I think I have enough summer reading material

This is the stack of books currently on my nightstand, in my que if you will. They are in no particular order, except that I did start "The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao" and also Harry Potter #1 (with my daughter). I also may have started "Marley and Me" quite a while ago, I'm not sure. After I saw the trailer for the movie for the 113th time, I sort of lost interest.

Best of Twitter

In one of my rare comments, Bone of "If You Only Read ONE BLOG This Year..." was kind enough to point out a typo I had in my sidebar preventing people from getting to my Twitter profile. How he figured out what the typo was specifically I don't know, but I'm glad he did. (And if you've never read his blog, you definitely should check it out, it never disappoints. Do not let the fact that he is a Cowboys fan deter you. If I could get past it, so can you.)

My first thought after fixing the error was to wonder how many witty, interesting things which I had tweeted had people missed out on? Surely there were many. Turns out after reviewing my history, not so much. Now I've only got 195 updates, not nearly as many as others, but still I was a bit disappointed in myself.

The brief, very edited highlights of my tweeting which you may have missed:

@kwerb Think we are finally done hearing about how we booed McNabb at the draft? Me neither.

"Experts say that although every spin is random, over time, the casino is the winner" Gee, really?

Based on the behavior of the bunnies in my neighborhood, it's clear that they've focused on quantity over quality.

Summer concerts, part 2: Wilco, in Portland, in July. With hens.

If it takes 7 consecutive tweets to make your point, please just make it a blog post instead. Thank you.

Ahh, yoga. I've missed you. Wii Fit just can't match the real thing.

Saw probably the worst movie ever made the other day: Sargent Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band. Stars Frampton & the Bee Gees. Just awful.

AP Headline: "Hugh Jackman visit to Mexico City canceled on swine flu concerns." This is big news?

Me to 10 yr old & friend: No, you may not run through the sprinkler, it's April. Yes, you may wash my car wearing your bathing suits.

Your, You're. They are two different words, people. I don't care if you only have 140 characters.

When you need a scarf, gloves, and a blanket, it's too cold for baseball. Minor league baseball, anyway.

Shopping list: margarita mix, limes, and butter. Only a few more hours until the lobster arrives.

Can't get this song out of my head today. Jenny Lewis & Elvis http://tinyurl.com/6998dm

Is April Fool's over yet? Enough already.

You'll never win the NCAA pool you pick with your heart. Pitt, you've done it to me again.

Not exactly "springing" forward. More like crawling.

Recovering from hooping class, where you are not allowed to say "I can't."

Trying to fix the oven. Making a 3rd dog out of the amount of dog hair that was under the stove.

It's a good thing I learned to drive in Pittsburgh. People here don't have a clue what real winter driving is like.


That's my "Best of" for Twitter. Go on, click over and follow me. It'll get better, I swear.

There's One Main Reason I Don't Think I Could Be a Vegetarian

Lobster.


(Sick quantity of lobster in this shot prepared by Chef Mote, October 2003.)

What do you call a vegetarian who eats seafood? I could do that, I really think I could. I don't think I'd need chicken or pork or beef if I could still have fish.

Seafood just somehow seems morally OK. I mean we're talking about eating things that live in shells that we dig up from the ocean. And big bugs. Plus they are ridiculously delicious.

I could give up things with faces though. Except fish. But is that technically a face? If you cannot see 2 eyes at once maybe it's not a face.

Dylan Moran's take on vegetarianism is one I think I could handle. Except for the part about the faces. (The whole thing is funny, but this is at 2:10.)

Twitter and Photocanvas: Part 1

I'm not sure exactly how long I've been on Twitter, but it hasn't been too long. I've only got 50 followers. I think the highest number of followers that anyone I follow has is 486,094. That's Al Gore. For someone with so many followers you'd think he put a little more effort into it. I mean, if you're going to say you are on Twitter and you are famous, at least make an effort. Plus he only follows 7 people, which I'm sure must be one of the biggest discrepancies between followers and followees you'll find.

I'm not sure how most of the people who follow me found me, but clearly they started following me just so I'd follow them. I 'm pretty sure they are the same people who tell you it's rude to not follow people if they follow you. I want to be a polite user of social media, so I dutifully follow them. Some I'm glad I follow, others not so much. A few I have unfollowed because their constant tweets were clogging things up for me. Maybe if my number of followers grows dramatically I'll decide to screw the politeness and only follow people I really want to follow.

This post isn't really supposed to be about Twitter, but the way it came about was because of Twitter. Somehow @photocanvas started following me, so I politely followed him back. Well, a while ago he tweeted:

Attention Bloggers new deal free 8x10 canvas for blog roll link and blog post about the canvas once you receive it first 20 to @ me

So I quickly replied. Something for free, plus a subject for a blog post? Perfect. Plus it's a pretty generic request, just asking for a blog post about something. I've probably already fulfilled the agreement by just what I've already written about it, so I could technically stop here I think.

I would feel pretty guilty about stopping here, though, so I will do a full review. That will be part 2 of this post, since I've had the start of this in my drafts for a few weeks already at this point, plus it's already way long and more about Twitter than the photo canvas. Stay tuned--part 2 coming soon. (My definition of "soon" being a completely subjective and undefined length of time.)

Indoor Gardening Isn't Really My Thing

Before you view the picture I took today of one of my indoor plants, I'd first like to refresh your memory of the overflowing bounty that was my vegetable garden of 2008:


And don't forget these:


Given those results, you'd think my indoor plants would look halfway decent. Not so much.


I'm not quite sure how this plant has managed to stay alive for the past 5 years. It's pretty resilient, obviously, since it needs to recover from this near-death state on a regular basis. Once you notice it looking like this, all you ned to do is dump a lot of water on it and within a day it looks normal. Vibrant, even.

Please note that the state of this plant should not be viewed as a reflection of the effectiveness of the aqua globe-(as seen on tv)-that you see. Turns out that you need to fill those with water on a regular basis in order for them to work. Maybe if I had 8 or so in this plant they'd do the job.

Terrifying Hiccups

I don't think that it is uncommon for dogs to be afraid of loud noises. Thunderstorms and July 4th are nightmares for my almost 13-year old mutt Gypsy. She can sense a thunderstorm coming hours before you hear a thing. Once it starts she quivers and pants the entire time--while standing on top of you, no matter if you are sitting in the couch, on a dining room chair, or sleeping in bed. Hitting rumble strips while riding in the car is a close second to thunder and lightning. Luckily the noise is brief and forgotten relatively quickly.

But nothing strikes fear into Gypsy's heart like my 10-year old daughter with a case of the hiccups. Last night I was on the couch, and I heard a faint hiccup from the kitchen. The next thing I knew I had a 55 pound quivering, panting mess climbing onto me. The shaking was so strong that the entire couch was vibrating. Even though I immediately banished the hiccupping kid upstairs, it still took Gyps a good 20 minutes to calm down.

I tried googling to see if the fear of hiccups was something other dogs experience. Apparently lots of dogs and puppies GET hiccups. But if other dogs also are completely terrified when they hear human hiccups, no one is writing about it on the internet. Except me.

My Blackberry Travels With Me....

My answers to the Plinky question "Describe the contents of your purse." I'm not sure which is more boring: my answers, or no post at all. I'm really just testing Plinky out, so maybe with a better question I'll generate a decent post one of these days.

Blackberry
Because just like everyone else, I think bad things will happen if I don't always have it with me. Just in case.

Wallet
For ID and credit cards, and my daughter's picture. Certainly not to hold cash.

Ibuprofen
Can't live without it.

Tums
See ibuprofen answer.

Tissues, gum, lipstick, mirror, checkbook
Required contents for most purses I think.