SassyBlonde

For all of you tea freaks out there (like me), go on over and check out Adagio Teas. What a fantastic selection of teas and teaware!!!!!! In particular I love the Iced Tea Duo. Nummy.

Heads-up courtesy of Gingersmack.

Mahnamahna.

I like his version of theology.

The Armageddon Flowchart

Found on fullramblomatic.com (and I quote, "If Bruce Campbell were a website, he'd be this one.") via Domesticat.net.

I've been saying that my husband gets PMS for years. Now these gentlemen present a site dedicated to the propostion of Men With Cramps. Well done to whoever put this together, I haven't giggled so much in a LONG time.

So I was going to try this, but lo and behold:

HowManyOfMe.com

There are: 0 people with my name in the U.S.A. How many have your name?

I just think it's funny that it says there are zero people with my name in the U.S. right now.

Oops!! Where did I go?? Dangit. I must be on vacation on a fabulous Caribbean island right now. Yeah, that's it. We'll go with that.

Courtesy of Kelly.

Omigod. I'm geeking out. This is so cool:

Dalek-O-Lantern
Cylon Jack-O-Lantern

Via Solonor.

"People who don't like egg nog are people who hate puppies and blowjobs, too. They cannot be trusted."

Love. It. Giggled until I cried.

From this post over at Bad News Hughes.

This picture just makes me insanely happy. Found via StumbleUpon.

When I was growing up in the Baptist Bible Belt of central Alabama, I was faced with a litany of sins to fear: Sex. Cursing. Impure thoughts. Being gay. Being sprinkled, not dunked. Not wearing makeup out of the house.

One of the many things you learned as a child was super-inappropriate and worthy-of-a-hiding-because-it-was-one-of-the-worst-things-that-could-ever-come -out-of-your-mouth was to "damn" someone.

Well, now you don't even have to say it, because someone brilliant has come up with this site. Hate your boss? Mad at your best friend for sleeping with your boyfriend? Vice versa? Get to it.

YouAreDamned.com

For all of you riddlers out there, here's a time vortex extraordinaire: Ouverture Facile. It's a series of Flash-based riddles that you have to ponder out or search the web to solve. I've already lost about two hours to the challenge, and may yet succeed in failing to get any work done tonight. Enjoy!

After spending so much time captioning my photos from China, I've been thinking a lot about good photography and I realized I've never posted about one of my favorite sites-- The Earth From Above, part of the photography site of Yann Arthus-Bertrand. There are pictures on that site that range from awe-inspiring to hilarious, and they're all beautiful.

He has a huge repository of aerial photos from countries all over the globe, many of which can be downloaded as wallpapers for your desktop. My WebShots wallpaper folder is crammed with them.

I know I left that half a mil somewhere... updated yearly per my habit, my worth has gone down exactly $445,220.00 on HumanforSale.com to $1,677,466.00. Fuck. And I was doing so well.

I have a feeling it's the extra weight and another year of age, per their breakdown. Ah well, we all depreciate I suppose. That's what turning thirty gets you, I guess.

Look out-- Pearl wants her money now, bitch!

I swear, I snarfed my soda when she said she wanted to get her drink on.

(From Jen Lemen.)

So, I'm up to my neck in pork fat at the moment... greasy keyboard keys are not sexy, so until I get this pig picked, go here and laff.

LOLTrek

Courtesy of Diane Duane at Out of Ambit, who I sincerely hope is feeling a little better today.

And the ratings are in...drumroll please...

Apparently there is some concern about my usage of the words "ass" and "sexy". Obviously, they didn't see these entries or it would have been an R rating all the way. Which is what I expected, since my husband can't read this at work because this entry got me banned for pornography by their content filters. Oy. Teehee.

Thanks to Solonor for the heads-up.


UPDATE: 07/01/2007
So apparently my rating has increased with the usages of the past couple of days:

That just cracks me the fuck up. Take that, censors. I'm all up in this R-Rated shit.

I would just like to state for the record that it is the fault of JozJozJoz that I've spent the last hour glued to my computer playing Nanaca†Crash.

Nanaca†Crash is a Flash game which uses characters from an adult PC game called Cross†Channel (warning, link is not work safe). Nanaca†Crash is not itself an adult game though; it's similar to the "penguin launching" game which was popular on the Internet a while back.

Wanna have the best pick at your next potluck? Check out these melons from Japan... squares, dice, faces. It kind of makes me laugh that they're being so serious about the process to make the faces... they sell pumpkin molds that do that.

I'm seriously dying to find a mold to make the star-shaped cucumbers. So fabulous!!

Most of you know that I have a huge affinity for cats, so it will come as no surprise to you that a lot of the artwork in my house is cat-centric, especially the pieces that come from artists other than me. I've been excited lately because I'm on track to buy a beautiful piece featuring a tiger, and through that artist I found the website of "Tiger Rose" Corcoran.

She does absolutely stunning large-format drawings of big cats, including tigers, snow leopards, pumas, you name it. Not only that, but she actively participates in and supports conservation efforts geared toward helping these magnificent animals. She just closed an exhibition at the Sladmore Gallery in London with some of the most beautiful and detailed work I've ever seen. Go check out her site as well as the organizations she supports.

Thought my outcome on this Alignment Test was interesting. It's good to know I have things in common with Scott Evil and Dr. Strangelove. Can you tell I'm procrastinating instead of practicing? Oy. (Breakdown after the jump.)

One of the places where D and I most like to hang out is our back yard, which we finally got mainly cleared and set up this year. The only ingredient that's missing is a great firebowl to sit around, and I think I may have found one I can't live without-- John T. Unger's Recycled Steel Firebowl, 37 inches to be exact. Unfortunately it's about ten times my budget, but functional art is the best kind, right? Sigh.

I guess I'm one of the few gamers on the planet still resisting Guitar Hero addiction, but I don't know-- if I saw the following I might just have to jump in on principle. :)

Activision Reports Sluggish Sales For Sousaphone Hero

[...]"In the career mode, you can rise from playing in park gazebos for church picnics to performing in the halftime show of the Harvard-Yale game," Hendleman said. "If you score enough points, you can unlock the ultimate level: playing in the John Philip Sousa–led Marine Band at Grover Cleveland's inauguration."

"And if you like multiplayer gaming, you're in luck," Hendleman continued. "In Sousaphone Hero's cooperative marching-band mode, as many as 135 of your friends can play simultaneously."

Hendleman also emphasized the "fun" rewards players receive as they become more proficient. If they hit enough correct notes in a row, the on-screen crowd yells "huzzah" and "bully," and the sousaphone controller's spit valve will "drain." Flubbing notes, however, makes the controller "fill" with spit, preventing further play and causing the crowd to throw rotten eggs at the hapless on-screen sousaphonist. If characters earn enough bonus points in career mode, they can spend their Liberty-head nickels on a red, green, or blue "sock" for their sousaphone's bell, or an invigorating chunk of peanut brittle. [...]

"I played the career mode for three hours and kept feeling like I was playing the same annoying circus tune over and over," kiLLlah_steVe of Columbus, OH wrote. "On one song, you're forced to play the same two notes back and forth for 96 measures."

Because I'm a raging insomniac and need more things to do in the middle of the night:

Ever wanted to have your own slogan? Thanks to my intrepid brother-in-law, Dancing Dragon, I now have a slew:

• "We do Sassy Right." (Wow, as if there's more than one person around who can make that claim.)
• "Grab life by the Sassy." (Good Holy Lord.)
• "Sassy Unscripted." (Hey-- new tag-line.)
• "Welcome to Sassy Country." (Hey, these guys are good.)
• "Wouldn't You Rather Be Sassy?" (Damn straight.)
• "Biting The Hand That Feeds Sassy." (For those days when I just can't avoid posting about work)
• "Mamma Mia, That'sa Spicy Sassy!" (Hey, you were warned.)
• "8 Out of 10 Owners Who Expressed A Preference Said Their Cats Preferred Sassy." (Whaaaa?)
• "Unzip A Sassy." (Ahem. The last guy who tried that out of hand got a death threat.)
• "The Incredible, Edible Sassy." (If DD doesn't say Eeew over this one I'll eat my shoe. But at least I didn't say BOX.)
• "Go On, Get Your Sassy Out." (Put that thing away before you get us all killed!)
• "Absolut Sassy." (There is so a not-for-prime-time photo in that somewhere.)

• "If you like a lot of chocolate on your Sassy, join our club." (Verra nice, how much?)

Even if you don't understand French, this clip will crack you up:

Have you ever just really really wanted to tell someone what you really think, no holds barred? Then you need to check out Hate Mail Greetings:


People, I love these cards. (I so needed this one last week.) It's like the Emily Post gone postal way of conveying your true feelings when you just can't take it anymore. Like when some asshat parks his SUV an inch away from your driver's side door. Or when your friend sleeps with your boyfriend. Or your ex. Or when it all just is too good to be true. Or when you just really need to be prepared.

Because "Jesus loves you, but I hear he's not picky."

(Brought to you bye the letter M, the number two, and my lovely sister. Thanks much, dude.)

Okay. These refrigerators are cool, but am I the only one who's totally grossed out that the brand name is Smeg? Gack.

"Oh hai. In teh beginnin Ceiling Cat waz invisible, An he maded the skiez An da Urf, but he no eated it."

Fun, right? Thanks to womynrev for the reminder about this site.

I like the way this person thinks. (I know it's been making the rounds for a while now, but it just cracks me up. It's so Jay and Silent Bob.) It's like they recorded my inner monologue, just a little:



Found over at Found Magazine.

I keep thinking that I need to be working up all of those erudite posts that I have banging around in my head, but then I get distracted (ooh shiny!!!!) by SUMURU because hey, it's my birthday on Sunday and everybody keeps wanting to celebrate this whole getting older thing. Oh, all right, so do I, I admit it. And it's hard to keep your brain focused when it's 5PM and you've already had your dose of culture for the day. That being said, I keep trying to figure out how to treat myself to a new Poppet.

"Whassa Poppet?" you say?

I'm so glad you asked.

Poppets are adorable and creepy little sculpture-people by one of my new favorite artists, Lisa Snellings-Clark (who I incidentally found through Neil Gaiman's post about dead bees-- the pathways to enlightenment are convoluted indeed.)

Most of you get that my mind is a strange place, and every once in a while I find an artist that really has their finger on the same sort of oddness that goes on there. For instance, Robert Dowling, some of whose artwork speaks to me in a way I can't really explain, and couldn't ever really hang in my house, but I seem to need to look at in the way the human body needs water.

Lisa Snellings-Clark's Poppets grabbed my attention like a tiny insistent fishhook when I saw them. I looked at them, I liked them, they appealed to me, and they wouldn't get out of my mind. They're creepy. They're odd. They're honest. And they're... well... cute.

So I bought one, and it's my little companion on my desk and the audience to my practicing. It'll go with me on my next tour as a silent watcher and photographic peeping tom. It hits weird in exactly the right way-- everyone who sees it in my office kind of stares at it and gives it the eye, trying to figure out if it's cute or creepy, and it makes me laugh. And now it needs some friends, and there's something to be said for developing your audience, so I'm trying to decide if I can decide between Pierrot, the Alien, Little Pink, Little Blue, or the Spook with a Sad Clown Mask. This is bad folks-- I'm not a collector by nature, but these little guys seem to want to come home with me in the worst way.

*giggle*

Yeah, my mind is a strange place.

So here's the thing:

I've missed you guys.

I've had some pretty heavy things going on in my life this year, things which basically have changed the face of my entire existence in one way or another. And I haven't really felt comfortable talking about that here, in public, for anyone and everyone to read. More importantly, there are very good reasons why I can't and shouldn't.

And frankly, it's killing me.

Because if you're still reading this, then I've probably known you, or had you as a reader, for long enough that you're probably wondering what the hell happened to me.

Because if you're still reading this, you're probably one of the people whose opinions and love I value enough that I'm going to need your help in the next year.

Because frankly, I need an outlet more in-depth than Twitter and less personal than Facebook.

So here's the other thing:

On March 1st, this blog is getting a makeover. I'll be moving it to a new server, shaking up the layout a little, and converting it to a new CMS, though the site address won't change. The ranting and raving and silliness will stay the same, only there will be some things that I don't want to share with everybody, some things that I may need to share and say, but only within certain circles. I'm tired of keeping it all pent up and I've done that for long enough.

If you're still reading this blog, and you're been a loyal reader or friend or even a long-time lurker, email me at (sassy{at}sassyblonde{dot}net) with the title of this post in the subject line or comment on this post and request an access key. I'd love to have you in the circle.

Til then, I'll be cleaning house and doing some renovation, and I'll see you on March 1st.

UPDATE: So, snow and circumstances being what they've been around here, I'm going to have to ask you guys to wait around a little longer, which actually ends up being appropriate for a lot of reasons. I've gotten all your emails and comments, and if you can hang tight for a few more weeks, I'll have the next phase ready on April 1st.