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Today was an unusually warm day. Of course, I dressed for a Maryland day in late October and ended up more with a mid-September Maryland day, so I was a bit warm, though Johnny came in the office, blinked, and said, "You look nice today!" So I guess the new skirt works.
Because of the weather, I suppose, we are in the midst of another ladybug invasion at work. As many of you know, the WAU is based out of an old house (so I do, in fact, work out of a bedroom, albeit without a bed), and according to my mom, ladybugs like to nest in old wood. We have plenty of that. So we routinely have ladybug invasions in our office/house.
About two weeks ago, I heard the telltale tickticktick of ladybugs clicking against my fluorescent light. I looked up and, sure enough, there were dozens of them. As kind of an interesting experiment, I decided to catch and collect them in an empty water bottle. When I was finished in my office, they covered the bottom of the bottle. I went over to Johnny's office to show him and ended up catching all of them in his office too. (Amusingly, Johnny is afraid of ladybugs. Not terrified but they do bug him. *winces at admittedly bad pun* He claims that they fly into him and get stuck in his shirt collar and claims that they "smell like lightning bugs," which they do. So I try to alleviate insect-related situations for him, when they arise in our office. It does seem like if we are going to get a wasp nest, it will be outside of his--not my--window. I'd have fun watching it, but he's terrified. Alas.)
I ended up with about one hundred ladybugs in my water bottle. We then went over the Mr. Vernon's old office, and there were about two hundred more over there, so we just stared into his office for a few seconds, agog, then solved the problem by closing the door.
Of course, I released my ladybugs outside. An hour later, twelve new ones had entered my office, but they were on their own. The next day, Johnny was vacuuming them off of his ceiling.
It got cold, and the ladybugs disappeared somewhat. But when it warmed today, they came back with a vengeance. When I walked down to the mailbox before lunch, they were pinging into me and clinging to my clothes. Johnny always claims that they get stuck on him and then end up in his car, and I've always laughed this off, but this did happen to me today so I guess I need to take his ladybug-related concerns a little more seriously.
On a non-insect-related note, the new LJ feature that allows me to monitor who adds me as a friend has turned me on to an interesting phenomenon: drive-by friendings. Apparently, people monitor the recent postings and friend anyone who posts within a certain period. If they are not friended back, they remove the person from their flist. This has happened to me twice now since I set my LJ to alert me to new friends; in the first instance, I posted twice in quick succession, and the same person friended and unfriended me twice. I find this interesting because--and maybe this has to do with how I use LJ compared to how some people use it--I don't see why one would want to friend a total stranger who has zero mutual interests. Nor do I see how someone with 800 friends could possibly read his or her flist every day. I have sixty-two people on my flist--many of them redundant journals, i.e. multiple journals belonging to the same person--and there are times when I simply cannot keep up with everyone to the degree that I would like.
I wonder if someone will friend me when I post this.
Well, the cold has moved from my throat (Saturday) to my nose (Sunday) to my lungs (Monday), which means that I am coughing and tugging my hip again. It is nearly impossible to cough without hurting myself. So all of the progress that I have made by resting and keeping off of my hip is slowly coming undone. That's annoying.
Bobby and I went to the movies to see the original Halloween on the big screen tonight. It was really cool. Tomorrow's my big day, my favorite holiday! Bobby has class but is skipping pickup hockey to come home and spend Halloween with me. We have a movie to watch and will take our usual walk through the historic district, trying to spot ghosts.
Happy Halloween, everyone! Have fun, be safe, and may the spirits be with you.
Because of the weather, I suppose, we are in the midst of another ladybug invasion at work. As many of you know, the WAU is based out of an old house (so I do, in fact, work out of a bedroom, albeit without a bed), and according to my mom, ladybugs like to nest in old wood. We have plenty of that. So we routinely have ladybug invasions in our office/house.
About two weeks ago, I heard the telltale tickticktick of ladybugs clicking against my fluorescent light. I looked up and, sure enough, there were dozens of them. As kind of an interesting experiment, I decided to catch and collect them in an empty water bottle. When I was finished in my office, they covered the bottom of the bottle. I went over to Johnny's office to show him and ended up catching all of them in his office too. (Amusingly, Johnny is afraid of ladybugs. Not terrified but they do bug him. *winces at admittedly bad pun* He claims that they fly into him and get stuck in his shirt collar and claims that they "smell like lightning bugs," which they do. So I try to alleviate insect-related situations for him, when they arise in our office. It does seem like if we are going to get a wasp nest, it will be outside of his--not my--window. I'd have fun watching it, but he's terrified. Alas.)
I ended up with about one hundred ladybugs in my water bottle. We then went over the Mr. Vernon's old office, and there were about two hundred more over there, so we just stared into his office for a few seconds, agog, then solved the problem by closing the door.
Of course, I released my ladybugs outside. An hour later, twelve new ones had entered my office, but they were on their own. The next day, Johnny was vacuuming them off of his ceiling.
It got cold, and the ladybugs disappeared somewhat. But when it warmed today, they came back with a vengeance. When I walked down to the mailbox before lunch, they were pinging into me and clinging to my clothes. Johnny always claims that they get stuck on him and then end up in his car, and I've always laughed this off, but this did happen to me today so I guess I need to take his ladybug-related concerns a little more seriously.
On a non-insect-related note, the new LJ feature that allows me to monitor who adds me as a friend has turned me on to an interesting phenomenon: drive-by friendings. Apparently, people monitor the recent postings and friend anyone who posts within a certain period. If they are not friended back, they remove the person from their flist. This has happened to me twice now since I set my LJ to alert me to new friends; in the first instance, I posted twice in quick succession, and the same person friended and unfriended me twice. I find this interesting because--and maybe this has to do with how I use LJ compared to how some people use it--I don't see why one would want to friend a total stranger who has zero mutual interests. Nor do I see how someone with 800 friends could possibly read his or her flist every day. I have sixty-two people on my flist--many of them redundant journals, i.e. multiple journals belonging to the same person--and there are times when I simply cannot keep up with everyone to the degree that I would like.
I wonder if someone will friend me when I post this.
Well, the cold has moved from my throat (Saturday) to my nose (Sunday) to my lungs (Monday), which means that I am coughing and tugging my hip again. It is nearly impossible to cough without hurting myself. So all of the progress that I have made by resting and keeping off of my hip is slowly coming undone. That's annoying.
Bobby and I went to the movies to see the original Halloween on the big screen tonight. It was really cool. Tomorrow's my big day, my favorite holiday! Bobby has class but is skipping pickup hockey to come home and spend Halloween with me. We have a movie to watch and will take our usual walk through the historic district, trying to spot ghosts.
Happy Halloween, everyone! Have fun, be safe, and may the spirits be with you.
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(no subject)
Date: 2006-10-31 05:19 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-10-31 05:28 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-11-01 12:46 am (UTC)Niki's link should work. It's nice to have, both as a convenience for real friends and as a means to observe the friending behavior of some of the nutjobs out there!
(no subject)
Date: 2006-10-31 05:58 am (UTC)because I'm a nosy person >:D, at least when I'm sure adding someone won't get me into some sort of trouble, but some people can be really WTF additions/deletions... like girls who not only have nothing in common with me, but are like the girls I absolutely just could not relate to in high school. They have no tolerance for nerds like me... so why add me to their friends list? Research or something? ^_^;Though I think I could see myself friending the same person again after removing them if I happen to like reading their journal for some reason (despite having few interests in common) and am shy and keep going back and forth in my mind between "It's fine to friend them!" and "No, keep her Friend of list clear! Some people get pissy about that sort of thing!" or something... and during certain slow periods of life, it's very nice to have an active friends list...
(no subject)
Date: 2006-11-01 12:46 am (UTC)I re-friend people who share a reasonable number of my interests. This includes all Tolkien people since I figure that Tolkien people are on board to either read my stuff or discuss the books, and I want them to have access to the f-locked entries. I have had a few people who have friended me because (I believe) they see my name mentioned a lot on the LJ of one of my RL friends. In these instances, it seems pretty apparent to me that they're trying to bone up their friend-counts more than having any legitimate interest in me, and with one exception, such friendings rarely last long. I suppose that they catch wind pretty quickly of how boring and dorky I can be except to other boring, dorky people. :^P These people, I do not friend back. I figure that if they are truly interested, they will leave comments and we will become, well, friends!
These drive-by friendings are different. In the first instance, the person stated that if not re-friended within one hour, all of the drive-by friends would be removed. I was removed. We had nothing in common, and the LJ appeared to be a place solely for posting links and graphics, which does not interest me. An hour later, the same person friended me again. It was one of my story-posting days, most likely, and I often post my story then type in a real entry. Again, I was un-friended at the end of the hour.
I got drive-by friended again yesterday by a different person. This one didn't state that she would unfriend within an hour, but by the time I got from work yesterday, I was unfriended again. And once again, it was a journal for links and graphics and other stuff that really doesn't inspire creative thought or discussion, which is why I use LJ.
But it's funny reading the LJs a drive-by frienders because so many people take great offense at being friended by a stranger. "I DONT LIKE U AND IM BANNING U!!1!!one1!!" was common. I didn't see the reason for the hoopla. For one, someone listing you as a friend gives them no special privileges, yet friending is surrounded by this great mystique. Secondly, that these were drive-by frienders was pretty clear. Ignore and they'll be gone by the end of the hour.
I suppose people need a reason to get upset.
And I need to post about LJ friending behavior. All this has got me thinking....
(no subject)
Date: 2006-11-01 01:36 am (UTC)WTF is the point of that... unless it's either an experiment of some sort, or just trying to test who'd make the most desperate friends or who's on the computer at the time? :P
But it's funny reading the LJs a drive-by frienders because so many people take great offense at being friended by a stranger. "I DONT LIKE U AND IM BANNING U!!1!!one1!!" was common. I didn't see the reason for the hoopla. For one, someone listing you as a friend gives them no special privileges, yet friending is surrounded by this great mystique.
Haha, indeed... I admit sometimes when I get in a particular mood and need the numbers on my "Friend of" list to exactly match the numbers on my "Friends" list, I've had to ban someone who I'd removed from my friends list just so I wouldn't see her name (and her journals wouldn't imbalance the numbers) anymore, and I'm sure there are people who get driven even madder by small details like how evened out their user info pages are than I do... but if you don't want one person reading your journal, you're probably no safer whether you're on their friends list or not. :P
Hmm, I think I just saw another friend of mine posting wondering about some "scripts that some people run that adds anyone who posts as friends" or something, and one of her friends commented saying that people seem to do that to see how many hateful "I hate you! Unfriend me!" comments they get... weird...
(no subject)
Date: 2006-10-31 07:38 am (UTC)(The chances are good for that, it's not really celebrated over here.)
(no subject)
Date: 2006-11-01 12:49 am (UTC)Trick-or-treating is sadly on the decline here, which bugs me since it was such a special night when I was a child.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-11-01 02:24 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-10-31 08:14 am (UTC)I have reduced my f-list from time to time, because I don´t really feel comfortable having people on my list who apparently don´t give a crap about me - I don´t wanna share personal stuff with them then. So I´ve removed them and they don´t even seem to have noticed!
Now I´m at this stage where I´m sick of doing all the de-friending too. If people are so goddamn indifferent, I can be the same.
But it does annoy me.
Err.... thanks for letting me use this place to rant.
;o) *somewhat guilty*
(no subject)
Date: 2006-11-01 12:49 am (UTC)I've unfriended exactly one person since getting my LJ. She unfriended me first, and I was trying to be considerate since my presence in her life was causing her all sorts of problems with her "best friend" (who hates/hated me, a feeling that is/was not shared). Because I am secretly evil, you see. ;)
But though I have 62 friends listed, there are far fewer actual people there. ;) A pretty sizeable number of friends have two or three LJs for different purposes, and I tend to have them all friended.
I totally agree about the "not giving a crap" part. I've been friended more than once because the person wanted to beef up their friend-count. This is knew because--of about 100 interests that I have listed--we shared not a single interest! And since I have things like "reading" and "friends" listed as interests, it's more difficult to be completely opposite me than to share at least a few. :^P Nor did they ever comment on my LJ. So that shows their interest, and with the exception of one still hanging around, they all went away eventually. As I told
Friending behavior is interesting to me. I think I'll have to make a post about this.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-11-01 08:38 am (UTC)Indeed? I must say you hide it very well. ;o)
I´m glad to hear someone else feels the same way though.
I realised I have very high standards when it comes to friendship and though I separate online friendships from real-life frienships, there certain forms of behaviour I have a problem with. And when someone friends me (even if I friended first, they STILL friend me back of their own will!), I expect them to at least TRY to establish some kind of connection.
I like to think I try (though perhaps some people would accuse me of not trying hard enough), but I will definitely lose interest if I don´t get anything back.
I mean, of course you´re not gonna connect with everyone on your f-list on the same level, but there has to be some connection, right?
Aaaaand there she goes ranting again. ;o)
Anyway, please do make a post about all this, I´d be very interested in reading and discussing it further.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-10-31 01:28 pm (UTC)Apart from that, get well (and rid of ladybugs) soon *hugs*.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-11-01 12:51 am (UTC)I actually really like the friend notification feature. I'm more amused than anything by drive-by friendings. I simply do not understand why a person would want to friend someone who shares no interests and is a complete stranger. I doubt they'd read my LJ anyway. My entries are far too long!
Friending behavior really fascinates me.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-10-31 04:45 pm (UTC)About the friending: well I have a steady group for a while now, nothing big is happening with friending or peeps unfriending after a day or so. Funny thing though, when a ex-friend gets removed, it always balances out with a new friend. But then I am friends only so people have to comment before they get added, unless I friend them first because I like them, or I know them elsewhere and suddenly get an lj. I do read everyone and leave comments. So yeah maybe the list seems huge (21 more peeps btw the exact same amount of friends listed at myspace), I can keep track and hopefully be a good friend to everyone. My communities however... I need to cut down on them. Some are incredibly active and flood my flist, others are almost dead... Oh well when I am really procastinating :)
(no subject)
Date: 2006-11-01 12:53 am (UTC)I try so hard to read my flist everyday and leave comments when I have something of substance to say. I can't always do it, but it's a nice hour-long reprieve for me to read my LJ and post comments.
I hear you about the communities. Some of them like
(no subject)
Date: 2006-10-31 06:37 pm (UTC)Let's have a party of unhealthy people! ;)
Halloween...I don't have a costume and am totally unwilling to buy one, but I got some black hair spray...
(no subject)
Date: 2006-11-10 04:05 pm (UTC)What does it say about me when I don't need to buy costumes; I can usually create one from my everyday clothes? :^D
(no subject)
Date: 2006-11-10 06:58 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-11-01 03:29 pm (UTC)We gotta get together soon, Logan is a month and a half old-you gotta see him when he's still little(you know they grow fast....;)
(no subject)
Date: 2006-11-10 04:06 pm (UTC)Crazy schedule be damned. :^P
I hope you're doing well and *big hugs*
(no subject)
Date: 2006-11-02 03:24 am (UTC)What sort of ladybugs do you have? The nasty orange Asian ones that bite, or the nice red native ones? We get the orange ones here mostly, and they are almost as annoying as box elder bugs. They get into verything!
(no subject)
Date: 2006-11-02 03:28 am (UTC)Our ladybugs don't bite and are the native variety. We get a mixture of red and dark orange with about a dozen spots on their backs. I've never experienced biting ladybugs. That's just wrong! Ladybugs are supposed to be cute...though they do smell quite bad.