Sticky post
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 6:29:44 PM
Note: I am not a friend collector. Please do not send me friend requests.
Tuesday, February 14, 2012 7:08:32 AM
Human Beings, Olympia, relationships
Washington is now the seventh state to legally recognize same-sex marriage. I love my state. Congratulations, everyone! I can't wait for the Youtube videos!
The following is reproduced from the
Seattle Times:
Originally published Monday, February 13, 2012 at 6:19 PMWashington gov signs gay marriage bill into lawGov. Chris Gregoire handed gay rights advocates a major victory Monday, signing into law a measure that legalizes same-sex marriage in Washington state, making it the seventh in the nation to allow gay and lesbian couples to wed.
Rachel LaCorteAssociated PressOLYMPIA, Wash. —
Gov. Chris Gregoire handed gay rights advocates a major victory Monday, signing into law a measure that legalizes same-sex marriage in Washington state, making it the seventh in the nation to allow gay and lesbian couples to wed.
Gregoire signed the bill surrounded by gay rights supporters. "I'm proud our same-sex couples will no longer be treated as separate but equal," she said.
Gregoire signed the bill surrounded by gay rights supporters. "I'm proud our same-sex couples will no longer be treated as separate but equal," she said.
Read more...
Sunday, February 12, 2012 1:18:11 PM
Just what this world needs. Yet another spam vector. I knew getting rid of the internal private messaging system in favor of just one more internet email system was a bad idea. I guess, in the final analysis, I don't care why the Opera-folk decided this was a good idea. However, I do know that I have enough internet email addresses.
Remember when they thought stripping html and bbcode formatting out of various parts of my.opera -- and particularly the "About Me" field on the About page -- was a good idea? Part of their primary rationales was security and
spam attacks. That didn't last long before many of their measures appeared to be repealed.
I rarely, if ever, got this sort of internet spam over the old messaging system.
----- Original message -----
From: "ddstella desmond" <ddstelladesmond@gmail.com>
To: undisclosed-recipients: ;
Date: Sat, 11 Feb 2012 15:24:21 +0000
Subject: FOR YOU
Hello,
My name is Miss Stella, I got your contact via www.myopera However I'm
writing to know If your address is in order.Reply me as soon as you receive
this mail so that I can send you my photo.Hope soon for your reply.
Yours,stella
(Stelladesmond21@hotmail.com)
Totally, "Stella." I'll get right on that.
(Here's the spam message above with
full headers.)
Monday, February 6, 2012 12:38:01 PM
Human Beings, relationships
| Every time I go to sleep I close my eyes hoping that I will be woken up looking in to yours. --amj |
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Thursday, February 2, 2012 2:12:52 PM
Human Beings
1936-2012I'll never forget The Sooooooooul Train! Love, Peace, And Soul, Don.
Sunday, January 29, 2012 11:34:32 PM
Human Beings
I've been developing this train of thought for a while: Capitalism is Satanic, and capitalists worship Satan. Indeed, the capitalist's Jesus is the Christian's Satan.
If I were to ever to gather the total sum of my thinking on the matter, I'm certain that I would not be allowed to live.
Friday, January 20, 2012 6:24:45 AM
Vegan!, Food, winter
Round Two of my experiments with potato-like soup-stuff. The
last time I made something like this stuff it ended up as some manner of stout gravy, so this time I made the stout gravy my purposeful goal.
| The only thing is this baking pan is red potatoes, celery, and carrots baked with a little black pepper, tarragon, and olive oil. My mom's 30 year old Cuisinart® gave the carrots and celery a nice uniformity in size. This mixture came out so good that I didn't really want to do anything else with it. Tarragon on potatoes qualifies as a culinary deity worthy of alms. I just wanted to throw it in a bowl and eat like I hate myself. The other ingredients of green peppers (caspicums), cauliflower, zucchini, and onion were cooked the night before. These were baked with thyme, black pepper, and olive oil. When they were done I was too tired to worry about a picture and just put them in the 'fridge. Broccoli is missing from the ingredients because I was distracted by [several] hot women while shopping, and forgot. |
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Another thing I normally do is drain the potatoes after boiling them and before mashing them. This time, however, I decided to just whip them in the water they were boiled in to retain the starch. I'm testing whether this will make the liquid in the soup gravy stuff less likely to separate after sitting in the 'fridge. It will certainly add to the overall consistency. All of the veggies were dumped in after the potatoes had achieved the consistency I was looking for. My hand mixer was bought for the singular purpose of whipping potatoes. It's great. The dark bits in the potatoes is the skin. Peeling potatoes just isn't something that normally occurs to me. Most people peel them, I know. It's a complete waste. |
| I didn't measure how much water I boiled the potatoes in. There was probably two inches of water covering them, and they were some pretty good-sized spuds -- certainly not "baby" reds. 500 ml of soy milk, and 250 ml of water were also added to the mixture and the whole mess was stirred together and returned to boiling. For what it's worth, the soy and water were the olny things measured. The herbs and olive oil were simply guesstimated (eyeballed), and sprinkled and drizzled, respectively. There's no broth added this time as I didn't want to make the base too thin. That's a big 7.5 litre soup pot, so there's plenty of everything to reach just below the handle rivets. |
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How is it as biscuits and gravy? I didn't serve too much of the liquid just because I didn't want everything to slide off the small, almost spherical rolls I cut in half and toasted, but in terms of appearance, aroma, taste, textures, and the all-important "stick to your ribs" quality of biscuits and gravy? I've completely outdone myself. |
Tuesday, January 17, 2012 10:14:00 PM
Olympia, Bicycles!, snow, winter
...
[Edit: Someone not here on my.opera or from opera in general suggested that some might not want tho see all the content that is part of this post. To that end, a text-only version may be found by clicking here.
What is below the jump may be offensive to some, and it's absolutely Not Safe For Work (NSFW).]
Read more...
Monday, January 16, 2012 6:02:33 PM
Bicycles!, winter, weather, Climate Change
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Actually, that's a George Carlin quote.
We've had uber-warm weather for the last two months. I mean like highs in the low teens C during the day, and lows often between 5-10 C at night. Crazy weather for us. Well, today is the first of my two-day "weekend, and the snow has finally shown up to join me on my day off.
What the hell..? I'm sure I'll go out on one of my bikes at some point. There's still grocery-gettin' to be done, but most fun seems certainly out of the question. Bah.
Hmm, maybe I can get my super-attractive neighbor interested in hanging out and keeping each other warm. Boom-chicka-wah-wah!
Saturday, January 14, 2012 11:02:12 PM
Human Beings
I don't consume a whole lot of commercial media, i.e., television, commercial radio, or any pop-culture literature. So, it's easy for me to forget what most of the other people in the U.S. are subjected to on a constant basis. That said, it does not mean that I do not think of these things in terms of the current oligarchical structure of the U.S. government. The United States has a very efficient propaganda machine in the form of its ever-consolidating media corporations.
For example, the Republican plutocrats in the U.S. and their supporters like to refer to the holders of high concentrations of wealth as, "job creators." This is in spite of every honest economist who accurately states that the true job creators are those that actually spend money and create demand. This is only a single example, and I do not wish to carry at length illustrating the matter. Any one interested in more examples of this twisting ideas and language need only perform a web search on the name
Frank LuntzMaria Gilardin has produced a radio show called
TUC Radio since at least 1993. TUC stands for Time of Useful Consciousness. I'd only discovered it shortly after moving to Olympia, roughly in 2003. To digress momentarily, as much as I really like the Internet radio stations I listen to -- I'm listening to Suburbs of Goa on Soma FM as I write this -- I've become increasingly aware of how much they are isolating me from my local community. One of the consequences of that isolation is that I rarely listen to the local low power FM stations that introduced me to TUC Radio. So with that in mind, I recently downloaded a bunch of recent episodes of TUC and two other radio shows that I haven't heard in a while.
On November 11, 2010 TUC recorded a show entitled
Alex Carey: Corporations and Propaganda
The Attack on Democracy. I was snooping around
radio4all.net when I found this show. It's nauseating listening. (Slackwrdave gets
stress headaches. I get nauseated.) If you choose to download and listen to this show, note that there is
part one and
part two. This is what motivated me to
purchase the book pictured at the beginning of this post. It arrived in the mail today. I suspect that it will push me ever further off the cliff of distrust in all things U.S. There is also a
five part video collection of this topic on youtube, but I haven't watched it so I don't know what its contents are.
I need chocolate. Peace.
Wednesday, January 11, 2012 6:53:43 PM
Caveat: I would like to preface this post with the statement that contempt prior to investigation has served me well over the years, and I see no reason to change this practice merely to protect the sensibilities of the Opera-folk.
Mail is replacing messages
At the end of January, our messaging system will be changed to My Opera Mail.
The good news? You already have My Opera Mail! Just visit your mailbox to start sending and receiving e-mail. Your e-mail address is your My Opera username followed by @myopera.com; 0x29a@myopera.com.
Going forward, all correspondence with other My Opera members will go through My Opera Mail. Any earlier messages you have in your inbox will go into a read-only archive. |
I'm sure it will be a disaster.
Saturday, January 7, 2012 10:02:12 PM
I've been working A Lot the last few weeks, and I'm so tired these days.
Tuesday, January 3, 2012 5:17:32 PM
Olympia, Vegan!, Bicycles!, Food
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I woke up around 10:00 AM on Sunday for some reason. No bad dreams. Just woke up. As I think I mentioned already, Baby came home on Saturday with her new bottom bracket, but I didn't have time to go for a ride. So on this first day of the new year I felt there could be no better beginning than to go for breakfast downtown at the last best local eatery that serves mostly standard U.S. style food with my best friend and my bicycle. I initiated the exchange with my bestie, Doty, with this:
Good morning! Think Darby's is open/packed?
Our plans were set a couple of messages later.
I arrived at Darby's downtown just in time to get a good spot on the seating list with only about a 15 minute wait. Typically, Darby's is packed on the weekends. It was rather surprising to get such a good spot on the list. I've waited for well over half an hour before just to be seated. Even then one can wait another half an hour to order. Today was not much different, with the exception of the aforementioned seating list. Of course, it's worth it!
Doty and I have been friends for at least eight years now. I'm not sure we've ever had an adventure or an outing where she's been on time. She puts up with my flaws. I put up with hers. We did, however, discuss for future reference what I should order for her the next time I am seated 20 minutes before she arrives. Ladies and gentlemen, my best friend (BFF!) Doty:
She wouldn't pose for me, so I had to take what I could get. You see a bit of our New Year's fare in this picture. The best images of brunch are below. It was great! I had the vegan tofu scramble with hash browns and swirly rye toast, Doty had some manner of non-vegan breakfast sandwich that is the default meal I am to pre-order when needed. We also shared what are the best homefries in probably the world.
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| Darby's Tofu Scramble |
Breakfast Sandwich |
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| Darby's Best-In-Class Homefries |
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I love my bestie, even if she does take uninvited samples of my toast. She would argue that that is precisely why I love her, though.
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I spent the rest of the afternoon riding around town until I had to go to work. I pigged out so much at Darby's it was hard to breathe. The weather was totally gorgeous. The notable thing about the pictures I took is what does not appear in them. There is no snow on the ground. Also, there were dark areas emanating from objects all around town. I am told these are called, "shadows." They are produce by something called, "sun." This, "sun," is said to exist all year around.
Saturday, December 31, 2011 1:21:32 PM
Olympia, Bicycles!, Human Beings
My Phil Wood bottom bracket made it to my local bike shop today. The guy at the bike shop called and had to leave a message because I was very much asleep. As soon as I was caffeinated, showered, and shaved and all that, I rolled
Baby out to the car, put her on the bike rack, and went to the bike shop. I had to leave her there overnight because I got there too late in the day for them to install the new part, and me get Baby all the way back home before work. This is what bike bling looks like:
The blue film is a protectant. It's not uncommon for these bottom brackets to last well over 50,000 miles before needing their bearings replaced. There was more packing material covering it when the guy at the bike shop pulled it out of the shipping box, but he took it off before handing the part to me. I was pretty bummed, but I already felt like I was being weird for wanting to take several pictures -- "It's for insurance purposes..." -- so I just let it be. Still, I feel like I missed out on a little something. I remember years and years ago, when I was still young and beautiful, hearing about Phil Wood hubs and bottom brackets as they were being spoken of reverently, and just assigning them to the, "it would be nice, but I'll never be able to..." bin of my mind. I'll ask for the cartons that the bottom bracket and those other shiny things you can see at the top of picture came in. Those other shiny things are the cups that hold the bottom bracket in to the shell on the frame. I do wish I had gotten a couple of side views of the bottom bracket that shows the bearing seals. Ah well, Maybe I'll tear the crank arms off when Baby comes home tomorrow if I have time.
The bike shop is in the space sharing a wall with where I currently work. I had to get to work, so I took my leave. As I was tearing myself away from Baby, the guy at the bike shop said, "Say goodbye to your bike." What an awful thing to say to a cyclist if ya think about it. Immediately out of my mouth came, "I never want to hear those words ever again." He didn't mean it with the finality I assigned to it, but still... Hush!
Many cyclists never get to have Phil stuff. I've been really lucky in a lot of ways. Baby is an evolving work of art. She has amazing components that I've worked very hard to bring together. The amount of money is dizzying. I suppose Phil stuff is similar to that other name in bicycle bling, Chris King, who manufactures parts that I don't suppose I'll ever get to own. As expensive as Phil Wood is, Chris King stuff is easily three times the cost, albeit for different segments of the cycling community. Phil Wood very much caters to bicycle tourists. I would love to have a Phil Wood rear hub, but by the time I'm ready to replace the hub that I have, there will likely be more of a trend to internally geared hubs. These are identical to old three speed hubs with about seven more gears packed inside. Someday, perhaps.
Thursday, December 29, 2011 3:31:56 PM
The Dream, Human Beings, Bicycles!, Food
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Once again, Rob Brezsny hits things on the head in a manner that is immediate and germane to my life as it is right now. He's good about doing that. Even if he just makes shit up, it's pretty accurate for bullshit, and deserves some amount of consideration. I just need to dissect what he's saying:
Historian David McCullough wrote The Greater Journey, a book telling the stories of ambitious young American artists who relocated to Paris between 1830 and 1900. They had to move away because their home country had no museums or art schools at that time. You Virgos may want to consider seeking a similar enlargement of your possibilities in the coming months. As you seek out the resources that will help you follow your dreams, be prepared to look beyond what you already know and what's immediately available.
Reference: http://freewillastrology.com/horoscopes/virgo.htmlHow does one stretch like that?
For starters, that which is beyond what I already know is almost anything to do with Hindi. I can say, Namaste, and the names of a few yoga poses, or asanas. Pose is pronounced mudra in Hindi, but asana is normally used to refer to postures, or poses. Farming is another thing of which I know little about. I'm pretty bright most of the time, though, so I may be able to figure out the farming aspect of my dreams. Another thing that really stands out as being beyond what I know and what's immediately available is some type of fund-raising. I am certain that there are grants out there for endeavors such as I wish to undertake. Namely, spend a year at Bija Vidyapeeth, then ride across Eastern Europe working at WWOOF Farms. (Here's
a great blog about one person's experience there that provides a nice introduction to Bija Vidyapeeth.) What if looking beyond what I already know means reformulating my goals? Spanish seems like it would be much easier to pursue in earnest, but there is nothing in Mexico that's similar to the seed farm in India. Bah.
I'm not sure what to think of the "what's immediately available" part. Does that mean what's immediately available at the time I'm ready to leave, or what's immediately available right now in terms of what I will need to move forward? My job is paying enough to allow me to save at least a tiny amount of money as long as my car doesn't die. I'm also continuing to work on getting the appropriate hardware and tires for my bike. A new
Phil Wood bottom bracket will be going in next week. I found grease coming out of the bearings on the non-drive side of the Shimano UN54 that's in there now. That's not supposed to happen with cartridge bearings. The tires that I want will be next. That should be it for the parts and equipment. I think I'm going to flip over the stem and see how much handlebar height I gain as a result. I still haven't worked out the prudence of taking my bike to India, but what I've read about India and bicycles so far suggest that it's a reasonable idea.
Or all Rob's prognostication could really mean is that I should go back to driving trucks.
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