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Wednesday, July 8th, 2009
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7:14 pm - linkblargh
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I have mostly switched to posting my links on Twitter. If you're interested in what I'm reading or thinking about these days, follow me there (same username as here).
Anyways, I have a lot of links I want to post, so here they are:
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0709/24722.html - Woah, the Democrat half of the House Intelligence Committee just accused the CIA of lying to them.
http://www.woot.com/Blog/ViewEntry.aspx?Id=8677 - humorous commentary on the proposed Google OS.
Article on how to convince a conservative to support public transportation.
http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2009/07/03/how-driving-a-car-into-manhattan-costs-160/ - brilliant analysis on money, traffic, and time.
Just in general, Infrastructurist is totally my new favorite blog. Urban planning, awesome!
http://www.stopthewaronfun.org/ - local morality cops have been persecuting owners of SF nightclubs, and it fucking sucks. Stop the war on fun!
http://www.kansascity.com/105/story/1293020.html - Ecstasy pills showing up as cartoon characters, mostly full of anti-worm medication BZP instead of MDMA
Inverse zombies, anesthesia awareness, and the hard problem of unconsciousness.
http://pugetsoundoff.org/how-to - great collection of digital media how-tos
http://www.flickr.com/photos/george_eastman_house/sets/72157606226772243/ - autochromes on Flickr
http://www.vanityfair.com/online/oscars/2009/06/qa-the-lyme-disease-controversy.html - interesting notes on Lyme Disease, and the complex of interrelated diseases that includes Chronic Fatigue, Alzheimer's, ALS, Fibromyalgia, MS, etc.
http://www.slate.com/id/2221397/ http://asert.arbornetworks.com/2009/06/iranian-traffic-engineering/ http://asert.arbornetworks.com/2009/06/a-deeper-look-at-the-iranian-firewall/ - three articles on the Iranian internet surveillance system; much more complex and scary than China's, by a lot.
That's good for now. There will probably be more soon.
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| Tuesday, July 7th, 2009
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12:41 am - Iowa
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My poor grandmother is about to lose a leg. She's had a staph infection in one of her replacement knees for the last year and a half, and they took it out hoping it could heal up. Turns out it had done too much damage, so she's faced with amputation. It looks like my dad and I are going out there to be moral support over this upcoming weekend. Sad for the occasion, grateful that we can be there for her when she needs someone.
Do any of my friends in Greater Freakistan know awesome weird people or places in the Des Moines area? Dad and I will probably spend most of our time with Grandma, but it would be nice to have someone to chat with or know cool places to go to spend a little time not worrying about family stuff.
Edit: Looks like we're going out sometime in August, not this weekend as we'd been thinking.
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| Sunday, May 24th, 2009
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3:57 pm - KallistiCon 2009: June 12-14!
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Hail Eris,
KallistiCon 2009 approaches at breakneck speed. Come join us in Oakland, CA for a weekend of craziness, ritual, inspiration, laughter, and pineal stimulation.
June 12-14
http://www.kallisticon.com
If you wish to attend, please email stmae@discordian.com as soon as you're aware of your intentions.
All hail Discordia,
St. Mae
stmae@discordian.com
--><--
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| Thursday, May 21st, 2009
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10:53 pm - film
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In the process of cleaning my house, I've found about fifty rolls of film that I need to develop. Until I get a job (or generous benefactor), I'm going to develop one a week.
This is the first roll, color 200 Kodak 36 pictures from my recent trip to Egypt. These pictures were taken at Karnak.
On my Flickr, there's a set for pictures from Egypt, and a set for highlights from the trip. Right now there's only 36 pictures, but I'll continue to add new ones to the set whenever I get more developed. I'll put the best ones in the highlights set, in hopes that people will look at them before they get exhausted from looking at an obscene number of pictures in the other set.
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| Friday, May 15th, 2009
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10:33 am - trust & public officials
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Yesterday, I posted this to Twitter:
...between a politician and the CIA, which one would you assume is more likely to be lying? would D or R politician change the answer?
There's a pretty interesting discussion of the subject on my Facebook wall (kill me now, I said there was something interesting on Facebook). As a number of people guessed, this was sparked by the Pelosi-CIA situation about waterboarding.
It's a complex story, so I'll summarize for those who haven't spent some time reading up. The CIA claims that Nancy Pelosi was briefed in February 2002 that they were using "enhanced interrogation techniques" (ie torture) on terrorism detainees. At the time, she was the ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee. In late summer 2003 she was elected House Minority Leader, which meant she left the Intelligence Committee (where she was replaced by Rep. Jane Harman as the ranking Democrat). Additionally, the CIA says that in September 2003, they briefed a Pelosi staffer and Rep. Jane Harman on their use of waterboarding. Harman was so upset by the revelations that she wrote a letter of protest to the President and the CIA about it.
The reason this is in the news now is that the Republicans are claiming Pelosi was complicit in torture, and thus has no grounds to call for a Truth Commission to investigate the Bush administration.
This Politico article has more details.
I have a complex reaction to the story. On the one hand, Pelosi is claiming that the CIA misled her in 2002 and all they really said is that the Bush administration was claiming legal basis for the use of enhanced interrogation techniques, *not* that they were actually using them. Given my understanding of and assumptions about the CIA culture, I imagine this to be true. Not only that, but she was legally bound not to let the information out to the public. She wasn't the Minority Whip at the time, just a House rep, so she didn't have a whole lot of power even if she had somehow managed to let the information slip. Additionally, she was probably engaged in an extremely delicate and complicated situation as she vied to become the Minority Whip when Gephardt retired in 2003. Even if she did know, I'm not sure I blame her. My guess is that she was briefed in a misleading way, but also probably chose the path of willful ignorance.
One thing I do really admire about Pelosi is how well she's kept the Democrats together on votes. I don't always agree with her choices (let's face it, I'm not exactly a centrist), but the way she's kept the party together is extremely difficult and has been significantly more effective than previous party leadership. Her operation strategy largely seems to be that so long as something on her agenda gets done, it doesn't matter who does it. She's been willing to take political hits for unpopular actions because she's in a very safe district, but she gets other reps to do as much as possible without her name on the action. While I don't always like where she goes, I do admire how she leads. On this theme, I don't have a problem with her not adding her own signature to Harman's letter of protest.
At the same time, yeah, it kind of does make her a hypocrite.
The big thing I'm worried about is that Republicans - mostly people who outright condone torture - will use this to block the Truth Commission. Whether or not Pelosi is something of a hypocrite (which, shouldn't that be obvious by now? after all, this is the woman who blocked Bush impeachment) shouldn't matter to whether or not we call these assholes out. A Truth Commission is important for us to heal some of the wounds of the last 8 years. Even if it's half-assed and biased, I'd like to live in a country that at least investigates some high ranking criminals.
All of this made me wonder about how much trust we place in government officials. In general, I assume that politicians and CIA members and similar persons will be lying a certain percentage of the time. Some will lie for scandalous reasons (adultery and prostitution and homosexuality, oh my!), some will lie for financial reasons (Haliburton, etc.), some will lie for perceived reasons of national security (weapons development, troop deployments, spies, interrogations, etc.). While I don't agree with everything perceived to be a national security risk, I do support lying about some of this stuff - for example, I don't think that weapons in development or troop deployments need to be on the national news, that's just basic security.
So just how much do politicians and the CIA lie? Do Republicans and Democrats lie the same percentage of the time? Do they lie about the same things, or different things? Do you think politicians or the CIA lie more frequently? Which of these lies do you care about (for example, I really don't care when politicians sleep with prostitutes except that they keep pushing anti-sexwork legislation)? What percentage and types of these lies do you think are justified, if any?
I know a number of my friends and readers here are anarchists who want to entirely remove the system. If you're going to answer the questions above, do so within the constraints of our current political system. Whether we should get rid of the system or not is a totally different discussion, and the role of truth and deception in a different system would obviously make for a different set of answers.
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| Monday, May 4th, 2009
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9:41 pm - more news of the Empress Norton
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| Saturday, May 2nd, 2009
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4:19 pm - may 1
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Last night I went to an awesome reading at Modern Times in SF. It was an interactive reading of manifestos, where members of the audience and performers read snippets of manifestos interweaving and interrupting each other. I had such a good time! It was like someone had done a Burroughs cutup of manifestos, and we read them with anger and passion and hilarity. They had provided pages with clips of various manifestos, so I got a chance to read a couple of things. I really enjoy dramatic reading, and it kind of made me want to write poetry so I could read more at other things.
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) badgerbag had organized it, and she posted a lengthy review (with quotes! and usernames!) over at Dreamwidth: Manifesto review.
I got to read part of the Bitch Mutant Manifesto, which now having read the whole thing I have kind of fallen in love with. Bitch Mutant Manifesto. Read it, it's fucking awesome.
Afterward, I went to see sarahdopp for her birthday madness at Bender's (happy birthday, again!). There I met up with neuroptik and dahveed76 and other lovely people.
Talking about potential futures with charliegrrrl, I mentioned imomus' recent brilliant post on Berlinification. Berlinification. I've been thinking about this piece since I read it. If you're interested in potential futures, read this post.
neuroptik and dahveed76 decided we were tired of shouting over the music, so we headed out to get pearl tea at Quickly in the Inner Richmond. Ask me to explain in person, but there was a mistranslation of the word "seed" on the video menu that resulted in a slide that purported to sell Semen. WTF. Seriously, go there and watch the video monitor of menu items for a while. OMG.
Heading home after dropping them off, I realized I needed a bathroom and didn't want to wait until I got back to the east bay (longtime readers will remember I live in Oakland now). I stopped off at Noisebridge (local hacker space where people can generally be found at all hours) thinking I'd be there for a couple minutes. An acquaintance who I'd been meaning to get to know for a while was one of the only people there, and we wound up having a really awesome conversation about life the universe and everything. I left four hours later....
Tonight, I meet up with my beloved metaphorge (fresh from his anniversary celebration with darkmoon - happy anniversary, pretties!) to head to A Touch of Pleasure, the opening reception for an art exhibit that includes the steam-powered vibrator a friend of ours made.
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| Wednesday, April 29th, 2009
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8:42 pm - SFBA: unemployed & daytime available people
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I wanted to get a list together of my friends who are unemployed and/or around during the weekdays.
Here's why:
1. Let's help each other get jobs! Sometimes in my job-ad-crawling, I find ads that don't fit me but would be a perfect fit for a friend. Similarly, I have some friends who work in recruitment at large local tech companies. They've been generous enough to pass my resume around, and I bet they'd be up for extending that to my friends if there happens to be a job that might fit your skills. You probably know people too. Why don't we pool our contacts, forward job ads to each other, etc.?
Comment and tell me what you're looking to do and where, and if I see anything that fits your skills or know anyone who can help, I'll ping you for a resume and email address. If you're hiring or know someone who is, check out the comments here!
2. Let's hang out! I really do have a lot of stuff to do around the house so I can't go play all the time, but it would be really nice to know who's around for a spontaneous picnic in the park or coffee on my way to the bank or whatever. This obviously extends to friends who aren't looking for work and are around during the day - stay at home mothers, students, self-employed masseuses, tech contractors, etc. It's really easy to get a little isolated by staying home all day, so it's good to have an idea of who is around.
Make sure I have your contact info (you can email tyrsalvia@lj if you don't want to post here) and a general idea of where you live.
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| Friday, April 17th, 2009
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5:45 pm - gratitude
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today is my birthday. i am 31.
this year, i am feeling adored and remembered by people i don't see often enough. some birthdays have felt invisible but for the party and my family, but this year so many people unbidden have wished me a happy birthday on facebook and twitter and even here on lj. there have even been phone calls! i didn't post about this (until after the well wishes had poured in, anyways). i didn't ask for this. i have friends and affection, unasked for.
and that is the greatest gift of all.
so grateful for my friends and my partner and my family today. feeling apprehensive about the future, but capable of tackling it and trusting and held up by the network of people who care. thank you.
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| Tuesday, April 14th, 2009
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9:24 am - laid off, looking for work & laptop
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One thing I didn't mention about my trip is that the day before, I got laid off. (On April Fool's. On my 6th anniversary with Fox. Sigh.)
As you all know, I was really super happy with my last job, and I'm pretty sad not to work there anymore. On the other hand, I got laid off with luminaries like the head of the business development team and the VP of Sales, so I guess I don't feel too lame. And hey, I have a lot more free time now.
So that means... I need a MacBook(Pro) and a new job. Can you help?
First the computer: I was able to use my work machine in and out of the office, so I didn't spend the money to get myself a nice machine. Now I'm stuck either using one of the house machines (not in a comfortable position for personal use), sharing a computer with Fox (what a good way to hate each other quickly!), or using my ancient Windows laptop. I can make do, but I'd be much happier with a MacBook(Pro) of my own. Got one to give away? Got one to sell for not too much? Got one I can borrow for a few months? Let me know, I'm interested.
The job: I'm looking for another support gig, or potentially a NOC engineer position. I am at my best when I can work at the intersection of people and technology, and I really actually enjoy doing tech support at an enterprise level. My skills are mostly Unixy, but I've done work with Windows and Mac platforms as well. I'm hoping to work in SoMa again, or somewhere in SF or Oakland close to BART. Failing that, I'm happy to go as far as the peninsula, but San Jose is a bit out of my range. Know of any opportunities? Please send them my way. For that matter, feel free to pass around my resume to anyone you think might possibly be hiring. It's a tough time out there, and anything my network can do to help would be hugely appreciated.
My support resume: http://AutumnTyrSalvia.emurse.com/
My NOC resume: http://AutumnTyrSalvia.emurse.com/NOC/
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| Sunday, April 12th, 2009
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9:18 am - home again home again
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We got back yesterday. The trip was a whirlwind - every day, we were touring for at least 6 hours. Either I was in awe of ancient ruins, fascinated by ...something, or exhausted. There was no time for reflection. Now I need to talk, think, look at pictures, daydream....
Anyways, I'll post moments from the trip in the next few days. I managed to send postcards to most of you, but not quite everyone (very sorry if I missed you!).
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| Thursday, March 26th, 2009
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11:00 pm - travel shopping
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I feel like I'm dressing up to be another person with the travel shopping I've been doing. (Uh, did I mention this in a public post here? I'm going to Egypt with metaphorge and darkmoon and her family! Next week!)
I'm buying clothes I like, but mostly things I wouldn't buy under other circumstances - long sleeved loose cotton shirts, brown things, etc. I bought a white straw-style wide brim floppy hat, even (though I may take it back, still deciding). I bought pants that aren't jeans!
I'm going to feel a little colonial in my formal cotton women's wear. I shall make sure to tip the natives, request tea, and use words like "shall" on a regular basis.
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| Wednesday, February 11th, 2009
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9:36 am - confess (Happy V-Day)
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Inspired by a friend of a friend, my own dreaming, and a hope that anyone still reads this thing....
This post is an anonymous confessional, Valentines-themed. Tell us what you need to go make your life more amazing and more delicious in the months to come. Tell us your love-pain, broken hearts and demons that wake you up at night. Tell us your undeclared crushes, your hot fantasies, stories about sexy things you've done lately. Make us cry, make us wet, make us feel human.
I am going to screen the comments here just for today, just to get the ball rolling. I will unscreen everything tonight or tomorrow (unless you specifically request that I not), so come back to read it then.
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| Saturday, February 7th, 2009
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1:28 am - musical obsessions
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I came back to LJ, but I haven't found as much of my desire to write. It's not that things aren't going on, just that I guess I've come to enjoy the quiet voice of my own narrative when it stays less linear in my head. So instead, I will share with you the music I've been obsessively listening to over the last few months:
Metric - fierce girl electropop
MGMT - funky electropop
Pinback - omg a new favorite band, melodic and sometimes disconnected dreamy indie rock
The Trucks - sexy dirty electroclash that kinda makes me want to fuck
Other names that I'm not quite up for describing, but if you're interested in doing some searching I highly recommend: Santogold, of Montreal, Meat Beat Manifesto, Mates of State, Felix da Housecat, Cansei de Ser Sexy (CSS), Black Moth Super Rainbow.
It's all so good, this music. It makes me writhe and dance and feel possessed. Loud and surrounding me, it washes over me like an orgasm and I am compelled to flow through it. So good.
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| Saturday, January 10th, 2009
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6:06 pm - French Postcard Artist Needs Help
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Check out this story:
Should posting the image below lead to three years of jail time and $100,000 in fines?
I first encountered this on R6XX's blog (check out R6XX - they sell art and books and a bunch of cool stuff, and they're friends of mine), and I've been sending the story to as many mail art groups as I know. I sent it to Wooster Collective (the first link in this post), and I'm glad to see they've picked it up. I've also sent it to PostSecret and Boing Boing, and I hope they'll post it too.
I know I send collage postcards through the mail, and this story really struck a chord with me. Please pass it on.
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| Wednesday, December 31st, 2008
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1:05 pm - be it resolved that:
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in 2009:
1. my friends, family and loves shall all be safe and healthy.
2. i shall be safe and healthy.
3. i shall travel more.
4. i shall actually get my house in order, and comfortably decorated.
5. i shall attend to my personal flaws, and grow as a person.
6. i shall get my accounts in order.
7. i shall engage in sustained fun on a regular basis.
8. i shall continue to get better at being a co-worker, friend, lover, and partner.
9. i shall work on interesting projects.
Yes?
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| Saturday, December 27th, 2008
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6:55 pm - ten years of discordian.com
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Hail Eris!
Today marks the 10th anniversary of Discordian.com.
In 1998, I was working tech support for an internet company. I spent a lot of time online, and I got to thinking that maybe it would be cool to get my own domain. I didn't want just a vanity site, I thought maybe I'd get something that sounded a little more interesting. Bored at work on Christmas, I noticed that Discordian.com was available. I'd already spent a couple of years as a regular in alt.discordia, and my username at my old ISP was haileris. I thought about it a couple of days. Why not? I registered Discordian.com on December 27th, 1998.
I had no idea to what extent Discordian.com would shape my life. I have met so many amazing people because of Discordian.com!
I put up a truly awful site that I made with godawful Paintshop and HTML skillz, and left it alone for a year or two. Then I paid a web designer to help me build Discordian.com 2.0, which was a pretty decent page for a long time.
When I met metaphorge, sparks flew and we created the Discordian.com 3.0 that you see today. He's done an immense amount of work on the site, and I can't wait to see what we come up with together next. We have hopes for a Discordian.com 4.0 sometime in the new year, and I know that our creative partnership will really make it shine.
In 2000, KallistiCon was born. johnnybrainwash puts in a ton of work every year to help make KallistiCon go, as does metaphorge.
Besides these names, we've had help from many others. People have written for Discordian.com, allowed us to present, joined us in ritual, helped us with hosting and technical issues, helped out at KallistiCon with cat herding and dish washing. We've had an audience - people have read the site, commented on it, helped us make it better. We have been deeply inspired by the Discordian community - yes, community!
Thank you.
We have a number of things planned to mark our 10th; we hope you'll join us in our celebrations. Here's to our next ten!
All hail Discordia.
-St. Mae, Discordian.com
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| Thursday, December 25th, 2008
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3:13 am - Coho bots!
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One of the strange and lovely features of the internet is the Coho/Salmon/Trout/Hat/Taco bot phenomena. This delights me! Someone has created bots that go searching through recently updated websites like LJ, Twitter, Xanga and similar and connects people via IM. It sends a message to each person, so they each think they've been messaged first.
Right after you've posted to LJ, ever gotten a message from someone named something like thecharminghat or transparentcoho? This is what's going on.
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/community.gif) themissinghat is a community to talk about this, post conversations, etc. There's even a page to request a fishbot, if you're bored and want to chat up someone random!
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2:41 am - salty cheerios
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anyone else make this? it's sort of the chex mix of cheerios.
cheerios
olive oil
soy sauce
worcestershire sauce
garlic powder
brewer's yeast (optional)
metaphorge thinks i'm crazy for this, but it's tasty.
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| Tuesday, December 16th, 2008
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11:30 am - email I am sending right now re: last night's Amanda Palmer show
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Amanda said, "this is going on the list of strange things I've signed."
To : [woman from Des Moines Craig's List looking to sell large plastic alligator]
Cc :
Attchmnt:
Subject : RE: plastic alligator
----- Message Text -----
I realize this is going to sound strange, but would you potentially ship it to me? I'm in California.
About 8 years ago, a friend [note: see merovingian] gave me 5 of these large plastic alligators as a Christmas present. I wasn't sure what to do with them, so they wound up living in the trunk of my car. Over the years I've brought them out for all sorts of silly things - impromptu alligator sword fights and parades, mostly. I once played one as a musical instrument in a marching band.
Last night, I was at a concert. My friends and I were part of the performance. Needing props in a hurry, we broke out the alligators. Anyways, at the end of the night we wound up getting the alligators signed by Amanda Palmer, the woman whose performance we were at. I gave one to each of my people, so we each now have an autographed alligator.
The sad note to all of this is that these alligators have strangely come in handy over the last 8 years, and these three can no longer live in my car lest the autographs wear off. One will be moving a couple of hours away. I am in need of replacement alligators.
I have been searching the internet high and low, to little avail. I have found a few potential alligator replacements, but yours looks to be the exact alligator model I have.
I'll understand if you're seeking only a local home and thus an easy transfer for your large plastic alligator, and yet I'm hoping that offering my ridiculous story may inspire you to take pity on two lonely car-trunk alligators seeking a third to help re-establish their colony.
I can mail you a money order, or pay you via PayPal. I am of course willing to pay shipping fees.
Would you do me the favor of mailing this alligator to me?
Sincere thanks,
Autumn Tyr-Salvia
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