Happy Groundhog & Garazon Day!

A"bump" since I'm too busy celebrating Groundhog Day to actually put up a new post about it.

 

(have to use a graphic because Blogger won't let me put in those special characters) means "grin" in IM chat or forum posts, but it in this case it also stands for "Garazon", one of my best and long-time online pals. The G for grin was first used by our mutual friend, Brad and I guess Garazon and I picked it up around the same time. It became a "nickname for the nickname" for me with Garazon and that's how I started abbreviating his screen name.

Garazon and I "met" in MSN Groups, but started to become good friends when he made a flashy Halloween page for his group, complete with embedded midi sound file and some other special effects. Making a page was one of my goals when I first got online and I was determined to learn how to do it, so I started asking Garazon all sorts of questions. I'm sure he grew weary of me bothering him, but he should have been flattered if he had only known how hard it was...and still is...for me to ask for assistance. 

I hope we don't ever lose touch, but even if we do, I'll always remember Garazon because of our time in Groups and that he once said Groundhog Day was one of his favorite holidays. I don't remember exactly WHY he said it was, but I thought that was very funny and every year since we met a dozen years ago in Groups, I always think of him on this day.

The 1993 Bill Murray movie Groundhog Day is also one of my favorite flicks and I try to watch it whenever it's on. I link to IMDb often when I post about movies, but sometimes I get so annoyed when reading posts about my favorite movies; the site is full of argumentative and insulting posts.  I can understand contention when discussing politics and religion, but movies?  Good Grief.  It gets extremely nasty when a movie contains plot elements of either of those two subjects and sometimes people try to interject one or the other into the discussion when there's no reason to do so.

Anyway...just heard on the news that the groundhog saw his shadow and there will be six more weeks of bad weather.  That doesn't mean much here in the Texas Panhandle; it was a beautiful, fairly warm day yesterday but this evening is supposed to bring freezing temps and rain and possibly snow. 

What It's Like

To Be Me

Problems With Quiz

Well, more problems than I usually have. Most of the other can be chalked up to stupidity and ignorance, but this one is beyond my control. (come to think of it, so are the others) I tried to play earlier and got an error message that said the site was too busy. I waited an hour, then tried again and got this one:

Internal Server Error

The server encountered an internal error or misconfiguration and was unable to complete your request.

Please contact the server administrator, root@localhost and inform them of the time the error occurred, and anything you might have done that may have caused the error.

More information about this error may be available in the server error log.

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I hope that the clock isn't still running after one of my first attempts; it looked as though the site was going to load, but after about a minute or so, I gave up. I will try again later.

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Update: I just tried again and got this error msg.:

FunTrivia.com We are temporarily experiencing some technical issues. Please try back later. We apologize for any inconvenience!

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I had gone to Down or Not just to make sure it wasn't something on my end. When it said FunTrivia was up, I went to the site (not ToTG Trivia Tournament) and got the above msg. Oh well.

OMG

I'm gonna be rich!

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Note: I have never used "OMG" in mails, posts or anywhere else on the internet before now. It's not a phrase - abbreviated or not - that I use in "real life" so I don't use it online. I don't invoke God's name when I curse nor when I'm exclaiming...not that I don't use other offensive words. (WTF you say?) I used it here because of the subject of this scam-spam email. As I always do when I post these emails, I've included their email address(es) so the web spiders will pick up on it and other spammer/scammers will spam the spammer/scammer.

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Mrs. Julian Martinez Reply-To: julianmartinezmrs@kimo.com 

Dear Beloved in Christ, 

I am Mrs. Julian Martinez an aging widow suffering from long time illness. I have some funds I inherited from my late husband, the sum of 7.5 Million Pounds and I needed a very honest and God fearing Christian that will use the fund for God's work, I found your email address from the internet and decided to contact you. Please if you would be able to use the funds for the Lord's work, kindly reply me at (julianmartinezmrs@kimo.com) to explain more for your full understanding 

Yours in the Lord, 

Mrs. Julian Martinez.

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I've said this before, but I think there's an extra-warm corner of Hell for people who bilk others in God's name.

Rumspringa

That's a new word I learned today. I saw it in a reply to a post in Big Hollywood - the topic was Katy Perry, Jessica and Ashlee Simpson and how they were raised in a church, but weren't being Christian in their careers. I like to read Big Hollywood but don't really like it when they interject religion or politics into their articles. (because 99% of Hollywood is liberal and the posts and replies mostly bitch and moan about it... and criticisms of religion almost always wind up sounding "holier than thou".)

One of the replies said the girls might be on their Rumspringa "and they'll get over it." From the context, I had an inkling as to what the word meant, but I wasn't familiar with it. Wiki says Rumspringa is a time when Amish youth "sow their wild oats". It was an interesting and informative read, so I did a little more research. I've read about Amish kids being busted for selling/using drugs and I seem to recall a recent murder that shocked the Amish community, but the funniest thing I have read about Amish crime has been beard cutting assaults. (Well, funny to me, but I wasn't the one getting my beard cut off.)

Maybe I'm insensitive about that, but I've never been able to grow a beard, just a mustache and Amish men don't wear mustaches. (I'm not sure about the Amish women) I could never be Amish, I guess, because I like my 'stache and my TV and microwave.

I also found out there's a band named Rumspringa and this is where I'd normally add the video, but I'm not in the mood for alternative music.

I do know an Amish joke, though:

What goes "clip clop clip clop - BANG BANG BANG - clip clop clip clop"?

An Amish drive-by shooting.

So Far, a Lucky Week

This just hit my email inbox:

I forget why I entered the contest; I'm sure the Grand Prize was something I really wanted or I wouldn't have made the effort. A magazine subscription isn't too bad of a consolation prize - I love to get magazines and after reading, they're good to line my trashcan with or to tear pages out of and put under the Beej's water and feed bowls. I used to take my old magazines to the laundromat but they would get stolen within the day.

It's been a fairly lucky week for me; I won this magazine subscription, fifty extra points for correctly answering the movie trivia question at StartSampling and last night I won $12 on the Powerball lottery.

It was also a very lucky week for some young punk in a red car.  I was out earlier and about to turn onto a busy street.  The light was red and there was a car ahead of me.  I started slowing as I normally do, easing to a stop. (saves gas, saves brake wear) There wasn't but a few car lengths between me and the other vehicle when the red car zoomed around me and cut in front.  I had to slam on my brakes to avoid slamming into the car.  I saw him glancing in his rear-view mirror and I gave him the bird.  He didn't look back again.  I was itching for a fight- he had scared me and that just about makes me angrier than anything else.

As we sat there waiting for the light, I got more angry.  He wasn't saving any time, he had to wait anyway.  When the light changed, he sped off, zipping from lane-to-lane w/out signalling. He also ran a yellow light when he got to the next intersection and turned. 

I wasn't in a very good mood, anyway.  I had tried to drop off my vehicle insurance payment last week, but there was a sign on the office door "Be Back Soon". I went back by several times, but there was no one there.  I put the check and invoice on the passenger seat and forgot about it.  When I got in my truck earlier, I noticed it and remembered that it was due tomorrow.  I got to the insurance office and saw the same sign on the door.  I went to the Dollar Store, did a little shopping and dropped back by only to see the business was still closed.  I killed a little more time and went back - the sign was still up, the door still locked.

Fuming, I went home and called the after hours number listed on the door.  Nothing.  I then called the regular number and a woman answered.  I told her I had been trying to bring my payment by and wanted to make sure someone was there to take it.  "Oh, I stepped out for a little while." she told me.  Yeah, a week is a "little while" I thought, but didn't say it.  She then informed me that the boss was gone, had been for a week.  That made sense then - she was enjoying her four hour lunch breaks.   She's lucky I didn't lose my temper with her.  She's even luckier I didn't have to file a claim for rear-ending that red car.

I'm lucky to win the few things I have this week.  To be honest - I'm even more lucky I haven't stroked out.   I seem to be getting more and more angry at things here lately.  I got a little angry earlier at a reply to my license plate post on Facebook.  An old friend and schoolmate wrote "Why would I want a license plate with 'Mike' on it?"  It shouldn't have, but it hit me wrong.  I started to reply "Well, it would be just as well....'smartass' wouldn't fit."  I've been a little snarky on Facebook myself lately, though, and didn't want to be a hypocrite.

To top all that off, the stray cat I've been feeding has been in heat. (I thought she was pregnant, but she is just fat.  I've cut back on her food- all she gets is B's leftovers now) I love cats, but the only thing more disgusting than the smell of cat urine is a female cat in heat.  Thanks to her "condition", there has been a dozen tomcats hanging around.  I've been woken up a dozen times  this week by the caterwauling;  it's either her and a male cat or two males dueling for her affections.  I've discovered one thing about cats;  you can't tell whether they're fightin' or foolin' around by the sounds they're making. 

It would probably help a great deal if I quit frequenting political forums.  If the Republicans nominate Gingrich, then they will have to give up the "party of family values" label they brag about.  If they nominate Santorum, then they'll lose any chance of getting a gay person to vote for them ever again. Both of them are a little...let's say "ethically challenged".  The Republicans definitely need to stop touting that they're for limited govt. and need to quit pretending they're conservative. (and the TEA Party has allowed itself to be hijacked by the neocons) I'm lucky I'm too old for the draft, because we'll need one for the war machine if we take on Iran.

I know I lowered my blood pressure at least fifty points by not reading posts in Dallas Cowboy forums.  The "Tony Homo" posts infuriated me.  Probably Santorum supporters.