Psst..I'm still here...

I have no idea why I stopped writing. I actually stopped writing in my journal awhile ago too, right around this same time. Me, not writing...that's a new thing. I don't know what I'm missing or what I should be doing instead.

Everyone has Facebook now (I am too old for MySpace, I've decided), but I'm not one of those people that checks it like ten times an hour.

Mostly I just wanted to write about how cold and still it is out right now. The moon, at 3/4 on the wane is just coming up in the northeast, and there is frost on the car windshields. Our neighbors have parked their snow shovels out beside their door, which reminds me to do the same. Snow is still aways off but it's sort of a tradition now.

The traditions this year are done until Christmas comes. King Richard's Faire, the Topsfield Fair, climbing up the Manitou to view the surrounding towns, going to Salem for ghost stories and good food.

Not much else to say, but hopefully, I will come back soon.

Olympics update

What is it with the Olympic commentators for the US? They are so snide about the athletes, no country or athlete seems safe. Just now they were talking about how the Romanian gymnastics team isn't as good as in years past, like years past (think Nadia Comaneci-as in 1976 Olympics). The woman commentator actually said, "Now I look at the Romanian team during practice and they are standing around the chalk board, just chatting...the intensity just isn't there. It's really a shame, an end of an era." Uh hello? You can make champions if you're willing to treat people terribly, or give them fantastic perks at the price of living hundreds of miles away from their family and homes, perks no one else gets in a poor country with a corrupt government (let's face it, every government is corrupt in its own way), drive them to their breaking point. Of course, you get champions then. But at what price?

If this is supposed to be about peace and setting aside differences, and friendly competition...jeez.

First impressions of China Olympics

I never realized how corrupt the Olympics are. Quick example, I just learned from the parade of nations commentary that the nation of Bahrain allows people to pay the government to become Bahrainian citizens so they can become Olypmic athletes for that country. That's handy if you don't make your nation's qualifying teams, because you can just buy your way into the Olympics.

These Olympics are so contradictory. They want us to believe that China loves and wants to share its rich history, but known as advanced and trendy. They are showing the worst way for those two things to coexist.

I hate to admit I was impressed by the opening ceremonies.

I like this picture

I got this photo from this website that I found on Dooce's website.

It doesn't have a name, so I called it "Cupcake Head."

Sports suck (Translation: why Dan and I can't ever seem to go to Boston)

Why is it that every time Dan and I plan to do something special, the local team of junkie/thug/criminals wins a shiny metal pot that the city of Boston feels the need to wave around in public to a bunch of fat drunks that are yelling, "We won!" when they did nothing more than shovel nachos into their food-holes, watch television and then run around outside tipping over cars and starting fires? (Okay, so last night, there wasn't any, so far as I know, cases of that, but there has been in the past for the baseball and football teams many times in the past, at least.)

(Translation: I'm pissed that Dan and I wanted to go into Boston on our first wedding anniversary, during the day to have some fun walking around, eating good food and relaxing on the Common, instead we couldn't go because we would have had to deal with Red Sox fans winning a World Series after 80-some-odd years. Now, Dan finally has a weekday off, and again, we plan to go into Boston for the day, and the Celtics win their first championship in 22 years, which means we can't do a Duck Tour, the first for both of us despite being lifelong MA residents.)

(Translation: Boston is a hole. Sports of any type suck thanks to the "athletes" who get paid to hit a ball with various sticks, throw a ball to one another and run real fast, only to squander their outrageous fortunes on cars, broads, crime and lawyers, never solving any environmental/societal problems, never curing any diseases, never fully contributing to the wellness of society.)

On a good note, I have nothing bad to say about the Duck Tour business. They called us the day before (today) to let us know the trip is canceled, and that they will refund the credit card in full, so we have time to replan tomorrow, and get our money back.

Gmail sucks

Does anyone know how to properly use gmail? Tell me, does this make any sense:

I send an email to Person A. A copy of the sent email goes into the sent folder. Now, say I sent Person A something and I've used the label option in Gmail to call it "Person A emails." So I put archive that email. Now there is a copy of it in both the Sent box and the Archive "Person A emails." Two emails.

So now say I'm the efficient, ordered type. And I want to have an empty Sent box, but keep the email I sent to Person A. If I delete it from the Sent box, and then empty the Trash, the email goes away completely from both the "Person A emails" archive and the Sent box.

What the hell? It's like if I had a stack of folders marked A to Z and I put a copy of something in both Folder A and Folder B, then go back a year later and want to put those in Folder Z, what I would do is throw away one, and keep the other copy and put it in the Z folder. One copy, in one folder. Just like one email in one archive. Not a folder of sent crap, and an archive full of crap. That's TWO crap piles.

Are you telling me this is the best Gmail could come up with? Even hotmail didn't do it that way. But hotmail was starting to reject emails from friends of mine, counting them as Spam. Can anyone say "AOL nightmare?"

Seriously, can anyone give me a quick lesson in gmail?

Why there will never be world peace (Or: The theory that cubicles make people crazy is actually true.)

I found myself laughing out loud at some of these notes on this website.

(http://www.passiveaggressivenotes.com/)

It reminds me of all the notes I've ever left and complaint letters I've written over the years.