Category Archives: friends

September 26, 2008 · 9:15 am

Week In Review

I finally went to my first 2008 Rockies game, which happened to be the last home game of the season. Shout out to Megan and Joe for giving me a ticket. I had a great time, even though the Dbacks spanked us. Opening Day for 2009 is April 10, and I plan to be there after missing the last two years because of Stupid Work Stuff.

After mentioning on Twitter that I’d sold a couple more bracelets before even getting around to posting them in my shop, an acquaintance/follower commissioned me to make a manly-looking mala bracelet for him. Cool beans! Not that malas are generally very girlie-looking, but I chose paint-brush jasper for it’s grey/black tones. The hard part was/is finding an affordable “guru” bead. This is the 3-hole-drilled bead that is used as the counting point on a mala, to mark the beginning and end of the circle. I couldn’t find what I was looking for, so I’m going to attempt to drill my own. As for the other bracelets: Still not photographed and posted.

My last contract day with my prior employer was Tuesday. I slipped out with a complete lack of fanfare, because I’m not very good with good-byes. Also, I was RACING to a FedEx drop box, and didn’t have time for chit-chat. I realize that the reorg put into place by upper management, under pressure from the Board and stockholders, was short-sighted. Heck, it was BLIND. But I don’t work (much) with upper management, the Board, or the stockholders. The folks with whom I worked are my friends, and in some cases feel like family. I will be happy to return to the office for more work whenever I’m needed. At twice my old pay, of course. :)

I took my mom in for a preventative maintenance ’scope, and she gets a clean bill of health. The family genes are pretty good at shielding themselves from everything we throw at them. Yes, yes, mom’s side of the family battles diabetes, and her sweet tooth (which I thankfully did not inherit) keeps me worried, but she has managed to escape that particular complication for YEARS longer than her mom or brother did. Still, I’m keeping my eye on her.

Two former colleagues and I met up for lunch, to discuss the possibility of joining forces into one design company. After speaking to our individual strengths and weaknesses, I’m not sure that we’d be any better off than we are as independent contractors, but I still want to see what the initial business plan looks like before I bow out (or shake hands on the deal).

With my new, limited income, I’m trying to stay close to home and keep as much money in the bank as possible. I went to the thrift store ONLY to do a quick check for a dress that could affordably be used for Costume Two. I didn’t find one, but I did find a vintage, self-belt dress for the ridiculous price of $2.95, so I bought it. It looks to be home-made, but by someone who really knew what she was doing. I considered buying the new-but-retro-styled wedding dress that needed a dry cleaning but was priced somehow at $4.95, but it was a size 4 and there was NO WAY that I was ever going to be able to use that for anything. The sad, sad part of that trek was finding a mid-century-looking buffet-style chest of drawers for $60, and not knowing anyone with a pickup truck to help me get it home. Regardless of provenance, I liked the shape. It doesn’t go with ANYTHING in my house, outside of the kidney coffee table in the basement, so I should just put it out of my head.

I came up with the brilliant plan of using Very Long Tweezers to remove the offending thread from my comatose sewing machine. Except that I didn’t know where to buy Very Long Tweezers. Mandelion came to my rescue, and suggested the local fabric store. Of course! One trip to JoAnn later, and I was holding in my hands tweezers that are specifically advertised for reaching tight spots in sewing machines. Perfect! Alas, they don’t fit into this particular tight spot. Oh, for fuck’s sake. In frustration, with the aid of the tweezers, a metal barbecue skewer, and scissors, I wrestled most of the thread out. I am skipping the last camping trip of the season this weekend, but hope to make good use of my time at home by getting some of these sewing/beading/photographing projects out of the way.

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Filed under camping, collections, doctors and dentists, family, friends, Halloween, jewelry, sewing, shopping, vintage

September 4, 2008 · 11:54 pm

random assortment of thoughts

My real neighbors (take THAT, Dave and Jessi!) are back in town for a couple of days. I spent a good chunk of Thursday with them, which was a lot of fun. We drove up to Boulder to grab some lunch, and as usual, the weather in Boulder was about 2 degrees warmer than absolutely perfect. So we walked around for a while, popping into various stores along the Pearl Street Mall. We played with EVERY SINGLE wind-up toy in Into The Wind. For some reason which is still unclear to me, although much appreciated, they gave me a Home Depot gift card. I immediately spent it on a new front porch light fixture and a neato programmable switch. The way I have it set, the light comes on at dusk but goes off at 11 instead of staying on ALL FRIGGIN’ NIGHT until dawn. Now that I have the new fixture installed… it looks kinda small. I don’t exactly have a grand entrance, but this light looks like it’s scaled for a dollhouse. Also, a CFL sticks out of the bottom a bit. I may have to uninstall and return it. :|

I have been sleeping funny-peculiar, and that combined with this whole unemployed-and-trying-to-freelance-for-reals thing is taking a toll on my neck and shoulders. In a stroke of good luck, my favorite massage therapist, who moved to L.A. a while back, is in Denver this weekend. Shout out to seeing Carrie, good conversation, and getting that gnarly knot out of my neck!

My father is coming up to visit next weekend, and, as per usual, my house is a MESS. It boggles the mind, how quickly I manage to clutter this place up.

Eric Laufer, lead singer for the Two Timin’ Four, was killed in an early-morning hit-and-run in Austin on Thursday. His body was found nearly a mile away from his bike. I am sickened.

ADDENDUM: It was Eric’s bike that was dragged that distance, not Eric. The events are still tragic, though slightly less horrific.

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Filed under family, friends, life-threatening clutter

August 17, 2008 · 11:58 pm

Late to the party

June 11th, 2007. Apple’s newest product, the iPhone, is the talk of… well, everyone. I had started to watch the Apple keynote announcing the phone with absolutely no interest. All I need my phone to do is make and receive calls. Wait, it what? It has a touch screen? It scrolls by touch? Plays video like an iPod? An ambient light sensor? A proximity sensor? It knows if it’s being held it upright or sideways, and flips the screen? On a phone?

And it looks like that?

Want. Wantwantwantwant. Even the sworn-to-PC guys at the office wanted one. So, June 11th came and went, but I was locked into a contract with Sprint. Dave got an iPhone. Megan got an iPhone. Mary Jo got an iPhone. Every Tom, Dick, and Harry in the friggin’ universe bought iPhones.

I was still stuck with Sprint.

That’s okay, I reasoned. The iPhone is too small anyway. My old iPod has 10GB of RAM, and that’s not going to be suitably replaced by a 4 or 8GB phone. I’d guess the next release will be 20GB; I’ll wait for those.

The next release was actually 16GB. Close enough. But…

I was still stuck with Sprint.

A year after the initial introduction, the next generation was released. A slightly more ergonomic shape, a few physical improvements, a faster network, more precise GPS, and snazzier software. Still, I am stuck with the fabulously craptastic Sprint. My friend Dave, who works as a tech writer, is now on his third iPhone. In an extraordinarily gracious gesture, he gave me his “old” 16GB iPhone for my birthday last month. All I need to do is activate it. When my (expletive deleted) Sprint contract expires in October. I wondered about taking it out of the box, and turning it on, just to see what would happen. Would it instantly take me to an activation screen? Would the more rudimentary features work? I didn’t think about it too much, and didn’t remember try it.

Dave is staying with me for a few days, and while we were working side-by-side on our laptops, he suddenly remembered that I can indeed use the phone, in a manner not unlike the iPod Touch, to play with all the goodies that aren’t phone based. I took it out of the box. I unwrapped the protective plastic film. I turned it on.

I squealed with delight.

Dave showed me the pertinent stuff. He recommended a few iPhone apps. He worked on his assignments, while I giggled and cooed over the phone, and he answered questions when I had them. I can only really play when I’m within range of a wifi signal, which this weekend meant when I was home. Still, I’ve done a pretty good job of learning my way around the standard apps, and the few that I’ve added. Dave has been an invaluable help as well (in addition to the iPhone business, he also hooked me into the Starbucks wifi system that I’d been having trouble with, disconnected the superfluous VCR from my TV setup, and updated my Wii so that it would STOP BLINKING AT ME). I already feel more capable as a user on the iPhone than I do on the Samsung phone that I’ve been using for the past 22 months. I found a neat new silicone outfit for the iPhone on Saturday at, of all places, the local Dollar Tree. I look forward to taking the phone to work this week, and testing it on the office wifi network. I very much await October, when I can plug this beauty into the iTunes Music Store and tell it to hook me up with an AT&T account.

For the few of you who haven’t yet used one: This thing is awesome.

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Filed under friends, tech

August 12, 2008 · 11:13 pm

The Town That Fun Built

An old Jersey friend (that is, I’ve known her for a long time, not that she’s old!) shared this vintage promotional video today. Seaside Heights was a day trip for me growing up, and I used to go down a couple of times every summer. I spent HOURS in Lucky’s Arcade, without ever knowing that it had such history! After all these years, only two mementos remain from my days on the boardwalk: a Lucky Coin (perhaps two, but I can’t currently find PROM 88 DEWD), and the uppermost piercing in my left ear. Also, the memory of my friend Kim looking at me at the top of the log flume and saying, “Your hair DOES look better when it’s wet!” Good times, good times.

Note: this little film is 16 minutes long! However, it’s totally worth watching if you enjoy amusement parks, or the shore, or boardwalks, or hyperbolical marketing videos, or 1960.

Icebox Cake! Calder, shoes, etc.

It’s another scattered, icebox cake post, kids. Without further ado:

August’s masthead is a tight crop of a photo I took of a Calder mobile (Red, Black, and Blue, 1968) which hangs in the Milwaukee Art Museum. Alexander Calder and Jasper Johns have been among my favorite artists since I was a little kid. I would have loved to have been in the room when Sandy Calder was doing a “Circus” performance. I’ll settle for having seen it on film numerous times, because it plays in a loop at the Whitney, where my mom used to take me every year for my birthday. To be fair, though, I wasn’t watching the loop as much as I was staring at the circus itself. I finally watched the film from beginning to end with my friend Mandy as we toured a traveling Calder show a couple of summers ago at the Walker.

I have, by my standards, a lot of credit at DSW. I spent an hour roaming the store yesterday, and managed to find one pair of shoes to take home. Maybe I’m sick? I’ll have to peruse their much larger online collection, and see if I can’t shake this bug. ;)

I have been busy, part I. I have (partially) reorganized my finished basement, in an attempt to uncover the living space that’s down there. I put together three sets of 3’x5′ shelves for all of the stuff that’s stored down there, and managed to unearth the sofa and carve out an area for my sewing table. I think I’ll get two more sets of shelves (open invite to strong, helpful people here: the shelving boxes are too heavy for me to lift) and finish out that wall. I still need to rummage through all the stuff that’s still scattered around, and take a lot of empty boxes to the recycling center. I have a tendency to keep every box that any appliance came in, just in case. (In the case of my rarely-used espresso machine, that box comes in handy as it actually stores the machine!) I am itching to get the basement guest room set up, but I am about to have three different people storing some personal belongings in there. The extra guest space can wait. Note to Scott, if you’re reading this: Maybe you can help me toss out my mom’s seemingly abandonded stuff to create more space for your stuff?

I have been busy, part II. Some squares might be 10 weeks away from planning their Halloween costumes, but my crowd has already been on it for a month. Hooray, hooray, my bestest costume buddy is flying in from Oklahoma just to party down with the Halloweeniest crowd around! Because there are always two parties, there will once again be two costumes. One costume is something that I have attempted over and over, but always bagged at the last minute because I have trouble getting one particularly important prop just to my liking. Lots of people offer suggestions, but it’s difficult to get any of them to actually work. This year, I am determined. Besides, the costume itself is almost done! Just a little more sewing, and the right shoes… and of course, that damned prop. The other costume is still being tossed around, but needs to fall into the theme of Heroes & Villains. I wanted to do Wonder Woman, just so I could get the boots (and, who am I kidding here, those rad wrist cuffs), but her outfit is skimpy and has been since her first appearance back in 1941. Yes, I checked. The metaphorical drawing board has lots of crumpled sketches right now.

Coming up: Soon, I hope to photograph and post my growing collection of handbags. Because they’re finally getting interesting. :) Also, the 2008 Olympics are about to begin! I’m having a few peeps over on Friday to watch the pomp and circumstance of the opening ceremony. Veggie pot stickers, Chinese beer, and whatever my pals deem to bring on their own. And a globe, so we can find all of the guest countries! Fun times. I may have to ruin my progress in the basement in order to clear out the “public” areas for my party. Such is my life of clutter.

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Filed under collections, friends, Halloween, life-threatening clutter, sewing