jon's had this link up on his site for a few days, and i love it: happy holidays from starwars.com

i think it's really funny. my favorite parts are when papa fett lights the fire with his hand and when little boba fett is snuggeling with his chewie doll. :)

here's a passenger's account of being aboard a plane with the 'shoe explosives' guy... this does not calm my fears of flying back to california next week. |via: kottke.org|

home for the holidays... just barely. i flew home sunday. some lady had a pretend hand grenade on a plane out of san diego on american airlines that day. i flew them. then, the image of a gun appeared on a security screening monitor at lax that night as well. (thank god i flew out of burbank.) and i got delayed for two hours in dallas because it was raining too much. (got home just in time to see it arrive the next day.)

i did get "randomly selected" (lucky me!) to be searched before boarding my plane out of dallas though. the little man thoroughly went through my purse and my laptop bag. he ran a baton over me... THEN pat me down. at least he was polite... asking me "if i didn't mind this?" "okay to do that?"

while i am happy to help out -- i have to wonder why/how i got picked for this. i hardly think i look dangerous. do i look like i have the potential to do something stupid on an airplane? what did i do to make that guy send me over to the search table? i wonder if they just have some quota they have to check on each flight -- the only other person checked on my flight was a middle-aged man. or, does the computer just select people totally at random? i'm sure there's an article about it somewhere. does the airline know something about me that i don't know?

while it's no two hour concert, this will do for now: the one musician i've always wanted to see live finally happens today -- sting on "the tonight show with jay leno." i'm going to be there!!

naked chef pizza

earthquake shakes northern alabama friday night.

coconut shrimp

i bought a wreath today. a live one. pine needles were all over the place. from my tiny wreath. now i know why i didn't grow up with live christmas trees in the house. anyway, happy holidays.

my dad's 57th birthday is today! happy birthday daddy-o!!

my favorite reaction/quote regarding today's unveiling of IT... "i guess walking is just too much for some people." that pretty much sums up my thoughts.

i'm in the process of teaching myself a new web design program called dreamweaver. so far i think it's great. and it's simple. i like that.

i saw harry potter a couple nights ago. it was good. despite the fact that two little boys sitting next to me insisted on commenting on everything that came on screen. finally, after one of them had already announced that a certain character was the bad guy in the end, the guy in front of him turned around and told him to shut his trap. and he did.

fortunately, i'd already read the book... so the kids' spoilers were nothing to me. in fact, i'm wondering now if i'm happy that i read the book first anyway -- i already knew what was going to be the outcome and basically just kept a mental checklist of things to come. don't get me wrong, i enjoyed the movie but i bet i would have been more excited by it if i had gone in knowing nothing.

i almost let out a chuckle when that certain bad guy did something at the end (highlight for spoiler-->when quirrell unwrapped his turban)-- it really reminded me of mojo jo jo from the powerpuff girls.