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Even though I’m exactly three weeks early, I’m declaring my resolutions today. It’s never to soon to get started on positive changes in your life, right? In no particular order: 1. I resolve to be a better friend. There are so many friendships I have let slip away. Drift is a natural thing in friendships, of course, but I seem to be quite good at letting people disappear for no real reason other than friendship laziness. Facebook has made this point abundantly clear by bringing people back into my life. Still, clicking on the like button or dropping a comment doesn’t count. I will tryRead More →

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In: Technoculture
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I now own a brand new Amazon Kindle, acquired just before Thanksgiving in a recent tech splurge. Reviews all over the net are fairly accurate. The weight, screen’s readability, size, forward and backward buttons feel great. I don’t like the five-way toggle button or the lack of lighting to read in the dark. I don’t care about lack of a touch screen since I despise fingerprints and smudges in almost OCD proportions. I found a cute Vera Bradley bag that fits the Kindle perfectly. I’m happy. DRM is an annoyance. It’s true, you give up “owning” the book due to intellectual property rights. It’s inconvenientRead More →

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In: Gratitudes
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1. Food, of course. Good food that you don’t normally eat. 2. The people who make the food. 3. Although I’m not the religious type, and I sometimes get impatient with people who are, I am thankful for their genuine expression of thanksgiving gratitude before the meal. 4. I’m thankful that my husband drove the whole friggen way to Florida. 5. The break from school. Much needed before hell week next week. 6. The cats. They are gracious enough to stay at home and poop and pee in their litter box (we hope). ∞

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I’m posting from my new Motorola Droid. It’s frustratingly wonderful. Or wonderfully frustrating. The WordPress app seems to be working well; the keyboard is easier. Immersion seems to be the key. My typical typing speed is 125-150 words per minute, not as fast as sentences form in my head, but fast enough to prevent frustration. Blogging on Droid is painfully slow. It is helping me improve texting skills, though, as a latecomer to that game. The new iPhone commercials inspired me to give up the granny phone and enter the new century. In particular, the ad for an augmented reality app caught my attention. YouRead More →

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In: Pop Culture
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Ever since Whoopi’s Direct From Broadway show aired on HBO many years ago, she’s held a special place in my heart. In the original HBO special, her character Fontaine, who is a junkie, goes to the Anne Frank house. This skit is a profound comment on race and humanity. I was excited to see Whoopi join The View, which is one of my favorite shows to watch when I’m not really watching TV.  I was terribly disappointed in her “rape rape” comment about Roman Polanski, for which she’s being skewered all over the net, and deservedly so. Still, she’s got an incredible talent for raisingRead More →

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Things I am grateful for… 1. V. So far, so good. It has replaced Dollhouse, Sarah Connor Chronicles, Battlestar Galactica, and Heroes. 2. Thanksgiving. Food. Vacation. Time with family. What else do you need? 3. The colorful scarves that I saved for twenty years are now back in fashion. ∞

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I am behind on… 1. Grading. SO MUCH GRADING. And it’s not even the crunch time yet. 2.  Cleaning. I never finished my 40 steps/40 days summer goal of cleaning my office. I have piles of crap all over the place and everything I dusted now has layers of dust again. Depressing. 3. Reading. My “to be read” pile is huge. 4. Health care. Dentist’s appointment and a dermatology appointment. For months now. 5. lolcats. Caught up on lolcats, goggies, lookalikes, and punditkitchen. Behind on Engrish and Failblog. Can’t catch up. At all. I’m trying, though, which shows my priorities are straight. 6. Dollhouse (therebyRead More →

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My childhood nickname was Binie. This is a huge confession. Still, the net has given me, like everyone else, permission to confess. Binie was short for my middle name, which I will in no way repeat out loud to any living soul. In addition, according to family stories, I somewhat resembled the character “Suzuki Beane” (1961).  Apparently, since I wore jeans with similar turned-up cuffs, and an attitude with similar turned-up edges, the nickname stuck. Suzuki Beane, who lived on Bleeker Street in Greenwich Village, was the child of hipster parents. She befriended a square named Henry, and the two of them ditched school toRead More →

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In: Politics, This Internet Life!
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Huffington Post has lost it. The site contains story after story about Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, and Sarah Palin. Sometimes other people are added to the mix — all the usual suspects. To be fair, they add balance with Jon Stewart, Michael Moore, and Arianna herself. On the whole, though, that site is obsessed with right wing bloviation. This obsessive coverage just gives the blowhards more limelight, attention, and power. It’s like feeding trolls. Sarah Palin is now promoting her book, which means she’s making the media circuit. Ultimately this translates to more Palin for us to look forward to on HuffPo. They will documentRead More →

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In: Humor, This Internet Life!
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Googlism is a fun site that tells you what Google “thinks” about you by posting short excerpts of Google search results on your name (or whatever). The site is fun, flattering, and insulting. Google squelched Googlism’s capabilities by preventing the application from gathering fresh data. It limits the results to before 2004. Googlism seems fairly harmless, so the limitation seems silly. Below are some of the Googlism’s for “Laura.” I left out the ones that referred to s*perm, c*cks, and other pr0n references (aww, darn!) as well as some that were pointless. laura is new laura is a racist and a total phony laura isRead More →