1. The tiny new stove that was put in my apt has a tiny oven that is too small for most of my bakeware.
2. If you are going to try to compensate for a tiny oven, reusing foil takeout containers does not work so well.
3. Pizza pans are worse. If you are going to use one, bake for less time and pay close attention to what oven rack position you use.
4. That trick where you put your hardened brown sugar and a separate bowl of water into a microwave together. Only kinda works. But well enough.
5. Creaming butter and hardened brown sugar together by hand in a bowl with a fork will take time.
6. If UPS is delivering the bike that you won on Ebay, for which you paid a pretty penny, despite the fact that you are home and have a working doorbell, UPS is likely to leave your new bike next to the garbage cans outside your apartment building without ever ringing your functioning doorbell. The same functioning doorbell that the Jehovah's Witnesses, the Census taker and the Postal worker have all managed to find and use.
7. When you remove the ball bearings from the hub of your wheel, you should count the number and make sure to put them where they will not roll away from you. A paper towel on the floor is not a good option.
8. Best to throw away condiments when they pass their sell by/best by/use by date. They will scare your guests.
9. Old bikes are not standard. They need, love, patience, degreaser, a regreasing, and the right tools.
These will elicit "good grief" sighs.
10. Sitting by the lake at night holding hands with someone you like, looking out at the water, the ducks, the trees, the skyline lit up by the light pollution while not talking, with your bikes beside you.
This will elicit a happy sigh.
Saturday, July 31, 2010
Monday, July 26, 2010
Oh, this old thing?
Twice in recent weeks, I've given someone a compliment about one thing and had them assume that the compliment made was for something else.
They go on at length about the thing that they wanted to be complimented on. The thing that they are especially proud of that surely must be noticed by all the world.
In these cases, far be it from me to correct them and go on at length about what to them is merely an element of the backdrop.
They go on at length about the thing that they wanted to be complimented on. The thing that they are especially proud of that surely must be noticed by all the world.
In these cases, far be it from me to correct them and go on at length about what to them is merely an element of the backdrop.
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
The internet was invented to transmit pictures of cats
see more Lolcats and funny pictures
In my role as Last Adopter - a couple of months ago I was at a BBQ at which a cat came up from the basement of the apt building through a tiny tiny hole. Everyone at the party referred to the kitty as "Basement Cat." I, naively, thought it was just generic name given to this particular cat. I did not realize that it was an entire lolcats tag and subgenre. There was no one to correct me until I watched a video from Next HOPE. What can I say, Last Adopter. I like this particular one very much.
Monday, July 19, 2010
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
Bike Envy
The bike manufacturing world hates short people.
For that I curse them like a loud drunk sailor.
For that I curse them like a loud drunk sailor.
Saturday, July 10, 2010
The Gel for Everything
I bought a tube of aloe vera gel today. I figured it might be good for those situations in which the skin needs something cooling, soothing and calming.
On reading the tube, it advises use for Sunburn, dryness, irritated skin, minor burns, itching, chafing, insect bites, on blemishes, as a shaving gel (shaving?) and a hair styling gel.
Hair styling.
Hair styling.
Hmmm, maybe I can use it to fix the squeak in my door hinge, to polish my boots, as an air freshener and as a nutritional supplement to cakes and puddings.
It's a universe of possibility.
On reading the tube, it advises use for Sunburn, dryness, irritated skin, minor burns, itching, chafing, insect bites, on blemishes, as a shaving gel (shaving?) and a hair styling gel.
Hair styling.
Hair styling.
Hmmm, maybe I can use it to fix the squeak in my door hinge, to polish my boots, as an air freshener and as a nutritional supplement to cakes and puddings.
It's a universe of possibility.
Sunday, June 27, 2010
As high as an elephant's eye
Today I decided to finally put together the sweater that I started knitting two years ago. And while knitting it, I listened to the audio from the documentary "King Corn."
It's a pretty powerful demonstration of how the enactment of a government policy shapes our lives. Government incentives and disincentives set the rules of the game. After that we all do our best to win by those rules. Guidelines point us in irresistible directions, and lead to intended and unintended outcomes.
But theoretically in our case, the government is us, so we have a say in what those guidelines are and our government is accountable to us, when assessing the outcomes. That is, if we care enough to pay attention and hold them accountable. Which is more than can be said, in general, for a corporation or a non-profit.
"We subsidize Happy Meals. We don't subsidize healthy meals."
- King of Corn
"If you take that meal, if you take that McDonald's meal. You don't realize it when you eat it, but you're eating corn. Beef has been corn-fed. Soda is corn. It's all high fructose corn syrup. It's the main ingredient even the french fries, which are, you know, half the calories in french fries come from the fat that they're fried in and that fat is liable to be corn or soy oil.
And so when you're at that McDonald's, you're eating Iowa food. Everything on your plate is corn." - King of Corn
It's a pretty powerful demonstration of how the enactment of a government policy shapes our lives. Government incentives and disincentives set the rules of the game. After that we all do our best to win by those rules. Guidelines point us in irresistible directions, and lead to intended and unintended outcomes.
But theoretically in our case, the government is us, so we have a say in what those guidelines are and our government is accountable to us, when assessing the outcomes. That is, if we care enough to pay attention and hold them accountable. Which is more than can be said, in general, for a corporation or a non-profit.
Wednesday, June 09, 2010
Bureaucratic Fiction
I am reading this book called "Devices and Desires" by K.J. Parker. It's kinda hard to describe. I found it in the SF/Fantasy part of the library but it's not really SF and while it has a Fantasy type setting there are no unicorns or wizards or magical spells.
It's full of tales of bureaucracy, war, engineering, politics, administration, and diplomacy. And while lengthy descriptions of the dynamics of bureaucratic systems would have put me straight to sleep as a teenager, at this age, in my current job, I find it strangely compelling. Much in the same way that I find time management games like "Diner Dash" and "Cake Mania" compelling.
They are not exactly fun. But resemble my daily closely enough while still being simpler and perhaps more manageable. I don't know if I identify with the book, or I just recognize so many aspects of real life in it with and feel a sympathy on some level.
It's full of tales of bureaucracy, war, engineering, politics, administration, and diplomacy. And while lengthy descriptions of the dynamics of bureaucratic systems would have put me straight to sleep as a teenager, at this age, in my current job, I find it strangely compelling. Much in the same way that I find time management games like "Diner Dash" and "Cake Mania" compelling.
They are not exactly fun. But resemble my daily closely enough while still being simpler and perhaps more manageable. I don't know if I identify with the book, or I just recognize so many aspects of real life in it with and feel a sympathy on some level.
Sunday, May 09, 2010
Really Big Words
I liberated three shirts and three books today. I put them out on the stoop and was gratified to find that they were all snapped up in about an hour. If you knew what a packrat I am, you'd know what a big deal this is. One of the books I had picked up off the stoop of another person. Yay, it goes around and goes around again.
On the way back from an very excellent hat-based Brunch, I stopped at a box on a stoop and found a box labeled: "magnetic poetry REALLY BIG WORDS."
I could not resist picking it up. I could always use a vocabulary builder.
I pick up the case and open it. To see that the words are short but the magnets with the words on them are VERY LARGE. The longest word in the box is "different."
Naturally, I could not just leave them on the street there. I had to take them home, box and all.
On the way back from an very excellent hat-based Brunch, I stopped at a box on a stoop and found a box labeled: "magnetic poetry REALLY BIG WORDS."
I could not resist picking it up. I could always use a vocabulary builder.
I pick up the case and open it. To see that the words are short but the magnets with the words on them are VERY LARGE. The longest word in the box is "different."
Naturally, I could not just leave them on the street there. I had to take them home, box and all.
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
a world of stupider out there
Mock duck curry, 5 shots of Jameson shared and Casiotone for the Painfully Alone in the company of BE. Not bad for a Tuesday night. Inexplicably, when I consider myself to have no money to spend, I spend more of it on ridiculous things. I bought a concert t-shirt. I bought several food items that each cost a dollar and a ring in the shape of an owl that will probably turn my finger green.
As we walked from the Continental to the Mercury Lounge for the show, I started to say that taking those shots was the last stupid thing that I was going to do. But I had to stop myself in mid-sentence. BE and I were pretty sure that there was a world of stupider out there that I am likely to embrace.
Casiotone was pretty darn delightful and I am, again, a fan of the rock show. I might just consider going to another one.
As we walked from the Continental to the Mercury Lounge for the show, I started to say that taking those shots was the last stupid thing that I was going to do. But I had to stop myself in mid-sentence. BE and I were pretty sure that there was a world of stupider out there that I am likely to embrace.
Casiotone was pretty darn delightful and I am, again, a fan of the rock show. I might just consider going to another one.
Is it all inside my head?
Songs sound different in my memory from the recording. Sometimes when I think of a song and I go to Youtube to listen to it ... the effect is not the same as I remember it.
I was trying to write a post and it started to be about too many different things at once. It became this tangle of so many things in a big ramble-y snarl. It's inspired by a recent episode from the TV show Glee about the power of Madonna. I fish out of that mess, this part:
If I had to pick a favorite passage in a pop song. It might be in the song "True Blue." The song is trite, conventional and predictable. But then, in the midst of it, there is an interlude:
At this part, the song soars up and out past the stratosphere for mere seconds and then falls back into predictability and familiarity. But for that moment alone, the whole song is redeemed. It is a transcendent pop music moment, one that can't be taken out of its damn context. Perhaps it soars, in part, because of its surroundings.
That is how it plays in my memory.
I just watched the video for "True Blue" on Youtube. I can feel where the interlude goes but it's muddled. It does not take flight in the way that it does in my mind's ear.
Perhaps my memory has built it up too much. Overhyped and analyzed it. That or, my brain's sound system is the MF bomb.
I was trying to write a post and it started to be about too many different things at once. It became this tangle of so many things in a big ramble-y snarl. It's inspired by a recent episode from the TV show Glee about the power of Madonna. I fish out of that mess, this part:
If I had to pick a favorite passage in a pop song. It might be in the song "True Blue." The song is trite, conventional and predictable. But then, in the midst of it, there is an interlude:
"No more sadness, I kiss it good-bye
The sun is bursting right out of the sky
I searched the whole world for someone like you"
At this part, the song soars up and out past the stratosphere for mere seconds and then falls back into predictability and familiarity. But for that moment alone, the whole song is redeemed. It is a transcendent pop music moment, one that can't be taken out of its damn context. Perhaps it soars, in part, because of its surroundings.
That is how it plays in my memory.
I just watched the video for "True Blue" on Youtube. I can feel where the interlude goes but it's muddled. It does not take flight in the way that it does in my mind's ear.
Perhaps my memory has built it up too much. Overhyped and analyzed it. That or, my brain's sound system is the MF bomb.
Monday, April 19, 2010
My hipster Mom
I look over at my mother and notice that she is wearing my Pearl Jam concert t-shirt from 2003. She has discovered the baby doll t-shirt. "I look skinny when I wear this," she says.
Since I was going to be here and their two shows at Mercury Lounge are sold out. I got a ticket to see Ok Go while home. (I have a whole crush post devoted to Ok Go which I have not yet finished and will post very soon.)
My parents response to this was typical. My father asked several times if I knew how to get there, made sure that I had ear plugs, washed the pollen and dirt off the car saying, "You have to drive up in a nice looking car when you go to the rock show," and pressed more food on me than usual - solemnly saying, "you will need energy for the rock show." My mother instructed me to drive carefully, asked several times when the show started, out of concern that I was running late and that I would miss it, and most importantly, asked me repeatedly not to drink.
They stayed up until I got home and we gathered around the kitchen table and had a snack. All of this was expected.
What was not was this question from my mother, "Who did you see at the show? Was it the Dead Milkmen?"
The Dead Milkmen.
THE DEAD MILKMEN!
When I was a sophomore in high school, "Bitchin' Camero" was my favorite song on the entire planet. I somehow sweet talked my mother into buying me the "Big Lizard in My Backyard" album and even more miraculously, I talked her into letting me see The Dead Milkmen in concert at Mississippi Nights. I went with StK, who was probably the most musically advanced and alternative person in our entire high school. I think I wore an enormous kelly green checked flannel shirt, purple socks and lace-up black ankle boots. I was too chicken to go down into the pit. In those days, one did not mosh. It was slam dancing in the slam pit. And if you fell in the pit there was a very real danger that someone would stomp on your head with a steel-toed boot and give you a concussion. I just kinda sat at a table in the under 21 section and marveled that the coolest of bands consisted of three regular looking dudes who seemed so down to earth. They were punk without having to wear dog collars or eyeliner or mohawks. The punk ethos was more than a hairstyle and some song lyrics. I was to learn this way later in life but it was all there staring me in the face. StK, bless his anarchist heart, got down there and grabbed some kid by the shoulders, boosted himself with a combat boot on the kid's rear, and flung himself into the pit.
The part of this story that I forgot was - the show ran later than I had told my mother that it would. (These were the days before cell phones.) She talked her way into the venue. She walked up to the door guy and said, "My daughter is in there, let me in to find her." The door guy resisted saying that the show was almost over and I would be out soon. But my mother insisted. And the door guy relented. She describes walked into an ungodly and horrible loudness, almost like hell looking for me.
Despite walking into deafening Punk Rock Hell, to fetch her silly nerdy, teenage daughter, my mother drove me to other rock shows. And on occasion let me buy a record or two. I never thought that she paid much attention to what I was doing or thinking or listening to back then.
She remembers the Dead Milkmen. She thought they were horrible. But she does remember them.
Since I was going to be here and their two shows at Mercury Lounge are sold out. I got a ticket to see Ok Go while home. (I have a whole crush post devoted to Ok Go which I have not yet finished and will post very soon.)
My parents response to this was typical. My father asked several times if I knew how to get there, made sure that I had ear plugs, washed the pollen and dirt off the car saying, "You have to drive up in a nice looking car when you go to the rock show," and pressed more food on me than usual - solemnly saying, "you will need energy for the rock show." My mother instructed me to drive carefully, asked several times when the show started, out of concern that I was running late and that I would miss it, and most importantly, asked me repeatedly not to drink.
They stayed up until I got home and we gathered around the kitchen table and had a snack. All of this was expected.
What was not was this question from my mother, "Who did you see at the show? Was it the Dead Milkmen?"
The Dead Milkmen.
THE DEAD MILKMEN!
When I was a sophomore in high school, "Bitchin' Camero" was my favorite song on the entire planet. I somehow sweet talked my mother into buying me the "Big Lizard in My Backyard" album and even more miraculously, I talked her into letting me see The Dead Milkmen in concert at Mississippi Nights. I went with StK, who was probably the most musically advanced and alternative person in our entire high school. I think I wore an enormous kelly green checked flannel shirt, purple socks and lace-up black ankle boots. I was too chicken to go down into the pit. In those days, one did not mosh. It was slam dancing in the slam pit. And if you fell in the pit there was a very real danger that someone would stomp on your head with a steel-toed boot and give you a concussion. I just kinda sat at a table in the under 21 section and marveled that the coolest of bands consisted of three regular looking dudes who seemed so down to earth. They were punk without having to wear dog collars or eyeliner or mohawks. The punk ethos was more than a hairstyle and some song lyrics. I was to learn this way later in life but it was all there staring me in the face. StK, bless his anarchist heart, got down there and grabbed some kid by the shoulders, boosted himself with a combat boot on the kid's rear, and flung himself into the pit.
The part of this story that I forgot was - the show ran later than I had told my mother that it would. (These were the days before cell phones.) She talked her way into the venue. She walked up to the door guy and said, "My daughter is in there, let me in to find her." The door guy resisted saying that the show was almost over and I would be out soon. But my mother insisted. And the door guy relented. She describes walked into an ungodly and horrible loudness, almost like hell looking for me.
Despite walking into deafening Punk Rock Hell, to fetch her silly nerdy, teenage daughter, my mother drove me to other rock shows. And on occasion let me buy a record or two. I never thought that she paid much attention to what I was doing or thinking or listening to back then.
She remembers the Dead Milkmen. She thought they were horrible. But she does remember them.
Sunday, April 11, 2010
Living ungraciously
Of late, Facebook is like my mom. It keeps pointing out friends that I have not been in touch with in a long time. "Maybe you should send so and so a message. I'll bet he/she would be happy to hear from you," said in the same tone of voice that she used when she would press me to write thank you notes. (I may or may not have mentioned to you that BBFK is a beautiful thank you note writer. A card from her will make you feel like a Million Bucks.)
As an awkward person of no social graces, I ignore Facebook's suggestions and my mother's and almost never send thank you note. Bad dog! No cookie! I count myself as lucky to have friends all things considered. And such fine friends at that.
As an awkward person of no social graces, I ignore Facebook's suggestions and my mother's and almost never send thank you note. Bad dog! No cookie! I count myself as lucky to have friends all things considered. And such fine friends at that.
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
When we tell the story of our lives
CK and I have been talking a lot about how wildly different two people's accounts of a situation can be. And how hard it is to reconcile yourself to the fact that the other person might never see things your way. Might never come to understand where you were coming from. Which reminded me of this Sacred Advertisement from Rob Brezny.
"SACRED ADVERTISEMENT
There was an indignant uproar after revelations in 2006 that James Frey's best-selling "memoir" A Million Little Pieces contains fabrications. He hadn't actually lived all of the experiences he depicted therein.
Hearing about it prompted me to ruminate on whether there's any such thing as a completely accurate account of any person's life. My conclusion: no.
In every autobiography and biography ever written, the author imaginatively strings together selectively chosen details to conjure up artificially coherent narratives rather than depicting the crazy-quilt ambiguity that actually characterizes everyone's journey.
If you and nine writers set out to tell your life story, you'd produce 10 wildly different tales, each rife with subjective interpretation, misplaced emphasis, unintentional distortions, and exorbitant extrapolations from insufficient data.
Celebrate the malleability of reality. Regale listeners with stories about the time you worked as a pirate in the Indian Ocean, or rode the rails through Kansas as a hobo, or gave a down-on-his-luck CIA agent sage advice in an elevator. When you call to get pizza delivered and the clerk who takes your order asks your name, say you're Brad Pitt or Paris Hilton. When someone you're meeting is annoyed because you're late, say you couldn't help it because you were smoking crack in the bus station bathroom with your mom's guru and lost track of time. If asked how much education you have, say you have three PhDs, one each in astrobiology, Russian literature, and whale songs. "
Rob Brezny
Give the cat a name
While chatting with L this evening, it came out that in my apt there are three places to sleep: the love seat, the twin bed, and a rolled up futon in the living room. He was mildly appalled by this and suggested that perhaps to sustain an adult relationship I might need to have a bed that could comfortably fit two people. And as a "grown ass woman" there were no acceptable excuses.
He does have a point. It's hard to feel comfortable in a room where there doesn't appear to be space for you. From my viewpoint, I always had the sense that this was a transient stop in my life. A visit. And a sense that, if I met someone who inspired in me the desire to buy a bed, I would buy a bed. That would be the sign.
Sort of the Holly Golightly thing: "If I could find a real-life place that'd make me feel like Tiffany's, then - then I'd buy some furniture and give the cat a name!"
But perhaps L has a point. Maybe Holly and I have it all backwards. Maybe you have to buy the furniture, name the cat, and put down roots. Maybe that process creates a place where you feel safe and calm and protected. Maybe I have to create "a place where me and things go together." through my own efforts. I make a place my home.
You bring in a bed and then there is space for another person to sleep in it beside you. And then you meet them.
I wonder which way it works - do you build a bed and they will come or do you wait to find the right place and then give the cat a name?
I am not sure that I have done enough traveling to say whether I've found the place. And I haven't built the bed.
It probably doesn't matter. There must be as many paths home as there are people who have homes. But I suppose it can't hurt to try.
Perhaps after three years of being here, it's time to buy a bed and give the cat a name.
Time to call it a life whether there's someone to share it with or not.
He does have a point. It's hard to feel comfortable in a room where there doesn't appear to be space for you. From my viewpoint, I always had the sense that this was a transient stop in my life. A visit. And a sense that, if I met someone who inspired in me the desire to buy a bed, I would buy a bed. That would be the sign.
Sort of the Holly Golightly thing: "If I could find a real-life place that'd make me feel like Tiffany's, then - then I'd buy some furniture and give the cat a name!"
But perhaps L has a point. Maybe Holly and I have it all backwards. Maybe you have to buy the furniture, name the cat, and put down roots. Maybe that process creates a place where you feel safe and calm and protected. Maybe I have to create "a place where me and things go together." through my own efforts. I make a place my home.
You bring in a bed and then there is space for another person to sleep in it beside you. And then you meet them.
I wonder which way it works - do you build a bed and they will come or do you wait to find the right place and then give the cat a name?
I am not sure that I have done enough traveling to say whether I've found the place. And I haven't built the bed.
It probably doesn't matter. There must be as many paths home as there are people who have homes. But I suppose it can't hurt to try.
Perhaps after three years of being here, it's time to buy a bed and give the cat a name.
Time to call it a life whether there's someone to share it with or not.
Monday, March 29, 2010
because it chose me
"If I had to choose a favourite [sentence], it would be because it chose me: for reasons I can't be sure of, although I am sure they go deep ..."
- Clive James, Cultural Amnesia
- Clive James, Cultural Amnesia
even the flowers
"[Benedetto] Croce was saying that all living things have a history: having a history and living are the same process. Even the flowers, he said, have a history, although only they know it."
- Clive James, Cultural Amnesia
- Clive James, Cultural Amnesia
Monday, March 22, 2010
The robe abides
I bought this very, very, cheap fleece bathrobe to wear to a "Big Lebowski" party. It's a horrible, fuzzy white thing with pale blue hearts all over it.
That party was in January, I am still wearing the dang thing while I putter around the house - usually with a ratty t-shirt and flip-flops. I have not worn it to the grocery store yet. But I fear that this and a lot of bowling might be in my near future.
That party was in January, I am still wearing the dang thing while I putter around the house - usually with a ratty t-shirt and flip-flops. I have not worn it to the grocery store yet. But I fear that this and a lot of bowling might be in my near future.
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