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Dreamweaver woes

Have I mentioned that DreamWeaver 3 is CRAP? Well, it is. It’s really annoying to have to constantly go back and forth between the 2 versions [DW2 and DW3], according to what I’m doing. Like now, for instance. I’m typing, so I have to use DW 2 because DW 3 i.s…s..o….s..l..o..w. Apparently DW 3 has issues with all browsers, which renders it useless in my book, since doing WEB DESIGN usually requires using a BROWSER. HELLOOOOOOO!!! I don’t know what the morons at Macromedia were thinking. In addition, DW 4 still has the same typing and table editing bugs as DW 3. Talk about useless upgrades…

Anyway, what I’m really posting for today is to let you know that I updated the About page with new info and pix. I fiddled with the links page a bit, but not enough to really make a difference. [nevermind, they are rolled into this new site now – A]

Another interesting thing I found out today as I was trolling my referrer logs trying to see who is scoping me out is that I’m listed in a blog list called Bloghop.com. Who knew? It’s also interesting to note that I had one bad rating and one good one. Tee! In addition to that interesting finding, I have stats about platform and browsers that will help me to get the new design right. For a change. It appears that mostly Winblows and Exploder are used to view this page, but Mac accounted for 1/3, so that makes me happy. ‘Specially since Netscape is such a piece of crap now that AOL got ahold of it – now I can relax and just deal with browsers that uphold the standards [MSIE 5, anyone?]. To hell with all the old browsers that just don’t cut it. Sorry Netscape, really I am! I wish Netscape would come out with just an email client. That’s what I use it for anyway. Eudora can’t show headers, so that’s out. Outlook is just, well, so MicroSux. Why doesn’t someone come out with a kick ass email client that does everything that Netscape Messenger does? Huh, WHY?

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Andy Graduates!

Found Links to amuse: Museum of e-Failure. Yes, this guy has made it his mission to go around to all failing dot coms and get a screen shot of their last site before they die and become just another Ghost Town on the Info Super Highway. It’s a worthwhile pursuit and I, for one, am glad he is attempting to document this cyberspace equivalent of ghost towns left from the Gold Rush. Interesting. [update 3.28.09: disobey.com is more of a blog now, but they still have some ghost sites in that section. It’s mildly entertaining. – A][update 2: Mar 2015. Totally a blog now. Don’t bother. -A]

Andy’s graduation sort of took over my life last week, which is why, Dear Readers, you’ve had no fodder here at Misangela. I know that’s no excuse, but hey, it’s the one you get. Andy is now, officially, DOCTOR Ray!

Andy's Graduation!
Andy's Graduation!

Our post graduation celebration was at the

Andy's graduation party.
Andy's graduation party.
with a bunch of friends.

He took Hobbes away to CA with him and it was a total scene at the airport. He cried, I cried, Hobbes whined. It wasn’t pretty and it took the rest of the week to recover from the emotional trauma.

What Hobbes thinks of CA!
What Hobbes thinks of CA!
Hobbes is still freaked out to be in a new home with no siblings, but we think he’ll adjust. Now, to get ourselves adjusted… [3.28.09, interesting note: This was the last time I was ever to go to the gate to watch someone leave. 9/11 took away that right several months later. Yes, the terrorists DID win IMO. – A]

Things are going fairly smoothly here at Casa Misangela, aside from the aforementioned stuff. The ID mailer went out last week and now I wait for responses. I certainly hope there are responses, otherwise, our Heroine gets to hit the pavement for a lovely ‘real’ job. I just can’t articulate how much the idea of that thrills me. //end sarcasm

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You Can Pick Your Nose…

…but you can’t pick your family.

My family and I haven’t had much to do with each other in a long time. It’s not that I hate them or anything, it’s just that I can’t live my life the way they do. And I can’t live in Knoxville, TN, either. They’ve never forgiven me for that.

Most of the time we have a truce situation: don’t ask, don’t tell. They don’t ask about my personal business and I don’t tell them anything about myself. Hey, it works for us, OK? They are conservative, bigoted and narrow minded people with whom I have nothing in common and it’s best if we don’t try to compare notes about how we live our lives, lest we break our truce and begin the Cold War again.

To give an example of this tenuous hold we have on civility and the gulf that separates us, let me tell you a bit about a conversation that I had with my mother today. But first, I suppose I should give a little background on what the family (that would be them, not me) is going through right now. My brother got a girl knocked up about 4 years ago and didn’t tell anyone until the baby was born in 1997. A paternity test confirmed his responsibility and he decided to take in this girl as well as her other illegitimate child, whose father is a drug dealer currently doing time. Yeah, a real NICE girl fer sure. Anyway, she takes him for a ride for about 2.5 years and almost bankrupts him by supporting the rest of her white trash family with his money and now she and my brother are in a custody battle for the child. My brother is currently losing the battle due to the courts’ predisposition to place children with the mother (no matter HOW white trash she is) and the added problem of a sibling that the system is loathe to separate the child from (no matter how neurotic and damaged that sibling is).

OK, so that’s the background of the situation. So, I get a call from my mother this morning with all the latest scoopage about the custody suit and this is sort of how it goes:

Mom: …and I thought you’d want to know that your name came up in the paperwork from Janell [that’s the white trash’s name -Ed].

ME: oh yeah? In what way? This has nothing to do with me!

Mom: Well, she said that you were a devil worshiper and uh…well…

ME: [laughing] And what? Do you think I care what that white trash says about me?

Mom: [concerned tone] Well, it was in the papers and she said you had a devil worship website…

ME: [not laughing anymore] So? Do you believe her or something? I don’t like your tone! Websites are public, Mother. If you don’t believe me, then go and look at everything I have up. Just because you and the rest of the people up there have no clue about the internet is no reason to insinuate anything about me!

Mom: [still a concerned tone] I’m not, it’s just that she is saying this stuff and it’s about you and uh…

ME: Why would I care? Why do YOU care? She has accused everybody up there of something at this point! She is just a malicious bitch who knows absolutely nothing about me. I don’t know why this concerns you. It certainly doesn’t concern me.

Mom: I just wanted you to know…

And the conversation goes on about other stuff after that. But it certainly left a sour taste in my mouth. I’m disturbed that my mother would even *think* such a thing about me. Hell, I’m disturbed that she has so little knowledge about me and my life. It saddens me to realize that I’m so alien to my own family, but I don’t see how it’ll ever change, either.

I must admit that I was biting my tongue in half with the effort it took to not say something smart assed like “well just because I dance naked in the back yard and sacrifice goats doesn’t mean I’m a devil worshiper”. Geez, the stuff those people think! And as for Janell, she is just acting like the white trash that she is. She is a cunt for turning on me in the first place! I was the only person in my family that gave her the benefit of the doubt when all this shit began and this is the thanks I get. I’m so glad that karma will take care of her in due time. She is a pathetic excuse for a mother and for an incarnate being. [Update 2013: Karma did in fact take care of her. She was murdered! I kid you not. Karma’s a bitch, baby.]

I sincerely hope that my brother gets a decent custody settlement. He deserves it. And I hope my family can open up enough to get to know me one day. Maybe one day we can all be friends. [Doubtful – 2013]

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Margaritas and Street Art

Well, just when I think that my life can’t get any weirder…

Friday night, Andy and I went out to eat Mexican and drink margaritas for Cinco de Mayo. 2 kickass margaritas and 2 beers later, we are strolling back to the car in Little 5 Points and I glance across the street, noticing some black guy putting down a bedroll. I thought he was just a vagrant or whatever, when I look at what he’s facing. He is facing a tree with small black and white TVs hanging in it. NO LIE. I immediately say to Andy: HEY, LOOK, an art installation!! So we cross the street and ask the guy what’s up with the art. He chuckles and says that I’m the first person to notice that what he has done is actually ART.

He asks us to sit down, so we do, thus becoming PART of the art, rather than looking AT the art. So, we are sitting in this parking lot, in front of a tree with 5 small B&W TVs hanging in it, with unique static on each one. We *are* the art. COOL.

After a bit he rolls up a blunt and we all get toasted, then we really start to talk some stoned shit about art and where he got his concept for this. He said that he’d dreamed it, but in the dream there were hundreds of tiny TVs about the size of grapefruits all over the tree. Of course that is very cost prohibitive, so he rounded up 5 little B&Ws to see how it would look. We agreed that the unique static on each TV was the coolest part of the concept. Tourists (people who live Outside The Perimeter in Atlanta, but come Inside The Perimeter to see the freaks in Little 5 Points on the weekends) were passing by and looking at us and the TVs with trepidation and fear. It was truly a surreal experience.

Of course, after the blunt we were waaaay past trippin’ so we stumbled to the car and headed home. Naturally, we stopped at our neighborhood bar, Trackside Tavern, where all CRUNK Decaturites end up late at night and had a couple of Cider Jacks to make sure we were indeed fucked up before we went home. It worked! :-)