I’ve posted Part 1 of my Twitter Guide For Writers over on Inkygirl. Although the post targets writers, there’s useful info for anyone who’s thinking of signing up for Twitter.

I created the comic at the top of this page for my post, to help illustrate why amassing huge number of followers should NOT be your main goal in Twitter (or any other social networking site, for that matter).

Photo credit: S. Truuvert

Jeff and I were married 18 years ago today. We’ve been through our share of ups and downs over the years but as I mentioned a little while back, things have been “up” for a long time now. I’m happier with our relationship now than I’ve ever been, and things just keep getting better.

Every marriage is different, but here are some things I’ve learned along the way and from talking to other married couples. If you’re in a happy longterm relationship (married or no), feel free to share your experience as well!

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Went to see my friend Allison last night. She and John just came back from a lovely trip in Newfoundland. Lovely, that is, except for Allison breaking her wrist during a hiking excursion! Eek.

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My sister and her family recently went to Paris and as they were strolling past a Gibert Joseph bookstore, one of my nieces spotted a whole rack of my Blush cards! You can see them on the far right of the photo above.

How cool is that?

Not only that, but some of my friends have seen my cards elsewhere as well: Kristen came across my cards in Pulp The Paper Gallery at 348 Danforth Avenue in Toronto, and Brooke saw them in the Vancouver Art Gallery:

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Caught this young groundhog shamelessly munching on our oregano yesterday. I’ve named him Nigel in honour of a friend’s cat. Wish the cat (who recently died :-( ) was in our garden yesterday. Nigel The Cat would surely have made short work of Nigel The “Eating Machine” Groundhog.

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Apparently Dave Carroll wrote the song with his band, Sons of Maxwell, after his 35-hundred-dollar, custom-made guitar was severely damaged during a United Airlines flight, with little sympathy or help from United. Here’s the story on the LAtimes site.

As one of the readers posted in response to the story:

“Revenge is a dish best served with country accompaniment.”

I was never a big fan of Michael Jackson’s, but I have to give him credit. Not only was he the first African-American entertainer to accumulate a strong crossover following on MTV, but his 1982 Thriller is the world’s best-selling record of all time. He’s made into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame twice, and his contribution to four decades of popular culture cannot be denied.

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The Toronto municipal workers’ strike has begun, and Toronto-types are all crossing their fingers in hopes that a settlement can be reached soon, especially with the upcoming warm weather (see forecast below). I was inspired to doodle the cartoon above after reading a Toronto Star article about how the strike is affecting the operation of kid-friendly venues.

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Happy Father’s Day to all you dads all out there! Especially my own father. :-)

Before you dismiss the video above as just another heavy metal band video, give it a try. I discovered this song by New York hard-rock band Guyz Nite while looking for a Father’s Day song to post on my Blip.fm page. It didn’t look like my kind of music, but I was amused by the over-the-top opening scene in the video…and discovered that the song was much more entertaining and moving than I expected.

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Enjoyed meeting Beth on the weekend; she’s a friend of Jeff’s gaming buddies whom everyone had met online but not yet in person.

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A while back, I mentioned that I was disappointed that Urban Tapestry hasn’t performed Library Boy much since we debuted it for our friend Rand in 2002 because of my sucky tendinitis tendons. Allison already has so much on her plate these days (she’s in the midst of writing report cards right now!). Thanks to those who volunteered to learn the song for singing in public — I’m pretty pleased with the song, and it seems a shame to retire it.

Sadly, I wasn’t able to find a taped recording of the song.

Happily, Jodi kindly volunteered to help me put together a recording for people to use as reference. I created a crude accompaniment using a bit of live guitar and a Garageband guitar loop; it’s not perfect, but it was enough for her to sing with. Jodi, by the way, is an excellent and reliable voiceover artist, so if you need professional voiceover work done, please do check out Voiceoversandvocals.com.

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Yay, the art I ordered from Beckett Gladney’s Etsy store arrived! It actually arrived a while ago, expertly packaged and looking even more gorgeous in real life than on the computer screen.

Beckett’s added more art and photos to her shop, by the way, so I encourage you all to go visit RIGHT NOW. Check out this gorgeous batik case:

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John and I got together yesterday with Patricia Storms at The Butler’s Pantry in the Annex. There was a lot of artsy talk, which was fun, as well as comics and kids’ books.

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Wow. I’m impressed that artist Jorge Columbo had the patience to paint the image above on the iPhone; he used a $4.99 iPhone app called Brushes (which, of course, I was compelled to immediately buy).

But back to Evil Squirrels and gardening…

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Watched the season finale of Lost with Jeff and our friend John Kalisz. No spoilers in this entry, don’t worry. All I’ll say is that I keep getting more confused.

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For those who sometimes send stuff to my P.O. Box address, my new address is:

1543 Bayview Ave, P.O. Box 116
Toronto, ON
Canada M4G 3B5

The new P.O. Box is easier for me to access, so I’ll be checking it much more regularly than the other address…at least once a week instead of once every few months. :-\

As I mentioned before, my music group (Urban Tapestry), were the Toastmasters at a local filk convention called FilKONtario. Part of the convention is devoted to “one-shots”, which are basically mini-concerts by anyone who wants to sign up, singing one song.

One of the sign-ups was a mysterious “Esty”, which turns out to be “S.T.”, short for Suburban Travesty. Apparently Dave Clement, Tom Jeffers and Walter had been conspiring for a while. The little sneaks.

Dave was Jodi, Tom was Allison, and Walter was me. Well…Walter carried out his threat of putting this on YouTube, and you can also find the lyrics to “Pretty FIlkers” (words by Walter! his first filk song!) at this YouTube page as well as on Flickr.

To Dave, Tom and Walter: you guys are SO doomed.

>:-)