Saturday, October 11, 2003
Goodbye Old Blog!
If you haven't heard from me, check your latest comments or e-mail. If it's not there, e-mail me. I'll be removing links from this page and just referring to it since I don't know how to move my archives over! :) Look out for lots of blogging goodness over there at the new homestead though! I'll figure out how to add commmenting soon.
Friday, October 10, 2003
Queer Eye Marathon is on....
What more reason do I need to set about moving my little place in the blog o' sphere? Wish me luck, and e-mail me if I don't get in touch soon!Thursday, October 09, 2003
Alphabet, via Robin's blog
A - Act your age - most people would say I probably act older then my age - married young, and will have babies young, although what classifies as young for having kids in these parts is pretty silly these days, IMO. I swear, the average age to even think of having kids is 35 around this place.
B - Boyfriend? - husband
C - Chore you hate? - vacuuming, so much I refuse to do it. That's E and little brother's job.
D - Dad's name - Dale (will be our first son's middle name)
E - Essential make up item - make up? what's tha? I don't need to make up for anything thanks. :) I do try to wear deodorant on a pretty regular basis though. LOL.
F - Favorite artist - lots, and I love whatever Balinese artist made my belly dancer statue.
G - Gold or silver - white gold b/c I'm allergic to silver but white gold looks just like it.
H - Hometown - Jersey Shore - still here!
I - Instruments you play - I sing. Constantly. E and friends say it's like living in a strange, strange, musical. Good? Bad? I don't know...
J - Job titles - Wife, teacher, animal scientist.
K - Kids - not yet, but SOON - E only has one semester of law school left. Whoo Hooo! We're waiting till he gets a job so I can possibly stay home once I have the baby.
L - Living arrangements - the not so virtual homestead, 2 acres, with old tiny farmhouse and machinery shop/forge in an old red barn. We rent, we'd like to buy and make this place fabulous - that or 20 + acres in Ithaca. Or maybe this place and then move up there. We're just enjoying where we are right now - today I had both rabbits out running around, and the dog until he got too annoying - Vicki and Luke have no fear of dogs, and she was jumping up and kicking him in the head whenever he got too rough, but he wasn't getting the message.
M - Mom's name - She has never used her (real) first name.
N - Number of people you've slept with - not answering that one here.
O - Overnight hospital stays - first time was a double hernia in kindergarten, then for tonsillectomy in grammer school, and lots of day stays...I haven't stayed overnight in a loooong time, regardless.
P - Phobia - foods I haven't eaten before, highway driving, needles - have medecine, working on some of these.
Q - Quote you like - none I like enough that I could remember them right now, like Robin, I'm not really a quote person.
R - Religious affiliation - Methodist. E and I are going to the local Methodist church right now by our new house.
S - Siblings - younger brother, 21 - he lives with E and I
T - Time you wake up? - early (6:45 on weekdays for work) and very late (11 or 12 on a really lazy Saturday! E and I are not morning people, suffice it to say.
U - Unique habit - Breeding insects and repiles, madagascar hissing cockroaches, melaworms, mice, leopard geckos.
V - Vegetable you refuse to eat - everything but raw carrots and cooked tomato products - again, this is where my meds and doctors come in.
W - Worst habit - Is my AS a habit? I guess not. Putting off doing the dishes till I get yucked out woudl probalb fit this description.
X - X-rays you've had - dental, I think that's it. With all the milk I consume, E jokes that my bones are made of solid calcium.
Y - Yummy food you make - lots and lots. The latest was tonight's - I made E a copy of a veggie dish he likes called "The singing cowboy" - I made seitan from gluten, simmered cutlets of it, fried it like chicken, served it with mashed potaotes, veggie gravy, and cornbread.
Z - Zodiac Sign - Taurus. (what a surprise lol)
Wednesday, October 08, 2003
Treating Myself Nicely
That's my priority tonight...missing two days of Lexapro finally caught up to me today. I was near tears all day and by 5 pm when the copy machine broke, let out with expletives I didn't even know I knew before (and I have a bad Irish mouth to begin with!) I also trudged home, thinking E would be home from school today, to find the homestead deserted. Turns out I had his schedule wrong. Either way, I'm being nice to me tonight. That means spiral mac n' cheese, not enough fudge to cause a sugar crash, and blog reading up here while I listen to the Yankees/Cubs game vicariously (I can't hear the game up here, but I can hear E's moans, groans, and screams of excitment coming up the stairs from the family room.)
In other news?
- We may be adopting a new female bearded dragon to breed with Ranger from a NJ Rescue so I'm excited to hear back about that.
- Lisa and Pink both have very cute new haircuts/dye jobs and are making me ache to break out the snip snip on my own head- you should check 'em out.
- My apple pie has been gobbled up, and I'm trying my second potato bread as we speak- it just isn't rising the way I would like. We need bread, so if it stays dense like the last one I'm going to turn out a white loaf that worked well last week.
- I need to plant the privet, I need to plant the privet...but when will I drag my butt home with enough energy to do so? Hopefully it can last till this weekend.
- I brought my last animal, Hannah the snake, back from school today - E was getting worried that the principal would stay p.o.'ed at me. I hope not. At least now there's nothing for him to hold against me. I've followed his daily memos to the T.
Robin has inspired me (via a chipmunk post of all things) to write about my life in Kalamazoo, Michigan a few years back. Should be ready for posting tomorrow. Hugs all!
Monday, October 06, 2003
Buzzzzzzzzz!!!!!: Crib Notes from the Fugue
That's caffeine talking, ladies. LOTS of caffeine, compliments of my migraine medecine and a few hours in a dark, soundless room. Sometimes I just fall asleep, but other times, my brain races. Tonight was one of those times. A brief overview (for my own reference as much as yours) of my creative whirlwind:
- Move the blog - if not to a different service, then to a different address at least. There are a few folks in my life who read this (may read this - I don't know) simply because when I first started I would give the address to anybody ~ "Hey, check out this cool picture of the yard/the dog/my cool new Tevas E got me". It's a lot more personal and part of my daily life now, a huge part of the community of women who support and encourage me and I'd like to take it back to square one as far as who reads it that I know - when I change the address I'll e-mail y'all individually- if I don't, send me a line. (I'll put a "closed for business" sign up here when I get to that point.
- Using one of the services I'm trying out, or a Mac photo page, make a cast of characters page- me, E, pooch, little bro - everyone/thing I refer to on a semi-regular basis.
- Edit/update my photo pages and figure out a way to get my new photos to appear first, if possible. I may just limit the photos posted to 10 or so at a time, and delete/add as I go.
- IRL, set up Golom in the arboreal cham cage I brought home tonight - get her some good food (she eats crix, but her favorite food is small lizards like anoles, so I bought her one, sort of a peace offering for ignoring her, this afternoon). When we get to our next reptile show, I'm going to trade her for some credit for a female cham - she's the only critter we have who I really tend to ignore to the point where I feel bad - she just doesn't interest me at all, and since I can't use her at school now - well....someone else who actually thinks she's the coolest thing going would take better care of her. E will be taking over frog duties anyhow, since with my help he's going to set up a cool tall vivarium with poison dart frogs for our new family room (the captive ones aren't actually poisonous, btw, because they aren't eating the same stuff they would in the wild - but still finicky delicate little creatures - beautiful though.)
- Brainstorming ideas for Jake, I'll e-mail ya' Santosha!
- Was inspired by a decorating book at M & J's last night- very cool, brightly colored, small paper mache animal ornaments. Very cool, gotta do that. It will also give me another reason to use up the paper mache mix I have and buy wheat paste since I have Samhain plans that involve Martha-esque paper mache faux jack o' lanterns over tea-lights.
- Plans for extra tidbits to throw in some cheerful lovin' mail for Lisa @ mamarama. It's a surprise, so I'm not gonna say.
- A barter/borrow/trade page or column on my blog (Lisa B.K., didn't you have one? - you still use that?) - there are a couple of things I have need of here at the new homestead that people out there in blogland may have lying around - a package of my goods & wares in exchange and voila, the barter system continues and bypasses excessive consumerism.
- Rethink my AM routine, if I make time for animal chores in the morning, the rabbits who just arrived and the bearded dragons who are now both home compliments of Mr. Principal will be better taken care of, and so will I since I'll be more likely to get enough sleep and eat breakfast.
- Go down my kindred spirits list and tell y'all why you - and everyone else - is on it. There's a lot of history there from the past year that I'd like to take a wade through
The frenzy is fading, so that's all I remember at the moment...it's kind of like a dream journal, write it fast before it dissappears into the ether. Goodnight everyone!
To Do
Already did a load of dishes, started a load of laundry, started a loaf of potato bread, and walked to the food store to get eggs and milk before making E and I breakfast...so I'm feeling pretty accomplished. That said, I haven't touched my school stuff and E needs me to fax something from Mama's for a fellowship application.
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Sign kids up for on-line textbook, put a link on classroom blog so they know they can access it. - Lesson plans for Tuesday-Friday.
- Figure out what I need to buy and use to do liver enzyme lab - find copy online as a reference.
- Wire rabbits' hay rack back onto their hutch
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Feed Ranger salad and bugs - find him a better bowl.- Feed Ani some salad - don't know if she'll eat it but I need to start her on it.
- Clean mouse cage
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See if pet store has my credit slip - if they do, buy an anole for Golom, crix for Ani (and to start breeding them) - Fool around with livejournal (thank you Santosha!) and I-Blog. See how they work.
Sunday, October 05, 2003
The Last Box
I'm happy to announce that the last boxes from our move were unpacked by my love this afternoon! Hooray! This was a good Saturday. A good Saturday involves:
- Sleeping in
- Opening up an account at our new bank with the very nice manager.
- A pedicure to fix my horrifying post-moving day feet - a little heavy handed on the exfoliating, but otherwise a good place - and also next door to our house.
- Books, books, and more books - we hadn't been to the library since before we moved. Among the treasures are a bread machine cookbook and two books on raising backyard poultry. I love the library. Always have, always will.
- Went over to Mom's - she and I are going to sign up at Curves tomorrow. I'm looking forward to it.
- Baking an apple pie - now it really is October!
- Trying out the bread machine - didn't work (we got a cooked mass - but it definitly didn't rise.) Dead/old yeast? I think that may have been the culprit. Trying again with a different bag of yeast and a little higher flour to water ratio tomorrow.
Now I'm off to bed - I fell asleep for a few hours earlier on the unmade, no sheets mattress, but I am definitly tired enough to crash again now. We went to a crazy-ass, not in a good way sort of crazy, bar last night.
Not a Shannon type place. Uh uh. Not to mention our buds didn't play till 12: 15 or so, resulting in a much later night then either E or I are used to nowadays. The bar had a whole crazy as I've said/satanist theme, with lots of day of the dead overtones - lots of skulls (cow, human, unidentifiable...), skeletons, weird dusty preserved stuff in bottles and under glass, and mucho drugs other then alcohol being plied by the clientele,who were more overly agressively drunk then friendly. Case in point? The punk band who were on second to last had as one of their groupies a little person, a woman dressed in a red satin dress, and blue wig. She was dancing on the bar, cartwheeling around, tambourine in hand - all fine with me. It was certainly entertaining, which I suppose was the point of the whole spectacle. But, bombed as she (and the rest of the bands' entourage) was, she just kept getting in everyone's face (to be funny?)- at one point she was trying to wrap red crepe paper around every one in the bar and would walk past you, grab you, and try to wrap whatever body part was at her level - personal space please! The bar was already crowded enough without a stranger trying to wrap me up in crepe paper without my permission, thanks. End of rant. That's why I'm tired!
Thursday, October 02, 2003
All In A Day's Work
I was practically exploding with energy when I came home today...hmmm do ya' think all of the extra sleep is finally making up for the sleep debt we incurred during the move? Definitly. And my cold is going away slowly but surely. All added up to a whir of shannon-ness buzzing around the homestead. I cleared the side beds but left those piles of weeds there, because the wheelbarrow doesn't have handles on it, just a trailer hitch for Landlord J's mini tractor thing. I'll put it on E's "honey-do" list for tomorrow. :) In the next few days I'll transplant in bulbs and hosta from the apartment - hopefully beat the frost, but we'll see.
Buzzed around some more - washing dishes (something was smelling like a whole lotta cabbage - finally figured out that one of the pots from the stuffed cabbage was still sitting around), cleaned out the mouse cage, cleaned out the bug cages, leos' cages too.
Of course, what would a day be without reading everyone's blogs? I'm too over-stimulated to comment in any coherent way, so I'll leave that for our (long!) weekend. Blog land reached out into RL this afternooon which always rocks, when what to my wondering eyes shoud appear but the Equinox mix from Lisa BK. Awesome.
Now I think I'll walk my busy little self (now hoping I don't crash in any sort of major way) to the corner and stop by Curves to pick up their pr stuff. If my mom does sign us up, that would be great - not exactly a gym type, but I certainly would like to have a palce to exercise in the winter that is just down the block. Did you know they don't have mirrors? Heard it on NPR the other day. Sounds promising. Hugs to everyone, 'specially the B-K's and their great soundtrack to my busy, busy day!
Tuesday, September 30, 2003
In today's news
- Begrudging boss-man handed over my paycheck - whoo hooo - grocery shopping, mum buying, and porch decorating ensued. I know a lot of people around here put cornstalks up for the fall, but how many can say they grew the darn corn themselves? Hmmm. Didn't think so! (Oh, is my farmer ego showing? ;) It looks really nice, and we had homegrown stuffed cabbage for dinner tonight before E disappeared with the boyz for basketball and who knows what else. A lot else, considering the hour.
- Landlord J's not-so-wonderful aspects are showing - drain is clogged, barn has no electricity, pilor light is faulty on half of the stove - they are "on his to-do list". I know he's busy and he's not really into the landlord gig per se - he did just inherit the place...so why doesn't he just sell us the darn place and forget about all this pesky maintenance? Hey, a girl can dream, in a few months maybe more then that...
- Queer Eye was watched (hooray!!!) and papers were graded - interim notices need to be filled out and handed into my supervisor tomorrow. I feel like I'm in pretty good shape considering how I had forgotten about the pesky things. :) Now to stay on top of the paperwork so it doesn't happen again.
- Pam from dad and little bro's work offered me six chickens today - little bro is going to inquire further tomorrow. Will have to ask landlord J about that ASAP. Also, how to keep the poor poultry warm? I'll have to figure out something, ask Janna and Ed.
- Keys were not made - copy of barn key, elevator key from school for animal moving purposes. Will have to get to that tomorrow.
- Mama and Dad (supposed to come here and celebrate Thanksgiving at our new house) decided to go to San Diego to see E's half-aunt instead. I'm not as upset as E is. Funny how an "outsider" can get used to the drama that is his family more quickly then someone on the insde. :)
Off to feed the animals - g'night everyone in blogland!
p.s. If anyone has a LJ code, I would love you forever if you would pass it on so I could bond with all my women in blog who are up there.
Monday, September 29, 2003
Sucked into the Void
Now weather it was my immune system sending a very strong message, the fact that the house has gone from uncomfortably muggy and hot to cold overnight (literally!) or just a bad case of the Monday's I couldn't tell ya'...but my afternoon projects were sucked into the black hole known as a long afternoon nap. I was a little p.o.'ed at myself when I woke up, thinking about all the projects I had planned, the beautiful clear autumn skies, etc. but I'm over it. I've started listening to my body more this year in an attempt to stay healthier, and so far so good. When my body just said "stop!" the other day I went home sick - and probably staved off a much more serious yucky illnes. Today my body needed sleep - and I let it.
I just finished making a big dinner for E after his super-long day in NYC (he had a big case in court this morning but it ran over and they are going to finish it via conference call next week) of cream pesto basil sauce, angelhair pasta, and mozz. garlic bread. While he vegges out, I'm taking care of the essentials...trash out to the curb, change of address forms to the fornt porch so the mailman can take them, animals fed and watered, a few papers graded (maybe)...and some more dinner - I didn't eat enough today. Check in with y'all later.
