Chawlk

1. Drawar
2. Fenxy
3. Decaflon
4. Two Credits
5. Wriging
6. Loose Suits
7. Chixe
8. Dud3s
9. Wing Colors

 

1. Jet-lag, adventure, food
2. I haven't been traveling out of the country that often lately, but I'd say I go to Europe most often when I'm off the continent.
3. Hotel Sacher in Vienna.
4. Casa Mingo in Madrid.
5. Downtown city centre
6. Train, hands down.
7. Anywhere in Asia -- I haven't gotten there yet and definitely want to.
8. Somewhere beachy and deserted. Belize, maybe?
9. Isabel Allende, although I think she probably counts the US as almost her own country now. Still...I'd love to travel to Chile with her.

You know, it's interesting -- for me, it kind of depends on the landscape I'm driving past. If I'm out driving through the open West, a lot of times I want some good, hollow, twangy, soundtracky stuff to get my mood on. It also depends on whether I'm driving at night or in the daytime -- that changes my drive-time song mood, too.

That being said..."Life is a Highway," cheesy as it may be, is an excellent song to have come on. Also, "Wherever You Are" by Geggy Tah.

Here's mine.

Carmodyarc, you crack me up. And Heliophage, you beat me to my idea. :-) I would only revise it to be Microhoo!

I actually get a lot of traffic on Sundays, which is odd -- there's a Green Thumb Sunday meme that I usually participate in, and I think that drives a lot of traffic. But I have fallen into a pattern of posting every other day on each of my blogs -- odd days on The Inadvertent Gardener and even days on 100 Proof. It seems to be working well for me, and has provided some structure for my planning and posting.

Mike, I'm impressed with your discipline -- I know even when my friends and I declare work talk off-limits, we struggle to really stick to that. It just takes up such a percentage of everyone's day!

I'm still trying to work out the balance, particularly because my fulltime job has just exploded into a million little pieces of work. Getting on top of the pile is really difficult. I've started by trying to cut out some of my freelance work to make way for it, but given a choice, that's not how I'd do it...

But a girl has to sleep, whether she wants to or not.

Yeah -- it seems like this should already be part of the way content is being written -- I thought the days of repeating things a bunch of times on the page were long gone?

This is all good info -- I have a very old Nikon (not digital -- old-school film) camera and a bunch o' lenses for it -- am thinking about a D40, D50 or D70 body and seeing if I can use the old lenses with it so I don't have to reinvest in a bunch of equipment all at the same time.

I have had great luck with my little Powershot, but boy do I miss the SLR shooting...

Ender, just out of curiosity, what pissed you off about CafePress? I've just started using them, so am looking for some feedback.

I'm going to skip the whole my-system-is-better-than-your-system debate...but did want to say that as a first-time caucus attendee, it was a bizarre experience, and wildly interesting. In my precinct, Hillary almost didn't even meet the minimum percentage for viability -- the overwhelming support was for Obama, with Edwards running second. However, even as a first-time caucus-goer and as someone who has lived in Iowa for less than three years, I managed to get on the county delegates list -- I'll be going to the county convention and possibly carrying forward from there. I've definitely never felt so close to the process, including when I was a campaign worker!

I'm a huge fan of The Envy Corps out of Des Moines, Iowa -- they recently signed with Mercury and have been opening on occasion for The Killers, so I don't expect them to languish in obscurity too much longer...

Another really fun Iowa band is Euforquestra, which has a really great Worldbeat sound and a great mix of instruments.

Thanks to everyone for your other suggestions -- great stuff!

That's an incredibly powerful and tragic photo essay...she was an amazing leader and politician. An incredible and passionate woman. Here's hoping this tragedy doesn't spark even more turmoil in an already torn country...

I didn't even realize they had a blog platform -- it sounds quite horrid, really.

I'm with ericjohnson on the Snakes-on-Plane reference. Also, "Fra-GEE-lay. It must be Italian!" from A Christmas Story pops out of my mouth more often than I would like to admit. I can't help it. It's always funny to me...

I love the Web 2.0 GRL one...that's so cute. You have some really creative friends -- I love it!

I thought it was incredible for all the reasons Jensized gave. I don't want to say a lot here -- I really don't want to give away any details -- but it's terrific. Definitely a great movie.

I want to go see it again, actually, so I can absorb all the stuff I know I missed the first time around. It's that multilayered and well-thought-out.

No question about it ... dark is it for me. I could give all the rest up easily if I knew I could have dark.

I could eat stuffing all day, especially with gravy. This year...we're going to try it with chestnuts, I think. Yum...

He didn't understand, so she pushed.

Oh my God. I just watched it. What? What? It sounded like she was just making random sounds into the microphone. At least she was close to hitting the right notes...

I am going to be watching it, too, even though I'm already technically through my quarterlife...and I'm interested to see how the interactiveness works -- has anyone else checked out the web site for the show? It includes "creative networking" -- kind of like MySpace, but with better portfolio tools. I went ahead and set up a profile but don't expect to add much more to it -- the T&C for the site includes that they can take what you post and use it, royalty-free, in any way they want in perpetuity.

Yeah, it does look like a total soap opera drama. But I'm curious to see how it goes, and, since I don't have a TV at home, it's one way for me to get my television-like fix without using Netflix to do it. So...we'll see how it goes. Plus, I loved the other stuff the creative team put together -- I was a "My So-Called Life" junkie, and I adored "thirtysomething."

For The Inadvertent Gardener, the tagline is "It's amazing what I'd do for a good tomato."

For 100 Proof, it's "Small, intoxicating stories."

Still no link to footage? I'm curious! I'm curious! (But, apparently, not so curious as to go hunt it down myself...)

Jensized, I'm right there with you -- every time I've had a plan in place, life has derailed it. Of course, that just keeps things interesting. :-)

That being said, I think it's important to have the big, giant, 60,000-foot goals in mind...but to also have concrete steps to take toward achieving them. If the goals sit high up in the clouds with no steps for you to get there, there is no way any of us will achieve our personal plan.

Azcazandco, thanks for the link -- am heading over to read right now.

This thread is hilarious...I'm just sayin'...

Not only do I read fiction online, I publish very short fiction online at 100 Proof Stories, as well. I probably spend much of my online fiction reading going after flash fiction or reading my favorite literary journals. One of my favorite sites is Very Small Dogs -- also a source of very short fiction that I find to be quite compelling.

I listen to fiction podcasts, too. Love the New Yorker fiction podcast and KEXP's The Writer's Block.

I figured out how to do that after watching friends in high school and just teaching myself. It is totally fun and addictive...I highly recommend learning it. Also, it helps break the boredom in meetings...

Cooper, your post was terrific. I'm glad others enjoyed it -- I definitely did.

Ozone42, I see your point, but in my case, it wasn't all that much of a stretch. It was sort of a stretch, but definitely not a huge one.

Palmettoart, I second that -- that post was definitely very well done.

RightOn, but the post PalmettoArt linked to was about someone taking action -- I thought that was great. And while I agree, it's better to be doing what needs to be done, I think it's important to also raise voices.

Karsh, coincidence or not, that was an important thing to write about. Scary stuff...raising awareness is so important.

Estarla, thank you so much! Glad you enjoyed it. I tend to post pretty regularly on environmental stuff, just by virtue of what I write about, but I like your interest in "just enough" -- I'm always interested in reading more about people's perspective on that.

I kept all my writing private both years that I participated, Scrivs. And trust me...while I was pleased to participate, the work I did requires some massive revision...it was not ready for the public at all...

Lisa, I highly encourage you to do it (as well as any other 9rules folks who want to) -- it's an amazing sense of accomplishment to make it happen. I did it two years in a row -- 2005 and 2006 -- but I think I'm going to skip out on it this year. I have another book project I want to work on, and if I can take the time to do NaNoWriMo, I figure, I can take the time to finish that book project and do what I want to do with that. So...maybe I'll get back to the event next year?

Of course, I reserve the right to change my mind between now and November 1.

:-)

Josh, straight unadulterated meditation is definitely a way to go, too. I love to sit and do that. I tend to use the podcasts when I absolutely cannot get my head to shut down...then, the podcasts are like the strategic weapons. :-)

Hmm...I think I got most of mine off iTunes, so I don't know if you can access those or not. But try My Thought Coach, which is one of my favorite resources.