11 posts tagged “qotd”
How did you create your username for VOX? What influenced your decision?
Submitted by Strive2Be.
I own/program an online 80s Retro Radio station, and my "DJ" handle is "Java Jane". I wanted something different from my station "handle" or username yet something semi-related. Thus Retro for the 80s flashback aspect plus Maven, because I'm supposed to be the alternative 80s "guru", as it's my personal music archive (which proudly contains many rare and downright obscure alt.80s songs, although the station is a mix between popular retro/new wave/synthpop and the more obscure stuff). That's it...
What's the infamous story people tell about you?
Submitted by Cherney.
OMG, there are sooooooooo many, some I'll tease you with here! If you asked this question in the last 9 years, the answer would be "none", as post kids, I've turned into the model mom and have pretty much renounced my former infamy. I'm still "crazy mommy", but not "infamous" crazy mommy! Prior to my kids, I've been pegged with monikers that ranged from "dePunka", and "Dangerous Deb" to "Wild Woman", and I always gave my friends and acquintances a new tale or adventure to tell, although fortunately, I always knew where to draw the line. My long term friends always ask me to write a book journaling some of my best stories, and we love to laugh as we relive them! Maybe one day I will write that book.
If asked, I don't know which of the many stories any given person might tell. There was the time in high school when we were reading the Merchant of Venice and the teacher was reading aloud the "boil and bubble, toil and trouble" intro lines and out of the blue, I felt compelled to I let out my best witch cackle at the top of my lungs, reminiscent of the wicked witch of the West's, "I'll get you my pretty, nah, hah ha ha" in The Wizard of Oz. The teacher and class fell to pieces in laughter and we laughed the whole rest of the class period. There was the time when I was in college where my girlfriend and I were flirting with some guys at the diner after being out all night, had breakfast with them, and all of a sudden, when we exchanged information, I realized the one guy was my former 7th grade teacher (albeit, he was cute)! Yuck! Maybe they'd tell of the time I worked for the U.S. Courts in Washington D.C. and while going to work every day in a conservative suit I cut my hair into a full on mohawk.
Could it be the time I worked for SONY in Los Angeles and due to sheer moxie talked my way into an extra roll on the 80s TV hit "Hunter"? Maybe it was the seat of my pants move across country, leaving a great job in NYC to move to L.A. with no job and knowing no one. Could it be the time I spent in Spain and all my adventures there, including dating a pop singer? Possibly it would be the time I went camping with my friends all of us clad in black leather and how we were stalked outside our tent by a black bear and ended up sleeping in the ranger's cabin??? Yeah, we were true hardcore campers - all clad in clubbing gear!
There was the time my girlfriend and I jokingly (and rather innocently) passed out "MPS" coupons to cute boys vacationing at the summer resort we worked at in high school, and when they got the idea they might cash in while we were out on a boat ride/water skiing trip around the lake, we dove off like a shot into the lake and ended up having to swim more than a mile back to shore. (Talk about naive and stupid!) That brings to mind memories the mad Algerian who stalked me all across Spain and wanted to take me back to Algiers and have me tend to his aging mother while he went off to cabaret all day. Yeah, that's right up my alley, bud...
It could be the time when my girlfriend and I were convinced we were being sold into white slavery in a Valencia night club. THAT is a story to be reckoned with, but at least led it lead to meeting our rescuer, a native San Franciscan living in Spain, which turned into a relationship, and later, once the relationship ended became an enduring friendship. Matter of fact, his sister flew in from the Bay area recently and we booked a hotel suite in Times Square to give our kids a "vacation" in Manhattan for a week and we did the whole tourist thing, something jaded, native NYers rarely do! Another friend could tell of the time driving back from a beach vacation where during the whole trip back, guys in a neighboring car were holding up signs to meet us, etc. and we were holding them up back inside our cars driving. We actually stopped and had dinner with them! Man, that would be a scary thing to think of my daughter doing today... I have so many exciting, interesting and sometimes hair raising stories from many moons ago, I don't know which one any given friend might relay about me, as there are far too many, many, too many to chose from, and many I just wouldn't share with strangers in a public forum, in order to protect the guilty, even if names were changed. LOL.
All I can say is I enjoyed my youth to the fullest, and because I'm generally confident and outgoing and not afraid to approach or be approached by too many people from all walks of life, it's opened many a door to adventure and light hearted craziness which have lead to many an infamous tale to be told. Yep, there were some risks (albeit only a few) that I took, that in hindsight I realize were flat out stupid. Thankfully they ended up well. Overall, despite being outgoing, adventurous and at times a touch crazy, I have maintained rewarding, solid friendships, and have many exploits and adventures for those involved to recount from the 80s to the early 90s. I think, along with all the infamous stories my friends have to chose from and might tell, along with any given story, I fancy they'd mostly likely tell of a caring, compassionate, true blue friend who has never betrayed their secrets or trust and who cares about them like family over the decades and that is what makes me most memorable and infamous to the people I hold dear...
Who is the cheapest person you know? (Not frugal... just annoyingly cheap!)
Submitted by kryan70.
My brother in law, hands down. A few years ago, my kids were going to get on a 25 cent merry go round ride with his kids and he wouldn't spring for their tickets, even if I paid him back, so they could get on at the same time. They missed the round and had to wait until I fumbled for money to get them on the next round. This is one of many examples. Yeah, I love my sister and her family, but it's a known fact, "he be cheap"... LOL
What websites do you visit every day?
Submitted by Chez Michelle.
In an effort to streamline my life and get more things done in less time which in turn allows me more time for the pleasant things and less time spent dealing with the daily grind, I pretty much only go to a few sites, as I have most of them consolidated under one roof. I swear by Netvibes as my start page, which is where I go several times a day, as I have everything I want there, for the most part. Weather, multiple emails, news, blogs and rss, my del.icio.us bookmarks, websites I like embedded, entertainment, torrents, travel, shopping, etc. all tabbed out nicely. I still do visit Google Reader (although I don't have to) when I'm really digging through all my RSS like a madwoman. In short, I visit tons of sites, from gtd, tech, entertainment, shopping, news, scrapbooking, music related, and more, but having all these under one roof means I really only go to a few sites a day.
Another site I daily navigate to is my personal hobby website for Generation 80s [alternative] Retro Radio to say "hi" to my listeners via the Shoutbox during the day and to my administration panel at Live365 to change or program my playlists daily. Of course, I come here, to Vox. Did you know you can set groups of tabs to open up simultaneously in Firefox, so all you have to do is click on the description on your links bar or in your bookmarks and all those pages you like daily will open? Even better is the Firefox extension Morning Coffee which gives you the ability to manage and organize regularly visited websites by day and open them up simultaneously by integrating it with your daily routine. Now you can have your favorite AM sites open when you come down for coffee, work related sites you must read open at 11am, or the news and comics waiting for you at night. If it could only make the coffee, I'd be golden.
If you could pick a cartoon world to live in, which would it be? Why?
"The now defunct "Duckman: Private Dick, Family Man", with Jason Alexander. I loved, loved, loved that show. I pine for, as I have a twisted toon crush on "Corny" aka "Cornfed". Duckman it is the perfect parody of the insanity of [my] life, with all the dark, quick witted humor and sarcasm I appreciate thrown in the mix. This was an adult cartoon that ran on the USA network late at night and had the music and voice of Frank and Dweezil Zappa respectively. Does anyone else remember the joys of Duckman?
If it had to be a current cartoon, it would be "Spongebob Squarepants", as I really would like to meet the Hash Slinging Slasher and play clarinet with Squidward Tenticles, and hang out in his tiki head, get all evil with Plankton, my favorite character, as he really knows how to bring sexy back. Yep, I'm twisted, but hey, at least I can admit it!"
What do you always forget to pack?
Submitted by quornflour.
Nothing. I'm far too anal to forget anything. I have lists made and checked off weeks ahead of time. Scary but true.
When was the last time you did something dangerous?
Submitted by Ross.
This morning. Besides, I haven't been nicknamed "Dangerous Deb" for nothing.
What did you drink that made you do your last famous Hollywood "spit-take"?
Submitted by LittleGreenBook.
What the hell? Are we scraping the bottom of the barrel for QotD? Maybe if I were a Survivor contestant at some point in my life, I might not scoff at this...until then, all I can say is, "Unreal"...
Have you noticed a climate change in the area where you live over the past few years?
Sorry all you tree huggers, those too busy or brainwashed and who have not delved into both sides of an issue, or those who love to drink that Kool Aid (and there are plenty of you or at least, you're the vocal minority, aided by the big media), but I'm about to take a stand that's going to really piss you off today. (Many of you I call my friends, but that doesn't mean we have to agree on everything to get along in life, we just agree to disagree). Maybe, via comments, you'll piss me off too! I decided to answer the QotD, so you're gonna get my brutally honest opinion, not some PC milque-toast answer to keep you reading my blog if you don't agree with me...
You know, I do believe scientifically that the earth's temperature has gone up a degree or two. I don't believe it's going to wipe out the species. Many of the phenomenon currently attributed to global warming were occurring before the rise of the industrial age, with no explanations of those events, even 100 years ago. We certainly are finite in our knowledge and don't know everything about our planet to explain every phenomenon. If you believe the earth has been around for billions of years, then you must know, as many scientists on the other side do, that we've gone through cyclical climate changes. Or do you really believe this is the first climate shift?
Here in metro NY, the first half of the winter was unusually warm, I mean like late spring warm. If you believe all the hype, allow "inconvenient truths" to permeate your mind, boy, that's all the evidence one might need to jump on the global warming bandwagon. The second half of the winter was so unbelievably bitter cold and we had snowfall after snowfall. That, in one fell swoop, would have you believe that there is no warming trend, the first half of the winter was a cyclical fluke. Are either evidence, one way or another?
That being said, there is no consensus among scientists that global warming exists, but if you pass around one sided information long enough, it becomes "truth", no matter how inconvenient, and starts to brainwash the sheep. Movies made by Hollywood and politico's passed off and honored as "documentaries". Progressive big media droning out their ideology as objective reporting. Most good people who believe the hype are far too busy with their daily goings on, and if asked, barely know who name of their representative, who is secretary of state or what the "D.C." in Washington D.C. stands for, yet have adopted opinions they've heard touted as iron clad scientific "truth" presented over the airwaves, rather than bothering to investigate the whole of the argument for themselves and coming to their own conclusion. Sad but true.
The rest of the true believers are for the most part are, IMHO, ideologues, their beliefs rooted in elitist neo-socialism (btw, show me one good model, I challenge you, or will you show me yours, which can't fail like the rest, LOL? ) and this is all part and parcel of their "progressive" mindset. Some even believe it's part of a bigger global conspiracy, but I'm not touching that with a ten foot pole. Funny, the media, political factions, even the internet, unless you really dig deep, flood you with arguments FOR global warming, but never are so open minded, as they claim to be, to present the opposing arguments for the silent majority on the other side. Unfortunately, digging for the other side of the argument so one can make up their own mind after filtering the facts, takes considerable time and effort, which few expend.
From the Wall Street Journal, this article quickly and succinctly sums up how I feel (written by an MIT science professor):
Don't Believe the Hype
Al Gore is wrong. There's no "consensus" on global warming.
BY RICHARD S. LINDZEN
Sunday, July 2, 2006 12:01 a.m. EDTAccording to Al Gore's new film "An Inconvenient Truth," we're in for "a planetary emergency": melting ice sheets, huge increases in sea levels, more and stronger hurricanes, and invasions of tropical disease, among other cataclysms--unless we change the way we live now.
Bill Clinton has become the latest evangelist for Mr. Gore's gospel, proclaiming that current weather events show that he and Mr. Gore were right about global warming, and we are all suffering the consequences of President Bush's obtuseness on the matter. And why not? Mr. Gore assures us that "the debate in the scientific community is over." [full article link]
Anyway, 'nuff said, that's my opinion. I don't see any direct evidence in my day to day life that it is any warmer or cooler than at any other time in my 43 years of life. I'd call myself an independent thinker, I hold no particular overall philosophy where someone could pigeon hole me to ascribing to one mindset, ideology or world view or another. This is what my considerable research and my own powers of deduction have lead me to. If I'm wrong, I'm prepared to go to hell in a hand basket. Until then, I my advice to Al Gore is you better get some solar panels or a windmill, as you're massive home is taking tons of fossil fuel to heat. Your private jet travel too. If you're gonna preach "green", your lifestyle better be "green", or you got no street cred with me. It's just more greenhouse gas polluting the atmosphere for a world wide progressive agenda...can you say Kyoto**?
**Touted as a world wide treaty against global warming, but proven that it's initiatives would not impact the reduction of emissions. It's really a protocol for socialistic redistribution of wealth, hindering the efforts of 1st world countries and giving 3rd world countries a leg up and a license to pollute.
