I added a series pass for Good Morning America to my DVR recently. I watch it when I’m puttering around making coffee and breakfast in the morning because it makes me feel like I’ve woken up at a decent hour. Please note: I NEVER wake up at a decent hour. Not unless I’m forced to. I don’t always watch the screen while I listen to the stories, but I’m glad I was watching today because this happened:

Do you see it?

It’s a gnome! On Josh Elliott’s shoulder! Thank you to whoever executed this expert photo bomb because you truly brightened my day. I’m also impressed with your ability or luck at placing the gnome right on his shoulder. Hair Flag Lady has nothing on you.

No one acknowledged the gnome during the broadcast, and he was nowhere to be seen after they cut back to this shot after the story tape. I’m guessing that a GMA producer quickly made him “disappear” or he moved on to photobomb The Today Show instead.

It is with regret that I must reset the counter in the sidebar to 0 after I woke up today to find this:

It has now been 0 days since Java Bean broke a glass. I found pieces on the couch as well as the floor, so I’m not sure what trajectory the glass took as it fell of the table. All I know is that I just vacuumed the couch extra well.

It’s President’s Day and I know it.

I am rather proud of myself for knowing today is President’s Day before I try going to the post office and find myself locked out, which is how I usually learn about these pseudo-holidays. I can’t consider a day to be a true holiday unless there is seasonal candy or greeting cards associated with it, so I consider days like this and Columbus Day to be somewhat fake holidays. Maybe if they started selling chocolate George Washingtons in anticipation of President’s Day I’d consider it a real holiday.

The only real benefit of such holidays is that you get the day off work, but since I work for myself that means nothing to me other than I get to wait until Tuesday morning for the usually flurry of post-weekend emails to hit my inbox instead of Monday morning. Woot? If anything, I feel more pressure to work on a day like this because I can try to catch up on things while everyone else is off eating chocolate George Washingtons. I’m also less likely to be interrupted by work-related emails during the day, so I can focus better on what I’m doing.

If you too find yourself going to the post office when it’s closed, I must recommend the site Post Office Open? which tells you yes or no whether the post office is open today. Very handy!

A close call

In other news, Java Bean knocked a glass off a table last night! However, it did not break, so his record of 607 days without breaking a glass still stands. He’s lucky we moved to an apartment with wall-to-wall carpeting. If we still lived at my old place that had hardwood floors I would definitely be resetting that widget in the right sidebar.

Happy Anniversary!

And in other, other news, yesterday was the five-year anniversary of my headache. It was first mentioned in this post on PastaQueen in a passing manner and then more in-depth here if you want to relive the trauma.

People sometimes ask how the headache is, so I thought I’d let you know that it’s better now than ever. Most days I have a 1 out of 5 pain level which means the headache doesn’t prevent me from doing most of the things I want to do. Sometimes it bounces up to a 2 or 3, and very occasionally a 4. But most of the time I feel fairly ok. It still shapes my life though. I make sure to avoid stress and I try not to work myself too hard, so I’m not doing everything I would without the headache. However, I’m grateful to be at a place where I’m coping well with my chronic pain and not being ruled by it.

There is no need to tell me you’re sorry or any of that if you were going to. I’m doing pretty ok and I’m ok with that! And no, they never figured out what was causing it or what the hell is going on in my pretty little head, but I doubt anyone could ever figure that out.

The Kindle edition of my first book, Half-Assed: A Weight-Loss Memoir, is on sale for only $2.99 at Amazon for the month of February. Now’s a great time to buy a copy if you never got around to it before or if you only recently got an e-reader or if you just like buying things on sale.

(Sorry, Nook readers, I have no control over sale prices otherwise I’d give you guys a sale too.)

Edited to add: BTW, this is part of the monthly Amazon 100 promotion in which Amazon discounts 100 ebooks to $3.99 or less. There’s a good variety of books there, so you might find another good deal!

ETA (1/31/13): I have obtained a first gen iPad without incurring significant debt! Big thanks to the person who made it happen!

As a web designer I have to test sites in multiple browsers and devices. As more and more people get tablet computers it’s become clear that I need access to an iPad to properly test sites. I’ve tried using the Safari browser which lets you switch the user agent to an iPad, but it fails to detect bugs that occur when using an actual iPad. I tested a site that looked fine in Safari when it was in iPad mode, but when I tested it on my brother’s iPad it was screwed up.

So, I need to get a frickin’ iPad, even though I can do most of things an iPad does on my phone. I’m pretty bitter about this since I don’t want to drop hundreds of dollars on a device just to test web sites. But I have to. The emulators just aren’t cutting it. And yes, I know I can write it off as a business expense, but I’d rather spend the money on a vacation.

Hey, Jennette, why not get a cheaper tablet computer like a Kindle Fire? Or an iPad mini which is cheaper than an iPad?
Because, the iPad still dominates the tablet computer field. More people will be visiting a web site on an iPad than on a competing Android or Amazon device. It makes the most sense to get an iPad so I can be sure that the majority of the tablet audience is seeing the right thing.

Why don’t you try winning one in a contest?
Tried that many times. Still haven’t won. And ever since the iPad Mini came out most contests are giving that away instead of the full-size iPad.

So, does anyone know where I can get a good price on an iPad? I don’t think I even need the latest generation iPad, just an iPad. I’m hesitant to buy one off of eBay. I was wondering if one of my readers has an old iPad they’d be willing to sell me at a reasonable price. Thanks!