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For Jerry: Why Facebook Sucks Today

Since you apparently can't read this message unless you are logged in to Facebook (effectively confusing the problem even more), I felt it necessary to post this on the good ol' public acccess internet, from Known Issues on Facebook:

Known Issues on Facebook 

Due to site maintenance, some profiles and Pages have been seeing a Profile Unavailable error message for over 24 hours. We estimate that this maintenance should be resolved in the next few hours. We apologize for the inconvenience and appreciate your patience.

Factoids

Too bad for Mixi.

Came across kind of a neat pick-me-up in the morning if you enjoy punctuation marks that are rarely used: 14 Punctuation Marks That You Never Knew Existed

It's morning, and we're about to sample some Melitta coffee that we only got charged 13 cents for at the store thanks to a broken scale.  If it's not any good, I still have the receipt.

Last night I played a guitar solo on a naked mannequin.

Crest Pro-Health: Tastes great, but my tongue has been numb-ish for about 3 days since I received a freebie of it in the mail.  Maybe consider brushing with instead of eating (as much).  But seriously, why the shit is my tongue numb?

I Roasted Squash and I Liked It

Inspired by a coworker, I decided to buy a butternut squash and take it for a spin in the oven this weekend.  It's Hallowe'en soon, and I'm feeling rather festive, so why the heck not?  I found an incredible amount of butternut squash soup recipes, but I kind of wanted to try my hand at it as a solid first.  I beckoned, my faithful Facebook friends answered with delicious sounding recipes.  I wanted to try them all, so I decided to combine them.  Below is the recipe for a delicious squash.  Make one and eat it with a friend or lover (or enemy, poisoning one half to taste).

You will need:

• 1 butternut squash
• butter/margarine
• ground cinnamon
• ground nutmeg
• salt and black pepper
• maple syrup
• crushed pecans or walnuts, roasted walnuts (optional)
• brown sugar (optional, but I imagine delicious!)

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350F.
2. Wash then cut butternut squash in half (CAREFULLY) lengthwise and scoop out the holes of seeds and fibres.
3. Place cut side up in a baking pan of about 3/4 an inch of water.
4. Glaze with butter/margarine lightly on the meat and in the scooped out holes.
5. Fill holes about 1/3 of the way with maple syrup.
6. Sprinkle a bit of nutmeg and cinnamon (not even half a tsp each works well) onto each half and brush across the squash.  Do the same with even less salt and pepper (or salt and pepper to taste, if you're feeling crazy).
7. For those more ambitious than I am, try to brush on a bit of brown sugar too.
8. Put in the oven for about 65 minutes, testing with a fork every half hour.  Squash should look golden brown, feel tender and squashy, and smell like a dream.  
9. Sprinkle on crushed pecans or walnuts, or try roasted walnuts.  Serves two (or three if you're not big eaters), and some people even use it as a side (not me).

Try it out and never be afraid to add your own variations.  In fact, if you have any squash recipes you'd like to share (involving butternut or other squash) please leave me a comment with a link or the recipe itself.  Enjoy!

Warning: Do Not Ignore Hundreds of Dead Birds

Fish die by botulism, birds eat infected fish; a likely story.  The timing is a little off-putting, though.  Why can't we just admit that the grief-stricken, poor economy-shaken birds committed mass suicide?  By the way, if you live on Georgian Bay and awaken to hundreds of dead birds in your yard, don't just start cleaning them up, contact your municipality first. Something might be up.

Unrelated, I urge you to play the internet's greatest version of the game Telephone, Doodle or Die, but also to draw/say something other than a penis or a Nazi when it comes up, as well as the same for any Homestuck references.  Those are just far too common on the site.

Squash: It's not just for decoration anymore

Apparently people eat squash, so this fall (maybe tonight) I am going to try an oven-baked butternut squash recipe.  If no review on this meal in the coming days, assume I have accidentally poisoned and killed myself and Miklos.  In case that happens, here is a picture of me as two ghosts in the park that I forgot about until just now:

It's ok to use your cell phones again, ppl

Because you felt so threatened by the possibility that cellular technology would be the death of us all that you actually put your phone into a safe deposit box and locked it away to prevent any electromagnetic fields from escaping and endangering your health any further, I am pleased to assure you that a new study says that we have no reason to connect cancer risk with the use of cell phones.  Until the next study proving otherwise comes out.

Sad Panda

I'm really not okay with this.

Endangered Bengal tigers among those killed after escaping from Ohio zoo

I understand, yes, the police were not trained to deal with the tigers any other way.  Surely though, there were people who were. Animal control, or, failing that, someone with more wild life expertise that the animal control people could've called.  I realize it was a critical situation.  It just seems sad and stupid and wrong for them not to have even tried to do anything other than shoot to kill.  Not to say I expect more or less from people today, but I really think this could have been handled differently, especially when 18 animals killed were part of an endangered species of about 1400 known.

But hey, as long as the human population is thriving and we're letting awful, awful people have babies without a permit.  Permits!  C'mon!  I've even coined a slogan.  "Permits: Hey, They're Better Than Genocide!" Consider it.

I strongly advise you listen to Modern Guilt by Beck if you haven't lately. Especially while driving and not texting.

Ambition and motivation. As someone living on this particular place in the world, I have the privilege of having just about everything I need and still being too lazy to go out and claim it. Domesticated life is wonderful but is easy to slump into and settle. What about dreams and goals? Where did those go? I like to blame my college experience on destroying all of them (because it did), but also negative people.  I can't blame them personally though. I should never have allowed myself to be surrounded by such bitter folks. More often than not, people confuse me with them. At worst, I'm optimistically hopeless. At best, I am ambitious but fruitless. Bring on the fruit!

I lead a satisfied life in general speckled healthily with days of utter sloth and cynicism. Maybe I really do need more fruit. Actual kind.

Let's all get motivated and do something we wouldn't do this week. Skydive, go for a run, floss. Figure it out and tell me what you do when you're in a funk created by work and the forgetfulness that somewhere in you lies talent. Dan, you are not allowed to post a snarky comment. That will be your thing!

Time to get out more, enjoy what's left of these crispy fresh days before Winter 2011 swallows us whole.

Well played, credit card company

I'm the kind of person who for a long time paid her bills the second she got them. Then I sort of slumped into becoming the kind of person who pays them on time. According to the $8 interest charge on my credit card this month, I am now a deadbeat in my eyes, but through no fault of my own of course.

If you've ever used the website I'm talking about (which I will not reveal because I dunno, couldn't someone steal my identity that way? Not that I'd even want to steal my identity), you'd know how disorganized and poorly laid out it is, and how I fear for grandmas and grandpas using it because apparently I can't even read it properly and now my perfect credit record has an $8 interest dent in it.

Here's a thought for that website: Invest in an Excel spreadsheet layout!

And that is why I am switching to a different company.

*fin*

Before anyone asks:

English

Wikipedia has an article on:

Tongue-in-cheek

[edit]Adjective

tongue-in-cheek (comparative more tongue-in-cheek, superlative most tongue-in-cheek)

1. (idiomatic) not intended seriously; jocular or humorous
   

   He gave a tongue-in-cheek explanation of why the sky was blue, offering a theory about some primordial discount on light blue paint.

From Wiktionary.

I TYPE THIS WAY FOR A REASON

BECAUSE I ALWAYS YELL AT PEOPLE.

That is today's post.  Mull it over, would you?

Good Day

I have to say, this is the first time in weeks I have been able to say "There is nothing on TV."  Even when we spent a week up north in the middle of nowhere with the rattly satellite that would lose signal every 7 minutes, I was happier about the programming.  I imagine this is a lot like what I can expect from my retirement years. Which is why I imagine so many old people are quite all right with dying.  Life's all about television, right?

My earlier post would suggest that today was not the happiest day in a while, but it really has been.  The boiling rage refers only to the person who could destroy it all (again).  That said, the events of today have led to an incredibly relieving conclusion to a year that's been pure shit bubbling on the back-burner for me and those closest to me.  I can only hope everything continues to get better.

Also, I vacuumed my couches today and I refuse to turn on the furnace even in this freezing cold weather until we replace the filter.  So don't you worry, the day-to-day remains mundane and highly domestic.

It's been good though.  [And now for a week of what's sure to be pure shit!]

Dear Trainwreck

I realize some girls were not lucky enough to grow up with the most supportive of families.  I am aware of how insecure this makes them.  I know it's why they walk around with skirts hiked up to their buttholes, and why they drink and drug themselves stupid in vain attempts to attract attention, so easily mistaking it for affection.  And for once, it's not the fact that they're contributing to the degeneration of all that women have worked so hard for a century to achieve that boils my blood.  This time, it's personal.

It's one thing to be unsure of yourself and have bad self esteem and to do stupid things to make yourself feel better, but it's a whole other ballgame when you decide to drag others through your mud over and over just to observe the effects, the amount they care for you and how much torture they would go through for you.  This does not determine your self-worth, but rather how pathetic you are for stringing them along on your sad little ride, and it makes them look bad for being good people too.

Solve your own problems.  Let others live their lives.  Because you never know how far you'll go to see how much someone cares, and you might just end up destroying them in the process.

Is that real ketchup? Yep!

I'm normally a summer person, but it's going to be mid-temp today and I actually don't mind it.  Yesterday I remembered how much I loved a hot coffee instead of just liked it as a morning routine, and today it actually motivated me to wake up before 8am on my first day of vacation.  Shit!  It's so good!

You ever type something and at the same time someone else says that same thing? I don't.

Why is there an actually 'cut'-looking version of the Koodo spokesguy on the dash in a Volvo commercial?  I need to stop watching television again.  Those days without the 'tube' (what do we call them now? 'Impossibly flat boxes'?) were both the most creative and the most depressing days of my life.

So, let's recap my summer:  La la la la la la la.

Summer was great, necessary, and full of new experiences involving spending far more money than I ever realized was involved in owning a finished house.  Apparently, yards are expensive to have.  Go figure.  And as usual, it turns out that I still prefer my time up north to my time filled with work down here in the deep south of Ontario.  Nothing is very surprising when you're an old person in your late twenties.

If I ever buy a burgundy velvet chandelier, kill me.

Sometimes, people's faces resemble peanuts with fish eyes slapped onto them.  There is nothing wrong with that.

So, on vacation we will go in a few days.  No blogging will occur during this time, as we have a land line, satellite TV but no internet there.  It's a regular old pioneer days up north!  And that's the way your mom likes it.

Remember the time Dalton McGuinty replied to my tweet about how he's a wiener?  Every time I see his commercials, I can't help but remember how much I hate every useless election in this country.  But we already blasted that topic in May, so I will move on.

Boobs.

When I was your age, blah blah blah!

Because Dan is a tingus, I have to blog again.

So what's new in the world?  Well, I just don't know.

Today I will outwardly consider how sad it is that money is such a motivator for some people.  Not in the way that they'll work, however. No, no.  I am referring to the money so readily available to deadbeats and other human embodiment of sloth who for no good reason actually opt to leech off the common working people instead of making a single effort.  Oh, and then the same people snootily shun those who have done well for themselves, or who have even made it marginally higher than the poverty line through honest work.

You know what? I am far from conservative, but something has to change with regards to this.  And there should be psychiatric evaluation before people are allowed to bring ill-fated children into this world.  We're all ill-fated to a degree, but sometimes you just know it's going to be a disaster, and maybe then we should ship the unborn child off in a warm little canister to someone who actually wants it.

If someone is honest, a good worker, but simply cannot find a job no matter how hard they try (and that is possible in our economic situation), then that's fine.  Welfare it up, grandma.  That's who the dole is for.  Not for people who think it's an acceptable lifestyle to bottom-feed and spend all their government cheques on cigarettes, booze, drugs, and absolutely shit-all for their kids.

These days, it's only a tiny percentage of kids I meet who are polite, smart, and who I think "That is what I want my kid to turn out like."  And it's because this is not a new problem.  The rotten apple doesn't fall very far from the rotten apple tree.  For too long, people have been watching their kids grow up without actually raising them, teaching them values and rules.  Be sure to buy them that iPhone at Christmas so they'll forget about the shit you spend your money on the other 364 days of the year.  It's not like you earned the money you're paying to the guy who stole it off a truck for you anyway.  Consumerism and utter laziness have led us down this muddy path where in the end, to each other, everyone -- the working person and the person who refuses to work -- ends up looking like a giant piece of shit.

If you actually need the government to help you out for a while, I hope you spend it wisely until you get your feet back on the ground. On the other hand, if you are one of the people who came into this life expecting everything, appreciating nothing and most of all giving absolutely nothing back to anyone, anything, then read this and proceed to shut your mouth about the people who are the opposite of you.  Any retort you make is null and void because all it takes is pouring coffee or slapping a burger in a wrapper for some poor dope to eat (and there is no shame in doing something like that) to be a contributing member of society.

And even if you do prefer to be lazy, but you still appreciate the handouts and realize you've won the god damn never-working not-much-money lottery and use that spare time to drive some kind of values into your kid (although probably not work-related ones; friendliness, an open mind, intelligence, the unintended drive to be better motivated than their parents ever were), good for you.  There are plenty of people who work way too hard and will never be able to say that for their kids.  That's a rant for another day.  But as long as you realize how lucky you are, cool.  For the most part, though, this is not the case, and in two words: It's stupid.

And now I'm off to munch on some apple strudel!  Tra la la la!

Grrrr...

"Pay money for me. I am so innocent and would never destroy your home."

A while back, we got a dog.  My family had several dogs when I was growing up, and I guess I must have been spoiled because they were the best dogs in the universe.  Our dog now is adorable, funny, sweet -- you can't help but feel like a total a-hole for no reason when you look into her sad little brown eyes.  She is also the most destructive dog I have ever known.  She's a yellow lab and her name is Casey.  Imagine Marley & Me, and then imagine that in real life where it costs money to replace things, and remember that in movie time, it only took two hours for the dog to kick over.  Now, I'm not saying I want her dead (far from it), but I am saying "My god, we have to live with this dog for another 10 years at least."

Everything you buy this dog costs $30 at a time, and she destroys it within minutes.  A few days ago I decided to chance putting her chewed up pillow back into her crate because I felt bad for her sleeping on a cold empty crate floor.  This time, I figured, I'd spray it with Bitter Apple, because the adolescent girl working at the pet store told me it works great.  Apparently she doesn't own a labrador.

Before we leave, we always make sure she has two or three toys to play with in her crate so that she doesn't get bored if she wakes up.  We came home today from a couple hours out eating and shopping, and this enormous comfy pillow was totally destroyed.  Torn up cover.  Fluff everywhere.  Her rawhide bone, rope toy, and Kong were untouched however. Bitter Apple my ass.

So anyway, here's my advice.  If you want a dog who does not cover your house with dog hair despite you brushing her daily, doesn't destroy everything she sees even though she has a MILLION good toys, and isn't totally fussy about everything she eats, do not ever get a lab.  And if you do happen to have a lab, do not buy them any toys, pillows or use any blankets you ever plan to not have devoured, because I guarantee you it will take 7 seconds for her to get the urge to ruin them.

But really, I love her.  If she would just keep looking cute all the time and not eating her way through our credit card limits, we'd be BFFs.  She's so fun to play in the park with and take swimming.  I just cannot wait til she's out of puppy mode.  Can. Not. Wait.  Anyone need a bunch of dog pillow fluff?

Mommy? Why do you have 20 blogs?

The answer to the above lies in my many personalities, my dear Dan.  (I assume you were the one asking the question.)  I wanted to create a blog for practical purposes -- little things I have learned and liked to know, or ideas, and the altogether simpler things.  After all, Rico has a blog, so it's only right that my domestic side does too.  And don't tell him he only has one follower.  He'll ride your ass for days trying to get you to explain what that even means, damn cat.

And then there's my good old familiar ranty blog, this one here.  [Aside: Bloggin' about bloggin'. Reminds me of years ago when a friend of mine was so poor he was smoking 'Smoking'-brand cigarettes.]  For a while, my interest dwindled, but like someone's dead grandpappy probably said, "Ain't no blog where ain't no blogger who done din' quit fer 10 hogs' hairs 'n come back gripin' 'bout how he ain't updated no blog no more." I think that's how that saying goes anyway.  It's been so long since someone's grandpappy last said that.

Okay I'm done this rant.  Now can someone tell me if they can see the Commatose favicon (the green icon by the URL in your address bar)?  I mean seriously.  It's there, it was there since the day I started blogging again, but now it doesn't appear on my screen no matter how many times I load, reload, re-upload, re-up, etc.  I LOVE YOU ALL.

Noma Noma Noma

Carpal tunnel's setting in, so I will be blunt. The lasagna we ate tonight was very good, even though it was hospital lasagna.  And I didn't even have to be hospitalized to have it.  So there it is.  Miracles do happen.

My New Goal

It's weird thinking that when I wrote that last blog, it was May. An entire summer has shot by us, and Jack Layton, who led the NDP to win more seats than ever before in Canadian federal elections has passed away.  Boy, was I angry (about Harper, I mean).  Truly, nothing ever changes in Canadian politics. We just expect and accept the stupid.  It is very sad about Layton, however.  I don't endorse any particular political party normally, but the guy himself had a heart and mindset that truly was for that of the people, and the incredible response of the Canadian people to his death speaks to that.

I'm not an emotional rollercoaster today, and it's probably because this hot, hot summer and working central air has left me knowingly a bit spoiled.

I've started a blog for quirky little tips that come to mind about anything under the sun, and it's called Tips from Your Mom.  (Sing its title along to "Hits from the Bong" and you'll get it, girlfriend.)  With this, I am creating a challenge for myself.  Come up with something at least slightly useful to people a minimum of once per day.  At the same time, I am challenging myself to run my thoughts off like a crazy person as usual on this, the one, the only Comma Toes Blog.  I hope you'll read and subscribe to both, and if you don't, well you're not having my babies anymore.  I promise to be less caustic, at least in 30% of the entries on this blog.  That is how much you mean to me.  Also, I am considering vlogging, if I can wrap my head around letting people see me talking to a camera without a ninja mask on.  It's something I'm not sure I'm ready for, but we internuts all have to try it before we die, else we remain in the dreaded purgatory of bland internet personalities come and gone.

And before I go, here is a picture containing a part of my cat, because after all this is Nikki Commatose's blog, and ain't no Comma Toes blog without a Rico Cat.

"I'm back, babies." - Slimebag Rico