My Penitential Friday so far has been clearly non-penitential.
After getting some work done I headed over to The Galley for a Seafood Platter because… well it’s Carnival Season. And that’s a good enough reason, isn’t it? Isn’t it? It is.
I’m glad we cleared this up.
Schemas and Plans through Prayer and Cleaning
My scheme is to do a lot of walking during Carnival Season, so I need to be well fortified. I was going to pass completely on having anything to do with Mardi Gras, but I noticed I’ve been setting aside walking shoes, stocking up on water, sunscreen, etc.
Anyway.
I have this habit of saving every web page which looks remotely interesting in my bookmarks/favorites folder/bar and then rarely going back to them until I eventually just wipe them all out and start over again.
In a stroke of genius I said, ‘Well let me just clear them out here, and then I’ll be able to navigate to them whenever I want to.’ I’ll can create a special bookmarks category, and it will be easy as pie. (Pie? Mmmmmmm…)
And this is clearly a penitential act as I’d much rather be outside cycling. But this penitential act will helps other, I know. Thousands will gaze upon it and find interesting links, and my time will have been well worth it. Indeed. It’s a schema, a plan.
So, here we go.
Part One
I’m Just Walkin’. I followed this guy’s walking trek across the USA. It was intruiging.
Next up… Er. OK, well not every bookmarked site needs to go here. Some just need to be discarded. Moving along…
The Short Arm Guy is definitely worth a looksee sometime. I think the theme here is that I’m fascinated by unusual people, since I am fairly unique myself.
Diet and Exercise Alert! Beach Bod Plan. Yes, that’s going really well. Yep.
Elizabeth’s Rome. While I have no desire to go to Rome any time soon, Elizabeth here blogs about the best places to go while you are there based upon her personal experience. It’s there so that when I go back to Paris I can find a similar site to peruse, if I even would have remembered to look at Elizabeth’s site again in the first place. Useless.
Some Photography…
Photo du Jour, over at the PBase site is however quite useful. My camera is a Canon EOS 5d mark ii, and I love looking through the shots over there, which you are able to peruse by camera model. The 5d shots sold me. That and Martha Stewart has the same camera so I figured it had to be a good thing.
Paul Lantz is also the proud owner of a 5d markii, and blogs occasionally with his photos. (His are much better than mine.)
Canon Field Reviews was a remarkable photography site by a user of Canon equipment, who got a better deal and now blogs for Nikon using the D3S. I love my Canon, but if I had an unlimited budget, one of the cameras I would be highly interested in would be the D3S. A good example of it everyday use can be seen over at The Pioneer Woman. Still, Martha has a Canon, and I am loving it too. I think it ultimately has more to do with the subject matter, the eye behind the camera, and photoshop.
And isn’t this beautiful? It was taken with a 5dmarkii.
Whew! This is exhausting and tedious work. I need some water.
This is going to have to all be categorized later, which will be a whole new brand of penance. But none of this is really penance it’s actually just homework. So I should stop whining and get back to it.
The Spirit of the Forest is alive and well in more beautiful photos.
Startlingly Clear Photos taken with a Nikon D3X. the PBase site is remarkable, but you cannot link to the images. You can, however, take screenshots to encourage visitors (and actually if you cannot, I’ll gladly take the screenshot down.)
Moving on to Food…
The Perfect Party Cake. I had read this sometime ago and for whatever reason thought it’d be good to make for a staff thing at some point. I have yet to try it.
That link led me over to Tuesday’s with Dorie, which is yet another reason I need to be walking around more. But the link explains all about the perfect party cake.
And if you’ve never seen an amazingly beautiful carved watermelon, head over to SmugMug’s Food Central and see the beautiful one there. 
Home Improvements
On quite a different note, Armor Proxy appears to be the place for restoring or painting concrete surfaces. I’m on a mission to try it out somewhere soon. And that’s actually a link I’ll be keeping handy.
Here is Armor Proxy’s Concrete Color Chart. Get ready to do some major drooling.
Wouldn’t you just love for your garage floor to be this awesome?
Everything you Need to Know to solve your concrete dilemmas.
And as if all of that wasn’t enough, you must check out their Extreme Duty line.
It is awesome looking stuff. You could paint masonry graves with it. Patios, carports, porches. Maybe summertime should be the summertime of armorproxying dangerously. I think it might end up very nicely.
In a major shift of focus, we have here an Essay on Islam. I enjoy reading online essays, but this one is on the tedious side, and I have not been able to make headway with it, which is why I saved it. I’m somehow convinced I want to read it. But not really. Nonetheless, there it is
Houses in Films
However, Hooked on Houses is an icon of pop culture. It’s filled with famous houses from movies and TV. If you like films, head on over sometime.
The Houseboat from Sleepless in Seattle is (or was?) on the market for a cool $2.5 Million. Its the largest home on Lake Union.
Silver Screen Surroundings is another site devoted to movie locales.
Decorating in Red and Green is a post which brought me to looking at the aforementioned movie locale sites. Pointing out the psychology in decorating for movie homes, it analyzes the house in “Home Alone”, and points out that almost everything in it is decorated in Red and Green. Fascinating. And yet, who knew?
Another Miscellany Phase
What’s not to like about Ben Casnocha? He’s probably already in your bookmarks somewhere.
A little something all about Gluten free Donuts. Hmmm, could be good for the money counters on Monday AM’s.
Though in retrospect, they might readily prefer Martha Stewart’s Moist and Boozy Fruitcake.
On the techno front, Aladdin Lighting Companyis offering LED bulbs to free ourselves forever of those pesky flourescents. I think. That’s one of those links which will be right up there next to Armor Proxy.
Christopher is a wonderful Catholic Blogger, and his link is headed for my blogroll which I will be redoing very soon. Highly recommended.
This is so goofy. It’s called Martha Stewart Pot. It’s kinda dumb.
Drafthorse Big and Tall Clothing. Big and Tall Clothing, at 6’6″, is always bookmarked.
Charming Catholic Homeschooling site.
A discount dinnerware site. Don’t ask me why, I don’t really know. But it was interesting at the time.
Music for Organ, Manuals Only. I admit it. I’m out of practice and have been working relatively pedal-less for months now! I’m seeking a therapist so I can be more open about it.
Chef Alexandra Guarnaschelli is the proprietress of my favorite cooking show. I bookmarked her fan page on Facebook so that I can add it when Facebook stops being ridiculous and lets me add more pages. I really don’t add a lot, but a lot of people have added me to groups and such and it’s a confused mess I am still trying to figure out. In the meantime though, so many great people I’ve met through there. Still, I do have to ‘Add’ a ‘Like’ to this fan page at some point.
Nearing the End
This is someone’s Post your favorite Artwork blog. I was having an El Greco kind of day, and stumbled upon it and thought it interesting. I subsequently was not very interested in it at all, but it had evidently already been bookmarked.
Ta Dah! El Greco.
The Bell of the Wanderer is a neat little weblog I’d like to read again. Clean style, artful presentation, thoughtful posts. Worlds better than mine here.
And Table Etiquette and Gluttony has readings from Wisdom helping to enlighten our minds and our waists. It’s thoughtfully done, and the readings are wonderful.
Strange, Bizarre, Thoughtful, Freaky, immediately caught my eye and my new best of buds. Whoever it is.
I want to use all of the artwork from this site, and find out a bit more about the Mennonites. They were all over Bolivia the times I visited.
And that about wraps it up for my Bookmarks Folder. I can clean it out and sleep well tonight. Maybe tomorrow I can get to the Bookmarks Bar, which seems to have just about as many.
Sigh.
I hope that all of you have some amazing bookmarks, and that you’re more organized than me about the whole issue.
Still, it’s done, and I am off for a robust walk.
