Musings on Life and Living

While Gretch was trying to work on her assignments for her various classes, I chose to sit at a nearby computer and see if I could figure out what was wrong with our blog's alignments and suches. Having failed at that (and quite thoroughly, I might add), I started bugging her to show me what was wrong. After gripping my face in a I-love-you-but-I'm-going-to-kill-you type of way, she had me go through the html, and then found the problem (something was set to 170px instead of being auto). Having made that change, the blog is all prettified. And Gretch hasn't had to resort to killing me. Now we (and when I say "we" I mean "she") just needs to tweak the blog posts so that they don't get covered by our pretty leaf design (it hangs over just a little teensy bit). So huzzah for Gretch!

Yes, some of you out there in the Internet are having problems reading our blog. I know. Gretch knows. You know. We all know! And now that we've got that established, we can all stop pestering my poor wife about it, right? Right. Awesome. You guys rock. Really, thanks for letting us know. But now that we do know, she's starting to get a bit frustrated that "everyone" is bugging her about it. Which is funny, because it really isn't everyone. In fact, I think it has only been two of you. But, then again, since our current readership is floating around 6, that means that, like, 33 1/3% of our readers have told us about this. Also, I think I showed her the comments, and then, when she was actually reading her email (something she does about once a week), she saw them again. So it was like seeing it four times instead of just twice. Anyway, she'll work on it as soon as she is done un-whelming herself of assignments and isn't working. Why don't I fix it, you...

My beloved wife has informed me, quite sternly, to stop using our blog for purposes other than its true intent. I admit that I am not quite certain what this means, but when I pressed for me details, I was given dirty looks from the woman I love. And since I really do want Gretch to be happy, I am attempting a "normal" blog post. It is my understanding that blogs are meant to be used to talk about what is going on in the blogger's life. Or, at least, that is what this blog is for. While I seriously question this, I will comply. My life is pretty boring, really. In case you don't believe me, here is a run-down on what I have accomplished today. After waking Gretch for the third time at about 7:00 am and getting her off to Parkland for her 8 am class, I spent the morning reading "Twilight" and listening to my not-awesome neighbours across the way screaming at each other for a very long time. I think the screaming started at 9:30 am, but it could have been goin...

So, like most good Americans, I have been keeping track of the financial news as of late. Unlike most good Americans, I am a consumate partaker of the news at all times. My day is not complete if I have not spent hours browsing through the Washington Post, Yahoo! News, and the BBC news wires. Either way, two names have been popping up in the news a lot lately, and neither one is a personal name for any one individual. These two names are Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. I never really thought much about them before. I knew of them only in the vaguest of terms. Recently I have come to realise that these two behemoths of the housing industry have essentially controlled mortgages and house values for the nation. (I exaggerate, I know, but surely you get the point.) What I did not know until just today is that these are actually acronymic names, along the lines of laser, radar, scuba, or, perhaps more appropriately, "nickel bee" (the name given by some for No Child Left Behind - NCLB)...

So, just a few moments ago I engaged in the following conversation on AIM. The identity of the sender will be changed to protect the not-so-innocent: Puzzled  (4:17:58 PM) : Do you synchronize your sneezes with others? Sir Xela  (4:18:41 PM) : pardon? Puzzled  (4:20:04 PM) : do i know u? . Sir Xela  (4:22:26 PM) : I do not know if I know you, so I do not know if you know me Sir Xela  (4:22:34 PM) : but my name is Alex and you just IM'd me PuzzledCoho  (4:23:21 PM) : u im'd me first, anyway, im busy at work right now Sir Xela  (4:24:35 PM) : you sent a message asking if I "synchronize" my "sneezes with others" There has been no response for five minutes. This happens to me all the time. Some random person sends me a message out of the blue, then insists that I sent the first message. I don't get it. It isn't a major peeve, but it is rather annoying. It's like when someone calls me, doesn't leave a message, and then gets upset when I cal...

It was inevitable. As Google continues to move toward a global hegemony of information technology, particularly on the Internet, they had to come up with a web browser. And so they have. Last week Google introduced the world to Google Chrome in it's Beta form. You can Google the product to learn more about it. I downloaded it, and have been using it for a week now. I like it. I think it is simple and easy to navigate. It has some pretty cool features, like giving you immediate access to your nine most visited sites when you open a new tab, along with a list of your most recent bookmarks, and other cool stuff like that. It is new, though, which means it doesn't have all of the cool gadgets and whatnots that Firefox or Internet Explorer have available. But the thing that has surprised me the most is that most of Google's own web-browsing tools don't work for it! I want the Google toolbar, so that I can immediately acces the number-one site listed on Google (that's wha...

I readily admit that I have spent the vast majority of my quarter-century on this planet thoroughly confused. I have been frequently overheard telling people that I really don't know what's going on - that I simply make it up as I go. And yet, for all that, I am finding myself in the peculiar position of being one of maybe a few dozen in the Lower 48 who had heard of Alaska's governor, Sarah Palin. The odd thing about it is that I did not learn about her from my friends who live in Alaska, or even from those who live near Alaska. I did not learn about her through researching oil exploration in ANWR. I don't recall seeing her name pop up at all in the news about Alaska's Senator, Ted Stevens, being caught up in yet another GOP scandal. I first learned about Gov. Palin when John McCain had secured the GOP nomination. As soon as Sen. McCain had hit the magic number of delegates, the news begin to churn out the list of names of potential running mates. As much as I am g...