See's Situation

It's not as dire as it seems. There was a big sign on the door that said just that particular store is closed. I can't make excuses to run over there on my lunch hour. The ones at the malls are still open.

I hate the mall and the idea of having to make a special trip just to get my See's fix disgruntles me. Plus if See's would have told me they were closing I would have stocked up.

That's a little bit of a joke because I have a few nuts and chews at the office plus 2 1lb Valentine's boxes (1 - milk chocolate , 1 - assorted) which I have to share with Bob. Plus I have a 1 lb box of truffles that I'm going to take to the office because the nuts and chews are getting so low. You thought I was kidding when I said I cried.

I don't eat chocolate every day or even every week. But when I want it, I want it. And it has to be good.

And speaking of chocolate, when I got to the grocery store last night I was thrilled to see that Cadbury Eggs are out. I bought one big one and a packet of a dozen little ones.

It's too early for wine (I'm typing this in the morning) but I put this bottle in the picture to keep the theme going. I'm going to see Kimberlee the massage therapist today and I'm giving it to her because it's Kimberly's Reserve. And also very delicious.

See's Candy downtown closed!

I cried when I saw the empty store.

We were just there the week before Valentine's Day. There was a line out the door and we all got a free chocolate. Even me and I went to wait outside because it was so crowded.

Sleepless in Vancouver

Remember when I was learning Illustrator? From this post it looks like it was in 2006. I haven't improved a bit.

That's one of the things on my list every weekend, to do a few tutorials and refresh my skills. I never get to it. An experienced Illustrator person could probably have made the above in 3 seconds. It took me about 15 minutes. Not bad.

I didn't sleep well Sunday or Monday night. Last night my eyes were drooping by 7pm but I bravely kept the light on until 9pm and then passed out the second my head hit the pillow. I still feel sorta wonky.

On Monday one of my headlights went out. My car is an 01 with 85K miles on it and it feels like all the pieces are breaking off. I think the windshield washer fluid thingy is leaking since I've never added washer fluid since owning the car and this is the third time the light has come on in three months. I don't want to spend another day + sitting around with my car in the shop and paying a couple hundred bucks for something stupid.

But I do want to take care of the headlight. I only drive to and from the park and ride which equals about 15 minutes a day but it's all in the dark

I'm dreading going back to Toyota because I complained about my last service. And my service contact called me about my complaint and he was very nice and apologetic. He also told me that he had zero recollection of my service problem (the one where I dropped off a drive-able car on Tuesday morning and never heard a peep about when it would be done and both me and my husband called them at least twice a day and then they called us Friday at 4pm and told us we could come get it) and they didn't like to have unhappy customers. Is that supposed to make me feel better?

Lie. Tell me it was miscommunication about the part and they thought they had it but they didn't and then their phones went out when the space ship landed and they couldn't call me. And their memories were wiped so they didn't remember later. I don't want to go in there and have them be all phony nice about replacing a headlight.

I am not much of a poetry person but I love this poem by Sherman Alexie: Unkissed.

It always cracks me up when actors are complimented on their courage. Like it takes courage to get a bazillion dollars to go to work where someone else dresses them and does their hair and brings them coffee and tells them how great they are. Then they pretend using lines someone else wrote.

Vancouver Lake and Powerlines

How come I can't make biscuits?

Unless I pop them out of a can. If you can pop them out of a can, how hard can it be?

I had a great recipe with buttermilk and I totally followed the directions. And the FLAT butter crackers that emerged were so embarrassing that I was too ashamed to take a photo. I ate 5 of them.

This was a big writing weekend which was unfortunately, not brilliantly productive. Today I gave myself a productivity goal instead of a time goal.

A time goal is when I say I'm going to keep my butt in the chair until x o'clock.

A productivity goals is when I say I'm going to keep my butt in the chair until I reach a million pages. Or, a million words. Or whatever the actual goal is.

The productivity goal keeps me honest when I'm distracted. It was a harrowing day. By 5pm my head hurt and my eyeballs were screaming for mercy. But I made the goal.

I told Bob I didn't want to spend 4 hours watching the Oscars but I keep running out in the other room to see what's going on. I thought they were streamlining the thing. It took 20 minutes to give out the first acting award. It was like a giant never-ending group hug. Like actors don't get enough love.

Future Tulips and Daffodils

I had some crocus (Remember that band Krokus? They had a hit "Screaming in the Night"? I'm going to see if I can find that on my iPod) that I bought specifically because they come early and are a tiny bit of color in the sea of bland. I saw them starting to peek out last weekend and when I checked them this morning, they were gone. Never even bloomed. Must be damn squirrels.

I wish I could put today in a bottle and take it out every February at this time. I dug around in the yard for a couple of hours. I cleaned up some stuff that I never finished in the fall and dug up some weeds.

We have a big compost bin and I have no formal procedure but every few years I empty it out into the garden. Not a moment too soon. That thing was so heavy I had to scoop out several shovels full before I could even move it to the garden. It smelled partly rich and composty and partly nasty badass. Lots of wiggly worms.

I think it's going to be decent tomorrow so I can work some more. It's nice to have a little bit of a head start on the garden in February.



Future Hyacinth

We've been getting these notices of doom from Comcast about how we need new equipment because it's the dawn of a new era and the frequency is changing or whatever. I think it's all a scam to make people pay for more stuff.

I read through the notice but I was confused because we already have digital cable. Comcast bills us for that. Wouldn't they know that we already had digital cable? I looked the pictures of the stuff we can get for our TV and it looked different that what we have.

So do we need new equipment or not?

I called the magical phone number of information and it's a scary recording with a lady that sounds like that generic lady on the Simpsons. And she wants me to say what I want instead of just pressing 1 for "I want someone to answer my questions." And scary recording lady wants to know what equipment I have so she can figure out if we need new equipment.

Funny, because that's why I'm calling her. I asked to speak to a real person and she offered to transfer me to my account executive. HA HA. You mean a person at a call center? And the real person asked me how many TVs I had without digital cable boxes. I said, None. She said, then I don't need to worry about it.

And that is why Comcast has not taken over the world.

I did something I haven't done in eons and I bought a computer game over the weekend. It's called World Of Goo. I decided to get based on this review and viewing a demo. As has been well documented here, I'm not looking for any more things to waste time on the computer, but every once in awhile I think it's a good idea to break out of my fortress of no distractions and try something new.

I'm not sorry. It has cute music and graphics and I had a great time figuring out the first two levels. That's right, I'm already stuck after 15 minutes of play. Only about 85 more levels to go. I really don't understand what's happening but I drag and click on the goo balls until they make that squealing-laugh sound like either Jawas or Ewoks. I think I unlocked another window where I could buy something. I'm not sure.

Recommended.

Last week I had drafted a joke post where I ordered up a sunny and 50 degree day on the weekend from Mother Nature so I could enjoy some time digging outside. Mother Nature responded by mocking me for asking. I never posted it.

This morning I woke up to rain clicking against the window but it all went away and by afternoon I saw bright sunlight coming from the window. Of course by that point, I had finally reeled my butt in and was focused on writing and related. I looked out the window and thought, "I don't feel like going outside right now." But it's February. And it's sunny. And it's 50 degrees. What kind of moron wouldn't go outside? (Aside to You-Know-Who: well, other than you.)

I had a wonderful couple of hours, whacking back the roses (the photo is from last year and from a neighbor's house) and pulling out dead stuff.

Now I'm back in and trying to get focused on the writing and related and not interested. I'm going to do my 500 words and start dinner and later I'm going to watch some shows. The only Friday show I've seen so far is Dollhouse and first impression: disappointing but it has potential. I liked the part where Helo had his shirt off.

The Wrap Up

When I was checking out at Trader Joe's the guy made fun of me buying this healthy cereal. "I'm sure it will be great," he said sarcastically. Turns out, it's Sugar Smacks only with some flax thrown in. So it's like the cereal of our youth cleverly packaged so we can enjoy it as adults. Bob has already finished most of the box.

* * *

This day has been wonky so far. I did FINALLY finish a book.. But as per always I can't seem to get organized and I had some unexpected distractions today that I'd rather not go into. Tomorrow will be magical.

* * *

I love Demetri Martin's new show. I've got Dollhouse and Sarah Connor waiting on the DVR for after dinner.

* * *

Way back in the early days of the Internet I used to go through phases where I would compulsively subscribe to mailing lists and Usenet groups. My thinking would be I could scan through lots of things and find things I liked. Then I would get completely overwhelmed because I can't delete things I haven't looked at. That would be wrong. So eventually I would cut back to just one or two things I wanted to keep up with (e.g. alt.tv.xfiles or whatever it was called) and dump all the rest.

I am continuing this pattern with GoogleReader. I will subscribe to anything for at least 24 hours. At one point I subscribed to about 20 news sources and another 20 science sources. Plus any oddball sites that seemed promising. I subscribe to any blog if I know the person or strangers if I read two good posts in a row. Or anyone who leaves me comments. I've subscribed to Flickr feeds, Twitter feeds, comment feeds.

And then I get overwhelmed because I can't stop logging in to GR and making sure it says All Items (0). Damn inner overachiever, goodie-two-shoes, OCD dorkwad.

Last week I finally went through and vigorously pruned the list. And I've pruned in the past. I had several subscriptions that hugely overlapped and it would get annoying seeing the same link to a youtube clip of a hamster juggling pancakes to the Darth Vader theme over and over. Honestly, 99% of the youtube clips embedded on websites are a total waste of time. People that I know and trust say: "Funniest thing I've ever seen," and I can't help it. I click and I last 12 seconds.

I am stepping away from the computer. I'm making Bob some beef for dinner with chocolate for dessert. That's how we do Valentine's Day at our house.

Not long ago I misplaced my lens cap again. Bob found it in the driveway.

I don't understand why they don't give you an extra lens cap with the camera.

They should sell them at Target in three packs and give them away free at restaurants in giant bowls next to the mints and toothpicks.

What I'm talking about when I say river bar.

Other people assembling office furniture.

Now I can't find my notes for my five second post this evening.

Very fun weekend hence not much sitting around the computer. My inbox is so depressingly full I'm considering nuking it and starting over.

When Mom and Dad are here we always have lots of fun adventures but never seem to get around to all the stuff we intend to do. Some things we did: tons of epic food, two excellent trips to downtown Portland to visit the new office and go to Powell's. Things we missed: international food marts, walk around the fort.

They headed out early today to beat the storm.



View of the new office with furniture.

I've been intending to write about about seeing Revolutionary Road a couple of weeks ago but I just can't seem to get to it. The short review is that I think the great acting and directing are distracting people from the idea that the story does not work. I do not recommend. Well, unless you like movies where you feel worse when you leave than when you went in.

I wanted to contrast that film with Wuthering Heights (09 Masterpiece Theater version) which I liked. I guess in tragedy it's hard to get away from the idea that the people act like idiots. But there is something compelling about Cathy and Heathcliff's passion. And I liked Heathcliff's sexy lips. I still haven't managed to finish the book. My book reading is appalling so far for 09.

The third film I was going to write about is Stranger Than Fiction with Will Ferrell and Emma Thompson which in summary sounds silly and shouldn't work but it's a very sweet and satisfying movie. I recommend.

I have another epic busy week. Half-assed posting, if any, will continue.

View from the office window

Quick Update

Busy week. Parts of it extremely not fun.

Insomnia! I haven't had sleeping issues since Clarion West last summer. Last night was night 4. woo!

Office is finally decorated. Photos to come.

Mom and Dad in town this weekend. Won't be computing much.

Dad's Workshop

I shook off my Saturday funk by making a brilliant dinner. The recipe was in the Oregonian but I can never find anything on their website. I found it on another site but the site had pop-up ads so I'm not going to send you there.

Here's the gist of it, it's really easy.

I used one of my pumpkins, I think the one on the far left. Don't use a jack-o-lantern pumpkin or you will be sorry. Those don't taste good. I think Cook's Illustrated did similar recipe with butternut squash.



I chopped it in half and saved all the seeds for the garden. I chopped it into more manageable pieces, peeled and put them in a giant roasting dish. I added some shallots sliced chunkily and some fresh sage leaves. A half handful?

Then I drizzled with olive oil, sprinkled with some salt and freshly ground pepper and roasted it in the oven at 450 degrees. Usually when I roast things it takes much longer than the directions say but this time was right on: 30 minutes. About halfway through I shook the pan around a bit.

At this point, the dish is completely delicious but if you want to take it to the next level. Boil up some pasta and crumble some goat cheese. Mix the roasted pumpkin with the drained pasta and goat cheese. I feel like I'm forgetting something but I think that's it. The recipe said to reserve some pasta water but mine dish didn't seem to need it.

My sweetheart is really easy to cook for and never says anything unkind about anything I make. If it's something he's not thrilled with he'll say something like, "Maybe this weekend we can try something not so lentil oriented."

He was a tad skeptical watching me shovel pumpkin chunks into the pasta and said he was still a little full from lunch and why don't I give him a small serving. HA! He totally went for seconds.