How to add an image to your Gmail signature

Here’s a cross link to the post I did over at the day job, New Tricks, regarding Blank Canvas.

Blank Canvas makes is super easy for Firefox users to include graphic images in their gmail signature.

The Amnesia Episode

Just like Fallon Carrington Colby (aka Randall Adams), I’ve been suffering from a bout of amnesia. No one whacked me up side the head or anything – my condition is more of the suppression of ‘painful’ memories kind of amnesia.

While I spent much of my past work life tethered to an lcd projector, I haven’t laid eyes on one of the things for almost 10 months now. In preparation for our hugely popular and now ’sold out’ (if something free can be sold out) May 19th ‘Get Yourself A WordPress Blog‘ workshop, we spent some time today planning the room configuration and screen projection.

When it came time to fire up the overhead, I drew a complete blank. For the life of me, I couldn’t remember the keystroke combination for overhead display. I was at a total loss – just like poor Fallon at the police station. All I had to do was answer one simple question – ‘what’s the keystroke?’

Wouldn’t you know it, that cutie Miles Colby was no where to be found? So I did the next best thing and phoned a friend who walked me through it.

My first paycheck

Since I missed the new employee orientation, I have no idea when my first day was at New Tricks. I think we’ve been at our Web Design / Social Media Marketing company a couple of months now.  It’s all a big blur – too many late nights trying to figure out css and chasing down who knows what. You know how it goes on the internets – you google ‘css align’ while watching Entertainment Tonight and the next thing you know it’s 4 am and you are surfing for shoes.

We’ve kept ourselves busy and I’ve learned tons.

But, last week something really big happened – - – my biz partner, Judi, and I paid ourselves for the first time. Mind you, it was only a WEE bit o money but we sure are proud of ourselves.

Let’s hope there’s more to come.

The Bs Are Back

The carpenter bees arrived for their annual feast of my front porch a few weeks ago. I don’t

mind them. Sure, the bees have some baggage. They make a big mess digging their holes. The little sawdust piles mix with the pollen, making my porch pretty nasty. But, they’re not the world’s worst house guests. For starters, they remind me that spring has arrived.

Double Top Secret Way to Publish WordPress.com Posts on Facebook

Call me a control freak, but I’m guessing there are other people out there in WordPress world who want to add some but not every WordPress.com post to their Facebook Profile Newsfeed.

RSS Feed

The easiest way to add your WordPress.com Posts to Facebook is by creating an RSS feed on your Facebook profile.  To do this see below. But, if you are like me, you may not want every single WordPress post to automatically go to Facebook.

Hats off to Judi and Callahan for solving one of the great mysteries of the world with such a simple New Trick.

Add A Link To Your Post

Here’s what to do:

• Compose your WordPress post as normal.
• Somewhere in your WordPress post, add a link back to your post.  I stick a little tag, ‘Link to this post‘ at the very end of the post. If you want to be fancy, you could use a white font for the link text so that it doesn’t show on your post.
  
• Insert a link to the Post’s URL (either by grabbing the Permalink or publishing the post and copying/pasting the URL) in the tag.
  
• Publish the Post.
• View the published Post.
• Hover over the link.
• You’ll get the ‘WordPress Snap Shots’ dialog box like below:

• Select the ‘+SHARE’ button
• From the ‘Bookmark & Share’ dialog box, select Facebook
• Follow the prompts

A few notes:

WordPress.com is the online hosted version of WordPress.

There is a WordPress app for Facebook but it doesn’t appear to be working at the moment.

How to add your WordPress.com posts to your Facebook NewsFeed.

• Go to your Facebook Profile page
• Select the ‘Settings’ button (just under the Status bar)
• Select ‘Blog / RSS’
• Enter the URL for your WordPress.com blog
• Give it a few seconds, then your blog posts should appear

From now on, your WordPress.com Posts will automatically appear on your Newsfeed as soon as (or shortly after) they are published.

Adding Flickr 2 Your Facebook Profile

Share your Flickr photos on your Facebook Profile

One of the few apps that still seems to be working with the new Facebook layout is Flickr Badge.

Sure, you can easily upload photos directly to Facebook Albums but, for one reason or another, you may want to keep the photos external.  In my case, I wanted to share existing Flickr photos with Facebook and Face-less friends without having to re-upload the photos to multiple places.

There are several different Facebook/Flickr apps available. The first few I tried created a separate Flickr tab on my Facebook profile page but I wanted the photos to appear on my Facebook profile sidebar so they could easily be seen.  Enter Flickr Badge to the rescue.

Here’s how:

• Logon to Facebook and Flickr (the Flickr logon is necessary so you can grab the URL of the items to be shared).
• From the Facebook search bar (located at the top right hand corner of your screen), enter ‘FLICKR’ or just click on this link: FLICKR BADGE.
• Select the ‘Applications’ tab from the results list.
• There are several different apps, but ‘Flickr Badge’ by Erik is the one I used to add the badge to my Facebook profile.
• Select ‘Go To This Application’.
• You may get an ‘Authorization Required’ prompt. If so, allow the application to access your profile.
• You’ll get the ‘Flickr Badge’ set up screen like this:

• From the ‘Type’ drop down list, select the Type of Photos you want to share. My photos were in a Set.
• In the ‘Data’ field, enter the URL value for the type of photos you are looking to share.

My url was something like: http://www.flickr.com/photos/leapdontlook/sets/72157607656291001

Since I wanted to share a Set, I simply entered: 72157607656291001 (no, silly, I didn’t type the whole string by hand, I just cut and pasted it from the URL name)

• Enter the number of photos you want to include on the badge. For me, the magic number was 10.
• Select ‘Add Photos’.
• You’ll get a ‘Yay – photos added successfully’ box.
• Select ‘Add to Profile’.
• Wallah – the badge will be added to your profile page.

Don’t be surprised if you get an error the first time you try it. I had to enter the Set name a  couple of times before it worked for me.

If you know of another cool Flickr/Facebook app, do tell.

Link to this post

A Life Without Times

Even though I love the new ‘job’ and the opportunity to learn new things, there are certain things about it that make me cringe.  Mostly, the things that remind me of my old job. Things that  take me to a mental place I never wanted to return.

Now that our first project is nearing completion, it’s time to think about documentation. I could live happily ever after having never written another line of documentation. I’ve been doing a great job of avoiding it up until now.

Tonight, I finally gave up the battle.  Before I’d even finished the first page, I realized a wonderful thing about my new life. Something I left behind 8 months ago but never even thought about till now.   What’s happily missing from my life ? The font -  Times (in all it’s flavours Times, Times Roman and Times New Roman).  You can call it whatever you want but nothing about that font says hip or fresh.

Font was a four letter word in my old life and no font caused me more grief than Times Roman. I hate it – it’s so old school, so last Reagan. It’s a newspaper font and we all know the way of the newspaper.  Just now I googled it to discover I’m not alone. There are even ‘I hate Times Roman groups’ on facebook and mySpace. One blogger summed it up best when he said it’s:

ugly, amateurish design, lacking soul

Times is an old trick. We would never, ever use it at our new venture, New Tricks.

So, tonight I celebrate ridding my life of Times Roman.

I think I’ll go with ‘Gloriola’ for my documentation. It won the 2008 TCD2 awards. Typographica says:

It succeeds in being a typeface of the now, without resorting to trendy gimmicks or ornamentation.

All of a sudden, I really dig documentation

The Next Leap

Normally, I’m not big on the self-help stuff, but since two different people people gave me Elizabeth Gilbert’s ‘Eat, Pray, Love’  when I left the ‘corporate’ job last summer, I figured I should give it a shot. After a bit, I got into the book.  I finished it while sitting on a beautiful beach in Mozambique.  The book follows the three chapters of the author’s self-discovery – eating in Italy, praying in India, and learning to love again in Indonesia.

Originally, I’d planned to give myself 6 months to sort out what I wanted to do with life. While my journey hasn’t been nearly as glam as Elizabeth George’s, I do feel like it’s had distinct phases.

Purge

Phase 1 was spent detoxing myself of the old job by traveling to South Africa/Mozambique. It was the only bit of my journey that was planned – if you count a FF Award ticket as a plan.

Pinch Myself

The second phase was spent volunteering for something that I’m really passionate about. It was a wonderful experience full of amazing stories. I still have to pinch myself that I got to be an itty, bitty part of history. I’m convinced that it happened the way it did because, just about the time I returned from South Africa and start volunteering, most of the Obama staff members were being shipped out to other states.  If I hadn’t  been able to find a parking space that day (a major miracle given the parking situation at 1080 spring st), I probably would have driven home and given up on volunteering.

Pinch Myself Some More

Once I finished celebrating our accomplishments and catching up on my sleep, the 6 months were over.  I still hadn’t figured out what I wanted to do but I knew alot of  things I didn’t want to do.  Every time I got ready to send out a resume, I choked. The only jobs that interested me had to do with website design and social media but I don’t have a whole lotta experience in those areas so, in today’s competitive market, my resume wasn’t exactly going to the top of the ever growing pile.

As it happened, my friend, Judi, who I met through the Obama campaign (Judi and her husband Duane graciously donated Urban Oasis, their fab Inman Park home/b&B/Studio, to the campaign as our get out the vote Staging Location) had been working on an informal basis with small businesses/artists to help them convert their old outdated or non-existent web sites to WordPress. WordPress, the blogging platform I use, can also be used as a CMS system. While it looks as good as high-ticket websites, it’s much easier to update/maintain.

Judi got the double-good genes – she is blessed with both an incredible sense of design and savy business skills. So, when Judi asked if I wanted to join in her new venture, I got out of the pjs, put on some shoes and headed right over.

The new venture is called ‘New Tricks’ and the tag line is that ‘It’s Never Too Late!’ – meaning you can always learn new tricks.

Before I joined the fun, Judi had completed a couple of projects on her own. We are just finishing up our first team project – a website launch for Milk Money Consulting. Milk Money provides talent and studio space for the recording industy. It’s been a fun project to work on and I can’t believe how much I’ve learned.

We hope to have a few more tricks in the bag before our official launch in mid-April.

So, I think I’m starting phase 3.  It doesn’t seem like a leap – more like a happy skip.

Stay tuned for more….

Note To Judi – No, I didn’t insist we go with orange  just so the logo would look good on my blog.

Happy Birthday Barbie – where’s my invite ?

Today is Barbie’s 50th birthday.

I wasn’t invited to her party (maybe the evite went to my old work email address?) but I’m guessing she celebrated last night with vintage champagne and carrot sticks.

Since I grew up with Malibu Barbie, I’m envisioning the event was held in LA.  Even with the economic downturn, I suspect it was a lavish doo.

I’m sure she wore a glam new outfit to the party – after all she had her own show in Feb at New York Fashion Week.  I’m not sure which dress I would have chosen – maybe the Vivienne Tam – but I certainly would have gone for those hot Christian Louboutin shoes.

I bet Ken was there with his partner. They probably arrived early to do her hair and make up. I’m sure Barbie and Ken remain close friends.  Afterall, she had to have known he was gay from Day 1. If you don’t believe me, then you didn’t watch the ‘Mod Hair Ken’ video above. Ken’s either a car salesman or dermatologist. I’m hoping the later so he can do her botox for free.

I’m sure Madonna was there – since the Material Girl turned 50 last year, I suspect she is helping Barbie adjust to the new age bracket. And, I think Vincent Chase from Entourage was in the house. Maybe he’s Barbie’s new boy toy?

There is some speculation on the internets that Barbie has been or is about to be made redundant. I just don’t see that happening. After all, she constantly reinvents herself.  According to the Guardian, over the years Barbie’s careers have included:

An astronaut and fashion editor in the 60s, a surgeon and gymnast in the 70s, and has since been a rapper, a Unicef diplomat, a palaeontologist, an African-American presidential candidate (non-partisan) and, perhaps most brilliantly, an art teacher.

“Career”, of course, is another name for “outfit”…

My guess is that, at this point, she is either self-employed or taking a career break. After all those jobs, she probably needs some time off.

I’m also guessing she woke up this morning (or perhaps afternoon) with a wicked hangover and aching feet. Serves her right for not inviting me to the party.

early 70s malibu barbie

Soup n Slosh

At the first sight of a snowflake this past Sunday, I did what every respectable ATL-ian did and made a mad dash for the grocery store.  The storm wasn’t much of anything – mostly slosh. It’s all gone now. The only thing left of ‘Winter Storm 2009′ is the emergency soup I made.

I’ve been on a bit of a Kale bing so I went for a Portuguese Kale Soup from the Food Network.  While the soup is like a Portuguese Caldo, in researching this post (remember research = high journalistic standards and job search avoidance), I learned that both the Scots and German’s are kale people.  Apparently, a kale culture has developed in north-western Germany. There, social clubs host a “Grünkohlfahrt” (“kale tour”) in late January, where they consume large quantities of kale, sausage and schnapps. Most communities in the area have a yearly kale festival which includes crowning a “kale king”.  I’d love to see that crown.

Dresden’s official Kale King is Dr. Michael Hupe. In addition to holding the Kale King title, Dr Hupe serves as MD of the Dresden Airport and Chair of the Dresden Convention  Bureau.

‘(The Revd) Kale King’ is on LinkedIn and just plain Kale King is on Facebook and mySpace. There was an ‘I ♥ Kale King’ sweatshirt on Amazon but it’s been discontinued – oh, drats.

Here’s the recipe. Some cornbread would have been really tasty with it but a diva can only spend so long in the kitchen.

It was tastier today than when I made it yesterday. I’d award it a ‘yum, yum, yu’ (or 2 ½ yums out of a possible yum, yum, yum)

Portuguese Kale Soup

Adapted from the Food Network website/Gertrude’s Gallery

Ingredients

• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1 tablespoon finely chopped garlic
• 1/2 cup diced onions - I don’t believe in them
• 1/2 diced turnips - the recipe didn’t specify a ½ of what so I assumed ½ cup but I pretty much went with 1 cup of all the veg plus the whole bunch of kale
• 1/2 cup diced carrots
• 1 bunch kale, stemmed and roughly chopped
• 6 ounces chopped chourico (spicy Portuguese sausage), or chorizo – I went with veggie sausage. I’m ok buying meat sausage at Whole Foods but couldn’t pull the trigger on it at the Kroger
• 3 bay leaves
• 2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley leaves – I passed on the parsley
• 2 tablespoons chopped fresh thyme leaves
• 6 cups beef stock
• 1 cup kidney beans – I drained
• 6 ounces diced tomatoes
• 10 ounces diced potatoes – I went with Sweet Potato – bumped it up to a cup or so

Method

In a large stock pot, heat the oil over medium-high heat. Add the garlic, onions, turnips and carrots and cook for 5 minutes. Add the kale, chourico, bay leaves, parsley and thyme and mix well. Add the beef stock, beans and tomatoes. Bring the soup to a boil, and then reduce the heat to low and simmer for 30 to 40 minutes.

Meanwhile, in a medium saucepan, bring salted water to a boil and add the diced potatoes. Cook until tender, about 10 minutes. Drain the potatoes and add them to the soup.

Remove the bay leaves and serve hot.

Say it isn’t so – I’m a tree killer

squeeze = trees

Everyone knows that UK toilet paper sucks. Not only does it feel like sandpaper but it comes in colors never-found-in-nature.  Think easter egg shades of light pink, green and blue. I always feared that the dye was cancer causing.

I’m a charmin girl. And never the ‘good value’ charmin – only the ultra soft, quilted, extra ply will do. When I lived in the UK, I’d smuggle back suitcases full of charmin.

So, I was crushed to see a recent article in the Guardian that American style toilet paper is tres bad for the environment. Somehow my beloved extra soft Charmin:

causes more damage than gas-guzzlers, fast food or McMansions

The problem is two fold – it’s made from extra virgin wood and the chemicals used in pulp manufacturing are harmful. Americans are big toilet paper consumers, using

three times more per person than the average European, and 100 times more than the average person in China.

The article links to the Greenpeace cut-out-and-keep ecological ranking of toilet paper products.

Unless I change my ways – I’ll be a big tree-hugging hypocrite – a modern day version of Mr Whipple.

A Diva is born

My Big Brothers, Big Sisters, Little sister (I’ll call her Lil T) and I were matched when she was an adorable little 7 year old. She’ll be 13 this weekend – leap day to be exact. It’s been an amazing experience – I’ve gotten just as much, if not more, out of the relationship than she has.

Outings were much easier when she was younger. She loved Puppet shows and Disney movies. Now that she is in the tween/teen years,  it’s hard to find age-appropriate outings.  Mostly, we get our nails done, go to brunch or see Madea movies.

Last Sunday, I was cramming for the Oscars.  Benjamin Button was the only remaining Best Picture Nomination on my list. She agreed to go for one reason only – Brad Pitt.  The movie was playing at Phipps Plaza – the ‘posher’ mall in the town.   She’d never been to Phipps. I parked so that we could walk through Saks on our way to the movie.  As soon as we walked in the door, her eyes got big and she went ga-ga. She especially loved the shoes and purses. She kept commenting how they were the real deal – not the fake ones.  It opened up a whole new world for her.

In the 6 years we’ve been together, I’m not sure I’ve ever seen her so excited. She’s a huge Hillary Clinton fan so last year I took her to meet Hillary. She even had her photo taken with her shero – but walking through Phipps Plaza was right up there with Hillary on the excitement list.

Some might criticize the adventure for being materialistic or cruel for showing her things her family could never afford but I tried to make it a life lesson by repeating over and over, ‘if you do well in school and work hard, you can shop here’.  As all girls do when they get excited, she whipped out her phone and started texting her friends.

She fell asleep during the really long movie. As she was groggily waking up, the first words out of her mouth were ‘where are the coach bags?”

So yes Lil T, it’s true, you can be anything you want when you grow up – even President or Phipps Princess.

Plugins for the people

I’ve been a bad blogger this week. But, just because I haven’t been posting, it doesn’t mean I’ve been fallen off the WordPress wagon.

WordPress, the blogging software I use, has two options: a hosted version called wordpress.com and the self-hosted version, wordpress.org. WordPress.com is very easy to use and has all of the functionality I need for personal blogging but, since I can’t seem to get enough of the software, I’ve been learning the more robust wordpress.org.

Widget World

In my former life working with a large commercial software package, you worked with (or around) what you had. If the product didn’t do what you needed, you worshiped the product development gods with offerings of sweets. Believe me, I’m forever grateful to my BFFs in PD.

In my new life, I’m like a kid in a candy shop with all the open source functionality available.  While wordpress.com has tons of plugins readily available, wordpress.org is a plugin picnic with over 4,000 available for FREE.

Here are a few I’ve stumbled upon:

Daily Doses

There’s a plugin to display a Daily Dilbert Comic on your site. Or, you can add a bible verse, using a Verse of the Day feed. Ayah of the Day translates a verse from the Holy Quran. You can choose between English and Farsi translation.

Saint du jour displays the saint of the day, “according to the timetable of the ordinary and/or the extraordinary form of Roman Catholic rite”.

There are widgets to post French, German, Arabic, Chinese, Italian, Indonesian, Japanese, Korean, Russian and Spanish Words of the Day. Some have audible options.

Of course you can post the Daily Horoscope – there’s even a Romanian version.

Psychic Read

Promises to secretly reveal what your readers most want to read….so you can give it to them. That way, they’ll keep coming back to your blog.

Next of Kin

This one may be my favourite. Next Of Kin monitors your visits to your wordpress system. If you fail to visit your blog after a specified period of time, the system will automatically send an email to whoever you choose notifying them of the bad news. You get to personalize the text of your notification email ahead of time.

Parsnip and Apple Soup

I do love me some parsnips. This week I made a Parsnip and Apple soup from The Sunday Times. Nothing elegant – just a friendly, easy to make, hearty soup. I’ll award it 2 out of 3 yums.

Exceeds Expectations

The creamy consistency – very thick and on the sweet side (sort of like moi) – more like a porridge than a soup. That’s a good thing for me but may not be for everyone else. I also liked the Thyme flavor.

Needs Improvement

The recipe called for 4 parsnips. I bought pre-packaged and didn’t realize till I got home how wimpy they were.  For the apples, I went with Granny Smith (I had to guess at the US equivalent of English Apples).  Not sure which was the bigger mistake but the apples overpowered the parsnips. I’d rename the recipe “Apple and Parsnip Soup”.

If I had a redo, I’d go heavier on the parsnips without cutting back on the apples. I wouldn’t want to sacrifice the thickness for the taste.

The recipe also called for Stilton Croutons. Stilton is pricey (at least in the US). I didn’t find the croutons added anything to the dish so save your money and go with store bought croutons.

Here’s How:

Apple and Parsnip Soup

Adapted from The Sunday Times “Parsnip and Apple Soup with Stilton Croutons“

Ella Heeks of Abel & Cole

Serves 6 (I think that’s stretching it)

• 3 tbsp butter
• 2 glugs of olive oil
• 1 onion, peeled and chopped – I don’t do onions so I always skip them
  
• 4 parsnips, peeled and chopped
• 3 English apples, cored and chopped, skin on or off – I went peeled
• 3 cloves of garlic, crushed
• 1 tbsp thyme leaves
• 750ml vegetable stock – this equals 25 US oz
• 125ml double cream – equal 4 US oz
• Freshly ground black pepper

Melt the butter and oil in a pan over a medium heat. Add the onion, parsnips and apples and fry gently for 10-15 minutes. Add the garlic and thyme and fry for a couple more minutes. Add the stock and bring to the boil, then simmer for 20 minutes.

Remove the soup from the heat and pour into a food processor. Blend until smooth, stir in the cream, season and serve with croutons.

Cows Cause Climate Change

Slow down and save the world

Guess The Guardian didn’t want The Times to corner the market on Cow News. This week, they reported that the chocolate maker, Cadbury, is working to reduce the carbon footprint of its milk chocolate by encouraging its cows to burp less.

Farmed ruminant animals are thought to be responsible for up to a quarter of “man-made” methane emissions worldwide though, contrary to common belief, most gas emerges from their front, not rear ends.

Apparently, the average cow burps the equivalent to the annual carbon emissions from an average family car.

The report goes on to state:

Cadbury has sent their farmers a guide for low carbon dairy farming, which includes advice on changing the diet of the cows to cut their eructations.

According to the googles, the primary cause of burping is eating too fast. Maybe there’s a future for me in cow counseling? Coaching the cows to slow down and enjoy the meal.

Red Bull vs Cow Cola

Mellow Yellow

According to an article in TimesOnline, the Cow Protection Department of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), India’s biggest and oldest Hindu nationalist group, is in the final stages of development for a new soft drink made from cow pee.

The drink – called “gau jal”, or “cow water” – in Sanskrit will be very healthy – made mainly of cow urine, mixed with medicinal and ayurvedic herbs.

“Don’t worry, it won’t smell like urine and will be tasty too,” Om Prakash, the head of the department, told The Times. “It won’t be like carbonated drinks and would be devoid of any toxins.”

The RSS, whose primary goal is to cleanse India of foreign influence and promote its ideology of Hindutva, or Hindu-ness, began promoting cow urine as a cure for ailments ranging from liver disease to obesity and even cancer in 2001.

The group hopes to launch the product by the end of the year. They may consider exporting it.

The product names are endless – Diet Dr Pee-Pee, Mellow Yellow, Cow Cola

research note: In the end, I chose the stock cow photo for this post but there sure are a lot of pee videos on youtube.

Demand accountability and transparency at Gaytona.com

Has Betty Jack DeVine lost her mind? Logo by Arge

Every year Betty Jack DeVne over at Gaytona.com names her ‘DeVine 9 1/2′ fantasy NASCAR team.   This year’s team has some very suspicious (and frankly alarming) members.

A few of the questionable entries include:

Reed Sorenson - We know that BJ DeVine added him because, since he is from GA, she’s afraid that she might run into him at the Walmart and it would be awkward if he wasn’t on the list, but is he even old enough to drive? Does he have to wait for his mama to come pick him up after every race?

Ryan Newman – please – he’s only there cause BJ likes a man with a fancy College Degree. Did she even look at him?  He’s a total dough boy – too wide to even climb in and out of the car window.

Tony Stewart – Yes, he is cute, but with the bad economy can his sponsor, Office Depot, afford to put gas in his car ?

Mark Martin – Does BJD really need ANOTHER sugar daddy? Isn’t there a legal limit on how many a girl can have?

We have formed a committee to demand full disclosure regarding the questionable selections to this year’s list.

Why Do We Care?

We, the ‘Real Americans Against Gaytona.com‘ or ‘RAAG‘,  are most concerned about BJ’s health and welfare. We have reason to believe that either her posse of hot young interns or her team attorneys (or both) may be keeping her so liquored up as to impair her judgement.

If not that, then she has totally sold out to corporate interests.

Who is the Committee?

The RAAG committee consists of:

• Big Daddy D – aka BDD.  BDD works in the NASCAR promotions industry and has a personal vendetta against BJD for not naming his driver, Clint ‘Cute Boy’ Bowyer, to this year’s list. Big Daddy D  is 100% motivated by $$$$.  We can’t say which sponsor is his employer but we’ll give you a hint – it’s not Hamburger Helper or Cometic Casket.

• Down and Out Diva – aka DAOD – could care less about NASCAR but lives to community organize and will adopt any cause to avoid her job search.

• Mr T – aka Mr T – Does whatever BDD and DAOD say as long as there are cocktails involved.

What can you do to help ?

• Watch this space for details of the upcoming protest at of Gaytona.com World HQ. We’ll be holding a sign making party in advance of the big rally.
• Join our facebook group – which we may get around to creating soon.
• Become a corporate sponsor. Fees are negotiable.
• Sign the online petition at DAATAG – By signing the petition you may be eligible to win a free sample of herbal teas.
  

Click here to sign the petition

Join our movement – together we can being about change to the Gay NASCAR industry.

Logo by Arge at www.argeart.com

How dare they find me a job

Vampire hunters kit - also works on do-gooder job hunters

Between saving the world through tireless community organizing, spending gobs of time researching important topics  like poultry production, chicken claws and tiaras for my ground-breaking blog and finding the perfect job for all of my unemployed friends, I’ve been pretty successful avoiding my own job search.

I’m not sure where other people are getting off poking their noses into my job search but these no-good, do-gooders better back off.  This week my friend A.D.D (not his condition – his initials) actually made a phone call to a prospective employer on my behalf.  And my former-friend KKK (not her real full initials but her evil streak inspired me to add an extra K) edited a cover letter for me that I’d been able to avoid sending for several weeks.

Don’t these people know that I’m going to win the lottery any day now ? Just as soon as I manage to get out of the house and actually buy a ticket.

photo from : corpsesforsale.com

Thursday Tea Smack Down

There’s no better way to warm up on a cold day than to put on several layers of flannel pjs, surround yourself with space heaters and have a warm cuppa tea. I’m partial to the Yogi Teas – especially the Lemon Ginger but not the Green tea varieties. At approximately $5 for a pack of 16, they are dear but still cheaper than a Starbucks.

I’m not much of a grocery shopper – I know my way to the Diet Dr Pepper and Charmin but anything else takes me hours and several laps around the store to find. The other day, while searching the shelves for something else,  I came across the Caribbean Dreams Teas. They were in the Jamaican section of the store – not with either the regular teas or natural foods. Who knew there are three different places where they hide the teas?

Since the Caribbean Dreams are much cheaper (something like $2 for 24 bags), I grabbed a couple of boxes – Lemon Ginger and Ginger Mint. The Lemon Ginger’s ingredients sounded promising: Ginger and Lemon Grass.

I regret to report that Caribbean Dreams doesn’t stand up. The flavour isn’t bad but it’s far weaker than the Yogi Teas. About the same strength as when you go for that second cup out of a previously used bag.

I was going to end this post with a witty spin on ‘you get what you pay for’  or ‘if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.’  But, while researching – no, not because I have my journalistic standards to uphold but because research is a great way to avoid the job search, I learned that Caribbean Dreams is a Tetley product (though separately owned). I also discovered that you can order a free sample of yogi teas online at http://www.yogitea.com/Pages/FreeSamples.html. Delivery in the US only. The current sample pack includes Meditative Time™, Mexican Sweet Chili™ and Berry Anti-Oxidant.

Maybe I have scored after all.

Little Miss Lemon Ginger

It’s Toddlers & Tiaras Tuesday

TLC’s Toddlers and Tiara’s airs Tuesday’s at 10 pm EST.

Ain’t nothing but a train wreck but everyone has to have one reality show guilty pleasure.

Last week’s episode, Week 2: Miss Georgia Spirit, happened to be in my very own home state. It’s everything you hoped for. I need good karma so I won’t hate on it out loud except to say I think there’s a real opportunity for software automation in the beauty pageant scoring business.

Tonight appears to be a repeat of Week 1: Universal Royalty State Pageant in Austin, TX.  Next week’s episode on Feb 17th will feature The Chitlin Strut in SC.

Week 1’s episode is on YouTube but the Miss GA Spirit episode is no where to be found yet. The best I can do is share the trailer:

more about “Toddlers & Tiaras“, posted with vodpod