The Wife and Big Sister are feeling ill today.  The Wife more than Big Sister since I swear Big Sister gets sick for only 45 minutes at a time.

Anyway they both have fevers and sore throats.  in fact, Little Sister also had a sore throat this morning…listening to a 4-year-old trying to clear her throat is both humorous and sad at the same time.

I, unlike the female members of my family, am not feeling ill.  Bored and unemployed but not ill.  So I can’t try the remedy that I link to below.  And there is no way on God’s green earth that I am getting my children or wife to try it either.  They aren’t fans of the pepper.

But I offer it to you for the next time you are feeling the ’sick taste’ in your throat.  I know I’ll be trying it.

Frugal Cure For A Sore Throat

Here is a picture of my sunflower.  It is not as nice a photo as Posey’s but:

a.  I don’t have as nice a camera as she does…although, neither does she anymore.

2.  I grew this sunflower myself.

I’m sure that little bit of a snark is going to come back to bite me in pest/bug infestation next week.

…only in the fever dreams of Fox News.

June is 2nd best fundraising month for Obama campaign

$52 million in June!  That is freaking amazing!

A few points to make that look even better:

1.  The Obama campaign has $72 million in the bank

2.  The DNC has $22 million in the bank

3.  $75 million of that was raised last month.

And this little tidbit:

The stunning tidbit from June’s totals is that the average donation has decreased, from around $100 in February to $68 in June.  In other words, while the average amount donated has increased, the number of donations has increased.  A lot.

Unfortunately the McCain campaign + the RNC has almost $100 million in the bank…although McCain only pulled in $22 last month.  So, if you are able and interested, donate to the Obama campaign.  They take donations as low as $5.  And for donations like that, you are entered in a contest to be backstage at the convention in Denver when Barack makes his big announcement at Mile High Stadium.  Hell, you don’t even have to donate to get in on the contest.

The announcement I am really waiting for is the VP.  Then I’ll get some more bumper stickers and yard signs.

It’s been a quiet couple weeks (except for constant McCain gaffs and media ‘satire‘) so it’s great to see Obama coming through with some serious cash and putting his money where his mouth is.

This. Is. Freaking. Cool.

I’ll throw out some names and some of you will recognize them…and then skip the rest of my post while you quickly click to watch the video. BTW, it’s Hulu so don’t even try it from work.

• Neil Patrick Harris
• Nathan Fillion
• Joss Whedon

Ok, now that those people are gone I’ll explain what this is all about.

Joss Whedon is the creator of Buffy:The Vampire Slayer, Firefly, and others.  He has a following online that can only be called fanatical.  Nathan Fillion is the lead of the previously mentioned Firefly (or Serenity as the movie was called) and has a female following that can only be called rabid.  Neil Patrick Harris (NPH) is…DOOGIE!  And Barney from HIMYM but really he’ll always be DOOGIE!

So Mr. Whedon wrote a little 30-45 minute musical in three acts.  Act I and II are up as of my typing this.  Act III will be up on July 19, 2008.  Then all three acts will be taken offline at midnight on July 20, 2008, in anticipation of selling the whole thing as a DVD.  That’s fine, everyone should get paid for their work, but in the meantime I STRONGLY urge you to watch the first two acts.  I have and it is…yes I’m going to say it…LEGENDARY!

NPH plays a low-grade villian who is trying to get into the bigtime by joining the Legion of Villians (or something).  But his plans are complicated by being in love with a woman he sees in the laundrymat and his nemisis, Captain Hammer (Mal, I mean Nathan Fillion).  The production values are Hollywood level and the staging is like a broadway musical…I am really, REALLY, looking forward to Act III.

Of course, we are heading out to Washington Wine Country soon and now the Freakanomics Guy comes out with this study that regular people (like you and me) can’t tell the difference between expensive wine and the cheap stuff.

This is not a surprise to me.  I’ve been to wine tastings where I could tell there was a difference between the wines but only if they were different grapes or significantly different regions (thus different cross pollination of the grapes).  But three different Pinots?  Yeah, I have no idea.

But, in case you want to act like you know what you are talking about…check this link.  He’s got a great run down of how to act like a wine snob.  Funny stuff…and true, from my limited experience.

This post at Boing Boing is the reason I read comment threads.  The post itself is about a $15 product at Amazon.com that claims to fix things like “Bat Wing”, a male-specific problem (see comment #6 for an explanation).  But the comments are even better than the stupidity of the post itself.

If you are ready for a chuckle or, ladies, a glance behind the scenes, as it were of why men are so often ‘grabbing themselves’, read this post.  And, top it off with just about every pop culture reference to testicles…just can’t beat it (ya see what I did there?)

The life of a freelancer is a series of busy weeks separated by long months of nothing to do.

So I am finding other ways to spend my time (between constantly looking for new work).  Some of the things I am working on are actually professionally related.  But mostly I am doing jobs around the house that I might pay professionals to do if I could get someone to pay me for my profession.

Ah the joys of bitching to the internets.

So what, pray tell, am I working on this week?  Well since last week was mulching the flower beds (all 6 yards of mulch) and cleaning the (ok, part of) garage, this week is painting Big Sister’s bedroom.  Below I’ve included a bunch of pics for your amusement.  Or at least to prove to my Mother (Hi Mom!) that I am actually doing something productive with my days.

This is the room before I had my way with it.

Primed and ready to paint

Pink walls, Blue ceiling

…and finally Yellow walls

I’ve got a ceiling and a four walls to re-coat tomorrow and then Big Sister can go back to sleeping in her own room. I’ll post a finished product once we have the room rearranged.

While The Wife sits beside me playing with a Rubix cube (and no, that is not a euphamism for anything) I sit playing this game:  Sunny Day.

It’s really very simple.  Click once to open the umbrella.  Click again to close it.  Land on car tops to stay in the game.  The more cars for each jump the more points you make.  Hit an apple for bonus points.  Hit a duck to drop like a stone.

I’m blogging about it so I can stop playing it.  How will you stop?