The Chipper Orange Shoe

11:28 am - Sir PTerry on Alzheimer's

YouTube Video here

This man is awesomesauce.

10:30 pm - Interview!

So yesterday I had my interview at the library. I also pounced on an Opportunity which amused the heck out of me.

See, I arrived about ten minutes early for my interview, and my interviewers were in a meeting (probably another interview), so the woman at the information desk told me to go sit down and she'd get me when they were out. I wandered over in the direction she gestured and lo and behold, it was in the "World Languages" section. Said section contained some books in Japanese, one of them being Ranma 1/2. So I picked that up and started paging through it, seeing how much Japanese I could remember (...as it turns out, not much. Oh dear). So when one of my interviewers comes out to bring me in, I'm standing there all redheaded and blue-eyed and (sorta kinda) reading Japanese. I was rather pleased with it, since I was super nervous about interviewing to begin with, and it sort of gave me a hook to start with.

I think the went pretty well, over all. I didn't gibber hysterically, and I made the interviewers laugh a couple times. I also convinced one of them to look into Discworld, due to raving about PTerry's writing when they asked me who my heroes were (I also said that I had wanted to grow up to be Pippi Longstocking when I was little. That was one of the times they laughed). I should hear back from them around Wednesday-Thursday next week. I hope I get the job.

Then I got home, and the internet refused to connect on my computer. It got repaired this morning, though. New router and suddenly, I'm no longer being booted off the internet randomly. This pleases me.

Now I just need to figure out what I want to dress up as for Halloween.

Also: This is awesome and you should watch it. And anyone have any idea why some combination of Firefox and LJ won't let me embed images in comments? I keep getting an annoying "missing parameter" error message.

05:26 pm - OMG INTERVIEW YAY

THE LIBRARY CALLED ME BACK AND WANTS TO INTERVIEW ME FOR THE LIBRARY PAGE POSITION!

06:48 pm - R.I.P. Arabella

This morning, Mom was unable to locate one of our chickens when she left for work. Turns out, Arabella hopped the fence again. Unfortunately, this time she ran afoul of the neighbor's dog.

Dammit.

I hadn't gotten around to bringing my camera out and taking pictures of the chickens yet, so I have no pictures of Arabella to share. But as you can see from this googleimage search, she was pretty wacky looking. She was also a bit of a brat and pecked my leg when I didn't produce the chicken scratch fast enough for her liking; and she was the first to hop over the fence (although Rosemary was the first to hop up on the fence).

*sigh* Gonna miss you, silly bouffant chicken. Hopefully your "sisters" won't follow your example.

Need to get pictures of the others.

01:41 am - Stuff and more stuff

Still in the process of slowly transferring over between computers. Because I'm lazy. I finally got Microsoft Office though, YAY for word processing!

Also, I handed in an application last week to work at a nearby library as a page. They have four part-time positions open. I really, really hope I get one of them, since it's basically EXACTLY what I'm looking for when it comes to "finding out about how libraries actually work". And they have set schedules, so I'd be able to work another part-time job in too. Fingers crossed!

Also, I got linked to this, and thought I'd share. It's an article about the death of a man named Norman Borlaug and how completely awesome he was (his work produced "a new disease-resistant dwarf strain of wheat that transformed agriculture, especially in the third world"), and how he is pretty much completely unknown by the wider population. It's a pretty interesting read.

The chickens have started jumping the fence. Stupid chickens. They are going to get mauled or eaten by the neighbors' dogs if they keep that up. Rosemary and Arabella are the worst offenders, although I've seen Luna and Dot up on the fence. And apparently they're now refusing to be tricked into going into their pen with offerings of chicken scratch. They're learning the wrong things, dang it!

Current Mood: calm

04:59 pm - Sometimes I hate technology

Got a used computer the other day, since mine has gotten too troublesome for me to want to continue bothering with. After various problems and shenanigans, the problems and shenanigans continue. The AdBlock for the latest version of FireFox is weird and not-working; it's not letting me reorganize my favorites list; several of the folders on my favorites list got eaten; and my iTunes playlists didn't get brought over, but the ones from the computer PREVIOUS to my last one did. WTF.

This is why I hate transferring computers.

Current Mood: cranky

12:49 pm - Silly chickens

This entry is brought to you by the letter "C", as in "chickens are weird". Also the letter "O" because I'm sitting outside with them so they don't escape or get eaten by cats or whatever.

For the first minute or so, they wanted nothing more than to hide under my chair. Now they apparently want to dig under the fence into the neighbor's yard and/or the driveway. They haven't pecked at me yet, although I do pause and stare at them when they get too near my ankles. Also to scold the next-door dog for barking at them on the other side of the fence.

...Ewww, one of them just pooped somewhere near my chair. That's going to make me want to come out and do this more, way to go ladies.

Current Mood: calm

04:27 pm - Out and About

So, as you may or may not know, my local comic book shop has moved. Amusingly, they're tearing down the building it was in and replacing it with a library.

Today I finally went down to the new location of my comic shop. It's nice there, very spacious and well-lit and the owner loves it. It's also about two blocks from my favorite sushi place. I call not fair!

Today's purchases were Runaways, Buffy, Booster Gold/Blue Beetle Back-up, and Agents of Atlas. I really should just get my own pull box at this point. And I'm definitely going to ask about ordering TBP's through her, for Dark Reign: Young Avengers and Batgirl, assuming I don't start picking up monthlies for the latter. ( Spoilers cut, just in case )

I also got the boots my auntie gave me back from the repair shop. They are all properly heeled and very sexy. Now I just need thick socks to wear with them, as my feet are narrow and thus make it near-impossible to find cute and comfy shoes.

Current Mood: calm

01:15 am - Busy day!

I went to lunch with my dad and my auntie and their cousins today! It was glorious fun. Everyone teased Auntie Jill about her new beau and gleefully made plans to embarrass her/terrify him when he comes down from Alaska to "run the gauntlet". He texted her part way through, and she let her cousins answer the texts. They enjoyed themselves TREMENDOUSLY and acted very much like me and my friends do. It's good to know that forty years down the road, I'll probably be acting much the same as I do now if they're any indication.

After lunch, we all piled into various cars and drove to my dad's cousin Steve's house, where I petted a VERY elderly cat. It's TWENTY-ONE YEARS OLD. It was skinny and arthritic and clumpy because it can't clean itself anymore so they have to clip the mats off. It enjoyed the scritchies a great deal though, and is apparently still a very happy cat (who will loudly berate her humans if they do not let her out on the porch so that she can sleep in the sun).

Then we dropped the cute boots that Auntie Jill gave me when she visited last off at the shoe repair place to get them re-heeled, as they are old, karmically-charged boots. I get them back on Friday, and then I will water-proof them because this is Seattle.

Finally, we came home and cleaned up the chicken coop. I pulled out all of the dirt-covered corn cobs and watermelon rinds (the girls love watermelon. I didn't know chickens liked watermelon), and shoved the dirt around so it was flat, and then raked in some fresh new dirt. They were super excited about the new dirt, they didn't even wait for me to get out of the pen before scratching around in it. We also built chickenwire "fences" across the yard so that we can potentially let the chickens out of their coop without them running away and being eaten by one of the many things in suburbia that eats chickens. Arabella's bouffant still amuses me.

Current Mood: content

11:30 pm - Pets!

( Cheech & friend below cut )

Today, we also added chickens to the pet crew. These ones are all girls this time. They have previously laid eggs. WE CHECKED.

Their names are Dot, Luna, Arabella, and Rosemary. The woman who owned them had to move to a smaller place, and she was very sad about having to give them up. Not sure what Michael thinks of them yet; although they did meet one of the neighbors' cats. They didn't like it much. They did like getting extra treats for it, though.

Current Mood: content

02:51 am - Back!

I've actually been back for a few days, but I've been lazy about posting stuff.

New Jersey was fantastic and all SORTS of wacky fun was had. White-water rafting was also fun -- we had a friendly competition with a group of cute guys, where we'd splash each other with our bailing buckets in the flatter places. And then we got them stuck on a rock. Okay, more stuck, they were already stuck when we got there.

Then I got home and found out that my apartment key never made it through the postal system. Boo and a half. I had to drive up to Bellingham anyway to sign some stuff for RPM, which was annoying. As it turned out, the woman who had been handling our apartment just quit recently, which probably explains why we kept getting contradictory information.

Today, my sister got a terrier-mix from a shelter. His name is Cheech, and Michael is highly displeased that we brought a dog into HIS house. I predict that there will be an epic bitch-slap at some point in the near future. Cheech is quite endearing when you're not a cat though. He spent most of the afternoon turning a tennis ball into a wad of spongy affection which needed to be flung every thirty seconds or so.

Current Mood: calm

01:11 pm - I'm in Vermont!

I have no idea why Mom insists on taking flights ridiculously early in the morning. 4AM wake-ups are no one's friend.

The plane ride was okay. Ish. Except we were surrounded by small children. I'm not even joking, it was a "where's the pre-K convention?" number of kids. One of them kept kicking my seat. When I finally turned around to ask them to stop, the kid's sister looked kind of startled and made them stop before I said anything.

THEN we drove from New Jersey to Vermont. That was about six or seven hours. On top of a five-hour plane ride. Blech. Blech, I say!

I also read all of the JSA books that Gavin lent me. Dr. Mid-Nite is delightful and badass; and I quite enjoyed all the stories.

And now I'm hiding out in the hotel room while my parents go and do all of the necessary stuff to get Dana signed out of her school.

Current Mood: hot

08:16 pm - Stuff has actually happened, I just haven't written about it.

I am officially moved out of my college apartment!

Yesterday, my parents and I drove up to Bham, boxed up all of my remaining stuff, and painted the walls. All I need to do is mail my key back to Monica and I am done.

Still don't feel like a grown up yet. When does that happen?

Getting the truck to bring my stuff down was an adventure. My parents rented a ten-foot truck from U-Haul...only for them to not have said ten-foot truck. So they got a seventeen-foot-truck for the price of a ten-foot-truck. We used maybe an eighth of the space for my stuff, especially since we'd already taken my bed apart and thus could store it in a much smaller space. The neighbor-cat helped by coming inside and wandering around going "HAY GUISE, WHAT R U DOIN IN THIS ROOM?" and being cute.

Then there was painting. I actually missed most of it, because Dad sent me to get water and candy. And then they called to say that they needed an extender handle for the rolly brush, and some rags, which Haggens didn't have. So I went to Fred Meyer and located the rags and handle and bought them. I had LITERALLY just walked out the door when Mom called and said "hey, we actually need more paint". I hate it when that happens.

Turns out that the paint we got wasn't exactly the right color, but it was close. If the landlords wanted the paint to match perfectly, then they should have told me what color paint they used when I asked. Repeatedly. The walls are all white now, that should be good enough. AND it turns out we didn't need that extra paint, so they can use that paint on the other two walls if they are displeased.

The room really looked better with two beige walls.

It also looked smaller without my stuff. It was weird.

In other news, my cat was snoring and twitching in his sleep earlier. It was cuuuuuuuuuute <3

And Miss Angela the hairdresser called me back about the woman she knows in the Ballard Library who might be interested in a library assistant! I'm going to send her my glorified cover letter/resume before I head out to the east coast. *crosses fingers for luck*

Current Mood: relaxed

04:25 pm - Jury Duty: Day One

So, I've got jury duty. Turns out, it's two-days-or-one-trial, so although I didn't get picked for any juries today, I still have to go in tomorrow.

I was in a pool of selectees for one case, but I didn't get selected. And the judge made fun of me for being a goody-two-shoes. I didn't know that judges were allowed to do that.

See, the judge started out asking all 39 of us if we had ever been pulled over for speeding or gotten a ticket or been called down to the principal's office, etc, etc. By the end, I'm the only one with my hand still up -- because getting yelled at upsets me and makes me highly anxious, so I don't do shit that gets me yelled at. And the judge poked fun at me for the rest of the time I was in there.

There's a lot of trials going on right now, which is good for me. It meant that I didn't have to read the book I got, which was less entertaining than I thought it was going to be. Shame on you, book! And another bright point, apparently jurors get 20% off at the Elliot Bay Book Company, which is supposedly somewhere nearby, but I couldn't find it. I'll do that tomorrow.

Current Mood: tired

01:21 am - Cat nasal cavities: Larger than you think!

So, the cat comes in this afternoon, like normal. I'd tried calling him earlier, since he hadn't been inside whining to be fed this morning, but he didn't come. He wanders over to his food dish and sneezes. Then sneezes a few more times. Then sneezes for at LEAST thirty seconds, without stopping. I go over and pet him and refill his water dish (which was mostly full, but I had no idea when it was last filled), and he eventually wandered into the front room proper. Dad came in and sat on the couch, and the cat hops up next to him and settles down half on his lap.

And starts sneezing again.

After about fifteen sneezes, he finally stops, makes a little snrk noise, and began grooming himself. Dad finds a damp piece of grass on his lap that wasn't there before. Apparently, the cat was storing it in his nasal cavity -- perhaps it was supposed to be a gift, maybe he's tired of us not eating the disemboweled rodents he sometimes leaves in various doorways. Who knows the strange and bizarre ways of cats?

The kicker? This piece of grass was about three or four inches long. Where the hell was he keeping that thing, snuggled up against his little cat brain?! It was like that pulling-a-quarter-out-of-someone's-ear magic trick, only with grass that is actually lodged in a cat's nose. I read a blog post awhile back that talked about something similar happening to one of her cats, but reading about it doesn't prepare you for the real thing.

Seriously, are the fur loaves keeping freaking Narnia on the other end of their nostrils or what?!

Current Mood: amused

02:04 pm - Update!

Go click on this link and sign the letter here. Because Don't Ask Don't Tell is goddamned stupid.

...Okay, yeah, utterly failed and updating this. Whoops.

Fish camp was fun, except for the mosquitoes completely devouring my feet and ankles. Fortunately, allergy meds take the infuriating itchy away, yay! I also got to do some hammering and sawing, which was fun. The cabin on the property has apparently hit the point where they can't really do anything new to it because they're replacing all of the old boards and such that are slowly rotting. I kind of wonder how they're going to take care of the support beams, because those are definitely going to need it soon. Also, freshly gathered clams and oysters continue to be absolutely delicious; and the dog was unconvinced that my ear did not require her tongue. And I read a trashy romance novel.

A couple days later, Dana came home to visit. She's here until the fifth. We went to get her a new phone and the salesman for SOME unknown reason turned to me and started trying to sell me a new phone, which ultimately ended up in me having to run outside so that I wouldn't have my emotional freak out in front of various customers and sales people. Kind of dumb of me, but I wasn't expecting to have to deal with that, and I forgot that it's sales people's job to keep pushing after you've said "no thanks".

Saturday I played Princess Leia in Gavin's Star Wars game, which was fun. I have a slightly better idea of what I'm supposed to do now, yay!

Also, in the process of trying to come up with a journal name for Sensor from Legion of Superheroes. Why didn't someone tell me that there was a warrior-princess giant snake with the ability to hijack people's senses in comics sooner? I would have been READING those! Unfortunately, they turned her into a weird naga-thing in one of the last arcs. She continued to be badass, but isn't a giant snake anymore.

I will have to fix this in the game. Yessssss...

03:45 pm

Huh. My Firefox hates my Facebook. Weird. Fortunately, I still have the old browser for just this purpose.

Going to be out of town from tomorrow until Tuesday. Going to Fish Camp, yaaaaaaaaay! I need to grab a bunch of books to read. It's always kind of nice to have the internet taken away from me, as much as I love it. "No, you CAN'T goof off on the internet. Go sit on the rocks with a book."

Speaking of, now that I have free time again, book recommendations teim is now! YAAAAAAAAAAY!

Current Mood: relaxed

11:28 pm - Because this is terrifying

( The Information )

دنیارابگوییدچطورآنهاانتخاباتمان دزدیده اند
Tell the world how they have stolen our election

- original article by one_hoopy_frood on LJ

All of these people protesting and we're supposed to believe that they actually elected this guy? With the huge majority he's claiming?

Right. And I'm Batman.

It's kind of marvelous how hard it can be to block the flow of information now, isn't it?

03:07 pm - *wibble*

GivesMeHope.com

Real Life Crowning Moment of Heartwarming concentrate!

'scuse me, I need tissues and something cuddly to hug.

09:13 pm - I HAVE GRADUATED!

They gave me a blue folder-thing with a shiny gold embossment on it and everything. Not my actual diploma, that'll take four-to-six or six-to-eight weeks, I can't remember which. I guess in case classes get flunked and need to be taken over again?

Man, that would SUCK.

Anyway, it was nice. I put on my own make-up and didn't do too bad a job (go me), and Mom and Dad and Aunt Jill came up to see me. Aunt Jill got me new pearl earrings, which are very pretty and I love them. And I wore the Italian leather heels that I got out of Grandma's basement years ago. Heels still suck, but these are quite cute.

I brought a book with me to the graduation ceremony, because I was BORED OUT OF MY SKULL at high school graduation. Didn't need it this time, though. We got to sit with whoever we wanted to (well, sort of. We were broken up into groups, but Angela and I kidnapped Dani into the Humanities, Surnames A-C group anyway). Also they didn't have people talking for ever and ever this time -- an alumni spoke and another graduate spoke, and then they started handing out diploma folders.

I did not trip on my way up to get my folder, although I made Dani and Angela promise to applaud and cheer if I did.

And then I didn't drop my student ID into the "time capsule" for the Memory Walk. Partially because I left my wallet at home, even though I made a point of bringing my tinypurse. Way to go, me.

Current Mood: accomplished