I just bought a new laptop and now I’m getting the bug for a smartphone. I have a dumbphone, you see, running on a prepaid no-contract service from Wal-Mart (which I’m pleased with overall). I could buy an unlocked iPhone 4 off of eBay for not too much (in the grand scheme of things) but I’m not sure I can so far justify the purchase and subsequent upgrade from the $30 phone plan to the $45 one. So, I’m curious about everyone else’s experience with smartphones and usage thereof. Or random observations that make me laugh. Points for any good jokes involving journalists using smartphones in a dumb fashion.

The thing I love about these kinds of posts is that, though obviously canned and not creative, they’re still interesting! Without further ado, the 10 posts of 2012 that gathered the most individual pageviews. Stats are drawn from the Google Analytics tool thing, and I have no idea how accurate they are, but they’re a decent starting point. 7 views – “LOMO #24: Guacamole,” in which I wonder why people first decided to eat a mushy Martian-green food. 7 views – “LOMO #22: Road tripping,” in which I picture an iPod radio broadcaster powered by miniature windmills. 8 views – “LOMO #30: Lists,” in which I complain about grocery lists. 10 views – “Reader interaction,” in which my beloved readers suggest topics to write about. (I have used some of them and do intend to hit the rest at some point!) 11 views – “LOMO #31: Jane Austen movies,” in which I make fun of back-of-the-box movie blurbs. 11 views – “LOMO #3: Patterns,” in which I describe, tongue-in-cheek, the progress of a se

¡Feliz Navidad! Joyeux Noel! Mele Kalikimaka! The things you learn from obscure Christmas songs. I attended a family swing dance and taught about a dozen people the basics of east coast single-step swing. Unfortunately, I don’t have my own photograhpic evidence of this splendid occasion – the pictures are all on my relatives’ Facebook pages instead. What did you do this Christmas weekend?

I came home from work this evening, carefully inching my way up the main street so as to avoid sliding on the new-fallen snow and crashing into the sidewalk. I gingerly stepped one foot at a time along the sidewalk at home to get to my mailbox. I saw a double-bed mattress sitting on the front porch. Somebody, please explain to me what UD*  is doing with a mattress… oh, and a bed frame… on the front porch. They’re not even set up so you can sit on them. At least then I might postulate that someone decided to experiment with living in the cool weather that Eskimos experience. Instead, the mattress is leaning up against one of the porch posts. Also, the mattress is covered in flowers, as if it were the mattress my grandmother picked out to match the wallpaper. A lovely winter view for my front window, but not exactly your typical masculine print. All I can surmise is that it was acquired secondhand. And if they remain there much longer – accompanied, in fact, by a strange station wa

I just felt obligated to point that out. Also to point out the interchangeability of the 12s, so that date could be read in U.S. or international style and still indicate the same day. In addition, this is the last day for about 88 years that all the numbers in a date will match. I will probably not be alive to see 01/01/2101, sad to say. I think, at 12:12 p.m. today, I will attempt something marvelous. Not sure what yet. Maybe I’ll bake some banana bread.

I got sick last Saturday night while at work. You know that already. That means I spent the entire weekend cooped up at home, with the exception of the absolutely necessary trips: to pay the electric bill, to buy groceries and non-expired cold medicine and to do laundry. That also means I had a lot of time to goof off. Because when you’re sick, you’re supposed to take it easy. Thus my predicament: Lots of time that I can spend, but not with people. We wouldn’t want to infect my entire church/extended family now, would we? For today’s Compendium, let’s first look at a list of April Fool’s Day food and drink hoaxes . Including Squeeze Bacon. (Thx to da baum for da link.) A writer for The New York Times recently exhorted my generation to take a hard look at the ironic lifestyle so many live . From the article, titled “How to Live without Irony:” Throughout history, irony has served useful purposes, like providing a rhetorical outlet for unspoken societal tensions. But our contemporar

Upstairs Dweller, a guy, usually works second shift. But for the last two days he’s actually been around here in the evening. Don’t ask me why; I haven’t a clue. And tonight, as I was gleefully pecking away at my keyboard, UD did a few strange things. He jingled his keys around upstairs. (OK, not so strange.) He came downstairs and flicked the porch light on and off a couple times. Click, click, click. (We have really loud old-fashioned light switches. They’re push-button style.) He went back into the foyer and clicked a light in there on and off a few times. Click, click, click. And only then does go back upstairs (to fetch his forgotten keys?) and then back downstairs to start up the truck. Which didn’t catch the first time. Squeeeeak goes a belt. It’s an ancient, two-tone Ford, I think, so I’m not surprised at the noises it makes. The ones produced by the Ford’s owner, however…

I came down with a cold last night while I was at work. It was me and the sports editor most of the evening. I sneezed. And sneezed again. (The sports editor just kept talking to some coach over the phone.) I read over pages and tried explaining the corrections to the page designer by phone, as usual. However, this conversation when something like this: Me: “OK, I’ve got corrections for you on A1 and A8.” Designer: “All right, give me two shakes of a leg to open this thing up.” (pause) Me: “Ok. In the hoops skybox, where it says Boys and Girls in Actions, can you take the S off of Actions, make it… not plural? I mean singular?” Designer: “Gotcha. Next?” Me: “OK, now there needs to be a line around the picture. I mean a box. A border?” Designer: “Got it fixed.” Me: “OK, now there’s some weirdness going on with the… byline! the byline for the holiday cheer article. It’s what, too far to the right. I mean left.” Designer: “I see it. Yeah somebody broke the styles or something. I