msbelle is adorkable. as is ita. And I'm really not allowed to move further north. I really hate winter that much and barely survive this version. And NYC kinda is too much for me with that involved (I used to say no huge cities. But then LA got me and was weirdly attractive.) I'd have to give up CARS. And aimless drives to the boonies not 30 minutes away that are the antithesis of NYC. But I do wish it were a twenty minute drive to visit.

ita, I'm wishing you no more pain, no matter how ridic that might be. You can keep the chosen pain, but the other needs to go.

grr, my tivo goes through the motions of connecting to the mothership via the phoneline, but it doesn't seem to actually be doing it.

I am going to bed in the hopes that my watchful eye it the cause of the failure.

I am not usually tech retarded, but I think I need some help with this thing.

I am having one of those - you can't do anything right in your life anymore - weeks. I am I am I am. Apparently I have also become an all about me whineybutt. sorry.

1) More than 50% of my neighborhood has cars. 2) The next express stop out neighborhood is even more car-y and has better parking and is right close to LI where there are still working farms and while not boonies - more boon-like if you know where to look. 3) I know you won't, but it's fun to pretimagine.

msbelle, you do a whole helluva lot right. Honestly. There are stumbling blocks. But you are amazing and I'm so very grateful to count you as friend. I hope that helps a little.

And we all have those times. We need our people to brace us for that.

eta: see above for proof! Sweetie.

OMG, I am exhausted. I just started to walk out of my kitchen with a burner lit, after using it to light a cigarette. Luckily, I left it on the clicky part, where you have to turn it to to light the gas, and the sound reminded me as I walked out. I got busted for my lighter at the airport, and apparently have no matches in the house at all. @@

Dude! You were my inspiration behind smuggling matches back from San Francisco! I'm so disappointed.

Turns out the thought of people causing other people consensual pain wasn't enough distraction. Not even learning about dilators and tuning forks (no dirty words at all) and how they're used to play did the job.

how they're used to play

I'm curious and afraid all at the same time.

And, I'm baking cookies to distract me from my job hunt.

Flipping ship

The FLIP research vessel (Floating Instrument Platform) is the only ship in the world having the ability to flip from a horizontal position to a vertical position while at sea.

FLIP is 108 meters long and weighs 700 long tons. According to Alan Bellows, "when in horizontal traveling mode, the long, hollow ballast area trails behind. When it reaches the desired location, the "tail" is flooded until the nose sticks straight up into the air, taking about twenty-eight minutes to reach vertical position".

During the flip, the crew stand on the outside decks. Scientists and crewmembers literally walk up the walls to stay upright. Suddenly, the aft side of the barge becomes its floor. That makes for some ingenious engineering feats in equipping its bridge, galley, crew quarters and scientific laboratory. Even its head, or bathroom, had to be constructed to operate in a vertical and horizontal position.

Freakish bathroom - it has a regular sink and a "sideways" sink. When the ship tilts, the sideways one becomes the regular one.

Zoom World

Astonishing Flight thru the Endless World-

Awesome. Surreal artwork - your p.o.v. zooms in and in and in....

Oh, there is a massive Digg rebellion underway right now....

This is insane, all of the stories on the Digg home page are currently related to a HD DVD encryption processing key that has been cracked. Under pressure from the MPAA, Digg admins removed the original articles and then Digg users started rebelling in protest, burying normal stories, while digging up the HD DVD stories.

It’s a pretty fascinating study of how online communities can react as one massive group. I’m sure Kevin, Jay and the gang are working hard to resolve this issue.

[link]

Digg A lot of pissed off users.