Desktop Daleks

What’s It Do?

I got two Desktop Daleks for Christmas. I unpacked them to put them on my desk. While doing so, this happened: Husband: “What’s it do?” Me: *blinkblink* . . . Exterminates! I would have thought that was obvious . . .

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Photo by Katherine Gray - Build Your Wings Photography

Wedding Anniversary Weekend of DOOM!

Ok, not really of DOOM. But, oh the mishaps were very Lathrop-y. Because it is so much fun and we have such a wonderful time with it at the Mocks, I tracked down a Beatles Rock Band Limited Edition bundle. It comes with a drum set, Hoffner bass controller, microphone and microphone stand. Buying all …

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Obey Gravity, it's the law!

House Stuff and Math is Hard

“Kitchen cabinets falling out of ceiling. Whee!” This was my post snippet to remind me to post about this stuff later. I should delete it to start in properly with what’s going on with the house right now, but that snippet really sums it up. What I should also do is change it to past …

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Woodpecker on Branch

This Is Why I Don’t Go To the Doctor

So, we needed to get our gutters cleaned. They were gross. It caused us problems during the Snowpocalypse of 2010 with hugemongous icicles forming on the side of our house. They dangled from the gutters and attached to one of the spare bedroom’s window. And then it melted. Into the window. Onto a box of …

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Felix in the Hamper

Kitty Tales – Felix and Housework

The mild-mannered feline pictured at left is my eldest and first kitty, Felix. I adopted him in Richmond when I was going to college there, much to my cat-allergic roommate’s chagrin. He wasn’t always mild-mannered, of course. And he still has some terrible habits. When he was wee, he would pounce my head in the …

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What’s It Do?Wedding Anniversary Weekend of DOOM!House Stuff and Math is HardThis Is Why I Don’t Go To the DoctorKitty Tales – Felix and Housework

Jan
18
2012

SOPA, PIPA, Censorship & You

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I’m incredibly surprised at myself for keeping so quiet about this issue until now. What seems like a million years ago now, I participated in “Grey Day” as a sort of grassroots effort in 2000 for People of the Internet to self-regulate how they generated their web content. It was the advent of “hot-linking” and posting whole swaths of copyrighted content on your website, because who cares? The C&D you got in your inbox very quickly informed you of who cared indeed.

Basically, it was trying to send the message that if everyone steals content for their websites, no one will make anything any more and everything would just be drab and blah and boring and “grey.” So, stealing is wrong, mmkay, don’t do it. It was a cute effort, but ultimately didn’t work. People still steal content on the Internet. All the time. There’s tons of ways to do it. And lots of people don’t even think they’re doing anything wrong.

I don’t like copyright infringement. It makes me kinda grumpy. I like copyright infringement on the Internet even less. People who honestly believe “Everything on the Internet is free” need a boot to the head as far as I’m concerned. Just ask Cooks Source magazine how free the Internet is. I’m fascinated by copyright law. I have extended family members who’ve made it their specialty (I come from a very litigious family).

So, with the hub-bub of SOPA/PIPA/Censorship, etc it’s very odd that I’m not being more active or vocal on it. If there was ever a day to be so, today’s the day. I’ve already written one of my senators, Ben Cardin. He supports PIPA and I was shocked and appalled. Then I saw text from a press release that he’s a co-sponsor of the bill to have an active role in it since he is no longer on the committee that would give it the most attention and also that he wouldn’t vote for it as-is. So, if you’re in Maryland, be a dear and encourage him to stick to his guns on that one.

So, what’s finally spurred me to comment? Google and this: End Piracy, Not Liberty. The last paragraph is the crux of the whole SOPA/PIPA thing: As written, it won’t work to stop piracy.

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Jan
13
2012

Oh, Spam, You Rascal

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Once upon a time, I had quite a laugh sifting through the weirdo spam comments I was getting on the blog. They haven’t been very funny in a very long time. They still aren’t. However, I’ve noticed that I’ve been getting tons more lately. And they’re all on really old posts. Yay Google indexing?

To all my recent spam readers, I bid you welcome and good tidings… Or something.

This post brought to you by “Doing anything under the sun to make me not notice the horrible headache I have right now,” the number “3,” and the letter “M.”

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Jan
10
2012

Waste Not…

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So, I’m in Dallas for work. When away from home, I avoid restaurants I can eat at when home like it was my only purpose in life. Technically, I’m in Addison. There are 3 things in Addison: a big fancy mall, hotels, and 873,000 restaurants. Finding an interesting place to eat is not even a little bit hard.

Two coworkers and I ended up at a place called Blue Mesa Grill. Wonderful place. Nice atmosphere, great food, and a ridiculously large tequila menu.

One of my companions and I ordered margaritas. I opted for a blood orange sage and he went for grapefruit tarragon. Our waitress switched them when she brought them. I knew from the first sip I had the wrong drink. My dining companion looked at the drinks and said, “Yeah, you’re right, but you’re not getting this back. Mine now.”

I had the waitress check to make sure the drinks had been swapped. She carried it off back to the bar, confirmed, and brought it back. I put in another order for the right drink and before she got too far, hollered, “Well, there’s no need to let that one go to waste…”

Hehehehe.

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Dec
31
2011

What’s It Do?

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I got two Desktop Daleks for Christmas. I unpacked them to put them on my desk. While doing so, this happened:

Husband: “What’s it do?”

Me: *blinkblink* . . . Exterminates!

I would have thought that was obvious . . .

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Nov
09
2011

Sudden Politics Nerd

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I am about to share a letter from Congressman Roscoe Bartlett (R-MD) but before I do so, I want to preface with a few things:

  1. I don’t like telling people how their politics should lay out. Don’t tell me how mine should. If we can agree on that ground rule, we can talk.
  2. I very strongly believe that even though the person in office is not the one I voted for, they still represent me and my interests. So when I write to that person, I do expect them to hear what I say and respect the gravity of their office and their civic responsibility to represent their constituents. You don’t only represent the people who voted for you.
  3. I’m sharing this letter at this time in correlation to the recent “personhood” amendment that was shot down in Mississippi yesterday. Mr. Bartlett shares similar views as to what that state amendment was trying to legislate.
  4. I do like Mr. Bartlett’s positive environmental work he has advocated. It would seem the environment is his strong suit and I would urge him, in the future, to focus on that instead.

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Jul
06
2011

Random Doodle July 5th

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I had written out some stuff about being a sucker for new pens, blank notebooks, and wishing I could draw rather than doodle. But I feel like just sharing the doodle. :)

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Jun
15
2011

Wedding Anniversary Weekend of DOOM!

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Photo by Katherine Gray - Build Your Wings Photography

Ok, not really of DOOM. But, oh the mishaps were very Lathrop-y.

Because it is so much fun and we have such a wonderful time with it at the Mocks, I tracked down a Beatles Rock Band Limited Edition bundle. It comes with a drum set, Hoffner bass controller, microphone and microphone stand. Buying all the pieces separately can easily creep to $200+. Sears.com has the Limited Edition bundle for $99. WIN! Rock Band 3 was on sale at Amazon (sans keyboard for now) and we were in business. It just all needed to get here. I hate both paying for shipping and being patient. I had to wait! Days! for these things to make their way to me. DAYS! In the five minutes we were snuggling upstairs, UPS came to the door and knocked a knock that sounded rather a lot like a cat running up the steps to us. Boo.

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Jun
07
2011

House Stuff and Math is Hard

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“Kitchen cabinets falling out of ceiling. Whee!” This was my post snippet to remind me to post about this stuff later. I should delete it to start in properly with what’s going on with the house right now, but that snippet really sums it up. What I should also do is change it to past tense, but that’s getting ahead of myself slightly.

When we bought the house at the end of 2009, one of the issues the home inspector brought to our attention was the kitchen cabinets above our sink island weren’t anchored securely into the ceiling. We instructed the sellers that they needed to fix this or else we no buy their house, kthxbye. A contractor came in, put some very heavy duty looking screws into the cabinets and everything seemed hunky dory from then on. Until Mother’s Day.

I had noticed the gap for a few weeks at that point, but it wasn’t until Mother’s Day that I became increasingly concerned. There was some caulk/glue along the back edge of the cabinets and as the cabinets pulled away from the ceiling, it created holes in the glue. Holes that I could see clear through to the cabinets on the other side of the kitchen. Not good. The husband and I swapped the heavy glassware from the sinking cabinets over to a more secure location and housed all our nice, light, plastic storage containers in the fail cabinets.

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Jun
01
2011

DC Comics’ BIG Announcement

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I would be horribly remiss in not posting anything about this topic (but what else would be new, there?), so here goes. Dan DiDio, co-publisher of DC Comics broke the news to USA Today they are rebooting the DC Universe and relaunching some 50 titles at issue #1.

I have relatively mixed feelings on this. One is I am insanely behind (going on five and a half months worth of comics) reading my comics, so this news lights a fire under my butt to get caught up and get the existing comics collection sorted before the reboot. The other is knowing that this could either go really well and be really good or turn out completely horribly and my favorite comics publisher will suffer and I won’t get to read the stories I love so much (not that I’ve been keeping up even though the pile we have is growing) anymore.

Reboots are not uncommon in comics and least of all for DC. Recently, however, DC has been King of the Crisis. Crisis on Infinite Earths, Identity Crisis, Infinite Crisis, Countdown to the Final Crisis, Final Crisis . . . Every two years there was another freaking crisis. Seriously? Having a crisis so often really cheapens the impact of those that came before it and numbs fans to the whole idea. After every crisis is some flavor of reboot.

I’m unsure on the idea of resetting comics numbering back to #1. For some titles like Justice League of America, Green Lantern, and Birds of Prey (the first is confirmed to be in the 50, the latter two I’m sincerely hoping will be among the chosen) have been reset to #1 a couple of times now. JLA most recently in 2006. Whereas Superman, Batman, and Detective Comics all number in the 600+; having runs continuing from the 30s and 40s.

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Apr
08
2011

The Power Outage Effect

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The Power Outage Effect is having the all-consuming urge to heat something in the microwave, charge my phone, or check the internet when the power is out. I’m having the same effect with the looming government shutdown and associated furlough.

I am potentially about to be without a paycheck and there are things I want to buy. BUY ALL THE THINGS!

There are purchases I wanted to make with my savings/tax refund to beautify my home and instead I will need that money for exciting things like my mortgage and other house associated bills.

But damned if I don’t want to be out buying the computer parts I need to fix my other desktop or ordering the furniture I want for the basement. I just know it would be monumentally irresponsible to do so. Ah well, this too shall pass.

Speaking of passing things, Congress (hint hint).

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