April 2005 Archives

To St. Thomas, USVI. And thank Jeebus because we got snow flurries here today. Stupid Minnesota. *shakes fist*

Y'all have a nice weekend.

Porn Bread

You must see it to fully appreciate it. Technically not work unsafe, except for the "porn" part in the URL. I think my favorite is the Vagina Danish. The Bukkake Cookies are ... I don't know what they are. They just are.

(via TCB)

So, I'm going to St. Thomas, USVI this weekend for my friends' wedding. A month ago I talked to the travel agent they set up about getting a room (I'm sharing with my other friend, the bride's younger sister). I spoke to her on the phone and put a fat check in the mail, per her instructions. I also gave her all the pertinent contact information. She had my email, and I gave her my phone number and address.

I get a message today from my bride-to-be friend saying the travel agent told here there's a problem with my check and some other stuff and I should call her ASAP. This is followed by a message from the travel agent saying all the documents she sent me just got returned in the mail.

!!!

If you are looking for a web design expert to spruce up your site, I strongly recommend the fine ladies at Bona Fide Style. They do both commercial and personal websites, so you can commission them to work on your business, your blog, or anything in between.

(My friend Mel is one of them. She rocks. Seriously.)

Bona Fide Style. Bookmark that, make it a Favorite, add it to your del.icio.us links, jot it down, whateva.

I wanted (a linklog / quicklinks / remaindered links / whateva). More importantly, I wanted the links inline with my blog posts, not over in the sidebar. The MultiBlog plugin did the work just like *snaps*fingers*.

The key factors in making this work:

My first post is up at Metroblogging Minneapolis.

It's just a "hi, I'm here" dealio, but never fear. There's plenty more to come. Cross-posting is discouraged, so there will not be much of that. I know there's a way to pull headlines in here via RSS, so I may do that with Metroblog. It's on my long list of blog projects.

I need to come up with a standard abbreviation for "Metroblogging Minneapolis." That's a lot of typing.

Wheeeee! I'm a Metroblogger! *cheese*

blogblogblogblogblogblogblogblogblogblogblogblog

Thus, Reader Poll Monday.

1. Other than water, what do you drink most? Coffee.
2. How do you like your steak/burger cooked? Medium rare.
3. Are you afraid of birds? Not irrationally so, though I would strongly prefer if they did fly in close proximity and/or directly overhead.
4. Would you rather eat a cupful of broken glass, or eat a cupful of live mosquitos? Mosquitos. But only if I'm on Survivor.
5. What are you wearing today? Black shoes, khakis, black v-neck sweater with white stripes down the sleeves and around the collar.
6. What is your favorite summertime activity? Hanging out around the lakes. Ooh, and making sangria.
7. Why did the chicken cross the road? Uhhhh....
8. If you could have any hair/eye/skin color combination, what would it be? I like my current skin color just fine, but I wouldn't mind having lighter eyes. Like, hazel or something. Green or blue would be obviously unnatural.
9. When is the last time you dressed up in a costume? What were you? I was Sue Bird for Halloween.
10. When you're not typing, do you prefer to print or use cursive? Print. I can't even remember the last time I wrote cursive except to sign my name.

We went to the roller derby this evening. Sherri mentioned a while back that she was going to the roller derby and I was all, "That's so New York. Those crazy New Yorkers." Little did I know that we here in Minne-scro-ta have our very own roller derby league.

Cheap Skate in Coon Rapids (btw, Coon Rapids is furking far) was jam packed. I couldn't believe how crowded it was. I was kinda tired, so I didn't really enjoy the event to its full extent, but lemme just say it was a spectacle to behold. What kind of people go to the roller derby? A bunch of punk kids, a bunch of suburban moms, and a surprising number of people who seemed to actually know what was going on.

I think my favorite part was every time a skater went down and they had to call in someone to look at her, the announcer reminded us that everything we were seeing was real. So, she's really hurt. Like, she took a skate to the neck or something. There was a "disabled list" in the program and those girls had some serious injuries! Various torn things in knees, dislocated shoulders, broken bones, whatnot.

Roller Derby is a huge production. I can see being involved as a skater. But where do you also get all the coaches, the volunteer EMTs, the sponsorships, the announcers, etc.? There are a lot of folks involved and I'm guessing no one's getting paid.

Next time we're gonna get there soon enough to get a seat in the front row. Maybe a derby girl will get thrown into my lap.

Bonus: I saw Wendy there! I peeped her from afar and geeked out. But then I was all, "What do you say to a blogger you've never met?" What you do is you just go over and say, "Is your name Wendy?" It works.

It's was yer birfday.

Yesterday was the silver anniversary of my roomie Laura's time here on this earth. As such we had a fantastic lunch at New Delhi* and that's also how we found ourselves at The Front last night.

Laura had a day chock full of activities that also included the St. Paul Art Crawl (which I bailed on, having partied a little too hard the previous night) and a fantabulous dinner at Azia.

Happy Birthday, Laura. You're the superest goat I know.

As heard on Weekend America, the premise of the Public Listening Project:

We have been going regularly to the local train station for almost two years wearing t-shirts bearing questions: one always reads, "What's Your Opinion?" and the other might be, "Should We Have Gone to War?" or some other provocative question.

Such questions are a non-threatening invitation to people who are ready to approach us and share their views on policy issues and how they came to hold them. As we listen with interest and respect, people vent feelings and, then, often become more free to think anew.

People appreciate being listened to without interruption. If their opinion is listened to with respect, then their "suspicion" of talking to someone who may have a differing viewpoint quickly evaporates.

It sounds fascinating from a sociology experiment sort of standpoint. Here's how they do it:

Muscle Beach Party is one of the gayest movies I've ever seen.

It was playing on the video screen at The Front last night. You couldn't hear any of it, but an hour of oiled up musclebound guys frolicking in pink satin hotpants is all one really needs to know. And then there's the chick dressed up in the captain's outfit.

By the way, did you know that you can no longer go between The Front and Ground Zero once you've entered one? I did not know that. It's been a long time since I've been to either, and Ground Zero doesn't interest me much anyway.

(In case non-locals are wondering, The Front and Ground Zero are neighboring establishments in the northeast Minneapolis neighborhood known as Nordeast. The Front is a red velvet-adorned, sort of 70s-styled place with naked art chicks on the wall and a little mezzanine overlooking the dance floor. Ground Zero is a more techno-y place known for their bondage nights.)

We were a little heebed by the massive amounts of straight people, not that we should have been surprised. It's been a while since I hung out in a place with so many straight people.

The DJ was fantastic. He had the whole 70s getup on. A giant fuzzy hat with matching fuzzy platform shoes, fringe on his sleeves, giant sunglasses. And a giant brandy snifter. You know the ones that piano bar lounge players collect tips in? This guy was drinking brandy out of his. Rock on. And very prompt with the requests. The first time we asked for a song, it was the next one on. The second time it came on about 10 minutes later. He played a great mix of songs from the 70s on through to current stuff.

It ended up being more fun than I thought it would be. So, The Front, not so bad. I'd do it again.

Is what I asked the bartender for upon arriving at Euphoria last night. Bad choice of words for a bartender in a gay club.

So Euphoria is the latest gay club owned by straight people in town. It's the new home of Twilight (which used to be at Loring Pasta Bar). I have yet to experience Twilight at Euphoria, and I'll miss the next one (which is next weekend, but I'll be out of town), but it should be pretty good. More like a dance party, but probably a little more difficult for people watching and mingling since it's an actual club and as such is MUCH louder than LPB.

Friday night is Lesbian Night. Too bad I saw a grand total of maybe 40 people all night. Including the staff and performers. The go go girls (and their boyfriends). The drag show. That's what we were there for. The drag show. Queens and kings. Hosted by Miss Victoria Rose. Including some kid named Landon whom apparently everyone has had some sort of run in with. Landon is quite social.

Okay, I'm not doing the evening justice at all. I had a few stiff and fruity strong and flavorful adult beverages and lots of laughs. Hopefully as the word gets out, business will pick up a little at Euphoria. It was depressingly deserted. It's a neat space. It just needs people in it.

As in, Yet Another Email Questionnaire. 'Cause Tepper made me, even though Lach beat me to it.

Not only am I smartly dressed today.... my underwear matches.

Buh-BANG. Unh. *JamesBrown*

UPDATE: Two days in a row. *strut*
UPDATE #2: Photographic evidence, as requested....

Nba.com has a feature called the Blog Squad. It features players, journalists, and other related folk (from the WNBA, too). Teams also put up blog-style road diaries from their players. Usually, it's pretty enh.

Paul Shirley, 12th man for the Phoenix Suns, recently made his road diary contribution. And it was actually really enjoyable. He's a pretty good writer.

In the four years since my college career ended, I have played for no fewer than eleven professional basketball teams. Of those, I left on my terms in four cases, was either released or not asked back in six, and will know more this summer regarding the last. There are probably [think oldest profession in the world]’s (I’ll do the censoring myself) that have had fewer jobs over the same span.

I really felt like I had a stellar set of games. Min: 0, TP: 0, FG%: Undefined. Bravo.

Nerdy math reference! I love it. I wish Paul had his own regular blog. He could be up there with Mark Cuban. Seriously.

Since I do not play much, I have some time on the bench to think about the things that are going on around me. By the end of any game, I will usually have scouted the crowd for the most outlandish outfit being perpetrated upon those in attendance, rated the looks of each member of the dance team, and come up with life stories for half of the first row. Today’s game was no different. Three random observations from this afternoon:

The Grizzlies may very well have the best announcer in the NBA. He has a knack for making everyone’s name sound intimidating. I wonder what he could do for a guy that has a girl’s first name as his last name?

While the audio presentation at FedEx Forum is strong, the visual side is a little shaky. I will just say this: The Suns’ dance team is much better…-looking; I am not really qualified to judge dancing ability.

I am afraid Memphis may get kicked out of the league. I could be mistaken, but I think they started three white guys— three American white guys at that. I am pretty sure there is a rule against that somewhere—some kind of quota, I think. Maybe I am wrong. I guess we will find out soon, when they have to bring back the Cincinnati Royals to fill the void the Grizzlies leave behind.

(Semi-related, yay for nba.com for having a comprehensive list of RSS feeds.)

First, for your website, there was the Antimagnet.

Now, for your vehicle: Support Our Ribbons. With ribbon maker!

I'm guessing that's where the 5% Dixie came from.

(via Dave and Tanya)

For a daisy chain of reasons, I decided to try and upgrade this here blog to MT 3.16, from 2.661. I thought I had heard folks say that upgrading to 3.x was pretty simple.

Why I thought this would be a good idea to do at 5 a.m., I have no idea. Running the upgrade scripts while forgetting to upload a few files directories is s-m-r-t smart. I was sure my blog was broken. But I think all is well now. A peek around in the support forum answered several of my questions (without my having to pay $70 for a license to ask the damn questions myself).

Soooo... what all that means is changes are afoot. In with some new features, out with some old features, and for gawd's sake, a new look. I can't do all that fancy Photoshop stuff, but I sure can change colors and move boxes around. Woo!

I will make all these changes gradually, just because I need some instant gratification like that. I don't have the patience to put a whole new site together and wait for a giant unveiling. So watch out for the evolution over the next few weeks however long it takes me.

I (like many others, apparently), cannot get Kelly Clarkson's Since U Been Gone* out of my damn head. Seriously.

And all you'd ever hear me say
Is how I picture me with you

Like, it's going on a week here. And wouldn't you know there's a dance remix*. Several, actually, but that's the one I like best.

If you, too, are 1) afflicted by this admittedly enjoyable song and 2) a giant nerd, perhaps you'd enjoy the Since U Been Gone Annual Report. (via)

But since you been gone
I can breathe for the first time

I wish it was "You" instead of "U." That's just silly.

I'm so movin' on, yeah, yeah

I love the "yeah yeah" part. Speaking of which, Ted Leo does an acoustic cover* that works in a bit of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs' Maps in the middle. (via)

How come I'd never hear you say
I just wanna be with you
Guess you never felt that way

*headbang*

Hee! (I love that word.)

My roommate, Autumn, was just telling me about this Onion article, and then I saw it posted at Gay Orbit. The article?

Why Do All These Homosexuals Keep Sucking My Cock?

Heh. Heh heh.

Yesterday was W4D1 (that's Week 4, Day 1) of the Cool Runnings C25K (that's Couch-to-5k) program. It was warm and drizzly and it was actually quite pleasant to be out in the rain. I was still kinda tight from sitting in the car all day Sunday, and after running I was much looser. Nice!

How about some crazy talk: I was actually considering purchasing gear. Maybe as a reward when I get around to doing a race. In the mean time I definitely need to get myself a cheapy watch. I've been running strictly for time, not for distance, so I have no idea how far I go. But I'd like to be able to stop carrying my cell phone around with me.

Another great motivator: If I can get to the point of running 3 miles/5k without too much trouble, I can totally get into hashing without embarrassing myself. At least not any more embarrassment than hashing inherently entails.

The forums at Cool Runnings have been a good read and very inspirational. There are lots of folks in the same general place as I am so it's nice not to be the only one who can't run a half marathon and who has stupid questions.

Michael and David are supposed to be giving it the old college try, but David has been felled by a bum knee. Michael's off to a good start just giving up smoking. Anybody else wanna join me?

I'm getting to it on Monday, for once.

1. What would be your ideal "last meal"? Steak with gorgonzola, white cheddar mashed potatoes, fried corn, a pint of Strongbow, and Bananas Foster for dessert.
2. Do you wear a watch? If so, describe it. No watch.
3. When was the last time you made non-microwave popcorn? No idea.
4. Would you rather shove your arm into a beehive or shove it into a scorpion pit? A beehive.
5. What's one thing you feel you really must do before you die? Fall in love again.
6. Why haven't you done it yet? I tried. It doesn't quite work that way.
7. Do you take a multi-vitamin? No, but I feel guilty about it.
8. Are you going to any weddings this summer? Yes. Two for sure, possibly three. All within the next month and a half.
9. Do you have any online "wish lists"? I have an Amazon Wishlist.
10. What would you rather be doing right this very second? I kind of want to go run, but today's my rest day.

I'm in Chicago, by the way. Y'all have a good weekend.

A couple weeks worth of Reader Poll Mondays (Reader Polls Monday?). On a Thursday late Wednesday night.

Today on Dr. Joy Browne, she asked if anyone's ever interrupted sex to take a phone call. I haven't personally taken any calls, but I've been interrupted.

You?

So, this week started with two crappy days of work. Then yesterday morning our landlord showed up unannounced, just as I was getting out of the shower. I will not go on (at this time) about what a dillhole he is, but I'll just say it was so unsettling that I forgot to put deodorant on before I left.

I got to work in a less than spectacular mood, and it turned out that according to the schedule yesterday was gonna be a little less busy than most, so I asked if I could leave early. I just needed a break. Plus I knew my Roomies & Pals were all at home having a nice dinner together.

Instead of busting through the work we had to do to get right to the easy part where they didn't need me to be there, we had such trouble getting going that it was five hours before The Professor and I could get a break in. I had said I'd try to stay until we completed a specific part, but after all that there was no way we were gonna before the end of the shift, so I reached into the Fuck It Bucket and had a piece of candy. And punched out and walked out the door.

Got home just in time for dinner (and Arbor Mist, and Evolution, and beer) with Roomies & Pals. Good choice, I think. And now I'm past my hump day for the week, because we're taking off Friday to go to Chicago for the weekend. Woo!

I'm (re)editing my resume (again). I think it would be a lot easier to do with HTML and CSS than to do it in a word processing program.

This morning so far has been a mixed bag.

Good: I slept uninterrupted through the morning.
Bad: I had a dream about Fly Girl (contents below for those interested).

Good: It's my running day. I've been looking forward to it.
Bad: It's 46° and damp.

Good: I got up, got dressed, splashed some water on my face and put my contacts in, and I'm still interested in going outside.
Bad: My customary one cup of coffee before running is rapidly becoming insufficient. And it lends itself to discomfort. Not to mention I'm pretty hungry when I get back.

Good: I have Friday off, so this is my hump day.
Bad: The last two days of work have been pretty stressful and I have no interest whatsoever in going in today.

Good: On FM 107, Kevyn was talking about words that sound dirty but aren't, so I emailed in my submissions and they got read on the air. I suggested "bunghole" (the opening of a keg where you put the tap in) and mentioned that I had "ejaculate" ("to utter impulsively") as a spelling word in 6th grade. Kevyn had fun with ejaculate for a few minutes.
Bad: I didn't win the contest. I think only folks that call in are eligible to win.

Tonight marks the first evening of the year in which I can lay in bed with the windows open and listen to the rain fall.

It could only be better if I could smell the rain. And perhaps if I were waking up to it with someone there to enjoy it with me.

The homebrewing has commenced. I was totally inspired by MJ and I've been totally supplied by Northern Brewer.

I picked the Sweet Stout for my first brew. It fermented all last week and I just put it in the secondary fermenter where it will sit for the next three weeks until I bottle it. I was gonna solicit names and offer samples and all that, but I think I better wait and see how it turns out first. If I don't completely fuck it up, I'll go all out for the next batch. Besides, I picked the dark beer for the first batch because that's what I like, but most folks I know prefer the lighter stuff and I'm not gonna be drinking all this by myself.

In the mean time, I'll be trying to consume as much dark-bottled non-twist-off-cap beer as I can find, so I don't have to buy extra bottles.

I'm at work today. Which sucks. But I know I have the next three weekends off and my The L Word hook up is non-existent this week, so it's not so bad.

Anyway, I'm working on a different line than I usually do, so some of the minor details of doing things are a little different. And it got to the point where I didn't know how to do something, and Lazy Overachiever (who's the only person who does know how to do it) wasn't in the room.

This involved lifting a pretty heavy object, and I didn't know how to work the mechanism that does the lifting. So African Lover Man — who is super buff and weighs about twice what I do, no lie — suggested we just pick it up. Yeah, easy for him to say. And my dumb ass agreed. So who ended up smashing their finger all to hell? Not ALM.

It's actually not that bad. My index finger is a little swollen and I took a chunk of skin out of the side of it. But I slapped a bandaid on it and took an aspirin. No big.

(Ow.)

I'm repopulating my browser bookmark bar. I try to keep it as clean as possible because the more bookmarks I keep in that bar, the smaller the viewing window is. What I usually have in there is:

• one folder of financial stuff
  
• one folder of stuff related to running my blogs/websites
  
• TV Guide listings
  
• a handful of bookmarklets
  
• links that I'm paying attention to right now that require further examining

I loves the bookmarklets. They do neat things. My favorites are listed below. If you've got any that you can't live without, pass 'em along.

I'm white. Although, I have better than average odds of not being a different race than I think I am, and I still ended up being half latino. (via Tiffany)

Man Date:

Simply defined a man date is two heterosexual men socializing without the crutch of business or sports. It is two guys meeting for the kind of outing a straight man might reasonably arrange with a woman. Dining together across a table without the aid of a television is a man date; eating at a bar is not. Taking a walk in the park together is a man date; going for a jog is not. Attending the movie "Friday Night Lights" is a man date, but going to see the Jets play is definitely not.

Would one carry a man-purse on a man date? Or is that overkill, even for big city hipster metrosexuals who would likely be the only types of guys to embark on man dates anyway? Actually, this seems like the sort of thing that the more highly evolved guys who are into mentoring and relationship-building (and probably go through lots of therapy (not that there's anything wrong with it...)) do.

(via hit-or-miss)

Charles Hill, proprietor extraordinaire of Dustbury, is celebrating his 9th blogging anniversary today. Congratulations, Chaz!

In other blogiversary news, Dean's World is three years old.

I got accepted to write for Minneapolis Metroblog.

!!!

I have a few post ideas ready already. Except my account activation is pending the submission of my bio and I'm completely stumped as to what to say. It only needs to be a paragraph, but I feel such pressure to be super cool and witty that I can't come up with one freakin' sentence.

I committed to posting there at a rate that is slightly more frequent than I've been posting here. I think I have performance anxiety. *shriek* But I'm super excited about it. I would also like to point out again how much I love love love the banner at the top of the Mpls Metblog page.

Now if I could just write that damn bio....

...when you shake that thang. Songs for the week. Chosen because I heard them while at the Town House on Wednesday night and thought, "I need to remember those so I can download obtain them later."

Outkast - The Way You Move*
Angie Stone - Wish I Didn't Miss You*

And the bonus, because I wish I had heard it at the Town House on Wednesday night:

Nina Sky - Move Your Body*

Almost time for a new dance mix disc, methinks.

*removed

So, Erica, I've been wondering....

What's better than a 60° Minnesota spring day? Checking the 10-day forecast and seeing that it stays that way.

How has your week been? Ups and downs. Enjoying the weather. Seriously, it's spectacular. Work is not completely intolerable. Saw Fly Girl across a crowded bar on Wednesday night (don't know if she saw me) and managed to keep my cool and not bother her. Then fretted for a couple days about what I should or should not have done. Hung out with Roomies & Peeps a fair bit.

What's new and exciting? My summer project is gonna be beer brewing. Commencing today. More on that later.

What's the strangest thing to happen to you this week? I'm actually considering putting off the beer brewing for an hour in order to go for a run. Okay, a run/walk. In which there is more walking than running. But there is running, and it doesn't suck.

How's that gas station creamer theft working for ya? At Uptown Rainbow last week the 32oz non-flavored CoffeeMate bottles were 2 for $2.38. As opposed to the 89¢ per 12oz I was paying at Holiday. Figures.

I'm a sucka for the chemistry. As much as I'd prefer to distance myself from it professionally, I secretly embrace the nerdiness.

(via the Tepster, aka sweepeamofo)