My Christmas Request of You

Okay, I’ve decided what y’all can do for me for Christmas.  Which I will do for you as well.  See, it occurs to me that there are bunches of you who are into stuff I know nothing about, but would benefit from being exposed to (Shut your coat, Exador.  Not that kind of exposing.).

And I probably have hooked myself onto some stuff you’d find cool, if only you knew about it.

So, I’ll pick five and tell you.  You pick five and tell me.

1.  Most useful guide to magical botanicals–Yronwode’s Hoodoo Herb and Root Magic.

2.  Coolest piece of avant garde literature that will also make you glad to be alive–Calvino’s Invisible Cities.

3.  Song you should have in your iPod, but probably don’t–Little Milton’s Grits Ain’t Groceries.

4.  Best guilty-pleasure blog–Crazy Days and Nights.

5.  Best bit of inside information about Dairy Queen–They’ll put whatever you want on whatever you want.  I can’t eat strawberries anymore, but my favorite thing to get at DQ until this unfortunate allergy developed was an M&M Blizzard with strawberry instead of chocolate topping.

Okay, folks, what should I know about that I don’t?

In Praise of the Raised Toilet Seat

I know the stereotype is that girls hate it when guys leave the toilet seat up.  In the past, I’ve been pretty neutral about it.

Yes, it sucks to sit down in the dark and end up with a butt covered in cold water.  But, you only have to do that a couple of times before you start checking to make sure the seat is where you want it.

(And, believe me, that’s better than the middle of the night “don’t check, sit down, and start before you realize the lid is down” nightmare, which I may or may not have discovered first hand when staying at one of your houses back in my drinking days.)

So, it’s always seemed to me that the toilet seat is just something you have to check, why stress about it?

And maybe it’s more annoying when you’re living with a lover, but for me, living with my brother, I love the raised toilet seat.

And I’m going to tell you why: Because, on any given morning, my most pressing wonder is “where’s my car?”

And, if I get up and the toilet seat is up, regardless of where the Butcher is at that moment, I know he came home at least long enough to drop off my car and go to the bathroom.

So, hurray for that.