"The new library fad: borrow a person"

Interesting article from the UK about a "Living Library" where patrons can come in and "check out" a person to learn about a subject, i.e. Gay Man, Immigrant, Muslim, Social Worker. You choose your person of interest and get 30 minutes to talk to them and learn about them. Kinda cool! It's like skipping through a book to only the parts that interest you... (via)

A weekend of sickness

My weekend in a nutshell:

• Came home from work early on Friday because I was sick and not feeling well with a cold
  
• Got progressively sicker as the weekend wore on... and now am doing better thankfully
• Participated in some low-key activities - naps, movie-watching, book-reading, laundry
• Watched the Cavs win on Sunday - yay! Only one win away from the next round
• Traveled to Woodbridge to return items to Ikea on Saturday - had to go since their return policy allows for returns up to 90 days and Saturday was Day 90
• Had dinner with Charlie while I was in Woodbridge
• Unable to participate in shopping, which I normally like to do in Woodbridge, because I felt very dizzy and sick while walking around the mall, although I did run into the shoe store on my way out of the mall and ended up buying two really cute pairs of shoes. I guess the good thing about being sick is I had no time for my usual deliberation, I just purchased
  
• Talked to my mom for a few hours Saturday night.... about my brother potentially moving down the street from them (good news?!) and about my uncle who passed away last week (bad news)
  

Bethesda Book Club

I'm in so many book clubs now and none of them really have any names so I guess I'll call this the Bethesda one, only because we met last night for the first time in Bethesda. Our organizer would like to call it the Oprah/NYT Book Club because she prefers to read books from those lists but I think there are plenty of enjoyable, undiscovered books out there so I'm resistant to that name. Anyway, we read an Oprah-recommended novel, The Corrections, and while as recently as Tuesday it didn't seem like I would finish the book, I actually did. I had about 260 pages to go on Tuesday but I actually managed to fly through the rest of the book in the following two days so that I was done before the meeting. I feel pretty meh about the book, parts of it were enjoyable but all of the characters were so unlikeable and annoying that it was hard to sympathize with any of them. Anyway, we really did discuss the book and the women were all pretty nice and we're trying to decide on a place and a book for next time.

Afterwards, a couple of us went to a bar/restaurant to eat and watch the game. It was a good time! The only down side was that I missed the latest episode of Lost. But I did tape it so I'll be watching it tonight.

Can't Win Them All

I expected the Wizards to win game three after being dominated in game two and heading home but Wizards 108, Cavaliers 72 was way more than just losing. The Cavs sucked. It was embarrassing.

What's odd is that people seem to not even care around here. Watching the game on Monday night at a bar, there were more people in the bar rooting for the Cavs than for the hometown team. Last night, I went to a bar to watch it and they said no one had asked to have it on so they were going to keep the Nationals game on instead since people had asked for that. How crazy is that? The Nationals are in last place in their division in game 23 of a season that lasts 162 games. The Wizards are in the playoffs! And on my way home, I saw a lot more people wearing Cavs apparel than I saw wearing Wizards apparel. Generalizing, I guess Washington isn't a basketball town.

24 Picture

I was pretty excited when I saw this picture of the cast of the new season of 24. And it's not because of the show. I've never seen an episode of the show before. I was excited because the spot where they are all standing is about a 7 minute walk from my apartment so it's kinda cool to think I've been there before. Of course, the picture was probably green-screened or whatever... I'm guessing the cast isn't really standing on the Memorial Bridge.

StopForwarding

This Web site will anonymously send an email to any forward-happy friend asking them to stop forwarding you. Here is some of the content of the letter:

Please do not forward chain letters, urban myths presented as truth, potentially offensive jokes, videos or photos without being asked or first receiving permission. If you find something that is funny and it is clean and you genuinely think the recipient will enjoy it then foward it to that person only (not in an email blast to all your friends and family) and include a personal note about why you enjoyed it and why you think they will too. Avoid sending forwards to friends or relatives that you've grown distant with. It can be frustrating for the recpient when the only correspondance you have with someone is via impersonal, unwanted email.

It's kinda funny and slightly passive aggressive, but luckily I don't really have any need to use it since none of my friends are constantly forwarding me emails. I also notice that the letter has some typos in it, ha! (via)

Earth Day, Plant a Tree

Happy Earth Day! I saw this apple tree-to-be you can buy and plant for $19.13 and I would so do it if only I had somewhere to plant it. Maybe someone else can do it for me! (via)

Two in a Row!

The Cavs won again tonight! Cleveland 116, Washington 86. Two more victories and they're on to the next round.

Cavs 93, Wizards 86

I'm stoked that the Cavs won the first game in their playoff series today! Although it kind of sucks that I can't watch the games at home since most of them are on cable and I no longer have cable.

National Library Week

In honor of National Library Week, Entertainment Weekly came up with "18 Sexy Trips to the Library Stacks". In other words, they showcase scenes that take place in libraries from 18 movies.

In Bloom

We have these trees in front of our building that our landlord said were cherry blossom trees. I'm not sure if they truly are because they look different to me than other trees that I've been told are cherry blossom trees. Nonetheless, they finally bloomed a couple of days ago and are really pretty. Here's a pic:

Shopping, Taxes and my life

This weekend was a pretty quiet weekend for me, which is good because I was really busy for about two weeks straight, including lots of dinner plans (including here, here & here), a book club meeting, friends in town, trip to Philadelphia for work, and a day at a library conference. While I really enjoy seeing my friends, I also really like quiet time too!

Yesterday, I started my taxes and even though I'm not quite finished yet (hey, I still have one day!) it looks like I'm getting a good chunk of change back for a refund. Which will be nice, but also probably indicates I should change what's getting taken out of my paycheck.

Today, instead of finishing my taxes like I should have done (hey, I still have one day!), I went shopping. I haven't been shopping in awhile and it's really soothing to me sometimes to just walk around a mall and try to find some bargains. I went to Fair Oaks Mall in Fairfax, then Kohl's, and finally Wegman's. I got some great deals at the mall. H&M gave you $10 off if you spent $50 so I bought some jewelry (2 rings and a necklace), 2 lightweight sweaters and a hoodie for $46. I think that's an awesome deal! And I also got a cute little change purse at The Limited for $3! At Kohl's, I bought some more jewelry (again, 2 rings and a necklace), another little purse and 2 pairs of shoes. I spent like $85 on all that but that's not bad considering that half of that total was one pair of running shoes, which I really think I needed. Hmm, and I bought a lot of groceries at Wegman's but hey, who can help themselves there?

Free version of Photoshop

Adobe recently launched a free online version of Photoshop, which might be useful. I haven't had a chance to check into it too much but I have used a previous version that you had to purchase so it's nice to have some basic photo-editing options available for free from a name you can recognize.

Mistaken Identity Story

I taped and then watched today the "Mistaken Identity" story that was on Dateline on Friday. And boy did I cry! From the poor families not knowing if their daughters were alive, to the one family finding out that their daughter was NOT alive and having to bury her, to the other family finding out their daughter did make it but was in a coma with major brain damage, to the ultimate realization that this girl that they were caring for constantly and watching slowly heal was in fact not the girl they thought it was, to the family who thought they were getting messed with all over again by some jerks telling them that their daughter was maybe alive after all, to the girl who survived dealing with survivor's guilt.... I was kind of a mess. Unbelievable, moving story.

That site has video but I'm not sure if it's complete. Also, the families are going to be on Oprah on Weds.

Author Name Pronunciation Site

I thought this was pretty cool, especially for the librarian/teacher/parent who might be faced with trying to pronounce author's names. It lists a bunch of author's names and when you click on one, you go to a link where the author is pronouncing his/her own name. Usually, they also explain the name's origins.

Some of them seem a little silly (did anyone ever have trouble with "Judy Blume"?) but others are pretty useful (I always did stumble over Jon Scieszka) (via)

BoltBus

I've heard you can ride buses from Washington DC to New York City pretty cheaply, but how about $1? BoltBus offers some tickets for only $1! And even their most expensive trips seem to be about $20. It all depends on when you want to go and how early you book. Pretty sweet! (via)

"Talkshow split gives gabbers new life"

An article in Variety explains how the Daytime Emmy awards will be splitting Best Talk Show into two different categories, one for information and one for entertainment. It mentions that Ellen Degeneres has cleaned up in that category the last few years while shows like The View were overlooked. Here's an opportunity for another show to win.

Huh? They imply that the new winner might be The View. HA! The View sucks. Have you ever heard their interviews? They are a complete waste of time with four people trying to get their questions in before the 5 minutes alloted for interviews ends. There rarely is any sort of cohesion or segue from one topic to another, either. And, during the Hot Topics section, which has the potential to be interesting, the women usually just offer ill-informed opinions on the goings-on of the day while talking over each other. Meanwhile, Ellen has to fill one entire hour of time every single day with interviews that she conducts by herself, with comedic bits, with a monologue and well, with dancing segments that kill time. But that was a clever way to kill time, you have to admit. People love it! She doesn't just show up five minutes before the show and express her opinion. I couldn't agree more with the critics interviewed in that article.

Fortune Cookie

I had a fortune cookie today and my fortune read: "An interesting sports opportunity is in your near future."

Hmm! What could it be? I immediately assumed I will win one of the March Madness Bracket Buster games and become a millionaire. What else could it mean?

It also gave me numbers: 8 15 17 20 35 42
Those are suspiciously close to the Lost numbers. But too bad I didn't have those numbers when I was creating my brackets!

SI.com Archive

Starting on Thursday, Sports Illustrated's Web site will debut "The Vault," which will feature all the content, including photographs, from all of its back issues. It will be searchable and also will let you literally "turn the page" from old issues. Sounds pretty cool. (via)

Guys suck

That guys suck is not really news, especially not to any single women out there. However....

I went out with a bunch of ladies Sat. night and got into the old discussion of why do guys take your number and then not call you? I think this has probably happened to everyone at some point or another, definitely has happened to me. But on Saturday, one of the gals in our group started talking to this guy who she had met before and had given her number to when he asked. And he never called. So the other gals were trying to encourage her to talk to him again but she felt like there must have been a good reason he hadn't called and was a little hesitant to even put herself out there.

So we discussed among ourselves possible reasons why guys do this. Theories included they were too drunk to remember afterwards that they did in fact take your number... they meant to call but time passed and they just felt like it was too late then... they took it with the intention to call but changed their mind later... they just like to collect numbers.

When we actually consulted a male, one of this guy's friends in fact, he added a new one to the list: guys take numbers as a way to end a conversation. Which shocked me in its obnoxiousness; I mean, there are a million ways to end a conversation without implying that you are going to call someone and talk to them again. Is this a common thought among men?

The next day I posed the same question to my male roommate. He gave me some of the reasons we females had also come up with and added, "Sometimes you ask for a number just to end a conversation." So, yes, indeed this apparently is a common thought among men. I can't get over how rude that is!

Therefore, here are some suggestions to men on other ways to end a conversation:
1.) "Bye."
2.) "It was nice talking to you."
3.) "Well, I really need to get going."
4.) "I need to use the restroom."
5.) "I need to make a call."
6.) "I need to get a drink."
7.) "Oh, I see someone else I want to talk to!"
8.) "Well, good luck with [that thing we were talking about]."
9.) "Wow, look at the time."
10.) "I really should get back to my friend."