Althouse: At the Early Spring Café...

April 12, 2011

At the Early Spring Café...

... you can talk about whatever you want.

33 comments:

The Dude said...: Early Spring? Maybe for the tundra, but in the civilized zone, Spring is long gone.

WV: derte - where we plant our seedes.; 4/12/11, 11:23 AM
Dose of Sanity said...: New way to view all blogger.com sites, add /view to the end.

althouse.blogspot.com/view

It's neat.; 4/12/11, 11:33 AM
Bushman of the Kohlrabi said...: Best buds?; 4/12/11, 11:42 AM
Unknown said...: The buds are a little further along than that where we are, but not that much.

You really had fun at the Gardens.

Sixty Grit said...

Early Spring? Maybe for the tundra, but in the civilized zone, Spring is long gone.

Depends on how you define civilized.; 4/12/11, 11:55 AM
Harry Phartz said...: Civilized = Miami Beach. The Entertainment Capitol of the World. How Sweet it is!; 4/12/11, 12:04 PM
Ann Althouse said...: @Dose Thanks for reminding me to look at that again. I've put links in the banner to prompt people to do that.; 4/12/11, 12:08 PM
Dose of Sanity said...: Timeslide is the most impressive to me. You don't realize it until you use the search function.; 4/12/11, 12:10 PM
The Dude said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 4/12/11, 12:17 PM
Unknown said...: Tried the new view menu.

Very interesting.

You are now cutting edge, Madame.; 4/12/11, 12:17 PM
coketown said...: Why tell us we can talk about anything we want, when we all really just want to talk about Elizabeth Edwards?; 4/12/11, 12:26 PM
coketown said...: Mosaic view makes me nostalgic for the newspapers of yesteryear, when so much text and images were shoehorned into as small a space as possible.; 4/12/11, 12:28 PM
Patrick said...: Those new views seem cool, but would take some getting used to. Is tehre a particular reason, other than change? Change is good! I think! At least when it makes things better, then change is good. Otherwise, not so much.; 4/12/11, 12:32 PM
Patrick said...: Apparently, automatic and required spell check would be change or the better.; 4/12/11, 12:33 PM
Dose of Sanity said...: @ Patrick - blogger will offer those as "dynamic" templates soon. They are "beta" testing them on all blogs right now. Literally any blog on blogger.com, just /view after the URL and you'll see the same 5.

I was messing with it last night, after spending hours coding to try and make a dynamic slider on my own blog (and failed - but you can't tell its not dynamic, ha); 4/12/11, 12:35 PM
Anonymous said...: follow me http://wowb1og.blogspot.com; 4/12/11, 12:42 PM
Peter Hoh said...: I like sidebar, but I also like the idea that -- as readers -- we could choose the kind of format we like best.; 4/12/11, 12:56 PM
coketown said...: So I need help. My mom's birthday is coming up and I'm sending her flowers, but I can't tell the difference between what flowers are good for birthdays and which ones for funerals. This one looks nice but those pink flowers and the general compression of the arrangement look morbid. Any thoughts?; 4/12/11, 1:14 PM
coketown said...: But she is turning 59 so maybe a hybrid birthday/mourning arrangement is appropriate. This one is festive! It should come with cocaine. Woo woo woo.; 4/12/11, 1:18 PM
Chip Ahoy said...: Coketown, that's a very nice arrangement, you should buy it.

Your comment reminded me of something that happened awhile back.

I stopped into a neighborhood club for their happy hour and struck it up with a fellow at one of those tables where you stand. It happened to be the club's anniversary so there was a small flower arrangement on the table. Green plants, actually, not flowers. I remarked on the arrangement noting that the arranger positioned a tall thin plant next to a low flat plant, shiny plant next to a matt plant, Deep green next to light green, fluffy next to serrated, delicate leaf next to sturdy leaf, solid next to variegated, soft next to hard, multi-leaf next to single-leaf, Large next to small. It was, in fact, a study in contrasts. And all of that compacted into a tiny traditional triangular composition. The man looked at me as if I had stepped off a spacecraft and said, "I didn't know plants could be talked about like that." That incident taught me to stop remarking on those types of observations.; 4/12/11, 1:59 PM
Lem Vibe Bandit said...: Why tell us we can talk about anything we want, when we all really just want to talk about Elizabeth Edwards?

There is some rumor going around that president Obama was born in Kenya.

Kenya, Kenya, Kenya, Kenya, Kenya, Kenya, Kenya, Kenya, Kenya, Kenya,
Kenya, Kenya, Kenya, Kenya, Kenya,
Kenya, Kenya, Kenya, Kenya, Kenya,
Kenya, Kenya, Kenya, Kenya..

you might want to look that up ;)

WV - bless.. I'm not kidding.; 4/12/11, 2:27 PM
coketown said...: @Chip: Oh no, you should always remark on those observations. I would have found it fascinating. But I think a lot of people--and probably the guy at the table with you--are caught off guard when they're asked to actually observe something commonplace. One of the most interesting reactions to observe is when you're talking a walk with someone and you say (borrowing a line from Chekov), "So-and-so, describe this view." First they're abashed, then they actually look at the scene and take it in. Verbally they say, "Shut up." But mentally you can tell they're paying extra attention to their surroundings for the rest of the walk.

I ordered the ones in the red box but now I have to write a note to go with it. That's even worse than picking the damn flowers. I'm always tempted to be funny and make some joke about her increasing proximity to the Big Sleep, but if she actually died I would never forgive myself. I read a description of a wine I think I could refashion to fit my needs: "You've aged delicately and with grace, with unmistakable complexity achieved only through maturation, and sensual hints of plums and smoke. However, the finish is mildly abrasive and pungent notes linger long after you've gone. Love, your son."; 4/12/11, 2:58 PM
Almost Ali said...: Oh, Lord, Coketown.

Forgive me, but no woman (or mom) wants to hear this: "You've aged delicately and with grace..."

But this is good: "Love, your son."; 4/12/11, 3:07 PM
reader_iam said...: Re: "Views"

I feel like I'm looking through Tumblr themes.; 4/12/11, 4:20 PM
HT said...: Got sick today. My joints hurt bad, stomach ache like you wouldn't believe - bucket is handy but so far nothing. Was running a 101 fever then it went down to 100 and I haven't checked it in the last couple of hours. This sucks. Is it the flu? Or bacterial from eating 8 day old chicken?

Also, does anyone else say boo to the new Firefox?; 4/12/11, 7:45 PM
coketown said...: I was limited to 210 characters to tell my mom how much I love her on the card with her flowers, but I did it in 100. "I thank God every day that of all the doorsteps the gypsies could have left me on they chose yours. Love, Coketown."

@HT: Report how you feel tomorrow. Probably a 24 hour bug. And yes, the new Firefox is a mess. That orange box in the corner is driving me nuts. And they took the "feeling lucky" feature out of the address bar, so now I basically have two google search bars. I used to like typing "althouse" into the bar and it sends me here. Now it sends me to the google search page. Dumb.; 4/12/11, 8:03 PM
Quaestor said...: [D]oes anyone else say boo to the new Firefox?

Me. 4.0 may be quick, but aesthetically it's a new nadir. Chrome and Safari are about as plain vanilla as they come, but at least they have a certain spartan elegance. IE8 is just off the map, and IE9 hasn't really addressed that basic failing -- not to mention the fact that in pushing Sliverlight technology MS has walked away from from some key elements of .Net, which makes many ASP pages behave erratically in 9.0, which explains the accelerated roll-out of IE10. (Sorry for all the dependent clauses, but this is a stream rant); 4/12/11, 8:08 PM
HT said...: I can't get that orange firefox box. i think my download was incomplete. the reload button is too far away. I can just type in "a" in the address bar and Althouse comes up. Must be that download is incomplete.

It's like someone punched me (over and over) in the gut.

Thanks.; 4/12/11, 8:08 PM
Quaestor said...: Coketown:
Click on the stupid orange box and choose Options, then enable the toolbar. The stupid orange box will go away.; 4/12/11, 8:16 PM
Earth Girl said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 4/12/11, 8:36 PM
coketown said...: That just makes it look like hideous old Firefox 3. I'd rather it looked like Chrome, with the tabs bar and the min/max/close buttons all flush, and the menu options hidden. I want, I want, I want. Me, me, me.

@HT: I disabled the address bar from doing that. It was annoying. I used to be able to type "bbc news" and get to their main page, "imdb (movie name)" to get to that movie's IMDb entry, etc. Now it always takes me to the google search page.; 4/12/11, 8:49 PM
Almost Ali said...: These new blog views allow quick and easy access to old posts. Pretty nifty, and worthy of an explanatory post.; 4/13/11, 12:21 AM
Almost Ali said...: (Very nice card, Coketown. She'll love it!); 4/13/11, 12:23 AM
HT said...: Feeling better today. I can move and walk, unlike yesterday when it hurt my stomach to move, and I had pain in between my shoulders and joints in general. Fever went down too.; 4/13/11, 4:27 PM