The breaking wave and the muscle.

So despite the frost on my car this morning, it was actually a fairly mild day weather wise. It's also the last day that I'll have any daylight after work hours, owing to daylight savings time, until the spring. And since I'm turning into a lazy bum I had decided before that I must must must get out riding today.

So off I went as soon as I could manage after work. I still could only get about 13 miles because of not wanting to be out past dusk. But it wasn't at all the most chilly of rides so I was quite happy. Plus I was surprised that I'd not lost as much as I could have in the way of riding ability.

Back at the house I was changing out of my biking stuff. I'd worn a new top thats all special sporty like and supposed to be good about moisture management and keep me warm and dry and all. I got a few things cuz TRM's dad works for a tennis gear supplier so we could get stuff cheap. Seriously the tags list MSRP of like $40+ and I paid less than $10. But anyways its a form fitting tank top so I was like hey this thing seems to work and it looks half decent.

Then I particularly noticed that I've this ridiculously defined muscle in my upper arm. Seriously it's huge. (Now this is really quite realative, I'm pretty small and have never topped 110, but generally not much in the way of musculature just the general skinnyishness).

Yup, I'm buff.

Although it makes sense. At work today I'm pretty sure I must have moved probably a half ton (seriously if you do the math I know I moved at least 30 of these boxes that were like filled with paper that was just the accounting stuff. I estimate they averaged at 20lbs. So thats 600lbs right there and that was just a portion of everything that I moved, it was ridiculous).


Go me.


Now if only I had someone to show. My fling lives nearly an hour away and TRM got a boyfriend and so isn't around much anymore :-/


“The breaking wave and the muscle as it contracts obey the same law. Delicate line gathers the body's total strength in a bold balance. Shall my soul meet so severe a curve, journeying on its way to form?”

Paper cutting me.

So I've been wanting to get more into my Scherenschnitte recently. The idea is maybe if I get my butt in gear I could actually sell some of my work. So then I was looking up good paper because I don't care much for most of what I have. And so while I was randomly searching around I changed upon this amazing tip:

-To make patterns for cutting take any image. Change it to black and white. And then increase the contrast-


At first I was sceptical. I tried it out on a bunch of different pictures and it never came out so nice as I wanted. But then I probably just got used to seeing the reliefs and things started looking better. So I took a picture that I have followed those steps using GimpShop, which btw I love (mostly because it's free). And then proceeded to doctor it a bit for my purposes.

This evening I printed it out and went at it. Here is the result:

The Great Epic Film Scores.

Tonight was the first POPS Concert of the season. I already have TRM roped in so she works the box office for me at least one day of each concert weekend, but I had another opening. So Little One came up, she wanted the $30.

But she also wanted to watch the concert to meet some requirements for school. So I got all excited and, after inquiring with TRM, got us 3 seats on a convenient aisle.

I think this is only the 2nd time in the year that I've worked at the symphony that I've actually taken a seat for the concert. There's just too much going on. If I want to hear something I'll just sneak into the stairs and watch from there. Sitting in an actual seat is a totally different, and worlds better, experience.

I sat there and I was actually swept up by the music. This is uncommon for me. I love music but audiences tend to distract me. I think that's a lot of why I think I'll always love playing [god do I miss playing] more than viewing it. It felt so good to just be there and feel the music, and feel the atmosphere. It reminded me of why my job really is not quite the hell that it's felt like for the past week.

Somewhat almost not really related I've come up with a new way to deal with angry people. Instead of just sitting there and taking their abuse and maybe trying to explain the reasoning behind our policies I should just burst into tears. It would be awesome.

I totally wasn't supposed to bitter in this post. Oops.

All growed up.

So last weekend I was in the final stages of my laptop hunting and so I wanted to make a trip to BestBuy to look at what they had there. And of course I took TRM with me.

She wanted to visit the nearby Linens and Things store because it's going out of business and so having a 'whole store' kinda sale going on (although seriously the stuff still wasn't particularly cheap, the real world is much to expensive for my tastes). So we stopped there first.

While we were walking around with no real goal in mind it occured to me that quite a few months back I had put a new pillow on my list of things to buy sometime. I had 3 pillows all which were quite squashed and not so awesome anymore. And then I thought I had solved the problem when I absconded with a pillow from Grandma's house as she was moving out. Sadly though it was only a small step above what I only had.

So there I was browsing the pillow section of the store. And seriously who buys pillows that cost over $100 - that's crazily crazy. I found myself a nice $15 one. I'll admit the expensive ones are better than it I'm sure. But definately not like 10X better. But I digress.

The interesting thing about the whole experiance was that it just made me feel quite particularly like I was an adult now. As a child pillows were just there. They materialized of their own accord I'm pretty sure. Probably with some parental assistance, but I most certainly did not ever have anything to do with the matter.

And there I was walking out of the store with the pillow that I just spent my hard earned income on.


I suppose maybe eventually I'll become a bit more accustomed to the whole on my own, not a child thing.




Or maybe it's better to maintain this innocent fascination with the silly little things in life.

I finally did it.

Towards the end of my last year of college I started to notice that my computer seemed to be slowing down some. Inevitably 3 years of hard use was taking it's toll. I easily admit that I'm not particularly easy on computers. Running 3 programs (an internet explorer, aim, and a music player) is about the minimum of what I will ever have up. And I like to find new things and play with them: new picture managers, cool programs like Gimp, etc. So invariably the dell was decent enough when I first got it, but given what I wanted to be doing not quite so up to snuff.

So that spring I actually started researching laptops, mostly as an idle dream. Then around graduation time (of year, not when I actually graduated myself) my parents said that they'd buy me a laptop as a graduation present - yippie! So the old computer chugged along into the summer quite well enough (I thought it was questionable then, but I now know better) through the summer as I contemplated my options.

Memorial day weekend hit and the good old Taurus met it's demise in spectacular fashion alongside the highway (good pictures that car fire did make). And as fate would have it my parents decided to contribute $1000 towards the purchase of a new vehicle. Have I ever mentioned that I hate cars. Because seriously I do. They just suck the fun out of life as I see it.

But I never gave up browsing the computer sites and dreaming of the day when I would have a shiny new bit of technology for my very own. I continued on with the old monster of a desktop. For a time it served well enough. But by last fall it was showing its age a bit too much. I stopped using it for much of anything involving new programs. And I even tried to avoid any non-vital program updates as much as possible. By this summer just trying to surf the internet while chatting with a friend could be difficult.

However I am a thrifty little bugger. During the first few months of my job I was seriously not spending any money outside of basic necessities. And so by the time I hit January when I started to seriously investigate my finances I had saved up quite the neat little safety cushion. And so when I prepared my budget spreadsheet the computer column was born. Dilligently I saved.

And as I saved I continued to ogle and drool over all of the pretty laptops on the interwebs.

My little pile of cash grew, and the goal was getting quite near. At last I finally decided to make a decision and go through with it.

I suck at decisions. By my logic my ridiculous hair is a perfect example of this. I'll just make do with what I have instead of having to decide something. Personality flaw number 83 maybe.

But last Saturday I seriously and for real when through with it.

For under $975.21 (including tax and shipping) I purchaed, from Best Buy. A Dell Studio 15. It has some pretty sweet specs. 2.1 processer, 4G RAM, 320 HD, WXGA+, bluetooth, webcam, much much shinyness.

After much waiting with bated breath and a literal recreation of this: online package tracking , my laptop arrived on Wednesday evening. Since then pretty much all of my non-work and non-sleep time has been spent with the laptop within arms reach. Yup, I'm that much of a dork.

There is just so much awesomeness to discover.

There are also a few potentially serious flaws. But I'm avoiding that.

Right now at this very moment. I have open Mozilla where I am typing this, AIM where I am chatting with Little One, I have Ruckus open and playing music, and iTunes is also open because I'm running some other little crazy program (that is a serious ram hog btw) that is supposed to be eliminating duplicates from iTunes, because after the transfer of songs onto here (plus a transfer from an external onto the old computer a few months back when we had to re-format the drive because of a battle between the old computer and something mean presumibly from the internet, and really the poor old thing didn't stand a chance) my iTunes library is pretty bad form. A bit ago I was not typing this or listening to Ruckus but I was watching the Dancing With The Stars that I missed from this week. It ran without a hitch, and even looked pretty durn good. [Although seriously I can't believe Cloris is still on the show - wtf people!]

I still can't believe I spent all that money on something so superfilous. So weird.

Oh that reminds me of another post I wanted to make last weekend.....

Every so often.

So ever so often, and really it is a fairly frequent so often, I think of a topic that I should like to write a blog on. However I am, obviously, a slacking blogger, and so not much comes of it.

Here are the topics from recent life that are in my head that I want to write about:
Parking in the Garage/Frost
Computer
Bike
Spending too much money
Ballet
Keeping in contact
Symphony Blogs
Blogging
Soup
Boys



-ok that list started to get a bit random as ideas popped into my head. Therein lies the danger.



I shall start with the first, and easiest. This was a random post that popped into my head.

It first occurred yesterday. There was frost on the windshield of my car. It's been getting rather cool now, but I'm still not willing to concede that the nice weather is done. Gosh durn it I want summer back.

And this frost was not the easy flick of the wipers and its gone kind. I had to actually go and find my ice scrapers and for the first time this year, clear my windows. Luckily I had been thinking ahead and found them in the garage a day or two before.

So I hastily scraped off my car and proceeded to work. Inevitably I was more hasty than I ought to be and my windshield had an odd haze to it for the first .5 miles. Seriously you'd think that I'd be more cautious given my history.

Fast forward to today!

TRM decided that we ought to actually use the garage to hold a car instead of random junk. So she cleaned it all up. She managed to get all of our bikes (there are 4 in total now) hung up on the ceiling.

However there are always some issues with using the garage. Namely, it is a 1 car garage, and there are 3 of us. It is reached by traveling through our driveway space which fits 2 cars in a line. And we are all journeying to and fro according to our own schedules. And so we are not unfamiliar with the fun of the car shuffle. Plus there was only one button thinger for the door. And really who is going to park in the drive way, get out of the car and go into the house, open the garage door, start the car back up, and park in the garage.

But then Jo came home with a button thinger for me. It's not particularly consistant but sometimes I am the first person home. And I am always the last person to leave. Whoa.

Yesterday when I got home I parked in the garage. Actually I parked very poorly in the garage. It's a pretty tight fit to begin with. And I'd not parked in it since she hung up all 4 bikes. So I was a bit curious to see if my car would hit them. Therefore as I got close to the bike I kept inching forwards. In the end I was pretty durn close, but the bike does actually clear, and I was much to far inside the garage so when I got out of the car I didn't have room to get to the door. Oops.

This morning when I drove to work it was amazing. There was no going out in the cold at all. Now the car wasn't toasty or anything close. But still - not freezing at all.

Delightful.

Hot Date

Yup you read right. I went on a ‘hot date’. Though what constitutes a date being ‘hot’? Basically I used the term to humorous ends. So it’s much safer to say that I just had a date actually.

It was good. We talked for nearly 4 hours straight and never seemed to run out of things to say. I’m pretty sure I don’t talk, like ever. How does that work. I’m thinking positive sign maybe?

But I’m not going to be spilling any details here. I’ve other outlets for that if I so desire. I want to know what is with guys and paying for things? Seriously.

We went out for dinner and he handily grabbed the check and took care of it. Ok all well and good. Not that I require it, I’d happily split the bill, but the in the old guy/girl standards that some people still live by it’s expected. Then since dinner didn’t take very long we went to a coffee shop where he also picked up the tab. Also fine ok he’s a guy and being manly like, whatever floats your boat.

The interesting thing was later I asked if he’d be willing to go to the opera with me. He was agreeable enough to the idea. So then when I said ok so long as the date and time works for you I’ll get the tickets, he said I’ll go so long as I can pay for the tickets…..Wait a minute what the heck is that? It was my slightly out there proposition and for a few other reasons in my mind it only makes sense that I’ll pay for them. But he was sitting there arguing with me.

I suppose in a way it’s cute and endearing, wanting to take care of or something like that? But in the end, seriously, what gives?


....maybe I ought to find myself a dragon to be kidnapped by or something....

"Some say that the age of chivalry is past, that the spirit of romance is dead. The age of chivalry is never past, so long as there is a wrong left unredressed on earth."