YouTube

I was afraid this was going to happen. When I first heard about YouTube, I thought, if this turns out to be what I think it will, I'm going to be hooked. And I am.
First there were chat rooms, then improved search engines, then blogs, then Wikipedia... with each one, I thought, ah, so THIS is what the internet was created for.
Well, I was wrong. Obviously, the internet was created for YouTube. This clearing house for video clips both famous and obscure is the greatest and most addictive thing to hit the internet since, um, Wikipedia. In fact, you could almost call it the Wikipedia of video clips.
The most apparent similarity is that YouTube depends on people like you and me to send in these clips and the response has been phenomenal. News clips, bloopers, music videos, political speeches... you name it.
Yesterday, for example, I had a blast searching out obscure songs, musical performances and videos I had only read about and had, for all intents and purposes, given up hope of ever actually seeing. There was only one I couldn't find on YouTube. That's pretty damn impressive, if you ask me.
The thing has always been, once a document of some sort has been created, we all know it exists somewhere, in some form, and that somebody somewhere has access to it. But how does the average schmuck like you or me get to see it? Enter YouTube. It's like a video Library of Congress on the internet, even better really. Do they even have a clip of the Monkees titled 'Listen to the Band- Pyschedelic Freak Out' in the Library of Congress? Somehow I doubt it.
I could spend hours going through this site and I'm sure I probably will. Hooray YouTube!

Mrs. Aaarslberg?

The folks asked me to type a letter to a lawyer today; no big deal, just a character reference really for an old friend.

As usual, Dad composed the letter, then spoke it out loud while Mom wrote it down. Then it was handed to me to type on the computer and print out. Happens all the time.

Mom's handwriting is always a bit tricky to understand and it appeared the lawyer had a middle name that I couldn't quite make out. So I called out, "What is this guy's middle name?" Mom called back, "Wine! W-I-N-E."
"Joseph Wine Gardner?" I asked.
"Yes!"

Okay, I thought. Then I heard Dad say, "His middle name is Wine?"
"Well, that's what you told me!" Mom said. "I wrote down what you said."
"His last name is Weingardner," Dad said.

By this time, I had already typed the body of the letter and then added the correct name at the top but failed to change the 'Dear Mr. Gardner' salutation and didn't realize it before I printed it and took it to Mom to proofread.

She began reading the letter to Dad and said, "Joseph Weingardner," then his address and then, "Dear Mr. Gardner..."
"His name's not Gardner!" Dad said.
"No, we're going to change that," she replied. "Dear Mr. Gardner... I mean, Weingardner..."

God, I have been laughing about this for the last four hours.