95 More Posts Until The End

My attention to this blog has been better lately, but lets be real, it has been sporadic in recent years. And now that I can't use the great and powerful Windows LiveWriter, I don't like posting pictures here as much as I used to. I tired to use what everyone tells me is the Mac equivalent: "MarsEdit" and another one - both were total crap as far as image editing and placement. But that isn't the only problem with hanging onto blogger, the problem is that my juicy stories need to be put on the secret blog (limited public viewing) or sold for cash or cigarettes and nowadays it is just easier to tell stories on tumblr, instagram, and vine and..hmm..maybe twitter. Although, my problem with twitter is that it is only as good as the moments I'm checking it. Too many tweets! You better hope your witty tweet showed up in the block of time I was glancing at my account or I will never know how hilarious you are.

Here is proof of my blogging decline:

2009 was obviously a big year.  I think moving to the south was very inspirational.  Let's not even talk about 2005!  What a statement! ONE post.

To further crunch the numbers and give you an idea of how much one has to "blog" to keep up respectable content:

3 posts a week = 156 posts a year
2 posts a week = 104 posts a year

And for fun, here are my comment stats:

Wondering about the comments awaiting moderation? Some cool spam from hotels in India and religious sites that I haven't brought myself to delete because I may need them for a story prompt or I may need to give my comment numbers a vanity-boost someday.

And finally the total number of posts on this eight-year-old endeavor (if you want to count 2005, nine years):

905 posts! 95 more I will have reached 1000 posts and then I can retire, well, retire this blog anyway. I would hate to set it on the shelf without a nice round number so I'm going for 1000. 

I found this handy days-from-now calculator and determined that if I were to start blogging once a day every day from here on out. This blog would retire on July 2nd, 2013 and August 9th if I wanted to take the weekends off. 

If I actually post 95 more times this year I will reach 111 posts for 2013 and that is back to 2011 levels! What if I get so inspired that I don't want to get rid of this beaute? We'll just have to see what happens. 

Library Book of The Week: FERNS!

Not all ferns are friendly!  You need this book to make sure you get along with the ferns in your house.  Published in 1976 by The Peter Pauper Press. (Illustrations to die for)

Food Critiques from "Four Weddings" Contestants

• The food was seasoned well and it was hot.
• Gumbo shouldn't have chunks of tomato.
• No seasoning.
• There was no labeling on the food.
• The beef is just bad.
• The pasta is kind of cold but it is good.
• The candy table had lots of options! There was chocolate and their was lots of sugar.
• The food wasn't what I thought it was going to be.
• My favorite thing at dinner was mashed potatoes. They were served in a martini glass.
• It was cold.
• It was different.
• I would have never put gumbo with mashed potatoes.

The show site.

The Olds Days

On my last visit to Michigan we went to the R.E. Olds Transportation Museum in Lansing.  Roughly 31% of my childhood/coming-of-age memories are somehow associated with the Cutlass so I was so excited to check this museum out. 

It may have been around awhile but we learned from a volunteer that the museum was under new direction and that they have hopes of it being of a Henry Ford level, By the way, if you haven't been to either of these museums you must go. If you don't know the history of the automobile you dont know America. But that is easy for me to say because I was raised in Michigan where everyone was somehow connected to at least one of the big three and I knew how to identify the production year of a camero from its headlights by the time I was ten. Thanks big bro! I have continued to develop this skill and hope to make it into a gameshow someday. 

The R.E. Olds Transportation Museum is on the Motorcities Passport Program, so that makes it even better for a National Park Passport enthusiast like myself. 

The place itself is lacking a bit of narrative (I like a museum map and a brochure/bio) so you never really get the whole story of RE's life or how things, like the cars, came to be and how things came to and end (Oldsmobile stopped production in 2004), but what it lacks in story, it makes up for in metal:

I spared you some of the photos of the earlier cars and skipped straight to the muscle. Grand National! Glory days!

I loved the group photos of all the folks that worked on the lines:

I wonder what happened to this rebel dude wearing the Lou Reed shirt?

To top it all off, the gift shop had vintage postcards from GM dealers:

*I like to imagine that 72 cutlass smashing a fixed-gear bike. Wait, I am totally kidding. I love bikes very much. 

Life of Tags

It has come to my attention that my brilliant idea to use #LATTS for an instagram tag for Left at The Thrift Store finds might be a bit confusing because it seems other people have been using that hashtag as well.

See what I mean: Check it out. Total sexy time.

Please continue to use the hashtag for both your thrift finds and body parts.

In other news:

It is nearly 70 and super sunny outside, but it looks like may be trapped inside under head cold quarantine for the rest of the day.  Looks like the rest of my afternoon will be filled up searching the hashtag #PECS.
And:
I'm reading this.
I'm writing about that.
And watching TONS of these.

Here is the 411

My phone kicked the bucket when I was in Michigan and I got an old-fashioned loaner phone to get me through my travels. I have a fear of commitment and didn't want to sign another cell contract so I was considering just living the flip-phone life, but the past two weeks have convinced me otherwise. Being without a smartphone for that time was a not-surprising affirmation of my addiction to my handheld information box (and instagram). I apologize to those of you who have been left in the dark as to how many vanity plates I've come across on the road and in parking lots, what interesting things I have been finding at Ikes, and what I have been drinking. It looks like I will be back online soon.

What was surprising to me was how the world of non-smartphone information has changed. For instance, the other night I was driving around looking for trouble in East Memphis and really wanted to see a movie but had no way to check the times or locations of the theaters. So I thought to call 411. I was stoked when the guy on the line asked me if I would like him to read the movie times. So we went through the list and times together. He must have been on the other side of the world because he would start each movie time with "showings at 1pm, 4:40.." and it was already 7pm in Memphis. I should have asked him for his recommendations. I'd like to start my own movie hotline where people can give me a call on my non-smartphone and we can just go over movie times and reviews from the local paper. I'd consider a TV Guide version of the service as well.

I did like having only dedicated access to my emails instead of having them fired at me at all times. For a while I imagined a time where I would just have this simple cell phone life, a thing that can "only" call and text. I would have to start carrying more reading material. Paperbacks or thin magazines like Newsweek. I would also have to probably carry around a flare, a digital camera, and a note pad and paper. Maybe a walkman. And an atlas. Thomas Guide? Definitely my library card in case I had to stop and get online somewhere.

Even though, thanks to large purses, I carry a lot of those things on me anyway, I opted to replace the crappy phone if only because being without my smart phone has made me realize that everyone around me gets nose-down in their phones in between activities, after eating, while waiting around for a third party... it really is like the new smoking habit. And I have succumbed to peer pressure.

 See ya on instagram: theskl