Friday Fun: Star Wars + Butter = uh, yeah...

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8 (and then some) years later, IT IS FINISHED!

I bet it didn't take David McCullough this long to write the darn thing, but I finally finished reading John Adams. Maybe that should be "reading" because I finished the last third by getting the audiobook from the library.

I got the book as a gift for Christmas 2001, and I don't really know why it took so long to work through it. I would pick it up, read a bit, put it down, not get back to it for months. The story was interesting, but it's not like I was hanging on the edge of my seat wanting to know what happened next. I knew the arc of Adams' life, I was reading for details. And details just weren't enough motivation to keep me reading consistently, I guess. I found very quickly that it was not good bedtime reading, since I would barely get through a page or two and fall asleep, and it's a very heavy book to let fall (this does not imply it was boring - if I can fall asleep reading about a dragon crashing through Gringotts bank, I can fall asleep reading anything).

The book had languished on my TBR pile for about a year before I did the Great Book Purge and cleared away the "I'm really never going to read this" books. Those went into a giant "Donate" pile and John Adams went on the "Keeper" shelf as a "I will get back to it, but I don't want it staring me in the face every day" book. (guilt, guilt, guilt)

Then a couple months ago, I was wandering through the audiobook section in the public library. As soon as I saw John Adams, I snatched it up. I started from the beginning, and 26 discs and almost 2 months later, I FINALLY finished the book yesterday while I was cleaning the house for Easter dinner. It felt a little anti-climactic, but I can now move on to other books completely GUILT-FREE! Yay!

What about you? Have you ever had that one book that you couldn't get through, but also couldn't let go?

Why don't you Topeka that?

Google has done some awesome April Fools jokes over the years (CADIE, Virgle and hiring for jobs on the moon, for instance), but I don't think they've ever gone as far as changing their name before.

I especially love their usage guidelines:

Why Topeka? Find out here

Find of the Day: Jane Austen's Will

The National Archives of the UK recently joined The Commons on Flickr, and today I came across this gem:

I haven't dug very far through their photostream yet, but I already found both a note written by Jack the Ripper and the only surviving letter written by Katherine Howard, Henry VIII's fifth wife. It's not just documents; there are plenty of photos. But it's certainly the documents that caught my eye.

Writer's Block

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Ten years ago today...

...I married my sweetie!

I love you, Dan!

Back to basics with Big Bird

I've had a very crabby, headache-y day (poor Hubby, poor LilGirl). I finally retreated to my cave...I mean, the office, and eventually I tripped across this video (did you know Sesame Street has a twitter account? Not verified, but still).

I remember having a set of these Sesame Street records when I was little (I still have the one with Rubber Duckie on one side and the Sesame Street Theme on the other). The ABC-DEF-GHI Song was in this set. Watching this video gave me a few minutes of childhood reverie.

Even when you're an adult, you can count on Sesame Street to cheer you up. :)

Friday Fun: The only movie trailer you'll ever need

Bleardy bleardy bleardy* St. Patrick's Day!

*my attempt at spelling Swedish Chef's words

WedPic: Photo"Pommed"

Last Christmas, our Pomeranian tried to imitate a famous squirrel.

"It's not a waste of time. Do it."

Like a lot of other people, I watched the Oscars last night. I was mostly unimpressed by the show, the speeches (mostly meh), the dresses (mostly ugly & some which were fine, but not worn by the right person) and the dancing (what was up with that?). The entire show was a bit of a slog.

However, I was especially struck by a couple of speeches near the end of the night. Sandra Bullock's acceptance speech made me cry - it was so very much the sort speech you'd expect from her, with humor and tears, and I'm very glad she won.

Another speech spoke to my heart and was probably missed or ignored by many, since it wasn't one of the big six. Michael Giacchino received the Oscar for Original Score for his work on Up. His words echoed through my thoughts the rest of the night and still do this morning, and I wanted to share them with you. Unfortunately, I can't find an embeddable version of the video, so if you'd like to watch it, you can watch here. I'll also include his words below:

Thank you, guys. When I was... I was nine and I asked my dad, "Can I have your movie camera? That old, wind-up 8 millimeter camera that was in your drawer?" And he goes, "Sure, take it." And I took it and I started making movies with it and I started being as creative as I could, and never once in my life did my parents ever say, "What you're doing is a waste of time." Never. And I grew up, I had teachers, I had colleagues, I had people that I worked with all through my life who always told me what you're doing is not a waste of time. So that was normal to me that it was OK to do that. I know there are kids out there that don't have that support system so if you're out there and you're listening, listen to me: If you want to be creative, get out there and do it. It's not a waste of time. Do it. OK? Thank you. Thank you. [via Oscar.com]

I hope every child can receive this kind of encouragement and support in their life. And it's a good thing for adults to be reminded of, as well, since the world tends to stop telling us creativity is not a waste of time once we're grown.

Photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/vlastula/ / CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

Got some time to kill? Ok, go (wink, wink)

Everyone else has tweeted/blogged/facebooked/shouted about OK Go's latest video, I may as well, too. I mean, it is pretty cool...

Friday Fun: Give Stan Lee an Oscar!

Hot off the...er...presses? Here's a just-released video from Funny or Die. Hey, he makes a good argument. :)

Stan Lee's Oscar Campaign from Stan Lee

How Star Trek should have ended, according to Darth Vader

Darth Vader tweeted this today (yes, he tweets), and I had to laugh...






I've been taking a little accidental-on-purpose break from blogging for the last couple weeks. I've basically been in late-winter survival mode (putting on the oxygen mask), and may be there a bit longer yet. So, instead of any of "real" posts, there will probably be a few lazy "here's something I found" posts for the next few days. Hopefully I'll have my rear in gear by Monday and get back on schedule.

Friday Fun: Muppets try out for Star Wars

It's Valentine's Day, and I only have one thing to say...

Mmmmmmmm, chocolate!

(Oh, that's NOT what the holiday is about? Oops...)

Photo by Darwin Bell / CC BY 2.0

Vancouver Olympics on Flickr

The IOC has set up an official Flickr group where anyone can share their pictures of the Vancouver Winter Games - I love it when an organization "gets" some part of social media. There are so many ways to follow the Olympics this year, whether on Twitter, Facebook, online video, or several other sites (There's a good list at TechCrunch) that I think I'll have more fun following the games than I've had in years. It'll be great to be able to experience the Olympics through the eyes of athletes and attendees as well as "old" media.

Friday Fun: Poor Beaker

Somehow, Beaker's musical aspirations always end in fire...



and...

The Making of a Super Bowl Commercial

Somehow I missed this commercial during the Super Bowl. I'm sure it has nothing to do with me being a big nerd who was madly tapping away on the netbook in the middle of a sports bar filled with people. Apparently, even though I'm generally such a distracte-bunny, if you put me in a distracting enough environment, I come swinging round the other side and can really focus. I got more work done on my work in progress during a few hours in the midst of Super Bowl revelry than I have since NaNoWriMo. Who knew? (and I'm sure it had NOTHING to do with the fact that the bar's wifi was locked down so I couldn't get on the internet)

Anyway, today I came across Leo Laporte on TWiT, interviewing the guys behind "The Man Your Man Could Smell Like." I was fascinated by the work that that went into this commercial. Watch the video to find out if it was one long shot or CGI trickery, while I go clean the drool off my keyboard

Wed Pic: We need more beach

IMG_0863, originally uploaded by mdesive.

We're in the throes of February, so here's some more beachiness.