Y is for Youtube

I know that today is supposed to be Z, but I missed posting on Saturday.  Before I get to my insightful post on Zebras or Zippers or something, here's what I'm watching when I'm surfing youtube:

vlogbrothers: a channel shared by two brothers, John and Hank.  They take turns making each other videos as a way of avoiding text-based communication.  John is an author, Hank is a musician, and both are self-avowed nerds.  They've become insanely popular, with an entire community of "nerdfighters" rallying around them.  They've spawned two other channels that I also watch; crashcourse, where John teaches history and Hank teaches biology, and scishow, a science news show by Hank.

Lindseythenerdiest: This is another vlogging-style youtube channel.  I actually found her through vlogbrothers and have been watching her ever since. Nothing fancy, just a funny, articulate, young woman ranting to the camera.

Elmify: this vlog's amusing twist is the infusion of different personalities; there's Elmify, her interrupting t-shirt-making alter ego, angst-ridden teenage Elmify, and pony-tail wearing child Elmify.  All these are played by the same woman, who provides slices of her life with a layer of humour.

TEDtalks:  I'm including this here because I used to really like it.  I would devour every video when it really was ideas worth sharing. Videos about scientific breakthroughs, advances in medicine and engineering and biology, ideas that could change the world.  A 20-minute powerpoint presentation (100 years by youtube standards) seemed to pass in the blink of an eye.  Now TED's videos have lowered considerably in quality.  Now they have talks about nothing in particular from whoever has been popular on the internet.

Sesamestreet: I may spend the most time watching this channel, although not always by choice.  All your favourite (and some not so favourite) Sesame Street skits are online.  Since the show is made up of short segments, it really lends itself well to youtube.  I'm partial to Cookie Monster and Grover, while my daughter enjoys Elmo (blech) and Abby Cadabby.

Here's one I enjoyed from Collegehumor, Dinosaur Office. I'm not sure why it's so hilarious:

And finally, one by my brother which my son and I have enjoyed for years:

The World of Jen (and William)

Rolling update
When William was just over a month old he learned to roll over from his front to his back. Shortly afterward, he would roll over instantly when he was placed on his tummy. Fast forward a few months, William learns the back to front roll. Now he immediately rolls to his tummy whenever he's placed on his back. This is great for things like learning to crawl, but not so great for things like changing diapers.

Tag
Jen and Carol's International Tag(the blog where we compare our respective cities with photos) has gotten more challenging, since we ran out of street signs to photograph. Right now it's stuck at "school bus" because I forgot it was summer holidays. Carol assures me she knows where the buses go at the end of term.

A Little Work a Little Money
I'm updating the October calendar for Today's Parent Toronto. It's an interesting exercise to search for info on Hallloween activities in the middle of July. I'm surprised at how many people have their websites up to date for that period. Yesterday I finished all I could do with the net and today I'm going to once again confront my phobia of calling people.

Meme Dreams
My dream of creating a super-meme has somewhat fizzled, as so far only my devoted husband has filled out my little survey. Just as well, I'm going on to bigger and better things.

Youtubing the Flash
Frequent visitors to this site will recognize this little flash I made a while ago of Spock mind-melding with an orange. With a little bit of finangling I managed to get the thing posted to youtube. It was not, as I first imagined, as simple as exporting the flash file as a video. The end result has a bit of weird interference at the beginning of the clip, but I think it adds to the charm. One day, I hope to create more flash movies of Spock mind-melding with various objects and animals, but that may be one of my lofty goals that never comes to pass. In any case, I'm now in the 21st century.

Baby-proofing Baby-schmoofing
William is getting better and better at that trick of putting his legs under himself and pushing forward. Next step, crawling. I don't have any stairs , luckily, but other than that I think my place is one giant baby death trap. I need to baby proof soon and don't know where to begin. Perhaps with a good cleaning and vacuuming. Ugh. Blech. I HATE to clean.

The masterpiece (or it should be after all this time)
I'm rewriting the one and only book I've ever finished (way back in the day when I first started dating Adam). I say "rewriting" instead of just "editing" what I'm writing now is barely recognizable. It started by me fixing a few things that had always bugged me. Then those small things snowballed into big things. And now it's like I'm writing a whole new book. My Mom and husband liked the original, but I don't want to be the kind of author who goes around toting copies of her self-published schlock going "all my family and friends enjoyed it".

And
The water in the pool is very nice.