Perhaps a peculiar Hamster Sacrament:
This is the body and blood of My Feeder, who bringeth treats and deconstructible burrows of cardboard from which no tussocks spring. I shall not fear. Fear is the rodent-killer. I shall bite My Feeder, and allow it to bleed around me and thru its fingers. Only I shall remain. With this bite, I set my soul in motion.
(My condolences for the turning of the Hamster Wheel on your Hiro.)
Leva @30, I thought that name, Arpaio, sounded familiar, wrt to extremism and illegal aliens... goog..goog...yep!
http://blogs.phoenixnewtimes.com/valleyfever/2009/02/mexican_senate_committee_denou.php
Arpaio denounced for forced march of illegal immigrants, Feb 2009, to his infamous Tent City jail area.
"... InfoWars.com—a site which, as Jim would put it, frequently wanders into the Tinfoil Hat Mountains, gets trapped by snow, and eats its own dead. "
Still literally laughing out loud at this description. I remember meeting the author of the InfoWars book at Computers, Freedom, and Privacy conference many years ago, and that makes it all the funnier.
We SO need Jonathan Coulton to do a song called Tinfoil Hat Mountain, possibly set to the classic Candy Mountain.
Bill @59, Carrie S @73 re: Silverlocke-- yes, my experience also.
WRT the slush pile and writing, it's the lionization of books that don't quite 'do it' for me that deters me from writing fiction. Given that the works I love most seem to be more on the sidelines of what's considered great stuff, it seems kinder to the editors not to send in that which moves me.
Witty anecdotes and colorful invective of mine have inspired many a friend and acquaintance to say "You should write!"[*] But there's got to be more to it than that, I'd guess.
All those writers saying "I can't NOT write" when in fact I'm rarely inclined to type or jot what comes so trippingly to the tongue. But that's another post, no doubt.
[*] Fiction. I do write non-fiction, but as a sideline, rather than a living.
I almost had to make a Kitty Litter Dash, some of these 'tips' here on MkgLt should come with Adjectival Advisories: may trigger eruptive synaesthesia.
We use the Swheat litter, which seems to give my kitties less coat-junk and breathing issues than either the crystalline or the clay litters.
WRT the Sisyphean defurring, few things work so well as a damp, just wrung-out washcloth, especially on the top of a couch cushion or along the back of the comfy chair. I've even been known to pour a tablespoon or so of water into one hand, set down the glass, rub both hands together, and do the Human Catfur Remover on some surface as a drive-by.
Fragano@144: ...farteen times farteen...
Bhayvees, hil sprechen zie 'fart'!"
Huh-heh-pai, heh-huh-pai!!
CNN was almost commentary-free, and certainly had no commentary during the quartet. While it meant that I didn't hear the latest gossip about all the folks entering the podium area beforehand, I definitely enjoyed just being able to watch and appreciate the event.
I usually love the silly links collections, but the ones of the dancing made me sad. Mostly I saw non-glamorous people having a good time, and being mocked for their lack of perfection. I saw some pretty decent dancers and singers who just happened to be old, or balding, or fat.
Who is the bigger sad sack, the drunken office-party dancer, ineptly having fun, or the sneering cynic on the sidelines, capturing the moment and 'sharing' it on YouTube so s/he can feel superior?
There's a well-known set of trite lines that ends with "and dance like nobody's watching." A few months ago I stayed up in SF at the main office to go out with coworkers to see a band that featured one of our colleagues. The opening act was good, and their act was good. People were happy, smiling, nodding, jigging their shoulders a little, but only a couple dozen of the 100ish folks there were actually dancing. There was room, but maybe it just "wasn't cool"? I danced, and had fun, and didn't care.
Whether at an office party or out at a club, if the dancing is only For The Beautiful People or The Talented People, there'd better be signs. Otherwise this old fat chick is gonna be dancin'.
So there.
They are better than sweet or sour,
Better than cobwebs spun kind by Fate,
Better than any hedge-fair berries,
Your green gage plums on a cool stone plate.
Hush, I stole them out of the icebox.
@9 (and others) wrt soupy or liquidy pies. Firstly, do you vent your pies? Generous venting really helps apple pies, I've found, as they do steam a lot. The usual tiny slits don't really work well with some of the juicier apples. I cut some small crescents, or, if feeling inspired, use my teensy leaf-n-acorn cookie cutters to cut vents.
Secondly, lattice top may be yr friend.
In downtown MV last night, unexpectedly found a crowd in the bookstore listening to one of the America's Chefs/Cooks Illustrated folks doing a reading. Can't get to the new SF, piffle!
Browsing one of the cookbooks near the door, I found some info on lattice-top pies. Apparently a lattice-top on a pie exists to solve just that problem, by letting the juices evaporate and reduce within the pie. Especially helpful for stone-fruit pies like apricot, peach, and cherry. I always just thought they were decorative.
Now I'm inspired to try making a lattice-top pie. Hmm, using my bigger leaf-n-acorn cookie cutters to make a pseudo leafy lattice could work, and be less work than the painstaking weavy stuff. More forgiving of flaws, um, I mean, "handcrafted artisan pie" marks.
While we were on our sabbatical in the RV, I made deep-dish apple pies in the toaster oven in a meatloaf pan. This one was delicious, even tho the crust got slightly burnt (not inedibly so); of course I'll include the recipe.
Link followers may comment on the blasphemy of store-bought premade pie crust. In this land of Minimal CounterSpace, it is a heresy we practice so that We May Haz Pie. I did grow up doing it right, with the chopping up of little pea-size bits of butter and hand rubbing flour to the beach sand texture and all that. Which may be part of why I use the shortcuts now. ;-)
My big thing with the flu shot is the darn mercury, namely the thimerosol preservative. I hear that the FluMist nasal spray does not have it.
There's a nice list of links on pediatric flu vaccines and preservatives, including FDA stuff out there. Sure, not much mercury in a single shot. There are folks who feel that multiple immunizations in close time proximity added up to autism though.
You may have to ask around a bit, but apparently you can get a thimerosol-free flu shot, and for kids and pregnant women, its especially recommended. Allegedly the type of mercury in thimerosol differs from the type in your "small can of tuna fish" (the "how could this be dangerous, it's the same as" object), in that it is a type more likely to build up in the brain.
I think I am learning to make:
* amends
* time for myself
* space for things that matter
But it could all be a giant crock.
I do really want to learn to knit, though. And finish several projects in the project cupboard. One is saving some old favorite shirts by putting on a new collar and sleeve cuffs of pretty quilting fabric. The shirts are a pair of old mesh polo shirts whose collars are getting ratty and the armbands separating from the shirt body. Had since 1994 and they are still comfy, have good color, and fit well.
The thread has long gone shiny, but I did want to say that it was science fiction that led me to classical music. Digging thru my aunt's college reading books as a little'un, I read Stranger in a Strange Land, and afterwards wanted to hear the Mars theme from "Nine Planets Symphony". When I got to a big enough place to have a listening library, lo, I sought it out and found I liked it (and much else) very much.
And for the playlist, "No Place to Hide", by Alison Krauss & Union Station.
"When i was a child
I used to love to watch the rain
I'd stand under the downspout
Let the water cool my brain
I never thought to worry
If the river rose too high
That all the seeds we planted
Would get washed out with the tide"
This thread is *exactly and precisely* why I absolutely loathe events like "Blog Like It's the End of the World". At least when it was about zombies I didn't really take it seriously. This seems sadly and copiously real and verifiable. I'm angry that I had to doubt it for a moment due to bliteotw idiocy that I've seen recently on friends' blogs.
I have both sympathy AND jokes. This truly sucks, and my heart goes out to the folks who are looking at wrack and ruin.
If folks would accept help from AsiaPac, perhaps China, Japan, and Korea could send young rice plants ready for transplanting, and people to show farmers how? World rice prices and flooded fields look like opportunity to some people, maybe even to Iowans ready for a laugh.
As for what little I can do-- if you or your family or neighbors need seeds, please let me know. We have a lot of seed-savers here, and we'd be glad to do what we can to help folks re-establish their gardens. We probably can't send plants, alas, but you'd be surprised how quickly things like beans and squash and cucumbers can re-establish when planted in the summer warmth.
Year sabbatical in an old RV, with cats, no A/C for most of it (while driving). Cats would hide under couch and soak up all the chassis and road heat, and be little panting rags at the end of a day's drive. I would soak dishtowels, wrap around icepacks and put them next to kitty tummies.
On a really bad move once their gums turned bright red, which is a DANGER hyperthermia sign. We stopped travelling after 11am after that. :-(
We finally found that our generator had been miswired, such that it could not run the Air Conditioner while going down the road. When we got that fixed, we could keep the RV comfortable for us and cats, and didn't have the same problem.
Kitties were about 9 or 10 years old at the time.
One of these cats came to me as a kitten at an SCA event, and when I had to take her home, in my non-AC car, she was suffering from the heat. I kept her damp by wetting my hand and petting her, and having her on a damp towel, in an improvised picnic-basket cat carrier belted into the passenger seat. She has been much more 'into' water than most cats ever since then, routinely sticking her head under the faucet and coming to jump on me with wet feet and shoulders.
She is also our Foot Drinker cat, eg, the one who makes it so we have to keep the water dish on a giant cafeteria tray. It's the only way to contain the water for Mrs SplishySplash.
Daniel B (#20): I'd heard Charlie on the MTA as a kid, but it didn't
stick in my mind until I picked up a Clam Chowder tape that had a
version on it. To this day I sing it "Vote for Ed Sobansky", as their
version used the name of one of the band members. :-)
They also had a cover of "Benson, Arizona", from the movie
"DarkStar" on one of their tapes. I still have it, stamped with the
address label from the Benson AZ general store when I drove through
there on my first cross-country solo trip. The folks at the store had
never heard of the song, and were quite amazed to hear it played for
them. They thought it was pretty neat that somebody would go to space
and miss ol' Benson. Except the teenagers, who couldn't believe folks
would want anything except to get away to Phoenix or some other big
city.
Anyone else here remember seeing CC perform at Disklaves on the East Coast in the early to mid 80's?
There's always Frappr, if folks want to self-map.
Happy Foo-Year, in several minutes, from PST-land. Coming into it with aging cats, a hijacked domain, a partially-painted living room in shambles, a new job starting on Jan 7th, a thriving winter-veggie garden.
It will be an interesting year.
| Year | Number of comments posted |
|---|---|
| 2009 | 9 |
| 2008 | 11 |
| 2007 | 10 |
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