Why I prefer to stay anonymous, thanks.

The internet is a weird and scary place. And its web is so sticky! We're all tangled in it, aren't we? Some of us are stuck closer to others. Case in point:

When I'm bored at work (ha! "when"!), I often visit and linger at chowhound.com(which I've mentioned before, I know). I've been there enough that I recognize a lot of the prolific posters and lean toward reading their posts. Anyway, there's one poster (who I will do the honor of keeping anonymous, though after you read this, it won't make much sense about why I would need to) who I particularly seek out because she writes fun stuff that I enjoy reading (she seems like a funky, out-on-the-town party girl, and while I'm pretty much the opposite of that, I appreciate her quirky style).

[Here I'm skipping over the stalker-y part of the story where I found her myspace page a few months ago. I'm harmless, really. But you know that already.]

Now, here's where it gets interesting (maybe). Today, she added a link on one of her chowhound posts to a personal web site. I visit the site, and it's a full-blown, all-my-information-for-the-whole-world-to-see, make-myself-vunerable-to-all-kinds-of-internet-stalker-shenanigans site, with her resume and email and phone numbers included. When I read her resume, I realize that, whoa, she totally worked in the same place at the same time as my friend L! I shoot an email to L asking if she knows her, and yep, she does. And she has all kinds of scoop about her personal life, and now I know way too much about a girl who likes to post little reviews of restaurants online.

Yeah, so that was that thing. It seemed more interesting when I just had it in my head.

Um...what??

You tell me.

I heart kitties

I fear I may be turning into an old cat lady before my time. There's no doubt I've been enjoying my "joke" Cat Fancy magazine subscription, I check Stuff on My Cat faithfully, and now I'm obsessed with the Meow Mix House. I had this window open all day at work. Is that wrong? I mean, it's a reality show…with cats! (I may have even cast a vote for my favorite. Seriously.) As if that weren't enough, I enjoyed a good amount of time clicking various links for Limecat today. I might as well throw in the towel now and buy a bunch of moo moos (mu mus? mummus? big Hawaiian-print dresses?).

In other news, we had a fun weekend during which we actually left the house on a Friday night to see Colin Hay at Largo. We were supposed to go with other people, but ended up on our own, which I think worked in our favor because we ended up at a nice table for two five feet from the stage (so there!). Mr. Hay is surprisingly funny and puts on a heck of a good show. His wife opened for him, and though I'd never heard of her before, I downloaded one of her albums from iTunes the very next day. Speaking of the very next day, N hosted a geek poker night at our place, so I got the hell out and saw Prairie Home Companion with Tigerpants. Ehh, I think I'm missing that part of my brain that would make me enjoy this. Perhaps that part of my brain is stuck in a red state somewhere. (There may be hope for me actually, because I think an old cat lady might very much enjoy this film!) According to Roger Ebert, I have no heart if I didn't love this movie. Thanks, Roger. You wanna know what I got out of it? This joke:

One penguin says to another penguin, "You look like you're wearing a tuxedo." The other penguin says, "What makes you think I'm not?" (If I knew how to program cricket chirps to play the minute you read that, I'd have done it.)

Middle-of-the-night freak out

(No, N, you're not having deja vu. This IS almost an exact replica of the email I just sent you.)

So, I was having this kind of idyllic Huck Finn dream about my childhood in Chatsworth last night, in which I was making the walk from C's childhood home to mine, playing in the mud and catching snakes along the way. I was still a kid and going home to my room in the house and it was all nice and good, and then I sort of woke up and turned over to change positions. When I rolled over, I saw N there in my bed and I freaked out! What was a MAN doing in my bed?! I'm just a KID in Chatsworth!! Then I remembered I'm an adult in LA and went back to sleep. Weird.

An omen or THE omen?

Anyone else in the general Hollywood area notice the skywriting around 5:15 tonight? I was driving home from work and I looked up to see a rapidly fading "6" in the sky above me. Another lopsided 6 followed, and then I sat and waited for the third, assuming this was an (awfully lame) ad for The Omen. But no! An "0" followed that! "660"? What the hell is that crap? But then, a long time later, another 6 followed, and then the plane added dashes in between = 6-6-06.

I dunno, if I were the The Omen marketers, I might just go for 666 instead. I mean, this way it just looks like a reminder of tomorrow's date. Unless it isn't a marketing scheme for The Omen and it's actually a warning of something to go terribly wrong tomorrow (or a reminder to vote! Are you voting? Am I?) (And, all kidding aside, I am slightly freaked out about something going terribly wrong tomorrow. There are a lot of crazy people out there. Does that make me crazy?) (Help me stop talking to myself in parentheses, please!!). Either way, the first 6 was so faded by the time the plane was done, that if you hadn't been with it from the start, you'd have no idea what it said. If I'd had my camera with me, this post would be a lot better.

Anyway, is skywriting really an effective method of communication? I'm thinking no. However, if you were into conspiracy theories, you'd have a good time here.

Why manufacturers should stop using that hard plastic packaging

Yes, that is the tip of my thumb sliced open. Gross, isn't it? You're lucky I spared you last-night's bloody version. I hate that hard vacuum-sealed crap everything is coming in these days! How the hell are you supposed to open it without doing what I've done here?? Sheesh.




Luckily, it didn't hurt much (in fact, I didn't even know I'd done it till I saw the blood on the floor) because it was my numb thumb tip. Maybe the new skin will grow back with some normal nerve endings! Woo hoo!