Updates I Should Have Made

Jaye asked me yesterday if Beth got to keep her job, and I realized that I never did let you know what happened, did I? Yes, she got hired permanently, so she gets to keep working and making money to pay for her gas and insurance and other stuff like cat food and cat litter. They took longer than they were supposed to to let her know, but in the meantime, she was still getting hours. She is also finally moving out of the fitting room and out into a department, so she's happy about that. She was tired of standing in one place all night. Currently she works Sundays and two nights a week, but this week she's working an extra night. Since she insists that there's never any homework, she might as well be working. Of course, all she wants to do is spend time with Tim, but he's sick this week anyway.

About Tim, he's pretty much kept himself out of trouble and has been working on paying us and everyone else back. We've got part of our money back, and we know where he lives...

Jeffrey's car went into the shop to get fixed Tuesday afternoon, and he picked it up after work yesterday, so it's all fixed. He got a copy of the police report, and, even though they didn't give her a ticket, the police had listed the cause of the accident as 'failure to yield' and therefore her fault. So he called the lady who pulled out in front of him and told her he wanted her insurance to pay for it, and after some paperwork and not much runaround at all, they mailed him a check. They also paid for a rental car so he had something to drive while the car was in the shop.

Anything else you're wondering about? Leave me a comment, and I'll try to bring you up to date so you're not just sitting there or losing sleep wondering what happened.

The Sourdough Recipe

Since I posted the picture of my bread yesterday, I thought I'd give you the recipe, too - just in case you're interested.  I actually took these pictures a while back when I made bread, but finally got around to uploading them and creating the Tabblo. 

See my Tabblo

Tabblo is fun, if you haven't tried it yet. You can upload pictures, choose from different templates, arrange the pictures on the page, change colors, apply effects, insert text, etc.  I think of it as kind of like digital scrapbooking, but then I've never actually done any scrapbooking.  Or maybe it's just a good way to create a page for a cookbook?  This looks like a page from a cookbook, right?

Open Windows!

My computer says it's 29° outside. (ETA: that's 29° Fahrenheit. I need to remember to be specific, don't I?) The sun is shining, and the back sliding door is wide open. No, I don't normally open up the windows when it's only 29° - though compared to some of the temperatures we've had around here recently, that's warm. No, the back door is wide open because Beth decided this afternoon was a good time to do her nails. She actually went and got them done a little while ago, but they didn't do a good job or she's too hard on them or something, and they're all off now. She wants some fingernails so that she will stop biting her nails, and she doesn't think she can just stop. I think she can do anything she decides that she is going to do, but never mind what I think.

So, anyway, the nails are all off, so she stopped at Walmart on the way to work yesterday and bought a kit to put her own nails on. The kids got out of school early today, so she had some extra time. Perfect time to do the nails, right? Except that she sat down at the dining room table to do them, and the smell soon took over the entire house. Cory, Tillie, and I retreated to the basement for a while, but I can't sit down there forever. Actually, I should be working on the computer down there, but that's going to have to wait until tomorrow. So, I opened the back door, hoping the fresh air will help to clear out the smell in here. I think it's cleared out a little, but it's still bothering me. I think there's something toxic in those acrylic fumes. It's more than just the smell; it's the way it makes me feel.

I told Beth that if she's going to do that again, she needs to go into her own room and close the door. She's had her nails done before. She knows how it smells. She knows things like that bother me. What does she say? She didn't think it smelled bad. Eventually I'll have to shut the back door, before it gets too cold in here, but, in the meantime, Tillie is enjoying it. She's sitting right by the screen looking out at everything, enjoying the feel of the air on her face.

After all this, Beth better stop biting her nails.

An Experiment or Two

I finally installed Windows Live Writer, which Deb mentioned ages ago. Oh, I downloaded it right away because it sounded like a very useful tool. Then I never got around to installing it, and Deb mentioned it again. I thought to myself that I really must install it and try it. But I didn't until today. Windows Live Messenger wanted to install a newer version, and along with that, they gave me the option to install Windows Live Writer. So I did, and I set up this blog and my LiveJournal one, and now I'm trying my first post just to see how it works.

The second experiment is one I haven't tried yet. Cory mentioned that one of his friends told him you could keep your glasses from steaming up when you walk in from the cold. You just have to walk in backwards and supposedly your glasses won't get steamed up. I remember this every morning when I walk into the house - of course not before I walk in but after I'm already in, my glasses are steamed up, and I can't see anything. One of these days I am going to have to remember and try this to see if it works. If you try it before I do, let me know, OK?

Wordless Wednesday #3 - Sourdough

Check out more Wordless Wednesday here

Won't They Just Shut UP?

I was watching Good Morning America. Next thing I know my local news is on. Breaking News - Brett Favre is retiring. So, for the last 45 minutes or so, they have been going on and on and on about it. Who really cares? OK, so maybe some people care, but seriously? They could tell us this during their regular news time. Interrupting regular programming is just plain rude. I'd rather watch infomercials about acne treatment than hear them going on and on about some guy who can't even pronounce his name the way it's spelled - and they honestly aren't even sure whether he really is retiring. No, wait - I'd rather watch the shows that are supposed to be on.

Of course, this is the same news crew that just had to break into Oprah to let us know the verdict was in on the wife poisoning case - the 10 year old case that just finally went to trial. They couldn't wait 15 minutes and tell us during regular news time?

Really, who decides what is breaking news? What is important enough to break into regular programming? So big you can't cover it during the regular time alloted to TV news? A national disaster, maybe? Amber alert?

Heads or Tails - 7 Things

Today it's TAILS - List 7 things in any category.

I'd like days of the week for 7 points:

1. Sunday
2. Monday
3. Tuesday
4. Wednesday
5. Thursday
6. Friday
7. Saturday

Yeah, I know, real cheesy. For more Heads or Tails participants, visit Skittles' Place

My New Logo?

I was supposed to be doing other things, but instead I started playing around at LogoCreator. It was fun. You can pick different types of logos, input your text and preferred colors, and create your own logo. Of course, I had to keep playing with it trying to get it just right. Here's what I came up with:

OK, it's not really a logo. It's more like fancy text, which I could do for myself with PhotoShop, but this I could do right online.

Then I found this site where you can create animated text, so I had to play with that, too:


Make Your Own Dancing Text Banners

OK, enough fun...

A Couple HTML Tips

It occurred to me as I was writing that last post that I ought to share a couple html tips I use on a regular basis.

First - Mouseover this link: My Flickr page. Do you see that little box pop up? The one that says, "See some pictures I've taken"? I love that little thing. Sometimes I just play with it, but mostly it's a good way to let people know what a link is about before they click it. To make your links do this, use the title attribute. Insert title="this is what this link is about" right after the url, like this:
< a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/bcmom/" title="See some pictures I've taken">

Be sure to use the quotation marks. A title can also be added to an image.

Second - I'm one of those people who hates to see text right up on top of an image. I like a little white space (or, in my case, purple space) around the image. To add space above and below the image, use vspace="15" - v for vertical. To add space to the left and right, use hspace="5" - h for horizontal. The number is the number of pixels that will be inserted between your image and your text. It can be whatever you want it to be. Just play with the numbers to see what looks good. If you want more space, increase the number. You'll notice that the numbers do not have to be the same. In this example - an award from Lady Banana, I also used align="right" to place the image on the right side of the post. If I had used align="left" the image would be, you guessed it, on the left side.

So the whole thing looks like this: < img src="imagename.jpg" title="an award from Lady Banana" align="right" hspace="5" vspace="15">

If you're inserting images by clicking on the little Add Image thing in Blogger, there is a whole lot more code, so you'll have to look for the part that starts with img src= and insert it into that part of the code. It's in there, I promise.

Did that help anyone? Hopefully it wasn't too confusing. :P A special Thank You to Lady Banana for the adorable award I used in this example.

I'm in the Spotlight

Tammy @ Mom Knows Everything has started a weekly feature called Spotlight on Bloggers. Each week she chooses a blogger to 'spotlight', and this week, I'm the blogger in her spotlight. You can read the Spotlight post here.

Also, I get this nifty badge to display on my blog:


Tammy, have I told you I think this Spotlight on Bloggers is a wonderful idea? I thought that even before you picked me to be in your spotlight.