Finished!

I finished my book, largely because of some free time during the day Tuesday and Wednesday. I'm glad I was in tech when I got the book so I didn't read it too fast. It was really good, and a great beginning to the end for the Wheel Of Time series. There were parts that were distinctly not Robert Jordan writing. Some of those parts were quite funny, so even though they weren't quite right, they were really welcome. It's a pretty dark book. A lot of bad stuff goes on but once you make it to the end it starts to look up.

How's that for vague and spoiler free? :)

The Gathering Storm

The Gathering Storm arrived at my house the day before yesterday. (Yep, Robert Jordan's been dead two years but he still got a book out before George R. R. Martin.) Yay, book! I read a couple chapters before going to bed. I couldn't stay up all night reading because I had to be at work at 9, for 12 hours, on Halloween. Kind of a drag, but it's not like I had anywhere to go if I had been home. I left the book at home because I figured there wouldn't be time to read during 15 minute breaks and meal breaks.

At lunch time we walked over to the new location of the Mixx, which is just as nice as the old location. Dinner, provided by the opera guild, only took only about half an hour. It was nice out so I walked over to the library, thinking maybe there'd be a copy of that shiny new book in the new books section. There wasn't. That makes sense, people wanting to read this book would place many holds on the available copies. Then I checked the books being held for people... success! I grabbed a copy destined for someone else, plopped myself on a bench and read a chapter. After that I put it back where it came from. I considered trying to check it out, but having a copy at home already there was no good reason for me to poach someone else's copy. Then it was back to the theater, to do notes for 15 minutes then wait 45 for the run to start.

I got home last night by 9:30 and had plenty of reading time before bed. I've read about a quarter of it so far, and I think it's really good. I think I can tell the difference between something RJ wrote most of, and something Brandon Sanderson wrote most of- but I'm not bothered by it. We've been waiting a long time to read what's next for all the characters so I'm not going to quibble over word choices. Anybody else reading this? Donald has given up on the Wheel of Time so I don't even have anybody to share my copy with. :(

I went back to work yesterday, after two days of staying home sick. I loaded all my stuff into the car and headed out. Shortly after leaving the house, I swatted at a bug in my face. It stayed out of view for a while. I was a block away from the theater at a stop light when the mosquito presented itself in the passenger side. Lightning quick, I clapped it. The light turned green. There was bug on my hands, my own goddamn blood, and I drove the rest of the way with my fingertips. I had a kleenex in the car but had to wash my hands once I got inside. That little fucker bug bit my ankle 3 times, and I JUST discovered that it bit me on the end of my elbow. Fuck.

I dreamed last night that we were staying at my Grandma's, and there was a tiny gray puffball kitten in our room. Robyn kept having to scruff her to get her to quit attacking our feet. Somebody told me she was pregnant, and I thought "good, we can get a kitten to be Anna's friend." In the dream this all made sense.

In the other dream, I was at work with Cat, (1) in a place that was not the theater but seemed kind of like an enormous school. It was still summer in the dream, so not many people were around. We were talking in the lobby and we saw Jerry(2) go out the front door pushing a 6' spool made up of 6 smaller spools of colorful and sometimes sparkling 1" tubing. In the dream I knew this was for an upcoming production, and that it was some kind of rope lighting. So Cat and I were checking a storage room for something and in the room was a genie lift and in the lift Nick(3) had left his wrench. I thought it was funny that he had left his wrench at work all summer. We left for the day and went to leave the building by going out the side door of a large stairwell, but I went back to use the bathroom. I looked one way down the hallway, and found a library. I went the other way down the hallway and I finally found one. Through the door was another large room, where some other people were setting up tables for some kind of event with ornate tablecloths and furniture. In the bathroom. I went through to the other side of the room and through a hallway into a bathroom that also included showers and baroque styling. All that time I was thinking about Cat waiting for me outside in her car.

Then I was awakened by jackhammers on the sidewalk so I'll never know what would have happened next.

(1) Cat is the electrician, and her name is a coincidence
(2) Jerry is a manager and wouldn't be pushing anything
(3) Nick is an electrician

Things I want to eat leately

* Ice cream. I've had some, but I just want more. Friday we went to Miami ice, but I had a Miami Ice which was very tasty but not the same. Saturday we went to Foo's but custard is melty and they put pecans instead of almonds in my concrete so I still want ice cream. In a waffle cone.

* Enchiladas. Donald and I went to Mannys a week ago and whatever the sauce is that they use for enchiladas, I want to EAT it. We all tried to go to Mannys on Friday but it was busy so we went to another place that was good but not the same so I still want enchiladas.

* Delicious Asian noodles. It's frikking hot here and not the time to eat warm noodly soup. That doesn't stop me from wanting it. About a month ago I looked at too many pictures of food online and haven't gotten any noodles so I still want delicious noodles.

Izze update: Izze in a can isn't as delightfully fizzy as Izze in a bottle. It's still really tasty though.

DVD's I must have

Battlestar Galactica 4.5
The Office 5
How I Met Your Mother 4
Big Bang Theory 2
Dollhouse I guess

not new but I want:
Kitchen Confidential (Another Fox casualty. Only made it to 13 episodes, but was really funny.)

Did I forget any? What about you?

I just bought some juice

I bought it from Amazon. The price was really good, and they gave me $.99 shipping. For 48 cans of liquid, I think that's a steal. Have any of you tried Izze? Donald and I love it. It's 70% fruit juice and 30% sparkling water. It satisfies my craving for the fizzy, and with no HFCS. I probably first had this stuff at Chipotle, where it goes nicely with your burrito. They also have it at Starbucks. More importantly (to me) they have it at Costco, where the 12 pack (12 oz bottles) goes for $10.99. At Whole Foods you can probably pay $5.99 for 4, so the Costco price is really good. Amazon just gave me 24 cans (8.4 oz) for $15. I don't always want 12oz of fizzy deliciousness, and putting the lid back on just lets the fizz out. I'm looking forward to the smaller size.

Flavors we love: Clementine
Flavors we like: Blackberry, Pomegranate
Flavors we don't like so much: Apple
Flavors we haven't had: Blueberry, Grapefruit, Peach

Last night I dreamed that I couldn't find my shoes. I had this big pile of shoes, and I'd find one shoe but then when I thought I had the other, it would be the wrong one. It was raining or something, so I was looking for a specific pair so my feet wouldn't get wet. Huh.

Bowling + Rollercoaster = Fun!

Holy crap! I gotta play more Rollercoaster Tycoon...

I took video of the baby birds and their birdhouse. Mama wren was very put out with me, and yelled quite a bit. I was just on the outside of my patio door at the time. I can't win though, the wrens yell at me even when I don't go outside. This morning I opened the curtains and got a good scolding that I could hear very well through the door.



Here's Anna in a Chipotle bag just for the sake of all cats in paper bags everywhere:

George Carlin Talks About "Stuff"

Like many people my age (probably) the first time I saw George Carlin was in Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure. Probably when I was 12. So he's funny, and then a couple years later you realize that he was even funnier before that! He was funny before you were born! He was that awesome.

"Desperate Times" works thanks to its performers - Kansas City Star

"Desperate Times" works thanks to its performers - Kansas City Star

The last paragraph:

"The bare-bone production employs minimal props and scenery, although lighting designer Margaret Spare at times provokes an impressive sense of atmosphere."

Neato.

Sesame Street - How Crayons Are Made

I always loved watching this, even though it's the orange crayon.

Surprisingly painless

I went to get our car registered today. (Oh yeah, we bought a car.* ) I drove downtown, parked about 3 blocks away from the DMV, and put 2 hours worth of quarters in the meter just in case. My mom had to wait 2 hours to get her new license, so I figured I'd be safe and not have to walk back to the meter. I walked over, went in to the office, saw about 30 people waiting in the drivers license area- and one waiting in the vehicle registration area. It took me about 5 minutes, and I spent most of that waiting while the nice lady typed stuff into her computer. Other than forking over $900 to the state, it was a snap.

* The new car is a 2006 Corolla, Indigo Ink Pearl. That's a fancy ass way to say dark blue.

Re-reading is fun

I've started reading the Wheel of time again. There will be a new book out this fall, which is quite a feat since the author died before finishing it. Luckily for those of us who want to see the damned story end- they hired someone to finish the last book. Robert Jordan had already written much of it, and left detailed notes on the parts he didn't write. At one point he vowed it would be wrapped up in one book even if it was thousands of pages long and had to be shipped with its own cart. Despite that, at this point, it will be published in 3 parts. Since I've already read 11 books in the series, (12 including the short prequel,) I don't mind reading 3 more, even if they won't be as long as the others.


These pics are from Striving to be Delicious. If only the cover art from the actual books was this good. They suffer from the generic crappy fantasy novel disease, where they are poorly painted and you usually can't tell who the people on the cover are supposed to be. It's not because the author didn't provide descriptions, he described everything in the books in way too much detail. So much detail that after reading thousands of pages, many of us readers just skim large portions of text. I think a lot of people gave up on Jordan around the 5th or 6th book partially because the details got to be too much, and partially because he showed no signs of wrapping up any plot threads, and even kept adding characters. Not me though, I like reading long fantasy series. It's paid off, exciting things happen in the 11th book... finally.


Right now I'm halfway through the third book. That puts me about 1,920 pages in. That just leaves about 7765 pages to go before I get to read something new!

It almost makes a person wish George RR Martin would keel over so someone could finish a Song of Ice and Fire. I mean, Robert Jordan's dead and he's still gonna finish his series.

Fun comic time

http://www.lucyknisley.com/

Out on a walk tonight we saw 3 cats, 7 or 8 bunnies, several dogs, and lots of birds. All of the bunnies were standing perfectly still trying to be invisible.

An orange cat was laying on the house sidewalk. A gray cat was in the grass menacing a baby starling while adult starlings scolded from a small tree. Some people walking dogs came by, and the cat took off around the side of the house. Another gray cat was in a second story window.

Walking under a tree I heard tiny chirps, and looked up to see a nest just a few feet overhead.

Lots of yards had freshly planted flowers. One house on a corner had raised beds for a garden in the front and back yards.

Spring is nice!

Picture time

I found this caterpillar last month in the backyard, and brought it inside to show Anna. Of course, it curled into a ball and didn't move, so she just sniffed my fingers and ignored it. I took it back outside and watched it hump around in its cute caterpillar way.

Here are some of my flowers. I planted the bulbs last November. I like fancy tulips.




I planted these in their pots a few weeks ago. I should probably put at least one of them in the front, but right now I really enjoy looking at them on the back step. There are pansies, snapdragons, creeping phlox, alyssum, and daisies.
This is the trellis my dad build for the back of the garage. The clematis in the middle should crawl up the trellis and bloom pretty red flowers. On either side we planted green beans. Not pictured- a small tub where I planted lettuce.
This bunny seems to like that spot, which is just a few feet away from the patio. I saw (probably) the same bunny laying in the same spot today. Anna like to sit very still and watch out the window. It's funny, because the bunny is almost as big as Anna.

I'm pretty excited about the lettuce and green beans. I thought about growing herbs, but I really wouldn't know what to do with them.

Ahh, sunshine

It's really nice out today. It's sunny, and warm, and I'll be spending large parts of it in the dark. I'm not letting that stop me though, I'm going to go out there and soak up some of that vitamin D. I already spent some time out on the patio and I resolve to spend more time.

Last night was opening for this show, so there was a party afterward. That means free food! I enjoyed the little crab cakes, and the toast with toppings, but I really enjoyed the stuffed mushroom caps. I think I had five of those. The big letdown was that there were no desserts. What the hell. I was looking forward to many flavors of tiny cake.

I bought a 4 lb. box of strawberries at Costco the day before yesterday. They were big, surprisingly nice and sweet, and I threw out 2 moldy ones the day after I bought em. Booo! I'm going to have to freeze the rest of them before they all go off. They should stay fresh longer than that, dammit.

What a time waster

A couple weeks ago I called my doctor to get a prescription refill. They gave me the refill, and told me to come in to test my blood pressure. So I scheduled the appointment today at 3:30, assuming the we'd be done rehearsing by then. (We've been in tech for over a week now.) We weren't, and are still rehearsing, so I got my boss to cover for me for an hour to go to this appointment. (Rehearsal ended at 4.)

When I got there, after I paid my copay and everything, they tell me that I didn't need to be there because I'm not taking the medication for my blood pressure.* So I paid them, and didn't get paid for the hour of work I missed, just to drive to frikkin Kansas. Great.

At least the weather was nice and sunny!

* Although my doctor emphasized that I should take care of my thyroid soon, because letting it go can lead to problems. Sigh.

I fell victim to a checkout line impulse buy the other day. There was this bag of Cracker Jack, just begging me to buy it. So I did. But I haven't eaten any of it yet. The moment hasn't been right. I might have had some Monday, but I had some peanut butter ice cream. I might have had some yesterday, but instead I had a big ginger cookie. I might have some today, but I had half a slice of lemon meringue pie already. I'm trying to eat less sugar. But I am feeling a little hungry.

I'm in tech, so I'm usually hungry and snacking in the afternoon, then pretty full after dinner. We're here until 11, and it's 8:30 now- I think I'll be having another snack soon.

9:30- I have eaten some Cracker Jack, and it isn't as good as I remember. :(

It must be summer now!

The lawn crew for UMKC's properties got here at 8:15 am and promptly started mowing grass that hasn't grown yet at the house next door to me. Also, they are using their back mounted leaf blowers to blow crap onto my yard.

Grargh!

This boat is real!!

I'm pretty sure everyone has seen this by now, but it's still awesome.

Well that was different. I'm pretty sure that the cat just managed to yak in midair while jumping off the windowsill. There's nothing like the warm* feeling of cleaning up something that was, until just a minute ago, inside your cat. Delightful!

*Literally. Also, squishy.

Yesterday downtown I saw 4 cops on horses, in a tidy 2 by 2 formation, riding the wrong way down a one way street.

That was my weird of the day. I saw a local TV weatherman at Costco, but that wasn't very exciting because I've previously encountered two other local weathermen.* If anyone was wondering, he was returning 2 boxes of regular Cheerios because his wife said the kids wanted Honey Nut Cheerios.

*I only have CBS left- I don't even know who their weatherman is... oh wait it's Katie Horner.

Road Rage haiku

drifting into lane
creeping closer to my car
pay attention, ass!

run through that red light
you're on a bike, it's all good
laws are not for you

no turn signal, huh
but now you are in my lane
I curse and shake fist

It was 65 on Wednesday.
Since sometime after 1am it has snowed several inches.
It will be 70 by Thursday.

I don't remember the weather being this fucked up when we were kids.

Call me crazy but...

I think Child Protective Services should take away all 8 of that woman's brand new babies. She already has SIX kids which she can't support with her no job. Also the doctor who did the IVF should probably be suspended or something. Seriously, humans aren't exactly equipped to have EIGHT babies at once. How can that be healthy? There can't be enough vitamins or whatever to go around.

The Barefoot Dilemma

My feet are chilly
Slippers would fix my problem
Or a pair of socks

Today at Costco I bought:

2 1/2 pounds strawberries for $4.49
4 pounds Goldfish crackers for $7.89
2 1/2 pounds Kashi cereal bars for $10.69
2/3 pounds Buffy Season 2 for $16.99

It's fun to weigh things on a kitchen scale!

PS: I may need about 2/3 pounds Buffy Season 3 as well...

PS 2: The Food network is currently at 111.5810. Did I watch it all evening yesterday? Yes I did.

Dammit cable. Sometimes we get Food network, sometimes HGTV. They will both move around to different places, but usually with the same ending. Lately, the food network has been at 109.5810. Today it was at 110.5810, but it cut out on me 10 minutes in to the food network chocolate challenge. It's a big tease. :( I wanted to watch the melty chocolate.

It's almost 60 degrees and pouring down rain outside. That's not the usual February, but I like it. I really enjoyed the weather Thursday and Friday when it was over 60 and not raining. I went for a walk and didn't need a coat! Saturday was a 2 show day, so I spent most of it in the dark in a little hot room. This show called for the addition of 2 video servers and another light board in the booth. Many computers + very little airflow = toaster oven booth! It's pretty bad by the end of the show. Only one more week until close.

Verizon Math Fail

Maybe we should all pay closer attention to billing. :P

This poor guy tries to convince verizon billing that .002 dollars is not the same thing as .002 cents.

kittens riding vacuum

Another good one brought to you by Cute Overload

Hips Don't Lie- Shakira - The Rock-afire Explosion

This is without a doubt one of the weirdest things I've seen on the internet.