What ‘Cha Got in That Purse Tour de Blog

Hi folks! I’m Caffeinated Librarian (aka CL) from (what else) The Caffeinated Librarian. By this time you all know the drill: Kelly’s out having adventures and asked a bunch of folks to Blog Sit while she’s gone. If you want to know my connection to our lovely hostess – Kelly and I are old blog friends from back when we both started our sites on MSN Spaces. A lot’s changed since then, of course. When I started I thought my blog was just going to be an easy way to keep in touch with my college friends who had spread out all over the country. And it wasn’t long until I created a weekly feature where I gave links to blog entries, news articles, and all other sorts of things that I thought my friends might find interesting. While some folks loved the new feature, I later found out that other people hate clicking on links (My mom. Teddy…as we learned yesterday.), so I added a short blog post on top of it all to give those folks something to do…and voilà – the Tour de Blog was born.

I don’t do Tour de Blogs much any more, for a whole host of reasons. But I know Kelly likes them, so I promised to give her one of her very own today. So with no more preamble…

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I am an insomniac. I wish I could say it’s something that’s caused by stress or food or such-like, such-like, but the truth is I’ve always had problems sleeping – even when I was a little girl. One way I’ve found to put myself to sleep is to have a TV on in my room; turn off all the lights, put the TV on mute, and most of the time I’m asleep in minutes. But sometimes that doesn’t work and I find myself awake at 2 AM and ready to claw my eyes out from watching infomercials.

And this, ladies and gentleman, is why God (or some divinely inspired genius) created dvds.

Last month I was all about watching Highlander: The Series when I couldn’t sleep but this month I decided to switch to my other great TV love: MacGyver. I’ve written about my love of MacGyver before, it was one of the first posts on my first blog, but at that time I hadn’t actually seen a whole episode in years. Now that I have seen them again, a few things have jumped out at me…don’t worry, I won’t bore you with all of them right now. I think one example will do.

So I’m watching this episode in season 3 called “Lost Love.” The set up is that there’s this female spy from the Soviet Union who’s hiding out on a construction site to spy on MacGyver. A security guard finds her so she disables him with a couple of Rockette-like high kicks (in heels, of course) and dumps his body (or actually his very floppy dummy stand-in) down an elevator shaft. Then she goes to take something out of her purse…

What do you think it is? Guess. Trust me, you’ll never get it but try anyway – I’ll wait.

….

Ready? Okay, she reaches into her purse and takes out…a pigeon. Yup, a live pigeon with a little note tied on to his foot and everything. Now, I do realize that this was the 1980s – before PDAs, email, and iPhones – but a frickin’ pigeon?! You can’t tell me that even in the 1980s THAT was the height of spy communication devices! I mean, just the logistics – How would you keep it in there? What if it decided to fly out of your purse while you were paying for your RC Cola at the 7-11? Seems like that would draw a bit of attention to you – just what you’d not want if you were a Soviet spy walking the streets of the U.S. What about when it poops? Pigeon crap all over your lipstick – come on! Not to mention that carrying a purse with a pigeon floppin’ about inside would have the potential to knock you off balance (especially in those stiletto heels). It’d be really funny if you went up to kick that security dude in the face and landed flat on your ass because of the stupid pigeon.

And the sad thing is, I’ve watched this episode since I bought the dvd set and yet I don’t remember this scene at all. You’d think that’d be something that would stick with you but, evidently, I’ve actually watched a woman take a pigeon out of her purse WITHOUT saying “What the Hell!” – I’m not quite sure what that says about me…

Anyway, on to some links:

• ~ I have to start with Super Jive’s post “I LOVE Your Blog. Now Take Off Your Clothes” in part because it’s such an awesome title. Plus, an article about Playboy offering to pay popular female bloggers to post nude…tell me that you’re going to pass up reading THAT.
• ~ If you’re not already reading Neil Gaiman’s blog, you ought to be (and if you don’t know who he is, then you definitely need to check him out). From there you can learn about age banding for children’s books and the “agent” Barbara Bauer mess, not to mention rooks and meeting your heroes.
• ~ Then there’s Guys Lit Wire, which focuses on books for boys (although there’s plenty there to interest everyone else too). This week the GLW folks point to an interview with Brendan Koerner that includes the subject of black soldiers during World War II; World War II books for teens; the ten best Batman books; and Loony Tunes poetry.
• ~ Another good book blog is Bookshelves of Doom. This week she discussed a book with plot characteristics selected by a focus group (see here for the GLW take on the same book); Lois Lowry comments on another challenge of The Giver; and a review of a book called Sovay.
• ~ Aynde lost some of her books this week, unfortunately.
• ~ Lots of interesting NPR articles, including one on Heavy Metal and Islam and good books to read during a flight.
• ~ Personally, I can’t imagine that people are still pondering whether “liberal” professors are brainwashing their students. That just seems so 1960s.
• ~ While I’m linking to BlogHer articles, other things there that caught my eye include posts on: the intersection between blogs and autobiographies; first kisses; weening yourself off plastics and Bisphenol A (BPA); and female superheroes.
• ~ Earlier in the week Belinda over at Ninja Poodles told us about an aid organization called Heifer International. She also gave us a recipe for spoon bread (one of my all time favorite foods, although I’ve never made it myself).
• ~ Betsy of No Longer Just “Some Girl” pondered classic works that she hates and asked her readers to list their own least favorite pieces of literature. [Addendum - While I'm gerryrigging some bullet points to this stupid list (Kelly what's up with your stylesheet?), I can let you know that Betsy also has a list of favorite Classics.]
• ~ Liz over at Quiet in the Stacks learned a traffic life lesson.
• ~ Over on io9, read about a 1964 teen magazine that predicted the future; a recently discovered collection of pulp fiction; or read about technology pioneers who have dropped off the grid. Oh, and you know you want to know what character from the new Star Wars movie/series has a likely death sentence (of course you do).
• ~ My buddy WHW has much to learn about women’s shoes. Luckily he has co-workers who are willing to teach him.
• ~ Speaking of shoes, do you remember those Nike “Air McFly’s” from Back to the Future? Would you like some real ones?
• ~ And finally, a couple of museums found out this week that their crystal skulls are fakes.

Enjoy.