{"id":5690,"date":"2013-08-22T21:59:07","date_gmt":"2013-08-23T04:59:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/grace-filled.net\/?p=5690"},"modified":"2013-08-22T22:13:06","modified_gmt":"2013-08-23T05:13:06","slug":"7-quick-takes-virtual-5ks-harmless-political-fun-and-overheating-laptops","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/grace-filled.net\/?p=5690","title":{"rendered":"7 Quick Takes: Virtual 5K&#8217;s, Harmless Political Fun, and Overheating Laptops"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/grace-filled.net\/7qt.jpg\" alt=\"7 Quick Takes\" \/><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center; font-size: 130%;\"><a name=\"qt1\"><\/a><strong><a href=\"#qt1\" style=\"color: black; text-decoration: none;\">&#8212; 1 &#8212;<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Slow going.<\/strong>  My laptop is overheating despite being on a cooling pad so Facebook is being slow (and of course, I have 15 hours of status updates to read) so I&#8217;m switching over here to write a Quick Take every time Facebook has to load more stuff.  Whee!  This is what I get for not being at my laptop for 12 hours.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center; font-size: 130%;\"><a name=\"qt2\"><\/a><strong><a href=\"#qt2\" style=\"color: black; text-decoration: none;\">&#8212; 2 &#8212;<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Endocrinology grumping.<\/strong>  I cleaned up my diet and my A1C got worse.  (I didn&#8217;t see my other numbers though my liver enzymes apparently continue to be beautiful &#8212; thank God for that!)  I think my endocrinologist would be an awesome coffee date but she has no clue about what my life entails.  I was able to test a little bit after eating lunch today but dinner eluded me because I&#8217;m sipping on tea a lot of the time.  (I need to move from my Lipton Pure Leaf stuff to Crystal Light or something because the Lipton stuff *will* up my carb load.)  My thyroid function is also the lower boundary of normal (thanks Mom!) so we&#8217;re going to up my Synthroid by half and see if that makes a difference.  There was the usual fight over trying new drugs because my insurance company hates me so she gave me samples while a prior authorization could be worked out and also a discount co-pay card for the meds she wanted to give me.  My glucose meter had died so they found me a new one (I use a Freestyle Light) and it had a $15 co-pay card attached for test strips.  (They can be between $50-$150 if you have to pay for them at the pharmacy.)  I see her again in 3 months and God willing, she&#8217;ll be happier with results.  I mean, I dropped 10 lbs while sitting on my butt so my dietary changes actually did something.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center; font-size: 130%;\"><a name=\"qt3\"><\/a><strong><a href=\"#qt3\" style=\"color: black; text-decoration: none;\">&#8212; 3 &#8212;<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Wow.<\/strong>  For those who are fans of the musical <em>Les Miserables<\/em>, you have to watch this.<\/p>\n<div style=\"text-align:center;margin-top:15px;margin-bottom:15px;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"One Man Les Miserables Nick Pitera Medley\" width=\"584\" height=\"329\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/R9IWAxSpgKA?start=400&#038;feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p>He also does an amazing parody of Disney princesses after their &#8220;happy endings&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center; font-size: 130%;\"><a name=\"qt4\"><\/a><strong><a href=\"#qt4\" style=\"color: black; text-decoration: none;\">&#8212; 4 &#8212;<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Humorous Amazon.Com reviews.<\/strong>  Amazon.Com has done the world a favor and has compiled <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/gp\/feature.html\/?ie=UTF8&#038;camp=1789&#038;creative=390957&#038;docId=1001250201&#038;linkCode=ur2&#038;nav_sdd=aps&#038;pf_rd_i=507846&#038;pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&#038;pf_rd_p=1601664422&#038;pf_rd_r=1Q9VH7RQ3QEQV68SXAP4&#038;pf_rd_s=center-B1&#038;pf_rd_t=101&#038;tag=buttafly-20\" title=\"Amazon.Com humorous reviews\">a list<\/a> of their products with fake reviews.  George Takei also should have a decent list on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/georgehtakei\" title=\"George Takei's Facebook page\">his Facebook page<\/a> and you might even be able to find him as a reviewer on <a href=\"http:\/\/amazon.com\" title=\"Amazon.Com\">Amazon.Com&#8217;s website<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center; font-size: 130%;\"><a name=\"qt5\"><\/a><strong><a href=\"#qt5\" style=\"color: black; text-decoration: none;\">&#8212; 5 &#8212;<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Some political fun.<\/strong>  Al Franken is up for re-election in 2014 for one of Minnesota&#8217;s US Senate seats and he is engaging in a little political fun.  He is <a href=\"http:\/\/www.alfranken.com\/landing\/e130821\/\" title=\"What will Al eat in his virtual postcard?\">letting people vote on what Minnesota State Fair food he will be eating in a virtual postcard to supporters<\/a>.  Choices are things like alligator, tater tot hot dish, a chocolate-covered pickle, a steak dinner-on-a-stick, ostrich, and walleye-on-a-stick.  I&#8217;m linking it here because I think it&#8217;s creative and it&#8217;s some harmless fun where Republicans and Democrats alike can vote on something.  It&#8217;s the 21st century equivalent of putting him on a dunk tank or a pie-throwing booth.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center; font-size: 130%;\"><a name=\"qt6\"><\/a><strong><a href=\"#qt6\" style=\"color: black; text-decoration: none;\">&#8212; 6 &#8212;<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Run for Little Flowers Giveaway.<\/strong> Katie at <a href=\"http:\/\/blessedwithfullhands.blogspot.com\/\" title=\"Blessed with Full Hands\">Blessed with Full Hands<\/a> is organizing <a href=\"http:\/\/blessedwithfullhands.blogspot.com\/2013\/07\/2nd-annual-run-for-little-flowers_30.html\" title=\"Run for Little Flowers\">the Run for Little Flowers<\/a> again and is having <a href=\"http:\/\/blessedwithfullhands.blogspot.com\/2013\/08\/run-for-little-flowers-giveaway-items.html\" title=\"Run for Little Flowers Giveaway\">a giveaway<\/a>.  There&#8217;s running gear, a $20 gift card (put up by me), and other things available.  The virtual 5K raises money for the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.littleflowerprojects.org\/\" title=\"Little Flower Projects\">Little Flower Projects<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center; font-size: 130%;\"><a name=\"qt7\"><\/a><strong><a href=\"#qt7\" style=\"color: black; text-decoration: none;\">&#8212; 7 &#8212;<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>More on The Bloggess&#8217; book.<\/strong>  Like Jenny Lawson (<a href=\"http:\/\/thebloggess.com\" title=\"The Bloggess\">the Bloggess<\/a>), I deal with generalized anxiety disorder but I&#8217;m not quite as humorous about it.  I haven&#8217;t told people about swallowing a needle at parties but I tend to be more likely to focus on one or two people and just have a conversation with them.  Like her, I also sound so much more normal online than I do in person.  I was interviewing a respite worker for Daniel and it was probably one of the more uncomfortable 2-hour blocks of my life.  It&#8217;s been interesting to read her book because I can totally see myself doing the stuff she has&#8230; well, kind of but with less dead animals.<\/p>\n<p>For more Quick Takes, visit Jen at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.conversiondiary.com\">ConversionDiary.Com<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&#8212; 1 &#8212; Slow going. My laptop is overheating despite being on a cooling pad so Facebook is being slow (and of course, I have 15 hours of status updates to read) so I&#8217;m switching over here to write a &hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/grace-filled.net\/?p=5690\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[13,1,25,7,26,17,12,18,10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5690","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-booksmagazines","category-daily-life","category-health","category-memes-and-link-ups","category-music","category-personal-issues","category-politics","category-sports","category-web-schtuff"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p38xoO-1tM","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/grace-filled.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5690","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/grace-filled.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/grace-filled.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/grace-filled.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/grace-filled.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5690"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/grace-filled.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5690\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5696,"href":"http:\/\/grace-filled.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5690\/revisions\/5696"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/grace-filled.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5690"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/grace-filled.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5690"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/grace-filled.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5690"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}