yeah ok, so I took Oprah's advice (she just popped up on my computer screen and I was in high-gear browsing mode thanks to Alex and porgy, who hearts well, rants well, and has excellent taste in movies... and I can hardly way to see the bust) and I went and took the RealAge test...

it has some excellent points, good detailed advice relating to the individual answers I gave, but is definitely geared toward providing information to telemarketers and advertisers based on the questions asked (the business of self-help, and even charity, is unfortunate but perhaps necessary in this commercial world where making money is the only way for an organization to survive and do the good things it is formed to do... I am reminded of Amnesty International's contribution page that took me a few tries to get through because of the info it required... take my money, not my mailing adress, phone number, and email address... you don't need to contact me or send me appeals for more money, that turns me off the giving I want to do... but it's a good cause so I gave the info and money)...

anyway, RealAge is sneakier in trying to send you stuff... unless you want more ads in you mail, remember to click NO every time they ask if they can send you some helpful material about questions you just answered... as for the results, I am five years younger than my chronological age according to the computer program criteria...

it (the software that evaluated my responses) said that having no biological history and screwed up adopted childhood and few close friends offline and no family and being forced to move due to the hurricanes and a few other statistics hurt my RealAge number and more, it says in three years I could be ten years younger if I do what it suggests (adjust my exercise, lose some weight, get my good cholesterol higher, eliminate stress, live a charmed life, you know, the usual idyllic stuff that even most people who can afford all the time don't do... imagine, being ten years younger in just three years...

oddly {me being odd, that is}, I actually did all the things they suggest for much of the nineties because I could afford the time and shared life with people who had similarly healthy lifestyle habits...

but I'm ok...

I took another test similar to this recently, but I forgot where or what the results were... obviously I don't give much credibility to these things, but they are amusing and this one, RealAge, did appear to have some good detailed science and health tips based on specific answers given...

I found it... it said I should live to 88... I'd like to see what the world is like in 2088, so I'll buy it (what?... you think it mean age and not year?)...

well, I can read, anyway...

I then wandered over to the senses challenge on the BBC website... I scored 18 out of 20 and would have had 19 if the dang timer didn't run out on the color naming question... and that line line-up thing tricked me... the second time I took it I got 20 out of 20... yay me, eh?...

hey, I take what little I get in this life and make the most of it... so I roamed around best places and realized I could not afford any of them today and even if I could, I wondered just what criteria they used because the little blurbs describing the places seemed slightly arbitrary and occasionally contradictory and small-town quiet oriented, or just too dang cold, but then maybe that's just me and of course my recently rediscovered loneliness drew me to ask, but what if you are not 18-24 or not looking to date someone 18-24 particularly, huh?... sheesh, humans, all about labels and status and categories and numbers... and when I was five and when I will be a hundred and five (if all goes well), this blatant and hidden ageism is just one more of the road block prejudices in the human mind that I don't understand (and don't want to, but it's not time for a rant, it's time to have fun)...

I was so just reminded of Helen whats-her-name from Dead Like Me... is that show still on the air?... it started the month all cable in the area went digital so my analog black box that got me wonderfully free premium cable for years was retired so I have not been able to find out if my lust for her was just a momentary fling or true lasting passion... I just remember catching an episode or two, laughing lustily, and wanting to know her better...

I just spent how many hours playing with this?...

I'm not sure what the point, is, probably keep everything above water... I got to seven items hanging, but had nowhere to hang the eighth... what am I missing (or is the eighth item just the ringer)... and those birds move around and change the balance... freaky... fun...

if you, like me, have old computers and can not run the latest versions of most software, then check here for an older version of software and have fun... now I have to find time to download and install some messaging software so I can try to find time to get addicted to chatting on the web in real-time again...

I should mention at this point that I am on an old computer, 64MB RAM and whatever video cards and sound cards were available in 1998 when this CompaQ was built... hey, for $100 I'm not complaining... the CD burner words and it can accept a high speed connection... that's what i should mention thought... usually the links I include are safe for any connection speed because until this week I did most of my browsing on the old laptop, which is still in the dark ages of 56K modem... but today I am on the desktop, DSL speeds (and my 21 inch monitor is spoiling me)... and with the help of the stumble thing that I installed, I am browsing without concern for size of sites, so some of the links might slow you down considerably if you on dialup...

and now you know...

and now I shall continue relating to you the highlights of the journey stumble me has taken me on so far...

meanwhile, I played the dot game and won... I played guitar for a little while... made some art... wandered around a few panoramic views... Paris, anyone?... and other perspectives of light and size... learned useful information and skills and here is information we can use (and if you wanna know how to make moss graffiti {the new rage in the bored jet set, or at least bored gardeners}, now you can)... it may not be quite as amazing as 2000 uses for WD40, but probably just as useful...

I even learned some latin...

and I wasn't done with my adventures on the web (and playing with my new toy)... love Star Wars?... love fast food?... it could be my sleep-deprived mood, but this is just too funny, at least until it quits... sithsense... I stared at snowflakes and realized that I really do love cartoons (and physics)...

some are brilliant (and some are just overwhemlmingly amusing)... and I watched a really loud driving lesson that most people must have already seen because they seem to know how all the pointers the film pointed out...

then I was amused again and again... even laughed... pondered the future... gazed into space... a lot... and watched time go by...

I'm even ready for terrorists, but was seriously not please (wake up and look at the numbers... it's ridiculous and belongs in a much more serious entry than this one so go read ham cuz good sense is hard to come by {especially around here when sugar and caffeine declare war on my brain} and come back when you've had enough reality... today I shall continue my meaningless meandering and stumbles)...

wait, I'll be serious for another moment... as amusing as it is, the scary thing is that there are a lot of people out there who try to follow these rules by dumping on their co-workers... don't do that, it's rude and will not actually get you the easy ride you're looking for... ok, serious enough?... well, this is how all wars should be fought from now on...

and how long can you spend with the fly guy before you lose your mind?...

of course I'd love to think of myself as creative and unique and so on, and I do feel like an individual all the time, but sometimes the creativity and wonder in the internet just has me sitting in awe of the talent and differences out there... so anyway, one of these days I'll look deeper into this list and discover just how common I am (probably pretty common, I imagine... hear me laughing, knowingly?)... who knows?... maybe I should step into days (daze?) of future past for advice (like I ever take advice, but the site is still alive and monitored 13 years later so maybe they know a thing or two, in case it matters lol lam lab laa)

among the many subjects I usually rambling on about (music being my first love, after love, that is, the falling in love feeling is still my first love, but you get what I mean, don't you?), I am fascinated by many other things and subjects and stuff on the net... like science and graphics and photography and fractals and perspectives and mathematics and futures and theories and all that is and may be the unknown, so naturally my list of stumbled upon sites that get my thumbs up will be diverse... or eclectic, to be modern or edumacated or something... I wish there was an easy (and fast) way to just drag and drop or cut and paste all the places I wandered in the past twenty four hours since finding this seriously addictive toy (blame Alex), but I tried to remember to cut and past addresses in the midst of my journey and hopefully you've found some time to visit some of the sites and even more hopefully, you've found some amusement and/or information that made your journey on the web worthwhile today... as much as I mock myself for my occasionally excessive (butt-numbing) excursions into marathon web reading and browsing, I love it and find my mind much the better for it...

there are amazing people out there and I've mentioned but a few of them in this entry... I think they all deserve a big hand...

. o O ( NOTES ARE THE NEW HAPPY PILL ) O o .
(just let me know you were here)