Yeah, that is my President. The coolest guy in the room, in a geeky sort of way. Can anyone seriously imagine any of the GOP clown-car-of-crazy pulling this off? Anyone?? Yeah…didn’t think so 
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- Please support #opsafe through CRASH Japan (Christian Relief, Assistance, Support and Hope) http://t.co/L7Oxiaii #DT @operationSAFE 2 days ago
- RT @thefix: You still haven't told me who the most underrated president is? You have 24 more hours! http://t.co/E37PqvAt // Carter 2 days ago
- RT @marcmaron: Where do we hang out once our parents figure out this Twitter thing? // google + 5 days ago
- Proceeds from the beautiful children's book "Ricky the Bear" help children recover from trauma http://t.co/0iKBdc7c #DT @operationSAFE 6 days ago
- Anyone want to hang out this evening? 1 week ago
- Who wants to hang out tonight? Dinner? MUST leave house. Long story. 1 week ago
- @hellonheelz Their heads just exploded. in reply to hellonheelz 1 week ago
- @KeithOlbermann Please feel better soon. in reply to KeithOlbermann 1 week ago
- OpSAFE is running camps in Tohoku, Japan helping children recover from trauma. Donate a tweet http://t.co/mFZpsqmi #DT @operationSAFE 2 weeks ago
- Let's play Words With Friends. My username is 'Betsytexas'. http://t.co/f9SO8pGz #GamesWithFriends 2 weeks ago
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MadGranny is headed home, and we’re off to spend the big kid’s gift cards that are burning a hole in his pocket!
Good morning bumz. Happy shopping MadKiddy the Elder!
It’s a good thing the Prez has that skin tone, or I think we would have seen him turn beet red after that little solo.
Newt is saying Obama can use a teleprompter in the debates. I really believe he didn’t make it through law school without knowing how to think on his feet. He will have real answers while Newt polishes his targeted points.
What time do the games start and on what networks. I believe I will go for the Giants and Patriots. My small greatnephew (don’t know what number) who just returned to the states from India lives in the Bay area and has become a 49er fan.
Patriots start at 2:00 our time. I am going to miss it as I am supposed to go to Austin to work with Gnomica on some stuff.
The other game is this evening.
@ gnome de plume:
I found the pats. Tonight might compete with some of my tv shows.
@ sharonlee:
That teleprompter BS is an old, useless meme. Obama will wipe the floor w/Newt, if he is the nominee. Bomb-thowing hot-head vs. cool, reasoned, sanity? If Newt ends up the nominee and doesn’t drop the N-bomb I will be really, really shocked. He’s going to skate as close to the line as he can, and given his ego mania, it’s more likely to happen than not.
The big kid got a new LEGO, and the Harry Potter (years 4-7) LEGO DS game. He’s a happy boy.
What happens when wild gorillas come to visit. Starts dreadful (yakking bleephead) and doesn’t get to utterly awesome until close to the end.
@ madmommy:
One of hubby’s clients used to work for Newt and says that he’s the most spiteful, vindictive hypocrite she’s ever seen. Shocking.
Ahem…it’s Years 5-7. Tell him that most of the red boxes are in Hogwarts and surrounding areas and most are not accessible until after completing all of the levels. Also, Snape isn’t considered evil this game and can’t open evil things, but Bellatrix can. I may or may not have played this one on occasion over Thanksgiving break.
Aw…RayRay haz a sad.
As John Cole tweeted, I feel dirty rooting for the Patriots 2 weeks in a row. Can’t stand Ray Lewis though.
@ Lea:
He also says that the red boxes are LEGO bricks, not boxes. Pedantic kid is pedantic 
He has encountered dark magics, and said that Snape not being evil makes sense now, since he couldn’t use him to open those items.
I showed this to the big kid. He
Who is the girl on the cover, who is hanging adoringly on Ron’s leg? We argued about this in the car. He said it was Hermione, or Ginny. I say neither of them would ever, ever hang adoringly on some dude. They are both too bad-ass in their own right. Especially a marginally talented dude like Ron
@ madmommy:
It certainly wouldn’t be Ginny…she’s his sister…yuck! Hermoine wouldn’t hang adoringly on his leg either and they don’t even finally kiss until the last movie. It’s probably Lavender Brown, the girl Ron was snogging in The Goblet of Fire, much to Hermoine’s chagrin.
Lea wrote:
He’ll create a new cabinet position and name Palin as Secretary of Getting Revenge.
She would be perfect for that although she can’t stand him, as witnessed in the emails to her staff that were released in Blind Allegiance.
@ Lea:
Oh, I wouldn’t worry about that. If it comes to that, it means the First Lady would be a Gaxian (I bet even the Cardassians couldn’t stand them).
@ Lea:
That was my guess too. Lego people are sort of androgynous-Harry is distinctive because of the scar.
The G-Men better bring their A game. There was an article in the TP this morning about abuse absorbed by Saints fans last week. Evidently there were quite a few arrests. After a SF fan was nearly killed this year at a Dodger game one might think that crossing the line would be frowned upon. Guess not. Go Giants!
sharonlee wrote:
Too bad for the first, and too bad for the second – of your choices.
sharonlee wrote:
Go 49ers!!!!
First game was a doozey. Ravens were better until the two oopsies. Lucky Pats.
The 49ers – Giants game looks to be a good one too. So far.
madmommy wrote:
Didn’t hear anything. Will have to check. Didn’t find too much. One story of taunting and such ugliness, and that police/security ejected and/or arrested unruly fans. There was an all 49er fan brawl though.
Ugliness sure takes the fun out of going to the games.
Certain parties should be aware that if not for the Patriots (twice) defeating the Broncs, they’d have Tebow fanatics all up in their grill 24×7. :pbbbt:
@ gordon:
I can appreciate that great favor to football-kind, but that cannot make me not dislike them. In my mind they are the Yankees of the NFL. And would it kill Belichek not to look like he just crawled out of a box under an overpass? I know they make decent logo-ed clothing that is league sanctioned.
Patriots beat the Broncos (and I wanted that), but did get lucky against the Ravens. Brady even said himself that he sucked in this game today and that the defense saved ‘em. Was a good game. I was a fickle fan for that game – couldn’t decide who to cheer for. So just watched the game. Brady ties the record for trips to SuperBowl.
@ gordon:
If you’re referring to me, the Patriot’s crushing defeat of Timmy did tip the scales in their favor despite the fact that I despise Hoodie with the heat of a thousand white hot suns.
Vegas odds are 41 +/- over under. Better be some scoring to get to that number. First game was way under their over under score of 49 too. And they gave Ravens 7 – so covered that spread. In this game, Giants have 2 points.
Pellora-
Here is the link to the article:
http://www.nola.com/nolavie/index.ssf/2012/01/fan_intimidation_at_candlestic.html
Lea – Steeler Ben settled his lawsuit from 2008 (resulting from some alleged ugliness at the casino in Lake Tahoe) this last week. No specifics given in the story I read. All hush hush. But it only took 3 nearly 4 years.
@ Pellora:
Yeah, Brady was way off early (and has been in a couple of recent games). Last week the defense was using offensive players to fill out the lines, but they came through this week. Probably due to that low-couture slob that you and your twin from another mother despise so obsessively.
@ madmommy:
Here’s the one I read and this one of the all 49er brawl and a shooting in Georgia by a Saint’s fan.
I may have to edit. I forget the code. Try that.
gordon wrote:
Me? I don’t despise but a few peoples. I think you have me and mine confused with someone else.
It’s getting late. I am working on something I would like to have done for tomorrow. So going to sign off again.
Go 49ers!
I’ll check in again later.
@ Pellora:
Ooops, I thought I was replying to MM (so twin[*] would be Lea).
BTW, I have nothing against the 9ers. I was in the Bay Area starting when the Raiders were actually good, then worked in SF during the Joe Montana years. I would suspect many of the trouble makers were Raiders fans who have had absolutely nothing to be excited about in more than a generation.
[*] We have no idea of the provenance of P2.
@ Pellora:
He goofed. That is directed at Lea and me
@ Pellora:
I saw that story about the shooting. Drunken stupidity to be sure. But if one pays a king’s ransom to attend an NFL game, it seems reasonable to expect not to be assaulted by hooligans. The line between all-in-good-fun boosterism and what is described in the article I linked (as well as a letter linked in that article from the SF Chronicle) should be clear to most people. Especially after what happened earlier in the year, the team and the league should have plans in place to make sure that security is sufficient to make everyone feel they can attend a game in saftey. I’ll be interested to see what happens after this game.
Howdy all. My evening tutoring family let me stay here and watch the second half rather than miss 20 minutes in the commute.
All that’s left is for the Giants to win.
Manning to mannigham!!!
I’m home from my Austin work trip. Had dinner at Torchy’s Tacos with Gnomette.
Go 49′ers!
Oh yeah, I forgot. S-I-L took some brownstones in NYC and did some remodeling and resold them and made millions. So he does know everything.
Well, the games today have certainly not been dull! At the rate things were going I wonder if Betsy was thinking she was headed for a sleepover at her student’s house
@ gnome de plume:
For the same reason people think they are experts on education simply because they were once students.
Hi honeys I’m HOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
@ gnome de plume:
i’m not an architect, but when i was househunting, i saw remodels that were gawdawful hack jobs. Even i, a non-architect, could see they were crap remodels. and they were charging plenty for those places
so yeah, making lots of $$$ selling a crap remodel makes one an expert 
@ newdealfarmgrrrlll:
Yep. I’ve seen lots of wasted money out there. People try to save money by not hiring expertise, but then they throw it all away by doing the job badly.
Oh noes! Gus is here! He is climbing on my shoulder and I am typing under his tail.
I need to go to bed, because I need to get up early to get the car into the dealer to see why the “check engine” light is on. 
zzzzz
@ Betsy:
Congratulations on your team, Betsy.
Gnome, the amazing thing is that people design the $99 programs to do all sorts of things. And then all those shows on flipping houses were popular for a good while.
Sleep well Gnome.
I’d imagine the $99 programs would be good for designing a bird house, or maybe a tree house for the kids.
Good night bumz.
Morning Bumz!!
Gloomy and rainy this morning
FYI, when I open the site I get the SOPA censorship page that you put up the other day. This computer is acting seriously wonky. Last night it suddenly decided to open page after page without stopping. Happened again this morning. Guess I know what some of the tax refund money will be going to
Good Morning from the Volvo Dealer in SA! Yes, I too, was met with the SOPA page that was supposed to stop us the other night, but didn’t.
I am sitting in the customer waiting area at their free WiFi spot. I brought my ‘puter with me to do some work in case they find something that takes awhile to fix. BUT I am sitting underneath a television that is tuned to FOX News!
I am not watching, but I can’t help but hear it! 
Glad it was a simple thing, Gnome.
I also was met with the blackout page when I logged in this morning. I am on IE at the office. I believe it was okay at home on FF. I love technology. Last week the office email went astray and I got security certificate warnings when I tried to login at home. The techs finally got it fixed late last night.
Morning all!
Gnome, you can always ask the desk people at such places to change the channel. Or ask the other waiting folks if they mind if you change it.
@ Betsy:
Actually, I asked the two remaining ladies, neither of whom were watching it, if they minded if I just turned the whole thing off! So I did!
I’m home now. I did some errands, including picking up two new Webkins™ for Gnephew #3. Poor Bucky. He thought they were toys for him, so he jumped and tried to get them out of my hands.
I may have to go get him a toy . . . poor neglected puppy.
I’m on FF and still am coming in through the SOPA black out page.
Now the SOPA page is gone.
@ gnome de plume:
Not for me!
@ gnome de plume:
@ madmommy:
It’s probably cookie related. Try not to eat all the cookies, OK?
I just deactivated the SOPA plug in.
And now it’s gone!
@ gordon:
I don’t need cookies, I had some chocolate birthday cake
@ madmommy:
Ya got any vanilla ice cream to go with that cake?
A man had 50 yard line tickets for the Super Bowl.
As he sat down, he noticed that the seat next to him was empty.
He asked the man on the other side of the empty seat whether anyone was sitting there.
“No,” the man replied, “The seat is empty.”
“This is incredible,” said the first man.
… “Who in their right mind would have a seat like this for the Super Bowl, the biggest sporting event in the world and not use it?”
The second man replied, “Well, actually, the seat belongs to me. I was supposed to come with my wife, but she passed away.
This will be the first Super bowl we haven’t been together since we got married in 1967.”
“Oh, I’m sorry to hear that. That’s terrible. But couldn’t you find someone else — a friend or relative, or even a neighbor to take the seat?”
.
.
.
The man shook his head. “No, they’re all at the funeral.”
@ gnome de plume:
Matter of fact, I do! Chocolate or vanilla?
@ Betsy:
Groannnnnn.
@ madmommy:
I’ll be right over.
I just got off the phone from an hour long conversation with an old friend in Dallas. I made the mistake of leaving MSNBC on the teevee. Now I am suffering with recaps of the Repuke Debate.
However, I have been reading about something that I am sure Gordon already knows about, but that I didn’t and found extremely interesting:
The Voynich Manuscript.
Morning, bumz. Had a good evening out with a small portion of the regular Monday group. Pizza and red velvet cake. Who could ask for more? Also I taught one friend how to produce labels from an excel file. I use mail merge in word although I am sure there is a report format somewhere in excel. She had printed out instructions which were 6 pages. I skipped that and went right to word. There was some difference since she was on a Mac and I am a PC, but I totalled wowed her with labels in about 5 minutes (took longer because Mac looked different) when she and another friend had spent a day trying without success.
Earned my tech stripes.
@ Sharonlee:
For you!
I ended my day and started my day in a foul, pissed off mood.
Too many things to list here, but Grrrrrr! Stupid things I have to take care of or clear up. 
On the positive side, it did rain a bit this morning. 
@ gnome de plume:
Hope things look up for you, Gnome. Just think, after you put your skills to the tasks, they will be done to your satisfaction.
@ Sharonlee:
And then Mr. Gnome forgot he had already promised to go the Harlem Globe trotters with her and kids after he said he would accompany me to a formal dinner Friday night. 
It is the usual situation. I give in for the sake of “the kids.” 
Not the one dealing with Stepdaughter and S-I-L. Like usual clients they want a dream kitchen on a trailer park budget.
@ gnome de plume:
Family issues are a whole different story. Can they change the globetrotter tickets to another night? Or can Gnomette attend the game and Mr. Gnome go with you?
As for the kitchen design, you are just the architect–they have to fund the project.
Hi all. Serious rain here all day, and forecasted for tomorrow! I have been doing job app stuff all day.
Jon Stewart Loses His Marbles Over Newt’s Hypocrisy
@ Betsy:
Good luck with the job app stuff.
@ Sharonlee:
The tickets were bought a month ago.
I’m going to see if my dad wants to go with me. If not, the director of development will be my date.
Flowerpot just sat on the keyboard.
The family issue is the same as it would be with a regular client. It is getting whip-sawn with information from one side and another. Plus it is seeing a pushy abusive husband with a willing submissive wife. They just happen to be related to me.
@ gnome de plume:
Can’t you fire clients? They will eat up too much time and energy. Ask for the fee up front and don’t work until they pay. (I know, it’s family, but one can dream!)
@ gnome de plume:
But this is a kitchen remodel, right? You have soooo many opportunities for revenge….
@ Sharonlee:
Gnome’s been in TX for a long time, and they’re kin. So you might be careful around the word “fire”.
Go read.
Things you should not ask your grandmother for 500
@ Betsy:
I had 2 girls (5th grade) ask me what a virgin was my first year of teaching. I pointed to the dictionaries and told them to look it up and come back if they had any questions. One was the girl who spelled “count” without the u on a spelling test but (fortunately) had no idea what she had done. That was a very educational year for me, in many, many ways.
Watching the SOTU. The Orange One is looking particularly dispeptic this evening. Cantor just oozes smarmy. Michelle looks fab in that blue dress. Oh, and the President is just killing it. He sliced up Mittens like a samurai and never even mentioned his name.
Gordon, are you in the part of Maine that can see the Solar storm effects?
@ sharonlee:
I’m supposed to be, but it’s way too overcast. Maybe a bit of extra light in the N, but nothing to watch. That’s OK, I got a great view of the 2003 solar storm, which was spectacular.
@ sharonlee:
GnomeSis might be able to see them. She is even farther north than Gordon, but she prolly has the same overcast issues. It is winter in Oregon.
I had dinner with my parents tonight. It was pretty yummy. Normally my mother fixes the big meal at lunch, but she didn’t have all the ingredients, so she had to wait. She is big on roughage nowadays. She is having this new relatively painless procedure that is fixing her hemorrhoids. She always blamed them on us (the results of her many pregnancies) but the doctor has told her to eat more roughage anyhow. I know. TMI. But I didn’t have anything else to talk about tonight. I am still in a weird state, mentally. Maybe it’s the weather – we’re supposed to get storms – so maybe the barometer is bothering me.
@Lea, I was the one who explained the phrase “teabag” to both Cassie and Texteen. Of course I asked Tengrain a week before they asked me ….
BTW, should I use his given name when he turns 18?
Betsy wrote:
Who? Tengrain? I didn’t know he was a minor!!!
I saw that storms are forming off to our west, so I just put Thundershirts on Beulah and Peewee now instead of waiting until the middle of the night. So now Beulah is all worried that the storms are already here.
Just great.
Logging out. G’night bumz.
Video isn’t up yet, but catch tonight’s Colbert Report. Apparently Rick Santorum just stood there when a woman in Florida voiced all the old Obama charges: muslim, not legally president, etc. Then he went on Morning Joe and said he couldn’t correct the woman because she was old and on a walker.
On Colbert tonight, an old woman with a cane stood up in the audience and proceeded to say outrageously negative things about Rick and Colbert just sat there.
Good morning. We had some savage storms overnight! Mr. Gnome just called to say they were moving through Houston right now. We got 4-1/2 inches of rain!
I think there has been some minor flooding, but I haven’t been out yet to survey the damage. Our morning paper didn’t arrive, so our delivery person was waterlogged or the delivery truck from Austin was. Having made storm preparations for the dogs ahead of time sure made a difference in sleep. I didn’t have to get up and put on Thundershirts™, and having given Beulah a tranquilizer, she was managed pretty well during the worst of it. Of course she was in bed with me the whole time! 
All of Austin felt the need to live-tweet the thunder and lightning from 2-4 AM. I think I may be the only one of us, though, who was able to sleep really late this morning to make up for it!
Sharonlee’s video:
@ Betsy:
LOL. Thanks for the video!
Yes, the storm was quite something! We haven’t had good thunderboomers like that in a long time. It must have started up here sooner because I looked at the clock when I first heard it and it was only 1:20am. I feel so smart having pre-armed my dogs for it. I got decent sleep.
Thanks for finding the video, Betsy.
Glad you all got your rain down there. The robins are confused and have started showing up here.
No Boys (or Girls) Allowed at Gender Neutral Preschool
No Boys (or Girls) Allowed at Gender Neutral Preschool
@ Betsy:
Focus is always on the bathroom. They say they have one bathroom, but I don’t read that to say everyone is in there at once.
I just remember Erma Bombeck during the ERA controverseys and the focus was on having to share bathrooms. Her comment, “Smart people, those airlines.”
I am noticing more and more around here there are “family” restrooms. I presume this would keep from a mother or father from having to take a child of the opposite gender into the men’s or women’s bathroom.
@ Sharonlee:
That is exactly what family restrooms are for. They also should have more room for changing babies and tending to other issues that one might have while shopping, including ADA problems. Mall operators discovered that family friendly service was good for business.
@ gnome de plume:
Of course, if we had to follow the commentors on the school post, we would have to have separate bathrooms in the home.
Actually, Gnome, the 45th parallel runs through Portland OR (and Minihappiopolis MN) and is about 60 miles north of here. So NDFG wins most northern bum.
Rain in TX! Hooray!! Though 4.5 in is a fairly extreme amount to get all at once.
@ gordon:
I knew that because the GnomeSisters figured it out for some reason once.
Actually, it is more usual to get great gobs of rain at once rather than nice gentle rain around here.
I just got in from one of my board meetings. One of the guys there said that he got more rain between 1am and 5am than he did from January to May of last year.
I may be at the 45th parallel but i’m close enough to the mississippi that i’m now classified as zone 5
i got up at 4:15 frikkin-AM! today
so all is going as planned resetting my sleep schedule for weekend shift.
New post upstairs.