Whoa. My story about Angora Man has been linked on a “fluffy” forum! The commenters actually seem pretty nice about it. I guess that explains where this last comment came from!

You learn something new every day. Horses can’t vomit. That’s slightly reassuring, given that the Snook and I are planning on riding some this weekend…

HUGE news from the Macworld Expo this morning: iWork ’05, iLife ’05, Mac mini, and iPod shuffle. Wow, looks like the rumors were all spot on! (All except the one that said the Australian iTunes Music Store would be opening. I’m bummed.) But sheesh, a $500 Mac! Snookums has already been ruminating on whether we should get one to replace our living room media PC.

Just stumbled across the weblog of John August, the guy who wrote the screenplay for Tim Burton’s upcoming version of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. He’s got a nice picture of the cast gawking at Augustus in the pipe…

According to the ABC, Australia has now donated more money per capita to tsunami relief than any other nation in the world. That’s really cool. I like living somewhere where, for the most part, people give a crap about what happens to other people.

New Poll: How much sleep do you get (on average) each night? I was inspired by this Ask MetaFilter thread about getting to bed on time. The Snook and I always plan to hit the sack at 10:30, but in reality that’s only when we begin our bedtime ritual. (First comes a bit of Internet, then taking vitamins, then putting away whatever laundry’s on the bed, then cleaning our teeth, blah blah blah…) And then inevitably I have insomnia anyway, which is only alleviated by the Snook reading me some Winnie-the-Pooh. (I’m not kidding. He does the voices really well. I should make an MP3 sometime.) So I probably really only get to sleep by midnight, which means I average about seven hours a night during the week. Invariably I sleep way later on the weekend, though the Snook seems to keep his regular hours. (I assume this means I need more than seven hours, but it’s sufficient for him.) So what do you guys get? Any other tips to help me establish a better bedtime ritual?

The Dreaded Ass Massage
I was feeling some shoulder tension on Friday so while I was over at Broadway running errands I thought to myself, “Self, you deserve a massage!” So I headed up to “Massage Link” on Level 1 and asked for the “Neck and Shoulder” massage. (I’m telling you exactly what I said so that any Sydneysiders who want to repeat the experience can get it just right.) A little Asian women led me over to a table where I lay down and she got to work. Everything was great, and I was doing my usual massage thing of drooling and wondering if my eyes were going to pop out and thinking, “Man, I should do this every week.” After about ten minutes, I could tell she was about to wrap it up and I was desperate, desperate to keep the massage going, so when she asked, “You want back too?” I said, “Yes, please, yes!” Two seconds later I remembered the weirdness I had blocked out from my only previous visit: She had massaged my bum! But it was too late to turn back. She continued down my back – and I suddenly feel compelled to note that I was still wearing all my clothes and our cubicle, while shielded, was still basically open to the shopping centre – until she got to the waistband of my shorts. Without a pause, she dug her elbows into my bum. (Well, I think that’s what she did. I couldn’t see.) Is that completely weird. Has anyone else ever received an ass massage as part of the standard “back” package? I was trying to be all rational about it, like “It’s probably medically proven that a lot of back problems result from tension in the bum” and “I guess I did give it a workout with all the strenuous sitting today.” Reasoning aside, it’s not the impropriety that bothers me so much as the fact that my bottom is extremely ticklish, and it’s all I can do to keep myself from bucking and throwing myself onto the floor in a hysterical tickle-evasion maneuver. I was literally gritting my teeth and trying not to squirm. In the process, of course, I tensed up every muscle in my neck, shoulders, and back… thus negating the entire point of the massage.

Anybody else want to go over there and see if you get the same treatment? I mean, I have a nice bum and all, but I can’t believe that I’d get the special ass treatment when the ripped hair salon guy next to me didn’t.

Heehee. Ani Difranco’s label store sells Righteous Baby t-shirts. The next person to pop out a kid is getting one of those!

Satellite Before/After Pictures of the tsunami-stricken areas. Damn. For those of you in Australia, you can donate to the relief fund at any ANZ branch (and probably every other bank as well). We kicked in $50 yesterday.

I just had a hell of a time leaving a comment over on Amy’s LJ site. First it timed out and gave me an error, and then upon resubmission I had to type in a captcha (twice!) to prove I wasn’t a spam bot. Anybody else experience LiveJournal difficulties? I wonder if it has anything to do with yesterday’s announcement…