January's spam totals:


That's around a 14% decrease in total spam since December, but a much higher percentage of spams making it past the blacklists and being delivered to my mailbox . I suspect this is because of the large number of viruses in the wild, most of which are written by spammers and which provided a bevy of disposable open relays for them to use. I'm still only having to manually deal with less than one percent of the spams I'm getting.

I was playing Final Fantasy X (and then, later, watching that awful George Clooney movie "Solaris" which was saved only by having Ophelia come snuggle with me for the last half of it), so I missed the Great Breast Debacle. Not that I particularly mind, though Mr. Bear has always had a crush on Janet, so he's probably sorry he missed it (he was watching Trading Spaces).

I got nothing done this weekend. Not that I needed to, but still. I'm usually so busy around the holidays that come these weekends in February and March when I have so little to do I always feel a little shell-shocked.

Right now I'm having some decaf chai made from a hopped-up dry mix that elusis brought home for me from Whole Foods. It's pretty good, now that I've added my own spices and a bit of creamer. Not as good as what elusis makes (I have some of that, too, but that gets saved for special occasions when I need the caffiene) but pretty good.

I'm assuming I won't have to pay taxes on it (or that I already paid taxes and the one million is what's left over). So.

1. Who do you call first?
Mr. Bear, so he can give his notice at work if he wants.

2. What is the first thing you buy for yourself?
Probably a nice dinner.

3. What is the first thing you buy for someone else?
Probably a nice dinner.

4. Do you give any away? If yes, to whom?
See below.

5. Do you invest any?
Half of it goes towards getting a house, including furniture and so forth. Once that's out of the way, we'd invest the remainder (if any), but it would be earmarked for house stuff. I figure for $500,000 we should be able to get a good house with all the accoutrements in the free and clear. Maybe not our dream home, but a pretty good one.

Of the other half, I have important things I'd like to accomplish (in no particular order):

1. Fund Mr. Bear's bachelor's degree and certification efforts.
2. Pay off all outstanding debts.
3. Buy a new car.
4. Take some trips, including taking Mom to London.
5. Establish trust funds for our nieces and nephews. Said trust funds to be used for college or educational expenses; if the kids don't want to go to college then the trust fund money can be used for buying a house. Once they turn 35 the money would be theirs without any further conditions.

These days, a million dollars isn't enough to "retire" on. Maybe we could, if we already had a house. Maybe. But it would certainly go a long ways towards easing our financial situation for the rest of our lives. We'd both still have to work, but we would at least have all our debts gone, a house and car in the free and clear (which is a major investment), and some security for the future for the children in our family.

	Name: Ophelia
	Favorite Food: Whatever you're having.
	Favorite Activity: Deigning.
	Philosophy: That's mine.
	Random Thought: Get that camera out of my face, monkey boy.
	Random Quote: Are you going to eat that?

	Name: Lenore
	Favorite Food: Cat rocks.
	Favorite Activity: Going to bed.
	Philosophy: Early to bed and early to rise. 9pm/3am should just about do it.
	Random Thought: I...um, er...what?
	Random Quote: Are you going to bed yet?

I was just reading John Kerry's website. I think I could vote for him, though I think he's a little fuzzy on his foreign policy, and I'm definitely opposed to mandatory civil service for high school students. He seems to dislike Ashcroft as much as I do, which is a plus.

On the minus column, the website is smattered with grammatical errors and typos.

It's very unusual for me to remember my dreams, but when I do, they're usually these hyper-real narratives like these:

( In which our hero fights zombies and snakes in the grass. )

Several people on my watchlist have been fiddling with their filters: adding/deleting, reorganizing, and generally clearing house. I figured I should let you all know about mine.

My filters are not based on the content of my posts, they are based on the type of journals they contain. I have four of them:

• journals Just journals
• communities Just livejournal communities.
• RSS feeds Just RSS feeds.
• not annoying Sometimes someone will post something that causes problems with my layout...maybe it's a really big picture, or perhaps it's a bit of HTML from a quiz that isn't quite right. "not annoying" is journals+communities+RSS feeds-that particular journal. Because my new layout is fairly robust and forgiving of problems like this, and because you folks are generally very clueful on this matter, the "not annoying" filter gets used maybe once every couple of months, and then it's only temporary.

My default view is everything: journals+communities+RSS feeds. Anyone at any time is welcome to view these filters; they are available under the "watchlists" dropdown on the menu bar at the top of my journal (which of course only appears in standards-compliant browsers like Mozilla, Safari, etc. but NOT Internet Explorer).

I do tend to filter my posts by topic, but I tend to post filtered stuff to an appropriate community. For example, I did once create a food porn filter, but then we made food_porn so I never used it even once. If I make a controversial or personal post, at most I'll post it using the "journals" filter and put it behind a cut tag. Really, though, my life (which consists mostly of "got up, had breakfast, worked, pet the cats, had dinner, went to bed") simply isn't controversial enough to warrant contextual filters.

Interestingly enough, when it comes to other people's filters, I am a filter slut. If you've got a filter, I probably want to be on it. Seriously. To date I've only turned down being on a handful of filters, and they've been stuff like discussions about newsgroups I've never read. (Of course nobody is obliged to add me to any filters...but if you ever ask, I'll probably say "yes.")

Anyone at any time is welcome to add my journal to their watchlists. Please note that if you add my journal, I will not automatically add your journal to my watchlists in return. This is because first of all I don't regularly check to see who has added my journal to their watchlists, so it may be months before I figure it out. Second, I have just about all the journals and communities and RSS feeds I can handle in the time I have to spend reading LiveJournal.

Similarly, anyone is welcome to remove my journal from their watchlists at any time. I won't be offended. I promise. I might wonder why you dropped my journal, and if the opportunity arises someday I might ask you, but I won't be hurt or anything.

Finally, I do read everyone's journals regularly. If your journal or community is on my watchlist, I do read everything you let me see. However, since I'm an Old Guard Internet user, I will usually only comment if I have something relevant or interesting to say (this means I won't usually post "me too" comments, or "lol" responses to jokes or similar content-free posts). But I do read what you post.

Thanks to everyone who sent birthday wishes yesterday! I also got a call from Mick Bolger of Colcannon, who called me up to sing Happy Birthday to me. (And it's very cool to have someone sing Happy Birthday to you in a deep Irish brogue.)

The day itself, however, was...turbulent.

This is what happened. ( In which glasses are broken, icy roads are traversed, and ducks are hacked. )

Mr. Bear made sausages and malted waffles for breakfast this morning. Tonight, we're meeting my family at our favorite Mexican restaurant for dinner.

Apparently Republicans have been spying on confidential Democrat memos and other files for a year.

Remember, folks, when you vote Republican, that's what you're voting for.

I really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really dislike having George Bush as president.

Really.

( I'm not nearly as cute as Aragorn... )
Yoinked from 9thmoon

Pear, apple, orange, papaya, lime, and ginger juice. I feel so healthy.

It's actually very good. Very sweet-tart, with a spicy ginger overtone. I almost added half a beet, but I figured that would be going a bit too far. I'll do beet with orange and ginger soon, the oranges need to be consumed.

Am I the only one who does this?

I take my morning serving of Grape Nuts™ pour on some milk, and nuke it for, oh, say five minutes. Add somewhere between a pat and a half to a pat and three-quarters of butter and some sugar. The result is a wonderful hot cereal with lots of texture and flavor. Of course you don't get the amazing crunchiness that is the hallmark of Grape Nuts, but it's worth the trade-off. Plus, this is a breakfast that really stays with you throughout the day.

Good stuff, Maynard.

One terrabyte for $2,000.

Jinkies.

Freshly made orange juice (made with elusis' new juicer) with a glug of sugar-free French Vanilla Torani Syrup.

Oh yeah.