In a past life, I was lola, a sultry leopard

According to this "test":

"Not much is certain in life — past or present — but we know this much about you: In your last life you were a sultry leopard named Lola. You were a showgirl, with yellow feathers in your hair and a dress cut down to there. You would meringue and do the cha-cha. And one night at the Copacabana (the hottest spot north of Havana), you fell in love with Tony, the handsome bartender. Tony fought Rico (he wore a diamond) for you and won. The two of you grew old and happy together, joyfully dancing your lives away at the club to the soulful tunes of Barry Manilow."

Hmmmmm...

Dumb computer software

My friend burned a CD recently and lent it to me. I threw it into my computer and listened to it, but of course all of the tracks show up without any information - no song title, no band info, etc. So, I listen to it but have no idea who's playing or what the songs are actually called (aside from what I glean from the chorus in the songs).

Anyway, I throw the same CD in my 4 year-old Sony CD player, and what do I get? SONG TITLES on the display! That's right - my friend plugged the info into whatever software they ripped the songs from originally, and that information got burned to the disc. And it shows up on my CD player. Now, why can't my computer software display the same information?

So many questions, so little time...

Definitions containing "last" in Japanese

My friend, E., is teaching English in Japan and will soon be studying Japanese at a university there. He sent a link to a page on the "Japanese Wordinator" defining words that contain the word "last". These definitions include: final three bouts on the last day of a sumo tournament; the first and last occurrence (event, experience) of one's lifetime; (vegetables) salted just overnight; cheating on train fare by buying tickets covering only the first and last portions of the journey...

And therein lies the reason I won't be learning Japanese in this lifetime. As E. pointed out, he gasps that there are even words for some of those definitions, and I agree. Good luck, E.!

Beautiful passage

My friend, A., sent this passage from the book, The English Patient by Michael Ondaatje. She said it reminded her of my compass tattoo, and I agree. It's quite lovely.

"We die containing richness of lovers and tribes, tastes we have swallowed, bodies we have plunged into and swum up as if rivers of wisdom, characters we have climbed into as if trees, fears we have hidden in as if caves. I wish for all this to be marked on my body when I am dead. I believe in such cartography--to be marked by nature, not just to label ourselves on a man like the names of rich men and women on buildings. We are communal histories, communal books. We are not owned or monogamous in our taste or experience. All I desired was to walk upon such an earth that had no maps."

Shopping from a cell phone

I read this article in the New York Times this morning: Those Born to Shop Can Now Use Cellphones. I think you have to login, so if you don't have a NYT account, the basic idea of the article is that more people are getting cell phones that can better render Web sites, allowing people to shop from their cell phones.

If you have the option of shopping online with your computer or your phone, which are you going to pick? I mean, I love my cell phone (the Motorola Razr), but I detest having to do anything Internet-based on it. No cell phone has a large enough screen or good enough touchpad to make me want to use it for shopping online. Half the time, I can hardly make out what the pattern on a Victoria's Secret chemise looks like from my computer monitor, let alone the minuscule screen on my cell phone.

But, I realize that this is new frontier. I went to a presentation awhile back about user interface (UI) design for different-sized UIs. For example, you display menus and information to people on a computer monitor in a completely different way than you do on a cell phone or PDA. It was really interesting to see how you can best use the real estate that you're given. And I admit that it is handy to have the option to go online to do things from a phone, because sometimes that's all you've got and you need to find a person or a movie time. But, I still don't see myself shopping from my phone; maybe I just lack vision...

Awesome family

I just have to say that I have the coolest family ever. I mean, I get annoyed with them sometimes and they get annoyed with me, but whenever one of us needs something, we come through. That's what family is all about :)

This last week, I was house-sitting for my cousins, R. and A., while they were on a ski trip. During that same time, my sister, brother-in-law, and their kids were staying at my condo because my brother-in-law's mother passed away and they needed a place closer to where everything was going on. I got back to my condo today, and everything was completely clean and neat - it's like no one was even here. The laundry was all done, etc. And, my brother-in-law fixed my bathroom sink, which was dripping and I kept meaning to try and figure out what the issue was. Talk about sweet. Here they are trying to deal with the cremation and stuff, and they fix my sink, and clean everything up. I told them just to leave everything and I would take care of it when I got back, but they took care of it all anyway. Too cool...

Happy New Year!

Well, we made it to the end of 2005, thank gawd. What a year. I won't even go back through all of the crap that went on with me, my family, and my friends, but suffice it to say that I think 2006 will rock in comparison to 2005.

Went out with my boyfriend, L., last night for dinner, a few games of pool, and some hot tubbing. Very, very nice evening.

Then tonight, went over to my friend, A.'s house to celebrate New Year's Eve with some friends. It was so much fun. Just a good girl's night in. We made a really good dinner, drank a ton of good wine, danced, and had an astrology lesson from A.'s friend, J. I learned that my sun sign is Aries, my moon sign is Libra, and my rising sign is Scorpio. Earlier in the night, I could have told you what that meant, but it's a bit lost on me now. Apparently though, they all make a very good combination (duh! - I mean, we're talking about me ;)) and it's good to have fire signs with air signs b/c they fuel each other. Then we watched Monty Python and the Holy Grail after our midnight celebration. It was a really great way to wind down the year and just kick back with some awesome friends.

Tomorrow I'm going to help my sister move into her new house (yay!) and then head back to hang out with Kati and a couple of our other friends, K. and S., for a good night of food, drink, and pool. And then Monday, I'll rest and get ready to spring back to work on Tuesday when everyone is back in the office.

The perfect end to an imperfect year...and now the perfect end to my perfect night would be some wonderful sleep :)

Open mouth and insert foot

Awhile back, I was sitting at lunch with some friends and talking about the Sony rootkit issue. One of the artists that had CDs that installed the rootkit was Celine Dion. I really can't stand Celine Dion, so I made a comment to the effect of, "well, it serves them right for listening to Celine Dion". One of my friends, C., was like, "hey, I like Celine Dion." So, open mouth, and insert foot...

Anyway, it became a joke between us, and recently while I was down in Vegas I stopped in the Celine Dion shop at Caesar's. I bought C. a bookmark for Celine Dion's new show. And when I flipped the bookmark over, I was absolutely ROTFLMAO at the wording on the back. You'd think that I was buying a diamond ring or something, not a bookmark.

It says things like, "[The bookmark] is also meant to become part of your everyday busy life as a marker in an agenda or book." Hmmmmm...is that what a bookmark is for? By golly, I'm so thankful that she cleared that little mystery up for me. It goes on to say things like "Bookmarks are there to take you where you left off. Call it a day, a page, a phrase, a thought. What is behind is passe, what is ahead is unknown. Pretty much as in real life..."

Barf. I've never seen so much importance put on something so insignificant. There's more, but I'll spare you the pain.