Manic Monday: Final

Today is the very last of the Manic Monday themes, and the word is "Final". Thank you very much to all of you who have read my Manic Monday posts these past few years. Now I have to think of something else to post on Mondays! Anyone have any suggestions?

Things the letters FINAL could stand for:

1. First, I Need A Life
2. Frank's Intestines Never Acquired Limpness
3. Frequent Intermittent Naps Are Leisurely
4. Freeway? Interstate? Nearly Always Lost!!
5. Fortunately, Indiana Never Annoyed Louisiana
6. Flatulence Is Not Always Loved
7. Flailing Ichthyologists Need A Lifeboat
8. Fantastic Illusions, Nibbling Away Lifetimes
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There may be a pop quiz later

In Michigan, we call carbonated beverages "pop".
I've learned that other places prefer the term "soda".
And still other places call all carbonated beverages "coke".

In this retro post over at the Jannaverse, back in August 2007, I explored the kind of confusion this can cause.
You may want to take notes.
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To summarize:
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Michigan:
Coke = pop
Soda = white powdery stuff
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California:
Soda = Coke
Coke = white powdery stuff

Feel free to analyze. :)
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Manic Monday: Shower

Apparently I am a sucker for shower gel.
I love it.
I love all the different scents it comes in. I even buy the scents that are made just for guys, despite being painfully single and living alone in a deep dark hole of nothingness.

*pause*

*listens to sound of self getting older with every passing second*

Anyway, I love shower gel, and for some reason I tend to hoard it. I have all these lovely scents, and yet I tend to use just a tiny amount so I can "save" it. Never mind the fact that there's plenty more at the store, along with a hundred other scents I could easily fall for.

Just the other day I found a bottle of chamomile scented stuff I've had for awhile. The bottle's almost full, and I have no clue why I don't just go ahead and USE it already.

If you're keeping track, this is #78,122 of my quirks.
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Manic Monday: Pines

The Manic Monday theme is "Pines," and I'm stumped.
(Heh! No pun intended).

All I can think of is an acronym:

Perhaps
I
Need
Extra
Sleep.

So true!
Plus, I just realized that "pines" is an anagram of "penis", but maybe I'd better just go on to bed instead.

Good night, everyone.
Have a decent Monday.
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It should at least be warmer than my body temperature...

Sometimes, to save money on lunch, mom and I bring leftovers to work.
I don't mind eating leftovers. I do, however, insist that they be heated up in the microwave first.
Mom, on the other hand, has no problem eating cold spaghetti, cold meatloaf, cold pizza, cold macaroni, cold ANYTHING.

I just.... can't.
Mine HAS to be warmed up first.

What about the rest of you?
Are you able to eat cold leftovers, or do you want them heated back up first?
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Things the letters PLANT could stand for

1. Please Listen And Notice Termites

2. Penguins Like A Nice Toffee

3. Perhaps Louis Admits Nothing Today

4. Pond Life: Always New Tadpoles

5. Pureed Liver: Acccgghhh! NOT Tasty!
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Chicken... tastes just like crocodile

You will all be thrilled to learn that Wikipedia has an entire page devoted to the phrase "Tastes Like Chicken."

It gives a list of animals that supposedly taste like chicken. I've copied it below. So, tell me, how many of these have you actually eaten, and did it indeed taste like chicken?
I've tried frog legs, and of course I've tried turkey. I admit that both have a chicken-esque aspect to them.
I'd love to know how many of you have eaten fried spiders.

Alligator/Crocodile
Fried spider
Frog legs
Giant Ditch Frog
Iguana
Opossum
Rabbit (especially domestic rabbit)
Rat
Rattlesnake
Squirrel
Turkey
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If any of you go to Ethiopia, bring me back some more of this!

Remember Jason from ABC group?
(Just say yes. This will go a lot quicker.)

He got back from Ethiopia a few weeks ago. It sounds like he had a wonderful trip. In addition to spending time with friends, he got to work as a substitute teacher at the International School in Addis Ababa.

And, guess what: and he brought me a present!

He and I both love super-hot spicy things, and Ethiopia supposedly makes some good spice blends. So he tried them while he was there.

Berbere ended up being not very spicy at all, he said.
But there's this other spice blend, called mitmita, which was decent.

He brought me back a generous sample.
I like it! It's not painfully hot (unfortunately), but still has promise.
It's somewhere in the "high medium" range.

Think of it as a slightly more exotic version of Cajun seasoning.
Yum!
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Let the nerdy party begin!

I'm excited!
I just got done wasting a few more moments of my life playing Word Challenge on Facebook.
And I beat my old high score!
My previous high score was 28,089, I think. That put me at the "poet" level.
My new one is 30,686, which puts me at the "anagram cyborg" level!

I realize this makes me a word nerd, but I'm going to brag anyway. :)

..
Surely this is enough reason for us to have a big nerdy party with all sorts of dictionaries and thesauruses and Scrabble games and crossword puzzles and anagrams and palindromes and other things that would give hot flashes to your old high school English teacher.
Bring your own synonyms. (Which, by the way, rhymes with M&M's. Sort of.)
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UPDATE! UPDATE!
I just beat my old score of 30686, and now my high score is 35237! :)
Woohoo!

Just imagine how much fun I would be if I actually had a social life!
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Ooooh! OOOH, another update!
My high score is now 39962.
I was SOOO close to 40,000. Drat!!!
Still, pretty cool!
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It's for medicinal purposes, I swear!

I have a sore throat today, so I went and bought some cough drops.
I got the regular cherry kind, and then I decided to try a new flavor.
Ginger Ale. (???!!)

Here's a picture of them.

They're ok, but I haven't decided yet whether I really like them.
The cherry ones are Luden's brand, which are tasty like candy but don't really have that soothing menthol kick.
The ginger ale ones have some menthol, but don't really have a lot of flavor to them. Yet, their subtlety might be growing on me. Hmmm.

I wish there were blueberry-flavored cough drops. I would love them so much, I'd eat them like candy and would probably never have another sore throat ever again.
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For better or worse... and quilted for extra softness

Have you ever heard of people making bridal gowns out of toilet paper?
Here are some examples of designs that won a contest.
The people actually did a really good job.

Imagine if people actually really wore these to weddings.

I could never do it.
The moment I leaned over to kiss the groom, everyone would hear a slightly muffled R-r-rr-ii-ppp!! And my bare butt would be showing to all the bridesmaids and the groomsmen and whatever unfortunate little kid happened to be carrying the basket of flowers.

Hopefully the guy would still marry me anyway.

If I ever get married, please don't take a videocamera to my wedding.
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Manic Monday: Snow

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My imaginary shopping spree

A couple weeks ago I did a post that explained how much I love office supplies.
Little did I know that I could have saved it for today, when the Manic Monday theme is "office".
If I had a thousand-dollar gift card to spend at any office supply store, here's what I'd probably get:

Legal pads: The veery veeerrrryyy narrow ruled kind. Wide-ruled paper annoys me.
Mechanical pencils: Only the kind with the twist-out eraser, and only 0.5 lead, thank you very much. Gimme at least five.
A nice big file folder to keep extra band music.
A 10-gb flash drive.
Whatever's left over, spend it on fountain pens.

If any office supply store ever has a going-out-of-business sale, I may be the happiest person on Earth.
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Manic Monday: Cell

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If all my cells were pizza-filled
(Sometimes I think they are)
I'd eat myself and disappear
Then you could have my car!
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Point me toward the sale on legal pads

Here I am! Still alive and everything-- though I had a bit of a scare this morning when I slipped and fell on the ice. Nothing like being re-introduced to gravity on a moment's notice.
This is my first Jantrails post of 2009. Sorry about the procrastination.

The Manic Monday theme is "Sale".

Ordinarily I don't really get into the whole "holiday shopping" thing, so I don't get all excited by the post-holiday sales, or the pre-holiday sales, or whatever else they're calling it these days. In fact, I try to avoid large stores that are bursting with manic crowds. I'd much rather be sitting quietly at home, reading or blogging.

But, y'know, the more I think about it, the more I've been craving office supplies lately.
I'm a nut for office supplies.
I don't even have an office, but that doesn't stop me.
I love paper, notebooks, envelopes, pencils, fountain pens, gel pens, colored paper clips, markers, folders, journals, sketch pads, portfolios, and many other things that can readily be found at office supply stores.

And, it's been awhile since I indulged my passion.
I wonder if anything's on sale over at Staples or Office Max.
I might even go check, if it wasn't for all the ice out there which would likely cause my imminent demise.
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Manic Monday: Tree

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Manic Monday: Candle

It would be funny if there was a candle shaped like a giant keg of gunpowder, so when you lit the wick it looked like you were getting ready to blow everything up.
Just imagine the fun you could have at airports!
You could even blog about it, once they let you out of solitary confinement.
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Manic Monday: Light

You know you're addicted to blogging when......

Q: How many bloggers does it take to change a light bulb?

A: None. Why bother? The screen gives off enough light while we're typing.

..............................................................................................................

On the bright side (no pun intended), this may lower my electric bill.
And I'm going to pretend I look attractive and exotic while I'm squinting.
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Apparently preservatives are delicious

Today's Manic Monday theme is "SHOP", so I'm going to tell you about something I bought a couple weeks ago while I was shopping in the grocery store.

You know how I've been on a tea kick lately. I drink tea all the time. Heck, I'm drinking some right now. (Really.)

Well, I was in the store, and I saw some bottles of tea in the organic section.
Organic bottled tea. No preservatives, no artificial sweetening chemicals, no high-fructose sludge. Just organic cane sugar and tea and natural flavors.

"Huh," I thought.

I looked at the price, and, much to my surprise, I saw that it cost exactly the same as the "regular" brands. So I figured What The Heck, and bought a few bottles of different flavors.

The first one (tangerine) was awful. It tasted like metal. Like if you tried sucking on a handful of old pennies. Ugh. Nasty.

The next (honeydew) was better, but still vaguely metallic. Strange.

The rest weren't so bad. (strawberry, plum, lemon). If I had to pick one to try again, I'd get the lemon.

Until then, though, I guess I have to guiltily admit that I prefer the tea with all the preservatives and chemicals and syrupy sludge and horrifying additives.

I had no idea that preservatives were so delicious.
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Manic Monday: Season

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