OK, so the dog didn't actually bite, he just lunged menacingly. But regardless, this is the sight we woke up to this morning--accompanied by the sound of our frantic cats skating across everything on our desk to get down from the windowsill where this character was nosing around. I have no idea what possessed his owner, because he was on a leash, a retractable one at that, and she continued to let him lunge and bark at the window instead of directing him elsewhere where there weren't terrified cats and half-dressed people peering back out at her. We figured once she saw us, she would get the message and take her dog inside or elsewhere--but not. At one point, she backed up from the window, but continued to stand there and stare at us, like some kind of challenge. To what? It was the weirdest thing and it made me so mad! The cats have been going around with flattened ears and spiky tails ever since. If you can't feel safe sitting in your own window, where can you?!That said, since there's not much of interest going on with us, here are some sites I've found helpful or interesting lately:
Lifehacker is where I learned about Retailmenot, a Firefox extension which automatically--yet unobtrusively!--notifies you of any coupon codes available (for free shipping, a percentage off, or what have you) at any retail sites you visit. I used to have to scour Google for them and this saves a lot of time! Just yesterday we saved $12.95 on shipping from Fannie May, and they have codes for just about anywhere else you can imagine too. I would say it's paid for itself already, but it was free!
Babycatcher is the blog of a 29-year-old nurse-midwife who currently practices in Malawi. Talk about an eye-opening look about a totally different set of problems than those currently facing maternity care in the United States. While she fights for access to basic technology, we're fighting to curtail the invasion of what is arguably too much. (I read on another birth blog the other day that natural, drug-free "physiological" childbirth is set to become the next "fight for women's right to choose"--it's become that controversial of an issue.) In both cases, caught in the crush and losing big-time are mothers, babies, and healthcare workers. Cue midwives.
Morning Coffee isn't really a site, it's another Firefox extension that lets you open any number of preselected sites with the click of a button. You can choose to add sites on a daily, weekly, or
other basis which is great if you have a number of blogs or news sites you read on a daily basis. I really love it because it's super convenient, and it also has the added functionality that when I've finished everything in my Morning Coffee, I know that then I should really get to work. (Whether I actually should have gotten to work about an hour earlier is not up for debate!) It helps limit (though does not eliminate) the "one thing leads to another" aspect of websurfing that has a tendency to get away from me.
Smitten Kitchen is a site with amazing recipes and gorgeous pictures. I believe they use the same Canon Rebel camera that is high on both my and my brother's wish lists.
101 Cookbooks is written by a blogger who has written her own cookbook and is also cooking her way through a sizable number (guess how many?) of others--which explains the high caliber of her culinary abilities. She uses a similar Canon, if not the same model, as Smitten Kitchen and achieves similarly mouth-watering results. The cookies that are up right now use her recipe for Organic Homemade Thin Mints which I am planning to make at my VERY earliest convenience.
SmartWomanRx actually has nothing to do with motorcycles, despite the sassy animation at startup. It's a site when you can buy mail-order generic birth control pills (OK, yes, I admit that sounds scary, but they're really quite legit) for as low as $13 a pack. They've been around for awhile, but until about a year ago there were usually other low-cost options available. Myself, I'm sitting at a $20/month copay on an already-generic drug, which makes me cringe when I think back to my days at the University of Iowa and their free generic drugs (Zolpidem/Ambien, anybody? At our house, we sleep better than anybody on the block and we do it for free! ...For a little while longer, anyway). While a savings of $7/month doesn't sound like a ton, it's something; and if somebody offered me a $7 coupon every month for the next five years or so, I would take it. Combined with the convenience of mail-order, it sounds like a winner to me. (Lest you worry about forgetting to order on time, you can have them overnighted for $19. While this does somewhat negate your savings, depending on what you pay now, standard shipping is free!). I also love the idea of supporting something innovative like this rather than just bending over for the pharmaceutical companies.
VistaPrint: not only do coupon codes abound for freebies like business cards, T-shirts, hats, and the like, but they are the first place I've found where I can easily fit both of our hyphenated names classily on on the top line of an address label. We paid about $4 for 240 of them, they arrived in about three days, and while what looked yellow on the screen is perhaps more of a lime-ish shade in real life, nothing compares to the thrill of seeing all 19 characters of our surname spelled out in all of its lengthy glory. In related news, you can visit the New York Times' Interactive List to see whether your last name is in the top 5,000 in the country. Neither of our family names made it, and the combination obviously didn't--but my sister-in-law's maiden name did, as did my mother-in-law's. Welcome to the road less traveled, ladies :)
So there you have it...a pretty good synopsis of what I learned in law school!
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