New Year Resolutions, sorta

I don't really *do* New Year Resolutions. It really makes no sense to me to suddenly decide that you need to change something and actually expect to break all your old, bad habits in one day that culminates the end of the stressful holiday season. Heck, the day after New Years is the national day of recuperation!

But, I do realize that I need to change a few things, and the next month will have plenty of new starts: new semester, new reign administration, new heating system.

So - I am going to propose a few changes to my current way of life. This is not seperate from the 101 in 1001 plan. In fact, it is most likely going to augment it. But I realize that I both need and want a few changes.

I've decided to break it into two parts: things I will continue through the year and things I want to get done over winter break.

So within the next month, I will set up the infrastructure for a year of:

1. Keeping my house as neat/clean as I did from April 2007 - Sept 2007.
2. Consuming consciously. This entails purchasing from local vendors and responsible companies. This includes food, toiletries, alcohol, cleaning supplies, and gifts.
3. Successfully gardening at least two food objects (ie: tomatoes and eggplants) and 3 spices/herbs.
4. Keep my bills organized.
5. Run http://gexxcooksknoxville.wordpress.com/ .

Over break I will:

1. Enroll in auto-pay for my mortgage
2. Figure out what is going on with my ATT bill
3. Clean my desk
4. Install my kitchen cabinet doors
5. Clean out my kitchen supplies
6. Install my coathooks
7. Play with my kittens
8. And generally simplify my possessions
9. Create my mother's website
10. Figure out my financial aid situation for the following year
11. Mount the headlight on my bicycle
12. Organize the basement for easy bicycle access
13. Get Orion and Neci their yearly shots
14. Spay Orion
15. Cuddle the kittens
16. and at the end.... update my 101 in 1001 blog!

Plan plan plan.... Now to just DO!

Yearly Xmas List (aka - consumer whore checklist)

In no particular order, here is what I'm hoping Santa brings... and the stipulation is nothing from WalMart or Target

• money (car payment, mortgage payment, regular moneys, association memberships, pay someone to fix my heaters)
• magnetic poetry set (original, haiku, green, romance novel)
• a nice 8-10 inch chef's knife and sharpening stone
• funky fingerless gloves
• awesome legwarmers
• brightly colored opaque tights that fit someone as tall as me
• a skirt to wear the tights with
• CSA subscription to Greenman Farms ($500)
  
• my heaters to magically work (or new, efficient heaters)
  
• a visit from the Spay/Neuter Fairy for Orion
• microplane grater
• extrusion pasta maker
• Jamie Oliver's cookbooks
• Confident Pussy Tshirt, in pink
• Papasan Chair
• Container / Organic Gardening books
  

See - I'm relatively not materialistic.

Marriage Equality Rally!

[newsbreak] Good news! Larry Summer is no longer up for Treasury Sec.  If you didn't know, he's the ex-ivyleague-pres who said women were inheantly inferior at math and science.  He even set up a home ec class for women so they didn't need to worry their little heads with all sorts of numbers. [end newsbreak]

So, Saturday was the Anti-passing of all the no gay marriage acts/props/ammendments.  Morgan and I made up posters (seen below), and he met me at the museum at 2.30PM with the plan to head right over to World's Fair Park.

Well... I head over to the museum, where I had 1PM a program to give, at 12.15.  I pull into the lot and am told that I need to pay, there's a basketball game.  I explain to the attendant that I am going to work at the museum and, not only that, I have 20 young girl scouts with parents coming at 1.  They tell me that they will need to find parking.  I respond that this is not acceptable, they were told where they could park before this, and the museum lot is to remain open for museum visitors.  Well, apparently there are only 5 spots left, and goodness knows how we'll do this.  So they call the head guy, who is very not pleased to see me.  The museum and the parking people have been at odds for as long as I've worked there.  The museum needs weekend visitors. When the museum advertises free admission and free parking, people expect that.  If they need to suddenly pay $5 to go do something free, they'll just as soon go home.  The museum loses visitors, and no one buys anything cool in the museum shop.

So he and I argue that parking a few cars in the free lot with everyone else having to pay is not acceptable.  I threaten to call people, like the museum's director, in order to give my girls a good experience.  At this point one of the original attendents comes running up and tells us that most of the cars in the lot are high school students here for visitation, and their program is supposed to be over at 12.30.  How about we just close the lot down for everyone except Girl Scouts (and other visitors, I pipe in).  That, I tell them, will work, assuming enough people leave.  What if we don't have enough spots still?  The attendants point out a bunch of open space, normally used by the daily attendant's kiosk, and say they'll park them in there.  We should be guarenteed 15 spaces between what's already open, what will open, and the informal spots.  So they change the sign to "Lot Full" and I head in hoping that the girl scouts are carpooling, like good environmentally concious individuals should.

I have 15 minutes to run upstairs, downstairs, middlestairs in order to get my 45 minute program, my 15 minute tool demonstrations, my 20 minute clay-based craft, and my 5 minute story set up.  I'm not ready on time, but that's ok, because the "Lot Full" sign confused some parents looking for the museum so they're on their way.  We get started about 15-20 minutes late.  Gargh!

We do the program, take a little longer on the initial program because they ask so many gosh durned questions, do the tools, take a quick break for me to move around the set up for the craft, make our darned clay pots, Morgan shows up, wash our hands, tell the story, and I clean up in record time.  I tell the guard the few things he needs to do (re-set some alarms, re-lock a few doors) since I don't have codes or keys.

3.20PM Morgan and I rush out of campus and over to Worlds Fair Park.  Everyone is gone!

Noooo!

So now I have two virgin signs for the next protest rally.

I'm annoyed.  Stupid parking.

Come to find out, about 120 people were at the rally, and the only counter protest was

LINK TO ARTICLE ABOUT RALLY IN KTOWN!  I really like this article.  Especially that it is written with a lean toward supporting same sex marriage and even includes religious leaders' comments supporting the equality of the right.

In other marriage-equality news:  December 5 is "No Gay for A Day" day, where the LGBT community and their supporters stay home from work.  Where I work, at the museum, we all feel that marriage should count.  The people I serve, children, would be the ones effected.  While children may repeat what parents say, they are still impressionable.  I'm conflicted whether my staying home would help.

Angry feminism!

I'm reading this post at Feministing Community about a PMS buddy site.  I'm in Morgan's living room, so he's there too.
"Can you believe this! There's a site where guys can enter the dates that they notice their girlfriend's periods and then get email warnings when their girlfriends should be PMSing so that they can act extra nice on those days."
"Do you want me to sign up for that site?" Morgan asks all eagerly.
"Morgan, you're asking if I want you to sign up for a site that flat out assumes that you're with a woman so ignorant of her own body that she can't tell you if she's feeling poorly from a monthly even.  That assumes that all women turn into crazy woman-zillas for a week because of uncontroled PMS rage.  That assumes all women are on a 28 day cycle! " 

I'm glaring with anger of the idea of the site.  Unfortunatly I'm glaring at Morgan.

His winter coat is on the arm of the chair.  He grabs it and hides under it
"Tell me Morgan!"
"I can't hear your feminist rhetoric! Not under my fort!  I'm hiding! You're scary!"

He comes out.  "Are you signing up for the site?"
In a whimper "No!"

Stigma

A list of things that need to be de-stigmatized.

• mental health disorders
• weight issues (either way)
• pregnancy
• abortion
• consentual recreational sexual encounters
• childfree
• sexual commodification (ie - prostitution)
• feminism
• the vagina
• foster care and social work
• religion whether it's belief or not
• self sufficiency
• requiring assistance
• economic difficulties
• pro-life/pro-choice combinations
• seemingly contradictory religious/political combinations
• success
• failure
• being in love
• love

Don't Let Obama overshadow the Issues

Obama/Biden is the chosen pair. Awesome. This is the positive set. The one that will NOT work against my values, as opposed to the heteronormative, anti-choice, gender-discriminatory McCain/Palin ticket. I may seem behind on celebrating, but I've been working on a massive post about the wedding I went to. And I got sick.

But what about all the local propositions?

South Dakota's totalitarian abortion ban failed. Good.
Colorado's attempt to define personhood as conception failed. Good.

What are we upset about?

I'm upset because:
Arkansas banned fostering or adoption by unmarried couples, and since gay marriage is not allowed this further disenfranchises homosexual couples as well as those who don't wish to participate in a heteronormative institution.
Arizona banned gay marriage.
Nebraska removed Affirmative Action from it's constitution. (WTF!)
Florida banned gay marriage.
California banned gay marriage, revoking marriage licenses from multiple married couples. Updated. But it doesn't make it any less of an issue!

So homosexuals are the new second class citizens. Look, I'm already refering to them as an "other". They must be. Ooops, theres "they" again. But we still let them live with their friends, isn't that what they want?

::sigh::

In addition to the demonstrations, there are two movements that I'm getting in on regarding this revoking / restricting of rights.

1. Second Class Citizens Don't Pay Taxes - If "the gays" are second class citizens, they obviously don't need to pay taxes. This movement is lead by none other than Melissa Etheridge. Huh. My gay friend (see, I have one! My "token" friend.) is also named Melissa. Must be a gay thing. See girls, you aren't allowed to marry anyone named Melissa, at least not in California, Florida, or Arizona. (Mel, please see the sarcasm dripping from that if for some reason it was as invisible as same sex marriage rights!)

2. Pressure IRS to Make LDS Not Tax Exempt - The Morman church supplied almost 80% of the funding to advertise for Prop 8 (against gay marriage - some confusing wording there). That's $19,000,000 (19 million dollars. the 000's are impressive!!!). $19 million to influence legeslation. Huh. Wait. LDS is a church, a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization. So they're tax exempt. But the IRS states "no organization, including a church, may qualify for IRC section 501(c)(3) status if a substantial part of its activities is attempting to influence legislation (commonly known as lobbying)." Support removing tax exempt status from the Mormon Church by signing this petition. Let's not forget that the Mormons originally had an issue with the American legal definition of marriage between one man and ONE WOMAN. Hence why Brigham Young stated "Marriage is a civil contract. You might as well make a law to say how many children a man shall have, as to make a law to say how many wives he shall have."

Party!

Voting Roundup

Well, actually, thanks to the early voting process in Tennessee, I voted a few weeks ago.  I've sent out reminder emails to people who hadn't made an intent to vote clear, and now I'm at work discussing our hopes and dreams in a particularly left wing office setting.

But now that we voted, what to do? (In addition to dragging other people to the polls)...

Free Stuff  - A couple places are giving out free snacks as a reward for voting. You can bring proof (stubs/reciepts/regestration cards), but most take your word on it.

• Krispy Kreme - You get a free donut
• Starbucks - You get a free tall coffee
• Ben and Jerry's (after 6PM) - You get a free single scoop of icecream

Watch the Results

• Bruce Schneier at Making Light - as the polls close.  Making Light beat CNN on the first poll results of the nation.  Dixville Notch- Obama:15, McCain:6.  We have a good start!
• Democracy Now - 7PM-Midnight EST
• GRITtv - Noon-2PM

election eve

i'm back from pa and wanted to write something awesome about what i termed "the great red slash" of PA (the I-81 and route 11/15 corridor).  I was driving I-81 through Virginia, listening to NPR, getting updates on polls and criticism/decontruction of polls and two different episodes of car talk, when I passed a barn.  It was painted black with, in large white letters, "I'M VOTING FOR THE HOT CHICK"

then i got sick. major food poisoning/stomach bug/something in my innards.

so i'll give you a link instead.

Sarah Palin on the first amendment
check out update #3 .... it has the actual mp3.

Obama on Left, McCain on Right, We can talk politics all night. And you can vote however you like.

This is a far cry from the "secret ballot" school mock elections.



I think a part of this is the constant appeal to get more people involved in the election process. The "Get out the Vote" program of the Bush 2004 campaign and it's trailing residuals as well as Obama's community organizer, bottom to top, encouragement of all.




So why are some adults so ignorant? I don't mind if people support the Republican views (fyi: priceless moment in this video- Male: "It's women's rights!" Female: "It's babykilling, I don't care what you call it!"). It's just the lies and fear mongering that are making me upset about how the election goes.

techno entertainment luddite adventure journey go!

while i'm not necessarily on the cutting edge of technology, i've normally been in the upper quartile at the least of knowing what stuff meant.  that is, of course, except for entertainment stuff.

so the other day morgan and i went out west in an attempt to see batman at the dollar theater (which now charges 4$ but gives you complimentary soda and popcorn).  we got there and found out that the newspaper messed up the listings.  i really didn't want to pay $10 for a ticket to a movie i had already seen and i was hungry.  this whole snafu made me sad and somewhat grumpy, as i had worked it out in my head and it was a marvelous plan to get morgan out of a funk caused by an annoying stats test.  we were driving home down kingston when morgan pointed out a decadent billboard and said "wow, that looks good." intent on doing something to get out of this mutual grump, i decided that desert would be a marvelous idea so we turn around.  in the process we end up in a store parking lot.  interested, we go in thinking that we would just check out if anything was interesting.

well, there was.  the sales person was so helpful! at the same time she upsold me twice! but you know what, i really like what i ended up with.  the first model was small, compact, with only one feature.  The second was larger with a variable setting.  The third and final had more than one function and three sets of conrols for a total of 5 buttons.  morgan and i messed with it while in the store and while at first this seemed rather intimidating, it didn't seem like something i couldn't handle.  so i had her bag it up and she got my name and all that good stuff and we took it home.

i feel like such a dork not knowing everything about all these tech toys.  i mean, i refuse to even think about ipods because they're apple, and the other mp3s... i have one, don't need more info. comp stats are lost on me. video games? fsck, i got me an NES and PS2. that's all anyone needs. right? right.

so looking at the walls and racks of technojoy totally freaked me out.  congrats saleswoman, you made me happy!

Article: 5 Pieces of Advice for the New Paupers

Full article here.

I've been worried about the economy's myriad aspects.  I'm a student, a home owner, and my career aspects (cultural resources) are viewed by the public as far from necessary.  I'm not related to commodities (food or mineral production), or even to vice at any level (bartender, musician, exotic dancer).  Instead, I depend on the government having enough money to enforce proper resource management on development projects, which in turn depend on agencies having been alloted the money to actually carry out said projects.

Oy veh.

John Dolan's article describes lessons he has learned in leaving grad school and entering the current economic reality.  And honestly, I forsee it as a viable possibility.  I'm only unable to get food stamps because my car is worth too much (according to this article I should sell it anyway).  The primary reason for buying a house was because it was much less then renting (and still is), but with renting when things break they get fixed.  I have the limited electrical knowledge, but lack the chutzpa to risk putting it into use as possibly frying myself or short circuiting my entire house, so I have two rooms without lights (the bathroom and the laundry room), and only two of my meager heaters work... sorta.  In the winter my house is primarily heated in sections with a transportable space heater and the oven.  Work is done in bed, with two cats cuddled under the covers against my thighs.

In fact, it is sympathetic to this exerpt from the article I'm drawing attention to:

"We had only an unheated boat, and that was not enough. We woke up to the thump of sea ice banging against the hull and realized that the old world was still very much in session. When we finally fled to stay with family, we stayed in our blankets up against their gas fireplace for weeks. You won't even want food much after a while. You'll want heat itself, not the chemical middleman. You are going to realize that cold is the most frightening thing in the world."

Yeah.  Happy winter.

i'm helpful!

I tend to be the "helpful" friend.

No, not really, I'm just (surprised? impressed? amused?) by the two "help me"'s I've been asked for today. Probably by the way the asker approached it. I like to think that I'm helpful in general, once when the sewer exploded up one friend's second floor apartment bathtub, again when a friend's husband left, still again at random other askings.

One: I dropped a friend off at the airport at 430AM.
how this happened:
friend: "I have a favor to ask you."
me: "I'll see what I can do, what's up?"
f: "Ineedyoutodropmeoffattheairportat430thursdaymorningwednesdaynighttakeyourpick"
m: ::giggle:: "ok"


Two: Laundry for another friend (in a way)
how this happened:
friend: "question"
me: "answer"
friend: "did i wake you up?"
me: "no"
friend: "ok, that was the question, bye"
me: "really?"
f: "no, there's a leak in my apartment so they're taking out the subfloor and the water heater which means that i can't take a shower or do laundry. and it happens that today i need to take a shower and i really should do laundry..."
me: "come on over"

ha. ok, to go do work now.

Weekend

Enjoyed the weekend.

friday night was first friday, it was my first first friday also, and lee and rusty and claire had exhibits opening. the plan was to dress up meet up at lee and rusty's gallery (@ cumberland and gay), do the "ooh, awesome!" thing then grab food @ 7 @ the bistro and make our way down to w summit hill for claire's stuff and then hit sassy ann's for a little cutthroat action.

so i dressed up, green low cut sweater hoodie, brown tank, short denim skirt, and brown boots. i had just had my hair done, and i even put on makeup. i felt so much like an undergrad getting ready for a night out. my normal "lets go out" clothes consist of a pair of ripped jeans and a tank top. ah well. it wont kill me to get dressed up now and again.

but the others were running a little behind. lee and rusty weren't even there when we had to leave for our dinner reservations.  so we ate, shared a bottle of wine, and went back.  at lee and rusty's there was a water cooler full of wine. a WINE COOLER if you will. so much wining was had, and there were multiple people who i hadn't seen in a while so there was a bunch of catching up going on there when it was like OK! MUST GO FIND CLAIRE!

morgan was driving (thankfully) so he toted my and shannonette's arse up to w summit hill in which progress i call claire up twice, the first time thinking i had a bad connection. the second time realizing it was just REALLY LOUD where she was. she was at the crown and goose, apparently her thing was over for the night (BOO!) I felt like such a pathetic friend missing her thing, especially since when i showed up at the crown and goose to talk for a few moments i was obviously feeling the wine.

when i first got to the c&g i saw nate and adam, so i talked to them for a bit. morgan and shannonette joined me in there, so they both said hi. it was morgan's first meeting of this cookeville group, but shannonette had met them previously. i guess bringing morgan may have been somewhat transparent (bringing the current boy when meeting up w the ex-boy's bro) but at the same time i wanted to find claire.

finally found her! after running into one of our prof's, that is. i was so intent on finding claire, though, that i just gave him a half wave while trying to figure out what she was saying. i'm doing great with my personal interactions. found claire, talked for a while, left, ran back by nate and adam, and asked about a wedding this coming weekend.  then asked about the ex's plans for this coming weekend (which is also brewers jam, and yes, is where i met him last year, and i hoped wouldn't be a big deal, but with some of the emails that he had been sending me and the fact that he kept checking my blog and myspace somewhat consistently until about 2 weeks ago, i'm honestly a bit worried about what might happen if we both meet face to face utterly beer-plastered) i find that not only does he not have plans to attend brewers jam, he also does have plans for something else. so no worries there.  i just don't want drama. i'm tired of stupid boys.

any way, after that, off to sassy ann's, where i change into my jeans and chacos. it was easy as i was already wearing a skirt. yay me.

cutthroat was cutthroat. yay. i was beat, though, i had been on the move since 7AM. had done the oil change thing, the hair cut/color thing, and then the social thing, so we cut out at about 1AM.  and went home. and passed out.

zonk.

good times.

the following day the morning was spent reading, and taking a shower, and getting things together, as that afternoon there was another dnd game (yay?). i think i'm enjoying it. I'm just trying to decide if i really like spending 5 hours i could devote to school stuff with this limited tangable reward system.  after the game we hit the mall and i had to physically restrain morgan from purchasing for me an item from williams sonoma. i know, what was i thinking. dinner was lovely mashed taters and tomatos with mozzerella with olive oil and balsamic viniger. because that was what i wanted. and the trend seems to be with him that i get what i want. i can't abuse this, but with wierd food cravings while cramping, it's totally legit.

sunday was good brunch at sunspot, grocery shopping, and more reading (read that as "napping), and monday was monday.

tonight i have options. morgan might still be in town, or he might not. if he isn't i may go watch the debate with jim (where? does he have a tv?) and play www.palinbingo.com with the prez candidates. or a may go see dennis at his open mike at the pres pub. or i may stay in and read this book about fair trade coffee if i don't get it done by then.

blargh.

media morning

i had found this a while back. i like it. it gives me the warm and huggies.



i found this more recently. it makes me feel conflicted.  gendered violence for the humor, anyone?



and this one is for my heather

total nerd

So, I played DnD last night. Total nerd. Level 1 Gnome Warlock.  The players seemed pretty cool and the DM was very welcoming.

I might do it again.

new experiances

proudness

so i did it. finally. i made my very own myspace picture. i don't like pix of me, so i go ahead and rip off other sites. my latest picture stated that my marxist feminist dialectic would bring all the boys to my yard. the newest newest one is to the left. thank online translators for the translation. hopefully i have it right!

maybe not all, but i do have one at the moment. i don't know if it was the MFD that did it or simply the fact that i could actually speak intelligently after multiple beers on random uber-esoteric,paradigmatic-shifting, rhetoric challenging, possibly-important topics.

woot.

i also, this afternoon erased all email correspondance with people i don't like. err.... a person i no longer like. i didn't realize quite what had piled up, but when i saw something with his name on it, i dug a bit and realized "damn, don't need this mucking up the inbozzle". Hitting the "trash" choice surely isn't as cathartic as burning things, but who needs catarsis when you've moved on.

and no, me stating that i've moved on is not denial that i haven't.

speaking of moving on, back to the MFD/Beer incident... YAY!

that's all. if you haven't met him, you obviously haven't seen me in the last 2 weeks, as we seem to do many things together. i'm home alone now for the first time in a while. i should be doing laundry....

hit the disc exchange today. picked up tickets for brewers jam. not missing it for anything. there's a crew of boucoup zwanzig joining me: eric, morgan, shannon, shannon, kimberly, heather, paula, jim, and more. yay.

also grabbed a PJ Harvey CD. i blame my DE dude for hooking me on her last last summer. damn him and his lucious prematurely entirely gray hair coupled with being a band teacher and a husband and father (i think he said he had kids) with awesome tastes in knowing what i want.... in music. DAMN HIM!

ask me about my recipe for curry. and remember that the farmers market has awesome summer squash this week. it goes well with curry.

and to the Ktowners who read this excuse for a blog... i'll be at GreekFest sometime after 3. I have some brownies that need my attention until then.

you know that you're not the crazy one when...

after recieving a slew of insulting emails with the final one stating "i'm not over you" and begging for a meeting: friends offer you the services of lawyer fathers, others refuse to let you sleep at home for fear of him doing something "not good"... all are a little bit of an overreaction in my belief, but it's a nice feeling to know that people give a shit about me.

phew... and I was worried that i would be viewed as having handled the break-up poorly because i moped for a few weeks and was sorta angry over someone i determined to be not worth my time.

can i just have no drama. please!

update on my side

It's been good. I like being an adult, to a point.

D's plane got in just fine at 2PM on Thurs, I got him at the airport (found him before he saw me) and we headed home, did the food thing, and started to chill.  A calls and says "L (her sis) and I are going to the farm NOW" so D and I jump in the car and go meet them there. It's only when we're finished the 1/2 hour trip do I realize that I totally forgot to call Mr. J, who I had mentioned this potential trip to the previous day.  We get there, swim, dive, kayak, tree-yak (no, not really) I see my first persimmon, we ponder as to the identity of some other tree, and have some general fun.  D and I then head home after poking in to see Dancer, A's horse, and chill/catch up.  At somepoint in there, I noticed that Nece's eyes were too goopy/squinty for my comfort so I called the vet and made an appointment for 930AM on Fri.

Friday I go to the vet.  The cat has Chlamydia... again.  So we're on a round of eye drops. yay.  Then I go to work, Dave comes with me to look around.  I finish up what I need to do for our people on Tuesday, and we head out, run some errands, and head back to my place.  We hang out for a little bit, I get a few things going for the Pirate/Zombie dinner party on Sat, and I do some reading for class (yaaay... blah).

I am now becoming fully indoctrinated in economical/ecological social stances.  The current book is continually repeating "capitalism is bad because it can only happen if you don't restrict growth" "unrestricted growth is ecologically unsound." yes, I get it. let's get deeper. MORE RHETORIC! I want to be more Pretentious.  MORE EXAMPLES! I want to see how *I* can utilize these paradigms in my own stuff.  Shift it, shift it good.  The class should be good, alot of structuralism/marxism.... plenty of my buddy foucault too.

So I drag D to the brewery, where he gets to have some of the world's best stout. Mr. J joins us and we have a fun, somewhat nerdy conversation. D is a chemist, J is all about alternitive/bio fuels, and lets just say that my field requires me to understand way too much schtuff. Woohoo!  Then, we wander over to the Pub for some beer and CUTTHROAT SHAMROCK!

We hang there for a bit before others who we know join.  So there's Mssr. E (from past adventures), his new roommate Mssr. D, my girl H, her boy G, my D from NY, and Mr. J (alphabet stew!).  At which point Ben from the band sits down at our table and joins in our conversation.  That was most awesome.  I think it was even better because D came all the way from NY to see them (in a ways), and Mr. J has only seen them once before, and I told him that the show at the Grotto was nothing like what most shows are.  So we're all talking, I noticed that Mr. J got numbers from Ben, I'm assuming for his Gf as she's also a band person (haven't heard them play yet, they come in town some point in October).  Twas most nifty.

The opener band rocked.  I was very very please.  And the CtSr show was amAZing!  One girl at the show pulled me aside and asked if I was the one "doing the research on that hammer" as she recognized me from my newspaper article.  I affirmed that "ahem, yes, that is me".  I was surprised she recognized me as in that photo I hadn't brushed my hair, was hiking backwoods / off trail for a while to get to the site, and was wearing a bulky wool sweater and Carhartt's.  But whatever.  No-name-boy (or "many-name-boy") also recognized me before I recognized him.  He ran off soon, though, on what H reported as a red Harley.  He said he was going to come up and hang out, but I think that I was familiarly slipping between 3 dudes (Mssr E, D from NY, and Mr. J) and that our previous interactions over almost the whole last 10 months has consisted of bar-room conversation over mediocre beer with thinly veiled flirtations, it wasn't the most welcoming environment. Shrug. It was an ego-boost.

Cutthroat ended only after many beers were accidentally and purposely released into the atmosphere, and I decided that with the beer and the hour D needed to have his first southern experiance of Krystals. So with Mr. J in the cramped back seat of my car and DfromNY in the cramped-pulled-forward passenger seat we went and initiated D on the finer points of ittybittyburgers.

Then, everyone safely at home, I had a reprise from the St.Pat2007 CtSrShow. I looked at my feet and they were DISGUSTING. So while I didn't have the energy for a shower, I stood in my tub and washed my feet. yuck.

Next day, feeling slightly not up for it, I started working on the dinner party.
It went marvelous. The Curried Goat was not too spicy, the hot sauces were flavorful, the riceandbeans in coconutmilk were divine. The spiked fruit salad was overly intoxicating (yay) and yeah. Success. We all chatted and played apples to apples, the cats weren't overpowering (allergies in some people) and it wasn't just D and i in costume. It ended a little earlier than some parties, but that was all good, as I was exhausted. R stayed a little later (I think I bugged him or something to do so, I don't know) and I ended up starting to fall asleep in my camp chair while he and D were talking about something.... important? I don't know.

Sunday, clean up was a bitch, and know i should be reading, but D is napping and we have a Boomsday party in a bit and I'm bored. My cats are also sleeping. They look dead.

Best to all!

Weekend party

So, this weekend I attended a smashing gathering of people. The plan had been for it to be much larger, but the core group who attended were most awesome. It was me, Miss S, A, Mr. J and Ms. J (Mr. J's long time friend who drove up from Atlanta).

S and i got there later than we had hoped, but were still the first people there. We scoped out the property, a horse farm, and found the bathrooms, the kitchens, the bbq area, and the lake. That lake was MAAAHVELOUS! It had canoes and kayaks and paddleboats and a dock and another dock and turtles and bugs and fish and...

Soon after A showed up, gave us a slightly more organized roam around, and we set up our tents (we were staying the night). While that was going on, J and J showed up ... with ribs. Sweet! So we were a ribbed, brated, beered, vegetabled crazyness of food, but that's for later. We all got the tents up, said "hi" to the others in the facility, piled up firewood, distributed beer stratigically to different locations and then donned our bathing suits and headed to the water.

After some swimming and diving (I'm so pleased with my new-found ability to flip on dives, i'm such a dork) we grabbed boats (S and i in a canoe, A in her own, and originally mr. J in a paddleboat, but when Ms. J joined they also shared a canoe)a couple of beers each, and played pirates. We stole/drank beer. S and I were UNSTOPABLE. At one point, we gave Mr. J a beer to appease him, then the next time we passed we took that one *and* the one he was drinking. We were up one side of the lake, down the other, and around all the islands. S and I found a case of fireworks on a far dock and told the others that it was beer (too far to see what it was at that point), but "we didn't have enough cup holders for it" when they were distracted, we worked on drinking our booty. The Pretty Pretty Princesses rocked, although there was some B-movie survival throwback moments when A stood up and was paddling, looking all Amazonian and the time that we all started drumming our paddles against the boat in rhythm and then went faster and faster until we yelled and attacked.

The funny thing about boats is because you're consistently off balance you don't realize the effects of alcohol ... until you get up. I could NOT pull the canoe up, it was killing me, and by that time some of A's friends, including K and her puppy, and also N and C (who have appeared a few times in the blog) were able to witness it. The solution: go swimming.

So after more swimming, playing with dogs, and such, we decided to go get the grill going. I had brought 1.5 bags of charcoal and a massive container of lighter fluid. As the grill was MASSIVE we decided to use the whole thing. Enormous fire, lots of meat (and grilled cheese), we had ribs. Then, down to the bonfire. By this point it was back down to the core so we sat and talked and chatted and chilled and set off fire works.

Eventually calming down and going to sleep, the next day was beautiful! I woke up with the sunrise. surprise, huh? So I laid watching the sky change colors to a most beautiful blue, at which point I was hungry. So I got up, grabbed some hotdogs for the dog, and radishes and cheese for myself, checked the time on my phone (about 9), and took out the canoe. I was able to paddle quietly, watching the turtles flop into the water, noticing all these crazy nymph carapaces, and cruising along with the ducks. Beauty beauty beauty.

I noticed some others up, so we fixed up breakfast and revived the fire, I'm rather proud of my ability to do that also. It had been a while since I had, and I wasn't sure if I would be able to.

Noshing on foods, packing up tents, and all that followed. Then we went back into the water. This time a grabbed a Kayak. That thing FLEW! We would have been even MORE UNBEATABLE had we utilized that vehicle. ah well.

Eventually, we did have to leave. Ah well. It was great!

The morning on the lake