Valentine's Creations

I am making some Valentine's words. Already I feel like coloring everything pink. They are separate and transparent, but look best on a dark background. As much as I respect Martin Luthor King Day, I couldn't see doing this with a "Happy MLK Day" so I jumped on over to the next holiday - but I do hope all of you have a good holiday tomorrow.

Time to Retire the VCR?

We have more than one VCR in the house and find that we almost never use it anymore. We figure that the next time we are fooling around with cables and cords, we'll retire one of the VCRs. The cable company's DVR is doing such a good job - and makes perfect recordings. Of course, we still want to keep another one around because we might want to record something to take over to Grandma's to show her. That's the only big drawback to DVR -- you can only watch it on the TV where it was recorded. Maybe something will come out in the future. Until then, we are keeping at least one VCR.

Today, the Internet has been up for 10 minutes, down for 10 minutes -- all day. Argh! I wonder what Comcast is doing. I tried going on dialup -- and found out how spoiled I am. Dialup was so slow that I could not stand it today.

At least there are still things I can do offline like Photoshop. I made an animation from my avatar as a bat-winged mermaid at the pool. (This is a nice scene to chat in -- animated fireworks are going on in the background on the other side of the pool.)

Got the Car Fixed - But I Didn't Know it was Broken

I took the car in for a regular maintenance oil change and came out with a $300 bill. I had to have new front brakes and "resurfaced pads," then wheel-balancing and several associated things. Did they push something off on me that I didn't really need? I have no way of knowing. I can't just rush off for a second opinion every time I take it in. I called my husband and he said we were "due" for those things, so I suppose it was all needed.

But how do we tell when we really need something or not? I guess there's no way, short of getting a second opinion. I trust that my car people are honest, but I can see how a place could get carried away with telling someone they need things -- big bucks for them. And it always seems to be the case. There's no simple oil changes anymore - always something else needs to done with the car.

Mushrooms are Healthier than We Knew, etc.

Reader's Digest says that ordinary mushrooms are the top source of an anti-oxidant. Here's the link to another article about it. Since I love mushrooms, I am happy to read this.

Enya and Madonna have new albums. I absolutely love Madonna's "Confessions on a Dance Floor" (I hope she makes more dance music) and I like Enya's "Amarantine." Enya only has a dozen songs on it and most of them have a kind of sad tone, but she is good background music on a moody day.

A friend of mine is using Skype to make phone calls. It is ridiculously cheap to make phone calls this way (calling home phone numbers with his computer). He is paying something like 3 dollars a month for obscene amounts of minutes. I want to sign up Skype to do this, too, even though I don't need it - but it is so cool and so cheap. He called my house and he sounded wonderful.

I finally bought speakers for my humble little 10 g, third-generation iPod. I am listening to so many podcasts now, I want to keep listening to them even during my shower or bath after I come home walking. (If I have time, baths are pure heaven.)

I am still making transparent pictures with my avatars -- I guess the whole thing fascinates me. There is actually some demand for this in the avatar chat world I like to inhabit. I might make personalized pictures of other avatars upon request there -- maybe charge credits (the money used there). If you would like to take a peek at this world, just click on the link --> Avatar Chatting. You can see a bunch of avatars right off and design one, if you wish.

This avatar place has something right. It is fascinating to design your own appearance and dress yourself up to chat with your friends -- and to chat in exotic scenery and 3D rooms, too. Lately, we've been doing chats while ice skating -- only problem is that some folks are skating too near the thin ice and they fall into the water . Chatting in the water is not so bad, though your poor avatar shivers the whole time.

Finally - Made a Transparent Glow

I guess GIF is not the only transparent format used on the Internet. Little did I know. I wish I could attend Photoshop classes -- but I am learning by listening to Photoshop podcasts and reading and watching Ochan, a friend who does wonders with it.

It's funny, but this graphic does not look transparent in the preview for this page as I work on it, but the web interprets PNG files as transparent, not just GIF - a simple thing I never realized. Someday I will be a Photoshop brain - ha!

Photoshopping (Again)

I can do gymnastics in the avatar world, but I'm still trying to figure out how to make a glowing transparent image in Photoshop. So far, I can make a transparent image, but I can not make it glow like a friend does with his images. The one on the left is mine. When I am working with it, it has a yellow aura, but the aura disappears when saved as a transparent GIF.

The image on the right is my friend's - in PNG format. See how it glows? I've tried saving in the format he uses but my own image loses her glow. It's interesting with his image, though - In Firefox, it is transparent. In Internet Explorer, it has a gray background ... where's a Photoshop guru when I need one?

Best French Toast Recipe

I have never posted my detailed French Toast recipe, so here it is, a family favorite although there are other good ways to make French Toast that I use, too - such as just dipping some regular sliced bread into an egg/milk batter and frying it in a pan, then spreading a little cream cheese on the hot bread and sprinkling cinnamon and powdered sugar over it all.

Play Online Games or Add Them to Your Site

Digg.com had this link to a fun site, Games 2 Web. You can plya all kinds of games here or copy the code and add one to your own page. Here's a little one below.  (Sorry for the sound on my main page until this game scrolls over next week.)

Free Flash Games