What was begun as an online journal of the books I read evolved...or maybe it devolved...to also feature behind the scenes goings-on at All About Romance from my perspective (mostly based on my personal feelings - okay, it's a personal pity party); topics I've gone over ad nauseum in commentary at AAR, including the nature of reviews and online behavior; and my non-cyber life (including family and items in pop culture that capture my interest, which is just about everything).

Please do not violate my trust. I restricted certain AAR-related and personal entries for a reason...to keep them as private as possible. Now that my blog is read-only, to access restricted entries you must already have a password; if you do, hold onto it so that you can continue to read restricted entries.

This blog is not part of All About Romance. I ask that you keep comments or questions regarding restricted blog content off of AAR.

Below you'll find the blogs I visit, broken out in my own odd little system of categories.

December 2005



Smart Kid...Dumb Move

Saturday, 31 December 2005 10:44 A GMT-05
For the past few months, our daughter has complained that the battery on her mini-iPod doesn't last very long.  It's taken some time to pin her down on how long it does last, and when I determined that indeed it seems to have intermittant batter
Category: Personal/Political
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Snarky Religious Question

Thursday, 29 December 2005 10:02 A GMT-05
Last week, along with many Americans, our family sat down and watched Barbara Walters' two-hour special on religion.  Here's our question: Born-again Christians believe that only those who believe in Jesus will go to heaven.  So where did p
Category: Personal/Political
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The Worst of the Year

Wednesday, 28 December 2005 12:24 P GMT-05
I just finished my annual "year in reading" ATBF column; it'll go online Monday.  I focused this year only on the best books I read.  In the body of the column I write about the best of the print books I read in 2005 (ev
Category: Reading
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Harry Potter and The Family Stone

Monday, 26 December 2005 3:16 P GMT-05
Over the weekend we went to two movies: the newest Harry Potter and The Family Stone. Although the first two HP movies didn't get very good reviews, we've enjoyed them all, and this one was no exception.  My daughter, who read the first four boo
Category: Entertainment

The Best Thing About Most Celebrity Autobiographies...

Friday, 16 December 2005 6:45 P GMT-05
I may have witnessed the best thing about most celebrity autobiographies last night - Bravo's Celebrity Autobiography: In Their Own Words. This celebration of snark featured comedians and comic actors reading segments from celebrity autobiographies,
Category: Entertainment

Songs In My Head

Wednesday, 14 December 2005 6:18 P GMT-05
Every couple of months I realize there's a song I want to download from iTunes onto my iPod.  But because I can never remember what it's called, or who sings it, it never happens.  I was finally able to recall the title and the group the la
Category: Entertainment
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Links

Saturday, 10 December 2005 4:48 P GMT-05
Earlier this month I wrote about needing to create static links for the 5,500+ reviews we have online so that they can be picked up by Google.  It's simply too daunting a prospect and so I've decided to forego the idea.  The number of&
Category: AAR

Where did those pages go?

Saturday, 10 December 2005 12:47 P GMT-05
In honor of the recent release of the newest Harry Potter movie, this Wednesday I decided to pick for this week's Castle of the Week something from England.  Since I'd showcased the locations used on the movie sets a more than once, and sin
Category: Personal/Political
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Ice Day

Thursday, 8 December 2005 1:37 P GMT-05
The weather over the past several months has been quite strange, even for Texas.  Summer was just about the hottest I can recall, with day after day after day over 100 degrees.  The only let-up we had was when we went to the Baltic, and bel
Category: Personal/Political
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Somebody...Please Explain!

Wednesday, 7 December 2005 6:14 P GMT-05
I'm dying for somebody to explain to me the psychology of a teenager who does their homework, yet fails to turn it in until it's too late to get full credit. TTFN, Laurie Likes Books
Category: Personal/Political
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Fingers...Who Knew?

Monday, 5 December 2005 12:16 P GMT-05
Whenever I finish a column for AAR, I take off a couple of hours to regroup, and after posting today's ATBF, I sat down to watch part of ABC's The View. I didn't catch the name of the doctor or the name of his book, but this neurologist or psychologi
Category: Entertainment
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