So I have been indulging in the most blatently passive-aggressive behavior I think I have ever witnessed myself indulging in. Or something like that.

I have an arrangement with my landlords that they can use my parking spot when I'm away at work, and it's pretty much understood that they'll be gone by the time I get home. This saves me from having to go get them when they're in my spot when I show up, and saves them from having to hurry over for a game of speedy musical parking spots.

But there's this one son who uses the office below my apartment for 'business'. I don't know what his 'business' is, and I'll tell you right now that when someone is described to me, as he was, as being 'in business' with no further elaboration, I imagine all sorts of wheeling and dealing of a shady and not-particularly honest or ethical nature. Who knows? Maybe he's swinging deals to feed hungry children in Africa, but that's not what concerns me.

What concerns me is that he parks behind my spot. Everyone here uses the extra space behind their cars to let their guests park and avoid the metered spots on the street. And what pisses me off is this guy will stay there till like 7 p.m., loooong after I get home and would like to be able to have people over.

Not that anyone ever comes over. But that's beside the point.

So when I get home, I either stomp all over the place, which hurts my feet, or I turn on the little stereo with big bass that sits on the floor and is loaded up with every disco cd I own and is tuned to the local dance station, and then I turn it up. After like 2 minutes, this will cause some sort of mental breakdown on my part, but I like to think I'm causing him some discomfort too and he'll JUST LEAVE ALREADY!

For you, Swetta: today I had chicken baked in Trader Joe's Marinara, with lots of parmesan cheese on top. It was way good. I think I'm getting the hang of baking chicken so that it doesn't turn out all dry and gross. Yay me!

Me, being a flaker:

I was going to do B2B until about half an hour ago when I was discussing it with a co-worker and talked myself right out of it. It's forecasted to rain (and I've done b2b in the rain, it's not fun), my feet are hurting lately (plantar faciitis isn't fun either), and my camera battery is old enough that it won't last for more than 15 minutes, much less 3 hours.

Each on their own is a lame reason to not go, but all together make for a compelling reason to sleep in on Sunday.

I hope those of you who do go have a great time. Take some pictures for me, 'k? Thanks!

Photo by Josh

So to all of you who I haven't responded to in email, or called, or IM'd or just haven't seen in a while ... I'm sorry. There's no excuse, really. I haven't been that busy, I'm not depressed about anything, there's no drama in my life that's distracting me ... I just can't seem to reach out. Also, work, where I do most of my online communicating, actually has been really busy lately (customers! software releases! business email! ack!). Hopefully that will ease up soon, and either 1) I won't feel awful about turning on the computer at home or 2) I can get some stuff done while I'm at work, instead of, like, working the whole time I'm there. Who knew work would be so invasive?!!?

So I hope you're all having a wonderful May and I'll hook up with you soon!

'Cause I'm like that: my AIM page

The only thing that can measure up to the fun of reading the LRB personals is reading the submissions of people trying to get a subscription to said personals in the comments of one of the smarter sites I like to read.

You know you're getting old when it's 9:30 p.m. on a Tuesday (read: I have to go to bed soon if I'm ever going to make up for the lost weekend sleep and I have to be up at 6 a.m.) and you're standing in your kitchen, considering making chocolate chip cookies. And you end the consideration by muttering, "Naw, I'll just wash the dishes."

Dammit, I'm making cookies ... and I'll wash the dishes while they bake. And get to sleep at midnight. Again.

I've been really busy doing a bunch of stuff that would bore you to tears to read, so here are all the links I have bookmarked lately. Sorry that many sources aren't credited and few of the links are annotated.

LIBRARIANS BATTLE FOR FREEDOM

toot tone 53 - this is for you, Jish.

Check out the warning video

Working poverty in Canada

James colbert

WH-Dinner-Colber.mov

Beeramisu

Tom likes it hot

Mr Squiggle

Roomba And The City

bad hair on mefi

best homemade lightsaber duel ever! [via Bradlands]

Two found ads that taste great together: Campari, choco. - I like the Campari one better.

The Republic of T.

HOWTO sharpen a knife

Fees Eat Away at Employees' 401(k) Nest Eggs

Twisted Sister: We're Not Gonna Take It - I was indulging in nostalgia.

Twisted Sister: I Wanna Rock - again with the nostalgia

Air France: LA VIE A BORD (via MeFi)

Fast-Food Trash

for my Canadian friends

Village People: Sex Over the Phone

Tampon Crafts: for any time of the month

Prepping for a shaker

Best fight scene of all time

San Francisco - After the '06

Mr. Picassohead

Geoffrey Chaucer hath a Blog merchandise

This could occasionally be very important information to you

PublicLoos: A Google Maps Mash-up

May the 4th be with you!

Speaking of which, seems they're going to release Star Wars yet again, but this time, Han will shoot first.

Thanks so much to all of you who send along amusing videos and Powerpoint attachments - I love that you think to include me in hilarity when these arrive in your inbox. And it's no longer painful since I upgraded from dialup.

However, if there's no personal message from you in the body of the email, I'm just going to delete the email.

With the proliferation of viruses that can either 1) cause your email client to send harmful attachments to everyone in your addressbook or 2) spoof your email address to make it look as though the harmful attachment is coming from you, it's just not worth it to me or my computers to assume it really is from you.

It's not a personal thing against you - viruses can come from anywhere, and this is just me protecting myself. All you have to do is say something unique in the body of the email and include your name and I promise I'll take a look at the email. Extensive experience with responses to personals ads has taught me to tell personal from generic messages, so something more than "take a look at this!" would be most helpful.

Thanks for spreading the joy!

We're going to see Def Leppard and Journey at Shoreline Amphitheatre in August. Wanna come with? It'll be a blast!