Random Thursday: Like Lambs to the Random

Random Thursday (ˈrandəm ˈTHərzdā): the day on which Sarah plunks down all the odd bits and pieces she’s been sent by friends or has otherwise stumbled upon this week in an effort to avoid writing a real post, the assembly of which usually ends up taking twice as much time as sitting down and creating actual content.

My whole attitude this week can be summed up in one word:  Baaaaaah.

So I went with it.

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Hipster Sheeple or Sheepish Hipster?

Hurts so good.

True story:

One day, during my brief sojourn as a music major, I was studying in my dorm room to Pachelbel’s Canon—actually, I was studying the Canon itself, for Theory class.

I wasn’t wearing headphones, and the door was open.

My RA stuck her head into the room in passing and asked me why on earth I was playing the GE Soft Light commercial over and over.

When I told her the original music had been composed around 1693,
she looked at me like I’d just won the trophy for Champion Freshman Idiot and said,
“Oh, please. Lightbulbs weren’t even invented back then.”

She wasn’t wrong.  Entirely.

(Thanks, Tina—I’d forgotten!)

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Rocking the Oxymoron

Ladies, Gentlemen, and Others, I give to you the song “No Stress”,
as sung by a musician named Wolf
to images from Shaun the Sheep.

Feel the awesome.

(Not that I didn’t appreciate the . . . effort . . . it must have take to create that other sheep vid you sent, me, Kev, but I like this one better)

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The Bathgate Conspiracy

According to Reddit, a sheepherder in Bathgate, Scotland, (safely) had been dying his sheep in bright colors for several years in order to entertain passing motorists.

This is the pretty picture that usually accompanies this announcement.

But if you look at the comments, a resident of Bathgate (Mayor_Goldie_Wilson) says that this isn’t quite right

The image s/he offers of the Real Bathgate Sheep™ is a bit less . . . Easter best.

But dark purple sheep?  Are still totally cool, y’all.

(I can’t remember who first shared the above image on Facebook, as nearly everyone did, but thanks! )

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A Small Amount of Sheep is Not Zero

And that is exactly what this video provides.

So there.

And remember, at any given time, you are never more than 12,750 km away from a sheep.

I find this oddly comforting in a really disturbing way.

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Random Thursday: Art for Art’s Sake

Thank you all for the comments, e-mails and support this past week.

Janie is home from the hospital, and—except for a slight hiccup when the power went out we had to take her to a friend’s house for her 10 p.m. breathing treatment—all is well.  Or nearly so.  She’s bored now, which is an excellent sign!

She helped me arrange this post yesterday morning while we were waiting for the nurse to orchestrate her release, thought when she saw the title, she said, “Who’s Art?  This is my post.”

Yeah.  She’s on the mend.

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Deadlines = Inspiration

Yes.  Yes he did.

Don’t ask me how I know . . .

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Celeste Doodles!

I don’t usually venture onto tumblr because the formatting stuns my bloggified brain, but I’m following Celeste of Celeste Doodles, because holy cow, the imagination on this woman.

She draws Girl Scout cookies as Girl Scouts. She creates Vulcan fashion, genderswaps the Star Trek crew, imagines them as bounty hunters, drops other characters into the Federation Academy, and gives Nichelle Nichol’s Uhura a decent uniform.  She even gives us a glimpse of the future of our favorite cartoon characters, all grown up.

I didn’t have time to beg permission to share her art here, so I’m going to link to her archives, which will give you a thumbnail overview of her work, and also link to Janie’s favorite three images of American Girl dolls as twenty-somethings, because she insisted, and I can’t blame her.

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Gastronomical Art

I thought the white stuff was cream cheese, but I was told in no uncertain terms by Watson that it’s marshmallow fluff.

It was interesting to note, at least to me, that her expression of disgust at the idea of cream cheese and peanut butter was the same as mine at the thought of marshmallow fluff, period.

So I thought I might as well take a poll:

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Body Art!

Get it?

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Dear Mr. Watterson

When Janie was just learning to read, she would take one of our many Calvin & Hobbes collections, sit in a corner, and puzzle out the words by looking at the panels.

Then she would bring the book to me and we read them together and laughed, though I would always tell her that Calvin was not a role model.

And now, when we can’t find Sunny, she’s in that same corner, reading about a toy tiger and his little boy.

It’s no surprise that we aren’t alone in our admiration of Bill Watterson’s brainchildren:

Random Thursday: Sad Cats, Cool Cats, and Simon’s Cat

It’s Random! It’s Thursday! It’s Random Thursday!

Several of you sent me a lot of cats this week. So I’m giving ’em back.

Don’t tell Mike Allegra.
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So That’s how it Happens . . .

Watson sent me this—she’s a bit worried, but only because she’s deathly allergic.

I told her my mother has been married for fifty years and has never had fewer than four cats since we kids left home.

On second thought, that probably wasn’t as comforting as I’d hoped.

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The Great Catsby

A mash-up of The Aristocats and that new movie adaption starring What’s His Name from Inception.*

It’s amazing how well this works.

The original is here, if you’d like to compare—it synchs with the above video about 38 seconds in.

(thanks, Kev!)

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Imminent Betrayal vs. Snuggles

Tough call.

Though I should probably mention here that our cat Toby is the reason I know from experience that when someone  jabs you in the eye unexpectedly,** you really do see red cartoon stars.

(via Siobhan, whom I forgot to thank for yesterday’s image as well—sorry, Vannie)

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Sad Cat Diary

This made me snort so loudly, Jane said “Bless you.”

(from Angela and Vicki and . . . someone else?)

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So That’s How it Happens . . . 

This is getting way meta . . .

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Cats Imitating Life

My friend Jen is a big fan of Simon Tofield and she sends me Simon’s Cat videos every once in a while.

This one is a near-perfect reenactment of my kids’ post-bedtime behavior:

I love how he’s perfectly captured Jane’s Cat’s exasperation with Sunny the kitten.

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*No, not the cute one who kicked ass or the sexy one who figured out how to get the job done.  The other guy.

**At least unexpectedly for you.  The only thing you can be sure of with the jabber is that s/he didn’t telegraph the hit.

So Familiar . . .

I had a brilliant idea for today’s post, but can’t remember what it was . . .

In the bottom of my Bag of Holding* is an ever-evolving wad of paper—envelopes, receipts, old computer cards, post-its, torn pages from legal pads, and a couple of abused memo books—all scribbled over with bits and pieces of plot and characters and dialogue and what ifs and a lot of miscellaneous stuff that I had to write down, lest they be lost forever.

I swiped the idea from Anne Lamott, one of my favorite writers, who mentioned in Bird by Bird that she carries a file card and a pen in her back pocket at all times to catch moments.   My wardrobe, such as it is, has a distinct lack of back pockets, and the kids tend to disappear my stock of file cards no matter where I hide ’em, but I do my best.

And it mostly works, though if I were more efficient, I’d transcribe these precious jewels each night and add annotations so I’d have half a chance of remembering why I thought it was vitally important to stop whatever I was doing, scrawl “cerumen = earwax” on my Visa bill in green ink, and save it until it turned into bagmulch.

It’s a cool fact and all, but after a week or longer—I have to start dating these things, or paying my bills in a timelier fashion—I’m not sure whether I wanted to gross out the kids, pass it along to the library’s Trivia Program Committee,** or write a story about the weirdly disgusting CeruMen who attack Hygiene City and are fended off by the Sonic Q-Tip Squad, until it’s discovered to be a terrible misunderstanding, because on a smaller scale, cerumen is actually the body’s way of cleaning its own ears, like oysters do with nacre and irritants,*** and the aliens only wanted to help keep the streets clean.

Which is marginally better than the plot I’m currently tinkering with, but never mind that—it’s the uncertainty that’s getting to me.^ I mean, maybe that bit of whatever had sparked something that would transform the American Literary Landscape™ ^^ or at least get me a book deal.

Okay, probably not—though the CeruMen thing might . . . nah—but it’s a new way of spinning my wheels without the pesky responsibility of forward motion, and I can’t possibly have too many of those.

And it netted me a post, so I’m calling it a provisional win. Even if the one I forgot was better.

How do you spin your wheels?

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*Calling it a purse is like calling the Grand Canyon a ditch—technically true, but not sufficient unto the purpose.

**The Trivia Program was two months ago. Just sayin’

*** Except pearls are more like luminous boogers, really, which is precisely how I feel about oysters, so it all fits together nicely. Yeah, I probably
did want to gross out  the kids.

^I should be used to it by—oh, Lord, I just realized that these  footnotes are the cerumen for my stray thoughts. Yick!

^^In a good way, so hush

The Bananas of Lust

Does anyone else collect possible titles for things they haven’t written and may never try to write?

Titles for any and all genres, for series or stand-alone, that instantly  inspire elevator pitches and make you catch your breath, envision cover art, or at least snort really loudly?

If you do, and your list is like mine, most of them wag the plot in directions you know you’ll probably never go, barring a major life change or Nanowrimo, but some of them actually seem like they might work . . .

The Obsidian Turkey

Epic Viscoelasticity (also suitable for an indie-rock group)

Song of the Echolocator

Languishing, Lingering Linguistics: A Provocative Study of Erotic Alliteration and Assonance through the Ages

The Curious Epitaph of Eleanor Mackelbee

Taking a Leek in Public: Thoughts on Irreverent Vegetarianism

And, for that coming-of-age series I mean to write someday about a teenage wereduck:

Quacking Up

Winging It

Swimming in Circles

Duck!

BeWere*

Even  if I’m the only one who does this, it’s a fun exercise.  And you never know—Rapture of the Kumquats could prove useful someday in a bizarre set of circumstances—and plot points—that will make the book fly off the shelves.

Anyone else have any favorite titles for unwritten works?
Titles for an unwritten series?
Comments on possible stories for any of the above?
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*I’ll bet this one has been used already and gave the  copy editors and library catalogers fits.

(The image from Wondermark is made possible by the genius and generosity of David Malki!)