can we all just agree that "shit talker," by headphones is a fantastic song?

particularly the chorus, "and i won't hold it against you / if you don't hold it against me," which is repeated several times. i would recommend this song to a friend. i am sorry that i cannot find you a link to a free download. good luck.

can we all just agree that baby goats are the cutest ever*?

seriously! i was at this wedding reception the other day and there were baby goats there and i thought, "oh man, i should definitely try to work baby goats into any wedding reception i ever have a hand in planning!!!"

*okay, okay, okay, maybe not ever...but pretty cute nonetheless.

can we all just agree that frisbee is super fun, even if minor injuries result?

i thought so! hooray!

can we all just agree that it's no fun at all when your ear stops working?

in the little buddy's defense, i bet it wants to keep working...there's just, um, blockage there that prevents it from being able to do so. much like the eye problems that are really the fault of a rogue eyelash, the only-having-half-my-hearing thing is really starting to cramp my style.

can we all just agree that windows live mail beta sucks?

i know that it shouldn't be too surprising, and that i've brought it upon myself, but good goat! windows live mail beta sucks!

long long ago i got a hotmail address that i still like, and it's a great thing to have for those "i-don't-actually-want-to-give-you-my-email-address-but-here's-my-email-address" situations (craigslist housing boards, i'm looking at you!)

and several weeks ago i got suckered into opting in to windows live mail beta (which sucks!) by an exciting african safari sweepstakes contest (yes, yes, i do have a working knowledge of statistics and i realize that i am extraordinarily unlikely [though no more or less likely that the other users of sucky windows live mail beta] to win...but dude! what if i did? african safari! so sweet!)

the first thing i noticed was that the interface is ugly. and sometimes when i log on it makes me go through a bunch of preferences before i can get to my email (dude, i don't care what color the bar is. give me my craigslist housing email!)

the second thing is that they've gotten really intense about classifying mail. it's not just junk and not junk anymore, some mail is isolated as potentially malicious, and it's more difficult to open. (unfortunately enough, it isn't actual malicious spam that is restricted, at least for me, it's generally craigslist housing board-related email that i need. and the sketchy online pharmacies and fake product tester recruitment email somehow get through just fine.) and links and images are disabled for unknown senders. whatever, fine.

the third thing (and here's where the ridiculousness really begins): part of the african safari contest which i will not win is that they send you email every once and awhile and if you click on a button you increase your chances of winning...but somehow every time but once (yes yes, i know...but won't you feel silly if i do win?) that i've clicked, it's told me that the contest is either over or not yet open for entries. huh?

additionally, it didn't occur to them to make their contest email an allowed sender. so before i can ineffectually click on the button, i have to activate the link to allow content. dudes, you're software engineers. i have a hard-earned BA in a liberal art, but this seems embarassingly obvious to me: IF YOU ARE GOING TO ALTER YOUR VERY OWN EMAIL SYSTEM SO THAT IT GETS TOUGH ON SPAM (um, except for all the actual spam it doesn't tag! funny joke!) AND ALSO MAKE A CONTEST THAT INVOLVES SENDING PEOPLE EMAIL, PERHAPS YOU SHOULD EXCLUDE YOUR OWN EMAIL FROM THE FILTER. i mean, email has to be excludable somehow...i certainly didn't add the penis pills people to my contacts, yet their stuff gets through just fine. and it's never the kind of spam i enjoy.

and finally, for some reason, windows live mail beta sucks.0 is broken. for several days now, i've been greeted with a message explaining that some of the new features are gone* because they had some problems, so now i'm using the "classic hotmail experience" instead of the "windows live mail beta [sucks!] experience," but they're working hard to bring w.l.m.b.s. back soon!

i am not impressed.

*IMPORTANT UPDATE: apparently "some of the new features" includes such exotic options as a search function. that's cool, guys, i don't need to search through my many messages ever. thanks!

update #2: now, the sweepstakes contest email gets delivered into my junk mail folder. weird.

can we all just agree that watching roly polys mate is a sight indeed?

there's something about one part of my garden that gets the little guys all randy...sometimes there are roly poly orgies. i'm kind of fascinated, but then i start to feel like i'm invading their privacy if i watch too much.

can we all just agree that it's pretty lame when some silly lady backs into your car?

but that it's even lamer when she's MAKING EYE CONTACT WITH YOU THE ENTIRE TIME?

can we all just agree that kids say [and do] awesome things [volume 10]?

so today g and i were at a party with lots of folks (many of whom didn't know each other) and there were blank nametags and markers set out. being good citizens, we put on nametags.

a little while later, a girl who was probably 5 saw my nametag and decided that she had to have one. she marched off to get it.

toward the end of the party, we were standing and talking to her dad. she came over and handed him a nametag that said, "DAD" in 5 year old handwriting, and said, "here, dad. now everyone will know who you are."

awesome!

can we all just agree that gas prices are getting ridiculous?

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editor's note: this is the first in a series of midmonth guest bloggers! woo! please welcome my dear friend daniel.
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I mean come on people, I don't care if you're young, old, conservative, liberal, green, republican or democrat or anything inbetween and beyond, nobody WANTS to shell out $3.50+ per gallon at the pump. Granted, there maybe some people (read oil company executives) who want to see OTHER people pay an exhorbitant amount of money just to be able to take their kids to school, go to work, or take a 3 hour road trip to visit grandma; but somehow I highly doubt that even they would smile when their credit card balance is suddenly $50-80 further into the negative after filling up their car just to keep it on the road for another week.

What further astounds me is that not much longer than 5 years ago, gasoline cost almost half this much; that's right, reach far far far back into the recesses of your mind and try to imagine, the first number on the price of gas was... a number ONE, followed by a dot eighty four, or sometimes even lower in fact! Yes it's true... Hey! Yea you, how much for that bicycle? Really, you can't sell it to me huh? Hmmm, ok. Well uh, are there any bus stops around here? What?! A buck seventy five to get downtown, and another buck seventy five to get back!? The bus comes by every half hour?! Help!!
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editor's note: thank you daniel! keep being rad and internationwide, buddy! and the rest of you, stay tuned for more exciting guest blogger experiences!
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can we all just agree that having guest bloggers is an exciting idea?

stay tuned!

can we all just agree that the perils of working with children are varied and occasionally humorous?

so sometimes i stick things to myself and totally forget about them. i'll be the one who walks out of a workshop or special event with the HELLO MY NAME IS SARAH MEOW* nametag smack dab on the front of my shirt, and i'll wonder why people are looking at me funny and why that one weird dude on the bus seems to be calling my name...creepy!

anyway, today one of the kids gave me a shiny easter egg sticker. i thanked her and tried to figure out where i was going to put it (sometimes i put stickers on my clipboard, but i'm not really into seasonal stickers out of season, so i tend to stick those on my clothes because then i don't feel as bad about getting rid of them). i settled on the dot over the i on my tee shirt, where the name of the agency for which i work was written in large white letters.

fast forward 4 hours to me at the checkout of the large grocery store near my house, wondering why the cashier is looking at my shirt and at me that way. i wonder if maybe he knows someone who works there or a kid who is part of one of their programs (it's a fairly large agency and very well-loved by lots of folks; its cult following has been the basis for a lot of warm conversations between me and customer service people who were pretty terse before they found out where i work), or maybe he's trying to figure out what it means (the name is potentially misunderstandable), or maybe he just thinks it's appropriate to stare intently at my chest, then stare some more, and follow that up with a little more staring, and then to look me square in the eye and smile.

fast forward again to 2 hours later, when i happen to glance in the bathroom mirror and realize that the cashier was looking at me like that because he was really confused about why that part of my shirt was so shiny and brightly colored, and then after that, because he realized that it was just a metallic easter egg sticker. ah. yes.

*where MEOW=my actual real last name

can we all just agree that piglets are ridiculously cute?

because they are. ridiculously, ridiculously, ridiculously cute. especially in person—err, piglet.

(especially these ones.)

can we all just agree that the 100th post is kind of cool?

excuse the nerd party, but this is post 100! woo!

can we all just agree that overhearing conversations like this is awesome [volume 2]?

kid: "but i WAAAANNNNNNNNNNAAAA!!!!!!!!"

mom?/aunt?/grandma? (with amusing brooklyn accent): "but honey, [unintelligible], and picking up a chicken that has diarrhea is that last thing you wanna do."

(vol. 1)

can we all just agree that this is worth a few minutes of your time?

so you may have been hearing lately about net neutrality, which has been called "the first amendment of the internet." net neutrality is a set of laws that ensures that any internet user with any telecom service can access content online equally. (for example, if you have comcast internet, you can access a web page just as you would if you used at&t, or a local service.) it requires that internet service providers (isps) give equal treatment to websites.

isps aren't really into this idea, and lately they've been lobbying congress pretty hard to take away these provisions, which would give them a lot more control, and you a lot fewer options. and congress appears to be listening to them. it looks like net neutrality is in danger.

this means that your isp could decide to make some sites load faster than others, based on how much companies paid to ensure that their content was readily available. or, isps could choose to block content altogether, to punish a company that didn't want to pay for "premium service" or to keep customers from accessing the pages of a competitor.

in short, the internet as we know it could disappear. below are links to some folks who have organized to deal with this crucial issue. please take the time to check them out. this is a big deal.

find out where your rep stands here, and call, write, or email them to let your voice be heard! contact info can be found here.

your friends over at moveon.org have put together a handy petition for you to sign here.

wanna keep up with this issue? sign up here to be added to a contact list.

wanna learn more? read the save the internet coalition's blog here.

can we all just agree that getting a flat tire sucks?

especially if you're on your way to work?
and you can't really think of anyone to magically come fix it for you?
and you don't have aaa anymore?

but that having a very kind and efficient man fix it for you, and refuse to let you pay him, at the first gas station you pull into, can be totally incredible?

can we all just agree that if a person is going to drive a vehicle, they ought to be sure they can park it first?

can we all just agree that a google images search for meerkats is a wonderful way to get your day back on track?

try it. you'll be glad you did.

can we all just agree that the offer of a 50-character login is generous, but totally ridiculous?

so i was just creating yet another login and password for my health insurance's website, and i learned that my login name could be between 4-50 characters. seriously, dude, how many people are going to exercise the 50-character option? i mean, i am definitely in favor of personal freedom, and i believe fully that it's good to have options, and still...i wonder who would want that.

and if someone chose that, what would it be? the alphabet, twice, with w omitted (heh. heh.)? their name, if their name was sarah or some other delightfully 5-lettered name, ten times? a lot of z's? weird.

can we all just agree that it's nice to have supportive friends?

me: blah blah i am feeling challenged in my professional life and it is difficult etc etc etc
friend: "but you're pretty, and i got your back"

can we all just agree that it's amazing how one 24-hour period can make your whole life sparkle?

can we all just agree that kids say awesome things [volume 9]?

while we were sharing what our favorite vegetables are:

"ummm...i forgot. is fries vegetables?"

can we all just agree that kids say awesome things [volume 8]?*

*with special thanks to g for reminding me to remember about it again. sweet!

cute kid: "sarah? you probably already know this, because you are grownup. monkeys scratch their butts and they tickle!"

can we all just agree that 1000+ pageloads is kind of exciting, in a totally nerdy way?

um, yes. since i can't get the blocking cookie to work, ever, and since i'm kind of scared of the help forum moderator for my site tracker, some of those pageloads are definitely me.

but still, it's exciting! go, little bloguito, go!*

*yes, i know "little bloguito" is redundant. i'm over it already. if you aren't, i'd recommend going here and looking at some kitties until you calm down.

can we all just agree that "snakes on a plane" is a pretty useful expression?

although there is some contention over the actual meaning of the phrase, i think we can all agree that it clearly means, "the worst idea in the history of human ideas." because, seriously, snakes? on a plane?

here, i'll demonstrate.

sarah: "yeah, i have to meet with meow today. snakes on a plane, dude, snakes on a plane."

additionally, it can be abbreviated as s.o.a.p., if necessary, and in this way, a person and her friend can exchange covert judgements about a situation. observe:

person: so yeah, that was pretty much her idea. what do you think?
her friend (brightly): um...soap? [it should be noted that the periods in "s.o.a.p." are lost in transcription.]
person (relieved): yeah, that's what i thought too.

see, it is brilliant. the use of this expression is anti-soap, my friends.

can we all just agree that exchanges like this are awesome [volume 2]?

mom: "well, i think it's kind of amazing, the way she's got you all buffaloed, so that you--"
me: "hold on! what? buffaloed? what kind of crazy cowboy talk is that? buffaloed? is that like cowed, but more serious?"
mom (laughing): yes, i guess it is!

can we all just agree that kids say awesome things [volume 7]?

today some kids were talking about throwing up (or browing up, depending on who you asked), and one of them was talking about how she had been sick, and another one vehemantly announced, "IT'S OKAY!!! EVERY KID THROWS UP!!! THAT'S HOW LIFE IS!!!"

can we all just agree that it's confusing and kind of frustrating when your fingers get too close to your touchpad and cause the arrow of your mouse

to dart away, swoopingly, from where you want, need, and expect it to be?

particularly if the reason why you're even still awake is that you're still still still working on something for a job that is, um, somewhat uninspiring?

can we all just agree that saul williams is totally amazing?

i saw slam the other day, and it reminded me how much i like him. so i've been listening to his mix tape and to amethyst rockstar lately, and thinking about what he said when i've seen him before, and thinking about getting his books.

i would recommend saul williams to a friend.