Don't look now, but...

You know, when people say something rude like "only nosy jerks will read this," I kind of want to slap them. If you don't want people to look, don't say anything. I will obviously read anything that is placed before my eyes and forbidden. I mean, what is the first thing someone does when someone else says "Don't look now, but..."? I mean if a tattoo-covered lady with a pet gila monster is in the next booth ordering gin martinis, how are you expected to not care until the coast is clear? Well, that is not the point of this blog, so I really don't know why I went off on all that--except that I kind of wanted to.

I also wanted to tell you that I have updated my links section to more accurately reflect who and what I am reading/internetting.

Actually, I am reading a lot these days. I have always read early and often, but lately I am dedicating the time I would normally spend pontificating via blog or craigslist reading others instead--mostly non-fiction, sociological/cultural critiques. I am even considering eventually getting a PhD in Sociology one day, so I guess you could call this prepping. I think taking time to shut your mouth/pen/keyboard and read--I mean, really immerse yourself-- is very good to do on occasion. After all, what kind of writer doesn't bother to read? A crappy one, that's what.

And now, a link fest for your edu-tainment! I have to spend some special shout outs to:

Rachel for sending me this: *hilarious*, scathing political indictment of the Bush administration by Bill Maher. "I like to download the latest scandals right to my iPod."

Chrissy for sending me this truly, truly funny New Yorker article ("Pass the wine, please. I want to become crazy."), telling me about 43 Things, a sort of online life's to-do list, and for in general exposing me to various new media that I have loved and embraced lately, such as my new favorites Feministing, ReadyMade, and Bitch Magazine, not to be confused with bitchmag.com, which I just accidentally discovered is a site that "honestly" reviews porno. Great!

So thanks everyone--and happy reading, even if it's not mine. :)

Familiarity Breeds Nick Names

Upon re-reading my last post, I was thinking about the various machines I own and the ways I have humanized them. That is, my car is Little Zippy. My computer is Lappy 5000. My one bike is Mrs. Breezy and the other Slick Shady.

This is very disconcerting since one of the great ploys of the advertising industry is to make products/things indispensable to the consumer by emphasizing their humanity and leading you to believe they are more reliable/friendly/groovy than the people you know. Now, obviously I would never choose LZ over Husby (MRT) or Molly T. (or any person--well, that I like), but my excessive familiarity is a bit alarming all the same. On the other hand, I *do* like LZ more than most of my ex-boyfriends and I don't have a soft spot for stuff like our refrigerator. And if cell phones had a nick name, it would be something like "The Great Irritant." Although, that does sound a bit like a wicked magician. Hmm.

MaryT Battles the Pink Robots

Well, crap.

Only a few blog entries ago, I was so enthusiastically recommending iTunes to others and now I'm feeling rather sorry.

This afternoon, my computer was running a bit slow, so I thought I might back-up my Christmas music as mp3s onto one disc, erase them from good old Lappy 5000, and save some space while ensuring that my iTunes copy of Dave's True Story's Mele Kalikimaka would be with my for the holidays next year. Wrong-o!

Apparently, when you legally buy music from the iTunes store, you are not the boss of it and try as you might, you cannot even back-up that music for your OWN PRIVATE USE as an mp3. What the EFF?!

After googling this problem and realizing that I also could not listen to this music on players other than iTunes (!) or portable listening devices other than iPod (not that I have something other than an iPod), I am kind of freaking pissed. Sure, sure, I should have read the fine print I guess, but this is definitely NOT in the spirit of copyright laws. I don't want to steal anything. I don't want to give anything away or allow others to do so. I want all musicians to get their due, etc. I just want to use music that I have legally paid for in the non-harmful ways it can be used. Oh, excuse me-- I apparently have only legally paid for license to it on a certain amount of computers/iPods. BAH!

I'm really in a huff about this and unsure of what to do. On the one hand, I *hate* being told what to do and have decided that I absolutely will NOT purchase Apple's iPhone (and not because I freaking hate cell phones), simply because they require you to use Cingular as your service provider (do not boss!). On the other hand, I really like the convenience of iTunes and its functionality (or mostly, anyway). Plus, I have already bought a good amount of songs and tv shows from them.

Yes, there are "underground" programs that can convert the files and yes, you can simply burn the songs to an audio cd and re-rip them to your computer as a non-protected file, but is this seriously necessary? What a waste of time and cds!

So do I go against something so wholly integral to my person as the "Do NOT boss!" rule and continue to use iTunes and purchase from the iTunes store? Or do I once again attempt to swim upstream for an issue that is not near the importance of a human rights one, but that I disagree with nonetheless and risk further cultural marginalization and abstention from fine digital bytes of Beyoncé?

Argh! I don't know. I'll get back to you soon.

P.S. As a long time Mac user and supporter of alternatives to big boxed crap everyone has/conglomerates that are taking over the world, I find the trend of Apple bossing people around to be disturbing. I mean, I guess if you create ingenious products, you can kind of do whatever you want. But what ever happened to the "think different" philosophy? Any corporation can do the whole "greedy, under-handed bastard" routine. Must Apple simply do the same thing in a shinier way?

"I carried a watermelon."

I have some disturbing news.

Some of you may know this already, but I just discovered via iTunes spring break mix that Patrick Swayze's runaway hit "She's Like the Wind" from the 1987 movie Dirty Dancing has been covered and is now a very popular hip-hop song.

So this:

She leads me through moonlight
Only to burn me with the sun
She's taken my heart
But she doesn't know what she's done

is now this:

Like u won't believe (No)
She leads me thru moonlight
Only to burn me wit the sun
Damn it I believe she knows
She's takin' my heart
She doesn't know what she's done
Baby please

You so wish I was kidding, but I got both these sets of lyrics from the same web site (stlyrics.com). Now what you're probably wondering is whether I am lamenting the fact that this song wasn't allowed to die in peace 20 years ago when it first, very surprisingly, ambled its way up the pop charts, or if I am defending my boy, Patrick Swayze's honor and integrity as an artist. Well, I think we both know that aside from his fancy foot work, he has no integrity as an artist. Though the resemblance of this "new" song to the original is an unholy one, the return of this particular oeuvre is proof positive that teenagers, from any era, have universally bad taste in music.

And by the way, I love Patrick Swayze and Dirty Dancing. As my good friend from elementary school would say* "Don't bust, please." Thank you.

*Full disclosure, she always preceded this phrase with "I love Michael Jackson."

A Gut Feeling

I just found this web site. It is so wonderfully weird! Click and see.

iheartguts

Perfect Strangers

Oh, did I tell you MRT and I just returned from the Great Smoky Mountains? We did. In our almost 2000 miles in 7 days, we met up with: an ornery sushi chef ("You been here before? How many time? When?"), some hippies turned hillbillies who looked frighteningly like Civil War veterans and milled their own lumber, a handful of kindly anarchists, a moody horse that nearly threw me and later farted at us in disgust and a pretty nice horse that, despite her niceness, almost trampled me while getting kicked by the moody, farting horse, D-licious convenience store coffee (stop at Weigel's Farm Store. They say award winning coffee. They mean it. Oh my!), very, very bad truck stop coffee, a Rice hippy on spring break in BFE Tennessee (first question from her mouth: "are any of y'all from Rice?" Random!), a dog that eats anything from cardboard to building supplies, a Bud Light-thieving homeless man picnicking in the park in a Members Only jacket, a rowdy troop of boy scouts, an angry crag of a road that nearly ate Little Zippy for lunch, Cold Mountain (yes, of book/movie fame!), the best honey bun I have EVER eaten or even imagined, three separate camp fires, one state park (in Arkansas), multiple national forests, a delicious goat-cheese-riffic picnic, two brisk hikes, giant bronze statues of Elvis and B.B. King, three state welcome centers, and very best of all--three great old friends.

So that's it in a nutshell. It was the perfect therapeutic combination of spending and saving, roughing it and luxury, waking up and sleeping in, fires and s'mores, with friends and just MRT, warm and sunny days and cool, breezy nights, reading and chatting, and seeing the country without seeing too much to knock out my wintry blues and spring me forward. The MRTs are back in Nac! Get ready.

Knit Wit and then some

I want to make an announcement about some things that I don't like: guns and knitting.

I mean this.

Listen my friends, my family, random strangers, and especially my husband: I don't like these things and given my amount of exposure to them and the overwhelming enthusiasm of others for me to like them and my consistent ability to still not like them, I am convinced, beyond a shadow of a doubt that I will never, ever want to shoot guns or knit a tea cozy in my spare time. I have zero problem with any of you doing these things, but please, please, please understand I don't want to participate.

I have shot guns on many occasions at summer camp and with my husband. I have been coerced into knitting circles and had yarn and needles aplenty thrown in my path. I have given these activities a fair shake and I must once again repeat: I am not interested in these activities.

It is not because one is too violent, nor because the other is too tame. In fact, on the violent(ish) end of the spectrum, I enjoy roller derby. On the tame end of the spectrum, I am just about to pee in my pants waiting for the sewing machine my Aunt Betty is giving me to get here so I can start my *NEW* hobby of sewing. Not to mention "Sew Fast Sew Easy," which I ordered from Amazon today. (Yay!)

But seriously. Please don't try to convince me that I want to do these things with you or ever. I don't want to. I love and respect all you knitters and gun enthusiasts, but as hobbies, they're lacking the "I care" factor too much for me to be persuaded to do them again. I'm glad we could have this talk and I hope you understand.

Respectfully,
Mary T.

Confession

Well, I haven't been blogging lately, so I'm sure you're wondering what I've been up to. I'll be honest. I googled "online typing test" and it changed my life. I just can't get enough of the myriad tests telling me that I typed well--and fast. I am not making this up. This is way better than all those video games peops shell out buckets of cash for, in my highly dorky opinion. Um...

So anywho, MRT and I are off to see the world bright and early tomorrow morning for spring break. Where we stop nobody knows, but we'll see you real soon, internet.

Love,
Typing Ingenue

Electric Boogaloo!

Look, you know how I feel about advertising of late, but I am trying not to be so cynical. It is bad for my heart and such. To that end, may I just recommend all the free iTunes stuff every week? iTunes is free and then these downloads are my favorite price of FREE. It's all free and they have all kinds of stuff from music videos, tv shows, and "webisodes" (I don't exactly know what this is) to pretty cool songs. And if you don't like the songs, you delete them--because they were FREE. Usually they list one song near the top as the free download of the week, but if you scroll down further to "Free on iTunes," you can find all this awesomeness. I get at least two free songs/week this way. I am currently listening to some crazy awesome salsa called Boogaloo Chévere. Some stuff I never would have heard about otherwise.

Also, if you are looking for a GREAT place to learn about music, may I recommend another site called Tiny Mix Tapes? They have a lot of music news and info, especially if you are interested in Indie Rock, but the best part of the site is under the heading Tiny Mix Tapes. There, peops submit all kind of obscure mix requests like "A mix for wearing skirts and flip-flops in spring" and "Oh no! My car just broke down and my bike is missing a wheel!" (I made those up, but you get the idea.) I have never made one of their mixes exactly, but if I like the name of a suggested song, I look it up in iTunes and sample it (for free) and if I like it, I buy the song. I learned about a lot of great bands this way--in fact, most of my favorite bands.

So celebrate spring and the desire to put a little boogie in your soul with some free music. Tra-la!

Attention! I made this myself!

And in only two hours or something like that. I know. I know what you're thinking.

"Mary is 26 years old and made a basic graphic with weird blotchy red color all by herself in only two hours? Why that's practically unheard of!"

But shut it--because even though I am photoshoply-challenged, I now have my own logo. Yes, a logo. That is mine. And affiliated (loosely) with roller derby.

You wish you had your own logo. Boo-yah.

P.S. Beware when instead of "boo-yah," MRT says "Poo-yah." Talk about silent killers!

A Golden Rule Indeed

Where was this book when I needed it?

Check out the Publishers Weekly editorial review:
This meticulously researched book, which grew from a much buzzed-about article in the Harvard Business Review, puts into plain language an undeniable fact: the modern workplace is beset with assholes. Sutton (Weird Ideas that Work), a professor of management science at Stanford University, argues that assholes—those who deliberately make co-workers feel bad about themselves and who focus their aggression on the less powerful—poison the work environment, decrease productivity, induce qualified employees to quit and therefore are detrimental to businesses, regardless of their individual effectiveness. He also makes the solution plain: they have to go. Direct and punchy, Sutton uses accessible language and a bevy of examples to make his case, providing tests to determine if you are an asshole (and if so, advice for how to self-correct), a how-to guide to surviving environments where assholes freely roam and a carefully calibrated measure, the "Total Cost of Assholes," by which corporations can assess the damage. Although occasionally campy and glib, Sutton's work is sure to generate discussions at watercoolers around the country and deserves influence in corporate hiring and firing strategies.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.


I can think of a couple of people I want to send autographed copies to!

Good Choice vs. Bad Choice

I am really enjoying my NPR calendar that I got majorly on sale. It has the best holidays on it. For example, today is National Pig Day. And March 14 is Potato Chip Day! Excellent. The Ides of March is labeled, too, of course. Beware! All in all, definitely a good choice.

Now, a bad choice. I don't know if it was in honor of pig day or what, but I was just behind a woman at the grocery store who bought no less than 3 giant packages of bacon, 2 rolls of breakfast sausage, 2 packages of smoked sausage, 3 packages of ground beef, 2 giant bags of Lays Potato Chips (and NOT baked, I thank you), 2 gallons of sweet tea, a gimongous bag of granulated sugar, and 4 boxes of Gas-X. What did she expect with all that meat? Oh yeah and to be fair to her produce purchases, she bought an onion and some green grapes. The single onion was of course tightly bound in a plastic bag that will sit for a million years in a landfill after her 15 second, unnecessary usage of it for a root that has been in the ground and that she will peel layers off anyway. But seriously, who am I to judge? It's really the Gas-X in combination with the extraordinary quantities of meat that concern me. Who was she making dinner for? The Abominable Snowbeast?