Butterin' bread
Solonor is so sexy, big and strong... He also gives good blog. *bats eyelashes*

Love,
Your Princess

UPDATE: I have good taste in men. My husband is in the top 10!
posted at 08:39 PM | link-

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Not such a "Big Easy"
Comments like this are exactly why I never talk sports smack pre-game in other people's blogs, or make predictions on where my Sooners will end up. Sorry 'bout the Wildcats loss, Ashley! Now I just hope the Jayhawks can represent for the Big XII and take care of the other Wildcat team this evening...

UPDATE: Two number one seeds went down today. How 'bout the Big XII representin'?!
posted at 07:56 PM | link-

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A Yankee Doodle, do or die

Time for another image grab bag -- if you want a patriotic design, snag one!
posted at 10:54 PM | link-

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Ex-zip-it B
I'm gziped now -- are you? (Link via Christine and Scripty Goddess.)
posted at 10:17 PM | link-

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Eight is enough...for now
Please join me in welcoming the Oklahoma Sooners to the Elite Eight, baby! The Butler didn't do it. (Next up the winner of the Syracuse vs. ~~Auburn~~ game.)
posted at 09:11 PM | link-

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God bless America

posted at 08:58 PM | link-

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We are living in a material world and I am a material girl
Madonna on war (from Entertainment Tonight): "We have to stop. We have to heal ourselves. We have to heal the world."

Well I'm so glad we got that straight. I know I'll sleep better tonight.
posted at 07:07 PM | link-

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I'm gonna be on tel-e-vision

Will of "Weblog Central" just e-mailed me the following:

Hey guys, wanted to make sure you saw that the Nightly News from last night is viewable online. It's the 7th clip.

http://www.msnbc.com/news/NIGHTLYTB_Front.asp

I'm not sure how to give you a clean link to the video itself. This opens the video but sizes it wrong.

http://www.msnbc.com/m/mw/mw.asp.....cover&opt=0

The link will disappear from the Nightly News page in a day probably, but the video should be viewable for a lot longer than that.

So there you go...fifteen more minutes of fame in case you missed it last night! Thanks Will!

posted at 04:15 PM | link-

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You wanna piece of me?

Just spotted over at Michele's...you can now get a piece of the blog over at Blogshares. My blog is valued at $14,150.86, an outgoing link is worth $619.60 and shares cost a mere ~~$1.60~~ ~~$1.61~~ ~~$1.75~~ ~~$1.78~~ $1.91. I'm cheap -- but you already knew that. Buy for the children. Elvis would have wanted it that way.

posted at 08:22 AM | link-

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Friday night I'm making Sharise
If this isn't in your MP3 collection already, right that heinous offense NOW. Happy Friday!

When I look in the mirror
I can't believe what I see
Tell me, who's that funky dude
Staring back at me
Broken, beaten down
Can't even get around
Without an old-man cane
I fall and hit the ground
Shivering in the cold
I'm bitter and alone

Excuse the bitchin'
I shouldn't complain
I should have no feeling
'Cuz feeling is pain
As everything I need
Is denied me
And everything I want
Is taken away from me
But who do I got to blame?
Nobody but me...

And I don't wanna be an old man anymore
It's been a year or two since I was out on the floor
Shaking booty, making sweet love all the night
It's time I got back to the good life
It's time I got back, it's time I got back
And I don't even know how I got off the track
I wanna go back, yeah!

Screw this crap, I've had it!
I've had it!
I ain't no Mr. Cool
I'm a pig, I'm a dog
So excuse me if I drool
I ain't gonna hurt nobody
Ain't gonna cause a scene
Just need to admit
That I want sugar in my tea
Hear me?
(Hear me)
I want sugar in my tea!

I don't wanna be an old man anymore
It's been a year or two since I was out on the floor
Shaking booty, making sweet love all the night
It's time I got back to the good life
It's time I got back, it's time I got back
And I don't even know how I got off the track
I wanna go back, yeah!

I wanna go back, I wanna go back
And I don't even know how I got off the track
It's time I got back, it's time I got back
And I don't even know how I got off the track
I wanna go back, yeah!

And I don't wanna be an old man anymore
It's been a year or two since I was out on the floor
Shaking booty, making sweet love all the night
It's time I got back to the good life
It's time I got back, it's time I got back
And I don't even know how I got off the track
It's time I got back, it's time I got back
And I don't even know how I got off the track
I wanna go back (I wanna go back)...

Song credit: =w=eezer
posted at 03:37 AM | link-

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Melts in your mouth...
When I weigh 500 lbs. in the next photo you see of me, I swear it's not my fault. It's the "Easter Bunny approved" 14 oz. bag of peanut M&Ms'. They're cute. They're pastel. They're oh-so-yummy and peanutty. Moth to a flame, man. Moth to a flame...
posted at 02:37 AM | link-

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All work and no play...
I just finished my latest masterpiece for Sekimori -- "Sofia Sideshow". This blog was so much fun to design. The author currently lives in Bulgaria and sent me a stack of photos he'd taken around the country. We picked the best ones, and I built his desired template around them (image 1, image 2).

I have two more designs to crank out by the end of the weekend, and more stacking up in the pile for next week. So need that vacation that's hopefully coming soon!
posted at 12:00 AM | link-

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Love and marriage
Me: Hey, can you help me get the kitchen picked up before the water-delivery guy comes tomorrow?
Him: <sighs heavily, puts down laptop and joins me in the kitchen> Yeah...yeah...
Me: <finishes the drink he'd asked me to make him> Ok, I'm going back to work now.
Him: Oh so I see when you say, "Can you help me..." it really means "Can you come and do it for me?"
Me: I said I'm going back to work. Woooorrrrk. Say it with me. You know, that thing you don't have to do between 5:30 p.m. and 8:30 a.m.?
Him: Whatever, you dreamer.
Me: You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one. I hope someday you'll join...
Him: <grabs a plastic grocery sack> Hey! Come here! Put your head inside this. It's really fun to try and breathe when...

You never saw moments like this on "Ozzie and Harriet", that's for sure!
posted at 09:39 PM | link-

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Look 'ma, I'm on TV (well, sort of)

It's not every day a girl gets to see her work on the NBC Nightly News -- one of the sites I designed (as mentioned last night) made it on the air this evening. One of the sites Stacy designed made it on as well. I'd have to say it was a good day...for Sekimori Design!
posted at 07:23 PM | link-

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Fun with numbers
So I had a guy...we'll call him "Mr. Blonde"...ruffle his feathers today at the $25 pricetag for 90-days banner rotation on WM!

Mr. Blonde has been a customer in the past, and had a problem with the number of hits his banner ad was bringing him. One day I linked him here at my blog when he signed up (as I usually do for new advertisers to give them the double-traffic boost), and he had almost 500 clicks that day from ATPTB. Back then, he wanted to know just why his banner wasn't giving him the same amount of click-thru traffic that my blog did. Well gee, let's see... A hardlink vs. a banner ad. Hmmmm. I don't know about you, but unless a banner really "grabs" me -- I won't click on it. That means, make it good. Not like something your 4th-grade child could put together in Paint Shop Pro. But I s'pose that's my fault since I didn't ask him to pay me to create a new one as well.

Fast-forward to today. His snide reason for not renewing his contract was because on investigation of my stats, I'd only had a half-million unique hits in three month's time. He claimed that was not nearly enough traffic into my site for his $25.

I decided to do a little research for Mr. Blonde using the same stats-tracking site he did. "The Knot" and WeddingChannel.com were not included (because if you have your own NASDAQ trading symbol you don't count as equal-competition) -- leaving my closest competitor as a site who averaged around 240,000 hits for the same 3-month period. A banner with them would cost several hundred dollars for the same time frame. My price? Again, it's twenty-five bucks. My traffic? Double theirs. My next closest competitor came in the 177,000 range -- followed by another with 50,000 unique hits, and another with 20,000 for the same 3 months.

Yeah, I'd say it was all my fault. Oh, and by the way -- I checked the stats for the site owned by Mr. Blonde as well. He averaged 54,951 unique hits during those three months. My traffic was ten times his. You do the math.
posted at 02:50 PM | link-

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Eye candy
For your viewing pleasure...a little "his" and "hers"... Or "mix 'n' match" if you prefer.

Totally your call -- enjoy your Thursday!
posted at 03:58 AM | link-

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PSA
Just a quick note that there's a good chance one of the sites I've designed, The Agonist, is going to be on the NBC Nightly News with Tom Brokaw this evening. I'll update if I see the site or its owner Sean Paul Kelley, on-air.

UPDATE: Or maybe not... Our local news said it would be a special hour-long Nightly News before it aired, but it only ran for 30 minutes here -- and no warblogging segment. (Here's the official reason why.) So stay tuned tomorrow!
posted at 06:19 PM | link-

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Always remember to wash your hands!
So this article explains a lot about all that time Chris missed from work last week...

I wash my hands religiously and obsessively every day, and I'm still amazed at the ick I clean out of my keyboard. Certainly there has to be a better way to design these things!
posted at 03:47 PM | link-

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When Robyn talks...people listen?

I forgot to mention... The other day I learned my site is in the "top 3" of the second round of "Best Known Blog" competition over at "Name That Blog". I came in right behind Scripty Goddess (duh!) and Name That Blog's owner. Not too shabby, ey? Now my secret plan is to sneak "Robyn" into every entry and try to bullet to the top! Bwah ha ha!

posted at 02:15 PM | link-

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There's fifty-seven channels and nuthin' on
"If you've got people after four and a half days saying they've had enough of the war, think of the magnitude of that statement," [Robert Thompson, professor of media and popular culture at Syracuse University] said. "World War II took four years." (Full article at CNN.com.)

This quote really hit home with me. I got to the point Monday with Todd home all day where I couldn't stop crying. You may have noticed my lack of blogging. I was the same way after 9/11. The news-addict in me wants to stay informed, but the "bleeding-heart" in me just can't absorb all the pain that quickly. After such a bloody Sunday with one bad news story after the next, I guess I hit my limit. And we haven't even got to the most gruesome and bloody of the battles yet. I decided that I had to take a step back for awhile, and I'm trying to limit myself as best I can (unless of course something major develops). To be honest, I don't know how the warbloggers do it. All day. Every day.

But WWII didn't have 24/7 coverage in living color, and they certainly didn't have as many (radio) networks and spin-off networks as we do today. Most war updates came in the form of black and white newsreels and cartoons before feature films, which were hardly instantaneous updates. Now we know the second sirens wail in Kuwait and see everyone grab their gas masks live. We see the bombs as they fall over Baghdad. We know the names of the fallen almost the instant men in uniforms appear at their family's doors. Gone are the days of Western Union telegrams. It's now, now, now -- get it on the air! Get the exclusive interview with the mom! Which only succeeds in making me start crying all over again...

And although I'd hardly compare what we're going through now with what our nation faced during WWI and WWII, we are getting it faster -- we are getting it much more in your face -- and depending on the size and price of your TV, the battle scenes are so real and lifesize / lifelike they almost seem to be occurring right there live in your very own living room. That, to me, is magnitude.

Footnote: After reading the whole CNN.com article mentioned above, I hope I never run into David White of Indianapolis. Because I'll spit in his face:

"I'd much rather watch the [NCAA] tournament because I can make money on it," said David White, 30. "There's no war pool."
posted at 03:20 AM | link-

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Rest in peace
Damn. Fuck. And any other expletive this year has left me too tired to type...
posted at 09:51 PM | link-

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The End
When you're dropping the curtain on a bad last act, what do you play for the finale?

And God looked down over all the earth and He was sick unto His stomach.

"Ok!," he said. "All right! I am fed up. I am disgusted. I have had it. Enough is enough. Gabriel," He yelled, "blow your damned horn! I am putting an end to all that crap down there."

"Well, it's about time," said Gabriel, taking his horn out of its case. "Do you want a nice modern riff or something military, like taps, or maybe one good long, strong -----."

"I don't care what you blow," said God, "just blow! Make it loud; make it solid and final and of all eternity -- make it ring from heaven to hell and back; make it reach into all men's souls and fill them with the realization that this is it. Make it bang!"

"T.S.Eliot says the world ends with -----."

"I don't give a damn what T.S.Eliot says -- you just blow that horn like I tell you!" said God.

"All right," said Gabriel, "all right, but you don't have to yell at me. After all, I'm a musician, not a plumber. I've waited a long time for this gig and I'm not going to goof it. You just tell me how you're going to end it and I'll come up with something that cooks." And he fit the mouthpiece into his horn. "You going to have it rain for forty days and forty nights again?"

"Well," said God, "I haven't really given it much thought."

"Well, if you're thinking of having it rain, you'd better forget it -- they got new drainage systems down there!"

"Maybe I'll make an earthquake," God said, "That would really -----."

"No good," said Gabriel. "I could give you some great quaky music -- but lots of those houses are quake proof, and I imagine you want to get them all at the same time."

"Of course, of course," said God. "I know that. I wasn't seriously thinking of earthquakes.... A plague is more my style -- maybe a plague that -----."

"They're all vaccinated!"

"Vaccinated? Hmmm... of course... that is a shame, though... In the old days, you could make a plague that would strike down every male child that -----."

"You could try to blast them," Gabriel said.

"That's right," said God, "a few good thunderbolts would really -----."

"But their ABM defenses would probably stop them."

God sat back and thought for a while. Gabriel fingered his valves.

"I suppose everything is fireproof," God finally said.

"Everything but the slums," said Gabriel, "and if you burn those out, they'll only rebuild with modern developments."

God was silent for a long time.

"Listen," He said, smiling weakly, "what the hell. Maybe... maybe we'll just forget about it for now. Maybe I'll give them a little more time -- after all, they are my own children, aren't they?"

"Ok by me," said Gabriel. "You want to hear a little somethin' anyway... I mean, as long as I already got the horn out?"

"All right," God finally said softly, leaning back wearily in His chair and closing His eyes.

"Play me some blues!"

-Shel Silverstein, Playboy Magazine, December, 1970
posted at 09:40 PM | link--it | mail it | (3) shout it

O-K-L-A-H-O-M-A
This is so freakin' ridiculous... Today it was announced that the Oklahoma basketball program graduates 0% of its members and has the lowest graduation-average in this year's Sweet 16. "A school is credited with graduating students within six years of their freshman year, and is not credited for transfers or junior college players who may get their degrees."

''Our graduation rate is 100 percent,'' Oklahoma coach Kelvin Sampson said. ''That freshman class (1995-96) was Bobby Joe Evans and Michael Cotton, and they both graduated. Bobby Joe from here and Michael from Boston College.

''They can stereotype us all they want, but the bottom line is our kids are graduating.''

As pointed out on FARK, "According to the NCAA, a player who transfers never graduates. Same goes for JUCO transfers. Until the NCAA redoes the way it calculates graduation rates, this whole this is like pissing into the wind." OU's roster is heavily paded with JUCO transfers, for the record.

But go ahead and make fun of Oklahoma all you want. At least we're not Oklahoma State.
posted at 07:51 PM | link-

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The world's most dangerous band
What happened to me? Is it old age? I used to hate Paul Shaffer. Hate him. When Dave would turn sideways at the start of the show, that was my cue to grab a drink. I'm not sure if it's turning 30 or what...but I find him freakin' hysterical now. I miss the hell outta Dave, but that opening singalogue was great tonight!
posted at 11:47 PM | link-

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And all that jazz...
Spotted over at Michele's...because he's doing it better than we are...
posted at 10:37 PM | link-

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I am the greatest of all time
Ok, let's do a pool right quick...who will be the first actor/actress/nominee to give a self-important, self-serving political speech this evening?
posted at 08:28 PM | link-

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