Some NFL Teams Should be Pink*

I am NOT going to talk about what happened at the Broncos Raiders game last week.†

I will, however, make a brief‡ observation on the NFL.




Many of the teams that most need to be pink aren't.§

When all the snide and snark drains away, I still want this:




I have all kinds of good Nintendo stuff,¶ Liberace stuff,# mascara stuff†† and maybe even a bit of knitting stuff.‡‡

Really... stay tuned!§§


*FOOTNOTE (asterisked... no, seriously): That's "pink" as in "Victoria's Secret," not "Pink" as in "Get This Party Started."

†FOOTNOTE (crossed): Brother texted me: "What the hell happened? I came in, it was 0-0, I put the groceries away, it was 14-0" While I was answering him, trying to find different ways to say "suck," they scored again. Dr. Doom opted for donuts at Safeway as a viable fun alternative to the game. OK, now I'm really not going to talk about it. And it truly takes a saint not to bitch about such a debacle.

‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Look how funny I am! I made a panty pun!

§FOOTNOTE (swerved): Detroit Lions, I'm looking at you.

¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): Wii! (and in my head that's "wheeeee!" so it's another sort of pun, just doesn't translate well to print)

#FOOTNOTE (pounded): Really.

††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): Really.

‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): Shock and awe!

§§FOOTNOTE (the mind boggles. Twice.): This blog is what RSS feed was MADE for.

Fascinating

America before Pearl Harbor... in vivid Kodachrome.

Sure, not my usual fare, but I love this stuff. And I love all of you. So I share.

I'm saintly that way.

My Life in Munitions Engineering

Christmas my freshman year in college, my father gave me a book called "Discover What You're Best At."† It consisted of a number of sections, each with an SAT/IQ-style test to evaluate the test-taker's proficiency at a career skill like logic, clerical, business acumen.

When I got back to my dorm room in January, I dutifully waited for my roommate to go out catting about‡ so I could have the two hours' required uninterrupted peace to get through the tests. I tested. Carefully, I tallied my scores.

I was off the charts in all categories%... except one.

You know those spatial relations tests? The ones where they show you a bunch of cubes stacked together in a configuration, then ask you to choose which one is the same, but from a different angle? That one, not so much.

Checking my scores against the career possibilities listed in the back of the book, it said I could be anything I set my pointy little head to§ except a mechanical engineer or munitions expert.

It said nothing about modular knitting. Maybe it should have.

As I may have mentioned, I'm knitting two Tamarix Quilt baby blankets¶ for my two favourite# cousins.

Now, you†† can knit the thing in 100 individual squares and sew them all together. Or you can knit it together as you go along and *not* sew 100 individual squares together.

I hear you.

Heather, the designer, is very graciously shepherding@ a KAL on Ravelry. Damned good thing for some of us who are destined never to field strip an AK-47.

There's a tutorial in the magazine, part of the pattern practically, that shows how to knit the whole thing together as you‡‡ go. Problem is, my spatial retardation doesn't allow me to go there without a fight.

First, she gives instructions on how to join a square on the left or on the right. It took me ten minutes to figure out whether it was the new knitting or the old square on the left... but I got that one on my own.

Then I cast on the requisite 39 stitches for a new square, picking them up along the edge of the existing square. Only I didn't think far enough ahead to realise that 39 stitches is two sides of a square, so I should only have picked up 19 or 20 stitches, then cast on the rest. I was halfway through the new square before I realised something was horribly wrong.

THEN, since I was knitting from left to right, it never occurred to me to think right AND left. I assumed if *I* was going from left to right, the only way anything could be done was to join the old knitting on the left end of the new knitting.




NOW I've finished the first row of squares. I told Heather I was planning on knitting ten strips of squares and sewing them together, and she pointed out§§ that I¶¶ could knit the whole thing together as I went along.

*blink blink blink*

I am paralysed. How should I proceed? Should I 1) dive in and try to knit, sometimes joining on two sides, 2) stick with my original ten-strips-and-sew plan, or 3) try building a bridge in my living room for mechanical aptitude practice?^





†FOOTNOTE (crossed): Possibly as a reaction to me telling him I was a theatre major.

‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): I believe it was 2.2 seconds, a statistic to make Porsche jealous. My first roommate was... social.

%FOOTNOTE (percented): Which, by the way, did nothing to help me discover what I was *best* at.

§FOOTNOTE (swerved): "Free to Be... You and Me" is earworming me like a mother right now - those Target commercials don't help

¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): From the latest Interweave Knits.

#FOOTNOTE (pounded): ...and most fertile.

††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): And by "you," I mean "I."

@FOOTNOTE (atted): Ha! Sheep joke!

‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): I

§§FOOTNOTE (I am incapable of straight thinking): Very optimistically, given my proven inability to turn right when the situation called for it.

¶¶FOOTNOTE (beat the drum slowly): And by "I," I mean "Heather or some other munitions expert."

^FOOTNOTE (careted): Or - and I just thought of this one - I could knit in a spiral, forcing me to knit the last square together with FOUR other squares. To gain saint points, of course.

OMG... O M G... omgomgomgomg

John Cusack is going to play Edgar Allen Poe.

I knew all this sainthood shit would pay off eventually and I would be rewarded.

Fireworks!

Actually, I'm irritated in an old geezer you-kids-get-off-my-lawn way about blown-up-in-my-backyard fireworks right now.†

Huh. I've already digressed and I haven't even started talking yet.‡

There are three great things I saw this weekend that I wish to share, plus a bonus of two happy things that happened:

1. I landed home Saturday afternoon and flipped on the TiVi.§ There was a baseball game right in front of me, which I was just about to turn off, when I noticed the player up to bat was Angel Pagan.¶ I wish I could have kids so I could name one of them Angel Pagan.
2. Driving to Jerusalem Restaurant for a very patriotic Third of July dinner, I passed the giant convent/Catholic convalescence home in the 'hood. There was a Barbie-pink scooter waiting at the giant gate to make a left onto 29th. "Wish I had a camera," I thought. "This would be a great blog bit." Then the scooter pulled in behind me and it was a bearded guy in aviator sunglasses and that made it all the better.
3. On the same drive, I was at a red light and across from me were two of the whitest, yuppiest, Chanel sunglass-wearing, designer polo shirt-clad 30-something dinks# ever seen, playing a vuvuzela and waving a South African flag out of the sunroof on their BMW. I'm not saying they *couldn't* be South African, but if they are, they're on the wrong side of the popular political tracks and maybe shouldn't be displaying the equivalent of one of us wearing a loin cloth and a feathered headdress and doing the Tomahawk Chop out of the windows of our BMWs.

Then I got to Jerusalem and the ever-so-adorable chicklet who took my order asked what my shirt meant.

"Rock-paper-scissors... lizard-spock," I replied to a peal of delighted laughter.

Then she cooed and exclaimed over my emergency wallet.††

It was a good day.

And that was a totally elegant segue into a package% from my not-so-secret-pal Jo.‡‡ Because my emergency wallet looks like this:




And Jo, not knowing a thing about my emergency wallet,§§ sent me this soap:




Which was an adjunct to that month's subject prize, the washcloth¶¶:




And came with a bonus soap dish:




And totally bath-related pirate cupcake set##:




So thank you, Jo, both for your patience and for the lovely gifts.

Give me another two months and I should be caught up.


†FOOTNOTE (crossed): But real fireworks, performed by professionals, are one of my favourite things.

‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): That may be a record. Lyda's going to be so proud when she sees.

§FOOTNOTE (swerved): As one does.

¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): I took Spanish, so I know it's pronounced "ON-hell pa-GONE," but he'll always be Angel Pagan to me. Plus? If you Google "Angel Pagan" (even without the quotation marks), you don't get a single religious reference for pages.

#FOOTNOTE (pounded): And I mean both in terms of "Jebus Cats, what a couple of dinks" and "Double Income No Kids."

††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): The wallet that goes in my pocket in which I keep my driver's license, debit card and a small chunk of cash to hold me over when I leave my purse somewhere three times out of ten. Usually home, mind you, but one should have the necessities with one. If that one has juvenile onset Alzheimer's like this one does.

%FOOTNOTE (percented): I'm smooth like peanut butter. Note how I not only tied it all together with the Cute as Hell theme, I managed to not let on that this package arrived two months ago and I'm just getting to it now.

‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): Who just revealed herself to me per the terms of our year-long swap agreement, in which I was totally wishy-washy and said, "Oh, let's be secret for six months, then not-secret for six months." I am fair, if indecisive.

§§FOOTNOTE (sssupposedly): I think.

¶¶FOOTNOTE (two heads better than one): Which was hard to photograph adequately, but does, indeed, have a black skull motif rampant on a black background.

##FOOTNOTE (that's the symbol for shock): Why? Where do you eat your cupcakes?

Double Crap!

The comments are often interesting. Sometimes, they're downright hilarious. Today, they were humbling, as Kari reminded me of a little oversight† on my part.

I was so busy talking about myself and saying things to make Kim hate me‡ that I completely forgot to tell y'all that Hans got a job too.§ Same place. We'll probably still have adjoining offices.¶

*whew*

There.

Back on the high road.#


†FOOTNOTE (crossed): *cough*

‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Dear Kim, I've said it before:

"Look at me," said the star, "I'm shining so brightly." Then it went supernova. The moral of this story is obvious. - Tanith Lee, The Silver Metal Lover

§FOOTNOTE (swerved): And he doesn't even have to be one of my minions.

¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): There is some chance I will have to move to the other side of our floor, given my two extant minions office there and it's where the empty offices where the two TBD minions will likely live.

#FOOTNOTE (pounded): Where a saint-in-training belongs.

Procedural Question

Took lovely vacation.†

1. Took fantastic new job.‡
2. Won tourney pool.§
3. Came home last night to find new Nintendo cooking game% on the front porch... along with a new chef's apron,¶ onion goggles,# a Cuisinart†† stainless steel stockpot and a truly beautiful, big bamboo chopping board.
4. Went to happy hour with Kelley. One bottle of wine, one beer, one order of chips and salsa: $16.25. God bless half-price bottles of wine.‡‡

The question is, do I buy the lottery ticket because I'm on a roll, or have I used up more than my fair share of luck?§§


†FOOTNOTE (crossed): With glow sticks!

‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Yes, I did. The company that's been my client for the last three years offered me a full-time, permanent position. After carefully weighing the pay (a little less than contractor pay, but that's expected. I'll have to watch my pennies for most of the year, I'm guessing, until I get used to not having free rein of my gross pay), the benefits (401K AND pension, raises AND bonuses, med/dent/vision for $1 a month, garage parking for $25 a month, four weeks paid vacation a year, 10 holidays and one floating holiday a year - for those of you scoring at home, that means I get a full month of and paid per year. Well, for the next four years until I get FIVE weeks vacation a year. Discount stock plan and LTIP [long term incentive program, and when I figure out the LTIP thing, maybe I can explain it to someone else], which means more cash prizes.), the location (same place, five miles from home) and the position (they created it for me, keeping in mind my short attention span, and I will have MINIONS. FOUR MINIONS), I decided that at my age and stage, I couldn't pass it up.

§FOOTNOTE (swerved): Cash, yes, but bragging rights more important.

%FOOTNOTE (percented): America's Test Kitchen...



to go along with my last two Nintendo-supplied games, which we never talked about.




Professor Layton: wonderful puzzle game (I like puzzles).
Style Savvy: like electronic Barbies.


¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): Red.

#FOOTNOTE (pounded): I'm very sensitive to onions. I hope the goggles work.

††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): Cuisinart!

‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): Every happy hour at El Camino, which sounds divey and suspect, but it's actually a really nice neighbourhood bar in what is considered a pretty nice neighbourhood. Despite the name and the discount wine.

§§FOOTNOTE (head... spinning...): I'd hate to be the victim of the first exploding lottery ticket or something, which is where I fear this is headed, given the Kharmic Green Stamps I've cashed in over the last few days.

#NintendoEnthused - plus there's a new hashtag that's supposed to say I've been compensated by Nintendo, but you already knew that and I don't remember what that hashtag looks like. Y'all know Nintendo ships me stuff and I talk about it. I hope you also know that if it sucked, I'd tell you so.

It totally does not suck.

Lovelace for the Computerlorn

From Think Geek, county seat of all things wise and weirdiful:

"Attention geeks far and wide!

Did you know that [March 24] is Ada Lovelace Day? The only daughter of poet Lord Byron, Ms. Lovelace wrote the very first computer program, inspired by Charles Babbage's analytical engine. Wherever you are tomorrow, show some love to the self-rescuing code princesses you know. Buy 'em some Fritos and raise a can of Mountain Dew in Ada's honor.

Hooray for girl geeks!"

And if there are any girl geeks out there who know how to reset my wireless card, I'd be forever grateful... I'd build a shrine to Ada Lovelace in my living room.

Saints are allowed shrines, you know.

The Moment You've All Been Waiting For

At least it's the moment I've been dying to share with you.†

[SUMMARY: Po-tay-to, po-tah-to.]

I shan't drag you through the litany of "stuck in the camera" and "busy at work" and all that. You know the song, I'll let you sing it on your own.

Suffice to say I finished Dr. Doom's Christmas sweater around the end of January,‡ then through the vagaries of joint custody, finally got it to him mid-February.

I took the basic top-down raglan sweater,§ I've been using for everything Nephew, added a textured alligator belly through the miracle of intarsia-in-the-round, then winged it on the sleeves.¶

%





It was the winging it part that really mucked up the works.

There I'd be in my chair at work, madly correcting, explaining, marketing, e-schmoozing and otherwise getting the job done, when suddenly, sleeve panic would hit me and I'd start doing the alligator thing with my elbows,# using paper clips to mark the place where alligator lips should be and re-figuring where alligator mouth should go...

[SUMMARY: Every person does multi-tasking in his own way.]

Is it any wonder I was so absent for so long? I had a lot going on.

In the end, I think it worked out pretty well.




But the true test is how it works for Dr. Doom.

[SUMMARY: Proof, meet pudding.]

First, getting naked in Chipotle.††




Then test-driving the beast.






Why, arm, what big teeth you have!




Let's see, important knitting stuff:

First, this is the proudest knitting moment of my knitterly life. It's the closest I've come to designing something, and it's something unique and cool and interesting and wowing and I'm just so tickled.

The sweater was originally inspired by this genius shirt from the Discovery Channel Store. I quickly realised that a white and pale grey shirt was no match for a five-year-old supervillain, so I decided to go with the classic gator.

Other than the pupils of the eyes, which are Dark Horse Fantasy, the whole thing is knit in Cascade 220 Superwash.

I made nose-holes‡‡ of I-cord loops.

The eyes took as long as the rest of the sweater put together. I had alligator eyes all over my living room for weeks. When one gets a solid vision of what one wants, it's hard for one to accept anything different.§§

One thing I believe the pattern misses, and that I missed too, is that when you put the sleeve stitches on holders to knit the body, you cast on an inch under the arm.

Which - and this is very important - adds two inches to the body of the sweater.

[SUMMARY: Math even I can do.]

On the one hand, I was delighted to get gauge. On the other, getting gauge meant I was the full two inches bigger than I wanted.

I had planned to sew up the sides, take out a couple of inches, but figured I'd better try it on the good Doctor first.¶¶ Yes, it's just a bit too big.

The neck is also big, being unfinished. I knit a nice 3-2 rib collar about 37 times and it always seemed too small.## So I left it unfinished for maximum headroom. Yes, it's just a bit too big.

I told Brother I wanted to take it home and finish it properly and he assured me Doom will be wearing a t-shirt under it most of the time, so aesthetically it's OK.

[SUMMARY: Aesthetics are what you're looking for in a sweater for a five-year-old.]

I don't know if he doesn't want to put me out or if he's afraid they'll never see it if I get my grubby hands on it again.

Hey! We've had a fair amount of knitting around here lately. You'd almost think this was still a knitblog.


†FOOTNOTE (crossed): And, y'know, it's all about me. And my lamp.

‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): And I would've finished it *much* faster if Dr. Doom hadn't given me a VERY COMPELLING game for my Nintendo DS for Christmas. *ahem*

§FOOTNOTE (swerved): And I'm not sure why I keep using this one, except that it's familiar. The sizing is all wrong, vis-a-vis boys S-M-L. I always ask Brother to measure a shirt that fits, then try to match the inches from there.

¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): Wing... sleeves... heheheheheh... I'm funny.

%FOOTNOTE (percented): With the new office, I no longer have a clean white wall behind a hanger to photograph my sweaters. Whatever shall I do now?

#FOOTNOTE (pounded): Sound effect: "RAWR!"

††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): Note the find cow hat on Brother's head, a Valentine's present from his favourite Seester. He brings me Icelandic sludge and lopi, I bring him cow hats.

‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): nostrils-nose holes ... to-may-to, to-mah-to.

§§FOOTNOTE (twisted definition time): Read: lesser.

¶¶FOOTNOTE (you can beat it into my head): I may not be a math genius, but I do have my moments of clarity.

##FOOTNOTE (square head, round hole, pound pound): Which I determined by trying to fit it over my own head, under the suspicion that heads grow less than anything else in a person's life, therefore kid heads must be nearly as large adult heads.

Knitpiphany!†

Carol Jean sent yarn.‡

Beautiful Black Bunny yarn.




Beautifuller even than I thought it was when I first pulled it out because it's so light, so pastel, I thought I'd have to let it grow on me.§ Only there's something moody and shoreswept about it, like the faded paint on a seaside ice cream shop, and it grew like kudzu in a wet summer.^




[SUMMARY: Poetic yarn.]

It's 50/50 alpaca/wool, and a generous serving size,@ so I squish it on a daily basis and didn't know what to do with it.

Then, in my current round of blog gluttony,¶ I ran across a lovely post with lovely pictures and a scarf that made me catch my breath.%

[SUMMARY: A pattern of melodrama.]

Perfect. It's *perfect*.#

This has never happened to me before. I'm a little dizzy.


†FOOTNOTE (crossed): Have I used that title before?

‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Despite my calling her Carol Jean behind her back, I got the yarn because I'm in her Black Bunny Yarn Club, rather than because I'm her BFF. I'm not as special as I may have misled you to believe.

§FOOTNOTE (swerved): It may shock you, but I'm generally not a pastel person. For those of you scoring at home, I think the top picture is more true to colour - at least on my monitor.

^FOOTNOTE (careted): Hans agrees.

@FOOTNOTE (atted): 530 yards of fuzzy, halo'd goodness. Just right for a saint-in-waiting.

¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): Some of you may have noticed swarms of comments from me, some covering posts you made months ago. That's me, catching up after the great Workicane (Workopalypse? Nine on the Workchter Scale? I'm working on it. Whatever it was, it was an unnatural disaster with gale force winds.) of O'9. The boss called last week because he had dinner with the VP who brought me on here and he asked what our (Hans and I) workload would be like so he could schedule in impending projects. "Divestitures are going to slow down this year," Randy the Veep is purported to have said. "What the HELL does that mean?" I wailed at John. "Six-day work weeks instead of seven? Only working twelve hours a day?" *ahem* Excuse me. A little vent is good for the soul. A saint-in-training can't afford to have a constipated soul.

%FOOTNOTE (percented): It's not the cleverest or the most complex or the most graceful, it's just perfect for the yarn at hand. And I *really* like it. The designer calls it "Mabel's Scarf," but I recognise a Greek key when I see it, so it's All Greek to Me.

#FOOTNOTE (pounded): I'm a perfection virgin.

The Iggle Has Landed!

The pink† cashmerino‡ finally made its way home.§

For the record? No mail Saturday, Monday, Tuesday... seven copies of the weekly grocery flyer, a Nordstrom bill from November¶ and my yarn today.

I feel *so* lucky to have ever received this package. I believe it may qualify as a miracle.#


†FOOTNOTE (crossed): It's a lovely, lovely pink.

‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): And the remaining two cones of green.

§FOOTNOTE (swerved): Home is where you hang your cashmere.

¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): I went paperless in December.

#FOOTNOTE (pounded): In the new theism, I believe my post office is Satan.

Rats Dead... Bodies Everywhere...

Is "rat-killing" specific to the petroleum industry, or do all people use this term?

Call me the Pied Piper of Petroleum Problems, St. Marin of the Dead Rat.

Sheesh. I'm putting "exterminator" on my résumé.

Attached

It's not quite like that, really.

You know those times you† send out a lengthy and hard-won work email, with careful wording that shows off your vast and varied vocabulary while maintaining readability, that hints at greatness and touches on the good of the company and all hinges on the concept that you attached the illustrative document... and you have to resend everything with some version of "Oops!" when someone@ says, "I don't see the attachment."

This reminds me of that.

[SUMMARY: Drawing on common experience to make myself feel less dorklike.]

Yesterday's post about knitting angst may have lost some of its oomph when you clicked the link to find yourself in a sterile grey house with sterile grey people staring out of different doorways while their sterile grey dog blends into their sterile grey carpet.‡

See, the Unhappy Hipsters blog isn't set up so someone with the technical acumen of a WWII vet§ can figure out how to link to an individual post. Only I didn't realise that until this morning.

[SUMMARY: I'm not as quick as I used to be.]

So, at the risk of infringing on copyrights,¶ I'm simply reenacting# the blogpost here so you can see what I really meant.




Trapped by the tawny palette, he struggled through yet another brown knit scarf.

(Photo: Randi Berez; Dwell, September 2005)


You're welcome.


†FOOTNOTE (crossed): And by "you," I mean "I." You probably stopped doing that ages ago.

@FOOTNOTE (atted): For me, it's almost always the boss or the know-it-all from the 6th floor.

‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): I'd never noticed how morose Dwell Magazine is.

§FOOTNOTE (swerved): That'd be me.

¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): Something a saint should never, ever do.

#FOOTNOTE (pounded): Like some historical event. It's not stealing or infringing, it's reenacting.

St. Brigid and the Six Weeks of Winter

It's that time of year again.†

Sheep‡

Thousands of sheep, soft-footed, black-nosed sheep--
one by one going up the hill and over the fence--one by
one four-footed pattering up and over--one by one wiggling
their stub tails as they take the short jump and go
over--one by one silently unless for the multitudinous
drumming of their hoofs as they move on and go over--
thousands and thousands of them in the grey haze of
evening just after sundown--one by one slanting in a
long line to pass over the hill--

I am the slow, long-legged Sleepyman and I love you
sheep in Persia, California, Argentine, Australia, or
Spain--you are the thoughts that help me when I, the
Sleepyman, lay my hands on the eyelids of the children
of the world at eight o'clock every night--you thousands
and thousands of sheep in a procession of dusk making
an endless multitudinous drumming on the hills with
your hoofs.

- Carl Sandburg


†FOOTNOTE (crossed): When St. Brigid brings a basket of teeth down the chimney and if she sees a turkey's shadow, it means six more weeks of winter.

‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): Because, despite all appearances, this is still a knitblog.

Guess Where I Am

First clue: usually I play this game on Twitter, but I'm in a place with no cell service, no 3G... T-Mobile radio silence.*

That's right, Billings, Montana. Trying to fix something I broke five years ago because I sucked then, but I don't suck quite so much now.**

[SUMMARY: Pride is a sin. I am a saint-in-waiting.]

Also? This computer doesn't recognise CTRL-C for copy or CTRL-V for paste,*** so I can't get my normal**** footnotes on the page.

I really like Billings,***** but I'll be glad to get back to Denver where the cell phones work and the footnotes come with pretty crosses****** and swirls.*******


*FOOTNOTE (one star): This happened the last time I came to Billings. And the time before that. The definition of insanity...

**FOOTNOTE (two stars): When the person you respect most in your field, ever, tells you you screwed up, tells you you're good at what you do, tells you you screwed up, tells you you're better now than you were when you screwed up, tells you everybody screws up, but you definitely screwed up, but you shouldn't beat yourself up about it... you spend a LOT of time beating yourself up about it. I suck.

***FOOTNOTE (three stars): Yet somehow recognises CTRL-B for bold. This is the most confusing alphabet book ever.

****FOOTNOTE (four stars): OK, so there's nothing normal about my footnotes.

*****FOOTNOTE (five stars): More fantastic restaurants per capita than Manhattan and an art museum that hosts the kind of collections only old oil money can provide.

******FOOTNOTE (six stars): I'm a saint-in-training. I *need* my crosses. Besides, isn't it a little confusing when I use the asterisks for emphasis and you're off looking for the footnote that goes with "need"?

*******FOOTNOTE (seven beautiful stars... MWAHAHAHA! *bats**lightning*): How'm I s'posed to get my swerve on if there's no swerve button on this stupid computer?

Clean Sweep

OK, my inclination here is to rant and rave and piss and moan and spit and claw and scream†...

[SUMMARY: My checklist for crazy.]

...but I'm going zen.%

The zero comments for the last three years, that's a fresh, clean start.

We can all go forward like we've never spoken of balloon animal sex and thermocromatic glass and past indiscretions and knitterly wiles.

Like a kid in a new school, it's a little scary, but each of us can invent a comment persona anew.‡ Nobody needs to know. There's no evidence.

[SUMMARY: *tick* *tick* *tick*]

JS-Kit can take their Echo and their promises and shove them up their collective ass.§ They bought Haloscan, promised wonderful things, told me numerous times I had to upgrade or lose everything and NEVER got it all working.

Consequently, other than Yvette's comment on kidrobot,@ anything that's happened over in the comment section for the last... three years is gone. I'm sorry if you commented in the last week and I missed you.

In the end, the only solution was to remove them entirely, including all the comments ever. I'll just use the plain vanilla Blogger comment option. Suits me just fine.

[SUMMARY: *sniff*]

The grapes were probably sour anyway.¶


†FOOTNOTE (crossed): In other words, just an average Wednesday.

%FOOTNOTE (percented): What a theological goulash... the perennial candidate for sainthood going zen.

‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): It can be like that time at camp when you told all your bunkmates you were a wildly popular and sought-after designer of mazes and the adoring throngs kept you up all night every night begging for more of your confounding and elegant creations. Maybe I'm projecting.

§FOOTNOTE (swerved): Don't start. That *is* the zen version of what I feel about JS-Kit right now.

@FOOTNOTE (atted): Which somehow made it through the gauntlet to the Blogger comment thingie. Yvette has superpowers.

¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): Plain vanilla and sour grapes. A taste treat whose time has come.