Flock blogging

I’m starting to get used to Flock.  Yay Flock! Its blogging/photo features are outstanding.  There are a lot of rough patches, though, which I suppose reflect its less-than-one-point-oh status.  I don’t even think they’re calling it a beta.  And for good reason, I must say.

For example, each tab in Flock has a ‘close’ button.  One of the downsides of this is that when you’re crowd-tabbing, you’ll click on a tab to read it, but mis-aim and accidentally close the tab instead.  I think they’re planning this for Firefox 2.0, too, which would be very inconvenient.  Though, I’m sure someone will write an extension undoing that anyway.  Heh.
Speaking of extensions, I love that you can now import a lot of the Firefox ones.  However, when using the undo-close-tab extension, the tab should reappear where it was originally, not at the beginning of the row of tabs.  I don’t know why it does this in Flock.

Also, why is there no “Tag for del.icio.us” button like there is in Firefox
(with the delicious extension installed)?  instead i have to use the
keyboard shortcut or install another space-taking bookmarklet (which doesn’t appear as a pop-up).  How
inconvenient!

Another nitpick: when blogging from the browser, the blog window should not be positioned “always on top” – what if you want to refer back the page you’re probably blogging about?  It’s frustrating not to be able to get back to it, not even to pick up the web snippets you were going to use.

i also don’t like that you can’t modify the location of your bookmarks. it’s really annoying.  But, looking around in the forums, I see that there’s a reason for this.  Still, they should fix that before v.1.0

Like I said, the blogging, web snippets, and photo-sharing capabilities of Flock make it almost a must-have for the big bloggers out there.  These tools make it REALLY easy to post cool pictures, quotes, etc from all over the web.

But a lot of those other things still keep me from making this my exclusive web browser.  Since they ARE in their very early stages, so I have no doubt the experience can only get better.  Still, in the meantime, Firefox wins =)

Blogged with Flock

Filed under: browser

on lunch

english muffin halves,
cheese slice (swiss) and
tomato, warmed on the bread

(so far, a panini!)

but then:
add eggs overeasy,
with onion, well-fried,

crowned with
spicy guacamole;
such deliciousness
to believe, must be tried.

I know it sounds kinda weird but when you put it all together, it works; it’s kind of like a sandwich version of a breakfast burrito. I might try whole wheat bread next time, though, to add more sweetness.

Filed under: food

this is not pablum! (well, maybe it is)

Eep, I’m already tired of this blogging-what-I-read everyday! It’s getting pretty dull, and I think I need to go back to the eye doctor, because I’m starting to feel the eyestrain from reading again (the last time I felt that was right before I found out I had very mild astigmatism).

But I’ve been reasonably busy doing other stuff: everyone’s birthdays seem to be in August, so there’s much shopping and lunch-eating, coffee-drinking, etc. Plus the whole, “getting ready for school to begin” business. Not to mention more relatives on their way to pay (mercifully) short visits.

And, my grandmother had to get a pacemaker installed so she was in hospital over the weekend. Actually, the heart valves she’d had put in a few years ago started leaking, but the pacemaker seems to be doing a good enough job taking care of it that she didn’t have to go into deep surgery to get replacement valves. But we had to cancel our Tokyo trip, just in case.

I finished up my GRE class last week, so I only have to tutor this one kid a few more times, and then it’s on to the Westwood branch of my company! Until then, I plan to enjoy this short break, watching videos like these ri-DONK-ulous bunnies, and this startled panda, and Colbert/Stewart’s presentation at the Emmys. I think my favorite part of that video is seeing Jeffrey Tambor’s reaction to the Manilow line. George Sr. loves the Colbert!

Also, “Kneel before your god, Babylon!”

Filed under: fun, meta, personal, video

glasses of lemonade

I just got this email from Acuvue that carried the subject “Travel Advisory for Contact Lens Wearers”:

Dear Esther,

We want to keep you updated on some information that you may need to know.

Vision Changes…and so do Airport Security Rules.

As you’ve probably heard, new security rules are being enforced at airports for everyone’s safety. Many liquids have been banned from carry–on bags. As a result, many travelers with contact lenses are being affected since only small bottles of rewetting and cleaning solutions are still allowed.*

However, there is good news for contact lens wearers!

Oh, good, I thought, they’re going to give us tips on how to get around these rules, which I could find useful if we do go to Japan next week. Either that, or tell us that they’ve started selling contact solution via duty-free shopping, I guess.

But nope:

As an alternative to carrying solutions, you can consider wearing contact lenses that can be worn for one day and then thrown away. There’s no lens care, cases, or solutions required.

To enjoy the no-hassle, healthiest way to wear contact lenses, you can talk to your eye care professional about 1•DAY ACUVUE® Brand Contact Lenses. Click here for a FREE** Trial Pair Certificate.

Have a comfortable trip!

Indeed! It’s good news, probably not so much for lens wearers as for Acuvue profits. Kudos to the alert junior exec. who came up with this approach to selling more disposables.

Filed under: Uncategorized

the best thing i read today

…..is this well-written description of Dave Barry’s Tropic Hunt from Blake Ross’s blog.

[Yes, Firefox Blake Ross. I don't remember how I got to his blog, but there it was!]

Anyway, he makes this Hunt sound like a ton of fun, which I guess makes sense because he calls himself a “salivating Hunt fanboy;” but what exactly is this Tropic Hunt (or I guess it’s called Herald Hunt now, even though Dave Barry’s currently on hiatus from writing for the paper)?

Like most things conceived in Dave Barry’s mind, the Hunt defies explanation. First, let me dispel your guesses. The Hunt, as last year’s official site so sharply explains, is not a scavenger hunt. It is not a geek convention. You are not looking for anything or solving mathematical equations. In fact, you hardly have to know anything at all to win, which is probably why tens of thousands of people participate. You just have to think like Dave Barry.

Now, if you’ve ever read Dave Barry’s columns in the Miami Herald, you’ll already have an idea of how insane this hunt must be, and Blake’s description seems to do it justice:

Some of [the clues] are too twisted and complex to describe, while othersseem easy until you’re huddled next to a few thousand other people andyour brain-turned-mush is mired in a swamp of inane (and wrong)theories. Over the years, hunters have tasted candy canes that werereally orange-flavored, dunked everyday objects in water to revealmessages and scaled buildings only to look down and see that they hadbeen standing on the solution the whole time. A fellow Hunter, AndyWenzel, runs a terrific website chronicling all 14 hunts since the first in 1984, complete with pictures.

…

Once the final clue is announced, it’s not uncommon to see peopleentering local businesses and spouting utter nonsense; they know howabsurd past solutions have been. Nobody wants to be the guy who lostbecause he was afraid to order green eggs and ham or enter anostensibly closed public restroom.

Yup. If I hadn’t read so many Dave Barry columns about what a scary place Miami is, I’d almost be tempted to go out there someday to participate in one of his Hunts! =D

Blogged with Flock

Filed under: best thing, fun

annoying!

Wow. I cannot believe how awful “Windows Live Mail” aka Hotmail is. Its interface is just atrocious. You’d think they’d try to follow Yahoo’s example and like, us Outlook as a model, especially given that Outlook is Microsoft’s own freaking product. Instead, it’s impossible to figure out how to do something like mass-selecting messages to delete at once.

Or am I just retarded? Or is this beta simply ridiculous beyond words?

I can’t figure it out, it’s unlike Thunderbird or Outlook express or anything else. I can’t believe they’re forcing me to use this instead of the old webmail. Ugh.

Never mind, you *are* allowed to opt-out, at the expense of storage space. Which is fine with me!

Filed under: computer, web2.0

the best thing i read today

oh, yes, and the best thing i read today? Fished from today’s Money Quote on “The Fix” at Salon.com:

Paris Hilton plays the critic with her own album: “I, like, cry, when I listen to it, it’s so good.” (Blender via Associated Press)

(00:12:04) Boba Boy: she alwys knows what to say
(00:12:16) Boba Boy: i mean, how can you top that?

Filed under: best thing

overwhelmed!

my family’s been contemplating a super-short trip to Tokyo, within the next two weeks. Just looking at a map of Tokyo, trying to tell all the names apart and keep them straight (if you think that’s bad, try looking at a simple subway map), is information overload aplenty for me. I’m not sure I’ll be able to handle an actual visit there.

I’ve always wanted to go to Tokyo, as I’ve never been. But wow. I had no idea it was so big, and like…. big. And full of names that are really hard to remember. Even more so because they aren’t exactly Westerner-friendly.

Still, if the fam wants to go, I sure as hell am not going to be left behind. Are there any Tokyo-veterans reading this who have tips for a fun, short (and not too expensive) trip?

Filed under: best thing

the best thing i read today

I luuuurrrrrrve Cute Overload – it’s the first RSS feed I check every day on my Bloglines, but it’s not the only “adorable animal picture” website out there. Just a Little Guy updates less frequently, but the author, whoever he is, has an enormous amount of ‘tude. His posts are almost as entertaining as the pictures he finds are cute, if not more so at times, and it’s only partially due to the rather blue nature of his posts.

So here’s a picture and commentary from one of the latest posts up on his site:

So you take one creature, infamous for its voracious consumption, and another creature, infamous for its tender juicy flavor and you get them to snuggle. World peace is obtainable.Shit, if I was that tiger I’d have a homebrew smoker up and running in about 20 minutes. Have me some baby back ribs, porchetta, mailino chops. Shit.

Really, this is one those pictures where you really want to get to the story behind the photo.

Luckily, the first person to comment on the post left a link to this Snopes article illuminating just what’s going on: it’s from the Sriracha (yeah I know) Tiger Zoo in Thailand.

The mixture of tiger and piglets depicted in the images above therefore was not something undertaken for functional reasons, but rather it’s a common form of visual entertainment provided by the zoo for the amusement of its visitors. According to the Pattaya Mail, these tiger-pig nursing relationships have also been reciprocated to the extent that the mother tiger shown suckling piglets was herself nursed by a sow.

Which is probably why those imposter tiglets haven’t become, well, pigs in a blanket (I got that joke from the site!! Don’t shoot the messenger!) The whole thing is a bit weird, maybe a tinge unsettling, but kind of cute, like that one hamster that’s best friends with a snake (I wonder how they’re doing, by the way?).

Aren’t they cute? Kinda?

Blogged with Flock

Filed under: best thing

the best thing i read today

BoingBoing has another post up about the rather strange dorodango phenomenon. I think the article they linked to originally was this one from Web Japan. This scientist became obsessed with making them, and then taught a bunch of preschoolers how to make their own dorodango, and now he studies them for insights on the role of experimentation and play in child development.

So what exactly are “dorodango”?

Hikaru dorodango are balls of mud, molded by hand into perfect spheres, dried, and polished to an unbelievable luster. The process is simple, but the result makes it seem like alchemy. A traditional pastime among the children of Japan, the exact origin of hikaru dorodango is unknown. The tradition was dying out until taken up by Professor Fumio Kayo, of the Kyoto University of Education, as a means to study the psychology of children’s play. In the course of his research, Kayo developed a simple technique for creating dorodango. With the help of Japanese media, Kayo has revived and extended the popular reach of this tradition to the point where it is now an international phenomenon.

The BoingBoing dorodango post that’s up today links to a whole gallery of these shiny, earthen spheres by a man named Bruce Gardner, who evidently has a fair amount of time on his hands (and also a lot of mud, although I’m sure that’s very good for the skin).

And there’s a lot more skill involved in making these things than one would at first surmise. That Japanese scientist recorded instances of 3-year-olds following him around for the best dirt to use, and of other preschoolers sharing (or hoarding) secret techniques for achieving the most beautiful dorodango. Just skimming through this step-by-step tutorial of one method for making a mud ball, you can see what a long and involved process it is.

I guess you can say this is no more silly an obsession than any other pointless hobby. It’s like art, or something. But the name, and the fact that these are nothing more than *balls of mud*, and the idea that it’s become “an international phenomenon” (4-year-olds doing this all through recess, I can understand, but adults, too?) — all of this strikes me as more than a bit ridiculous. But I guess there are worse things one could do with one’s time.

Filed under: best thing