« November 2003 | Main | January 2004 »

December 31, 2003

my favorite big bad

sarah was saying that the mayor is hers. we had a buffy marathon at shayne's house the other day, and we watched an episode with some good mayor stuff in it.

i'm inclined to agree with her, though angel is really great as a bad guy. he just enjoys it so much. and i liked the master, too, he just doesn't get enough of the story that season.

adam and the first/caleb were definitely disasters.

much of the way the willow story was handled was pretty bad-- the heavy handed addiction metaphor, egads. but jeez, she just looked so good with the black hair and the veins ("i'm simply covered in these viens...").

yeah, i'd have to say either the mayor or angel. or the master.

Posted by lisa at 06:44 PM

my inner house needs renovation

i guess it's a good thing that i like to renovate houses.

this morning i dreamed that i visited the house of my friend h.

(h. is a friend who symbolizes something in particular to me. h. recently went on disability, i believe for depression. h. is no longer at work. h. did not return my last email. to me, h. is someone who was overcome by a force inside, a force that i see and fear in myself.)

it was an old victorian in need of a lot of renovation. i was there with some radio station people. i remember the bedroom was occupied by a california king with a dark burgundy cover. the bed was much too large for the room. wonder what that means. heh.

i remember a vast cast-iron door, like the door of a potbelly stove, except larger than a person. i was afraid to open the door, but someone else did and we found a secret staircase inside the house. i remember in the landing was h.'s diary (which i didn't read, though i thought it might shed some light on h's state of mind).

i remember thinking, "this is just the sort of house i like to work on" (which it was), and what it shame it was that h. seemed unable to make any headway with the place.

there was more, but now i don't remember. a lot of running around with radio station people, i think.

Posted by lisa at 04:51 PM

printfest

yesterday i finally got frustrated with my inability to print at home, and bought a printer.

i have to say, printer technology has come a very long way since i last bought a printer in the mid-90's.

i got a photo-quality printer with separate tanks for each color that makes virtually no noise and spits out a page of text in about the amount of time it takes for me to turn my head from the computer screen to the printer.

how much was this astounding machine? $150.

it's starting to make me really love my cube, not just as a nifty museum piece, but as a highly functional desktop. it's zippy, the LCD monitor is bright and crisp, and hey, it prints! plus, the speakers sound pretty nice, and i can listen to xdu online whilst printing.

Posted by lisa at 12:31 PM

enough radio to choke a large horse

i did two shows today... 2 - 4pm and 8 - 10pm.

it was very quiet, though at the end of the second show i did have someone call to ask what the last few songs were, which was gratifying.

and jason had a kind word.

bendte arrived for her 10pm show sporting a new haircut; we both go to the same guy to get our hair cut. she said their inspiration for how he did the back was that scene in 16 candles when the girl gets her hair caught in the door and her friend cuts the hair off to free her.

she cracks me up.

i also talked to sylvia in the afternoon, about thrift stores and, oddly, horseback riding. i also gave her some advice on men, but she probably won't take it.

Posted by lisa at 12:21 AM

not safe for kids!

i had the disorienting experience of having this blog site redirected to yahooligans when i went to view it on a computer i bought recently. my initial panicky thought was that my site had somehow been hijacked, but when it came up ok on a different computer, i realized that the previous owner of the computer must have installed some kind of parental controls on it.

so i'm very excited that my blog is offically unsafe for children. yay!

Posted by lisa at 12:09 AM

December 30, 2003

biking

you know, i love the idea of biking. it's so clever.

the last time i tried it, i really sucked at it though. not only did i not have the aerobic capacity to go very far, but i'm not very skilled in general.

the creepy neighborhood lawn guy, who has been exclusively riding a bike since i've known him, seems to have acquired another mode of transport. it appears to be a a heavy duty electric golf cart with no awning. i'm actually a bit happy for him, because it's clearly awkward for him to carry lawn tools on a bike (which he did, amazingly, manage).

creepy though he may be, i do kinda worry about the guy and would like to see him do a little better.

i'm still not going to hire him though.

Posted by lisa at 12:53 PM

puppies

i dreamt last night that i was late for my radio show. i'd simply lost track of time. it was 9, and i was supposed to go on at 8. jeff herrick was on, apparently covering for me, but i thought i had better get up to the station quickly.

for some reason, i decided to walk. i had just moved, so i didn't know the area well. i was in downtown raleigh, on a major road, but in a really shitty neighborhood. i was lost. i finally asked a couple of girls, but they were not really any help. then i spotted a small group of police, a few of which were mounted on horses. i think i had a conversation with someone about how i knew that police mounted on horses would help me, because they were mounted on horses.

they agreed to help me. i thought they'd call a car, but instead they took me to the local animal shelter. it turned out that they were animal shelter officers.

i decided to adopt two dogs. i realized i wasn't thinking carefully about my ability to care for dogs, just that i liked the dogs and wanted to take them home. they had everything there i needed, crates, leashes and collars, everything. they packed the dogs up into a backpack for me so it would be easier for me to carry them.

i think it was somewhere in that dream that i spotted a remake of the old citroen 2cv. it was very similar to the new beetle, but the roof was shaped differently, and the windows were the color of the body of the car. i saw a red one and a yellow one. i waved at one from my beetle and he waved back, because our cars were so similar.

then moseman woke me up because he was hungry

i had another dream. i've lost most of it, but i recall being taken through a building with many rooms and staircases, all panelled in handsome, dark wood. it was a very natural place. then a young woman who was an office worker in a brightly lit office took us down one particular staircase outside her office to the jungle.

in the jungle, we followed a path to where the natives were. we could do something with these quills that had a bit of feather only at the end, and which had been dipped in something that i later decided was the scent mark of their tribe, but we had to pay some money. there was a feeling of threat in the air, but nothing bad happened.

i didn't have any money on me so i didn't take a quill. back out of the jungle and in the building, i talked to jacob. he thought it would really be better if i had a quill, as he did. he had some money so he lent it to me and i tried to go back for a quill.

i got lost in the many rooms and confusing staircases, but eventually ran across the young woman. i tried to convince her to take me back to the staircase that would lead to the jungle, but she was dubious that the quill offer would still stand. the natives were unpredictable and might hurt me if i went back.

Posted by lisa at 12:04 PM

December 29, 2003

fuck.

it would appear that i'm getting new neighbors.

they have at least one, and i suspect more than one, very vocal child.

my cat is afraid of children. specifically, their voices.

i'm not the biggest fan of listening to stranger's children, myself.

we were enjoying a beautiful, peaceful, quiet day with all the doors and windows open. then they arrived. this makes the third time i've seen the white minivan and heard voices at the house in the last week; now they're inside the house, so it's safe to assume that they're moving in.

at least the sound of the children's voices makes the cat run, which is good exercise for him.

i swear, i've got to find a way to buy that place.

Posted by lisa at 01:14 PM

chunky shoes

ooh, i had a dream last night that i had a pair of those really, really chunky platform shoes that were big in the 90's. i was realizing that i needed to get rid of them, but was feeling kind of an attachment to them.

i actually am hanging on to the spacegrrl boots-- you know, those silly silver chunky boots with the 3-inch soles-- i know they're way out of style now, and i probably won't be wearing them except maybe for halloween or the alien ball, but they're basically a museum piece now :) maybe i'll even display them in the hallway with all my VW stuff once that goes up.

of course, if i ever have a daughter, i can pass them on to her and they'll be the coolest, most retro thing she's ever seen. hell yeah!

Posted by lisa at 11:18 AM

i'm increasingly in love with clinton kelly

i didn't so much like him at first. what can i say? i don't like change. i was used to wayne.

well, as the episodes have worn on, he's started saying more and being a little less shy. and he's very charming.

but the thing that really caught my attention was when he complimented that girl's nick cave t-shirt. hey, good taste in music!

and then in this last episode, he's wearing a shirt with a pattern that i could swear is from an album cover. i tell ya, there's nothing like a subtle music reference to catch my attention. i can't figure out which album though! i thought the cars at first... but no. then maybe the who.. tommy does look a little like it, but not quite. i can't find a picture of the sweater online. argh.

but i hafta say, mmmm, clinton!

oh, and i love that fitted tweed jacket and vest that stacy is wearing on the second shopping day.

Posted by lisa at 11:11 AM

December 28, 2003

delight in the oddest things

i went out shopping this morning, which was kind of a treat because i've been feeling very fatigued the last couple of days and haven't been doing much. that's normal when starting atkins. it just means my body has a lot to adjust to, especially not having a lot of available carbs to burn.

anyway, i'd gotten a bee in my bonnet recently for an electronic label maker, inspired by my recent round of de-cluttering and organizing. so.. that's what i bought while i was out shopping today. and it made me feel very happy for some reason.

i'm so organized that i even have a can full of monsters. that was the first label i made. "Monsters".

Posted by lisa at 09:37 PM

December 27, 2003

caffiene.

it's funny, but caffiene is the thing i miss most acutely. in fact, i'm not going cold turkey on it; at that point in the afternoon when i'm tired, cranky, and headachey, i do have a cuppa tea with splenda and it just fixes everything. i feel happy and good again.

horrible, isn't it?

see, caffiene can affect blood sugar levels. i've had bad crashes just from caffiene and artificial sweeteners alone. it's not something i should really have.

but a little is ok.

Posted by lisa at 02:41 PM

December 26, 2003

i'm so ready to be back on atkins

last night i was exhausted when my normal betime rolled around. i tried to go to sleep, but couldn't because i was acutely aware of the beating of my heart.

this is a bizarre thing that i remember happening a lot before i first went on atkins. he actually mentions it in his book, on a checklist of things that atkins will help with.

another thing he mentions (i think) is shortness of breath, which i definitely had pre-atkins last year, and thought was just because i needed to get more aerobic exercise. well, both of these things disappeared not long after i went on atkins, and they've both come back in the last couple of months since i've been eating whatever i feel like.

i also made myself feel horribly ill on christmas eve night by having pound cake and milk before dinner. i thought i was going to barf right in the shanghai waiting area while waiting for my dinner.

so anyway, today is my first day back on atkins and i hope i read this entry again if i ever start seriously slipping again. i can tolerate small amounts of sugar if i'm eating well all the time, but habitual intake of sugar and white flour make me sick in a variety of different ways, and overall degrade my quality of life.

now i'm hungry :)

Posted by lisa at 01:04 PM

December 24, 2003

fashion oddities

sarah found another great hat

unfortunately, it only looks good from the back-- somehow this one doesn't look good from the front. we thought it looked very 2001.

when i was in a department store last week, i spotted racks and racks of sweaters with initials embroidered. like what laverne from laverne and shirley used to wear.

also spotted recently-- santa drives a bmw. how is this fashion related? well, santa also apparently wears a fur coat. eeewwwww.

Posted by lisa at 05:58 PM

radio hangout time

did a radio show last night. and who should be there when i arrived but mark, betsy, and baby oscar! he's the hippest toddler since penny brought her baby jake up to the station. and a very good baby too, hardly made a peep. and his hair is RED RED RED!

shortly after i went on, jonathan and susan came by and hung out with me during my show.

jonathan does a show at kbcs in seattle and susan was involved in college radio as well.

Posted by lisa at 05:24 PM

pretty flower mood

i think moodstats is going to be my new favorite web thing.

unfortunately, i think have to ante up the $15 to see my moods translated into a field of flowers, but it might just be worth it.

Posted by lisa at 04:25 PM

no, there aren't any gay/feminist/remotely liberal people HERE...

aaaauuuuuuuuuuuuuuggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

you know when something really has me upset, because i lose the ability to articulate.

parks service now creationist groups' bitch

and don't miss that last paragraph, wherein one discovers that the parks service now has a book in their bookstores explaining the creationist view of how the grand canyon is only a few thousand years old. and park rangers aren't allowed to say that creationism is bullshit anymore, either.

yay.

and when did "feminist" become a controversial and offensive thing to be??

i say again....

aaaauuuuuuuuuuuuuuggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

(via boingboing )

Posted by lisa at 09:38 AM

December 23, 2003

leaden time

you're at work
you can't really leave
there's nothing to do (well, there is but you don't have any reason to do it right now)
it's a skeleton crew
your eyes are burning from staring at a monitor
you've surfed everywhere you want to surf
you've got nothing to blog (but this)
you've exhausted conversation with your co-workers
you're thinking of the pound cake that you foolishly left at home.

Posted by lisa at 03:41 PM

December 22, 2003

my many holiday radio shows

tomorrow night, 8-10pm
friday, dec 26th, noon-2pm
sat., dec 27th, 5-6pm
tues., dec 30th 2-4pm and 8-10pm

Posted by lisa at 06:17 PM

tufted

jason's trying to get a group of ten for the tufte thing

edward tufte is coming to durham

jason's hoping that even if we get a group discount for people at disparate companies, we can still get the companies to pay.

Posted by lisa at 06:05 PM

untidy museum

late yesterday afternoon, sarah asked me to meet her at the untidy museum on broad street, and help her decide whether to buy a dress.

sylvia joined us as well.

i was quite pleased to discover that they're opening a coffee shop in the space adjacent. because the sidewalk in front of the store had just been painted, one of the staff led us through the future coffeeshop to get to the store. i took a moment to discuss coffeeshop design with him; he seemed interested in what i thought. i told him that it really needed good lighting. it's a vast space, with no ceiling, and flourescents. unfortunately, i came away with the impression that he plans to use the existing flourescents and just try to tone them down by shutting off a few and painting some of them.

i realized later that they really need some lighting at human-head-level or even below, to create the illusion that the ceiling is not so high and vast, and to give the space intimacy. and it really needs to be soft and incandescent.

but you never know, i'll be very interested to see what they come up with. he said it would be all vintage furniture, and i think the word "cozy" came out of his mouth, which is all to the good.

i was also very, very pleased to find that the untidy museum now sells fluevogs! in fact, they had this shoe which i'd spotted a couple of months ago, and immediately thought was perfect for sarah. she thought so too and tried it on in the store, but she doesn't normally wear heels so i don't know that we'll be seeing in her in them. they looked pretty damn amazing though.

we also both fingered these. the heels are shaped like hearts if you look at them upside-down. right-side-up, the heels actually look a bit like a cloven hoof, which is cool.

Posted by lisa at 04:09 PM

i eat with gusto, damn! you bet!

went to cici's pizza for lunch with dave and joe. i think it's fair to say that we all ate with gusto. damn!

joe's kind of a pizza snob because he's from NYC, but even he was really into it today.

anyone who likes to watch women eat with enthusiasm would have enjoyed it.

yes, this blog is now all about food. yum.

Posted by lisa at 02:01 PM

read it and weep!

weep, that is, if you're not having a gourmet meal cooked for you on christmas day.

mom says:

"We're having shrimp cocktail, butternut soup, roast beef with horseradish cream, potato gratin, spinich casserole, rolls, and a cranberry lime white choc tart. Yum Yum!"

it'll be my last big meal before atkins begins again. so i want to look forward to it :)

Posted by lisa at 11:22 AM

December 21, 2003

creepy tv

if you think about it, those OnStar ads are creepy.

i wonder how often the OnStar operator is actually talking to a dead or nearly dead person?

"Sir? We got a signal that your airbag deployed. Are you all right? Sir? Sir?" Sigh. "I think we got another dead one...."

Posted by lisa at 03:31 PM

awwww, yeah

it's less than a week now before i go back on atkins, so i'm trying to make a point of enjoying some things that i won't get to enjoy again for a while.

i got good and hungry, even waited a little while to get hungrier-- then got takeout from the q shack. not just chicken bbq, but hush puppies, onion rings (they made a fresh batch for me), and mac & cheese. and a diet pepsi.

i ate every scrap of food. it was so goddamned good.

i had been hoping to go to krispy kreme with christa & ray before the holidays, but it didn't happen. oh well. maybe next summer.

i think i would like to go to caffe driade and have an espresso milkshake. i forgot to do that last year at this time, and oh my god those things are to die for.

if anyone would like to accompany me there sometime between now and the 26th (well, effectively, it would have to happen by the end of the day on the 24th since they'll almost certainly be closed the 25th) lemme know. it's a lovely coffee shop in chapel hill.

Posted by lisa at 03:29 PM

radio lisa

as anticipated, there was no 12-3am dj after me last night, so i continued on until 2am. i almost completely ignored playlist, and as is always the case when i do that, i got calls from people saying that they liked what i was playing. i'm sorry to the xdu music directors-- but that just doesn't happen when i do a playlist-heavy show.

in fact, i originally decided to call it quits at 1:30am, and announced that over the air. a guy immediately called me and begged me to stay on. i'm easy; that's all it really takes. i stayed on til 2. he called again at 2 and tried to convince me to stay on longer, but i had already started shutting things down and i was pretty loopy-- too loopy to really do a good job, actually.

one of the reasons i largely ignored playlist was because i'd sifted through my entire vinyl collection and a good chunk of my cd's and had brought quite a bit of my own music with me. i even broke out this steve reich box set ("drumming") that i almost never play. it turned out to be an excellent way to start the show-- it mixes with virtually anything, even the "all robert earle keene, all the time" hour that preceded me-- and sheds a lot of light on the glenn branca track we've currently got on playlist. branca was so clearly listening to this stuff when he started out, probably that exact piece in fact.

bendte told me recently that she likes to listen to my show because i give some background on the music i play. i really had not noticed that i was doing that; i don't go into a lot of detail, but every once in a while i'll have an interesting tidbit to share. i hate it when dj's go on at great length about the personnel on a record or boring stuff like that, so i usually try to keep the info to tidbit length. but since she's said that, i've let myself go a little more and am probably more likely to share a little.

i did make a very interesting discovery while on air last night. i played a track from this joe meek comp that i play almost every week lately, and realized the lyrics were oddly familiar. turns out that one of my all-time favorite songs by the fall, "o, brother", is a cover of this song. the original is "little baby" by the rondos, and the lyrics make a hell of a lot more sense when you replace "oh, little brother" with "oh, little baby". crazy old mark e. smith.

steve reich popped up again later in the show; there's a dub cd by weevie on playlist right now, and i was startled to find that one of the tracks was called "bruise blood dub" and had a little notation next to it which said "come out to show them". well, that's from a very early reich track, in fact it's on "early works". sure enough, the weevie song samples from reich (who was himself sampling when he composed that). i'll have to bring "early works" with me next time i'm on air and play the two together.

Posted by lisa at 11:17 AM

December 20, 2003

on air tonight

i'll be on air tonight from 10-midnight. actually, it might run a little longer, because i'm not sure the 12-3am dj got a sub.

playlist will be here

Posted by lisa at 09:27 PM

these days

earlier this week i downloaded nico's "chelsea girl" from the iTunes music store. I finally got around to giving it a good listen today, and found that the opening riff on one of the songs sounded undescribably familiar, but i was sure it wasn't from hearing the nico song.

thank goodness for google; it helped me find the full story on that song.

unfortunately, i think it was the k-mart commercial that i was remembering.

Posted by lisa at 04:14 PM

December 19, 2003

if you want pound cake, read this

for the last few years, i've made pound cakes at christmas. it's my stepfather's mother's recipe and it's to die for.

so if you're reading this, you're my friend, and i want to give you some pound cake.

no, it's not even remotely low carb, low fat, or sugar free.

if you want some pound cake, sound off in the comments.

Posted by lisa at 09:24 PM

xmas

today, i did the bulk of my xmas shopping and wrapping. everything is finished; all of the presents i think i am obligated to give are squared away. every so often, i'm surprised by someone i didn't know was going to give me something. i have a lot of trouble remembering from year to year whether i got things from the people outside of my immdiate family in the previous year.

i like this single day devoted to christmas shopping concept. i've never tried this before. i will have to remember it for next year. doing it on a weekday is probably key.

i think being very focused helped me to not make any impulse purchases for myself. well, ok, i made one-- a blouse for sale on $17. pretty much my best year ever in that department. to some degree, i was able to channel impulses to buy little luxury items for myself into impulses to buy them for other people. i fingered a lot of bubble bath in bath & body works, but in the end only bought some smelly candles for my aunt martha (with a gift receipt in case that's not her thing). I also bought a lot of high quality chocolate for other people, since that stuff is waaaaayyy off limits for me.

actually, there is one more thing i plan to do, but i'll put that in its own post.

Posted by lisa at 09:22 PM

eh.

i think the holiday singleness panic is hitting; after months of no replies to my personal, i've gotten two "winks" in the last two days. "winks" are what used to be called "collect calls"... they don't cost anything for the sender, but to reply it will cost me money.

unfortunately, neither of my winkers (that just sounds dirty, in a british sort of way) are even remotely appealing to me. one had almost no information in his ad, and the other.. just didn't seem very fun or attractive (to me).

the next time i complain about a dearth of guys, you can remind me that i got two "winks" and wasn't interested.

Posted by lisa at 12:49 AM

December 18, 2003

av geeks tomorrow

AV Geeks Surprise Show , tomorrow night, center for doc. studies, durham, 8pm.

anyone going? want to go?

Posted by lisa at 10:03 PM

thumbelina, part 2. With x-rays!!

Got my hand x-rayed. After a rather amusing conversation with the doctor at the radiology clinic, I got to take the x-rays with me.

serious radiologist: "The doctor wants to have a look at your hand."
(we go into a little dark room full of people and x-rays)

doc: "hi, i'm doctor so-and-so"
me: "hi, can i see my x-rays? can i HAVE my x-rays??"
doc: "um, can you have them, um, well..."
me: "well, i did pay for them."
doc: "actually, you paid for our interpretation of them."
doc: "well, maybe if we signed them out to you to take to your doctor and they somehow never made it to your doctor... and we never had this conversation."
doc (to the serious radiologist): "could you prepare a signout form?"
serious radiologist: (glare. stalk away.)
doc: "actually, i have all of my x-rays at home, all of my wife's, my kids'."

he examined my hand to make sure i didn't have "gamekeeper's thumb", which is where a very important tendon along the top of the thumb is torn. i'm happy to say that, not only do i not have any fractures, i do not have gamekeeper's thumb, either.

(it is so called because when landed gentry went hunting with gamekeeper in tow, if a bird was fatally wounded but didn't die immediately, it was the gamekeeper's job to wring its neck. occasionally, the gamekeeper would screw up and tear his own ligament in the process of killing the bird. because they didn't have the delicate surgery needed to repair the ligament, the gamekeeper would be disabled for life.)

apparently the doc had gamekeeper's thumb himself, because he showed me a little scar on his thumb right where the ligament is located.

anyway, i have the x-rays in hand (HA!) and if possible, i'll post them. because i am sure you are all dying to see the inside of my hand.

afterwards i went to char-grill. yum.

oh, and i had this thought that i should change the appearance of the splint. it's so ugly. painting it springs to mind. i could also knit a splint cozy, which might make it more comfortable to wear, as well as more fashionable.

Posted by lisa at 02:08 PM

splinty goodness and other banalities

the splint hurts my hand. boo.

i'm going in a little while for the x-ray.

maxwell decided to keep the car overnight so mark, the guy who usually works on my car, could have a look at it. (mark was out sick on tuesday when i first brought it in.) mark performed the brake switch recall that i had forgotten i needed, and chances are that was the cause of the GPL. the dumbass service writer that i spoke with didn't know that, but i did and mark did, so that's pretty much what matters.

it occured to me as i was driving away that VW service writer might be a really great job for my friend BJ. she's a substitute rural postal carrier somewhere in the middle of nowhere in Maryland. She can't move until her daughter is 14 due to some bizarre custody agreement that was reached with her in-laws when her husband killed himself, so for the next 4 years she's gotta stick it out in this place with no economy or jobs.

so i've been trying to help BJ find a new career she can move into. why neither of us thought of the service writer idea before, i don't know. when we were first discussing the job thing, i asked her what she has a knack for, and she told me that she's really good at dealing with irate people. she's also a total VW geek-- way more than i am-- and clearly knows a hell of a lot more than mr. lameass dude at maxwell. when i suggested the idea to her, she was totally excited. the closest VW dealership is a bit of a drive, but we're talking about a woman who will drive to NC on a whim, or out to Wisconsin to pick up a set of new wheels for her car. Commutes don't faze her.

so anyway, spacepod is back with me (thank GOD! they had me driving something called a chevy "classic". what the hell is that?? it was hateful. i am so spoiled.) and the GPL is off, but the heat is making a very distressing noise. Well, the fan that blows the heat into the car. So i'm going back Friday morning to have mark remove the screwdriver that he left in my car or whatever it was.

i'm taking tomorrow off work to finish up my christmas shopping-- and, hopefully, the wrapping as well. tonight i must be extremely organized and have a total battle plan for friday so i can get it all done.

i saw LOTR last night with georg and his friend jeff. sarah was supposed to come, but she's been fending off the flu for almost a week now so she couldn't make it. it was good, but it wasn't fall out of your chair, spit on your neck good. my two major complaints are:

- the wigs looked really wiggy. i'm sorry, but that just bothers me. the movie is rife with amazingly hot guys and all of their looks are ruined by this wig thing on their foreheads.

- no humor. i'm spoiled by years of watching buffy; i want it all. drama, vast armies of orcs, people getting it on, and belly laughs. they still work the gimli/legolas friendly competition humor to good effect, and gimli gets off at least one good one-liner, but that's about it for humor in this thing.

the homerotic subtext is actually not really even subtext anymore; at the very end i actually thought for a few moments that frodo was going to give samwise a huge kiss on the mouth. he was kinda giving him that look.

it was fun. i didn't notice the 3 hours, i have to say. go see it, if you want to. don't if you don't.

Posted by lisa at 11:27 AM

December 16, 2003

dissed again?

well, i wrote to another personals guy; he logged in shortly after and it's been a few days and i haven't heard anything.

i guess it's possible that he didn't get notified that he has a message. so i have to wait for some other girl to write to him before he gets my message, if that's the case.

or, possibly, he's decided not to write back to me.

on the up side, i think i have come up with something interesting to do with the personals experiences that i've written down. i told jason about it, because he'll probably wind up being a co-conspirator if i actually do it, but who knows if i really will get around to doing it, so i'll keep it under my hat for the time being.

Posted by lisa at 11:33 PM

thumbelina

went to health care. she determined that it's probably a ligament in my thumb, and probably not a fracture-- but they want me to get my hand x-rayed tomorrow, just to be sure.

this was not the nurse practitioner who i usually see. i have to say that this one has a much better sense of humor and i kind of liked her better. something about the way i'd express myself when she pinpointed the painful motions tickled her and she started laughing so hard, she made me laugh too.

i didn't like her nurse though. the nurses and nurse practitioners come in pairs. the nurse i usually have is very sweet and chatty and she always wears the old-school flowered nurse's coat-thing, which somehow seems to say "i'm here to take care of you and this is where i want to be" more than street clothes. this nurse, who was not friendly at all, was wearing street clothes.

so anyway, she fixed me up with this crazy splint for my thumb and a prescription for-- surprise-- Anaprox, which is what I took for years and years for cramps, before it became available over the counter as Aleve. It's basically a powerful anti-inflammatory.

she also wants me to go see their physical therapist the first week in january. i tell ya, they do not do things in half-measures there at health care. at least the health care visit and the physical therapist will be free; the splint, x-ray, and prescription are not (though the Anaprox should be pretty cheap. I could just take the Aleve I already have, but baby i LOVE Anaprox, and I won't say no to having some around. That shit will knock some cramps OUT. And it'll knock you out too, if you take enough.)

Posted by lisa at 04:49 PM

on air tonight

playlist will be here

you can look forward to... rasputina... a song from the "fire walk with me" soundtrack... probably the black girls and hugo largo to round out the chicks with string instruments in rock bands theme... and to continue the chicks with string instruments theme (though in this case, it's not rock) a track from composer ellen fullman on her "long string instrument" -- i met her this summer.

and who knows what else :) maybe some senor coconut, some what peggy wants (for the violin)

Posted by lisa at 04:23 PM

mo cam - office

http://spacepod.org/mocam/office/

this cam is running off of the G4 cube in my office. it's set up to run automatically from 8am - 6pm every weekday. eventually, there will be a birdfeeder outside the window that it's pointed at.

today the weather is good, so the window is open.

when i get a replacement ac adapter for my tangerine ibook, i can use it to set up web cams in the bedroom, which is where he probably spends most of his time.

Posted by lisa at 09:55 AM

December 15, 2003

knittin' for the kitten

amazingly, moses is tolerating a collar that i knit for him.

Posted by lisa at 10:13 PM

frisky mo'

i've been having pretty good luck getting the cat moving in the evenings. this evening i changed out the tassel on his kitty fishing pole to a leather thong. (not that kind of thong! ew!)

he went totally nuts over it! eventually he got it in his mouth and carried it off to a dark place in the hall. guess the leather makes it seem mouse-like.

i weighed him again. no weight loss, but that's no great surprise. at least he's moving. and he seems to be ok with the very limited amount of food he's getting.

i got a web cam going in the office during the day, though there won't be anything to see unless i open that window. i need to get one set up in the bedroom-- i think that's where he's spending his time.

Posted by lisa at 08:01 PM

people will surprise ya...

my new manager offically rocks. when i told him my schedule for taking the car in tomorrow, he suggested that i work the afternoon at home to reduce my commute time. working from home is like this kind of holy grail amongst members of my team; we all have great setups to work from home, and there are times when we would really prefer to. but our old manager was always very uneasy about the idea. she never would have suggested it, in this situation.

he said he was going to suggest i work from home all day, but i have a healthcare appointment in the morning so i do need to come in then.

and then when i got home, i had a christmas card in the mail from van boy . now, is that good manners or what? how many of you send christmas cards to people you spent one night with?

unfortunately, i can't send a card to him; somehow i doubt that "guy living in van, eastern seaboard, usa" is going to reach him.

Posted by lisa at 07:56 PM

logistics

called maxwell this morning. got someone new on the phone-- i hate that. i like talking to the people who know me. (but i could hear holly laughing in the background, and she knows me, so that made me feel a bit better.)

i asked the guy if it was ok to drive the car with a flashing glow plug light. now for those who don't know, the glow plugs are specific to the diesel VW. they warm the fuel when it's cold, because diesel fuel tends to gel up. so a flashing glow plug light would logically indicate a problem with something TDI - specific, and there aren't that many TDI - specific systems in the car. The turbo and the glow plugs themselves are the two things that spring to mind. The car starts fine, so i assume the glow plugs are still functioning correctly. If the turbo weren't working, believe me, i'd know-- the engine is only 90 hp without it.

so the guy tells me to have the car TOWED. i mean, i read the manual, and the manual did not say to stop driving the car in this situation. so i express my disbelief to him, and he eventually concedes that if the car is starting ok, i probably don't need to have it towed.

anyway, i have an appointment for tomorrow afternoon.

then, i did what i should have done in the first place. i searched the TDI forums. guess what a flashing glow plug light means? oddly enough, it usually means that one of your brake lights is out. so much for logic.

dave is in class all week (which i think i knew and forgot, bad me), and it appears that charles has caught his wife's flu (poor guy-- he just got over a stomach virus last week, too). so my usual rides are unavailable and it would be difficult, this time around, to take spacepod elsewhere (i'd try the new Cary place if i could get a lift).

Posted by lisa at 10:43 AM

December 14, 2003

mittens & etc.

for those awaiting mitten news breathlessly at home, i knocked out the second mitten today. i'd start the hat, but my left hand is still f'd up and i should give it a rest.

since it's been a week and the hand doesn't feel better, really, i'm going to go to health care about it.

one slight complication; i can't get to healthcare without my car (it would take me about 45 minutes to walk from the end of campus where my building is located to the end where health care is located), and spacepod has had an intermittently blinking glow plug light all weekend. i'd rather not drive him, but the manual doesn't say not to drive it so i'll drive it to work tomorrow and hope for the best. hopefully i can get an appointment at maxwell reasonably early in the week.

What it looks like when knitting the thumb.

Posted by lisa at 11:39 PM

if filmmakers were web designers...

this cracked me the hell up.

the business of using every bit of space on a page is one that web designers encounter all the time. i think people often view web pages as newspapers, especially the pages i tend to do, and that's why the slightest open space on a page "looks wrong", or is an affront because i'm wasting their precious screen real estate.

it's understandable, but frustrating, because web pages aren't newspapers.

Posted by lisa at 11:30 PM

December 13, 2003

knitting

last year after the parade, i decided i wanted a matching set of scarf, mittens and hat that would coordinate with the all-silver decorations on the car. i realized that i'm as much a part of the display as the tinsel and the bows-- plus, i'm waving, so everyone sees my hands a lot.

well, i only finished the scarf in time for this year's parade, but today i finally finished one of the mittens. the mittens go quick except for the thumbs, which require knitting in the round with little tiny needles. i hate that part.

Here's the scarf and mitten. The mitten wants a friend!

yes, the mitten has tassels. they're good for waving, and playing with cats.

Posted by lisa at 11:45 PM

not so cleanly swept

i had one of those weird days where i started cleaning, not up, but OUT. i think it was partially fueled by a peppermint mocha.

i've now got batches of stuff to go to goodwill, batches to sell on the bulletin board at work (unless any of y'all want some pink plates? (not the fiestaware.) didn't think so.) the tiki party supplies are on their own shelf in the china pantry-- as is all the cocktail stuff, which was my ultimate goal. the beautiful hostess platter that sarah and georg gave me has finally gone into the china pantry as well.

if i had a large team of hapless pa's to help, i'm sure the entire kitchen would be completely cleaned out and organized. but hey, i don't. i didn't attack the food pantry, except to pull the ice cream maker out of it, because it's a several hour job in and of itself.

Posted by lisa at 10:30 PM

December 12, 2003

and i thought i was bad

sometimes, especially around the time of roswell, i pay my bills late. i always pay them within the month that they're supposed to be paid, but sometimes it goes as late as the 22nd or 23rd. i hate this habit, and i should probably set up online billpaying and automatic withdrawl to help alleviate it. i'm just really paranoid about that kind of thing.

ok, now i am watching an episode of "clean sweep" and something they found in the house just blew my mind. the organizer found some unpaid bills. by some i mean an entire box full. it was a box about 12" x 8" completely stuffed with unpaid bills and other mail that required attention. the organizer found unopened envelopes with new credit cards in them that had never been activated. i... can't even begin to imagine living that way. the stress of having that sit around must be unreal.

it's also kind of heartening to realize that, although i still have a clutter problem, i'm not bad enough to really qualify for this show (i think), and i'm SO much better than i used to be. most of my current clutter could be sold at a yard sale or given to goodwill, whereas in the past most of my clutter was garbage.

Posted by lisa at 06:53 PM

how to get your cat to move

at lunch today joe, dave and i had a brainstorming sesh. joe's full of interesting ideas on how to get a cat to move around.