GetSheila

New Masthead For December 2006

The new masthead is up for December. My friend Natalie Lopez created my first masthead back in June and showed me how to use Photoshop. Here is where it has taken me so far:

June August 2006 (by Natalie):

October 2006:

November 2006:

December 2006:

Technorati Tags: banner, masthead, skin

Procrastination For Linear Thinkers

I have mentioned procrastination before but I have a whole new method to share with you today.

Read.

That's it. Read. It is elegant in its simplicity, no?

I have found I can spend not just hours but entire days reading: feeds, blogs, websites, email, forums. And that only covers the online content! I do not have time for the other kind, you know, where you sit on something soft and crack open a book or magazine. (Oh how I yearn for simpler days.)

Then, if I think I am going to run out of time-sucking reading material, I add a whole new dimension to the process by interacting with what I am reading. I leave comments; answer email; post in the forums.

If I still need something to keep me from the task at hand, I draft a post for my personal blog.

(...)

I should probably go now.

Tags: procrastination

A Torrent of Torrents

It is 9:45pm. I am about to go to bed and leave my computer in a completely different room. I know! How can this be?

Well.

I finally downloaded my first torrent today. Two, in fact. But you cannot simply download files and think you are done, oh no. That would make you a leech and leeches are frowned upon. So much so that you may find that no one wants to send you files anymore.

So I will not be a leech. I will upload at least as much as I download. But to do that, I have to leave my computer on overnight, uploading to its electronic brain's content. (It is slow, this uploading business. I think I picked "bad torrents" but how was a girl to know?)

::sigh::

Sleep. With no computer to lull me into unconsciousness. What an intriguing idea.

Tags: file exchange, torrents

Childhood Food Memories

My sister made Pillbury Crescent Rolls tonight and I had a food flashback. I used to roll wienies up in the crescent dough to make hot dogs baked inside their own crescent bun. And then there was the condiment: mayo and ketchup mixed together into a slimy pink dipping sauce. Oh if only we had some wienies to roll up right now.

I used to eat wienies right out of the freezer, too, still frozen and popsicle-like.

And if I am not mistaken, I am pretty sure my sister used to lick butter.

How about you? What are your childhood food memories?

Tags: favorite foods, childhood memories

The Twelve Days of Christmas It Ain't

Life By The Numbers

12 days until the office Christmas party. O drunken joy.

11 months until my next birthday. Oh wait, am I still having those?

10 + 5 = 15 years since my oh thank god I am finally divorced party. And I am still thankful.

9 times a day I want to smack somebody upside the head but don't, because that would be wrong.

8 years until I turn 50. Sweet Mother of God, where did the time go?

7 regular cast members on Medium I really should do in-depth histories on a la James Lipton of Inside the Actor's Studio but who has the time?

6 minimum posts a week for Medium Dreams, which no longer seems to be a problem now that the show is back with new episodes.

5 parking spaces at work, with mine the farthest from the building and the rainy season upon us.

4 cups of hot tea per day, minimum. Darjeeling. Milk. Sugar. And I don't care if my teeth are no longer white. I have been drinking tea since I was a pre-teen. I do not believe they were ever white.

3 cats to call my own and keep me from the lonelies. If I end up a crazy old cat lady, with cat hair all over my clothes and smelling of cat pee, so be it.

2 computers, y'know, in case one breaks down or is otherwise busy doing other things.

1 year until my mom turns 80. Wow. Go mama, go!

____________________

Kudos to Erica at Librarian Avengers for a great post idea. Trot on over and check out her hilarious self.

Technorati Tags: 12 days of christmas, lists, life

We All Have Issues

I first saw this test on Maryamie's blog, who got it from DrumsNWhistles. I meant to take it but the holiday was coming and I had a lot to do and, well, you know how it is. But then I saw it again over at imhelendt's blog and realized it was a sign and who am I to argue with the cosmos?

I have issues with...

chaos travel submission society present

Take Word Association Test

Chaos: Yeah, not a fan of chaos. "A place for everything and everything in its place," that's me. I do not understand why it is so hard for people to pick up after themselves. If you don't do it now, you will have to do it anyway at some future point and meanwhile it will be weighing on you as a to-do item and who needs that kind of stress? Ditto desks full of unfinished projects. How do you people function?
 

Travel: I believe I covered my feelings about travel in previous posts (why must I travel alone?, why must I travel alone, part 2, etc.) Suffice it to say, travel is an energy-sucking time vortex I avoid whenever possible.

Submission: When friends are asked to describe me, I do not believe any of them have ever used the word submissive. But I might consider playing that role for one night, if the right person asked nicely.

Society: I do not necessarily dislike society. It just pisses me off sometimes. Like when groups forms and decide what they think is best for them must, by default, be best for everyone else, so they proceed with their little agenda without bothering to find out if, in fact, it really is good for (or desired by) everyone else. Also, the shame society puts on people who don't fit in? That really pisses me off, too.

Present: I'm not sure what's going on with this one. I have issues with the present? I do tend to look forward to what *can* be in the future. Perhaps I need to live more in the moment. I will work on that.

Click on the link at the bottom of my results to take the Word Association test yourself. Or click over to Similar Minds for a plethora of additional tests.

Google Search Trumps Technorati

Just an FYI to let you know I changed the Search feature in the upper right hand corner.

I used to have a Technorati search there but I discovered lately that it was searching all of Technorati blogs, not just GetSheila like it used to. Now maybe that is just a temporary bug over at Technorati but, frankly, I have neither the time nor the inclination to wait for them any longer. They have already annoyed me by:

1. Making it impossible to do what they call "claim" my Medium Dreams blog on Technorati, even though I have followed the instructions provided on their site to the letter;
2. Not responding to multiple requests for assistance with claiming a b5media blog (2 requests from me and countless others from other b5media bloggers);
3. Listing my GetSheila blog as one I have claimed on Technorati, yet not finding it when I click on it over there.

This what get when I click on GetSheila on Technorati's list of my blogs:

It would be funny if it weren't so frustrating. According to their stats, I have not updated GetSheila for 60 days, yet I ping them every time I update (which is almost daily.)

So enjoy the new Google Search button. It works beautifully. Well, sort of. If you enter a search term that also happens to be a tag (like "travel"), you get duplicates. Oh well. I'll figure out something better later.

Props to Hsien for pointing out the Technorati search bug. And speaking of Hsien, have you visited her blogs lately?

• Cotton-Pickin' Days (personal blog)
• A Hearty Life (where she mentions me and my mp3 Zelda in her Fibby the Defibrillator post)
• Genetics and Health
• Play Library (kids toys, games, books, and other fun stuff)

Did I mention Hsien has a really good brain? I wish we lived closer so I could visit often and absorb brain food by proximity osmosis.

Technorati Tags: hsien, search, technorati

My Former b5media Bio

I updated my bio over on the b5media bloggers page. This is the one I had up before. It is really more of a blog entry than a bio so, now it is.

Hi, my name is Sheila Livingston. Welcome to my blogging bio. I started blogging in June 2006, which makes me a bit of a newbie, but I actually got my start a decade earlier at KPMG (one of the evil Big Four public accounting firms). As a shiny new tax specialist in the Silicon Valley office, I was told the new guy (that would be me) was required to take on the duties of weekly happy hour coordinator. I should have known by the gleeful expression on Former Happy Hour Coordinator Guy’s face that it was a setup, but I was all agog with the excitement of a new job. (Tip: During your first week of employment, never agree to take on any duties not specifically included in your official job description.) So every Thursday I sent an email to my happy hour distribution list with the week’s destination along with an anecdote to keep myself from getting bored. And every Friday I received email complaints about my choices. A sampling of what I learned: Whiskey drinkers hate micro-breweries/beer drinkers hated martini bars; Workaholics cannot fathom leaving the office at the freakishly early hour of 5:00 PM, even on a Friday; Every location is either too far from the office or in the wrong direction or makes parking impossible for at least one person in your group. Sheesh. But I stuck with it and soon began to receive emails from people I had never met (and who didn’t work at KPMG) asking to be added to the distribution list. Well, sure! Fresh blood is always a good thing. But I found that while my email list grew, live bodies at happy hour did not. Strange. In the interest of not spamming people every week with an invite to a happy hour they would never attend, I sent a “would you like me to take you off the distribution list?” email. The response was an overwhelming “NO!” People told me they looked forward to the weekly anecdotes and liked knowing others were having fun even if they couldn’t join in personally. What do you call that? Happy hour lurking via email? I realize it wasn’t really blogging, those emails, but it feels like pre-blogging to me: regular two-way communication based on what was going on in the writer’s life and evolving through feedback from the readers. Today I live in Fresno, located in California’s Central San Joaquin Valley. By day, I work as a CPA for a small public accounting firm, where every time I mention that I blog my boss says, “Tell me what a blog is again?” By night, I blog and pretend it’s physical exercise. b5media blog: Medium Dreams Personal blog: GetSheila

Tags: bio, sheila livingston

Turkey and Tivo and All Things Good

Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house...

No wait, that's not right. Damn Mom and her Andy Williams Special on TV all evening!

I picked up my mother Wednesday night and she is staying with me and my sister for two nights. She sleeps in my bedroom so I am on the Aerobed in the living room. I am seriously thinking about making it my new bedroom. Well okay, not seriously, but wouldn't it be fun?

It is huge: a livingroom / diningroom combo with a vaulted ceiling. We have everything we need with the family room and eat-in kitchen so this giant room is superfluous. I have already claimed over half of it with my desk, couch, and TV. The only other things in here, besides the various kitty condos, are the pieces of exercise equipment. (Yes, they have actually been getting used lately. Not by me. Don't be ridiculous.)

Being out here on the Aerobed, I have finally come to appreciate the awesomeness that is Tivo. Until now, I had only used it to play back Medium, but today I actually got to watch some of the other things I recorded. I fast forwarded through all of Jay and Dave's monologues to get right to the interviews I wanted to see. Did you know they don't bring on their first guest until HALF WAY through the show? I had no idea. That's thirty minutes of monologue and other crap to listen to. (Yes yes, I know they are funny in their own right but I don't have time for everyone's funny. Only zefrank. The Show's time on this earth is limited so he is my priority.)

But the best part of sleeping out here is that Turvy sleeps with me. He doesn't do that so much in the bedroom because he feels cornered in a room with only one emergency exit and uses it whenever another cat comes in.

What can I say? Obsessive-compulsive people have obsessive-compulsive pets. Someone has to love us.

Technorati Tags: thanksgiving, tivo

Turkey Day Favorite

My favorite food on Thanksgiving has got to be candied yams. Lots of brown sugar and butter on top of blended, whipped, or otherwise smashed up yams. None of those giant yam chunks for me, thank you. Although I am particular about my yams, they do not actually have to be yams. Sweet potatoes are just fine, too. In fact, I am not sure I know the difference. Yams are orange and sweet potatoes are yellow on the inside, right?

What's your favorite Thanksgiving Day dish? And don't feel you have to limit yourself to just one. Do you prepare it or does somebody else do it best so all you have to do is show up and bring the wine?

Technorati Tags: favorite food, thanksgiving