Go forth and fill your libraries with media.
Seriously, thanks to everyone for being so amazing and patient. You are the reason I love Vox.
I was just told that the Amazon Conduit will be fixed by tomorrow. I will post here as soon as I get word that it's back up and running.
I know this has been frustrating and I am sorry there wasn't more I could do to make it less so. I really appreciate your patience though.
Cheers,
Bad news. As many of you have probably noticed, the Amazon Conduit was not fixed in the last week's release. Unfortunately, there was an undetected bug that is preventing the conduit from working.
We are working on this bug fix and hope to have the Conduit back up and running this week.
I will keep you posted.
Thank you for being so patient.
Blog Action Day is every October 15th, when blogger are asked to post something about a single issue to show our strength and conviction as an online community. It's a great way to feel connected to the greater good, and the participation of so many bloggers to support the world's leading non-profit organizations is something you can do to help, right now. By blogging today, you're supporting some of the world's leading non-profits and sharing your voice for change.
This year's topic is climate change, and we'd love to read your thoughts on the topic. If you participate, leave us a link to your post in the comments, so we know to check out your post!
Go to www.blogactionday.org to learn more, get a badge for your blog showing your participation, and see some ideas for your post on climate change.
Can't wait to read your posts!
~ daisy
The Amazon Conduit will be working again on October 15, 2009. Thank you to everyone for your patience.
Have a great weekend,
daisy, Team Vox
In my last Team Vox post, I let you know that we're aware that the Amazon conduit is broken and that we're working to fix it. Many of you want to know when it's going to be fixed and I'm so sorry I haven't gotten back to you about that sooner.
Unfortunately, I don't have an exact date to give you, but rest assured, the Amazon conduit will be fixed in the coming weeks.
In the meantime, I'm about to finish my latest book and I could use a few suggestions as to what to read next, so... if you don't mind, let me know in the comments what's on your nightstand and/or what book you think I absolutely must read next.
Thanks! :)
Some of you may have noticed that right now you cannot add books from Amazon to your Vox library. Giving people a glimpse into what's on your night stand is important to many of you, so I just wanted to reassure you that we are doing our best to get this bug fixed. I'll keep you posted.
So sorry for the inconvenience.
Hope you have a great weekend!
daisy
A few days ago, M's mom was explaining to him that she needed to clip his fingernails because they were too long and had caused him to "scratch his perfect little face". Needless to say, M wasn't too happy about this, and instead of telling him to man-up and hand over those filthy nails, she did what she does best: bribe him with extra snacks and cookies if he behaved during this event. They kept yakking about their days and made plans for the next 300 years for about 10 minutes, and then she turned to me and said, "You know what I'd like you to do?" Out of pure reflex, I answered, "Anything but clipping his nails. I'm scared of that." Which is the truth. On a normal kid, I'd do it without problems, but M is about the fuzziest kid on the planet. If there were trophies for real life drama, he'd have a shelf full of them.
To my utter surprise and disbelief, she half-scoffed, half-smiled while saying "God no, I'd never ask you to do that. That's a mother's job."
I tried hard not to scoff myself. A mother's job? Clipping your kid's fingernails twice a year does not exempt you from every other responsibility as a mother and automatically give you an End-of-the-Year Award for Best Mom. A mother's job includes making meals for your children, getting them ready for school, making sure they eat the right foods -by doing more than instructing your nanny to do it-, reading to them and putting them to bed, and possibly, spending as much time as you can with them, to the point where they get sick of you. I could count with my fingers the times I've seen them eat together as a family, or the times she has made them a meal. Does she even know how to make breakfast? I've never seen this happen. On the days the housekeeper is off, Dad wakes up and makes the kids bacon strips and eggs, or waffles. Dad. On Saturday and Sunday mornings, the kids are left non-perishable breakfast things out so they can help themselves [although I wouldn't blame them for this: they wake up painfully early, and I think it's a good idea to teach the kids to fend for themselves when they have to]. When you are a mother, there's no such thing as "not being a morning person" anymore. You're a morning person, an afternoon person, a middle-of-the-night person... you can't turn your 'mom' button off.
Maybe it's just me, or the difference in cultures, I don't know. Growing up, my mom wasn't the most dedicated -she didn't attend PTA meetings or school functions [she had to work, and the school functions were during the day], and she shipped me off to grandma's house every summer and almost every weekend, which I loved anyway- but I cannot remember a day when my mother didn't get home from work, exhausted from the long day and long walks [no cars!] and make my dad and I dinner, and the three of us sat at the dinner table going over our days and discussing whatever was on TV. And I mean real dinner, on a real stove, with no microwaves or frozen meals or pizza deliveries, and many times with an incredible lack of ingredients. She was an artist, a magician, and I don't know how she did it, but she did. She'd wake up extra early and put my socks and shoes on while I was still in bed so I could get an extra minute of sleep, and had my uniform ready by my bed and warm water in the bathroom, and a glass of milk for me in the kitchen. When I look back, I don't see the many times she pulled on my hair and smacked my head with a comb because I wouldn't stand still while she was brushing my hair. I don't ever remember longing to be with my parents, and I never missed them, because there was nothing to miss; they were always there. And I still ran down the 4 flights of stairs every day when I saw my mom coming home, and even though the first words out of me were usually "what'd you bring me?" [hey, I WAS a kid!], we both knew that it was really more than that. Because my mom never really brought me anything from work, but I still ran down the stairs every day and tackled her with a hug and carried her purse the rest of the way.
A mother's job is more than showering your kids with all sorts of ridiculously expensive material things. It's more than having the best toys, the best video game systems, the best set of golf clubs and birthday parties at GameWorks. A mother's job is taking your child to the doctor and staying there. It is sacrificing your weekend plans if your child has a stomach virus and dropping everything else in the world if he's crying your name because he's sick and he wants mommy. A mother's job needs to draw a thick, black, distinguishing line between a mother and a nanny. I am not against having someone pick up your kids from school and entertaining them while you're at work or when you want to go out on the weekends. If you can afford it, more power to you. It gives me a job. But a nanny should absolutely not be a third parent.
A mother's job? Sometimes I wonder if you know what a mother's job really is...
I bought food from Taco Bell today. A number five [nachos with cheese], hard taco, pepsi. The usual.
It was weird eating it by myself for the first time. For one, I can't even eat it all. We always share my nachos, and you know to pick the ones that have the beans on them, because I don't like the beans. And you eat the taco, too, because even though it's the same meat and the same sour cream, I insist in not eating it because I don't like the lettuce. The drink [pepsi, always pepsi!] is an adventure of its own, because even after sharing [me throughout the meal, you only at the end... what is it with you not drinking at all till you're done eating?] we never finish it up. And of course, there's the fact that I didn't even like Taco Bell until a few months ago, and I only do like it due to our many late nite food adventures.
But I ate it, and I ate it all, all by myself. I don't know if I should be happy or sad.
I recently finished reading a book entitled "Sniper: 93 Confirmed Kills". I know many people are wondering what the book was about, but I'm not going to give anything away. I'm not one of those people who will ruin the end of the book or a movie unless I feel ruining it would amuse me in some way. If you want what the book "Sniper: 93 Confirmed Kills" is about you'll have to read it for yourself. I will share some of the other working titles the author was kicking around before settling on the ambivalence that is "Sniper: 93 Kills" and those were titles like "Man Shoots People", "Waiting in the Bushes for Somebody to Walk Out So I can Shoot Him" and "Harry Potter Loses It in Vietnam and Shoots 93 People with a Sniper Rifle." Perhaps the most troubling passages from the book are ones like "93 was only the number of confirmed kills, I shot way more than that." Further, the marine detailed how it might take him 4 days to travel a distance of 100 yards in order to remain undetected by the enemy. It took 30 minutes to raise his canteen to his mouth to take a drink. God bless that man. I wouldn't have the patience. I have a 45 minute drive to work everyday and I complain. "I have a 45 minute drive to work EVERYDAY! Gas costs me like $100 a month. This is worse than Vietnam!" I'll often say to anyone who will listen to me, which really isn't as many people as you would think, considering how charming and handsome I am. Well, I suppose my drive to work isn't worse than Vietnam. Maybe the Korean War, but definitely not Vietnam. This guy couldn't even properly use the bathroom while sneaking up on Charlie. When you're taking care to spend four days crawling on your stomach 100 yards in order to shoot a General of the opposing army it's no fair standing up and yelling "Time out guys! I have to take a dump!"
If you know what it's like to have to take a dump in your pants then you know exactly what it's like in Vietnam.
It was truly an eye opening sliver of what the war was like, even if the biographer was an untalented hack writer who pounded the guys life's work out in one weekend while hungover. I cannot even begin to wrap my head around the situations our troops are put in and I appreciate the fact that there are men braver than I am to fight for our country. You should appreciate it too, because if you had to rely on people like me in the military we would be conquered by spiders. I don't mean Giant Mutant Spider's from planet Arachnatroid either, I mean your common household spider. I hate them and the way they surprise you when you walk into your bathroom at 4:30 in the morning to take a groggy piss.
Speaking of spiders, my friend and I once took a road trip to the University of Southern Illionois (Go Saluki's!) for a bit of fun and so he could meet with one of his professors concerning his Master's Thesis. Being the enthusiastic youngsters we were at the time we decided to drive through the night, leaving Cleveland at 11 pm and arriving in Illionois at 7 am. I drove the entire trip save for 20 minutes, when I handed my friend the wheel and, 19.5 minutes after beginning to drive, began to doze off. I was awaken by the car jolting into the center lane and the fender of a semi aprroximately 3 inches from the passenger window where I had laid my head to rest. I took the wheel back and wiping the drool from the corner of my mouth, finished the trip. About 30 minutes before arriving in So. Ill. and just as I was becoming half delerious my friend started by saying "I don't know if I should tell you this. But it might be something you want to know." He seemed fairly conscious and present in the moment, I guess thats what a good nights sleep does to you. "In Southern Illinois there are what we call 'Groundlings'." he informed me. "Brownies?" I slurred, myself half asleep at the wheel and wondering why he had such a serious tone of voice when discussing snack food.
"No, Groundlings. Groundlings are one of the most poisonous spiders indigenous to the United States, and there are a lot of them in my area."
There was a brief pause where I stared at him, unsure of whether he was screwing with me or if I had just gone loopy from the cigarettes, coffee and lack of sleep.
"So. Just thought you should know." He added.
"Okay." I began coming to terms with this. "But really, how serious is this. How common are they?" I asked, fully expecting the issue to not be as serious as he made it sound.
"I found one in my bed last week."
...
...
...
"Am I going to die?" I asked him
"You might, but only if you get bitten and don't get help within a few days, as long as you catch it early they just amputate your arm or something." He was pretty nonchalant about the possibility of being murdered by arachnids.
"How do you tell if they bite you? Does it hurt?" He wasn't offering some of the more important facts unless I pressed him.
"No, actually you can’t tell at all. It’s amazing. You don’t even feel a pinch and then 2 or 3 days later your arms swells up and they have to cut it off. Or you die.” With the way he spoke one might assume we were discussing something interesting he saw on television, the difference being I was going to die.
“Just make sure you shake out the blankets before you go to bed. They tend to hide in blankets…and couches.” that was the final word on the subject.
Not surprisingly I was not able to fall asleep when we arrived at his apartment. In fact I slept very little over the next three days, alternately worrying about dying and understanding that since I didn’t have health insurance, if I did actually get bit, I would prefer to die. I also figured if I was going to be killed by a spider I may as well be awake not to feel it.
I did not die that weekend and I’m happy to report that the Sniper survived too. He won various medals for bravery (jumping through a wall of flames to rescue fellow soldiers in a Helicopter crash) and I was able to avoid being bitten by a spider. It’s amazing how much we all have in common, if you don’t think about it for a second.
Links from my Neighborhood
Check out the RockMe. Schedule. I'm not sure if this is a...
All of us as Six Apart
Vox's parent company
