Jen and Nancy and Paul and some others might be interested in this: Betrayal at House on the Hill is getting a new edition late next year.

• 07:26 Desperately in need of massage. And
  massage job. Will take the former first. #fb

• 17:56 OMG I have the bestest, most wonderfullest husband in the whhhhhhole world!!!!! #
• 18:01 I'm working late again, and @obfusciatrist came by with Myer lemon pizza from Amici's. Mmmmm nom nom nom! #
• 18:06 Hahaha my co-worker is moaning in her cubicle eating some of the pizza. Awesome! (She's having to work late, too). #
• 19:47 Still at work. Damnit. #
• 20:15 I'm ALMOST DONE for today!!!! #
• 20:52 Oh god, why am I still at work? Gaaa. Hmm, time for another slice o' pizza. #
• 12:30 @achemdoc Happy B day! #

Via LoudTwitter

• 21:30 Very bummed to discover that "Pie Bar" serves pizza, not pie. Still, the beer's good.
• 21:44 21st Amendment Double Trouble: incredibly smooth double IPA. No huge hop explosion, just subtle deliciousness.
• 07:10 Wish I'd known about this place while in Birmingham. Not too close, but would make a good excursion: bit.ly/4Q16A3
• 08:22 BoG and Bolwinkle, ready to head to the bike expo. gdzl.la/7hdy1g

• 13:06 @WickedAVP But DL is so gay-friendly! #
• 13:15 I saw "Clicking her heels for Halloween" somewhere and I read "Clicking her heals" in WoW. lol #wow #
• 14:08 When I got up yesterday, Alex had already gone to work. When I got home, he was already asleep. The same thing might happen tonight. Sadface #
• 14:37 @Jonsstreeteats Might look into some techniques people use out in Burning Man for their tent structures (cement in coffee can, etc). #
• 15:03 @Jonsstreeteats Vented flaps like Gustbuster umbrellas! tinyurl.com/ygmta7n #

Via LoudTwitter

• 17:05 Working the salesforce event at Moscone. This is pretty swank for us. gdzl.la/7gU8Sc
• 08:02 Wunderground tells me it's raining. Did they just get bough by Fox News or something? gdzl.la/7h1NvH
• 09:21 Today's #earworm. Don't ask me how the hell it got in my head. bit.ly/7i7Ecu

My husband plays his knuckles like an instrument sometimes. Having too much time on his hands, he actually made a video of it. We've been yukking about this thing "going viral" for a week now (which for us would be like two dozen views), but I keep forgetting to post it on livejournal.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nSc1kzPaPqc

• 17:56 @Zachary006 Racetrack went bye-bye yesterday. #
• 23:26 RT: @PalmPreGuru: Amazon Slashes Palm Pre To $79.99; Pixi Now $24.99 bit.ly/2y0Lhr #
• 12:05 @mattycus -- Is Penance hasted by Borrowed Time? #
• 12:07 @mattycus So the ticks go off faster and the channel is shorter? I knew it didn't eat up BT... did you read my tweet about not having ... #
• 12:08 @mattycus ...learned Penance Rank 4 until last week? lol. I went from bottom to #2 in 25-man charts. rofl (when you add absorbs) #
• 12:09 @mattycus Shield > Penance > Gheal > Fheal, #2 in the heal charts ftw! I respecced for faster GHeal too. woot. #
• 12:12 @mattycus I don't know HOW I missed learning Penance rank 3. D'oh. I think GHeal will be my ace in the hole. Killer! #

Via LoudTwitter

• 17:49 RT @shig23: WHAT bit.ly/1n4duM (Scroll through the images for more possible uses.)
• 09:37 I'm not sure I'd use it for anything I can't do with the iPhone, but I still want a Chumby. bit.ly/273hiA
• 15:21 I really need to get down there soon. RT @deyoungmuseum: Fall colors in the Osher Sculpture Garden pic.gd/fc40e6

Postcard winners!

We wish to extend our heartfelt gratitude for sending so much joy our way. Frank is still blushing with excitement over the love notes, proposals, propositions, and occasional intimate photos sent from his admirers around the world (China, Norway, Japan, and Poland just this week)! At his request, we blindfolded Justin, one of Frank's BFFs, spun him around in five dozen counterclockwise circles, and asked him to point to ten random postcards/envelopes pasted to the wall. After a brief trip to the bathroom, he chose the following lucky winners, to whom we will give a six-month paid account token (for paid, basic, and plus users) or, for our permanent account holders, a $15 voucher for the LiveJournal gift shop.

So, without further ado, the winners are:

1. seraphene
2. fotog
3. boykitten
4. seshat_6
5. anti_aol
6. lisalees
7. katrinkacat
8. mistyboston
9. _woody_lein
10. another_slender

Bugs, Tweaks, and Enhancements

1. We fixed a bug from the last release that was causing screened comments to become unscreened if they were edited
2. If you happen to be gaming around the corner, check us out on Facebook and be sure to spread the word!
3. We've added new vgifts to celebrate Thanksgiving! Check out our feathered friend, below!

Give more with charitable vgifts

In honor of national adoption month, we're offering a charitable vgift (priced at $2.99) to support Love Without Boundaries, an organization that provides healthcare and adoption to orphans suffering from life-threatening diseases. LiveJournal will donate 100% of gross proceeds from the sale (we'll cover the cost of credit card transaction fees). To learn more about Love Without Boundaries, please visit lj_cares. You can purchase your Love Without Boundaries vgifts in the Virtual Gift shop. We'll keep you posted on how much we raise!

Photos of the week

We're delighted to showcase yet more incredible photos from some of our brilliant LiveJournal photographers around the world. Keep posting (and tagging). And be sure to show some love by commenting on the awesome view at lj_photophile.

Check out this week's photos and more amazing user content after the jump!

( Read more... )

Curtains

Thanks, again, for joining us. See you next week!

Tags: comments, facebook, lj_cares, photos, postcards winners, writer's block

• 17:54 @StanfordSteph Wow you are starting to run fast, lady! I always had trouble jogging under 10-min miles. #
• 12:32 Our main tank unguilded. "Not hardcore enough." We got Anub down on the 3rd try in heroic 10-man last nite, & get to phase 3 in H-25-man. :\ #
• 12:51 RT @feliciaday: Just voted The Guild for Best Online Video Web Series mashable.com/owa #openwebawards (Me too!) #
• 12:54 @cstephens One letter difference between "public defender" and "pubic defender"! #
• 14:07 Speaking to a German engineer, scratching my head and wondering what the hell "YARFA" was... until he said "YARFA fertual machine" -- JAVA! #

Via LoudTwitter

Perhaps the greatest YouTube video I have ever seen. VERY VERY VERY NSFW do to animated violence, animated sex, animated poo, animated naughty fingers, etc.

You know what sucks? When it's 11:22 pm and you've been wearing a bathrobe and socks for several hours and you go to feed the cat and realize that the cat food you bought yesterday is 3 floors down and across the parking lot in the trunk of your car and you have to get dressed and walk out into the cold to get it. That sucks. Granted, in the long line of things that suck it's pretty minor. But it still sucks.

• 10:43 Have you ever done something really stupid that's embarrassing? I did that in World of Warcraft last night. At least I was amused... #wow #
• 10:44 Disc-specced but wanted to tweak my Holy talents; went to see a trainer, and discovered that somehow I never learned Penance rank 4! #wow #
• 10:47 All this time I was downranking Penance! W/ tweaked Holy talents & Penance rank 4, I was #1 in heal charts instead of bottom 2! rofl #wow #
• 10:48 @smartwatermelon Now you know how women feel when they visit their doctors once a year. #
• 11:23 @mattycus Where in the world is TUESDAY Hawaiian shirt day? I grew up in Hawaii, and everyone there knows Haw'n shirt day is "ALOHA FRIDAY" #
• 15:15 If I owned a house with a yard, I would buy tinyurl.com/yleomga to plant. Ate this in Costa Rica and it was soooo yummy. #
• 15:18 RT @SodaStreamUSA: Hey everyone! Check out our NEW AND IMPROVED @SodaStreamUSA website: bit.ly/WAsBp ! We use ours everyday! #
• 15:23 @KrisAllen I preordered mine from Amazon so I'll get it in a few days! #
• 15:23 @obfusciatrist zomg I experience Transdimensional Materialization Phenomena all the time! #
• 15:30 RT @troymccluresf: Buying Palin's book from @greenappleguy? Profits going to save Alaskan wolves from aerial hunting is.gd/4XmfC #

Via LoudTwitter

• 16:48 How to use an apostrophe: apostrophe.me/ #fb

I bought a Droid. My Blackberry has served me well for almost three years (which is the longest I've been able to keep a phone without breaking it, ever). The Blackberry finally started misbehaving a couple of weeks ago, so I put up with it until the Droid came out and then bought it a couple of days ago. I've been holding back on a review for a while because I'm really not happy, but I'm not sure if the problem is the phone or if the problem is Verizon.

Apparently my condo is in a black hole for Verizon. If I walk more than three feet away from the window my phone cuts off sound and then drops off calls within about 3 seconds. Even more annoying, Bob sounds so muddy when I talk to him that I can't tell what the heck he's talking about more than half the time. And this has happened in the car too. Even when I'm parked in an area with good reception. So I don't know if the processing is bad on my end - I've tried it with a wired ear piece, the handset, and on speakerphone, and I'm constantly having to ask him to repeat himself. I'm going to have to call my mom tomorrow just to test if it's only Bob I can't here. So maybe the microphone on his phone (also a new Droid) is bad, but he hasn't had any complaints from anybody else.

Either way, it's really annoying and I finally gave up and got off the phone with him tonight because trying to have a conversation was more pain that it was worth. That's bad for a long distance relationship in general.

But, other than the whole using-it-as-a-phone thing the Droid is pretty awesome. Clear screen, I haven't done a lot of surfing with it, but I'm amazed at how well it renders web pages, the keyboard is big enough to be usable and I can skate by with the virtual keyboard if I need to for a quick text. The integration with gmail and google calendar is seamless (not surprising, but really really nice) and my other favorite app, Remember The Milk, works great.

If I weren't planning on moving in the next 60 days or so I would take the phone back tomorrow and switch back to AT&T. As it is I'll test it and see if it really is just a problem with my condo over the next wek or two and then decide whether or not it goes back to the store.

• 11:57 Seen in an email sig file from an engineer today: "Linus Torvalds: "A developer is someone who uses a mouse as a paperweight! #
• 11:58 @WarcraftPets What I REALLY wanna see is a Spectral Whelpling! #
• 12:04 @tikistitch Tiki, that is not a musubi press! It's for molding your hard boiled egg (you do it while it's still hot and maleable). #

Via LoudTwitter

• 15:35 It's amazing how much more productive I can be when there aren't coworkers involved.

Hmmmm. So, Vince and I were watching his geek show The Guild the other night, and I might have made a couple of geek jokes at his expense or ribbed on him a bit.
The episode we happened to have watched was about the nerd corps camped out at a GameStop waiting for the new release of their game.

WELL. I just got an automated message/phone call from GameStop letting me know that Left 4 Dead 2 will be released at midnight tonight, and they will be open and some festivites at the store will begin at 10 PM.

And I am very, very seriously considering Zoey-ing up in my Halloween costume and heading to the store to pick up my copy, which of course I pre-ordered.

Yea.

• 19:28 Hahaha gotta look closely! RT @mox: Somehow this just isn't right. twitpic.com/pkqu3 #
• 19:33 @obfusciatrist Re liquid shampoos: Used to be easier buying bar shampoo, A people also just washed hair w/ bar soap. #
• 13:36 @davidrperry Have a great time, you instant-platinum Castaway Clubber!!! #

Via LoudTwitter

• 18:57 RT @beer47: A London restaurant unveils the world's most expensive bottle of beer: su.pr/2GnUF8
• 20:57 Ayup. bit.ly/36Iqk6
• 07:50 My old @xtracycle (now Sarah's) is featured on their website. bit.ly/3fqHZH - photo at top.

I just cleaned out my refrigerator. I found six tubs of sour cream in various stages of decay and five tubs of hummus. Yikes. But at least I've stopped my crazy half-empty milk carton habit.

With the rest of the day I need to:
- Finish my PHP homework which is due tonight
- Put in a couple of hours on a data model for one of Bob's projects (that we're both getting paid for)
- Make bean soup and refried beans with what's left of the beans I made on Monday (it's a lot, I started with two pounds of dried beans) and portion that out for freezing
- Put in a couple of hours on my work project. I shouldn't have to, but I need to make sure my ass is covered and my work is impeccable this week since I criticized Gary yesterday. Office politics are fun. Not.

• 20:38 Grats Zaboo on getting to sing "La Biblioteca" rap on Joel McHale's "Community" sitcom tonight! Woot. #theguild #
• 20:42 @DrewDaywalt Can't wait to see it! #

Via LoudTwitter

• 17:44 While I understand the case that every man *should* have a few dress shirts around "just in case," the thrift store is so close and cheap...
• 23:25 Just spent a fantastic evening at the Opera House celebrating Cecil WIlliams' 45th anniversary at Glide. Great entertainment and GREAT food!
• 23:25 RT @jymdyer: twitpic.com/paw1x - ♪ Traffic jam caused by a They Might Be Giants gig at the Booksmith, Haight-Ashbury.
• 06:35 Asleep sometime after midnight, awake shortly after four. High-stress gig til eight tonight. Oh yeah, this will be fun. *headdesk* #fb
• 06:37 The question I'm pondering now is, when I die, will I wish I'd spent more time sleeping?
• 06:44 Move aside and let the mango through. #sleepdep

• 20:52 Cutting thru 25-man heroic Trial of the Grand Crusader like buttah... now just gotta work on Anub'arak... #wow #
• 20:56 Mmm nom nom nom. RT: @zappos: twitpic.com/p71g7 - Winner: Coolest idea at a dinner buffet - Mashed Potato Martini Bar! #

Via LoudTwitter

We've made some additions and improvements to Notes!

The Notes feature has been added to two action-taking pages:

• You can now add a Note directly on the Add a friend page - handy if you'd like to mark down where you met them or another name you know them by!
• On the Ban and unban users page (under Account -> Privacy) you can now add a Note, including to a group of users all banned at the same time (so that next year you won't need to ask yourself "hey, why did I ban these guys?")

Other changes:

• When you're viewing your existing Notes they're grayed out; click in a field to activate it to change the text (this page can be found from the header by using Profile -> Manage Notes)
• Changes to editing:
  • When you're going to create a new Note but one already exists, you'll get a warning that you're editing an existing Note
  • You can now delete a note from the "Edit note" pop-up in the hover menu
  • You can now delete notes for multiple selected users on the Manage notes page
  • When you change Notes on "Ban|unban users" page, they can be edited and saved with "Save Changes" button

Tags: notes

My favorite moment in classical music is still the big key change* (and even more so the subsequent shift back to the starting key leading into the finale of the piece) at the end of Ravel's Bolero, but the big low brass part* (joined by trumpets soon after) at the beginning of the fourth movement of Dvorak's Symphony #9 ("From The New World") sure rivals it.

*It occurs at 7:35 in this YouTube video, with the shift back leading into the final part of the piece at 7:56. Start it at about 6:00 to get the full effect.

**It starts at about 0:22 in this YouTube video. You've heard it before.

Notes augmented

We've enhanced and de-bugged Notes. If you haven't tried it yet, now's the time! You can create a private note when you ban multiple users. You can also delete multiple notes at once. Lastly, paid users have the option to add a note (visible only to you) whenever you add or remove a friend (guaranteed to avoid embarrassing social mishaps). If you don't currently have a paid account, you can upgrade now! It only takes a few minutes and costs less than a bad shopping mall haircut (plus, it's way more fashionable)!

Product tweaks and bug kill

1. In another effort to zap spam, comments containing links from domains LiveJournal deems untrustworthy are now automatically screened
2. The issue causing random comments to vanish has been fixed!
3. If you visit a LiveJournal page and get prompted to log in, you'll be returned to the same page after you sign in (Thanks, Dreamwidth)!
4. If you don't edit the timestamp for an entry at all, the entry timestamp will indicate the time the entry was posted instead of the time the Update Journal page was loaded
5. Comments with paddings/backgrounds render correctly within the comment box (and will no longer wrap outside the box and break frames/margins)

New FCK fixes rich text editor!

1. We've updated our RTE (Rich Text Editor) to FCKeditor version 2.6.5
2. When switching from the RTE to HTML editor, links for syndicated feeds are no longer broken
3. RTE now functions properly in Safari 4.0
4. An extra line/space will not be auto-inserted whenever you switch from RTE to HTML editor
5. The insert image link now works correctly in all browsers

LiveJournal Cares

We’re pleased to introduce you to lj_cares, a new LiveJournal community dedicated to raising awareness and funds for U.S. charitable organizations that improve the health and well-being of people around the world. Each month, we’ll spotlight a nonprofit that is making a significant global impact through medical research, public outreach, and/or humanitarian social programs. Charities will be selected in accordance with the U.S. calendar of national health observances based on a high rating (of over 60%) on Charity Navigator and global scope of impact.

In this, our inaugural month of November, we will celebrate national adoption month by offering a charitable virtual gift (priced at $2.99) to support Love Without Boundaries, an organization that saves the lives of orphans with life-threatening diseases and places them in loving homes around the world. LiveJournal will donate 100% of the proceeds from the sale of charitable vgifts (we'll cover the cost of credit card transaction fees). To learn more about Love Without Boundaries, please visit lj_cares and read about how they helped save Baby Kang and the Rainbow Twins from fatal illnesses, who are now thriving in nurturing families. You can purchase your Love Without Boundaries gifts in the Virtual Gift shop.

Papered in postcards

A couple of weeks ago, we asked you to send in postcards to surround us with LiveJournal community. Thanks for coming through! We've received postcards all the way from Germany, Finland, and Canada and from all over the US, including Texas, Florida, Alaska, Montana, Wyoming, Indiana, Hawaii, and Oklahoma just to name just a handful. We're thrilled with our improved decor.

Please keep the love coming for one more week by writing to Frank the Goat, Esq., c/o LiveJournal, Inc., 539 Bryant Street, Suite 210, San Francisco, CA 94107. Be sure to include your username, since we'll be drawing the names of ten random contributors next Thursday to win paid account credits!

Photos of the week

We have more dazzling images posted by talented LiveJournal photographers from around the world. We're hoping to span the entire globe, so please continue posting and tagging. Of course, you can also sit back and enjoy the view at lj_photophile.

You can see a sample of this week's gorgeous photos and check out spotlight communities and awesome user content after the jump!

( Read more... )

Curtains

We thank you, once again, for joining us. See you next week!

Tags: bugs, csi wii, fck, lj_cares, lj_photophile, notes, rte, writer's block

I really think Glee is schizophrenic. ( spoilers )

It's been four years and one week since I met The Q, a.k.a. Love of my Life, a.k.a. Susan. I found our first ever communication today (check the comments).

The 18th is the anniversary of our second date, which involved playing board games with Nancy and Paul.

My point is this: I love her.

(Side note: My sister, whose is coming to visit us tonight, turns 50 on the 18th.)

• 18:53 Perhaps it's presumptuous, but tonight I'm drinking my homebrew from a @dogfishbeer glass.
• 07:38 I'm not a veteran and have never been very pro-military, but dammit, if you're a vet you should get today off. Or at least free drinks. #fb
• 08:21 We finally started selling Bromptons. They're nothing if not adaptable! bit.ly/2R9mgF

I wish I knew how to play the accordion. Also, I wish that I flew model planes. Really, I wish I did anything that people might find interesting.

• 06:05 Not surprised at all here. RT @urbanophile: Most dangerous large metro areas for pedestrians - is.gd/4RGBM
• 07:37 I wish the Strida was a fixie. Great fun to ride around the shop, but you can't back up. gdzl.la/7eG1Qy

• 12:18 You can buy "creamy" fruit flavors of Halls cough drops in Latin America. They are SO much tastier than the too-minty ones sold in the U.S. #
• 12:27 @mrswatermelon "Halls Creamy" looks just like LifeSaver rolls-type cough drops, not in a candy bag. Refresh is fancy, comes in bags. #
• 13:02 Lunch: Mediterranean platter with grilled veg, chicken skewers, hummus, cous cous, flat bread. Heavenly! just missing some yogurt sauce. #
• 13:07 @davidrperry Looks like a typical copy edit mark-up. Copy editing is a truly thankless (but essential) job. F' collaborating an edit pass! #
• 13:33 @davidrperry AC is not bad. You should just wear Speedos everyday. btw that copy edit thing -- I meant "F Outsourcing" #
• 14:39 I know I was on vacation when it happened, but my thoughts goes out to the people in Ft. Hood. #

Via LoudTwitter