S.L. Viehl's Blog, page 229

Payless Ten

Ten Things You Can Have for Free

Freeware caution: always scan free downloads of anything for bugs and other threats before dumping the programs into your hard drive.

Cha-Ching allows the user to "manage your finances quickly" and "quickly create a budget, enter transactions and track spending, all within a beautiful user interface that will make managing your finances a true pleasure. Cha-Ching 2 is re-written from the ground up to take advantage of the very latest features available in Mac ...

Wishing You

Holiday Treat Ideas

If you want to get some healthier treats into your children's Easter baskets this year, check out Caeli Esser's article Easter Bunnies do not eat Snickers.

An Easter egg hunt is always fun, even when the kids are supposedly too old for them (mine aren't.) Some tips: don't use real eggs unless you're hiding them outdoors, or count the eggs before you hide them indoors; have extra empty baskets to hand out to your hunters in case someone falls on their basket or a handle breaks; if you have ki...

Advergrins

Wouldn't it be great if every ad we saw made us laugh out loud?



(I think from now on this will be my personal metaphor for "interrupting Mom when she's working.")



(This is even funnier if you and your amour started out looking like the couple on the left, and now look like the couple on the right.)

See more hilarious print advertising over at Web Design Ledger and real world advertising at UKInsurancenet.com.

(Thanks to Gerard over at The Presurfer for the links and the laughs.)

Forever Young imag...

noʎ ɹoɟ op ı sƃuıɥʇ ǝɥʇ

˙sʞuɐɹd ʎuɐɯ ooʇ ɟo ɯıʇɔıʌ ǝɥʇ ǝɯoɔǝq ʇ,uop puɐ 'lıɹdɐ ɟo ʇsɹıɟ ɹnoʎ ʎoɾuǝ 'sɹnoɥ ɹnoɟ-ʎʇuǝʍʇ ʇxǝu ǝɥʇ ɹoɟ unɟ ǝʌɐɥ noʎ ǝdoɥ ı 'ɹɐɟ sıɥʇ pɐǝɹ oʇ pǝƃɐuɐɯ ǝʌ'noʎ ɟı 'ʎɐʍʎuɐ

˙ʇıɟ ʎssıɥ ɐ sɐɥ ɹǝƃƃolq uʍop ǝpısdn ʞuıl ǝɥʇ ǝpoɔ oʇ ʎɹʇ ı ǝɯıʇ ʎɹǝʌǝ ǝsnɐɔǝq 'ɥƃnoɥʇ 'sʇuǝɯɯoɔ uı ʞuıl ǝɥʇ ʇnd oʇ ǝʌɐɥ ll'ı ˙ʇxǝʇ ǝɥʇ dılɟ oʇ pǝsn ı ɹoʇɐɹǝuǝƃ ǝɥʇ spuıɟ ǝslǝ ǝuo ou ʇǝq ı puɐ 'ɥƃnoɥʇ 'ʇɟɐɹp ǝɥʇ uo looɔ ʎʇʇǝɹd ʞool sǝop ʇı

˙llıʍ ƃuıɥʇou ssǝnƃ ı 'sɹoʇısıʌ ʎɯ oʇ uoıʇoʌǝp ɹǝʇʇn ʎɯ ʍoɥs ʇ,usǝop ʇsod sıɥʇ ɟı os ˙...

3 Books

Just Read: Broken by Shiloh Walker, trade paperback

Why I picked it up: In a word? Quinn. He was a secondary character (as well as the brother of one of the protagonists) in Shiloh's novel Fragile, and he stayed in my head long after I read that one.

What I liked: Quinn. The pace, the characters, the focus. Quinn. The slow unraveling of the mystery surrounding the female protag. Quinn. The clever plotting. Quinn. A huge twist, which if anyone gives away they should be flogged publicly while...

Ragged

I reserve the right to make fun of anyone who SPAMs me, and this week I got three of these:

Dear Former Subscriber:

Hmmm. I never subscribed to your rag. I could never afford it. So you're lying to me already.

Time really does fly.

And yet you would be the people who constantly bitch about writers using too many cliches. Hokay.

Since you last received [The Rag:], so much has happened within our industry.

Wait, I remember now. I signed up on a web site to get some sample copies about nine...

Fortitudo Nos Defendit Denarius

Ten Things About Latin

Freeware caution: always scan free downloads of anything for bugs and other threats before dumping the programs into your hard drive.

Latin 1: The Easy Way by C.J. Cherryh (who also used to teach Latin, btw.)

Is there a Latin blogger out there? Of course there is.

From Preces-Latinae.org, How to Pronounce Latin .

If you need to translate something in Latin to English, French or German in a hurry, try the online translator Lexilogos.

For when you need to build your own Latin ...

Blog Capsule

A lot of people think I'm psychic. I'm not. I make a few educated guesses. Occasionally I just bet on the right random pony. Mostly it's simple dumb luck. Honestly, if I really could predict the future, I would not be Paperback Writer. I would be Tibetan Cave-Dwelling Chick.

But after yesterday's bizarre coincidence (and really, that's all it was) I'm willing to test my own unpsychic ability to prove once and for all that I have no ESP. This will be a decidedly unscientific test; I'm ju...

Not My Fault

Someone e-mailed me a link to the announcement of a Kensington mentorship/writing competition called "Writing with the Stars" and asked if I had anything to do with it. Ah, no, sorry. Evidently this is a real contest, and wholly unrelated to the parody Writing with the Stars that I wrote almost exactly one year ago.

Of course someone at Kensington could have rifled through my archives, but given the scalding tone of that particular parody, I rather doubt they nicked the idea from me.

Also, ple...