Scrivener is a Mac-specific drafting program that a lot of authors swear by. Word has been pissing me off monumentally, doing this Great Shrinking Document thing when I switch between having the laptop hooked up to my monitor and using it as just a laptop. The Word Doc will literally shrink to one-eighth the original size and the only way for me to expand it back to regular size is to quit Word and open it up again.

So, hence, the Great Scrivener Experiment. It has some remarkable features, but it also has its own quirks that I'm trying to decide whether I can live with or not.

Sounds interesting, Barb! I'm still a PC girl, though. Jennifer Crusie mentioned a program I would love to try, although I can't remember the name of it now, but I think it might be a Mac thing, too.

Happy birthdays to Noah and Grace! I canna believe it.

I saw Alice tonight, too! It was my first modern 3-D, and I was impressed that I could actually see it. Historically, I only look out of one eye at a time, so have always had trouble with that kind of thing....

I was just reading this post on Jezebel about teen musical idols and realizing that I was in a spot that was too young for New Edition and too old for Joey Lawrence and NKOTB. The music of my 5th - 8th(1983-1987 )(is that the time when you like boybands?) was Michael Jackson/Madonna/Cydi Lauper dominated IIRC. Am I crazy?

You're not crazy, but we were definitely into New Edition, and we're the same age. But then, I was in Boston.

I have a horribe feeing that we were not into New Edition because they were black. And we did not know any black people

What about Duran Duran?

Ooh, racist!

I'm trying to think who was on mix tapes I made in 8th grade off the radio, and all I can come up with with "At This Moment" or whatever and "Boom Boom Boom Let's Go Back To My Room." Classy!

Edit: I did loooooove Duran Duran. I feel like that was 85. Edit again! Seven and the Ragged Tiger was 83, and that was defintely the record my cousin and I were obsessed with. [link]

I graduated high school in 1985, so we were a little ahead of the boy band thing, I guess. We were into Madonna and Prince, but also Springsteen and Pink Floyd and the Who.

I think my Tiger Beat phase was over in sixth grade or so with Shawn Cassidy and Andy Gibb.

I just sent Emmett, Matilda, JZ and megan walker off to board game night at the local community center/neighborhood place.

I'd just spent six hours wrangling Matilda in the East Bay during Emmett's game (that being, an hour and a half of commuting back and forth, an hour of warmup, and three and a half hours of game) so I'm a little wiped.

Number 1 Reason Emmett Is Having More Fun With Baseball Now That I'm Not His Coach:

Me: So what were your final stats for today?
Emmett: 3 for 4 with a walk. And I stole five bases.
Me: Yeah, but you were terrible on that last go round the bases. You almost got thrown at first because you slowed down going into the bag, you didn't slide stealing second, you half slide/half kneeled when you dove back to the bag on the pickoff attempt and when you were at third you didn't go back to tag up immediately when the fly ball was hit so you weren't in a position to go.
Emmett: I didn't get thrown out at first! I didn't slide because I saw the fielder coming in for the ball so I knew the throw wasn't there. It didn't look pretty but I didn't get picked off. And it's only the second game of the season so my instincts for tagging up aren't there yet.
Me: You got thrown out at home.
Emmett: The coach sent me! That wasn't my fault. Why do you only mention the negative stuff?
Me: Because there's nothing to learn when you do it right. And trust me, you've still got a lot to learn.
Emmett: I stole five bases!

And Bobby Brown left New Edition at the end of 1985, so their heyday was 83-85, too. Good times. I still love "Is This The End." [link]

It's funny to think about how little I was then!

Also funny to think of how much money I spent to see BBD, Johnny Gill, and Keith Sweat in concert in 1991 or so.

Yeah, I was gonna mention there wasn't much of a gap between New Edition and New Kids. But previous to that there was a Boy Band gap, which I do discuss in the Bubblegum book noting how the non-Boy Band Duran Duran sort of took care of that demographic.