LMNOP

So a couple of weeks ago--to the notice of pretty much nobody--Gwyneth Paltrow launched this bizarre shell of a lifestyle website called Goop.com.  Right now it consists entirely of a Flash intro and six icons demonstrating the sections that will (presumably) contain the site's content someday, although right now if you click any of them you get some stupid letter outlining the promise of things to come.  No explanation of why the site is named Goop is offered, although my guess is that it stands for Gwyneth's initials, GP, with two empty round holes in between to symbolize her dead, vacant stare.  (Clever design, actually.)

The first paragraph of this letter reads like a cross between a new age self-help manual and a Dick and Jane book--

--and goes on in that manner in an attempt to get us excited--via the most sanctimonious, Gwyneth-y kind of excitement possible--about Goop.  Excited enough to come back and check it our again when there is actually content, or whatever.

So anyway, back to those six sections I mentioned.  Here they are:

Make. Go. Get. Do. Be. See.  OK, Ms. Paltrow.  I get the vibe you're going for here--simple, minimalist, clean--but still pretentious and douchey.  To that end, may I offer a few suggestions for future expansion?  Once your site becomes the runaway success I'm sure it is destined to be, I say you build on those six sections and add a few more more.  My recommendations follow.

But I'm getting ahead of myself here--really, Gwyneth, I'll be happy with whatever you can throw me.  Teach me how to improve my life!  I await Goop's buildout with the bated-est of breath.

(Referencing this post and the recent comments it has accrued)

Michelle: so I see that athletic trainers continue to hate me

  for real though lauren, if I ever die suspciously

I never thought he would progress beyond his previous favorite game of "Run Off with the Ball and Chew It," but at some point in the past couple of weeks Pancake finally started to understand the point of Fetch.  It's like he's been going to How to Be a Dog classes during the day while I'm gone.  Maybe next they'll do a chapter on Bringing in the Newspaper or Barking at the Mailman.

The Internet was unsurprisingly Obama-centric this week, so there are a couple of political links this week.  However, there are also baby animals to even things out.

• Apparently women really do have cooties.
• Pygmy hippo baby born in Australia
• Would you rather have a snake massage or a fish-bite pedicure?
• Kids' letters to Obama.  "I was hoping you can make a recycling rule to help something called Global Warming."
• From 52 to 48, with love
• How to preserve your "Obama Wins" newspaper
• The Six Most Insane People Ever to Run for President
• What's really the deal with the whole "Price available upon request" thing in magazines?
• "A British 19-year-old has officially changed his name to 'Captain Fantastic Faster Than Superman Spiderman Batman Wolverine Hulk And The Flash Combined.'"  Ummmm, cool?
• Kitty + yogurt boxes = hilarious

I will hopefully be back tomorrow with a Pancake breakfast.  Decreasing daylight hours has meant fewer pup pics.

I've already shared Pancake's Halloween pictures, but just finally got around to posting and captioning the Flickr set for Kelly and Doug's Halloween party in Bmore.

This year Kelly, Doug, and I had an elaborate idea to go dressed as Mario Kart characters for Halloween, but due to some extenuating circumstances (car accident, big proposal at work, three freelance proposals, inability to find a Princess Daisy-esque wig, etc.) that made my week hell, I bailed on Wednesday night, two days before the party.  As Kelly and I brainstormed replacement costume ideas that night over the phone during ANTM commercial breaks, it became evident that there was no costume that I was not too apathetic to partake in.

Except one.

Kitty cats.
Not the most creative costume ever, but the Meowing was fun.

In other news, my nephew had TWO costumes for his first Halloween.  Pick your fave!

 

Today is Election Day, and if this is the first time you are being made aware of that fact then I would probably like to hang out with you sometime and talk about what it's like to use an abacus, practice subsistence farming and actually bury your own head in the ground for 22 hours a day.

Anyway, this has been the most interesting and exciting campaign season of my lifetime, a fact I confirmed today by performing the following election-by-election analysis of the contests I've lived through.

1984: Reagan vs. Mondale--my first election.  At the time, I was about 17 months old, so you can just imagine the range of issues I was considering: none whatsoever.  And it didn't really matter what I thought anyway, as nothing I did could have stopped Reagan from stomping Mondale, 525 electoral votes to 13.

 

1988: My only memory of this election is of occasionally hearing the name "Dukakis" and thinking it was funny and also slightly naughty-sounding, like some kind of doodoo/caca combination.  Anyway, this was yet another Republican kill, bringing the cumulative electoral vote totals within my lifetime to 951 for the Red Team and 114 for the Blue.

1992: In a 100% improvement over my retention of the '88 election, I have two memories of this campaign.  The first thing I recall is hearing a lot of kids in my school talking about Clinton's appearance on Arsenio Hall, a show I'd never heard of but pretended to be very familiar with, lest I look naive in front of the other eight- and nine-year olds.  My second memory is of thinking Ross Perot was an idiot; after all, I was only in third grade, and even I knew that quitting was a bad strategy.  He also looked funny.

1996: I recall taking a liking to Bob Dole, because he was old and weird and he fell down in front of everyone, and the middle school me could certainly relate to such humiliation.  As such, I proudly cast my vote for Dole/Kemp in our school's mock election, which they won over Clinton/Gore in a super-landslide.  This ran counter to the results of the real election, so I guess small Catholic grade schools are not the best election predictor.

2000: Just a smidgen too young to vote, I didn't give a rat's ass about this election until it turned into the huge, farcical shit show you and I all remember.  Then I just wanted it all to end.

2004: This was the first year I ever cast my very own ballot in a Presidential election, and I started off my voting career 0-1.  Hopefully today my record will improve to 1-1.

If I hadn't already picked the name Pancake years in advance, my dog could very well have been named Splinter, since he bears a striking resemblance to Master Splinter from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.  Multiple people pointed this out to me when I got him last year--it's something in the whiskers, methinks.

So anyway, this year I decided Pancake would be Master Splinter for Halloween.  Since I can't sew, Etsy seller fancyguppy made me an amazing, perfectly Pancake-sized costume.  Pictures are below:

I also have Halloween pictures of my actual human friends, and I will upload a Flickr set of those as soon as I finish sorting through them and determining which are scary in a good way, and which are scary in a "double-chins and wonky eyes" way.

This was supposed to go up yesterday, but I was caught by a barrage of trick-or-treaters as I was putting the finishing touches on my half-assed costume, so it's a day late and the Halloween links are now a little less relevant.

• Um, best photo sequence ever: pig is fed alcohol and then shot into the air.  I almost didn't click on it, fearing gore, but it's actually pretty cute.
• How globes are made.  Pretty sweet.
• Is the universe fractal?  Do I even understand what that would mean, anyway?
• Giant Lego Man Washes Ashore
• World's Largest Beach Ball
• Filed under "Total Monstrosities:" Hello Kitty wedding gowns.
• A puppy and a lion cub!
• How Google got its logo

I'll leave you with a final, Halloween-appropriate link--"Pets in Costume: Cute or Creepy?"  Upcoming editions of Pancake Breakfast will surely inform you of my take on the matter, much to my boyfriend's shame.