The Governator Gets Subliminal

Saw this over on Ken Ashford’s The Seventh Sense blog.

California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger returned a bill to the State Assembly Tuesday night with a little note explaining why he was not signing the legislation. As he explains in his note, he feels the Assembly has failed to act on real concerns in the state.

Simple enough, right?

But Wednesday morning, some sharp-eyed readers felt that the Governator was sending a subliminal message to the state lawmakers.

Is this real? Apparently it is, and if it is it’s pretty amusing in…you know…a bad sort of way.

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Posted in Humor, Politics | 2 Comments

More News Release Gaffes

I am still amazed every morning at the spelling and grammatical errors I read in news releases that cross my desk, supposedly written by professional journalists. Is this more evidence of the “dumbing down” of America? Is this the quality of graduates that journalism schools are producing? Did spell check break? Was the copy editor napping?

Or am I just too damn picky?

Everyone makes mistakes, I understand that. I do too, all the time. That is why you have proofreaders for manuscripts and books and copy editors for magazines and newspapers and Denise for this blog. And it’s why you do those things BEFORE you publish the piece.

Before I met and married the love of my life I used to date a copy editor for a (formerly) great metropolitan newspaper. I would routinely, sometimes daily, dissect the incorrect phrasing of an article or point out the spelling and/or grammatical errors of articles in the paper (that were not in the sections she edited) and she always wondered aloud why I didn’t get a job doing what she did.

Anyway, here are the gaffes that came across my desk yesterday morning, along with my snarky remarks.

“…hadn’t been in her basement for two weeks, and low and behold she had water in it.” Well, now this one makes sense because the basement is “low” in the house, right? However the correct phrase is “lo and behold” which is still rather conversational for a news piece. By the way, “lo and behold”, means “look and behold” not “get down and behold”, lol.

“What it did, it shook the house and jared the sheet-rock and made it crack.” Is that Jared, the Subway Sandwich guy? Is he now “Jared the Sheetrock”? More likely is that the writer meant to write “jarred the sheetrock” though simply stating that it cracked the sheetrock would have been sufficient, given the context. Oh, and yes, “sheetrock” is one word, not hyphenated.

“…determined that it needed to be demobilize and…” Let’s just forget about those silly grammar rules that say verb tenses should agree. In other words, if you use a past tense verb in one part of the sentence, any other verbs must be past tense as well. Otherwise you sound like…well, we’ll leave that part out of this.

Interestingly, I just received the November 2009 issue of The Writers Network News (a free monthly newsletter available from Zebra Communications) and it has this little piece on proofreading:

Why the world needs editors and proofreaders

Many, many years ago when I had my first newspaper job I had to both write and proofread my articles. I covered a local wedding and wrote “…the bride was draped in Chantilly lace, except I didn’t catch myself, and the story ran “the bride was raped in chantilly lace…” and THAT’s how you really LEARN. Alvin Guthertz

The Writers Network News is an excellent resource for writers. Go check it out!

I think my desire to read proper English (especially if it is written by professional journalists and writers) is perfectly natural, but Laura Miller has an article up on Salon that says I’m stuck up and should just get over it.

What do you think?

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Posted in Grammar, words, Writing | 1 Comment

Google Wave Requested

Well I just signed up to receive an invitation to use Google Wave. Let’s see IF I get an invitation and, if so, WHEN I get an invitation.

I’ll let you know here first.

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Posted in Google, Google Wave | Comments Off on Google Wave Requested

Treats, No Tricks

Sunday night was a treat for me. The plan was to chat with Mikey and Heather on webcam, but Yahoo Messenger seemed to be having problems so we consoled ourselves with a phone conversation. It would have been fun to see them, but it was still nice to talk to them on the phone for a few minutes and hear their voices and my daughter’s. I don’t know how other people are, but I imagine it’s the same for most people; it always makes me feel better to hear my kids’ and grandkids’ voices when I’m away from home. I slept like a baby Sunday night.

Monday night was another treat for me. Cindy’s mom and dad stopped in Atlanta on their way back to Orlando from the mountains of North Carolina and we had a chance to visit when they invited me to dinner at…wait for it…wait for it…CRACKER BARREL. That was a surprise, wasn’t it? We all love eating there. If that chain ever closes we’ll probably just drift apart, lol.

I’ve said before I’m very fortunate to have the in-laws that I do. Most people just endure theirs but I enjoy mine and always look forward to an opportunity to spend time with them.

We caught up with each other over dinner and I was able to get photos from them that they had taken on Sunday of the cabin progress. I had brought my laptop and we put my father-in-law’s camera memory stick in my reader and downloaded away, then enjoyed viewing them on the laptop screen. I’ll have them uploaded soon. And my mother-in-law suggested that when we move to Maggie Valley that I write a blog about the adventures of a pair or flatlanders during their first year in the mountains. I’m kind of liking that idea. What do you think? Would you read such a blog?

Our time together was over much too quickly, but it brightened and lightened my spirits.

So far this Halloween week, it’s been all treats and no tricks. Just the way I like it.

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Posted in Atlanta, Family, Maggie Valley, Mikey, North Carolina, Restaurants | 3 Comments

Another Florida Writers Conference Missed

Once again, I ended up working out of town when the 8th Annual Florida Writers Conference was held this past weekend.

I’m pretty sure I know what will happen now. Since this will be my last year living in Orlando during the annual conference, at some point in the future I’ll find myself off during the conference, but I’ll be living 10 hours away in Maggie Valley, North Carolina.

Well, I’m sure Cindy will find it to be a good excuse to visit family in the Orlando area.

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Posted in Florida Writers Association, Orlando, Writing | Comments Off on Another Florida Writers Conference Missed

Random Thoughts

None of these are mine, but I’ve seen them all over the ‘Net and in e-mails and I generally agree with most of them. Your mileage may vary.

– I wish Google Maps had an “Avoid Ghetto” routing option.

– More often than not, when someone is telling me a story all I can think about is that I can’t wait for them to finish so that I can tell my own story that’s not only better, but also more directly involves me.

– Nothing sucks more than that moment during an argument when you realize you’re wrong.

– Have you ever been walking down the street and realized that you’re going in the complete opposite direction of where you are supposed to be going? But instead of just turning a 180 and walking back in the direction from which you came, you have to first do something like check your watch or phone or make a grand arm gesture and mutter to yourself to ensure that no one in the surrounding area thinks you’re crazy by randomly switching directions on the sidewalk.

– I totally take back all those times I didn’t want to nap when I was younger.

– Is it just me, or are 80% of the people in the “people you may know” feature on Facebook people that I do know, but I deliberately choose not to be friends with?

– There is a great need for sarcasm font.

– How the hell are you supposed to fold a fitted sheet?

– I would rather try to carry 10 plastic grocery bags in each hand than take 2 trips to bring my groceries in.

– I think part of a best friend’s job should be to immediately clear your computer history if you die.

– The only time I look forward to a red light is when I’m trying to finish a text.

– I have a hard time deciphering the fine line between boredom and hunger.

– How many times is it appropriate to say “What?” before you just nod and smile because you still didn’t hear what they said?

– Every time I have to spell a word over the phone using ‘as in’ examples, I will undoubtedly draw a blank and sound like a complete idiot. Today I had to spell my boss’s last name to an attorney and said “Yes that’s G as in…(10 second lapse)..ummm…Goonies”

– What would happen if I hired two private investigators to follow each other?

– MapQuest really needs to start their directions on #5. Pretty sure I know how to get out of my neighborhood.

– I find it hard to believe there are actually people who get in the shower first and THEN turn on the water.

– Shirts get dirty. Underwear gets dirty. Pants? Pants never get dirty, and you can wear them forever.

– I can’t remember the last time I wasn’t at least kind of tired.

– Bad decisions make good stories

– If Carmen San Diego and Waldo ever got together, their offspring would probably just be completely invisible.

– Why is it that during an ice-breaker, when the whole room has to go around and say their name and where they are from, I get so incredibly nervous? Like I know my name, I know where I’m from, this shouldn’t be a problem….

– You never know when it will strike, but there comes a moment at work when you’ve made up your mind that you just aren’t doing anything productive for the rest of the day.

– There’s no worse feeling than that millisecond you’re sure you are going to die after leaning your chair back a little too far.

– I’m always slightly terrified when I exit out of Word and it asks me if I want to save any changes to my ten page research paper that I swear I did not make any changes to.

– “Do not machine wash or tumble dry” means I will never wash this. Ever.

– I hate when I just miss a call by the last ring (Hello? Hello? Dammit!), but when I immediately call back, it rings nine times and goes to voicemail. What’d you do after I didn’t answer? Drop the phone and run away?

– As a driver I hate pedestrians, and as a pedestrian I hate drivers, but no matter what the mode of transportation, I always hate cyclists.

– Sometimes I’ll look down at my watch 3 consecutive times and still not know what time it is.

– It should probably be called Unplanned Parenthood.

– I keep some people’s phone numbers in my phone just so I know not to answer when they call.

– Even if I knew your social security number, I wouldn’t know what do to with it.

– Even under ideal conditions people have trouble locating their car keys in a pocket, hitting the G-spot, and Pinning the Tail on the Donkey – but I’d bet my ass everyone can find and push the Snooze button from 3 feet away, in about 1.7 seconds, eyes closed, first time every time…

– It really pisses me off when I want to read a story on CNN.com and the link takes me to a video instead of text.

– I wonder if cops ever get pissed off at the fact that everyone they drive behind obeys the speed limit.

– I think the freezer deserves a light as well.

– I disagree with Kay Jewelers. I would bet on any given Friday or Saturday night more kisses begin with Miller Lites than Kay.

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Posted in Uncategorized | 1 Comment

This Could Save Your Life!

This always confuses and, frankly, irritates me. A TV station will air a promo for an upcoming piece on their newscast. It’s Saturday afternoon and here’s the promo:

(A black and white skull and crossbones appears on screen and the voiceover begins) “It’s a dangerous product that everyone uses and it could kill you and your loved ones. This exclusive interview from channel blank’s Jane Doe reveals information that will save your life! Thursday on the 11pm news broadcast!!”

Wait a minute! You’re going to make me risk my life for 5 days waiting for this information just so you can pump up the numbers for your low-rated Thursday 11pm newscast???? If it’s that damn important, tell me now!

Guess who won’t be watching, life-saving information or not!

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Posted in Personal | 3 Comments

“Cap’n, She Canna Tae Much More!”

I’m checked into my new hotel room. Everything is good though I’m not thrilled that there are no thermostat controls in the rooms, only fan controls. I assume it’s because this is an “atrium” style hotel (most of the rooms open into the enclosed atrium – see photos below) and they want to keep the temperature at a moderate level, but I usually prefer to have my room a little cooler than most people. I’m sure I’ll adjust, especially since the good points heavily outweigh that one negative.

View from my door looking across the atrium.

View looking down in the atrium.

Plus I’ve had my first amusing experience here. I had come up (I’m on the top floor, which is the 10th) to check out the room before bringing my luggage all the way up to the room. One thing I didn’t do was turn on the TV’s (one in the front room and one in the bedroom) and I know better but for some reason I didn’t do it. Later, after I had unpacked and was settled in, I turned on the front room TV to be greeted with sound but no picture. I checked the bedroom TV and it was fine. I called down to the front desk, explained the situation, and the clerk replied, “No problem sir, I’ll send the engineer up.”

Whoa! They have an electrical engineer on staff at this hotel? I mean, it’s a nice hotel but not THAT nice.

A few minutes later there was a knock at my door and when I opened it I was greeted by…the maintenance man. He came in, quickly identified the problem as an encryption card issue that required a simple reset, and in a few seconds my TV was fully functional. As he was about to leave I said, “So, you’re an electrical engineer?” and he replied, “No, hotel maintenance. But we handle most of the simple problems.”

Ah, the desk clerk must have meant maintenance engineer.

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Posted in Atlanta, Hotels, Humor | 3 Comments

Sheepback Mountain Cabin Progress

Last week, Cindy flew to Maggie Valley to spend a week with her friend Rebecca and look in on the progress of our Sheepback Mountain Cabin. It’s difficult not to get excited when you see the street sign for the road you got to name and the walls going up on the first story above the basement. Not to mention the light dusting of snow that fell on Saturday and Sunday and what the view will be like from my future office window.

Here’s one of the photos Cindy took and the others can be found here on Facebook or here on Flickr.

Monday I’ll get some more photos from Cindy’s mom and dad when we meet for dinner here in Atlanta and I believe Rebecca has some as well that she will be sending. I’ll post those when they arrive.

Our cozy little cabin on Sheepback Mountain is slowly taking shape.

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Posted in Cabin, Maggie Valley, North Carolina, Sheepback Mountain | 2 Comments

Things That Make You Feel Good

The highlight of my day today was when my grandson text-messaged me from my daughter’s phone to ask if I could chat with him on Yahoo Messenger this Sunday. We coordinated a time and I’m looking forward to it so much. As I told him, I was thinking the other day that I would like to chat with him on the webcam. And now we will!

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Posted in Mikey | 1 Comment

Hermit Crab

I’m moving to a new hotel Saturday. It’s one that is closer to my office and, frankly, has nicer amenities than the one in which I’m currently staying. Plus it’s closer to a Publix, where I prefer to buy my groceries, and to some popular restaurants when I want to eat out. In fact, Cindy and I ate at the Cheesecake Factory in that area when she visited me back in May.

But the biggest reason I chose this particular hotel is because last week I had checked our staffing list and did not see anyone from my office staying there. Not that I don’t like the people I work with, because I do (at least most of them) and they are great people, but I am just not the type who enjoys a lot of social interaction. I can fake it very well (I’m told) when I have to, but deep down inside when I get back to my hotel at night after a long day I’d rather just be a hermit in my room and that becomes problematic when your co-workers are staying in the same hotel. You know, when they find out you’re staying there too they want to go have a drink after work or go to dinner together after work or go do something together on your day off…and that’s very seldom my preference. As I say, I like my co-workers and they’re fine people, but I can probably count on one hand the ones I’d LIKE to spend time with when I’m off work (and if you’re reading this, please be assured you ARE one of those, lol). So I booked a reservation thinking I could be my “hermit” self without going through the scenes above.

But today the main reason for my hotel choice was blown apart after I discovered that several of my co-workers had just moved to the same hotel. Some of them are very gregarious and outgoing. One of them, upon finding out today that I was moving there, has already said, “Let’s get a drink together one night.” I said, “Oh yeah, that’d be great” but you probably already know what they didn’t; that I wasn’t entirely honest in my response. Now I’ll be trying to figure out how to sneak into the hotel each night and make it up to my room without being spotted, or making up lame excuses or, in some cases, just giving in and doing it so as not to offend anyone.

When I was a kid I’d pick up hermit crabs on the beach, never dreaming I’d become one someday, lol.

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Posted in Atlanta, Hotels, Personal | 2 Comments

Eating Healthy In Spite Of Myself

I went to Cracker Barrel for lunch today (the one on Jimmy Carter Blvd. in Atlanta) and ordered my usual favorite, which is the fried chicken tenderloin sandwich on grilled whole wheat sourdough.

The last time I got one of these, I was so determined to be good that I didn’t even use the mayonnaise they give you on the side, choosing to eat it “dry”, so to speak, to avoid the fat and sugar in the condiment. The sandwich is tasty enough without it, so that was no big deal. I’m trying to alter my tastes and expectations to eat a little healthier.

So I’m on my lunch hour, which means my time is limited, and the server mistakenly brings me a GRILLED chicken tenderloin sandwich on grilled whole wheat sourdough. I look at it for a moment, realize I don’t have time to wait for a replacement and it’s going to be healthier for me anyway, and take a nice big bite.

My tongue: Hey! This is pretty good!

My brain: (in a pouting tone) But it’s not as good as what I usually get.

My tongue: I think it’s very tasty. Don’t you feel all those pleasure signals I’m sending to you?

My Brain: Oh…yeah that IS pretty good!

My heart:
And it’s better for me, so we’re good all around.

Me: When did my internal organs start talking?

Anyway, sometimes I eat healthy…in spite of myself.

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Posted in Atlanta, Personal, Restaurants | 4 Comments

50 Useful Blogs for Writers

Over on The Word Blog, Randy Ray has compiled a list of 50 Useful Blogs for Writers. He’s broken them down into 21 blogs of Writing Tips, 10 Word of the Day blogs, and 19 Grammar blogs.

Plus, if you read down into the comments, there are links to some other blogs for writers that might be of interest.

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Posted in Blog, Grammar, words | 1 Comment

Undeserved Authority

Today was one of those days that make me think I should just get into writing full time.

Unqualified people with undeserved authority simply burn my biscuits.

That’s all. Thanks for letting me vent

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Posted in Atlanta, Writing | 2 Comments

A Quandry

Do I want to buy it…

…or take it out on the water?

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Posted in Humor, Photography, words | Comments Off on A Quandry

Takin’ Care Of Business

Today was a “mostly at my desk” day doing paperwork and preparing an agenda and collateral documents for a large conference call this coming Wednesday, so I took advantage of the seat time to listen to music on my iPhone using the stereo Bluetooth headset so no one could hear my tunes.

Everything was fine until, apparently, I got into the music a little too much. Foot tapping, arm waving, air-guitaring and head shaking to Takin’ Care of Business by Bachman Turner Overdrive earned me some funny looks and is NOT a good idea in a big government agency office.

Taking care of business and working overtime
Work out!

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Posted in Atlanta, Humor, iPhone, Music | 2 Comments

Swine Flu Scare Escalates

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Posted in Disney World, Humor | 1 Comment

Artwiculate

Here’s another suggestion my brother sent me that is of particular interest to people who enjoy words and expanding their vocabulary.

Artwiculate is a Twitter-based word of the day competition. To play you just use the word of the day in the proper context in one of your tweets. Other tweeters vote as to how effective your use of the word was in your tweet. You can earn points when people like your use or retweet it. But for wordsmiths, the real fun is in constructing a tweet using the word in the best way possible and in seeing how others use the same word of the day.

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Posted in Twitter, words | Comments Off on Artwiculate

Myriad Musings

Last night or early this morning I had a dream that my mother, who is in an assisted-living facility, was living on her own and had bought an alligator with a bum leg as a pet. She said it was a safe pet because with its bum leg it couldn’t move fast enough to catch anyone.

I have NO idea from which strange recesses of my mind that dream might have originated. It was almost as outlandish as my dream involving Mariah Carey a few nights ago. But not nearly as fun.

I think one of my co-workers was ticked today that I didn’t take her hint that she wanted to go to lunch together so she could talk about office politics, but I really prefer (and in this case, needed) to have some time to myself and NOT have business on my mind. I’m such a social hermit anyway.

Wow, just found out today that a lot of my friends in other departments are being sent home on Saturday.

Thinking about going to the High Museum here in Atlanta to see the Da Vinci Exhibition on Sunday. But since it’s my only day off this week, I may wait and see if we get 2 days off next week. I love just about anything to do with Da Vinci. This exhibit is scheduled to be there through February of next year so as far as I know I have plenty of time.

Today a woman walked into the men’s room of my office building while I was in the stall. I could see her through the opening between the door and the wall and was about to cough as a hint she was in the wrong room. But just before I did she spotted the urinals on the wall and beat a hasty retreat out the door.

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Posted in Art, Atlanta, Humor | 3 Comments

Hit The Road Jack – Albany Georgia Visit

Tuesday morning I had to drive 3 1/2 hours from Atlanta to Albany, Georgia for a visit with an elected official’s staff. I had lunch in Albany and while there used part of my lunch hour to take a photowalk in the city’s beautiful Veteran’s Park and the Ray Charles Plaza. In case you didn’t know, the late Ray Charles was born in Albany, and the city has a unique shrine dedicated to their favorite son. As you can see in the photos below, part of the plaza has a giant-sized piano keyboard.

The walk was a nice break before climbing back into the car for a 3 1/2 hour trip back to Atlanta. By the way, the first part of the title of this post “Hit The Road Jack”, was a number-one hit on the Billboard Hot 100 for two weeks beginning the week of October 9, 1961, just over 48 years ago. I think my very favorite version of the song is from the 1989 movie “The Dream Team” where Peter Boyle and some of the other patients at a mental health facility sing it during a bus trip to a baseball game. If you don’t crack up when Boyle sings the chorus, I just don’t know what will ever make you laugh.

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Posted in Atlanta, Georgia, Music, Photowalking | 1 Comment