Staples 55

Shirley has a new email address, updated on the Class Contacts page.

You have got to see these videos on myspace.com! Tyson also has his own website (click “enter” to watch the video)! I say, a dog who taught himself how to skateboard deserves his own website! You gotta see it!

(Right now I’m wondering what Bruce Kent ’s “Tyson” has done for us lately…?)

[Forwarded by Len Eskey, 1-14-06]
Another timely consumer alert; this one from Len. Jist of the story is that, while encoding of your credit card ID number on the magnetic strip of your room key card is possible, it is not likely that hotels will do so since it serves no legitimate, practical purpose on the room key (it’s already in their computer). This is especially true of the more computer-savvy hotel chains. Independent hotels may be another story. And, individual hotel staff members are always an unknown factor.

The real menace is that–because the room key card is the same size as a credit card, and because encoder/decoder machines are commercially available–they are being used to fabricate duplicate credit cards once they’ve obtained your account info.

Bottom line: I’ll never return a room key card to any hotel again. Thanks, Len! Check out the full story at Snopes.

P.S. To minimize the risk of having your credit card ID stolen via an online purchase, always clear your cookies before shutting your machine down. Use your browser’s tools to do so:

• Internet Explorer Tools > Internet Options: click [”Delete Cookies”]
• Firefox Tools > Options [Clear Private Data: at least check “Cookies”]

My understanding is that a certain form of malicious adware can be written into your machine’s “cookies” and resent back to the adware host. Thus, they have your ID–even your Social Security No.–if you happen to enter it online. (”Cookies” are snippets of personal information, including credit card numbers, collected and written to your own machine’s disk by the website host you are visiting. The purpose being to facilitate processing of future visits; an online “getting-to-know-you” marketing practice.)

[Forwarded by daughter, Julie, 1-15-06]
Amongst all the crap floating on the net, there comes once and awhile a gem (click photo to enlarge)…

[Forwarded by Noel Castiglia, 1-5-07]
Good tip passed along from Noel. (I’ve had my Amex card swiped twice in the past 60 days.) What a society we’re becoming…

Bob’s email address has been added to the Class Contacts page.

As we were getting ready for the big reunion in 2005, Heather sent me a CD album, recently recorded, entitled Heather Moz Trio - Spring, 2005. A delightful set of five decidedly blues numbers featuring Heather doing vocals, John Haley, guitar, and John La Rouche, chromatic harmonica. For questions about her album, please contact directly.

To play this audio file you will need Apple Computer’s Quicktime player. If you don’t have it, you can download it free here (specify your operating system and signup options).

Click the Play Now link to hear Up Jumped Springtime (the shortest number on the album). Can’t wait for the next album, Heather…!

 Up Jumped Springtime: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Photos are from LetsBeFriends (I’ve forgotten who forwarded them to me). Flash movie (using forwarded photos, adding captions) by your humble webmaster.

Now, if only humans…

Marianna McAlarney Renzulli has added her email to the Class Contacts page. See Red Barn photos of Marianna and hubby, Joe, on Reunions pages.

[Forwarded by Pete Mullen, 8-26-06]

• Possums sleep in the middle of the road with their feet in the air.
• There are 5,000 types of snake [in the world] and 4,998 live in North Carolina.
• There are 10,000 types of spider [in the world]. All ten thousand live in North Carolina, plus a couple no one’s seen before.
• “Onced” and “twiced” are words.
• It is not a “shopping cart”; it’s a “buggy”.
• And let us never forget, it’s not a “garden hose” or simply “hose”, it’s a “hosepipe” (one word).
• Fire ants consider your flesh a picnic.
• People actually grow and eat okra.
• “Mamenem” means the whole family: “Are mamenem comin?”
• There ain’t no such thing as “lunch”. There’s only “dinner” and then there’s “supper”.
• “Backards” and “fards” means I know everything about you.
• “Jeet?” is actually a phrase meaning, “Did you eat?”

Here we go. You know you’re from North Carolina if:

1. You measure distance in minutes.
2. You’ve ever had to switch from “Heat” to “A/C” in the same day.
3. Stores don’t have “bags”; they have “sacks”.
4. You see a car running in the parking lot at the store with no one in it, no matter what time of the year.
5. You use “fix” as a verb. Example: “I am fixin’ to go to the store.”
6. All the festivals across the state are named after a fruit, vegetable, grain, insect or animal.
7. You install security lights on your house and garage and leave both doors unlocked.
8. You carry jumper cables in your car…for your own car.
9. You know what “cow tipping” is.
10. You only own four spices: salt, pepper, chili power and catsup. No genuine North Carolinian ever called it “catsup”. Down here it’s “ketchup” and let’s not forget pepper sauce for the turnip greens!
11. The local papers cover national and international news on one page but require six pages for sports.
12. You think that the first day of deer season is a national holiday.
13. You find 90 degrees Fahrenheit “a little warm”.
14. You know all four seasons: almost summer, summer, still summer and Christmas.
15. You know whether another North Carolinian is from east, west, or middle North Carolina as they open their mouths.
16. Visiting Wal-Mart is a favorite pastime known as going “totown”.
17. You describe the first cool snal (below 60 degrees) as good Chili weather.
18. A carbonated soft drink isn’t a soda, cola or pop…it’s a coke, regardless of brand or flavor.
19. Fried catfish is the other white meat.