Traffic to the site has slowed down. I'm hurt. So I will tell a story:

I am at war with a Claire.

And she doesn't even know it, so it's Claire's Secret War. Who, you ask? With the Claire at planetclaire.com.

Don't get me wrong, it's not that I want the domain. I love being a .org. Wouldn't change it for the world, I swear. But the war rages on all the same.

You see, occasionally one of my friends will accidentally send an email to claire@planetclaire.com—my friends, they don't believe in address books, apparently—and she never replies. Ever. Now isn't there some internet code of ethics that states you must send a reply informing the sender that it's the wrong person? I believe there is.

In fact, the most famous mix-up was Shanny constantly inviting me to dinner and accidentally sending it to the other so-called Claire. This other Claire must have thought some random woman in Minneapolis had an unnatural obsession or something. It went on for months.

I'm sure this Claire is a perfectly lovely woman and all, don't get me wrong. She has a perfectly lovely site and I'm sure a perfectly lovely voice to match. I just have no life.

But I digress. Back to The War of the Claires:

See, lately I've been gaining some ground. The tide is turning. How can I tell?

Occasionally I'll type "planetclaire" into Google just to see where I show up. Now normally, Miss Dot Com shows up above me. But recently, I've nudged above her. And then I get bumped down! And then back up. Now, I'm not one for conspiracy theories (much) but it seems as though Google is manually pushing her up to the top. I gotta say, I'm guessing I get more traffic than she does.

So in order to fight, I type in planetclaire and click on me repeatedly. This is a war that must be won! By me! So if someone reads this and is bored... I'm just suggesting...

And if anyone actually does this and can prove it... um, I'll whip up some planetclaire merchandise. Or cash.

All right, I have my rant for the morning. It concerns gay marriages. As of late, the mayor of San Francisco has been allowing City Hall to perform same-sex marriages. What do I have to say to that?

It's about friggin' time.

The ban on same-sex marriages is one of the more wrongheaded thing I have come across in my 26 years on this planet. The logic behind it fails me. It goes hand in hand with the stupid nature versus nurture argument: are people born gay or did something in their upbringing "turn them gay"?

Eh! Times up! Thanks for playing! It is neither nature or nurture, but both. You can't get away from genetics any faster than you can get away from your upbringing. It's a combination, people. Which reminds me of something I once read. I'll admit it, I think it was from Doonesbury. And I severely paraphrase: "Who the hell would choose to be gay with all the problems that come with it?" I always liked that.

What the hell is my point?

Well I'm not sure. I'm rambling. But I think, in the long run, my point is that we have no control over who we love. The heart wants what it wants, so to speak. And I don't think the government should have a say over who we publicly bequeath our love to. And I have a feeling, deep in my soul, that God feels the same way. And if [He] doesn't, I'll be partying down in Hell with all the rest of of the sinners that the Right has identified.

Okay... went away for a bit and reread my rant and it sounds stupid. But honest. That's how I feel. I wanted to re-edit it but I won't. The reason I came back was to mention that the sending of bouquets to San Francisco (read below) has gone national. The Star and Tribune has an article which I will not try and link to now.

This just in: I have made it my new life mission to include the word "snazzy" into as many conversations as possible.

There's a snazzy movement started here to send flowers to couples waiting in line to get married. What a wonderful idea.

"I'm Eddie. How do you like me so far?" is...

An ongoing pick-up line/theme from Keen Eddie, a show I'm considering adding to my short list of Best. Shows. Ever. Bravo is rerunning the episodes now and I'm remembering how much love I had for this show. It was actually replaced by The OC, which is funny, as I remember resenting the show for killing off Keen Eddie. I hope they come out on DVD.

My favorite fun fact from the show: while trying to cast the part of Pete the pit bull (Eddie's pet) they found a dog in a crack den or some other unseemly place in London. They weren't going to use him for the part, but couldn't bear to leave him. So they rescued him. He ultimately showed so much personality that they decided to use him as Pete. Awww.

Oh, and The OC rules.

You know, I like that nobody reads this. I'm left to my own devices to write whatever I want. So I have a confession. I love cartoons. In particular, Arthur. A cartoon on PBS. Or tpt if you're in Minneapolis. Which I am. It's bloody brilliant:

Arthur celebrities:
Larry King
Art Garfunkel
Some boy band (N'Sync or Backstreet Boys)
A theme song by Ziggy Marley
An appearance by Alex Trebek and Mr. Rogers
And has referenced Harry Potter, Edgar Allen Poe, other people...

Whoa. This week has been unsane. I have a new second niece (or something... I forget the relation-thingies), a new child for a co-worker, and our resident super-genius got engaged to our Gal-Friday-at-the-front-desk (high school sweethearts).

Plus plus, Celebrity Mole 2 is winding down, and, in a Reality TV meets a faction of my life, our sales VP met Stephen Baldwin at some Christian Broadcasting convention. She said he was weird. Lots of "Dude"s. But she thinks I'm weird.

Hmm... another "we did that!" moment when we were at Target this afternoon. We were looking for a copy of pat the bunny and I looked at the endcap and found my Hot Wheels book staring back at me. I was tempted to buy it, but I refrained.

I just found out that my 48% geek co-worker has his own website. So now I'm not the only person I know with their own domain. Whew!

It's bitwiseOR.com which is apparently some brainy computer term I'm too dense to fathom. But he does have a Pong game for people to play. And he rigged it so you win a lot. Good times.

He's too smart for his own good. He's going to take over the world someday. You heard it here first.

There's a quiz online, "Are You a Geek". I took it last month after seeing the link on a music list I'm on. I was 18% geek, which seemed low knowing me, but I was happy with it. I have two officemates around me, and I sent the link to them. The first, Heathrow, took it and scored -2%. Negative geek. I didn't know that was possible. The second person, a brilliant computer geek who I adore, scored 48%. No big surprise. So that's who I'm surrounded by: anti-geek and uber-geek.

On a related topic, we were discussing when we were first exposed to computers. The general consensus was around fifth grade. The game everyone remembers? The Oregon Trail. You had to cross the US in a wagon, making sure to bring enough supplies and hoping against hope that your family didn't catch cholera or diptheria (they always did). Then the final raft ride along the river to end the game. Who thinks these games up, anyway?

Yeah yeah yeah, John Kerry had an affair. So what. The shocker today is that Barbie and Ken are splitting up. Seriously.

The plastic duo are no longer going to be married, according to Mattel. That link is worth it to see the media announcement and the broken heart photo. Ah, hell. I'll just grab the image. It'll save you the trip.

Two days away from Valentine's Day, and I'm thinking the truth is Ken didn't want to buy her anything.

Barbie's new man? Blaine the boogie boarder.

Well I chose the star for a favicon. Apparently there was no caucus, primary, or election regarding the decision, so I got over myself. It actually became quite simple when I remembered my asterisk was the star. Duh. The stupidest part is I'll never see it, being an Apple girl and all.

We went to It's Greek to Me for lunch (for those dying to know, I had spanakopita and a side of gyros). We took Lake Street back to the office and I gave Heathrow a driving tour:

"That used to be the Sears Building, that's the saddle shop, that's where I went to junior high, that's where a cop was shot, there used to be a carnival there, that used to be a whore house, that's where I went to high school..."

Good times.

Random history: Lake Street became Lake Street because the soldiers from Fort Snelling would take it to get to the Native American communities. The largest and most popular cemetary was the one on Lake and Cedar. Um... that's all for now.