saturday

Regis and I put Gus in the back seat and motored to Mankato yesterday. We had our usual errands to do and then we stopped at Pet Expo. I wonder why people think your dogs want to visit. Or they stop to compare dog genetics. Our dog is part poodle, too, one guy tells me. I think he should spend his disposable income on dental work and a laundromat instead of dog food.

They also want the dogs to meet each other. I don't really think Gus cares about meeting other dogs in the pet store. What are they going to do...set up a coffee date? My dog does not need to meet every scruffy Shitzu that comes through the door. The whole thing makes me nervous.

I find myself struggling a bit to write here. I think I should avoid politics because you can't write about that without extreme sarcasm, I avoid religion because I don't want to offend people, I should avoid sports. What's left? Do I issue disclaimers at the beginning of each post?

Irony and sarcasm...it's what I do best.

I could be cranky today. It looks like Siberia outside today and it's wearing me out. I'm reading Ian Frazier's book about Siberia which I love but it could be a poor choice for reading material during the drudge of a Minnesota winter. I ordered Mile Marker Zero: The Moveable Fest of Key West. Here's a review from Amazon:

For Hemingway and Fitzgerald, there was Paris in the twenties. For others, later, there was Greenwich Village, Big Sur, and Woodstock. But for an even later generation—one defined by the likes of Jimmy Buffett, Tom McGuane, and Hunter S. Thompson—there was another moveable feast: KeyWest, Florida.
The small town on the two-by-four-mile island has long been an artistic haven, a wild refuge for people of all persuasions, and the inspirational home for a league of great American writers. Some of the artists went there to be literary he-men. Some went to re-create themselves. Others just went to disappear—and succeeded. No matter what inspired the trip, Key West in the seventies was the right place at the right time, where and when an astonishing collection of artists wove a web of creative inspiration.
Mile Marker Zero tells the story of how these writers and artists found their identities in Key West and maintained their friendships over the decades, despite oceans of booze and boatloads of pot, through serial marriages and sexual escapades, in that dangerous paradise.
Unlike the “Lost Generation” of Paris in the twenties, we have a generation that invented, reinvented, and found itself at the unending cocktail party at the end—and the beginning—of America’s highway.

Speaking of copying an Amazon review into my blog. Regis and I have been bantering lately about the SOPA legislation. Here's an example of how it might work. Because I have copywrited material here, I am in violation and they could shut me down. Of course, I'm not sure how they'd know or who "they" are but that's the issue.

Another interesting thing. I have a lot of music on my computer. Most of it purchased through iTunes because I thought that was the honest thing to do. I decided to transfer it all to the Google cloud so when my computer goes belly up, as they all eventually do...my music would still be there only in the cloud.

So, as I start to upload it, none of the songs that I purchased would go because they are in an mp4 format which means that iTunes has them encoded with DRM. Digital Registry Management code. iTunes thinks I only rented those songs from them and therefore what I can do with them is limited.

I could copy them onto a CD then load them again and it would work...but doesn't that seem like a lot of work?

Songs I have gotten through less legal means, say someone lets me copy a CD they own onto my computer, belong to me but not something I purchased. Weird.

If these cloud people are going to examine each and every syllable of music that I store in their vaults, they should start examining every syllable of written prose people try to store. How can they ever police this?

And yes, I know this is a rant that most people don't care a fig about.

Yesterday, I wore a bright red sweater and my red Norwegian wrap. I wore my white lambswool scarf. The old dudes in the coffee shop hooted and said I looked like Mrs. Santa. Sure enough, I went into Kohl's and heard several small children asking their moms if I was Mrs. Santa. Even the lady behind the customer service desk said she did a double take. Did she really think I was Mrs. Santa? What a hoot.

Ella is coming over today to decorate the Valentine tree. I bought three strings of red and pink lights, a bunch of shiny hearts, and some other gaudy stuff. She will love it. I found a red sparkly dress on the Christmas clearance rack that will be perfect for Valentine's Day. If it were my size, I'd be wearing it!

All for now. There could be Valentine tree photos later.