velocity lab, you can beet a rapidograph to death and voter registration

you know how i like to be a fly on the wall at design and blogging events, right?



well, imagine my delight when i could combine both of those things PLUS hanging out with cakespy jessie (i super heart jessie! she's so cool!)



at the lab at velocity on wed night. apparently, i wasn't the only person who was excited. check out the crowd!



here's the panel. represented l to r, mirrormirror, decorno, shellterrific and not martha.



it was an informative event in a blogging 101 kind of way (these things often are) and the dry soda was flowing like wine so of course i had fun.

what made my night extra special, however, was the fact that the number 8 bus was only 5 minutes late. i'm not the only person who thinks the number 8 bus sucks, btw. (although my obsession over routes and times makes me think that i should change my name to beth.)

anyway, NEXT month at velocity, it's moxie and kristen and you know how i adore those ladies! i'll post a reminder closer to the day of.

life hasn't been all concentrated in solu though. yesterday i tried to get my rapidograph pen to work with beet juice.



it didn't work even though beet juice is thinner than most inks. i suppose that i should mention here that i HATE rapidographs choosing to go with microns when i need a super fine line. (i'll go so far as to say i swear by sakura products in general. and, no, i don't get paid by them. their products just *work*. (and very well, i might add.))

well, ok. microns don't work on lemons.




but not much does except sharpie. (weird art supplies because of suspect and fugitive, of course.)

so guess what, poodles! leff and i are officially seattle residents!



it only took us, what, 2.5 years? bish plz, at least we can vote in the next general election. (which, let's be honest, i probably wasn't even doing in tn since they use effing diebold machines.)

yeah, i called you bish.

so this weekend it's all about books and hair. but not books about hair. see you monday maybe with a modified mullet! (no, not a mullet. perhaps a rat tail? would i be 5 steps ahead of the hipsters if i did that? mwah-ha!)

memorial day weekend cont

i think that i've finally recovered from the big memorial day/35th bday weekend blowout! (for reals, kittens. if you swear off sugar and booze for three months and then binge on it for three days, it kinda' does a number on all of your systems including, but not limited to, the lymphatic. (peristalsis rocks!!))

lesse', where did i leave off....oh yes! monday. monday was full of food and people. c and m invited us for a lovely dinner in uqa. we took a walk to help their twins settle down. (the mention of twins should make c (of c&b's) biological clock's alarm go off. heh heh!)

uqa can be strange. i didn't know this.



it can also be beautiful. i was aware of that fact.





here it is being strange again. or, at the very least, trying to be all villa villakulla-ish. or maybe slightly british.



can you belive that c and m made me a coffee ice cream cake for my bday?!? with HOMEMADE COFFEE ICE CREAM?!? oh, i'm just dying thinking about how great it was!



thanks so much, c&m!!

also on monday, leff and i met larry and flo from flickr! we had breakfast at mecca. here's flo's plate of biscuits and gravy.



it was awesome meeting them. they're such a laid back, creative couple! i only wish that i hadn't been so full of sugar/booze and could've at least not seemed as weird as i really am. (it takes energy to maintain the "i'm not scary, really" image. energy that i was sadly lacking.)

tuesday, of course, was for catching up on things. so unless you want to read about the joys of laundry (and i'm assuming that you don't), it looks like i'm done here.

tonight, however, is the lab at velocity! be there or, um...be...somewhere else since it's not possible to be two places at once. yet.

seriously though, the lab will be awesome. you should go if you're in the seattle area.

i'll leave you with the link to the brilliant riding the bus with my sister/john ritter mashup that was on jezebel. it makes me uncomfortable that i laugh so hard at this clip. please keep in mind that i'm not laughing at the developmentally disabled but at rosie o'donnell's terrible acting job.

do you want a deviled egg, jesseeeeeeee? toilet seat assistance in row number one! thank you! bwah-haa!

caution: a billion photos! proceed at your own risk!

this was a big weekend for me. no really, it was! i'm being serious for a change. i mean, jesus, i turned 35 (which is a decade longer than i expected to be around). thankfully, i had no time left for maudlin introspection due to sprinkles



and "twin peaks"! do you SEE my "twin peaks" bday cake!? it's made of donuts and has a log candle!



the log hasn't imparted any secrets to me yet. which, you know, fine. people already think i'm strange enough as it is.

we'll get back to "peaks" in a moment. i need to thank some people. first up, leff for not only making the awesome cake above but for these two kick ass books!



murakami and japanese graffiti! my bf is *so* the greatest in the world!

even more thanks to slogrl who got me a whole freakin' oldenberg!



i haven't picked it up yet though.

even more more thanks to c for the cuuute ugly doll and the foresight to bring me a towel so i'll always be prepared!



and, not pictured (yet), thanks to c and b for the gift certificate to bailey coy! i can't WAIT to pick up some books!

seriously, everyone, THANK YOU!!! presents were not required but i love them and more importantly all of you! you're so awesome!

continuing in the vein of awesome, let's get back to "twin peaks". leff, you may have heard, is the most incredible bf in the world. (you didn't hear? please refer to just under the murakami/rackgaki photo.)

just why is he so incredible and/or great? he arranged for us to have a mini cooper



to take on a "twin peaks" sightseeing tour! he piloted the agent to twede's (aka the double r) in north bend!







a small related aside, this whole week i've been making twin peaks fugitives for s&f. fugitives like the catalog lady



and laura palmer.



while at twede's i had the damn fine cup of coffee and a slice of cherry pie



which, i'm sure you're not surprised to learn, i used to make an agent cooper fugitive.



i love it when a plan comes together.

back to the "peaks" tourism. after pie and breakfast (not in that order) we headed to snoqualmie for the falls. it was very misty



but i could still see the great northern hotel (aka the salish lodge).


leff has better photos as usual. (he has more patience than me.)

when we drove through snoqualmie, we passed the railroad museum. guess what was there? cars that looked similar to where laura palmer was killed!



creepy, huh?

also, the giant log from the opening titles!



or possibly a relative of that giant log from the opening titles. i don't know for sure.

the whole weekend wasn't just "peaks" related though. saturday was quite sunny and, as such, was made for walking around and taking pics.









have i mentioned that i have a wicked sunburn? i do. and i'm, perversely, loving every minute of it just like loverboy. mainly because it reminds me that we had sun for a while.

right, today is biz-ay so i best hop in the shower. see you wed!

sleeping the week away

thanks to the narcotic effect of painkillers, this has been one of the least productive weeks that i've had in a long time.

i'm not complaining. i've needed the sleep.

it just makes for especially boring blog posts. 'cause, honestly, the only other things i've done besides crash out for hours at a time is watch movies.

prince caspian? soooooo goooood! well, except for the one ham handed scene where they couldn't slice out the christian part of c.s. lewis. but, you know, it's c.s. lewis so it's forgivable. esp since it's at the end of the movie.

what i can't forgive is the big pile of crap that is indy and the crystal skull. (*so* glad that i didn't pay to see it.) not only is everything dreadfully obvious in the first fifteen minutes but, here's the kicker, indy didn't have any good lines. *that's* sad. my decades long crush on harrison ford is based not only on his rugged good looks thing but *most importantly* his ability to play a smartass.

it's like he was neutered in the latest indy. it's kinda' depressing.

k, i have to catch up on things before i turn 35 on sunday. have a great memorial weekend if you're in the u.s.! if not, you know, enjoy the next two days.

xanax and phone numbers

guess what, tender vittles. i had to get a root canal on tuesday.

thankfully, i've got a great dentist who not only hooked me up with some xanax to help ease my drill and needle phobias



but who also made sure that the procedure was virtually painless.

no, i'm not kidding.

even though the root canal wasn't so bad, i'm still recuperating. (the left side of my mouth is a little tender.) i'll probably be back on solid food in another day or so but until then, i'm enjoying my diet of ice cream, yogurt, chocolate milk and commercials on youtube. you know, like the io digital cable one.



and the awesome freddy freaker from the late 80's/early '90s.



if i recall correctly, my little bro did indeed dial the freak phone one night and ask specifically for freddy. i don't think he was able to join the party the fast and easy way. nor did he ever find out exactly what was hot and what was not. poor kid.

damn, this is even more nonsensical than normal. i think i need to stop writing, take some more pain meds and eat a pint of green tea ice cream.

it really is summer, twin peaks fugitives

if you were in seattle this weekend, consider yourself lucky! it was AMAZING outside!



the sky was so blue and the weather was so warm that it was almost worth putting up with prolonged winter blahs just to experience the past weekend.



no, that's a lie. i wouldn't wish this last winter on even my worst frenemy. (i linked just so you could read the quote from "mean girls" at the bottom.)

anyway, it was so beautiful outside that everyone was either at the beach, in the mountains or at the cheese festival. this meant that places like the library



and sam were virtually empty. *sooooooooo* awesome!!

even the thai place where we had lunch was pretty devoid of customers. again, i thank the lactose mini gods of the cheese festival. they may not know how to organize an event so that the traffic flows well, but their ample curdage can leave the rest of the city wide open. so, you know, thanks for that cheese lords.

what else is new. ah, yes! since this is my last week of being 34, leff and i are celebrating by being "twin peaks" tourists. translation: my 35th bday is looming this coming weekend and we're going to north bend and snoqualmie falls where part of "twin peaks" was filmed.

to get myself ready, i've been making fugitives based on "tp" characters. like, audrey corne (meal) (audrey horne made from corn meal)



and donna hayword(s) (donna hayward made from, uh, words. you know, like in a book.)



i'll be doing this all week. hopefully, it'll culminate in a site specific piece on sunday, the d.o.b.

have i mentioned how depressed i am about turning 35? i know, in the overall scheme of things that it's not really old but come on, it's five fucking years until 40. sigh...

k, i gotta' go track down a new dentist. see you wednesday.

ike-heee, ike-hooo, ike-haaa, ikea-huh

leff and i have this love/hate relationship with ikea. things we love? budget prices for swedishness, their cafeteria, lingonberry jam.

everything else kinda' sucks. (including the semidisposiblitiy of most of their furniture.) i particularly despise their website which appears to randomly decide what can and cannot be shipped.

one really helpful item that falls into the arbitrary non-shipability black hole? dioder multipurpose led lighting.

that is why we ended up renting "ice", the semiautomatic zipcar (q: what in the name of all that's gracious is a semiautomatic? a: in europe i'm an automatic. in america, i'm not. (*cough*)) to drive to renton while humming "under pressure". (oh yeah, i was rockin' the mic like a vandal.)

did i mention that we only had 30 minutes to grab what we needed? ha ha, yeah. that sucked. but at least we got our dioder strands, dammit!



ikea sometimes reminds me of the league of nations. i think it's all the flags.



and maybe the lutefisk.

with that i have GOT to get outside! i think we skipped spring and jumped right into summer! it's time for big gulp slurpees mixed with vodka, stupid pop songs and sunscreen! huzzah!

retail therapy

this spring is killing me. not only is it 11 days until i turn 35, but it's been grey, rainy and awful pretty much nonstop since the middle of august last year. (i know, that techinically includes fall and winter as well as spring but you know what? shut up, that's what.)

i'm ashamed to admit it but sometimes when i get in a deep funk like this, the only thing that drags me out is a dose of conspicuous consumerism. that's why i headed to schmancy to pick up some plush for my nephew fetus



and ended up bringing home all of these guys for me and leff too.













you know, i might not send the mr. beardsley yet since he has ingestible buttons and tiny eyes. mmmmmmm...ingestible buttons and tiny eyes...*drooling*

what else did i do yesterday? i dropped by nancy, annoyed kate and fell in love with this leopard "rug" that she has.



and then i screwed around for a few hours trying to make a yo yo ma out of mayo (a mayo yo ma, geddit?) but it didn't work and i got really pissed off. but it was ok because i remembered that i had this embarrassed little cupcake sticker in my phone



and i felt better knowing that even baked goods are having a hard time dealing with the dreary seattle spring too and are kinda' ashamed about it.

on that note, i'll let you get back to work (although, really. does your boss let you read my blog at work? doesn't the name 'cause the filters to have conniption fits?) and i'll get back to scouring etsy for baby goods.

i feel the need to reiterate here--I DO NOT WANT KIDS! i just want my fetal relative to have books (my brother admitted to me that he doesn't own a single one. sigh...) and cool clothes.

i also want him to not have a southern accent, but that's another story. *adding french, japanese, german and spanish language tapes to amazon cart*