I've got an assortment of designs and I plan to add more as I get the time. You can show your Ohio love, make a geeky joke, declare your love of tofu, and more. You can put any design on several different types of shirts, so if you don't like what you see in the picture, change it. :)
If you have any suggestions for designs, feel free to email me or leave it in the comments. I hope someone finds something they like!
I cut the last of the fall flowers today. The dahlias (the yellow ones in the photo) finally have bloomed. Good thing it's been a hot fall.
The red ones are pumpkin peppers, an ornamental pepper. Jeff spotted them in a bouquet at Trader Joe's last year, and then we found seeds. They're red rather than orange, but still pretty.
I made a big dinner tonight, first in a long time. Roasted chicken for Jeff on the grill (which was easy - whole chickens were on sale), grilled potatoes, sauteed greens, salad, and portabello mushrooms with cheese for me. Cinnamon chocolate cake for dessert. Yum. We even ate it at the gateleg dining room table. With Pure Evil Chardonnay. A nice meal.
It's been another one of those weeks where I've been very busy, but I couldn't possibly tell you what I was doing all that time.
Oh well. Today, at least, in addition to these apple cranberry walnut bran muffins, I've made inari, marinated tofu to make roasted tofu later tonight, packaged up last night's chipotle mac & cheese in individual frozen servings for future lunches, dropped off donations to the animal shelter, sold some books and DVDs to Half Price Books, got some new trousers and a pair of shoes, picked up dog food, and I'm still working on the laundry. And I still have to figure out what to make for dinner.
Oh, and I also signed up for a beginning knitting class at the Yarn Shop, and a couple classes at Wholly Craft. But those aren't until November.
Yeah, the whole week has pretty much been like that.
I really did intend to post more often after my last post. But, well, life again.
Work really has been keeping my busy. I'm involved with two really big projects right now, both with pretty tight schedules, so that's keeping me busy during the day with little time for slacking off. In my "free" time, I'm doing a lot of stuff to make life go smoother, like cooking ahead and doing laundry.
Too keep things from getting boring, Kaylee decided it was a good time to get a C diff. infection, and Cordy is helping out by developing allergies. Both are doing much better once we figured out what was going on. :)
Jeff is fine. Also busy with work. But he's making progress on building a tiki bar for the spare room upstairs. He's even sensibly building it in sections so he can get it up the stairs.
The garden is starting to crap out, even though the temperature has been near ninety degrees several times in the last week, including today. This has been the hottest October since the 1960s, according to the news.
While trying to relax in the evenings, we've been watching TV (of the new shows, we like Chuck & Reaper; Moonlight's super-dumb). I've been crocheting. Also reading a little bit - I recommend The Devil You Know by Mike Carey.
We have grand plans for this fall, though how many of them will actually happen, I don't know. We're getting quotes on siding for the house, but I'm pretty sure that won't happen until spring at the earliest. We've found a mead recipe to try; it's just waiting for the weather to cool down and the pets to be healthy (we need to be able to exclude them from the kitchen - and the back door). The bathroom also needs a paint job to go with the new shower curtain and towels (blue instead of yellow).
Ach. Lots of stuff. Sorry for the radio silence. I'm trying to be better about it!
This is the time of year when things are supposed to calm down, right? Then why won't they?
The girls are enjoying themselves at least. The weather is pleasant, if a bit too cold at night for Kaylee. Perfect for Cordy, though. Maybe a bit warm at 50 degrees. :)
Work's still busy. I went in on a Saturday voluntarily for the first time this week, but that was better than going back after a long Friday! And as I was leaving, I saw this:
On their way to an air show at Rickenbacker ... I hope. At least, I didn't notice any bombings ...
No, I haven’t fallen off the planet. I have, however, been unexpectedly busy, so that’s why I haven’t been posting much.
I’ve been to Youngstown to visit the family, and that took an entire week to catch back up from. Kaylee got sick, and that also threw off some plans (she’s better now, thanks). Plus, work is getting busy, so no time to goof off there.
Sigh. Just busy. Playing a lot of catch-up. But things are pretty good, even though.
Saw Stardust. Thought it was fine, if dull and a little long. I liked the special effects, at least.
I’ve been doing a few simple swaps on Swap-Bot. Nothing too complicated of rushed, like hats. I can crochet hats quickly and easily. So that’s a good one.
The garden is starting to peter out, though I did pick the first radishes from the fall planning yesterday. The peppers are almost done, and the flowers are starting to fade. But with any luck, I’ll get more radishes and beets and turnips, too.
So I’m busy, but still here. Hopefully I’ll have more interesting things to blog about soon – and the time in which to do it!
I don't often show you the front garden. It's nice, but for some strange reason, I tend to think it's boring, even though it's not.
There was a big sale at Oakland Nursery this weekend, and we loaded up on stuff for the holes in the front, including some hydrangea.
We also picked up a small spirea.
I don't know if I mentioned last year that we replaced our smaller water feature with a 100 gallon water trough (purchased at a farmer supply store for about $50). It makes a wonderful water feature that's deep enough for our water lily to live through the winter. Jacques and Petrolina just went to work in there last week, and we got a new solar fountain, too.
And one patch of Jeff's bananas lived through the winter.
And, of course, we have snapdragons and portulaca, Jeff's and my favorite garden flowers, respectively.
So that's the front garden. Maybe another picture when the lilies bloom.
PS: Hi, Uncle Chuck! (My Uncle Chuck just let me know that he subscribed to my blog. He's my mother's older brother and he lives out in San Diego with my Aunt Terry.)
Since Lindsey complained that I didn't take any photos of myself at Ben & Joann's wedding, here's one:
What's the fun of having the camera if you can't manage to avoid being photographed? :)
That's a skirt I made the Thursday before the wedding and a hat I bought at Rite-Aid that morning. I was quite pleased with the combination for a summer outdoor wedding.
We had a great time. I've only got a few photos on my camera from the actual ceremony (thanks, S!), but I've got a roll of film to get developed and maybe even digitize the VHS tape they sent home with us. Plus, pretty much all of our guests had cameras, too. Here's a photo to tide you over until I get more for you.
Sorry about the radio silence. I've been busy with the new job and unexpected home repairs (all taken care of now, thankfully).
Jeff & I are off to Las Vegas this weekend to renew our wedding vows - it'll be five years on May 25. I'll have pictures when I get back. Maybe video, if you're lucky. There'll be some Elvis. :)
I took The Folly (my car) into the shop today, only to find out that it needs $4,000 worth of repairs (on top of the $475 from today). That's about what's left on my loan and about half of its trade-in value.
So, I may be in the market for another car, though I had really been looking forward to being without a car payment in a few months. I'm thinking used. Something with good gas mileage, what with the insane price of gas, and the fact that I now have to drive to work (the one bad thing about the job). And I'd really prefer to keep the price to $16,000 or under.
Anyone have any suggestions? Anyone love their car and think I ought to get one, used or not? Anyone have a stay-away-from story?
So far, my thoughts are a Saturn Ion or a Toyota Yaris. But I'm not married to either idea.
And yes, we have thought about the one car thing (or one car and a Vespa), and while it's not an impossible thing, Jeff doesn't like that idea. We're also considering trading in The Folly for a beater car for Jeff to drive (since he doesn't drive to work and his Saturn Ion is in pretty good shape so that could be my daily car; as Jeff just said, "I want to be able to bail out of work and go play golf, which I can't do if we just have one car.").
It's especially funny if you've seen Shaun of the Dead (and Point Break and lots of other movies :), but you don't have to get the super-funny.
This was the first time we've been to Studio 35 in a while. It's a great place, but it's only got one screen, and if we don't want to see what's there, we just don't go. They have double features, but the second one is usually past our bedtime.
The theatre is only a couple blocks up from us, and we try to walk up there unless it's really cold. The block that Studio 35 is on is starting to pick back up after a few years in decline. There's a new gallery there, as well as a new gift-type shop.
paint stairway and hallway (tan or taupe or something bland)
make new curtains for kitchen
make curtains for dining room
re-cover screen in dining room
repaint DVD cabinet and Jeff's cabinet and footstool in living room
take dog-joggers off bikes
clean up area in front of The Folly's parking space
re-caulk windows
weatherproof doors
general weatherproofing
replace back porch steps
make shade for back porch steps area
just pick a damned color and paint the bathroom
So not as much done as I would have liked in two months, but not too bad, either. Some of the stuff will be easier to do now that it'll be more consistently warm out. And I've picked out colors for the bedroom and stairs, so it's just a matter of actually getting the paint and painting. Still haven't picked out a color for the bathroom. I'm not sure I ever will...
We decided to go with a cellphone for our home phone, so I went online to add it to our plan. While there, I discovered that both Jeff and I were eligible for phone upgrades. Since we pretty much both hated our phones since the moment we got them, we jumped at the chance.
Other than having a phone for phone calls, I wanted to be able to take photos and download them from the camera to my phone (not just send them to another phone or email address). That's all. Should be pretty easy to find out if one does that, right?
First, I got the Samsung C417. Cingular sells a USB data cable for it, so I figured my chances were good that it did what I wanted. No such luck. So after one call to Cingular where they assured me that it did work, another where they told me to return it to a local corporate store (couldn't because it had been refurbished), and finally one where the very good customer service rep called the local store and got them to agree to take it back, I tried to find a new phone.
They didn't have the one I wanted, the Sony Ericcson W300i. OK, fine. So I told the guy my requirements and he told me that the LG CU400 would suit my needs. OK. I bought it and the data cable.
No. It didn't work. Sigh. I needed the LG CU500. The 400 didn't have the chip to store the photos on that the computer could read. I went back to the store again. Politely scolded the guy who sold the 400 to me and got what I needed, including a chip.
Works perfectly. Finally. The irony? This is the phone that Jeff originally got online. We now have the same phone, and I could have just saved a lot of time and frustration by getting the same one in the first place. Sigh.
But, hey, look: Kaylee:
And here it is after I downloaded it to my computer and fiddled with the colors a bit.
Not too bad.
And I spent last evening making custom ringtones. That was kind of fun. Currently, my phone rings to "Dracula From Houston" by the Butthole Surfers. :)
So much is going on here right now, not the least of which is that I'll be starting a new job in a couple of weeks.
My old (still "current" for the moment) job wasn't willing to give me the challenges I wanted to take on, so that was pretty much that. In a couple of weeks, I'll be an employee of The Ohio State University, in a job where I'll have all the challenges I can handle!
So if things are a little hit and miss around here for the next couple months, that a good deal of the reason why.
(And the picture of Cordy through the fence? Because she's cute. :)
Today is the vernal equinox, so it's officially spring today. It's actually beginning to look like it, too; I even saw some crocuses this morning when we were walking the dogs.
In honor of spring, I have a very springy snack set up for swapping.
I have a set of five, with a few minor chips. The bottom says "Taste Setter Collection." The design appears to be a transfer of some sort (or something like that) rather than being painted directly on the dishes and cups.
At some point, without my noticing, all of my friends seem to have moved away.
Weird.
Now I have to make some new ones. I'm unlikely to do that at work for a multitude of reasons, so I guess I'm going to have to take a class or join a club or volunteer somewhere.
I'm thinking of volunteering at one of the local animal shelters, even though I know it'll be hard not to want to take home all the animals I can stuff in The Folly.
I've been watching MeetUp for local meetups that might interest me, but so far, nothing. Maybe I should just start one.
I've looked into some local enrichment classes, but nothing's struck my fancy.
Ah, it's actually warming up a bit, and tomorrow it's supposed to be 57 degrees and stormy. I think that counts as "in like a lion" don't you? I hope so, anyway!
But, as it gets to maybe be looking like spring (and I spotted daffodils poking up in the front garden), I start to think about all of the projects that I'd like to do. I thought maybe I'd make a list so I don't forget anything. This list is not in order of importance or timeliness, just as I happen to think of it.
paint stairway and hallway (tan or taupe or something bland)
make new curtains for kitchen
make curtains for dining room
re-cover screen in dining room
repaint DVD cabinet and Jeff's cabinet and footstool in living room
take dog-joggers off bikes
clean up area in front of The Folly's parking space
re-caulk windows
weatherproof doors
general weatherproofing
replace back porch steps
make shade for back porch steps area
just pick a damned color and paint the bathroom
Hm. That's all I can think of at the moment. I think that's plenty. :) *You'll note that a lot of it's painting. We've been in the house for over five years now, and things are starting to need to be painted, and well, after five years, I'm getting a little tired of the rest of it.
Lately, it would seem that there are those who believe I've become invisible and/or deaf. This is annoying. It has also led me to develop a (partial, I'm sure) list of stuff that I just don't care about:
panty lines
the latest fashions
getting older
hair color
the state of fingernails or toenails
the lives of celebrities
dieting obsessions
how much stuff other people have
religion
sensationalized crimes
status
Some selected commentary:
If panty lines bother you, wear looser clothes or go without panties. Or, get over yourself. No one's looking at your ass.
You will get older. There is nothing you can do about this. Well, there is a very effective way to stop the aging process: die. It will also solve the problem of your hair going grey, which, depending on genetics, is probably also inevitable.
Celebrities are just people. They may be prettier people, but they're just people. I've met some celebrities. Some are nice, some are idiots, just like everyone else. They're not special, they're just famous.
If you want to lose weight, eat fewer calories than you use. You can go on an all-chocolate diet and this forumla will still work. You can eat anything in the world that you like, and this will still work - you just probably will have to eat less of it than you'd like. What won't work is bitching about your weight while you eat a meal that could feed a small family.
Kidnappings and murders happen to people who aren't blonde and pretty, too, you know.
Hey, I set up my own t-shirt shop at skreened.com! Why? Why not? Seemed like fun, and maybe a way to make a few extra bucks.
Sorry about the radio silence. I've been busy with the new job and unexpected home repairs (all taken care of now, thankfully).
