It's the End, My Friend...The End

This post recounts the time I spent purchasing and reading Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows from start to finish...

6:30-10:30 PM: I arrived at Borders and received a blue wristband which placed me in the third group to purchase my book (orange - which was gone at 10 AM, silver, blue, green, pink, and purple). I found a comfy chair in the cafe where I could get a good vantage point on what was happening around me and do my sudoku. Many people showed up in costumes included some who were older than I. They, the older ones, were "casting" spells, talking about how great Alan Rickman is in the movies and in Robin Hood: Men in Tights (which I did agree with), and actually turned and ran screaming from another person dressed up as Voldemort. I got up to get a drink and treat at just the right time because as soon as I'd gone through the line, the line had a long wait for the rest of the night. Some dorks came by and taped spoilers to the window. I made a phone call to Mike at 9 pm to see how he was doing. Ben, who normally goes to bed at 8 was still awake playing with his cousins.

10:30-11:00 PM: I began roaming the store to see what was going on. There had been several announcements over the intercom system which could not be heard in the cage. Perhaps the most important announcement was a door prize drawing where the top five prizes were the first five spots in line. After getting my ticket, I returned to the cafe to inform all the people I'd been hanging with on the couches about the door prizes. After that, I continues roaming the store looking at all the costumes and tables set up where kids could make doorknob hangers and other crafts. Go figure, I ended up in the computer section. I flipped through a book on iPods and gleaned some information from books on .Net and Photoshop. I meandered over to magazines and learned all about Posh and Beck's American invasion and about Katie and Suri's day at the beach.

11:00-11:40 PM: It was then that I realized that the magazine rack had not been pushed back against the windows after the last round of posters had been placed in the window. I tucked myself back between the two and had my own "Quiet Space" to relax, listen to the announcements, and do sudoku.

11:40 PM: Security told everyone to assemble either in the back corner of the store opposite the cash registers or to go outside. Not really wanting to get smooshed in the back or go outside in the cold I stayed in my "Quiet Place." Door prizes were drawn and I was 10 tickets away from winning movie tickets and concessions.

12:01 AM: Book sales started. After waiting through most of the blue group, I got out of my "Quiet Place." When the staff had finished up handing out wristbands, they'd left 5 glow-stick giveaway wands hanging from the back of a chair. After waiting 20 minutes to see if they'd come back for them, I picked them up and put them in my purse. About half way through the silver group, I decided to mosey toward the back of the store and see if I could get in line. A security officer was the back of the silver group and I'd noticed some other blues who had had the dame idea I had. I was probably the 20th blue person in line. Another 10 minutes passed before the blue group was called to assemble.

12:48 AM: I purchased my copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows and drove home.

1:15 AM: I arrived home, fed the dog dinner, put the dog out to potty, grabbed a drink, brought the dog in and put him away.

1:30 AM: I began reading.

4:30 AM: 200 pages later, I laid down for some sleep.

9:30 AM: A phone survey solicitor woke me up. I fed the dog, put the dog out to potty, and ate breakfast.

9:45 AM: I played with the dog with my right hand while my left hand checked my email, visited Woot! to see if they were still wooting off, and checked to see if my hold of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows on CD was available. The online library catalog showed that there were two copies of the CD on the shelf.

9:56 AM: I put on clothes and drove to the library.

10:15 AM: I was not successful in retrieving the CD...I was 70th on the waiting list for 25some copies. I filled Mike's gas tank on the way home for $2.76 a gallon.

10:30 AM: I recommenced reading.

12:30 PM: At page 362, I broke for lunch. I checked the Big Brother 8 live feed blog to see what was going on and updated our finances.

1:15 PM: I continued reading.

2:49 PM: I took a break at page 502.

3:15 PM: I continued reading.

4:15 PM: I was at page 589.

6:26 PM: I finished reading the book, content with the end of the series.

Total Reading Time: 9 hours 45 minutes

iGoogle...Do You?

Until recently, I would have said, "No, I love MyYahoo." I decided I might give iGoogle a try after seeing one of my friends use it and I love it way more than MyYahoo.

I'm lovin' the Google Reader gadget. It lets me compile all the rss feeds that I read into one thing instead of having to have a separate page for all my feeds like I did at MyYahoo. I can sort my feeds by tags. So if I feel like reading the E! gossip versus the local news versus my friends' blogs, I can. No, if only MySpace would allow external readers to pull blog info, but I guess that's what keeps people going back to MySpace.

I've uploaded my Outlook calendar into Google calendar and now Mike and I, finally, have a way to share our calendars easily.

So, iGoogle, do you?

Me, not We - How to Destroy America

Former Governor of Colorado, Dick Lamm, gave an eye-opening speech on the dangers of multiculturalism which recently made its way into my inbox and I wanted to put it out there one more time for all y'all to read. It's sort of scary. He gave this speech in June of 2005. It's now July of 2007 and we're going down this path. Check out the original and revised speech.

Happy Birthday Woot!

So I'm up at 1 am, a usual occurance, and I think, ummmm, I think I'll go over and see what Woot is offering for sale today. Lo and behold, they're selling the infamous bags of random crap (AKA BoC, Bandoliers of Carrots, Blingged-out Cabbage, Big Orange Cat, etc.) In any case, I click on the "I Want One" button and select that I want 3, enter my 3 digit code off of the back of my credit card and an hour and an half later I find out that I am indeed the proud owner of 3 bags of crap. I can't wait to see what I get in my bags!

Here's the description from the Woot website:
Bag O’ Birthday Crap XX: For You’re A Jolly Good Sucker

Today is Woot’s third birthday – we’re almost potty-trained! – so welcome to the party. But instead of taking home a goodie bag, how about a Bag O’ Crap? The Internet’s most beloved consumer ripoff returns for a celebratory reel around the crap fountain. Whatever you do, don’t buy it. Come on, it says “crap” right there in the name. What are you, nuts?

If you must proceed, CHECK THIS OUT. Somebody misunderstands this concept every time, so please READ THE BIG PRINT:

1. WHEN YOU ORDER THIS ITEM, YOU’RE ORDERING ONE (1) BAG WITH up to THREE (3) PIECES OF CRAP IN IT.

2. YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR SELECTING THE QUANTITY: THREE WHEN YOU ORDER.

3. YOU WILL WASTE FREIGHT IF YOU ORDER FEWER THAN THREE. And you’ll get less crap. Wait, why is that bad again? Do you people really need more crap?

You’re only getting one bag, no matter what. The order quantity you select is the number of crappy items we’ll put in your bag. Select THREE. Later, you’ll enjoy the satisfaction of taunting the surprisingly large number of less observant Wooters who ordered less than THREE.

We make absolutely no promises about the quality or the desirability of these bags or their contents, except to promise that their quality will be low and their desirability will be non-existent. We will take your money and send you literal garbage in return. Happy birthday to us!

THE HOLY CRAP COMMANDMENTS v2.0:

I. Thou shalt expect nothing beyond one bag of some kind and your chosen quantity of crappy items (which should be THREE).

II. Thou shalt not whine and complain when some people’s crap turns out to be nicer than yours.

III. Thou shalt take a moment to consider whether you might be better off just not buying this crap.

IV. Thou shalt not order just one crap and blame it on anything but your own inattention.

V. To paraphrase Stephen Stills, shalt thou not get the crap you want, want the crap you get.

The crap will be shipped via SmartPost, the crappiest shipping method available to us.

Confessions of a Pill Poppin' 20-something Momma

Okay, so I guess it's time for an update. Let's see. I've been doing pretty well at remembering to take my supplements. I take them with meals, so it's been pretty easy to remember. You sit at the table to eat, you take your pills. I've missed a couple of breakfasts when I got to sleep in. There have been a few dinners out. All in all, not bad.

My weight loss is stable. I haven't rubber-banded back after the weight loss challenge. I'm still under 200 which is great. I have to get back to the gym to see if we can't work a little more of this off. Maybe I'll get back after this potty training nightmare is over.

I've got to get some MapQuesting done and another load of laundry into the dryer before I go to sleep.