blog sprint

One Minute Writer for today:

What past clothing trend do you think should never come back in style?

Big shoulder pads, nipped in waists, pleated and tapered pants with frilly socks and pumps. Frilly white socks and black pumps.

M C Hammer pants. Fanny packs. Jellies (hello Crocs). (I had the stinkiest feet ever when I was little and Jellies were in. Oh poor everyone around me who was subjected to my stinky feet clad in plasticky, rubbery badness.)

Pretty much anything you see in Working Girl. Especially Joan Cusack's hair and makeup.

After I've mentioned all of this, I should probably add anything that I wear. I'm not exactly stylish (take the California Raisin shirt I was wearing yesterday...no there wasn't actually a picture of a CR on it, but, well, people comment on that shirt a lot and yet I still wear it).

oh yes it's ladies' night...

Today got off to a somewhat less than spectacular start. Pic got up at five-thirty (if I hadn't been there when she emerged from my body, I'd question if she was my very own child). I somewhat woke up but drifted back to sleep until, oops, 6:40. I wanted to leave at a bit before seven, so, yeah, that was out. I rushed to take a shower and get dressed, thinking that Cardo would take Pic to school later in the morning because he was going in late today. Not so. Although Cardo fixed his car last night, it turns out he only really "fixed" it. (Actually, he's out in the garage right now "fixing" it some more.) I wasn't late for my morning duties, but I would have liked to have been there a good half-hour earlier.

Things went well enough throughout the day. I'll not chronicle those events. Ms B was gracious enough to drop me off at home (grazie Ms B). I ate soup and a hunk of bread and did some reading. I was freaking exhausted, though, and fell asleep until almost five. Oops. When I woke up, it was dark, I was still exhausted and I was annoyed. I was supposed to go out tonight, which I had talked to Cardo about, but he ended up working a later shift. Mr M was going to watch Pic until Cardo could come pick her up, but there was the problem of me getting Pic, feeding us and then walking over to Ms J and Mr M's house. I called Cardo and told him I was thinking to not go. I didn't feel like walking in the cold, dark autumn night. I was tired and cranky.

Because the Fairy of All That Is Gracious must have visited me, Ms J offered to pick Pic and me up, which she did. We got food from a local Chinese place (that also serves sushi, although we didn't get any) and all ate dinner together at Ms J's place. Ms J and I left a bit later and met up with Ms L and Ms B for an evening of Much Ado About Nothing. The theme was (loosely, I think) Reno casino and the masque was a Halloween party (complete with "Happy Halloween" projected on the back screen lest we not catch that). It was definitely fun to go out and support Barrister E as she performed a great Beatrice (or such is my opinion of her performance).

It was fun. It was great being out. It was great going to the theatre (although it did bring back frosh and soph memories, including memories of my first college crush). Cardo and Pic have been driving me to distraction with their bickering with one another, so it was nice to have a break from that. Of course, I kept thinking about how well they were getting along, but I figured Pic would be going to sleep shortly after Cardo picked her up.

Next time, it'd be great to maybe get in some more hanging out time to go along with catching a show. At the same time, I was thinking how great it would be to have a freaking date with my husband that consisted of more than just dinner and then rushing home. Dinner would be great, but it would be better followed by some slow dancing. I think the last time we slow danced was for a moment at Auntie C and Uncle A's wedding. Before that? Poke's wedding? In 2006. Previously...Peecho's wedding in 2005. Then our own wedding in 2003. Hey, apparently more people need to get married (or at least pretend to) so I can rest my head on my husband's shoulder and slip my hand into his while we sway from side to side.

Well, this is getting sad. I always have this weird comedown after going out. It doesn't help that this time I felt guilty about going out, either. So, anyhow, I need to get out more (ha! as if there's all this, what do you call it?...time) and shut off my freaking analytical machinery more.

window shopping

I'm not so big on t-shirts anymore, but I'd like this shirt. [Image credit...click the link.]

blog sprint

One Minute Writer's prompt for today is...

Write about three realistic goals you'd like to achieve in your lifetime. [As opposed to all of those goals I'll achieve in others' lifetimes. I doubt that I'll enjoy posthumous fame.]

Okay, I can at least type those out in one minute (except my tendency to elaborate, often in parenthetical form, might cause me to only get through part of one before my little bell rings).

1. Actually get a job that I hope is at the end of this very long, very freaking expensive road.

2. Buy a house. Not just any house, but a perfect house (not just any kiss, the kiss of true love). Okay, so I'm, of course, setting myself up for failure here, but I've had so long to daydream that I have all of these specifications about what our house will be like. Here are just a few examples. The house needs a library, like a room we take you into and say, "This is our library." We won't own any fancy books that cost thousands-upon-thousands of dollars, but we will have thousands-upon-thousands of books (oh, that's right, we already do). I want a pantry. I want yards with trees, particularly fruit-bearing trees, please. I don't want a brand new, built-for-me house. I want someone else to have lived in the house before us. I could go, and have gone, on and on about this.

3. Learn to sew my own clothes. This is my project for this coming summer. I so want to be able to make my own slacks because I'm so tired of polyester pants, it's not even funny.

Okay, so those first two might not really count as realistic (because, no, I haven't been living in a bomb shelter in my backyard for several years...I don't even have a backyard, hence #2), but I like to pretend that they are.

among other things...

...automatic flush toilet are something I just cannot stand. I can flush my own toilet, thank you very much. If I don't flush the toilet, it's because I've chosen not to, and I don't choose not to if I'm in public. (Hey, it's TMIF.)

I'm paranoid about public bathrooms. This runs in my family and I'm successfully passing this neurosis on to Pic. When I was very young -- and finally tall enough -- my mom taught me to hover. That's right, I avoid actually sitting on the seats in public bathrooms. (When it comes to private bathrooms, I have much more faith. There's just something so unknown and so, I don't know, public, I guess, about public bathrooms.) As far as I know, the nether-regions of all of the females in my family have not touched a public toilet from the moment we all reached hoverable height (so not a phrase, but I think you get it).

Just a bit ago, I went to use the restroom. I was rezipping and rebuttoning my pants* when the stupid toilet flushed. Argh! I hate that. Haven't the people who designed these stupid toilets ever heard that statistic about the contents of the toilet being able to jump six feet when the toilet is flushed. Normally, I redress, unlock the door and then flush the toilet with my shoe-clad foot...then I immediately flee the stall.

What I also don't understand is when automatic flush toilets aren't flushed. The stupid things always flush on me while I'm still standing in the stupid stall. How can you just not flush those things?

Well, I suppose that's enough bathroom commentary for now. You're welcome.

pork chopsh and...

...okay, so there was applesauce, but no pork chops. Yes, that's right, I'm posting a picture of a mug containing applesauce. "Why?" you might ask. "Because," I might then respond, "I made this applesauce."

That's right. I'm pretending to be domestic and I made the applesauce. Okay, so applesauce has to be one of the easiest things to make, but still...

I peeled and quartered the apples and cut out the cores. I added a bit of water to our big soup pot, added the apples, put the lid on, turned on the stove and then kind of forgot about the apples. Oops. When I remembered about them, the water was boiling, so I removed the lid and stirred the apples around a bit. They were already breaking up by then. I left them for about a half-hour more and they were sauce. After they'd cooled, I added a bit of maple syrup (because, why not?), but I can't really taste it.

I only had five Granny Smith apples, so that's what I used. Okay, so I had six, but Pic swiped one before I got started. This was actually the perfect amount because the finished product easily fit into one of our containers. Next time, I'll probably make more and I'll use a variety of apples. Oh, and if I have a food mill by then, I'll cook the apples with all of their parts still attached and run the cooked apples through the mill.

I got the, um, recipe (more like the technique, I suppose) from How to Cook Everything. Oh! Looking that up, I see that there's 10th anniversary edition! Yea!

now more narcissistic than ever!

I've been completely wasting my time playing with these for the last half-hour. Ha! Sorry to pass them on.

Makeover-o-Matic

You can't add any foundation-type-makeup to this (that I can find, at least), which means in my final picture, I have plenty of makeup and plenty of acne. Fun stuff. When I showed Cardo my "after" picture, he said, "You look funny." Hey, it's not my fault the blush is applied to like half of my face! I tried to remedy it.

My Virtual Model

This one's a little frustrating because I can't readjust specific body parts. Also, I don't look at my underwear-clad self in the mirror, so looking at the depiction here is somewhat depressing. I haven't figured out how to "shop" with this thing, but I wasted enough time and I have things to do (like find out why it smells like feet right here).