For Aki

My friend Fred was fooling around with Photoshop and came up with this cat ensemble.

I'm Going To Saint Martin!

YAY! I'm going to St. Maarten/Saint Martin! YAY! </Special Ed>

My passport came in, so now my trip with Noelle to St Maarten is a go! Unless I need to get visas, but I don't think that I do. This is very exciting to me as I have not been out of the country in more than 15 years. And some beach time will be much appreciated after all the work around the house and being generally housebound these past few weeks.

Weekend Update

Another busy, busy weekend, although I got out with Noelle and did some fun stuff instead of just working the whole time.

Friday Night: Went with Noelle to see TMNT, which was pleasantly much less lame than I feared it might be. I never really cared much for the cartoon show, but the movie was moderately entertaining. The main story, about an immortal general trying to bring back his cursed siblings, was a lot better than I expected. The main reason I went was the trailer they showed at Comic-Con last year, which was fairly impressive. The turtle animation was great. The human animation was ok (and looked inspired by the Incredibles or Jimmy Neutron). I really liked the environment animations, which had a softly lit, radiosity-ish look to them. Anyway, it wasn't Shakespeare or anything but entertaining nontheless.

Saturday morning Noelle and I went to a couple of nurseries. We got an orange tree and a plethora of rose bushes at the Almaden Valley Nursery. Then we took an exciting trip up to Yerba Buena Nursery , which specializes in California native plants. I got a Ceanothus (wild lilac), a California Buckeye, and a bunch of new irises (different colors than the ones I already have) for the house. Landscapers are coming next week, woot!

Saturday night a bunch of us went to a party at the Porn Palace, which was a fundraiser for Cam's bar that he operates (with some other folks) at Burning Man. I was the DD so I got to people watch, which was quite entertaining since it was a sort of a goth party, complete with lots of vinyl and leather costumes (and one dude who looked like he escaped from the set of Tron), NIN remixes, a bondage equipment museum, chains hanging from the ceiling and beams, poles for pole dancing, and public floggings. Or as they call it in SF: Saturday Night. It was all very fun, but I was really tired by the time I drove everyone home.

Sunday we slept in and then got up to paint around most of the windows that I got put in a few weeks ago. We got most of it done by the afternoon (we were trying to get them all done ahead of the rain that came in the past couple of days). Then Noelle, Wendy, and I went up to the Flower and Garden Show at the Cow Palace in SF, which really kicked the ass of the ones I went to back in Maine. Almost got out of there without buying anything until the very last minute, when I caved and got some ludicrously priced windchimes. Drove Wendy home and then Noelle and I had a nice dinner at PF Changs.

Very tiring. At some point I look forward to the phase 1 projects being done (which they will be once the landscapers finish up next week).

Limping Around

So as of last weekend, I can fit my foot on my injured leg back into my boot. This is great progress because before then it hurt too much to bend my foot into a closed toe shoe and I had to wear sandals or other strap on footwear. I'm still limping a bit, but I'm getting around a lot better now.

Note To Self: Post Office

Note to self: If you go to the post office at 8:30 to pick something up, the lines are a lot shorter than they are at other times of the day. Unlike Starbucks. :-p

Pick, Pick, Trowel, Trowel

OMG I am tired. The weekend has been devoted almost entirely to installing a new sprinkler system at my house. I am sunburnt, sore, and worn out. My feet feel like I've been hiking all weekend. I think I've been to Home Depot more times this past week than in the past five years. Props to all my friends who turned out to dig up my yard. Things did not start out so well though, the first trench digger we rented seemed to have trouble cutting through, well, dirt. And it was hard to start and was hard to keep running. So we ended up renting a second trench digger (United Rental rocks, yo!) which had a lot more sac than the first one. We got all the trenches dug by last night and the first circuit of sprinklers installed by dark. Today we hooked up the lines in the back yard and there was, relatively speaking not so much digging to be done. Noelle and Jeff deserve special credit for the planning and execution of this nefarious scheme.

This afternoon Noelle and Esther and I headed over to a greenhouse and we got some trees and smaller plants. One is a frankentree: it has plum, peach, and nectarine branches all grafted onto one trunk. My neighbor traded me some lilies for some of the extra irises I had lying around (literally, we had to execavate them to put in a new sprinkler line). Noelle got those in as well as the perennials in the front walkway, so the place is looking better already. In a week or two I should have some new trees and a new lawn to go with it. Right now there will be pleasant sleeping type activities.

Dig, Dig, Dump, Dump

Oy, more project work going on at the old homestead last weekend. Jon and Jeff came over Saturday and and helped dig trenches under the concrete at my place in preparation for putting in sprinklers next weekend. Noelle and I did a couple runs up to the dump and got rid of debris from some work I've had done over the past few years. I was pleased to find that scrap wood gets shredded into mulch at the dump. It's pretty strange going up there since it's right behind all of these expensive homes in the hills.

On Sunday there was basically just lots of cleaning and organizing, but that still managed to eat up the whole day. Noelle built a bunch of shelves we got at Ikea a few weeks back and finished up the office organization so that as a result it's now neater than it's been since I moved in here. Well, it was before I shoved stuff around to make room for the Window guys who are putting in new double pane windows as I type.

BTW, we're putting in sprinklers this coming Saturday, if anyone wants to help with those. :-)

300

A bunch of us went to see 300 last weekend. Excellent movie. Some of the dialog was a bit clunky, but otherwise I thought it was great. It's really visually arresting. This the first time I can remember where the trailer of movie really delivered the kind of experience that the actual movie did. There were a lot of bullet time type effects and an ocean of digital gore. It really was a lot more violent than many of the movies I've seen of late, but it seemed about right for a Frank Miller story. I would definitely see this one again.

Bang, Bang, Hammer, Hammer II

It's been a busy week in terms of home improvements. The garage door has been replaced with a snazzier model. The new one is very quiet and dampens the street noise nicely. The inside of the garage now looks like a human uses it (as opposed to me). I.e. it is much cleaner and more organized. I had my wall furnaces (i.e. the big ass space heaters that warm my house) cleaned and inspected yesterday. The insulation job started yesterday with my crappy (and clogged) eave vents being replaced. Today I have a lot of insulation in the roof and about a third of the walls have been filled with blown insulation. That job should wrap up tomorrow. Next week: new windows!

Diaper Astronaut Fired By NASA

Yahoo News reports that Lisa Nowak, the crazy lady in the diapers who was also an astronaut, has been fired, a month after her arrest on kidnapping charges. Evidently she still has a naval position, so don't cry too much over Lisa just yet. Maybe we can go back to Anna Nicole Smith stories now. [article]

FCC Punishes Broadcasters Over Payola

The FCC has fined Clear Channel Communications, CBS and two other broadcasters $12.5 Million and ordered 4200 hours worth of free airtime for independent artists as a punishment for payola. I don't know if it will have much effect or not on corporate radio, but it is gratifying to know that there is some comeuppance for the greedheads. Maybe some cool bands will get more airtime now. Fingers crossed. [article]

Colbert Gets B&J Flavor

Ben and Jerry were on the Colbert Report the other night to announce their new flavor which they've named for him: Americone Dream. Tooling on over to their web site, I see they have a bunch of delicious new flavors including Cinnamon Buns, Banana Split, and Creme Brullee! YUM!

WonderCon

Last weekend Carl and Noelle and I went to WonderCon up in the City (it was at Moscone). Noelle was sweet enough to wheel me around most of the day since I'm still kinda gimpy. It's like Comic-Con lite, probably about a fifth the size of the San Diego Convention, but on the other hand, it was a lot easier to get around on the show floor. Got me some autographs, new trade paperbacks and dropped in on some of the panels. We missed the 300 panel, which was a bit disappointing, but it was a great day if one likes Ex Machina or Y: The Last Man (which I do), since I got to see Pia Guerra, Tony Harris, and Brian K. Vaughn (and get some autographs). We also saw Brian Posehn walking around the show floor (seen most recently on The Sarah Silverman show) which I thought was a bit strange at first, but he voiced Jim on Mission Hill, as well as some other cartoons, so I guess it makes sense. Overall I enjoyed the show a great deal. It's much cozier than Comic-Con SD, which can be quite overwhelming at times.