Monday, November 30, 2009

58" Long, but Only When Lying Down

My red scarf (yeah, I'm doing one of those as well) is now 58" long, when laid out on the carpet...but only seem to come up to my chin when I'm standing up...(I'm 63.5" tall)

Either I've grown, or um, something changes quite drastically between laying something down and having gravity play with it.

Hmm, I just read what I wrote,and I am 12, as I am giggling with how dirty that all sounds. Is it sad I have to remind myself I am still just speaking about yarn? I must be tired.

Was My Last Post Really That Long Ago?

Hmm, the 22nd...I um, guess it was.

So 'member how I said I was stuffed last week? We had Turkey dinner #2 on Friday, the um, 27th (in lieu of black Friday, more on that some other day). I swear, there must have been a competition between L&L and J&L about how much wonderful food they could make and convince me to eat.

There was a couch with my name on it...and then given a blanket to collapse under...cuz boy-howdy, my system was so devoted to digesting my arms and legs totally froze!

Andy did not make it past the first few minutes post feasting, opting to go to bed instead of watching "the something Riddick" or whatever movie was on. Knowing it would be very very bad of me to lie down so soon after eating (hello heartburn) I watched and inspected my eyelids in turns. We were all stunned into silence, and part of it really was because the movie was soooo gimmicky and terribly cliche...but really, what were we expecting.

My eyelid inspecting won the coin toss in the end and I awoke to the final line of the movie...which, along with most of Vin Diesel's dialogue needed translating...but whatevers, a click of J's magic remote and suddenly we were SUCKED into the stories behind The Facts of Life. No really! And we were all awake and laughing and commenting and my word, what is wrong with Natalie's eyebrows?!?! (If I pick up the outside edges of mine and lift them a la Mr. Spock, I get the same weird skin looking deal going, so I should shut up now...). And Mrs. Garret was still alive! And singing on cruise ships! Oh my youth...

It was a grand way to end the evening.

Another Thanksgiving successfully navigated. Oh, except for the pies I made...

I didn't mention the pies for J&L's did I?

Well, same pies as L&L's. Except I fiddled with the crust after some more comments and recommendations at work...I did something TERRIBLY wrong. I have pictures I can load later. They are quite pretty. Perfect for the bright lights and long hours of food photography. But if you want a slice? Break out a hacksaw for the crust...no really.

I have no idea what went wrong. As of last night I can finally cut into it with a regular non-serrated knife. But on Friday? HA HA HA HA, we had so much fun making fun of my rock hard pretty crust, lemme tell ya.

Remind me not to mess with a good thing.

Sunday, November 22, 2009

Early Thanksgiving...

I am officially stuffed.

And there are so many leftovers!

Which I didn't cook!

I love being the "single person" at couples' Thanksgivings...especially early ones like L&L&T's! Now I'm set for sweet potato pie until Turkey Day!

I would upload pictures of the pumpkin pie and the stuffed mushrooms Andy and I contributed, but a) I forgotted to take pictures of the mushrooms, and b) the pie pictures didn't come out AT ALL as my hand hurt too much when I was trying to take them...

Besides, these pictures outdo what mine would have looked like a million to one:
I used this pie crust, and I just gushed about it in Bezzie's comments:
Dude, I shall never fear pie crust again, all I'm sayin'.

About my hand...
So you know how when you stub your toe/have a hang nail/papercut/whatever you seem to find it over and over and over again and hurt and rehurt and rehurt it ad infinitum?

Well, whaddaya know, when you burn your hand as you're taking your bean-filled pre-baked pie crust out of the oven? You will inevitably burn it again with scalding hot water! Then burn it again when you put in the ready-to-be-baked but VERY HEAVY pies into the oven! And yet again when you go to take the tin-foil tents off the edges! And then what felt like a few more hundred times as you're frying the shallots (did you know they are also known as green onions?)! And flying grease on an oven burn? Oh yeah, a new kind of torture, not to mention more burny bits while baking the mushrooms to prepare them for the stuffing!

Or maybe you do if you are me...Regardless, my left hand HURTS, and looks like I set the back of it on fire, or maybe ironed it...or, as I actually did, found that the oven racks are WAY TOO CLOSE TOGETHER! And adjusting them while the oven is set to 400 degrees is a STUPID IDEA. Also, pumpkin pies in pyrex baking dishes are heavier than they look.

I hope next year's me will reread this post before attempting either of the above recipes to avoid looking like I ripped duct tape off the back of my hand. I'm off to go find the neosporin.

Wednesday, November 18, 2009

Never Ever EVER Mention Your Plans to Save Up for a New Computer In Front of the Old One...

I know this, really I do, an yet I must have swallowed a stuuuuupid pill as I was working on my budget yesterday.

I'm sorry, Mini, but I REALLY miss having a lappy. It's rather hard to hall you into bed to watch some late-night online b-movies (dude, reliving my misspent childhood with all the old b-movies on hulu, seriously).

And during my pox scare? (No spots yet, I have never been so happy to have my sinuses so stuffed and my head pounding so hard...just a sinus/cold thing...so far...) I really could have used some in-bed computer-doctoring instead of dragging my sorry sore body out of it to see what Dr. Intarweb had to say about how my symptoms compared to the dreaded adult-chicken-pox...

So, yeah, my mini has started to act up by locking up or not shutting off applications, or simply refusing to wake up and force a restart. I'm hoping that whatever temporary insanity it has will amend itself with the next Apple Update. They tend to release them at about the same time that my mini starts freaking out...so fingers crossed because my budget has me not purchasing anything costly for at least a COUPLE YEARS, Mini, did you hear that? YearS. Pretty please get better.

Also, no plague here. And yes, definitely planning on becoming Chicken Pox inoculated as soon as I can find out if my insurance will pay for it...otherwise it's another budget item expense. I realized that if I stay on with my present company, we work with so many countries and people that um, well, it does not hurt to have some extra protection when it comes to childhood diseases I never had.

Sadly, my extra day of staying inside waiting for the pox bloom, also made me miss out on reserving space for the Theo Chocolate Tour. Okay, it was more like I spent all day sleeping and therefore did not call the place to reserve any spots seeing as I was unconscious. I obviously needed the sleep, but um, yeah, kinda pissed at myself and disappointed that I'll not be doing the tour this time around. This is where staycationing trumps a real vacation, though. I can always make it a Saturday trip sometime in the distant future, no worries :).

I did venture underground yesterday, and that was rather fun. There was even a, um, "not quite right" person on the tour, at least for a little bit...to me it just added to the Seattle ambiance. To others? They were much happier to see the backside of his floppy coat and dirty sneakers as he took off at a run far far away from our group.

If the predicted weather holds (torrential rain beginning late tonight) I can go to the Zoo today. The only thing stopping me is the fact that being outside mucking it from one damp display to another in temperatures that "feel like" the upper 30s might not make me happy about such a decision. I'll be begging for a sinus/cold relapse that way...I think my best bet would be to go to the Seattle Art Museum today and catch the Michelangelo/Calder exhibits. Which, being a big dork, really call to me more than the cute Long Tailed Macaque. The zoo might be cheaper in winter...but I might have to wait for temps in the 50s for me to enjoy it better.

The Seattle Times just published a "What to do in Rainy Weather" article...which I found rather amusing. As little as I've accomplished this staycation, I'm not disappointed at all. It really does beat being in the office working, after all. I do still have to motivate and get the xmas shopping done. I've scoped out where I want to go...just need to firmly decide on when.

Sunday, November 15, 2009

Staycation or Sick Leave...That is the Question

Have I mentioned I've never had the chicken pox?

On Wednesday AM we were let known someone in the building had come down with them. I was told I couldn't even know what floor they were on, but really how likely would it be that I'd been in contact with them? (!?!)

Are you kidding? You are kidding, right? Hello? Accounts Payable just before the closing of the month sees more faces, paper, and interaction with everyone in the building than the public bathroom near the Space Needle! (Okay, maybe I exaggerate.)

Hello yesterday...I stayed in bed pretty much all day:
- Low grade fever.
- No energy.
- And yeah, I'm kinda itching a couple spots where neither my psoriasis nor my pityriasis rosea have ever been...
- BUT, sniffly as all get out.

So, it could be anything! Personally, since I didn't wake up covered in spots today, I'm leaning more toward stress rash + sinus infection from the 40 year old dust that was blasted over us during the confetti cannons at the They Might Be Giants concert + maybe standing in the rain and cold and wind after midnight at my age and not getting enough sleep might make me catch one of the million colds out there right now + IT'S MY VACATION I WILL NOT BE SICK! = Me in a very bad mood.

But I am just back from the outside (!), armed with Aveno Anti-Itchy Baby Bath stuff (I could not find the adult version), just in case.

For some reason I have it in my head that if I succumb to something, it'll be tomorrow, cuz you know, that would be my first day of vacation and all. Not that I made the best time/weather choice as the Pineapple Express is supposed to hit us full force then...

If bad things come in threes, um, universe? What's it gonna be? Or am I being to brazen to ask?

Tuesday, November 10, 2009

11-10-09...Countdown Day...

Okay, I'm a big dork, and get a kick out of the silliness of numbers sometimes.

I guess last year's 10-09-08 was more melodic, but um, I remembered today's today, so there.

And we are counting down very important things this time around:
- I'm leaving work early to go get the apartment ready for visitors
- We're going to THEY MIGHT BE GIANTS tonight!!!
- I'm playing Seattle Tourist (tm) ALL, NEXT, WEEK

Yep, staycation here I come.

I can't wait! I've got a list of things I'm going to do, but only one per day, cuz I am also very lazy and what's a vacation that doesn't involve sleeping in and having time to chill?

So far I want to:
- Take the Seattle Underground Tour
- If it's clear, go up the Space Needle
- If it's not pouring, go to the zoo
- If I can convince Andy to come with me, go wine tasting
- Do the Theo's Chocolate Factory Tour

And in the PM/AM rest of the day? Get my xmas shopping done and over with.

Small goals, really.

If you've done the Seattle tourist thing? Or ever wanted to be a tourist in Seattle? What would you want to do? I need alternatives due to that silly WEATHER thing we have here.

Thursday, November 05, 2009

What's that Word that's used When you are Using Someone for Profit?

And can you exploit a dead person?

Bodies, the Exhibit? (I won't link, you'll see why.) I went the the Seattle showing. From an artistic and possibly medical point of view? Very informative.

From a gut-feeling? It made me very sad.

The website spoke in vague generalities, giving you all kinds of factoid information that seemed super informative in that trivial-pursuit kind of way. But once I scraped away all the floral language I understood that all these bodies came from China and that this exhibit was in no way tied or associated with anything medicinal. Looking at the bodies and body parts and the way they'd been posed and the people they'd hired to care for the "exhibits" made it obvious that every bit, from the laser lights to the bone-shaped ice trays at the gift store, was for raking in as much money as possible.

This part may not be true but it's what I imagine taking place:
- People died.
- Their families sold their bodies to this corporation (not science, mind, but a corporation out to make loads of cash).
- The corporation then plasticized the corpses and molded the muscles and tendons into people running and shooting darts and playing football.

And by their sizes and again, my imagination (possibly overactive), I think the fellow swinging the tennis racket, well, I totally got the feeling that he had never even set eyes on one when he was alive.

Because really? I totally understand donating your body to science and your organs to others and all that stuff. I was a pink-dotter when I had a license that had the dots, but what scenario do you imagine occurring to "give" your body over to a company? It's more like sell...and it wouldn't be you doing it but maybe your relatives...that maybe can't afford to bury you...(I did mention my overactive imagination) and that made me really want nothing to do with this exhibit and it's fake nod to the wonders of science and the body.

It's the Holden Caulfield inside of me I suppose...but I hate this kind of fakery. Disneyland, Renaissance Faires, Roadside Attractions, even Casinos are honest with you. The main goal is to part you from your money as they entertain you. You paying to get a learning experience with the kids running around in fake lab coats giving you BS stories about the "attractions?" That was kinda hard to swallow.

The website, and some of the kids in the coats, were happy to tell you about the process used to create what was there. And truthfully? It is amazing that this process exists. We are definitely living in the future and all that noise. I just wish we lived in an honest one.

Now, if you're an artist and don't feel like digging up and dissecting corpses to figure out the skeletal and muscular structures? Go. It's useful and informative. And some of the bodies and especially the circulatory systems? Amazing. Just don't over-think it, the way I did.