Picturesque

Two bees

or


not two bees


Wheeze the juice, bud-DY! (LMK if you catch THAT obscure reference ^_^ )


Yeah, I like bees


and attempting to freeze them mid-flight.


going to get Mollusc's ears pierced -- a little nervous


a little jealous :)


a little more nervous


"One. . . Two. . . FIVE!"


Happy :)


more not Susans


a random sticky note I found that I suspect was written by The Prawn, given the subject matter


I thought that MuNKi was insufficiently Star Wars Geeky until he surprised us with this. OK, he's still not all that Star Wars Geeky, but he sure knows how to make those of us who ARE very, very happy! ^_^


I found this particularly amusing, given one of the suggestions for Diesel's caption contest this week. ^_^


Utah is still morphing.


I used a random stripping technique my friend's mom showed us for this one.


I love the Autumn leaves fabric in the borders on this one. I keep finding myself drawn to fabrics by a couple of designers, even when I have no clue who did them.


Seeing a theme in fabrics here?






one of my faves

I have some four patch and nine patch blocks, too, but all those pics had some digital funkitivity going on.

And finally, the first book I chose at the library book sale yesterday. I cannot freaking believe they had this, or that it was even made. Some of you may remember my discussion of how the kids like to watch this movie when MuNKi is out of town -- primarily (I suspect) because our tradition is to start it at midnight, and it's a three hour movie. ^_^ Perhaps we'll be uploading some more YouTubes soon. . .

2 Flicks

MuNKi and I watched 2 flicks over the last 2 nights. The first was Wild Hogs. I'm not really sure what I expected of this, but I enjoyed it and laughed a fair amount. There are some good lines and a lot of great gags (like Dudley's tattoo. ^_^) Ray Liotta is a convincing bully, but when it comes down to it, putting a bunch of fake tattoos on him does not make him a convincing biker. At all. But as I said, he bullies well, so I guess he can get away with it.

The one we watched last night was Little Children. I really don't remember what I saw that made me want to check this out, since I had no clue what the plot was. I didn't even remember the name of it when we got to the vid store - just that it had Patrick Wilson and Kate Winslet. Fortunately, the guy at the vid store was able to figure it out based on that, so we were able to pick it up.

Right off, it was evident (because of the narration) that it had been based on a book, so that gave me hope that there would be an actual plot. As it turns out, there were two plots. Honestly, in this film, nothing in the story is furthered by the second plotline. Nothing. You could cut out the whole thing and it wouldn't make any difference. As it turned out, we did fast forward through some of that story towards he end. I can only assume that it's quite a different story in book format. But the main story is really very good -- nothing earth-shattering in terms of newness of concept or situation, but compelling nonetheless. And steamy. OMG. Did I mention steamy? Part of my brain was screaming "traitor" at me for finding Raoul hot in this. ^_^

I had a lot of morbid fears during this flick then never came to fruition. Knowing that, I'd like to see it again. And just fast forward through that whole other storyline. ^_^

If. . .

If we hadn't stayed for sparring, we wouldn't have left an hour later.

If we hadn't left an hour later, and then decided to grab a dvd from the rental place, we wouldn't have met the woman who had walked there.

If it hadn't been pouring buckets, we wouldn't have thought to ask if she had a ride home.

If we hadn't taken her home when we did, we wouldn't have seen that big bump in the turnout lane.

If we hadn't backed up and stopped, gotten out and looked, we wouldn't have known it was still alive. (It sure looked dead!)

If we hadn't flipped that big-a$$ snapper back over and carried it off the road, it would most definitely have been run over again and killed. Of course, when I say "we," I mean that I flipped it over and then, after it tried to kill me, watched from a safe distance as MuNKi braved life and limb to carry it off the road. ^_^

The moral of this story is twofold:

♦ life is a series of choices that all have an impact on something

♦ sparring saves lives. ^_^

Taking the "L" out of "Quilt"

I'm kidding, of course. Because if I did quit now, the quilt would look like Utah. ^_^

But I also don't have any pics, because MuNKi is doing brain surgery on the computer I need to use for picture uploading.

I have 34 squares right now. I'm still not sure how many I'm shooting for. I kind of figured I'd stop when I got sick of it. If I have to, maybe I'll cheat with wide sashing. (those strips in between) ^_^ And now that I see that frog quilt, I'm reminded that I have a bunch of those batik squares of my own from years ago, except mine are dragons and celestial stuff. Ooooh! I think I feel the next project coming on already!

Tomorrow we're off to a friend's house for sewing and swimming. The kids are very excited. :) And then it's class and sparring for MuNKi and me in the evening. I think all my testing pains are gone now. The only thing hurting now is my throwing arm from dodgeball. ^_^

How Appropos

~Today all but one of the adults who tested on Saturday came to class because it was our classmate Anna's first and last class as a black belt. She's off to college on Wednesday, and she will be sorely missed because she was a lovely addition to the class. Her dad will still do class with us, and her brother, too, when the soccer season is over, so at least we'll get to see her at the Christmas parties and such. Because it was a special day, after the initial kicking, the Master let us play Dodgeball - "Seniors" against the teens. This is ALWAYS a riot. And we always cream them, too, even though youth and speed are on their side. ^_^ They won only ONE of the 8 or so games we played. ^_^

~Yesterday, when I finally fired up my email, I had another acceptance for a (smutty) story. Woo hoo!! Appropriately enough, it is entitled "Sparring Partners." ^_^

~Today I made a bunch of quilt squares and additionally figured out that the line I've been using on my machine that I thought was the 1/4" line is actually the 5/8" line, hence all the math weirdness when I tried to construct blocks. The good news is that when I had to add bits on, the squares almost inevitably looked cooler than they had before.

Oh My Gosh

Honestly, I just never pictured myself with one of these. It just seemed so unattainable.

The test lasted 7 hours and most of that was kicking. At the end, we sparred and finally broke our boards. There are now 4 of these at my house. I have to come up with a new life goal to replace the one I knocked off my list today. ^_^ Oh, and I lost 4 pounds during the test.

Here I Am

as ready as I'll ever be.

*deep breath*

Holy Hannah!

It's time to get Mollusc's ears pierced!

Miss Herd (sister of Miss Scene and Miss Demeanor)

"Tomato Siren"

something purplish


something pinkish


Not Black-Eyed-Susans and purplish stuff


The Impatiens have filled in exactly as I had pictured them in my mind's eye.


And the climbing things are doing what I wanted them to, as well!


false sunflower (my absolute favourite right now) and echinacea


fields of gold


Mexican Hat? Something that sprouted from a perennial mat that I unrolled and "planted."


More of them


What's in the sling?


A bunny of course!


Rabbit Ears X 2. ^_^

We had a blast at the party tonight. I played Four Square for the first time in decades (decades, really?!? ooh, scary!) and Bocce for the first time ever. :)

Patchy

I had a quilting class today courtesy of a BG's mom. There were 3 of us there -- BG and I and another friend -- trying to learn stuff, and I think I did make some headway. I also found some cool fabric and decided to take a shopping day at BG's mom's house in the very near future. She used to own a quilt shop and has tons of gorgeous fabric that she's selling on eBay and is basically giving away at $2/yard. As a bonus, her tastes run along the same lines as mine, so she has lots of stuff I adore. Yummy. Additionally, she's a "who needs rules?" sort of gal, which is me to a T, so she had lots of cool suggestions for techniques I would like.

I made these to bring along, and they are pretty tasty!

Mollusc ran herd on my Littles and BG's Littles, which in truth meant that she hung out with BG's quail, kitties, swan, and wild Sandhill Crane family while the Littles all played with Legos. The cranes are extremely cool and will let you get within a couple of yards. BG's kitties are still only a few months old, and they like to stalk the cranes, but when they get too close, either the mom or dad crane will make crazy dinosaur noises and open its wings and march right at the kitten in question, sending said kitten bolting! Boy do I wish I'd brought my camera.

Mollusc is a huge bird enthusiast, and as icing on her bird-enjoyment cake, she found BG's quails' first egg ever today!

I felt so awful today (in my kidneys I think) that I tried to call the doctor but had the wrong number. I thought it was the right number because they never answer their phone anyway. BG gave me Acetaminophen, and it was miraculous how much better I felt. I did get an appointment for tomorrow morning, so I guess I'll suck it up and go even though I'm feeling much better now. Because you know if I don't, things will come to an ugly head on Sunday. :-/

It's No Accident

I can still vividly remember arguing with my older sister (when I was 7) that people had "accidents" not "accents." Ironically enough, this was outside of the hospital where we went to school at the time.

As it turns out, I do NOT have an accent. I know because my dental hygenist told me so.

So there.

Oh, and my dentist (who, as it turns out is Kevin Costner (at least from upside-down) - who knew? I suppose he fell in love with the area when filming here and I guess one of his movie roles must have prepared him for dentistry as a career) told me that I am "basically cavity-free by today's standards." Interesting. So I've got that going for me. Which is nice. ^_^

Tazy

It's going to be a bit of a crazy week. I have a dentist appointment today. (just for cleaning) MuNKi is having a bit of tooth pain again so he'll prolly get one soon too. There's a party at the house of another TKD family on Saturday. (That will be awesome!) A good friend of ours from MuNKi's Air Force days comes on Sunday to stay until Friday. Fishy's b-day is on Monday. And of course there's that big looming thing on the horizon that keeps waking me up with a knot of dread in the pit of my stomach.

I've decided that what will be will be and I need to stop being nervous about the test. We'll see how well that works.

Oh and I'm fighting off a UTI. (TMI I know) I'm polishing off my second jug of Cranberry juice. I laughed when I saw the slogan this morning: "straight from the bog!" Mmmmmm! Deelish! Fortunately I remembered the homeopathic Staphysagra at about 3 am and I think it's already helping.

I'm not sure how much I'll be around for the next week or so. . .

Shit

2 of the 4 kids are sick with a cold/fever thing. A third may becoming down with it. What are the odds that the 4 of us who are testing will be well in two Saturdays?

Shit.

We've gotten out all the big guns (zinc, ACF etc, etc) and are drinking tons of water.

Just ack.

Would You Put This in Your Mouth?

So I always try to get the Sunday Freep for the coupons, and every now and then I put my fingers over my eyes and peep through them while I do a quick scan of the articles. This one* caught my eye because it has pictures (at least in the paper it does) and, well, that's how I roll. ^_^

There are 3 recipes given in the article: Individual Zucchini and Cheddar Frittatas, Spinach and Black Bean Burritos with Salsa, and Brainy Brownies.

Naturally, I wanted to know what might confer intelligence on a batch of brownies, or, to proceed down a more frightening avenue of thought, what might turn a brownie into "brain food." (This is the point at which horrifying images of fish paste began to rear their disturbing heads.)

My sense of morbid curiosity was richly rewarded when I read on the list of ingredients: "1/2 cup Purple Puree (see note)." Of course I did immediately see note, because I know full well that, whatever ingredients Good Brownies are allowed to contain, none of them are purple. "Purple Paste" turns out to be made from blueberries, lemon juice, sugar, water, and -- wait for it. . .

spinach! Or, if you don't have spinach, you can use collard greens. Yum!

The point of these brownies is, apparently, to trick your kids by "hiding foods kids should eat in the dishes they will eat." (emphasis mine) I have an idea; how about giving real food to your kids instead of fast food and junk food, and leaving the sacrosanct realm of Brownies the hell alone?!?

Save the spinach brownies for Rehabbers, I say. ^_^

*If you look at the first comment there, it may have been left by me. I also may have typoed "frittatas." Imagine.

It's a Dog's Life, Well, Two Dogs and a Rabbit Actually

We went birthday shopping for Fishy at Tree Town Toys in Ann Arbor today. O. M. G. It's kind of reminiscent of J. T. Puffins back in Madison (though it will be hard to ever top that place!) and every nook and cranny is filled with FABULOUS things.

I nearly wet myself over the ginormous variety of darling Calico Critters stuff. They have that cool fuel cell car kit that I can't imagine anyone actually paying $150 for as a child's toy, but that sure is neat. They have tons of Plan Toys wooden dollhouse goodies, Playmobil galore, Legos, craft kits, and Schleich and Papo out the wazoo. They had darling sleeping puppies that just lie there and breathe. Silly, huh? So why did I keep going back to stare at and coo over them? ^_^ Corolle dolls and goodies, Animalz (soooo cute!) and oh so much more. As it was, I stuck to some Lego kits and marbles, bearing in mind the recent "going through stuff for the garage sale" experience. I have a marble shooter set coming in the mail for him that I imagine will get misused for a great number of things. ^_^ And I'll make him a snazzy drawstring bag to keep that stuff in.

We came home to an exciting message from Egan that BABY ANNA IS HERE!!! Welcome, wee girlie!! :)

Shortly thereafter, the Bigs and I were doing our pushups and situps to the headbanging noise of Creed when some of our friends from TKD called to let us know they were bringing the menagerie over for our week of petsitting while they're off at camp. Excitement! The kids have been looking forward to this for a long time. In addition to the original lhasa apso and rabbit whom we've babysat before, there is a new lhasa apso - a 6 or 7 month old little boy named Bandit. Ayla, the girl dog, has adopted me as foster mama, and as I type, she is lying on the couch next to me looking remarkably like one of those breathing puppies. Bandit is hanging out by the front door, enjoying the cool breeze wafting up his nostrils, and Patches, the evil rabbit ;) after spending some time alternately conjoined to Mollusc and Sluggie, is now in his hutch thinggy in the yard where he can mow the lawn and possibly continue to eat the baby's breath. (his mom said he usually knows what's OK to eat, but I should still look this up just in case) He really is a very cool bunny. We just need to make sure that all power cords stay well out of reach! So the current household animal count is: MuNKis: 5 (1 lg, 4 sm) , CATS: 4, BIRDS: 2, DOGS: 2, RABBITS: 1

I'm finally reading the last Outlander in earnest now. 100 pages down, 800 or so to go.

Meditations

The Celtic festival of Lughnasadh has come and gone.

Two days ago, a single yellow leaf fluttered down in front of us as we drove down 8 Mile.

I find myself looking forward to Fall with growing anticipation.

Random Update

~We went to the Teen Reading Party at the library and saw friends whose house had burned up several months ago. They're back in finally and unpacking, and they just bought a new (3rd) goat! Yay!

~Our green peppers were free at the co-op today, we got salt-n-vinegar Kettle Chips, and I saw a lady I know for the first time since learning she's been lying to friends about another friend of mine. It could have been awkward, but I let her feel that way and decided not to feel it myself. It worked. ^_^

~Red Belt Class was fun - poomse (forms - my favourite) in all different directions, and nunchucks. Does it get any better? I did do over 200 pushups today. But only the first 150 were close together. (at home) The others were spread out. Every time we drop our nunchucks or let them hit the ground we have to do 10, so yes, I dropped mine several times, and I threw in a bonus 10 when I actually kind of flung them and they hit another person who was already doing pushups for dropping his. ^_^

~MuNKi and I watched Derailed and were very pleasantly surprised after it looked like the movie was going south for the duration. MuNKi saw what I never expected.

Take a Pill

This one goes out to my favourite chemistry-type person, and also to a couple of people I know whose jobs are sucking their will to live. You know who you are.

And then no more Jonathan Coulton, I promise. (If I can find my Keeping Promises pills. . .)



I had a hard time deciding between this one and the stick guy version.

I'm Blogging This

I saw this game at Target today. It had to be blogged. ^_^

This evening we went to Kohl's ostensibly to get new work shirts for MuNKi, but in reality, he only got one, while the Bigs and I came away with 2 or 3 things each. :-/ This meant the joy of getting new stuff, but also the pure torture that is Trying Things On. Plus, MuNKi actually had the strange idea to make me try on a shirt that was not only a bizarre dark teal (OK, granted I may see things in this spectrum a little differently than he does, but still. . .) but had puffed sleeves to boot. I ask you. Puffed sleeves? Me?!?!?!? Clearly he's gone mad. I could not, would not, on a train, I would not could not in the rain. I will not shall not even with a high-powered semi-automatic rifle trained on me.

That is all.

IKEA

Billy the Bookcase says "hello!"

What's not to love?

Re: Your Brains

Because mine are kind of mushy right now. Jonathan Coulton is one of my favourite lyricists and songwriters. That's my way of saying that while you may never have a Spiritual Experience listening to his stuff, you sure will laugh at all the clever witticisms.

Zen Sarcasm

In a stupefying fit of complete lackidaisicalness, I give you my favourite Zen Sarcams:

~ Do not walk behind me, for I may not lead. Do not walk ahead of me, for I may not follow. Do not walk beside me either. Just pretty much leave me the hell alone.

~ The journey of a thousand miles begins with a broken fan belt and leaky tire.

~ It's always darkest before dawn. So if you're going to steal your neighbor's newspaper, that's the time to do it.

~ Always remember that you're unique. Just like everyone else.

~ Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way, when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes.

~ If at first you don't succeed, skydiving is not for you.

~ Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach him how to fish, and he will sit in a boat and drink beer all day.

~ If you lend someone $20 and never see that person again, it was probably worth it.

~ A closed mouth gathers no foot.

~ Duct tape is like 'The Force'. It has a light side and a dark side, and it holds the universe together.

~ Experience is something you don't get until just after you need it.

~ Never, under any circumstances, take a sleeping pill and a laxative on the same night

Oh yeah. We saw Premonition last night. Ehhhhh.

I didn't like it even though it was well-made, had great acting, interesting plot etc, because I thought it was a shitty ending. If you've seen it or are never going to see it, I'll tell you why. On the plus side, though, there was some nice eye candy for both MuNKi and myself.

In other news that blasted tooth fairy forgot Fishy's tooth last night. Fortunately for her, so did he. So, crafty being that she is, she did the switch in the afternoon, and then innocently asked whether he'd thought to check under his pillow. Score: Mama - 1 CRS Diesease - a big fat ZERO.

C D B

U C D B?


S. I C D B.


I C D B 2. D B S A B-Z B, S-N D?


O! R S D B?


C U 8-R B!

With thanks to William Steig.

In Which One Letter Says So Much

So most of you know that we started our garage sale today. OMG what a lot of crap we've accumulated in the last 4 yrs. :-P This, I think, is why it was good to move every 2 years. Even though, yeah, it was sucky.

Mollusc pointed out this morning that there is only one letter separating "Garage Sale" from "Garbage Sale." One letter, and maybe nothing else.

We did OK today. I was thrilled to sell a toddler bed, and equally unthrilled when it unsold again. :-/ My friends moved their big pieces and I got rid of some junk, too, though my kids made more $ than I did.

Surprisingly, it's been Mollusc who has been the taskmaster when it comes down to purging things. Usually, she's the sentimental one. But this time I heard her saying "One big elephant and three babies. We don't need three babies. One, or two?" And in reply to the immediate arguments from the peanut gallery, "Have you EVER seen a mother elephant with three babies?" ^_^

Once all the work of getting stuff ready is done, the good part comes - sitting with friends, chatting, and doing occasional math; drawing chalk outlines of the littles in the driveway to amuse them, eating together and hassling the bigs about bringing out more stuff if they really want to buy something from their friends. :-)

Diesel You Can Afford

It's here! Diesel that will give you unlimited mileage for one low price, and is environmentally friendly to boot.

That's right, folks! Diesel is releasing a compilation in actual book form of his best blog posts, paired with some never-before viewed, untouched-by-human-hands, freshly mattress-tagged, non GMO, non-pesticide, non-tested-on-animals, organic, preservative-free material. "Antisocial Commentary: From the Secret Files of the Mattress Police" is going to be published on 8/15, but you can start placing “pre-orders” on Diesel's fabulous site on 7/26. That's right! Today!! It’s going to retail for $11.95 + S&H for those poor sods who aren't in the know, but you can pre-order a signed copy for $9.95 with free shipping. Does life get any better? Well, Daniel Craig could phone you up I guess. And if you buy this book, maybe he will.

I adore Diesel for many reasons, not the least of which being that be bribed me to write this post. ;-) From Caption contests to cutting edge Geographical and Celebrity News, to Bold Political Commentary, he never fails to make me laugh. And if I can't laugh with him, I can always laugh AT him. ^_^

Now, of course, like the rest of the world already does, you could just read Diesel's posts for free on his blog, but bringing these glorious works to paper opens up whole worlds of new possibilities -- toilet paper and lopsided origami fodder being just two possible uses. Why not rip out a particularly relevant post, fold it into a paper airplane (with a very sharp nose) and sail it into your boss's office? If you're lucky, you might even hit him/her in the eye. Or go evangelical on someone's ass and nail "Harry Potter and the Inevitable Slide into Satanism" to their door (preferably in the middle of the night.) You might consider smacking a troublesome co-worker upside the head with this gem, or buying 200,000 copies and dropping them on Canada from a low-flying aircraft in an effor to promote World Peace.

Really, the possibilities are endless. And so are the laughs. :)

Mishmash

I'm doing the chicken-with-its-head-cut-off thing this week. After I teach this morning, I'll likely be getting ready for our big garage sale until class and sparring tonight. We're making good headway, but I wish we had another week or two. But since we're doing this in conjunction with some other families in the sub and they're putting out the big sign, we're trying to take advantage of the higher traffic.

I took what I think were some interesting birth photos last night, so I'll try to share those soon.

In the meantime, please discuss the most random things you can dredge up. ^_^

Potter Pics

It's really bright out here!


Carpe Noctem. If it ever comes.


Caught by the prize patrol!


This is fun!


Jelly slug?


Bertie Botts vomit flavour!


Eeeeew!


Is it a permanent tattoo?


It's cold!


But cool!
(I was going to get this as a tramp stamp to surprise MuNKi, but they were only doing arms and faces. ^_^ )


Dragon for Prawn


Friend's dragon. Sweet!

***Don't read the caption below the next picture if you don't want a slightly veiled
spoiler.***


Photographic evidence (if a bit blurry) that we were right all along.


Sluggie ♥ Snape


OMG! Actual BOOOOOOOKS!!!!!


Almost made it!



Day 2


Someone cough up a copy for ME already!


Unimpressed.
(and Sky Chair™)

My last statement (below) contains a reference to the book. It's not a spoiler, but you might want to skip it anyway.

And FTR I ♥ MOLLY WEASLEY!!!!

I think she got the best line in the book. ^_^

Just One Word

Excellent!

Harroin

I dislike drug references. They make me uncomfortable. But I like puns too much to pass up on this title. :-P ^_^

The new Harry is stinking great so far. We bought another copy at Sam's today and things work like this:

Mollusc reads one. Sluggie reads one. I commandeer one, read a chapter or two and give it back, then go steal the other one, read a chapter or two and give it back. I convince Sluggie to play a computer game while I read another chapter or two. I convince her she's having too much fun to quit and read some more. I finally return it and send Mollusc to the shower, stealing her book as soon as she she sets it down.

This book does not have any slow places so far. It's addictive. But to be nice (and here is where you must award me Mother of the Year or perhaps Century) I prise the book from my hand and allow the girls to take it to bed while MuNKi and I watch a movie. This is not easy. This is painful. I find myself shaking and delirious. Is that a dementor in the corner? Hermione is giggling and waving at me from the other couch. She wants me to go and get the book back. No! I can do this!

Who am I kidding? No I can't. Accio book! Accio book! Why isn't it working? Accio book dammit!!

I struggle through the Russell Crowe film. The trembling won't stop and Russell doesn't look nearly as hot as usual. Jeff doesn't get nearly enough lines. That guy who's in everything these days appears, and his wistful ogling of Christie's bum almost distracts me, but I can feel myself sliding back into that pit of desperation. I need the book. Nothing is good without the book. The book makes everything sharper, brighter, and better-smelling.

The stupid film doesn't have a blooper reel. WTF is wrong with directors these days?! How am I supposed to keep going like this? There are 3 Russell Crowe music vids on the menu, and a desperate mashing of buttons on the remote produces 3 songs with pretty good melody, rather decent singing and crap lyrics. Oh the humanity!

One of those kids had better be asleep by now. That's all I can say.

Night Owl

How long do you think I would have to stay up to snatch the book from the hands of a finally sleeping child?

It will be like the Tooth Fairy. Only in reverse. And with a book. And no tooth.

This is the very last first time I get to read a new Harry Potter book. I've decided to try and savour it as much as possible.

Who's Giddy?

OMG now that we have our wristband, it is really sinking in.

If you were at our house today you would hear random shouts of:

"Who's excited?"

"Who's giddy?"

and

"Olé!"

You would be treated, as well, to rousing renditions of "The Mysterious Ticking Noise."

The kids are bouncing off the walls. Well, they're currently swinging and singing (the Mysterious Ticking Noise Song) and shouting, but you know. *I'm* bouncing off the walls.

This is something the likes of which my kids may never see again. I'm excited for me, but mostly, I'm excited for them.

"I've found the source of the Mysterious Ticking Noise; it's a pipe bomb!"

"Yaaaaaaaaaaay!"

Day Zero!!

OK peeps! Technically, this is Pottergasm day! (it's 12:10pm) Wow, huh?

After a chat with Amanda, I realised that I would need to call the store in the morning and find out more about expected crowd sizes, limitations on customer numbers, etc. Yikes. I think we're going to have to skive off of red-belt classes. We need some of Fred and George's Skiving Snack Boxes. ^_^

It's not so bad if we do. We busted our butts in class today. Bigtime. I got plenty of exercise just laughing during warmups after the guy behind me made a comment during jumping jacks that I immediately misinterpreted. MuNKi joined in the frivolity immediately, realising instantly what I must have heard (or thought I'd heard) and there was some general silliness from there on out. I love this group of people! :)

We had a full house and got paired up on bags and worked so stinking hard! I soaked my entire shirt just in class. Usually it takes class and sparring to do this. Sorry if that's TMI. It just feels really amazingly great to work like that and come out still smiling. ^_^ And then it was on to sparring, where I got paired up with the sweatiest guy in class for drills. He literally rains on the floor. Seriously. That was a good match-up since we both have long legs. We killed ourselves even more, and still managed to have a good time. Somehow the guys paired up beside us both got broken. But they'll be OK. It wasn't anything serious.

Earlier today the sky opened up and just dropped an ocean on us. It was amazing! I love thunderstorms. The Littles and I left the house in dry weather, though there was a bolt of lightning rending the sky in front of us. By the time we got to the stoplight by the library (a block-ish away) it was HAILING. And when we reached the library about a minute later, I could barely see a thing. I let the Littles out and parked (fortunately the closest spot possible was available) and then RAN. Didn't matter. I was drenched. What fun! The wind was blowing like crazy. I gathered the herd, and we watched the wind and rain for a bit, then RAN to the car. Well, some of the girls started running the wrong way (towards where we always park) and by the time we were all in the van, yes, we may as well have been swimming.

When we got home, there was no lightning left, so the Bigs played out in the rain and hail. What fun. :) I love when the weather is hairy like that.

Have a very Harry day. ^_^

Rise and Shine!

I usually like to wake the kids up by putting in a CD in the morning. It has to be better than coming awake to a screeching alarm (or mother for that matter.) Vivaldi and general Baroque come in handy a lot for this, but there are plenty of other choices. Today it's Genticorum. The songs are peppy, foot tapping, hip shaking things that you can't ignore. The often raucous tunes are sometimes accompanied by bawdy lyrics. Good thing they're all in French.

What I'd like to know this morning, though, is whose John Mayer CD is that in the drawer and how did it get there? Also, my legpad is still missing. I'm beginning to suspect that there may have been some sort of horrifying improbability incident.

What are you listening to today?

What I Would Like to Know

is how in the hell can I lose a leg pad between my sparring bag and the wash?!?! I mean really.

Grrrrrrr!!!

7 Things

• I have a bruise on my right bicep and forearm from "string slap*." (I'm left-eyed. And yes, I was holding it wrong. My funky-shaped elbows don't help.)

• I made a little boy cry in class this morning, but I think he still loves me. (Don't worry, I only gave him pushups because he wasn't listening/obeying.)

• Teaching big kid class was a success. (I'm doing all the morning classes this week.)

• We had our first harvest of Perilla leaves, and a yummy lunch of rice and leaves with sauce. Fishy was so excited!

• Class was a big workout, but fun!

• Sparring made me sweat my whole entire shirt up. I love sparring.

• 3 more days!!!

*And archery term that means exactly what it sounds like it would.

Time for the Quarterly Kitchen Disaster Report

OK, so in actuality, I'm only good at maybe 4 things. It's amazing, really, that MuNKi has held onto me this long. Perhaps he keeps me purely for my entertainment value. Yes, it's time for another Kitchen Disaster Report. ^_^

So Sluggie wanted "Zebra Cake" for her birthday, which made my day, because after 29 birthday cakes, I just kind of dread making them. :-P Zebra cake is simple, though. Piece of -- well, you know.

However.

Who knew that those stupid Nabisco™ wafers would be as hard to find as they are? And also, since when do I read directions? (Just ask MuNKi) I think I got my fill of that whilst fixing expensive aircraft, so now I just like to be free and let it all flow in creative ways, ya know? Usually.

Now the last time I whipped cream, it never ah, stiffened. I hear it happens to everyone, but it had never happened to me before. That's the kind of thing that happens to Other People, you know? In retrospect, this was probably due to the bowl being too warm, but yesterday I thought that maybe I ought to read the directions instead of just beating the stuff indicriminately on high speed.

Lo and behold, the carton directed me to "beat at a low and consistent speed." Yup. So I did.


Can you guess what I made?

It was like living in Little House on the Prairie. I made butter! ^_^

But, yeah, that is not the greatest for gluing together chocolate wafers for zebra cake, so MuNKi had to bring me more cream.

In the meantime, we have some rather sweet butter for our toast and jam.

***

In other news, we continued our decluttering mission today. This time we worked in the basement, rockin' out to some very inspirational tunage from ~d. (Thanks ~d!!)

Of course, once we found the hula hoops, productivity suffered a sharp decline. ^_^

Oh Crap

I'm not going to use that tired old cliche about raining and pouring. And I'm not going to talk about things coming in 3s. No, realli.



The funny thing is, that the moment MunKi opened his mouth to tell me the news today, outta the blue, I knew exactly what was coming. He said something like "So this isn't as bad as it could be. . ." and I finished the whole thing. We're scary psychic like that sometimes.


Life is dealing us an interesting card. :-P Several weeks ago, MuNKi got an email from the Company Prez saying that it had just come to his attention that some employees had company cars. MuNKi being one of those. (Duh. His job entails driving, driving, and driving, among other things. The company car was part of the hiring contract.) The BAD part was that this fuckwad wanted to change that. Well shit.

We haven't been a 2 car family since I-don't-know-when. I've never really liked the idea, and plus, it's just not practical $-wise. In the past, if I needed to have the car, I'd drop MuNKi off at work at voila. But not with this job, since with this job, MuNKi must have the car all day, every day. Shit. Did I mention, Shit?



So the good news is that they're at least going to give him a car allowance if he gets a car that follows the set rules: must be a 4 door (shit - we actually could have used a truck for hauling crap here and there at times), must be 4 yrs old or younger (shit - that ain't cheap), and, OK, I don't really know what else. I hope it doesn't have to be American. Because unpatriotic (and extremely unDetroitish) though it may seem, I'm tired of paying repairs for those pieces of shit. And can I just add that I will never EVER own a Ford again? Besides Toyotas are made here now anyway.



The bad news is that car insurance here in Detroit is close to, if not THE highest in the country. The van is listed with me as primary (spotless driving record - touch wood) and the company car is insured by MuNKi's work. So "this is stink." (to use a Miyazaki line)



The good part, is that we could use this 2nd car for anything we like, not just MuNKi's work. So I could even use it if need be. But CRAP. I have a feeling that this is going to end up costing us. *weeps*



I did, for about a half second, toy with the thought of MuNKi upgrading the van to something younger to meet requirements and myself biking to TKD with the chitlins. But going on our sidewalkless main street with 4 kids - esp the 5 and 7 yr olds - seems like a kind of crappy idea if you know how MI drivers can be. And we certainly couldn't do it in uniform, so add backpacks into the equation, which even then might not be so bad, except that this whole scenario would suck big monkey balls come winter's frost, slush, ice and snow.



I so did not say that. Please continue on as if nothing had happened.



We bought a new dishwasher today. I guess # 3 is on the way. Any bets? *big breath*