Friday, September 30, 2005

cake!! CAKE!!!

today is cake baking day!

i'll be making leff a cake for his birthday (oct 3rd). it's more ambitious than the cake i made in may so i'm not exactly sure how it's going to work.

i'll start posting photos here and at flickr as soon as leff gets out of bed. (he has to go with me to the store since i haven't gotten paid at my new job yet. yes, it sucks that i'm making him pay for the raw ingred of his own bday cake, but that can't be helped. *sadness*)

Wednesday, September 28, 2005

i apologize for not writing. again.

hi, everyone.

again, apologies for the delay in posting. i've just started a new job that i care nothing about. and while i do have a great deal of apathy for this nondemanding position, i don't have a great deal of time since it's been taking up quite a bit of that these past few days.

also, searching for another job to replace the one i'm so apathetic about has also made a dent in blog entry availability.

soon, chickadees, very soon i'll write something that's not an apology for not writing.

Wednesday, September 21, 2005

GOOOOOO, SHED!!!

check it out!! irregular shed was quoted in the registar AND at out-law [dot] com!!

we'll pwn the media by next week, shed dahlink! HAHAHA!!!

Tuesday, September 20, 2005

hey, what a day!

i woke up this morning thinking it was going to be a shitty day, but HOLY CRAP was i wrong!!!

on the phone with mtv news!

do you see this photo? do you know what i'm doing in this photo??? i'm talking to stephen totilo (from mtv news!) about my katamari damacy cake!!

i mean, WOW!! how cool!!!

i should have the link for the article tomorrow or the day after. i'll be sure to post it here!

ah, three and a half minutes of fame! HAHAHAH!!

Monday, September 19, 2005

my paint esplode!

acrylic paint does weird things when it's squeezed out of a tube and it dries.

this happened while we were moving. the blue was stuck to the bottle of gloss medium. it's kind of nice in a way...

my paint esplode!

Sunday, September 18, 2005

what a shocker!

guess what's on twice on pbs today?

alone in the wildernes....again...

yep, "alone in the wilderness".

sheesh....

ca-bull!

seattle basic cable is kind of shite.

despite having two pbs stations, univision, azn and a public access channel that rebroadcasts news shows from korea, china, vietnam and japan, it's really quite shite.

here's why.

my whole cable viewing life i've had the turner channels. you know, tbs, tnt, etc. more recently in the turner bundle (within the last five or six years or so) i've been watching turner classic movies and turner south.

not anymore. while we still have tbs and tnt, the only other turner channels that comcast in seattle carries is cnn.

i fucking hate cnn. not as much as fox news, mind, but it's still utter, useless crap.

oh wait! have i mentioned that not only am i turner networkless (at least the good parts of it) but that i don't have wgn?!??!

let me repeat that, i don't fucking have wgn!$!!!!#@#!@!#@!%#%#@

i'm never going to get to see the cubs play again unless i order a damn cable package. or go to a bar that's got the damn cable package. what if the cubs get the wild card again this year?!??! what am i going to do?!??! (yeah, that'll happen. *eyeroll* we all know that the cubs never win anything.)

also? i won't get to see the edited version of the blues brothers ad infantum which kind of makes me sad.

oh, and those two pbs stations? they're in, like, permenant pledge week mode. i've seen alone in the wilderness more times than i can count now.

maybe i'll just have to get out more. maybe that's why people in this part of the country are such outdoorsy types. (it couldn't be the cascade mountains or anything....har har.)

better yet, i'll get leff to up our netflix account to five out at a time instead of our current three. mwah-haaa-haaa!

Saturday, September 17, 2005

morning = happy

my new apt/flat is great on saturday mornings. it's very quiet in my neighborhood so i can hear the *ding!!* of the pedestrian crossing sign when it changes. (it sounds like someone has won a prize every time it's safe to cross.)

the bagel from my corner grocery is properly chewy and tasty and i can occasionally catch a whiff of salt air from the sound when the wind blows the right way.

but the gulls still scare me. because sometimes when they squawk it sounds like someone's getting strangled.

the crows are okay though.

Thursday, September 15, 2005

word verification is on

sorry to inconvenience everyone but i've had to turn the word verification on in comments.

too much spam from too many stupid ass bots. assbots. hur hur!!

i do have to apologize especially to any blind or visually disabled people that may have been reading this blog as word verfication makes it impossible to read comments with any software/machine that you might be using. hopefully this spam issue will sort itself out in a little while and i'll be able to return comments to normal. i'm very sorry.

i *heart* google!

i've yet to expound upon my love of all things google lately.

i know for a FACT that my life in seattle has been made 80 billion times easier because of google local and google maps. (oh, directions! i love you so!!)

why do i know it's 80 billion times easier?? because google local and google maps weren't around when i moved to baltimore. so i had to figure out that city using phone books, any periodicals i could pick up from the street, road maps and just plain trial and error.

so let me sing the praises of google!! LALA-LALALA--LAAAAAAA!! i *heart* you soo much!

one looooooooong post with lots of photos

i apologize to all three of you that read this blog. i meant to have SOMETHING posted here last week but i caught a mystery disease and was unpacking and leff's been using the computer to code for his top secret job, blahblahblah...

why don't i just start from the most recent news and work my way back?

ok, so last night i dyed my hair again.

better red than dead

this is my favorite red so far. note to self: feria 67.

i finally made it to a coffee shop.

first local seattle coffee shop...

uptown espresso is quite nice. and the chai that i got was probably the best chai that i've ever had. and i've had some chai in my time. leff's cafe americano was quite delicious as well!

the lady in front of us at uptown ordered a coffee with a list of requirements so long that it needed its own pamphlet. and i laughed at her because complicated coffee drinks are SOOOOOO 90's.

but despite the litany of directions on how her coffee should be made, she somehow left out the word "mocha". so the barista left out the mocha. and then the lady complained. and i laughed at her again.

then the barista, who was cute, bitched about her to me and leff.

ah, seattle. i love you!

moving on...

leff and i accidentally ended up at seattle center while we were looking for a flexcar location. (i'm selling michico nissan, my sentra, as soon as i can get a duplicate title from tennessee. i lost it in the move.)

big al @ needle

yeah, the space needle is so close to home that we just stumbled upon it.

also, while we were at seattle center we tripped over the mobile story corpsmobile. (we keep tripping over lots of things these days. it must be the air...)

npr interviewmobile

i heard about the booth in grand central station in nyc a few years ago, but i had no idea that there were two mobile booths touring the country. i might interview leff.

i'm making a lot of progress on the apartment. i sorted the books by color a la chotda.

colo(u)r coded library

and the bathroom is finished. although the shower curtain is too short since our new tub is super deep. like, jacques cousteau could do a program from the depths of our tub deep.

oh, and the bedroom is finished. it's just the living room that still needs unpacking at this point.

this sunday we went to the ballard farmer's market. lots of organic fruit and veg, lots of fresh flowers. and one incredible booth with super inexpensive, delicious produce yeilded this onion.

onion pulls on a hat and enjoys a cup of coffee

it was a huuuuuuuge onion. one of those = four smaller onions. i've got to go back to that guy's booth! he had baby bok choy for $1 a bunch!!

have successfully found trader joe's, safeway, larry's (all three of which are grocery stores that i can WALK to) and one of the targets.

urban target

this target?? tres impressive. it's entered through the parking garage. and it's two stories with a cartscalator.

yes, i'm easily impressed.

i also am now the proud owner of a seattle public library card! i went to the queen anne branch on, like, my third day here.

queen anne branch library

it's an original carnegie library with stained glass windows!!

the librarian that gave us our cards was wonderful! she found it quite amusing that i already knew the specs about the seattle library system. (but how could i not?? it's only, like, one of the greatest library systems in the country!!)

have i mentioned that you check out your own books?? okok, you scan your card and then place your books onto a flat surface that reads, i guess, an rfid chip that's imbedded in them. then you press ok, print out a return date slip and you're out of there!

have i also mentioned the lack of overt security systems at the queen anne branch? in memphis, leaving the library is like leaving fort knox. there are magnetic sensor things by the door and often a security guard. in seattle? none of that. not even the magnetic sensors. of course, i haven't made it to the central branch yet (that's sunday, i think...) so i may be a bit premature in saying that people in seattle might not steal books.

also, nancy pearl is teaching two classes at, i think, uwashington this year. i might try to audit the second one since i'm too late for the first.

AND salmon rushdie and ha jin are BOTH going to be in seattle!!! (not at the same time though.) i've GOT to go to BOTH readings/signings!!

but back to mundane things. on labor day leff and i took an eight mile walk that started at the dna bridge at elliott bay park

dna bridge

took us to pike place market and then back home. pike place was stupid crazy busy with tourists so we didn't stay long.

note to pike place tourists: if you've seen one busker, you've seen them all. get the fuck out of my way, cornfed, before i kick you in the nuts.

*ahem*

the day before that we drove through freemont and stopped at the troll.

the troll

we drove past the lenin statue too but i didn't get a photo.

what to say about my brief time in freemont? it's confusing. the roads are all crazy curvy and one way and they dead end and god i don't even know where the hell we were in freemont.

but i want to try the greek place that happy gilmore recommended!

*whew!* long post! this will have to suffice for today. i'm not sure i even want to write about the drive across the country as it was 1) dull in most places 2) painful most of the time due to a swollen, broken toe, massive bruises that were turning black they were so deep and the multitude of cat scratches i received from anxious kitties 3) i just really don't want to think about it right now.

here's the link to the photoset of the moving photos. and that's all she wrote!

i'm baaaaaaaack!!!

Thursday, September 08, 2005

hey hey hello

i haven't forgotten about you, moon cakes. i've just been really, really, reeeeeeally busy. new city and unpacking and all that. but i promise, swear on a stack of xavier hollander books, that i'll try to at least tell you about seattle soon. because, so far? seattle rocks. i've been wondering where it's been all my life. (note: this is subject to change once i have to battle traffic on the way to a 9-5 and/or winter rolls around.)

good news though! the kitchen is unpacked!

kitchen 1

kitchen 2

Sunday, September 04, 2005

i'm in washington!

yes, it's true!! i'm in seattle!! HOORAY!!

it's been a long week and i've still got lots of unpacking to do. i've only just now caught up with my flickr comments. my fingers are kind of numb from typing.

i'll give you a proper trip round up here shortly. there's just too much to be done in real life at the moment.

also, i'll post a transcript of the audioblog from idaho as soon as we have the speakers hooked up to the computer. (i can't remember what i said! haha!) sorry about the bad sound quality but i had to call from a pay phone. mobile service was spotty for some of the trip.

anyway, time to unpack. comments should be back on in a bit.