you have any pets? I have four cranky cats and you can see them here, here, here, and here. 28. How old are you now? 37. 29. What did you want to be when you were little? It changed pretty frequently. I remember wanting to be a vet (’til I realized how much school was involved), a teacher, an orthopedic surgeon, and a psychiatrist. 30. What are you meant to be doing today? Aside from doing laundry and vacuuming the upstairs, my day’s pretty much open. I need to watch some stuff I’ve DVR’d lately to clear some space.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ From my comments: The picture of Hawaii is so beautiful. Would you consider offering it as wallpaper? And since I’m about to experience my first 8+ -hour flight, can you offer any suggestions for how to best cope? The full-sized picture of Hawaii is here – you’ll probably have to size it down to use it as wallpaper, I wasn’t sure what size to make it. As for the 8+ hour flight, when I was getting ready to leave for Hawaii someone suggested that I get some Ambien from my doctor. She said it’ll knock you out and you’ll sleep deeply and wake up feeling really refreshed. I wasn’t able to give that a try myself, because I didn’t get a chance to see my doctor before I left, but believe you me – I wished like hell I had! If anyone else has advice for someone going on a long flight (and 8+ hours? My heart goes out to you!), leave it in the comments, eh? ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ Okay, a lot of you don’t know what hotlinking is, so I’m going to explain it the way I’d want it explained to me. Say you look at this page, and you say to yourself “Oh my god, that look that Yo Boogity has on his face EXACTLY describes the mood I’m in today. I must put that picture up on my page!” What you should do (we won’t get into the fact that you shouldn’t be stealing pictures of other peoples’ cats for your own use without asking permission; that’s a whole ‘nother topic.) is right-click and save the picture to your hard-drive, then upload it somewhere, whether to tinypic or another free image hosting site, or if you have your own domain, somewhere on your domain. Then, when you’re ready to put the picture on your page, you would link to the picture where you saved it – whether it be one of the free image hosting sites or your domain. But if you’re a hotlinker, what you would do is right-click on the picture, see that the image is located at http://cats.robynand3rson.com/graphics/StanleyOne.jpg, and you would put that address in your image tag. That way, the picture shows up on your page when people check it out, but every time your page loads, it steals bandwidth from me, because I host the image, which is located at the cat.robynanderson.com address. I hope that clears it up for you. Have I mentioned that finding someone is hotlinking an image on my site really pisses me off? I spent all weekend obsessively checking my stats and changing image names so that someone who, say, intends to wish their friend a happy birthday by hotlinking to an image of a cake on my site might come back to find that they’re actually wishing their friend a happy birthday in a whole new way. If that ain’t the face of a bandwidth thief, I don’t know what is. ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~]]>

comments in this entry about gave me a stroke yesterday. And yet, I read every damn one of them because I’m a sucker for stories that piss me off. Heh.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ So I went to the doctor’s office on Wednesday, because the skin on my face is itchy and blotchy and there are rough bumps – not all the time, but a lot of the time – and I’ve been meaning to ask the doctor if she thought I had rosacea for ages now, and finally I sucked it up and made the appointment. I was sitting in the waiting room, and it was pretty packed, because this is a very busy doctor’s office. Sitting behind me and over a few seats was a woman who didn’t seem to know that unless you want everyone in the area to listen to your conversation, you should use your Indoor Voice. Instead, Phone Woman was talking at full volume, and I did my best not to listen, and instead concentrate on my book, but she was so loud that finally I just had to put my book down, stare at a wall, and just listen to the conversation. Phone Woman, it appears, works with a woman named Brenda. Brenda is a horrible, horrible woman. She’s trying to hold Phone Woman back, she’s trying to mess with her career, she is INTIMIDATED by Phone Woman, who is a strong, black woman and won’t take any guff from anyone. Phone Woman doesn’t know why Brenda’s gotta be like that. Obviously Brenda is threatened by Phone Woman and is just lashing out. Brenda doesn’t even know how to say a simple “thank you.” Why, when Doug did her that big favor a little while back, Brenda couldn’t even be bothered to utter the words “Thank” and “you”. Instead, she said “I don’t need your charity.” All Doug wanted was a thank you, a little show of appreciation, and Brenda wouldn’t give him that. “Thank you,” said Phone Woman. “That’s all she had to say! A simple ‘thank you’ would have made Doug as happy as a sissy with a dick in his mouth!” My jaw dropped, and I wasn’t the only one – an older woman sitting across from me gave me a “do you believe this?” look, and we shook our heads at each other. Someone needs to teach Phone Woman how to use her Indoor Voice, because I’m 99% certain that the woman sitting two seats down from Phone Woman, the one with two kids under five, had to answer the question “What’s a dick?”, because those kids were listening to every word coming out of Phone Woman’s mouth. I wasn’t around to hear the question, though, ’cause it was my turn to see the doctor. She prescribed a cream for me to use on my face. Hopefully the blotchiness will go away; I’m keeping my fingers crossed! ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ Did I mention that my parents are in Hawaii again? My father’s there temporarily for work, and my mother decided to go with him again. Obviously, the spud and I won’t be going to Hawaii again, but I had a dream last night that I we were in Hawaii during Spring Break, and it was beautiful and warm. See, this is how my memory works – I tend to remember how beautiful and warm Hawaii is, rather than remembering how miserable I was, with the head-to-toe rash and the noise from the street construction and how freakin’ HOT I was. I remember the good stuff, and I get the yearning to go again. I’m not going, but I kind of wish I was, you know? I told Fred the other night that someday we should go to Hawaii and drive out of the city to the North Shore, and hang out all day at the practically-deserted beaches. Which is what we should have done last summer, really. But then I remembered how it’s a matter of 12 hours on a plane, and how much it drives me crazy to sit in one place for that long, and how I wanted to run screaming up and down the aisles of the plane, because I was thisclose to losing it, and we were still 3 hours from Hawaii, and Fred reminded me that it’ll only take a few hours to get to the Bahamas (which is where we’re going for our 10th anniversary), which is pretty, too. Just give me the ocean and a little patch of beach, and I’ll be happy, you know? But Hawaii sure is pretty… ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ At the beginning of February, I decided to try to read a book a day every day of February. It’s going pretty well – see my reading list here – and I’m pretty sure I’ll make my goal of 28 books in 28 days, but I don’t think I’m going to do the book-a-day thing again anytime soon. See, I like reading. I love books, and I like hanging out on the couch and reading, reading for a few hours before bed, for half an hour or so in the morning after I’ve taken my shower. But trying to cram in a book a day this month has made me cranky and impatient. I had a long run of really good books, but the books I’ve read in the past few days have had me muttering “Yeah, okay, GET ON WITH IT, quit your yammering about what the room looks like, and GIVE ME SOME ACTION.” I don’t want to be cranky and irritable – I love books! So like I said, I’m going to finish out the month (and cheat by reading the shortest books on my bookcase), but next year when I say “I’m going to read a book a day for the entire month of (whatever)”, remind me that I don’t really want to do that, wouldya? ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ I hate it when people hotlink, OH how I hate it. It’s another thing that makes me cranky and irritable, when I find that someone’s direct linking an image, and therefore they’re stealing bandwidth from me. Hey, my husband works hard so I can have my own domain. Why should I provide bandwidth for some cheeseball? Fucking bandwidth thieves. Hey, you know what would be kind of embarrassing? If you were so, so, so very cool. And you joined some badass ‘burb, like – just for example – the Go Fuck Yourself ‘burb. Or even if you didn’t join the ‘burb, you just saw an image you really liked. I don’t know. Maybe one like this: Only because you’re so, so, so cool, and also a badass, why would you bother saving the image to your own domain, or using one of the free image places, like tinypic? You’re so, so, so cool, and such a badass, that you have better things to do with your life. And that person who owns the site you’re stealing bandwidth from, she’ll never notice. And even if she did? She’d be impressed. Because you? So cool. So badass. She’d certainly never move images around and rename them so that instead of seeing the above image on your site you’d, instead, see this one: “Robyn,” you are whining. “This is unfair. Not everyone knows that hotlinking is bad! Not everyone knows that they shouldn’t steal bandwidth! You’re mean! I don’t like you! You suck!” To which I say only: Ignorance is not an excuse. And it sucks to be you. ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ Love to eat them mousies . . . Mousies what I love to eat! Bite they little heads off, Nibble on they tiny feet! ]]>

this site and this site this morning, considering that I neither love nor hate Paris Hilton. I mean, I think she’s a blight on the face of humanity, but other than that, I’m just kinda “eh” when it comes to her. Someone needs to tell her to stop tilting her head, though, or her neck is going to freeze that way.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ We were watching Survivor last week, and at one point (I’ll try not to spoil it for those of you who haven’t seen it yet), Jeff Probst said “Ulong.” “Oolong?” I said to Fred. “Is that like the tea?” “I dunno.” He thought for a second, then grinned. “Funny. I thought it would be spelled U-L-O-N-G, like an ‘unsigned long’ from programming. That’s a 32-bit number that can only be positive. And zero. Anything from zero to a little over 4.7 billion.” He considered. “Except I always figured it was pronounced ‘you-long’, because of the ‘U’,” he said. “Maybe that’s my Alabama coming out.” We watched TV for a second or two in silence. “4.2 billion,” he said suddenly. “Not 4.7. Because a regular signed 32-bit integer only goes up just over 2.1 billion – that’s 2 to the 31st power – and an unsigned would be one more power of two onto that, so–” I made a loud snoring noise and gave me a wounded look. But he shut up. ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ So yes, Fred is having a vasectomy, which means (god willing and the creek don’t rise. Heh heh heh. I said “rise”!) there won’t be a little Fredbyn running around here and I won’t be blogging about our kid and getting into flamewars with people who leave snide comments about our parenting choices. Also, Fred won’t be gagging over a shitty diaper. Did anyone see that on America’s Funniest Home Videos Sunday? That was hilarious – you note that none of the people gagging over shitty diapers was a woman. Anyway. So I gather from the reaction that this is a surprise to some of you – someone in Fred’s comments said that it kind of came out of left field – which surprised me (that y’all were surprised, I mean), but then I remembered that you haven’t been here when we’ve been discussing it over the past six months or so. And then I remembered that more than five years ago I posted an entry saying that I was going to go off birth control in March of 2000 and start trying to get pregnant, so I guess I can see why the surprise. I don’t know at what point we ended up deciding that we didn’t really want to have another kid; I think it’s been a gradual decision over the last few years. We went from kinda wanting to have another kid, to definitely not wanting one. If one or the other of us desperately wanted a kid, I’m pretty sure the other one would go along with that, and I’m sure we’d both love the kid with all our hearts. In like manner, had I accidentally gotten pregnant I think we would have had the kid and right now y’all would be snarking about its name or clothing or lack of a hat in cold weather. But we just don’t want another kid, we really don’t. I know that disappoints some of you, but, well, to have a kid just ’cause y’all want us to would be pretty damn silly, wouldn’t it? ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ Several people said that, in the Tubby movie I put up a few days ago, I don’t sound like they expected. That’s funny, because I’ve always wished that I had a whiskey voice like Ellyn from Thirtysomething. I don’t, though – I have a high, girly voice and usually it makes me cringe, though I didn’t think I sounded too bad on the Tubby video. Last month when I listened to Dooce on NPR, I was blown away by her voice. “That’s not Dooce!” I said. “That’s some GIRL!” I don’t know, I just didn’t expect her to sound all girly. I think I expected her to sound like Marge Simpson’s sisters. ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ “You know you want me.” ]]>

Don’t they make you want to take a nap?]]>

The Forgotten (which I mailed 2 1/2 weeks ago) hasn’t gotten there yet, and To Wong Foo (which I mailed two weeks ago) hasn’t gotten there yet, either. But Saw, which I mailed on Friday at the post office, got there yesterday. We’ve always had problems mailing stuff from home – more than once I’ve mailed a bill payment (back when I was doing that silly “writing a check to pay a bill” instead of paying electronically) to have it just kind of disappear for a while, causing a late payment, and then show up a month or so later at it’s destination. For a while I stopped mailing anything at all from home, but I got lazy and started mailing stuff from home because it’s just so much more CONVENIENT than getting in the car and driving a few miles down a busy road to mail stuff, but I guess I need to go back to only mailing stuff from the post office. Or asking Fred to mail stuff from the post office on his way home from work. I can tell you this – I’m not terribly fond of my mailman right now.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ So I’ve been a cleaning maniac lately. I finally got around to cleaning the hell out of the library/ dining room last week, and did so much straightening and dusting that I almost didn’t recognize the room. I cleaned out the closet in the kitchen, cleaned the downstairs bathroom (which I do far too infrequently). Yesterday, Fred hooked me up with a wireless network connection, so that we could finally get rid of a wire or two, and then we moved stuff around on top of the filing cabinet, which is where the modem and, uh, other shit are located. He moved everything off the top of the filing cabinet, and I dusted (man, there was a lot of dust), and then I looked down behind the filing cabinet and decided to break out the vacuum cleaner and vacuum behind it. Finally, Fred ended up pulling the filing cabinet out away from the wall so I could get back there with the vacuum. Just so you know, that filing cabinet – and it’s a nice one – was put there the day we moved into this house in August of 2001, and it hasn’t been moved since. As you can imagine, there was a ton of dust and cat hair and crap not only on the floor, but clinging to the wall and the back of the filing cabinet. And under the filing cabinet, where there’s a gap of three inches? Scattered mouse shit. Quite a bit of it, actually. Apparently at some point in the past three years and seven months, we had a mouse living under our filing cabinet. Whether it was one of the mice the cats ended up eventually bringing upstairs to the bedroom, I have no idea. That’s the only place I’ve seen mouse shit so far, but I haven’t pulled my desk out to clean behind it since we moved in, so god only knows what’s living back THERE. I can predict that there’s an awful lot of cat hair, though. That much I do know for sure. ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ So, Fred was looking at an old floppy, and he found a movie. Since y’all have been harassing (YES, I said harassing!) me for a new movie of the (ha!) week, I decided to upload it. It’s a movie of Tubby, just sitting on the back of the couch, minding his own business, while I try to get him to let loose with one of his bitchy meows. In fact, at one point I sound like I’m making sheep sounds at him, for some reason. So anyway, there ya go. Click on the “Movie of the week” link over there to the right under “Other”, and please right-click and save it to your hard drive, please. Oh, and by the way that manly-looking hand that reaches out and rubs Tubby at one point belongs to Fred, not me. In case you were wondering. ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ Spot practices his Paris Hilton “come-hither” look. ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~]]>

Mo!!! (Miz Poo sends kisses to Frankie!)

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ Every time I put up a picture with the water bottle full of coins somewhere in the background – like this one – someone (or several someones) want to know when we’re going to take the coins to the bank. The answer, of course, is when it’s full! The long answer is that that change is going to pay for part of our 10th anniversary trip to the Bahamas (in 2008!), so we’re going to keep tossing our change in there until a few months before our trip, when I’ll start rolling the change. Which, I’m sure, will be tons and tons of fun. From my comments: Hey, are your cats on Catster? They sure are: Spanky, Spot, Miz Poo, Mister Boogers, Mr. Fancypants, and Tubby are all on Catster. One more thing.. I have a new mouthguard (similar to your old one in fact.) and ever since I got it I wake up thinking I am eating something. Trying desperately to CHOMP through whatever it is. Sheesh, probably a good thing I have the darn thing or I might not have teeth LEFT. Yours looks odd, no front to it. Thinking the back part must be quite thick.. Yeah, the back part is pretty thick – and the last few mornings I’ve woken up actually chewing on the mouthguard as if I had gum in my mouth. I swear, if I chew through this thing, I’m going to be pretty peeved! Also, I think that the way it’s made – with no front part to it – is so that I could wear it during the day if I wanted to. I don’t grind my teeth during the day, but some people do. I can’t imagine comfortably wearing it during the day, though – it makes me lisp even worse than I already do. My mouth guard looks a lot like your old one–is it the kind you boil? Anyway, the new one looks a lot comfier. Can you breathe through your mouth while it’s in there? (I had a cold a couple of weeks ago & couldn’t wear the mouth guard because I can only breathe through my nose while I’m using it, and what with the cold I couldn’t breathe at all with the mouth guard in. Sucked.) I know what you mean about the gag reflex with them, though–if my stomach is the tiniest bit upset I just can’t fall asleep with mine in my mouth. No, the old one was one I got from my dentist, too – years and years ago. More than 10, I think. They took an impression of my teeth and made the mouthguard, if I recall correctly. I don’t have any problems breathing through my mouth with the mouthguard in, thank goodness, since I’m a total mouth breather! Speaking of dreams! Robyn, I had a dream about you the other night. You invited a bunch of guys over to your house for a slumber party, and you told me that Fred, for SOME reason, was not happy about it. You said you couldn’t understand what the problem was. LOL He just never lets me have any fun, does he? Hmph! ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ Pet store kitty pics from this morning are hither. ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ “It is RAINING, and I am wearing MY COLLAR, and it’s PISSING me OFF.” “I will BITE at the air! Bite! Bite! Bite!” “I will BITE some more! Bite! And if The Momma doesn’t stop calling me ‘Boogity’, I will bite HER, too!” ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~]]>