Breakthrough Chrome Extension!

Have you ever thought, while browsing the internet, that something just seems like it's missing?

Does your new, shiny Chrome browser look suspiciously like your Firefox after all?

Have you ever closed a tab and wished there was something more final about it?

Have you ever been forced to use Internet Explorer on someone else's computer and realized that you actually enjoy the spontaneous clicking noises?

Have I got an extension for you.

Chrome has introduced what will without a doubt be the latest big trend in browsers: sound. I don't mean sounds embedded in web pages or anything. I mean the same kind of exciting little sounds your OS makes when you minimize things or get an error message. I think you'll find that this selection of fabulous noises really enhances the browser experience. I, for one, now feel somehow disappointed every time I close a tab and it doesn't make a noise like shattering glass- and don't even get me started on my adoration for the scrollbar effects!

Seriously, just try it. I think you'll appreciate it.

How I Know The Internet Has Killed My Brain:

When I saw this, the first thing I thought was: "Oh man, they missed out on the perfect opportunity to put this to Yakkety Sax."

Yep. That's it. I'm officially insane.

News Flash! *blink*

Well, I have some bad news for the three* of you that read this blog. Tomorrow I start school, which means any posts after this one will be uncertain. I'll probably be able to get in a few here and there still, but don't plan your life around it or anything.

Want a bit of news to make this a bit better? I have come across an alternative name for the Hair Chorus: Mount Rushmore. Is that not amazing?

Also, every time it says 1 Comments down below a post I die a little inside. Not because there are so few comments, of course (I'm used to my blog's pathetic readership), but because it's so damn gramatically incorrect. So do a good deed, spare me the irritation, and comment some more. I'll respond this time!

*I know I'm being a bit optimistic here

(I also know this post title was groan-worthy, and I apologize sincerely)

Things That Make You Feel Like An Idiot

Hand pointers.

By that, I mean sticks with a little pointing hand on the end of them, used to illustrate things on PowerPoint slides and exciting things like that. (They're a little creepy, now that I think about it.)
Sure, while using them they're nifty, but what do you do with them when you're done?

I have had to hold one of these for someone before. The thing is, with a pointer like this, you are always pointing at something or someone, whether you wish to or not. When you see it's pointing at some random person's leg you'll feel like a creep and then aim it at a table. Then you're realize how stupid it must look to be obviously pointing at a table and will casually flick it up to point at the ceiling. Shortly after this it will occur to you how bizarre pointing at the ceiling must look, and, humiliated, you point it at the ground before realizing that's not much better. In a final moment of desperation, you'll point the finger at yourself, before realizing that now you just look like an egotistical bastard. And then you give up and set the pointer down, trying desperately to ignore whatever you are calling attention to now.

No, there is just nothing good you can do with a hand pointer that is not in use.

Why I Hate My Cell Phone Camera

1. Point camera at object. Move and tilt camera until object is mostly in frame.

2. Attempt to get camera to focus.

3. Once camera is in perfect focus, mash down on camera button and hope it will take a picture.

4. Camera either slips out of focus just as picture is taken or goes into video mode. If the latter happens, fumble to get the camera back into picture mode and repeat process.

5. (optional) If the resulting picture is intolerably blurry, you may delete it and try again; just keep in mind this increases the chance the next picture will be blurrier than the first by 70%.

6. Once the picture is finally taken, discover that how you tilted the camera to get the object in the frame resulted in the picture being upside down in a way that no amount of gyroscope-tilting will fix.

The Meaning of Life

is an impulse buy.

No, really. A while ago in an independent bookstore I saw, next to the checkout desk, a small shelf of small brightly-colored books. They were short introductions to such varied topics as communism and calculus and beat literature. And the topic of one was The Meaning of Life. I am not making this up. I couldn't. It's one of those things that's stranger than fiction. I wish I had taken a picture to prove it to you. Or better yet, I should have bought it- I mean, who couldn't use a short introduction to the meaning of life? I'm quite curious as to what that book says it is.

Something to ponder

Am I the only one who thinks/says "I want to go home," even if I already am home, whenever I'm uncomfortable? Where do you think we're referring to? A happier place? The place we were before we were born? Heaven? Unconsciousness? Dreamland? It's a good thing to wonder about whenever you think that modern life has everything figured out.

Interesting Topic of the Day: Polaroid Manipulation

Today's interesting topic is Polaroid Manipulation.

Polaroid Manipulation is, in short, a sort of old-school, analog Photoshop. You know those old-style Polaroids that come out wet, start black and then develop into color, and that you apparently aren't supposed to shake to dry? Well, if you do shake it while it's still drying, you'll come out with a surreal, wavy, wiggly, painting-like picture, that looks almost like a reflection in water. Shaking it different ways results in different patterns of waviness. People have turned shaking the little pictures into a sort of art, telling how you have to shake just the right way to achieve just the desired effect.

The fall picture is a good example of a photo that was truly "shaken like a Polaroid peec-tchah!"



Another way people can manipulate Polaroids is with a toothpick or something of the sort, scraping the dye off in places to achieve another kind-of painting effect. They can outline things, shade things, make things look like snow, make random borders... This way of manipulating Polaroids requires slightly less practice and slightly more creativity and drawing talent. Even though it may at first sound inferior to the wiggly-wobbly picture produced by shaking a Polaroid, you can do some really awesome stuff to your photos that way, too. A good example of a scraped Polaroid is the picture of the lamp.




(photos from here and here, if you check out the Flikr pools they're in, you can find some other really cool manipulated Polaroids, too)

But it's been done, I bet.

I have always wanted to start a band called Natch, and then put out an album called Natch Rally. Geddit?

Subject-O-Matique

After pasting something random again today:

"Anachronistic Antidisestablishmentarianism: A Case Study"

I noticed a pattern. It always happened in Yahoo Mail, in the subject line. So I googled this strange phenomenon (after googling Anachronistic Antidisestablishmentarianism: A Case Study and turning up a Wordpress blog post about a teen searching for Jesus) and guess what!!!

It's a Yahoo Mail Easter Egg!!!!!

This has to be my favorite easter egg ever. Yes, even more favorite than the one in the last post. I then proceeded to go through them all. I love them. I am SO using some of these phrases for posts in the future.

Not Another....

Paradox, that is. Listen closely and you shall see...

Sesquipedalian.
Now here is a word that just does not make much sense.
It means using long words.
Now, just using the word sesquipedalian would indicate that you were sesquipedalian.
Which would make the use of the word sesquipedalian just a formality, as it had already been shown that you use long words.
*brain fries*

Question of the Day

Is that kind of noodle pronounced rAYmen or rAHmen? Discuss.

(regular posting will resume soon- Chris has been sick. Blech. Until then I'm posting all this stuff to make it up to all my non-existent readers.)

A Small Thought

HOOGAH SHAKKA HOOGAH HOOGAH HOOGAH SHAKKA HOOGAH HOOGAH HOOGAH SHAKKA

This is what is being blasted through my headphones right now. I wonder when it changed to this song. It just occurred to me to wonder why I'm listening to this.

Blueness

(enjoy the craptastic alien abduction concert corny fighting plus crappy animation video for this song)

I feel the need to announce this. You know that wildly popular (kind of carppy, now that I hear it again) song, Blue by Eiffel 65? I misheard some lyrics in it. I had never looked up the lyrics to it, ever, and I got a shock when I did. You know that little rap part in the middle? This part:
I have a blue house with a blue window.
Blue is the color of all that I wear.
Blue are the streets and all the trees are too.
I have a girlfriend and she is so blue.
Blue are the people here that walk around,
Blue like my corvette, it's standing outside.
Blue are the words I say and what I think.
Blue are the feelings that live inside me.

Well, prepare yourself for my version-until-five-minutes-ago.
I have a blue house with a blue window.
Blue is the color I vomit and I wear it. (Ew, yuck, blarg, gee-ross!)
Blue are the streets and now the trees are blue. (minor mix-up here)
I have a girlfriend and she is so blue.
Blue are the people here that walk around.
Blue is my corvette, its engine on fire (YOW! Lay off on the starter fluid, buddy.)
Blue are the words I sing when I think. (If singing helps you think, I guess...)
Blue are the feelings that live inside me.

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Now playing: Of Montreal - Lysergic Bliss
(That was actually me, I changed it to what I'm listening to on internet radio since it doesn't work with that)

Random Tired Thought at 12:12 AM

Don't forget to leave a contrail as you go up. It makes things more interesting for the rest of us.

(Well, I didn't promise it would make sense.)

Random Is What I Do Best

Presenting the next part of Bee's meme at long last! This is the random one. It actually wasn't that hard, seeing how good I am at random things and all. Blame me for procrastinating it.

7 random things about me!!

1. I have an irrational fear of a certain song by The Decemberists.

2. Everyone says this music-blasting light up tree the people across the street bought and have in their front yard is annoying, and I agree, but I secretly like it and hate it that whenever the husband comes home he shuts the music off.

3. I am currently watching a fat guy in a red shirt and a jean skirt ride a bull on TV.

4. I had a crush on a cartoon character at 4.

5. I cannot make a decent rhyme- one that isn't like "thread" and "bread"- to save my life.

6. I can say the phrase "I sit and stare at nothing for hours on end" (je rest assis et je regarde fixement dans le vide pendant des heures) in French, but not much else.

7. I wiggle my ears when I'm trying to hear something, like it will actually help.



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Now playing: Johnny Rivers - Secret Agent Man
via FoxyTunes
(I have always wanted to rewrite this song as Secret Asian Man)

*blush*

Bee was kind enough to tag me for not one, but two tag game meme things. I'm a little late with them. Here's the embarrassing one, as promised. Expect the random one soon.

8 (oh, okay... 4) EMBARRASSING THINGS

1. When I was in a play in, I don't know, 1st grade, I had the opening lines, and I went out to speak, in front of everyone in my whole entire family and the school, when the big piece of background scenery came crashing down on me from behind. I didn't even notice until it hit me. And it was caught on film. I have never truly recovered from that.

2. I have an unfortunate way of staring at any objects headed my way until they hit me. Call it Deer-In-Headlights Syndrome. When playing basketball once, someone threw the ball at me. Instead of catching it, I stared at it until it bounced off my upturned face. And it went into the basket! One in a million.

3. I slipped on ice on the top step after a nasty ice storm, once. It was a really comical Chaplin special, with one foot coming flying out from under me almost 90 degrees after planting it, and me landing flat on my butt. I bumped down all three stairs, and absolutely flew all the way down the path- on my butt, remember, with both legs and both arms flailing wildly- until I finally managed to skid to a stop where the paved little path bends. It must have looked hilarious. And I know a few people who were out at the right moment saw. Not to mention I had a bruise almost the length of my thigh that lasted more than a week. Owie.

4. I ripped my shorts one day this summer- a great big split, right down the back seam- and went around all day with it on. In the mall, with everyone and their uncle in it. I honestly did not notice until I took them off. How bad can that get??

5. No more, I've already humiliated myself enough...

Me, too.

Two rather odd (but what did you expect from me?) PostSecrets I can very much relate to me.

Now you will know two pretty weird details about myself.

Take That, Bad Grammar!

If there's one thing that miffs me on the web, it's stuff like this:
heyyyyyy i like ur blog cuz itz cool k cul8r!!!!!
I understand using it for texts if you get charged by the character. Heck, if you got charged by the character, I'd shorten even more that that. I'd abbreviate everything. It would be funny. I love abbreviating random things. I would just write stuff like SWU? and people would have to guess what it meant (in this case I was thinking So, what's up?). But on the internet there's no reason for it. It's just plain lazy. Not to mention bad grammar irritates me. Grammar Nazi here! So when I saw this avatar today, I was like "Heck, yes!" Enjoy The Grammar Geek avatar!


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Now playing: Red Hot Chili Peppers - Snow (Hey Oh)
via FoxyTunes

Give Thanks!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!!!

Below I have posted a link to the lyrics to Alice's Restaurant. I won't torture everyone by posting the whole thing right here. I just have a link, so if you want to read them, you can, but if you don't want to, you don't have to. It will also keep me from stretching out my blog page by a ton, because that song is more than 20 minutes long and it's all talking. Now there's something to be thankful for. Enjoy!

By the way, I guess listening to the whole of Alice's Restaurant on Thanksgiving is a New England thing. Hmm. Who knew?

http://www.arlo.net/resources/lyrics/alices.shtml
Also, the full version of this song is on my blog playlist, so if you have never heard it you may enrich your life with it.

**please excuse the huge text, try as I might I can't seem to make it smaller... Blogger being wacky**