Category Archives: What did you do today raincoaster

In the Cards

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So there I was, minding everyone else’s business on 7 different social media platforms as one does, when suddenly I saw it. And it’s a good thing I did, because I can’t even find it now, but there it was at the time, right there in front of me in black and white or, as we “in the biz” say, in 000000 and ffffff: a tweet about Julian Assange‘s tarot cards.

Now, I don’t know about you. I only know about me. Do we have to go over this again? But one thing I do know about other people, and particularly people who pride themselves on being mathematically/computorially/autodidactically inclined is, the very existence of things like tarot cards offends them on some level.

So, naturally, I forwarded the information about Julian Assange‘s tarot cards to the head of the JulianAssangeFanciersGuild. And who among us would not have done the same, I asks yez? Eh?

Quite.

Some time later I got chatting with the tarot card reader (a tarot card reader who does readings via Twitter: welcome, in one perfect swoop of fellage, to the Twenty-First Century) and she offered to do a reading for me, for free. And as I’m inordinately fond of that particular F Word, I accepted, and that with what I believe is called alacrity. And while you’ll have to do without Julian’s reading, for lo I cannot find it, you can read mine, and it is VERY entertaining, particularly if you know anything about tarot.

Now, you can argue whether or not it “works,” but the one thing you cannot argue is that it is very, very, VERY, and did I mention VERY unlikely that any person’s reading will consist entirely of Major Arcana, ie facecards, over multiple readings and, indeed, multiple readers.

But.

Somehow, it always works out this way for me. Al. Ways.

And so it was this time, mathematically impossible as it was.

http://twitter.com/#!/NYC_TarotReader/status/95938100647309313

To everything, turn turn turn, there is a seasoning WAIT THAT'S NOT HOW IT GOES!

To everything, turn turn turn, there is a seasoning WAIT THAT'S NOT HOW IT GOES!

http://twitter.com/#!/raincoaster/status/95937120891441153

http://twitter.com/#!/raincoaster/status/95939359014006784

http://twitter.com/#!/NYC_TarotReader/status/95939865031622656

There's a big yellow thing in the sky and I think it's giving off radiation WHAT DO I DO???

There's a big yellow thing in the sky and I think it's giving off radiation WHAT DO I DO???

http://twitter.com/#!/NYC_TarotReader/status/95940251993903104

http://twitter.com/#!/raincoaster/status/95939147805626368

http://twitter.com/#!/raincoaster/status/95941368962228224

http://twitter.com/#!/NYC_TarotReader/status/95942274445344768

http://twitter.com/#!/raincoaster/status/95941470657318912

http://twitter.com/#!/NYC_TarotReader/status/95942431429758976

http://twitter.com/#!/raincoaster/status/95943988221194240

http://twitter.com/#!/NYC_TarotReader/status/95945119831818241

http://twitter.com/#!/NYC_TarotReader/status/95945873439207424

http://twitter.com/#!/raincoaster/status/95945828996362240

http://twitter.com/#!/NYC_TarotReader/status/95946238322679808

http://twitter.com/#!/raincoaster/status/95945760771817473

http://twitter.com/#!/NYC_TarotReader/status/95946984938147842

What can I say? He made me do it!

What can I say? He made me do it!

Hang it all, Houdini!

Hang it all, Houdini!

http://twitter.com/#!/raincoaster/status/95946603814322176

http://twitter.com/#!/NYC_TarotReader/status/95947885811740672

http://twitter.com/#!/NYC_TarotReader/status/95948034923442177

Well, can’t disagree with THAT now, can we?

http://twitter.com/#!/raincoaster/status/95948421407584256

http://twitter.com/#!/NYC_TarotReader/status/95949146032312320

and some further remarks I got via DM:

they follow each other. Resurection 2 regeneration/gestation

I read both neg and pos as part of the read. Positive if best happens. Neg if u fuck up! Either possible according 2 ur actions. Open future….

Freedom…reads situation and best and worst outcome…depends on how u handle it,,,,

So hanged man is the persecuted or the Ego B4 tranSformation. And Death is Transmutation or Inertia/Slow Change. Either can happen..

It a Eyes Wide Open Conscious Choice.,free 2 choose….the old free will thing…it says choose w caution…here’s situation and ur CHOICES

And I choose: to take this as an easy blog post! So, I’m ahead on that whole “productivity” thing already!

Batman’s Blind Date Unicorn Chaser

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Batman's Buggysnake was HUGE!

Batman's Buggysnake was HUGE!

What’s that they say about not frightening the horses? Now that we’ve set the mood, here is a lovely little video of Batman’s sexiest costars, including everyone from Eartha Kitt to Tallulah Bankhead. Okay, they’re really one soul in two bodies. How about everyone from Zsa Zsa Gabor to Jill St. John…oh, okay, same deelio. Lemme try again.

Well fuckit, just skip ahead to 1:29 to witness Batman having a Brady Fetish Moment.

MARCIA!!!

Doesn’t that just turn your crank?

Batman gets his bat trunks in a twist

Batman gets his bat trunks in a twist

As if that weren’t enough, check out this Euro-fabulous (or is that Brazilian-fabulous) Bat Dance, 100% Prince-free!

and the sequel

But wait: there’s more! Yes, it’s Hump Day, and that means gossip links! And since this roundup took me two and a half hours, you’d better believe you’re only getting one post per blog today! Click over the jump for the extra-elaborate and extra-profane celebrity gossip for the day.

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Can YOU take it?

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Can you take it? I sure as hell can't.

Can you take it? I sure as hell can't.

And they won’t even tell you what “IT” is.

My problem is, IT is at home, IT being the task of packing up essentially a three bedroom house’s furniture and stuff and either bunging it into storage or moving it up to Yellowknife in the narrow window when there’s a (long) road up there which isn’t an ice road and besides I don’t even have a driver’s license anymore so How In God’s Name I Am Going To Do This I do not know, but anyway…

How was your week?

In case you’ve heard rumours, well, they’re all true unless you heard them from legendary fabulist Steven Schwartz, in which case they’re probably amazing fabrication and I’d appreciate your noting them in the comments, as one day I may write an encyclopedia of internet drama and cancer-faking mythologists are definitely going to feature prominently therein.

But the rumours about me moving to the land of permafrost and the lynx nuisance at the city dump? Those rumours are true.

Yes, some poor company has offered me gainful employment, almost like a normal person, starting July 1st, which means several things:

  1. this will be a major score for my female friends who want to pick up some clothes free, cuz god knows I ain’t taking anything I can’t fit into or didn’t graduate in
  2. I have a shitload of furniture for sale, at all levels of quality from Oh My God Amazing down to You’ve Got To Be Fucking Kidding Me
  3. I forget what this one is.

Anyhoodle, there will be a party at some point, probably of the bring-a-bottle variety or, knowing my friends, the bring-a-bottle-and-a-sleeping-bag variety. I’ve already handed the reins of the Shebeen Club to Ian Alexander Martin of Atomic Fez publishing reducing my press-release-writing workload considerably.

Before I leave I’ll be speaking at Northern Voice blogging conference and Social Media Camp Victoria, and my newest round of online workshops starts next week. Then, poof! I’ll be out of the Downtown Eastside and up in the land of the polar bear. Where a dinner of (excellent) fish and chips will run you $60.

GAH!

So, before I head off to the wilderness, I’m throwing yet another celebrity link roundup your way. In Vancouver, I could be relatively sure of bumping into one or more of these people every few months. In Yellowknife? Maybe not so much. So, that’s an improvement!

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Liveblogging Morphine

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Cover of "Midnight Phantom"

Cover of Midnight Phantom

I wrote this when I was in the hospital with my first gallbladder attack. I was there five days, and in my memory I wrote this over the course of many, many days and recorded many, many different experiences.

I did nothing of the kind.

What I did was, write it on morphine. Holy crap, how Coleridge ever puked up Kublai Khan while on this stuff is entirely beyond me. Prolixity is not a quality it confers, lemme tell ya. But in the vague hope that you’ll find it amusing, I will copypaste it here for your enjoyment (?).

Demerol better bring its A Game

Demerol better bring its A Game

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what did you do today, raincoaster?

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i hate facebook

What did I do today? You mean besides become enraged by Facebook? I spent the better part of an hour first trying to get it to accept an ad without churning, churning, churning, churning, finally had the brilliant idea to disable Adblocker, which was successful at getting it to finish churning, whereupon I moved on to the second step where I put in all the details about who I wanted the ad to be shown to (don’t worry, it wasn’t you; you’re smart enough to use Adblocker, like me, right?) and how much I wanted to pay and goddamn if it didn’t really, REALLY want me to pay in British Pounds and use Dawson, Yukon time.

I think Facebook must be secretly controlled by Richard Branson from an underground lair he has in Dawson, Yukon.

So! So I get through that part, I get through even the pricing part. There’s a part where you can set limits on how much you want to spend in a given day, and a place where you can say how many days you want the ad to run. Now, I figure you multiply the how much by the number and you get the total maximum cost for the campaign, right? Oh no, how could that be right? We’re talking about Facebook!

So you can pay via Visa, Mastercard, or Paypal. Yay, I have Paypal. So I click Pay By Paypal.

And it asks me for a credit card.Going round and round and round and round: the Facebook customer service experience

Sure, you can pay by Paypal. But not if you have to. It’s rather like the retail banking system, where anybody can get a loan as long as they can prove they don’t need it. What’s particularly annoying is, thanks to a couple of good months I actually have enough in my Paypal to pay for the whole campaign, even if it cost the maximum every damn day. I could pay for it right now, and they could just refund me the money it didn’t end up costing me. But will they? Nooooooo…

Anyway, Facebook sucks, which I’m sure is not news to you savvy readers.

What else did I do today? I’ve been astonishingly productive, and it’s obviously not ME, but some alchemical magic reaction between the Diet Coke and pasta salad left over from my birthday party along with the Evening Primrose that I’ve been trying to remember to take.

I did this:

Posted:

I also listed Blogging for Writers online workshop on (yes) the dreaded Facebook, so if you know any English-language based people who are interested in learning how to blog and use social media while improving their writing skills, pass the link along to them.

Made some aesthetic decisions about my new site at Making My Life which is a network of various social media platforms including audio, video, and blogging. I’ll be moving raincoastermedia over there and focusing more on my social media teaching and less on all the hyperlocal blogging that I’ve been doing such a bad job of.

Had to put out several fires, only one of which was mine. If anyone finds their life boring and staid, I have quite a collection of second and third-hand social media drama that you can take off my hands for free any time. Also, apparently an email went out saying my course on Social Media for Nonprofits was going to be fantastic (great, so far so terrific!) but alas, it also went on to say that there were several free places available. Guess what? Nobody wants to pay. The free spaces in my courses aren’t supposed to be for agencies on the Downtown Eastside, they’re for clients of the agencies: you know, poor people. I think I negotiated a compromise everybody can live with, but god help me, I didn’t get into this to give stuff away to the middle class. Also, BOB is charging me full price for the room anyway, so one free seat just evaporated so we can give the money to Shirley. All of which prompted the post outlining the social media scholarship policy. There, it’s in black and white!

Posted everything relevant from raincoaster media to the SMCYVR Facebook page and to the raincoaster media page itself. Sigh. At least THAT worked okay.

Deleted all the outdated emails from the Shebeen Club mailing list. Attempted to buy a Facebook ad for the Shebeen Club meeting but, crunching, crunching, crunching…gave up.

Promised this woman who messaged me on FB (it’s FB day, I swear; the CanadianPolice on Twitter just pinged me to complain how crazy things are lately, so it’s not just me or Vancouver, it’s everywhere) I’d read her MJ post (she was polite YAY and said she’d read mine, so reading hers was the least I could do, and she’s right about that) but OMG it’s a big one and I’m not sure I’ll get it all done today.

Bitched on Facebook about not being able to buy an ad on Facebook and promptly got two emails offering help. Problem appears to be solved, but I’m too sleepy to finish the job tonight and besides, the bank’s not open yet, it’s not even 7am.

Oh yes, sent three pitch letters to editors today. Sure, it’s spec work and probably free, but it’s ink and paper AND it’s tremendous profile-building. It’s nice to be able to put “President of SMCYVR” on an email. Which reminds me to put it in my signature too.

Tuned up the professional profile on raincoastermedia: what do you think?

What did I not get done? A podcast. Sometime between now and 7pm I’ve got to record and upload a podcast. It was an assignment I gave everyone last week in the Blogging for Writers online course, and the least I can do is try it myself! Wish me luck!

Will in all likelihood go for a walk/jog now, provided I can find my Zune, which is the only portable timekeeping device I have that still has a working battery.

Then: I will have a Martini and collapse. Yes, gin is not in the diet. But it’s very good for collapsing with. With which to collapse. Whatever.

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