Kennedy and Camera

So, Teddy Kennedy died this week. I find it hard to work up any tears or any other emotional response. Senator Kennedy wasn't someone who's career I chose to follow. I've heard comments both glowing and disparaging of him in the past days, and I suspect that both are probably based on some amount of truth.

Nobody is a saint, certainly not Edward Kennedy (or me!). However to remember a man solely for his actions as a terrified 20-something young man on ONE NIGHT in his life is just as unfair as choosing to look only at his Senate career and ignoring his drinking, womanizing and possibly supporting the IRA (not Individual Retirement Accounts...)

In the end, if my Christian upbringing was correct - there is only one Judge who can decide whether Teddy Kennedy's heart and soul were in the right place, and it ain't me, it ain't you, and it sure as fuck isn't Rush Limbaugh (much as Mr. Limbaugh seems to THINK he is Deity). I'm quite content to leave these matters in the hands of Deity and not stick my nose in.

The camera is officially dead. RIP camera. Actually, RIGarbagecan, as there is no response from it, even after replacing the batteries. New Digital Cameras are a bit pricey, and I'm not trusting the dubious folks on E-Bay, so I guess I'll wait for the Xmas super-sales.

Thursday again

The days, they all kind of run together. The local market is having a price war with their competitor, and there have been some good prices on beef lately. I got 3 nice steaks for $7.88 and a lovely roast for $6.50. Met my co-worker C in the parkinglot and discussed it - which is funny, as she sits about 10 yards down the hall from me, but we usually don't lunch in the same places. This week we've gone the same place 3 days out of 4.

Tomorrow the boss is buying us pizza for lunch to celebrate co-worker R getting his college degree. Yay R!!!!

The nights are spent mostly working on my quilts or reading. Not playing much computer games, as my hands have been complaining the last week or so. When I play WoW, I use my left hand to work the arrow keys and my right hand to "mouse" - and the odd angle this puts on my wrist had been having the effect of numbing my last 2 fingers on my left hand - and finally became unpleasantly painful. So I'm taking a "rest break for my health" - although I will check in from time to time because us addicts are like that, ya know.

Meanwhile I am sleeping with my hand on a plushy teddy-bear to keep myself from grabbing the mattress and cramming my hand between the bedframe and the mattress in the night, which exacerbates the problem. Don't ask me why my subconscious hand likes to burrow between the mattress and the bedframe. I asked it and it just shook itself at me. The bear doesn't seem to mind.

I've been trying to take photos of the current quilt - but as the twitter tweeter twatter thing says over ---->> there ---->>, I was taking a photo and there was this ginormous POP and no photo and the camera won't power up. I will try changing batteries tonite, but I strongly suspect that my 10-year-old $70 camera has given up the ghost-image. *moment of silence*

So while I don't have a lovely photo of my current work - the fabric for the man's quilt I'm making when cut into strips looked like a batch of neckties hanging off the table - I did get the pieces for part of it cut and I laid them out on the quilt currently in the frame for a trial-run, and WHOOO BOY do I like how it will look.

This doesn't mean the recipient will love it, of course, but *I* am well pleased at how the colours mix and blend and how the pattern works. It's not overly bright, it's not overly dark - although it does have a very dark element to it. Since I RAN OUT OF PINK THREAD *rolls eyes at self*, I'm putting the brown/green/pink thing on hold for now and will work on this one as soon as I find a free bobbin for the machine.

I'm trying something a bit different this time. Going to use 100% cotton thread to put it together. I read somewhere that if you use cotton thread on cotton fabric, the seams are less likely to split along the thread-line, because polyester thread is stronger than cotton, and cuts the threads of the fabric.

I think it made more sense when I read it, because I think I suck at explaining things.

Wet Monday

Most all of this weekend it has been raining cats and dogs and small furry creatures from Alpha Centauri. Woke up to yet another thunderstorm. I sure do hope Mom Nature is getting all this wet out of her system so this winter will be dry. Cold I can deal with. Sn*w.... Not So Much.

As a result, I've spent most of my time indoors, doing a little housework, and rather a lot of napping - but also working on quilt stuff. Chopping up fabric, for the most part.

There is the Pink & Brown thing to finish - I never did get it completely cut out, and even though it is EASY PEASY to piece, it isn't making me anxious to finish it, which suxxors.

Then there is Amanda's Green Thing MachII - I've cut a few strips out of each color and as soon as I get the blocks done for the Pink & Brown Thing, I'm going to piece a few of the blocks for that one and see how well it looks. I am positively optimistic about it - which may be utterly unfounded - but we shall see.

Then there is a quilt that is a bit of a challenge for me. I got a list of colours (UK spelling intentional) from a friend and am trying to make a special light-weight one for him with them included. Not easy, as he is primarily a Dark One in terms of colour preference, but I think I've come up with something that will work well. I've got the fabric, now I just need to cut and piece. This one is also calling to me to work on it.

I also have the blue&white card trick to cut and piece. I'm really motivated again for some reason, and I'm glad glad glad about it.

I think I'm going to have to take some more pictures.

Warning - Politicallish stuffs and quilts. And flies. ugh.

Birthers.
*snicker*
Ok, there is really only ONE way to deal with people like this. No proof will ever be good enough for them. GOD HIMSELF could come down from the heavens and proclaim in a voice heard by all in the universe "BARACK OBAMA WAS BORN IN HAWAII" - and they'd claim it was the short-form God and wouldn't believe it.

No, the only way to deal with their childish antics is to answer them in kind. POINT... and LAUGH.

The lady who stood up in the town-hall meeting and screeched like a harpy about her birth certificate? How would she have handled it if everyone around her, instead of sitting like headlight-struck-elk, had turned, pointed at her, and laughed their asses off? LOUDLY!!

And that, my friends, is how I intend to handle EVERYONE who mentions this stupid non-issue to me. Point at them. Laugh AT them. Louder than they can screech. I can laugh REALLY LOUDLY when I want to do so.

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I have found some excellent fabric for a couple new quilt tops. One for Manda, as the one I made for her some while back was ... destroyed by accident. Sorta. Long story. Regardless, I am in process of making a new, similar, one. I just need ONE MORE green bit to pull it together. I am determined to find that bit in my stash and not purchase any more.

I also have another top in the works - this one for an offshore friend. Just need to do cutting and sewing. It should be highly dramatic. I love that. Bright, colorful, dramatic... I am so utterly against making dull,insipid, pastel things. Not sure why. I used to like pastels. Now they just turn me right off.

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So last nite I come home from work and discover my entire kitchen has been invaded by small black flies. Not gnats - real flies - but small ones. UGHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. Utterly grossed out, I grabbed the cats, tossed them into the upstairs bathroom, shut the door and set off a bug-bomb in the kitchen.

This morning we are fly-free. Thank the Goddess.

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For Croila - this link goes to a photo of a car that is kind of exactly like the Little Blue Neon - except mine is dark blue and has a dent in the driver's door and has no sunroof and the AC doesn't work and there is a 1/2 bowl full of shredded wheat in the passenger foot-compartment that I need to vacuum out tonite.

I have no actual photos of tLBN as far as I know.

Neon Hell - Part 2

So. I got about 2 weeks worth of OK out of tLBN before it decided yet again to refuse to start. *sigh*. This time I got smarter and had it towed to the dealership where I purchased it. I figured if they couldn't fix it, I'd guilt-trip them.

Well, I ended up having to rent a car for one day, but I finally did get them to fix tLBN, and it's worked fine since. Broken wire in the wiring harness to the starter.

Seriously expensive repair, in all, but at least it works now.

Another post a little later on more recent things.

Neon Hell - Part 1

I wrote the following blog post about 1 1/2 weeks ago but didn't post it for no known reason, and while I COULD update it to make it more currently correct, I have no intention of doing so. I will write an updated post later.

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Where in the world has Sewmouse been?

Home, mostly. Buried under a pile of laundry and the inside of a closet. Not in that order.

I've decided to clean out my dont-wear, don't like, don't fit, don't need clothes and feed them to the charity box. This has necessitated my going into my tiny walk-in closet and tossing out stuff I wont/cant wear. This has made a heap in the middle of the bedroom floor, which then becomes a huge laundry pile, as even though these clothes have been hanging in the closet for eons, I feel that it would be rude to give them to the charity box in their current condition, as they are a bit musty and dusty.

In between, I have been sleeping too much. Or maybe it's not too much, because even though it is too much, it seems to be having a beneficent effect on my levels of energy and ambition. I guess being asleep too much but more active when awake is better than being a semi-comotose slug with normal sleep patterns.

I've also found a new addiction - this silly little online version of Civilization or Age of Empires - called "EVONY". It is online and multiplayer. Rather primitive, but addictive too. It's not WoW, but it's a nice little distraction.

It has been raining cats and dogs and small furry creatures from Alpha Centauri around here the last few days. The humidity is oppressive, even though the temperature is not. It's like living in a tepid-mist vaporizer. The dehumidifier gets full too fast for it to do any real abatement. Yesterday morning while waiting for D from work to pick me up (more on this later), I started the washer, the dryer and the dishwasher all at the same time. It was like a sauna in the kitchen. I ended up going outside to wait for D in the rain rather than stay in the house. I fully expected the cats to be all fluffed out like cartoon cats when I got home. They weren't. They were sitting on the sofa looking at me like "WTF do you think YOU are doing here?"

So anyhow - I had to have D pick me up because he took me home the night before. The morning before, the Little Blue Neon decided it didn't want to go to work. Unfortunately, the Little Blue Neon does not have this option on weekdays when I have the outside CPA scheduled to come in and still need a couple of hours of uninterrupted time to finish getting things together for him.

Oh well. Called the tow truck, had them drag tLBN to the repair shop near work, and they drove me to work. EXPENSIVE TAXI!!

However, they've had tLBN now for 3 days, and even though they know that there IS a problem, because it screws up for them - it is the dread "Intermittent" problem, and it will not screw up when the repair guy has his tools with him. /facepalm

The CPA and I came up with an answer. We think tLBN has a crush on the courtesy van from the repairs shop. As the CPA put it - "That's why it only gets TURNED ON when it is at the shop".

I do so desperately hope they can find out what is wrong with it today so I can run errands and stuff over the weekend without fearing that I'll get stuck somewhere with a nonfunctional Neon. (Nonfunctional Neon at the Dysfunctional Dennys perhaps? *giggle*)

I also have discovered something about me. I cannot write when people TELL me to write to them. I get all blocked and can't think of dickall to say. Just sayin'.

The Death of a Dream (not emo) or "Mindi's Great Adventure - NOT"

I had a thought the other day. My cats were born, have grown up and lived their entire lives indoors. The only times they've been outside they've been in a carton or a crate. (Carton to bring them home, official "cat-carryall" crate since.)

So I thought - Hey! The back yard is fenced, Mindi is Fat, I bet she would enjoy sitting in the sunshine on the back patio while I have my coffee in the morning on the weekend! I had these sweet mental images of Fat Kitty laying in the sun - swiping at the leaves of the now-defunct daffodils, watching the birds...

So. Yesterday morning I pulled out the lawn furniture from the garage, cleaned off the winter dust and made a nice cup of coffee, then brought Mindi outside.

She cried. Oh dear LORDY how she cried. At least 4 other cats in the neighborhood took up the caterwauling - it was Drama Queen Central in my back garden. You would have thought I'd pulled her skin off. Then she hid under my chair. Which was ok, but I kept telling her it was ok, and she didn't need to be such a chickenshit.

So she started to do a little exploring, and decided to hide between the fence and the air conditioner. Which would have been ok, but she got herself stuck UNDER the fence, 1/2 in my yard and 1/2 in the neighbor's yard, where Ike the Dog lives.

She would NOT come out. not even for a can of tuna. No Noms were good enough for her to leave her tidy little cave. I would have left her there until she felt safe again, but ... Ike the Dog lives there, and she was 1/2 in HIS yard. I couldn't take the chance.

Ike the Dog's owner (you will note, I know the DOG's name, but not the guy or his wife's names... *rolling eyes at myself*) locks his back gate, so I could not do an end-around and yank her out from his side, so I leaned over my AC unit and tugged and pulled and pushed and tugged and swore and pulled and pushed and re-positioned and pushed and shoved and pulled and tugged and... KITTY. Picked her fat arse up and tossed her into the kitchen, closed the door and sat down in the sun and drank my coffee and realized that the buccolic dream of spending a morning in the sun on the patio with the kitty was just never going to happen.

[emo moment] *sigh* [/emo]

Quick Update

The drain cleaner stuff is called "Insta-Flo".

It was gorgeous this morning - I had my coffee outside and the cool breeze, fresh air and sunshine was utterly PERFECT.

I think I am going to try taking Mindi the Fat Kitty outside in the back and see if she likes it. I don't think she can get under the fence and get away from me - and she might like to sniff stuff and sit in the sun.

Back to work.

The Weekend of Memorial - and Noms.

So this last weekend was Memorial Day weekend. The day we remember stuff. I think it's like remember the troops stuff. Mostly it is about mattress sales and the First Official BBQ of the Year - and now you can wear white shoes for a few months without being technically a dweeb.

This was also "unclog the bathtub drain" weekend. Saturday morning's shower was marred by the fact that by the time I was done, the bath had filled up so far the water was over my ankles. This is NOT GOOD©. So, I went to Ace Hardware, and talked to the Helpful Hardware Man. Actually, he was like the Helpful Hardware Teenage Boy - but still, in the finest tradition of Radio Shack, he did his gosh-darndest to help out the poor, clueless old lady (me) and get her out of the store as fast as possible. In the Ace Hardware, I suspect they want to go back to shining up table saws and testing the Sawzall's. At Radio Shack, (AKA Pocket-Protector World) I'm much more convinced that they want to get back to their D&D game in the back room. Geeks.

Anyhow - so I went to Ace, talked to the kid, and ended up with NO DRAINO. Instead he sold me this small bottle of stuff that you can't even get on your hands without it burning you - that you pour into hot water running into the tub, and then let it work for a while and then flush it out with more hot water and VOILA! No clog.

Or so said the kid.

So I went home and used it. Sunday morning was the Big Test Day - started up the shower and if I hadn't washed my feets, only the BOTTOMS would have gotten wet, because the drain worked THAT WELL!!!. I do not, however, remember the name of the stuff and it's at home and I'm not so I'll edit it in when I know. Or not, if I forget.

So flushed with my success, I made the Chicken/Lime/Cucumber salad that I'd been drooling over in the cookbook. It was ok. I think I will cut down the amount of sourcreme/mayo mixture and increase the amount of ginger. It seemed a bit too "creamy" for my tastes. It has cilantro in it. Steven Colbert says NOBODY wants to eat cilantro. Heh. Fine. More for me.

Had BBQ Monday, now my back is complaining, I'm not sure the 2 are actually related, but it gets everything caught up to current.

Tonight I shall vacuum. Bleh.

No Helicopters Were Harmed In The Making Of This Post

I never did find out anything more about the noises that woke me up the other day. Perhaps it wasn't a broken helicopter at all, but my neighbor with his window open and snoring REALLY REALLY loud. *sigh*

Which doesnt' explain the yellow police tape, but maybe someone was doing a Tony Orlando and Dawn tribute show in the middle of the expressway. It could happen.

Some good things.

A guy I've been fighting with over the phone at work sent an e-mail yesterday to my boss - admitting he was WRONG. I love being right. I really, REALLY do.

Managed to get 4 bags full of clutter out of the house this week. Made enough of a dent in the mess for me to feel pretty good about it. SOOOOO much more to do, but my back limits the amount I can get done at any one time.

I will say, however, that this is the longest sustained "positive energy and resolve" mental period I've had in years and years. If this is what I can expect from menopause, and if I can get my back to cooperate, I may someday have my dream living area makeover completed. I am determined to start with new bedroom draperies. I'm tired of the deep burgundy curtains and the dark floral swags. I think I want to go with something pastel turquoise and seafoam green. Lighter. Cooler. More user-friendly.

I found the local "progressive" talk radio station here. It has shows from Air America, as well as some local programming. While I do NOT agree with absolutely everything they say, I don't feel as if they want to tar and feather and deport anyone who disagrees (although they may poke some pointy sticks at them), and much of their "agenda" are things with which I agree, having had MORE than enough Faux Noise thrown at me over the years, this feels just lovely.

I know that last sentance is a grammatical mess - and I don't give a rat's ass.

Not so good things:

The Fat Kitty, Mindi, has gouged my arm in at least 8 places. I am a wonderland of cat-scratch scars. No wonder the nurse at my Dr.'s office keeps asking me if I am afraid of anyone I'm living with.

"Yes, I'm terrified of my cat..."

Right. Might be good for a laugh.

I broke yet another of my pretty blue and white Corelle dishes. You can't buy them retail anymore - unless you go to one of the used-china shopping sites online, and they want a FORTUNE for just one piece. I could buy a whole NEW set of Corelle for what they want for just one cup and saucer. As my 30-year-old dishware is slowly getting destroyed, I'm thinking that perhaps along with the new curtains I'll have to get some new dishware.

Maybe I'll count it as a "reward" for myself if I ever get the bottom level of the house completely "decluttered". It's actually a "reward" that I'd consider giving some thought (and effort!) toward achieving.

Maybe periwinkle and seafoam, instead of pale turquoise....

I feel a quilt pattern coming on... AEGH!!!