Having a Dog Day Summer? Here's a Linkfest to keep you kids busy!

Found some wonderful things on the internet.  Sometimes we get bored with life, and that's when we need to dig deeper, to recognize the boredom comes from shallow roots, from wanting emotional satisfaction based on stimuli, rather than the richer consequences of work, serving, playing, living.  Sometimes writing can be all about look at me.  Well today, I'm telling you, look over here. These are neat cool amazing things.  Go...enjoy.

So here they are:

For the theologian in your life, if they haven't discovered Fr. John Riccardo's podcasts, go here.  If they want something to read, and I promise you, this will take a lifetime, go here. 

Don't have time for that much?  Fine, here's Fr. Barron's Word on Fire site. If nothing else, watch his youtube videos, I love his critiques of popular culture. 

Writers need mood music, and one of the biggest tools for writing, for creating the emotional layers of a scene, is weather.   My daughter put me wise to this site where you can orchestrate your own storm.   The site is Ambient-mixer.com and they have ways for you to listen to horror or nature, to manipulate wind and water, fire and thunder.  Have Fun!

Not content to rule the clouds like Zeus?  Not to worry, there's a Universe creator here.  I honestly could stay all day at this site, just drawing. 

But if I'm not feeling creative, I go watch these guys here.

or if I need to laugh and my funny bone seems tired, I try one of these three sources:

1) Brian Regan.  He's funny, he gets what family life is really like and most of his stuff you can show your kids and they'll be laughing along with you. 

2) HISHE (How it Should Have Ended) is a fun site that does great spoofs of much that amounts to popular culture these days, the Superhero café is a personal favorite of ours.   If you haven't seen the one for The Lord of the Ring, stop what you are doing.   Go here.

3) Back before the web was all Grumpy Cat Memes and Youtube videos, pioneer websites fought epic battles with words.  One of the best places to experience a mental brawl about the things that really mater --like Red Shirted Ensigns vs. Stormtroopers, was The Grudge Match.  Personal favorites include the drinking contest between Boris Yeltsin and Ted Kennedy and the aforementioned Startrek/Starwars battle of the glorified extras. 

So...if you aren't yet having fun, I have only one thing left to offer. Go to the store, get some Diet Coke and Mentos and show your children, adults can be absurd as well. 

 

I'll be back to serious blogging on Tuesday.  See you then.  Leave a favorite link in the com box for everyone else to discover. 

To Those Who Came over from Mark Shea...

Welcome.  I think the post he meant to link to was this one. Rock Paper Scissors Lizard Spock.

 But stay, pull up a chair, introduce yourself.  I'll try to amuse.  And Thanks for coming! --Sherry

Shoeless Joe and Blog Action

When I was a mere junior in high school, I went to prom with a guy who wore polished white shoes with gold buckles and a powder blue tux. My brother Joe opened the door, took one look and said, "Nice shoes."

If it hadn't been for my desire to simultaneously bust a gut laughing and bust his chops for insulting my date, I'd have asked him to change into a tux and brought my brother instead.

Ever since then, the word "Nice" has been...a loaded term for me, fraught with meaning because of it's vagueness.

Today I got an email saying...Nice blog. The email author disclosed that he would like to link my site to his in return for his being linked on mine.

I clicked on the site. It sells athletic sneakers.

Most of the free world spends many a sleepless night in wonder of what an online shoe salesman likes to read during the sports void that takes place after the Superbowl and before Opening day. Now, the mystery will be solved.

CHOCOLATE FOR YOUR BRAIN would be one of a mere fifty listed sites considered link worthy in the "Other" category, along with 15 other categories with fifty blogs each listed. The email assured me that thousands of people visit this site daily, and it would increase my traffic.  My guess is they're the saps that link to the guy's blog in hopes of driving traffic to their own, coming to see if the links have been put up and if they actually work.

Since I can't find a counter on the site, I cannot know the verasity of this claim. The "About Us" section of the website indicates it's been in business since 2003 but the write up on the decision to provide extrodinary customer service to those needing to find out the finer points about buying a sneaker (think Air Jordan), posted in December of 2007.

So maybe they're just updating the website and have found me to be an up and commer. My gut says to let this opportunity pass but I'm still a newbie, only providing quality blog entertainment since October of 2007 with a mere 19 visiting on a good day, so I just don't know. It's just a link and I'm pleased that someone noticed, but given the fact that there's never an indication of what the reader actually liked in my blog, I'm left to wonder.

Still, the email said "Nice blog."

So I'll return the favor.

"Nice" shoes.