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February 28, 2005

time for a new furnace. could you throw in an a/c unit with that?

it's cool. i knew this day was coming. i have the financing all set up, that's not a problem. it would have been nice to pick and choose my time, and not to have to live with cold while i work on this... but hey, at least i'm in a postition to do what my house needs.

the fan motor in my furnace is mostly dead. the slower speed normally used for heat is totally dead. that weird smell yesterday was my motor coils burning up. niiiiiice.

furnace fixit man switched the motor so the heat now uses the faster speed normally used for a/c. that will work for about 15-20 minutes before the motor starts to "sing" and ultimately locks up again. that's actually enough to keep the house from getting seriously cold, like it did during the ice storm. we also went through all the ducts and he adjusted the dampers for me so that i'll actually have heat in the bathroom for the first time since i moved in, and hopefully things will be a little warmer in my bedroom.

well, that is, when i get a new furnace.

the "comfort advisor" (hehehehe, oh that is just priceless. just call him a salesman, puh-leez.) came to visit later in the afternoon. we discussed what i want to do, he got a tour of the house and the basement, measured everything inside and out, and told me that he'd do a computer analysis to make sure of what i need.

now, for those of you who are house geeks and really want to know this, i'll give you the detail i have so far.

my furnace is inside with the coil for the a/c; the a/c compressor is outside. the heat is gas. for my house he thinks i will need another 100k btu furnace (that's what i have now). the current unit is about 16 years old and rusty from the moisture in the basement. they are recommending a SEER rating of 12, which will be the minimum standard as of next year. that's about the point where i'll get my money back for the added expense via savings in my monthly bills, if i stay in the house for about 5 years.

my current furnace is about 80% efficiency and they can go up to 90%. there are some concerns about exhuasting the new furnace. if i go up the chimney, as i am doing now, the chimney will have to have a liner, which it may not. if i go out the side of the house, i'm concerned a little about my neighbors kids being so close to a pipe that's shooting out carbon monoxide. it's probably safe but, you know, i don't want to brain damage anyone.

for the a/c unit he's not sure what i'll need. it appears to be even older than the furnace. they'll pour a new pad for the new unit... aside from that, i have no more detail.

the ductwork seems to be ok the way it is. it's not insulated, but everyone seems to agree that that's ok since it's in the basement. it keeps my pipes from freezing and warms the basement slightly, which is a good thing in the wintertime.

he had the name of someone he thinks is a good water intrusion expert, so i'm going to give that guy a call. my water intrusion issues are... BADDDD. the fixit guy and i could literally see the water pouring in at one point.

so anyway. lots of people to call tomorrow. i realized at around 6:30 this evening that spacepod has been with My Favorite Mechanic all day and i haven't heard from him! which probably means that he didn't get the message to call me at home.

dude, i am like exhausted. don't ask me why, all i did was hang out on the sofa all day.

Posted by lisa at 07:39 PM

big weekend

so friday i did watch ivanhoe with sarah and shayne, and ate yummy food... came home and plugged away at the Big Radio Station Project for a while, got really pissed off at it, wrote to d. for php advice, gave up and went to bed.

saturday morning, took christa to costco to shop for party food; we got there before they opened so we detoured to home despot. she helped me select some hardware for something i want to do with 9 westy, something i've been thinking about a lot lately. i think i am close to trying a proof of concept on this idea.. just need to think it through a little more.

spent saturday struggling with the Big Radio Station Project, and learned to hate the thing. have changed its name to include the word "asswich". didn't get very far with it.

saturday night of course was christa's partie. that was fun! i was one of the last people there. i gave someone, who shall remain unidentified so they are not embarassed, a ride home when i realized they were a little, uh, loopy; i was dead sober myself so i was happy to do it.

i remember around 2:30 sitting on the sofa next to il rossi and feeling very sleepy and saying, "wow, i'm sleepy", looking over at chris and seeing he had his head back and eyes closed, so i said, "and you are too!" and then he said, "i wondered why i was thinking in spacegrrl's voice..." so i offered to make him a series of recordings of things he might often think, like "gee, i have to pee but i want to solve this problem first", which was something i'd found myself thinking several times that day anyway.

so i guess i finally got home around 3:30, slept in til about 10:30 then dove back into the Big Radio Station Project, made a lot more headway with it, i am getting my arms around it a little bit now. i watched part of the MI-5 second season, which is just as good as the first, so far, so i am very pleased and want to mail back all three of my netflix discs today so i can have a big MI-5 marathon soon.

all day my heat was smelling really weird, like that smell when you first turn the heat on in the fall and it smells like a bunch of little bits of dust are being burnt up, except it was stronger and wouldn't go away. it got so bad that i finally turned the heat off and had to air out the living room with the door open and ceiling fan on.

pj came over around 7:30 and we headed out to the Interpol show. there were many minor annoyances and we got separated in the totally insane, jam-packed crowd, but it was a good show, better than asheville i thought. the way they played "turn on the bright lights" was especially slow and grand. i finally gave up on being up front and went to the back where there was more room and easy access to water. i was pretty happy back there. spotted goth boy in the crowd but otherwise very few people i knew.

it was pretty damn cold when i got home so i decided to try running the heat briefly just to warm things up before bed. the blower never came on, it just made this ominous buzzing noise, and the smell was even worse. i turned it off and had to air out the living room for almost an hour before i could close the door and go to bed.

this morning i got up and couldn't bear to face the shower in the frigid cold. i called the furnace-fixing people and then ran out to take spacepod in to see My Favorite Mechanic, and drove the great blue beast home, which was exciting in the rain on I-85. now i am working from home and waiting to hear from a furnace-fixing guy.

i'm pretty well prepared for him to tell me that the furnace is dead or not worth fixing this time. well, financially i'm prepared. of course i haven't researched my options or gotten any quotes yet. and the basement is pretty bad right now. a lot of water is coming in, because both of my gutter drains are clogged with tree roots and the gutters are not cleaned. last night during the opening band i was thinking about which items in the basement i could reasonably donate to goodwill, to kick start the process of clearing out the basement. there's also a large amount of scrap lumber that should go to the dump, but i think it's not the highest priority for clearing out right now. i've got spacepod's original alloy wheels which need to be put up for sale, and this mass of black foam rubber from the scrap exchange that i can't use because it outgasses too much. there's a cardboard box of crap from my old apartment that i never unpacked. the box is rotting away because it keeps getting wet. it probably all just needs to go in the garbage. there are also the doors to the house-- some of the original doors which need to be painted and installed, and then a bunch of cheap hollow wood doors that i've decided i didn't need and removed. they are all getting a little moldy down there. the cheap doors can probably go to goodwill or somewhere.

i feel like clearing some of the crap out of there is something i need to do before installation of the furnace begins, or the installers are going to find that stuff just getting in their way. i've been stalling on that project because it's just so icky, cold, wet and dirty down there.

in the meantime i've got half a case of firelogs left over from post-icestorm preparation panic; my real firewood is all wet and useless right now but the logs help a little. i've also got the little space heater that i bought for use in 9 westy; it helps a little. if the furnace guy tells me that i'm in for a long cold spell then i'll need to start looking into more powerful means of heating my space temporarily.

wednesday night i am going to see chris noth in a play at duke, then thursday is the debut of the Big Radio Station Project to some friendly beta testers; hopefully the furnace issue won't be so much of a distraction that i can't get it the rest of the way ready.

the diet really did not fare well last week or this weekend. too much social stuff and places to be and schedules to keep. things break down when i have too many things going on. i don't really have a good plan for this week so perhaps i should fall back on my spinach casserole; it does seem to be a magic solution at times. actually i had thought about making something equally rich with broccoli and cheddar cheese, and sarah suggested using turkey sausage as a more heart-friendly alternative to pork sausage.

haha, i remember telling someone about this casserole, maybe at christa's party, and their reaction was, "sounds... heavy". i guess it's not to everyone's liking :) personally, i'm a fan of heavy!

Posted by lisa at 10:10 AM

February 27, 2005

stuff i done you ain't done

1. crossed fjords in denmark on a train inside a ferry.
2. driven solo around the country, 8,000 miles in 3 weeks, running a live web cam during the NC -> NM leg of the trip.
3. stood on the edge of a cliff on the Isle of Skye in Scotland on a perfectly clear day.
4. attended three of my parents' weddings, and been maid of honor in one of them.
5. spent time with, knew, and still remember three of my great-grandparents.
6. lived in a 100 year old tobacco barn.
7. hung out with adam sandler at wxdu.
8. have a 100 year old reed organ in my living room.
9. attempted to make a film about roadkill (all the film came back black)
10. watched movies at drive-ins in Idaho, Oklahoma, New Mexico and North Carolina-- all in the same car.

Posted by lisa at 05:49 PM

February 26, 2005

AUUUUGGGGHHHHHHHHHH

i think i just spent four hours trying to get a single feature in the Big Radio Station Project working. and i haven't succeeded. and it's not even original code that i'm writing; i'm just trying to get someone else's code to work in our environment.

this is totally exasperating.

why the hell would you have two functions with the same name, one in old-style code, one in OOP? is it just to make me completely crazy, or is it because this thing is a piece of shit?

bite me.

Posted by lisa at 06:36 PM

the continuing coolness of airtunes

so this weekend i'm spending a lot of quality time with my laptop, working on my Big Radio Station Project.

at some point i may tire of my house and move operations to Our Favorite Coffee Shop. but at the moment, i'm liking the living room scene.

one of the reasons the living room scene is so hotttt right now is because i basically have a remote control for my stereo. and that remote control is sitting right in my lap.

i can play any playlist or song in iTunes. i can adjust volume and equalizer settings without moving my ass. i can play any pre-recorded radio show i've got on the Cube. i can change my mind or skip songs or whatever, all without interrupting my work flow.

it's pretty cool.

:|:

the other great thing about the Living Room Scene is that it's very nearby to the Kitchen Scene. And the Kitchen Scene just produced an extremely tasty strawberry smoothie. Yummmmmmm.

ingredients:
* huge, whole frozen strawberries (from costco-- wow)
* plain, full-fat yogurt
* whole milk
* half a scoop of vanilla soy shake mix
* a capful of sugar-free vanilla syrup

mmmmmmmmm.

Posted by lisa at 01:38 PM

February 25, 2005

HOTTTTT

Posted by lisa at 11:15 PM

grilled cheese of the day: i don't have a name for this one.

thick sourdough bread from a good bakery, aged extra-sharp cheddar, minced green onion. eat with tomato soup that has had garlic, onion, parsley and basil added to it.

Posted by lisa at 12:47 PM

foster pups

i don't normally do this, but it sounds like a particularly bad case. my mom just mailed me about four puppies that need foster homes. they are being kept outside. they have a non-contagious form of mange that requires they be washed daily and cared for. they have very little hair because of the mange, so the fact that they are being kept outside is especially a problem. a friend of my mom's has taken them to the vet but has no place for them.

i have the contact info and a little more detail... contact me if you can help.

Posted by lisa at 10:11 AM

February 24, 2005

it's radio, only much more complicated.

the airport express arrived this week, and this evening i have finally had a chance to work through configuring it. configuration wasn't difficult but it was less intuitive than apple products normally are. an ipod this is not. it can do many things, all of them network-ey and therefore not necessarily apparent to normal humans.

i've got it set up now to do bridging from my existing airport network (this means my airport signal is crazy strong in the living room, and that i don't have to have the express plugged into an ethernet cable). it's also set up to do airtunes, the feature i bought it for.

now hopefully the cube can use the fast wired network connection while also sending music over the airport network, but i've yet to determine that. the cube is busy recording right now and i don't want to disturb it.

just to make things interesting, i am currently sending music that actually resides on the cube to the airport express via my powerbook. itunes has a feature called rendezvous that will automatically share itunes libraries between computers on the same network, so the powerbook can access the cube's itunes library that way, and play any of that music.

since the music i am playing is actually sarah's radio show from last week, it's really rather eerie. i'm listening to xdu on my stereo as always... except that it's a week old show and it's making two hops over a wireless network to get to the stereo, instead of being beamed directly into my receiver via the magick of radio.

i've had a cabling problem with my stereo and tv for a while now, and the airport express isn't helping. i'm gonna have to disassemble my whole setup one of these days and get the cabling straightened out. i guess i've been putting this off because it'll involve drilling more holes in the cabinet. and i might need to face the idea of drilling holes in my floor, to really do it right. that, and i'm slack.

Posted by lisa at 10:05 PM

grilled cheese of the day: the diner classic

wonder bread, american cheese. eat with french fries and lots of ketchup, and the cola or root beer beverage of your choice.

Posted by lisa at 12:45 PM

clove is just love with a c.

i'm just sayin'.
and that's especially true when the clove in question is a garlic clove, and it has a hundred brothers and sisters, and they are all soft and roasted, and they are in your calzone.

Posted by lisa at 12:07 AM

February 23, 2005

links of interest, from d.

triangle bloggers
blog together

Posted by lisa at 11:30 PM

grilled cheese of the day: the patty-less melt

rye bread, swiss cheese. eat with garlicky green beans.

Posted by lisa at 12:39 PM

February 22, 2005

schedule

yesterday, i added a new component to my lengthy morning ritual: exercise. i set the alarm 30 minutes earlier and took a walk.

it went fine, i didn't scrape my knee, destroy my glasses or break my arm. i didn't get mugged. i was not chased by rabid dogs. i did see vomit on the ground but it wasn't too gross. i did see young children waiting by the side of the road get into red minivan rather than a school bus, but it was probably ok.

today at lunch i commented to d. that it's completely absurd that i need three hours in the morning. it is, it really is. the schedule breaks down something like this:

  1. thirty minutes of lingering in bed after the alarm goes off
  2. thirty minutes to walk
  3. thirty minutes to cook and consume breakfast
  4. thirty minutes to surf the web
  5. thirty minutes to shower, dry hair, and dress
  6. thirty minutes to drive to work

yep, that's three hours. and that's about how it breaks down.

d. suggested i bring the camper to work to eliminate #6, but that doesn't seem like the logical 30 minutes to eliminate. the cost/benefit analysis doesn't really pan out on that one.

i'm thinking #1 and #4 could be eliminated or at least combined. but in reality, i'll probably just skip #2 a lot in favor of extending #1.

Posted by lisa at 12:29 PM

February 21, 2005

meal planning

last week i decided to start planning dinner a week in advance. here is what i discovered:

last week, i made something that i thought was going to be a side-dish, but which wound up being a main course. it's a variation on something they make at the company cafe, called "snappy spinach". it's basically a spinach casserole made with pepper jack cheese. my variation is to add a package of cooked, crumbled country sausage.

it was insanely delicious and satisfying. however, i could just feel my arteries clogging as i ate it, so the next time i make it, i'll definitely opt for a much leaner meat, and add seasonings to it to make it more flavorful.

tonight, i'm making chicken parmesan. i made my own italian breadcrumbs by putting two slices of low-carb bread in the food processor with some dried parsley, basil, and some garlic powder. i dried them on a baking sheet in the oven while the oven pre-heated. it really wasn't that difficult to make. it should carry me through all the dinners i'll have at home this week.

:|:

i've been thinking a lot about how to make this diet liveable over a long term. not just a few months, but as long as it takes to get down to my goal weight. the weekly meal planning is obviously going to help, both because it makes dinner more manageable after work, and because it's forcing me to expand my repertoire of recpies.

i'm trying to modify my attitude toward "cheating". i think it helps a lot to realize that straying from the diet just means it will take a little longer to reach my goal-- not that i have completely lost control and might as well give up. sticking with my rule of returning to a strict interpretation of the diet immediately after straying (i've decided that the word cheating implies a good/bad dichotomy that is not helpful) has helped a lot... it's not that difficult of a rule to follow, and it makes me feel like i'm staying in charge of things.

Posted by lisa at 07:42 PM

February 20, 2005

fashion design and costuming

many, many thanks to pinky for blogging about the leigh bowery documentary. i watched it last night.

she does a good job of describing the film and the man, but just to very quickly summarize: he was a performance artist/costume designer who took fashion design to the level of art, and he made his body a living sculpture through his designs.

in the 80's, during the time when he was active in the club scene in london, during the time when the New Romantics were taking clubbing fashion waaaaayyy over the top, i was a dorky teenager catching tantalizing snippets of all this on tv.

we all remember the 80's fashion as displayed in molly ringwald films-- preppy, a little 50's retro but in a really tacky way, lots of pastel colors and big, hairsprayed hair. there was an element of costume to some of this stuff, but only in a very conservative way.

watching this film reminded me of the other 80's fashion... the stuff that is pure costume and artifice. the world where adam ant was almost conservative.

back in those days, i had free access to a lot of fashion magazines, because my stepfather was a cover girl salesman, and the company sent him subscriptions for free so he could keep up with the advertising. we got mademoiselle and glamour pretty regularly. cosmo would appear from time to time; mom didn't really want me reading cosmo because of it's strangely skewed, trashy view of sexuality, but i got my hands on them anyway and just took a lot of that stuff with a grain of salt.

the fashion, though, was of great interest to me. i clipped a lot of photos of looks that i liked and plastered them all over my bedroom. my favorites tended to be loose clothes with a vintage 20's or 30's feel that created a long line with no curves. i was skinny enough back then that i probably could have pulled something like that off had i been able to find the right things at the thrift stores.

i raided gran's 50's clothes from the attic. the clothes were great, but the colors were all wrong for me, and i knew it but wore the clothes anyway. i still have the most awesome of those dresses up in my attic, but i don't know if i'll ever fit back into it.

every night i'd spend a lot of time trying on different outfits. i was always interested in what sort of shape i could create on my body, as well as what sort of mood i could create. the most outrageous outfits were never seen outside of my house; even my family didn't see those, although i had to sneak out into the hall to look at the full-length mirror. we're definitely not talking leigh bowery outrageous, but stuff that would have provoked too much of a reaction in the halls at school.

my senior year of high school, i started to go a little more over the top in what i'd actually wear out of the house. clothing became one of my primary means of self-expression, and of course also of identifying myself culturally. i'd get laughed at in the halls pretty regularly. once i happened to wear one of my more silly outfits on a day when i received an award at a school assembly, and the entire assembly started laughing at me when i walked out on to the floor. unlike leigh bowery, i didn't really enjoy this kind of reaction.

it amazes me, though, that with all of that experimentation, i never really discovered what looks good on me, and i had a completely skewed idea of how i actually looked in clothes. i would think that those excercises in fashion would have raised my self-awareness, but instead they seemed to obliterate it. interestingly, bowery seems to have had this problem as well. in the film they talk about how he would dress during the day, on the street, and how he would wear these terrible wigs and think they looked perfectly natural.

i do still experiment from time to time, though my experiments rarely see the light of day now. i'm too old to be laughed at. i've worn my share of outrageous things in the workplace. but i wonder if i shouldn't explore this side of myself in some other way... pretend i am a couture designer and create my spring 2006 collection out of things from thrift stores and the scrap exchange. and make you all be my models and traipse up and down someone's living room in my creations while our friends get drunk on cosmopolitans.

heh.

Posted by lisa at 10:46 AM

if i had a motel...

it would be just like this place

Posted by lisa at 10:32 AM

if i had a cooking show...

it would be all about grilled cheese sandwiches. every week, i'd show a different kind of grilled cheese to make, and the best sorts of things to have with that kind of grilled cheese.

Posted by lisa at 10:29 AM

February 18, 2005

baffling office wear

ok, now for the majority of my career at my current workplace i committed fashion crime after fashion crime. over the years i was like a parade of all the hapless fashion victims that have found their way to WNTW-- all in one person. i will admit it. it was bad.

but i have reformed (or have tried to), and i'm going to take the liberty today of sharing with you something very odd that occured in the fashion life of my office today.

a woman (whom i do not know), very very petite. perfectly groomed, cute short blonde hair and nice makeup. and then...

a t-shirt that was easily a 3X Long. It reached past her knees, and was wide enough that i could have fit in there with her. white, with a design on the front that i didn't catch.

black leggings. skin tight. i think there may have been white socks and an athletic shoe. possibly a tight black shirt under the voluminous t-shirt.

now, people at my workplace do work out-- we have a gym. this could have been workout wear, but workout wear typically does not make its way past the gym locker room.

(with the exception of one man who wears a gray, oversized sweatshirt and baggy, faded-wash jeans to work every day.)

myabe there was a reason. maybe she had a fashion disaster after arriving at work and only had time to change into whatever was in her gym bag, not go home and change. who knows. see? i said it was baffling.

i also think this is a woman who normally dresses very well. given that she apparently works on my hall, i am sure i have run into her in the bathroom. for sure i'll be noticing from here on out what she's wearing.

??????????????????

Posted by lisa at 09:04 PM

mo-cam in full effect!

he's sleeping on the bed right now.

Posted by lisa at 11:13 AM

February 17, 2005

Little, Big

"In the winter, summer is a myth -- a rumor, a legend, not to be believed." — "Grandfather Trout" (John Crowley, Little, Big)

this quote pops into my head every so often; it's part of the lisa language. i couldn't remember where it came from, so i googled it when it popped into my head this afternoon. that made me think about the book it came from, which is an all-time favorite of mine.

i was startled to discover that the reviews of the book on amazon are over-the-top glowing, all stars filled in, and not bogus reviews but well written. funny since i've never known anyone else who has ever read it! because it's a fantasy novel, i rarely recommend it; i assume that most of my friends are not fantasy-tolerant.

i am myself not really all that fantasy-tolerant. much less than i used to be. the reason i love this book, though, is because the ideas are beautiful. the idea of a zodiac embedded in the tiles of a new york city subway station, which also has a whispering chamber. the idea of a groom having to travel on foot and depend on the kindness of strangers as he goes to meet his bride (not because he has no money, but because her family requires that he pass that gauntlet).

happily, a 25th anniversary edition is planned. i wonder if they will produce a tarot deck that mimics the deck used in the book? that would be cool. i wonder what sort of fanatic will purchase the $900 "lettered" edition? i think the $95 "trade" edition is more than pricey enough for me...

Posted by lisa at 05:21 PM

i care about every pixel!

i do. i really do. i just don't have the time or the mental fortitude to give every pixel the care it deserves.

but i'm in love with the UI i'm designing right now.

:|:

went to see "ocean's twelve" tonight. decided i could not hack a serious and heartwrenching oscar nominated film with the girls so i struck out on my own.

daaaaaaamn! i didn't expect it to be so good! it was almost worth the insane amount of money i paid to see it.

i really, really love a pure heist film. not one that ends up with dead people, one that focuses on the strategy, the twists.

i think if i were going to make a movie, i'd try to make a heist film. once, sarah, shayne and i watched an allyson hannigan movie that we thought was going to be a heist film, but turned out to be short on heist and long on heroin use and violence. when it was over, someone said, "hell WE could do a better heist!"

it would be perfect really. shayne is a great planner. sarah is a great marksman. and me, well, i'm the wheel (wo)man, of course :)

i don't actually want to commit a crime; not that i have any great sympathy for rich people and insurance companies, i just don't want to wind up in jail.

oh well. it's fun to think about.

Posted by lisa at 12:23 AM

February 16, 2005

the mo-cam

the mo-cam is online today!

Posted by lisa at 09:10 AM

radio worth noting

clink radio with steve g., wednesday mornings from 7-9am.

Posted by lisa at 08:55 AM

that darn cat

the last time i visited my grandmother in new york, she had a cat that she called D.C., which was short for Darn Cat. or at least, that's what she told me. maybe it was really short for Damn Cat.

so anyway, the thing is, i had forgotten how what terrible manners my cat has. now that he's all frisky again, he's had no trouble remembering how best to make me crazy while i am trying to eat. he paces along the back of the sofa (on which i am sitting). he tries to climb over me and he puts his face as close to me as he can. he knocks over things on the side tables. this morning i finally put him out on the porch while i ate-- he was happy to go, though.

at one point, he knew the word NO. i haven't needed to use it in a long time but i think i'm going to have to start again. we'll see just how good that little pea-brained memory is.

Posted by lisa at 08:37 AM

February 15, 2005

passing a frozen torch

over a decade ago, i took a super-8 filmmaking class at NCSU. i worked very hard in my class and completed one film successfully. i started a second film, the final class project. all of the film i shot came back black. i never made that film.

since then i have had a lot of super-8 film in my freezer, i guess left over from the class. i have moved it with me from place to place over the years.

anyway, i decided it was time to give it up, so tonight i gave it to a filmmaker friend of mine in the hopes that he'll find an interesting use for it. i assume that since it has been frozen and thawed multiple times, it could produce some odd results.

a long time ago i wanted to be a filmmaker, so it was hard to give that film away. i think the only thing that made it ok was giving it to someone who will make good use of it and who has done many nice things for me in the past.

Posted by lisa at 07:20 PM

memesville

1. Total amount of music files on your computer? 3616 songs/10.2 days/16.03gb

2. The last CD you bought was... on iTunes, The Specials/The Specials. In a physical music store, I bought a batch of four: Trojan Lovers Box Set, 600% Dynamite, Chicks Rock comp and Durham Rocks comp.

3. What was the last song you listened to before reading this message? "I wanna be adored" by the Stone Roses.

4. Write down five songs you often listen to or that mean a lot to you.

1) Roadrunner/Modern Lovers
2) Harvest Festival/XTC
3) Cinnabar/Pram
4) Interpol. It's hard to pick just one.
5) Hot Potato/Freestyle Fellowship

5. What 3 people are you going to pass this baton to and why?
christa, jason! and d.
d. claims to have a blog, let's see him put his money where his mouth is. besides, he's a huge music geek.

Posted by lisa at 07:15 PM

i guess i know where i get the killer immune system

So yesterday my grandmother went into the hospital with pneumonia. Reports were that she was very sick, dangerously low blood pressure, high heart rate, looked terrible... everyone was figuring that this was it.

And this morning, she's pretty much fine. Looks good, ate breakfast, chatting with the nurses. Go grandma.

This is the grandma up in Maryland (my mom's mom) for whom I made the little comic book about Moses at Christmas. As you may recall, she's not exactly all there in the memory department anymore. My aunt m. reported to mom this morning that she told the nurses in the hospital that she has 14 children (she has four). I told mom that I think I need to meet the ten aunts and uncles I didn't know I had!

Posted by lisa at 10:56 AM

February 14, 2005

what is indecent, anyway?

these days, college radio dj's and administrators are often left scratching their heads over just where to draw the line between material that is indecent and material that isn't.

actually, the real issue is determining which material might be likely to inspire a listener to complain to the FCC. once a complaint reaches the FCC, the station is probably pretty much screwed regardless of whether the FCC decides the complaint is valid or not.

at the college radio station where i work, we're supposed to give a warning before each indecent song we play (and we can only play them during safe harbor hours-- late at night).

once, sarah did an all-indecent show, and she diligently gave a warning before each and every song. it was pretty amusing.

i was thinking it would be both amusing and a sort of commentary on the current situation if we were to give an indecency warning before every song we play, for a period of say about a week. or even a day.

the warnings usually go like this: "The following song may be considered indecent by some listeners." but for this little project, perhaps it should be more like, "The following song may be considered indecent by some listeners. It may not be considered indecent by other listeners-- or by anyone at all. We're not sure anymore."

Posted by lisa at 03:27 PM

February 13, 2005

that was easy!

i went to fiddle with iRecordMusic this evening to see how close i could get to my plan of having recorded radio shows playing when i get home from work. well, a new version was available, for free, and it has built in integration with iTunes now! iRecordMusic will automatically update a playlist in iTunes for you when it records a stream.

i have a little proof-of-concept set up for tomorrow that will just play over the speakers of the Cube. My airport express is on order, so when it arrives i should be good to go!

I'm trying to get VNC working so i can remote-control the cube from my laptop in the living room. that way i can set up recordings and remove old ones i don't want without having to leave my sofa. so far i can get connected, but there's something wrong with the display and i can't see anything intelligible.

Posted by lisa at 10:56 PM

ah, nature

yes, i remember nature. that place where they don't have television.

i actually did some yard work today. it's gratifying to see how easily the front yard bounces back now, after having put some real work into it late last summer. sure, there's plenty more i could have done with it today, but standing in the front doorway, it looks all presentable now.

i also took on the adorable task of scrubbing my big green curbside trashcan. it had begun to develop a very powerful odor. lovely.

somewhere in all this-- i think during the trashcan adventures-- i stressed my elbow a little. although i really do have the full use of my arm for the most part, it's not completely healed and i'm still supposed to baby it for another month. i'm sure i didn't do any lasting damage and by morning it will be fine. i'm so used to being able to use it however i want, i didn't really think twice about doing yard work today. but i guess i still need to watch it.

now i'm watching 'the way we were', which i've never seen before. after that scene in 'sex and the city' where the girls use it as a metaphor to explain carrie and big's relationship, i've kind of wanted to see it.

we all know robert redford did and still does have it going on. but what i always forget is how hot babs was back in the day. i totally get it. i kind of want to see 'Yentl' again so i can see her dress like a boy.

the first part, when they're at university, reminds me of a little train of thought i've had going on recently. i was trying to pinpoint what it is about the look and feel of 'rushmore' and 'the royal tennanbaums' that i find so appealing. sometimes i think of it as "old new york", but of course, 'rushmore' doesn't take place in new york so that's not really right. today i realized what it is; it's that they remind me of 'the catcher in the rye'. i read that book over and over again when i was in high school, but never since. i am sure i would find holden caulfield unbearably annoying now, rather than sexy and mysterious, but i should try to find my old copy of it and read it again.

Posted by lisa at 08:23 PM

February 12, 2005

home automation

so this week i've been on a sort of home automation kick. i bought a couple of light timers. i bought some doodads for my outdoor lights that will turn those lights on when it gets dark out. those aren't so good-- the lights are dim. not sure why. nevertheless it's nice to come home to a lit house without having to go through an elaborate morning routine of light turning on (and having lights needlessly burning all day-- my grandpa would be so proud).

now the next thing i'm working on is having some music playing when i get home from work. here is my (yet to be fully thought-through) cockamamie scheme (note that the goal is to avoid all manual intervention and automate this whole process):

1) record radio shows i think i will like using iRecordMusic on the Cube in my office.
2) get them into iTunes (this may require some Applescripting, but I hope I can just save the files to a directory that iTunes will automatically pick up... yet to be investigated.)
3) get an airport express (they are $99 refurbished right now) to send the music from iTunes on the Cube out to the stereo in the living room. (possibly put the stereo on a timer, too, but i'm not so sure about doing that).
4) schedule iTunes to start playing a particular playlist (probably a Smart Playlist that will automatically pick up the latest recorded radio shows) right before i get home. This is easily done with a 3-line Applescript that is fired off by iCal.

if i actually get all of this working, y'all better do some killer radio shows so it's worth it! :)

a programmable thermostat will have to wait til i get a new furnace & a/c; christa says not all programmable thermostats are compatible with all furnaces, and since they're pricey-- around $300-- i don't want to get one now and then have to discard it in a few months.

Posted by lisa at 07:32 PM

February 11, 2005

the refined morning routine

it's amazing how much i do love mornings now.

feed the cat.
get the bacon started.
get the electric kettle started, for tea. prepare tea mug with earl gray and splenda.
wash dishes from the day before.
mix yogurt with protien shake mix
prepare a tray with the completed breakfast
turn on wxdu on the stereo
eat breakfast while watching the cat decide between watching the bacon and looking out the window
save a tiny bit of bacon for the cat and give it to him at the end
read email and blogs
shower
dress
go to work, completely awake.

Posted by lisa at 09:07 AM

February 10, 2005

pick yourself up, brush yourself off, and start all over again.

pinky asked about successful context switching... falling off a diet then getting back on it. so i'll write this.

this week i broke my diet twice, both times in response to a compendium of circumstances that seemed overwhelming. in both cases, one of the circumstances was being really fucking starving ravenously hungry, so i think that probably means i need to snack more.

in both cases i made a big point of being sure that my next meal was on the diet plan. it's hard. once you've cheated it's very easy to feel like it's too difficult to continue. or that a little cheating doesn't matter. but if you only slip for one meal and no more, you remain charge of what you're eating... not your emotions or whatever it is that drives you to eat badly.

i've been wondering a lot lately how much locus of control has to do with this stuff. apparently a sign of strong external locus of control is learned helplessness-- "playing the victim" in pop psychology terms. i think the core of my struggle with eating is being in charge of what i eat vs. allowing myself to be guided by mysterious, unknowable factors ("i don't know why, i just really want some french fries right now.") i mean yes, you have to listen to your body, but if you think your body is telling you that you need to eat french fries for your health, you're almost certainly quite mistaken. if you're having a strong, physical french fry craving (not an emotional one), chances are that you need to read up on carbohydrate addiction, stat.

anyway, i think i might try coming up with a week-long menu plan for next week. i think more planning will help me both stay on and enjoy the diet more, and i won't have that "crap-- there's nothing for dinner" problem. i'll let you know how it goes.

Posted by lisa at 08:00 PM

if i pretend i'm not sick, maybe i won't be.

now honestly, things are not as bad here at ANP health-wise as they are at say, mondo mundo or at the von pinkersons. but i am, you know, kind of not completely well. i'll admit it.

here though is why i'd like to ignore it:

see, i made these cute little icons, and i want to get to the place where i can actually use them, and soon! form.gif form_manage.gif

Posted by lisa at 10:50 AM

February 09, 2005

sad day

today is a sad day.

i will be thinking about sarah, georg, thirteen, and lina.

Posted by lisa at 07:39 AM

February 08, 2005

the tortures of the damned!!!

ok, that's a little dramatic. i have to say that the temptation level yesterday was very high. code orange. no, wait, i don't want to use the terrorist scale. i need different scale. let's call it code puce. as in, i want a grilled cheese and fries so badly for lunch that i could almost puce.

but i didn't. and on the up side, my jeans did feel a bit looser yesterday. after a week, i've lost three or four pounds. it'll slow down from here on out, the beginning is always more dramatic.

:|:

last night i sat there in front of the entire board of wxdu and told them a specific date by which my Big Radio Station Web Project would be complete. which means that i should be all embarassed if i don't get it done by then. here's hoping the promise of embarassment keeps me on task. Jason! wanted to take me out to Federal as a sort of motivational/reward thing, but i had to turn him down. i knew if i walked in there last night, i'd walk out with a belly full of fries and beer. besides, i had chicken in the slow cooker.

Posted by lisa at 08:13 AM

February 06, 2005

boo.

the cold is definitely getting to me today, so i called a local heating/cooling company that does sunday calls (for a fee, of course). a very nice sounding man will be coming over shortly to see what he can do, but if it requires a part he doesn't have... well, maybe i'll run out to wal-mart for a more powerful space heater. the little one i bought for my camper does virtually nothing.

it also appears as if the a/c adapter for my laptop has quit working. grumble.

i woke up dreaming about mac and cheese, onion rings and hush puppies from q shack. those kinds of thoughts are bothering me way more than they ever have in the past.

i think after mr. furnace man comes, i should get out of the house and do something to distract myself.

:|:

update-- for those who are just dying to know-- mr, furnace man was able to get it going again and only charged me the emergency call fee. he says that my furnace is about 15 years old and at the end of its life span. i know that my a/c unit is in about the same state. yippee.

oh, and my a/c adapter wasn't broken, it was just plugged into a bad outlet (apparently).

Posted by lisa at 01:27 PM

movie worth mentioning: Simply Irresistable

On the surface of it, this is just a fluffly romantic comedy. And, actually, that's pretty much all it is, through and through. I originally watched it because it stars Sarah Michelle Gellar.

However, I find it has certain merits that not all fluffy romantic comedies have:

1) The clothes. Re-watching it today, I noticed for the first time that SMG's wardrobe is done by Todd Oldham, which helps explain the many beautiful yet eccentric outfits she wears. There is one early in the film that literally made me gasp, even though i have seen it many times before.

2) The food. I really do have a thing for movies with good food in them (see previous entry about 'Dead Like Me'.) I first remember experiencing this while watching Babette's Feast. After watching that movie I cooked up a storm. The food in this film is both beautiful, and looks as if it would be delicious. The restaurant featured is adorable and I love imagining myself cooking in it. Sometimes, I make up restaurant menus in my head... I know restaurants are more work than I'd want to do, and I'm not really a good enough cook, but it's fun to imagine what the menus would be if I had my own restaurant. You can believe that there would always be an excellent vegetarian option!

Perhaps my restaurant would be something like, "food for your inner child", since the foods I like the best are the kinds of foods kids like-- grilled cheese, french fries, that sort of thing.

Posted by lisa at 09:13 AM

February 05, 2005

dutch beetles go to ikea, too

i have bookmarked a single tag in flickr: "beetle". today i turned up this photo. from careful inspection of the license plate visible in another photo in this set, i can tell that this beetle lives in the netherlands. and from the table strapped to its roof, and the large swedish-blue concrete bunker behind it... i'm guessing it's making a trip to ikea.

see? life in europe is just the same as here. except probably with less bacon.

:|:

today i made some progress on my Big Radio Station Project; it's going slower than i'd like, however. at the moment i'm trying to untangle someone else's code to understand why their software isn't working in our environment. tiresome.

sarah came over this evening for dinner and 60's british spy thrillers. "on her majesty's secret service", and then "the ipcress file". two of my favorites. oddly, they both involve mind control, which seems quite dated today. it must have been a fascination in the 60's. i theorized that they used telly savalas as blofeld in the bond film, rather than donald pleasance, because they needed a blofeld with a suave and compelling voice to pull off the mind control stuff.

of course, both films feature tons of great 60's fashion. "the ipcress file" is populated entirely with extremely surly british people who do not seem to be very happy, which makes it very funny at times. the theme music for "on her majesty's secret service" is some of my favorite work by john barry. it's unique in that the main theme does not have a vocal. that makes it hold up a lot better than, say, something with sheena easton (or duran duran, as sarah pointed out). actually, there's a lot i could say to recommend each of these films, but i will restrain myself. if you are looking for a british spy thriller from the 60's, start with one of these.

during the course of the evening i discovered that my furnace would not light. the gas company says they have not cut me off, and a quick google search reveals that i probably don't have a pilot light, so my initial theory that it had gone out is probably bogus. i can hear it trying to light, but the fire never does start. i'll have to call someone about it. good thing it's not too cold and at least i still have power.

Posted by lisa at 11:41 PM