Musings and Mirth

About Me

I spend way too much thinking about me. This is the blank space where that paragraph should be.

Apologies

Oscar season has sucked up all of my time. But I am thinking about beginning a new project and I’m very excited about it. That means I will be updating more. Right now, I just want to say that my daughter and I keep watching Burn After Reading because it’s so funny. It funnier than I ever thought it was the first time I saw it.

Christmas and New Year’s have come and gone – and now it’s time to face down the next year of my finite life. I will try harder to update more.

Switching Servers

I have decided to go with Liquid Web for now. I know that come Oscar season, my website, will experience its usual crunch, especially during important announcement days. Otherwise, The Planet’s servers have been great. We’ll see how Liquid Web holds up. Fingers crossed I made the right decision. I realize that much of the problem is me and my inability or lack of education on how to run my own dedicated server. I’m one of those people who hates asking for directions and asking for help; I’d rather just do it alone. So far, I’m impressed with Liquid Web’s tech support. The Planet has pretty good support but most of the time they give you the stupid person’s recommendation first – like “did you try rebooting the server?” Uh. yeah.

This was my problem – I needed more IP address to redirect my websites to them. Since the server only gave me one or two, the other websites weren’t dedicated IPs but sharing IPs. That caused problems with the WordPress themes I was running. Since I didn’t know that at the time, I freaked out and quit The Planet. Anyway, Liquid Web gave me the extra IPs, no problem. So all is well again.

I’m thinking out loud on this in case there is any lost soul out there. This had to do with the GD library and Timthumb, by the way.

Final Day in Paris

I don’t know why it’s taking me so long to finish up my Paris trip. Maybe because I can linger on those days before I totally store it away in my memory for the long term. The one really strong memory I’ll have from Paris, and believe me, I already want to go back, is one night Emma and I stayed in the Hotel Foundary and watched Shakespeare in Love in its entirety. We found it on YouTube and watched one part after another in the dark hotel room. It was really great – and I can’t quite pinpoint why it was great – it had nothing to do with Paris particularly. We had one more day and we were wiped out in all possible ways. That was why we chose to hang out in the hotel instead of walking all over the place.

However, there were two places we wanted and needed to see. One was the Catacombs and the other was the Montparnasse cemetery. I wouldn’t want to live in Montparnasse – I like the other side of Paris better, over by the Marais and the Pompidou.

We decided to brave the Metro for the first time to get to the Catacombs and seriously, the Metro is a lot easier than you think. But you can’t bumble around like a dumbass – you have to kind of know what you’re doing. We wasted two tickets going to the wrong side but figured out our mistake the hard way. Once you get it you get it and it isn’t that bad, but god help you if you try to talk to any of the metro workers. The thing about people in Europe in general – they don’t care about you. But it’s especially true in France. They don’t care if you’re having a problem – it is not their problem. That aspect of European travel ALWAYS makes me feel better to be American. I tried to explain one problem I was having to one of the women working behind the glass but she brushed me off with a wave of her hand and a disgusted nod.

I really wanted to leave Paris. I thought I had mistakenly purchased a book of Metro tickets instead of one ticket – turns out I hadn’t but I thought I had. I guess I’m just used to American customer service where they give a damn because it makes a difference to their business. In France, health care is taken care of, wage is decent enough – there is no real competition so why bother?

Eventually, after a few transfers we found ourselves in Montparnasse proper and we headed to the Catacombs. The line was too long but we waited anyway. We wanted our last day in Paris to be easy-ish with just one or two things to see. This seemed like the perfect thing to do. We had a couple of loudmouthed Americans behind us talking as if they were the only people who existed. And I suddenly could relate to the Parisiennes hatred of us.

While we waited in line I went and got us a hot dog – one of those great Paris hot dogs with the hot mustard. Oh, those are almost worth the trip back for. Although there are so many things in Paris that call my name, even now.

Once inside the Catacombs you walk down an endless spiral staircase – down and down and down and down. It gets darker and colder and damper. You’re kind of grateful for the crowd because you know if your heart stops suddenly there are people to help you out. You walk a bit before you get to the bones and then it’s just wall upon wall of skulls and bones. It definitely puts one’s existence into perspective the way cemetery’s don’t; this isn’t about honoring an individual life – this is about how many people have come before, lived, had their little dramas and heartbreaks, minor successes, diseases and whatnot, and then died and became bones in a pile.

I couldn’t get out of there fast enough, although it had one upside: it was the only place in Paris so far that did not smell like piss.

Upon our exit, we decided to get a good street crepe, as opposed to the touristy kind. We found one at a small booth in Montparnasse – I got the orange and honey and Emma got the Nutella and banana (that is the one to get). They were delicious, even if they did drip all over us.

Afterwards, we wandered down to the cemetery, but to be perfectly honest, our feet could not take anymore walking. That was that for us. We hobbled over to Jean Paul Sartre’s grave, snapped a photo and then called it a day.

We got up very early, like 4am, in order to take our metro to the airport. We opted out of the Bee Shuttle because it had been so expensive the ride in. It was trippy but doable, lugging our suitcases down the cool streets of Paris, sans coffee, down the stairs and occasionally up the stairs. A nice gentleman helped us up one flight of stairs. There are kind people everywhere, you just have to be lucky enough to bump into one.

We finally got to the airport but we knew Emma’s passport had been lost there and was in the Lost and Found somewhere. We were told that it didn’t open until after 9am and our flight was to leave around 10am. Emma burst into tears after Security managed to get the Lost and Found opened but alas, no passport. Eventually we just went to our airline and they had her passport all along.

We boarded our plane and without incident, as in “international incident” we were flying out of Paris. Paris is the place of our sweetest dreams, even still. The longer the time between from then and now, the more we mature and grow, our memories filter out the stuff that made the beautiful city agonizing. And all that remains is that unending beauty. Paris captured my heart. I know I will be back there sooner rather than later. And I don’t even care that Paris doesn’t love me back. It’s an unrequited love and that isn’t the worst thing in the world.

The next thing to happen would be three connecting flights on our way back to LA – Paris to Milan, Milan to London, London to Los Angeles.

Blog World Expo – I Wanna Go

I really want to go to Blog World Expo – so much so that I’m writing a sleazy post in order to qualify for a giveaway. Already this sounds like one of those terrible spam mails where the spammer pretends to speak in an overly familiar way? Well anyway, here is my one shot. Universe and Internet, be kind. I never win anything, do I? Never. It just doesn’t happen. Ever.

WikiPedia War Over Obama Peace Prize

Not soon after I woke up this morning, the so-called controversy rang through the Twittering class of loudmouths and shriekers. Of course they would hate the choice. After all, the Wingnut plan to discredit Obama was kind of working. Even The Daily Show and Saturday Night Live were on the attack. But along come the Swedes. And now what, more worldwide acclaim?

And then the crying and the whining:

BUT HE HASN’T DONE ANYTHING YET! It’s funny – someone says something and then it is repeated by people over and over until everyone thinks that’s what they’re supposed to say. No one stops to wonder whether it is true or not. So I started tracking Wikipedia for a few minutes, knowing the wingnuts would be out in full force. And they were. I quickly started editing and deleting – finally it looks kind of right. Controversy should not mean a while bunch of whiners crying because the ball went on the roof. It should be reserved for actual controversies, like when a mass murderer is nominated for the prize. Here are some of the pics. You can read the variations.

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Random Thoughts on the News

I think it’s really weird that the press is poring over details of the Stephanie Birkitt/Dave Letterman love affair. I have an idea that Letterman will divorce his wife Regina and marry Birkitt. What do you want to bet. See, here I go, joining the choir. This Letterman thing is far from over. Sure, he did put himself in a good light by coming clean on his show but it is just too juice for the press to ignore. It will not be let go by the wingnuts either. Finally they have something really big on Letterman to invalidate any objective commentary he might have given over the years to help the Democrats.

But Birkitt is in a stew. The only hope she has of making things okay in her life is to write a tell-all book. She is infamous now and perhaps un-hireable (is that a word?) as a result. Her best bet is to make Letterman marry her and they can travel the world together. He’s probably too old now to cheat on her. Merill Markoe famously said that she always thought she would be the only woman Dave ever cheated on.

The weird thing about these women? They all look alike – they all have that pointy nose, weak chin thing going on. They are also probably smart and funny – well we know Markoe is funny:

letterman

Anyway, I wish the Dave story never happened. I wish he hadn’t pretended to be with someone a long time because it made him look like a good guy. I wish the sweet, honorable midwestern Dave still existed.

On the other hand, perhaps we put way too much on our celebrities to be better than human, better than us. And maybe that isn’t fair, and maybe it is what drives people like Letterman and other politicians to have to lead double lives in the first place; why can’t we like them as they are?