Also, I wouldn't want the moose in there during mating season.

My first thought at seeing the couple climbing into bed with a moose was "There is a relationship that needs refocusing."

I can see not wanting to be in close proximity to your partner in bed...hey, I sleep alone coupled or uncoupled...but when you invite a MOOSE to make the point? Overkill.

Not to mention...what if that behemoth rolls over in the night? Partner Pancake!!

Not to mention...what if that behemoth rolls over in the night? Partner Pancake!!

It's a Darwin Award waiting to happen.

They should film it as THE REALLY REALLY UGLY DACHSHUND.

Cocktail Party Physics talks about infrared. As in photography, discovery of, etc: [link]

The link has some stunning pictures in near-infrared. And the guy who discovered infrared originally called it "calorific rays" (as in calories=heat energy, I'd assume).

Do any of you listen to the NPR series "In Character"? They are asking for nominations for characters and I thought some of you might be interested in writing in support of Buffy.

I once had the cashier ask me for ID when I used my credit card. I mentioned that I noticed that he did not ask the person in front of me for ID or even check the signature, at least not in the way he did mine (holding the card up to the receipt, etc.) He said "The signature on the card is smeared, how do I know it's you" I said "With as closely as you were looking at the signature, I'm surprised that you didn't notice MY PHOTO on the back of the card."

Mashed potatoes are so YUM! Also, easy to eat with my sore mouth.

Ugh, sara, I hope this week is less painful than you think it's going to be.

I won awards for my penmanship in grade school. The Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary were relentless taskmasters in teaching the Palmer Method. If they could see me now.... The pen does not come off the paper for my signature. It's barely recognizable as my name, which gives it the added benefit of being difficult to forge.

This has lead to the REALLY secure method of me writing the person's number down on a post it note, charging them the next day, and then shredding it. This is rather ridiculous.

@@ (Everlasting thanks to Jesse for a typewritten means of expressing how my eyeballs have rolled right out of my head into the next ZIP code.)

We're old, people.

We are not. We're just more experienced.

Yeah, it doesn't really surprise me. I keep a personal cell, even though work issues me a treo because I like to keep my work and home life separate, but I know a lot of people who don't.

Vortex and I are as one. I have a work BlackBerry and a personal BlackBerry (I like the QWERTY keyboard for texting.) because work does not need to know what I do outside of the office.

{{{Theo}}}

I always love when cashiers scrutinize your signatures, because 1) they never are even close for me (credit card being ultra neat and the slip being a train wreck), and 2) unless they are handwriting experts in their spare time, they really aren't in a place to judge anything at all.

When I worked retail, we were required to compare signatures. There's a section in the merchant agreement with most card brands that, at the point of sale, a reasonable effort must be made to ensure that it's the person named on the card signing the slip, or the merchant may be held liable for fraudulent use. And by reasonable, they mean the legal "reasonable person" standard. I was trained to ask for backup ID if I had any doubts. I would frequently ask for a driver's license because I'm not a handwriting expert. Most customers were fine with it and appreciated the extra precaution, but I'd always get a few that went ballistic. Fine, you don't want to hand over the license, then you don't want to buy this suit and top.

It still surprises me when women come in with their husbands' cards, and are surprised when I won't accept it. If it's a joint account, you should have your own card.

Or teenagers with one of their parents' cards. I worked in a Banana Republic in a ritzy mall. You'd have thought I was depriving them of life, liberty and basic sustenance.

edited to send mouth~ma to Gloomcookie.

I have a roll of IR film sitting in my fridge waiting to be used. I just don't have anywhere near dark enough to load and unload it.

When I got my tires rotated last week, the guy at the counter asked for my ID to check the signature on my credit card. I said I was glad he asked and he told me he had recently caught a stolen credit card that someone had tried to use - he was suspicious and wouldn't take it and when he called the credit card company after the suspicious characters flounced off they confirmed that the card was stolen.