BlogCatalog

I recently signed up with BlogCatalog in order to (I suppose) mingle with others in the blog community. I ran across this site through a link I found at Steph's blog and joined out of curiosity. Where this will take me is anyone's guess.

So far, in the short amount of time since I signed up, it's smelling a bit like MySpace. Buried in my archives is some banter regarding my observations of the MySpace community (I really need to work on a Search feature to sift through those archives!). Perhaps my comparison is premature.

At least in BlogCatalog's effort to clone features for The Rest of Us, we get to pick and choose what to include in our accounts, and use it to refer to our own blogsites and not (totally) have to reinvent the wheel. Save for the advertisements. But as it's often been said, there's no such thing as a "free lunch".

I don't feel quite so dirty now.

Spectacle

"Asked whether Spector's celebrity helped him, one juror replied, "He got to buy some experts." The juror, who said he voted for guilty, was one of a handful who agreed to take questions from the media."

Whether Phil Spector actually murdered Lana Clarkson or if it was a result of her psychological condition toward suicidal tendencies, we still won't know for sure. The jury's still out. Plans are underway for a retrial after a 10-2 deadlock in favor of conviction. As for the coif, either the juror was wrong in assessing that he bought some experts when he could not even afford a proper haircut, or he is correct in that Spector had no money left over for one.

And Then Comes the Fall

Summer is officially coming to an end... Fall begins on Sunday!

It arrived a little bit early when our weather began to change mid-week (this past week). Today's high was perhaps in the mid-60s - quite unusual for our area. And some rain showers. No matter, since Autumn kicks off with a forecast for a fair day that may reach temps in the low 80s.

Go figure.

I'm not complaining, since I missed out on motorcycling today yet I can still salvage a riding weekend. However, I prefer riding on Saturdays and then taking a sabbatical Sunday to relax (and in my mind at least, to get some errands done around the house... yeah, right).

Pump It Up!

I'm taking a page from Steph's book, and decided to check out the Crystal Light website for this contest. Here's my creation:

It appears that the website is targeted toward women, presumably because they're always trying to find ways of watching their weight. Helllllooo. We should all be concerned about obesity (but I am a diehard diet cola junkie myself). Not for the zero calories... just for the taste of it. Or it could be I've become a caffeine addict; I should be so lucky if this is my one major vice.

Doh!

O.J. may be having problems finding a proper marketing outlet for his book, but there is one yeller feller who has faced a lifetime of adversity... and survived it all. Possibly to become this holiday season's surprise best-seller (who knows? this may develop into a screenplay), our illustrious Homer Jay Simpson speculates on how he would have gone about and Doh'd it.

Who'd you think it was, Willie or Moe?

Apple Hill

One of the areas I rode through on Saturday was Apple Hill, a community of apple orchards, wineries, pumpkin patches, xmas tree farms and other businesses near Placerville, CA (the area's address puts it in Camino, CA). When I was younger, Apple Hill was an annual destination when I was dating Patti. It was also where I took Sharon on our first date (picking up a pair of pumpkins to carve for the upcoming All Hallow's Eve).

Here you can find just about anything apple: apple cider, streudel, crumb cake, butter, jelly, fritters, ala mode or ala not, caramel apple, apple taffy... the list goes on. You can smell apples (and autumn) in the air; the leaves begin to change and, as so with the temperatures, will soon fall.

Uh, I'm waxing nostalgic. Sounds like I may be riding through again, only this time I'll stop and enjoy some time there.

Fires

It doesn't appear that summer is about to go quietly into the night. We have a couple of major fires burning in NorCal... one in the Plumas Nat'l Forest (about 100 miles from here), and another in the Bay Area (Santa Clara - Silicon Valley). Smoke, especially from Plumas, blanketed a very broad area and caused Unhealthy Air Quality alerts in the Sacramento Valley. This weekend I rode a total of about 300 miles and witnessed our pine forests peeking out from the cloudy soup.

At least it wasn't so bad in the upper elevations where I was riding.

No Clothes

Those who cannot see,
the Emperor is threadbare?
Yes-men, yes-women.

One for Matthew

Matthew, can you dance the happy Snoopy dance?

Dance, laugh and be happy!