Why Not?

cough

2007-03-28T15:18:00.000-06:00

Last night I was choked in turns with a plastic bag, a leather jump rope, and a club. The plastic bag really stuck to my neck, making it difficult to get my fingers underneath it, but it made rustly noises, so it's not really a weapon of stealth. The leather jump rope was pretty awesome. It hugs the neck all the way around, cutting off both air and blood. Doesn't work well in a noose, though; there's too much friction to get a tight seal that way. The club was pretty rough on the trachea, (I kept feeling like I had to cough for a few hours afterwards), but it did nothing to my blood supply and, as a long, stiff object, was much more easily controlled than the flimsier devices. Best scenario: Lying on my back, someone sitting on me and choking me with the club. Very easy to get out of. Worst scenario: Lying on my stomach, arms pinned to my side, being choked with the jump rope. There's just not a lot you can do, and very little time to do it in.

Round Two comes tomorrow. I love self-defense week in karate.

Inspector Hellacious Crumsteen

2007-03-12T10:29:00.000-06:00

My success has been noted on my record. I have 3 more cases to solve before I will receive my next promotion.

I have been having the best time playing old Carmen Sandiego games! I downloaded Where in the World, but then I realized I never actually played that one. So I downloaded Where in the USA and have been having a grand old time with all the nostalgia. It asks you to find the last bold-faced word on page x from the manual, though, in order to be promoted, so for my first promotion I just guessed and put peanut. It worked! I thought I was magical and psychic. Then for my second promotion, peanut also worked so I concluded that the game was just lenient. I've been using peanut for all my promotions since.

I tried downloading Where in Time, because that was my favorite, with the awesome Chronoskimmer and coffee machine, but I could only find a Commodore 64 version. I got the emulator and everything, and I could play the first part, but then it died when it told me to put in disk B. I'll have to figure that out.

I tried to find Gold Rush as well, but I haven't been successful yet. If anyone knows where I can get that, I will pay you in actual gold. That game is my childhood.

Don't walk on the grass, Jerrod!

Hello again

2007-02-09T21:00:00.000-07:00

Wow, I haven't updated since August? Oh man, all sorts of cool things have happened since then! In Sep/Oct I went to Germany and Czech Republic.

Click for Prague joy-->

In November I hosted my very first Thanksgiving. In December I had a raging Christmas party. In January... hmm, well maybe January was dull. But in February, I got my ear pierced by a woman who had diamonds coming out of her cheekbones. I mean really, how does one do that? (Apparently, subdermal anchors.)

So I won't promise you that I'll write more, because yeah yeah, I say that and then I don't do it and everyone hates a liar. And I'd rather have you all hate me for being boring rather than for being deceptive.

But what's going on with me recently? I had a good karate class on Thursday. I went to the early and late class because I had to make one up. I pretty much sucked in the first class. I was doing things wrong, easy things, and I could tell my instructors were thinking, "What the hell is wrong with her? This is the easy class!" Every ten minutes one would come up to me saying, "Try this." "Slow down, try this." "Ok, just do this." With undertones of "For the love of god, chick, get it together." It was fairly humiliating. But I thought about everything that had been said to me, processed it in the fifteen minute break, and did much, much better in the second class. Night and day difference; I was really proud of what I accomplished. And you know what the kicker is? The woman giving me all the advice wasn't even there for the second class! So she went home thinking I was a total schmuck! But that's ok, because I know that I did well, and in the end, isn't that the most important thing? The answer is... no.

I was close

2006-08-29T15:38:00.000-06:00

Twasn't my ACL, 'tis my MCL. (Medial as opposed to anterior) The doc said it didn't look serious so it should have healed up by now on its own. He said it may not have healed yet because it's being re-exacerbated. I said, "Hmmm, maybe by going to karate twice a week? After which it always feels even more sore?" (Hey doctor, it hurts when I move my arm like this.) So he told me what any schlub on the street could have told me for 5 cents. Take a break from karate! I'm going to stop going for about two weeks, and if my knee doesn't start to improve, they'll take a closer look. But the good news is that I can still start training for the triathlon with some gentle biking because it will keep my knee moving in a nice, straight plane. So I tried, Karen, but I guess I'm not backing out after all!

Well, maybe not...

2006-08-29T10:04:00.000-06:00

So as some of you may or may not know, I threw my back out the other week. By coughing. (Lame!) Well, I was out for over a week, went to the doctor, got some meds, and slowly healed up. So now I'm all better, right?

Except... my stupid knee got injured in karate a month ago and it's still giving me trouble. So even though I just went to the doctor and just got attitude from a nurse for my "narcotic" meds, now I'm going back to the doctor to say, "Uhhh, yeah.... now my knee hurts this time." I'm so getting red-flagged.

Well, I wouldn't be too worried about my knee since it doesn't really hurt that much, but it seems to be in my ACL area. And according to WebMD, if I leave any ACL injury untreated, I'll be a cripple for life. So I figure it's worth the $20 copay to get it checked. I'm just worried... if this really is one of those nasty, slow-healing joint things, I could be out of karate for a long time, and forget the triathlon. :(

I just got an appt for this morning, so I'll report back and let you know if the doctor said, "Bed rest for six months" or "Walk it off, you attention grubbing wuss." I'm hoping for the last one, even if it does mean I won't get a lollipop....

What have I done??

2006-08-28T11:10:00.000-06:00

Yesterday I promised Karen I would enter the Danskin Triathlon with her next July. Yes, me. Slugsly McGee. But I was intrigued because it sounded like something I could actually do. 5k run, 1/2 mile swim, 12 mile bike. I already know I can run 5k, though I might not enjoy it, and I can probably ride 12 miles, though I'll need a better bike. As for the swim, I've never tried that kind of distance before, but with gigantic feet like mine, how can I fail?

I suppose this means I have to start training now. Heh, training... cool. Makes me sound like an athlete. "Sorry, no refined sugar for me. I'm in training." "Excuse me while I hit the gym. I'm in training, you know."

I'll keep you posted on my progress. So far the only thing I know is I've run 2 miles in 20 minutes. Don't laugh... I can probably run it faster; I've just never tried. But now I suppose that time has come.

Pictures

2006-07-31T13:58:00.000-06:00

Now that I'm back in the swing of things, I've finally got some pictures to show you all! In late April, I headed out to California for Natalie's wedding. It was a gorgeous affair and Natalie looked like a pretty, pretty princess:

I also got to see the San Jose crew and spent a beautiful day hiking in the hills:

and hearing a bobophone concert:

Very shortly afterwards, I went to Oahu with the Kennedy clan. It was fantastic; Matt and I loved it there more than any other trips we've taken recently. We preferred the windward side to crowded Honolulu, though. Next time we plan to stay in a little beach cottage on the North Shore rather than in the big city.

Here's the Arizona Memorial in Pearl Harbor:

And here's Matt on the Missouri shooting down enemy aircraft (i.e. seagulls):

The best pictures are the ones Matt took and uploaded to Flickr. Check them out, you can see flesh-eating bacteria beaches and the giant sea turtle that bloodied Matt's leg. Plus a fantastic price on fungus. Here's the first photo, then click on the picture of me in the brown shirt in the top row and proceed thusly. For some reason the slideshow goes backwards otherwise, and then the humorous captions don't make sense.

And finally, on Memorial Day weekend, my mom and I walked the Bolder Boulder. It's like a mountainous Bay To Breakers, so of course we went in costume. We were dainty Victorian ladies, and the people around us were very envious of our parasols!

Why I Hesitate

2006-07-30T23:13:00.000-06:00

I haven't written in here for ages for one simple reason. There's just too much! How can I have a simple chat with you now when there's so much ground to cover? New houses, vacations, music, reunions to report on... There's too much pressure to provide details on everything that's happened since May, and it grows worse every day.

So, no updates. I'm just jumping back in. Maybe in time there will be news of the summer, but in the meantime I have only one thing to say. One no-pressure item, completely in passing, that will not set up a brick wall for future posts.

I spent $10 on a single vanilla bean today.

That's it! That's the update you've waited almost three months for. And though it was almost certainly not worth the wait, at least I can write again without that nagging obligation over my head.

The planets have aligned

2006-05-05T11:07:00.000-06:00

We're buying a house!!!! I'm just as shocked as you are. EIGHT DAYS we've been on the market and we've gotten two offers so far! They were both lowballs, but we're in the process of countering and working out something, because we found our own house to move into!!!

http://www.realtor.com/Prop/1058678258

Isn't it lovely? There aren't any interior pictures on Realtor, but I'll take my own as soon as we move in! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

What a difference!

2006-04-28T08:21:00.000-06:00

We're officially on Realtor.com! Here's our listing: http://www.realtor.com/Prop/1058963445?lnksrc=00045. Depending on when you read this, you may see either the old picture or the new picture of the deck. Check out the difference! It's all about marketability. (And flowers)

Before

After

We also took a better picture of the front of the house, with some actual blue sky and a better angle.

Before

After

So now that everything's as pretty as we can get it, it's time to sit back and wait....

House pictures!

2006-04-26T13:55:00.000-06:00

I'm just being downright chatty now, aren't I? Here are the pictures I took early this morning of the front and back yard. Guess which direction our house faces, with the brilliant back and the gloomy front... If it doesn't cost extra, I may take another front picture in the afternoon to get some more illumination.

By the way, check out the new stain-paint on the back deck. We decided it's either the color of peanut butter or butterscotch. Either way, I want to spread it on toast.

Template

2006-04-25T16:15:00.000-06:00

Does my new template make me look fat?

Food findings

2006-04-25T14:21:00.000-06:00

For the home cook, it is a glorious experience to start with a recipe or an idea, make some changes, add some ingredients, and improvise your way to something unexpectedly delicious, something that at first bite promises to become a staple in your repertoire. After so many average experiments, last night a keeper was born. Karen, I will describe it in extra detail for you, separated from your beloved kitchen as you are.

Chop two slices of bacon and drop them into a skillet over medium heat. Relish the delicious smell of rendering fat. Add half a chopped onion and one minced clove of garlic, listening to the intoxicating crackle as it hits the pan. Sautee until soft and golden and oh so fragrant. Add a splash of balsamic vinegar and cook until the vapor turns from assaultive to sweet. Chop three fresh, ripe tomatoes and stir into the onion mixture. Add about a quarter cup of water, bringing the pan to a soft simmer for five minutes. Lick the delicious sauce off your spatula when no one is looking. Sprinkle in some fresh torn basil leaves and allow yourself one more taste before continuing. Crack four fresh eggs directly atop the bubbling sauce and cover the pan with a glass lid. Watch as the clear whites turn milky in the heat, mingling with the sweet red tomato juices and the golden brown bacon. After five minutes, when the whites have just been poached firm, uncover the pan and spoon the eggs and sauce into two wide bowls. Sprinkle lightly with shredded cheese, which will melt into gooey perfection. Pick up your bowl, inhale the aroma, pierce the yolk with your fork and let it run in a yellow river before taking your first satisfying bite.

The End

Movin' on up

2006-04-25T14:04:00.000-06:00

Hello, my neglected blog readers. I bet you're tired of seeing that same scone staring at you every time you open the page. Well, no pictures in this installment, but there may be soon. Matt and I are putting our house on the market tomorrow and will be moving into our forever-house as soon as it sells. (Hopefully in the summertime.) No more sharing a wall with neighbors! No more vacuum sitting in the middle of the floor because there's no closet! We'll have a fireplace! A linen closet! A basement! A kitchen with more than two drawers! Paint on the walls! A tree in the backyard! It will be fan-freaking-tastic, and I can't wait.

Tomorrow we have to take pictures of the front and back yards, then we can officially go on the market. We were SUPPOSED to have that done already, and we spent a lot of time making the yards lovely with new flowers over the weekend, but yesterday the weather decided that the 70s are boring and that it wanted to SNOW. On my brand new flowers!! Poor little things didn't have a chance. I protected all the ones in planters in my garage, but I'm afraid the ones in the ground are goners. So tomorrow morning I'll take a picture of their frozen flower corpses and hopefully they'll still look colorful enough. When our house is on Realtor.com I'll share the link, and you all can look at it and lie and say you'd buy it in a second and we'll be sure to get an offer soon.

Tea Report

2006-03-26T15:14:00.000-07:00

I put on afternoon tea yesterday for my mom and Matt. I had intended to take pictures at the time of the lovely spread, but I got too preoccupied with the procedure and then the chowing down. So I've photograped the leftovers and a historic recreation of the place setting. I put on the tea as an exercise in cake-producing and occasion-managing for my possible future pastry career. Well, the tea was lovely and everyone enjoyed themselves, but I learned that I have a LOT to learn still.

Currant Cream Scones with Orange Blossom Honey Butter and Boysenberry Preserves

Currant Cream Scones: I got this recipe out of The New Best Recipe, a cookbook from Cooks Illustrated magazine. They were pretty good; nice and sconey with a lightly browned top and soft interior. They were weren't very sweet or flavorful, but the cookbook said that was the style of British scones. They're more of a plain base for sweeter toppings, as opposed to American scones which are eaten plain and are therefore more stand-alone flavorful. I think next time I'll use the follow-up recipe, Cakey Scones,which contains an egg and will probably make it more... well... cakey.

Orange Blossom Honey Butter: From Cooking Light magazine, although there's nothing light about it. Honey, butter, and both lemon and orange zest. Simple and absolutely divine!! The only downside was it was a bit runnier and sweeter than I was hoping, but a reduction of the honey to butter ratio will solve that in the future.

Boysenberry Preserves: Smuckers. Shhhh.

Caramel Cookies

This deceptively simple recipe came from Bon Appetit. It was difficult to make and required one throw-out/start-over, and the cookies themselves have been schizophrenic. Fresh out of the oven, delicious! Soft texture, rich flavor, darn good cookie. By tea time, I had a plate of caramel paving stones. However, my guests were gracious enough to dip them in their hot tea and call them perfect dunking cookies. Then the following morning, when I expected them to be even harder than ever, they'd resoftened in the night! So I'm not sure what to make of these possessed cookies. I still haven't decided if they deserve a spot in the recipe box yet. Better eat some more.... *munch munch munch*

Tea Sandwiches

Smoked Salmon and Cucumber with Dilled Cream Cheese: Not bad, but not particularly good, either. I blame the salmon. It was very, very salty and kind of mushy. Next time I'll find a better brand. The dilled cream cheese was scrumptious, though.

Curried Egg Salad: Delicious!! Mango chutney and curry and onions and cumin and yuminess. That was one of my favorites. It was just a little wet for a tea sandwich; it oozed a bit out of the edges. So I'll have to tone down the liquid in the future, but otherwise it's a keeper.

Petit Fours

Lemon cake layered with lemon buttercream and fresh strawberry marmalade: Wonderful as a cake, not as a petit four. It was a mega-four. A monstro-four. I layered it too high, I cut it too big, and I certainly shouldn't have used fresh fruit, which made it lumpy and unstable. But I really couldn't get that upset about it because it tasted so good. So I'm saving the recipe for a future full-size cake, but I'll have to find something else for petit fours. And do you know how hard it is to make a straight line of piped icing on the top? If you move too slowly, the icing squiggles up. If you move too fast, the string breaks. My decorations were certainly... rustic. But like I said, it's hard to get upset when it tastes good, so I'll just have to keep practicing!

Billion dollar idea

2006-03-20T11:11:00.000-07:00

Transparent cats.

That way, when they lie on your reading material, you can continue reading and still let them think they've won.

Eh? EH?

My cupcakes are ruined

2006-03-17T18:11:00.000-07:00

I'm miserable. My happiness is dependent on the success of my baked goods, and both are a crumbled mess.

Olympic Hopefuls

2006-02-21T09:28:00.000-07:00

On Saturday, my mom and I had a lovely time ice skating! Never mind the fact that it was record-breakingly cold. We made plans to skate, and skate we did! It took a bit to get used to the skates, but we were soon flying around and performing magnificent tricks, as you can see below:

(Check out my swirly ice circles!)

It would have been a bit more atmospheric during the Christmas season, when they were playing old-fashioned carols. (In February, they go back to 80's songs from Footloose and Dirty Dancing.) But the outdoor rink was still cute and scenic in the middle of historic Old Town Louisville. It was worth the 7 degrees!

Practice makes... better, at least

2006-02-21T09:17:00.000-07:00

I've been going to the Fado sessions fairly regularly now, once every or every other week. And I'm getting better! It's amazing! Last night, the first song I sat down for, I'd never heard it before and I played the whole thing! It was crazy. Usually I just move my fingers around the way I think they should go, trying to imitate what I hear, and it takes me a lot of false tries to find the right melody. But this time, I got it right on! Plus, one of the guys at the session gave me a big songbook of all the most commonly played reels. All I have to do is play through those a few times on my own, get a good feel for them, and I'll be made in the shade. There is nothing in the world like playing music in a group! And now that I can play more confidently, all the better. :)

Lighten Up

2006-02-15T16:47:00.000-07:00

Ok, enough with the emotional/inspirational posts. Try taking this test! Programming Language Inventor or Serial Killer? I got a 7/10.

Poem

2006-02-15T13:29:00.000-07:00

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.
We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?
Actually, who are you not to be?
You are a child of God.
Your playing small does not serve the world.
There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you.
We are all meant to shine, as children do.
We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us.
It is not just in some of us; it is in everyone.
And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.
As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.

--Marianne Williamson "Our Greatest Fear"

This was our final reading in the Streetwize course. Just excise the god parts and I love the message.

The Z is for Zanchin

2006-02-14T22:00:00.000-07:00

I've just completed Streetwize, a self-defense course at my dojo, Way of the Crane. It was an amazing, moving experience that I'm still on a high from. The course was three days of training, and then tonight was graduation. The first day was the most meaningful to me. Since I've been a karate student for over three years now, I was already familiar with most of the techniques, but the first day was about the mental aspect of self-defense. About the people who try to intimidate you, put you down, manipulate you, take advantage of you... and about why we let them. Being very shy and afraid of conflict, this was the most valuable thing for me to learn about. (I hear you out there... "Shy? Christine?" Well, be happy, because if you've never seen me shy and meek that means I love you and am comfortable with you.)

The next two days were about the basic self-defense techniques: how to get out of chokeholds, collar grabs, pins, etc. It wasn't new for me, but damn how I do love it. I always feel like a puppy rolling around with its littermates. And I did learn a very valuable lesson in patience, how struggling wastes energy and how to save myself for the right window of opportunity to strike.

Graduation tonight was fantastic. We were to be jumped by six of the biggest, toughest karate students and fight them off using what we'd learned. I was so nervous, even though it's something I've done plenty of times before. But it just felt different. When it was my turn, I used what I'd learned. I didn't struggle; if I didn't have any openings, then I waited calmly while my attackers thrust my legs apart and said terrible things to me. And when it was time, POW! Right in the kisser. I even had a wicked awesome move where I managed to swing my leg up and over the guy pinning me and kick him in the head. That was sweet.

So after an exhilarating round of rough pins and grappling, and feeling pumped up and energized, the advanced students performed katas for us. It made my heart ache, it was so beautiful. Kata is the most gorgeous expression of movement; it is so full of grace and elegance and power. Going through the contrast of the visceral self-defense and the peaceful kata made me fall madly in love with karate all over again. I can't describe what it means to me, beyond the punches and the kicks and the hi-yas that everyone thinks of. All I can say is that it's truly an art form.

So after that wonderful experience, I just had to come tell my three loyal readers all about it. Now if you ever hear me complain about the warm-ups or about being tired, tell me to shut up and refer back to this post!

One year down!

2006-02-05T19:19:00.000-07:00

Today is the one year anniversary of my mom moving to Colorado. Huzzah!! And so far her only complaint has been "Not enough snow." Here is the celebratory "four seasons" cake that we enjoyed to commemorate the occasion:

One down, many more to go!

Pictures!

2005-12-27T22:54:00.000-07:00

I found my camera cable, so here are some pictures of life from the past month. (By the way, the Woman of the Incredibly Teased Hair didn't turn out well on my cell, so you'll just have to imagine the highest hair you've ever seen and triple it.)

Here's Matt's dad cutting down our Christmas tree in the woods. It was small, but it had character. And little pine cones.

Christmas and Elway, together at last.

Here's a dresser I got secondhand, which I jazzed up with fancy paper, drawer pulls, and a cat.

Here I am right after my blue belt test, still drunk off the blood of my enemies.

And here's a bruise I got in class that I'm particularly proud of. It transformed from a greenish blue into the lovely mauve you see now.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

2005-12-23T15:32:00.000-07:00

Evvvverywhere you go! I don't care if you're tired of Christmas music; I still like it. :p Well, I was going to include a picture of our Christmas tree, but I can't find my camera cable, so I'll just describe it. John Elway, old fashioned candy, the Death Star, a hula girl, a Romulan warbird, baby's first Christmas 1980, and the lunar lander.... It's the merriest tree you could ever have. Tonight we're going to my mom's to drive around and look at all the lights in the "country club" district. (Number of lights: 1,000,000 Number of houses NOT decorated by hired professionals: 0) Tomorrow, my mom's hosting Christmas Eve brunch and then Christmas Day will be at Matt's parents' house. I'd tell you all the cool things I got Matt, but he might peek, so I'll have to update you later. Then I'll also report whether or not there really is a pony under the tree for me.

In random news, I saw an old woman at the mall whose hair brought new meaning to the word "tease." It was literally standing on end, straight up in the air. And judging by her unashamed expression, I believe it was actually intentional. I had to take a surreptitious picture with my cell phone, but unfortunately, I can't put that on here either. You'll just have to trust me.

I'm learning my tunes!

2005-12-16T15:04:00.000-07:00

Gravel Walks:

0002100000010310001230120321031
0002100000010310001230120321031
0302010000103103020120321031
0302010000103101230123203210310

Da New Rigged Ship:

0233432023343201221232133
0233432023343201221232133
43202014320201432020143200
43202014320201432020143200

That's only about the first half of each song, but I'm getting there!

Saints be praised!

2005-12-14T12:10:00.000-07:00

All right, all right, I'm back. That's sweet, I didn't know that many people cared if I updated or not. So Merry Christmas everyone!

One of the most exciting things that happened to me recently is that I got my blue belt in karate. It's a huge turning point, a year and a half in the making, and it means all sorts of new, fun, challenging things to learn. It's also proved to be very stressful, though. All of a sudden I feel quite inadequate, since the expectations upon me have jumped but I'm still the same person I was just a couple of weeks ago when I tested. I know that's the way it goes, that's how I improve, by raising the expectations and working harder to meet them. But at the same time, it's disappointing to try hard and still be bad at something, by the very nature of working to become good. But that's life, isn't it? That's how character is built. So I should just swallow my pride and work as hard as I can to get good. But it's still humbling.

In the same vein, yet another Irish pub in Denver has an open session, but I STILL haven't gotten off my curvy butt to learn a good set of songs. I know... *counting* ...maybe 5 songs I can contribute, and since half of them are Scottish, they probably won't even show up in the session. So I have a list of tunes to learn, but I just never get around to taking the time to learn them. Even after two Fiddle Camps and multiple self-promises to do it.

Moral of the story? Common thread? Work. Struggle. Discipline. No easy way out, except through real effort. And I'm a lazy slug, so there you go. I need to shut up and do the work required to be a karate master and a swingin' fiddler, because the rewards are worth it.

There. Would you still have hassled me for an update if you knew it was going to be self-indulgent ramblings on my failings as a human? All right, I'll give you something fun.

NAKED KAREN!!!!!

Quote of the Day

2005-10-05T11:34:00.000-06:00

"Creationists make it sound like a 'theory' is something you dreamt up after being drunk all night." - Isaac Asamov

Jingle bells, jingle bells!

2005-09-28T12:46:00.000-06:00

Yes, I know I'm early, but I'm excited! I just purchased some Christmas violin duet sheet music. I need to get it early so I can practice the songs up and then record a Christmas album. I still have mixed emotions about recording; sometimes it's wonderfully rewarding and sometimes it makes me want to put my violin down the garbage disposal. But overall, it's a good experience.

In other news, I'm going to L.A. tonight!!! Yay!! I'm going to have a marvelous girls' weekend with Karen. We're going to tour the WB studio and shop Rodeo and go to a fancy restaurant and see movie-magic in action and go the Comedy and Magic club and all sorts of cool stuff! I'm leaving right after work, so you can imagine how time is draggggggging....

You'd think three would be enough...

2005-09-26T15:32:00.000-06:00

But no. I was restringing my violin and I had three spare A's. More than enough, right? So I open the first one and.... it's used. ?? Apparently I put a used string back in there, though I don't know why. So I open the second one. It's broken. ???? How did that happen? Odd... So I open the third one. Pristine. I start stringing it up, and even as I tightend it, it felt weird. Then... KAPOW!!! Broken.

ARGHHH!!!!!

I had already mixed up the original A and the used one I found with the rest of the strings, so I couldn't even put those on as a spare. Now my violin has only three strings on it! It looks like some poor, neglected violin that someone keeps in their attic because they don't know what to do with it! :( And the music store was closed so I couldn't buy anymore. It was a sad weekend.

I'm back!

2005-09-23T22:52:00.000-06:00

Sorry for the long hiatus, but I am back. Much has happened, in vacations and haircuts and hair color changes and general life. (Here's the cut without the color)

But there's something else I want to talk about right now.

WASPS. I HATE WASPS. I have a crippling, paralyzing fear of them and an absolute, utter, festering hatred of them. WHY does the most hideous, despicable and thoroughly evil species in the world have to adore raspberries? My beautiful raspberry bushes in my back yard, which I have nursed from mere twigs to lush abundance, are held hostage by SWARMS of wasps!! It's Grand Freaking Central Station for the whole county's wasp population! They have little wasp jamborees all over the scarlet, jewel-bright clusters. The berries hang there, mocking me, so plump and ripe and sweet, and just handfuls to be plucked off. But I go into a literal cold sweat at the mere thougt of wasps touching me (ugghhh, see, I just got a shiver writing that sentence) so I haven't been able to harvest.

However, I recently had the brilliant notion to harvest in the middle of the night when the wasps are in their nests! Huzzah! On my first attempt, I went out armed with a bowl and a flashlight. Yet before I could pick a single berry, a night-owl wasp came flying out of the leaves and I went screaming into the house. On my second attempt, I chickened out again and had my mom harvest some for me. It was win-win; I got my berries and she got to lord her non-insect-phobic self over me.

And tonight, I just finished my third and most bountiful harvest. It was all going quite well until I ran across a wasp sleeping on a leaf near where I was harvesting. I shrieked, ran to the door, brushed myself off a hundred times in case a sneaky one had landed on me, and let the adrenaline wear off. Then, ladies and gentleman, not only did I go back for the bowl, I PICKED TWO MORE BERRIES!!! Aren't you proud of me? I sure am. I kept my flashlight trained on the sleeping beast while I plucked the last berries, and every instinct told me to run screaming down the street, but I did it! And I have a bowlful of fresh, ripe raspberries to show for it!

Now that might not seem like much to you, or you might think I'm silly and dumb to be so afraid of wasps, but I am. And they patrol my crops. And it sucks. But I persevered and I beat those bastards at their own game! Score one for the good guys.

Arrested Development rocks

2005-08-25T12:10:00.000-06:00

It is by far the funniest show on TV. Everybody watch it!!

Gob: Well, gee, I didn't think the woman I'd be checking out at Spring Break would be Mom.
Buster: She's better looking than the whores you date!
Gob: Don't call my escorts whores!
Buster: Mom's still got it!
Gob: I don't date whores!
Lindsay: Stop it! Stop it! This objectification of women has to stop!
Michael: It's just mom and whores.

Enough said.

Plans

2005-08-24T15:54:00.000-06:00

I just got smashed in ping pong. Matt's got a killer serve that I can't return. Oh, the frustration!

Anyway, I've got plans. Big plans! I'm going to LA, yay!! Karen and I are going to do all the awesome LA things before she departs for the land of orcs and sheep. We're going to tour a studio, shop Rodeo, play on the beach, all that good stuff. I'm so excited!

I'm also planning my recording career, and yes I use the word "career" very loosely. I am currently practicing the 2nd violin part of the Bach Concerto for Two Violins, set to be recorded by 9/1. Then I'll use computer magic to record and mix in the first part and voila, I'm a duet. My other planned recordings are all the songs I learned in fiddle camp, plus the stringed parts of Beethoven's 7th symphony. Who knows, then maybe I could mix in all the other parts too. I could be a one woman orchestra!

I will let you, my faithful audience of 3 or 4, know when it's finished. Then I'll burn a CD and hound you all to buy it. Deal?

Fiddle Camp

2005-08-15T13:42:00.000-06:00

There's way too much to say in one post. It was amazing and wonderful and intensive and aggravating and tiring and enlightening and inspiring and so much fun. I miss it already. I learned so much in such a short amount of time. My brain felt like a heavy, wet sponge full of music, and I was sure that if I squeezed it, discordant notes would pour out like water. I learned the importance of scales and all that music theory I blew off. I discovered a form of jazz that I get. I played by ear until I could see the changing intervals in my head. I became friends with beautiful, inspiring people. I could say the corniest things about the experience and they'd all be true. Of course, there were a few times when I wanted to throw my violin across the room and renounce music in all its forms, but that's just part of the love-hate relationship. I wish I'd practiced more; I wish I'd listened to my violin teacher when she taught me proper form and technique. I wish I'd realized she did it for a reason and she wouldn't have wasted her time on it if it hadn't been important. I'm so sorry I neglected my violin so much, and I wish I could keep the spirit of camp with me so I don't do it again. But it's hard to keep it up when that environment and camaraderie is gone. I have to keep myself inspired now; I have to keep listening to music and trusting that I can create it myself if I practice enough. I have to remember to be stoic and not berate myself when I mess up. I'm scared I'll become apathetic again, like I did last year. But the only thing I can do for the large scale is to work on the small scale. So I will practice tonight. I promise myself I will practice tonight.

Matt's New Photography Page

2005-08-15T13:38:00.000-06:00

Everyone look at Matt's new webpage! I designed the layout and Matt filled in the galleries. There's a few more things I want to tweak, but it's a good start. Check it out!

One of those Bloggy things

2005-08-15T13:36:00.000-06:00

I WISH: I was independently wealthy
I MISS: having nice neighbors
I HEAR: bluegrass in my headphones
I SEARCH: for the mountains to see which way west is
I WONDER: what I'm doing
I CARE: either too much or too little
I AM NOT: disciplined
I AM: infuriating
I DANCE: in a twirly fashion
I SING: under my breath
I CRY: far too often
I SMILE: far too widely
I LAUGH: far too loudly
I LIKE: myself
I LOVE: life

I KNOW: most of the state capitals
I HOPE: Demon's happy inside
I WRITE: secretively
I WANT: peace
I NEED: love
I HAVE: ideas
I CONFUSE: everyone
I LISTEN: attentively
I NEVER: read horoscopes

I REGRET: putting my foot in my mouth
I FEAR: Liquid Bandage
I PRETEND: I'm a cat
I'M HAPPY: when I fiddle
I'M TRYING: to improve
I'M SORRY: I stopped practicing
I'M READY: to start again

Revenge of the Pasta

2005-08-01T15:00:00.000-06:00

Is it wrong to rejoice in the misfortunes of others? Oh well. HA!!!

Maker of Atkins diets files for bankruptcy

Slumping popularity of low-carb diet, plus increased competition, leads company founded by late diet doctor to seek Chapter 11 protection.

The Atkins diet has fallen on lean times.

The company started by the late nutrition guru Dr. Robert C. Atkins to promote a low-carb lifestyle has filed for bankruptcy court protection, a further sign of the waning popularity of the diet.

Full Article

Golden Retriever Butt Fur

2005-07-28T14:04:00.000-06:00

Here it is, in all its glory. My hair. Think before you dye, kids!

Business as usual

2005-07-28T09:26:00.000-06:00

Here at work, we had to install an instant-messaging thingy that lets you broadcast questions company-wide, theoretically so we can take advantage of the wide array of expertise in IBM. So far I've received such illuminating broadcasts as:

Is it raining?

Are you happy?

How do I set a laser printer to stun?

It's refreshing to know that even the best and brightest in the technology field still revert to childhood when given a new toy. Wait, what do I mean "even?" Especially!

Any thoughts on funny questions I can submit back?

Things To Be Grouchy About

2005-07-26T16:55:00.000-06:00

I'm in a very bad mood, as evidenced by my post below. So I'm going to list all the things I'm grouchy about at this moment. Maybe it will help. Or maybe it will just make you grouchy. Feel free to add your own items; share the irritability.

1. At least two more years until the next Harry Potter
2. I hate hand-washing my nice pots and pans and knives
3. I suck at playing songs by ear and Fiddle Camp is coming up in two weeks
4. All my shoes are ugly
5. My cat's not very nice to me
6. Work is boring
7. My house is small and a duplex to boot
8. I have braces
9. My hair looks like golden retriever butt fur
10. My ZOSO record is warped and useless

More coming as I think of them.

(Edit: I'm not in a bad mood anymore, but there's still plenty to be irritable about.)
11. I have no upper body strength
12. No one carries bangers around here
13. I have too many pennies
14. My new blue pen leaks
15. I have a spider bite on my belly
16. Wasps are eating my raspberry bushes
17. My nose is crooked
18. Family Guy's lost its edge
19. Someone in my office is eating something stinky
20. Customers SUCK!!!!

I don't wanna! pout

2005-07-26T16:50:00.000-06:00

I'm so not spirited or energetic right now.... I'm going to bail on karate tonight unless I get one comment telling me to go. You have 10 minutes before I go home and curl up on the couch. Ready.... go!

Edit: Too late! I'm going home. This means I'll have to go to two classes on Thursday. :p

Happy Birthday To Me!

2005-07-25T14:10:00.000-06:00

I had a lovely 25th birthday on Sunday! It started off at the stroke of midnight while I was attending a Pimps n' Hos party. I was granted the title of Head Ho and given a congratulatory cheesecake. I'd enclose a picture, but I didn't have my camera, and it's probably all for the best. Let's just say it wasn't the kind of outfit you go grocery shopping in.

Then I had my birthday dinner at my mom's house, who made me spaghetti carbonara.

Mmmmmm, cholesteroly... I baked my traditional applesauce cake with orange icing, because it wouldn't be a birthday without it. After dinner, I opened my presents which included cashish, two very cute outfits, a tea kettle,

and a record player. The record player was a flashback hit for everyone. We sampled CCR and Tommy while I marveled at the needle, the tracks, the pitch adjustor, and the hypnotic rotation.
I've got a whole stack of records to play with now, arranged alphabetically from Allman Brothers to Neil Young. It's so deliciously retro!

I'm so boring

2005-07-19T09:43:00.000-06:00

Aren't I? Well, I'm back in the game after Karen lambasted me for neglecting my audience. (Which, I believe, only consists of Karen.) So hi! I had a terribly exciting weekend. I went spelunking, which was scary and dirty and exciting and squeezy. I saw big puffy white cave growths the size of basketballs which take 1000 years to grow a cubic inch. I saw lots of cave pocorn and cave bacon, which made me hungry, and I army crawled through lovely wet columns and tight spots called The White Rabbit Hole, The Meatgrinder and The Striptease, which, true to its name, claimed one of my buttons. I'm going to have awesome pictures once the disposable camera is developed. Until then, you'll just have to use your imagination.

snore Huh, wuh?

2005-06-29T12:52:00.000-06:00

Hola amigos. I know it's been a long time since I rapped at ya, and this has even been an exciting week for me! I promise an update forthcoming, but for now...

Have you ever wanted to destroy the earth but just didn't know where to begin? Take a few notes here: 10 Ways to Destroy the Earth

I'm free!

2005-06-18T14:04:00.000-06:00

I got my Holter monitor off! Yay! And now I have a series of red circles all over me from the electrodes; it looks like I've been attacked by an octopus.

Lub-dub, lub-dub, lub... LUBDUBLUBDUB!

2005-06-17T15:15:00.000-06:00

That's what my heart sounds like. I have a quirky little rhythm that's been quirkier than usual for the past week. Lots of sudden thumpings, kind of like a head rush for your heart. So I'm wearing a Holter monitor today (electrodes on my chest recording my heartbeat into a little box).

I'm hoping my heart will have another freak-out so it can record it, but my heart seems to know it's being watched and is behaving itself. So cross your fingers for me and send palpitaty thoughts my way. (By the way, this is not a dangerous heart condition so don't be afraid that I'm going to keel over. It's just kind of annoying.) Oh, and about an hour after I got hooked up I recorded a severe case of cardiac arrest, i.e. the cable momentarily came out of the recording device. I wonder what kind of pills I'd get if I didn't tell them that's what happened...

In closing, a word of advice. If you are a married woman of child-bearing age, never send an e-mail at work saying "My husband and I have to leave early for a doctor's appointment." I meant "carpool," they heard "secret sonogram." I'm going to drink heavily at the next company picnic to quash the rumors.

Update: Yay! I palpitated a bit! Let's hope for some more.

An Ode to Science by Phil Plait

2005-06-17T11:43:00.000-06:00

I know a place where the Sun never sets.
It's a mountain, and it's on the Moon. It sticks up so high that even as the Moon spins, it's in perpetual daylight. Radiation from the Sun pours down on there day and night, 24 hours a day — well, the Moon's day is actually about 4 weeks long, so the sunlight pours down there 708 hours a day.

I know a place where the Sun never shines. It's at the bottom of the ocean. A crack in the crust there exudes nasty chemicals and heats the water to the boiling point. This would kill a human instantly, but there are creatures there, bacteria, that thrive. They eat the sulfur from the vent, and excrete sulfuric acid.

I know a place where the temperature is 15 million degrees, and the pressure would crush you to a microscopic dot. That place is the core of the Sun.

I know a place where the magnetic fields would rip you apart, atom by atom: the surface of a neutron star, a magnetar.

I know a place where life began billions of years ago. That place is here, the Earth.

I know these places because I'm a scientist.

Science is a way of finding things out. It's a way of testing what's real. It's what Richard Feynman called "A way of not fooling ourselves."

No astrologer ever predicted the existence of Uranus, Neptune, or Pluto. No modern astrologer had a clue about Sedna, a ball of ice half the size of Pluto that orbits even farther out. No astrologer predicted the more than 150 planets now known to orbit other suns.

But scientists did.

No psychic, despite their claims, has ever helped the police solve a crime. But forensic scientists have, all the time.

It wasn't someone who practices homeopathy who found a cure for smallpox, or polio. Scientists did, medical scientists.

No creationist ever cracked the genetic code. Chemists did. Molecular biologists did.

They used physics. They used math. They used chemistry, biology, astronomy, engineering.

They used science.

These are all the things you discovered doing your projects. All the things that brought you here today.

Computers? Cell phones? Rockets to Saturn, probes to the ocean floor, PSP, gamecubes, gameboys, X-boxes?

All by scientists.

Those places I talked about before — you can get to know them too. You can experience the wonder of seeing them for the first time, the thrill of discovery, the incredible, visceral feeling of doing something no one has ever done before, seen things no one has seen before, know something no one else has ever known.

No crystal balls, no tarot cards, no horoscopes. Just you, your brain, and your ability to think.

Welcome to science. You're gonna like it here.

30 days, 10 hours, 38 minutes, 24 seconds!!!!!

2005-06-15T13:08:00.000-06:00

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince is almost here! EEEEEEE!!!!!!! What's going to happen? Who's the Half Blood Prince? Will Harry get with Ginny? Will Hagrid please get eaten by his stupid brother? Will Dumbledore pull an Obi-Wan to Voldemort's Vader? I don't know! That's why it's exciting! And all I can say is GOD HELP YOU, JK ROWLING, IF YOU KILL LUPIN!!!

2 down, X to go!

2005-06-15T09:36:00.000-06:00

Happy anniversary to me! Matt and I went to Del Frisco's to celebrate last night, where we had lovely tremendous steaks and a divine 7-layer lemon cake. (Yeah, just forget that last post of mine...) We weren't sure what we were supposed to do, reminisce, rejoice, etc. So while we were perfectly happy to be there, we decided that celebrating two years of marriage as an achievement is a sign of some pretty low expectations. Instead, we considered it a splendid excuse to get dolled up and eat at an expensive restaurant. Cheers!

Diets suck

2005-06-13T12:46:00.000-06:00

A lot. I'm doing Weight Watchers, which is the best plan out there, but it still sucks. Sure, it's all fine and dandy when you have all your meals planned out and nothing going on, but what happens when it's time for your anniversary dinner at the finest steakhouse in Denver? Or when you pack a nice lean ham sandwich for lunch and then halfway through you suspect the ham is tainted and you have to find something "healthy" in the cafeteria? Or when your grandparents-in-law send you home with a peanut butter and chocolate ice cream cake for your anniversary?! That's when the suckiness begins.

And then you start to get all feminist the hungrier you get. "I'm not going to let some MAN dictate what my body should look like! In fact, I'm going to eat this entire Entemann's raspberry danish in protest of unrealistic ideals. Hah! That'll show 'em." But then the damn summer fashions suck you back in again.

One bowl of soup already gone. One yogurt cup remaining. 4 hours left to go.... :(

Dude, this whole town is high

2005-06-12T15:51:00.000-06:00

...or so say the touristy T-shirts of Estes Park. We just spent the weekend there in our friend Steve's cabin. We had dinner at the Stanley Hotel (aka the Overlook of The Shining fame):

and we hiked in Rocky Mountain National Park. Here are my attempts to be Ansel Adams:

We ended the hike in a lovely glacial cirque. It is impossible to describe what it's like to stand in one of those. Pictures can't do it justice. It's just very, very... big. And tall.

I also bought a tin whistle in a Celtic music shop in Estes Park. I'm terribly excited to try it out. My last tin whistle was an awful P.O.S that even my whistly-talented friend Bob couldn't get to play right. So now I have a nice Clarke whistle, and pretty soon I'll be playing My Heart Will Go On with the best of them. I'm going to lock the cat in a closet and practice now.

Let's get literary!

2005-06-10T10:09:00.000-06:00

The candle flame gutters.
Its little pool of light trembles.
Darkness gathers.
The demons begin to stir.

Carl Sagan "Demon Haunted World"

Now that's a book I really want to read! Carl Sagan rocks the cosmos. I also want to finish reading The Universe in a Nutshell, but I still get hung up on pear-shaped time. If anyone can explain that to me, please do so because I want to move on to chapter 3. Or please recommend any other books that have rocked your world.

On the far other end of the spectrum, did you ever wonder what Kirk Cameron of Growing Pains fame is doing these days? This you have to see.

I bet you didn't know that you're a murderer. Yes, you are. Kirk Cameron explains why. He also explains why not witnessing to the unsaved is like letting little children burn to death in front of your uncaring eyes. You don't hate children.... do you?

This just in!!

2005-06-09T13:07:00.000-06:00

I've identified the sneaky bastard who stole wilddemoncat away from me. It is... me. From several months ago, when I set up a blog and promptly forgot about it. If you don't know me already, that should tell you just about everything you need to know. Will portugo go the way of wilddemoncat? Forgotten by time? Only your support will decide.

My first post

2005-06-09T09:35:00.000-06:00

Wait, I know this feeling.... writer's block.

Hmmm.

I know, I'll just show you pictures!

This is my wedding party. We're on the beach outside the Monterey Plaza Hotel.

This is Brugge, where we honeymooned and spent 90 euros on a dinner of eels.

This is a columbine photo that my brilliant photographer husband took.

This is said photographer husband who is sad because not only has he been ponchoed against his will, but his friend is wearing his favorite shirt as well.

This is my crazy cat Demon. Now someone else on blogspot already took the name Wilddemoncat, which was my first choice. Can you honestly look at this picture and say that name shouldn't be mine?

This is my favorite illusion that blows my mind every time. "It can't be!" you say. Oh, it can.