"Well! I've often seen a cat without a grin," thought Alice; "but a grin without a cat! It's the most curious thing I ever saw in all my life!" -Lewis Carroll

She did it to me again today. Couldn't find the little bugger this morning. She didn't wake me up, nor did she come down for breakfast. Unlike a couple of Fridays ago when I had to work from home, there was no pitiful howling coming from underneath the stove, and indeed one quick look with a flashlight proved she hadn't gotten herself wedged under there again. It's the one...the only...disappearing cat!

Well, I had to take a shower and get my butt to work, having overslept half an hour without the morning paw in the face wake up call. Cold leftover coffee, check. Cat food in the bowl, check. Hot shower, check. Clothes on, check. Hair dry and teeth brushed, check. Car key and house key, check. Butts and lighter, check. Bolt!

Twelve hours later, the little schmuck met me at the door in from the garage, pretty as you please, if nothing ever was amiss this morning. She never was the brightest cat, certainly not compared to my two previous ones, but ever since she turned 15 and developed diabetes, she seems to be a few IQ points short of a hamster.

So, here's to my "adorable booby," as Virginia Woolfe once said (referring to her husband, who apparently was none too bright himself): hugs, and a shot for you!

Consolation Prize

The peanut butter and jelly wins.

Incriminating?

You asked for it, Jessica. You won.

There is something else that is pretty cool about Jess capturing the prize. This win ended up going to a really wonderful cause.

A couple of days ago, Jess came up with an idea to stimulate votes that was pretty hard to pass up. Here is Jessica’s offer in her own words…

There is a cause that is very near and dear to my heart right now - Moreena’s daughter, Annika. Annika is in need of yet another transplant due to a liver disease; she went in to the hospital four months ago and has already capped her insurance limit of $1,000,000 which means that, on top of her health issues, this little girl is currently uninsured.

Right now, I have 44 votes in the Best of Bad Art contest. I will donate $1 for every vote I receive up to $150; also, if my artwork wins, I will auction off the piece to one of you who have made your, ummm, interesting taste known. All money raised will go to Annika’s insurance policy. The final contribution may not be a lot in the scheme of things, but I need to do something.

How cool is it that my goofy little contest could actually turn into something useful? I couldn’t be happier. If you would like to help contribute to Annika, check out Jess’s blog where she has links and info how you can help. Click HERE.

Or give up on the contest, because I cannot contest fools for believing this crap. Two fucking days ago, she came up with this one? Realistic, for sure. You go put two and two together.

The contest was jacked. Not by me, nor any of my friends. In the end, it got jacked by a person with a sympathetic story, and the person running the contest to promote the contestant's charitable cause plea for votes.

All I did was ask a few friends to vote, and after the counter got reset to zero, I didn't even ask my office-mates to go back and revote for me, but I wouldn't have won, anyway, even if they had.

I thought I was simply up against a naked lady, not a sympathy plea, but hey, live and learn. Never wave your bad art out there ever again, because nobody wants it--sell it at a garage sale.

Sour grapes? Not at all! I admire the tactic and wish I had thought of it, using one of my family's diseases for charitable contributions--multiple types of concurrent cancers, heart, Alzheimer's, arthritis, etc. I already have arthritis myself. But none of us are cute kids anymore; we're all adults, so nobody would have given a flying rat's ass, anyway. You all know that's the truth.

Kudos to you and your approach to the contest, Jessica. It was a winner for sure.

Now, for those of you who are inclined to flame me for this post, go ahead. I don't really care. This whole thing was just a rather bad experience. When the contest "owner" was promoting one contestant over another because of the charitable contribution aspect, it was never meant to be a level playing ground.

Dinner's probably still a couple of hours away from being done (beef stew using a cubed up london broil that I had frozen a couple of months ago), so in the meantime I snacked on a few tortilla chips dipped in this delectable item made in El Paso. If this is considered medium, mild, if there is such an item, must be really bland. I would have preferred hot, but my grocery store only had medium. Still, it's pretty good. You really can taste the chilis, but they in no way overpower the cheese. The texture's nice and smooth, and doesn't even need to be nuked to soften up a bit.

Regarding dinner, the nice thing about beef stew is that it's a great way to get rid of random things in the fridge that are sort of at that "use-it-or-lose-it" stage: onions and potatoes that are starting to get a little soft, that leftover half can of beer, etc.

The Winner IS.....

...the ham sloppy joe. No bad art can ever beat a ham sloppy joe from Hill City Deli, nor Millburn Deli, for that matter. The sandwich runs ~ $7, and probably has well over 2000 calories, but you can get 3-4 meals out of it, so it's still relatively cost-efficient.

Turkey joes are really good, too, but I felt like hamming it up today.

This is the only art I'm going to vote for.

The Voting Has Begun for the BoBA Awards

The voting is on for the best of Bad Art Awards. I'm seriously losing to a couple of really tacky paintings, and need your help. In fact I need all the help I can get.

Hop on over to Deni's and vote for the Indian Mask you see below. Please...pretty please...pretty, pretty please. I hate groveling, but I can be very good at it! ;)

VOTE FOR MY BAD ART! Here's the pic I entered in Deni's BOBA contest: scary, huh?

Nutsy day back at work--I had to wipe FA's butt and change his diaper. Then I had to fend off our Toronto office folks. Sheesh. Everybody thinks their client is my one ond only one, and gets my full attention. Um, no, not if I have to do client support duty for our internal folks who are supposed to be doing the real client support.

Guys and gals in sales & support, I'd prefer it if you didn't run with the motto "Ready? FIRE!!! Aim." That sequence is just a little bit out of order. I've never shot anything other than a .22 rifle or a CO2 pellet gun pistol for simple target practice. I only made it up to Marksman bar 4 with the rifle at summer camp when I was 12. Do not trust me with your life, although it's okay for bagging small animals, and yes, I know how to use the safety.

But I really fucking resent it when some sales person comes to me at 4:45 pm and says "Oh, I promised it to the client tomorrow. I'm going to look really bad if you don't deliver. I gave them your name, email, and number, so it's up to you now!" Just ONCE, I want to leave one of their butts hanging out in the wind, and wave it in front of a client and say "The first I heard of this project was the end of the day yesterday; it'll take me a few days to do for you, even if I could devote my full time to it."

Dinner last night was fantastic. It featured this little guy below, and Bambi to the right. Yum.



We split some pizza-like thing for an appetizer that was unleavend pizza dough, so it came out flat and really crispy, with melted gorgonzola on top. That alone could be a meal for one person. We both love blue cheese. Last time we were there, we split one as well, and it was just as good this time.

Much as I love their shrimp Fra Diavolo, a lobster item on the menu caught my eye, and I was already to try that until the waiter ran through the evening's specials. I decided to order the lobster special instead. SJ decided to order the venison special--rack of venison. It arrived split into two chops, and was cooked in the rare to medium-rare range. I've never tasted a bite of venison before that was so tender. It was farm-raised somehere in Texas. Both were really excellent dishes, although there was no way I could even touch the mound of pasta under the crustacean.

Fortunately, it was not a big lobster. Even so, I couldn't finish one of the claws, so when the waiter offered to wrap it up for me, I agreed. Then I forgot it after paying the bill and leaving a cash tip. Oh, well, it was really only two bites. SJ did a much better job on his entree than I did. I was just too stuffed to have dessert or even a capuccino.

Funny how the waiter was fawning over us and checking up seemingly every two minutes during dinner, but when we were ready to leave, he was nowhere to be found to bring us the bill. Finally, the busboy tracked it down and brought it. I got a chance to actually cash in my two $100 AmEx Gift Cheques that I won in the office as awards for Superstar of the Year (2004) and Dream Team of the year (2005).

Last time we went to L'Allegria was I think for my 43rd birthday, again, not on the actual day, but on a nearby weekend. They've raised their prices since then, so we were a bit over $100 this time before tip, but that's okay. How often do we do this? Actually, my parents gave us $100 at Christmas time to cover dinner out, and whatever that didn't cover, my employer did with the award money. Eating on someone else's nickel is nice. Yeah, I could afford it myself, regardless, but it was a nice bonus, and I got cash back instead of a line item on my AmEx bill.

Well, it looks like dinner tonight is some leftover vegetarian chili I made awhile ago and froze. It's tasty, but obviously has a different texture than meat chili. I'd venture a guess it rates two alarms. Not at all bland, but it won't numb your mouth and lips, nor make your eyebrows sweat.

Buen apetito!

Dinner is set for tomorrow night at L'Allegria in Madison. Happy belated Valentine's, everyone. Barring the jumping bean, and her insulin shots, we should be okay for the long weekend. I hope the rest of you who have delayed it as well have a good one.

We had another all-day marathon Leadership Committee meeting today. It ran from 8:30 am - 5:55 pm. Since it's a new year, we're back to having our dinners again afterward. This time it was at Pipa, a Spanish restaurant in the ABC Carpet building a few blocks north of Union Square on 19th St. The place specializes in tapas, which to me is nothing but slightly fancy party snacks, but there were a few entree-type items on the menu.

Of all things, I ordered the shrimp pot pie and no appetizer. There was also some bistec served on a bed of mushrooms with a veal stock reduction for sauce that sounded really good, too.

I was sitting next to a guy who ordered an appetizer shrimp cobb salad that was huge, so he shared it with me. It was good, but I only had a few bites. They didn't skimp on the shrimp. I figured the pot pie would be plenty for dinner, and far better than anything Stouffer's my mom used to leave for the babysitter to pop in the oven when I was a kid. It was, but the crust, far from being flaky as advertised on the menu, was rather undercooked beneath the very top layer and sort of had to be pulled apart. But the inside was really good and creamy. Fortunately, the entire "pie" wasn't much bigger than a ramekin, or there's no way I could have eaten the whole thing.

I've read mixed reviews of the place. It was pretty good, but not stellar. For Spanish food, I actually prefer Bolo, but I suppose this was a little different. The mojitos were good. I'd never had one before and was wondering what all the fuss was about, so when a bunch of others ordered them, I ordered one, too.

I skipped out at 8:05, before dessert, to catch an 8:44 train, which got me home around 10:00. Most of the suburbanites do that, and the out-of-towners who come in for these meetings stick around later. The day's long enough as it is, and we have an Operations Committee meeting tomorrow that'll run from 8:30 through lunch time. I really hate these meetings. They drag on forever.

Enough for tonight. Time to hit the sack. I can't wait for this holiday weekend when we can celebrate Valentine's Day for real. I vote Italian, but French will do if L'Allegria's booked.

I hate days like this and tomorrow. Two days solid worth of management meetings. And I have to stick around for dinner out after today's, meaning I won't get home until 10 pm at the earliest.

I couldn't connect to my hard drive remotely via VPN, so I had to use Secure LogMeIn, which worked, but when I forwarded my office email attachments to myself at home to print out and edit to present this afternoon, the friggin' email didn't arrive within a few minutes for me to printo out here, so I had to print them out at the office. I won't be able to edit them on the train on the way in. Darn meeting starts at 8:00 am (8:30 if you skip b'fast). Fine for the out-of-towners, but for those of us who have nearly two hour commutes, it's a bitch.

Six to twelve inches, my kiester! We already have 18" and it's still coming down pretty heavy. At least we all knew this was coming and prepared ourselves to batten down the hatches and go nowhere. Since I live in a private subdivision, our landscapers have started to plow a little, but the township hasn't bothered. It will later in the day because it really doesn't need a headache during morning rush tomorrow. If for some reason I can't get to the train station tomorrow, I have full office connectivity from home, right down to my office desktop computer's hard drive; I just have to call a non-toll-free to get my voice mail.

As you can see from this picture, we have snow in abundance. It's not as much as the blizzard of January 1996, I think it was when a roof slide dumped enough snow on my patio that I couldn't see daylight out the sliders at all. That patio railing is just above waist height on me, so that gives you an idea. Yes, I took the picturefrom inside, through the screen door, so that's what that funky looking grid is. Tha patio fireplace is pretty much buried under snow over there in the corner.

My dad called earlier. His snowblower's basically useless when it's this deep, so he's shoveling his driveway the old fashioned way a little at a time with frequent breaks. Poor guy. He's in his late 70s. I wish I could go over to help, but I can't even get out of my driveway in the car yet, let alone drive two towns away to help him shovel. At least he's smart enough to take it a little at a time, and his driveway's only 40' long.

It should be fun trying to commute tomorrow. I have "all weather radials," which basically means rain tires, on my car. No snow tires, and chains are illegal here. Yes, I know how to drive on snow and ice, but I don't relish it. I can anticipate when some jerk's going to go skidding through a red light and t-bone me if I actually go when I get the green, but I can't do a damn thing about getting rear-ended while I'm stationary at a stop light. Fortunately, most people around here know to take it slow and not tailgate when it's slippery out. But there's always some jerk in a huge SUV who thinks that "four wheel drive" = "stops on a dime," when it means no such thing. I just hope that jerk isn't the one behind me.

It's a Pete Yorn evening. Listen to a few of his tracks here. Jersey boy who moved to Cali. Easily as listenable as Southside or Bruce. Suh-weet!

So here's the start to my alleged blizzard weekend: wake up Saturday, and there's no snow yet. I had to phone in an order to the vet to ask for a refill Rx of 100 syringes, with no drug to go with it. My vial of insulin is perhaps 1/3 used for my cat, so I still have plenty of that left, but I was down to four syringes. Since there is a CVS pharmacy on my way home from the vet, which I have to visit anyway to pick up a case of Purina DM (diabetes management) cat food, I had them phone in the Rx for the syringes there, but CVS has no previous record of her on file. God only knows what the pharmacist is going to think when I show up to buy syringes, but no insulin to go with it... Her original Rx for both was at a different pharmacy one town away.

The vet's assistant estimated it'd be an hour or two before the Rx was ready, so I sit and wait here, have another mug of coffee, etc. So far, the snow hasn't hit. There's no point in driving over there to the vet to get the case of cat food before the pharmacy can have my 100-pack of needles ready for me to pick up. The vet and CVS are roughly half a mile apart, with the vet being the furthest away from my house. I have to drive past the pharmacy anyway to get to and from the vet, but that strip mall is not easy to pull out of, into traffic, unless I'm extremely patient and wait for someone to take pity on me and wave me on in front of them while the light's red, anyway.

Here's a link to the whole procedure I have to perform on my poor old fart kitty every evening after her dinner. The pictures there speak louder than words. Fortunately, she's a really good kitty, and I'm very quick about it, so she doesn't even flinch. She only needs two units a day, not the 17-18 you see in the syringe picture above, so even though a thumb-sized vial of insulin costs ~ $80, it lasts a long time.

[edit--I finally got her syringes from the original pharmacy this afternoon. Phew!]

Looks like we're going to get hammered over the weekend. There are 6-12" predicted for my entire state. None of this "am I borderline, so it could go either way?" nonsense. Break out the X-C skis, baby. Better yet the telemark ones, because they're better at breaking trail. I doubt anyone's going anywhere this weekend, because chances are our subdivision won't even start to get plowed until the snow's almost stopped. The Township may try to keep up with going around 3-4 times as it continues to snow, but it didn't last time we got a good 8+", so I doubt it will now. I think it only bothers doing that if the snow happens during the work week and they're worried about morning or evening rush.

Naturally, I stopped by the grocery store on my way home from the train station, and as expected, it was a mob scene, because everybody else had the same idea. This might be a good weekend to make a batch of lasagne, chili, or risotto. Maybe even mac & cheese from scratch, venison stew, or pork chops with applesauce. Milk, check. Pasta, check. Cheese, check. Tomato sauce, check. Burger, check. Beans, check. Arborio rice, check. Chicken stock, check. Venison, check. Potatoes, check. Onions, check. Garlic, check. Carrots, check. Pork chops, check. Apples, check. There are a LOT of possibilities given those ingredients.

Stay warm and dry everyone!

Batphones and boneheads. That's the theme for this evening. I was on a conference call with my boss in my office, with the door closed and had the phone on speaker. We're right smack dab in the middle of the call with a client when my cell phone rang. It was buried in my briefcase on the floor in the corner. I dug it out flipped it open and immediately shut it. Well, by god, it immediately rang again, so I figured I'd just flip over the briefcase to muffle the noise a bit (the ring volume was pretty low to begin with) and let it go to voice mail. Four rings went by and it stopped, so I figured voice mail got it. Apparently not, because moments later it started ringing again, and I whipped my coat off the back of my chair and tossed it on top of the briefcase to further muffle the noise, and it stopped after four rings. Put the speakerphone on mute and told my boss "unless somebody just died, there's no excuse for that during office hours--other than myself only half a dozen people even have my cell number, and they know not to call during office hours." Took the speakerphone off mute, and we finished the client call.

Half an hour later the "batphone" in the hallway on top of a file cabinet started to ring. Now that's the hotline emergency phone to use when someone has a heart attack or something other than a fire (different procedures for a fire). It never rings--well maybe twice in almost three years. The guy whose office is across the hall went out and answered it, then hung up. Ten minutes later it rang again, and the person in the cube around the corner answered it then hung up. Next time it rings, I'm really tempted to answer it myself and say "This is Commissioner Gordon." Yes the phone is a really old-fashioned looking model and it really is red. It looks just like the batphone except that it has a numeric keypad instead of a rotary dial.

Moving on to bonehead...Fat Albert (named in memory of the tv show) or FA for short, was emailing from LA where he's a sales associate, saying he was having problems getting CampaignRF to run using the .flt file I sent him after he edited it. Okay, he didn't need to edit it, because I had already done the necessary editing for him, and I made that clear in my email, but he went ahead and dicked around with it, screwing it up in the process. Ed and I had to tell him to just use the one I sent as is, and reinstall it. That worked.

Then he emailed again saying he was getting an error message about Telecume not having filters for age 10+. I don't know what version of those two .flt files he was using, but I sent him mine since they worked for me. Okay those worked for him, too. Then he emailed to say he was having a problem with the filter file for CinemaCume when he tried to combine in cinema advertising audiences to Wal-Mart in-store tv (proprietary database for a client, set up like magazines), regular tv (TeleCume), and movie theaters (CinemaCume). He was even generous enough to take a screenshot and dump it into Powerpoint and attach it. Why he can't just drop it into the email body so I can read it inline without having to open a huge attachment is beyond me.

Well, wouldn't you know it? First off, there is no filter file associated with the CinemaCume app--it uses the one from the app from which it originally cloned--TeleCume. Second, the error message said nothing about a filter--it said that the TeleCume app couldn't find the age 2+ demographic it needed. I pointed this out and suggested he go into TeleCume and create it. That worked! He was astonished.

My thought cloud: FA, if you bothered to actually read the error message before you panicked and sent out an SOS about it, it told you exactly what it was looking for, and it didn't have the word filter in it at all. It said "demo," not "filter." That's your clue. It wasn't even a CampaignRF error message; it was a TeleCume one. He's friendly, he's nice, but he's a real bonehead.

The scariest thing is that he actually mans the client hotline in out LA office.

And you know, this just all circles right back into the batphone theme. Since the QA/Product Development person was working from home, I became FA's hotline "go-to" person today. It's not my job to do that, but I got stuck with it because I actually know what the fuck I'm doing, and happened to be available.

Here's a link to perhaps the only country band I like. These ladies can play, and they look really hot to this middle aged lady. I never looked that good even when I was in my 20s. Introducing Cowboy Crush. That's where they have their new song called "Hillbilly Nation" posted. Well, it's just a clip, but it's a toe tapper. Enjoy. I'm on their email list and got an email from them this evening. The fact that I would even join their email list goes to show how much I like them.

My cat has been like this for the past few days. It's driving me nuts. She can't sit still. On my lap, back down on the floor, up on top of the table, across my keyboard or over the mouse and back on my lap. Pick a spot, girl, and stick with it, will you?

Here's a link to something funny--it's a flash media clip. The Farting Preacher ones are good as well. I've seen them before, but was reminded of their existence by AdvertisingSux when I read her latest blog entry this evening. She had found the farting preacher. Just don't have the volume up too loud if you view them in the office, or people will wonder whether you finally lost it. You can tell I'm bored this evening. I hate Mondays.

And here's a hat tip to se7en for creating this nifty new template for me. I'm really happy with his work. I was in no rush, but from the time of first inquiry to having it up and posted was a matter of a couple of days after I lost one day replying back with some basic preferences. Looks as good in Inept Explorer as it does in Firefox. Now we know why back in my ad agency days I was a media research director (numbers nerd), not an art director. The cost is quite reasonable, turnaround's quick, and I would highly recommend him.

No, he didn't ask me to plug his work. I elected to do so on my own. There's nothing wrong with a little word of mouth advertising. If LisaBinDaCity hadn't given him a free plug, I'd never have known he could do this sort of thing.

Halftime Show

Bill Cowher vs. Mike Holmgren?

Wow, the Rolling Stones were really sad. Mick looked like a fucking fool. And the crowd went wild. Okay, The Stones are The Stones, but when you're 60+ and look like a corpse, you look stupid trying to look cool. Don't get me wrong. Mick tried really, really hard! But I wouldn't pay to see this live.

~Froggie

[edit--Steelers won, baby! Yay!]

American Expressionless. Normally, I have no problem with them, but the bottom line is call, instead of trying the internet route to them. Voice jail is better than their website!

Pay via phone, not internet, nor snail mail. It's easier, and that's saying a LOT. Online has a serious lag time which I don't like. I've paid my bill via phone, but it still shows my previous balance 15 minutes later online. And for this, I had to mute my tv during the Super Bowl? It's not right.

Horse races. I love watching them, and am doing so on tv now, but as a rider myself, I can't help but wonder about a few things. Why whip the horse? Especially during a race, you can just whisper in its ear. If the horse likes you, it will comply, and if not, you shouldn't be riding it. No, I've never read The Horse Whisperer, and have no desire to read it, nor do I have any desire to see the movie. I'm sorry, but that's the end of it.

THIS is a Valentine's Day present? Buy six and save a bunch? Don't get me wrong; I love Cabela's and I don't want to buy my guy anything he doesn't want, but socks?

On the other hand, he's getting me lightbulbs. At our ages, we go by needs.

We could spend a year laughing over this.

Yes, we will have a nice fancy dinner out, but other than that, it's a crapshoot.