The Organ of Meaning

Short nerdy post.

Gmail labs removed the right-side labels option today and added the option to hide certain labels. They’re arguing that it’s not necessary any more because of the ability to hide them and make it small.

What I know is that I can no longer have my calendar app and my labels viewable at the same time. Even if I have moved my chat over there like they suggested.

Attention Gmail people – it’s still necessary!

Oh, and now you can drag and drop things into labels. A useless option for those of us who do actually use the “Gmail Ninja” tips they put out – you know, using the keyboard shortcuts.

So, after my prandicle of a lunch this afternoon I decided to clear out my inbox a bit and I ran across an email from a site that I visited last night. It’s called “Save the Words” and it’s put on by the Oxford Dictionary people. It’s a site that’s encouraging people to pick a word that they like that is “dying” in modern usage and adopt it to use it as much as possible. I have adopted the word “prandicle”.

Isn’t he cute? He means “a small meal.”

The site is at SaveTheWords.org.

In the past week I’ve really taken a shining to Twitter. I posted about its value the other day in a reflection on my social life and used it today a bit to track the crazy storm (complete with tornadoes within the beltway) that came through the DC metro area.

I got an idea from a tweet (the proper name for a “post” on Twitter) that a friend of mine wrote in which he mentioned a service called Arlington Alert which sends you a text message or email when there are disastrous things going on in the area and I thought, “I wonder if they have a Twitter account to follow.”

They didn’t.

Honestly, I can’t complain. I live in a city that has updates for alerts that can go out through SMS (text messages), email and RSS Feeds… RSS feeds huh?! That’s when the idea hit me. I can create an account for Arlington Alert on Twitter and run it off the RSS feed that they provide.

And, here it is:

@ArlingtonAlert

Enjoy.

This is an email that I got from her today:

To the future whelpleys, trying to remember what the good wine was from Trader Joe’s with the giraffe on it,

It was Zarafa Pinotage (2007), South Africa.

You’re quite welcome.

- c

PS – the coffee is poisoned. don’t drink it.