Thursday Thirteen Things You Should Know About Product Labels (#21)

The source of my green educational Thursday Thirteen this week is Crissy Trask’s It’s Easy Being Green.

Thirteen Things about N. Mallory

1. Biodegradable: The Federal Trade Commission defines “biodegradable” as a substance that has been scientifically proven to break down entirely and return to nature within a reasonably short time after disposal. However, because most detergents and soluble chemicals degrade in wastewater systems, they don’t always completely break down into eco-friendly substances. Read the label carefully to make certain the product is made up of nontoxic, renewable ingredients.
2. Cage Free: While this label guarantees that
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   Tags: green living, recycle, biodegradable, animal rights, organic, humane, waste, Thursday Thirteen, bloghopping, memes

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Thursday Thirteen Vanity Plates I Took Pictures Of This Week (#20)

Today’s Thursday Thirteen is brought to you by the letters W, I, and G, and the numbers 5 and 23.

I found these all in less than seven days. I swear, New Englanders have the most Vanity Plates per square mile.

Thirteen Things about N. Mallory

1. This guy is just “CREWZN.”
   
2. I can only imagine this person is a self-styled “gangsta”. Though, in a Mazda? Probably not very credible.
   
3. This must be a mother.
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   Tags: vanity plates, photo blogging, thursday thirteen, meme, bloghopping, license plates, automobiles, cars, parking lot, parking garage, Maine, New England

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Monday’s A Bitch: 01/08/2007

Random Joy

1. After a long day, I like to kick back with…? HGtv, my afghan, and my animals.
2. Do you know anyone “famous”/who is the “most famous” person you’ve ever met? I’ve met lots of famous people at sci-fi conventions — actors, writers, and artists. Most seem to be more down to earth at them. Laurell K. Hamilton, Jewell Staite, Ruth Thompson and Timothy Zahn come to mind. Didn’t care for Anne McCaffrey or Claudia Christian at all.
3. What is your favourite piece of classical music? - Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring

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Tags: Monday\'s a Bitch, meme, bloghopping

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Thursday Thirteen Things I Wonder About (#19)

My mind works in strange and mysterious ways…

Thirteen Things about N. Mallory

1. How often do other people change out the underwear in their underwear drawer? I mean, so they schedule a regular amount of time? Twice a year maybe to go through and throw out all the ratty old underwear they wouldn’t wear on vacation or on a date or in front of their cats and replace them?
2. Speaking of underwear, am I the only one who’s ever bought new underwear just so I didn’t have to wash clothes? Or whole new outfits
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   Tags: Thursday Thirteen, blog meme, meme, bloghopping, WAL-Mart, Target, the puppy, South Park, underwear, The Closer, Monk, Eureka, T.V., Amazon.com, mold, mildew, fibromyalgia, migraines

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Getting Ready For 2007

So, thinking about my “Things I’d like to do in 2007,” I decided to get a head start.

• I took the To Do lists — daily, 2x a week, weekly, biweekly, monthly, quarterly, 2x a year, annually, etc. — and assigned the items dates or days of the weeks. I put them all into my Palm Z22; the to do program has a repeating functionality which allowed me to do all sorts of neat things. I am giving myself permission to go
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  Tags: Thursday Thirteen, knitting, reading, books, housecleaning

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Looking Backward: The Twelve Firsts Of 2006

I’ve seen this meme here and there this month. I can’t recall where now. The idea is to re-print the first sentence of the first post from each month in 2006. With the New Year approaching, this seems like a good time to do so…and I’m curious.

(If the “first post” fell on a “Quote of the Day” or similar, I skipped it to one of my own posts.)

• January 3, 2006: History Repeating Itself?
  

  So, four years ago, the hospital I was at went through lay-offs and an
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  Tags: memory lane, past, 2006, meme, comments, Blogging & Other Blogs

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Thursday Thirteen Things I’d Like To Do In 2007 (#18)

So this is the time of year when everyone is doing New Year’s Resolutions. I prefer not to do “Resolutions” because they’re generally broken and joked about by the middle of January and forgotten by President’s Day. Then, next January, they’ll be resolved again.

So, instead, I usually try to use the time to reflect and think about the things I’d like to work on in my life, changes, improvements, and so on. I don’t make myself any impossible promises though. I know my limits and I know physics. There’s no way I can lose 60 lbs in 2 months, for example; nor is it likely that I’ll be getting up at 5am any time soon to exercise 3 times a week.

Anyway, here is my list of things I would like to do in 2007, no promises, but I’m working on it. Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: Thursday Thirteen, bloghopping, meme, New Years Resolutions, gardening, knitting, debt, weight, health, writing, Green Living, housekeeping, dysfunctional family

Pet Peeve #2,314: Deleting Disagreable Comments

It’s enough that the world is filling up with Princesses, Divas, and self-involved Assholes, but why even bother having a blog and inviting people to comment if you’re going to delete all of the comments that disagree with you? If you’re going to do that, could you at least put some sort of warning or disclaimer that only worshipers at your altar should spend time and risk carpal tunnel responding to your every thought, whine, or tribulation?

Tags: pet peeve, bloghopping

Thursday Thirteen Favorite Christmas Decorations (#17)

(I apologize if some of the pictures are a little dark. I tried to use natural light because the flash washed them out. I’m much better at taking landscape photographs.)

Thirteen Things about N. Mallory

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Tags: Thursday Thirteen, bloghopping, blog meme, Christmas, decorations, ornaments

Thursday Thirteen Things That Have Gone Wrong Today (#16)

Today is a Murphy’s Thursday Thirteen.

Thirteen Things about N. Mallory

1. I overslept.
2. I forgot to take my morning medicines.
3. I was out of both fruit and granola when I went to make breakfast.
4. When I got in the car to drive to work, I realized I was out of gas.
5. When I got to the gas station, I realized I had no purse.
6. When I got home to get the purse, I sideswiped my side view mirror on my garage.
7. I picked up regular instead of Diet Pepsi at the gas station.
8. When I finally got near work, traffic was backed up 1½
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   Tags: Thursday Thirteen, blog meme, bloghopping

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Life Meme

Got this from the Laughing Muse:

1. What time is it? Nap time?
2. What is your full name? Fnord.
3. What are you most afraid of? Dying alone and no one finding my body for weeks.
4. What is the most recent movie that you have seen in a theater? Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest.
5. Have you ever seen a ghost? Yes. Several.
6. Where were you born? Columbus, OH.
7. Ever been to Alaska? Nope.
8. Ever been toilet papering? Nope.
9. Loved someone so much it made you cry? Yes.
10. Been in a serious car accident? Serious enough to end up on crutches for a week once and sprained my
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    Tags: blog meme

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Pet Peeve #3,129: Restrictive Comments

I can’t tell you how frustrating it is to read an interesting blog entry and want to comment or join in an on-going comment discussion only to find that you can only comment if you have a Blogger, Google, or Yahoo 360° account. (The worst ones are even more obscure or require registration with the website.)

The absolute last thing I want to do is sign up yet another account where I’m going to have to remember yet another sign-on name and password — because likely my usual sign-on has already been taken and it’s not a good idea to
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Tags: pet peeves, bloghopping, meme, commenting, registration

Thursday Thirteen Famous Movies I’ve Happily Never Seen (#15)

Feel free to try to convince me to change my mind.

Thirteen Things about N. Mallory

1. Gone With The Wind — Though I did read the book. I absolutely couldn’t stand Scarlett or Ashley. I did love Rhett Butler, of course, the rogue. Still, I’m not sitting through a technocolor movie of the story.
2. Pulp Fiction — Gratuitous violence. Well, I think that’s what it is. That’s what it seems to be from the descriptions I’ve garnered from my male friends who’ve seen it and the commercials. It just seems to glorify violence and after seeing Natural Born Killers in the theater, I can’t stomach that kind of glorification anymore. Read the rest of this entry »

   Tags: Thursday Thirteen, meme, bloghopping, movies

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Thursday Thirteen Geeky Buttons (#14)

I’m a geek. O.K. I’m a roleplaying geek. Many of my friends are roleplaying geeks. About 15 years ago, we were on this kick where we’d keep track of the really off-the-wall things we said, usually during roleplaying games. Sometimes, the quote was something we overheard somewhere else and repeated because it “sounded” like something we’d say — you know something “geeky cool”. Then if the quotable was worthy enough, I’d have it made into a button at the next sci-fi convention I made it too.

As I was packing to move into my house, I rediscovered my stash
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Tags: bloghopping, meme, Thursday Thirteen, geek, roleplaying, buttons

Thursday Thirteen Things To Worry About (#13)

I’m a worry-wart. I worry about all kinds of things and I can’t turn it off. I worry about whether or not my cats hate me. I worry about whether or not my co-workers are talking about me. I worry about whether or not the world is going to blow up today or if my house is going to burn down or if my headache means I’m getting a brain tumor.

I’m in therapy. At least I’m trying to get a grip, but it turns out that there are a lot of people who worry about
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Tags: Thursday Thirteen, meme, bloghopping, risks, accidents, health, cancer, fear, interesting trivia

Thursday Thirteen Things Most People Don’t Know About Me (#12)

I moved to Maine 2 1/2 years ago, leaving my old life behind.  Most people up here and most people online don’t know many of these things from the first 33 years of my life…

Thirteen Things about N. Mallory

1. I was a Stand-up comic in New Orleans for about 2 years after college.  I loved it at first, but it’s very hard to be a clean comic and the guy who booked our shows kept booking us into the sleaziest of places.
2. I lost 55 lbs in 2002.  I’ve gained it back since moving, but I was
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   Tags: Thursday Thirteen, meme, bloghopping

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Exercise Your Mind - 11/08/06

Election 2006

• You have your marching orders…. — Nicole Belle @ Crooks and Liars reminds us of the Republican’s “Contract with America” when they took control of Congress in 1994.
  

  This year’s election offers the chance, after four decades of one-party control, to bring to the House a new majority that will transform the way Congress works. That historic change would be the end of government that is too big, too intrusive, and too easy with the public’s money. It can be the beginning of a Congress that respects the values and shares the faith of the American family.

  Like Lincoln, our first Republican president, we intend to act “with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right.” To restore accountability to Congress. To end its cycle of scandal and disgrace. To make us all proud again of the way free people govern themselves.
  

  Let’s hope that the Democrats learn from the Republicans’ mistakes.

• A Remedy for Negative Political Ads — Paul Silver @ Donklephant has a remedy for all of those negative, deceitful ads since there’s not likely to be any law regulating truth in political advertising anytime soon.
  

  Perhaps the solution lies in changing the geometry of the question. Instead of trying to regulate the content of ads, we use public funds (or funds from the Parties) to run a frequent public service message that corrects the inaccuracies of any recent ads - perhaps produced by the Factcheck.org folks. Since a candidate would not want to have the airwaves filled with objective criticism they would be inclined to stay as reasonable and civil as possible.

• A Remedy for Election Tampering– Paul Silver @ Donklephant also thinks there should be a reward for information leading to a conviction in crimes related to election tampering.

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Tags: 2006 election, Republicans, Contract with America, Contress, ethics, scandal, Democrats, negative political ads, election tampering, politics, factcheck.org, DHS, TSA, passports, Hasan Elahi, FBI, mental illness, anxiety, depression

Thursday Thirteen Discombobulated Worries This Week (#11)

My brain is way too scattered and full of anxiety to focus on one particular nifty topic this week. So, now you get to see the really true discombobulated, highly anxious me.

Thirteen Things about N. Mallory

1. What if the sale on the little red house falls through and I don’t get it?
2. What if the sale on the little red house doesn’t fall through and I do get it and it turns into a money pit?
3. What if those nice flippers are taking advantage of me because I’m a naive first time buyer and I don’t know what I’m doing?
4. What if my dog is depressed? He’s been lethargic and hasn’t been eating at home, but the doggie daycare folks say he’s hyper and playful there. Maybe he just hates me.

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Tags: Thursday Thirteen, meme, bloghopping, anxiety, home buying, acid reflux, IgAN, autoimmune kidney disease, discombobulated, the puppy

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Friday Five First Sentences Challenge– 10/27/06

Here we go again.

1. There was no way in hell she was going to the opera.
2. Three hundred years had passed since the banishment of the War God and now the cracks in the world were truly starting to show.
3. Shaina had made up her mind; she was definitely, probably going with decaf this morning.
4. Bill was going to kill his brother.
5. Taylor watched in horror as the crack slowly crawled across her windshield, forking in the middle and branching out like two great arms in some desperate plea.

Now it’s your turn…

Tags: Friday Five 1rst sentences, writing, fiction, meme, bloghopping

Thursday Thirteen House Hunting Ponderings (#10)

This week’s post obviously is the result of my recent house hunt wanderings. Clearly I have my own opinions and sense of style. None of my comments are meant to insult so please take this post in the spirit of the Thursday Thirteen meme — an opportunity to get to know each other…here’s me. Feel free to comment and opinion right back. I’d like to get to know you too.

Thirteen Things about N. Mallory

1. Seriously. $500K is a bit too much to be asking if you have the pinkest bathroom ever and a Space Shuttle mural in the living room.

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Tags: Thursday Thirteen, meme, bloghopping, house hunting

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