Archive for February 2006

I think this Easton Courier article covers an important issue for all of us to be aware of. My daughter is an active online chatter and she found her way to MySpace, a trendy site for her friends and kids in her age group. Unfortunately, it’s a gold mine for the pedophiles.

Since I knew she chatted online a lot, I asked her what sites she uses on a regular basis. I looked at them and her profiles. I talked to her about grown ups who pose as kids and even use kids’ photos for “proof.” I also sent statistics from a police officer who talks about the topic. Here are the stats (source unknown):

The average teen is online an average of 5.5 hours a day.

65% of teens and children receive indecent solicitations in Chat rooms, another 24% in Instant Messenger.

The FBI reports there is a 100% chance of a child meeting a predator in a chat room.

75% of teens report sharing personal information about themselves and family to strangers in chat rooms or on blogging sites, such as Xanga and My Space.

From the sponsor: Heal faster with tumescent liposuction.

Internet leads to bookstores’ demise isn’t a surprise, but bookstores are still valuable. Most likely, the mom and pop stores are the biggest hit. A popular children’s book store in Plano closed recently after many years of service and entertaining kids. Tis a shame.

Meryl is sick, so she’s not posting much.

From the sponsor: Hair transplant isn’t just for men.

Happy 12th birthday to my oldest!

* Sand Fantasy has amazing videos of an artist who uses nothing but hands and sandy to create changing pictures.

* Techdirt posts funny blurbs related to tech and has current news, rumors, book reviews, and white papers.

* Web Gallery of Art isn’t a fancy site and uses frames (ick), but it has over 10,000 pictures of artwork along with commentary. An art-lovers dream.

* Lemmings was one of the few games I played when I began life after college and it was hard to stop. They’re back! You can play them online, on PSP (thank goodness I don’t have one), and create an interactive wallpaper. [ Thanks to Adverblog for addicting me again ]

* Considering U.S. President’s Day is coming up on February 20, it seemed appropriate to point to the Presidential Pet Museum.

From the sponsor: Since the Academy Awards are coming soon, you can bet many entertainers are having Los Angeles cosmetic surgery. Here’s a Facial Plastic Surgery blog and its February 3 entry happens to mention the Oscars.

The Occupational Outlook Handbook Writers and Editors entry talks about the nature of the work of those in this field including training requirements, job outlook, and earnings. The handbook also covers news analysts, reporters, and correspondents; and public relations specialists.

From the sponsor: These occupation resources will let writer wanna-bes know if they can make enough money working as a writer or reporter so they can afford liposuction surgery… not that they need it!

Mugs, ties, shirts, sweaters… tired of giving those as gifts? Or does the recipient have just about everything you can think of? Not likely when you check out these sites with original and unique items.

I could spend hours on many of these sites. Instead, I forced myself to break away and post them here. This way, I have them all bookmarked in one place.

Kevin Kelly’s Cool Tools isn’t a shop stop, but Kelly finds a lot of cool stuff. Kelly writes, “I am chiefly interested in stuff that is extraordinary, better than similar products, little-known, and reliably useful for an individual or small group.”

Etsy sells handmade gifts. You can shop by color, location (geolocator), time (time machine), material, tags, and category. Click on Sampler to get top sellers, top items, random sellers, random items, and recently sold items.

’80s tees brought on lots of memories from my child of the ’80s days.

Eco-Artware.com has artful, creative, and environmental-friendly gifts. Street signs have been recycled into keychains. Motherboards become coasters.

Surprise.com gives you gift ideas from all over the Web. Know someone who’s all stressed out? Loves to talk politics? Is socially-conscious? The site provides ideas for all of them and more.

t spheres help the overly stressed folks by combining massage and aromatherapy.

Turn Your Head makes an optical illusion of your profile into a three-dimensional visage.

Big Feet PJs sells grown up PJs with (drum roll) feet! If you or the recipient lives in a cold place, this might be the answer to warm nights (insert crack joke here).

Do you know someone who is slow to wake up? With this Puzzle Alarm Clock, he has to wake up and put the four-piece puzzle back together to shut up the clock.

For the traveler, Weekends Away has theme gift suitcases and gift cards so you can pick the right one to fit the occasion or the recipient’s personality.

Individual Icons recycles jewelry made out of objects like chainmail, grommets, and rulers.

Find unusual and lesser known games at US Games, which also carries tarot cards and has a Web museum of rare cards and games.

Satinbox.com carries a variety of original and unique lifestyle product gifts that you would normally find in different specialy stores and boutiques. With Satinbox.com you find products categorized by your recipient’s lifestyle. One of its bestsellers is the fashionable apron.

Wootini sells three-dimensional art from artists all around the world.

Uniting word fans and geeks with L33t tiles.

Have fun with strangers with Flapart Covers in which you put your real book inside these phony books and the titles will shock your friends and strangers who look at the cover to see what you’re reading. Sample titles: Do-It-Yourself Liposuction, Coroner by Correspondence, and How to Steal From Your Employer and Get Away With It.

Don’t know if your recipients have food allergies? Play it safe with Divvies, which sells good food that are free of nuts, milk, and eggs. The only thing is those with gluten allergies aren’t covered. The food is even Kosher.

For book lovers and book club friends, Overdue Media sells items that say things like “WWDD: What would Dewey do?” “What happens in the library stays in the library.”

Can’t find the right accessories for your iPod? Think Different Store is a real brick and mortar store that — of course — sells online. Sure glad it’s not located in my town. Heck, not even my side of the country as it’s in New York.

Give your flashlight some legs with Flashlight Friend. No more rolling off the table.

Elsewares carries products from independent designers like the Egglings and iPod flourish.

Museum of Useful Things is about beauty and function.

Pixelgirlshop has fine art and homemade items.

I heart NY, I heart TX. What do you heart? Show it off with jewelry from State of Mine. [Last few Links: Daily Candy]

StitchPixie sells vinly and jewelry pop art and retro novelties in bright colors.

Dora’s book from Nick Jr. Personalized Books was a slam dunk with my three-year-old, a big Dora fan. He took it to school and the staff loved it. He told his teacher, “Zachy book.” She thought he meant that it was his book; she looked closer and realized he was IN the book: name and face. Current offers are Dora and Blue. I’m sure it changes as different characters get popular with kids.

Four Idle Hands has devilishly good stuff. I loved their 6/06/06 contest and lucked out in coming in second place. I ordered insomnia bookmarks and they’re wonderful. Unlike a typical flat bookmark, these stay within the page nicely because of their thin string, which doesn’t slip considering both ends have an object.

Quirky Gift calls itself the “home of really unusual presents.” For the person who can’t quit smoking, you might consider the coughing ashtray — if you’re brave. For the hosts of the New Year’s party, a champagne parachute.

American Science and Surplus is passionate about “discovery and invention.” The site contains closeouts, surplus and overruns of eclectic products related to science or education. The business has been around since 1937 and you can learn more from the manifesto.

My 10th grade computer literacy teacher wrote notes in shorthand. None of us could read it and it intrigued me. Shorthand classes are hard to find, but it’d be cool to know how to write in “code.” Shorthand Press attempts to revive the art of writing shortcuts with its products.

Don’t trash those special tees. Recycle them into quilts. I collected uniforms, shirts from shows, and others over the years and had them made into a quilt at Old Town Quilts. I love it. I want to add on to it, if I can as I’ve collected more.

Chopstick Art and Furniture.

Daydream Toy showcases original toys for all ages including a beanbag doll (Beanstalks) that can stand on its own feet.

Office Playground: Gifts for coworkers, bosses, and even yourself.

Pylones: Fish pens, crocodile staple removers, colorful sugar pots, whimsical umbrells are just of the few of ordinary items receiving a personality. One caveat, the site is difficult to browse but it’s worth it when you find the right thing.

TreasureKnit: Photo blankets, pillows, towels, tapestry.

Knock Knock: Greeting cards, stationery, organizers, and other fun stuff.

Grandma’s Chicken Soup: Winter… love it… hate it… we don’t want to think about it, but
people often get sick with a bad cold or G-d forbid, the flu. Of course, chicken soup is wonderful in the winter, not just when you’re ick.

Barbara K 30-piece signature tool kit: All the tool basics in one case along with instructions, which have a place in the case so they don’t get lost.

BeyondBookmarks: Know someone in college? Far away? Recovering? Send ‘em a fun care and gift package.

Wishingfish.com: “Eclectic mixture of styles: vintage and modern, funky and sophisticated, East meets West.”

See Jane Work: Stylish and useful tools to help working women manage their time and stay organized.

Toss Designs: Bags and designs that combine style and function.

Purseket: Switch purses in an instant and find everything.

Dynomighty: Recyclable goodies like wallets, tags, jewelry.

ModCloth carries affordable and trendy accessories and clothing.

day-lab stocks retro, vintage and eclectic jewelry, accessories, and knickknacks.

Modern Tribe has unusual Jewish gifts like No Limit Texas Dreidel.

Teramasu has the latest in fashion accessories. Cute stuff!

LittleSomething.com: Small gifts priced under $10. They will mail your gift with a message.

Fred Flare: Stay cute! I’d love to have half of these products.

PexagonTech: Personalize USB drives. Pick the color, storage size and content to personalize it.

Unemployed Philosopher’s Guild: Find unique gifts involving politics, philosophers, pillboxes and lots of other funny bedfellows.

Perpetual Kid: “Entertain your inner child.”

Foodzie: Etsy for foodies.

Updated: 30 December 2009

Mugs, ties, shirts, sweaters… tired of giving those as gifts? Or does the recipient have just about everything you can think of? Not likely when you check out these sites with original and unique items.

I could spend hours on many of these sites. Instead, I forced myself to break away and post them here. This way, I have them all bookmarked in one place. This list is regularly updated as more cool stuff comes in. [ Read more... ]

Also the 2005 gift ideas entry has good stuff.

Book Clubs Get the Message by Reading Online talks about online book clubs. I’m involved with one, but it hasn’t been as active as I’d like.

I’ve also been to an in-person book club meeting and it was a lively discussion. I’d like to see online discussions succeed as they have several advantages:

* Don’t have to try to get a time that works for everyone as online discussions occur whenever you read and respond to your email.

* No driving anywhere.

* Helps those who are shy get involved.

It helps me overcome the barrier of going to an in-person meeting and worrying about whether or not I’ll understand the people I meet. When I don’t understand them, they think I’m an idiot or that I’m being rude.

American Society of Newspaper Editors has a page devoted to trust and credibility. One of the resources is an Ethics Tool from Poynter (free registration required). “The Ethics Tool will help you develop a solution to an ethics problem — a solution that you’ll be able to articulate, test and defend. The tool poses a series of questions about your ethics case, and then compiles your responses in a document you can print or just read online.”

Poynter also has a detailed article on accuracy, which offers tips on fact-checking and for improving accuracy when writing or editing stories. [Links: LII ]

Like I would let this day go by without saying a word about my dad who celebrates 75 years of his life today. Dad may not read my blog or even know what a blog is, but he’s largely responsible for who I am today (Mom and me, too, but it’s not our birthdays.).

I wrote about my dad in Stories of Strength. The younger kids love him as he can imitate Donald Duck. His office is full of Donald Duck stuff as a result of his wife, children, and friends buying him stuff. An accidental collection, for sure.

He loves sports. He was my go to parent for that as I played softball, volleyball, basketball, and soccer. Heck, I even did track (shotput and discus). Dad played football for James Madison High in Brooklyn and was offered a scholarship. But instead, he had to go to the local college and help with the family business.

Happy three-quarters of a century, Dad! It’s appropriate that his birthday is on Super Bowl XL Sunday. Dad’s one XL guy!

From the sponsor: OK, get ready to crack lawyer jokes. But seriously, there are justifiable times when we need a personal injury lawyer.

The IE 7 Beta Preview has been released and people are talking about it in many places. Some people may have downloaded it and installed it, forgetting that newer versions of IE always take over past versions. Thanks to several excellent resources, it’s possible to uninstall IE 7 and run it separately without losing IE 6.

To remove IE 7 (Thanks, Techenclave):

1. Click Start > Control Panel > Add or Remove Programs.

2. Check “Show updates” radio box.

3. Scroll down the list to find Internet Explorer 7 and click Uninstall.

4. Restart and IE 6 is back where it was before IE 7 swallowed it up.

Run IE 6 AND IE 7 (Thanks, Jon Galloway):

1. Download IE 7 beta preview.

2. Download WinRAR.

3. Double-click on the WinRAR executable to install it and click Install.

4. Click OK from the WinRAR Setup window.

5. Click Run WinRAR.

6. Click File > Open Archive.

7. Click on the down arrow next to Files of type and select All Files.

8. Browse to wherever you saved the IE 7 executable, select it, and click Open.

9. Open the files to a folder of your choice.

10. Close WinRAR (uninstall it, if you wish).

11. Open the folder where the IE 7 files are located. Find and delete SHLWAPI.DLL.

12. In Windows Explorer while you’re in the IE 7 folder, right-click and select New > Text Document.

13. Rename the next document to IEXPLORE.exe.local. Do not add .txt on the end of the file name. That’s the full file name.

OK, I had to nix the last line because a security update broke this. Whenever I tried to open a link in IE6, it opened in Firefox. I have to use IE 6 for work stuff. Thanks to Jon for letting me know. Jon posted the steps here.

When I run it, the IE7.bat doesn’t stay open in the background. So I ran IE 7 normally and then clicked on IE7.bat again after I closed IE 7. IE6 works again.