The Velvet Cerebellum

I put the little guy in the car with a blanket and turned the heaters on in the seat. We got to the vet and he very subduedly (is this a word) tried to play with the other dogs and cats.

The vet loves loves loves ghengis, she's the vet that he's seen mostly since I got him. She always gets so excited when she sees him.

She checked his ear and cleaned it out for me. I clean his ear with the liquid, but I rreally need to be getting in there with a q-tip once a week but I'm so scared that I'll hurt his ears. We're just going to have to practice.

My vet gave me a big thing of ear medicine, way more than he needs. This way, when he gets another infection I can just treat him at home and not pay another office visit. I'd probably go in anyway, I feel better knowing that he's being looked at by a professional. Still, it's nice to not have to buy the ear goo every time.

So yeah, I guess little little ear tubes means I'm going to have to be more vigilant, even if I am super squeamish. I don't want to hurt my little guy.

Okay party peeps, I'm off to Ramadan dinner with Jessi and her husband. yay Egyptian food!!!

Posted by Heather at 4:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »

Ghengis was scratching his ear more than usual again. I say 'more than usual' because ever since the day I brought him home he has scratched at his left ear and shook his head a lot. I even have video of the day I brought him home and he's shaking and scratching. Most of the time he vet can find nothing wrong, every once in a while, it turns into an ear infection.

The vet and I don't really know what to make of his ear. There's no hearing loss, no mites, and no signs of allergy.

I was concerned about his ear last night, figured I'd call the vet and make an appointment for this evening or tomorrow. This morning, when I sat down to check my email and drink some tea Ghengis came to curl up next to me. This is not unusual, this is our morning ritual, cuddling for 30 minutes in the morning quiet. What was unusual was how desperate he was to cuddle, he kept shifting and repositioning.

I looked down at him and he gave me the saddest face, his lower jaw was quivering. Dogs can't cry the way little kids can, but they can come close. So, the first day of my boss' vacation and I have to call in late to work to take my dog to the vet. I'm totally getting a note from the vet just to prove I was not just taking the morning off.

sigh, poor little puppy.

Posted by Heather at 8:43 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »

it's not the jumping, the barking, the happy dances or hyperventilating joy, those things are nice from the dogs when I return from a trip, but they aren't what really make me happy. What I love is the exhausted dog pile, the happy, contented, tired dogs that pile onto me and fall asleep.

The goat farm was a wonderful weekend. We had so much fun. I'll post pictures and stories later. Now is time to chill and watch movies and drink jamaica Tang.

Posted by Heather at 7:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »

Happy (early) anniversary to David.

Friday is our 1 year anniversary and while I'd prefer to write about it on the day of, we will be going to a goat farm to celebrate and I won't have internet access.

So, a year ago I'm emailing this guy and we decide to meet. I call him from my office to try to set things up. I end up on the phone with him for like 90 minutes. Then I get home, get ready and call him for directions. I end up on the phone with him for so long that I have to tell him that if he doesn't let me off the phone I'll never get there.

I pick him up and we go to the Chatterbox Cafe. He's very tall and thin, he has a nice smile, laughs at my jokes, makes me laugh. So far so good.

I order my dinner and when it arrives it is full of onions and olives, two things I hate. After eating around them and picking them out, he graciously offers to trade meals with me. Nice. I forgot he was vegetarian, my meal has chicken, he's eating it anyway.

Hmmm, so he's really nice. Now I am worried, maybe he's too nice for me, maybe he'll get to know me and dislike how un-nice I am.

We go to coffee and sit there yammering on about this and that. He tells me about eating the sand on the beach in Kenya and canoeing in the bayou in Louisiana. I'm sure I tell him retarded stories.

I'm a little nervous, I'm smoking like a chimney.

I drive him back to his place and we end up sitting there talking again. Strangely, at this point I am still unsure about the progress of the date. We're having good conversation but does he like me? I don't know. Do I like him? I'm not sure yet.

I'm not even thinking seriously about anything, I'm nt looking for serious, I'm looking for something casual, a fling before I sell my house and head off to the east coast and reinvent my life.

So I'm not sure how the date is progressing, then we kiss.

And now he's here and I didn't move and he's good and kind to me and my dogs and he makes me giggle and smile and laugh.

So I guess that date a year ago went pretty well.

I like you, David.

Posted by Heather at 6:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »

I hit a dip in the road of my mind early in October, it was a hard time all around. To know me is to know that I have a low level anxiety that loops around in my head sort of constantly. On occasion the anxiety kicks itself up and I find myself wading around in a soup of unpleasantness.

I spent most of this month worrying about everything, was I fucking up my life somehow? was I making poor decisions? was I wasting some unseen opportunity? I don't know! I mean look at most of the people that you know who are fucking things up, it's not like they can see what's happening! How would I know, I'm in the middle of whatever I'm fucking up, I can't see from the outside.

Things were not so good, but as these things go, they got better. I analyzed the hell out of it and got a grip on myself. Am I fucking things up? I don;t know but I guess it depends on your definition of 'fuck up'. I have a good job, I have my own place, I pay my bills as soon as they arrive (except my insurance, I threw that in my purse and totally forgot about it!) because I can, I have a good relationship with someone who is kind and intelligent and fun, I have my dogs and they seem generally content with the situation.

There are things I could be doing, I suppose if I put forth the effort I could be president of the moon someday, but I don't want to be. I prefer a quieter life and I have that.

And, so while you really should not trust the self-assessments issued forth by the crazy people, I think I can safely say I am doing okay.

And I've become more productive! I'm cooking dinners more often, cleaning things up, keeping track of stuff better. Sure, we still have 'chips and salsa' nights (how could you not when you have a stocked supply of Herdez Salsa Verde straight from Mexico? I'm trying to be judicious in my eating of the Salsa Verde, but it's hard!), but I'm really trying to put a meal in front of David on more nights than I am not.

It's important to me. It is my way of saying he is worth the effort. And he seems to appreciate the effort. It works out.

Speaking of...
Last night I peeled and shredded 2 small potatoes, drained and rinsed 1 can of chick peas which I then ground in the food processor. Combined potaotes and chick peas and 1 egg and a little olive oil and lots of spices (cinnamon, cardamom, ginger, chili powder, red pepper, salt, pepper, cumin, cardamom). Shaped them into patties anf fried them up. Served them with an onion, apple, raisin, carrot, cinnamon, orange chutney/relish that I invented on the spot.

I thought it was pretty good, but it definitely could have used more flavor. I was worried about overseasoning and it ended up on the bland side. next time, garlic and lemon and oregano will be added to the patties (which were a lot like soft falafel) and the sauce will be closer to a puttanesca (sans the olives, I hate olives).

My audiobooks idea has been going swimmingly! Keeps me productive! I went to go by another as I am almost done with 'The Year of Magical Thinking'. The iTunes interface kind of sucks, I really dont like it. I end up having to go to Amazon.com and looking up things I am interested in and then going back to iTunes to look for it. I got the bright idea to get "Quicksilver", Neal Stephenson's first book in the Baroque cycle. Now I like Stephenson, I think he writes good stuff. I also think he writes too fucking much in his stuff. Brevity and getting to the point are concepts lost on him. I figured I could get the audiobook and get through the daunting Quicksilver faster. First off, it was $47, I'm not spending $47 on an audiobook that I will likely only listen to once. And why would I only listen to it once? Well, because it's 22 goddammed hours long!

I'm pretty sure I don;t even have 22 hours left in this life! I downloaded "Anansi Boys" by Neil Gaiman and should be starting that tonight.

Speaking of...
I've got dishes to do so I can make us some dinner. Can you put molé on salmon? I'm gonna find out (david will get tofu. We know you can stick mole on tofu).

So long, party people.

Posted by Heather at 5:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »

So, what did I do this weekend? I played gender specific role playing games! Specifically, David did the Man things like replace the exhaust system on his car and I did the Woman things like laundry, dishes and cooking dinner.

I ended up making fried rice with the tofu and bok choy. Not entirely exciting but not bad.

Tonight my sister is coming over and we're slumming it with KFC! aw yeah, i know how to be dirty.

There's not much else going on, really. I researched reliable Volvo mechanics, found one near my house. I made all the arrangements with the dog sitter for this coming weekend. I looked up flights for new orleans for thanksgiving, they're expensive, plus all trips must factor in boarding the dogs at a kennel or getting a dog sitter.

This weekend is the GOAT FARM!!!! We are so excited! Goat Farm! Nothing says romance like surly ungulates.

Did you know Tang makes Horchata? they do! It's in my fridge right now. It's overly sweet but good.

Posted by Heather at 5:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »

In my never ending quest to find the winning strategy to turn my into a productive adult I've started buying audiobooks from iTunes to listen to while cooking or cleaning or whatever.

Positive results so far.

A word of advice, though, if you are blue. If it is a gloomy day and you are feeling down and it's been 'one of those weeks', do not download Joan Didion's "Year of Magical Thinking". It's an excellent book, but you will find yourself crying into the dishwater and you don;t need that.

I want to make eggplant parmesan for dinner, but I dont have half the ingredients and would have to run to the store. On the other hand I DO have bok choy and tofu and both of those need to be used before they go bad. Why did I buy the big bag of bok choy from United Noodle?? Because it was stupidly cheap and I like bok choy.

Problem is that you can really only make stirfry with bok choy and tofu and that just does not appeal to me.

I'll keep you posted on the results as I am sure you are dying dying dying to hear what I make for dinner every night.

I wonder if my sister is interested in highly unhealthy food for dinner tomorrow night. Just the two of us. I'll wear my fat pants.

Speaking of fat pants, I did fat pants laundry (the laundry where you put on the giant pants you only wear inside when no one is looking, in my case a pair of too long black velvet pants that are baggy and tie at the waist) and you wash every single other item of clothing you own. Everything is washed, even David's brown shirt that I love so much.

When David gets back from home depot I will poll his dinner opinion and get started.

Posted by Heather at 6:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »

Yesterday I was tasked to go to the library and get some movies. I never go to the library. I never go and I try to tell people, in English words, why I cannot go to the library..."I am completely and totally incapable of returning items". I don't know why this is, I really don't, but I seriously cannot return things to places like the library or Blockbuster or whatever.

No one ever believes me, either! They always counter with "but it's easy" or "convenient" or "you just have to drop it off". It's really not a matter of ease or convenience, the library is 6 blocks from my house, it's incredibly easy and convenient. There is just some mental block in my head, i am incapable of returning things. I just don't do it.

So yesterday, against my protestations, I was sent to get movies from the library. I went and had to go through the ordeal of switching from a hennepin county library card to a minneapolis public library card (she also would not listen to me, I tried to explain it was not worth it for me to get a new card, I'll never use it. I think my problem with the library is that it puts in me in a number of situations where nobody will listen to me). While she's messing with the beeping computer and I am constantly repeating my phone number to her because she mistyped it I am also helping the happy asian family next to me use the auto-checkout (they kept scanning the wrong bar code).

Finally, the librarian lady, acting all confidential and embarassed for me prints out a piece of paper that shows I have a previous fine.

I'm wracking my brains, when did I last have a minneapolis public library card???

12 years ago!!!

Yes, back in 93 or 94 I checked out a book and, true to form, never returned it. I had a $30 fine. $30. It was more than the book was worth I'm sure. I didn't even remember the book or checking it out.

So this is it, this is my severe mental defect. I cannot return things t the institutions from where I borrowed them. Blockbuster owns my soul for all the late fees I've paid them, the library got a $30 check from me for a book I don't even remember.

Netflix seems to be working out okay for me, for now, but that won't last.

Posted by Heather at 1:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »

It's one of those grey days with the weather that has more bite than mist but more mercy than drizzle. Chilled, but not cold. In response I'm making veggies and dumplings, it's like chicken and dumplings but without the chicken. I am out of mock duck and tofu and don't feel like making seitan right now. So veggies and dumplings. Good for us.

The other night for dinner I marinated some canned mock duck and onions in garlic sesame oil, franks hot sauce and lime juice, cooked up some rice, seasoned black beans with garlic, lime juice and special secret seasonings. Fried the mock duck and onions and served the whole thing with molé sauce (david got all the onions, i hate onions). Fantastic!

The molé that Lily brought me requires you to mix 3 parts water to 1 part molé. So, I don't 2 quarts of molé in the fridge, I have what amounts to 2 GALLONS of molé in there! Happy eating! I made up the sesame seed variety (ajonjola? Lily is that right?). God it was good. I've had good molé but damn.

Dang

Work is coming along with the new site, hopefully I can go live soon. I'm bringing over each post one at a time. The funny thing is that the halfway point was reached at a post just over a year ago. I've been going since early 2001. I've really ramped up production around here. I use the term production loosely, in the same way a bulimic might 'express her creativity' into a toilet.

SO, while David practices his guitar and the dogs snooze and chew things, I will wander off into the kitchen and do my best to maintain the illusion of a productive human being.

Also, to those of you within breakfast radius, I'm taking a break from coordinating breakfasts for a while. If any of you want to take the baton and run with it, i will gladly pass it over. Otherwise you'll have to wait a bit until I get things back under control again.

Posted by Heather at 6:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »

How is it that our mothers managed to put a meal on the table every damned night? How did they do that? I swear to god I'm lucky if I can get a real meal out there 3 times a week. I'm wondering if having kids is the defining point? The only other person here is David and I know he is capable of feeding himself so it's not like he's going to starve to death if I don't put a plate in front of him.

The sad thing is that half the time i'm uninspired, which is a joke to anyone who has seen my pantry. There are ingredients in there that are so exotic, even I'm stunned. Bhutanese red rice? Yeah, second shelf from the bottom. Egyptian feta? Door of the fridge! Udon noodles? Fridge AND freezer! Authentic mole from mexico? 2 quarts! 2 varieties! in the fridge.

Of course the things I do want to make, like kale risotto or spanakopita have missing ingredients.

I've mentioned before that I would love to do something like the Julie/Julia Project as long as someone else funded it, but honestly I just don't think I would stick with it. I would get bored or tired or disinterested or completely fucking freaked out about removing the membrane from calves brains (is there a membrane to be removed? I don't know!).

The only time I'm really inspired to cook is when I have company over or when I have discovered a new ingredient. Even then I rarely pull out anything new. Poor Owen has been fed the same lamb meal probably 3 or 4 times now.

Cooking is like a drug, an addiction, you need more more new new all the time or you don't get high and if you're not getting high then what's the point?

I have mole and I have seitan and I have rice and I have veggies and I am going to have to make seitan mole tonight because I really really need to get better about cooking meals.

Maybe I need to write more about what I cook. That would serve the dual purpose of being accountable and driving all of you away from my site completely from the last straw of boredom.

I took pictures of the process of making the rack of lamb dinner in order to share it but I completely forgot to take pictures of the entire middle part of the process and also forgot to take pictures of the side dishes being made so we essentially go from seasoned meat to plate.

Any suggestions out there? Any moms that manage to feed their families every night? Do I need to just give in and start buying more frozen food? Is it worth it to do that just to maintain the illusion of a thoughtful meal?

Posted by Heather at 5:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »

Part of the fun of knowing the lovely Lily is all the keen Mexican treats she brings. I took two bad years of high school spanish. I don't speak spanish at all, if I tried to order something in spanish I'd end up with a live goat and a hair dryer. So, Lily sends and brings a plethora of treats for me, everything's in spanish.

Now, I can't speak spanish or really even understand it spoken. I do have an odd talent for reading it, not well, of course, but slowly. I sound out the words, figure out what the root might be and using the root and the context I can usually muddle out the meaning of most things.

Of course, it does not help if you are trying to make a glass of tamarindo Tang and the unit of measure translates to 'soup spoon'. What the hell is that.

The other fun thing is that I am pigging out on Herdez Salsa Verde! I'm a happy little piggy. She brought 8 million different kinds of salsas. Sadly, I am the whitest of the white girls in america and the salsas from Mexico are just too too spicy. Even the Del Monte salsa verde is too hot. I'm such a wimp. Lily and I will have to set up some sort of underground salsa railroad. I'll be funneling so much money to Calexico in exchange for so many unmarked cases that the feds are going to get involved.

Let's see...anything else?

Watching "The Day After Tomorrow" is a little upsetting in light of recent weather events. It's a bad movie to be sure, but still, weird to watch cities being destroyed by the weather.

Heavy rotation in the car right now. Lovely and sad song.

Also, don't you love days when your hair looks good?

Soon the chochobo will be home!

Posted by Heather at 8:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »

Okay, here's our not-so-quick rundown....

Friday:
I leave work at noon to give me a couple hours to finish vacumming and clenaing things up a bit. I have yet to learn the biggest vacuuming lesson of all. if you are going to vacuum you MUST bring Ghengis outside and walk him around until every single turd in his entire body is out. Period. the second he sees the vacuum he will run around with poops falling out of his butt. He's not squatting and pooping, no, he's running around in crazy blind fear with poop falling out all over the place. And you can't freak out because if you do he will panic and run under the bed and it's much harder to get turds out from under a king sized bed in a little bedroom.

Anyway, lesson relearned only to be forgotten next time.

I got bored and headed to the airport early and waited for Lily. I am not so smart. If i am bored at home where I have my computer and 2 wildly entertaining dogs and a dvd player, why would I be more entertained at the airport? I did learn that the roses from Chile arrived at the airport at 10:42 that morning and were SUPER FRESH and worth the price.

So, Lily finally lands and finally ends up at baggage claim and she FINALLY finds her bags and we hit the road. We head to lunch at a wonderful little coffee shop deli thingy recommended by Jessi. The food was great and the weather was perfect enought o sit outside, but half way through the meal i realized just where I was and I felt like I was invading on someone's turf. I ate my food, encouraged Lily to eat hers (she starts talking and forgets to eat) and we went on our way.

It was a great weekend to be in minneapolis. The weather was beyond perfect, the leaves were changing, it was downright bucolic.

We headed over to Whole Foods where I filled a cart with everything I needed to feed lamb to five people.

I'll post pictures later, but with the help of Lily i made my semi-famous rack of lamb dinner complete with fabulous appetizers and dessert (it's very hard to whip up a zabaglione after so much wine).

David was a total peach (this is his theme for the entire weekend, he's pretty amazing), he helped clean up and then made Lily's bed.

Exhausted and giddy on wine we all headed to our beds.

Saturday:
Up! 3 people negotiate the bathroom and then we're off! We head to Victors for plantain omelettes and mango waffles and black beans and rice and cortaditos and everything else wonderful and cuban. The whole time, David practices his spanish with Lily. We eat and eat and eat and laugh and share stories and generally have a good time.

Now we're off to the Mall of America! We don't look at much, we see a few things, wander a bit, I get coffee because 1 cubano and 1 cortadita was just not enough. We excitedly hit H&M and immediately freak at the crowds. I buy a metric buttload of hair accessories and Lily tasks David to get a purse off a mannequin!

Camp Snoopy is the ultimate goal of the day and we go get our points and wander in. This is where things got hard for me. I was tired. TIRED. and I don't do well in crowds. I was completely overwhelmed by the place. First things first we go to the 'Mystery Mine Ride' which is no longer the Mystery Mine Ride, but the decor is the same. The MMR is one of those where you sit in a room with a crazy film playing and the chairs tilt all crazily giving you the illusion of flying about in the movie. They had "SpongeBob Squarepants: The Ride!" so you know I was all over that. Sadly, it was set up for little kids so it was not so exciting.

Lily and David like rollercoasters. I do not. I rode on the regular coaster as that is not much of a coaster, and David took her on the twisty freaky scary coaster and the axe thing that swings you around and flips you upside down.

Home to regroup for a few minutes then Honk Honk Noodle with Jessi and Ahmed! As per usual we ate til it hurt! We even ate these tiny octopusses that were super cute (but chewy).

Home again to relax for a little while! David practiced some songs then we went to Balls Cabaret and we got to see David sing. I'd never seen him perform there so it was a treat for me as well. In honor of Lily's visit he sang the "I Don't Like" song in Spanish, "No Me Gusta". So cute.

We didn't get to bed til almost 3am.

Sunday:
We wake up again (what's with all the waking up?) and negotiate the bathroom and find ourselves at Cupcake, the happiest place on earth.

Remember when i hit the wall the day before? i never really recovered from that. Apologies to david and lily, i was too too tired and too too cranky. It's hard to pack all of minnesota into a visit, and it was so important that we do this so lily could see everything!

I ate a cupcake, an apple and brie sandwhich and pumpkin creme brulee.

I completely gorged on desserts all day.

We showed Lily the capital building and found the portrait of Jesse Venture and all the others. Then driving up Summit ave, and the river and to the falls and I had an ice cream which should have cheered me up but my feet hurt and sometimes I am a 5 year old.

Then back home for a final bit of chilling before we sent Lily on her way home.

It was a beautifully fun weekend and Lily is such a sweet and charming girl. Also, she likes my dogs, she gets points there!

Posted by Heather at 1:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »

lily has been dropped off at the airport. Sad. So much to write about, so many many many pictures and delights. Will write about it soon.

Miss you, Lily.

Also, one year ago today i donned a dress, picked up a fella in a powder blue tux and headed to the classiest wedding i had ever been to. Happy anniversary Dena and Levi!!

Posted by Heather at 1:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »

Holy crap, so I got home last night and went to check my site to see if there were any comments on the new post and WHERE THE HELL IS THE POST??? Oh, right, I got all distracted while writing it then it was time to meet the girls for happy hour and I shut my computer down and forgot to post.

It's for the best, I'm sure it was boring.

Cafe Du Monde is opening next week!!! YAYAYAYAY! I keep watching the news and seeing the little bits of New Orleans that i loved and it is heartening to see them coming back to life. It is heartening to learn that most of the panicky screaming by the media regarding the rapes, the mass murder of children, the mad max gangs roaming the streets, were overblown and untrue.

Lily is at the airport and preparing to get on the plane! Go lily!

Tonight I am making my lamb dinner for Lily and David and Owen and Shawn. I love the lamb dinner, the people who eat the lamb dinner love it. The lamb dinner is the shiznit!

Last night was happy hour with the girls from work (when i say that I feel like I work in the accounting office for a second rate medical insurance company located in a bland box near an interstate in the suburbs. I'm like 2 degrees away from knit coordinates from JCPenny and hosting Oprah's book club in my living room on the weekends). We went to Mortimers. We were roundly hated by the bartender and we have no idea why!! We went to the counter, asked for our beers and paid, but she was surly! We weren't drunk and unruly, we hadn't even had a chance to become unruly! Also, an old, half-drunk guy tried to sell up angel paintings while we sat there. It was half priced thursday or so he says. We did not buy.

Also, the Sister Kenny institute used a stroke survivor to call me and ask me to donate money to the stroke research program. I felt bad. I told him to send the materials and I'd look them over. I have the hardest time actually saying 'no' so i just end up asking for materials to be sent to me.

Okay, chochachos, I have to do payroll so i can leave work early and get the house ready! Have a goodly weekend, I'll post pics next week.

Posted by Heather at 1:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »

The weather, in it's cryptic fashion, has decided to vomit its misery onto the land in order to purge itself for Lily's triumphant visit. It was cold and drizzley and ugly today, but the weather channel promises temps near 70 for the weekend. Let's keep our fingers crossed, this is October in Minnesota, anything can happen.

Also, Lily found my salsa verde. She's a peach.

Today was my bi-monthly day of reflection and ponderences. The day I stop and wonder quietly to myself "how the fuck did I get from there to here??". These are interesting days, not bad days at all, just good days that remind me that things don't just happen, that there is method and causality and maybe a little magic. There are still things I don't understand, but I'll continue to dissect them.

And, of course, part of my life includes two dork dogs. maddie has finally figured out tug-o-war! I am so proud. I'm pretty sure she never really played with other dogs before and I'm also thinking her previous owners were not ones to get on the floor and play with her. Ghengis loves a good game of tug with one of the stinky dinosaur carcasses, but I can only deal with him draping a wet, empty polyester dinosaur over my hand so many times before i have to send him on his way. Somehow, he managed to get Maddie to take hold and keep holding. Maddie has also invented a game wherein she collects ghengis' most loved toys and lays on them while he freaks out and snuffles her.

Speaking of snuffles...if you are going to get a pug, please for the love of god name it something other than snuffy or snuffleupagus. Seriously.

I need to finish the laundry, do the dishes, make some hummus, vacuum and generally make things look nice.

nice.

Posted by Heather at 1:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »

Dear China, thank you for inventing the pork filled steam bun. What a wonderfully convenient delight. So wonderful that I ate 4 of them for dinner (they were small).

Oh, but China, why must the steam bun expand in my stomach? Why must it upset me so? I spent the night in and out of vividly inexplicable dreams.

China, China, China, you merciless scamp, whatever are we going to do with you?

With love,
h

Posted by Heather at 1:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »

For some reason Herdez has decided to stop selling its Salsa Verde! or something. I don't know. I can't find it anywhere. Even Lily, who lives in the land of the good mexican food, cannot find the Herdez Salsa Verde. I can find the Salsa Casera, I can find other brands of salsa verde, but I don't want those, I want Herdez Salsa Verde in the little green can. Find it for me, send me a case, I will pay you back.

I kept getting these notices at work saying my email box was over the size limit. This perplexed me, I do keep a good number of emails, but certainly not 150mb worth. So I keep deleting things and moving stuff to local folders. Then I find this odd sent items folder. Now a sent items folder is not particularly odd, we all have them, I have 2 (or so I thought) on my work email since I have two accounts running at the same time (mine and the department mail). I found a 3rd, odd sent mail folder and it was chock full of sent mail starting from last November when I got the new computer and switched from POP3 to IMAP.

So I dutifully started reading the mail and deleting it. What a fucking trip that was to see stuff I sent to people a year ago. For the most part, there were no surprises, emails to David and Alan and Alex and Ethan and my mom and whatnot. Just your typical conversations. It was also an interesting topographical map of my relationship with my ex at that time. Pleasantly joking with each other in one email, sniping the next. It was a weird time. Some of the emails hurt my stomach for having so much anger in them, others made me sad, we were trying so hard to be nice.

Still others made me realize that for all the history and the trying, this was the right choice.

But on a brighter note, Alex explained the precession of the equinox to me today. The other day he answered my questions about constitutional law, today it was astronomy. Seriously, he should have one of those columns where you just write to him and ask him anything, he'll have the answer.

I need to clean the house tonight so that Lily will not think I live in a toxic waste dump!

I can't wait for lily to get here, we're going to have a great time and we will never have a moment to rest.

Then 2 weeks and we go to the Goat Farm!!!!!

Posted by Heather at 1:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »

It was all about food.

Saturday, Jessi and I went to do our ethnic grocery shopping. First, Bill's Imported Foods for our Greek and Middle Eastern stuff. I got chick peas and tea and mini eggplants and pistachios and orzo and some spices and zatar. Then Jessi totally turned me on to Egyptian feta. You don't know feta until you've had double cream Egyptian feta. After that we went to United Noodle for all our Asian food needs, including the aforementioned rice crackers, red bean ice cream, green tea mochi, sushi rice, every kind of bizarre ramen I could find and steam buns (veggie for him, pork for me).

Afterwards, David and I went to a fundraiser dinner for a Samoan who needs a kidney. I was all excited about eating Samoan food until I got the food. It's a lot of very greasy and salty meat. Sigh. But the evening was fun and the cutest little kids were running around.

Sunday, after a movie and chilling at the coffee shop doing the crossword puzzle (I'm better at crosswords than i ever thought I was. Go me) we came home and I made the most delicious stuffed eggplants ever. Ever. What I did not know about eggplant (I'd never cooked them before) is that you lose a lot of volume squeezing out the water and frying them. I pulped the eggplants, salted the pulp and drew out the bitter water. As that was going on I prepped the other ingredients and was suprised at the amounts, I figured there was too much stuff to fit back in the shells. I was way wrong. After you fry the eggplant insides along with the garlic and onion you end up with this very tasty frizzled concoction that is more flavoring than filling. You mix that with tomatoes, the magical egyptian feta and chopped mint and stuff it all back in the shells and back. So good, like crack.

and I discovered that Maddie can eat a bowl of tzatziki in about 3 seconds. Note to self, maddie is taller than ghengis and can get into more things.

People brought me wine during my housewarming, it's a nice gift. Unfortunately, I don't know who brought what, but if you were the person who brought me the Yellowtail Shiraz-Grenache, thank you. It was entirely too lovely with the eggplant and pilaf.

Posted by Heather at 1:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »

Nice: Spending the afternoon with your dogs and splitting a bag of rice crackers with them.

Not Nice: Whne one dog horks up a blob of rice cracker and the other dog eats it.

They're monstrous creatures, these dogs of mine, but they are mine and they reflect their owner.

Posted by Heather at 1:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »

It is with a certain amount of dread that I watch the days get shorter, the leaves fall, the cold air seep in.

I know that logically I should face the winter with a positive attitude and hope for the best, but I know better. It's so hard though. The bitterly cold mornings, the insanely short days where the sun stays firmly entrenched in the southern sky, the day after day after day of solid grey cloud cover.

I have special lamps, whether it is the science or the suggestion, they do help. I keep them on and I sit by them. They make crazy blue-white light.

David and I talked a bit about it. He went through it last winter, but I had other stuff going on at the same time, other things with which to explain my irrational anger or crying jags. He was understanding, willing to be proactive about it. It was good.

I figure that I'll travel more, flying from place to place, outrunning the demons. I can afford it more now, and I have the vacation time. I'll put the dogs in the car and go away. I'll put the dogs and the boy in the car and we'll go away. I'll book a flight at the last minute and stand at the ocean and listen.

I'll probably also be more insular, not talk to as much, not visit as much. My phone was fucked this week and it was nice.

Some day I will move to a warmer place.

Posted by Heather at 1:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »

I feel like I've been shopping a lot! Yesterday i ordered a bunch of clothes for fall/winter, everything was on sale too. What happens to your winter clothes? Where do they go? why do you need more and more every year? Anyway, forced myself to get colorful things, i'm on a lifelong quest to make sure I wear enough color.

My new cell phone came today. If I could get one piece of advice it's to stay the hell away from Motorolas! I had a Motorola V300 and while it was not an expensive phone to say the least, it was a big piece of shit. It's key problem was that it would just end a call after 30 minutes. No warning or anything, you would just suddenly be talking to air. After it did this a few times it would lock up and you'd have to reboot it. It also could not hold a signal, admittedly, this was probably due more to the dog eating the antenna (antenna is a word I can;t spell and I must look it up every time). I'm back to a Nokia, the 6101. It's cute, it's little, I like the flip phones. It has more features than I need (who needs video on a cell?) but it also has features I wanted. Go me.

I've also been buying birthday presents and other presents left and right.

And I went to Target and bought more dog treats than is morally responsible.

and to switch gears...

Yesterday on NPR they did a segment on aging. A man spent years interviewing his grandmother as she progressed into old age and into the fog of alzheimers. In the beginning I was struck by a statement of hers, it was early on in the recording sessions, she was still lucid. She said the thing that was hardest about getting older was forgetting your life, she'd said she had had a wonderful life but was forgetting the details. I don't want to forget my life. I have had such great happiness, wonderful memories and adventures and friends, I don't want to forget that. I don't want to forget Ghengis, or being punch-drunk hysterical with laughter in a rest stop bathroom outside Chattanooga TN, I don't want to forget 2am chili cheese fries at Ben's or rollerskating an entire summer away when I was 7. I want to be able to sit around with my friends in 50 years and still be able to recount in great detail the horrors of the Precious Moments Chapel, or that time I went to the State Fair with David and I did all the things I ever wanted to do, including eating cotton candy and watching the fireworks. I want to sit there eating my shitty nursing home gruel and wow people with my descriptions of lunch at Len Bergs in Macon.

I don't want to forget any of this. I hate the idea that I would know, much like the lady in the segment, that i'd had a good life, I just couldn't rember it. She knew, she knew she was forgetting so very much and it bothered her a great deal.

Perhaps this is why I vomit so much of my brain onto these ephemeral pages. Perhaps I just want a record, not for you, but for me.

And it has been a good life so far these 32 years. So many people met, so many places visited, and there will be more.

If only we could be as tall as we are happy, I'd wrap myself around this earth twice to smile on such joys that are my days.

Posted by Heather at 1:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »

Things are chugging along nicely at the new velvet. Tonight I edited the style sheet. Took me considerably longer than it should have because I was not grasping the overwhelming power of Movable Type. Do not go into the ACTUAL style sheet that you have set up on the server! Do not edit that style sheet, you will be painfully disappointed when you go to save something in the MT control center and it overwrites all of your work. Ouch.

I've kept essentially the same color scheme that I have here. I'd like something new, but 1) it's kind of an identity and 2) I am far to functionally retarded to actually put colors together. I end up with atrocious mixes. None of you remembers the first iteration of this site, it was bad, all reds and purples. So, I've learned that if someone makes you a site with a good and solid color scheme, you keep that color scheme.

If anybody has any advice regarding exporting and importing MS Access data into MT let me know, otherwise I'm jumping in as soon as I hear from Keith (he has a pc with Access on it, I don't).

I've got nothing good to say. I was supposed to go to Target to pick up sundries and put it off to tomorrow justifying the delay with the promise of doing dishes tonight. Except I ended up not doing dishes. And I ended up spending too much time trying to figure web stuff out. The only real thing I accomplished is purchasing a metric buttload of fall/winter clothes off the web.

So, I'm cranky, I ate no dinner, my dogs are desperate to go out which means I need to get dressed.

grumble grumble

Posted by Heather at 1:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »

Set up my new domain host, setting up the movable type site, have a headache (but not from frustration, just tired from working on it). I need to figure out how to get my old posts in the new thing and also change the colors so it is not boring blue.

I will keep you updated, hopefully the transition will be smooth.

Also, let me say it again, you CAN get a reasonably priced domain hosting that has 24/7 in house tech support! I love Pavel. Pavel is real and speaks english and answers emails and does NOT use the word "Kindly" over and over again.

Okay, i'm off. I'll be more interesting later.

Posted by Heather at 1:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »

#one

I renamed the dogs again, Top Speed Banana and Molasses Face Piggytail. I think Maddie misses being The Right and Good Princess Boombalatty, but she'll learn to accept it. Ghengis doesn't mind as long as I pay attention to him.

Busy busy day. Been working on lots of futzidy things at work. I get bedevilled by the little things, I hate to do them, they build up. This is my week to get them done.

Tonight is laundry night. Fascinating.

Tonight is also investigate other web host nights. I am discovering something very surprising. It is NOT HARD AT ALL to find reliable, reasonably priced web hosting that has in-house tech support. I was starting to get worried for a minute. Every domain I contacted I asked clearly if their tech support was based in the US and what is in-house or contracted to a second party tech support company. Answers are splut, BUT there is no wild variation in cost. People, listen to me, you can get in house tech support from people who speak english and actually have access to the machine in question for comparable prices.

It's raining, I'm doing laundry, David is at class.

Okay, this is the schedule for the Official Lily Visit:
Friday: Lamb night, Owen and Shawn will also be in attendance.
Saturday: Cupcake, Mercado Central, Mall of America, Honk Honk Noodle with Dena and Levi, watching David perform at Balls.
Sunday: Maria's Colombian Cafe, ....other stuff to be determined! Maybe we'll do the Mercado on Sunday and have dinner there.

How excited am I to have lily here? Too excited for words.

Honk Honk Noodle!!

Posted by Heather at 1:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »

Okay, I'm just warning you now, this is going to be long. I am going to try to edit where I can, but it is going to be long. Your reward? Not much, but it feels good to not have much. or something.

Friday
Duplex buddy, katie, brought us a huge plate of tofu spring rolls just out of the blue. They were fantastic. I made sure I did not eat too many as I knew we were going to the Riverview to see a movie.

The Riverview serves the best popcorn in the city with real butter. So good. David and I inhaled a large while watching "Broken Flowers". Not a bad movie, very Jim Jarmush though a little too slick compared to his previous stuff.

Afterward, David and I threw the dogs in the car and went on a late night drive. So much fun. We ended up in Rochester. The dogs love going in the car, but it they get really disconcerted when we don't stop at the dog park within a few minutes of leaving the house.

Saturday
Saturday was 12 flavors of chill. David had to go out in the morning, and he napped when he came back. I spent the day reading, watching movies and hanging with the dogs. We took the dogs to the dog park after dark which is a bit odd. You can barely see them, but they had fun.

After was Chipotle, more chilling, some chilling, hanging out, chilling and bed.

Sunday
Up early early early early. John and James were running the Twin Cities Marathon. John, James and their mother, Mrs Lee, came to the house sometime after sunrise but before my brain turned on. David and I drove the guys to the Metrodome where the race began. David, Mrs Lee and I went to Maria's Colombian Cafe for Cachapas, the best fucking corn pancakes on the entire planet.

Then to the 15 mile mark to cheer the guys on and get pictures, then home to wait...
Then off to the capital to pick them up at the conclusion of the race. They did well, they made good time. This was John's 3rd and James' 1st marathon.

The five of us hung out at my place for a while and the dogs were the star attraction, how could they not be. My dogs rule. Actually they're jackasses, but what are you going to do.

The Lees went home to rest and David and i took a nap. We made plans to meet for dinner at Hong Kong Noodle (honk honk noodle) for dinner before parting. I can not tell you how disconcerting it is to wake up to partial light that looks exactly like morning light and not be sure what time of day it is or if you are late for work or ...wait, honk honk noodle!!

God I love this place and it is even better when you go with a group and 3/5 of that group is from china! We had beef with asparagus, tofu and black mushrooms with vegetables, squid with vegetables (spicy), hollow vegetable in bean curd sauce, seafood in curry broth and my all time favorite: crispy sole with crunchy (crunchy crunchy so good) garlic. We ate in the traditional manner where you just have your little rice bowl and you pick from the platters, adding a little at a time to your rice bowl. I was so in heaven with the food that I would occasionally space out. God it was good. So very very good. Who wants to go to honk honk noodle with us??

Monday
On top of everything else today, i also slammed my finger in one of my desk drawers. The pain was so bad i could not make a sound. I put a sushi bandaid on it to make it better.

Yeah, so what made today so fucking irritating? I go to show someone the photo i had up and I find some dick kids have hacked all my subfolders. It was a stupid and inelegant job, you'd expect more these days from these kids, but whatever. Last week i'd decided to move my website to a new host because I was just getting nowhere with my tech guys. Seriously, if you want to spend a weekend fighting circular logic, there's an office full of wieners in India that would be happy to help you. So, my patience at an end I get to go open a support ticket named "okay, what the hell" which amuses me because it keeps popping up in my mail notifier. Today on the tech support roster we have 'Gilbert', 'James', 'Jared', 'Rey' and 'James' again. I think I have had all these guys before. of them, I love Rey the best. he seems to be the smartest of the bunch and his answers are not copied and pasted from somewhere else.

At one point they even blamed me and my password for my ftp log in. First of all, the 'hackers' didn't even use my ftp log in, this was some automated process and secondly blaming me is akin to this:
Security guard: Your office got broken into because it has a door and windows
Me: but you left the door unlocked. and open.

So it got fixed, but not after I got emails and calls. and i got pissed.

The time has come, i'm investigating domain hosts. I am entirely willing (and capable) to pay more for a small company with in-house, in the U.S. tech support. I want people who are available, people who know the servers, people who have actual knowledge and not just the knowledge base. I have a short list already, if anyone has anything to offer let me know. At that time I will also be setting up Movable Type as I will be sure to confirm that they can handle it.

Easy ASP Hosting has been fine as long as everything was running smoothly (except for those early days when my database wouldn't connect and they had some driver issues on their end but they fixed that). They are inexpensive and if you have few needs they're good to go with. But, seriously, their tech support will make you want to rip your face off and send it postage due to cuba.

long long long day.

I'm going home. I'm going to pour me some Maker's Mark and maybe do the dishes. Photo will be updated this evening when I get a quick chance.

Coming up....Lily will be here in less than two weeks. I had to send all my contact info for her to give to her mom so she could be sure that i would not hack her daughter to bits. Dear Lily's mom, I will not hack your daughter to bits. I promise.

Goat farm at the end of the month!!!

Also, when the fuck did Canada suddenly because not part of the US? Seriously, I know we like to pretend they're all autonomous and such, but for paperwork purposes they're just part of the US right? Why did I have to pay to call Canada? I'm calling up the president, we need to invade Canada and rectify this situation. It cost me like $15 to call there!

Posted by Heather at 1:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

« September 2005 | Main | November 2005 »