Sunday, May 27, 2007

memorial day weekend in bed

so, who gets a cold in the end of may? i do. this sucks. so, i'm in the fold out bed in the guest room with the sore throat and the stuffiness and the completely plugged up right ear. did i mention this sucks? i'm completely wired, though, so i'm not at a loss for entertainment or communication during my banishment. i've got my laptop, my blackberry and my zen mp3 player. i've got my trillian instant messenger going on my laptop so i can buzz my cutie to bring me tea, if i need it. it's like a 21st century bell! and i've got the slingbox connection going, so i can watch tv from my laptop while in bed. on the low tech side, i've got two white furballs taking up some space on the bed doing their best to keep me warm. i'd like to think they're concerned about me, but they're just happy to have any excuse to sleep on the bed. right now, i'm watching the indy 500. there's three women driving this year (sarah fisher, danica patrick & milka duno) - how cool is that!?

Friday, May 25, 2007

samaritans too busy these days?

as i was walking up to the bus stop this morning, i saw a woman in a car pull up next to another car and start honking. "oh, she must know the person in the other car," i thought. then she really started honking. the light was green, so she was holding up traffic and the other car wasn't moving either. i was starting to be annoyed by this traffic-blocking reunion. after a few seconds more, the woman drove off, but the car in the other lane was not moving. i looked up and then i saw that the driver, a man in his 30s or so, was just sitting there, his head slumped forward onto his chest. just as the car drove off, another woman approached the car on foot and started knocking on the driver's side window. nothing. no response. the guy did not move. not good. i got out my phone and started fumbling with my phone to call 911. i told the kids sitting on the bus bench to look around for a cop car and flag it down if they saw one. as i was still fumbling with the phone, the woman who had been knocking on the window came over to the sidewalk and, just as i was asking her if she had tried to open his door, the guy in the car snapped his head up and drove right off like nothing happened. he must have been asleep or having a george michael moment or something. now here's the kicker, after the guy drove off, we were all talking excitedly and one of the kids said, "oh yeah, he was like that for about five minutes." i can't believe that a man could be slumped over in the seat of his car on a busy city street for five minutes until someone did something.

Sunday, May 20, 2007

garden

nasturtium with bee

a bee visiting the nasturtium flowers in my patio container garden.

Friday, May 11, 2007

do not name the well...

one of my favorite websites is cuteoverload.com. it's like a little vaction in the middle of a bad day. you can go the site and see cute little kittens and puppies and hamsters and you can't stay mad after looking at a few posts. seriously, they should do up a mobile web capable version so you could calm down people in arguments, etc. by just pushing your mobile phone in someone's face with one of the pictures on the screen. or broadcast it on giant screens all over baghdad. whatev. anyway, there was a podcast that had an interview of the site's creator, meg frost. the interview remarked on how positive all the comments are and i have to agree. i don't generally read too many comments on blogs that i read, except in a few circumstances: cuteoverload; some food blogs; and knitting blogs, like crazy aunt purl. in all these kinds of happy blogs, you tend to get really positive, supportive and funny comments. it restores my faith in humanity. but on critic sites and hipster sites like chowhoundchowhound or mefi, you just get people trying to take the poster and/or the other commenters down a notch. and some of these "cute" sites have huge numbers of readers and tons of comments. it's kind of like web 2.0 providing new proof of the old adage that you draw more flies with honey than vinegar.

...from which you will not drink. oh my god. i've turned into my mother.