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| So I am thinking I should try to share some photos, get some views, some feed back, yada yada. I guess I should give a brief life update for those who read this: Still employed, still in Albany, still taking belly dancing, still taking assorted other classes, still baking like a fiend, still playing WoW, and oh yeah, engaged to Trysten. :-D In other news, the photos!: My favorite:  Posies:   More here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/midnyghtchilde/ | |
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| So I went dreaded bathing suit shopping this weekend. The last I did this was freshman year of college, in order to have suits for VA beach. Those ones are actually too loose now, despite being barely worn since that trip, and we're going to Disneyworld in May so I need a new one.
It actually wasn't bad, except that way too many suits now have annoying little plastic clips that are A: going to break and B: get totally twisted and tangled. I found a brown and pink (OMG PINK?! ME?! I must be ill) that is cute, so I just went ahead and bought it. Surprisingly, its a 16, despite my pants normally being 18s. But in retrospec, my summer dresses are a 14w and a 16, so I guess it's not far off. Seeing the bajillion high schoolers prom dress shopping in the mall this weekend also reminded me I need to get rid of my old prom dresses, since they're way too big as well. This disappoints me, as I really adored my burgundy prom dress >.> I may yet try to get it taken in sometime.
Now I need to find some sort of hat for sun cover for my poor pasty Irishness. Sunscreen is my best friend, but I'd love a hat. I generally look retarded in hats though, so this may take some creativity on my part. I may settle for a bandana of some sort, just something to cover my scalp and part which are guaranteed to end up burned.
I saw the chipmunk who lives in the wall today, which means it must be summer. Now I am planning touse my contest winning 50$ gift card at Lowe's to get patio gardening supplies for my many veggies. We'll also need some room for the bikes we are bringing back, since Trysten wants to get into biking once more. And I have to learn to ride one. >.> Yeah ok, there's my big dark secret, I never learned to ride a bike. Kiss my ass, I didn't have a drive way (it was loose stone) or friends in neighborhoods to do it with. And my balance sucks. And I really, really really like my knees, although they hate me, and don't want them any more scarred then they are. I think we'll do some string beans, and two tomato plants, and something else this year. I already have herbs out the ass - my two basils are over a year old and still going nuts, my parsley I had to murder one so I could reclaim a pot but the other one is gigantic, and now I have planted dill from seed which is merrily sprouting in the spring sunshine. My jesuspepper plant staged its come back after 2 weeks of no watering after I <i>cut the entire thing off at the base</i> and now has a few inches of growth, new leaves, and a possible bud. Go figure.
I am so glad that spring is here and I don't have to be locked up inside anymore! | |
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| The BBC reports that most people will have only read 6 of the 100 books here. ONLY SIX!!!
Bold the ones you've read, italic ones only partially read
1. Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen 2. The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien 3. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte 4. Harry Potter series - JK Rowling 5. To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee 6. The Bible 7. Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte 8. Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell 9. His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman 10. Great Expectations - Charles Dickens 11. Little Women - Louisa M Alcott 12. Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy 13. Catch 22 - Joseph Heller 14. Complete Works of Shakespeare 15. Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier 16. The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien 17. Birdsong - Sebastian Faulk 18. Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger 19. The Time Traveller’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger 20. Middlemarch - George Eliot 21. Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell 22. The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald 23. Bleak House - Charles Dickens 24. War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy 25. The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams 26. Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh 27. Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky 28. Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck 29. Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll 30, The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame 31. Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy 32. David Copperfield - Charles Dickens 33. Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis 34. Emma - Jane Austen 35. Persuasion - Jane Austen 36. The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis 37. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hossein 38. Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres 39. Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden 40. Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne 41. Animal Farm - George Orwell 42. The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown 43. One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez 44. A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving 45. The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins 46. Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery 47. Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy 48. The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood 49. Lord of the Flies - William Golding 50. Atonement - Ian McEwan 51. Life of Pi - Yann Martel 52. Dune - Frank Herbert 53. Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons 54. Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen 55. A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth 56. The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafo 57. A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens 58. Brave New World - Aldous Huxley 59. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon 60. Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez 61. Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck 62. Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov 63. The Secret History - Donna Tartt 64. The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold 65. Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas 66. On The Road - Jack Kerouac 67. Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy 68. Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding 69. Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie 70. Moby Dick - Herman Melville 71. Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens 72. Dracula - Bram Stoker 73. The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett 74. Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson 75. Ulysses - James Joyce 76. The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath 77. Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome 78. Germinal - Emile Zola 79. Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray 80. Possession - AS Byatt 81. A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens 82. Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell 83. The Color Purple - Alice Walker 84. The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro 85. Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert 86. A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry 87. Charlotte’s Web - EB White 88. The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom 89. Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle 90. The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton 91. Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad 92. The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery 93. The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks 94. Watership Down - Richard Adams 95. A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole 96. A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute 97. The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas 98. Hamlet - William Shakespeare 99. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl 100. Les Miserables - Victor Hugo
hmm...read 16 and partially read a few more.
Silly list though, since sometimes the series is listed as one and sometimes a particular book of that series is also listed....
I also hate Dickens, a lot. He really did get paid by the word. The story lines may be great, but I just cant force my way past his blithering to read the whole book.
Dune is really awesome though, just finished it actually.
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| So yes, it's been a while. Even though the holidays ended and January is usually kind of quiet, this year it has not been. Work has been busy. Not as crazy busy as last year I suppose, but busy enough. Most of this is because we are down 4 people from this time last night. The good new is, we are technically hiring, and my job is most definitely secure. As a matter of fact I've saved the group a few times and got recognition and a reward check from my boss for it. I've been researching heavily into laser diffraction and particle size since I am now the administrator on the instrument, we're having problems, and nobody else knows it >.> I have quite literally RTFMnoob. I've also been put in charge of installing and learning a brand new instrument in a relatively new field of study, a powder rheometer. Some days I feel overwhelmed with new information in fields that I never even remotely touched on in college, but I am managing to stay afloat. By boss trusts my judgment and seems to believe that I can handle it all, so all in all it is good. Trysten and I are taking a ceramics class for the next 8 weeks or so through the school, which should be fun. I am looking forward to some painting and molding and what have you. I still dance every Thursday and my teacher is talking about getting us on stage at some point (cue silent screaming inside). When not working or taking classes we've been bouncing amongst get-togethers with friends and coworkers. I've finally 'befriended' a few coworkers and we go out to lunch/free hockey games/etc on occasion. I've begun working to redo some of my wardrobe, finally tossing things which aren't flattering and spending a little more for things that are. We're raiding in WoW again, casually this time and no responsibilities. I've been trying to take more pictures, I uploading some from the course of the winter here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/midnyghtchilde/Otherwise things have been bleh as winter drags on. I am looking forward to spring and planning what to pot in our patio garden already. We are going to Disneyworld in May :-D WOOO DISNEYWORLD! which has me perpetually excited. It'll be a whole week with my Mom and Brother and Trysten. It will be awesome. In general I find myself using email and facebook pretty much exclusively for keeping in touch. I almost forgot my log-on for AIM, truth be told, when I had to re-enter it on my new computer. I did break down and get a new, Vista gaming system as I was sick of my game looking like shit on my 4 year + old system. | |
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| In the last year, on the person front, I: -learned to bellydance -learned to bake bread, from scratch, with yeast. -learned to make applesauce, from scratch. -learned a few new cookie recipes, and pumpkin bread recipes -taught myself to knit and made two hats -took an art class for drawing -started a garden of plants and herbs and what not in the summer -made a network of friends, branching off of one friend -hosted a sit down Thanksgiving dinner for 8 without any problems -connected with my second cousins and started regular dinner parties
at work I -got a promotion -developd and wrote a method for analytical testing -had blood wok done and got clearance for highly potent materials -became system admin and trainer for two instruments (raman and particle size) -learned most of the equipment inside and out including daily calibrations for over a dozen different instruments
I think over all I have developed quite a life on my own two feet. I'm proud of myself and Tristen that we are on our own and without any loss in quality of life from what we were raised with. We did not have to live on ramen or sleep on futons or suffer bad roommates and dirty run down apartments in order to transition from "college student" to "work adult," and for this I am thankful and wonderfully proud. We live in a nice area, have good jobs at least somewhat tangentially related to our degrees, have nice new cars, lovely new furniture, and most important to me, no real consumer debt, beyond car payments, both of which could be paid off tomorrow with what we have in savings, if need be. We are frugal and creative and if we had to, could live on one salary or the other (I did the math, as I freaked out about the new NYS budget proposals, and despite my lower salary it would be tight, but doable, without touching our savings on my salary alone). My annual review is upcoming and hopefully will entail and a nice raise. I'd love a promotion but given how HR acts I doubt it, but possibly at mid-year "review" time, so around June/July.
I am also dang glad to have developed a real social circle in Albany which includes friends from all over and my cousins, alongside friends across the state and the country who I continue to keep in touch with. I'm still working on crossing a coworker or two into friends territory, but maybe in the new year.
I honestly don't think I would have done it if I hadn't taken the leap to be on "my own" in the dorm several hours from home a and from anyone I knew. I'm especially thankful to have escaped Rochester, even if I have yet to escape NYS.
So looking back, despite a few bumps in the road, 2008 has been far far better than 2007 was. Looking foward I think 2009 may be a litte questionable, given the economy and all, but since we have a solid foundation we will make it through just fine. And hopefully things continue smoothly and I will continue to aim to return to school for a conservation masters in fall 2010, simply because I want to, and I know now I won't be doing it just because I am afraid of standing on my own two or because I can't get a job.
So here's to 2008, a few days ahead of our New Years Party at Our Place! | |
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| I asked for a skirt for Christmas. I have my veiled made thanks to my mom, and hopefully soon I will pick up some kind of top. Unfortunately classes dont start for af ew weeks after the holidays, which makes me sad. But I saw this and laughed and just had to share. Twas a belly-dance miracleWith my large fleshy limbs, so lively and quick,
I flew through my routine, my hips shaking: Chic!
More rapid than eagles my dance moves they came,
And I smiled, and twisted, and called them by name; “Now Maya! Now, Snake Arms! Now, Belly-Roll Shimmy!
On, Hip-drop! On Chest-lift! On, Slow Undulation!
Spin across to the wall! To the front of the mat!
Now Shimmy Fast! Shimmy Fast! Shimmy Fast, FAT!” | |
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| This is a meme from Odd One Out. Bold the things you’ve done.
1. Started my own blog 2. Slept under the stars 3. Played in a band 4. Visited Hawaii 5. Watched a meteor shower 6. Given more than I can afford to charity 7. Been to Disneyland/world (Disney World, 3 times now) 8. Climbed a mountain 9. Held a praying mantis (and many other bugs and toads and creepy crawlies) 10. Sung a solo (I was a cantor at mass for a while...aka the person who leads the entire church in song from the podium, as well as a choir girl and soloist in the school plays....once upon a time) 11. Bungee jumped 12. Visited Paris 13. Watched lightning at sea 14. Taught myself an art from scratch (I just taught myself to knit from the internet) 15. Adopted a child 16. Had food poisoning 17. Walked to the top of the Statue of Liberty 18. Grown my own vegetables 19. Seen the Mona Lisa in France (No, but I did see Pablo Piccasso's original pieces in Madrid) 20. Slept on an overnight train 21. Had a pillow fight 22. Hitchhiked 23. Taken a sick day when you’re not ill 24. Built a snow fort 25. Held a lamb 26. Gone skinny dipping 27. Skied a marathon 28. Ridden in a gondola in Venice 29. Seen a total eclipse 30. Watched a sunrise or sunset (many times, over Lake Ontario, gorgeous) 31. Hit a home run 32. Been on a cruise 33. Seen Niagara Falls in person (many many times, its only an hour and a half away) 34. Visited the birthplace of my ancestors (not yet but soon) 35. Seen an Amish community 36. Taught myself a new language 37. Had enough money to be truly satisfied 38. Seen the Leaning Tower of Pisa in person 39. Gone rock climbing 40. Seen Michelangelo’s David 41. Sung karaoke 42. Seen Old Faithful geyser erupt 43. Bought a stranger a meal at a restaurant 44. Visited Africa 45. Walked on a beach by moonlight 46. Been transported in an ambulance 47. Had my portrait painted 48. Gone deep sea fishing 49. Seen the Sistine Chapel in person 50. Been to the top of the Eiffel Tower in Paris 51. Gone scuba diving or snorkeling 52. Kissed in the rain 53. Played in the mud 54. Gone to a drive-in theater 55. Been in a movie 56. Visited the Great Wall of China 57. Started a business 58. Taken a martial arts class - And a dance class! 59. Visited Russia 60. Served at a soup kitchen 61. Sold Girl Scout Cookies 62. Gone whale watching (Off Mass. Coast, went to Gloucester too, where the events in A Perfect Storm happened) 63. Got flowers for no reason 64. Donated blood, platelets or plasma 65. Gone sky diving 66. Visited a Nazi concentration camp 67. Bounced a check 68. Flown in a helicopter 69. Saved a favorite childhood toy 70. Visited the Lincoln Memorial 71. Eaten caviar 72. Pieced a quilt 73. Stood in Times Square 74. Toured the Everglades 75. Been fired from a job 76. Seen the Changing of the Guards in London 77. Broken a bone 78. Been on a speeding motorcycle 79. Seen the Grand Canyon in person 80. Published a book 81. Visited the Vatican 82. Bought a brand new car 83. Walked in Jerusalem 84. Had my picture in the newspaper 85. Read the entire Bible 86. Visited the White House 87. Killed and prepared an animal for eating 88. Had chickenpox 89. Saved someone’s life 90. Sat on a jury (Unfortunately.) 91. Met someone famous 92. Joined a book club 93. Lost a loved one 94. Had a baby 95. Seen the Alamo in person 96. Swam in the Great Salt Lake 97. Been involved in a law suit 98. Owned a cell phone 99. Been stung by a bee (nope, despite smacking them) 100. Ridden an elephant (And the Renn Faire!) | |
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| So after a nice long holiday it's back to the grind and the slip and slide into Christmas and the new year. So currently my list in no real order is:
-Start the baking and party prep for Saturday's Thanksgiving dinner for 7 -Christmas shopping - which is about half done -Complete second knitting project to give as a gift. My first hat is done and looks like a hat but is lumpy from taking it in (it was way too big) -Put together gift baskets, which means baking 5 loaves of wheat raisin bread and making icing to go with candles in an eco-friendly reusable bag plus maybe some cookies for coworkers/neighbors/friends -Decorate for Christmas -Plan for a New Years Eve party, the first in many years, since we will be here, and I want to blend some coworkers with my cousins (who is technically a coworker too, lol) and friends. -Make Christmas cookies, maybe gingerbread cookies this year with my much-loved cut outs -Get back to the WiiFit Yoga, since Tuesday dance classes are over for a few months -Car insurance shopping, since its renewal time again -Read over my 401k info and adjust accordingly -Back up my photos to a jump drive and my files to the portable hard drive
Hmmm that should be about everything, too bad there are not enough weekends for all the baking and cookies and what not.
Otherwise, Thanksgiving was a nice, but being "home" for so long is starting to feel awkward. I love seeing my family, but its weird to be staying at home, its not my home anymore really, my home is here in my apartment. My brother had many friends over Fri. and Sat. nights for much drinking, and I was amazing to learn that most of his "popular rich boy" Pittsford friends are unemployed and at home...despite their hoity toity private college degrees. It was so weird to hear comments like "yeah my mom will kill me" and "my parents let me sleep all day at least"....and admittedly it was darkly delicious to hear them talk like that and realize how well I am doing on my own two feet. It's that evil nerd revenge delight. Life is good.
Oh yeah, and Foster's home for Imaginary Friends RickRolled the Nation at the macy's parade...it was fucking hilarious. | |
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| Really, the article title says it all: Walmart worker trampled, 2 shot at toy storeSeriously. The economy is tanking, people are dying in India, and retarded ass Americans are TRAMPLING PEOPLEa TO BUY A FUCKING TV. "We're so broke waaah but we can run out an buy tvs and shit we don't need cuz its on SALE cuz its CHRISTMAS!! But pity us we cant afford the heat next month or to send our kids to college or to retire! Waah!" Good fucking lord. And the fact that they had the gall to complain when made to leave the store because someone DIED???!!! Despicable. Disgusting. Not enough words in the goddamn dictionary to describe it. Not surprising, considering the driving I saw today and the cutting people off and what not just to "get there first!" and spend more money. I am so disappointed with most of humanity. | |
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| So I think I broke my toe. Its only my baby toe, and its my left foot, and it hurts like a bitch, but I cant *do* anything about it. Argh. The only thing I can do is keep popping tylenol and advil and try to stay off it...which is virtually impossible since my two labs are at opposite ends of the hallway, and being the do-all go-getter of the team means I inevitably spend half of my day dashing back and forth across the building.
Anyways...I baked two loaves of bread this weekend which turned out delish. Homemade bread + homemade corn chowder = win on a cold fall day. I also finally dried some parsley and basil from my going-apeshit plants that threaten to take over the kitchen. Then I made a batch of white chocolate chip cranberry oatmeal cookies tonight. I've just been in a baking mood. It's cold and it keeps the apartment warm (and my bills down, lol)
So despite the fact that my toe hurts like hell, things are good. I have a solid job, my company is doing really well despite the economy, so hopefully that holds, and I realized today I had about 3k more in my savings account than I realized, which is the good kind of realization.
Im also really excited to be having a great big thanksgiving dinner at our apartment on dec. 6th for our friends. I love Thanksgiving, its my favorite holiday, I think it surpassed Halloween. Its all about food and friends and family and no stupid gift giving crap. We are planning the whole shebang, so it should be a great time. Even better it turns out Tom will be around Thanksgiving week/weekend, so we will have a chance to catch up.
But this is the last update for at least a week or two since WOTLK is out Thursday :-D | |
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