Why did my day get better? Because when I got home, sitting on my porch was the LATEST VOLUME OF RUNAWAYS!

What? You’re not reading Runaways? You don’t know what you’re missing!

Apparently I’m not the only one struggling on this Monday.

Details of the weekend? Napped and read and napped and read. (Heat makes me extremely lethargic. Ugh.)

Upcoming week? Busy busy busy. Plus Michael’s birthday. Plus my Dad’s birthday. Pumpkin pie for Michael, and I believe Lemon Meringue for my dad.

Otherwise? Nothing.

So feel free to put your feet up and enjoy the air conditioning. I’ve got it cranked down to 70. Ahhh!

I know that several of you (Shawn) do video blogging (or whatever it is we’re supposed to call it) so I’m asking for some advice.

I’m thinking about getting a Flip, so I can have my grandmother send messages to my cousins, who will be scattered about the country by August. I thought it might be especially nice for the twins to have video to see, thought they might not appreciate it for a few years. (And I’m also hoping it will encourage my cousin to take video of the twins, but I don’t think that’s likely–simply because he and his wife are simply not that organized.)

So how difficult is it to deal with video? I have never used any type of camcorder–ever. Is learning the Flip and posting the videos on the web (Flickr? YouTube?) going to be a steep learning curve for someone who hates to read the instruction manual? Or should it be straight forward?

Essentially, is this going to be a big headache that would stress me out, or is it straight forwad and will be appreciated by my cousins so I should go for it?

Here is some of this weeks flower pr0n.
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Go wish Shawn a happy birthday!

bogart \BOH-gart\ verb
1 : bully, intimidate
*2 : to use or consume without sharing

The legendary film actor Humphrey Bogart was known for playing a range of tough characters in a series of films throughout the 1940s and 1950s, including The Maltese Falcon, Casablanca, and The African Queen. The men he portrayed often possessed a cool, hardened exterior that occasionally let forth a suggestion of romantic or idealistic sentimentality. Bogart also had a unique method of smoking cigarettes in these pictures — letting the butt dangle from his mouth without removing it until it was almost entirely consumed. It is believed that this habit inspired the current meaning of “bogart,” which was once limited to the phrase “Don’t bogart that joint [marijuana cigarette],” as popularized by a song on the soundtrack to the film Easy Rider, among other things. Today “bogart” can be applied to hogging almost anything.

Once again, Kat steals the show.

So as I’ve mentioned before, I’m still learning Photoshop. I have to admit that once I got past the basics (and the fact the whole stupid program is counter-intuitive), it’s actually a lot of fun to play with.

I’ve currently been learning to use the brushes and to change the colors of specific aspects of the image.

Non-reality based flower pr0n below.

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This always makes me feel better.

I may need to listen to it several times today.

To offset Janiece’s discovery of another underfed actress, I point you to the hotness that is Helen Mirren.

She is one amazingly beautiful woman.

Apparently, malaise is contagious over the Internet.

I’m going to take a lunchtime walk, and hopefully that’ll make me feel better.

ADDENDUM the First:
Now I’m shifting from cranky to pissed off.

So despite making threats, I didn’t actually eat any “orange melty salt“, but instead found something much better. Terra Chips. Specifically, Kettles Sea Salt White, Russet & Sweet Potato Chips.

These are really good.

Here’s the ingredient list: Ingredients: a blend of white potato, russet potato and sweet potato, canola oil and/or safflower oil and/or sunflower oil, sea salt.

That’s it. And 120 mg of salt per serving, which is quite low for chips. (The “low sodium” meals my grandmother gets are mostly 600 mg (ignoring everything higher than that.)

Are they health food? No. But a hell of a lot better for me than “orange melty salt”. Even with the vegetable dip I had with ’em. (Sour cream is dairy! It has calcium! That makes it a health food!)

And with that, I’m off to drink a REALLY LARGE glass of water.

So the other day over at Eric’s place, while we were looking at some of Eric’s very nice pictures, Tania was complaining that she takes lousy pictures.

Well, Eric and I both said that the secret is simply to take a whole lot of pictures and at some point the law of averages is going to be in your side.

I don’t think Tania was convinced, so to make my point, please peruse every single picture I took today on my camera. Notice that the vast majority of the completely and totally suck. Because I’m not a very good photographer. Is it frustrating? Yes. I really wanted a decent picture of my front garden. Didn’t get it, but I’ll try again tomorrow.

And that’s my point.