The Great Mystery!!

Ok, I've been thinking about this rather a lot, and I got a lot of nice comments from the quilt pictures and all that, and a lot of people I've talked to before and since seem to be of the impression that it is just a gut-wrenching nightmare to make a quilt.

Bah. Not all that hard at all. Especially if you keep firmly in mind the fact that you WILL make mistakes, there WILL be spots where the points do not match exactly decide to meander all over several continents but nowhere near where they are supposed to be, and NOBODY ELSE WILL NOTICE.

Right now, may I just interrupt myself long enough to say THANK THE GODDESS that this stupid Blogger saves for you whenever you stop typing, because some idiots who shall, of course, go nameless *cough*sewmouse*cough* might just decide to close the damn window instead of minimizing...

Right. Ok. Back to the quilt thingy.

So - In the interest of being crafty without actually having to cut fabric, I am thinking I will post a "mystery quilt" here. This will not be some new, fancy, never-before-seen pattern, it will be pure, simple, basic patchwork with no real tricky bits. Something even a guy could do... *winks at the SO and ducks*

In the process, I can show all the little tricky bits that make it fun and also keep it "easy". I'll put a couple of different methods of finishing, so that you can choose your own difficulty.

The world needs more quilts. Quilting takes time, keeps your hands busy, leaves a residue of heartwarming coziness and anything that does all that is certainly bound to increase the peace in the world as it increases in production - yah?

So... Starting Sunday (yes, I shall actually BLOG ON A WEEKEND) - I will put up a weekly post in very, very, small baby steps - that will eventually lead to a quilt large enough to wrap up in for TV watching.

Thoughts? Flames? Ideas? Bad Lawyer Jokes?

News is No News to Those Who Know News

Another 28 baby tomatoes and 3 big ones. This month has been an absolute dream in terms of self-grown healthy veggies. I'm so spoiled, I don't think I'm going to be able to stand the months and months to come with only supermarket cardboard tomatoes!

I read on John Good's "Left in Aboite" about AT&T unilaterally deciding that lyrics sung by Pearl Jam at Lollapalooza that denigrate the Commander Guy should be CENSORED from airplay. Linky Thingy This morning it appears that AT&T is backpedalling like mad, Oh, it was an OUTSIDE VENDOR... they did NOT tell them to censor that!!! OH my goodness, OHNOEZ!!! *smirk*

As if I needed any MORE proof that GWB is planning to be the Kim Jong Il of the former USofA. Dear Decider is already censoring the media, now he's censoring the songs... WHY AM I NOT SURPRISED???

In other news - Laura Bush, and Jenna are writing a childrens book that supposedly pushes the "joy of reading". How about the "JOY OF NOT BEING SUBJECTED TO CENSORSHIP, Laurie? Of course, it HAS to be a childrens book - so the Dear Decider is able to fucking READ it.

Ahh, another bank statement to balance. Goddess, I love this. No - seriously! It's my favorite thing to do in my job. It's kind of like a treasure-hunt or a crossword puzzle. Just when you think you have it all 100% - something goes wonky and you have to reassess. I love it. Soooooo much more fun than account analysis or AP coding.

Tomorrow and Sunday are supposed to be badass hot here. If it gets too bad, I'll leave the cats some ice water and take off to the cineplex and see that Harry Potter film - or maybe the Bourne thingy. My personal movie reviewer (*waves at Lea*) has recommended both of them. At the very least it keeps me cool for the 2 hottest hours of the day. It has been cooling off nicely at night, so no complaints THERE.

Take care, eat chocolate - and remember:

A day without sunshine is like... Night.

528 days

Interesting Things from the Interwebs...

Everybody in the UK is writing a book. And getting it published. And they're all essentially compilations of their posts from their blogs. Dayum.

I need to write a better class of posts, I suppose. Not that I disagree with a LARGE number of them. Tom Reynolds from Random Acts of Reality for instance, has an interesting topic (although I really think Kal does an equally excellent job), and writes well. I'm sure his blog makes a grand book, and just wish I could get it here via Amazon without dealing with the asshat book re-sellers who want $12 for the book and $20 for shipping.

On the other hand, we have some goofball guy who is cruising chatrooms as a female ("loopylisa21f") and behaving stupidly and then using these "chat logs" as the fodder for his literary work. He also has been promoting this venture by co-opting time on other people's blogs. The really sad bit is that loopylisa21f isn't all that entertaining. Certainly not funny enough to be getting the kinds of reactions that the folks allowing him to co-opt their blogs are allegedly having ("hillarious" said one - "funny stuff" said another). I still have the KOOCHD transcript, which is 100,000 times funnier than anything I've seen this dude come up with - and the infamous coffee-chat from years, and years, and years ago - that still cracks me up. This guy is a novice, and not all that amusing.

In other news...

Some guy tried to smuggle his pet monkey onto an airplane under his hat. I thought ALL livestock had to travel in the plane's tummy. Since when do they let little doggies on in doggie-handbags, or monkeys in hats? FFS. You can't even bring toothpaste on the airplane, but you can bring things with TEETH?????

Yesterday I picked 43 baby "cherry" tomatoes off the 2 small bushes, and 3 mid-size ones off the larger bush. If this continues, I may have to make some pasta sauce from scratch. I've always wanted to try that - never had enough tomatoes to do it. This could be my year - although peeling all those itty small tomatoes would be quite the chore...

Off to run checks - TTYL

530 days

Meet George Jetson.. Dodododododo doodleydoo...

Wow, already... I figured it would be long long after I'm dead and gone before we saw Jetsons style commuter vehicles... I was WRONG!! *grin*

I want one.

And then I want it to fold up into my briefcase.

531 days

For Jules

Missions Accomplished:

Finally I have managed to do 3/4 of the "get this done this weekend" chore list. The worst bit was working up the mental gumption to wash off the louvers on the bifold door that leads to where the furnace lurks. I know this sounds stupid - but every time that I'd think about getting out some cleaning supplies and tackling it, I'd find 20 other things that just HAD to be done first...

Saturday I woke up determined. I went down and filled up a bucket with cleaning solution and threw in a clean "shop rag" and started in. Before breakfast. Before coffee. Before laundry...

In all, I think it took me about 20 minutes to really carefully clean all the louvers and wipe down the door, getting rid of the dust and cobwebs and grime. Hardly any time at all, really. Why is it that something that really is NOT a huge undertaking can be so hard to actually force oneself to BEGIN?

Wasps have invaded the tube for my garden gate. This is an issue. I despise flying stinging critters. I don't mind bumblebees, or even honeybees, although I will not tolerate them INSIDE my house, but wasps and hornets and the like are disgusting. I had a bit left in the can of wasp/hornet insecticide, so I sprayed it into the tube this morning. Not one, but TWO of the icky things came out of the tube, then had the temerity to die while STILL HANGING ON TO THE TUBE. This suxxors and doth not swallow. I believe I shall have to stop at the Ace Hardware on the way home and buy another container of the insecticide, and murder any more of them that may be hiding in the tube, as well as spraying off the two that are hanging there. Damn bugs.

What is it with tubes anyhow? Damn things build their muddy little nests inside all kinds of tubes - especially clothes-line tubes and such. Bugs with a "round" fetish. *shudder* Gah I hate those things.

AC update - I had the guys I bought the AC unit from out AGAIN to try and find the freon leak. They hung themselves over the unit and grunted a lot, hung themselves over the furnace and grunted a lot - but in the end they claimed that the leak was in a pipe that goes "through the concrete under your house" and that they couldn't replace that without either 1) tearing up my entire floor and much of my cabinetry, or 2) running an exposed line through the bathroom, behind the washer & dryer and then along the bottom of the vinyl siding and under the back door, or 3) tearing up my entire soffit inside the house to run the line along side the ductwork.

All this for... the meagre sum of... 1200 bucks.

Fuck that.

Fans are cheap to run, and work fine. Come October/November I'll contact 2 or 3 other HVAC contractors and get a bid on what it would cost for THEM to run a line from the "A-Coil" to the outside unit - during the OFF season. Until then, I have an exceptionally expensive paperweight in my back yard. I'm pissed off. But nothing I can do, so I'll just deal with it. Besides, there's 10000 other small things I can do and fix up around the place. Still need to get a key to the meter room, however.

In fact... I think I'll go call about that right now.

Oh, and TFWY - Mission Accomplished, Dude. Will send him another next Monday. In fact, I may make it a regular Monday thing.

532 days