bloom

i have been trying to find time to post this for three days! my african violet is BLOOMING!!! YAY!!! i know this is a small thing for many of you out there with thumbs greener than mine, but for me--this is a triumph. it is all thanks to the recommendation of my friend alyce's hubby, rick, who told me what i needed was an african violet pot. of course, i was all--wtf is THAT dude? but i went to my local nursery, logan's, and i asked about it. low and behold--they knew exactly what i needed. i transferred the poor spindly little plant into the new pot about 6 months ago with very little hope. however--it WORKED! my violet is huge and healthy and BLOOMING!!! perhaps i am more excited about this than is warranted. but man--it's awesome.

aside: rick assures me that my blog is very boring and that no one will read it until i start writing more about my misspent youth and telling stories about my family. which, hello? i don't want to do. the blog is about NOW and about ME. so--sorry if i am boring, people. this is just the way it's gotta be.

ah, charleston...

in the hotel garden...

charleston is one of my and the hippie's favorite places to go for a long weekend. in fact, it's the first place we ever went away together, come to think of it. it's just a peaceful and relaxed place filled with beautiful homes and gardens and glorious food!!! last weekend, we dragged the pseudo-in-laws down there so they could experience it, too. a week ago today, we were poking through the shops on king street, taking a little wine break in the garden owned by our hotel, and getting ready to go to a wonderful dinner at magnolia's, one of our favorite restaurants of all time. after dinner, we went on one of charleston's famous ghostwalks, a walking tour where they take you to a few haunted places and regale you with ghost stories local to the area. totally fun, even though there is definitely a cheese factor to it. we finally ended up out at a local cigar bar where the boys lit up and sipped whiskey while denise and i indulged in a spot of champagne. definitely a good evening.

deep sea tank


sailboat on the cooper river

sunday as GORGEOUS!!! we went to brunch at the hominy grill, my absolute favorite restaurant in charleston. we got lost of course, as we always do since i always forget the name of the cross street it's on--my bad! after a FABULOUS meal, we went to the south carolina aquarium, the best small aquarium i have ever seen--it's just the right size for an afternoon and really well-done. of course, i took most of my weekend pictures there, as i always do. denise was in love with the sea turtles--she's so cute--she gets as excited as a kid over things. then the hippie was just as excited over the sailboats out on the cooper river. we sat and watched this one boat for the longest time as it was practicing for a race, running through a series of exercises over and over, both with and without it's spinnaker. just a beautiful day to linger ourside. dinner was a boatload of memphis style ribs at sticky fingers, followed by a long walk on the waterfront to work them off. we finally ended up at tommy condon's, this irish pub where we generally have at least one beer at some point every time we go to charleston. there was even some live "irish" music, played by a couple of down-home boys, one from charleston and one from new jersey. i'm not sure that really counts as "irish", but it was fun none the less.

monday, we grabbed some starbucks and walked the battery again in daylight so dan and denise could experience it both ways. then after a quick drink, we hit the market for the touristy stuff, went into one of a kind art & fine craft gallery (which still has a couple of my wire things for sale in it), and walked over to hyman's for a big fried-seafood lunch. that place is such a charleston institution--you almost HAVE to go there. late lunch over, we grabbed some more coffee and headed out. we set the "kids" up in the back seat with the hipie's laptop and a dvd of the incredibles, so they were happy. all in all--a really good trip. i think the pseudo-in-laws had a good time--i know we sure did. :)

check out the rest of the pictures if you like.

note: you can also check out my pseudo-m-i-l's post about this weekend--she's bloggin' these days.

i wanna be a cowboy, baby

the best boots EVER

well--not really. i don't want to be any kind of boy actually. but DAMN i love my cowboy boots!!! i got up this morning, threw on some jeans and a t-shirt--it's friday after all--and i was like, hmmmm--what shoes will i wear? my eyes fell on my boots, and i was like--why have i not worn these fabulous things in so long??? so i picked them up, dusted off all the cobwebs, and slid them onto my feet. and man, NOTHING sounds like good-fitting boots--that swooshing thunk that sends me reeling back to new york and my youth when i lived in these things. i forgot how freakin' awesome they are. gorgeous butter soft distressed brown leather with row after row of stitching on the shaft--the most comfortable footwear i have ever had on my feet. if i had to walk the breadth of this country, i would choose these boots to do it in. my day might be crappy, but my boots? they're rockin', man.

mad hot ballroom

after much talking and talking and talking about it, the hippie and i are finally taking a ballroom dance class, introduction to social dancing I. last night was our first class, and it was SO MUCH FUN!!! i am amazed at how big the class is, and also that it is almost 50-50 men and women. there is only one extra woman in the mix, which is much better than expected. this was the first in a 12-week series. i danced with many people, as did the hippie, and then i even got to dance with him for at least a few minutes, too--he was my favorite of course. i just can't wait till we learn a little more and get a little better. and people keep asking me how i got the hippie to do it--and all i keep saying is--it was HIS idea! i am a lucky girl--what can i say?

spamalicious countermeasures

the spam comments, they have gotten out of hand. it's gotten so that i get 5-6 spam comments while the new post i have written is still posting!!! i delete them IMMEDIATELY, but it's a huge pain in the ass. and now the spam-bots have started posting on my older posts as well--fuckers. so thank god blogger has added an anti-spam thingy, which i have turned on. now you guys will have to type in a verification word to publish comments--sorry for any inconvenience, but i got no choice.

china doll

willow

faces like this one make me miss painting. is she not a doll?? this is willow, the daughter of our friends chris and mari. i was just looking through some of my pictures, came across this one, and was arrested by what a beautiful child this is all over again. when she was a baby, i saw here almost every day, and now that she's all big, i only see here a few times a year. that ain't right. i need to get over there to the other end of our neighborhood and see her and her big sister lucy.

the porch

dig in, © jennifer johnson^*

when my friend kimmie got married, i got the chance to reconnect with two of her very cool and amazing friends from college, jenn and kristin. we have more or less kept in touch over the last year, and now, things have taken a turn for the fabulous! jenn is getting ready to jump with both feet into a new venture, and lucky me--i get to tag along! jenn and kristin live in cape hatteras on north carolina's outer banks, one of the most beautiful and peaceful places on earth. she has been taking photographs for years, but has recently come into her own, recognizing and nurturing her own talent. she also knows many other artists in the area, plus she knows ME! anyway--the point of all this is that she is getting ready to launch her own gallery, featuring her own work and that of the artists she knows, including me. she just closed on the property that will house the shop, which will be called "the porch"--terribly cool name. and for now, she has put up a beautiful website, Photos from the Porch, featuring her work as well as her background and inspiration.

one of my wire things

for me, this is exciting because it has inspired me to make wire things again! (lord, i need to update that web site!!!) jenn has ordered a boatload of them from me, and i will be working on them over the next month or so. the plan is to deliver about 60 of them to her the weekend of november 5th, when she will open the gallery with a wine and cheese reception for the artists. i am so excited for both of us i can barely stand it!

yay for jenn! think good thoughts for her as she follows the dream we both share. and hey--if you are out cape hatteras way--look her up!

* picture used with permission of jennifer. no copying, please.

reading: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, by J.K. Rowling
ok, so i actually read this a while back. and it was great, if more than a tiny bit shocking. i am still not quite over it to tell you the truth. but in reading book 6, i found that there was a lot i had forgotten from the last few books, so i went back and re-read those, too. and then i read this one again. time well spent, my friends. time well spent. i continue to, like so may others, enjoy the hell out of these books. i am waiting and waiting for the hippie's baby brother to get old enough to enjoy them as well--he's almost there. and i would like to take some tiny amount of credit for pushing my friend emily over the edge into finally taking them on. i can't believe she resisted the hype so long, and then read all 6 in less than two weeks--she's a real trooper. go em! but i digress...

i am not going to say a word here about plot, since you never know who has and hasn't read them. but ooo, do i have me some theories! i WILL say this--ms. rowling has my number and still impresses me just as much now as she did when i picked up the first book. props to anyone who can get so many children psyched up about reading! how will i survive the wait for the last book??? at least i have the movie for the goblet of fire to look forward to--that one's my fave anyway.

colorado weekend, a week later...

aspen

balance

last weekend, i went to see meredith out in colorado, where she has been going to school for the past few years. this trip, man--i tried to go two years ago, but got laid off. then i tried to go last year, but had just started working again. third time's the charm i guess. we had a beautiful, laid-back girl weekend. we talked, ate out, knitted, shopped, and drank tea. and while everything we did was fun, the best part was just getting to sit still and talk to my friend for so long.

we spent about 3 hours in an ENORMOUS yarn store called showers of flowers. dude! if you are a knitter and are ever in the denver area, you HAVE to check out this store! it was about the size of 8 of my LYSs, plus another 4 in sale yarn, PLUS a whole warehouse. rows and rows of yarn and needles and needle cases... holy mother of god, it was awesome! i showed more restraint in there than i have in YEARS, although i DID buy my body weight in new knitting needles. and we went into downtown boulder where i bought nearly everything they had to offer--some venitian vodka glasses for the hippie, some cool handmade soap, spices, chocolate, and various other small, expensive, easily packable items. my favorite.

i went to meredith's class, which was so funny--she has students of all flavors in there. the asshole who doesn't take notes, talks shit the whole time, and tries to trip her up. (he did not succeed.) the note-passing people who are surprisingly like meredith and i were when we were in school together. a professor emeritus sitting in the back taking it all in. weird to be back on a campus like that--makes me feel a little bittersweet (again) about that whole PhD thing. i guess i will always have mixed feelings about that.

we also managed to sqeeze in about 3 hours up in rocky mountain national park, which is where i took the bulk of the pictures i have from this trip. it was BEAUTIFUL. one of those warm windy sunny fall days where the sky is so blue you could just drown in it. stands of yellow aspens in the middle of those green green pines all up the sides of the mountains--it looks like rivers of gold running down the hillsides. check out the pictures if you want.

on the way home, i got on the plane and leaned down to pull out my knitting just as the woman sitting beside me did the same. we chatted the whole way home, just sitting and knitting--it sure made the flight go faster! and as always--i was so glad to be home...

beautiful day with the animals

flamingo slumber

underside

ibis

i have been trying to find time all week to get some pictures posted from the trip to the zoo we took last weekend with this hippie's friend, eric. heh, i guess eric counts as my friend, too at this point--funny how i still lable him as "the hippie's friend." but i digress... so we went last saturday--it was GORGEOUS outside and a perfect zoo day. windy and sunny, not too hot or humid or crowded... plus this particular trip to the zoo was kind of cool because i was not as focussed on getting so many pictures--i just took a few of some of the details i liked about the foliage and some of the birds, things i generally neglect at the zoo. the result is that i dig almost every picture i took. check them out here on flickr.

zamboni

zambonis

yay for the return of hockey! after last year's idiocy and lack of a season, it's great to have the canes back! tonight we went to the first pre-season carolina hurricanes game. as we were walking in, i said to the hippie--what i want to see for this return game is for the canes to beat the capitals seven to nothing. and well--i ALMOST got my wish. it was a six to nothing shut-out! go canes! it's kind of weird watching this team, with so many unfamiliar faces, but they certainly look promising--the new goalie in particular (#30 cam ward) seems just awesome. should make for an interesting season--i am sure we will go to many more games. meanwhile--what's my favorite thing about hockey? why, the zambonis of course! so--i took an illegal pic of them with my phone. :)

playing with pliers

ankle bracelet for tina

last night i went to meet emily and ann to knit, but instead i ended up whipping out this little ankle bracelet as a birthday gift for tina, my coworker. tina has long envied the ankle bracelet my friend rita (who designs GORGEOUS jewelry) made for me, so i decided that i would see if i could kind of knock off rita's design. granted, i would have just bought one from rita, but she had to go and take a day job and stop supplying me with a constant stream of fabulous jewelry. anyway--i was pleased to discover i could still make something cute. this is sterling silver and little teardrop shaped glass miyuki beads in irridescent black. it's always fun making something simple and tiny--i haven't had the pliers out since i made the earrings for kimmie's wedding last spring. maybe i should make some more of this stuff...

Southern Card® in tact for now

a few months ago, my friend sam threatened to revoke my Southern Card^® because i had never made a cobbler of any kind. well--now i have! whoo hoo!

peach cobbler in the making

this past saturday, the hippie and i went out for the big breakfast at big ed's, and discovered a tiny farmer's market in the middle of downtown raleigh. there were these big beautiful peaches outside the door just calling to us. we investigated, and i walked away with peaches, baby lima beans, corn, a big fat gorgeous tomato, and plans to cook all weekend long! if i cooked this way every weekend, i would be as big as a house! but the late summer fruits and vegetables were just too much to resist. i made shrimp and grits and biscuits, a big breakfast with lots of bacon (food of the gods) and cheese grits and more biscuits, my own version of fried chicken, lima beans with onions and thyme, boiled corn, and i just sliced that tomato up and ate it plain--delicious. last night we ate leftovers, and i wasn't even sorry about it.

the weather this weekend was also just perfect--warm windy sunny days and cool nights, lower humidity than we have seen in months. nothing makes me want to nest more. the house is clean, the laundry is almost caught up, and i am ahead on christmas present making. got in some good quality porch time, too. i need about 8 more of these weekends, and i will be set.

oh, and let me say one note about bill neal's southern cooking, one of the greatest cookbooks of all time. he had a little write-up about making cobbler, and how his children grew up calling it "pig pie" because he always used pig-shaped cookie cutters to cut the biscuit dough to put on top of the fruit. i used a star--we can't ALL be bill neal.

the price of relief

hey. in spite of a fantastic weekend, i remain pensive. some is PMS i am sure, but mostly it's becasue i keep getting distracted by thoughts of new orleans. what a totally shitty situation. i feel like the government response time was slow, but i am sure glad they are in there now, restoring some form of order. general honore should run for president. i feel terrible for the people whole lives are pretty well destroyed and who will have to rebuild everything, both physically and emotionally. i worry constantly about the streams of children who are separated from their parents, whose parents may well be dead. i am proud to know and hear stories of people who have already done so much to help, and equally horrified by those who have done all they can to impede the efforts of others. snipers especially. and i keep thinking--how would i feel if that were me... yuck.

i gave some money to the red cross, but it felt so abstract that i still wanted to do more. there is a local business here sending specifically requested supplies to the woman coodrinating the sheltering of about 15k people at LSU, so i decided to help out with that, too. i made up some easily distributable packets of toiletries so that people taking shelter at LSU can at least wash the grime away. i went to target and i bought all the small sized bottles of shampoo and conditioner and all that kind of stuff that i could afford, went home, made up some packets for men and some for women. over a hundred dollars and two hours later, it is still only enough for 10 people, and it will only last those people a few days. few things have brought home for me the cost of the relief effort like doing that one small thing. this is just going to be, as my mother would say, along row to hoe. i can't even imagine how much it's going to cost before it's all said and done!

the good news is that since friday, this one local business has already sent 104 boxes of supplies and $9000 to LSU's relief fund. things like this really do bring out the best and worst in people--thank god the best usually wins out.

at last, the long awaited knitting update

a.l. de sauveterre's beautiful cashmere

NEW YARN!!! YAY!!! i absolutely adore the cashmere i got from axelle at two pointy sticks. she gave a heads up that cashmere prices were about to increase, so i went ahead and ordered the yarn i want to make a clapotis out of. it's going to be a little while before i get to actually use this yarn--i have promised myself that i am going to finish crumpets and get at least half my christmas knitting done before i cast on anything that is just for me. this is my version of self-dicipline. but isn't it GORGEOUS?? don't you love the color??? i think axelle's colors are so beautiful, pretty much across the board. never mind my coworker who had obviously been smoking the crack pipe when she said to me, "i don't know--i don't really like this color. why not just get black if you are going to make something out of cashmere? and really--this just feels like yarn to me--i guess i don't get it." i love her, but she doesn't get it.

FOs from july and august


pink ribbon scarf detail

this stuff is all pretty fresh off my needles. a new blue felted bag--i am planning to make quite a few of these; a ribbed alpaca scarf in a lucious charcoal color--so soft and warm it makes me want snow; a frilly ribony hot pink scarf with drop stitches i actually figured out how to do all my byself; a purple baby hat for an un-named baby, and a crazy pink and yellow and orange baby hat for ella, who has outgrown the pink one i made for her earier this summer (before the Evil Lead Incident). i really really love both of these scarves. i have a ton of scarves i will be whipping out for christmas, but these two are for me.

the grey scarf is made from two skeins of this bulky alpaca yarn called jay, from goddess yarns. out of all the yarns i have knitted up so far, this one is probably my favorite. it feels fabulous and it is a joy to knit with. depressingly enough, this company is going away. you can still get the yarn online, but once it's gone, it's gone. figures. the ribbing pattern is something i stole from my friend jennifer who is making a ribbed poncho out of this yarn. can't wait to see that when she's done!

the pink scarf is made from one skein of a yarn called cinema--it was an orphan in a sale bin, and i loved the color so much i just bought it with no plan. then when the hippie gave be some size 15 ebony needles from lantern moon for my birthday, i couldn't wait to use them, so i cast that pink yarn onto them. the drop stitch thing seemed like it would show off the yarn well, so i just decided to see if it was done the way i thought i might be. and apparently it was! i absolutely love how this came out, and now i have similar plans for another ribbon-y yarn i have from prism, only i want to do longer drops with that one and maybe pair it with a fine cored fuzzy mohair... we'll see. (note--that cinema yarn is now discontinued, which just figures--i think my love for a yarn is may well be its kiss of death. the same can be said of perfumes and bath products.)

crumpets approaching the goal line

and last, but SO not least, i finally got crumpets off the needles last night. as you see, i still need to weave in the ends, add the croched trimon the bottome, and add the ribbons for the straps and the tie at the waist. this thing has taught me a TON, but it has certainly been a trial by fire. i will never use this yarn again, even though i think it's beautiful. it splits if you look at it hard, snags on ANYTHING, and the knots in it will NOT stay tied. i am going to have to put some glue or something on those if a kid is going to be able to wear this. that said, however, i am really proud of this little top. it is by far the most complicated thing i have tired, and i think it has come out really beautifully so far. i have learned to add beads to my work, to make a cable, to increase stitches, and why it is important to knit with two strands of variegated yarn at one if you are doing straight stockinette. just look at all the unintended patterning in that skirt--you can tell every time i changed yarns. i will know better how to deal with that in the future. i will post another picture when it is done done, but i was so excited to get it bound off--i could not wait to share!

now, i have one more scarf to finish up for me, and then it's christmas and baby gift central for me until further notice. the bad thing about that is that i won't be able to put up a lot of knitting pics until all these gifts are given. oh well--you guys can wait.

speak/blog of the devil...

just got an email from axelle telling me my yarn is on the way!!! YAY!!! she even gave me some tips on working with cashmere yarn on on how to get the most out of it, which, as a newbie, i definitely appreciate. what more could you ask for? i am still just DYING to see it in person!

hanker for a hunk of yarn

yarn: estelle, color: orion

i ordered 3 skeins of this wondersful sport weight cashmere from axelle over at two pointy sticks at the end of last week, and i am DYING for it to get here!!! and it's not like i don't have other things going on. it's not like i don't have 10,000 things on my needles and in the queue. but still. this is new. this is my first cashmere. i want THIS! i can't wait can't wait can't wait till it gets here! i am going to make myself a clapotis out of it, like about a million other people on the internet have already done. (just do a little google on it--you will see what i mean...) but it really does look like just the best of the scarf and wrap and shawl worlds all rolled into one. very excited.

in other knitting news, the hippie is knitting. he's really good at it, too! he's getting set to whip up a cashmere scarf of his own (the men's cashmere scarf from last minute knitted gifts, which looks like this). he's already stolen my rosewood knitting needles for it. he's an even worse snob than I am about his supplies! perhaps i have created a monster...

crumpets moving into final stages

i posted a crumpets update over on the knit-along site if you are interested. that thing has taken me an eon! i am still working on a more substantial knitting update. it's coming--i swear!

the birthday haul

birthday presents!

tuesday was my birthday. i don't really think that much about my birthday--this year for some reason getting older has bothered me a little more than usual--i think it's that biological clock thing bringin' me down. but the celebration this year was good--very satisfying. as was the haul--just look at all this stuff! between getting some lantern moon knitting needles as an early present from the hippie, going to beaufort for the weekend, then getting a whole slew of antique teacups from alyce, countless cards, joelle hoverson's last minute knitted gifts book, the extended version of the fellowship of the ring, practical magic, a B-52s CD, a cure CD, a copy of intercourses, a leatherman micra, my FABULOUS new set of illustrated jabberwocky prints from angi shearstone, and a beautiful pair of silver and mother-of-pearl earrings--i would say i did pretty damned well this year. the hippie bought all the things i needed to make a fabulous birthday dinner for mself over at harry and jenn's house. i WANTED to cook, so no feeling sorry for me for having to cook my own birthday dinner! we had bacon-wrapped scallops, grilled asparagus, garlic yukon gold mashed potatoes, and some petit filets with a very rich demi-glace. combined with some fabulous red wine and some chocolate cake for dessert, it was just perfect. laid back birthdays are the best kind.

a little less lead

update on our little friend ella. you will remember that i mentioned before that, through a series of acts of dumbassery, our friends' 9-month-old daughter ended up with some nastily high lead levels. well--some GREAT news: her lead levels as of the 22nd are down to 10.4µg/dL. this is phenomenally good. here's hoping that she will establish a new baseline that is well below 10. thanks to all of you who have offered helpful advice, contact info for toxicologists, and well wishes for her so far! continued prayers and good thoughts for the leadlet and her parents (who are still living in a tiny hotel room) and kitties (who are still living in the nasty lead dust) are appreciated.

farewell to stardust...

last week i got an email that made me awfully sad--the subject line was, "farewell to stardust." as i have talked about before, stardust is easily our favorite restaurant in the state, and one of our favorites, period. the hippie and i have gone there as often as we could, and they have always remembered us. plus, it's been a beach trip tradition since we started going to emerald isle instead of the outer banks. between ashley and ralph, the owners, ahsley's mother who has often greeted us at the hostess stand, molly, one of the greatest bartenders ont he planet, and darla, the best waitress ever, it has just always been an amazing dining experience. we have felt like part of their extended family. so--to celebrate our birthdays, we planned a spontaneous weekend trip to beaufort to go to stardust one last time. and what a time it was! honestly it felt a bit like a wake. we ate too much, talked too much, drank too much, and basically went down with the ship. FABULOUS evening. check out the photos, which i think capture the spirit of the evening in spite of the poor photo quality.

let me also say that the rest of the weekend was awesome as well. there was a full moon on friday, so we actually got to go on a moonlight sail--divine. and we did a whole lot of nothing. sat in our favorite of the local coffee shops and read and knitted. poked in shops, had lunches at the beaufort grocery company, hung out on the porches of our B&B... it was the Right Thing^®.

jealous of howard stern

howard stern: not my fave

and i hate howard stern!!! what does this say about me? I am actually JEALOUS of howard stern's hair. i got a haircut a couple of weeks ago--i was going for something like uma thurman's hair in the movie be cool--and the girl who did my hair cut it about 4 inches shorter than she should have for it to fall where we had discussed it falling. this is a risk when your hair is curly--people fuck it right up. they cut it like it's straight hair, and then it shrinks up to your scalp in little annoying flyaway ringlets. can you tell i am unhappy with this haircut??? then randomly today, i come across this picture of howard stern of all people, sporting the hair i wanted. what is THAT all about??? add in that my favorite restaurant is closing, my car is about to cost me another zillion dollars to take car of, and my favorite yarn brand is not only being discontinued, but the whole yarn company that produced it is has been dissolved, and well--i am not having a good week here people. *sigh*

apparently i am clever

i'm a ravenclaw! at least, according to the sorting hat, i am. my friend emily is reading the harry potter books for the first time, and she found this great link to a little quiz to submit yourself to the sorting hat. i could not be more pleased with my results! i know, i know--some people would think that gryffindor is the only good choice, since that's where harry lives. but i'm sorry--he's way more impetuous and somewhat foolishly brave than i will ever be. i am slightly cautious--i admit it. and i like smart people--i admit that, too. so yeah--ravenclaw is the right choice for me. as you know, the sorting hat is never wrong. go ahead--sort yourself!

running for charles

charles cox, one of the nicest people i have ever met, has worked for my company almost since its inception. he is a good man, one of the best, with a bright smile, a big heart, 5 gorgeous boys and a loving wife. kodak once literally stole a picture of his red-headed boys, who are like a bunch of stair steps, for a commercial--they are that beautiful. and in the unfair way life has of kicking people who seem to good to deserve it, charles was diagnosed a few months ago with pancreatic cancer. i am sharing this with you because another person i work with, rich lemert, is preparing to run in a marathon to raise money for pancreatic cancer research, in honor of charles and his family. as i am sure you have figured out by now, i am not huge on the idea of solicitation, so there is NO PRESSURE meant by sharing this. however, i know that many pf the people who read this blog know charles personally, and will be interested in this.

so--disclaimers aside, check out rich's page about his marathon preparation. it you feel inclined, you can donate to this most worthy of causes. and if you don't want to, that is totally cool. either way, please keep charles's family in your thoughts.

butterfly moment

butterfly

i can't just whine about feeling like ass today--i feel i should add something a little more positive on here to avoid depressing the crap out of you, dear reader. yesterday, i was waiting outside in the sunshine for the hippie to pick me up to go out to lunch, and this butterfly landed on the lantana bush right beside me. isn't it gorgeous? thank goodness i had my phone with me so i could capture the tiny beautiful moment when everything was quiet and i got to watch it slowly flapping its velvety wings.

sick. ick.

i had grand plans to post a big old knitting update today, but now i am sick and can't care about long blog posts and pictures of knitting and stuff like that. i am having trouble concentrating at all, and think i may have to go home from work and take a nap very very soon. blah. is there anything worse than a cold in august? and where did i even GET this cold??? yuck. it's storming like a mofo outside, and i have to say, it suits my mood just fine.

knitting update including the many things i have finished in the last couple of weeks as well as my fabulous new needles, to follow when i stop feeling assy.

honeysuckle time

while driving into work this morning, i came across some DJs playing run DMC's old school hip hop song, peter piper. very amusing--totally takes me back to the days when kimmie and i used to write raps in class, long long ago in high school. i turned it up loud and cruised toward the job with a smile on my face.

when the song was over, the DJs were so into it, they played it again, this time with themselves as accompaniment--they were yelling louder than run DMC. again--very amused. but the best part was after that, when they were trying to do the weather report, and the girl was laughing so hard you could barely understand that it might rain this afternoon. then the guy came on to do the traffic, and he sounded just like the great barry white, all low, and slow, and growly, and he said,

"on the road right now, it's honeysuckle time...
there's nothing in your way on the raod today..."

i ask you--what could be better than that?

getting the lead out

our friends' daughter ella has lead poisoning. the severity of her case is still a bit of a mystery to me, although from what i have read so far, her blood lead level (BLL), while alarmingly high, is not high enough to warrant invasive and somewhat dangerous chelation therapy unless she is exposed for a long period of time or her BLL goes up to 45µg/dL (hers is at 24.3 µg/dL right now, a week after the fire). still--i am so worried about her and her parents!!! and even more than that, i am angry for them.

their landlord hired painters to remove lead paint from the outside of their house. the painters put up plastic on the insides and outsides of the windows to protect the interior from dust. so far so good, right? the big cock-up was when they decided to remove the paint from the exterior with a BLOWTORCH (illegal, by the way--i wonder why?), and set the fucking house on fire! then the fire department continued the spiral of moronic behavior by chopping a hole from the exterior of the house through to the interior (into the baby's room), ripping the protective plastic off the windows in the process, and filling the apartment with smoke and lead-based paint dust. so yeah. shitty scary situation.

please think good thoughts for our friends and their baby daughter, as they try to get the lead out of her blood.

it's a small, small (blogging) world

the way i got into reading and writing blogs was starting with one blog, clicking on it's links to another blog, clicking on that blog's links to still other blogs, and so on. isn't this how most people get started? but recently, some things have happened that showed me that even in blogger-land, it's a small world. really small. potentially uncomfortably small.

about a month ago, the sam was alerting me to the fact that sarah brown had pictures up from a party she had been to on a rooftop in brooklyn, and that in these pictures was a photograph containing a beer samantha had once had and had been trying to remember for ages with little success. note: sarah's blog was one of the first blogs i ever started reading on a regular basis, and i still read it from time to time when i want to be reminded of what it was like when i was young and living in new york. plus, she's damned funny. but anyway--i immediately rushed over to flickr to check it out. and lo and behold! the rooftop was the very same one that alyce and i once went to a party on back in the dark ages of like 1995 or something. we sang all of bohemian rhapsody on that roof with a guy named fireman mike who was from maine and whose girlfriend nastia (her real name) was shooting daggers at us with her evil eyes all night. we got drunk and i barely managed to save alyce from the lecherous grasp of the skeezy roommate of the guy whose party it was. so what are the odds that the same rooftop, on which i stood for a single night, would re-appear in this manner? strange, non?

and then--even weirder: late last week, i was reading this fish, yet another blog of a young new york-dwelling lass, and i started clicking links. the fish, she has quite a few of these, and i was feeling rather random. so i clicked and read, clicked and read, until i ended up here, on the blog of a girl who just moved into my neighborhood, onto my very street. her blog even had a picture of the house at the end of the street. of COURSE i left a comment! how could i NOT??!?! i am still kind of amazed at the randomness of it all. she emailed me back, and we now have plans to be all neighborly and meet for a glass of the sweet^* red vino on thursday--whoo hoo.

but wait--it gets even weirder. further investigation reveals that this woman is friends with the local friends of the hippie's ex. this i also know because of blogs--this time because of the ex's blog. i don't think that the new girl has any personal ties to the ex, but man, what a coincidence!

life--it's all just one big set-up.
*and when i use sweet here, i do not mean sweet as in sugar on my tongue. i mean divine--dry with more than a hint of sassiness. the full roundness of plums and cherries on the palate. perhaps a peppery finish. ahhhhh...the vino...

companions

i have noticed a trend among bloggers to post pictures of their pets on fridays, and have decided to honor this tradition by posting some pictures of my kitties. they actually have their own webpage, but i have not updated it in forever (plus it's in serious need of a stylistic overhaul), so here are some more current photos, all taken with the treo650. still love my phone.

samson lounging

samson is the sweetest cat i have ever had. he weighs more than a tub of lard and has fur as soft as feathers. he's a lap cat who loves to hang out and watch movies with us--his favorite film is the pixar short film, for the birds. he listens to the chirping very intently and tries to get the birds on the screen. he has a tiny little meow like he is mike tyson or something. he sleeps on my feet every night.
he likes strings and especially loves chewing on wool, alpaca, or any animal-based fiber i happen to be using when i am knitting. he's the only one who insists on sitting in my lap while i am trying to work.

fergus trying to swat the phone
out of my hand

the king of mischief, fergus is the funniest kitty ever. he gets in trouble about ten times more than the other two cats, and is capable of scaling up to five shelves of our living room bookcases. he knocks things over, is often found up on the mantle, and LOVES to play. he will chase a laser pointer like there is no tomorrow, and he has a ferret he tosses into the air and can backflip after--i have never seen anything like it. when he meows, it sounds like a static-y radio station trying to come in. he's a pouncer and an athlete, a beggar and a thief, but is also the most comforting of the cats to curl up and nap with. he is also a big fan of cereal milk and likes to jump into my lap when i am eating breakfast. he likes to help me knit, but will make off with the needles if i am not looking. he prefers bamboo to plastic or metal, as do i.

scout hugging the couch

scout is the acknowledged alpha of the cat set at our house. more dignified than the boys, she generally refuses to play and looks upon our attempts to entice her with great disdain. she is the loudest animal on the planet, bar none, and often wakens us with the dulcet sounds of her screeching. it's an ex-stray thing--she can't stand to see the bottom of the food bowl and will yell until it is filled, even if it's 4am. she is so sweet though, and leans into the petting like a doberman. she tolerates the attentions of our two-year-old friends and just likes to be nearby. take caution if she gets on your lap, however--those claws of hers are lethal and don't retract the whole way. and for god's sake--do NOT try to pick her up! danger, will robinson. scout always sleeps nearby when i am knitting, but doesn't really like to help like the boys do.

all three of our kitties are rescues, and all three are fabulous. i think i paid up on the Bad Cat Karma with josephina, my former cat who was the meanest cat who ever lived. i loved jojo--we had an understanding--but just ask anyone else who knew her, and they will tell you she was a terror. maybe it was that whole hermaphrodite thing she had going. but anyway--dues paid. wonderful cats obtained. blog post about cats complete.

really big kitties

kaela, 10 months old

the hippie and i took denise and tristan to the carnivore preservation trust when they were here, and i still can't stop thinking about it. it was just AWESOME, very different from a zoo, and utterly educational. this place started out as a breeding facility for smaller cats who are keystone species in their ecosystems and were being killed off by humans and environmental losses. they have a lot of servals and caracals and ocelots as well as some non-cats--binturongs and kinkajous, left from this program. eventually, however, other groups started picking up the ball on protecting these species, so the CPT evolved into a rescue facility. now they still have small cats, but they also have quite a few jaguars, leopards, and tigers as well. this tiger is 10 months old and was rescued, along with her brother rajah, about 20 miles from my sister's house. they just found these 6-month old tiger cubs walking along a dirt road. can you imagine coming across something like that??! can you imagine your 5-year-old coming across something like that??? holy crap!

what kills me about all this is how many people think it's a good idea to have a big cat like this as a pet. and then when the cat gets too large to handle, they just turn it loose. one of the cats at this facility was found tied to a lamp post in downtown houston! WHAT are people THINKING? and i learned while we were there that this facility gets 8-10 requests for rescues every month--WAY more than they can take. and if no one can be found to take the rescued cats, then they are just euthanized. horrible. sometimes i like animals more than people.

oops--that was almost a rant there for a second...

anyway--if you live in north carolina or are traveling to this area, this place is totally worth checking out. i took that picture above while standing about 3 feet from kaela. how cool is that?

cheese grits

a while ago, i asked the hippie, "do you love me?"
he replied, "of course i love you!"
and i said, "why?"
i admit, i was in an insecure mood and feeling the need for some reassurances--it was probably pms or something. anyway--his response was classic: he said, "because you have a sweet ass and you make me cheese grits."

simple. to the point. and as my friend sonya said--pretty damned good for a Southern woman. i mean seriously, can i ask for anything better than that? love my hippie. :)

day at the beach

bailey, tristan, & lucas

while denise and tristan were here, we went down to the beach (ten days ago already!!!) for the day. our friends betsy and charlie just moved to wilmington about a month and a half ago. they have three kids, the oldest of whom is lucas, who is only with them over the summers and is a scant 6 months older than tristan. those two totally hit it off when they met two summers ago, so now we try to make it a point to get tristan some lucas-time if we can. plus--who doesn't love a day at the beach???

pink fish

the pseudo-in-laws and i caravanned down with jenn and gabriella, then picked up betsy, lucas, and betsy's fabulous girls, bailey and olivia. then we headed to the NC aquarium at fort fisher. we looked at seahorses, clown shrimp, jellyfish, turtles and various other cool stuff. then the kids looked for fossils outside, where it was almost too humid for me.

bailey

after the aquarium, we headed to the beach, where i could NOT stop taking pictures. i will post them all--i promise! but until i get time to get everything onto the server and into the gallery, there are a handful of them on my flickr gallery. :) the kids were so cute, getting spanked by the waves, digging holes in the sand, catching fish in their nets, and just generally raising a ruckus.

tristan was totally sad when we had to leave at the end of the day, and i have to admit, i would not have minded staying a little longer myself. the hippie and i definitely need to make a trip back down soon. i miss charlie and betsy and the kids.

stuff and nonsense

all kinds of stuff has been going on lately, but as stated--i have been too damned busy to say much about it. now that i have a free minute, ai am like--let's see--what are the highlights again? prepare yourself for a long rambly post.

numero uno--the sam came!
she was here over 4th of july weekend, and of course, it was FABULOUS to have her here and just get some time to hang out. she always times her visits such that we end up putting her to work. she has come here to help paint, to help throw parties (like this time), for job interviews, etc. the one time she just came to visit (the first time, actually), i was in the emergency room with a nosebleed that wouldn't stop and a blood pressure of 172/134. i had to get our friend steve, who she barely knew at the time, to pick her up. and then she got to see my apartment looking like a murder scene. there was literally blood everywhere. so yeah--we need a do-over just hanging out weekend sometime. the sam, i love her.

numero dos--the peach cobbler incident.
while she was here, sam threatened to revoke my Southern Card^®! can you believe the nerve of that wench??? and all becasue i have never made peach cobbler. like THAT is all there is to it! it's true i need to learn how. peach cobbler is one of those things that i would give anything to have my grandmother back in her right mind long enough to learn. my grandmother is alive and in good physical health, but her mind is gone. and every time something like this comes up, i am sorry i can no longer call her for advice in the kitchen or to learn one of her longstanding fabulous recipes that is now lost forever. her sage stuffing, her pecan pie, her blackberry and peach cobblers. *sigh* dimentia sucks. but i digress... samantha brought with her not only her grandmother from texas's peach cobbler recipe, but also her great grandmother from goergia's as well. i have grandmother jealousy. i STILL haven't made any cobbler--but the one sam made was awfully tasty. :)

numero tres--we had a big old cookout.
on the third of july, we had a bunch of people over for burgers and dogs and baked beans and potato salad and watermelon and peach cobbler and banana pudding, etc. oh yeah, and mint juleps and vodka limeade and beer. there was a dozen tiki torches, a yard full of kids pretending to be tyrannosaurus rexes, a cast aluminum table generously offered for party use by our neighbor janie, two kinds of artichoke dip, a trio of 4 year old girls drinking lemonade with cocktail umbrellas and various party straws (fish, flowers, birds), a herd of people all just hanging out, and a couple of games of bocce in the park a block from the house. friends and smiles and drinks all around. things ended on the early side, but it was still a good time. did i remember to take pictures? of COURSE not! that is always my failing at these events.

next: a cocktail party. love the kids, but once in a while, you gotta lose them and hang with some grown-ups.

numero quatro--my pseudo-mother-in-law is coming!
that's what my boss calls her. :) the hippie's mother and baby brother are driving down from PA tomorrow for a visit. i think i look forward to their visits every summer even more than the hippie does. i think i am lucky that i like my SO's mother, and that i get along with the rest of his family pretty well, too. i am going to take some time off at the end of this week to hang out with them, maybe drive down to the beach for a day. tristan (the baby brother) has only been to the beach once in his life (when we took him), and he LOVES it. if only the remnants of dennis will go away and leave us alone...

i am thankful that unlike wendy, i don't have to stock up on pork products and gin when the (pseudo-)in-laws come! (wendy just survived a rather trying visit, and did so with humor and style and grace. her's has become one of my most favorite blogs.)

numero cinco--my friend tom is in town.
and that means sushi for dinner tonight! tom is one of my favorite people i have ever worked with. when i was working in tech support for this company, i actually started out LIKING my job, if you can believe that. i was working with tom and our friend chris, and it was fabulous! a blissful 3 months before all hell broke loose and never let me look back. but again, i digress. tom lives in PA now, but is in for a week of work here in RTP. we get to relive the time when we had tea together every morning for a whole week. :) yay for more friend time! tom, by the way, is the crassest person i ahve ever met. it's like his claim to fame. well, that and the fact that he is also one of the smartest people i know. miss the tom.

ok--that is SO enough rambling for now. i should go do some more work, although i swear, people--i am burned out today!

reading: The Time Traveler's Wife

The Time Traveler's Wife, by Audrey Niffenegger
this book is simply amazing. the plot is a bit of a mind-fuck, but seamless and totally original. the concept of involuntary time travel as a disease or a genetic mutation or the next step in the evolutionaly process is fascinating. the characters are real enough that they made me laugh and cry as though i knew them personally. audrey niffenegger's descriptions of people and places and events are very sharply visualized--i think it absolutely shows that she is an visual artist using words as a medium to paint a story. i have mental images of some of the events in this book that i know i will keep for a long, long time. and when nearing the end, i simply could not put his book down. i finished it at 2am this morning. i don't want to say a lot about this book's details--hard to talk abut it without giving things away. but i DO want all of you to read it. it's one of the best books i have read in years!

one side note: does anyone else find the book group questions they have stated including in the backs of books nowadays annoying? why is it that the publishers assume i can't understand this book well enough on my own to come up with decent discussion topics without being led into them by the nose?

fried on friday

this whole not-having-time-to-blog thing is getting old. i have been totally bogged down in the details of a conference i am planning for work. the conference is next week, so hopefully things will finally slow down a little bit. i can't wait to get it over with so i can get back to my normal work. don't get me wrong--i love planning a party, but this is whole week of meetings, with over half the attendees traveling and needing help with their travel arrangements, plus dinners and parties, trying to coordinate cars and transportation, and trying to come up with stuff for people to do in california where i don't live or know my way around all that well. it has been a TRIAL, and i am TIRED--whew!

at least i HAVE found time to knit a little bit this week. i am making progress on my crumpets top at last!!! check out the update i squeezed in over on the knit-along today. i think i have shown this top to anyone i can get to look at it. it's nice to be so excited about something i am making. :)

you, too, can be a statistic

i took this weblog survey at MIT because i am all for helping the scientists. these guys are trying to figure out how weblogs are changing the way we communicate, which i think is pretty interesting. if you are a weblogger yourself, go check it out! it only takes a few minutes. the bigger their sample, the better their study will be.

pearl

pearl and her kittens

my friend sonya's cat, pearl, had three wonderful kittens this past sunday. sonya is currently in norway, so i have been visiting these kitties all week long--they are so tiny and sweet that i just had to share them with the world! this picture is of the cat family on tuesday when the babies were a mere three days old. beautiful.
note: there are a few more pictures on flickr if you feel like checking them out--just click on the pic above.

pink martini

aimee, karen and jackie (and barney)

last weekend my girlfriends aimee and karen came to town to hang out. conveniently, this coincided with one of jason's game weekends up in pittsburgh, so we had the run of things all by ourselves.

aimee and karen stayed in this lovely B&B in our neighborhood--it was GORGEOUS, and they were both very pleased with it. i was pleased to finally be able to go inside this house--i have been dying to look inside it since we moved into the hood. and they were kind enough to let me come for breakfast on sunday--that was really nice.

pretty much, we ate, we shopped, we ate, we drank, and when we were done, we took some advil and then ate.

saturday night, we went to an outdoor symphony featuring pink martini, this FABULOUS orchestra from oregon. they are this fusion of classical, latin, swing, caberet, and torch style music. it was really really cool. (both of their CDs are on their website in their entirety--definitely worth checking out if you feel like listening to a little music.) luckily my friend tina from work was there and had a table with extra seats--she totally saved us!!! we had lawn seats, and we went at a normal pre-concert time thinking that would be fine--little did we know that people apparently show up in the early afternoon to stake out their spots on the lawn. it was PACKED! so--thank goodness for tina who called me to offer up her table for us to share. it was AWESOME--we ate cheese, drank wine, and everyone made fun of me for bringing real dishes and cloth napkins. what can i say? i like a special occasion to be special.

i took karen and aimee to my favorite restaurants and bars around town, and that was all good. unfortunately, we are apparently not too old to be hit on by morons in bars. while we were talking among ourselves, sipping pink martinis and smoking cigars, a couple of STUPID guys utterly intruded upon us! they would not leave no matter how mean we were, and they were generally doing their best leech impersonations for half the night. they made fun of where we went to school--we made fun of their cheap wattered-down scotch. when we finally got rid of them, we walked back to my house and sat up half the night on the porch talking and drinking vanilla almond martinis made by yours truly. MUCH better!

all in all, a great but exhausting weekend. makes me wish more of my girlfriends lived closer. *sigh*

yuck yuck yuck

i have lots of nice and happy and fabulous things to blog about, but right now i am too depressed. i just had to call a woman and tell her that her missing cat is dead. blah. i wish i hdan't even seen the poor kitty, who was hit by a car last friday night, right in front of this woman's house. i am filled with sadness for her. she cried. i cried. not a good way to start the day.

blah.

i will blog about something better later, i promise.

hippie's last day

today was the hippie's last day at the company where we met and where both of us work. worked. well--I still work there. anyway...

he is going to work for his previous employer and will finally get back to doing work he loves, which is terribly exciting. plus this new place is only 5 miles from the current one, which means i can still see him for lunch. yay! the sad part is that we have been commuting together, and now we really won't be able to. plus, it has been kind of nice having him so close by during the day, even if we don't really hang out much at work. still--these are small sacrafices to make for having him in a position where he is going to be so much happier. and hopefully this will mean the end of the 100+ hour work weeks he has been faced with for the past few months--personally, i am tired of those! and whatever else happens, he now has two blissful weeks of unemployment ahead with a job waiting on the other side: bliss. and he gets to start it off with a game weekend with his boys, so double and tripple yay for the hippie!

love you hippie! congratulations!

new blog

i started a new blog today to go along with my new resolution to try to lose some weight. not my first such resolution by any stretch, but i am hoping this one will stick. i started to keep this new blog unpublished and to myself, but i figure--what the hell--a little support from those of you guys who are interested can't hurt the cause. if you are so inclined, check out southern fried fat. if you are not interested--no worries--that's why i made it into a separate entity to begin with. either way--wish me luck!

reading: Assassination Vacation

Assassination Vacation, by Sarah Vowell
fabulous! this is the first book i have truly enjoyed in a long while. whether you are a history buff or not (i am not!), sarah vowell makes it all extremely interesting. she is witty and sarcastic and political, and while you may not agree with all her views, she will definitely make you think. further, she will also make you laugh. basically, she took herself on a little tour of the people and places associated, even very loosely, with the assassinations of presidents lincoln, mckinley, and garfield. she went everywhere and wrote about everything. as much of the book is about her experiences in all these historical locations as is about the history itself. i was amused the whole time, and i learned a TON about these presidents and their assassins. any writer who can pull THAT off is, in my opinion, a great one. i can't wait to check out her other books! bottom line: HIGHLY recommended.

note: sarah vowell is also a contributing editor on this american life, a frequent contributor to salon.com and mcsweeny's, and the voice of violet parr in the pixar movie, the incredibles.

yarn sale!

haul from the yarn sale

my LYS had a GREAT sale a couple of weeks ago, and check out my haul! all of this yarn was about a hundred bucks, and covers at least ten christmas presents--excellent! i bought some stuff for which i have plans, some i don't have a clue what i will do with, and a lot of high quality orphan singles to use for small projects (a one skein wonder, perhaps?) and/or trimming. it's kind of silly how excited i get over new craft supplies--makes me feel like an actual real knitter.

scout sleeping on my knitting

meanwhile, this picture of scout was too amusing and too typical of cats not to share. i finished knitting this blue, soon-to-be-felted bag, laid it out on the couch, turned my back for all of two seconds, and scout immediately turned it into a temporary cat bed. what is it with cats and the need to be on the new thing, whatever that may be? maybe it is as the hippie says, and all cats are Bad Cats. good thing they are so cute, even when they are being bad. :)

blossom

gardenia

the winter before last, i took the pruners to these two enormous bushes beside our front porch. no one had trimmed them at all in at least ten years, and they were not only tangled together, but they were also ugly, leggy, and taller than the house. so i decided to cut them way way back to see what happened--if they didn't make it, i would just pull them out and put something new in. against all advice, i cut them back to about 1/6 of their original heights, shaped them up, and waited. (i also pulled my back in the process and could hardly walk for 2 months, but that is another story. let's just say i should have either gotten a better tool (read: chainsaw) or some help (read: hippie), but i am stubborn and was determined to do it myself (read: moron). but anyway...) so that spring, they leafed out a little, but looked crappy, and i thought they would not make it. but i am a hopeful person, so i just left them alone--this spring, i didn't even trim them.

well--last night i was watering all the outside plants (which took like 40 minutes!), and i kept getting these faint whiffs of gardenia. and i was like--WHERE is that coming from? i followed the smell, and lo and behold--my gardenia is blooming! and not just a little--it is full and bushy and COVERED in beautiful, sweet-smelling blossoms! it is still in need of a little shaping, and it is still all entangled with the other bush, which is also blooming. but man--it was such an unexpected treat! i cut one and brought it into the house, and now my whole kitchen smells like gardenias. yay for blossoms! :)

rant: wolf camera

one of my goals for saturday (in addition to cleaning the world) was to get prints made of some pictures from the beach from a couple of years ago. they are specific pictures, long planned for this extremely cool frame from pottery barn that the hippie gave me for christmas. so i put the pictures on the SD card in my fabulous phone, and i take it with me on a target run so i can make prints there. but NOOOOOOO! target is upgrading their photo equipment and i am DENIED!

so. we get home, walk up to the local wolf camera, go over to the digital photo printing kiosk, put the card in, pick the images i want to print, and click "print." seems simple enough, right? then i take the receipt up to the guy at the counter, but the register isn't working. in fact, NONE of the registers are working. so we wait while they reboot their system. then the guy takes the receipt, and prints out a different receipt and hands it to me. and i am like--but where are the prints? and he is all, "these will be ready at 6." so, i am wondering WHY he can't walk to the back and get them out of the printer--i mean, they ARE digital media and not actual film to be developed, and i did click "print," which you would THINK would PRINT the pictures--but whatever--we leave. at 6:15, we come back. they are CLOSED. they closed AT SIX. so i ask you--what the fuck? and are they open on sunday??? NOOOO! so yeah. i STILL don't have pictures for my frame. i guess i will try to make it there before they close today. anyway--this is my second bad experience at wolf camera, which appears to be run by morons and provide bad, but very expensive service. ugh!

slow day at the office

after the last two work weeks being absolutely full throttle, today is actually kind of boring. i have a few things to do, but nothing earth-shattering. my bosses are at a conference in a different time zone, all tied up in meetings and out of touch with me--thus, i have little to do. i am just keeping on top of things and trying not to mourn the fact that i am not home knitting. adding to the boredom, the sam has deserted me to go home to her 'rents this week, leaving me without the running YM conversation that keeps me going throughout the day. *sigh*

all that said, once i make it through the long afternoon ahead, i have something fabulous to look forward to! our friend mary is flying in tonight! YAY! she is just one of the most awesome people on the planet, and i LOVE it when she comes to stay. her birthday was last week, so we are taking her out to frazier's tonight to celebrate. whoo hoo!

this weekend, we ran about 9M errands, and i FINALLY found the time to clean the beejezus out of the house. i finished the massive overhaul and re-org of all the bookshelves, and believe me--this is no small undertaking at our house. it took all my evenings for a solid week! we bought a new shelf for the DVDs, so even those are organized. (alphabetizing! my favorite!^*) even the tufts of cat hair blowing all over the place are minimized.

odd how much some cleaning can lift my spirits. i have been a little stressed lately, and i tend to nest when stressed out. there is actually a lot going on, but i am not at liberty to discuss it on the internet yet. it's all out of my control, so i think i have just been focussing on the things i CAN control--i.e., the house. i have not even had time to knit as i have been cleaning everything in the world instead.

man, i am boring today! maybe i should have called this post, "slow day on the blog." i promise to get back to normal and to come up with something more interesting to talk about in the very near future.
*not really...

geeks are better...duh

who doesn't know this already? apparently things i have known for years are now being validated in the news. check out this article: nerds make better lovers. while i dislike the implication in this article that nerds are "less-than-perfect male specimens," and that they are "grateful for what they can get," i DO agree that they are fabulous and awesome and that a geeky man is the best companion a girl could ask for. i sure do love mine, anyway...

never enough days at the beach

beach umbrella

week before last, we were at the beach. and yes--it has taken me this long to get around to writing about it. i have been so freakin' busy catching up from being gone a week, i haven't had time to do much of anything personal since we got back. i am getting back into my groove now, though--this promises to be a really long post.

bananas foster

meredith and i cooked a lot over the course of the week, as we always do. we kind of trade off being each other's sous chef. it's amazing how much we eat and how little we end up spending on it! we spent more on the three times we ate out than we did on the food for the whole rest of the week. for breakfast we had french toast, shrimp and grits, scrambled eggs and thyme with bacon and cheese grits, etc. for dinners, we went all out. we had a beer-boiled shrimp night, a grilled tuna night, a mahi mahi tacos night, a pasta night with lots of fresh shellfish cooked in white wine and lemon... we also made strawberry rhubarb pie, and little key lime pies, and the highlight of all the desserts, the dessert we got to set on FIRE: bananas foster! meredith and i read all these safety precautions, made fun of people who need safety precautions in the kitchen, and then proceeded to follow NONE of them. the heat from the fire actually blew my hair back! it's hard to tell in this picture, but my arm is actually IN the fire. stupid? maybe. fun? yes. will we do that again? DEFINITELY.

hippie chillin' on the deck

the hippie spent the week either working or hanging out smoking ceegars on the deck with grant and brent and jeff and chad. he's so cute when he's all laid back and chillin'--i could just eat him up! but i digress... those boys went through about 4 bottles of scotch and a couple of bottles of whiskey as well. meredith and i forewent that for some pineapple infused vodka martinis (from last month's bon appetit). the vodka took a couple of days to make, but it was damned fine in the end. and our drinks were absolutely GORGEOUS--isn't that what really counts?

ella in her li'l critter hat

i did a little knitting at the beach, even though i STILL have not gotten started on the crumpets top. i DID manage to whip out this little pink critter hat for ella, using yarn i found for less than two dollars in a really random craft store the hippie and i stumbled across while out shopping for his new kite. the hat came out really cute, fit her perfectly (i totally guessed!), and turned out to be a good idea, as it was pretty chilly on the boat when we went sailing--she wore the hat the whole time. :)

left to right: grant, brent, meredith,
ella, jeff, carrie, jackie, jason, chad

the requisite group shot of the group as we are sailing back into the harbor at beaufort after going on a sunset sail. yes, meredith is actually driving the boat! this has become such a tradition for us. this is the 6th year that we have managed to go on vacation together. some have not made it every year, but meredith, jeff, grant, and i have gone every time. i hope we are still going in 30 years, when the kids are having kids. i love these people so much--they are, as meredith said, part of our chosen family. what a fabulous week--i wish we had stayed longer...

there are a ton of pictures in the new gallery the hippie made on our web server--check them out here.

30-minute dinner for two: mediterranean chicken stew

dinner ingredients:
mediterranean chicken stew

voilá--to make amends for being away so long, i offer you 30-minute dinner #2: mediterranean chicken stew. this recipe is something i whipped up on the fly when we were hardcore into the south beach diet. yes--it's healthy and yes--you can even eat this during the first phase of the diet. it's also awfully tasty and quick to make. and the big bonus is that this meal is all cooked in a single pan--just say yes to easy clean-up!

INGREDIENTS

• 1 whole boneless chicken breast (or two split breasts--same thing)
• 1 large clove of garlic
• 2 stalks of celery
• about 1/3 of a large yellow onion
• olive oil
• 1 cup dry white wine
• 1 small (14.5 oz.) can of peeled, whole tomatoes
• 1 can of artichoke hearts
• 3 sprigs of fresh thyme
• 3 sprigs of fresh rosemary
• 1 fresh bay leaf or 3 dried ones
• 10-12 stalks of asparagus
• 1/2 a lemon
• salt and fresh black pepper to taste

DIRECTIONS

food prep first: cut the chicken into 1-inch pieces, slice the celery stalks into 1/2-inch slices, and sliver the onion. next drain the artichoke hearts, cut each in half, and set aside. pour 2-3 tablespoons of olive oil into a large skillet for which you have a lid. add the garlic through a press and heat on med-high heat until the oil is hot. add the chicken and quickly stir so that each piece is coated with olive oil. immediately add celery and onion and sautee until the chicken is slightly browned on all sides, about 2 minutes. add white wine and crush tomatoes into the pan with your hands. (note: you can also used diced tomatoes if you prefer--i did tonight because that is what i happened to have on hand.) stir and bring to a boil. add artichoke hearts (progresso is my preferred brand--again, not what i had on hand tonight), thyme, rosemary, bay leaves, and some fresh black pepper. reduce heat to low/medium, cover, and let simmer for about 13 minutes. meanwhile cut asparagus into bite sized pieces. after 13 minutes, add asparagus to the pan and continue cooking, covered, for about 5-6 more minutes. remove from heat and sqeeze the lemon into the stew. remove the herbs and add salt and pepper to taste.

when not south beaching, the hippie and i eat this with some hard crusty bread, preferably someting with rosemary in it, like the rosemary demi-batard we got from whole foods for tonight. it's also good with some fresh parmesan shredded on top. i recommend serving this stew with a light red wine such as sogno divino montepulciano d'abruzzo from italy, which is a mere $8.50 a bottle at our local wine store.

not dead yet...

man, i haven't posted in forever, and this post promises to be REALLY lame. i was planning to post from the beach, but that never quite came together. and since i got home, i have been going full throttle at work trying to catch up from being gone for a whole week. for now, suffice it to say that the beach was fabulous, that pictures are coming, and that i will be posting again very, very soon. right now, however, i have to go fold some laundry and roll up a bunch of change. can you hear the excitement in my voice? can you?!