Photo Mania

Mayhem - did I tell you he's back on restriction? Yeah, FOUR D's on a progress report will do that to you. Good thing he's cute, eh?

Bug wanted to dye his hair black. It's a little blue and kind of elfin, but I think those are pluses in his book. He got A+'s in both of his classes! Yay! We like adult high school!

Wasabi says, "Where are mah eyes?"

Tallulah says, "Treats please!"

Kira says, "But I'm not even yours!"

The Ninja Princessa says, "Yay! I'm off restriction! I can play video games for the first time since February!"

Action shot of Havoc. And a close up of the dimple.

Linus on the porch with a look of "Quoi?"

Bet from faaaaaar away. Obviously I hadn't figured out the zoom yet.

Chaos being Calvin (will post more in this series tomorrow because they are pretty funny) and also him snuggling with Tallulah on my bed.

The kids brought me tortellini in bed (b/c I don't like breakfast foods). They were cute and silly and I love them to bits!!

Guess what I got for Mother's Day?? (And if you didn't guess cute pink camera then dude, what's wrong with you?) Peace.

Serious Tool User

Find more photos like this on NaBloPoMo


I took a bunch of new photos today to post to NaBlo and they made a little slideshow for me. Isn't this cool? I'm going to make an actual Who's Who post with static pictures sometime soon. The 100 Things post is two years old and needs updating. I think a visual guide would be fun. So consider this a preview.

In other news:
The Bat Mitzvah was incredible. Anna has a beautiful voice. She's been studying and training one on one with a woman from her synagogue specifically for this day since she was in the third grade. Her Torah portion was exquisite. Her smile as she sang the last few bars was radiant. I could tell her mother was tickled pink. It was a wonderful service, very inclusive. The only hitch came when they processed the Torah and started on the side of the room that had no idea what to do. Even that was ok, though. The sanctuary (temple?) was architecturally stunning. Beautiful woods, the Ark made from gorgeous lapis tiles, soaring beamed ceiling with windows up high letting lots and lots of light in. It was spacious and intimate at the same time. What a beautiful place to worship. I love sacred spaces. The reception afterwards had yummy food and great conversations with other parents. It was a lovely experience.
Peace.

WWJB?

I absolutely LOVE this picture from the site What Would Jesus Blog. It seems like it would be irreverent, but it isn't really. I think my old boss (the dean of the Episcopal cathedral) would appreciate this image immensely. It's that living word thing, don't you know. I just love it. I'm not sure I quite understand the site as a whole (since I don't listen to enough music to know what it's talking about) but I enjoy the way the author (JC? :D) rides right on the line between deeply respectful and utterly outrageous. Absolute gem to find tonight. Thank you Terminally Cute for having this crazy link on your blogroll.
Peace.

Icons, Badges, And Buttons - Oh My!

You may have noticed a little more clutter in my right side bar recently. I've found two wonderful sites (groups? what exactly is the right blog word for these eddies in the ether stream?) I may have to move my blogroll (and I sure as heck need to update it!) so I have room for these other ways to connect. I have enjoyed surfing other people's blogrolls but recently I've been finding myself clicking on their button affiliations more often. I'd love to hear what works for other people. Do you zing around on your own? Do you follow links (blinks or blogrolls)? Do you like buttons and badges better? Comment at me! :D


Now here's what I've found:
The first new gem is my "Passionate Blog" badge. It connects to Magpie Girl's Small is Beautiful manifesto which starts by saying, "We believe stories are valuable, no matter how matter how many people read them." How can you not like that?? If you have time, check out their blog roll or their Saturday prompts. I found this just when I was needing some reaffirmation about baby steps. I took a few steps ignoring whether I was being watched (evaluated, judged) or not and now my training plan is zipping along and I have some sketches for my quilt project. Sometimes it takes a nudge here and there!

The second delight is the "Wishcasting" icon. I loves me some magic. Her concept? To provide a safe space to launch wishes. She encourages you to be a magic maker and a wish tender by inviting you to offer up your own wish and to support someone else's. Communal wishing! Fantastico! (*I'm not sure why social bookmarking strikes me as silly but communal wishing thrills me down to my taproots. If I were consistent, I'd be boring.) Check it out. Send a wish into the world - and hey, while you're there, look for my wish and give it some oomph in the comments. Easy, fun, magical, brilliant.

The third thing (which lest you think (again) that I can't count, isn't really considered new since I already told you to look for it) is my NaBlo button. I am having gobs o' fun with NaBloPoMo! Click my badge over there and see. It's connectivity with zero pressure. I've added a dozen interesting blogs to my "I want to read more of THIS" list and I've met several new friends. Me! Anxious, tentative, bag of self-doubts me - making friends out of strangers. Cool, creative, insightful, fascinating strangers, no less! It is absolutely a testament to how telling our stories (e.g. blogging) can bring us together - which I didn't know when I started nearly two years ago. (Hey - blogversary coming up on the 26th! Can you believe it?)

Recap:
Talk to me today! Tell me about your linking, surfing, blog winnowing habits. (<--This is known throughout the (blogging) world as "begging for comments" and it's considered a tad bit unsavory so don't make me take it to the next level, my dearest internetters.)
Admire my icons. *preens* Make a wish. Think Small, be inspired.
Venture forth to NaBlo.
And as always,
Peace.

In Which I Am A n00b

I'm learning how to use some blog tools and I just clipped this map from the Washington Post with Clipmarks. Yay me. Tool user and all that.

clipped from www.washingtonpost.com

This whole technology plug-in, upgrade thing is a lot like washing the baseboards. You wash the baseboards and see how filthy the carpet is, so now you have to vacuum and shampoo the carpet. Then with the floor and the baseboards so clean, the walls look like ass so you have to clean and then repaint those. Then the blinds look dingy and so on and so on. Today (after my first post when I was trying to write other stuff and do housework) Linus came in and said he'd found this plug-in that I would really like because it would easily and intuitively let me clip bits (pictures, text, or video) from websites to email or blog. Mind you, he'd already tracked Libray Thing down for me this morning. Then, while installing ClipMarks there was the option of having the sources for anything you clip automatically saved in your del.icio.us bookmarks. My buddy Ray has been trying to get me hooked into this del.icio.us thing for...I don't know. How long has it been around? Probably that long and maybe even longer, because like Linus, Ray is a serious computer nerd and is always in on stuff before it even happens. Anyway - I've never quite understood what it was or what the point is. The idea of social bookmarking makes me giggle (bookmarks - so social - wouldn't want to have any of that anti-social, introverted, solitary bookmarking going on) but I like the idea of saving the source of my clips. So we went through another whole sign up thing. Then to make sure it all worked, I had to find some stuff to clip and save (like coupons - only prettier and um, more web-y.) I went to the Washington Post website to find a good article - only to have to register again there. "Re-gi-stray - shun time, c'mon! There's a party going on right here..."

Now I am all plugged-in, signed up, and ready to be social with my books and bookmarks and clips. My life is an open blog. Only now there is a notice at the top of my toolbar that informs me I am following (0) clippers. I am also told that no one is following me and I have no favorite clipper. Let's see - who is the most popular web clipper?! I should follow them! How many followers do I have? Oh no, not enough. Must. Clip. More. How do developers not laugh their heads off when they design this stuff? The virtual world is psuedo-social at best. Linus (bless his heart) keeps trying to explain the concept of a web 2.0 world to me. I'm assimilating as much as I can as fast as I can, but I do realize that there is a lot in the ether that is passing me by. I smile and nod when I hear about easy share, sharewear, bookmarking as a social activity, tag clouds (which morph into searchable, expandable tag bundles sometimes for no apparent reason), and netpubs and bl@h, bl@h, bl@h. (<--That last bit is my little leetspeak joke.)

Which brings us right to the second post I was going to write AFTER I finished all that other stuff on my list but which I will now write BEFORE getting to the stuff on my list. (See this? This is the stuff on my list not getting done. Ever. Clean socks? Highly overrated.)

The other night at supper, it was Mayhem's turn to talk. (We take turns. So civilized.) Mayhem was telling about his new Adidas and about the salesman we talked to about fantasy football the whole time we were in the store. (Sidenote: the salesman knew considerably more about fantasy football than he did about selling shoes. I'm the one who used the measure thingy to size up Mayhem's foot, I'm the one who read the tags about what the shoes were made of and how to clean them, and I'm the one who pointed out that they were on sale.) Mayhem's comment after saying this guy was leading his league by 100 points was, "That guy was poning." Uh, what? Mayhem, by way of explanation said, "He totally poned his league." I was trying to figure out what cornbread has to do with fantasy football.

Me: What are you saying? Spell that word.
Mayhem: What word?
Me: Poned.
Mayhem: P-W-N-3-D.
Me: What?
Mayhem (louder this time): P-W-N-3-D.
Linus: (sounds of pumpkin soup being snorted out of his nose)
Me: What do you mean? That's not a word. Three-d? Like three dimensional?
Linus: It's from leetspeak. There are no vowels. Hackers used numbers.
Mayhem (speaking at the same time as Linus - and thereby dashing my earlier claims of being civilized): It's total domination. You don't use vowels.

At this point in the conversation, I am utterly confused. (Please note I did not have a handy dandy little link to follow to find out what the heck leetspeak was. And not only were Linus and Mayhem trying to explain the lack of cornbread connection at the exact same time, but Chaos and Bug were cackling, making it even harder to hear.) World domination, hackers, spelling without vowels, leeches speaking? WTF?

Apparently I have become my mother. I was probably Mayhem's age when my mother said at dinner one night, "Mick? Mick who? You mean Mickey Mouse? I don't think his lips are all that big." We have never let her live it down. I did eventually understand the explanation and derivation of the pseudo word "pwn3d" and upon further research, found that I particularly like the urban dictionary entry on pwnage. Too little, too late, I fear in terms of the balance in my cool points account. I am overdrawn. I have zero credit in the video culture currency that is required to operate in my teenagers' world. I have been relegated to permanent n00b status. I'd like to think that they'll still let me visit their world and even that in a decade or two, they'd consider emigrating. For now, I think I'll just camp out here in the borderlands. With the other dinosaurs.
Peace.

Error Message Writers Or Philosophers?

While webcrawling today I was told by a numbered error message:

"Sorry, but you are looking for something that is not there."

Cheeky bugger.

Distraction

Wednesday I learned how to solve the Rubik's Cube. Yay! It's been a mere 26 years since the one my Uncle Paul gave me drove me up the wall of frustration. Before the rejoicing gets out of hand, I should probably mention that I didn't figure it out all by myself. I just figured out the solution guide. That is enough cube accomplishment for me. Apparently this sentiment ranks me low down on the cube mania scale. I see on the official website that "cube fans everywhere" are invited to various competitions (Chicago for the US Cube Open and Hungary for the World Championships). Cube community members can chat (about cubes? all cubes all the time?) They can even send cube greeting cards to one another. For the serious cubers (maybe the ones who wore their cubes out?) there is now a virtual Rubik's cube online. Who knew?

In further avoidance behavior news - I have spent the better part of my computer time this week being distracted by random links. I have come across links to all kinds of things I didn't know about like the fan fiction genre of femmeslash, the gender neutral pronoun het, and the very interesting term tranzi which is being used by people I don't agree with to mean things I didn't know it meant. All very hmmmmmmm.

I have also been writing. You'd think writing and blogging would go hand in glove - and sometimes they do for me - but this week between the lure of links and non-blog writing, I've used up all my computer time. Fortunately or not, I have had plenty of time to worry about my son, Chaos, who is away at bible camp. He comes home today. Will I be able to tell if he's been born again the minute he gets off the bus? I imagine all kinds of horrible things like the youth leader telling me how proud they are that they got him to speak in tongues. (Given Chaos' interesting way with language - it's the most probable of his spiritual gifts if he were to lean in a pentecostal direction, don't you think?) In reality, I think Chaos is relatively impervious to religious fervor. Now sneak attacks of the hormonal variety? Not so confident about his skills deflecting those. How pretty are the girls at camp, do you think?
Peace.

Connection

I've been completely self-absorbed for the last week. Lilycentric. There has been so much to do, so very much to do. My poor friends. All they've heard is a frantic whine from me. I'm excited. I'm exhausted. I'm exhausting!

Last night and this morning I decided to go traipsing around the blogosphere. I hadn't been doing much visiting recently. I realized how nice it felt to be connected again to people I don't know! Isn't that weird? But it's true - it felt good to be reacquainted with the details of familiar strangers' lives. I lurk a lot. I follow the progress of new quilts and new babies. I sympathize with other folks who are training or selling their houses too. I read about travels and drool over gorgeous pictures of Australia and Japan. I get inspired by the books people are reading and make mental notes to add to my "Read Next" list. And this morning I went to see Neilochka at Citizen of the Month and found out that Sophia's next surgery is today. Perhaps right now (although since they're West Coast, that would be very early.) He is funny and odd and I love his blog. I immediately sent my thoughts and prayers and then almost as immediately worried that I shouldn't have said anything because they don't know me. But then I think, that's the point! He blogs - he puts it all out there and most of the people that read his blog were strangers until they started reading and commenting. I have to keep reminding myself that that is how blogging works. It makes total sense until I apply it to me. Then I feel like my comment of good wishes might be seen as strange and unwelcome. What is that about?? Anywaaaaaay...prayers, good vibes, and general lurking have gone on this morning. I feel connected. I love being connected. I think it is a good and joyful thing (always and evermore) to be connected in kind and random ways. If you don't have your morning's quota of brain/heart power already allocated, please spend a moment or two thinking healing thoughts for Sophia. Then we'll all be doubly connected.

Now I have to go paint some more [curse word, curse word] trim. Not so joyful. Yet, if you are reading this, then you're connected to me as I paint (and curse). And that's pretty darn cool. What would be cooler is if you could pick up that brush right there ...
Oh well - I guess there are limits on this here ether connection.

Peace.

Peace.

Look What I Can Do!

A Touch of Technophobia

It is amazing how much I love the idea of new technology and how much I resist (out of abject terror) the implementation of it in my life. I get completely hung up on being able to "do it right" (aka perfectly) before I take step one. It is paralyzing.

When I am faced with incorporating a new technology, say, a cell phone that takes pictures and plays an obnoxious array of customized ring tones, my amazing procrastination abilities come to the fore . I delay and pussy-foot around all the while expressing delight, excitement, and enthusiasm for said new technological wonder. (Can ya' tell I'm Southern?!) I am loathe to acknowledge (outloud) how inadequate I feel when faced with a small (yet expensive), time-saving (hahahahaha), culturally imperative device. I can think of things that must be looked up (like which obscure tv show has the theme song that goes hmm, la la, be dah). I can think of people to poll ("What do you think of my new V-tech turbo 1.2 Qhz titanium hulled communication modulator?") I can find magazine articles to read comparing column upon column of incomprehensible features found in all the latest doohickeys like mine (like mine but different - probably exactly like mine but cheaper, more powerful, and "easier to use" if only I could decipher the symbol key for the rating categories!). I can refuse to leave my house therefore obviating the need for a cell phone at all! The list of things I can find to do while I'm fixing to get ready to think about getting started to use my new can't-live-without-it (although I did until just now) thingy grows and grows. It is my defense mechanism for putting off the inevitable moment I start finding out all of the things I CAN'T (but should be able to) do.

For instance, during the recent cell phone replacement ordeal, I discovered that what I can't do is turn my cell phone on when I want to make a call (or turn it off so that it stays off when I'm in the movie theater.) I can't set up my voicemail, let alone check it. (Though I'm tempted to take that one off the list as it's turned out to be an unexpectedly pleasant lack.) I can't take pictures or save them as "wall paper" on the"desk top" of my PHONE! (When exactly did phones get walls and desks??) I can't set the alarm feature to remind me of appointments or wake me up on time while traveling, but somehow I did manage to set the silly thing to go off at precisely 4:13 (a.m. - natch!) every day.

I should say for the record that I am married to a man who would be the first to sign up to have experimental neural enhancing cyber thingies implanted in his brain. He was in "IT" when he was 8 - and they didn't even have "IT" then - just a bunch of brilliant nerds who took apart toasters and put them back together in a way that enabled them to hack into the Dartmouth something something network. I broke out in hives the first time someone IM'd me (two years ago)(even though I'd set it up, pinged them, and sat awaiting a response).
You know, I wasn't always haunted by phones and panicked by messages. In fact, I used to think of myself as quite savvy and technologically daring. And then I had children. Wee bairns who, even though pre-verbal, were never the less able to make my attempts at electronic media manipulation look pathetically clumsy compared to their graceful assimilation. My children as a herd, absorb new technology. Literally - they glom over it like amoebas (amoebae? amoebi? See? I'm doing it already! I am fixing to stop writing this - my very first post - because I can't remember the difference between Latin and Greek plural forms nor from which of those two languages the word 'amoeba' originates. I feel compelled to stop and look it up or apologize for not already knowing it - but I'm not going to do either because the POINT is....) My children suck new things up into their tentacles and voila! They instantly understand what to do even if the new technological widget has twelve different control buttons. Presumably, the Geeky Widget Inc. product development staff understands that my children do, in fact, have tentacles and are therefore fully capable of using twelve buttons (and a random number of joystick toggle hoojer-ma-boppers) simultaneously.

For a while there, I was under the delusion that as soon as I took the time away from my reading/crafty hobbies/wincing at the decibel level of the many media machines propagating in our "family" room, that I, too, would quickly intuit the how's and wherefore's of the modern electronic world. I'm a sci-fi fan for heaven's sake! Larry Niven! Vernor Vinge! William Gibson!!! I can get this stuff.

And the machine universe replied, "Silly rabbit! That is the equivalent of saying that because you loved Snoopy as a kid, flying his dog house while pretending to be the Red Baron, the FAA should give you a pilot's license!" Fact - at the age of three, my youngest could x,square, and triangle circles around me. I've never been able to catch up. (Digression - it's exactly like that lesson in compound interest over time where the very wise 15 year old puts $5 a month into an account for a year and leaves it completely alone and then the 30 year old schmuck who didn't start saving early enough slaves to put $500 a week into savings for the next 30 years and he still can NEVER catch up!! That's the kind of gap I'm talking about!)

But there's HOPE!! And maybe it's the technology equivalent of winning the lottery. I have discovered a small loophole in the cyberese small print of my official contract with Technophobes R U. Daily, I already sit smack dab in the middle of quilt studio cum office - typing away at my computer. In all the time that I save by not being able to play Crimson Skies and Robot Death Monkeys, I do research. I write letters. I journal. I blog without blogging. I'm a master at blogging without blogging! And now I'm blogging! Getting photos and linky things attached in all the right places may be more challenging - but I'm up to it. After all, what's the worst that can happen? (Now mind you, I can usually come up with a bazillion and two horrible things that can happen as a result of any action or non-action I may take but for once... I can't. ) Is this a sign of things to come? Is the grip of technophobia loosening? Have I finally taken my sweet hubby's advice (delivered in his best Scooby-Doo voice) to 're-rax'? Is blogging really all it's cracked up to be? Dare I dream it to be so? (The answers to this and other completely irrelevant questions will undoubtedly be the subject of future posts.)

Peace.