Drinking for the grade

As you might already know, I'm taking a super-neat class this quarter called "Twitter and Organizational Communications." For those of you on Twitter, we're @uwtwtrbook and often tag #uwtwtrbook. The purpose of the class is to write a book on Twitter. Cool, huh? I can see my name in print already! We've got a huge repository on the class blog at http://twitter09.wordpress.com already, so if you're interested in Twitter it's worth a look.

Each of us is to contribute a chapter for the book and I got the green light to write on how the wine industry uses Twitter. How awesome is that? I already drink wine while I'm on Twitter, so I'm practically an expert.

Over the next few weeks, I'm going to dive into research (with a glass of red, of course) and determine how best wineries and wine associations use Twitter all over the world to promote, engage and listen. I'm just breaking ground on finding sources now, so if you have any connections to wineries that use Twitter, send them my way! I'm planning on hitting the road for some interviews, so I'll take event and itinerary recommendations as well.

And I'll be drinking a lot of wine just to make sure I... um... understand the industry.

For all of you who lost me at #uwtwtrbook, you might read Paul Constant's Twitter article in The Stranger. Upon learning that the UW is hosting a class on Twitter, one article commenter wrote, "...please send me a list of anybody who actually signs up for that Twitter class, so that for future reference we can all remember that they have zero credibility in anything they do, ever. Which, since they're taking a class on Twitter, will probably not be much of anything but building their thumb muscles and already bloated conceit."

So yeah, I'm super stoked about writing this book.

Homebuying has a layover

The funny thing about buying a home is that timing is seldom perfect. Unlike going from rental to rental and looking for Aug. 1 or Sept. 1 move-in dates, home sales happen... whenever they can.

Over the past few weeks, Amanda has moved her stuff (mostly clothes) to my place, and as of this week she's officially living in the Ballard Burrow with me and The Wives. All of her stuff is in my room, of course, and the personal possessions of two 20-somethings does not fit easily into 150 square feet. We've stacked high but already had some falls like a lost game of Jenga.

But it's temporary. The house sale is slowly moving along, and in the interim the Wives have been super-flexible (with the incentive that when I move out they can turn my room into a yoga/pilates room). I'm thankful for that.

Probably the most difficult part of living in sin right now is how temporal everything is. We can't quite settle in at Ballard: We can't unpack Amanda; I can't pack up yet. We don't have a lot of room to move around. We're like caged birds - happy and singing, but probably happier with more room to fly around.

Homebuying is, in a lot of ways, a trip. This trip happens to have a layover.

Just a funny picture from last week

Drooling over massages

After reading Jeanna's post about about her "fear of farting during yoga," I was reminded of my own strange fear: drool by massage.

I already have a problem drooling in my sleep. I can turn a dove-white pillow canary-yellow in just weeks. The closest sense of relaxation to sleep is the massage, and I've been known to drift in and out of sleep (and drool) while on the chair or table.

I had a massage at work today, and our usual massage lady, Cathy, brought some new, unusual moves to the table. She used her elbows on my upper back and it was as effective as a sleeper hold. I must have only been out for seconds before I woke up to catch a building spit swing.

I've been spoiled by free massages this past year. I've gotten them nearly every month at work as a bonus for billing clients on time (tougher than you think), and had a couple free hook-ups through Amanda's boss. For all of life's stresses right now -- grad school, work and real estate -- I'll take all the massage handouts I can get.

Still, I'm always a little nervous about the drool factor.

Obama addresses joint Congress

Democrats finally realized that the President's most public job is as spokesperson. The statements on education and renewable energy are just awesome.