If you use last.fm, you might want to try these:
HacKey looks for patterns in the keys of your favourite songs. Apparently I like G major (18% overall).
I linked to this site once already but it’s good enough to get another: Normalisr ranks your favorite artists and albums by an estimation of how long you have spent listening to them.
Blogger FTP Deprecation
I only mention this because there are still a few people with blogs publishable to cosmicbuddha.com via Blogger (even though they are no longer really updated), including T, G-man, and my mom. Google is cutting you off because it costs them too much money. If you want a blog here, I’ll set something else up, so let me know.
On the Mic
I’m writing this while taking turns recording dialog for textbooks with Kylie, a recent graduate from Indiana State University currently teaching at our Language Center. I’m still pretty wasted from the past couple of days, helping with our faculty’s annual International Fair.
I know I’m really behind posting new photos of the babies, but truth be told, I haven’t really been taking any, either… Sometimes raising babies feels like combat, with violent spurts of intense action and getting in small batches of sleep when you can in between.
Like I said, I was pretty tired and went to sleep earlier than usual next to Max, but he woke up and threw a fit at four in the morning and woke up his sister, too, so Nam and I had to hold one each, One or both of them always need to be carried at times like this, so we both ended up shuffling around like undead in clumsy figure eights, in separate rooms so that when one went to sleep, they wouldn’t be woken by the other again. Max’s tantrum was around an hour long, so we ended up waking up partially and from there it always feels like you have to climb a hill all day long; sometimes a quick nap in the afternoon is a necessity, be it in the parking lot or in the office when nobody’s around for a couple minutes.
On the brighter side of things, Max likes going to school now. Until ten or so days ago, parting at the nursery school gate was a big ordeal; crying baby and guilt-ridden parent. Now, however, his face lights up when he sees the school coming up, and last week he even slammed the gate shut on Nam – it’s nice picking him up now as well, since he smiles after not seeing you all day and doesn’t cry anymore. It’s kind of a highlight of the day, now. It’s easy to forget that we were contemplating pulling him from school altogether and waiting until he was older just a couple weeks ago… Your child’s tears make you act drastically at times.
Mina is almost 2 months old (born Dec. 6) drinking milk at an incredible rate, weighs over 5 kilos (born at 3.5), and has GROWN OUT OF HER ONESIES. She is now wearing the biggest size onesies that Max was wearing at 6-8 months. She punched me square in the eye this morning and it hurt.
OK, it’s my turn on the mic again, gotta go.
Pulling plugs again
The Kujira Crown has a mysterious problem with its plug contacts corroding at a high rate – enough to affect performance after just two or three weeks. I originally thought it could be fixed by using colder plugs, but that hasn’t helped at all. As it turns out it doesn’t seem to be caused by the engine running hot at all – the Crown’s been parked for a month since I haven’t renewed insurance on it yet. I pulled the plugs once and cleaned them a few weeks ago and only started the car to keep things running a couple times during that period. However, I took it for a spin around the neighborhood after the battery died last week and noticed the low end was really weak and sputtery, so I pulled the first plug. Corroded green again. Back to square one.
I pulled the rest of the plugs today in anticipation of insuring and using the car again next week, and found water on the threads of plugs number three and five. I hope that doesn’t mean something too bad. I’m drying everything out with a fan and under the sun this afternoon. Perhaps it is not too much to ask that this solves the problem.
Dwarf Punk
Not nearly as good as the Daft Hands video of yesteryear, but any day is a good day for DP.
a feed for everyone
Google Reader now allows you to create feeds for any site; even ones without syndication (RSS, Atom, etc.): Follow changes to any website
I was still hanging stubbornly with Bloglines until mid-last year, but they had so many feed errors it was really a no-brainer to move onto GR. There are a few Bloglines features I miss in Google Reader, but really, it’s a far superior product.
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UPDATE: Trying to be a smartass, I added the Wikipedia’s Random Article link (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random), but it ends up subscribing the recent changes link instead (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:RecentChanges). I’m going to continue experimenting with some other uses as well.
Game of the Year (so far)
First Person Tetris
The room is waaaay too clean.
Max and Mina Tag Team
One cries and needs to be held while walking – not sitting, not laying down, not even standing still! – and eventually cries loud enough to wake the other one. They keep us awake for long stretches but somehow get rest themselves by alternating crying times.
On a happier note, Max seems to have gotten over his separation anxiety at when we drop him off at nursery school. I dropped him off the past couple days and noticed he was crying less, and only fake crying at that. Today Nam called to say that when she dropped him off, he walked into the school himself and shut the gate on her!