Silly Site o' the Day

It was a day of stuff-do-age here at the Riggs Residence, as I can't do much more than putter about and cough, and cough, and cough some more. I'm sure this will go away someday, but it's getting really annoying. Let's have one last holiday-related video before the turning of the year:



Yeah, showbiz is a cutthroat world. Via The Mary Sue. Happy 2012, everyone!

Silly Site o' the Day

Picked up way too many comics after work today; my arms are still hurting from the carrying. At least I didn't get any X-Men with googly eyes (via The Mary Sue)...

Silly Site o' the Day

So while it's still nominally the season, is Jesufy Yourself sacrelicious or what?

Silly Site o' the Day

Timely Team Unicorn Instructional Films presents... Zombie Survival Tips for the Holidays!



Via The Mary Sue!

Silly Site o' the Day

Well, work wasn't too bad, except for the coughing fits that I suspect will continue for some time. The homeward-bound commute was the worst, as it's difficult to breathe in water even when one isn't congested. Ah well, I should just close my eyes and think of the silly season. Here are some Newt's Nudes (via BoingBoing); maybe I should have kept my eyes closed.

Silly Site o' the Day

Wow, back to work already and I'm still not healthy. Winter sucks, and it's still just December! Hope everyone's holiday weekend went well. In case you still need to buy gifts, here's a Gift Ideas Generator.

Silly Site o' the Day

Well, the Christmas dinner is eaten (the veg didn't come off well, the duck wasn't as good as we've had in England, but the 'shroom sauce was great and the pud was yummy) and we've watched the Doctor Who special (okay but a bit padded) and I'm ready to go to bed with visions of getting better dancing in my head. Maybe tomorrow will be my first day without coughing... in the meantime, here are some Christmas Kitty album covers at I Can Has Cheezburger? - enjoy!

We Wish You...

Happy Christmas, all who celebrate it!



That's Robin's illustration for our holiday card this year. Christmas dinner will consist of duck with port wine and wild mushroom sauce, root vegetable gratin, chestnut puree and of course plum pudding. Prepping the rutabagas, sweet potatoes, celeriac and parsnips really took a lot out of me, particularly as I'm still coughing up a lung or two, but it's all in cooking now and all I have to do is make the sauce (the puree and pud can go in the microwave, thank goodness). I can has Christmas nap now?

Silly Site o' the Day

Have you seen Google's interactive doodle today?



There, that's enough posting for now. I'm off to actually celebrate the holiday with Robin and the kitties...

Belated Friday Cat Blogging*

Just got finished taking the "official" photos of the Riggs Residence holiday table and card wreath:



I love the oranges, the birthday balloons, the lit Chanukah candles by the fiber-optic Christmas tree, all the crackers, the pressies, just about everything!



See there, enough people still send cards in the mail that it makes this wreath worthwhile. In the middle you can see part of Robin's big 50th birthday card that I had our friends sign at the New York Comic con (Neal Adams insisted his signature be at the top, he's definitely the John Hancock of this particular document!).

But that's not why you're reading this. You came here to see kitties, and kitties you'll get! First is Datsa, wearing both of the crowns we got in the Christmas crackers we opened today:



Amy, on the other hand, has far more dignity, and has decided to lay out on my old poncho on the couch:



Nice and cozy! Oh, and Tony Ricketts has now returned with a new Jingle Cats video, here's an ITN report about it:



*(Friday Cat Blogging is ™ Kevin Drum)

'Tis the Season

Once a year I link back to my "Wholly Trinity" of Christmas-related media culture essays from nine years ago, and today's the day:

My overview of various televised and movie versions of Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol -- You Shall Be Upheld in More Than This*

My love-hate relationship with Rankin/Bass cartoons -- "So That's Where He Got the Crown of Thorns!"

My Christmas music post -- I Hear People Singing, It Must Be Christmastime

Enjoy! Our annual online card appears in this space tomorrow, but Robin's already made it his Facebook photo. If I can deal with it I'll try to enjoy A Christmas Carol online later by accessing the original text...

*This needs major updating since it doesn't include Disney's 2009 computer-animated version with Jim Carrey, as well as a few others I've acquired in the meantime. I've started work on a comparison chart, but with this illness I haven't actually rewatched all the Christmas Carol versions I have yet, so I'm afraid it'll be updated next year along with (maybe, just maybe) the other two essays. Something to look forward to during Pen-Elayne's 10th anniversary year!

Now, back to NORAD tracking Santa!

Silly Site o' the Day

Still coughing, but at least I didn't have to commute to and from the office today, as my supervisor suggested I work from home. Afterwards we did the last of our pre-Christmas food shopping, which nearly knocked both of us out (Robin's almost as sick as I am by now, having picked up my cold through no fault of his own, poor thing), but at least it's all done. And I've just made this animated gift box for you (via Gerard), so there's that. Now off to bed?

Silly Site o' the Day

My first full day back at work, if you count a 3-hour lunch with my fellow admins to celebrate the season. Wow, what a great lunch! Trattoria del'Arte, highly recommended! Anyway, I'm now starting to think about Christmas dinner for Robin, but alas, I don't have any food-related silly sites at the moment to tie in with my ramblings. How about some vintage Terry Gilliam playing with even more vintage Christmas cards?



Via The Mary Sue.

Silly Site o' the Day

A little better today, but I couldn't last the whole day at work, so I left about 3 hours before quitting time so I could get credit for an hour lunch and only use two paid-time-off hours. Not that I don't have tons of hours saved up, but I guess it's the principle of the thing. Anyway, I see that the folks at Bad Lip Reading Theater have now partnered with Funny or Die, so I apologize that this video has a commercial before it:

Via BoingBoing.

Silly Site o' the Day

Chappy Chanukah, and yes, I still have a lot of phlegm from this awful lingering cold which is why all the "ch"s. Here, let April Winchell tell you the story of Hanukkah (you all know it's spelled like umpteen different ways, right)!

Silly Site o' the Day

Even sicker today than yesterday, which I didn't think possible. Thanks to Robin all our holiday cards have been mailed out, at least. Wish I could breathe, or see the monitor properly, or any number of things I usually take for granted. At least I can still smile, thank to this video via The Mary Sue:



I swear, the older Takei gets, the cleverer he (or his people) get(s)...

Silly Site o' the Day

See, I didn't even know imitating Kristen Stewart was a thing, so thank goodness The Mary Sue passes along this gem from Laura McDonald & co.:



Sacrelicious! The more you know...

Silly Site o' the Day

Quick! Go to Google and type in "Let it snow"! Robin finds the coolest things to make me feel better when I'm sick...

Silly Site o' the Day

Alas, the cold is now full-blown, so I couldn't even enjoy getting out of work at 1 PM or, so when I decided to call it quits and take a couple hours paid time off. I feel about as creepy as Cyriak's holiday video:



Via BoingBoing, and I hope you didn't watch it just before going to bed.

Silly Site o' the Day

Ugh, my first winter cold of this season. I'm going to bed. Please to enjoy the new episode of Simon's Cat:



G'night. *sniffle*

Silly Site o' the Day

Looking for that perfect Rick Perry parody ad? Here's a great candidate:



Via BoingBoing, which is collecting more.

Silly Site o' the Day

Via Mark Evanier, here's a site that tells you all about some fascinating and little-known punctuation marks. For the grammar geeks among us!

Silly Site o' the Day

Still wondering what to buy to fill out your Christmas list? You can't go wrong with a product that gets these kinds of Amazon reviews (via Jill).

Silly Site o' the Day

'Tis the season for catching up on things, and today was finances and DVR'ed shows. Maybe next weekend it'll be blogging, who knows? 'Tis also the season for weirdass photos, via Fruitcake (itself via I Can Has Cheezburger?).

Silly Site o' the Day

Just got back from the best office holiday party I've ever been to, where politics weren't discussed at all, so how about a PAC name generator (via BoingBoing)?



Sadly, this has been used to create actual PAC names (also via BoingBoing), proving once again that truth is stranger than fiction.

Silly Site o' the Day

How about a catchy ditty via Kath David?:



To me steampunk is like any other art - I know it when I see it. And most of the time, it ain't it.

Silly Site o' the Day

Is the pepper-spraying cop meme dead yet? Then I really need to get rid of this link to the Tumbler blog of all the Photoshops (via Arthur) as well as this meme-crash:



That last one was via The Awl.

Silly Site o' the Day

My version of Advent-type stuff: Ugly Renaissance Babies (via Neil Gaiman). Brilliant stuff.

Robin and the Big Five-Oh

Today my soulmate celebrates his milestone 50th birthday. As much as I love writing, words seem terribly inadequate to describe how I feel about Robin. I am in awe of his talent, and it's maddening to me that Marvel and DC aren't beating down our door offering him work. I think it's astounding the way he and I will verbalize the exact same reaction to things simultaneously - and not just because we've been together 13+ years, we did it right from the start. Every day with him is a joy and a wonder. I feel like the luckiest person in the world to have found my soulmate. Happy birthday, darling!

Silly Site o' the Day

You know, you're only as old as you feel. Tonight I feel older than I should, whereas tomorrow Robin will have aged an entire year and probably won't feel a thing. In any case, I think we're about ready to join these lively seniors:



Via BoingBoing.

Silly Site o' the Day

Just made it, a few minutes under midnight of our 13th anniversary! As you can surmise, I had other things to do today besides blogging. :) Anyway, here's a silly site I like for both me and Robin: The Mary Sue's collection of stock photos featuring ladies lounging with laptops.

Silly Site o' the Day

Oh darn. Comedians everywhere are just a little sadder today. Men for Cain, we hardly knew ye.

Silly Site o' the Day

This Miniatur Wunderland? I want to go to there. Not to Hamburg to see the display, although that would be incredibly cool, but to the realms it depicts:



Via BoingBoing.

Friday Birthday and Cat Blogging*

I'm liking the ease of Facebook photo albums more and more. I hit one button to take all the photos from my iPhoto album and make a Facebook album out of it, and I can link to individual photos from here as I like. Meanwhile, Facebook itself seems to be where it's at in terms of friends - I remember the days of actual physical cards, then e-cards and blog comments, now it's mostly people there wishing me many happy returns of the day, throwing up their own e-cards and videos... it's a great little town square for me! I'm up to 100 friends and relatives sending along their best wishes, including folks I've known since childhood, cohorts from my INSIDE JOKE years, actual Famous People... I'm really blown away!

But back to the photos. I got out of work at 3 PM (last month my company reinstituted early Friday departure through the end of the year so people could do their holiday errands and such, and this is the first week I actually got out on time, I've worked OT the last three times) and Robin and I walked up to Central Park. Here he is at the Artists' Gate, naturally:


No, I don't know why there's a lamppost growing out of his head. I guess because having a lightbulb there would have been too cliche? Anyway, we walked over to the Columbus Circle Holiday Market to "window" shop and enjoy some no-sugar-added hot apple cider; yum! I took a few photos while we were sitting and sipping; this one's my favorite, showing a Central Park path leading away from the kiosks:


We then headed down to Midtown Comics in the Times Square area to pick up a fairly substantial haul, as for some unknown reason we seem to have dropped off DC's comp list, then dined on surf and turf at Red Lobster; yum again! After that we took in just a bit of the Bryant Park Holiday Shops, as that's where we had to get the express bus back home anyway:


It was still pretty early when we arrived home, about my usual weekday arrival time anyway, and before feeding the cats Robin took this photo of me, Datsa (with his arms around me as usual) and my birthday present, a lovely wildcats metroyshka from here (I collect nesting dolls):


My birthday blouse actually looks a little better than it seems to here; I got lots of compliments on it at work today! Oh, and while we're on Friday Cat Blogging, here's an adorable one of Amy from a few days ago, caught in mid-grooming:


This has probably been one of the easiest pictorials I've ever posted here. Hats off to the iPhoto/Facebook album interface!

*(Friday Cat Blogging is ™ Kevin Drum)

Studious 54

Off to celebrate my 54th birthday at work and elsewhere. Back later with a Silly Site and (possibly) photos of interest.

Silly Site o' the Day

White Rabbits, and welcome to the month of celebrations here at the Riggs Residence, kicking off with my birthday tomorrow, then our anniversary on Sunday, Robin's birthday next Tuesday, and Chanukah and Christmas somewhere down the line later in December! Let's kick things off with a weird little item debunking a horrific modern viral urban legend about a tattoo artist's misogynistic revenge on his girlfriend, which I'm really glad is fake (via Neil Gaiman).