John Lydon flogs British Butter

I've always found the formerly Rotten Sex Pistols frontman to be endearingly straightforward. I think it's funny and delightful to see him in this setting looking like a wayward Weasley uncle being menaced by sheep, chased by cows and a face in the crowd. He were never a pretty young man, but as a geezer, he's kind of cute.

Nice pears.

Pretty maids all in a row.



In that special way I have, I managed to have a grand time at Mom and Dad's on Thanksgiving and remembered the deer head and my suitcase and my retainers and cell phone and cell phone charger, and managed to forget my handbag. *harumph*

So Friday night I drove back to Dallas, very nervously, and spent the night at the folks' house. I got up early Saturday morning and swung by Downtown Dallas' Farmer's Market for some fresh fruit and veg for putting by. Sunday I made a double batch of mild Cranberry Jalapeno jam, a batch of pickled sweet peppers and a batch of canned pears.



The pears were beautiful and they appear to have turned out nicely in the jars. I put a cinnamon stick in the syrup as it steeped while I was prepping the fruit, but it made for a bit of a mess in the syrup. (sorry, sweetie) Someone will just have to forgive me for that. I saw a tip online somewhere that you can use a melon-baller to neatly scoop out the big business of the core and the pips on a pear. Turns out, they're right! Looks super-tidy, actually.

Hopefully, they'll taste as good as they look. :) Sunday tally: 14 half pint jars of cranapeno jam; 5 jars canned pears; 5 jars pickled peppers. That's a chorus of 24 thrilling little jars snapping sealed. *smuck!* *smuck* Always makes me think of Smuckers preserves, because that sound is totally *smuck!*



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Sunday, Puppy Sunday: Jolly Roger Sweater Puppies

Yes, Live! (nearly)Nood! Puppehs!

Okay, not even close to nude, but here's some live action footage of Miss Wigglebutt and ickle bruvva. What possible thing could rival the delightments of a fine pair of pups got up in such sweet threads?

I can't think of a thing.

you could have knocked me over with a feather.

I thought I'd never see the day when Gang Of Four music would be used for a commercial campaign. Lo and behold if Natural's Not In It is being used for an XBox commercial. As with all GO4 music, I found them very hooky and memorable and I can see why the rhythm track would seem compelling for an energetic commercial. It's been many years since they were on my frequent flier play list, and yet their biting social commentary comes back to me often in little bits and pieces. (That Essence Rare comes springing to mind, and I quoted Damaged Goods not long ago here).


So, what strikes me as particularly ironic is not simply that they've sold their music for a campaign (and I don't blame them one bit for making a bit of dosh off an old track and hopefully kindling new interest in their work, but that the lyrics of Natural's Not In It always seemed anti-commercialistic in nature to me. But maybe I've always looked at it wrong. *shrug* I still like it. Was shocked, but pleasantly surprised to hear it unexpectedly.

Natural's Not In It

The problem of leisure
What to do for pleasure
Ideal love a new purchase
A market of the senses
Dream of the perfect life
Economic circumstances
The body is good business
Sell out, maintain the interest
Remember Lot's wife
Renounce all sin and vice
Dream of the perfect life
This heaven gives me migraine
The problem of leisure
What to do for pleasure

Coercion of the senses
We are not so gullible
Our great expectations
A future for the good
Fornication makes you happy
No escape from society
Natural is not in it
Your relations are of power
We all have good intentions
But all with strings attached

Repackaged sex keeps your interest
Repackaged sex keeps your interest
an original version below -

Farmer's Market

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Jayne's Hat Costume at DragonCon

Found this costume of Jayne's Hat over at Poorly Dressed FailBlog, but I do not concur. Considering all the abysmal get-ups folks get got-up in for Halloween or whatever, I think this one is actually made of Win. It's funny, and kind of cute, in a scary way. I know a lot of folk are rabidly fond of Jayne, but this is mebbe a bit much. Still, she's having a good time, it was a clever idea and well-executed, in my opinion.

JAYNE: How’s it sit? Pretty cunning, don’tchya think
KAYLEE: I think it’s the sweetest hat ever.
BOOK: Makes a statement.
JAYNE: Yeah, yeah!
WASH: A man walks down the street in that hat, people know he’s not afraid of anything.
JAYNE: Damn straight.

Sunday, Puppy Sunday: matchey-matchey.

[Yes, this is how veddy veddy tired I was when I went to sleep a little after midnight. I was in bed, pupping up a post from my iPhone and reasoned that I'd just had a day off, it therefore must be Sunday today. oops! This week'll just have to be a two-fer!]

I normally don't hold with dressing your babies in matching outfits, but like their skull parkas from last winter, I couldn't resist these sweaters. KEWT!!!


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I'm thankful for...

my grandparents. Grandpa killed this buck about 25 years





ago. I didn't have to fight any cousins or siblings for this. To my amazement, teh puppehs haven't lost their minds over it. Yet.

Good memories of my grandpa.




(yes, Virginia, my living room ceiling will start going up in the next week or so)
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Thanksgiving

Got here last night and mom dished me up a bowl of her soup. On non nom. It's sweet to wake up at my folks' house.


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Later 'maters.

I had a cherry tomato plant that finally bore fruit this fall. I kept waiting for the one on the bottom to get bigger, but I suppose it decided to ripen before it got freezie around here. They were delicious. Next year it is my hope to have tomatoes coming out of my ears. I'm going to can up the awfulest mess of salsa and tomato stuff you ever saw.


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Thank you, India. Thank you, Terror.

Wow. CEO of Rapiscan Systems who makes one of the backscatter x-ray machines used to irradiate folks at our aeropuertos was a guest of the Obamas on their visit to India. Why does this not surprise me?


I wonder how much this guy and his company are making selling their machines to American airports?

I think people bent on terrorizing the flying public would not be deterred by these scanners and I am skeptical about their efficacy as well as their safety for frequent travelers. I think the traveling public should pick a day for a mass protest. I'm thinking everyone who is willing to go through the scanners, albeit under duress, could spell something provocative on their body with reflective tape that would make their feelings known*. I suggest FUTSA, but someone can probably think of something more clever and to the point.

Then there's the folks who insist on a pat-down. While such gear is reputed to be uncomfortable, I think it would be a special treat if the TSA screeners found a lot of folks sporting, uh-- how shall I say?-- under gear of a sexual and bondage-flavored nature. After all, air travel these days is pretty much a form of masochism anyway, so why not mince up to the fondling station wearing a little secret something lewd, bawdy and very personal in nature, but entirely legal and non-threatening? I suggest strap-on day. Chastity Belt day. (don't read this next bit, Dad. I have no idea what that all means. I just saw one when a package broke open on the mail sorting slide in 1987 at the Dallas Bulk Mail Center. I'll never forget that. It wasn't masturbating-monkey weird, but it was definitely weird.) - Buttplug day.



I'm loving the idea of the guy who did an impromptu strip sans tease. How about a whole bunch of people getting pre-emptively nekkid whilst waiting in line?


I think it's ironic that in the name of so-called safety, folks going about their own business are being subjected to increasingly dehumanizing rituals. What then if someone manages to pull off another terrorist act in spite of these machines and invasive pat-downs? After all, no one has successfully pulled off another 9/11-style attack using commercial airliners in those scanner-free years after 2001, have they?



Looks like we're in for it, no matter what we do. Once a candidate for the governor's seat in Austin was on the campaign trail and a storm was looming. A reporter asked him if he was upset about the impending bad weather, he quipped that the weather was just like rape- "if it's inevitable, just relax and enjoy it**." Well, if being fondled or irradiated by the TSA is inevitable, I say we at least go out of our way to have fun with it.



I already detested flying. I feel sad because I don't know if I'll ever feel like going through all that invasive stuff just to see England one more time. I feel a little sad about that.

And to whinge on a bit further-- not a single one of us is guaranteed a tomorrow. Life is dangerous but we are made complacent by the relative ease of the western life we've built around ourselves. I think it's a great joy to not have to worry about the banal horrors of a world without antiseptic and the kind of sophisticated safeguards we have in place, but we should not take that for granted. At this very moment, some great rock could be hurtling through the depths of space and coming right for us. Should we all be standing around, knock-kneed and peeing ourselves because something bad might happen?

Life is pain, highness. Anyone who tells you differently is selling something.

I'd rather take my chances with my privacy and dignity intact, TYVM. On a scale of degrees, the perceived benefit of body scans and TSA-endorsed groping is vastly outpaced by the abhorrent degree of exception I take to having my privacy thus invaded. Our government is perpetually thinking of new ways to bilk yet more money out of us, and they must be perceived to be doing something about threats to our society. Therefore, bodyscans are our dinner-and-a-movie. Either we do something to illustrate the preposterous scenario with which we are faced or we succumb.

* Himself suggested that subverting the process could get someone prosecuted, so mebbe this is not a great idea? I dunno.

** A bunch of us voted for Ann Richards instead

Matchless Music Maven -- fellow music entoosiast...

...well, I say fellow, but I'm not a stitch on her when it comes to sheer voracity of musical appetite... Anyhoo, Bad Tempered Zombie has composed an ode in my honor for correctly guessing which two tunes on her Friday Random Playlist on itunes shuffle were by bands she'd never heard of.

Anyway, it's not every day one has an Ode composed in one's honor, so I'm going to ride that wave of adulation, real or imagined. No matter what she says, I disagree that the ode is a crappy contest prize.

Yours truly,
Post Punk Priestess
[my new title]

I can't remember where I found this...

but it always makes me giggle just to think about it.

Cheeky, cheeky.

There's a tv show called Dancing With The Stars and the viewing public calls, emails or texts in votes for the contestant, with one person and their dancer partner being foxtrotted out the door each week, culminating with a big people's choice sort of finale.

Apparently some people question the numbers gathering methods for these votes, and someone at msn.com is outraged that the vote was hacked, netting nascent hoofer Bristol Palin staying power whilst better dancers have been shown the exit sign, possibly because some folks are voting (shock! horror!) more than once for their favorite dancer(an occurrence which apparently only outrages the author if the beneficiary of said extra votes is affiliated with a conservative politician). The author interviews a computer expert who concedes that 'this isn't supposed to be a "one person, one vote" election', but he goes on to identify those votes as fraudulent despite what the expert said about the intentions of this method of data collection. The harangue goes on to say the ramifications here are that with some voter bias and cheating, just as the inept Bristol could take the win with the DWTS competition, so too could we end up with her embarrassing tea-party style mom taking the White House in 2012.

I realize Bristol took the job on that show of her own volition and criticism will come along with the adulation. As long as her mother is a lightning rod, Bristol probably thought she might as well join in and have a laugh and kick her heels up, since she's in for uninvited media exposure every single day anyway. But if she is having a good time and actually enjoying herself, why wouldn't people be drawn to support that? It's supposed to be entertainment, for goodness' sake.

Himself said maybe people are voting for her not based on technical skill but just on moxie. He cites the affection inspired by the Jamaican bobsled team and Eddie the Eagle at the Calgary Olympics in 1988 and says what's wrong with it if people are voting with their hearts rather than with the withering criticism of a ballroom dance judge?

In the case of Eddie, the ski-jumping establishment was outraged that an interloper could waltz in with little qualification, garner so much attention and [in their eyes] make a mockery of their sport. Eddie didn't win at the Olympics in any category-- that went to folks technically more proficient - but Eddie did win the hearts of the world. I suppose when people think things are set up for a predetermined outcome, they get butt-hurt when things don't completely run on rails.

It would be really scary if ignorant people went out and voted without having a lick of sense or the first inkling of what is going on at the highest(er, uh, lowest) levels of our government and how that directly impacts their lives. When that happens, you end up with something like 2008.


I hope Bristol wins. I couldn't give a toss about the show-- I don't even own a TV, but here's to a young woman going out and daring to try despite the naysaying establishment. Here's to Bristol for smiling and not turning into some bitter, pinched emaciated fashion victim, no matter what the critics say. Same goes for her mom.

Sunday, puppy Sunday: sun bunnies

It was cold and the sun was streaming in the window but not at a good angle for teh puppehs to catch some rays. I pushed a trolley to the window and put a towel on the second level. Chuy seemed reluctant but Praline got the idea right away.





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Hey Dad - Look at this video of the March 2008 flood in Cherokee Village and Hardy

The first big bridge shot is the bridge over the Spring River as it wends into Hardy. The water is normally 40 or 50 feet below the bridge. Creepy.

Also, see the footbridge at Papoose Park at about the 1:15 part of the video? Wow. Amazing to see such familiar places so flooded... Our family is from that neck of the woods.

Cranberry jalapeno jam - first foray into canning...

With long distance guidance from FarmMom, I've dipped my toe in the pool of canning now. This jam seems like it will be ossum, fingers crossed. I seeded and veined the peppers thoroughly, but I expect it will still be too spiky for some appetites. I spect it'll be perfect on a turkey sammy or with roast pork. The possibilities abound. Yum!

It's a little thrilling when you hear first one, then a chorus of the little lids snapping sealed. Cute!

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from my iPhone

Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter - The Book

Check out this great MSN video: Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter - The Book

hee hee

new music and housecleaning.

One thing I haven't done in a very long while is to plug in a new cd and clean. This is used to best effect when I clean something that's been dirty to which my eye has been drawn again and again. Why I haven't cleaned it before I cannot say. Today it was the ick under the ballfoot bathtub. Apparently water condenses on the outside of the tub and then runs down, and for some reason, dust seems to really stick to those areas. The dirt makes me think it would be great to do a tub enclosure so that dust wouldn't collect under there, but then I'd be laying in bed some morning about 3:37 and I'd have to go after the enclosure with a crowbar because I'd know-- I'd just know it needed cleaning down there. Ew. This gives me pause and makes me think of switching to a modern acrylic slipper tub, even though I hate the way acrylic feels. Ew.

So, it's been this way since I moved in. Yucky. Yeah, I've been a lazy bum, and other, bigger tasks have pulled focus, but Thursday night it was the new cd from Interpol and I was carried in aural trasports as I tucked into the mindless task of cleaning. This was the first listen, but I do like the new cd. Probably my favorite from the cd will be different in a week or a month, but today it's The Undoing, and there's no video and I don't want to embed something here which may disappear any moment.

Instead I'll give you Lights from this album. Peculiar video, but I like it. love the application of the liquid latex glove. Strange video, but par for the course. Or for the coarse. I don't think this album will win over a new herd of Interpol fans, but I do think if you like Interpol already, you'll not be disappointed.

Thrills!!!

Very clever rendition of Mozart's Rondo alla turca by two Polish guitarists.

Nailed.

Breda asked what was on my nails in the beet photo. That was Saturday and two manicures ago, so I've enlarged the photo. I painted a base of Sinful Colors Tapping Nails and layered on two coats of NYC Starry Silver Glitter on top. Tapping Nails is a very bright orange. Starry glitter has holographic micro glitter in silver with larger flecks of pink and blue hexagons that look a little dotty. It's fun to layer them and see what you get. Keeps it interesting, too. Oh, and the NYC glitter stuff was just .99 at the drug store. I feel like I have the fingernail sensibilities of a pre-schooler, and that's alright with me. :)

I'm betting the glitter would look A-mazing on top of my gunmetal gray. OH! Gray with glitter and then a matte layer? Hmmm... I've gotta go paint my nails.

See ya!

I predict

that the Australian twins who shot each other on a Colorado shooting range today will turn out to be rabidly anti-gun people who were trying to make a point.

I think it's really crappy they'd work so hard to try to get furriners barred from American shooting ranges for the bad behaviour of just a couple.

I still love...

Lush.



There should be more girlie rock bands.

"Is this your customer? I can't understand what she is saying."

A memo came out from BossMan to all the coordinators inquiring about a voice mail that came to the general mailbox.

A flurry of responses from my colleagues resulted and I then sent a tongue-in-cheek email to just BossMan:

"Uh, that is my customer. Thank you for parading my shame to my colleagues!"

He sent back an email indicating extreamusement and that the message could not possibly have been English. I responded that I'd secretly feared without listening that the hogwash message came from Ms. Punjab, but I'd employed a cheat and plugged the origin phone number into the dashboard and it pulled up Our Favorite Customer.

Then came a "reply to all" from a superb lady saying "that customer belongs to Operator[not Phlegmmy], but I don't think she's speaking English at all."

My "Reply to All" said "Actually, this is my customer. She was not speaking English. She was speaking Crazy. I have been a Crazy-magnet all my life, and I am fluent in Crazy. Me speak Crazy very well."

Thus resulting in general responses of mirth and relief, for they all get the crazy customers too, as much as it seems I have cornered the market.

I have to say that I get something like an endorphin rush when I send out a Reply To All and hear a murmur of delight tittering throughout the department. This I would liken to the post-tattoo experience, though slightly less painful and with a deficit of its attendant hepatitic paranoia and no outlay of cash at the conclusion.

[All that is by way of saying that one should not refrain from getting a tattoo based on hepatitic paranoia: one shops around and one finds a reputable artist who is fastidious in hygiene and exacting in method. One recommends not acquiring said tattoo in the clink. One is just saying...]

Sunday, puppy Sunday: puppehs mit beets

Himself had never eaten properly prepared fresh beets, a situation which now has been rectified. On the advice of brilliant cooks Stingray and Labrat, I wrapped them in foil and baked them for about :45. Then I let them cool a bit and simply served with goat cheese. Himself liked them, and so did I. Teh puppehs wanted some but other than a few goat cheese crumbs, they were deprived.

It was a marvel how beautifully the skins peeled off the hot beets, and with a minimum loss of edible flesh. Yes, I have asbestos fingers. About 10 minutes into eating, I noticed steam was still rolling out of the beets and marveled that I'd handled them early. Probably one of those silicon mitts is not a bad idea for holding the beet as you peel.














Well, okay, they did lick the plates.


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Fait a confit!

All I know is it smells very Italian in here. I thought this liter jar would be full and then some. I tasted one tomato and it seems good to me. Will put this stuff through its paces in the coming days.

Esteemed commenter JPG asks what the ingredients were. Here's how I made this confit which was a glorious salsa alternative on this morning's breakfast burrito:

1 quart yellow cherry tomatoes, cut in half, 1 pint red grape tomatoes, cut in half, 1 large shallot, thinly sliced, all of these tossed in a few Tb of olive oil

placed 2 Tb of olive oil on a baking sheet and sprinkled 2 Tb each of fresh, chopped basil, rosemary and flat italian parsely, along with thin slices of 2 cloves of garlic, and coarse salt and freshly cracked pepper. Next step was to array the tomatoes/shallots cut-side-down on the baking sheet, and then cover with yet more of the herbs and garlic. I placed this in the oven about 225 deg F for about 1.5 hours. I was watching for the tomatoes to lose their firmness but not get completely mushy. I left the pan on the stovetop and let it cool almost to room temperature. Then I picked out the garlic and bunged the rest into the sealing canister, and I topped the lot off with more olive oil to cover any tomatoes sticking up out of the liquid and popped it into the refrigerator.

The house smelled wonderful. This would have been glorious to spread hot on top of fresh garlic toast. From what I gather from many recipes I saw online, this should remain well preserved and edible in the fridge for a couple weeks. I doubt it will last that long. Nice way to winnow out the zest of summer, though, innit?

Yummy stuff.

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Yellow cherry tomato confit, stage 1

I'm just improvising based on a variety of recipes I looked at online. We'll see how it goes.


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Heaven on a plate.

Previous missive found me waxing euphoric on an omelette.

Okay, this was glorious beyond measure.
I confess a predisposal to affection for Sophie Dahl because she bears a striking resemblance to one of the most gorgeous creatures on earth, my lovely niece C. But this recipe for an omelette tribute to author Arnold Bennett was more than a bit enticing to me. She showcases this as a home alone-day-style indulgence, but I think this is the most glorious omelette ever, and may finally inspire me to invest in a proper omelette pan. I poked about the 'nets and found a bit about this omelette, but I do think the Miss Dahl's lemon zest definitely improves the entire affair, plus the association with her excessive adorability makes it all the more delectable, in my humble opinion.

Himself is working tonight, but I've asked him to bring a colleague for a properly decadent breakfast of this omelette after his shift in the morning. Lucky me if they say yes, for I shall have a second helping!
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Location:Home.

Good googly moogly.

This is so frelling glorious. I have to blog it. Naow.





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007's M [Dame Judi Dench] as you've never seen her...

I had no idea she played Sally Bowles in Cabaret in 1968




Funny to hear that brittle hoarseness of her voice was there 40 years ago, too. It's funny, though, because as brilliant an actress as she is, she's not quite guttersnipe enough for Sally Bowles in my mind. Still, it's cute to see her in something completely different.

If I'm wrong, I wish someone would splain me, but...

I think the students protesting the student tuition fees in England are a right lot of tosspots. Same goes for the whiners in France protesting the retirement age going from 60 to 62.

What a spoiled, impudent, self-indulgent bunch of wankers. Yup. I said it: they're all assholes.

Guess what? You know that education all those people feel entitled to so they can command a higher salary than the folks who tucked their chins and put their noses to the grindstone after basic education? That costs someone something. No one owes you a melon-farming education, asshats, so suck it up and pay the ever-loving fees, take out student loans, borrow from a kindly relative-- whatever you have to do, but quit frelling whining. Education is something you should have the pride and moral fibre to flipping earn. No one owes you that.

And what about the things you've destroyed in your little shitfit, eh? Could the destructive attitude of trustafarians like yourself be a contributing factor to the rise of education costs, mebbe just a skoshy bit? Jerks.

Then there's the protestors in France-- from the photos, the people all looked really young. Frankly, they looked a lot like the young people in the British student videos-- soft, spoilt and useless as teats on a boar hog.

When you think of contemporary mob scenes, it's never with a warm knowledge that needed social statements were being made. It usually appears that thugs on the periphery are seizing an opportunity to act out whilst riding a wave of other people's acrimony.

I'd bet good money that none of those students goes hungry, that they get all the latest fashions and probably most of them are carrying a cellphone that costs as much as an average Joe makes in a week. The same sort of wankers walk around in Che Guevara tshirts, full of manufactured angst at imagined injustices when in fact Westerners live in a world our forbears engineered to shelter us from many of life's harshest realities and hopefully enable us to make the most out of life.

I've never seen anyone with smallpox. I've never seen a mother and her children dying of water-borne illness. I've never lived in a shack with no mod cons and I don't know anyone who has. I'm not saying people should shrug off real and pressing dangers or moral outrages in our world, and injustice should not be tolerated, but first we need to have a real discussion on what, in fact, constitutes injustice and moral outrage. Even destitute people in the West can find free food for themselves and their children. Medical care is available, food, housing. This is not third-world shit where your kids are sitting in filth with houseflies crawling across their eyeballs. We all need to have a sense of gravity and humility about the relative riches we have in our lives and how we need to use those riches as springboards to an even better existence for ourselves and all the little ones we hold dear.

Right now you're looking at a computer, whether your own or borrowed, and you are in a heated or cooled structure. You are comfortable most of the time. You have access to a staggering wealth of information through this box, you have a working brain and there is a world full of raw resources waiting to be tapped. You have the key to unraveling nearly any problem you ever could face, if you would but use it. But no one owes you. You really should have the dignity to earn it.

Only you can change the way you live.

...stayed up late...

Tuesday night I meant to get in bed very early, but I saw a link to the videos of Matt Lauer's interview with George W Bush and stayed up an extra hour listening to him field questions-- often rather withering in nature-- from his interviewer.

I already knew I liked GWB. I already knew he was a decent person, and principled. He was sharper than his critics ever gave him credit for being. I remember how people accused him of being a puppet for Cheney and of being a colossal dimwit and in almost the same breath they'd say he knew all along that 9/11 was coming or-- more baffling still-- that he was in some way involved in its conception and execution. I don't know how some could reconcile calling him addle-witted and yet a sociopathic mastermind. Listening to him speak in an interview such as this one, not rising to the bait and yet standing his ground, I marvel that anyone would find him not likable.

The tone of Lauer's questions seemed quite contentious, and yet GWB fielded them with grace, candor and the genuine good nature I've always associated with him. I loved that his response to Lauer's mentions of high approval ratings and low ones at different points in the interview were met with essentially the same response of "so what?" He didn't take the job of President to win a popularity contest, and he had very clear and grave ideas of his responsibility in that role. He understood he could not afford the luxury of needing to be liked at all times. I'm thankful that when 9/11 happened, he was our President.

I didn't learn anything new from these video clips, but I did find reinforcement of two things of which I was already convinced: I like George W. Bush, and Matt Lauer is a tosser.

from Ireland/monkey housin' syndrome

bog snorkeling.

Um, why???
*********************

There's a company my company deals with and they are doing a little introduction thing featuring me in their upcoming newsletter, for some reason. They asked me what was the strangest thing to happen during a transaction since I came on board with the company, and I had a really hard time coming up with something. Dealing with neurotic, unreasonable people is always strange because mentally ill people are tedious and sadly predictable in the most silly ways--but that's pretty much a given in about any service-related job.

I wanted to say that nothing at this job even touches the hem of the garment of strange in my book. Managing apartments once I had a resident give notice and I asked his permission to show his loft to a new prospective tenant the on the following day and he said sure. We walked into the space and at all times I tried to keep myself and my A-line skirt between the prospective new tenant and the bong and frisbee of weed on the coffee table. It was sort of a little two-step, but I managed to keep the prospect innocent of the offending articles and vowed to wait until he left the place to show his apartment again.

Then there was the elderly nudist who (still lives there-- My sister manages it now!) wore nothing but hot pants as he rode his bicycle around the property, twig and berries festooned in sadly withered swags oozing unctuously down the saddle-- so said others who live there.



*shudder*

Then there was the time the lady came to look at lofts and brought her pet Capuchin monkey who (ruined!) drank my iced tea, tore up someone's $1500 rent check, sat on my head and rearranged my hairdo and then flopped on its side looking up into my eyes intently, shoved its hand down its diaper and set to work doing something which could only be described as masturbatory, for reals. The lady kept asking if I'd seen her on the news, she having just won a custody battle in court against the SPCA for the little brute. A few days later talking on the phone to a fellow manager of lofts in the design district, I said it had been an odd week and he said "you have no idea: I had a monkey in my office on Tuesday." I said "you too?" Apparently she was making the rounds in attempt to get attention for herself and the monkey. Yes, here is an actual picture of the actual monkey. I can't see its hands, but I have my suspicion about what they were up to at the moment the photo was snapped. In fact, if someone hasn't throttled the little beggar by now, I'll bet it's interefering with itself at this very moment.



Oh, no. I haven't seen strangeness on the job in a long time.

And I don't miss it.

rest in peace, Shirley Verrett

An absolutely gorgeous soprano with effortlessly elegant and refined technique.

I think this is super-cute!

This is my track Wishery, comprising vocal syllables, musical chords and sound effects recorded from the 1937 Disney classic Snow White And The Seven Dwarfs. Enjoy!

sweet! I love how they put it together and the video is cute! Just a little taste of Disney without over-serving.

reason #million-and-something Why I Love Tam:

because she writes stuff like this:

But while I was eating lunch I watched the Brat Prince keep trying to strike his favorite chin-uplifted Mussolini pose, with its haughty "Who farted?" moue of confident disdain, but it wouldn't stick, and his facial expression kept drifting back to one that looked like a man chewing on a cat turd.

Tam, tucking into grub at a pub, day after election where the TV monitor was on mute

BWA HAW HAW HAW HAW!!! All this time I was trying to figure out what that expression represented. A man chewing on a cat turd. Yup-- it fits.

Sunday, Puppy Sunday: Sock Pup

Getting cold, I got out my fuzzy house socks, and found one of them is air-conditioned. Two guesses on how my sock got air-conditioned...
Oh well. I still have ossumly cute pups. :)

Don't touch the remote- you don't know how it works!

A message from Dads about Daylight Savings TIme:



h/t to Bad Tempered Zombie

buttermaking

I had some heavy whipping cream left over in the fridge and I was baking a cake Wednesday night so I thought I'd do something with the cream and I left it out on the counter for an hour or so to warm up. I remembered Stingray's post on making butter, and always wanted to try that. My mom told me when she was a kid, they'd make butter in a quart jar, just tossing the jar from hand to hand. I couldn't find a clean jar with a lid I trusted, so I put the cream in a ziploc container (green with silver sparkles).

I sat at the computer and chased links and watched videos as I shook the container. Fairly quickly, it seemed to become whipped cream and just seemed thick and like there was barely movement in the container. After I'd been shaking it for about a dozen or so minutes, I noticed that it went back to liquid form and was super-sploshy. I kept shaking it for a few minutes before I realized I had butter in the bowl.

This butter is super-creamy and very smooth, very sweet. I took a poppy-seed cake to work Friday and the butter, too, and people oohed and aahed over it.

I'm just wondering about its efficacy in baking-- would it be better or not as good as the hyper-processed, regular product we get from stores? All I know is the next time I have a party, along with an array of stinky cheeses, there will be a sizeable bowl of fresh butter. Yum!

can you hep me?

I've not been shopping for a new door, actually. There's loads of work needs doing on my Great American Hovel™ before I reach the new door stage. Still, I kept this brochure on Masonite doors around for yonks, it getting slathered with paint and unidentifiable smeary stuff, and I couldn't quite put my finger on why I hadn't tossed it, and tonight it hit me-- I want those support pillar thingies for my porch. The bits you see are actually just decorative, but they are a damned sight better than the ones my porch currently sports. So, are there patterns for these things somewheres? What are they called? I mean, they're not columns in the classical sense-- are there patterns available? How hard are they to replace? Can this be done in a weekend?

Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?

Greatest invention

Rich Hall

coolest bathroom wall plaque EVAR!!!

Saw this at a friend's house on Wednesday and I'm besotted. I thought - oh! I'll just pop over to ebay and see if I can pick one up. I really love the little glittery butt, too. Super cute, sez I.

So, over on ebay? Yup: $295. Srsly. Guess I'll have to admire it from afar!

Good morning, here's the news...

...may it all be good. Or my version of good, anyway!

Carbon/Silicon

h/t to DBA Dude

midgets and strippers and booze: oh MY!

You may have heard that Courteney Cox is divorcing David Arquette. Last week there was a video being bandied about where David was in a red satin smoking jacket with black lapels, champagne in hand and wallerin' onstage with a midget stripper. Yes, by all means-- google it-- it's actually kind of funny, but not funny the superior way the BritTabs want us to think.

Was it tasteless? Yes, rather.
Was it a questionable thing to allow to be documented? Probably, particularly for someone going through a dee-vorce.
Was this something that could be construed as erotic? Uh, not to me, but I suppose to someone else...
Did David Arquette do anything wrong? Not in my book.

I poked around on the internet and found something indicating that David Arquette wasn't just some random drunk at a party/stripper thingie-- he was the M.C. of an organized party, and in that capacity, I think it would make total sense for him to get onstage and act out with the other performers, a la Joel Gray in Cabaret, oui?

Anyway, I can't see a thing he did that was wrong-- this just looked like someone having a lark (however pitifully drunk he may have appeared). Is he free, white and over 21? Damn skippy. Does he have the right to go out and be a little obnoxious on occasion? That's a big 10-4, good buddy.

Speaking of bad behaviour, David's sister Patricia was at a movie premiere and reporters were plying her with rude questions about her brother's outlandish behaviour. Big Sis fired back:

"What's the worst thing you ever had happen to you? Do you ever masturbate? Have you ever had an abortion? Can you imagine these kinds of questions? Why do you think this is all right? It's not all right! Who here can live in a glass house that has made every right choice and everybody understands?"

I already really liked Patricia before, but I applaud her for being a good sister and handing it right back to the nosy photogs. And it's heartwarming that at a time when he must really be hurting, David knows a sister has his back. It's heartwarming to me to know that David has a sister like mine. :)

First Halloween in my new home...

When the lovely FarmFamily arrived for my birthday, they brought a few pumpkins from their garden, which they placed on the porch. One day a couple weeks ago, a neighbor brought me a nice homemade loaf of pumpkin bread. The next day, I noticed one of the pumpkins was missing. Those two events are probably unrelated, but it was interesting.

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Little Town is a pretty quiet place, but there are a lot of kids around. Quite a few houses around town pulled out all the stops with the Halloween decorations, and I figured there'd be quite a few costumed little varmints come through.

I bought a 4 lb bag of candy that boasted over 200 pieces, but I felt a little fretful, worried that if I gave every kid a handful (as is my tendency), I might run out. Himself took me over to the dollar store and heroically procured pounds and pounds more candy. Back at the hacienda, I dumped said candy into a big lovely basket, checked and re-checked the front porch light was on, then set out to do quiet things around the house so I'd hear if someone came knocking.

I lit some citronella candles to shoo away skeeters, and I put a few candles in bright glass containers so there would be a little extra light, and waited, me and my 10+ pounds of candy and the dogs cordoned off in the kitchen so they didn't run out when I'd have the door opened.

Then they came. I took a picture of every trick-or-treater who came to the door. They were each and every one the utmost in adorable. Here they are, every last one:

Ninja, dragon and someone from Star Wars. I told them how great their costumes were and then they were off with their lovely mama to the place across the street.



I should have given them about an extra 3 pounds each of candy and just turned off the lights. Next year I'll go help at my parents' place and save the trouble.

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Went to a girlfriend's lakehouse for a party Saturday night so the entire Halloween experience wasn't a wash as far as the weekend went. Everyone wore costumes except me. Well, there was one 80-something guy who just sat on a golf cart, but everyone else was a something-or-other. I wore a western shirt, so my girlfriend made me wear a cowgirl hat, and I hung around with an Indian chief for a bit, saying clever crap like "what do you mean 'we', white man?" Several of the costumes were x-rated. There was a flasher guy with an overcoat and a spring-loaded appendage which popped up when he opened the coat. He won an award in the competition, and Cruella de Ville shouted "put it on! put it on!" as he went up to accept his prize. Everyone laughed. There was more than one Dirty Old Man in attendance.

Early in the party, most folks kept one eye on the big TV someone brought out on the lawn to show the Rangers in the World Series, and I have to say it was adorable to see Barbara Bush snapping a photo of her guys out on the field for the first pitch. I'm no sports fan, but I was happy for the general joy of the occasion of local team done good. :)

A bald guy with a very authentic-looking devil get-up seemed a little too eager to get me to hit the hard stuff. I was sipping a 32 ounce iced tea I bought on the way to the party (yeah, I know: boring!) and he wanted to make me a Bloody Mary and get to know me better. "uh, I have a boyfriend" I demurred. He said "is he here?" as if that were all that mattered. I said "no, but I'll bet he'd be here really fast if you wanted to discuss my availability." :P Then it was his turn to demur, wisely. He was older and I figured that combined with a beer-goggles moment-- that by comparison I must've seemed young and fresh. Or desperate or whatever. Inwardly, there was eyerolling.

The old-guy theory was disproven shortly thereafter when a 28 year old guy said he wanted to make out with me. More eyerolling, this time observable. The beer-goggles theorum has yet to be disproven, though. I'm also toying with the notion that people in costumes use them as an excuse to behave very badly. *ahem*

Back to my friend's house, we stayed up late playing cards and then got up and played more cards in the morning. I learned to play canasta, and I quite liked it! Anyway, so the general weekend was good and I've learned something-- clearly, Halloween is only for the grown-ups anymore. Pity, that.