Caught in the act of doing something

Tiny For Ron Herman

Tiny Tiny Tiny! This is so cool!!! Click for lots of Tinies!

We got back from Las Vegas today at 3 pm, and promptly fell asleep. I am so tired, I can barely think. I thought maybe I'd just go back to bed when I woke at 6:30 pm, but felt like I'd be mad tomorrow morning, when I woke up at 5 am, mad that I totally slept Sunday away. Also, I had some really weird dreams I want to shake off about fantastical casinos and supernatural phenomenon.

What was the weekend like?
It was great, it was really fun and furious. We stayed at Harrah's, which was pretty decent for how cheap it was, except for a few surprises, like a closed swimming pool that shocked and appalled us as we stood in bathing suits in disbelief, staring at the Closed sign, mouths hanging open, hangovers raging. I give my sister this credit, her energy is boundless, her drive to dance through the pain is limitless, and she's so in shape now I can barely keep up with her. Will we ever find out what happened to Jason, bearer of the Italian horn? Was he really staying at the Venitian? What of Bucklehead from Utah, he is a really nice guy. How we've come to admire the white Professor from the outdoor dance bar at Harrah's, his beard and bow tie and horn rimmed glasses, watching him learn how to two-step from the black guy with the 110% Real tattoo, as he smoked furiously on his cigarette, waving his arms dramatically to Naughty By Nature. And what of my lucky quarter? It is still being saved for the right slot machine, the moment to play it not yet come, as the perfect machine eludes me. I thought I'd found it in Paris, at the French Kiss machines, but alas, they are ticket only, and won't take a real 2 bit piece.





All in all, I'm so exhausted and I can barely stand on these shaky legs, and wish I could call in sick to work tomorrow, but I shant. And what with how busy this coming week is, I am not sure I'll find the time to really get some real rest, so I'll spend the rest of this evening trying to quietly collect my mind, reading, and making something to eat out of a poorly stocked kitchen. My head is so achy but it was a weekend well worth it that I'll never forget.

WTF???

Why is this sign in my front yard?
Why does it say that a daycare for infants-12 year olds is opening in the apartment 3 feet across the hall from mine?
Also, I would never take my child to a daycare in this building, in this neighborhood.
Also, WTF?
Also, I don't like this! We were just blessed with the auction dissapearing, why now are we plagued with a daycare?

We were at Costco last night until 8:30 waiting for new tires to be put on my car. After we got bored of perusing the store, we sat outside to wait, and I caught up on some good blogs on my phone. I read through the latest post on Bold Type , which had several new interesting books listed. I want to check out The Sacred Book of the Werewolf by Victor Pelevin, which would be fun to follow my Anne Rice streak. I finally finished The Queen of the Damned last night, and it was really amazing with a very intense ending. I had no idea these books are so much more than just about vampires, they're about humanity and it's evolution, philosophy and politics. She's an amazing amazing storyteller, I would love to have an imagination so sophisatcated and unique, capable of creating such depth of character and endlessly evolving plot. Anyway, it will be great to move on to something else, as I still have a pile of books on hand to get trough. Next is the diary of Anias Nin I think, that I got at a used bookstore and had been waiting for a while.

Catball

Catball I love you.

This weekend is gone in a haze of :
1. Queen of the Damned - my vampire book I'm 3/4 of the way through now

2. Little Big Planet - where I'm struggling to learn all the controller can do but I LOVE my lions mane + kitty nose + black cape combo costume

3. Microfleece - which I unsuccessfully tried to make the back of a small quilt and had to set aside for another project, but much fluff remains

3. Watermelon Sangria - which David and made and took over to visit David, Heather and baby Lily, where we watched Lily chase Mia the cat all over the apartment religiously

4. Naps. Sleepybear naps until noon - very uncustomary for us but inescapable today

Skirt

I finally used this fabric patch I got from Cynthia Yee (aka Menta) on Etsy a year ago. I stitched it on this little gray skirt I accidentally bought at Target. Accidentally because it's size extra small, but was on the medium sized hanger :) I love the girl, she's so cute, and she's tying on a tiny typewriter. We traded a couple of my journals for her prints and this patch was just a thoughtful little bonus she sent over. Love her stuff, but her shops gone now - you can see her Flickr page with a all her work on it though.

Still Stripping

This evening I dropped in on Joannes Fabrics on my way home and paged through some pattern books. I'm looking for a dress pattern so Karen will teach me more about dress making, one on one, and improve my crappy sewing skill. I think I'm going to get a Built By Wendy pattern I've had my eye on for a long long time, but have always been scared to attempt. It's the white one in the ad, but might be too small to see here.I LOVE this birdie fabric! I'm going to see if I can find some online. I just love looking at the pattern books, it reminds me of being little with my mom at the fabric store, and looking for halloween costume patterns, or church dresses. I guess it reminds me of her a lot, which is why I love sewing and crafting so much in the first place.Then I quickly scoped out the shelf of crafty books and mags, and cracked myself up with the cover of this quilting book. Still Stripping. HA! My mind immediately jumped to that Chris Rock joke, about how a dad's main job in life is to keep his daughter off the pole. Just gotta keep em off the pole.

The Container Store!

Hoo-ra!
Lindsay tipped me off that a bunch of Punch product is at The Container Store right now, and lots of my pieces are there, so David and I drove over after work to see it. There are gift bags, wrapping paper and wine boxes from my Baroque Pear and Golden Patterns collections, and it was really cool to see them on display in such a nice store. I was very proud and got a few picture on my phone. David was impressed with how great they look, he'd seen them in the catalog but confirmed how much nicer they look in person. It's hard to see how pretty the gold foil is in photos. Anyway, I felt fancy!!

Windmill Pattern

I've been inspired to do a little knitting as the nights are turning colder. The Tiny was over one evening and we went through my closet 'o yarn, and she found this super soft pretty blue color. I'm making a new wide scarf in a windmill pattern from my stitch book. Here it is so far, modeled by the Lovely Mr. Cat.

Music + Images

Having an iPhone, thus, an iPod for the first time ever, I've been getting to listen to music so much more, and I realized how seperated I've been from music in such an intimate way for some time now. In the 2 years and some months we've lived here, sometimes I have my little crappy CD player in the bedroom and sometimes it moves to the craft room, and I forget about it. Thusly, I cut my listening down a lot, unintentionally - I used to listen late into the the night every night ever since I was in Jr. High probably. There isn't much extra room in our bedroom, and I sort of forgot about it, and now, I've been listening endlessly, meditatively as before on my little phone when I'm at work and the gym; I take it in the kitchen while I'm doing dishes, and I love it. I've been shmutzing around on iTunes, and downloading some new stuff, and falling back in love with the old stuff. I opened up some of the digital booklets for albums I've bought, and thought I'd share some of what I've been listening to with the images in the books.

Lykke Li
I heard her on Morning Becomes Eclectic, and I love it. It's awfully poppy, but it's foreign, so that make it ok! I believe she's from Sweden, and her voice is so barely there, breathy and sweet. Little Bit and Time Flies are my favorite tracks.

Q-Tip
I confess, I just bought this tonight, so I don't have too much to say on it, except I'm really excited. I bought an issue of Wax Poetics magazine this summer that had a great interview with Q-Tip in it, and it made my mouth water for his fun, clever, playful hip-hop. Remember that time, when hip-hop was funny and sweet and smart? Yeah, thank him for it. I can't wait to get this into rotation with my Tribe Called Quest albums.

The Cinematic Orchestra
These are mostly instrumental songs, and they all feel like they're movie soundtrack songs somewhat. But from a movie you've never seen, from a movie that happens as you move though your own life, something that isn't attached to any other reference in your mind. It's very clean and sweeping and makes me feel open and hopeful. It's little booklet contains a series of photographs the group wanted to include as a visual supplement to the tracks, something to inspire the mood for listening. I love them, all full of interesting light.

Zoe Keating
Once upon a time, Zoe was in Rasputina (a group of rock-cello ladies) - but now she's solo and she has a process of recording and looping her self so she creates rich sound texture on her own. I discovered this album because she was featured on a small segment of Radio Lab - and as a Rasputina fan it made me take a chance on it. Another great album to go abstract too - simply lovely. I love the track Sun Will Set most of all. The whole album makes me feel like I'm in a forest full of light and leaves.

My overwhelming joy of the presidential race has not left me, but I am deeply saddened by the passing of Prop 8, banning gay marriage in California. It amazes me that Californians would give rights to chickens before gay humans.

Good News Has Been A Long Time Coming!

For the first time in eight years, the American people have made me feel proud. Last night was incredible to watch, I'd listened to coverage on NPR from 8 am until I got home, and seeing him speak to the crowd in Chicago was truly awesome. It's about time we finally got some good news!

Halloween Phantom

Last night to celebrate Halloween, we went to the Walt Disney Concert Hall for a screening of the original silent movie, Phantom of the Opera with Lon Cheney as the phantom. It was accompanied by live music preformed on the huge organ with pipes up to the ceiling. We had dinner before around the corner, and enjoyed being downtown and seeing people dressed up in costumes here and there.