More Technorati Stuff

I am now in the top 2,500,000 blogs. I'm catching up to Bill, who's way up in the stratosphere at top 2,000,000 blogs.

Registering with Technorati

Technorati Profile

Fun Quiz

This was fun. I got 9/20. Some of them I should have gotten right, others were me being dumb.

Surprisingly, I did well on one of the colors questions. I did terribly on question 5 (the answer is wrong!) but I got a perfect score on question 8.

My advice: don't let the clock pressure you. You have more time than you think, so read the question carefully. They are written to trick you.

Use Pot, Lose Weight

It's true! A UK pharma company is looking to test a new drug it developed based on cannabis that reduces hunger.

While some of the 70 different cannabinoids (actual name) in marijuana can stimulate appetite, others can suppress it. Clinical trials are planned for the second half of this year. Sign me up! One problem: there are no other side-effects with this drug. Great. Super. Really. Wow.

The best part of this article? "GW's marijuana plants are grown indoors in a secret location in Southern England." (FYI - 'secret location' = basement of a college student)

Uncle Bill's Blog

Finally, a shout-out to my cousin Bill's Blog: shakespeareteacher.com

It's a great blog about a bunch of cool stuff. I've had some of my favorite political discussions with Bill and loved his Shakespeare reading group. It's highly worth checking out if only for the weekly riddle.

Bill is serious about getting people to his blog. He's registered with technocrati.com and is now in the top 2 million blogs listed. Someday I'll get to doing that myself. Maybe after I do all that home recording I said I would do? Or maybe after I go for that leisurely jog I've been thinking about?

Maybe I'll just think of how nice it would be to register and leave it at that. Besides, I think a 4 person audience is about all this blog can handle. Right Harley/Brian/Bill/Jen?

The Guilt of Extreme Home Makeover

Harley got me into Extreme Home Makeover. This is where a team of designers and builders come to a deserving family and redo their home, giving each person a specially designed room and catering to their specific needs (i.e. making sure it's good if a family member is blind, in a wheelchair, autistic, etc.).

I admit I like the show. Since Lilah was born, I get emotional easily. TV shows that I could shrug off before now make me tear a little (I'll never admit to it, though). I know how much I love my child, so I can relate to others who are trying to take care of their families but having a hard time.

I think the show is great. They do really nice things for families that need it. Sure, it's a staged TV show and the bottom line is still to "make money," but they still do really good things while earning a profit.

I've been watching the show for a while and have seen some families that lost children, spouses, or had serious illness/injury take a toll. But lately, I feel guilty while watching the show because I only care about the families that are REALLY bad off.

You lost your job and had to move to a smaller house? So what? Arthritis? Big deal. One family had a room built dedicated to the memory of their son who died of cancer. Another had a house built for the family to prepare for the husband/father to die of brain tumor. This was real, visible pain that wouldn't be solved by a new house or funky decorations.

So as sick as sounds, I don't watch the shows where the new house is going to make all the difference. I watch to see the families where the problems can never be fixed, where the pain can never go away. I guess it's that I watch the show to see others worse off than me, which helps me appreciate what I have and satisfy this strange, voyeuristic need to witness the terrible reality of others from the comfort of my living room.

Damn it, when does LOST start again?!?

Hiroshima

Found this website with graphic images of Hiroshima. Amazing what a nuclear bomb does to a city. Be careful. If you don't want to see disturbing photos, don't open.

Nicknames for Lilah

Lilah-bear
honey-bear
sweet girl
pretty girl
best girl
girlfriend
little face
big little girl
big girl
sweet thing
boo
booboo

Telecommunications Explained

Stephen Colbert explains why Cingular is changing its name to AT&T. Awesome!

Koy Detmer Fanpage

The prodigal field-goal holder for the Eagles has his very own fansite. What a riot! The first posting on today's page is the funniest, and sums up my emotions quite well:

WHY DID THEY PUNT? I don't get it. Oh by the way, did you know that a hurricane hit N.O.? I sure didn't, that's why I'm so happy the announcers told me EVERY TWENTY SECONDS. This just in: The Saints rebuilt N.O. with their bare hands, and Sean Payton has a 15 inch dick. THANKS, FOX GUYS!

I know New Orleans is having a dream year, and the city is on a comeback from very dark place, but Philly was on a role! We were having a dream year of our own that was stopped, just like Westbrook at the line of scrimmage. I know they are enjoying their success, but I hate that it comes at the expense of Eagles fans. The Giants still suck.

Second Anniversary

Last night was Harley and my second wedding anniversary. We actually celebrated on Friday night after I did 2 days of traveling. It was our first date night! We went to The Palm for steak, since we always go vegetarian; my steak was amazing, like tuna sashimi. It was really the best I’ve ever had. Harley had pasta, but the experience was wonderful. I loved going out again, but especially for steak!

Last night, we just hung out at home. Considering how much I’ve been traveling, hanging out at home was the perfect way to celebrate. At 10:30pm, I fed Lilah and burped her on my chest. She turned her head and stared up at me. I smiled at her and she gave me a huge smile. It was the best! She hung out with me for a good 2 hours, just kicking away while watching the Golden Globes. It was really awesome. I miss her all day, so the nights are important to me.

At midnight I go to bed. Harley says, “Good night! Thank you so much for the anniversary card!” I never got her a card. I know what I need to bring home tonight.

Trey's Guitar for Sale

Check out this website for Languedoc Guitars. This is the soundman for Phish who built all the guitars for Trey. Now that the band isn't touring, he's making a push to sell this model of guitar full-time. I'd recommend reading the piece written by Mike Gordon. I've wanted this guitar for sooo long. At $10,000 a pop, I'm going to keep wanting for quite a while.

Take a look at the website for Abyss Guitars. Don't the guitars on these 2 websites look surprisingly similar? Isn't it creepy??

I Hate Texas

Terrible evening. My 5:30pm flight to Dallas from Newark was delayed 90 minutes. There was no movie on the plane and the guy next to my hogged the arm rest. My Hertz car cost double what the travel agent said it would. My Neverlost didn't work and it had me go all over the state to get to the hotel. Stupid "President George Bush Turnpike" didn't have anyone to break a $1 bill to pay the 40cent toll. Luckily I had the change, but the toll machine didn't register it and I had to go through the toll booth. If I get a ticket, I'll fight it.

The roads in Texas are TERRIBLE. They have huge dips and humps but no warning. The signage is so bad it sent me into a parking lot instead of the freeway entrance. By the time I get to the hotel, it's raining hard - JUST IN TIME for me to get wet walking from the car to the lobby. I'm thirsty and there'ss supposed to be tea in the room, but housekeeping must not have left any cause it ain't here. And for the kicker... the operator called me Ma'am.

All this, and I got to wake at 6:30am. Woohoo. F&*kin' Texas.

EPILOGUE: I tried to get a drink at the vending machines, but the Stupid "President George Bush Turnpike" had taken all my dollar bills. Still, the bar had my favorite beer on tap (Sam Adams Winter Brew) and a few nice people. One was from New Orleans, another a Giants fan, and a bunch from Dallas so we talked about football. They also told me everyone runs the toll booths on the turnpike, and you get 3 free ones. It was really nice, the first nice thing Texas gave me all evening.

Great Trey Anasatio Article

Found this on my lunch break. It's a good article, with some nice info on Trey's new album, the Phish break-up, and his overall philosophy. Glad I read it.

Here's my favorite quote. Sometimes, he drifts off during a song and looks like an invalid. It's creepy, but he plays so weel that you have to forgive him, even love him, for it. This helps explain what that's all about:

"What I'm doing when I'm staring out over the crowd is, I'm listening for the music coming out of the air and then I'm just playing that... And if I look right into the lights, my glasses have moisture on them so they start to break into prisms and stuff and then voom, I'm gone."

My New Year's Resolution

To Eat Healthier

The better I eat, the better I look. My belly will go down, my skin will clear up, and I'll have fewer cavities. I want to be healthier. Eating right is the first change I can make to get me there.

Of course, my first meal of 2007 was a sausage omelet (but I did have whole wheat toast). I followed that up with a healthy dinner of buffalo wings, fried chicken, and breaded mushrooms. It's gonna be a great year!

The New Weird Al Video

White and Nerdy It's surprisingly funny! Not only is the song and video funny, but it's pretty catchy, too. I find myself humming the tune without realizing. The rhymes are varied and intricate, very cool. I think my favorite part is Donnie Osmond, both for what he represents and his dance moves.

I'm not sure if Eminem will admit to being influenced by Weird Al videos, but he should. They have a similar visual vocabulary in all their videos. In any case, Weird Al is definitely using some of Eminem's style, both lyrically and visually, in his new work. And thank God! I was a huge fan when I was 9, but his stuff got too kiddy. Now, it's a little edgy (just a little).

Eminem seems to have given weird Al a new model to follow. But while Eminem makes fun and uses others to get laughs, weird Al still keeps the punchline directly on himself. It's nice, and very much in character with weird Al's sense of satire-as-an-honor. I'm glad that hasn't changed over the years.

Check this out after you watch the video. It's nice to know that today's geek-kids can now embarrass themselves in front of the entire world, instead of just their parents.

Parenting Tip

Make sure that the carrying bar on the infant car is locked and the child is strapped in BEFORE you pick up the chair with the baby in it. Otherwise, the chair could suddenly shift vertically and the baby could fall out and right on the floor. Not that this happened, of course. This is hypothetical. This in no way happened to me at 2:14am on Thursday night. And I didn't feel terrible, either. Nope.

On a completely separate note, Lilah doesn't cry right away when she gets hurt. She looks at you with this "What the hell was that?" look, which morphs into a "Why would you do that to me?" right before she starts to wail. It's so sad and so cute all at the same time.

One more thing... be VERY careful when moving the baby during a nap. The disturbed wake-up is extremely ugly to witness and requires special attention by Mommy. This can cause the offending father a great amount of grief.