iPod Wallpaper 3

-- Post From My iPod, Astronaut

Eureka! It’s Big Jesus!

A friend and I went for a mini-vacation to Eureka Springs this week.  I had never been there before which is surprising to me, since it is only 2 hours away.  It’s named after the many springs that are nestled in the nooks and crannies of the hills in which it is set.  Because the spring water was believed to have healing properties, the town sprung up around them.  Now, it’s just a tourist town, but all of the old buildings are still standing, and they are beautiful.  It was raining most of the time we were there, and, shamefully, I didn’t manage to get many photos.

My very favorite part of the whole trip, however, was visiting the Christ of the Ozarks statue, to which I fondly refer to as “Big Jesus.”  I love Big Jesus.  I absolutely love him.  Big Jesus stands on a hill overlooking downtown Eureka Springs, and from certain spots you can peer up at him through the trees.  Apparently, he was erected in the 60s by Gerald Smith, a religious and political leader, who also is known for his association with white supremacist and anti-Semitic organizations.  For me, that bit of information is delightful.

 

Isn’t he delightful?  Nearby, there was a supposed 10x10 section of the Berlin Wall outside of a small chapel.  I found its proximity to the Big Jesus to be the perfect location, and the artwork decorating it is my favorite.

Ich habe kein Angst!!! 

Those photos turned out well, despite the fact that it was raining at the time.  Later, when we finally made it to our motel, we discovered our room had a delightful mural on the wall of a forest scene with little animals and the like.  Unfortunately, I can’t do it justice.  I took a picture, but it didn’t turn out.  I did, however, take a really cool night picture of our motel, so if you are ever in Eureka Springs, you should totally stay here, just so you can laugh at the mural painted at the wall.  Other than that, the motel didn’t have much going for it with the exception that it was cheap. 

Anyway, I’m back from vacation.  Back to my studying.  It’s only a little bit sad.

Remembering the Delights of my Childhood…

Today, I was randomly talking about the Badlands of South Dakota with a friend, and as soon as she said the word, “badlands”, a song lyric from a time long passed popped into my head.

From the badlands came the killer/ lived by the knife and the gun…

The first line of my very favorite song when I was a child.  I could almost remember the whole thing as I tried to sing it to her, but parts were missing, so I looked it up on YouTube.

I went to the Jim Stafford theatre in Branson, MO when I was little, and I loved it.  My dad bought me a cassette at intermission.  I listened to that tape a million times.  It’s probably the one album I’ve listened to the most in my life.  It eventually was passed down to my little brother and sister and they listened to it as much as I did.  I don’t know what eventually became of the cassette, but we sometimes sing the songs in the car on family vacations. 

As a bonus:

When I was looking up Cow Patti on YouTube, I found this clip I saw once on a TV show about news bloopers.  It stuck with me, and I immediately recognized the title, Black and Gus.  It has been the cause of much laughter in my family.

And with that, I must bid you a fine farewell for I am off to bed. 

My iPod Wallpaper: 2

Cute!


-- Post From My iPod, Astronaut

Fish!

We went fishing up at the pond today since it was such a beautiful day outside. I caught 11 fish, and we ended up with a whole basket of fish. It was really fun. I love fishing.

Usually, my dad cleans and fillets all of the fish, but today he taught me how. If you ever need any fish filleted, call me. I'm your fish cleaning girl.

Now, I'm sleepy and need a nap.

-- Post From My iPod, Astronaut

Writing Stories in my Head

I’ve been writing stories in my mind for a few weeks now.  They just come to me, and I entertain them for a bit and then let them slide away out of my grasp.  Today, I decided to actually take the time to write one down.  I thought it might be fun to share. 

Left for Dead

The young woman sat out on the front porch of a run-down, tan house. It occurred to the passers-by, if not to the young woman, that the porch might one day collapse taking her to the ground with it. She sat there watching them pass as if it were the only thing in the world she had to do; at that moment it was. As the world passed her by, she sat there in a trance-like state, chain-smoking, and lazily flicking the ash from her cigarette to the porch floor.

She sat on that porch day in and day out for weeks on end. Sometimes wondering if she felt the same as an old, retired spinster who had nothing better to do than sit on the porch and fuss over her many cats. Surely, she convinced herself, that it wasn’t the same, if only for the fact that, in her mind’s eye, those old ladies never sat on the porch smoking, and usually had a broom in hand sweeping the stray leaves onto the sidewalk below, periodically using the broom to chase off stray dogs that hunted her beloved cats.

Lost in thought, the young woman absent-mindedly picked at the frayed armrest of her chair. She wondered how long she could stand doing nothing. It felt as if the world really had passed her by, left her for dead along the side of the road. The pedestrians out on the sidewalk paid as much attention to her as they did the headstones as they walked by the cemetery down the street.

“Left for dead, indeed,” she muttered under her breath as she reluctantly stood from her tattered old chair and headed for the door.

The screen door slammed as she walked into the house, the inside nearly as ill-kempt as the exterior. The young woman picked up a remote, turned on the television, and unceremoniously plopped to the old, plaid couch. The television screamed for her attention, but she paid it as little mind as she had those walking past her house while she sat unmoving on the porch.

Hours passed, her comatose form welcomed death; in fact, she yearned for it, but deep down she knew, even in the depths of her depression, that she was alive. She felt the spark of life, the need for passion, but that passion at the moment lay dormant, lost for all intents and purposes. Time slowly passed and eventually the darkness only marred by the flickering of the television enveloped her. She had lost all track of time, minutes melted into hours, and thoughts danced in her head.

Abruptly, she bolted upright grabbed a pen and a bright yellow post-it from the random collection of odds and ends on the coffee table. She scrawled a note, stuck the post-it on her roommate’s door, and bounded off into the night.

Skittles Vodka: Round 2

I’ve been blogging recently about my desire to make Skittles infused vodka.  The problem was my desire for more than was absolutely necessary.  I wanted to buy some clear glass flasks to place the vodka in upon making it.  The problem was that they were almost 5 dollars a flask and I didn’t want to fork out that kind of money.  I’m also glad that I didn’t. 

It occurred to me that I could just buy small bottles of vodka and use them to infuse and store the vodka.  That’s exactly what I did.  When I told the liquor store cashier that I needed five 200 ml bottles of vodka, he said sure, and then good naturedly asked if I was planning on making Molotov cocktails.

After buying the vodka, I headed home and started dividing the bag of Skittles I’d bought into color groups. The picture below shows the vodka and Skittles after I’d divided them into groups.

After dividing the Skittles into their respective colors, I placed 60 of each color into a bottle and shook them up like crazy.  They almost immediately changed color, and the white insides were left on the bottom of the bottle (as seen in the next picture).

After the bottles had been shaken, I left them until the next evening.  The Skittles had nearly all dissolved, but the white residue from the insides needed to be strained.  I used a great many coffee filters and a funnel to strain out all of the white gunk, and it left me with five beautiful bottles of Skittles flavored vodka.

I was going to wait until after I’d actually tried the vodka before posting this, but I can’t seem to find the perfect time to drink it.  The vodka is currently enjoying a chilly home in my freezer.  After the taste testing, I’ll post Round 3. 

Skittles Vodka via Mix that Drink

It DOES Exist!

I received this message via email today:

hey,
i was at that liquor store just now looking around and they totally Have the crystal head vodka there. they never put it in any newsletter but it was on the shelf. i think i am going back there on thursday for some hardcore absente and cognac tasting so if you still want it i can get it for you. it's $49. want?

To which I replied:

They HAVE it?  srsly?  totally want.  soo bad.

(Yes, my English is very sloppy at times, but that isn’t the point.) This is the point: I’M GOING TO HAVE THE GREATEST VODKA EVER MADE!!! Sorry for the capitalization.  I only wished to communicate the happiness, excitement, and overwhelming joy I am feeling at this very moment. 

I haven’t been this excited since… I don’t even know.

It made yesterday extra good since (if you are following me on Twitter you will already know this) Regina Spektor’s new CD will be out in June.  It’s called Far. 

Double excitement! 

Is Obama Finally Pushing Back on the Wall Street Barons Supreme Arrogance?

Sent to you via Google Reader

Is Obama Finally Pushing Back on the Wall Street Barons Supreme Arrogance?

So President Obama is finally waking up to the damage being done to his credibility and authority by AIG, a company that is for all practical purposes now an arm of the government but whose leaders are acting as if the reverse were true. Obama called the hundreds of millions of dollars in new bonuses an outrage and said he'd do what he could to block the payments.

But this still misses part of the point, and Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo cut to the heart of why in a piece yesterday:

I don't believe the bonuses themselves are the heart of the matter, nor the fact that they're going to the very executives who caused AIG's implosion or even the galling reality that, since all money is fungible, they're being paid with taxpayer dollars. What's really driving this forward -- and what makes it such a dangerous moment for the White House -- is the jarring image of the administration's impotence.

Secretary Geithner found out about the bonuses. He told AIG CEO Edward Liddy it wouldn't fly. And Liddy, in a curiously imperial letter, tells Geithner that much as he is pained by the situation -- to blow it out his ass. Which he apparently proceeded to do.

Congress, as usual, is merely whining. Here's what it might do: Enact legislation that imposes a 100 percent income tax on bonuses or whatever the financial wizards want to call them at the companies receiving our tax dollars for their, and the economy's, survival. Congress will continue to whine.

I'm still not certain that Obama gets how bad the situation is -- a ward of the state looting the taxpayers' pockets and telling the president to shove it, and, until today, the president and his people meekly saying okay. In less stable nations, revolutions get started with less cause.

The Wall Street crowd -- AIG is hardly the only culprit in looting from the rest of us -- remains deliberately oblivious and supremely arrogant. In less stable nations, this kind of stuff leads to vigilantism.

Sent from my iPod, Astronaut.

Fun new series: My iPod Wallpaper

Today's wallpaper features a toilet and a pope. Don't ask me why. I just know that I like it.



-- Post From My iPod, Astronaut

BlogPress is a liar (Okay, maybe liar is a bit harsh)

I tried BlogPress for the sole reason that it would have landscape mode for blog publishing. In case you were wondering, it doesn't. Don't waste your money. It would be so nice to be able to use landscape mode for typing. Believe me, on an iPod touch it is much easier since it makes the letters larger and you can manage to use both thumbs instead of only one finger. It's much easier. I'm sure you can imagine. Sadly, BlogPress blogging software for iPod touch doesn't have that even though it says it does. Don't waste your money. I wish I hadn't.

Edit: I reevaluated BlogPress this morning, and it seems that I was wrong. BlogPress is not a liar. I figured out how to use landscape mode AND I figured out how to insert pictures. It's definitely not the most intuitive iPod app, and could stand to have documentation included in the app. Good iPod apps are streamlined and intuitive and do not need any kind of documentation. This is obviously not a good iPod app. It's okay at best and I must admit it gets the job done. However, it could be better. In case you were wondering.

-- Post From My iPod, Astronaut

Trying out blogging apps for Astronaut

BlogWriter Lite is okay, but I would prefer one with a landscape mode. Does anyone know of one with that feature? Taking suggestions.

Too many annoyances…

I just spent all day on dear old Alice (my old Dell) trying to get all the programs I use regularly on Ampersand downloaded to her.  Ampersand, sadly, has a problem with her hard drive, and she has to take a trip to Texas for repairs which I assume means everything I had saved on her will be wiped, completely.  Luckily, I have saved all of my thesis research in my Dropbox (I linked to Dropbox, because it’s the one program that is awesome that you had no idea that you needed, but once you have it you won’t know how you lived without it.), so it’s mostly okay, but there are a lot of files I had downloaded on it that I wish I would have backed up.  I would have put them on my new hard drive, but I didn’t have time after I got it, to put anything but a few files on it. 

Anyway, Alice is now up-to-date, and I can use her for blogger and twitter more easily.  I’ll have to hold off on the Skittles vodka update since I have no way to get the pictures from my camera to Alice.  You will get an update though, it just may take awhile. 

Now I have to start studying for my comps.  Have a good day!

It’s official…

… I’ve seen everything.

Quote from the bettybeauty.com website:

Our Award Winning
betty™ products are specially formulated color dyes for the hair down there. In less than one year, over 150,000 happy customers are using betty to naturally match their hair above, cover gray or just for fun! Whether you're a blonde (be a true blonde now!), radiant auburn, rich brunette, raven black or want to try hot pink for fun, our easy to use no-drip formula gives you the perfect finishing touch.

Seriously?  Who buys this stuff?  Teenagers who think it would be fun to turn their pubes pink?  Slutty grandmas… or I suppose grandpa’s? 

Like I said, I’ve seen everything.

via betty: color for the hair down there.

One Last Fun Thing...

I think I should be able to leave soon... finally.

You should definitely check this out. It's passed the time while I've been stuck being a secretary.

Top Ten Happy Hour Hacks via Lifehacker.

Edit: Here's another good one.

Do Bar Tricks.

Actually, you can get to the Bar Tricks through tha Happy Hour Hacks, but I didn't know if you actually would look at them. You should. If you don't believe me, look for yourself. :)

Fun Things I've Found Today...

Since I'm the secretary at History Day today (For some reason, people seem to want me to be a secretary this semester. Maybe it's my calling.), I've been surfing the interwebs in between tallying contest results and taking photos with the fancy DSLR camera that I wish I could have.

Just thought you kids might be interested in some of the fun things I've encountered along the way:

Really Bored Dude Camouflages Self as Paper, Bags and Boxes at an Ikea Store via Gizmodo.

Catholic Bishops Call for Abandonment of Technology During Lent via Gizmodo.

Biography of the last Chinese eunuch via BoingBoing.

Also, a quick update on the state of my Skittles vodka endeavor. I've had many people (OK, two people.) encourage me to make the Skittles vodka, so... I will be making it. Soon. Maybe not tomorrow, but at least in the next couple of weeks. I'll keep you updated on the process.

I must go back to my duties. I'd rather go to sleep.

The Truth about Twilight

My aunt gave me Twilight (the novel) for my birthday back in December.  She said that she was sure I’d really like it.  I didn’t really believe her.  Then one of my friends read it and said it was hilarious.  She told me I should read it so we could talk about it, because it was too good to not talk about.  I read it over the next weekend (that was last week), and it cracked me up.  I had not realized it was targeted to teenagers since everyone who had recommended it to me was at least thirty, so that came as a big surprise to me. 

Anyway, I did enjoy the book.  I enjoyed it for what it is: an entertaining teen romance novel.  Stephenie Meyer is clever and witty, and it was an animated, quick read. 

As my friend and I talked about it at work last week, we decided that we needed to see the movie while it was still in theaters.  Last night, found us sitting in a darkened movie theater eating smuggled candy and watching the worst movie I’ve seen in many many many years.  (Don’t get me wrong, I was expecting the movie to be bad.  I was sure it would be corny and hilarious, but even I couldn’t have predicted how terrible it turned out to be.)

I’m not even sure how to begin, how to describe the myriad of ways the movie sucked.  First of all, the acting was horrible, or rather the over-acting.  It was as if the casting director went to the local high school drama society and offered them all a part in the movie.  Sure, it was supposed to be a movie targeted at teenage girls, but I’d hope even a teenage girl would notice the terrible acting in this movie.  J.R. Jones of the Chicago Reader summed it up succinctly in his review:

This adaptation of the best-selling novel by Stephenie Meyer never rises above the level of a teen soaper on the CW.

Second, the special effects are terrible, and they don’t look real at all.  I prefer it when the special effects accurately depict unreal feats in a believable way.  The movie adaptation of Twilight left too much to be desired in this category.

Last (I could go on, but in this case I’ll forego anymore grumbling for the sake of a shorter entry.), the vampires… oh, the vampires.  Can you say cheesy?  Overdone? not true to the original source?  All that and more characterize the vampires of Twilight.  At times, I felt as if I’d traveled back to the silent movie era.  Over-the-top does not even begin to describe the showdown between the vegetarian vampires and the carnivorous vampires on the baseball field.  Lots of hissing and long-angsty looks ensued. 

Don’t pay any attention to movie reviews promoting Twilight:

A darn good hunk of pop moviemaking. –Ty Burr; Boston Globe

Twilight, the first movie adapted from Stephenie Meyer’s series of best-selling teen novels, is going to be a big hit with young girls, and deservedly so -- the picture delivers. –David Denby; The New Yorker

Twilight works as both love story and vampire story, thanks mainly to the performances of its principals. –Michael O’Sullivan; Washington Post

I honestly have no idea what those critics are talking about.  They must not have seen the same movie I did.

This is my favorite review.  Christine Champ understands.  I just hope she didn’t go see the movie.  She would have been as disappointed as I was:

Summit and Twilight: Was a Bigger Budget Needed?

The Pursuit of the Perfect Twitter App

I like Twitter.  I’ve officially communed with the masses, and joined in on the Twitter craze; however, I do not like having to go to the website just to check my Twitter feed and write on Twitter.  It’s bad enough that I have to check my email and my blog reader and now my ebay.  (Listen to me, I sound like some whiny overworked brat.  I’m an over-privileged baby; that’s what I am.) Anyway, as I was saying, today, I decided to address my annoyance, and find the perfect stand-alone Twitter app. 

Digsby has been my drug of choice for the last three months or so, and it has been working out fine.  It’s especially good for instant messaging.  The Twitter integration, however, is a problem for me.  Sure, the notifications were fine, and I didn’t have to go to the website to take care of my Twittering needs. 

“Well, then, what is the damn problem, already?!” I know you must be asking. 

The problem is that it is annoying when one wants to tweet.  It’s not easy and intuitive as I had wished.  So, the first thing I did was to google “Twitter apps”.  Many people seem to be having the same issues as I have been having. 

The first app I downloaded and tried was the Vista Twitter app called blu.*  blu was fine.  That’s all.  Fine.  It looked pretty, but aside from that it is all show.  Flashy.  As if it were built for someone trying to get laid.  You know, the same as anything else, but covered up in nice clothes and maybe a nice cologne.  Not to mention the name.  Don’t even get me started on the name.  I had yet to find my perfect Twitter client. 

Next, I downloaded the open-source Twitter client, Spaz.  It wasn’t much different then blu.  Less flashy, but more of the same.  Still not the intuitive client I wanted.  I tried again.

Finally, I tried twhirl.  twhirl is also not what I had in mind either.  There, I said it, there is no perfect Twitter app.  They do not exist.  Of the apps I have tried, twhirl is the best.  It has its annoyances just like every other app I’ve tried.  The biggest problem is that when you hit the “x”, unlike every other messaging client I’ve ever tried, it actually exits out the whole program.  I just want it to minimize to the tray.   I will use twhirl for the time being, but when the perfect app materializes, I will be the first on the bandwagon.

*What is it with all this creative capitalization.  I was taught that proper nouns are capitalized.  All this non-capitalization of proper nouns messes with my head.  Not to mention, just think of what it is doing to future generations.