- New Thing Learned for 16 February: It doesn't exactly squash down into an infobite, but I spent the afternoon putting the new eBay sellers' form through its paces, which I suppose counts as Learning. It now features savable Templates, if you want a single distilled nugget of wisdom for your files.
- New Thing Learned for 17 February: Chef Boy-Ar-Dee was a real person, Hector Boiardi, a Cleveland restauranteur whose patrons loved his sauces so much that he started the food brand as a sideline. One gets so jaded by made-up corporate "personalities" like Betty Crocker and Britney Spears that one tends to forget that some of them once had real entrepreneurs behind the smiling boxes. [Source: Wikipedia.]
- New Thing Learned for 18 February: Color-coding the different sizes of threaded rods is a good idea in theory, but not when it's put into practice by dipping both ends into paint thick enough to clog the threads, dammit. [Source: Home Despot.]
- New Thing Learned for 19 February: Hopelessly burned-on gunge on an iron pan such as a wok will come off when scrubbed with a cut potato and a little dishsoap. Not that I even own a wok, but it was amazing to watch. [Source: How Clean is Your House?.]
In Regular Business, first a meme from the weekend:
List 10 songs that begin with the letter given to you and explain why you picked them. If you want to play, ask and I shall give you a letter.atlanticat gave me the letter "k."
Gaius happens to know exactly ten songs that begin with "K":
- Karma Chameleon, Culture Club
What self-respecting (or perhaps not-self-respecting, more to the point) collection of 80's pop would be complete without everyone's favorite musical transvestite? (And yes, I'm well aware that the period produced more than one. Shut up.) - Keep Yourself Alive, Queen
Queen's first single, a bit rough around the edges but full of energy. - Killer Queen, Queen
"She keeps her Moet et Chandon / In a pretty cabinet"... - Kiss, Prince
Come on, how can you not love a song that exhorts a dimwitted tart to "Act your age, not your shoe size"? Tom Jones covered this song with marvelous results, but alas, that was on one of the CDs that the (move-before-last) movers lifted, and I haven't come across a recording of it again since. - Kiss Me, Sixpence None The Richer
I don't know why this song makes me so happy, it just does. "Sweet" is an easy-to-screw-up quality in the music world, but this is that rare song that nails it perfectly. - Kiss Me Deadly, Lita Ford
AAAnd about as far from "sweet" as it gets, here, but this song about the rougher side of modern love still works for me. - Kissing A Fool, George Michael
George Michael flirts with lounge singing. Lounge singing flirts back. - Knock On Wood, Amii Stewart
Mmm, disco. - Krankphreak, Psykosonik
A track from the techno album I use to dislodge xmastime attacks of Feliz Navidad. It's probably the most unusual CD I own, actually, and for the most obscure reason. - Kyrie, Mr Mister
One of those songs you imprint upon in high school when everything sucks and the music of the period is your escape. Lord have mercy, indeed, and I'm going to go sulk about how long ago that was now.
Other than that, I spent the long weekend helping Mum make some sense of the workroom; it's still a mess, but a few more boxes are unpacked and a few others relegated to storage, and it's actually beginning to look like a usable room these days. Housewarming party tentatively pencilled in for second quarter 2007, I think...